The Things We Promise

by J. C. Burke

  ‘Oh God, Gemma!’ Louise said and she took my hand.

  I didn’t cry. I wasn’t trying to be strong either. Maybe I’d cried too much yesterday because I honestly didn’t even feel close to tears. Maybe I sounded the way Billy did. Sad but matter-of-fact.

  Louise was super nice and understanding. Last year her uncle had been killed in a car crash, so she said she knew how I felt. But I don’t think she did. You could tell everyone that your uncle had died in a car crash and they’d all feel sorry for you. But if you said that he died of AIDS, people might say something bad back. Mum had tried to warn me last night but I already knew. I wasn’t an idiot.

  Did she really think I’d forgotten about Aunty Penny’s nursing friend Karen, who used to work in the AIDS ward at King George’s? The owner of her corner store found out where she worked. Next time she went in, he told Karen that they wouldn’t be needing her as a customer anymore because they were a family business.

  Aunty Penny and Mum swore their heads off. They threatened to write letters to the local council and dob to the anti-discrimination people. To me, it was a story about something happening to someone else. But now that someone else could be us. Last night Mum wasn’t really being Polly Pessimistic. She was just saying it how it was.

  In the end, telling Louise didn’t make me feel better. It made me feel guilty.

  I had broken the golden rule of loyalty. Andrea was my best friend and I should’ve told her first. So after school I spent my current life savings buying the latest Cleo and Cosmo magazines and headed to her place.

  Andrea’s mother, Deidre, answered the door in a hot pink velvet tracksuit with streaks in her hair to match. Her arm, elbow deep in bangles, jingle-jangled as she pulled me towards her.

  ‘A little bird told me Billy’s home.’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ she started. ‘I bet he’s here to do some fabulous celebrity’s hair and make-up and you’re not allowed to reveal their identity? Is it Olivia Newton-John?’

  This is how I answered. With a question. ‘Is Andrea upstairs?’ And I bolted away before she could reply.

  Andrea was sitting up in bed, surrounded by tissues and eating jubes.

  ‘Want one?’ she offered, pouring some into her hand. ‘Don’t take the green. They’re by favourites.’ That’s probably why she was presenting me with a handful of purple and yellow ones.

  ‘No, thank you,’ I said. I hadn’t realised until now but I’d never be able to stomach jubes again. Especially the purple ones. ‘I bought you some magazines.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘How’re you feeling?’

  ‘Sick. By nose is so blocked I want to chob it off. The only thing I can taste are jubes.’

  ‘That’s no good.’

  ‘How combe you’re acting weird?’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘Yes, you are. You’re acting all forbal and bolite.’

  ‘So I’m normally rude, am I?’

  Andrea pulled a face and hoovered up another palm of jubes.

  ‘How combe Billy’s home?’ she asked through a technicolour mouthful. ‘Did you know he was cobing hobe?’

  I was shaking my head because I knew that once the words were out I wouldn’t be able to take them back.

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘There’s something I’ve got to tell you.’ I swallowed.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Saul died.’

  ‘What?’ Andrea punched the mattress. ‘No! What habbened?’

  ‘He – he got AIDS.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Saul died of AIDS. And Billy’s HIV-positive.’ This time I said it much faster than when I’d told Louise.

  Andrea was staring at me as though she’d just spied the Grim Reaper behind me. Still I made myself keep talking. ‘That’s why he’s home. That’s why Billy came back. I just walked in the door one afternoon and he was there.’

  ‘Gemma!’ she gasped.

  ‘I know. It’s bad.’

  ‘It’s really bad,’ Andrea answered. ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘What can I do?’ I shrugged. ‘I just have to try and be there for Billy. He’s so …’

  ‘But what are you going to do about beoble finding out?’

  ‘I …’

  ‘Have you told anyone, like at school, I bean?’

  ‘No,’ I lied. ‘Just you.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Andrea, Saul died. He died. I’m so sad.’ My bottom lip had started the shakes when Andrea slapped her hand over my mouth and said, ‘Shoosh. Mum’s coming.’

  Deidre walked into the room with a plate of chocolate biscuits. ‘Special treat,’ she said, handing them to Andrea. ‘Don’t drop crumbs or you’ll have rats in here before you can say Jack Robinson.’

  ‘Jack Robinson,’ Andrea said.

  ‘Ha ha. Very funny,’ Deidre replied, closing the door behind her with a wink.

  ‘I bet I know why Bum just closed the door.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She wants me to bumb you for info because she reckons Billy’s here to do some secret celebrity’s hair and bake-up.’

  ‘Oh,’ I replied. ‘What are you going to tell her?’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to tell her the real reason, am I?’

  ‘W-why?’ I stammered. ‘What would she do?’

  Andrea’s room was starved of air. I was hot and my limbs felt strange, like they’d detached themselves from my body. I suddenly couldn’t feel them anymore and I couldn’t hear what Andrea was saying. All I could see were her lips stretching over words and the blur of her arms waving around like she was about to topple over and off the bed.

  But I sat there and nodded, pretending to take in every word. When the only ones I was actually hearing were Billy’s words from last night. It’s like I’m in this really bad dream. That’s what it feels like.

  Andrea wasn’t at school all week. Polly Pessimistic had busted free from my head and was out in full force, playing havoc like she’d never done before. It was one bad thought after the next. And just when I didn’t think they could get any worse, they did.

  Is Andrea avoiding me?

  Is Andrea avoiding me because Billy’s HIV-positive?

  Is Andrea avoiding me because she told her mother and her mother doesn’t want her to come anywhere near me?

  Is Andrea avoiding me because she told her mother and her mother doesn’t want her to come anywhere near me because she thinks I’ll get AIDS from Billy and then give it to Andrea and then Andrea will give it to the rest of her family?

  Am I still the wind beneath Andrea’s wings?

  Just when I thought I was going to have to put a vacuum up my nose and suck Polly Pessimistic out of my brain once and for all, one good thing happened.

  I spied Billy in the kitchen with his arms crossed, staring at the fridge. At first I thought I’d caught him frozen in the middle of a sad thought. I contemplated sneaking away. I wasn’t sure if he’d heard me come in and I could do without hearing another sad thought, whether it was mine or my brother’s.

  But then he piped up and said, ‘It’s a really nice dress, Gemma.’ And I realised he’d been staring at the photo of my dream formal dress.

  ‘You like it?’ I asked him.

  ‘It’s gorgeous. You’ve got the legs too.’

  ‘Mum reckons I should—’

  ‘—have a long train at the back?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No way! That’s Demi Moore, 1989 Oscars. So last year as we’d say in showbiz!’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Simple but chic,’ he said. ‘Which fabric did you like the best? Claude knows he’s on standby to send it over.’

  ‘Um …’

  ‘I’d do it exactly the same as this,’ he said, pointing at the photo. ‘Black velvet. Gold braid edging. Gorgeous. Slicked-back hair. Big earrings and red lips.’

  ‘So … you’re still going to do my hair and make-up?’r />
  ‘Of course I am!’ Billy answered.

  ‘Really? Truly?’

  ‘Try and stop me, baby girl! You, Andrea and another friend. That’s what I promised.’

  ‘Can you do Elizabeth Taylor hair?’

  ‘I can do anything!’ he answered.

  The next day after school, another good thing happened. At least, it started out that way.

  In last period, Louise had been drawing pictures of the Roxette dress. Now I had their song stuck in my head, except I only knew the one line. Maybe that was because the band were from Sweden or somewhere and they didn’t really know what they were singing about so they mumbled their words. Kind of like Mr C, but he jumbled up sayings and words. ‘Hit two birds with one stick’ and the one that once had Saul laughing so much he had to excuse himself and run to the toilet: ‘an otter he can’t refuse’.

  So, I was walking out the school gates, minding my own business and softly singing that one Roxette line to myself, when I heard someone call out, ‘Hey, what happened to you the other day?’

  How had I not noticed Ralph up ahead, maybe only five metres away, getting into the lime mobile?

  Footpath, open and swallow me. I was looking so not-cool with my scrunchie falling out, giving me a loose side ponytail that was straight out of the 1970s. The problem was that I had to walk right past Ralph. If I crossed the road it would’ve looked too obvious.

  Ralph was half sitting in the driver’s seat with the door open and one of his feet still outside on the ground. ‘Apparently you were meant to come and get me,’ he said, ‘but you never showed.’

  ‘I am so sorry,’ I said, lingering by the car, not sure whether to stop and talk or keep walking. ‘I honestly forgot. I walked out the gate and next thing I knew I was halfway up to the main road and …’

  He made a grunting sound that I thought was probably the end of our longest conversation yet. But then he said, ‘I mean, I’m hardly inconspicuous in this electric-green car.’

  ‘Oh? Really? No. I didn’t see you. Or the car.’ The fibs were flowing. ‘But yes, you’re right. It is electric-green, isn’t it? I’ve never noticed that before.’

  ‘You’re the only one then.’

  I let out an awkward laugh that sounded more like a sheep baaing.

  ‘Hey, do you want a lift home?’ Ralph asked. ‘I have to pass the end of your street anyway.’

  ‘Oh? Sure. Okay. Why not.’

  The Belle Modelling Agency 1989 folder was on the floor in front of the passenger’s seat. Nothing would’ve given me more pleasure than to slide my grubby school shoes across the title. For a second, I regretted dodging the dog’s poo at the school gates. However, I picked it up and said, ‘This looks like interesting reading.’

  For a second, Ralph looked at me and I almost stopped breathing.

  ‘It’s Vanessa’s,’ Ralph finally said, taking it out of my hands and chucking it in the back seat, giving me a chance to quickly compose myself. ‘I have a bit of a flick through it if I’m caught in a traffic jam.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ I said. ‘Thousands of traffic jams around these parts. It’ll probably take us an hour to get to my place.’

  ‘Ha ha,’ Ralph replied, starting the engine and pulling out into the street that was only five blocks away from mine. ‘You’ve always been a bit of a smartypants, haven’t you, Gemma?’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘I’m not saying it’s a bad thing,’ Ralph answered. ‘It’s good – being honest and saying what you think.’

  Was I falling into a trap? Was this one of those negative-positive, upside-down compliments? I was seriously suspicious, and I was doing everything in my power not to take a sneaky look at him.

  ‘Remember that time in Year 9, when we were studying The Hotel New Hampshire in Literature Circle?’ Ralph began.

  What I remembered was that in my copy of the book someone had crossed out ‘Gemma Longrigg’ and written ‘Jamma Longdickupyourbum’. Andrea had wanted me to dob. But I wasn’t a dibber-dobber and I didn’t care about what some pathetic poofter-hater had written.

  Suddenly, a thought occurred to me. Maybe Ralph was about to confess? Maybe he’d been the one to graffiti my book? Or maybe Ralph was a poof himself? He’d just told me it was good to be honest and to say what you think.

  ‘… remember how you challenged Mrs Bryce?’ Ralph was saying. ‘You shot up your hand and started …’ I had no memory of this. Zero. None. Zip. I wished I had, because if Ralph remembered this then maybe I wasn’t so invisible? So unremarkable? ‘… you were waving your arm like crazy, Gemma, trying to get her attention but she was …’

  No, Ralph definitely had me mixed up with someone else. And worse than that, that someone else was probably Andrea because she was always waving her arm around like a demented person trying to catch the teacher’s attention.

  I wasn’t sure what idea tortured me more. Ralph not noticing me or Ralph confusing me for Andrea. I couldn’t prolong my pain and embarrassment any longer so I butted in and said, ‘You’ve totally got the wrong person. It wasn’t me.’

  ‘Yes, it was! I remember everything about the Lit Circle days.’

  ‘I think I’d know what I said. I do remember studying that book.’

  Ralph was freeing up a hand from the steering wheel. ‘I bet you five dollars it was you.’

  ‘You’re wasting your money,’ I told him.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ His hand was still there, almost touching me. I was staring at it as though I’d never seen one before. I wanted to touch his long fingers but he snatched them away laughing, ‘Too chicken to shake on it, because you know that five bucks is mine.’

  I laughed back although I wasn’t really sure what we were laughing at. ‘I’m not really a mad hand-waver in class.’

  ‘I know. You’re more the controversial one who starts the discussions.’

  ‘So, there you go. Not the mad hand-waver!’

  ‘Ah, but you were on this day, Gemma. That’s my point. You waved your hand and barked at Mrs Bryce, telling her she was stereotyping the characters. She was saying how awkward and weedy the brother Frank was because he was a fag and the jock footballers hassled him because he couldn’t defend himself.’

  I had just lost five dollars.

  Ralph was right. I had totally forgotten. Blocked it out of my memory. Locked it in the box where the other ones were stored. It was the day after I’d said that to Mrs Bryce that my book was graffitied.

  ‘You let Mrs Bryce have it, Gemma. You told her that just because the character was gay it didn’t mean he couldn’t be good at sport and …’ I was nodding. Now Ralph was hitting the steering wheel and hollering, ‘You do remember! You owe me five dollars!’

  ‘We didn’t shake on it.’

  ‘Cheat! No way!’

  ‘Anyway, how come you remembered such a stupid thing?’

  This was the moment I wanted him to say, Don’t you know I’m always watching you?

  Of course, he didn’t. He shrugged. Then, said, ‘I knew your brother was camp so I got why you were making the point. It sucked and some of the guys were being dickheads. Didn’t one of them graffiti your book?’

  There was my answer. It was boringly logical and utterly unsatisfying. The lime mobile was about to turn back into a pumpkin and me into one of the ugly sisters. My Cinderella moment was over and I wanted it back so I could try again.

  We were almost at the corner of our street. I wished I could say, Turn around. Let’s do that drive all over again. Maybe Ralph felt the same way, because as we neared my place, he suddenly slowed down. Really slowed down.

  The two of us were sitting there, the engine rumbling, the car hovering. We were going nowhere. It was as though we were caught in a one-car traffic jam. But now there was the world’s most awkward silence between us. It was almost like that silence you get the second before you kiss someone but I was sure we weren’t about to do that.

  Say something, I was telling myself. Speak. Say
anything.

  Ralph kept one hand on the steering wheel but was turning himself around to face me. Relax! I was shouting inside my head. Stop looking like a freak!

  Now Ralph was staring straight at me and saying, ‘Gemma?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Vanessa told me your brother’s home.’

  I nodded.

  ‘She also told me about his boyfriend dying in New York.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Don’t take any shit from anyone, Gemma.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘AIDS in the burbs. Not everyone’s going to like it.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Just saying.’

  I couldn’t get out of Ralph’s car quick enough. I was bounding up the stairs, two at a time. AIDS in the burbs. AIDS in the burbs. Those words had stuck to the lining of my brain. Not everyone’s going to like it. Exactly what did he mean by that? Did he think my brother’s germs were going to float down the drains to his house, killing him and his precious sister? Maybe Vanessa wasn’t as relaxed about it as she made out. Maybe they thought my brother was going to kill the whole suburb like the Grim Reaper and his bowling ball?

  I ran into the kitchen and filled a glass in the sink with water, all the time saying to myself, I hate you, Ralph. I hate you. How could you look me in the eyes and say that? I sculled the water, half of it running off my chin and onto my school shirt, and when I’d finished I slammed the glass into the sink like I’d just won a drinking contest.

  That’s when I realised I’d taken a dirty glass out of the sink and I didn’t know who had drunk out of it.

  We had to take our toiletries into the bathroom now whenever we wanted to use them so that we didn’t accidently mix up our toothbrushes. After Billy shaved over the sink he had to clean it with some stinky bleach. Mum didn’t want to use paper cups and plates. She’d thumped her fist on the kitchen table, declaring measures like that were over the top and that in reality AIDS was hard to catch.

  Even Ita Buttrose had told all of Australia that you couldn’t contract the virus from a mosquito. But my lips had just touched the rim of a glass that held a fifty per cent chance that my brother had too, and how did I know that his germs weren’t lingering?