“Probably…” he murmured
“Arrr! Come on Ad don’t be a loner!” I whined.
“Ok, Ok, I’ll get Chris and Dean, jeese.”
“Ok good, I’ll get some water balloons, you two bring 2 bottles of water each..”
“What?!” they all cried
“What!?? I’m getting three bags of water balloons and a bucket, least you lot can do is bring plenty of water!”
They agreed and we all set off home to prepare. I chose the quickest route home via the endangered art of fence hopping, well it cut twenty minutes off my hike and I never stole, broke or vandalised anything or anyone. I was too young to apply to the council for a side alley to be built at the bottom of about 50 houses’ gardens, so I did it.
So once I had completed my five-minute journey, I got home, ate washed changed, informed parents, and then, I packed.
“Ok, water balloons, bottles of water in case of idle friends, food, spare jumper and trousers” I muttered. Now the supplies were in order I set off down the perilous route de la gardens.
We told each other to meet at “The Big Tree. This tree is not the biggest in the quarry at all, yet that is what its is known as. I used to believe “The Big Tree” happened to be the only tree with space at least 5 metres either side. In my 10 year old head, it got its name due to ancient nomadic forest dwellers that might have settled here, because they had sufficient space and shelter, it was creatively named “the big tree”, crazy.
They were all there, Danny, Mark, Stuart, Rob, Adam, Dean, Chris, and for some reason, Chris’ little brother Julian. We settled down and quickly began making water balloons before the sun and heat died down. The most traumatic ritual was soon to follow; the picking of the sides.
“Alright” I said firmly. “Me and Rob are Captains, seen as were better than every1 else, hahahaha…ha..ha…” They stared in pure disbelief before bursting into hysterics. “OK OK OK! Dean and Rob you can be Captains.”
“I Don’t want to be Captain” Dean objected. “I’m always captain”
“Eh? What are you on about?” Rob said confusingly. “What’s wrong with being captain, it’s an honour you stupid nonce!”
“Don’t call me a nonce, you divvy pansy” Dean retaliated. “Just because you love ordering around everyone doesn’t mean I do”
“I don’t order people around, take it back, now!” Rob…ordered.
“Err, Rob, shut up for a second” I interrupted. “Dean, doesn’t want to be Captain, we can’t force him. It will have to be Stuart and Rob”
“Shut up I’m not going against Stuart, I know you Stuart, you’ll pi** in the water balloons like last month” Rob loudly announced.
“What are you talking about Rob, that was you! Not me” Stuart denied quickly among the jeers of laughter.
“Hey Hey Hey HEY! Right, Rob are you sure you wont just be able to go against Stuart, It will be uneven sides if you don’t”
“No way, forget it” Rob stated. “It’s not just that, he cheats in other ways as well!”
“I do not!” Stuart cried.
“Ok Ok, fine, Danny and Mark are Captains” I said exhaustingly.
“No, were not going on opposite sides, were always on the same side” Mark argued.
“Yeah we’ve been on the same side since year 3, if we don’t we just argue” Danny said firmly.
“OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!! Aaargh, Right, so Danny and Mark need to be on the same side so they don’t argue…bloody hell” I yelled to the morose morons. “Ok, what about Chris and Rob?”
“No because then Julian would have to be on my side, and that’s not happening, I want to be the first to soak him!” Chris said menacingly.
“You best not Chris!! I’m only here because Dad has to pick up Mum from work, I’m not getting soaked!!” Julian quickly whined.
I tried again “Alright, how about Chris and Stuart”
“That’s fine with me!” Chris blurted.
“Its bloody not with me, I’m not having Julian, we’ll never win!!” Stuart protested.
“Ok Ok” I was getting very frustrated now “what about Adam and Danny?” I sighed.
“I can’t, I don’t know the quarry very well, you guys are here all the time, this is my second time here, the first was in a car” winged Adam sheepishly.’
“Come on Ad its not even a big wood” We all moaned drearily.
“No, how can I take charge of a team if I don’t know where I am!!”
“Oh for..AARRGH!!” My patience was wearing thin with my now group of complaining OAP bingo ladies. “Look, lads, we’ve been arguing for about half an hour on the captains, the water balloons are warm, the spare water, is also warm, now, I ask again, who are going to be the Captains!? Dean can’t, because he’s too used to it, Rob can face Stuart because he pi**** in the water balloons, Chris won’t do it because he wants to drown his brother, and Stuart won’t have Julian because he’ll lose. We have to sort this out now, why not me and Chris?”
There was no disagreement. Nobody objected, nobody laughed, nobody cried or whined, finally a decision!! “Yeah that’s fine” they all murmured.
“Yes finally! About bloody time, you think we can get a game started now?” I cried. We began to move to the foot of the starting hill. I noticed Julian standing with his hand out.
“You guys, you feel that?”
“Oh Christ….”
