Gracie Faltrain Takes Control

by Cath Crowley

  I can’t help thinking that there’s a whole team of us out here. And only Martin playing soccer. I don’t look at Coach or Martin when I walk off at the end. I keep thinking about Flemming’s face. And wondering if it looks like mine.

  Martin, Flemming and Alyce come back to my place to celebrate. ‘Did you see the way we thrashed them,’ Flemming keeps yelling on the way home. His voice is too loud for Saturday afternoon. It belongs in the game.

  ‘We were there. We saw it,’ Martin says. He only puts up with Flemming these days because he knows that Alyce likes him.

  We have a break after the first DVD. Martin and I stand outside. ‘Be careful, Faltrain,’ he says when we’re alone.

  ‘I can handle myself.’

  He shakes his head. ‘I didn’t mean that. Mum told me once that you become who you set out to be.’

  ‘So I’m setting out to win.’

  ‘Does it feel like we’re winning?’

  Sort of. Maybe. I mean, I’m not in hospital after every game. I’m alive. Dad told me once that life’s not black and white. It’s blurred at the edges. So Flemming threatened a guy in the break. That guy hurt Corelli.

  ‘Do you really think we should let them run all over us, knock us down, Martin? Is that how you want me to play the next game?’ Half of me wants him to make it easy, give me the answers like he always does.

  ‘The old Faltrain would never have played like this, that’s all. She’d have found another way.’

  ‘There is no other way. I’m not good enough. I’m not strong enough.’

  ‘Then maybe the answer is that we walk.’

  ‘Quit? Flemming would never agree to that.’

  ‘I didn’t ask him to walk.’

  ‘You said you knew I’d always vote to fight. You told me that before we started playing like this.’

  ‘Fight, fair enough. But not dirty. Not for the fun of it.’

  ‘You think I’m having fun out there?’

  ‘I think you’re having the time of your life.’ He’s looking at me the way I looked at Flemming today. Like I’m ugly.

  ‘Last year I would have trusted you with anything, Faltrain. And now I watch you play and you’re like a stranger.’

  It feels as though Martin’s edging his way to a place I don’t want to go, like he’s about to tell me we’re over. ‘I’m the same person I always was,’ I say.

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Yes.’ I say it louder so he believes it. I say it that way so I do, too. I try not to think about the ad and the letter and his mum. Martin has a way of reading my mind and the way he’s talking tonight, I have a feeling that if he finds out what I’ve done, I’m dead. I have to change the subject. Quick. After a few minutes goldfish Martin will swim in and I’ll be safe.

  ‘What do you think Alyce and Flemming are talking about in there?’

  Martin shrugs.

  ‘Flemming’s laughing. That’s a good sign, right?’

  ‘You and your stupid signs. You want to know how he really feels?’ He picks up the soccer ball lying on the ground and launches it at the window. It smacks against the glass so loud Mum yells from the front room, ‘Gracie Faltrain! Stop playing near the house.’ I guess I’ve got my answer. Alyce and Flemming don’t even look up. They just keep right on talking.

  ‘He wants to walk me home,’ Alyce whispers quickly when Flemming is out of the room. I should be happy for her. You take a chance and deal with whatever happens later. And if you don’t take chances then you may as well be dead, right? But seeing Alyce happy makes me scared. Because the way Flemming’s playing the game lately, I’m pretty sure she’s not going to win.

  When they walk off down the street, they’re two shadows almost holding hands. That’s meant to be the most exciting bit, the almost part, when nothing’s happened but you’re hoping it might. For the first time in my life, though, I think it might be better not to play. I can’t bear to watch Alyce almost win the game she’s been waiting to be picked for almost all of her life.

  31

  One bad pizza and you’re vomit boy for the rest of your life.

  Freddy Jabusi

  ‘Alyce,’ I say, pulling the doona over my head. ‘It’s eight o’clock in the morning.’

  ‘I’m just so excited.’

  ‘Why?’ I push the covers off my face so I can see her. ‘He asked you to the dance after you left last night, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes,’ she squeals. ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes!’ Alyce looks like she has swallowed the sun. Not the hot and burning, middle-of-the-day sun, just the warm, end of afternoon one. I think I can actually see pink shining from her edges.

  ‘So Alyce Fuller is about to score.’

  Her eyes practically explode. ‘Oh no . . .’

  ‘Calm down. We’ll get to that part later.’ What was I thinking? Alyce has to crawl before she can walk.

  ‘I think maybe he does like me, Gracie. Can you believe that?’

  ‘Of course I can.’ Good for you, Flemming. So you’re not the biggest idiot of all time. ‘We need to get you a killer dress, so you look hot at the dance.’

  ‘I was thinking about something pink with long sleeves.’

  I drag myself out of bed. Even on Sunday, my work is never done.

  Jane and I always talked about what we’d wear to the Year 11 dance. ‘You’ll go with Nick,’ she said. ‘And I’ll go with some mysterious guy from another school. We’ll stay the night at your place and get ready together.’

  It just goes to show that no one can predict the future.

  ‘So I can’t wait to see Annabelle’s face when you tell her Flemming’s your date,’ I say to Alyce while we’re looking at dresses.

  ‘You can’t tell her, Gracie.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Andrew asked me not to say anything. He wants some time to break the news to people.’

  Sure he does. He wants, like, two years, until you’re not in high school.

  ‘I can’t believe that idiot. He wants you to lie? What, does he expect you to wear a bag over your head so Annabelle doesn’t know you’re his date?’

  ‘He’s going to tell people, Gracie, when the time is right.’

  The time would be right, right away. But if Flemming can’t see that then we’ll just have to show him. ‘What about this one?’ I pull a long black dress off the rack.

  ‘I don’t know, Gracie, it’s a bit . . . revealing.’

  ‘Just go and try it on, Grandma.’

  Alyce comes out of the change room slowly, checking to see there’s no one in the shop but me.

  ‘Wow. You look fantastic. You’ve got boobs.’

  She tries to stretch the top higher.

  ‘Don’t touch it. You look perfect.’

  ‘I won’t be comfortable.’

  ‘It’s the price you pay for fashion. Buy it.’

  ‘He’s taller than me.’ She leans in to whisper. ‘He’ll see right down my top.’

  Exactly. ‘No he won’t. Stop worrying so much.’ And of course, as soon as I say that, in walks a reason to worry.

  ‘Well, Alyce, buying a dress for the dance? It’s so brave of you to go on your own.’

  Annabelle: one. Opposition: zero.

  ‘Alyce has a date, actually,’ I answer.

  One all.

  ‘That’s right. I did hear that Freddy Jabusi was looking for a partner.’

  Let me explain just how nasty Annabelle is being here. Freddy Jabusi took Anita Fleck to a dance in Year 7. He was so nervous he vomited on her dress. In front of everyone. He’d had pizza for dinner. Annabelle Orion is suggesting that my best friend, Alyce Fuller, go to the dance with pizza vomit boy.

  Annabelle: two. Gracie: one. But not for long.

  ‘Alyce is going with Andrew Flemming. Susan must be so disappointed.’

  Two all.

  ‘Alyce and Flemming?’ She starts to laugh. ‘No way.’ I can feel the advantage slipping away. Annabelle isn’t upset. She’s ecstatic. I’ve given h
er the best piece of gossip she’s had all year.

  It’s not me who lost, though. It’s Alyce. Up until I saw her face, white next to Annabelle’s smile, I’d completely forgotten she was playing. Alyce hangs the dress back up as Susan walks in. Annabelle is going to love spreading this news.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say when we’re sitting at the bus stop. ‘But she would have found out sooner or later.’ Alyce doesn’t answer. The sun has disappeared from her face.

  ‘Don’t worry. People like Annabelle always get what they deserve.’ I watch them walk out of the shop as the bus appears in the distance.

  ‘Susan was crying,’ Alyce says on the way home.

  ‘What?’

  ‘When they left the shop, Susan’s eyes were all red.’

  ‘Good. I hope she bawled her eyes out when Annabelle told her about you and Flemming.’

  Alyce looks at me. ‘What’s the difference between her and me, Gracie?’

  ‘You want the obvious answer?’

  ‘No, really. She must have been so disappointed. She’ll have to tell her mum that Andrew is going to the dance with someone else.’

  ‘So, you’re saying Flemming is the bad guy?’

  ‘Sometimes there’s not a bad guy, Gracie. Sometimes there’s just another side.’

  32

  I’m a dog?

  Alyce Fuller

  ‘Heard you’re taking Fuller to the dance,’ Jason Newman says in the tuckshop line on Monday.

  ‘So?’ Flemming asks.

  ‘So look at her, she’s a dog.’

  ‘Come on now,’ Annabelle says, and for a second I think she’s had a heart transplant. ‘Even dogs don’t have hair that bad.’

  This is about the tenth time today I’ve heard some idiot make a comment about Alyce. Who do they think they are, the love gurus? If Flemming wants Alyce instead of Susan then it’s none of anyone’s business.

  ‘I think she’s cute,’ says Corelli.

  ‘Yeah, well, coming from the guy who had his head readjusted on the weekend, that doesn’t mean much,’ Jason laughs.

  ‘Shut up, Newman.’ Flemming should have been the one to say that, not Martin. But the second Flemming bought his sausage roll he ran.

  ‘Good one, Martin,’ I say.

  ‘There’s nothing good about this, Faltrain.’

  He’s right. Even I can see that Alyce has lost the game. Now we just have to get her off before she breaks something –

  ‘I give it two more days,’ Annabelle says to Susan.

  – like, say, her heart.

  33

  Running an ad in the paper once: forty-five dollars.

  Running it twice: ninety dollars.

  A warning that the bill’s arrived and your parents are about to kill you? Priceless.

  Gracie Faltrain

  ‘Gracie,’ Mum calls out from the kitchen when I walk in the door after school. ‘Your dad and I would like to talk to you.’ When both parents want to talk it can only mean one thing: interrogation.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘My MasterCard statement arrived today.’

  I think I need a lawyer.

  ‘It seems that someone other than me has been using my account.’

  A really good lawyer.

  Mum and Dad sit across the table from me. I’m surprised she doesn’t drag the lamp over and shine it in my face.

  ‘Where were you on the night of the third?’

  I shift around in my seat. ‘Home.’

  ‘I know you were home, Gracie Faltrain,’ her voice gets louder. ‘Because I have the statement to prove it.’ She pulls it out from under the table. The woman watches more television than me. ‘You put an ad in the paper to find Martin’s mother. You stole my credit card.’

  ‘Stole’s a strong word.’

  ‘I’m sorry. You took my credit card and used it without asking. Is that better?’

  ‘I had to do it for Martin.’

  ‘Why didn’t you use his dad’s money? Or at least ask me first?’

  The room feels hot. My jumper is itchy. Mum won’t stop staring.

  ‘Martin doesn’t know, does he? Does he?’ Her last words grab me by the shoulders and shake me.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Gracie, what have you done? People’s lives aren’t something to mess around with. That family is hurting. This could hurt them even more.’

  ‘I’m fixing things for them.’

  ‘You’re fixing things the way you always do, by running and breaking them. This isn’t a game of soccer. This is life.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘You don’t, Gracie. You’re a kid. How could you know what that family’s going through?’

  ‘You think I don’t know what it’s like to miss having your family together? I was here last year, remember, when Dad was away. The only thing I wanted was for him to come back. I would have done anything to make that happen.’

  ‘Gracie, this isn’t the same thing. Martin’s mum walked out for good. She left that family with no explanation and Clem Knight had to stay behind to pick up the pieces.’

  ‘Well he didn’t do a very good job, did he?’ I yell.

  ‘I’d say he did a bloody fantastic job, a damn sight better than your father and I. Haven’t we taught you anything?’

  Her last words suck the air out of me. Her face is the colour of ash after fire, white but hot.

  ‘I think you should go to your room, Gracie,’ Dad says.

  I sit on my bed and stare at the floor. I don’t get changed, or turn on music. My legs ache from Saturday’s game. My throat hurts from yelling. My chest hurts most of all. Because that’s where Mum’s words are sitting.

  She creeps into my room at six this morning. I know the time because I’m wide awake. She gets under the covers with me and lies there the way she did when I was a kid.

  ‘Gracie, I’m sorry.’ Her voice is like my legs after soccer, shaky and tired. ‘But you’re changing people’s lives in a way that you can never undo.’

  It’s too hot under the doona. My head feels full of rain. Last week everything seemed clear. Martin would always be in the goal square unless he found his mum. Flemming was right about the way we should play. I’m not sure about anything anymore.

  ‘So I won’t tell him. I’ll throw the letter out. Martin will never have to know.’

  ‘There’s a woman on the other end of that letter, Gracie.’

  ‘She walked out. She’s the one who hurt him.’

  ‘So she deserves to have her hopes raised and then dropped? She’s his mother. He’s her blood. I’ve always tried to let you make your own mistakes. And most of the time you find your way. But you have to step into Martin’s life and imagine what he’s going through.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘No, you put Martin’s life on over your own. You imagined how he would feel if he was you. You got it all backwards.’

  ‘So how can I fix things?’

  ‘You have to go forwards now, Gracie. You have to play this out to the end.’

  ‘But if I tell Martin I’ll lose him.’ I’m sure of it, after Saturday night.

  ‘I know and I’m sorry,’ Mum says. ‘But it’s time for you to hear the hard stuff. You have to lose this time. There’s just no other way you can win.’

  34

  Okay. Now I get it.

  Gracie Faltrain

  I have this feeling in my stomach all week like I’m walking along a shaky bridge overhanging a very deep ocean. The letter from Mrs Knight is as heavy as a hundred bricks in my bag. I’ve been carrying it with me everywhere along with the ad, trying to find a way to explain to Martin what I’ve done without losing him.

  ‘Faltrain, is there something wrong?’ he asks while we’re sitting in the café after school, waiting for our drinks to arrive.

  ‘No, why?’

  ‘You’ve been acting weird all week.’

  ‘No I haven’t.’

  ‘Are you worried about the match this Satu
rday?’

  ‘A bit, I guess. It’s rougher now that we’re close to the final. It’s not easy playing when there’s a team out to get me.’

  ‘There’s always someone out to get you, Faltrain. Last year it was your own team. Is winning so important that you’d give up the whole reason you love the game? It’s not about playing rough; it’s about skill. That’s what you always said to me.’

  ‘There’s no way out now, Martin.’

  ‘There’s always a way. Like my mum said, “Marty, it’s not whether you win or lose the game that matters” . . .’

  ‘I have to go to the bathroom.’ I can’t listen to him talking about playing fair anymore. Not when I’ve been rolling around in the mud for weeks.

  I make a decision while I’m in the bathroom. I love Martin. I want him to trust me again. I can’t lose him. And I won’t. Mum’s wrong; I can start playing a different game from now on. It’s not too late.

  When I get back, Martin’s holding my bag, staring at me. The afternoon has disappeared from his eyes.

  ‘I forgot my wallet,’ he says. ‘I used yours.’

  ‘That’s fine. Are you okay?’

  ‘You’re a crap liar, Faltrain. I knew something was up.’ It’s only then that I see the letter and the ad, crumpled in his hands, as well as my bag. ‘I recognised her handwriting straight away.’

  ‘Martin, let me explain . . .’

  ‘I don’t want to hear it.’ He clenches his teeth. He sounds like he’s drowning, his words gurgling up from somewhere way down inside of him. Before, when Martin tried to explain about his mum, it was just words. Today I see his eyes filling up, ready to spill. I see the inside of him, the things he’s been hiding. I see years and years of hurt.

  ‘I don’t even know you anymore. You cheat on the field, you lie to me. You treat Alyce like dirt . . .’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Gracie Faltrain is only interested in helping one person. Herself.’

  His feet tap out a fast beat on the concrete as he runs away. My heart taps out a slow sad one. And they don’t match at all.

  ‘Gracie, why do you live like this?’ Mum asks.

  Because I’m stupid. Because I never see anything until it’s right up in my face, and by then it’s too late. I need life glasses, to blow everything up to three times the size so I can see things coming.