The Yearbook Committee

by Sarah Ayoub

  Charlie rolls her eyes. ‘Too little, too late, don’t you think?’ she says bitterly.

  They look at each other for a moment and she shakes her head, then looks away. He has the pained expression of a person that can never do anything right.

  ‘Come on, guys,’ Matty says quietly, his deep voice cutting through the tension. ‘Gillian wouldn’t want this. Any of it.’

  I nod and look down at my lap. ‘She cared about this yearbook so much. She’d want us to stay friends.’

  ‘And she’d want us to be there for Sammy,’ Matty adds. ‘Can’t we focus on that?’

  ‘Poor Sammy,’ Charlie says, rubbing her temples. ‘Alone in that house with those parents. I was so focused on hating Lauren that I forgot about him. How’s he doing?’

  ‘Better than his parents, I think,’ Matty says. ‘Neither of them are handling it well, Gillian’s mum especially. She kind of looks like shit.’

  ‘Shame it took all of this for everyone to wake up,’ Charlie says. ‘What a fucked up world we live in.’

  Everyone goes quiet, and I realise that their efforts to make me feel better have been for nothing.

  Tears well up in my eyes again. ‘Distract me,’ I say, my voice cracking. ‘Please. Tell me something else.’

  ‘Well, Charlie’s my sister,’ Matty says quietly.

  ‘Huh?’ I ask, my head shooting up.

  ‘Turns out Charlie’s stepdad, Stan, is my dad,’ he says. ‘He and my mum were married once. She fell pregnant, but they found out at twenty weeks that the baby had Down’s syndrome, so she had the baby aborted. And then she couldn’t fall pregnant for ages, so he left. By the time he was out of her life, a pregnancy test came back positive, and that was me. He never found out.’

  ‘Wow,’ I tell him. ‘Is this why she’s been a little down?’

  ‘Well, she actually saw him a year ago or so. He was shopping with Charlie’s mum, and she panicked. And apparently I made the situation worse by introducing her to Sammy at work that day.’

  ‘But why would the abortion thing come up seventeen years later?’ Ryan asks.

  ‘Some women feel immediate relief, others make peace with it really quickly, and then there are some whose grief hits years, even decades later,’ Charlie says. ‘I think seeing Stan and Sammy after so many years in the one day was just the equivalent of a bomb going off in her system.’

  ‘That’s scary,’ Ryan says. ‘You never know what someone is hiding.’

  We go silent.

  A while later, Ryan and Charlie leave. Matty stays behind.

  ‘Are they a couple now?’ I ask, gesturing to the door after they’ve walked out. Matty shrugs, but a hint of a smile appears on his face.

  ‘Well, they’re not not a couple, if you know what I mean,’ he says. ‘They go everywhere together, she bosses him around, and he looks like he’s won the lottery when she does, even though they pretend to fight about it.’

  ‘So not everything has changed.’

  Matty chuckles and moves from the chair to the edge of the bed. ‘I think they’re afraid to come out and admit they’re together; Charlie isn’t even sure whether she’s moving yet . . .’

  He trails off. It’s quiet for a moment, and I can tell he has something on his mind. Thankfully, I don’t have to pry.

  ‘Was Gillian happy?’ he asks. ‘Before it all . . .’

  I swallow, then nod. ‘She was mad at Charlie,’ I say. ‘But when she got to the party she just wanted to forget about it and enjoy herself. We were hanging out together; she was having a good time. She believed Lauren was really trying to patch things up. She was . . . optimistic.’

  ‘And you really didn’t know the drink was spiked?’ he asks. ‘Sorry — I’m just trying to make sense of it all.’

  ‘No, Matty,’ I say quietly. ‘I promise I didn’t. But I had the pills. I thought they were herbal.’

  ‘She didn’t have to take it, though,’ he whispers. ‘Please don’t blame yourself.’

  He looks at his watch and tells me he has to go. Despite their shaky meeting, Stan has agreed to let him meet his new half-sister today.

  ‘I’m happy for you,’ I say when he tells me.

  ‘Happy,’ he says, biting his lip. ‘I think that’s a foreign concept to us now.’

  I watch him leave, then curl up into a ball and wipe a tear away.

  Hours later, I’m thinking about Ryan’s words. You never know what someone is hiding, he’d said. And suddenly I’m not just upset, but enraged.

  Everything about Mike makes sense: the enigmatic personality, hatred of the police, the two phones.

  I hop out of bed and slip on my shoes, determined to have it out with him. After all, I know where to find him — every drug runner has a zone or a ‘hood’. Isn’t that why he was always hanging around at the park?

  I’m halfway down the hall when I realise I have nothing to fight with.

  Dad once said to me: ‘Arm yourself with evidence, smarts and strategy to get the outcome that you want.’ But right now, I have none of these things. And taking down one runner isn’t going to get me the outcome that I want. If I want to make a real difference — to prevent another episode like the one I have survived, and which many others have not — I have to play the big game.

  I’d watched every CSI, every true-crime and forensics show I could get my hands on. But I was no longer content to be on the outside looking in. I was no longer content with being called too frail or feminine. But most of all, I was no longer content to be fighting my true calling.

  I was going to change my university preferences, and enrol in a Bachelor of Policing.

  Gillian’s story had reached its horribly sad conclusion, but maybe I could someday rewrite someone else’s.

  Ryan

  Ryan Fleming Lost.

  No one answers their phone any more, I think, hanging up. Everyone’s probably still in shock, reliving that night. So I send out a group text message:

  I think we need to add some sort of postscript/note to the end of the yearbook. If you want to help me write it, come to mine at 6 p.m.

  No one replies.

  At about 7 p.m., when I’ve convinced myself I’ll be writing it alone, they turn up. One by one, like ghosts from a life I lived long ago, they wander through my house to the back veranda, where I now spend my days sitting and staring out into a sky that was once filled with more promise than pain.

  We write without laughing, or joking, or fighting. We just spill it all out. And then Matty saves it to a USB stick that he tucks into his pocket, and reminds us that the yearbook goes to the printer tomorrow.

  We exhale — a big, collective sigh of struggle and sorrow.

  One week later, I get an email telling me that the yearbooks will be delivered to our formal venue that afternoon, the day before the big night. I take the car to greet it, like it’s a long-lost friend I’m desperate to see. And when I open the first box, pick up a book and flip through it, everything just comes flooding back: forty weeks of teenage angst, thirteen missed soccer games, eleven assignments, seven stressful HSC exams, three late-round university applications and no St Jerome Medal.

  Oh, and one epic task that cemented a now-unbreakable bond between five strangers who became four friends and a memory.

  The yearbook committee had started out as a random bunch of people who walked the same halls, sat the same exams, shared the ordinary school experiences that became extraordinary as we learnt to look beyond one another’s façade, Facebook profile picture, group of friends. Who knew that after all those meetings, the five of us would not only accomplish what we set out to do, but become better people just by knowing and learning from each other?

  Charlie: the feisty snob with a big heart, who taught us all not to accept the limitations placed upon our lives.

  Tammi: the girl who started out as a victim, but who eventually taught us to follow your gut and not let anyone else get in the way of what you want.

  Matty: the guy w
ho single-handedly kept his mum afloat, and defied all the negative stereotypes about our generation, and never said a word about it.

  And Gillian: the girl who had so little love and still gave better than she got.

  I’ve been in a lot of teams in my lifetime: scout teams, soccer teams, debating teams, track teams. But this team is the one that has found a permanent place in my heart. If I ever forget how to be a good guy and how to treat my fellow man, then I know that their experiences will remind me.

  As we evolve from children to adults, our outlooks change. Goal posts shift, strategies are altered, and the game gets a lot more demanding than we ever imagined it could be. And life suddenly becomes as unpredictable as a sand dune — one wrong choice and everything falls apart, drags you under.

  Mrs H once said that we should leave the world better than when we entered it. At the time, I didn’t understand what she meant. But this year, in Studies of Religion, I learnt about the apostle Paul, who once wrote that we could have great knowledge and a faith that could move mountains, but if we didn’t have love, then we were nothing. And if we speak without love, then what we say is just noise. Sure, his exact words were ‘booming gongs and clanging cymbals’, but it’s all noise, white noise.

  St Paul could probably say a lot about noise. And faith that could move mountains. In fact, he was so dedicated to his Jewish faith that he made a mission of stoning Christians, until God Himself asked him what the go was with all the persecution, and he stopped letting the noise in his head affect the love in his heart.

  That’s the thing about choices. They’re an act of knowledge, of faith, of love. It’s how we make them that sets us apart, because every single day, worlds are colliding, and our choices shape so much more than just our own story. And if we want to change this world for the better, then we must be the best possible version of ourselves, because who we are in each moment is our gift to the universe. This is what the present is: when the sum of one person’s past meets a world’s collective future.

  I’ve spent so much of my high-school life listening to noise. And maybe there’ll more of it in my future. But, like St Paul, I’ve had a little change of heart. He owed his to the voice of God, but I owe mine to the yearbook committee. And I’m so thankful.

  Notes from the Wish Dish

  Hey Tammi,

  I thought you were a massive doormat when I met you. I hate girls who are like that because, to me, they have not made anything of the rights they have been granted by women who protested and burnt bras and fought for us. You always seemed so afraid to me. Afraid of David, afraid of Lauren, afraid of disappointing everyone. Like you didn’t see the bigger picture. But over the last few months, I really got to see that you are not a doormat. You were just different to me. It must have been hard realising that the guy you liked for ages wasn’t the person that you thought, and I bet it takes real character to still accept a person who has a lot of flaws. The thing about me is that I always go in guns blazing. I fight first, talk later. But you let people get things off their chest, be themselves and you still do your own thing on the downlow. You are the embodiment of that saying ‘live and let live’. I think that is a great quality to have, and I think the way that you give everyone the benefit of the doubt — and the calm way you approach everything — will make you an awesome police officer. Good luck in the HSC.

  Charlie

  PS Just quietly, I think in a few years’ time you will look back and be glad you were the one to break it off with a guy who goes by DeLooka instead of DeLuca on the net. Trust me.

  Charlie,

  I didn’t have friends when I started here two years ago. My friends were rhythms and beats and melodies. But even though I was sort of alone, I was still happy. Then when I started year 12, cracks started appearing. And suddenly the music wasn’t enough to keep me going.

  And then this chick from Melbourne with an attitude and another chick who I thought was just a prissy pollie’s kid show up and start asking favours of me, and changed everything. These two girls were like salt and pepper — so different, but they each had so much flavour. You were feisty and in control and Gillian was happy-go-lucky (or whatever the expression is). You two have balanced everything out for me, and I finally feel like I have some support, even though I have no solid answers about anything. I am so thankful to you both for holding me up. Life just tastes so much better with you guys around.

  Keep rocking,

  Matty

  PS: Damn, I was supposed to wish you good luck in the HSC as well. But I don’t think you need it. The HSC should be afraid of you killing it. I know you will.

  PPS: Please stay here. I know I’m not the only guy who thinks you should ;)

  Gillian,

  Here’s a good-luck note for your HSC! I have been following your blog and I am amazed at how much it has grown. It’s like, WOW, you took something so basic that we all use (the internet) and basically started a business on it. You will make a great business woman one day.

  Also, while I am writing this, I want to say I’m sorry about everything. I know we stuffed up. We were trying to be your friends when Sylvana moved away, but then Lauren got so upset about that night, and when she gets an idea in her head . . .

  You know what? I shouldn’t blame everything on her. I have a role to play in this as well. But I am trying. I have never been brave. It’s funny, because I really want to be a police officer. But I was never brave enough to stand up to Lauren, or David, or my dad. And it’s strange because these are the people I love more than anything — and I should be able to be honest with them. Maybe that’s why I can be such a moll to complete strangers, or people who are not close to me, like you.

  Anyway, I can’t stop thinking about that night at the party. You were the first person in my life to tell me that I should be loved unconditionally, and you made me realise that every person who meant something to me had conditions for how I should be. I was just living up to someone else’s ideals.

  But that’s not me any more; I am going to be different. I will still love those people, but I won’t let them walk over me. Thank you for teaching me more than any textbook ever could. David will probably have a massive party when the HSC is over (he has been talking about it for ages *rolls eyes*). You should definitely come with Matty and Charlie, and this time I will be proud to call you guys friends.

  From Tammi

  To Matty,

  It feels weird writing a note to a guy. Especially if you’ve hardly ever spoken to him. But I thought this was a cool idea and I am kind of surprised at how the whole yearbook thing turned out, so I don’t really mind doing it. I guess I just wanted to say I’m sorry I never really got to know you over the last two years. As the school captain I should have made you feel more welcome, done more beyond the school tour I gave you on your first day, the one that Mrs H made me do. I guess I always thought you were a bit of a loner. You hung out by yourself all the time, with your headphones on, and when the teachers didn’t notice you had that black hoodie on top of your blazer, which made me (and a lot of other people) think you were strange. Weren’t you ever hot in there?

  But now I see you were just . . . above it all. And, dude, I really like that about you. I like that you do your own thing, and don’t care what anyone thinks. You just seem to see beyond everything . . . and stay away from drama. And the photos you’ve been taking for the yearbook have been pretty cool too.

  Anyway, I know you don’t want to go to uni, but I really want to wish you the best for the HSC. The last year has taught me that our biggest dreams need back-up plans, so study hard, in case the music thing doesn’t pan out. But I bet it will, because I have never met anyone more hard-working. I bet you will go on to manage some global superstars. If you ever meet Taylor Swift, can you call me? It would be good to see her legs in real life.

  From Ryan

  Dear Ryan,

  I know it probably didn’t feel like it this year, but I think you did good. Sure, the soccer thin
g is still uncertain at the moment, but I hope you learnt something about yourself this year. And I hope it is the same thing that I learnt about you. You see, so many people in the grade thought you got school captain because you were popular and smart and good at sports, and we didn’t think you deserved it. You just stayed in your bubble with your (now ex-) girlfriend and your crew. You hardly spoke to any of us.

  But over the last year, I was really impressed with you and the way you handled your friends. I know you can’t change people, but I could see that you were trying to help them to see the light. Good on you for trying, but people grow up in their own time.

  Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that I think you are an amazing leader. If you think back to our first meetings, you had a bunch of people who either hated each other’s guts or had never even spoken to each other, that you had to nudge into doing tasks they didn’t want to do. And yet you never let any of us get out of the work, and we ended up making a pretty good yearbook, one that I am super proud of. I can’t wait to see it in print. What I am trying to say is that you are a good leader. One who really gets in the thick of it. I honestly admire that about you, and I can see why Coach still wanted you to go to soccer games and stuff. You have that quality that makes people listen, learn and want to do better. Just because you can’t kick goals, doesn’t mean you won’t motivate people to kick theirs. I bet that will be just as rewarding, and I wish you all the best for the HSC, and for your future.

  From Gillian ☺

  PS Sorry I wrote a lot. All that blogging practice!

  Acknowledgements

  I’m so blessed to be able to do what I love and call it work, but I am even more blessed because of the stellar support system that has made this book a reality.

  Thank you —

  Selwa Anthony and Drew Keys, for the encouragement and guidance.