Something Else Entirely

1 - You better believe it, baby. You're stuck with us.

Never, in all my life, would I have anticipated that at 17 I would be sitting impatiently in a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, travelling across the Pacific Ocean at 37,304 feet towards the gorgeous, volcanic landmass surrounded by the motherload of deep, oceanic swell just waiting to barrel my stoked Australian ass, otherwise known as Hawaii.

Hawaii. The holy grail. Sacred, sandy ground for surf rats like me. A spiritual mecca for salt fuelled hearts. The heaven-sent gift from whatever karma gods humanity hasn't managed to piss off yet in all their irresponsible, selfish destruction of mother nature.

Or simply just a beautiful reward for actually pulling my head in, accepting help for once, getting my life in check, and finally getting a break from my messed up family. My biological family at least. The ones who would be so spaced they would forget that kids actually needed nutrition from sources other than drugs and booze. The ones who smoke so much that your primary school teacher assumes you're the one lighting up on a daily basis. The ones who put holes in walls after too many (or too few) beers, or when paranoid delusions involving the government somehow occupying your youngest brother's bedroom and living room start taking over. The ones who didn't finish school and haven't been able to hold down a job for longer than 2 days because, surprisingly enough, employers want people who arrive on time and not fully cooked, and don't support drugs being dealt out of their places of business.

The ones who tag team to hold you down, punch you in the face, kick you in the ribs repeatedly and wrap their coked out, boney hands around your 15-year-old throat for a chance at your wallet to satisfy the need for another hit.

What a fabulously enjoyable time that was. Not the least bit psychologically damaging. The time of my goddamn life.

Enter the pivotal moment: the final catalyst needed to effectively change my life for the better; to escape my past, take a healthy leap forward into the unknown away from all that bullshit, and finally stand on my own two feet instead of waiting around for things to get better like a naïve child I was back then.

Except I didn't make that decision, and I didn't leap into the greater unknown filled with possibilities of a better future. I locked myself in my room, not that it made any difference to my older brothers or parents who could just kick the door in; or, easier still, reach in and unlock it through the gaping hole my oldest brother Jaeden made in my door with his fist when I was 12.

I just locked myself in my room for a week and cried, avoiding Mr Scott, my favourite teacher at school who I now get to call Tanner on account of our personal relationship outside of the education system, and Ruben, my boss and favourite human being of all time.

Tanner knew I was struggling from the first time he met me at school. He was a new teacher, fresh out of university, and apparently had the personal experience in life which meant he knew the warning signs to look out for in neglected and abused kids. It was like his eyes would zero in on any fresh and visible cuts and bruises within half a second, and he'd be able to tell you what body part or implement made the mark and how long ago it happened based on his amateur assessment of shape, depth and specific green-purple-black discolouration of my skin.

He cornered me one day and told me about his old best friend Sadie, who lived in a shitty house with an asshole of a drunk stepfather and a battered, depressed mother, and how he had to watch his best friend try and fail to cover up the same things I now was.

I told him to fuck off and mind his own business because he didn't know shit about me or my life. He gave me an after-school detention for the language and I arrived at his classroom to find a microwaved meal and a bottle of juice waiting on his desk. He said it was for me as I apparently looked like I hadn't eaten in days—which I hadn't—and I again told him to bugger off and that I didn't need his fucking sympathy meals.