Poster Boys

by Scott Woodard

Genres: Young Adult; YA Coming of Age

Synopsis

A jock, a try-hard and a space cadet. Highview Grammar will rue the day it put 'History' on the curriculum - because this unlikely trio is starting a revolution.

Edward Heffernan wants one thing: to get away from Nolan Li. If he cuts ties with the embarrassing Nolan, his reputation at Highview Grammar can only go up.

But when Nolan gets a note from the coolest kid in Year 9, Edward sees a chance to be popular. James Crombie is everything that Edward and Nolan are not, but it turns out this trio have one thing in common: they're all sick of the culture, tradition and rules of their snobby 100-year-old high school. And they're ready to do something about it.

A laugh-out-loud debut novel that mixes razor-sharp satire with a rollicking plot and a whole lot of heart. This is a YA coming-of-age caper about accepting yourself just as you are.

Release date: February 24, 2026

Publisher: Hachette Australia

Print pages: 256

Sample

SCORES LOCKED. BASES empty. One hitter left, and it had to be Nolan.

‘Do you have any advice?’ He hauled his damp green shorts off the grass. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing.’

Our teammates around us on the boundary sniggered. Our opposition on the oval glared. I dug my fingers into the lawn. If only I could disappear and leave him talking to himself.

‘Hold the bat by the grippy end,’ I muttered. ‘And try to hit the ball.’

‘That’s good advice,’ he said. ‘And maybe I’ll hit one-handed.’

Laughter rippled down the boundary. Jocks in compression tights elbowed their mates. Chester Lynch shook his pumpkin-sized head. I shoved Nolan’s ankle. ‘Just hit like a normal person.’

‘But I played tennis in primary school, so maybe I’d be better if I held the bat like a racquet. You know, tried top spin.’

If anyone else had said this, they’d be taking the piss. But not Nolan. He wasn’t actually an idiot; he just had a way of looking, sounding and acting like one. Three other softball games – fifty other kids – were spread across the Back Oval, and I was stuck next to him.

‘Keep your eyes open, watch the ball, hit with two hands and run,’ I said. ‘That’s all you need to do. Okay?’

Nolan nodded and shuffled to the plate, which was a white, plastic square dropped on the Back Oval. The school didn’t have a softball diamond or even a softball team, so I don’t know why softball was part of Winter Sports Day. No-one knew the rules, not even Mr Batista, and he was referee.

Not that it mattered: once Nolan struck out, Wilmer would lose, and Sports Day was over.

Wilmer was our house. All four houses were named after important old principals, and Ernst Wilmer literally died at school. Apparently, he’d gone out with a smile, staring glassy-eyed at the school he loved – the Rose Gardens, the Chapel spire, the hand-cut bluestone bricks of the Quadrangle – before face-planting down the Admin Building steps.

With a namesake who literally died at school, it was no wonder we often did the same.

Nolan’s technique wasn’t terrible. He bent his arms, levelled the bat and took a few practice swings at the air. He might’ve even stood a chance if anyone but Crombie was on the pitcher’s plate.

James Crombie was everything I wasn’t. He was a jock, but not a meathead; smart, but not a nerd. He had the tan to match his surfer-blond hair, biceps like doner kebabs and a chest as flat as a street sign. His cheeks were pimple-repellent, and he smelled like nothing. Literally nothing. On the oval, no matter the sport, it was assumed that Crombie would win. He was the only good thing Hogun House had, and the whole of Hogun knew it.

Like us, Crombie didn’t understand softball, but he could throw things fast and straight. He tossed the ball in one hand and stared Nolan down. Nolan smiled, bent his knees and wiggled his arse like a Labrador.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I’m ready, thank you.’

Batista blew his whistle and Crombie let rip with the kind of projectile that wiped out the dinosaurs. Nolan took a step back. His right hand dropped as the bat swung up.

He couldn’t help himself. He’d had to try top spin.

Two sounds followed: the hollow thwack of ball on bat, then the crunch, like an egg against concrete. Crombie dropped to his knees. He pressed both hands to his nose as blood seeped through his fingers.

Before I could think, we were all on the field and running to the pitcher’s plate. Nolan reached him first, still trailing the bat at his feet. He kneeled at Crombie’s side as we gathered in behind, but Crombie waved him back with a bloodied open palm. That was our first glimpse at Crombie’s high-speed nose job. His face looked like roadkill.

‘Give James some space.’ Batista shunted his belly through the crowd. He took one look at Crombie, then swivelled back to us. His ruddy red cheeks had turned white as porcelain. ‘Lachlan, run to the Sick Bay. Get a nurse.’ No-one moved. There must’ve been six kids there called Lachlan. ‘The game’s over, boys,’ he told the rest of us. ‘Get changed and go home.’

A few jocks stayed at Crombie’s side while the rest of us shuffled off the oval toward the change room. I tried to camouflage amongst the yellow Wilmer polo tops, but I should’ve known there’d be no escape from Nolan.

‘Edward!’

He stood on shaking knees, using the bat to prop himself up. The whites of his eyes were stained pink. His thin lips pressed into a long, flat line. Kids parted around me until I stood out like a boner in the Chapel. I had no choice but to go to him.

I knocked the bat from his hand and led his bony wrist along the foul line to the boundary. Around us, the other matches had resumed, but their energy had shifted. The shouts and cheers had blunted. Eyes followed us up the embankment to the asphalt. Soon, the news of what had happened would be everywhere. Every kid would have something to say – and they’d all want to say it to Nolan. While our teammates turned right toward the gym and the change room, I led Nolan left, past the library.

‘I don’t feel so good,’ he muttered.

‘How do you think Crombie feels?’

‘I hope he’s in shock, then he’s not feeling anything.’

I dropped his sleeve. His arms dangled at his sides like two-minute noodles. We walked into the shadow of the Science Block, where the dumpsters overflowed with empty flower punnets and hacked-up boxes.

‘What did you use top spin for?’ I said, but the damp, shaded air had taken the edge off my anger.

‘It was an accident,’ he said. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

He turned his doe-brown eyes on me. How could I stay mad at something so helpless? It was like shouting at a dandelion.

‘Of course I know that. No-one thought you would even hit the ball.’

Nolan laughed. It bubbled up from somewhere deep in his belly and rolled through him like a wave. His self-pity washed away as quickly as it had formed.

We walked past the boatsheds and onto the levee. From here, we could watch the oval through the gum trees. The school had two ovals, but we didn’t use the main one: Highview Oval was reserved for Firsts footy matches. We couldn’t even step on its hallowed lawn. The Back Oval was for lunchtimes, phys ed classes and sports days – where kids like Nolan could embarrass themselves away from public eyes.

But inside Highview’s school grounds – from the ovals to the Back Quad, the canteen shelves and the Chapel pews – gossip moved faster than Crombie’s softball.

At least it was Friday afternoon. By four, the last few kids had traipsed toward the change room and their weekends. The coast seemed clear enough for us to do the same.

‘You know you’ll get hell for this,’ I said as we climbed the steps to the change room.

‘It was an accident,’ said Nolan. ‘You said so yourself. Nobody will think I wanted this to happen.’

I held open the door. ‘I’m just saying, prepare yourself.’

THE CHANGE ROOM was empty, but the smell of crusted socks and deodorant meant kids weren’t far away.

We had nowhere to hide if they found us. The long, open room was laid out like a church, with rows of scuff-marked benches around a central aisle. Gum-spattered locker bays ran along the walls. Fluorescent lights clung to the roof in metal cages, clogged with spiderwebs, dust bunnies and old hair. They bathed the room in blue light, like a serial killer’s freezer.

I dressed quickly, but Nolan was happy to dawdle. He took four goes to open his locker, two minutes unlacing each runner, then another unbuttoning the neck on his polo. I’d never seen anyone use those buttons. It’s like they were included as a dweeb tester.

‘If you don’t hurry up,’ I told him, ‘I’m leaving without you.’

I needn’t have bothered rushing him. As Nolan neatly folded his shirt, footsteps thumped up the stairs.

‘There he is,’ said Matthew Hislop from the double doors. ‘The perp himself.’

I was jealous of Matthew Hislop: he knew how to blend in. And that was in spite of his looks. His hair resembled steel wool and his pimple-puckered cheeks looked like Barbecue Shapes. His nose was more blackheads than skin. But what made Hislop invisible was that he knew how to bully.

We were all meat in the high school food chain: sweaty, pimply meat, trying not to be eaten alive. Picking on me was easy enough, but picking on Nolan was easier. He was a legless chook, pre-plucked and flailing in marinade. He was fast food.

‘What were you thinking, Nolan?’ Hislop strode between the benches, dodging the puddles of old shower water. His collar hung unbuttoned beneath his tie – the calling card of cool kids and wannabes. ‘Why’d you aim for Crombie’s nose?’

This was how a bully started: passive aggression. They inferred your idiocy rather than calling you outright stupid. That way, if a teacher intervened, the bully could claim innocence. You’d been shot by a gun that never smoked. Hislop and Crombie weren’t even friends. They walked to school with different kids and never sat together. Crombie played footy at lunch, while Hislop stalked the Quadrangle’s breezeways, looking for cheap laughs and victims like Nolan.

‘I didn’t aim for his nose.’ Nolan pulled on his school shirt. ‘I aimed for the ball.’

‘Crombie’s on his way to the hospital,’ said Hislop. ‘His nose is flat. Pancake flat. Batista said he’ll never breathe from it again.’

‘Mr Batista’s not a doctor,’ said Nolan.

‘He knows more than you. You don’t even know how to play softball.’

Nolan hung his head and dropped his shorts to his ankles. ‘I thought the school would teach me,’ he said. ‘It’s a school.’

Hislop sneered. The blue light glared off his greasy cheeks. ‘Batista was talking to Nackers about you. Nackers looked pissed.’

Dr Nakamura was our vice principal, although anti-principal would’ve been a better job description. If Dr Honey – the real principal – ever said your name, it meant you’d won a trophy. If Nackers dropped your name, it meant you were dead. Nackers had literally killed people for the Australian army in the Vietnam War, and we’d heard he still kept a sword on his desk for ‘special occasions’.

‘And he’s the least of your problems,’ said Hislop. ‘Do you know who Crombie’s dad is? He’s a rich-arse politician and he’ll make your life hell. He’ll probably get you expelled.’

‘You’re being ridiculous,’ said Nolan. His shorts lay forgotten at his ankles. ‘It was an accident. Kids aren’t punished for accidents.’

‘Of course they are. You’re a liability. You’re dangerous.’ He jabbed a thumb at me. ‘It’s no wonder your only friend is this loser.’

‘We’re not friends,’ I clarified. ‘We just share a lot of the same classes.’

‘Shut up, Heffalump. No-one’s talking to you.’

‘A liability?’ Nolan said to himself. Goosebumps puckered his thighs and his shirt hung open, like the world’s boniest playboy. He stared into his locker while his fingers stroked his hairless chin. ‘Interesting.’

Hislop smirked. Spit bubbled from his lips. ‘So, you’re admitting it?’

‘I’m still thinking about it,’ said Nolan. ‘But I might be.’

‘God, you’re weird.’ Hislop turned to leave, probably to share Nolan’s latest embarrassment with whoever was still left at school. ‘And put some pants on. Nobody wants to see your granny panties.’

‘That’s not what your mum said,’ I yelled, but his footsteps were already on the stairs. Nolan went back to the mammoth task of putting on pants.

‘Why did you admit you’re a liability?’ I said.

Nolan shrugged. ‘He might’ve been right.’

Maybe nothing else would’ve happened if I’d questioned that, but arguing with Nolan was like fighting a brick wall. The wall has no idea what’s going on, so you only end up hurting yourself.

It was a three-minute walk to our lockers in the Quadrangle. From there, we lugged our bags down Founders Walk, between the Chapel and the Drama School. At the Rose Gardens, we passed the statue of Dolf – Highview’s first principal from 1862. His hollow eye sockets followed us to the Back Gate, then out onto Honour Street, which curled between the mansions to the train station. We barely talked that afternoon; Nolan was off in his own little world. Nolanland. The only place he made sense.

My concern was what he’d find there, and what he’d bring back.

‘You’re not thinking up some stupid new idea?’ I asked as we boarded the train.

But Nolan just laughed. ‘Why would I consider an idea if it was stupid?’

NOLAN LIVED AT 8 Fitch Street, Malvern East. He told me this one day on the train and I memorised it. Whenever I rode my bike on weekends, I’d always keep at least three blocks from his street. I saw enough of Nolan Li at school.

Nolan’s street was on the rich side of Burke Road, where kerbs were lined with plane trees and iron gates. Our side was all station wagons, buzz-cut lawns and cottage gardens. Back in primary school, I had friends on these streets. I hadn’t talked to them in years. They went to Malvern High, and I went to Highview.

Our house on Sanders Street was just like the others. Dad kept the hedges spirit-level square. He turned the soil and picked fallen leaves from the lawn. He said the engineer in him liked things neat. Really, he couldn’t sit still. His eighties pub-rock mixtape blasted from the back deck as I dumped my bag by the phone in the hall. It was only 4.30, but he stood at the barbecue char-grilling sausages. The garden umbrella hung over his head like a UFO. Mum sat in scrubs at the patio table with her greasy after-work hair tucked behind her ears. Her pen rested on the morning’s Crier crossword.

‘It’s early for dinner,’ I said from the door.

Dad gestured with his tongs at a chair. His Bogolong FC polo pressed tight against his biceps and chest. ‘I thought we’d have some family time before I hit the hay. The flight out is at dawn.’

Dad was a geological engineer. He’d worked ‘fly-in flyout’ in the Pilbara since I started at Highview. He said it was because I was old enough to be the ‘man of the house’, but everyone knew that Highview had Melbourne’s highest school fees. It was just another thing the school excelled at.

‘How was Sports Day, Mr Softball Star?’ said Mum as I sat.

‘Fine. Uneventful.’

‘Did you beat Hogun?’ said Dad.

Mum laughed. Her crow’s feet seemed to stretch to her ears. ‘It’s like you never left that school sometimes, Sean.’

‘Royal green beats in my chest, Bea.’

I knew what came next: Dad never quoted ‘High High Highview’ without at least singing to the end of the verse. He raised his tongs like a conductor’s baton.

‘And every other school’s impressed as we rise to every test, for High High Highview marches on.’

I sank in my chair and prayed the hedges might keep Dad’s singing from the neighbours.

Mum shook her head with a smile. ‘I’ll get the salad ready.’

‘There’s still five verses to go, honey.’

‘You two sing them together.’

She closed the door as I reached for her crossword. If I looked busy, Dad mightn’t ask more questions. For a merciful moment, all I could hear was the sizzling barbecue, a muffled guitar riff and Dad’s automated sprinkler misting the pansies.

It didn’t last long.

‘So, just between us blokes, did you beat Hogun?’

Why did he care so much? Jokes about Hogun stopped being funny in the seventies. And what exactly was I meant to tell him? The class dweeb had landed two big hits: one on the ball and one on a jock’s nose?

I changed the topic instead. ‘Why’s your flight so early?’

Fat crackled on the burner as Dad pierced the snags. ‘Gotta be back for the footy. It’s our last game before finals and I’m acting captain.’

‘So, you’re going to win, then?’

He threw a wink over his shoulder. Black stubble already dotted his jaw – he wouldn’t shave again until he landed back in Melbourne. ‘Who captained Highview to second on the ladder in 1979?’

‘You captained one game, Dad.’

‘Yeah, the one that mattered. If that arsehole Mike Hislop was still captain, we’d have finished sixth.’

‘Hislop?’ I dropped the crossword. ‘I think his son is in my class.’

‘Is he Hogun, like his old man?’

‘Sure is.’

‘And did you beat him at Sports Day?’ Dad placed a burnt snag in front of me and grinned. ‘If you change the subject one more time, I’ll know you lost.’

I thought of Crombie crumpled on the lawn as Nolan kneeled beside him. It was hard to believe that anyone could’ve won that afternoon. ‘I don’t know,’ I said.

‘Then I think you lost, mate.’

THE SPORTS DAY results were on the noticeboard by Monday recess. Wilmer came last.

‘Don’t beat yourself up,’ said Nolan. ‘It’s only a game.’

I knocked his hand from my shoulder. ‘Only losers say that.’

‘And we lost.’

Highview held separate Sports Days for the junior, middle and senior schools. The scores were combined to make that final outcome on the Quadrangle noticeboard, so at least us middle schoolers weren’t entirely to blame. Still, we were now ten points behind Hogun – and thanks in no small part to Nolan.

‘We’ll really need to step it up on Friday at cross-country,’ I said.

Nolan fiddled with his juice box. ‘Actually, I’m planning to walk cross-country.’

This was classic Nolan: drawing hate from his classmates and not even realising it. I glanced along the breezeway in case someone had overheard. Kids talked in classroom doors between the locker bays. Four jocks played soccer with a flattened Coke can. I turned back to Nolan.

‘But we need the house points.’

‘Snot Swatter!’ Will Gilles shouted as he headed for his locker. That was Nolan’s new nickname. Across the morning, it had evolved from Bone Crusher to Fly Swatter and finally Snot Swatter. Thankfully, Nolan didn’t notice. He must’ve thought Gilles was shouting at some other kid named Snot Swatter.

‘The house competition is meant to be fun, isn’t it?’ said Nolan.

‘Yeah, but it’s only fun if you win.’

‘Well, I think I’ll still have more fun if I walk.’

I pictured him strolling to the finish line as the rest of Year 9 mock-cheered him home. The phrase ‘walk of shame’ jumped to mind – I could’ve been a great bully if I wasn’t such a pushover.

‘Nobody likes cross-country,’ I said. ‘Ask anyone: they’d rather go home. But they suck it up and run anyway.’

Nolan’s eyes lit up. ‘Maybe they should walk too. Walking releases endorphins, the happiness hormone.’

‘No, running releases endorphins.’

‘Are you sure? It never makes me happy. It just makes my lungs hurt.’

‘It’s meant to hurt. It means you tried, and if you don’t try, then you’re costing us house points. Even I did a training run yesterday.’

This was technically true. Inspired by Dad’s footy win, I’d pulled on my shorts for a run to the creek. Five minutes later, my chest was on fire, and I knew I’d need to pace my training. I walked to the fish and chip shop instead.

‘You’re a noble person, Edward.’ Nolan’s hand returned to my shoulder. ‘You have everyone’s interests at heart. But my parents have a saying: “live your own life, not someone else’s”, and walking will make me very happy indeed.’

It always amazed me how he could be so certain of everything – and also so wrong.

Nolan wasn’t an outstanding student. His mind took in classes like a paper shredder, then latched onto inconsequential details. Period four was Australian history, and by the end of lunch he was stuck on conscientious objectors.

‘That’s what I am,’ he said as we walked to maths. ‘I’m a conscientious objector to cross-country.’

Our classroom loomed at the end of the walkway: past the canteen, the Languages Building, the bottlebrush bushes and payphone booths. That gave me 100 metres to prove Nolan wrong.

It’d never be far enough.

‘You’re not getting shot at in cross-country,’ I told him.

‘But the fighting’s only a small part of being a conscientious objector,’ said Nolan. ‘It’s also the politics. We’re being forced to fight a war that I don’t believe in.’

The canteen disappeared behind us, but the stink of hotdog water settled in my stomach. ‘So, you want the houses to be friends?’

Nolan smiled to himself. ‘Wouldn’t it be nice?’

‘But the houses were invented to compete with each other.’

We weaved through a crowd of fun-sized Year 7s outside the Languages Building. Nolan veered right to run his fingers through the bottlebrushes.

‘I know,’ he said, ‘and it’s wrong. The school’s made this system to pit us against each other.’

My 100 metres were up. We slipped into Batista’s classroom and took our usual seats near the back. The room was nearly full, so I kept my voice down. ‘If you’re serious about objecting, then surely you’ll need to quit Wilmer entirely.’

Nolan stopped unpacking his pens. ‘Do you think they’d let me?’

I scratched my workbook as though it were a scab. I’d just committed a cardinal sin: I’d given Nolan an idea.

‘Why do you care what they think?’ I said quickly. ‘You’re a conscientious objector.’

‘You need to care about what they think to object to it.’

I wanted to reply, but the room had quietened. James Crombie stood in the doorway with his nose and cheeks covered by a thick cloth bandage. It skirted his top lip, hung on his ears, looped behind his hair, then emerged under his eyes. He scanned the room for a desk, but only one remained – and since no-one wanted to sit near Nolan, it was right behind us.

I stared at my pen as Crombie’s chair scraped back and his books smacked on the tabletop. His laboured breaths were all I could hear as Batista started class.

Batista was a large, almost spherical man. Under each armpit sat a permanent sweat patch. It started the day at the size of a coaster and by period six was a full Lazy Susan. I’d heard dogs need to keep their noses wet, and Batista’s armpits were probably the same.

Batista must’ve liked maths more than us. That’s why he kept his back to the room and talked to the whiteboard instead. When the board was full, he’d wipe it clean and start over again. According to folklore, he’d once filled up seven boards before turning around. We could’ve sneaked out of the room and he wouldn’t have even known. He’d probably have preferred it.

Three boards into probability, I noticed something was wrong. Nolan was taking notes.

Nolan never took notes. All class he’d just stare at the teacher.

‘I’m being polite,’ he’d told me once, ‘and it shows I’m listening. Ninety-three per cent of communication is non-verbal, and fifty-five per cent of that is body language. The eyes are the most expressive part of the body, so how can I be listening without looking at their eyes?’

‘But they’re teachers,’ I said. ‘If there’s something we need to learn, they’ll tell it to us. They won’t teach it with their eyebrows.’

‘Yes and no,’ said Nolan. ‘Teachers say a lot of things, but if you watch them closely, you realise just how little of it is worth remembering.’

How he could read the back of Batista’s head, I’ll never understand. Maybe Batista talked through his underarms, like two sweaty Rorschach tests.

I snuck a look at Nolan’s notes, but it wasn’t maths. He was writing a letter.

25 August 2003

Dear Mr Johnson,

It is with a heavy heart that I’m resigning from Wilmer House.

This is not because of anything you’ve done as House Master, nor is it because another house has given me a better offer. It is because, after much soul-searching, I no longer believe in the house’s values.

Please know that this doesn’t necessitate the end of my time with Wilmer. I’ll proudly return to the house with the following changes:

I know Wilmer is no better or worse than any other house, but that doesn’t mean what it’s doing (and what it believes in) isn’t wrong. Wilmer can change things for the better, and when it’s ready to do so, I will return with open arms. Until this time, I have made my decision.

My resignation is immediate. I do not require compensation for my services up to this time.

Thanks, and have a good day.

Nolan Li

Nolan signed the page with a random flourish, then returned to Batista’s . . .