‘Where’s my t-shirt?’ said Jessie. ‘I took it off right here last night when I put on my PJs.’ She looked down at a pile of shoes and hats on Abby’s floor.
‘Maybe it’s over there.’ I pointed to our scrapbook, which was lying open on desk. ‘See? Underneath?’
‘Yep, got it,’ said Jessie. ‘Thanks.’
‘Pass me the book,’ said Buzz. ‘I want to see it.’ I picked it up and gave it to her.
‘You know,’ she began, thumbing through the pages carelessly, ‘I think we should maybe ask Stella to be one of the Smart Girls.’
‘That’s a great idea,’ agreed Jessie.
‘Oh,’ I said. But nothing else came out. My legs forgot they were supposed to be helping me pull on my jeans.
‘Hmmm,’ I said. I had to say something, and I was deliberately trying not to react. At least, not on the outside. Inside, my heart was thumping and my brain was churning. And then I had a plan. I smiled. A big, bright grin. ‘Actually, that’s a good idea.’
‘Do you think so?’ said Buzz. She sounded surprised. ‘Really?’
‘Well, maybe,’ I said. I was doing my best acting. Super Positive Abby—leaping tall buildings in a single bound. ‘I mean, she might enjoy it. She probably misses being in a club, now that she’s not with her friends. And they are such good friends, too. She’s always telling us how much she misses them.’ Secretly, I rolled my eyes. I was really tired of hearing about Stella’s amazing friends and how close they all were.
‘Do you think she was in a club in Sydney?’ Jessie asked.
‘I don’t think so ...’ said Buzz. Her voice trailed off and she looked thoughtful. ‘She’s not really the type. Actually, maybe she wouldn’t enjoy it. She might think it’s a bit, you know ...’
‘What?’ said Jessie, curious.
‘I don’t know,’ said Buzz. ‘Maybe a bit ... young?’ She looked at me with a funny face. A guilty face. ‘Not that I’m saying it is,’ she said quickly. ‘It’s just that, well, not everyone appreciates clubs and stuff like us.’
I nearly fell over. I was trying too hard not to breathe the most enormous sigh of relief ever. ‘Yeah,’ I said, trying to be cool and non-caring. ‘Not everyone likes clubs.’ I shrugged. ‘So, let’s not even tell her about it.’
‘I agree,’ said Buzz. She nodded. ‘Let’s not tell her. We’ll keep it to ourselves and not let her know.’
‘You’re right!’ nodded Jessie. ‘Anyway, we’d have to make more pages for the book and that would take a long time.’
‘But that doesn’t mean we won’t hang out with her,’ said Buzz. ‘We’ll still do that. We just won’t tell her about Smart Girls.’
‘Absolutely,’ I said, still trying to hold back the world’s biggest smile. ‘We’ll be nice to her. Like we have been. Kind, and all that. Mostly, anyway.’ I looked serious. ‘It’s the least we can do for someone new. But she won’t be one of our group. Anyway, she doesn’t really fit in. We’re still the three bestest, most totally awesome friends in the whole world.’ I let the smile go as far as it wanted to. Which was far. Everything was going to be okay.
‘Smart Girls stick together.’
Chapter 12
I was happy again. Mostly, anyway. Officially, the Smart Girls Club had moved off school grounds entirely. It made things easier.
‘So that we don’t make Stella feel uncomfortable,’ said Buzz. ‘We don’t want her to feel left out.’
I nodded my head with a concerned expression, so that it would be super obvious that we were only not telling Stella about Smart Girls for her own good. It was a subject that no one talked about.
Unlike the big subject that everyone was talking about.
High school.
Kangaroo Valley had no high school of its own, but it was stuck almost exactly in the middle of two bigger, high-school-filled towns. It meant Valley kids either went west on one school bus, or east on the other school bus when they got to Year Seven. Who was going where was always a massive topic of conversation for pretty much most of the senior class. To make it even more complicated, there were at least nine high schools that Kangaroo Valley kids could choose from.
‘I’m just so sick of the question,’ complained Buzz. It was the end of first term and she was sitting at the Year Six seats with her feet up on the table as she filed her nails. ‘I mean, do you think it’s even possible to get through Year Six without someone asking you, “Do you know which school you’re going to next year?’’’ She put on a silly voice and tossed her head around.
‘I know,’ said Stella. She rolled her eyes. ‘I mean, why is everyone so interested? I’m going to Chrys. Deal with it.’
‘You mean St Chrysostum School?’ I said. ‘That one with the red-and-grey uniforms?’
‘Yeah. But—’ Stella giggled at me. ‘That sounds so formal. Everyone just calls it Chrys, don’t they?’ She looked over at Buzz. ‘Bianca, you know. I’m right, aren’t I?’
Buzz nodded grandly. ‘Everyone calls it Chrys,’ she said.
But I wasn’t listening anymore. Instead, my face was growing a smile that was getting bigger and bigger.
‘Did you just call her Bianca?’ I gave Stella an incredulous face and began to laugh. ‘Seriously? I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone call her Bianca.’ I looked at Jessie. ‘Only her mum calls her Bianca. That’s so funny.’
I laughed, then snorted and my drink came out of my nose a little bit, so I laughed even more. Sam slapped me on the back, Ollie just about fell off his chair, and then Jessie began to giggle as well, holding up her hand to cover her mouth and making little ‘he-he-he’ noises.
But Stella and Buzz weren’t laughing.
Instead they were sitting still—stiff and offended.
‘It’s just my name,’ Buzz said. She looked hurt.
‘I think it’s a really nice name,’ said Stella comfortingly, taking her arm and patting it. ‘It’s beautiful. And it really suits you. Don’t worry about them.’
My face went red and the snorting stopped. Beside me I could feel Sam trying to control his breathing.
‘I wasn’t laughing at your name, Buzz,’ I said. ‘It’s just so unusual to hear someone say, “Bianca”, out loud. Here at school! I mean, you get it, right?’
Buzz sniffed. ‘Yeah, but it’s mean to laugh.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, I like my name.’ She turned to Stella. ‘Wanna go to the loo?’
‘Sure,’ said Stella. And the two of them stood up, turned their backs to us and headed off to the toilets without even looking back.
‘Don’t worry, Ab,’ said Jessie. Her face looked red too. ‘You didn’t mean it. She’ll get over it.’
‘But it was funny, wasn’t it?’ I made a face towards Buzz and Stella’s backs, disappearing out of view. ‘I’m not crazy, right? You thought it was funny too, didn’t you? I mean, you were laughing.’
‘What are you worried about?’ said Sam. ‘It’s just a stupid name. I’ll call her Buzzy Bee when she gets back. Just to annoy her.’
‘Don’t!’ cried Jessie, hitting him playfully. ‘That’s just mean.’
‘Buzzy Bee. Jessie J,’ said Ollie. ‘Hey, that actually suits you.’ And he smiled at Jessie who giggled back and then immediately turned a bright shade of pink.
‘You guys! Stop. Just forget it, okay?’ I let out a deep breath. ‘It’s over. Let’s go back to what we were talking about before Buzz got all mad. Is anyone else going to St Chrysost ... I mean, Chrys?’
It turned out that both Ollie and Sam’s parents had applied for Chrys. Derrick Banks was heading to St John’s School in the other direction, and Kye Hamilton and two other boys were going to Bommo Public. No one was heading to the really expensive school, Baker Secondary College. I could understand why. Who had that kind of money around here? Except maybe Buzz’s mum and dad.
‘You know h
ow they wear those really long skirts at Chrys?’ said Jessie. ‘I’ve heard that the girls wear their pyjamas underneath them when it’s winter. Do you think it’s true?’
I snorted. ‘I doubt it. They’re pretty fussy about their uniform. I don’t think you’d be able to turn up with flannelette jammie pants underneath. Someone would notice.’
‘You’re probably right,’ said Jessie. ‘I kind of wish I was going there. But I don’t know yet. I think Mum put in the application. But I might also be going to Bowral High. It depends.’ She shrugged.
Something was niggling me. And then it became clear. I shook my head. ‘We should all be going to the same school,’ I said. I pounded my fists against my legs in a thinking kind of way. They left red marks that faded, so I did it again. ‘Seriously, the three of us girls should go to the same place. Or at least in the same direction. It would be terrible if we weren’t even on the same bus together.’
‘You’re totally right!’ said Jessie. ‘What if Buzz and I were on one bus and you were on another?’ Her eyes went big. ‘It would be terrible!’
‘Well, that’s it. We’ve got to organise it,’ I said. I shrugged. It was obvious. ‘You, me and Buzz have to get into the same school. There’s no other option. Even if she is mad because I laughed at her name.’
Buzz and Stella came back eventually and things went back to nearly normal. Basically, whenever Stella called her ‘Bianca’, I tried not to laugh—although I did sometimes have to turn my face away to hide a smile, as it sounded so ridiculous. But after a while, I stopped thinking about it at all because the issue of high school just wouldn’t go away.
To be totally honest, the whole conversation with Buzz and Stella had caught me by surprise. ‘Which high school?’ wasn’t even a question in my house (and it wasn’t because I knew where I was headed). It was more because no one had actually thought about it.
At least, if they had, they hadn’t told me.
I’ll have to ask Mum when she gets back from work, I thought as I got on the bus home. But then I got totally engrossed in my library book—the latest one in a new series that Mrs Nickell, our librarian, had bought specifically for me. I loved the first book so much that I had been pestering her to get the sequel since, like, day one of Year Six. I almost forgot to get off the bus altogether because I was in the middle of the near-death-by-dragon scene and I hadn’t quite gotten to the miraculous escape bit yet. I had sesame seed slice for afternoon tea and mucked around with Ziggy, followed by an extra-long singing practice because I really, really loved the new piece Francesca had given me the week before. Then it was time for dinner and homework and some extra study and more reading. It wasn’t until nearly nine o’clock, when I could hear Mum down the hall distractedly trying to prise Miles away from his Lego and get him into bed, that I finally remembered to ask.
‘Mum! I forgot. Which high school am I going to?’ I yelled from my bedroom.
‘What?’ she yelled back. ‘Miles. Come on! You can do that tomorrow.’ There were footsteps and then she stuck her head in my doorway. ‘Sorry, darling, what did you say?’
‘I asked, do you know what high school I’m going to?’ I repeated. I put down my book. The dragon was nearly defeated. ‘Like, am I going to a public one or a private one? And where?’
‘Miles!’ Mum stepped back into the hallway. ‘Okay. Good. I’ll be there in a minute to read to you. No. Into bed! B. E. D!’ She looked back at me, distracted, like she was trying to focus. ‘High school? Are people thinking about that already?’ She sighed. ‘Life gets busy.’
‘It’s just that everyone says they’ve already applied for Chrys,’ I explained. ‘And Jessie and Buzz and I think we should all go to the same school.’
‘Chrys?’ said Mum, like she didn’t understand the word.
‘St Chrysostum. You know, the grey-and-red uniforms. In the Highlands, up the mountain.’
‘Oh, right.’ Mum looked puzzled. ‘They call it Chrys?’
‘Yep. Everyone does.’ I shook my head and made a face like, I’ll never understand people.
‘Okay.’ Mum took a big breath, kicked away a small pile of blocks that Miles had left in the hallway and smoothed down her op-shop dress. ‘So, tomorrow, remind me and I’ll look at it for you. We’ll get it sorted out after the holidays for sure. I’ve just got too much to do for camping to really think about it yet.’
Chapter 13
It was autumn holidays—not too hot, not too cold. Just right for camping. And camping always meant the peninsula. And the Wilsons.
The Wilsons lived about an hour-and-a-half away from us, up on the Highlands. They were Mum’s friends from her ancient past at university. It was Rosie Wilson who was Mum’s friend, although she wasn’t a Wilson then. It was when Rosie married Dave Wilson that the whole annual camping thing started.
Don’t get me wrong, I loved camping. We had the coolest tents that belonged to Dad’s family when he was a kid. They’re so old and have all this history in them (plus a few patches from the time Miles crashed his bike into the tent and ripped the side). Nothing got wasted in our family.
We also didn’t just go to the regular campsites and caravan parks. Mum said they were just full of noisy tourists, who made even more mess and litter when they were away than when they were at home—which was saying a lot. We went to the campsites where you had to park and walk to a spot ages away, while carrying all your stuff. The toilet blocks were tiny and there was no hot water or power. But we didn’t care. As Dad said, we were there to camp, not to transfer our kitchen a hundred kilometres down the road.
We usually stayed for a week—we cooked over the fire, went for bushwalks, told ghost stories at night and swam in the surf every day. Well, at least the kids did—Mum said ‘it’s too cold,’ sometimes, but I couldn’t feel it. Everything was great.
All except for one thing.
Elizabeth.
Boring Beth.
She was the Wilsons’ daughter. They also had a son, Tye, about a year younger than Miles. They played and got on well—but Elizabeth and me? Well, that was another story.
Okay, yes, I was mean to her that one time, and I knew I shouldn’t have been. But there’s a part of me that still thought I wouldn’t have done it if she’d just been less boring. She was always so quiet and a bit nervous, and she read all the wrong kind of books (no adventures or dragons anywhere—blah). She liked to sit and think all the time and never wanted to play. Not like Buzz and Jessie.
When I was four, I invited Elizabeth to make sandcastles with me, but she said no. She just wanted to sit next to her mum the whole time. When we were six and I decided that maybe giving her a nickname might help, she just stared at me and then started crying.
‘She called me Lizzy. Waaah.’
Boring Beth had never wanted to climb trees or explore the rock caves or even pretend that a bunch of sticks were a wand. She hardly had anything to say to me before the Big Tree Disaster and she’s had almost nothing to say to me since.
The Big Tree Disaster happened when we were nine. I had decided that year that Elizabeth and I were going to be friends. When we arrived, I asked Mum if we could sleep in the same tent. I saw her make a face to Rosie and then the two of them were like, ‘Oh, sure. That would be great. A girls’ tent! Yay! You guys are going to have so much fun.’
I saw Elizabeth’s face but I ignored it. She’d see how fun things could be with me around, and then neither of us would be lonely. Everything would be alright from then on.
Mmm. Not quite.
I’d started off by asking her what she wanted to do, because obviously that’s polite and friendly, and I was determined to try. When she didn’t have any ideas except for reading a book that I didn’t want to read, I said we were going to go for a walk. She ran off to ask Dave and I could see he was kind of making her go.
‘It’ll be fun,’ I heard him s
ay, so I smiled widely at her in encouragement.
We had set off down one of the paths that ran kind of parallel to the beach, but into the bush, towards my favourite tree. It was huge, with big, hug-like branches and drippy vines that made it look like it had a beard.
‘We can make this our tree,’ I said to Elizabeth, feeling really generous. ‘We can have a hideout here. Like a clubhouse. Me and Buzz and Jessie always play these sorts of games.’
She looked at me with unenthusiastic eyes. ‘Why do you always tell me about Buzz and Jessie?’ she asked. ‘It’s always Buzz did this and Jessie did that. I’m not them,’ she said. ‘Anyway, I don’t really like clubs.’
I was shocked. ‘You don’t like clubs? But they’re the best. We should have a Spy On the Boys Club while we’re here. That’s super fun. I’ve done that with Buzz and Jessie too, spying on Ollie and Sam.’
Elizabeth’s eyebrows rose weakly. ‘Maybe a reading club?’
‘What’s wrong with spying on the boys?’
‘I don’t want to.’
‘But why not?’ I said, frustrated.
She shrugged and turned away, like she was going to go back to the tents.
‘No. Don’t go,’ I said. I was determined to make friends. This was going to work. ‘It can be a reading club, if you want.’
She turned back and her sandals made tiny clouds of dust.
‘Okay,’ she said.
‘But I’m the president,’ I said. ‘Because I’m four months older than you.’
‘Being older doesn’t mean anything,’ she said.
‘It does,’ I said. But I said it in a nice way, so she wouldn’t get upset. ‘It does with my best friends, Buzz and Jessie. It matters with them. We always make sure the oldest person is in charge.’
‘Being oldest doesn’t matter.’
I shrugged. ‘Okay, whatever.’ I walked around the other side of the tree. ‘Hey, do you want to climb the tree?’
‘I can’t climb trees,’ she said.
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