‘This isn’t just a schoolyard altercation,’ I say. ‘Hayden could be seriously injured. I think you need to sort this out now.’
‘Fine.’ His arms fold, flesh spilling out the ends of his shirt. ‘What happened?’
My throat dries. ‘They cornered Scarlett and when I tried to help her—’
‘He attacked Hayden,’ the kid says, interrupting me. ‘I don’t know what his problem is.’
This time Timmy doesn’t agree, but he doesn’t argue either.
Ando nods and waves at the boys to go. They don’t hang around. Ando’s eyes narrow as he looks at me. ‘You’d better hope Hayden gets better fast.’
‘I didn’t throw the punch.’
‘So you say.’ He waves at the departing cars. ‘But two exemplary young men from our football team say otherwise.’
‘Those “exemplary young men” stood and watched while Hayden tried to hurt my sister.’
Ando steps closer. ‘You’d want to be able to back up your claims before you go accusing a poor boy who’s lying unconscious in hospital.’
I stand my ground. ‘He’s a drunken pig, unconscious or not.’
‘I will not let this incident ruin my school’s reputation. The members of our football team are the children of respected citizens in this town.’
‘I’m not going to take the blame for something I didn’t do.’
But I’m talking to his back. He’s already walking away.
Scarlett and I are the last to leave.
The walk home stretches even longer than usual, and for a while neither of us speaks. We cut through the cemetery, the quickest way home.
The wind has picked up again and I think about offering Scarlett my jacket, but I’m too angry with her.
‘What were you thinking?’
‘I told you. It wasn’t how it looked. I trust Hayden.’
It takes all my hard-won self-control not to snap. ‘I was there. Even if we ignore the possibilities of what he planned to do, consider what actually happened. He pushed you.’
Her gaze drops to the mud on her dress. The dress she’d worked so hard to make. But when she lifts her head she’s bullish. ‘It was an accident. He’d never deliberately hurt me. You don’t know him like I do.’
‘I know tonight he sent you flying without a second glance. I know he’s spread rumours about you. God, Scarlett, when you had the chance to get away, you hung onto his arm like some kind of …’ I press my knuckles hard into my eye sockets, trying to erase the memory.
‘He swore he didn’t tell anyone, and anyway, who cares about what stupid ignorant people at school say?’
I hear the lie in her voice. Our house is too small and the walls too thin for me to miss her tears when the talk began. She didn’t like being cast as the town slut any more than I wanted to be the bad boy.
And tonight our reputations made it easy for them to point the finger.
I glare at her, stunned that she’s still defending him. ‘Not caring won’t help you when I’m locked away. This isn’t some schoolboy fight; that punch hit him bad.’
Her face pales to match her dress. ‘But you’re innocent. And a minor.’
‘What does that matter? I’ll be eighteen soon enough. Hayden’s parents are royalty in this town and they’ll want blood. No-one is going to take my word against Timmy and his mate. Plus, I have history.’
‘History because of me.’ There’s a hitch in her voice, and she might as well be twelve again. She avoids the details of what happened, just like she always does.
I exhale through clenched teeth. ‘I’m not blaming you. I wouldn’t. That was his fault.’
‘That’s not how it sounds.’ She crosses her arms defiantly. ‘I didn’t hit Hayden, or accuse you. In fact, I didn’t ask you to come over and play protective big brother at all.’
‘I didn’t have a choice.’
‘You didn’t have to fight. Did you stop to think for one second that I might have had the situation under control?’
‘Three big guys with your back against the wall?’ My muscles tense at the memory. ‘It didn’t look like it to me.’
‘Well, despite what you might think, you don’t know everything. I’m not …’ She swallows. ‘I’m not twelve anymore. Maybe Hayden’s not the only reason I didn’t leave when I had the chance …’
My chest tightens. ‘You mean me?’
Her eyes are big and brimming with tears and she pokes her finger hard into my chest. ‘You big idiot.’
‘I’m not Dad. I would have walked away.’
She swivels and picks her way through the graves with a straight back, heading towards the gap in the fence that leads to home. I know she won’t listen to anything else until I change the subject. Scarlett only hears what she wants to. And anything bad about the scumbag who fathered us isn’t on the list of acceptable conversation topics.
I catch up and touch her shoulder. When she looks up her eyes are shining with tears. Genuine ones. After more than seventeen years of us against the world, I know the difference.
She wipes her cheek but leaves a trail of snot. ‘I was scared.’
Something aches in my chest. I ignore it. ‘You were stupid,’ I argue. But I can’t stay angry. Not at Scarlett. ‘Are you hurt?’ Hayden held her pretty roughly, and he’s a big guy.
‘A couple of bruises. Nothing that won’t fade.’
I hate that she can be so matter of fact. I stop in front of her and wait for her to look up. ‘No-one has a right to touch you like that.’
Her gaze slips off over my shoulder. ‘He didn’t mean to, I’m sure of it. He was angry. Most of the time he’s gentle and sweet. He says I’m special.’
‘And did he mean to bring half the football team along to your special moment?’
She hesitates, but only briefly. ‘He can’t help that they followed him.’
I exhale slowly, keeping a rein on my temper. It’s like Dad all over again. It doesn’t matter how much I tell her Hayden’s a sleaze, she insists on holding onto the fairytale image she’s concocted in her head.
I hear a familiar sound. Sniffles. I glance sideways, but she’s hiding her face behind her dirty gloved hand and staring straight ahead. With all the crying I’ve heard over the years, I should be able to ignore her tears. Between Ma and Scarlett it’s lucky we don’t have our own private stream running to the creek.
We walk past three more graves and a broken headstone, shining ghostly white in the light from the lanterns that line the path, then I cave. I can’t help it. I put my arm around her, let her lean against me for a moment. ‘You’d better not be crying for that idiot.’
Another sob. ‘I’m mad at him, of course I am, but you saw him lying there. I just want him to be okay. I want to know he’s going to wake up.’
‘And then what? He’ll be your boyfriend? Wake up from his sleep and say he wants to be with you? Life isn’t a fairytale romance. Not ours, anyway.’ A vision of Callie Jones sneaks into my brain. Long, honey-blonde hair twisted back on her head. Skin like a vanilla milkshake. I shove the image back where it belongs. Out of sight and out of my mind. ‘We’re not like them.’
‘Do you think I don’t know that? You’re not the one who gets called a slut by people like Bree Madden.’ She perches on the edge of a big raised grave, the last plot before the fence, and slips off her sandals. They’re cast-offs from one of Ma’s friends from her last job. The one she managed to keep for over a month, until she was late for too many shifts. Scarlett rubs at her toes. ‘My feet are killing me.’
I’ve walked through here a lot—too many times to think there’s anything but empty flesh beneath the graves—but I’m still not immune to the place. ‘Do you have to sit on someone’s grave?’
She lays back. ‘It’s just a box.’
‘Show some respect.’
She huffs. ‘What if you’re held responsible?’
‘I’m screwed.’
‘Jail?’
‘I don’t kn
ow, but whatever happens, I’ll make sure you and Ma are okay.’
‘I want to help.’
I know she means drop out of school. She hates the place and I don’t blame her, but one of us should have a future. ‘You can help by doing some homework occasionally.’
‘What’s the point? I might not have a choice, if you go to juvie or whatever. You said it yourself, everyone is going to want to blame you for … for Hayden. It’s not like what I say is going to help. I’m just the slut—who’s going to believe me?’
Hearing her describe herself that way … I clear my throat. ‘What if I told you someone else was there tonight?’
She sniffs and her eyes instantly brighten with hope. ‘Who? Why didn’t you tell me? This changes everything.’
I try to put confidence into my nod. But as I jump the back fence and unlock the door to the dump we call home, my muscles tighten. Deep in my gut there’s a stab of envy at how easily she can latch on to the positive. I can’t bring myself to point out that the witness has already missed one chance to come forward.
‘I need to talk to Callie Jones.’
CHAPTER
3
Callie
In my family we have an unspoken rule: we don’t talk about anything unpleasant unless we have to.
True to form, I’m the first out of the car when Mum pulls into the driveway. I don’t look at her or my brother in the back seat, too aware of the alcohol on my breath and the crushing pressure of the decision I have to make.
The headlights are still shining on the garage of our two-storey house as I hurry up the path between perfectly manicured rose bushes and sculpted shrubs. My dog, Lion, whines at the gate, but softly, so Mum doesn’t tell him off.
I need to be alone so I can try to sort out what happened. Monday looms just the other side of the weekend, and with it the possibility of a morning in Mr Anderson’s office.
My sandals dangle from my left hand but even with them off, each step is painful. Red, liquid-filled blisters throb where the strap bit into my toes while I was dancing. If it wasn’t for the blisters I’d wonder whether that girl on the dance floor had really been me.
The front door opens, spilling golden light onto the porch. Dad steps out into the circle of light. Deep grooves line his forehead and he’s shoeless, wearing one green and one blue sock. ‘Callie, we were so worried. Was there an accident at the school?’
I glance behind me, to where Mum and Sean are still climbing from the car. My brother looks almost as awful as I feel. I wonder if he drank the punch too.
‘Something like that,’ I mutter.
Usually that would be enough to let me past, but Dad hasn’t been himself lately. In fact, I can’t remember ever seeing him without matching footwear. He touches my arm.
I washed my face and hands as best I could in the girls’ bathroom, but I can still taste the vomit in the back of my throat. I am so never drinking again. I exhale and then look up, trying to keep my telltale odours to myself.
His frown deepens. ‘Did Jonny show?’
Jonny.
If I admit that I haven’t thought about my boyfriend once in the last half an hour, will that make Dad more or less worried?
I’m saved from having to decide when Mum sweeps past me. ‘Let the children get some sleep. We can all talk in the morning. I’ll make pancakes.’
I don’t think food is going to fix this, I think at her, but at the same time relief sweeps over me. Pancakes are a good sign. And some sleep will help me get my head in order and figure out what to say. I hope.
Dad’s hand comes out again but drops just as quickly back to his side. ‘Night then.’
Just when I think I’ve escaped, Mum turns back. Her gaze is worried. ‘You’d tell me if you or your brother were involved, wouldn’t you? Any hint of trouble could affect your scholarship.’
As if I could forget. The jerk of my head seems to satisfy her. She hurries away towards the kitchen, back to whatever she was doing before coming to pick us up.
The soft carpet doesn’t make the staircase any shorter, but I keep going, knowing my bedroom is waiting at the top.
At the landing, the hum of the fan and the swish of water tell me that Sean beat me to the shower in our shared bathroom. As usual. That boy spends more time in the beige-tiled room making his blonde-tipped hair just the right amount of messy than I do with both hair and make-up to organise.
I stop outside the bathroom door. A few years ago I could have walked in there, averted my gaze and talked to him about what happened at school. Bree might have been my best friend but Sean and I, at only a year apart, were a team. But that was before Sean shot up five inches and discovered he could kick a football like a demon.
I turn away without touching the handle.
My bedroom welcomes me with its midnight-blue feature wall and the white furniture I restored by hand last summer. It drove Mum insane that I wouldn’t order a matching set from the city, but by the time I was done painting every piece with the same gloss white, even she had to admit it looked great.
The hammering in my head fades the moment I step over the threshold.
I flop onto my bed without turning on the light. Moonlight seeps in through the big window overlooking the front yard and the quiet street. Alone at last, I let myself think about the night. How I wish I’d been one of the crowd spilling out from the dance instead of frozen on the concrete steps while Rhett went to rescue his sister. From Hayden Chapman.
Hayden cheating on my best friend is bad enough, but what would he have done if Rhett hadn’t intervened? I remember Scarlett begging him to let her go, and fight nausea as I see the other boys standing there. To watch what? The humiliation of a public dumping, or something worse?
My stomach tightens into a hard ball. How I wish I hadn’t seen who threw that punch. My brain skids away from the memory as my phone buzzes. Happy for the distraction, I pull it out of my purse.
There are two texts from Jonny. One now and the one from earlier, when I was talking to Rhett.
I’ll be there soon.
Traffic a nightmare. Heading to Mum and Dad’s. Miss you, babe.
Right. He misses me. So much so, he didn’t bother to show for the dance. There’s no traffic bad enough to delay him that long. I roll over and stare at my white ceiling with stinging eyes. So many nights I’ve lain awake here after studying, my mind still buzzing with chemistry equations or calculus theorems, tracing the shadows of the oak branches outside my window until I fall asleep.
But there’s no peace in it tonight. Instead, I see the huddle of boys in suits gathered around Rhett. The twisted expression on Hayden’s face as he grips Scarlett as though she’s his.
The fist that could ruin everything.
I should have headed back inside when Rhett broke into a run. I knew there’d be a fight. And good school captains hurry inside to tell the supervising adult that there’s a disturbance in the school.
But I didn’t.
I could blame the alcohol, or the fear of being caught in such a state, but it wasn’t either of those things. I didn’t think. My brain didn’t function. Instead, I half-followed, always staying in the shadows but getting close enough to hear every word and see everything.
Down the hall, Sean’s door closes. I gather my pyjamas from where I left them folded under my pillow and head for the shower. The spray of water on my skin begins to wash away the scent of sick that I’m sure oozes from my pores.
But it doesn’t stop the memories.
I cried out when Hayden hit the ground. Felt the thud of him hitting concrete like a blow. I’d covered my mouth on a wave of fear that they’d hear me, but they were too busy with Hayden. At least, Rhett and Scarlett were.
Hayden’s friends did nothing.
Other than land the blow in the first place.
I force my eyes open and step out of the shower. The towel is all furry softness, when what I want is sandpaper to scrub my brain free of the memory of fist
striking flesh. But it wasn’t Rhett’s fist. Regardless of what Mr Anderson wants to believe.
Brushing my teeth until my gums are raw doesn’t change what happened. My favourite polar bear-covered flannelette pyjamas don’t envelop me in a comforting hug.
There’s no sign of Sean in our shared TV room, but I didn’t really expect to see him. Not tonight. He must be trying to make sense of what happened.
Back in my bedroom, my phone rings.
Rhett. My mouth dries but I banish the ridiculous thought. He doesn’t have my number and besides, it’s not as though he knows what I saw. No-one does.
It’s Bree.
‘Hey,’ I say. ‘Are you still at the hospital? How’s Hayden?’
‘No change.’ She sobs quietly. ‘They’ve put him in an induced coma. The doctors are talking brain injury.’
My knees give way and I land on the edge of my bed. ‘Really?’
‘Uh huh.’ The sobs are turning into wails now.
I stare at my window. The oak tree is swaying hard now, the branches scrabbling at the glass.
Brain injury. This isn’t going to go away.
‘He’ll be okay,’ I manage. It’s the kind of supportive thing a best friend would say. One who didn’t know what Hayden had been doing behind the art centre. This isn’t the time to tell her about Scarlett.
Down the line there’s the unmistakable crackle of a PA system and the sound of people rushing past. Bree takes a couple of deep breaths to control her crying and then says, ‘What if he isn’t?’
There’s a waver in her voice. She really cares about him. The knowledge that he’s not a casual fling for her makes what I saw worse. If she finds out about Scarlett she’ll be heartbroken.
‘Callie? What if he isn’t?’ she asks again.
I don’t know. I don’t want to know. ‘He will be,’ I say instead.
‘You’re right.’ She’s almost sob-free now. ‘Hayden is a fighter.’
Little does she know. But I make a supportive noise.
It seems to be enough. ‘His parents said I’m welcome to stay. They know how close we are.’
‘Is there anything I can do?’ I ask.
What I Saw Page 3