Life on the Swan - 1. Swan Chapter 1

After the dramatic reunion between my cousin Sebastian, and his husband Lewis, during my cousin's graduation ceremony at the university, the family settled down to a more quieter and relaxing lifestyle, with Seb and Lewis settling down at their home at Fowler Bay, 24 kilometres South of Denham, while the twins had decided to continue with jet setting around the world when-ever they felt like it, and they jointly bought a grand house on the banks of the Swan River, in the suburb of Mosman Park.

Meanwhile, I was enrolled into a private grammar school in Perth’s Western Suburbs, as I still have two years of education to complete, and because Seb and Lewis were out bush, I had no choice but to be a boarder at the school, but I was allowed to spend Friday night to Monday morning at the twin’s home, in Saunders Street, Mosman Park, where they have a husband and wife team as gardener and housekeeper, to maintain the house and gardens, and they live in the guest house.

Although surrounded by houses on the North, South and West sides, the house has exclusive river frontage, with its own private jetty, plus there is a heated indoor pool and a tennis court, and I enjoyed just relaxing and doing absolutely nothing.

If I got tired of that, I would get out my BMX bike and go for a ride around the suburb, following the tracks along the foreshore. It was during one of these bike rides that I came across two interesting signs, the first was in Rule Street, North Fremantle, in an area known as Rocky Bay, where there is 300m2 of land for sale, that is right on the river, with exclusive river frontage, but it does have a 20 bay public carpark, right next to it.

The second property was while on the ride back to the house, and I as I was cutting through one of the number of river frontage parks, just before the tennis club, that I noticed that 15,840m2 of parkland, at he end of Stone Street, Mosman Park, was even for sale, by expression of interest from the local council, which I thought interesting.

When I arrived back at the house, I had a quick shower, before starting up my computer and I did a search of the two properties. Once I had gathered as much information as possible, I forwarded it to Sebastian with an attaching letter, to explain what I wanted to do.

“Dear Seb and Lewis, hope all is going well for you up in Denham, it has been fairly boring here in Mosman Park, so I went for a long bike ride to the North Fremantle bridge and back. During the ride, I came across two patches of land that have exclusive river frontage, and I would like to ask if you could buy them for me as an investment. Love Xander”.

Less than half an hour later, while I was playing computer games, my mobile rang, and it was Seb calling. “Hey mate, I like your thinking on these two properties and I have already spoken to both Estate agents, and made an offer on both properties, under a new name, which I will have officially set up by the end of Monday” Seb said to me.

“Oh, why not in the family company name, or do you want to keep this low key?” I replied, “Yes exactly that, now do you have an idea what you want to call your first investment company?” Seb said to me, and I thought about this for a moment, before giving a response.

“How about Huon Investments,” I suggested, and there was some silence on the other end of the line, until I heard a loud sniff and clearing of the throat, “I think that it is a great way to honour your father, I will get right onto it, is there anything else?” Sebastian asked.

“No, only that I want to make it my home eventually, but I am not sure what to do just now, I was thinking as part of a sweetener with the local council, we could make the Rules street property into a public park, so as to have less restrictions placed on us with the Stone street property” I said.

Seb laughed, “I like your thinking, and you will make a good businessman when you finish school, young man, I will talk to you again soon, bye” Sebastian said before ending the call.

I was about to walk into my first class for the week, when I received a text message from Sebastian, “Local Council has agreed to your proposal of turning the Rule Street property into public park, at our cost, but once we have purchased it, payed the one year of rates and developed it into a park, the council is happy to accept it as a gift, with no further costs to us.

With the Stone Street property, that want at least half an acre of the land to be public space, and in return, we will have exclusive river frontage, and permission to build a small jetty onto the river, as long as it goes no further than 5 metres from the foreshore. Seb”.

I smiled as I broadly as I finished reading the message and switching the phone off as per school rules, and I walked into my first class still smiling. “What are you smiling about Devonport, dreaming of your first boyfriend?” one of the school bullies in my year commented as I sat down in my usual place.

“Shut up shit face, it has nothing to do with relationship, and more about business” I snarled back at him, just as the teacher walked in, “Sorry sir” I added, when the teacher frowned at me, and he nodded his head in acceptance at my fast apology.

Just over 45 minutes later, as the first lesson came to a close, I stood up and headed for the door, when I heard the same bully, Devries say in a loud whisper, “What would you know about business, you are just the new boy with a funny English accent” which had a few other boys laugh at the comment.

“Che idioto hackerare il ragazzo per sapere dove” Devries said in Italian, which made me smile slightly, knowing that Italian was not taught at this school, and that only Devries, and one of his mates, Gianni who was standing next to him, and his younger brother were fluent in Italian, I couldn’t help but speak up.

“You call me an idiot and a hack boy from know where eh! Well I think you had better be a little more careful on what you say, before you speak up in future” I said revealing that I understood every word that he said, and both Devries and Gianni both looked shocked with their mouths open.

“Sono bulli ignoranti come te che danno a questa scuolo un brutto nome” (It is ignorant bullies like you that give this school a bad name), I added in clear and fluent Italian before walking off down the passageway, just as I heard the teacher speak to Devries, and I stopped to listen in on what the teacher had to say.

“Devries, ho senito e capito tutta quella conversatzione con Devonport. (I heard and understood all of your conversation with Devonport). If I hear you bully anyone for the rest of this term, you will be suspended, from school immediately, do I make myself clear, Mr Devries?” the teacher said sternly, changing back to English mid sentence.

“Yes sir” I heard Devries respond, before I continued walking, smiling the whole way to my next class. I managed to avoid the bully and his mates for the rest of the day, and because he was a day boy, I wouldn’t have to see him again until the next day.

“Hey, Devonport, I want to talk to you?” a loud voice, who I knew to be Devries, and I ignored him and kept walking, but just before I reached the classroom, I felt a firm hand on my shoulder, and I tried to shrug it off, but instead I was forced to step towards the lockers.

“I just want to talk, see no mates hanging around me, it’s just you and me” Devries said in a calm voice, which surprised me a little, as I stepped back and leaned my back against a locker, waiting in silence. Devries looked around, and the hallways were nearly empty now, and he sighed then looked at his feet.

“I am sorry man, I don’t want to be mean, it just happens… I get that way when… I really like someone” Devries said in a soft whisper, just as the bell sounded to mark the start of the next class, and he dashed off inside, with me following, stunned at what I had just heard.

“Did I hear right? Is Devries possibly gay or bi?’ I asked myself, as I tried to tune into what the teacher was saying, and I struggled to concentrate on the class, as thoughts flew around in my head. When the bell sounded for the end of the class, I waited for most of the students to leave, before I packed up my books, and as I was a piece of paper dropped onto my desk, just as Gianni walked past me.

I placed the paper into my trouser pocket and finished loading my books into my backpack, and made my way to the next class. During the lunch break, I sat on my own as usual, in the far corner of the dining hall, and I spotted Gianni talking to Devries, who appeared to be visibly upset.

This is when I remembered the piece of paper, and I retrieved it from my pocket, only to have it snatched away by another student, as he walked past me, and I tried to grab it back, but lost balance and fell off the chair, and a lot of the boys in the dining hall laughed.

“That’s enough boys, get back to your lunch” one of the senior teachers commented loudly, as I returned to my chair, and looked around to find out who had pinched the note from me, but I couldn’t work out who it was. I saw Gianni looking directly at me, with a worried look on his face, and that changed to a smile, before he turned back to speak to Devries, who was seated at the same table.

“Hey, don’t worry about the note, it was written in Italian, so Jefferson the guy who grabbed it, won’t be able to understand it, and I will get one of the prefects to retrieve it for me” Gianni said to me as I was walking out of the dining hall. “Was the note from you? What did it say?” I asked softly.

“I am just the messenger, you know who it is from, and what it said was to ask you to meet with him after school one day soon, so he can talk to you, without any interruptions” Gianni said. “Err, I am not sure about that, I am a bit confused about what all this is about, one minute he is bullying me, and next he is… well you know. Tell him I will think about it, and get back to him next week” I responded, and Gianni nodded his head before heading off to find his friend.

A few days later, on a Thursday afternoon, between classes, I saw one of the teachers reading the local community newspaper, and it was the headlines that caught my attention. “Local Council sells prime land to refill the coffers” was the headlines, and I immediately knew what it was about.

“Excuse me sir, when you have finished with the paper, may I read it, there is an article in there that I am interested in reading” I said to the teacher, “Certainly Mr Devonport, I have finished with it anyway, so you can have it” the teacher replied as he handed over the paper, and I thanked him and dashed off to find a quiet place to quickly read the article on the front page.

“Due to some bad investments, the Mosman Park Town Council decided in the full council meeting last month to sells some prime river frontage land, to allow for the council to honour its commitments for the remainder of the financial year.

The 0.24-hectare, piece of land at 36 Rule Street in North Fremantle, and the 1.43-hectares of land at 12 Stone Street, Mosman Park, have been sold to the same investment company, Huon Investments. At the time of printing, there is little known of the company, except that it is only just recently been registered, with a Swiss Law firm handling the transaction.

It is understood from council minutes made available to ratepayers, that the Rule street property and 0.24 hectares of the Stone street property will become public open space, it is not known what the remaining land will be used for”.

Back at my locker, I placed the newspaper into my backpack, and headed to my last class of the day. With it being a public holiday long weekend this coming weekend, I had asked Sebastian to organise for me to get some of tomorrow off school, so I could travel up to Denham, which he had managed to do, and I would be heading to the airport straight after lunch, to catch a company plane to Denham.

When the plane landed at the Shark Bay Airport, just out of Denham, the heat of the afternoon, hit me like a brick wall, and I stopped for a moment to recover from the shock, before stepping down onto the tarmac, and walking to the waiting vehicle, were only Lewis was inside.

“Hello young man, how has school been treating you, these past 5 weeks?” Lewis asked me as I climbed in, and secured my seatbelt, glad of having the air-conditioning in the vehicle to cool me down. “Ok, I guess, it’s been a real strange week this week, but apart from that its been ok. Where is Seb?” I replied.

“In town shopping, getting some of your favourite foods, since you are staying with us for the weekend” Lewis replied smiling, before driving away from the airport. While we waited for Sebastian to turn up, as we parked in the shopping centre carpark, I showed Lewis the newspaper article, which I still had with me.

“Not a bad article, not too much detail, which is good for us, now do you have any other property that you would like to invest in?” Lewis asked me, and I gave a shocked expression, which made Lewis laugh. “We just want to give you a good head start in business that is all” Lewis said to me.