The Donut Diaries Read Online Free PDF

down.’
    I didn’t want to. I really didn’t want to. But I couldn’t think of what else to do, and then there was always the faint chance that these kids might be OK after all. So I sat down, gave a weak little smile and got ready to make some conversation. I think I might have been on the verge of talking about the weather, or last night’s telly. But before I could even open my mouth the seven kids (the tables sat eight) all got up. One by one they came round and emptied all their disgusting food on my tray, so it piled up and spilled over. It looked like a dinosaur had taken a dump on the tray. Then they all took their now-empty trays and raced out, giggling like girls. Except for the FHK, who had the same blank face as usual.
    I was stunned by all this. I knew they’d played some kind of trick on me. Kids on other tables started to point and laugh as well. Then I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned and looked into the face of Tamara Bello.
    ‘You understand what’s happening here?’ she said in that voice of hers like melted chocolate.
    I shook my head.
    ‘Anyone who doesn’t finish their lunch gets a dinner-hall detention.’ She pointed towards the exit, where a teacher was checking the dirty trays that the kids were piling up.
    ‘A what?’
    ‘You’ll find out.’
    ‘But, but … they can’t! It’s not fair!’
    ‘Life isn’t fair. Tuck in.’
    Then Tamara Bello was gone.
    I stared at the mound of muck on my tray. Of course, I couldn’t eat it. It looked like it might be able to eat me . I thought about trying to explain what had happened to the teacher on guard. But I couldn’t say who had done it, partly because I didn’t know the names of the scumbags, and partly because even if I had known I couldn’t have said, because if you squeal on people, that’s it, you’re finished – you may as well just go and flush your own head down the toilet.
    So I was stuck.
    Then something clattered down in front of me. It was an empty tray. I looked up into a funny little face I recognized from my form class. Little, that is, except for the front teeth, which were as big as shovels. All things considered he couldn’t have looked more like a rodent if he was playing the part of King Rat in the panto.
    ‘I picked up two trays by mistake. Just leave that mess there and show the empty tray to the teacher. Do it quickly before anyone notices.’

    He had a funny way of talking – every so often he’d make a sort of ‘ ungth ’ noise. So it sounded more like – ‘ Ungth I picked up two ungth trays by mistake. Just leave that mess there and ungth show the empty tray to the ungth teacher.’
    ‘OK, thanks,’ I said, still in a bit of a daze.
    ‘ Ungth like, er, now .’
    A gang of kids were leaving and I joined in with them. I dumped the empty tray and I was out of there!
    And I think I’d made a sort of friend.
    I ate three plain donuts on the way home. I reckoned this was OK, as I’d definitely got my average down. Before I went to see Doc Morlock I was on four a day. Since then I’d been averaging about two. So I could have three and still be heading in the right direction.
    DONUT COUNT:

Wednesday 13 September
    THINGS A BIT better today, in the sense that nothing really terrible happened. I hung out with my new friend, the goofy short kid. Turns out he’s called Renfrew, which is one of those names that you sort of half think might be funny, but you’re not sure why or how. I’ve decided to forget that he looks like some kind of vole or whatever, and also to ignore the fact that he goes ‘ ungth ’ all the time, as he’s the only friend I’ve made, so far. Anyway, he’s probably writing in his own diary right now about how his only friend is a tub of lard called Donut, who happens to like Dermots.
    Anyway, Renfrew came up to me after morning registration and said: ‘ Ungth that was pretty pants what those Xavier kids did to you yesterday.’
    I agreed that it was, indeed, pretty pants,