A Thousand Perfect Notes

by C. G. Drews

  ‘I’ll remember.’

  ‘Me too,’ Joey says, squishing to walk between them.

  They walk in silence, the weight of a joke and a lie as heavy as holding the world. Joey jumps cracks, yanking on Beck’s arm at each leap, which only reminds him how much he aches.

  It’s only when Joey pauses to steal a handful of daisies from an unsuspecting garden, that August says, ‘So what happened really?’

  Joey sneezes into the flowers.

  ‘I told you.’ Beck knows the difference between caring and curiosity. Knowing someone for less than a week equals curiosity, not caring. ‘And you know what they say in German.’

  ‘Not really,’ August says.

  ‘Halt die Klappe, du Schwein!’ Joey shrieks.

  August blinks. ‘Still not working for me.’

  ‘Joey said to shut up, you pig,’ Beck says. He shoves Joey into a puddle and she shrieks. ‘But I was going to say: das geht dich nichts an.’ He glances at her. ‘Mind your own business.’

  ‘I seriously don’t know which of you is ruder at this point,’ August says.

  Joey points to Beck. ‘He’s grosser. Because he’s a boy and boys are stinky.’

  Beck swats at her but she runs ahead with a maniacal laugh.

  August smirks.

  What is with her? How come she refuses to get offended?

  As if to prove how insults aren’t going to deter her, August waits while he drops Joey at preschool and gets stampeded by a teacher wanting to know if she was sick, where the absentee note is, why she can’t get hold of his mother by phone. Beck shrugs and mumbles and stumbles out to make a mad dash across the road as the last bell rings.

  They fall into the tardy crowd as they make for the concrete stairwell to first period. A couple of guys are laughing way too loudly, and someone shoves into August and makes her trip up the last steps.

  Beck could grab her arm, just to steady her.

  He doesn’t.

  August clutches the rail and gives a fiery scowl. ‘Get over yourself.’

  A tall kid, with greenish blonde hair like he’s been swimming in a pool of algae, sneers at her. ‘Aw, sorry I tripped you. Did I hurt your feelings, tree hugger?’

  August’s face is pinched. Beck considers squeezing through the gap between her and Algae Hair and just going to class, but – but—

  ‘I can give you a hug to make it up.’ Algae Hair grabs for August’s arm and she snaps away from him.

  Beck does move through the gap between them, but he shoves Algae Hair hard on his way past. It gives August a second to get to the top of the stairs. But Algae Hair and his cluster of lowlifes are on their heels.

  ‘What was that, then?’ Algae Hair demands, lilting mockery gone. Because when a boy shoves a boy, it means blood and war, apparently.

  Beck has no time for this. He rolls his eyes at August and pushes towards the hall.

  Algae Hair gets in front of him. ‘Did mummy give you a pat on the cheek?’ he croons in a baby voice. ‘Or is daddy too much of a pansy to use his fist?’

  Anger ripples down Beck’s spine. He’s never been bothered by jerks, never even focused on them. And now? He wants to smash someone’s living daylights out.

  What’s he becoming?

  ‘Beck.’

  He turns to August.

  ‘This is, um,’ she clears her throat, ‘this is the butthead who I had a disagreement with last week. About the frog. I might’ve kicked him.’

  ‘You didn’t kick him hard enough.’ Beck shoves past, his shoulder ramming into Algae’s hard enough to emit a surprised grunt. Then, August beside him, they stride down the hall.

  Algae Hair gives shouts at their backs, but they’re all late. There are detentions to look forward to. A teacher is in the hall. It’s not an auspicious day to be expelled.

  They’re about to separate, August to classes where people work, Beck to where they sleep – but she swings in front of him.

  ‘I get that you won’t do the paper,’ she says, in a rush. ‘So I’m just going to make up your part.’

  ‘Or you could report me?’

  ‘I might,’ she says, ‘or you’ll tell me about your face and we’ll call it even.’

  Even? He’ll get points for a paper he hasn’t helped with?

  ‘Or,’ she says, ‘I might just hang around anyway, until you tell me.’

  ‘I’m not your friend.’ It comes out jagged. ‘My crap doesn’t matter to—’

  ‘I’ll stick around,’ she says fiercely.

  Beck hesitates.

  But he can’t.

  ‘I punched someone,’ he says. ‘They punched back. I’m actually a violent creep and you should go back to your real friends.’

  August doesn’t blink. ‘You’re a sucky liar. Guess I’m sticking around you.’ She turns with a flip of her hair, and runs down the hall, only turning long enough to make a fist and point to her knuckles. ‘Your hands. You didn’t hit anyone.’ Then she’s gone.

  Beck glances at his knuckles – not split or bruised. No. He never fights back, no matter how much he dreams about it.

  He drifts into class and sinks into a desk like he’s been there the whole time. No one notices. No one asks where he was the last few days or where the bruises came from. No one cares.

  Why does August? There’s something incredibly off about the way she bounces and how she insists on wearing colour – even if it is just some blue ribbon twisted around a lock of hair, or Sharpie scribbles on her arms. She’s too happy for real life. That’s it.

  Life is rubbish. It’s cruel and unfair and it always kicks the feet out from under you. It mangles dreams and spits in your face. When a kid turns fifteen, it’s like understanding the bitterness isn’t going to go away and life is destined to taste like sawdust. Fifteen is when kids get angry.

  But August isn’t.

  It’s not fair. His throat is hot and his eyes prick with crushing misery. It’s not fair she gets to be happy.

  Beck sits by the football oval – far away from clusters of sociable teens – and regrets forgetting to grab a pizza roll for himself. August. She’s to blame. She’s a problem, any way he looks at it.

  She’s particularly a problem when she flops on the grass beside him with an apricot muesli bar, her satchel and an insufferable smile.

  ‘I’ve tried to be nice about this,’ Beck says, ‘but I really can’t stand your face.’

  August peels her muesli wrapper. ‘You break my heart. It’s a pity I find your face so adorable. Well, the half that isn’t purple.’ She lies on her back and takes a bite of the muesli bar with a deep sigh.

  Is she … flirting?

  ‘Don’t you have friends?’ Beck says. ‘Or walls to kick?’

  ‘I have friends.’ August closes her eyes, like the muesli bar is such bliss. ‘But what about you? How come I never see you chasing a footie with the other aggressive and hormonal boys who think grunting and kicking a ball is fun?’

  ‘I’d rather stab myself in the face.’

  August cracks an eye open. ‘Aw. Somebody’s had a bad experience with friends. Did no one share their toy cars with wittle baby Beck? Want to talk about it?’

  ‘Hmm, let me see. No.’

  August crooks her arm behind her head for a cushion and takes another bite of her muesli bar. ‘You’re so confusing, Keverich. One day you carry me home, the next you bite my head off. I used to have a dog like you. Completely psycho and always bit me and attacked anyone who even looked at it.’

  ‘Let me guess. You cuddled it into submission?’

  ‘Actually, Dad shot it.’

  Beck chokes, like someone just punched his throat. He leans forward and hacks so violently, August has to pound his back.

  ‘I’m joking!’ She laughs.

  ‘Ha,’ Beck manages. ‘Ha, ha.’

  August shoves him lightly. ‘My parents run a veterinary and animal rescue. They’re all about cuddling vicious dogs and feeding them treats.’

&nb
sp; She finishes up the muesli bar and lets the crumbs drop to the grass. Beck hates how that bothers him. Such a waste. He’d give a lot to scoff a crumb by now, since dinner last night was nonexistent, breakfast a holy terror and lunch a blank slate.

  ‘Are you going to feed me treats?’ Beck inquires.

  ‘If I thought it would work – absolutely.’ August raises an eyebrow. She has ridiculously thick and wild eyebrows that quirk with every expression.

  Beck gives a long-suffering sigh. ‘Is there a reason you’re still here?’ At least he could drink to fill the black hole in his stomach. Water or water. Life is so full of fun options like that.

  ‘Actually, yes.’ August stuffs her wrapper back into her bag and rummages through the chaos of folders and papers. ‘I’ve decided to contrast our music tastes for the paper.’

  Music.

  Why

  would

  she

  choose

  music?

  Beck’s mouth is dry. ‘How is that political or moral?’

  August has a sly look. ‘And here I thought you weren’t paying attention. But! Since you asked, it’s religious. I’m going from the angle that some people worship musicians and bands get cult followings and I’ll outline the difference between enjoying music and being obsessed with it.’

  Sounds complicated. ‘Well, great. I have a five-year-old sister who is addicted to bawling the Hokey Cokey all hours of the day. You can contrast that with – what do you listen to? They-kiss-they-break-up-they-kiss-again kind of stuff?

  August fishes a notebook from her bag, flips to a clean page – most of them are covered with doodles – and taps a purple pen against the spine. ‘I listen to indie rock, actually. Ever heard of Lemon Craze or Twice Burgundy?’

  ‘What kind of name is Twice Burgundy?’

  ‘I don’t know. Once Burgundy was taken? It has a nice ring to it. Tell me you’ve at least heard their song “Falling Into Technicolour”?’

  They sound like idiots who compose lyrics out of weed and vodka. ‘No.’

  August slaps the notebook against her forehead. ‘You’re such a disappointment, Keverich.’

  He ignores the knot in his throat.

  ‘They’re glorious.’ August raises her arms like she’s going to hug the sky. ‘They’re weird and most of their lyrics sound like they’re high –’ ha! He knew it! ‘– but they have soul, and I’m in love with one or both of them.’

  Beck manages a strained smile. When will the bell ring and save him?

  ‘So –’ she’s back to tapping the pen against the notebook ‘– names of your crappy rock bands that scream and howl?’

  Wait while he just rolls out a list of Liszt, Grieg, Chopin and Bach. Wait while he explains how much better Steinway pianos sound over Yamahas. Wait while he explains that playing Rachmaninoff makes him feel powerful.

  ‘Um, yeah.’ Beck racks his brain for a name, any name. ‘All of them really. So long as it’s – um, loud.’ If she presses for details, he’ll just make a run for it.

  August looks at him long and hard, then shrugs as if he’s such a loser and scribbles notes. She’s actually silent for a minute and Beck finds his fingers tapping a string of Chopin’s notes absently. He stops and balls his hand into a fist. Can he explode from being such an idiot?

  ‘You’ll owe me, by the way.’ August pauses and pokes the purple Sharpie dangerously close to Beck’s nose. He lurches away. ‘I haven’t decided exactly, but it’ll probably be you giving me chocolate every day for a month.’

  ‘I’m pretty sure “no” is the only way to answer that.’

  Maybe he would buy her chocolate as a thank you – if he had money. But if he had money he’d buy Joey an ice cream or get himself some jeans that aren’t too short.

  ‘Or,’ August says, ‘you agree to a friendship truce.’

  ‘But “friendship” implies we’re friends –’ and we’re not ‘– and “truce” implies we’re fighting.’

  ‘We aren’t fighting?’

  ‘I would call it “stiff acquaintance with a touch of hate”.’

  ‘I’m not stiff.’ She flings an arm around his neck. ‘And I don’t hate you.’

  Beck peels away. ‘You will. Give it time.’

  ‘Then cut class with me.’

  Beck stares.

  ‘Oh, don’t act righteous.’ She pulls a hairband from her wrist and knots her hair into a thick bun. ‘You showed up to school, so that’s half the battle, and I think you and your purple face could use a morale boost. I could use a mental health day.’ She stuffs her notebook back into the satchel. ‘We’ll go on a quest to find cake.’

  She bounces to her feet and stretches a hand to him.

  Beck Keverich doesn’t act. He fantasises. He longs. But he does exactly what he’s supposed to do.

  Until he takes her hand and she yanks him upright and he somehow says, ‘It better be a big cake,’ and they abandon education and sneers and presumptions that he’s a punch bag and she’s a tree hugger, and they escape to be different people entirely.

  It should be an impossible task. Finding cake? Leaving school grounds? Wearing a uniform? Beck is entirely certain someone will point and shout ‘THEY’VE ESCAPED THEIR PRISON!’ and haul them back.

  Either August doesn’t share this fear or doesn’t think it’s impossible.

  August probably exists in an alternate reality where nothing is impossible and no one is too mean and the sun doesn’t stop shining.

  They cut across the football oval and battle their way through a small patch of scrub to the road. From there it’s a stroll to a nearby shopping complex. It’s nothing fancy. Most of the shops have bars on the windows and the ones with the most business are cheap one-dollar shops and McDonald’s. It’s excruciating bypassing the smell of hot chips and cheesy burgers. He’d eat just about anything by this point.

  But August leads him to a coffee shop in a poky corner that has exactly zero customers but them.

  None of the tables and chairs match, and daffodils sit in beer bottles as centrepieces. One wall is a chalkboard with a million scribbles in every colour and the other is crammed with mismatched photo frames. Dreamcatchers hang across the entrance so thickly, one smacks Beck in the face – and then swings around to smack him in the back of the head as well.

  ‘What exactly do they sell here?’ Beck rubs his skull and stares at a pile of bongo drums, which might be for decoration or for spontaneous costumers to thump.

  August wags her finger at him. ‘When a person buys you cake, don’t question anything.’

  ‘Can I question the cake’s ingredients?’

  ‘No, you ungrateful whelp. You eat it, even if it’s made of chia seeds.’

  What – what are chia seeds? Are they even a real thing? Is this his last meal on earth—

  ‘Beck,’ August says patiently, ‘this is an alternative café. Just sit down and keep your mind open.’ She points to a table that is probably an antique and a chair that is probably from the dump. ‘And please don’t make horrified noises.’

  ‘Alternative as in how?’ Beck’s voice is pitched a little high. ‘They sweeten the cake with human hearts?’

  ‘Um, more like alternative-as-in-the-cake-is-sweetened-with-stevia.’

  Beck sits down. ‘Is the death short and easy?’

  August swats him.

  She slips around the register – Beck is pretty sure that’s not how you order – and disappears through a curtain of beads to the kitchen. There are distant pots clanging and panpipes droning from a single dilapidated speaker. August is only gone a heartbeat before shouts and greetings explode from the kitchen and someone bawls August’s name like they haven’t seen her in nine years.

  Beck wants to regret coming – it’s just too weird – but he’s so hungry.

  August reappears, clearly pleased with herself. ‘My mum’s best friend’s cousin works here. Everything is half price for me. Also he won’t tell the school or my parents.’

/>   ‘Aren’t we lucky.’ Beck’s voice is dull. ‘I have to get my sister at three.’

  ‘We have time.’ August’s ocean eyes settle on Beck’s face with a serious and piercing look that makes him uncomfortable. ‘I’m almost entirely certain it’d take you less than ten seconds to demolish a cake, anyway. Do you ever eat?’

  ‘I eat,’ Beck says, defensive.

  ‘My dad would take one look at you and try to fatten you up.’ August shakes her head, smiling.

  It’s strange to Beck how she mentions her parents offhandedly, lovingly, like they don’t rake her over the coals on a regular basis or spit out how much they loathe her.

  ‘You’ll meet them when you come over,’ she says.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Oh, you will eventually. I know these things.’

  Beck resists the urge to catapult out the door. Why does August make him want to run and stay at the same time? How come he can’t muster the energy to truly get rid of her? Because she pays attention to him? Because she laughs instead of seethes at his snarky quips? Because she’s buying him cake?

  The last one. It’s the last one.

  A server swishes out of the beaded curtain carrying a tray that looks like it was made from an old crate. He has long dark hair that hangs to his shoulders and tie-dye fisherman pants that balloon so much they look like a skirt. But his shirt says Hate On Me And I’ll Punch You, which kind of throws the chill vibe.

  Beck wisely decides not to hate on him. Ever.

  ‘Yum, thanks, Morris,’ August says. ‘It looks delicious.’

  A violent hippy named Morris?

  ‘Anything for our favourite August.’ Morris sets plates and mugs down and smiles crookedly. ‘Not going to snitch, but skipping school …’ He tuts. ‘Dude.’

  ‘I know, I know.’ August turns into a pathetically adorable puppy dog. ‘But just look at my friend – he’s practically starving to death.’

  Morris squints at Beck. ‘Well, he looks your type, I guess.’

  ‘Um,’ says Beck.

  ‘You know,’ Morris says, ‘pitiful and starved.’

  ‘Thank you, Morris,’ August says. ‘Goodbye, Morris.’

  ‘All right, all right.’ He shrugs, tucks the tray under his arm and ambles back to the kitchen.