‘Actually,’ I say as we reach the kitchen, ‘I was … I was wondering if I could have that cooking lesson?’
‘Ah, of course you can,’ she says and she really does look pleased. It makes me relax.
‘Today I am making — we are making — pesto for pasta. It’s Archie’s favourite. He loves it so much he could eat it every night.’
It’s nice, being in the de Souza family kitchen, even though it’s a little weird that Archie’s not there. I wash basil leaves and then Archie’s mum shows me how to sprinkle salt over the garlic to make it easier to crush. I’m enjoying it so much that I almost forget about Archie. We’re up to toasting the pine nuts when I hear the front door open.
My heart thumps. The pine nuts sizzle. I forget to move them around the frying pan and Archie’s mum rescues them from burning by taking the pan off the flame.
I wish she could rescue me.
‘Mum! Rio bought the best PlayStation game! We’ve just been playing it and he’s let me borrow it for the night.’ Archie’s voice flies down the hallway. ‘He ordered it over the net and I so want it. I promise I will wash your car.’ There’s a pause as though Archie is considering something as he walks towards the kitchen. ‘I’ll wash Dad’s too,’ he adds and his mum smiles at me and shakes her head.
‘He never does it properly, he always misses spots,’ she whispers, like it’s a secret just between the two of us. I try to smile back but I feel my lips wobble at the edges.
I hope he’s happy to see me.
‘I can put in half,’ Archie’s voice is closer now and it’s kind of funny how he’s negotiating with his mum even though she hasn’t said anything. ‘Or two-thirds if you … Edi! What are you doing here?’
His eyebrows lock together and his head jerks backwards, like he’s shocked.
I try to steady my heart.
Shocked doesn’t mean unhappy. Shocked doesn’t mean unhappy …
‘Archie, gentile,’ Archie’s mum says and she speaks Italian to him so I don’t get exactly what’s going on but I think it’s something to do with him being rude.
‘Sorry, Edi,’ he says. ‘I just … it’s just … I didn’t expect … a bit of a surprise.’ He toys with the PlayStation disc in his hand.
I breathe deeply and try to sound calm. ‘Your mum offered to give me a cooking lesson,’ I say.
He nods. I think he’s okay.
‘So, Edi,’ says Archie’s mum, as if there’s nothing awkward going on. ‘After that, all you have to do is put everything into a blender with a bit of olive oil and you’re done. You have all that?’
‘Yes. Thanks,’ I say. I pick up a dishcloth and I turn away from Archie and I’m about to wipe the bench like I would if I was cooking at home, but my hand is trembling. I can feel Archie’s eyes on me and I really don’t know if he’s okay with me being here.
Archie’s mum shakes her head like I shouldn’t even think of helping her tidy up and takes the dishcloth from me. Then she goes to the fridge, gets out a plate of chopped fruit, hands it to Archie and shoos us out of the kitchen.
I follow Archie into the lounge room, even though I’m really nervous about what he might say.
I sit on the couch. Archie doesn’t say anything. He walks straight over to the PlayStation and puts the disc in.
‘I hope you don’t mind that I came over,’ I say to his back.
Archie shrugs his shoulders. It’s not the reaction I was looking for.
The TV screen goes on and the PlayStation game loads. Archie walks back to the couch with the remote. He doesn’t sit very close to me.
‘It’s okay,’ he says. He presses play, which is really annoying. There’s a space-age warrior on screen. Archie makes him jump and run and collect points.
‘It’s just …’ I say and then stop.
Archie click, clicks. Every time he wins points, there’s loud music. I just sit there, feeling awkward.
‘Can you pause it?’ I ask.
Archie hits the pause button. Then he turns to me. ‘Anything else?’ he asks, and the way he says it brings a sting to my eyes. I blink and swallow. I feel like we’re in a fight and I don’t know how we got here.
‘It’s just … we don’t really spend much time together, do we? You know, like Leo and Hazel?’ My voice is wobbly.
Archie puts down the remote and shifts closer to me. It’s such a relief when he does that I have to bite my lip. I so don’t want to cry.
‘Like at school, you mean, Edi?’ His tone is softer. ‘At lunchtime?’ I think he feels bad for snapping at me before.
‘Yeah, partly,’ I say.
‘That’s because I play soccer. Leo doesn’t,’ Archie says and I can see him reaching for the remote like that explains everything and now he can go back to the game. But I really want him to understand, so I continue.
‘The thing is,’ I say, ‘maybe it would be a bit easier to get some time together if you didn’t play so much soccer,’ I say.
‘Oh,’ Archie says. ‘You don’t want me to play soccer at lunchtimes?’
‘No, I don’t mean that,’ I say quickly. ‘Just some of the time, so we can hang out together. If you want to, I mean.’
‘So you just want to hang out together a bit more, like Leo hangs out with Hazel, hey?’ he asks.
‘Yeah.’
‘Okay,’ he says and then he gets the cutest cheeky look on his face. ‘Leo’s not going to beat me.’
I shake my head and roll my eyes but I’m smiling. ‘It’s not a competition,’ I say and next thing I know Archie is tickling me and now I’m really laughing and I’m glad I came over, and I’m glad I said what I said. I think things are going to be even better between us from now on.
‘I can’t wait until the caravan meeting tonight,’ Jess whispers to me. ‘I’ve got so much to tell you all.’
I lean in as close to her as I can with Archie holding my left hand. We’re sitting on the slopes at lunchtime, with Hazel, Leo and Olympia sitting behind us. It’s a sunny day, not too hot and not too cold. No Eliza. Perfect!
‘Oooh,’ Archie says, raising my hand in the air. ‘Good save, Pezza.’ The soccer field is past the basketball courts, but he can obviously still make out what’s going on. I don’t mind.
There’s a tap on my shoulder and I turn around. When I do, Archie lets go of my hand.
It’s Olympia who tapped me. ‘I have some special news too,’ she says.
‘Oh good,’ I say, but Archie’s hand is out of reach now. Because of her. And he’s completely engrossed in that soccer game again.
‘Edi, let’s go shopping together and get stuff to make nachos,’ she says. ‘I have a feeling it’s going to be a long meeting,’ she says with a smile. ‘We’ll need sustenance.’
‘Yeah, okay,’ I reply. Mum and Dad are going to be out at some gala or something so it will be easy to use the kitchen without anyone breathing down our necks.
‘It’s actually okay sitting here,’ Archie says. I reach for his hand again and squeeze it. ‘You can really see the mistakes people are making. Like, Pezza should have passed to Nelson on that last …’
I squeeze his hand again, a bit harder.
‘Sorry. I mean it’s nice to sit with you, of course.’ He laughs, then lets go of my hand and puts his arm around my shoulder.
I lean into him. I wish lunchtime could go forever.
‘What are you up to on the weekend?’ I ask.
‘Er, I’ve got a bit on,’ he says. ‘Like Saturday and Sunday are chockers with soccer stuff and family stuff.’
That means I won’t get to see him till Monday. Unless … ‘What about tonight?’ I ask.
Jess gives me a look.
‘Nothing on tonight,’ Archie says. ‘Wanna hang out?’ He obviously hasn’t heard what Jess and Olympia have said about the caravan meeting. Lucky.
Archie has nothing on tonight. My parents are going to be out. We could be alone.
Jess’s look turns into a glare. Olympia prods the
base of my back with her foot.
I could go shopping and get stuff to make pesto. His favourite. He could eat it every night.
‘Why don’t you come over to my place?’ I say, ignoring the foot that’s now firmly implanted in my back. ‘Say, six?’
‘Cool,’ Archie says.
The bell goes and Archie and Leo go together to their lockers.
‘What about our caravan meeting?’ Hazel says as we walk up the breezeway towards our lockers.
‘I’ve been saving up all this stuff to tell you,’ Jess adds and she’s practically stomping. Olympia doesn’t say anything for a while. When she opens her mouth, I expect she’ll defend me.
‘I have something I want to talk about too,’ she says quietly.
I sigh. ‘Come on, guys,’ I say. ‘Don’t guilt me.’ They’re all being a bit OTT. It’s only a caravan meeting after all. ‘I had to do it. Archie and I have a chance to have the house to ourselves.’
Hazel shakes her head. ‘You guys can come over to my place,’ she says to Jess and Olympia.
‘There, that’s settled then,’ I say.
‘Yeah, I guess it is,’ Olympia says.
The three of them walk in front of me as if they’re annoyed.
Oh well, it’s no biggie. They’ll get over it. And I’ve got a whole night with Archie to look forward to!
I’m so running late. For starters, I forgot to get pine nuts at the supermarket and I had to go back and stand in the queue all over again.
As I walk home, I text Mum.
Okay if Archie comes over tonite? Have maths test on Monday.
Actually, that’s true. Archie is coming over and I do have a maths test on Monday. I get the text back straight away, which is good because my phone is nearly dead.
That’s impressive, Edi. V dedicated. Okay.
It was pretty smart to tell them Archie’s tutoring me. It’s definitely making things easy.
I rush home. Mum and Dad have already left. I stick my phone on the charger in my bedroom and go down to the kitchen. I put my iPod in the docking station, turn up my music really loud like I can never do when Mum and Dad are home, and start on the pesto.
It’s nice having the house all to myself, and knowing that Archie’s going to be here soon. I sing along to the music as I cook. The pesto looks okay. It’s not as green as Mrs de Souza’s. I’ll have to ask her about that next time I see her. I have a packet of gnocchi I bought from the supermarket. It’s not homemade, but I think it will be fine. I set the table so I won’t have much to do when Archie gets here. When it’s set, I stand back and look at it.
Soon, Archie will be sitting across the table from me. I’m going to ask about stuff. Stuff other than soccer. It will be good to find out what his favourite music is. I could even talk to him about PlayStation games. There’s a couple I like. Maybe he’ll like Guitar Hero too? I’ll tell him about my brother — how he lives in New York and he’s smart and funny. How he works really hard but he still finds time to Facebook and even Skype sometimes, though the time difference is a killer. So he’ll know more about me too. About what I’m like on the inside.
Then, after dinner, we’ll go into the caravan. Like we did last time, but this time it won’t be rushed. We’ll have some time in there. Together. I feel soft just thinking about it. All warm and melty.
He’s going to be here in fifteen minutes, and I haven’t even changed out of my school uniform yet.
I float upstairs to my bedroom. I think I’ll wear my yellow top. I lay it out on my bed with my pale blue jeans. I can still hear my music and I’m kind of dancing, swaying even, as I get dressed. When that’s done, I sit at my dressing table and brush my hair.
There’s a text message on my phone. I pull it out of the charger and check it. It’s from Archie.
Hey Edi. Soz but have family thing 2nite with the Gabriels so can’t come to yours. x
I put the phone down. I pick it up again, hoping the message has changed somehow.
It hasn’t.
I do it again.
It still hasn’t.
I put my head on the dressing table. The warm, melty feeling I had before has turned hard and cold in my chest. My heart is ice.
A family thing 2nite with the Gabriels …
I’m pretty sure that’s Alice’s family. Her surname is Gabriel. They’re old family friends of Archie’s family.
When I finally lift my head up, it’s heavy with thoughts that bump into each other.
I’ve made pesto. Specially.
The table is set.
The girls are at Hazel’s without me.
I’ve got nothing.
If Archie couldn’t come here, why doesn’t he ask me to go to his?
The last thought stays with me as I go downstairs to the kitchen. Maybe I can put the pesto into a container and take all the stuff over to Archie’s? He probably just hasn’t thought of it. That’s all. I text back.
How about I come to yours? I can bring stuff.
I stare at the kitchen table, the two table settings. And wait. It feels like ages before he texts me again.
Soz. Going to Alice’s. Mum says rude to take an extra. Gtg. Call u soon xx
I am an ‘extra’.
Alice is ‘family’.
I am alone.
It’s Friday night and everyone is doing something, except for me. Even Mum and Dad are out and they won’t be home until nine o’clock. Two and a half hours from now.
I switch off the iPod. I don’t feel like listening to music anymore. I sit down. Where I was going to sit opposite Archie. Which used to be opposite Jai.
I send the girls a group text.
Actually I might be able to come over after all. U there?
Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. Nothing.
I ring Hazel’s home number. Her mum answers. ‘The girls went for pizza and to see a movie. I’d say they’d be in the movie by now,’ she says.
I hang up. Jess said she had something to spill tonight. When it’s Jess’s turn, it’s always funny. She goes off track and leads us through all these funny little stories, and we have to keep bringing her back to the point.
I remember, suddenly, that Olympia had something to share as well. The thought catches inside my chest. I should have at least asked her what it was today.
I put my head into my hands. They’re probably all laughing. Sharing popcorn in the movie theatre. Or sharing stories afterwards. Life stories.
I’m here, all alone. Missing out. I’m missing out on the girls, on Archie, on everything.
I turn on the TV in the lounge room. There’s nothing good on. TV noises waft around me. I get my laptop and go on Facebook, but there’s no-one I want to talk to.
I stare out the window. There’s a hollow space inside me. Tears slide down my cheeks. There’s no-one to see them.
It’s 7 p.m. here. Which means it would be 5 a.m. in New York. Jai would be asleep.
I don’t care. I pick up my phone and dial. I imagine it ringing into the early morning at my brother’s flat, halfway around the world. Six times, seven times, eight times.
‘Hello?’ It’s a blurry Jai voice. A sleepy Jai voice. ‘Hello?’
‘Jai,’ I say, and as soon as I say his name aloud, I can’t hold it in anymore. I just cry into the phone.
‘Edi?’ Jai says, as though he’s really awake now. I feel bad because he’s got to get up in a few hours and he’s got so much on his plate and I can’t even talk. All I can do is bawl. He’s on the other side of the world and he’ll think something is horribly wrong — and things are horribly wrong, but he might think someone has died and every time I think a new thought, I seem to cry harder.
‘Edi? Edi, what’s happened? Are you okay? Edi, take a breath. Talk to me.’
I try to breathe.
‘Honey, what’s wrong? What’s going on?’ Jai has never in my entire life called me honey. He sounds so panicked.
‘Jai,’ I say, my voice trembling, ‘I’m okay. Mum
and Dad are okay. I just …’ I suck in a breath. Blow it out. ‘I just miss you!’ I say and I feel like a complete idiot because we know we love each other but I don’t talk like this to my brother, and I definitely don’t call him in the early morning and send him into a panic.
‘Edi, calm down.’ I can just about see Jai on the other end of the phone, trying to figure out what to do with his crazy sister.
‘I miss you too,’ Jai says. ‘Of course I do. But is some-thing wrong? Are you hurt?’
‘No. I’m fine,’ I say and the crying has calmed down and I just feel like an idiot for getting him out of bed. It was so stupid of me to call.
‘I’m just … I’m just tired. Honestly, I’m fine,’ I say. ‘Go back to bed.’
When I get off the phone, I just sit there. I’m still staring out the window when a taxi pulls into our driveway. Mum and Dad get out and I wipe my eyes. It’s weird they got a taxi. Mum normally drives. She must have left her car at the gala. When they come in, I think I know why they’ve left the car. Mum’s a bit wobbly on her feet. It looks like she’s had one too many champagnes.
‘Hi, honey,’ she says, coming over to the couch. ‘Has Archie gone already?’
I shake my head. Try to sound fine. ‘It ended up that he couldn’t make it,’ I say.
Mum sits next to me on the couch while Dad goes into the kitchen. She looks at me. She doesn’t say anything for a while. Then she reaches out and tucks some stray hair behind my ear. She hasn’t done anything like that for ages. It makes the lump in my throat grow bigger.
‘Oh, Edi,’ she says. ‘He seems like a nice boy. I’m … um …’ she stops there and I think that’s it, but finally, as Dad comes into the lounge, she continues. ‘I’m sure there’s a good reason why he couldn’t come.’
Now there’s a fluttery feeling inside my chest to add to the lump in my throat. Could it be that she knows?
‘Of course there’s a reason, Alisha,’ Dad says, standing behind the couch and opening the window. ‘We’ll have to pay him. Tutors don’t work for free. Let’s get onto that during the week.’
I Heart You, Archie de Souza Page 5