Miss Understood

by James Roy

  ‘I am,’ he said.

  ‘For the newspaper?’

  ‘Yes, indeed.’

  ‘Is it a good review?’

  ‘Three stars, this one,’ he said. ‘Solid effort, eclectic menu, good service, a bit on the pricey side.’

  ‘Eclectic? What does that mean?’

  ‘Um . . . mixed up, I guess.’

  ‘So why didn’t you say that?’ I asked him. ‘Anyway, Mum wants to know if you want a cup of tea.’

  ‘Tell her I’d love a cup of Joe. That’s coffee, by the way.’

  It was a nice autumn day, sunny and warm, but not hot, so after I told Mum that Dad wanted some Joe, I decided to go out into the front yard to eat my lamington and drink my tea. Dad fertilises the lawn all the time with this stuff that looks like chocolate sprinkles, and that makes the grass really soft and cushiony, so I flopped down there and ate slowly. It was quiet in our street, which isn’t even really a street – it’s actually called a cul-de-sac, which is just a fancy name for a dead-end.

  Not much happens near our place on a weekday. It’s the weekends when it gets extra busy, with all the young families coming along with their enormous three-wheeled prams, and babies in backpacks, looking for somewhere to park their cars and wagons while they go and walk through all the HomeFest display houses. Often that includes our place.

  Here’s why. The houses on both sides of Henry Court are display homes, almost all the way to where the bulby bit at the end begins. There are six regular houses with real people living in them around the bulby bit – first there’s us, then the Greens, then Mr Hanson (who lives by himself with his two little fluffy dogs who yap at everyone from inside his front security door), then the Nguyens, then Miss Huntley, who is old and lives by herself (and doesn’t have any pets as far as I know), and last of all the Franklins, who moved in not that long ago. That means HomeFest comes right up to the Franklins’ fence on one side of the street, and right up to ours on the other. And that means that sometimes people don’t know where HomeFest finishes and our normal, family houses begin. And it’s pretty annoying.

  For a while, Mum put toys on the front lawn to make it look like someone lived in our house, but after someone stole my new scooter, she stopped doing that.

  Next, Dad made a sign, which he laminated and put beside the front door. It said: This is a private residence, NOT a display home. But then people thought that meant it was the private residence of the person who looked after the display village, and they’d start knocking on our door at seven o’clock on a Saturday morning to ask what time we’d be unlocking all the houses.

  That was when I took over. I made a sign that had a picture of a really angry dog (nothing like Muppet) and big, scary words that said: OUR DOG IS DANGGERUS!!! PLUS HE HAS REELY BAD DIZEESES THAT YOU DEFINATELY DONT WONT!!! SO DONT COME IN!!!

  Mum and Dad didn’t like that one much. Muppet didn’t seem to mind, but in case I haven’t made myself clear, Muppet is a dog. Even so, Mum and Dad told me to take that sign down.

  Obviously my sign needed to be a bit clearer, and I decided I could make it more truthful as well, so I did another one on Dad’s computer that said: This isnt one of the display house’s, so DONT TRY TO COME IN, and DONT NOCK ON OUR DOOR. Trespasser’s will be PERSECUTED!!!!!!!!!!

  My parents didn’t like that, even though Mum said that she thought the idea of torturing people in dungeons for believing that our house was part of HomeFest was pretty funny. ‘But it’s still very rude, Lizzie,’ she said, once she’d managed to wipe the smirk from her face. ‘It’s not very welcoming.’

  ‘I didn’t think we wanted to be welcoming,’ I replied. ‘Isn’t that the point?’

  ‘And I think you’re just being a bit rude,’ she said. ‘Go and take it down.’

  See? Misunderstood, again.

  CHAPTER 5

  That first day there wasn’t a lot of action in our cul-de-sac. Miss Huntley across the road was pruning the roses in her front garden, and some men in orange vests were digging a hole next to a white van at the end of the street. I could hear a mower somewhere behind the houses, way off in the distance, and a radio was playing a daggy old song. But that was about it.

  I finished my lamington and brushed the dandruffy bits of coconut off the front of my shirt, which made me think about Thomas Spiegelman again. It’d be time to go back inside soon.

  ‘Good morning, Miss Elizabeth,’ Miss Huntley called. She was wearing a funny, floppy white sunhat. ‘Why aren’t you at school? Are you ill?’

  ‘No, I’m doing school from home now,’ I called back.

  ‘Been expelled, eh?’ she asked, grinning cheekily.

  ‘Sort of, yeah. Actually, that’s exactly what happened.’

  ‘Oh.’ Suddenly she wasn’t smiling any more, and as she straightened up, she pushed her hands against the lower part of her back and pulled a painy face. ‘Sorry about that. What did you do?’

  ‘Nothing, really.’

  ‘Of course not. But seriously, what did you do?’

  ‘I set fire to the principal.’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘Who hasn’t? Weren’t you at the Catholic school? The one with the funny name?’

  ‘Our Lady of the Sacred Wimple.’ I said. It felt strange, hearing someone talking about my school, but knowing that it wasn’t my school any more. It was kind of sad.

  ‘Well, I think recess is almost over,’ I said, standing up. ‘Time for writing, I think.’

  She clicked her secateurs. ‘Have fun doing that, while I continue my never-ending battle with this garden.’

  Now, I’m not a garden expert, but I think Miss Huntley’s front yard looks pretty good. Lots of flowers, colourful shrubs, thick green bushes that are magically covered with tiny pink blossoms every spring, and all these delicate ferns along the wall under the front window. She also had a small pebbly garden beside the letterbox, with lots of little cacti scattered through it.

  ‘I don’t know much about plants and trees and stuff, but I think it already looks great,’ I said.

  Miss Huntley smiled. ‘This garden is like my face, Lizzie – it takes a lot of hard work to get it to look this good.’

  Mum heard me come back inside while she was in my little brother’s room. She called out, ‘Okay, recess is over, Lizzie. Can you please keep going with what we were doing before – I’m just changing Richie’s nappy, then I’m going to put him down for a sleep.’

  As I walked into the dining room I saw this written on the chalkboard: HSIE. And under that, she’d written: Practical Project.

  I frowned at the words. A project for HSIE? A project, on my first day at my new school? It usually took teachers at least a week to get around to giving out that kind of big, serious homework. And here was my newest teacher giving me a project on Day One!

  ‘Did you know about this?’ I asked Muppet, who was lying on the floor near my chair. If he did know he wasn’t telling. He just looked up at me, yawned and went back to sleep.

  I was ready for Mum. ‘What’s that mean?’ I demanded the moment she walked in, before she’d even had a chance to sit down.

  Her eyes followed my finger. ‘It means exactly what it says – it’s a project.’

  ‘What kind of project? And I thought we were going to do reading after recess.’

  ‘Don’t be rude. We were going to talk about the project after lunch, but if you like, we can do that now.’

  ‘Yes, please,’ I said. I wanted to get this bit over with. I’m not a big fan of projects, especially since my pirate one had, thanks to the burning of the cardboard principal, ended up getting me expelled from my school.

  ‘All right.’ Mum laid her big, fat copy of Henry Lawson’s Collected Works on the table. ‘HSIE – it stands for Human Society and its Environment.’

  ‘I know that much – we do it at my other school. At my old school. We did it at my old school.’

  ‘So we’re going to do a practical project,’ she went on. ‘And of course, whe
n I say “we”, I actually mean “you”.’

  ‘Why?’

  She blinked, as if it should have been the most obvious thing in the world. ‘Because it’ll be more interesting than sitting around here doing exercises out of workbooks,’ she said.

  ‘So what will I have to do?’

  ‘I want you to talk to someone interesting, then write a story about them.’

  ‘A story? Don’t you just make stories up?’

  ‘Not always,’ said Mum. ‘In this case, when I say story, I suppose I mean article. This will be a bit like being a journalist.’

  ‘But I don’t want to be a journalist,’ I said, because I don’t.

  ‘Doesn’t matter – this is what we’re doing,’ she said.

  ‘Don’t you mean what I’m doing?’

  ‘Right. So who do you think you could talk to?’

  ‘Can’t I just write a story about the time I went to the beach or something like that?’

  ‘You’re not in second grade, Lizzie,’ she replied. ‘And stop sulking. Besides, this project needs to be about a real person.’

  ‘I’m a real person,’ I said.

  Mum sighed. ‘Lizzie, you know what I mean. Anyway, you don’t have to decide now, but have a bit of a think and let me know when you’ve come up with an idea. Then we’ll talk about how we can arrange an interview.’

  ‘I really wish Grandpa wasn’t dead,’ I said. ‘He had heaps of good stories.’

  Mum nodded. ‘I know, he would have been perfect to talk to. Anyway, back to what I was planning to do now; have you ever read The Loaded Dog?’

  I groaned, and it’s possible that I might have rolled my eyes. ‘Only about three million times,’ I said.

  CHAPTER 6

  Dad likes to sing. He’s not very good, but he doesn’t care. Once, at Uncle Tony’s fiftieth birthday, he broke a karaoke machine. He reckoned it wasn’t his fault, but these are the facts: it was about his sixth song, he was singing loudly (and badly) when the speakers suddenly went pop and bang, a whole bunch of blue sparks flew out of the back of the machine, and there was a smoky smell in the room that was quite different from the smoky smell of Uncle Tony’s barbecue. Everyone thought this was pretty funny, and one person even fell off his chair from laughing too hard, but Dad didn’t look even slightly embarrassed, not even when someone pointed out that he was singing ‘Smoke on the Water’. Dad just shrugged and said, ‘So what? That’s not what I was singing anyway.’ And then he started singing all over again, without the microphone or any backing music at all this time: ‘Slow-motion Walter, fire engine guy . . .’

  He does get song words wrong quite often. He reckons he honestly doesn’t know that they’re wrong, but I’m pretty sure he’s not always telling the truth. I mean, how could you get a song as wrong as he did tonight as he came down to the kitchen for dinner?

  This is what he was singing: ‘The ants are my friends, they’re blowin’ in the wind, the ants are all blowin’ in the wind . . .’

  ‘Um . . . no,’ Mum said. ‘I’m sure that’s not right.’

  ‘Yeah, you know – the Bob Dylan song,’ he answered. ‘“The Ants are Blowin’ in the Wind”.’

  ‘I heard what you sang, but it’s wrong,’ Mum said.

  Dad shrugged. ‘We’ll just have to agree to disagree. So, how was your day, Lizzie? Make any new friends?’

  I scowled at him. ‘No. Did you?’

  ‘Well, as a matter of fact, I . . . Well, no, I didn’t,’ he admitted. ‘Did make an enemy, though.’

  ‘Another poorly received review?’ Mum asked, putting the salt and pepper on the table, then moving them out of reach of Richie’s grabby little fingers.

  Dad chuckled, but his eyes looked kind of dark at the same time. ‘Well, put it this way: I don’t think we’ll be getting an invitation to the Feine Wurst staff Christmas party.’

  ‘Feine Wurst?’ asked Mum as we sat down and started eating. ‘That’s the name of the restaurant? As in, “Fine Sausage”?’

  ‘Das ist korrekt,’ Dad replied.

  ‘And was it?’

  ‘No. It should actually have been called “Yuck-wurst”. Which is pretty much what I said in my review.’

  ‘Yuck-wurst!’ chirped Richie.

  ‘I don’t think this country is quite ready for Austrian modern cuisine,’ Dad said.

  ‘Yuck-wurst!’ Richie said again.

  ‘Back to me,’ I said, which made Dad smirk. ‘I didn’t make any friends, but I did learn to do long division.’

  Dad raised his eyebrows at Mum. This seemed to impress him. (I guess he’s fairly easy to impress.) ‘Long division?’

  ‘You wouldn’t understand,’ she said. ‘Not something you’ve ever needed to use in your job.’

  ‘Speaking of which, this is good ragout, Denise,’ he said, chewing slowly.

  ‘Ragout? It’s a casserole, Marty,’ Mum said. ‘Not everything has to have a foreign name. Oh, no,’ she sighed, as she saw me catch Dad’s eye.

  ‘Do it,’ I said.

  He didn’t need a second invitation. He laid down his knife and fork, dabbed at the corners of his mouth with an imaginary napkin, and cleared his throat. ‘The servings of the cazuela de pollo were generous, if slightly uneven in size when compared with those of some of my fellow diners.’ (He nodded towards Richie’s little bowl, which my brother had pretty much emptied all over the tray of his highchair.) ‘Nevertheless, the presentation was homey and honest, and the flavour of the free-range chicken was beautifully complemented by robust rosemary tones and velvety shiraz notes.’

  ‘It wasn’t shiraz,’ Mum said, spooning up some of the casserole from Richie’s tray and trying to feed it to him.

  Dad raised his hand, which made Mum roll her eyes. (This happens quite a bit in our house.) ‘All in all, an interesting dish from a new and promising arrival on the Henry Court dining scene. This is definitely one to watch. How about you, Betty?’

  I sat back in my chair and put the tips of my fingers together under my chin. ‘To be honest, Marty, I thought the runny stuff went really well with the chunks. You know, a bit to slurp, a bit to chew. It’s no good if you have to use a spoon, and it’s no good if it’s too dry.’

  ‘Very true. And the flavour?’

  ‘Strong chicken flavours, with a bit of tomatoey-ness around the edge.’

  ‘Nice review. How many stars, Betty?’

  ‘Five solid stars,’ I replied. ‘How many from you, Marty?’

  I saw him glance across the table at Mum. Even though our review game is all in good fun, Dad doesn’t like to hurt her feelings by giving her cooking low or even medium scores, especially when he’s such a bad cook himself. That’s why he says the same thing every time.

  ‘Four-and-a-half stars.’

  ‘Still leaving room for the perfect meal, Marty?’ Mum asked.

  ‘Of course. It’s like being an Olympic figure skating judge – I’ve got to give myself somewhere to go.’

  ‘You could go to Yuck Sausage.’

  ‘You know what I mean,’ Dad said.

  ‘Yes, I do. And one day we’ll get there,’ Mum sighed. ‘One day.’

  While we ate, I kept sneaking glances across the table at Dad. The night before he’d been in his study sniffing like a crazy thing. I hadn’t seen his eyes then, mainly because he hadn’t even turned around in his swivel chair, but I did know from having had hayfever myself that his eyes would have been very red at the time, and even a bit puffy. Now, almost twenty-four hours later, his eyes looked completely normal. But my hayfever never goes away in less than a day, so either he’d got better extra quick, or he’d never had it in the first place.

  But my dad’s not a liar, so it had to be the first thing.

  ‘Dad,’ I said. ‘How’s the hayfever?’

  ‘The what? Oh, the hayfever! Yes, it’s fine now. Thanks.’

  Mum was looking back and forth between us. ‘Hayfever?’ she said. ‘You had hayfever, Marty? You never get hayfever.’


  ‘I know. Weird, huh?’ Then, as if he was making a point, he sniffed, before turning back to me. ‘Anyway, Betty, tell me about your day.’

  ‘I just did.’

  *

  I don’t think anyone anywhere should have to go a whole day without talking to their best friend in the whole world, so before getting ready for bed I called Jenni.

  ‘How was your first day?’ she asked me.

  I had to think before I answered. I’d been all ready to say, ‘It was terrible! The work was boring, I was lonely, and my new teacher is really horrible.’ That would have made Jenni feel better, which would have made me feel better as well, but I couldn’t say it. I really couldn’t, because it wasn’t true.

  That’s why I said, ‘Don’t tell Mum I said this, but it was actually pretty good. How was yours?’

  ‘It was terrible,’ Jenni said. ‘Boring. Plus I was lonely. And Ms Richardson was in a horrible mood.’

  ‘That’s a shame,’ I said.

  ‘Hey, Lizzie, I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go,’ Jenni said, right out of the blue.

  ‘Already? I just called you!’

  ‘I haven’t finished my homework yet. Man, I hate maths! Do you have homework?’

  I wondered if I should tell her that I did, just so she wouldn’t feel too jealous.

  But she wasn’t going to let me get away with not answering her. ‘Lizzie?’

  ‘I didn’t get any,’ I said. ‘Mum doesn’t believe in it. Besides, all my schoolwork is homework now, isn’t it?’

  Jenni sighed. ‘You’re so lucky,’ she said.

  Just then, Dad came to my doorway and stood there, waiting for me to notice him. This is something he does. He says it’s because it’s rude to talk over someone’s phone conversation, but I reckon it’s more rude to stand there listening in.

  ‘Jenni, can you wait for a second?’ I said. ‘Yes, Dad?’

  ‘It’s getting late, Lizzie, and you’ve got school in the morning.’

  ‘Is that meant to be funny?’ I asked.

  He sighed. ‘Sorry, I mean . . . Anyway, it’s late, so you should get to bed. Oh, and it’s bin night, remember?’