“I married her in grade six,” one named Joe Salvatore tells me, grinning.
“What did a wedding consist of in grade six?” I ask.
“An exchange of rings made of grass and a reception of candy and sherbet,” he explains. “Chaz refused to attend because she was his best friend since they were born and he thought she was his.”
“As if,” Santangelo says, scowling. Griggs doesn’t look too impressed, either, and Joe Salvatore seems to enjoy their irritation. When Raffy finally reaches us, he lifts her off the ground and smothers her with noisy kisses and she’s giggling in a way I’ve never heard before.
I talk local politics with Santangelo’s mum and teacher shortages with Raffy’s dad. I do the twist with Santangelo and politely decline an invitation to go for a drive with one of his friends. I do the Time Warp with Jessa and the Zorba with Raffy and, when I need to stop for air, Jonah Griggs is there and he takes my hand and leads me through the crowd until we’re outside.
I take deep breaths, looking at the town stretched in front of me. When I turn around, he cups my face in his hands and he kisses me so deeply that I don’t know who is breathing for who, but his mouth and tongue taste like warm honey. I don’t know how long it lasts, but when I let go of him, I miss it instantly.
We end up with the Townies and Cadets at McDonald’s on the highway at two in the morning. I look around at everyone and I can’t help thinking how normal we look and I don’t think I’ve ever felt normal. I watch Raffy as she removes the pickles from her hamburger and hands them over to Santangelo without them exchanging a word and I realise again there is more to that relationship than spelling bees and being enemies. These people have history and I crave history. I crave someone knowing me so well that they can tell what I’m thinking. Jonah Griggs takes my hand under the table and links my fingers with his and I know that I would sacrifice almost anything just to keep this state of mind, for the rest of the week at least.
Chapter 17
On one of those days during the holidays when they were completely bored, Webb came up with a plan. The five of them sat by the river, at the very spot where Webb dreamed of building a house.
“We build a tunnel,” Webb said. “It runs from my House to Tate and Narnie’s and then we take a detour and it goes from their House, underneath the driveway and then to the clearing.”
“Purpose?” Jude asked, practising his overarm with rocks against the tree.
“To get around after hours. It’ll be tops.”
“Tops, will it be?”
“The Great Escape. They built a tunnel,” Fitz said, enthused.
“They needed to, morons. It was a matter of life and death,” Jude said dryly.
“We’re bored to death, Jude, so isn’t that a matter of life and death?” Tate asked.
Webb was grinning. Tate, too. They always grinned in unison. Like they were thinking with the same mind, sharing the same heart. Ever since any of them could remember, Webb and Tate had been like that. Jude knew it was why he was drawn to them. They were like beacons for Narnie, who couldn’t seem to operate without them and Fitz and Jude loved the three, unashamedly.
“They think I saved them but they saved me,” Fitz once told him. “I didn’t exist before I belonged to the Fucked-Up Four.”
“Five,” Jude had corrected.
He could hear Webb, Tate, and Fitz discussing the tunnel as if it already existed.
“Narnie, explain to the delusional trio why the POWs needed that tunnel more than we do,” he said.
“Nazis,” she muttered, sitting against the tree. Bad day for Narnie.
“Weren’t your grandparents Nazis?” Fitz asked, lining up at least five imaginary enemies and, with his finger and popping sounds, eliminating them one by one.
“They were Germans,” Narnie said. “Big difference.”
“Although Oma Rose vas a Nazi vhen it came to eating za sauerkraut,” Webb said in a bad German accent, and for the first time in a long time, Narnie laughed.
“I’m all for the tunnel. It could save our life one day,” Tate said. “We could be chased by evil and have to hide down there.”
“Evil out in Jellicoe? I wish,” Fitz said.
“Think of how tunnels saved people from Hitler,” Tate said.
“Yeah, but last I heard Hitler was dead. The bunker, a gun, Eva. Ring a bell?” Jude said.
“Cyanide,” Narnie corrected.
“We’ll pretend we’re the East Germans trying to escape to West Germany. No Nazis.”
“Just Communists.”
“All we need is to be able to get from one House to the other and then from that House to the clearing,” Webb said, slightly frustrated by the fact that nobody but Tate was taking him seriously.
Jude looked from Tate to Webb, shaking his head.
“You know what?” Webb asked. “I’m getting another fantastic idea.” The seven P.M. call bell rang in the distance but Webb was in another world.
“Skirmish,” he said, impressed with himself. “Let’s have a war.”
There was a new plan every day, bigger and better than the day before. Each afternoon at four o’clock they would meet to discuss it.
On Jude’s last day they met at midnight and camped under the oak by the river. Fitz handed them a bottle and Webb took a swig, spitting it out instantly.
“What the hell was that, Fitz?” he asked, trying to regain his breath.
“Grappa. Got it from the Italians next door. Burns your insides out.”
“And the enjoyment is?” Jude said, taking a swig, his eyes instantly tearing up and his breath coming in gasps.
“I reckon if I put a match right here, you’d see fireworks,” Fitz continued, taking out his matches and breathing heavily into the air.
Still trying to recover, Jude stared at him. “Why would you want to do that, dickhead?”
“Live on the edge, GI Jude. That’s my motto.”
Fitz took out a cigarette and Jude grabbed it out of his mouth. “You’re going to set us all on fire, you homicidal feral fruitcake.”
“Hand it over,” Tate said, taking a few deep breaths before swigging from the bottle. She stared at Narnie in shock and started coughing out of control. Narnie fanned her down, patting her on the back until the coughing subsided.
“Can we stay focused?” Webb asked, taking out a purple leather book.
“Mate, no one is going to take you seriously with a book that looks like that,” Jude said.
“Yeah, Chairman Mao and his little purple book,” Fitz said, laughing at his own joke.
“It’s Chairman Meow to you, and I’ve got a system set up that’s going to blow your mind.”
“I wouldn’t mind other parts of me bl—”
“Fitz!” Tate said. “Grossed out. Majorly.”
“Is anyone listening to me?” Webb asked, annoyed. “Is that too much to ask?”
“I am,” Narnie replied.
Webb leaned over and grabbed her face. “Then I can die happy.”
Narnie patted the space next to her and Fitz sat down obediently.
“Okay, we play skirmish,” Webb said. “Cadets, Townies, us. We split this area into territories and anyone who tries to invade loses ground. We have rules of engagement, diplomatic immunity, and one or two fisticuffs.”
“What part of this are we going to enjoy?” Tate asked, pointing to Narnie and herself.
“The part where we take you hostage and ravage you,” Fitz said.
“You’re an animal.”
Fitz did gorilla impersonations and Narnie shushed him gently.
“Fitz, you head the Townies, Jude heads the Cadets, and I’ll get the Houses together back here. We need to get the six Houses working, so we need rules.”
“No fraternising with leaders of other Houses,” Tate said. “Rule number one.”
Webb looked taken aback.
“What happens if you do?” he asked, jumping on top of her and trapping her with his arms and
legs.
“The two leaders get placed in exile…together. For the rest of their lives.”
“Okay,” he said with enthusiasm, jumping off her. “I’m writing that rule in. ‘No relationship between leaders of opposite Houses’.”
“I’ve got one for the territory wars,” Fitz said, his eyes bloodshot from the spirit. “If trespassing occurs, there’s payback.” He jabbed at thin air. “One to the jaw, two to the gut.”
“So what does the winner get in the end?” Tate asked.
“They get to sit around with the losers and say, ‘I am King Xavier of the world.’ Repeat after me.”
“And me?” Tate asked.
“You get to be my queen.”
Tate looked pleased with the idea.
“How come you’re the leader of the community?” Narnie asked, almost smiling. “Why can’t Tate be?”
Webb looked at his sister, grinning. “Why can’t you, Narnie?”
Fitz leaned his head on Narnie’s shoulder. “And I’ll be your queen?”
“You can be the eunuch,” Jude said, shoving him out of the way, “and I’ll be her prince.” He bowed and took Narnie’s hand, kissing it, and their eyes met. It was awkward for a moment until Narnie looked away.
“So how long will it take to get your troops in gear?” Webb asked him. “We’re serious here, you know.”
“Mate, we’ve been ready for years.”
“By the time you come back next year, we’ll be ready—tunnel and all.”
“If it’s going to be like The Great Escape, make sure there are trail bikes,” Jude said.
“So you’re in?”
He shrugged. “As long as I get to play Steve McQueen.”
Spending days with Santangelo and Griggs becomes a habit for the rest of the holidays. Most of the time the Mullet Brothers, Choi, Ben, Santangelo’s sisters, and Jessa McKenzie come along as well. We end up either at Santangelo’s place or Raffy’s, but mostly the former because Raffy’s mum and dad teach the Townies and keep on asking them for overdue homework.
The Santangelo home is like a madhouse. I’m not quite sure how his mum finds time to be the mayor of the town as well but she manages. She’s the only person who gets away with calling Santangelo a “little shit” and once in a while she’ll go for the collective and refer to both Griggs and Santangelo as those “two little shits.” Most of the time the “two little shits” take it on the chin but sometimes Santangelo says, “I’m fucking out of here,” and his mum warns, “Don’t you dare swear, you little shit.” The Santangelo sisters, Griggs, and Raffy ignore it all, but Jessa and I are fascinated and frightened at the same time. We wait for a showdown but it tends not to happen and then everything’s all calm again and the only two left in a mess are Jessa and me. Sometimes we are very relieved to escape it all.
It’s during those moments that I notice how similar we are. Both Jessa and I have spent almost half our lives brought up by people other than our parents and neither of us have siblings. She has no recollection of her mother, who died of cancer when Jessa was two years old, and I have too much recollection of mine. Jessa lived with her aunt but hero-worshipped her father, who died when she was nine in some apparent freak accident, and my only memory of my father is of being on his shoulders and touching the sky. Though after Santangelo’s revelation about the boy in the photo, I’m not too sure anymore. More than anything, we have Hannah in common, and somehow during these holidays I begin to see Jessa as a kind of link to whatever it is out there that I need to work out.
“Do you think of Hannah a lot?” she asks me when we move back to the House close to the end of the holidays. I’m letting her sleep in the spare bed in my room because everyone else isn’t back until the weekend and there’s no one else in the dorms.
All the time, I want to say.
“Sometimes.”
“Do you think something’s happened to her?” she asks quietly.
All the time, I want to say.
“Sometimes.”
“Taylor, just say the seri—”
“Don’t,” I say, irritated, turning over, away from her. “Jessa, forget the serial killer. There are enough other things to worry about.”
“She’d never leave us, so it can only be the serial killer.”
I grit my teeth and count to ten so I won’t yell at her. “He only takes teenagers,” I say, not so reassuringly. “She’s in her thirties.”
“But I read on this website that, in the townships stretching from the Sturt to the Hume Highways, there have been eleven attempted kidnaps and three actual kidnaps of women over twenty-five in the last ten years.”
“Can I suggest another website? It’s www-dot-shutupabouttheserialkiller-dot-com.”
She is silent for a moment and I feel guilty about the aggression.
“If Hannah doesn’t come back, I’ll have no one,” she says in the smallest voice I’ve heard her use.
I reluctantly turn to face her again but looking at Jessa’s face always has this sledgehammer effect on me, so I lie on my back and stare at the ceiling.
“Hannah’s coming back. Anyway, you’ve got whoever looked after you before you came here.”
“My aunt. But she has my cousins and I know she likes me, even loves me, but it’s not like I felt as if I belonged. Until Hannah turned up.”
“She turned up one day? Just like that?”
“Uh-huh. I just thought she was so beautiful. She said, ‘Let me look at you,’ and then she cried and held me and said that if she had known about me, she would have come much sooner.”
“Funny. She turned up just like that for me as well.”
“Maybe she’s like in that TV show where those angels moonlight as people and they come down to help others. You know. Like in Touched by an Angel.”
“I don’t think she’s an angel, Jessa. She swears worse than Santangelo and Griggs.” I turn and lean on my elbow, facing her. “So what did she say when she showed up?”
“That she was a friend of my dad’s, but I don’t really believe that. I couldn’t imagine Hannah knowing my dad and she seemed much younger than him, anyway.”
“I’ve never known my father,” I tell her.
“My aunt said mine was a crazy man and that he lost his marbles years ago, but I don’t think he was, you know. I think he was just really sad.”
“Maybe because your mum died.”
“I don’t know but when he came to visit, he’d tell me the best stories about growing up around here. When Hannah told me I’d be coming here when I was twelve, I was ecstatic.”
She looks at me intently. “She used to talk about you. She’d tell me that when I came to the school, I would have you and that she’d be the luckiest person in the world because she’d have both of us. I used to think she was your mum.”
“I have a mother and she’s not Hannah.”
“But don’t you ever wish she was? I do.”
I don’t answer. I just wish Hannah would come back and tell me off like she used to. Or even keep me a little at arm’s-length, which she always seemed to do with me. Not like Jessa. I’d watch them together: Hannah would smother Jessa with kisses and cuddles and they’d giggle like kids. Maybe my guard was up all the time and she was reacting to that. But I wish she had seen through it and I wish that once, just once, I had told her how I feel. That I feel safer when she is around. Sometimes I had tested her, wanting so desperately for her to let me down so then I would have an excuse to walk away. But she never did. I wish I could tell her it breaks my heart that I miss her more than I ever missed my mother and that the thing that frightens me the most about next October when I graduate is not that I won’t have a home, but that I won’t have her.
“You know what?” Jessa says after a moment, yawning. “I reckon that Brigadier knows where she is.”
My pulse does this thumping thing that happens every time I think of him.
“Why do you say that? Has he ever hassled you? Tell me!”
> She frowns and I don’t know whether it’s because she remembers something or because of my aggression. “He looks at me all the time.”
“Does it freak you out?” I ask, not wanting to put more fear in her head.
“No, but Chloe P. reckons he could be the serial killer.”
“Oh, please,” I say, even though I once thought the same.
“She reckons whoever it is lives between Sydney and Truscott.”
“Which covers seven hundred kilometres, narrowing our suspects down to about one million people.”
“And the kidnappings have always taken place between September and the end of the year and would probably be committed by someone who drives those seven hundred kilometres. The Brigadier would get to cover at least five hundred of them. He goes back and forth from Sydney to here all the time. Well, this year he has, anyway. Last year he wasn’t around, or the year before, and there were no kidnappings.”
“How do you know?”
“That he wasn’t around last year? Because Teresa, one of the hostages, is going around with one of the Cadets and he told her and she told me.”
“Can you point out to Teresa that the Cadets are our enemy and she’s not allowed to ‘go around’ with one of them?”
“But you pashed Jonah Griggs and he’s the leader of the enemy.”
I stare at her in amazement with absolutely no comeback.
“We saw you at the party on Saturday night,” she says, grinning, “We thought it was really romantic.”
“Who’s we?”
“Mary and Sarah and Elisha and Tilly Santangelo and their cousins and some of their friends from school. How can you breathe when his tongue—”
“Go to sleep,” I say, turning over again.
I wanted to say that I didn’t need to breathe on my own when Jonah Griggs was kissing me, but seeing he hasn’t touched me since that night, I can’t even bring myself to think of him. It’s not like he’s ignoring me, because that would be proactive. It’s like I’m just anyone to him. Even when we were squashed in the back seat, our knees glued together and our shoulders touching and my insides full of butterflies, he was speaking over my head the whole time with Santangelo about some ridiculous AFL/Rugby League thing. Somewhere along the way, Jonah Griggs has become a priority in my life and his attitude this week has been crushing.
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