by Andrew Daddo
‘Done,’ beamed Hendrix. ‘You’ll be having a go, I’m pretty sure of that.’
The hipster behind the counter talked them through the rules and showed them what to do. It was easy, and as long as Emily did what she was told, everything would be fine. They were buckled into harnesses, and when Emily saw how rank Hendrix looked in his, she burst out laughing. His school shorts were not the best look once they were gathered into his crotch. Her leggings on the other hand, were fine.
Hendrix tried to straighten himself up but she pushed his hands away. ‘No no no no no! Not before I get a photo.’
She practically threw her phone at the Hipster and asked for a portrait and landscape version, but refused to show Hendrix once the shots were taken.
‘I’m going to get it printed on canvas.’ She laughed. ‘Oh, my God! This is the best!’
‘Let’s go.’ Hendrix muddled his way up the wall, going for speed instead of accuracy. Emily kept the rope taught, worried that if he fell she wouldn’t be able to hold his weight. When he tapped the top he said he was going to jump and she begged him not to, telling him to climb down instead. He jumped. She screamed and pulled the rope hard against the harness, leaving Hendrix dangling in mid-air. Emily quickly worked out if she yanked on the rope she could make him bounce in the air. He yelped when she yanked and she nearly lost hold of the rope from laughing.
‘Come on, let me down you sadist.’ It didn’t hurt in the slightest, but he loved the way she cackled.
‘Go again,’ Emily cajoled, once he’d hit the ground. ‘You cheated that time. You’re meant to use one colour to get to the top, not all of them. I think it’s like skiing – go the black run, that has to be the hardest.’
Hendrix did his best to get his shorts under control, pulling the fabric out from the harness. ‘You’re going to split me in half if you keep bouncing me like that.’
She yanked on the rope, making him squirm all over again.
Hendrix quickly unclipped. ‘Your go.’
Emily gave the rope a mighty jerk but it was too late, the carabiner clip clattering up the climbing wall at the end of the rope. The hipster let out a gruff bark and they got the message.
‘Come on, it’s easy.’ Hendrix retrieved the clip and moved toward Emily.
She was suddenly serious. ‘Yeah, I know it is. And, I want to do it, but I’m not sure if I should.’
Hendrix gave her a dead-eye. ‘Coulda, woulda, shoulda.
It’s not dangerous.’
Her fingers went for her neck, again. ‘Yeah, but I kind of promised my mum –’
‘And I definitely promised my dad, and I reckon my dad is a lot worse than your mum.’
She wanted to tell him, the timing was as good because there’d never be a good time. But the niggle in her heart was stronger than the fuzzy logic in her head. What if he figured she was damaged goods and bolted? Emily wasn’t sure she’d stick it out with someone who’d basically been given a death sentence, so, why would he? Here was a beautiful boy with a whole world going on, who actually looked as if he liked her, and she was about to throw an anchor round his neck and drag him into misery. He was nice but was he an angel?
‘Come on! Have a go.’
‘Patience. I’m thinking.’ It wasn’t a lie. If she told him about the growth, things could go the other way, too. He could stop her doing everything, really wrap her up in cotton wool, and that would be worse again. Or he might not give a shit and keep treating her like she was the one. The stupid thing was, Emily felt fine.
‘Give it,’ she said, motioning for the carabiner. ‘Buckle me up, cowboy. Sometimes you’ve got to say, “What the fuck.” Got that, Goose?’
‘Yee-haw!’ went Hendrix in a woeful cowboy drawl. He clipped the carabiner onto her harness.
‘You haven’t seen Top Gun, have you?’
He made a gun with his fingers and pretended to shoot, then blew the ‘smoke’ from the barrel of his gun.
‘Oh, my God,’ she laughed. ‘Put Top Gun on our to-do list. You’ve got a lot to learn.’
Hendrix guided the rope through his harness and got set to help her up the wall.
Her only thought was that she’d hooked a beauty.
They took turns for ages, getting better until fatigue made them worse. They drew the date out for as long as possible before dawdling a goodbye. Hendrix knew he’d be late but thought he had it covered. Emily didn’t give a stuff about her curfew. Goodbye wasn’t a tragic wrenching, but fun: a nice kiss, a warm hug. They felt like friends.
Friends with benefits.
Hendrix was surprised to find his dad coming out the front door as he came through the gate. The way his dad said, ‘Oh, you’re home. Good of you to make it, Champion,’ sounded very passive aggressive. Hendrix was literally forty minutes late, it was nothing. There was heaps of time to get the training in. Time to spare, even.
‘What were you doing, Drix?’
‘Nothing. I was at the library. I’m not that late, Dad.’
Hi dad blew wind. ‘Don’t lie, Drix. Jesus. It’s sad and hopeless and actually pretty pathetic.’
He had his phone in his hand as if he was expecting something.
Colour flooded Hendrix’s face, but he stuck to his story. ‘Dad …’
His father’s raised palm shut him down. He tapped away at his phone, then held it up for Hendrix to see. Hendrix felt like his heart stopped. It was a picture of him and Emily from the indoor rock-climbing centre. There was the smallest of shakes to the phone as his father held it out, he was so furious. ‘Seriously? What the hell is this?’
‘How did you …’ Hendrix started, but there was no point going on.
‘Anna, Emily’s mother, sent it to me. To show me what a great time you two are having. Rock climbing! Fuck me. What if you fell?’
‘There’s a rope. You can’t fall.’
‘Course you can fall, you idiot. What if you were too heavy and she couldn’t hold you? What if she wasn’t paying attention? What if she had another turn? You break your ankle, it’s over. You know that.’
‘Dad,’ Hendrix started.
His father shook his head and cursed. ‘You’ve had your chance. Plenty of them actually, and like a dumbass, you blew it. I’ll be taking you to school from now on. And picking you up.’ He pushed past Hendrix and went back into the house. ‘Get to the gym,’ he barked. ‘You’re late for training.’
Hendrix couldn’t believe it. It had to be the maddest way to get nailed, and while he was pissed off, it was with his father, not Emily. It wasn’t her fault.
His dad was so over the top. Hendrix was torn between doing normal teenage things and letting him down. At least he wasn’t out drinking and smoking weed and popping eccies like half the other kids at school. He was running and training and studying, swapping an oxygen starvation mask for a homemade hyperbaric chamber most afternoons. His mates talked about scoring girls and getting pissed and he literally couldn’t enter the conversation because he barely knew what they were talking about.
Hendrix knew he had to sacrifice certain things because that’s what he’d been told forever. It’d never looked like a sacrifice before. But now he had someone competing for his time, and the equation wasn’t adding up.
Hendrix trained harder than he was meant to, to show he was committed, which riled his father even more. They ate dinner in silence.
‘You’ll thank me,’ his father said, as he reached across the table for Hendrix’s plate. ‘I promise not to gloat when you do.’
Hendrix studied with his door closed, and when his phone rang, he pounced. ‘Well, hello stranger.’ He smiled. ‘I was just thinking about you.’
Emily was straight into it. ‘I’ve got a big idea. Do you reckon you can get away for a night, or two?’
‘To do?’
‘I dunno. Go camping. Or go somewhere. Just me and you. Like, we just piss off into the bush. We used to do it in Benalla all the time, we’d just go, it was fun. But with you, it’d b
e more fun, don’t you reckon?’
‘Hell, yes,’ went Hendrix. He could barely breathe. ‘But how’s that going to happen? It’s like I’m in prison here.’
Emily was way ahead of him. She put on a mob voice and told him to get somewhere the cameras weren’t. As if she were watching, Hendrix left the house and stood by the front gate.
‘Here’s the plan, Hendrix. You are going tell your dad you’ve got a school camp and he’ll have no choice but to let you go.’
Hendrix guffawed. ‘That’s hilarious! You do comedy now, I love it. Dad won’t buy it.’
‘Sure, he will. You get your mates to come over and talk about the camp. You get them to help you pack, too. Make it a charity camp or something, raising money for obese whales or one-legged cyclists with red hair, I dunno. Anything. Only, there is no school camp. Instead, we go away together. Just the two of us. We can camp, if you want, so it’s not a complete lie. Or we can do something else, like, I dunno what. Something cool. What do you reckon?’
Hendrix laughed. It was nervous and high-pitched. He walked up the street a bit, so he was definitely out of earshot. ‘I love it, but it couldn’t work. It wouldn’t. Jeez, Em, it’s ridiculous, isn’t it?’
She was under the doona on the couch, the house to herself for the first time in ages. ‘How much do you want to spend the night with me? Just the two of us. Aloooooone.’
That did it. His voice hurdled another octave. ‘Yeah, right. So, um, when is this school camp?’
‘Well,’ said Emily, completely surprised he’d consider it. ‘No time like now.’
Hendrix turned back and looked at his house. ‘Oh, wow. If he falls for it, that’d be his bad, right? You have to understand, if I got busted, that’d be it. I’d be grounded forever.’
Emily couldn’t believe it. In the weirdest way, it reminded her of yabbying when she was little and it was the most exciting thing in the world. It felt like the string was slowly being dragged into the water by the yabby and she had a hold of it, waiting for the right moment to apply some pressure and pull the string back. Too fast or too soon and the yabby’d be off. Just right, and the yabby would come up out of the water with its big greedy claw holding tight to the bait.
‘Hendrix,’ she breathed gently into the phone. ‘If you can find a way, I can find a place.’
She hung up, then squealed. She’d surprised herself with the ‘aloooooooone.’ Even getting up and repeating it to herself in the mirror. ‘Aloooooooone, Hendrix. Aloooooone.’
She knew it’d never happen, but imagine if it did. Forget Hendrix’s father, her mum would never go for it, not in a million years. She wanted Emily to ask him for dinner, but Emily thought that was lame because it was a boyfriend girlfriend thing to do. And he hadn’t asked her out, yet.
‘So, he’s not your boyfriend?’ Siss said, with their mum looking on.
Emily was embarrassed. ‘No. Not really. I dunno. We’re tuning.’
Her mum jumped in. ‘Put it this way, Em. You’re walking down the street and you see him and you’re about to walk up to him and some other girl gets there first and starts kissing him –’
Emily could feel her colour rising. ‘Mum!?’
‘Would you be upset if that happened?’
‘No. Yes. I’d kill him!’ She tried to laugh it off but was serious. ‘Or her!’
Anna put an arm around her. ‘He’s her boyfriend, isn’t he, Siss?’
Emily knew it already; he didn’t have to ask. Hendrix made her feel ridiculous, like she couldn’t get a groove on when she was with him in case she got dorky. But then, she could barely function without him because when he wasn’t there, it felt like the best part of her was missing.
Emily wanted to tell her mum about camping. She’d be okay, she thought. She’d flip. They all would, but she had to get out and do something. Where she was or who she was with would have no impact on the growth, she was sure of it.
Almost immediately, Emily abandoned the thought of telling her mum. There was no point. Hendrix would never get the story past his dad, anyway. The whole idea is demented, she thought. But we have to think of something because he’s the one. She’d been thinking about it more and more. What it’d be like, how it’d go, how to make it special and not some clumsy, panicked fumble in a car or a park.
The fog cleared.
Oh my God, we’ve got to go camping, that’s all there is to it. Hendrix can tell his dad it’s a Duke of Ed camp. Extra points, last-minute fundraising, anything.
She texted Hendrix:
Duke of Ed camp.
Then she googled where the camps might be.
Ethan walked in behind Hendrix and went straight for the fridge.
‘Hey,’ went his dad. ‘Get the hell out of my fridge.’
‘Hey,’ said Ethan, as if he was joking. ‘Where’s the normal food? Where’s the soft drink, the snackage?’
Hendrix was shitting himself. His best mate was about to get a boot up the arse and ruin everything. He went to the pantry and grabbed a container of nuts and dried fruit, their homemade trail mix.
Ethan turned the container in his hands, looking to see the contents. ‘Nice, if you’re a rabbit.’
Hendrix’s dad watched on. Hendrix rarely had friends over and he was obviously intrigued. ‘You’re the other runner, right? From Drix’s school. Ethan. You did well at regionals,’ said his dad, warming slightly.
‘Yeah, it was good. All thanks to Drix, of course. He dragged me up and down Anderson Street, didn’t ya, mate? Nearly killed me.’
‘Something like that.’ Hendrix nodded. At least Ethan had got that part of the story right.
‘Definitely improved.’ His dad stayed at the table. ‘It’s good to train. Do you do anything else? Cross fit? Weights?’
Ethan fished around in the mix, picking out the nuts. It was pretty gross, like double-dipping a carrot stick into homous. He shook his head. ‘Not much more than that. The usual. Footy in footy season, cricket in the cricket season, basketball in the crossover. We run a bit there.’
Hendrix wanted him to get on with it. If Ethan kept crapping on he might talk himself into a hole where his dad would bury him. He wanted to know if Ethan’d had any proper training, if he monitored results, kept stats, watched his diet – all the things he was doing for Hendrix.
Ethan shrugged, said he didn’t actually care that much. ‘Like, I care, but I’m not going to the Olympics, you know? I’d rather play footy, for the Demons. Team sports are more fun, no offence.’
‘None taken,’ said his dad with a smile. ‘I hadn’t realised the athletics team wasn’t an actual team, but anyway.’ Hendrix was ready to call the undertaker, Ethan was about to be put away. ‘Sometimes I think it’d be good to be like Ethan, don’t you think, Hendrix? He’s clearly a natural athlete.’ Hendrix nodded, but knew his father meant none of it. ‘But then, we can’t all fall out of the womb with God given ability and beat all comers, can we? Some kids have to work their arses off for their chance. Without training,’ he said, nodding at Hendrix. ‘Without proper and consistent training …’ He left the sentence to ring around the kitchen. To Hendrix it was crystal clear how that ended.
‘He’d still win,’ went Ethan. ‘He’s a freak. Hey, gotta go, Freak. See ya.’
Hendrix was like, Now? You’re going now?
When Ethan walked out the door Hendrix’s heart sank. His father looked from the door to Hendrix and shrugged as if it was all a bit strange.
That went nothing like we’d planned it, Hendrix thought. Ethan was an idiot. They’d rehearsed the whole thing, but his dad must have flipped him out. Again, Hendrix cursed his father’s intensity.
But then the door opened again and Ethan came in shaking his head. And almost as an afterthought he said, ‘So, are we using your tent or mine? Did we work that out?’
‘… Ahhhh,’ went Hendrix.
‘Tent?’ said his dad. ‘For what?’
‘D of E,’ Ethan said, looking surprisingly
good at being surprised. ‘Tomorrow. Two-day camp. Duh!’
Hendrix almost flatlined. No one said ‘duh’ to his dad.
His dad looked at him. ‘You didn’t tell me about a camp.’
Back on script, Hendrix looked hurt. ‘Course not. I wouldn’t be able to go. Didn’t see the point.’
‘Why wouldn’t you be able to go?’ His father pulled a new face – now he was looking hurt. It must have been for Ethan’s benefit.
Hendrix held his hands out, as if weighing things up. ‘Dad, we have to train, I just assumed. Stick to the plan and all that.’
‘But, tomorrow? For how long? You should’ve said something. Just one night?’
To Hendrix, his father sounded fair dinkum. Maybe he’d misjudged him.
Ethan put his hands up in surrender. ‘I’ll go home,’ he said. ‘Sorry, I thought you were coming. Everyone else is. We definitely talked about it, didn’t we? I’ll just use my tent. No harm. See you, Mr Stenson.’
Ethan left. Hendrix would tell him he had to do drama. If he didn’t, his talents were wasted.
Emily nearly fell over when she got the text.
It worked. Dad’s dropping me at school at 7 tomorrow morning. Hope you’ve got the camp spot.
Are you kidding?
Nope
How?
Long story. Will have time to tell all of it. Cool, huh?
Woah, shit, thought Emily. Careful what you wish for and all that.
She’d have to tell her mum what she was doing, there was nothing else for it. That was their rule. Only, what if she said no? Of course she’d say no. There was no way she’d let her go camping for a night with Hendrix. Would she?
Emily doddled around the house trying to muster a way to ask. There were options. She could catch the train to Benalla, say she was going to visit Dad. But her mum would call and talk to him, so that would never work. She could pretend she was on a school camp, too. Except, she’d barely been to school in four weeks and didn’t look like going back, given the home-school packages she was working through. She could leave a note, say she was going to see her mates back home because she missed them. Throw in ‘sorry’ and ‘I love you’ and ‘I thought you’d say no’. Or she could just leave and come back in two days with a swollen heart and a story to tell. It would be cruel, but eventually her mum would get over it.