Gassy Gary

• Aloisa Budisavljevic, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2007

Gary’s mum was driving him to the swimming pool when he heard a weird noise coming from his stomach. No time to worry about it because he had a swimming competition. He knew he wasn’t a great swimmer, but his teacher had said they were one short for the relay, so he had put his hand up. Brad and his mates laughed. “You can’t swim to save your life Gary!” Brad shouted.

Halfway down the pool Gary felt a gurgling in his tummy. All of a sudden, without him realising, Gary was at the other end of the pool. He looked back and all he saw was trillions of white bubbles. Gary’s tummy felt much better. His mum was in shock. “How did you do that?” she asked.
“Something I ate that made me kick really fast…I think…” Gary answered. Imagine coming second! Not even Brad could laugh at him now.

When he got home, he wrote down everything he had eaten that day. He wanted to find out what had made him kick so hard at the pool. “Chocolate, Vegemite sandwich, baked beans for breakfast, tomato-cheese sandwich…” He remembered reading somewhere about a girl called Louise who was the world’s fastest runner. She ate Vegemite sandwiches every day. Gary ran downstairs shouting, “It’s the Vegemite sandwiches, it’s the Vegemite sandwiches!” Next day, he and his mum made tonnes of Vegemite sandwiches and off he went to the pool.

He pushed off the wall (he couldn’t dive in yet) and kicked his legs as fast as he could but he hardly got anywhere. “Maybe it wasn’t the Vegemite sandwiches” thought Gary. “Then what was it?” asked his mum. He didn’t know.

Back home he forgot all about it because The Simpsons had started. He made himself some baked beans on toast and sat down to watch it.

Next day he had the next round in the swimming competition. Again he felt something weird in his tummy. “On your marks, get set”. “Bang!” went the gun, off went Gary! He was far behind all the other swimmers. Then Gary felt something in his stomach and whoosh! It was like he was flying in water! His head hit the wall. He looked up and saw the bubbles behind him. Everyone else was still swimming. He had won! Gary’s head still hurt but he didn’t care. He’d won! All his family were all cheering him on but his dad looked a bit sick… Everyone started to look sick …

He went on the Internet and read up all about food that made you gassy. That’s what did it! Before all his competitions he stuffed himself with beans, cabbage, sultanas and nuts. “Gassy Gary”, his dad called him. He didn’t care. He swam faster than Brad and all the girls thought he was cool.

The only thing was, he could only do outdoor competitions …The smell was deadly.