Jesus.
The thought of getting on the plane is hard enough without being close enough to smell the raspberry smeared on her lips.
‘Um …’ I begin, already feeling weak as piss for what I’m about to say. ‘I … I better go. I’ve still gotta finish packing and the drive up to Sydney tomorrow’s gonna be a bitch. Dad reckons we’re heading off at like 6 am, so …’
‘So. This is it then. Go.’
Another step closer.
‘Yeah.’ My hand finds her waist. ‘My official goodbye, as requested.’
‘Nup. Changed my mind. Don’t want one.’
‘We’ll still talk.’
‘Yeah … until we don’t.’
‘You planning on deleting me from your phone? Hey, maybe we really will bump into each other again. Someplace exotic. Or back here, like the first time. Or in the middle somewhere.’
‘The middle, huh?’ She nods. ‘I was thinking and … well, I think you need something to remind you that things weren’t so bad here.’
‘Oh yeah?’
She laces her fingers through mine and we melt into a kiss so soft it’s like she’s trying to savour every detail of my mouth.
‘Hmm, I see your point, Chicken Girl, I do, but I think my memory already needs jogging.’
‘You’re very forgetful, Mr Dark. Ever thought of getting your head checked?’
‘Only every day. Why do I like Durnan again?’
My heart flip-flops as she twirls over to the bed, edges onto one side of the mattress, and gestures for me to lie down beside her. My body’s curled up next to hers, and our T-shirts and jeans and Cons twist around each other like pretzels.
I don’t know how long we lie like that; wound into one. Eventually our lips part, breath punctured, but Layla doesn’t uncurl herself from the nook she’s made her own.
Then, later, a whisper. ‘Don’t freak out,’ she tells me, ‘but I think you’ve got part of my heart now.’
Too late.
Freak-out commenced.
‘Just a part?’ I want to make this easier, I want to hear her laugh — and she does — because I have no idea what I’m supposed to say next.
‘Yes, just a part. Greedy.’
Pause. ‘So … like your right ventricle? Or your aorta?’
Layla snorts. Success again. ‘You dag, I take back everything.’ But she wriggles in closer and her fingers don’t unlock from mine.
‘Same though,’ I tell her.
‘Same what?’
‘Just … same. All of it.’
‘I don’t want to do this.’
Another pause. ‘Same. Same.’
We say goodbye in her bedroom, in the hallway, on the veranda, then side by side on the gutter outside her house. Her neighbours are washing their ute two doors down and the foamy water streams along the kerb and around our sneakers.
I listen to Layla tell me she’ll miss me just a little as she presses her heels down on the white bubbles.
It’s happened. We’re out of goodbyes. I pull her in and she wraps around me like a vine. Neither of us seems to know how to end it so the hug goes for way too long yet it’s somehow still not even close to being long enough.
Eventually we unlace our bodies. Her fingertips find mine again, brushing my palms and the backs of my hands for the shortest of moments. This time when we pull away, it sticks. I leave her alone in the soapy suds as I trudge off down the street.
When I look back, she’s halfway up the lawn and headed for her front door. I wait a second. She turns around and our eyes meet. Her lips crease into a smirk and I can almost hear her voice in my head. Piss off then, Mr Dark.
Layla
Milo: Got to the airport without the family killing each other
Layla: Hey, b’day boy. Missing me already, huh? PS: Fine, you got me, I miss you too. PPS: Good day so far?
* * *
I’ve been sitting on the grass in front of Mum’s grave for a few minutes when the sky opens. Rain falls, sparse and sharp at first, before filling the air with fat droplets. Don’t complain, it’s good for the farmers, I can almost hear Mum saying as I hurry to my feet and fumble with my umbrella.
I swipe at my hair; it’s already saturated. The few people straggling at nearby graves run for the car park, their feet skidding across the manicured lawns.
In a few minutes I will be alone in a cemetery.
You’d think after five years of avoiding coming here I’d have given it some thought, but I’m unsure about what I’m supposed to do. I stare at the plaque on the grave again. Mum’s name is etched in the bronze: Cate Montgomery. She always thought Catherine sounded too posh for her; I thought it was perfect.
My eyes trace over the words on her stone: Loving Wife, Mother and Friend.
I try not to take in the hundreds, maybe thousands, of other graves lined up in every direction around me.
Nothing prepares you for being surrounded by death.
I reach into my pocket, hand closing around my phone. Then I remember: Milo really is going. There will be no last-minute freakouts, no showing up at Shirin’s telling me he can’t go through with it. He’s already at the airport, about to do the biggest thing of his life, all on his own.
I have to do the same.
I slip the phone back into my pocket, then crouch down and rest my palm on the uneven stone.
‘Hey.’
I’m not expecting a reply, but the clang of silence still hurts.
The rain hits harder, turning the grass and dirt at my feet to mud. I stare at her name again, too choked up now to even whisper. Maybe she can read minds … well, hopefully just in this moment.
So, I’m here. Hi, Mum. Hey. Sorry it took so long. My feet slip in the sludge. Crap! Sorry. Um … what’s new? Actually, no, that’s dumb, forget that. Okay, now I’m just a dork standing by herself in a cemetery in the rain. The thing is … I really am sorry. I should’ve come earlier. You think that too, right? But I do love you, more than anyone, and nothing will ever change that, and I guess I kinda hoped you already knew it. I know, I know … I’m lazy.
A bolt of lightning cracks through the sky.
I shriek and topple backwards into the mud.
A laugh sneaks out. Then another. This would only happen to me. Wet through to the skin, I struggle to my feet then slog through the muck until I’m at the edge of her gravestone.
Fine, I was too scared to see all this again. I know I should’ve come when Dad did … or when he stopped coming. I’ve just been trying to be strong, like you. All I want is to be someone you’d be proud of …
I pull the umbrella further over me as the rain buckets down. I shake my head at the absurdity of it all.
I must look like a friggin’ drowned rat now … Mum, are you mad? Actually, don’t tell me. We’ll just pretend everything’s perfect — like that time I went to Michael Hadid’s house party when you thought I was going to a sleepover at Jill’s. You knew that one, right?
Thunder rumbles, so heavy and deep it sounds like the sky’s about to cave in on itself.
I don’t know what else … oh, I walk dogs now — get paid and stuff. Turns out it’s a real job. Who knew, right? And Dad’s trying. Well, he’s away a lot still, but he’s starting to. His girlfriend is great. You’d like her. Heaps, I think. Is that weird? Probably. Sorry … again.
By the way, you’re stuck with me ’cos I’m going to keep coming back here, if that’s alright with you. ’Cos I hate that I let you down every day I stayed away.
A tear squeezes out.
Then another.
And I’ve missed you every day.
Then another tear, until they’re mixing with the rain and flowing down my cheeks. As I cry, I imagine her watching me from wherever she is — this silly sight of me alone in the pouring rain in the middle of a cemetery — and a muffled little snort of laughter slips out as I wonder if she really is sipping on a strawberry milkshake. I’ve thought it so many times I’ve almost convinced
myself it’s true.
I wipe at my nose with the back of my hand as salt from my tears licks at my lips. This is so gross. Oh, Mum, I bet you’re thinking, pull it together, Layla, you’re making me look bad in front of my friends.
The sky cracks again, causing me to jump, and a fresh shower of rain pours down. In the distance, a row of trees slope to one side in the wind. I fiddle with my bracelet from Milo, spinning it around my wrist.
I kissed someone, Mum — don’t tease me — and it was kind of amazing, but then it was also kind of a disaster. He left Durnan today, so that’s that, I guess. Unless he comes back, but I don’t think he’ll come back.
Fine. You win. It was Milo. I know! But don’t worry, things’ll be okay for me here. Max the dog’s got me. And I’m hanging with Amvi Prashad again — remember her? I think she used to eat sand at preschool.
I crack up at the memory, then scan the cemetery again, for once hoping I’m still alone.
Yeah, Durnan’s good. I’ve got this feeling like … well, like anything’s possible. Probably sounds stupid, but you won’t tell anyone, right? Who am I kidding? You were always a blabbermouth. Guess I know where I got that from, hey?
A gust of wind whips my umbrella inside out. I yell in protest, but my words get snatched up in the swirling storm as I battle to hold onto the handle. The umbrella sways, dancing in the sky, refusing to follow orders. An extra strong gust comes through and the umbrella snaps, wires jutting in every direction. I wrestle with it against the wind, laughing ’til my cheeks ache.
Milo
Layla: Sorry, big day. You still there?
Milo: Yeah, boarding soon tho. You OK?
Layla: I’m great. Hey, I’ve decided to rate us 4 stars out of 5
Milo: No final star? Brutal
Layla: Always room for improvement
Layla: You can go to Hollywood and find me one
Milo: Deal
Layla: I’ll meet you on the Walk of Fame. PS: Fine, 4.5 stars. PPS: Rule 5 alert. PPPS: You still owe me a blimp!
Milo: The blimp was mine! And stuff the rules
Milo: Hey Lay, they’re calling my flight so I’ve gotta run. Bye again, Chicken Girl
Layla: Til we meet in the middle, jerkface. It’s sure been something
* * *
My stomach hasn’t stopped churning at the thought of leaving Durnan. It churned all the time Mum stood next to me in the check-in line, as I dragged myself through the gate for boarding, as I crammed my backpack into the overhead luggage compartment. Fine … fine! My stomach hasn’t stopped churning at the thought of leaving her.
Shaking my head as I suss out the movie selection on the flight, I tell myself to get over it. Harden up. Remember why I’m doing this.
Why am I doing this?
I pull down my tray table, and rip open the packet of chocolate-coated almonds Mum bought me for the trip — a substitute for no birthday cake. I pop one in my mouth and crunch through it. Better than grinding my teeth down to chalky dust.
Jesus. I’m going overseas for the first time ever. This is what I wanted. Want. I should be thinking of London and travel and adventures — adventures I can’t even begin to imagine. I shouldn’t be thinking of her. Not Layla. Not now.
Thousands of girls, she teased me. Yeah, right.
The woman to my right yawns, then takes my armrest hostage, her enormous fluffy jumper prickling against my bare arms.
Elbows pinned to my sides, I check my phone. There are no new messages. Just the final goodbye from Layla. I read it again. My stomach whips and I try to convince myself it’s due to the old man spluttering phlegm into his fist to my left and the twenty-three-hour flight in my ridiculously near future, but I don’t even believe my own bullshit any more. Okay, the old guy’s phlegm isn’t helping.
It’s like my brain doesn’t get that Layla and I were floating together in limbo.
Because we weren’t together. Not together-together. Not in a way that anyone else in Durnan will ever gossip about over bunches of kale at the Saturday farmers’ market. There’s no Layla loves Milo carving on the eucalyptus tree at the river. We never walked down the main street holding hands, or stuck our tongues down each other’s throats in the back row at the cinema before the lights even went down. We never won an award at the Year 12 formal telling us we were destined to be married forever.
As far as everyone in Durnan thinks, Layla and I mean nothing to each other.
Except I don’t give a stuff about what everyone in Durnan thinks.
I pop another chocolate-coated almond in my mouth and plug in my earphones, hoping I can drown her out with a song.
For the next five minutes and four seconds, my mind gets stuck on a loop of the moments in the past month leading up to this one.
Mum not letting me out of her sight for two days after I told her about London.
Dad ripping my map in half, then taping it back together the next day like nothing had happened.
Trent barrelling into my room every day to see if I was up for another marathon video-game session.
Then the six-hour drive this morning to Sydney International Airport, where the four of us took turns attempting small talk about what was waiting for me and what was to come for them.
At the gate, Mum cried and held me close when I told her I’d miss her, causing a scene in front of the other passengers like I knew she would. She begged me to message her every day so she knows I’ve not been stabbed and left to die in front of Westminster Abbey. After shouting her two coffees and a choc-chip muffin, I negotiated her down to three times a week with a face-to-face video chat thrown in once a fortnight — and told her to lay off watching the nightly news and gruesome detective shows.
Always one to keep up appearances, even in Sydney where he knows a whopping zero people, Dad told me he was proud of me for taking a risk, like this was his plan for me all along. He fidgeted with the locks on my backpack, telling me a crook could rip them right off and I should have bought the more expensive ones at the travel store, then he ruffled my hair before making a final dig while Mum was in the bathroom. Something about hoping I’d ‘find myself’ overseas like Paul Chamberlain’s daughter did before she studied medicine. Gritting my teeth, I let his words wash around me rather than absorbing them into my skin.
Trent gave me a quick hug and a few slaps on the back, a crooked smile and a filthy joke to finish before I walked through the gate: a quiet understanding that we’re all good.
‘Pray for me, bro,’ Trent muttered, gesturing to Mum and Dad bickering behind us.
I laughed out loud then, as I do now thinking about it.
The plane rumbles to life and the woman next to me gasps in surprise. I tug at my seatbelt to check it’s tight enough.
‘Sir, please put up your tray table.’ A beaming flight attendant leans towards me, almost choking me in a cloud of flowery perfume. ‘And turn off all electronic devices — we’re preparing for take-off.’
‘Sorry,’ I say, looking down at my phone. ‘One sec.’
Layla’s message is still on the screen: Til we meet in the middle, jerkface.
I type out a text — another goodbye, more personal jokes, a try-hard attempt to prove how much I’ll miss her, miss whatever the hell that was. Music pounds in my ears as my thumb lingers over the message, aching to link us one more time. But I just stare at the words. I stare at the words until the man beside me sneezes and I look up, catching a hint of blue fading into the grey clouds through the tiny window.
Someone taps me on the shoulder. ‘Sir, I said it’s time to put up your tray table and turn off your phone,’ the attendant says in her sugary voice. ‘Shall we make everyone on the plane wait? Or are you ready to join us for the flight to London?’
Cheeks reddening, my thumb trembles over the send button. But then my eye catches Layla’s words again: It’s sure been something
I swallow.
Then I delete my unfinished text, watching the letters disappear one b
y one until there’s nothing left but a flashing cursor. Everything that can be said has been said.
‘Yeah,’ I tell the attendant, turning off my phone so I can’t re-type the message. ‘I’m ready.’
If, like Layla, you would like to chat with someone, you can get in touch with one of these wonderful organisations:
BeyondBlue: 1300 22 4636 and beyondblue.org.au
headspace: 1800 650 890 and headspace.org.au
Kids Helpline: 1800 55 1800 and kidshelpline.com.au
Relationships Australia: 1300 364 277 and relationships.org.au
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First, a big thanks-a-million to the HarperCollins dream team: Lisa Berryman, Cristina Cappelluto, Eve Tonelli, Nicola O’Shea, Pam Dunne, Michelle Weisz, Holly Frendo, Bianca Fazzalaro, Jacqui Barton, Hazel Lam and Helen Littleton (for opening the door). Your hard work, vision and kindness continues to amaze me year after year.
Here’s looking at JT: the big beautiful brains behind the title Remind Me How This Ends. I’m grateful every day that I signed up to that one wrong university subject because it led me to you.
To my darling friends and family, especially McMills FamBam: thank you for always being there with support, love and Beau-man cuddles. Little Nettie and Big Al, I wouldn’t have limped over the finish line without your cheerleading. Special mentions also have to go to some of my sunniest word-wranglers — Kimberly Gillan, Simone McClenaughan, Rachael Craw, Ellie Marney, Rebecca James, Nicole Hayes, Trinity Doyle, Fleur Ferris, Erin Van Der Meer, Sam Faull, Holly Richards, Jeremy Lachlan, Sarah Ayoub, Allison Tait, Lauren Sams and Will Kostakis — for always knowing what to say to help me find the light. Also a shout-out to Kate Forsyth, Charlotte Wood and Ali Manning for helping me to lean into this experience in a new way.
Finally, to my readers: thank you for letting me share my imagination with you — before, now and always. Here’s to many more adventures together.
Remind Me How This Ends Page 23