Frontier - 15. FR Chapter 15

“Without going into details, Anton has had to deal with a situation with bullies at his younger brothers’ school, and last night we had a discussion about it, and came up with an idea,” Simon announced to the others.

“Well, at one stage I was attending a private school, until a family situation changed all of that, and I started attending government schools. At the private school there was a system, where students are selected as Prefects, a little like class and year representatives in the government school system. Prefects are responsible for monitoring student behaviour, stepping in to stop any incidents, and report these to senior staff.”

“From what Simon tells me, there isn’t even a student representative system in place at this school, and in his first day here, yesterday, he witnessed a number of students misbehaving, and being close to bullying other students. As you can gather, Simon and I are very much against bullying or any kind of discrimination, that includes sexual orientation, race and religious. We would like to set up on our own, a year representative or prefect system, so as to deal with any kind of bullying or discrimination of any kind,” I announced.

I was a little surprised that all five other members of the group agreed with this idea, one of the boys looked at another who nodded his head, and looking at another guy he also nodded his head.

“There is a gay couple amongst us, and we are fully supportive of their relationship. We have protected them when any slander or abuse has happened, and we have kept it to ourselves, and not involved the staff,” one of the boys said, and I looked at the other two, who started to blush a little.

“That is awesome to hear guys, and you have Simon and my support as well. I was physically abused by my father for many years, after my mother left him to escape simular abuse. With Simon’s help I was able to escape that situation, be reunited with my grandfather, and more recently with my mother. My grandfather and I jointly own a yacht, and two of my crew are a gay couple, and they are hard-working great guys to know. Simon is also part of my crew,” I said to the gathering.

“Let’s meet in the library at lunch time to discuss this some more,” Finn, one of the guys suggested.

“If no one has any objections, how about we delay that till after school, and meet at my yacht,” I suggested.

“You don’t mean that huge trimaran in the marina do you?” One of the other boys – Jack - asked, and Simon and I smiled and nodded our heads. “Holy sh…eep,” Jack said and we all laughed.

“I presume that is a yes,” Simon asked, and everyone agreed.

We headed back to the lockers to gather our books for the next two classes. I had specialist mathematics, and geography, and Simon was in my second class. When the bell sounded to mark the start of the 45-minute lunch break, I headed straight to my locker, and Simon arrived shortly after me. He asked me to follow him to the cafeteria.

Once we had purchased our lunch, Simon lead me to a table, where the five guys I met earlier were all seated. Each of them said they had contacted their parents, and told them they would be late home, as friends were getting together after school. With that said I remembered I hadn’t let Mum know of the group coming after school. I retrieved my mobile phone and called Mum on the yacht.

“Hi, Mum. Simon and I are bringing a group of friends over for a chat after school. Can you prepare some snacks for us please?” I asked her as soon as she answered.

“Yes, Dear. That will be fine. How many are coming?” she asked me.

“There will be seven including me and Simon. Thanks heaps. See you at about 3.20pm,” I replied.

Simon and I had study period in the library as our next class, with me having music as my last subject for the day. I wanted to learn to play the piano. When the last bell for the day sounded, I was pleased that the school day was finally over. I made my way over to my locker to deposit my books, and Simon and the other guys were there waiting for me. We all had bikes, so it didn’t take us long to arrive at the marina. We secured our bikes to a couple of light posts, before heading down the jetty to the yacht which had the pontoons closed to reduce the space for the berth.

I lead the way on board, and Mum appeared from inside, when she saw us arriving. “Welcome, boys. Come inside and sit down in the saloon lounge. I have drinks and snacks ready for you all”, she said, as she gave me a hug.

“How are the boys?” I asked mum quietly.

“They are resting at the moment,” Mum informed me as she followed us inside. We all sat down in the saloon lounge area. We chatted about various things, as we ate and drank, and about fifteen minutes later Simon went to the office and retrieved his laptop computer. He turned it on and opened up a new word document, as he sat down and looked over to me.

“Ok, let’s call this gathering to order,” I said to the guys gathered in the saloon.

“I wish to nominate Anton as Head Prefect,” Finn Edgar announced.

“And I second that nomination,” Alex Strathmore added.

“Who is in agreement?” Finn asked, and everyone put up their hand, except me. I was stunned by the sudden motion.

“The motion is carried, unopposed,” Simon said with a smile as he typed the event into the computer.

“Well, thanks, guys, for your confidence. I will do my best, but I want you all to know that this is a team effort, not just one person leading the others. Now, as I mentioned before, this is a leadership team responsible for keeping order in the school grounds, during the hours of 0800 and 1515 hours - that’s 8am to 3.15pm to those who don’t know the 24-hour time method. I would like to suggest that we have a senior leadership team of five, and at least two prefects for each high school year, from year 7 to 11.

I recommend that we keep this between us for now, and when the school administration eventually get wind of it, we as a senior team will speak to the administration staff. Is everyone in agreement with this?” I announced, and everyone said yes. “Now I would like to request nominations for the senior leadership team, and nominations for prefects from each year,” I added. Ten minutes later, it was agreed that Jack, Finn, Toby Jenkins, Simon and I be the senior leadership team, and three nominations for each school year were made, in case one nominee refused to do the job.

Jack recommended that a weekly senior leadership team meeting be held on board the yacht, and Finn suggested that it be after school on Thursdays. Everyone agreed to this. I called an end to the meeting, with a suggestion that we split into two groups, so Simon and I can give our new friends a tour of the yacht. While Simon took his group of four up to the fly bridge, followed by his pontoon cabin, I took my group of three downstairs to look at some of the guest cabins, then down to the crew area towards the bow of the yacht, ending at the main bridge & office.

We met back in the saloon, and I mentioned to Simon that the boys were resting in the twin guest cabin, and to not disturb them. Simon nodded his head, as he headed that way with his group, while I took my group to my pontoon cabin, then up to the fly deck, where Jack and Finn took off their shorts and shirts and jumped into the Jacuzzi. I laughed as they splashed each other wearing only boxer shorts.

When the others appeared, they did the same thing. With a smile Simon headed downstairs to retrieve some spare towels, so the guys could dry off. I sat down on the sun beds, and watched my new friends have fun for a while. When they stopped splashing each other, Finn looked at me.

“Any reason why we can’t have the other two guys as prefects?” he asked me, and the others looked at me on hearing this, and I chuckled.

“I think it would be good idea to have backup prefects, so yes, let’s do that,” I replied.

About ten minutes later, the guys climbed out of the Jacuzzi and dried off, before getting dressed, and heading back on the main deck. They thanked my mum for the afternoon tea, and they headed off to their homes around town. Simon took the wet towels down stairs to the laundry, and started up the washing machine, while I went to see if the boys were awake. I found them sitting on their beds, playing the card game Fish. After saying hello, I headed back upstairs to the fly bridge.

While there my phone rang. It was Gramps calling. “Hello, Anton. How was your first day at school?”

“It was good thanks, Gramps. Met some great guys in my year, and we are setting up a student leadership team to monitor and deal with any bullying and discrimination,” I replied.

“That’s good to hear. I hope that it works out well for you. I will be in town on Thursday afternoon, so I will see you then. I need to have a chat with you, once Jasper and the lads have returned,” Gramps said to me.

“Can’t you tell me about it now, Gramps?” I asked him, a little annoyed that I wasn’t being told what was happening.

Gramps chuckled. “All will be revealed on Thursday. See you then. Bye for now,” Gramps said and he ended the call.

I went down to the galley, where Mum was organising dinner, while Simon was transferring the washed towels to the dryer.

“Gramps is coming into town Thursday afternoon, about the same time that Jasper and the lads arrive. I have no idea what it is, but something is happening,” I said to Mum.

“We will have to postpone the leadership meeting in that case,” Simon added.

“Yes, we will. Can you remind me about that at morning break tomorrow please?” I asked Simon and he nodded his head.

After dinner, the boys watched a bit of television, while Simon and I set up our computers and homework on the dining room table. We spent an hour going through what we had learnt earlier in the day.

The next morning, the group met in the front courtyard of the school, and we each were given the names of two students from a lower year that we had to track down and ask them if they were interested in being a member of the leadership team, and if they were, to meet at lunch time in the outdoor undercover area. Simon and I had English as our first subject for the day, and it was the same teacher as I had for Literature, which I didn’t mind.

My second class for the day was Physics, and I had the same teacher as I had yesterday for Specialist Mathematics, which was also good. So far, I liked all the teachers that I had for my classes, and I hoped that this would continue with the other subjects that I still had for the remainder of the week. The next class was Biology. The teacher also took me for Chemistry. He was a bit of a grumpy teacher.

When lunch finally arrived, I put my books in my locker, and headed for the outside undercover area, where the rest of the leadership group was gathered, along with some others. With nineteen students in total gathered, I cleared my throat and everyone stopped chatting.

“Good afternoon. I will keep this as short as possible. To the twelve younger students, welcome to the Leadership Group. The aim of this group is to monitor and take action when there are any incidents among the students. We suggest that you just keep an eye on students in your year, but if you happen to see some bullying or discrimination of any kind, whether it be sexual orientation or race or religion, step in and try and cool the situation down.

“If you feel that you cannot handle it on your own, don’t try to. Go and find another Leadership team member, to assist. Whatever you do, don’t put yourself in danger, if you can’t handle it on your own. Look around and remember who is gathered here today. We are a team and we are here to help each other as well as all students in this school,” I said to the group.

“Since most of you don’t know that is my friend, Anton Hamilton, and I am Simon Adamson, along with Finn, Jack and Toby. We are the senior leadership team. You will find us in the cafeteria at lunch time, along with Mike and Sam, so don’t hesitate to come and talk to us,” Simon said. “Stop and talk to us if you see one of us in a hallway between classes or at morning break, and we will happily chat with you, no matter what it is about.

“We are here no matter what, and we also prefer to keep this group between us students, so no mention of this to any teacher or staff member. If they try to talk you into telling them about this group, tell them to speak to Simon, Anton or any other senior team member,” Toby added.

“Now let’s introduce each other, so everyone knows who is in the group, before we head off and have our lunch,” Jack suggested, and once all the introductions were done, the group set off to their separate locations to have lunch.

By the time, we had bought our lunch and sat down, we only had twenty minutes left of our lunch break, and our group started to chat about our teachers, as we ate. I noticed two of the year eight boys from our earlier meeting hovering around, and I motioned for them to come over.

“Hi. We are from year 8. We just wanted to let you know about some year 9 students that have been giving most of us a hard time,” one of the boys said to us.

“I think I know who you mean. I saw them on Monday, my first day here. Thanks for letting us know and keep up the good work. We will look into it for you,” Simon said.

After the two boys, had returned to their group, Finn spoke up. “I will find our two year 9 team members and have a chat to them, see if we can resolve this issue, or at least let the bullies know that they are being watched,” he said, as he gathered the last of his lunch and headed off to look for the team members from year 9.

“Just to let you two know, Finn’s brother is one of the year 9 team members, so he will get it sorted quickly,” Toby said to me and Simon.

Just as we were preparing to head to our lockers, Finn reappeared a little puffed out. “All sorted. My bro and his friend and the two year 8 reps have just had a chat, and they know who the culprits are, and will keep an eye on them,” Finn announced.

“Oh, by the way, Thursdays meeting is cancelled till next week, as we have commitments tomorrow,” Simon said to the group before we all headed to our lockers to gather our books for the last two classes for the day, which for me were Music and Geography.

At the end of the day, Simon and I headed back to the yacht. Mum had some afternoon tea ready for us when we arrived.

“Hi, Mum. How are the boys today?” I said as I walked into the saloon with a smile. The look on Mum’s face told me something was wrong.

“I’m a bit worried about Neal. Ten minutes ago he said he hadn’t been feeling very well, so I told him to go and lie down,” Mum said to me.

I dashed downstairs, and one look at Neal told me he wasn’t good. Grabbing my phone I dialled 000, and asked for an ambulance to come to the Jurien Bay marina urgently. Once the call was over, I dashed upstairs.

“Simon, I need your help now. Mum I have called for an ambulance. Can you guide them in when they arrive,” I said before heading downstairs again. I grabbed a hand towel in the bathroom and moistened it, and placed it on Neal’s forehead. When Simon arrived we each grabbed a side of the bedspread, and rolling it up tight against Neal’s sides, we used that as a grip, to gently lift Neal up off the bed.

With Simon slightly towards his feet, and me slightly closer to his head, we managed to squeeze through the doorway, and took him upstairs, and gently placed him on the casual dining table on the main deck. Simon went and grabbed some blankets, while I took Neal’s pulse, and wrote it down on a pad that I grabbed from the bar, recording the time that I took the pulse. Next I counted his respiration and also recorded it and the time.

“Can you go and get that medical report, including the scans of Neal, that are on the office desk please?” I asked Simon, and he dashed forward to do as I asked, while I took another pulse and respiration reading and wrote them down, before pulling out my phone and calling the local medical centre.

“This is Anton Hamilton. My brother Neal Wallis was there on Saturday, for x-ray and scans. The doctor had said to keep an eye on him as he has spleen bruising. About fifteen minutes ago he complained that he wasn’t feeling too good. When I got home five minutes later, I found him only just conscious, sweating a lot. His forehead is cold, his pulse and respiration are very high, and we have called for an ambulance,” I said.

“This is Dr Hunt. I remember Neal. Have the ambulance bring him straight to the medical centre. He may have ruptured his spleen and needs surgery right away,” came the reply. After agreeing to this, I hung up and saw that the ambulance had arrived.

“On board, here, officers,” I shouted as Mum tried to talk to them, slowing them down. Ignoring Mum they came on board and came straight to the table. I explained to them the telephone conversation that I had just had, and that they were expecting Neal for immediate surgery. I also showed them the information that I recorded.