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sucking on his bottle, swaying in Sue’s direction. Sue stepped back. Steve Strachan was the heavy of the Greenhills gang. He was six feet tall, wore ugg boots, a lumber jacket, a big, black moustache, and his teeth, when he sniggered, were like fangs. He fingered girls in the pub pool. When he jumped in, everyone jumped out.
    â€˜Yeah, twenty of us went frew ’er,’ Steve boasted. ‘She loved it.’
    â€˜She kept fallin’ asleep but,’ Gull complained.
    â€˜Oh, ya jest gotta slap ’er round a bit. Roll ’er over. Stick it in. Twist it roun’. Haul it out … (snigger, snigger) she loved it.’
    Molls made me feel sick. How could anyone love it? ‘Yeah, she sucks a mean cock,’ Strack slobbered. ‘Don’t hog the bottle Gull!’
    â€˜Hey Susie,’ I whispered, ‘there’s Cheryl.’
    Cheryl was staggering around the yard, falling all over the boys.
    â€˜Oooh’ar, she’s drunk.’
    â€˜Hope Wayne doesn’t find out ….’
    â€˜She’s gonna get a bad name.’
    â€˜And she got a ring from him last week … What a moll … Oh, gidday Cheryl.’
    Her big mouth dropped open, ‘Hi.’
    Gull turned around. ‘Oh, it’s Noaln. Watcha bin drinkin’ Nolan?’ He looked at the bottle she was grasping. ‘Tequila … rugged stuff for a little girl.’
    â€˜Oh shuddup,’ she drooled.
    We gasped. Nobody ever told Gull to shut up.
    â€˜What? You drunk little girl? You’d better drink some milk. Wait here.’
    Gull returned with a glass of milk from the kitchen.
    â€˜Drink this,’ he ordered, handing it to Cheryl. She looked at it in disgust. She looked at him in disgust. She looked back at the glass. Splat!
    Oh my God. Milk all over Seagull.
    Sue and I drew back into the shrubs and considered leaving.
    Gull sobered, drew himself up and growled.
    Suddenly from the balcony came a shout: ‘Tracey’s olds are home!’
    A mass of drunken teenagers swarmed over the back fence and down the side, throwing their cans over with them. Gull hauled Cheryl over and in three seconds the yard was clear and the lights in the house were turned off.
    â€˜Susie, is that you?’ I whispered from behind the barbecue.
    â€˜Yeah.’
    â€˜Let’s get out of here.’ We sneaked down the side passage and met the boys at Boardie’s panel van.
    â€˜Sprung!’ cried Jeff Basin, the local dubbo. *
    â€˜Oh der,’ moaned Boardie sarcastically. ‘Come on, let’s split.’
    â€˜Reckon.’ I sat next to Bruce in the front seat, my hand on his thigh. Danny pulled Sue over the back. He stank of stale beer and cigarettes.
    â€˜Come on …’ he slobbered, mauling her breast. He hadn’t got a screw since last weekend.
    She lay down in silence and started peeling off her Levis, zippered coat and little white shirt as we bounced along the road.
    Halfway up the Princes Highway, Bruce hit the brakes.
    â€˜Hey. There’s Jacko! Get in Jacko! Jump in the back!’
    So Glen Jackson jumped in the back, just in time to see Susie madly pulling on her leopard-skin underpants.
    She was terrified. Jacko had a big mouth. Now she’d be known as a moll. The whole of Sylvania would know. It’d be scratched into school desks … whispered about behind her back in the canteen …
    â€˜Small swell today, eh Danny?’
    â€˜Yes, nor’ east badly, Jack.’
    â€˜Reckon. Gidday, Susan.’
    Maybe he hadn’t noticed after all …
    Girls never talked to each other about screwing. If you did you were slack. We thought it was a secret between us and our boyfriends. Yet that’s all the boys did talk about, way out on the flat sea, sitting on their boards, in between sets. They told every detail. The Greenhills guys knew the ins and outs of every girl in the gang.
    Monday mornings weren’t so bad if I’d