"I have to go mum, you don’t understand, I loved that gerbil, and I’m willing to go anywhere and everywhere to find it. This is a dangerous quest, I may not be back for sometime, I may not be back at all. Fluffy meant the world to me, and by God I will not just sit here and masturbate while certain death awaits my dear pet," Matt whimpered as a tear came to his eye.
"Okay Matthew, I’ll pick you up from the video store at six thirty," came the reply from the kitchen.
Usually the missing gerbil ploy was just and excuse for Matt to run off down to Video Ezy and waste a good six or seven hours sitting in the adult section, but not this time. Fluffy was missing, and Matt had to find him. His bag was packed; one sock, three carrots, a dead lizard he found under his bed, two mouse traps, a ripped singlet and fifteen kilograms of cheese. He trudged out the door, slowly turning on his heel to look at his mum for what may be the last time. He stared at her for some time, a smile spreading across his face, until he realized he had spun a full circle, and was looking out his door, across the road into a completely different house. A girl, about his age, was getting changed in the window, she looked up at him and a disgusted expression commandeered her face, she reached out and pulled her blinds shut. The smile on Matt’s face grew, his journey had started out well.

Before Matt had gone far, he hadn’t left. For one has to leave to go far, hence it is logical to assume that before one goes far, one hasn’t left, or has gone a distance shorter than far. But it came to pass that the former was applicable to Matt presently, this suddenly dawned on him, and he left. Before he had gone far, he heard the distant rumbling of a school bus, approaching him from behind. He spun on his heel, once again turning a full circle. This frustrated him to the point where he yelled out, "My God! I just can’t turn ‘round!" "You look pretty round to me, fatty!" Screamed a Nambour High punk out a window of the passing bus.
Matt was confused; it was Saturday, what was a Nambour High student doing on a bus?
"Beats me," Matt spoke nonchalantly as he watched the bus trail off into the distance.
"Everything beats you, you run like a fat, constipated toddler!" Screamed a second NHS punk, as another bus rumbled passed Matt. Matt was not a good judge of distance, nor did he have very good reflexes. There was a gap of about four meters between he and the bus as it trundled by him, and a gap of about four minutes between the time when the bus was next to him and the dive into the shrubs adjacent to the road Matt thought was necessary to avoid certain death.
"Shit! I didn’t know whales could get beached this far inland!" A third punk yelled from a third bus at Matt, who was lying a the bush.
"I can’t handle this anymore!" Yelled Matt as he started running, in the direction of a mysterious and ominous forest, placed right next to the road for convenience of the author.
"From what I hear, you need tweezers to handle it!" A fourth punk bellowed from inside the fourth bus. Matt ran and ran, fatigue set in, but he was content with his effort, no longer could he hear the verbal abuse of his tormentors. Little did he realize, he hadn’t stood up yet, he couldn’t hear any subsequent insults as there had been no subsequent buses, and hence no subsequent punks. He was still in the shrubbery, head turned towards the forest, legs protruding out into the air. He stood up briskly and brushed himself off, surveying the houses in his general vicinity hoping no-one had seen his attempt at inverted running. Unfortunately for Matt, no-one hadn’t seen, there was a crowd of people in front of him, and a roar of laugher emanating from them. He spun on his heel to walk into the forest, but did a full circle and began to walk towards the crowd. He realised his error, and walked off backwards into the forest, tripping over a rock. He made sure he stood up facing the forest this time. He walked forwards away from the crowd, and hopefully towards Fluffy.

It was not long before it was short. For it was growing, not shrinking, and hence it was short then long, not long before it was short, and "it" was a large snake across the path Matt had chosen to walk on. He glanced at it, and as he walked he came to the conclusion that it takes him at least half an hour to accelerate to walking speed, being as heavy as he is, and it was not worth stopping to do something logical to avoid the snake. He stepped right on it and kept walking, thinking himself lucky to have escaped the encounter unscathed. You see, he did not realise he had been bitten fifteen times. Matt began to feel nauseous, and eventually collapsed, "Hmm, must be a cardiac arrest," said Matt to himself, disappointed he had not brought the defibrillators Nambour hospital had given him. He went there on such a regular basis suffering heart failure it was far more economical for them to just give him a set, now he only had to make the odd trip for a routine quadruple bypass. Defibrillatorless and venomfull, Matt fell unconscious, drifting towards inevitable death.

He awoke, lying in the same position that he had passed out in. One hand down his pants, the other with an extended digit placed firmly up his nose. There was a note on his chest, it read:

Look you stupid retard, if you die, who are we going to bag out? For shit’s sake, stop being a moron and just get back on the road so we have something to do.
Sincerely,
The Punk Patrol

So, the punks saved me, Matt restated the glaringly obvious to himself, you see it usually took him three times to understand something. Hmm, it looks as though the punks have saved me, he understood now, and was annoyed for two reasons. Firstly, he was now in debt to them, secondly, that finger in his nose was not place in there, it was glued, and thirdly, they had stapled a large pointy stick to his buttocks. Also, it was now evident that Matt could count just as well as he could walk after having just ripping a stapled, large, pointy stick off his arse. But he trekked on, his left nostril dripping blood, a consequence of ripping a glued finger out of it. He was very sore and tired, as he had been gone for well over nine minutes now. At least nine minutes and twenty seconds, judging by his watch, which was actually a small ferret of some kind, nailed to his hand. Upon closer inspection, it was a gerbil, with a small name tag reading Fluffy. Matt kicked himself for being such a buttwax. No wonder Fluffy had run away, Fluffy had always been nailed to his wrist, ever since he had first found him in the middle of the road, and used a spatula to scrape off his stiff, rotting carcass. Fluffy must have seen Matt nail this new gerbil to his hand, which was also named Fluffy, and thought that Matt was trying to replace him. Matt loved Fluffy with all his heart, nothing could replace him, he would never even try. He only nailed this new gerbil to his hand because... because... why had he done it? He couldn’t even remember doing it. Then he thought how confusing this scenario was, and it dawned on him how astonishingly stupid he was. This pleased him, his mum told him he’d never realise how stupid he actually was, but, in truth, the overwhelming feeling of stupidity Matt is feeling at this very moment is infinitesimal when compared to the actual full scale of his stupidity, and to the aggravation the full scale of his stupidity instills in those who surround him. Surely you can sympathise with this, but fear not, your frustration shall be quenched in a short time, as the voice of reason enters the story, in the form of a tall, English man.

Matt pressed on, Fluffy was out there somewhere, and Matt had to find him. As he walked, he thought so hard he gave himself three simultaneous hernias (a medical impossibility, for a human) trying remember why, and when, he had impaled this new Fluffy to his wrist. He plodded along the path, when suddenly a tall, English man emerged from the foliage around him. The man abruptly blurted out, "Look, you stupid git, that gerbil IS Fluffy, the original Fluffy, you never took him off your wrist you snotty faced pile of rhino dung. You never have ever since you found him, you unbelievably idiotic tit! My God, I have to tell you this every week!"
Matt was quite scared indeed, so he spun on his heel to run off, but he turned right around to face the man, who, anticipating this, immediately head butt Matt, breaking his nose in fifteen thousand, four hundred and ninety two places.
"Ouch," Matt remarked, as his body was flung around from the impact, pointing in the direction from whence he came. What was he doing in this forest? He had no bloody idea, and thought himself a fool for asking himself a question he didn’t know the answer to.
"Now, get your festering arse down to Video Ezy and look at some breasts!" A voice laden with a thick English accent boomed from behind him.
The force from the aforementioned head butt had cleared Matt’s memory of the last few hours, and disorientated him somewhat. Having nothing better to do, he took the advice of the tall, English man and waddled off to Video Ezy. And this is the way it will always be. It’s a pity Matt didn’t have a greater attention to detail, otherwise he may notice the gerbil nailed to his hand each Saturday morning, and would not need to leave home to look for it. It is a pity, but that’s just the way it is. Next Saturday Matt will leave home, thinking Fluffy is missing, get tormented by the Punk Patrol, wander into the forest, get head butt by a tall English man consequently making him forget all about his day, walk to Video Ezy to look at partially naked ladies and get picked up by his mum, just in time for dinner.

THE REVIEW:

Bronson K Volcomstalker: It's obvious that Anstey researched the subject matter of his story extensively. From the large amount of attention paid to Matt's affection for small rodents, to the minute details, like Matt's penchant for naked ladies on the back of pornos at Video Ezy. Anstey knows his subject inside and out, which is why I'm considering Dan for psychological evaluation. Although it could be considered a blatent rip-off of Timmy's beautiful story, I'm more inclined to see Anstey's expansion of the 'Punk Patrol' as a literary homage to Timmy's genius. But yeah, I liked how there was a tall English guy in it too. And the bit where Matt's running was likened to that of a constipated toddler. Ironically, that part made me shit myself. But the 'spun on his heel' bits, what the fuck were they about? Did anyone else notice that? Spike Firestorm: There's more to this story that meets the eye. "...breaking his nose in fifteen thousand, four hundred and ninety two places." Interesting. Fifteen thousand, four hundred and ninety two. 15,492. 15/4/92. 15th of April, 1992. The exact date on which Matt fell off the toilet in a diarrhoea-induced spasm and broke his nose. Coincidence? With Dan's reputation as a pervert, I think not. Incidently, I'm pretty sure that the 15th of April was when the Titanic sunk. Not in 1992 though. I think 1912. Well, a while ago anyway.