Rainjoyswriting - The Secret Diary of Maes Elric-Mustang.pdf

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The Secret Diary of Maes Elric-Mustang Aged Eleven and One Half
Chapter 1
Mr Thomas had set the project, and in a way that made it even worse because Maes had
thought that Mr Thomas was on his side. He noted books Maes might find interesting in
the margins of his essays, he'd taught Maes how important memorising poetry was, he
could make the entire class be silent while he read Shakespeare out loud so that Maes
could actually listen . . . and yet, as Maes suspected every adult eventually would, Mr
Thomas had betrayed him all the same.
The class peeled out after the bell, and as Mr Thomas stacked exercise books on his desk
Maes stood silent by the door, chewing the inside of his cheek and staying very still, like
a small statue in a green blazer. Mr Thomas murmured, "Yes, Elric?"
Possibly his dad had known this would happen, but hardly anyone ever bothered with
his full last name. "I - your project -"
"I've set that project for this class every year for the last ten years." Mr Thomas said
mildly. His glasses sat low on his nose and there was a permanent furrow in his brow
except for the rare times when he smiled; currently he was frowning over the inky
exercise books of nineteen thirteen year old boys and one eleven year old. "It
encourages boys to think about where they came from, and into what world, it gives
their lives context and allows them to wonder who they want to be given the world they
came into. And you -" He glanced up keeping his face bland, his eyes a very languid blue -
"would like to be excused, I take it, all the same. Extenuating circumstances."
Maes kept his face very blank, which he was very good at, and stared back.
Yes, he would like to be excused, he would like when this topic came up to always be
excused. He was trapped in a classroom with a pack of adolescent boys who scented
weakness as piranhas scent blood and they were supposed to put together a project
about the day they were born, and Mr Thomas knew what that entailed for Maes of all
boys -
He could keep his mouth very flat, but he couldn't stop his cheeks from heating.
Mr Thomas smiled, just slightly, and the crease in his forehead folded out. "What did you
think about Eliot?"
The words tumbled from him automatically. "I liked her, sir. She writes as if - as if she
knows, and she cares, about people, people not being what they're expected to be."
The crease had folded out entirely now. "Good," Mr Thomas murmured. Something in his
smile reminded Maes of his father's slight smile when he tipped the book Maes was
reading up to check the title. "Good. I'm glad you liked her. You are not, by the way,
excused from the project."
Maes held his jaw steady, held his eyes expressionless, and said, "Thank you, sir."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ed waited by the school gates as the children poured away like draining water, pattering
off to parents, to cars, to the short stroll home in feral squabbling packs, like ferrets.
Actually he waited on the school gates, on the squared brick post the school gate hung
from, shoes dangling above the path, gripping the edges of his precarious seat with both
hands, his eyes trained on the school and even his nostrils seemed to work like a
watchdog's. Maes was already late, he wasn't usually amongst the very last children to
leave, and even all in the same bottle green he could recognise his son out of a crowd of
thousands . . .
"Hi, Mr Elric." Runi said as he walked past.
"Hey. You seen my kid yet?"
"Sorry."
Ed sighed. "Walk home safe, Runi."
"See you later, Mr Elric."
Ed ran through the options. Maes could be talking to one of his teachers; sometimes they
did have to hold him late to check how his work was going, if he needed more of it
because Ed's kid was so clever sometimes he thought his chest would crack with pride.
Maes could be checking the stuff in his locker, what he'd need for tonight/tomorrow.
Some dumbshit teacher could have held him back to tell him off (Ed would get their
name and make his vengeance known).
He could be ill, he could be missing, he could have been kidnapped -
There he was, slouching his way around the building and across the grand front drive.
Ed swallowed around his heart, closed his eyes for a second, opened them again and
promised himself that he'd be calm. He lifted a hand and waved; Maes looked up at him,
dark eyes expressionless from across the driveway, and raised one hand a very little
back, hurried over with his head down. Ed jumped down from the gatepost and grinned
at him, couldn't not, he always did, and said, "Hey, kid."
"Hey, Dad. When - am I going to be old enough to walk home on my own-?"
Ed scowled. "When you're older than me. C'mon. How was school?"
"It was school," Maes muttered, somehow managing to trot to keep up and yet still drag
his shoes at Ed's side. Fancy cars were pulling away containing kids in dark green,
driven by servants, and Ed smiled and nodded to a couple of the nannies he saw every
day, but on the whole now the kids did walk themselves home alone. But Maes was only
eleven, all his classmates were twelve and thirteen, and none of their dads were
megalomaniac idiots whose jobs required armed guards and Ed worrying his stomach
raw every single second of the day that his kid wasn't in his immediate eyeline -
"Well, what did you study?"
"The same things we always do."
"You wanna name one?"
"Maths?"
"How was maths?"
"It was maths."
"I get more when I talk to your Dad about stuff he doesn't wanna let on, you know that?"
"Dad, it was just school, it's the same every day, it's boring . How was work?"
"It was-" He waved a hand at the brittle-blue autumn sky. "It was work."
He looked down. Maes looked pointedly up at him.
"Okay, so let's talk about something interesting , then. How're you, kid? What trash're you
reading right now, anyway?"
"I don't read trash."
"You read complete trash an' it is gonna rot your brain. What is it this time?"
Maes scowled at him, clearly anticipating the direction of this conversation, and looked
across at the row of parked cars beside them. "I'm reading the A R Holmes short stories."
"A R Holmes? Who's A R Holmes?"
His voice pitched very flatly, "He's an alchemical detective."
Pause.
"An alchemical detective."
"Dad."
"An alchemical detective ."
"Dad."
"An alchemical -"
"Dad!"
"It'll rot your brain."
"It will not, what would you know about it, closest to fiction you ever come to reading is
alchemists who get it wrong-"
"Apparently the only thing they do teach you in school is answering back your dad."
"You said I never had to accept any received wisdom, you said questioning shows a
healthy-"
" Jeez , kid, seriously , shows how much I know, doesn't it?"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Maes sat at the kitchen table with a sandwich while his dad kicked the washing machine.
"It will-" Thud. "-will-" Thud. "- work ." Thud. Thud.
"You should ask Mr Fury to have a look at it again," Maes said.
"But it should work ." His dad stood back, stared at the machine in baffled frustration,
then his face changed a little, a subtle inwards tightening of the eyebrows, and he said so
quietly that Maes didn't think it was for his benefit, "How did Mum cope without one of
these things . . . ?"
Maes thought of the folded t-shirts, the balled socks that appeared in his drawers
smelling of soap and fresh air, thought of his self-emptying laundry basket, and thought
that machinery being 'revolutionary' seemed to mean that usually it didn't work very
well. His dad screwed his hair up and his shoulders began to lose their rigid hunch of
rage, began to slump.
"Do you want some of my sandwich?"
His dad mumbled automatically, "You eat it, you're a growing boy."
"I don't like ham."
"You do like ham," he sounded hurt by that, offended, like Maes had just said he didn't
like him . "You've always liked ham."
"I don't like this ham. It's too pink. Pigs aren't this pink."
His dad sighed, walked over and took the offered half a sandwich. He opened it up to
squint at the contents first and said, "You're right about that, I guess. Never seen a pig
this colour in my life."
"When are we visiting Riesembool again?"
"When your Dad can get the time off, kid."
"When'll that be?"
"I dunno," in a very slightly odd tone of voice, so Maes glanced up at him from his
glistening pink sandwich meat. "I dunno, kid. He's busy."
He was always busy. Why the odd tone of worry in his voice?
Maes contemplated further questions to take his mind off it. Hey, Dad, tell me about the
day I was born. How did that even work ?
At first it had been easy to accept, after all. The eggs and seeds and special cuddles
business had simply involved his dad and his father rather than the eerily smiling man
and woman in all the nice books he'd been given, and when you're a kid you don't worry
much about the realities of what goes in where and what comes out where. But now
Maes was eleven years old and thanks to whispers in the playground, the cruelty of older
boys, and how very matter-of-fact his father could be about certain questions - so long as
his dad wasn't in earshot - Maes was painfully aware of what went in where. What he
wasn't sure about was the rest of it, how it worked. He felt like he needed to see x-rays.
And -
Very suddenly he remembered his dad asleep on the sofa with a book over his face and
his t-shirt hiked up, and the long, fine scars over his stomach muscles.
On the day I was born the doctors sliced my dad open to remove me from his womb because
I'm pretty certain (but cannot in a billion billion years ever ever ask) that he doesn't have a
vagina.
"Eat your sandwich, kid."
"There's something wrong with this ham."
"Hasn't done me any harm."
Maes stared at the sandwich for a bit longer, then ate it while his dad kicked the washing
machine some more.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It was dark by the time his father got home and they finished dinner - his dad's moods
could be divined from the state of dinner and burnt meant frustrated; the washing
machine had a few extra dents to show as well - just in time for Maes to scramble
through to the living room afterwards and snap the radio on. Half past seven meant the
radio adventures of A R Holmes, Alchemical Detective (sponsored by Brighto washing
powder, for criminally bright whites). All the boys at school would be talking about it
tomorrow and Maes . . . well, Maes could at least listen to them.

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