Burnt Snow

by Van Badham

  I then dialled my mother. The call, surprisingly, rang out – and I felt guilty at how relieved I was when it clicked to voicemail. ‘Hey, Mum,’ I said, as Fran swerved around a corner, ‘just calling to tell you everything’s fine, hope Nanna’s getting better, and I’ll be home tonight. Love you,’ and hung up.

  On my phone were ‘thank you for yesterday’ messages from Nikki and Kylie, two more messages from Lauren I didn’t read and three missed calls – also from Lauren. Have been unconscious, I texted Lauren quickly. Will read and respond soon X.

  ‘You sound close,’ Fran said, her eyes on the road.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘You and your mum.’

  I didn’t feel at all close to the look-at-me-Mr-Jogger woman I’d seen on the weekend, but I wasn’t going to explain it. ‘She’s up in Sydney for a bit. My grandmother’s not well.’

  ‘That’s sad,’ said Fran, ‘Oh my God, did you ever go to that party? The one with the strippers and things?’

  ‘It was on Saturday night,’ I said.

  ‘Was it cool?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, my mind on other things, ‘nothing happened though.’

  8

  We arrived at school in good time, parked the car and staked out a position at the gate. Nikki arrived, a burger already at her lips. Her hair was in pigtails and she wore a long-sleeved white T-shirt under her shirt – the weather was getting warmer, so I could only presume she was affecting a style change. After seeing her at her craziest yesterday, I felt confident enough to call out, ‘Don’t you ever get sick of those burgers?’ as she approached.

  ‘Nuh,’ she said, biting into it. Tomato sauce oozed onto her thumb.

  ‘How’d you go yesterday?’ Fran asked her.

  Nikki rolled her eyes, licked the sauce off her thumb and chewed. ‘As good as possible with Saint Marlina Judgmental in the house. I dealt with that guy,’ she said directly to me. ‘Mr Curly, or whatever. I told him he’d been asleep and dreamed all this stuff about me being evil, and he bought it. He did accuse me of stealing his ring, though, which was pretty funny. I took all my stuff out of my bag to prove I hadn’t. It was like going through airport security. He was so upset. Embarrassing.’

  ‘Did they let you out before the bell?’ Fran asked.

  ‘Nuh. They wanted me to sit there and get eyestrain from making myself look innocent until the last bell, just to waste everyone’s time,’ she said, scrunching the spent burger wrapper into a ball. ‘The thing with the garbage bags was fine – Marlina had thrown them out by the time I got home and when she dobbed me in to Mum I just cried and told her that I’d left the fridge door open and discovered everything had gone off over the course of the day. The story I made up for coming home early and going back to school was pretty funny – I don’t think Marlina believed that I came home because of a savage nosebleed but I don’t care. Her boyfriend’s such a jerk. Elton, his name is. He’s English. Please.’

  ‘Is he staying there too?’ I asked.

  Nikki shook her head. ‘They’re way too pure for that. He’s got his own room at Noah’s. How crazy is it that she’s got a boyfriend with a hotel room at the nicest place in town and she’s staying with her parents just to harass me about the garbage?’

  I wondered who else was staying at Noah’s, and whether other guests were white points of light.

  As Fran and Nikki talked about the hotel sheets at Noah’s, I pondered the Finder situation. Disaster with the girls had been averted when the Circle was closed, but Marlina and her boyfriend – and Jeules, of course – were dangerous people to be asking my friends tricky questions. I guessed Jeules had been posted to the school from Finder Central, or whatever it was, because of the crows. If they were ‘reading signs’ from these weird events, like Izek warned, between the crows and the fire in my street, they had a pretty narrow zone to hunt their witch in. My hand flew to my pendant when I realised that some of the construction workers repairing the damage on Boronia Road could be snooping Finders too.

  My palms started to sweat with anxiety; if the Finders had heard about the broken windows in the classroom, I might as well write witch on my forehead and build my own funeral pyre to spare them the trouble. Of course, I consoled myself, if they did know about the broken windows, I’d probably be dead already.

  Still alive, I had to make a plan to stay that way.

  I breathed out.

  I rationalised that, even with Jeules and Marlina lurking around, it was still possible to keep a low profile. From the weak magic of Jeules’s ring – the ring I still had in my pocket – I had my doubts that Finders had abilities as strong as mine. Sure, Kylie and Michelle and Nikki had obviously been party to witchy goings-on, but they were all fine now; between my spells and Nikki’s talent as an actress, Jeules probably had, at best, only a confused suspicion of general magical activity rather than proof against a specific individual. Avoiding Marlina was as simple as not going anywhere near Nikki’s house; in both cases, or even in thirty, if I could stay calm, restrain the inner bear and stop casting spells until the Finders gave up and went home, none of them would pick me for the unwilling novitiate witch I was.

  Thinking about it, the real danger to me lay in a magical reaction that could cause another crow storm or a street fire.

  Danger, of course, that travelled everywhere with Brody Meine.

  Just as I started to fear merely sitting next to him in Modern History – first period today – Kylie and Belinda turned up together and walked into Nikki and Fran’s conversation.

  Kylie might have had the magic-crazy taken out of her, but she was looking worse than she had yesterday. Her eyes were almost blood red and very sticky. I noticed that Belinda was holding her hand.

  No one said anything for a couple of minutes. Only when Michelle wandered over from the bus stop and joined the group did Nikki broach the subject.

  ‘What’s the latest?’ she asked Kylie, flicking a dour glance to Belinda.

  ‘I think Steve and I are breaking up,’ Kylie said, and sudden tears ran down her cheeks. She buried her head in Belinda’s shoulder.

  ‘Kylie went over to Steve’s last night and they had the mother of all rows,’ Belinda informed us, patting Kylie on the head. ‘He’s saying he wants to think about whether he wants to get back with her.’

  ‘That’s good news!’ Michelle said, sunny with hope.

  Kylie cried even harder. Belinda made eye contact with the rest of us and shook her head.

  The bell rang.

  My fists clenched.

  Modern.

  9

  I walked slowly to class, concentrating on breathing in, breathing out …

  Nikki and Belinda spent the walk speculating on whether Ms Dwight would be back today, and what had been so wrong with her yesterday that she had left the school grounds in an ambulance. It occurred to me as they talked that I probably could have done something for Ms Dwight when I saw her being taken away. I remembered Nanna, and the sparrow with the broken wing that she had put into the tureen and healed. I knew a lot of healing spells, but when I’d seen Ms Dwight in pain, I hadn’t done anything.

  My stomach constricted with a sense of guilt.

  The girls and I turned into the classroom and took our respective places on opposite sides of the room. Brody was already at his chair – and pulled mine out for me as I shuffled behind him.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, sitting down.

  I breathed out.

  I didn’t want to be engaged in any conversation; I dropped my bag on the floor and turned my back to Brody. Unloading things for the lesson, I pretended to search for a pen. With no teacher in the class, everyone was talking and I hoped it would distract him.

  ‘Need a pen, 19?’ he asked over my shoulder.

  ‘I’m all right,’ I said, pulling a pen from my bag. Sitting up, I gave him a polite smile. His green eyes burned into mine.

  ‘Thanks – again,’ I said, hoping that he couldn’t hear the quiver in my voice
.

  I forced my eyes to my desk, where I busied myself, pointlessly, with the notes in my folder. I prayed that a teacher would walk in any second, but Brody seemed to be radiating his presence around me, smothering thoughts of anything but him.

  Only a couple of nights ago, I had been a scarf of mist around his smooth, naked neck.

  The pen in my hand was a multi-ink one, with a rotating barrel of different colours. Using both hands, I meticulously flicked through the entire barrel of available inks. It was the only way I could occupy myself. I knew Brody was looking at me.

  ‘Crazy day yesterday,’ he said, turning his head towards the classroom door.

  My pen snapped in half. Springs and tiny bits of plastic bounced all over my desk.

  ‘Guess you will want to borrow that pen,’ he said, smirking, reaching into his pencil case. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Belinda and Nikki watching the unfolding pen circus.

  He placed a black biro on the desk in front of me.

  I breathed out, waiting for his hand to leave the pen until there was no danger of us touching.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said again. My hand actually shook as I picked up the pen.

  Again, I breathed out.

  And then a tall man with curly blond hair bounded into the room. He wore a burgundy-coloured shirt that didn’t quite match his jeans, and he carried a pile of teaching manuals that he dropped onto the teacher’s desk with a loud slap.

  ‘Right,’ he said.

  I clung to my pendant for dear life.

  He grabbed a whiteboard marker and wrote the word JEULES in large letters across the whiteboard. ‘This is my name, Year 11,’ he said. ‘You can get used to saying it while I go back to the staffroom to collect the roll. I’m obviously replacing Ms Dwight, who is obviously not here.’

  He was halfway to the door when Louise Parker called after him. ‘Mr Jeules, what’s wrong with Ms Dwight? Will she be back?’

  ‘She’s not well and it’s up to Ms Dwight,’ he snapped, smiling coldly. And he walked out of the room.

  Everyone started talking to one another again. Everyone except Brody and I, who sat together but stared off in different directions, ignoring one another in a very obvious way.

  ‘Louise!’ a voice from the corner rang out across the class. ‘Louise, she’s in hospital,’ said a loud, female monotone. ‘She went yesterday.’

  It was Joanie, from my first day. The one Nikki called Joanie Moanie.

  ‘Is she going to be all right?’ asked Louise.

  ‘Is she coming back?’ asked Nikki.

  ‘How do you know?’ asked Belinda.

  ‘My aunt’s a duty nurse at the hospital and knows her,’ Joanie said. ‘Ms Dwight had a miscarriage. Yesterday. At the school.’

  There was a collective groan of sadness in the room.

  ‘She really lost her baby?’ asked Louise.

  Joanie nodded. ‘They got her an ambulance straight after our class.’

  ‘That’s so sad,’ said Nikki.

  ‘It is.’ I turned to Brody, despite myself. ‘Ms Dwight’s such a nice person,’ I said to him in a gentle voice.

  Brody didn’t reply.

  He sat with his fingers dug into the muscles of his legs, and his shocked face was completely white.

  10

  No sooner was Jeules back in the room than Brody was out of his seat, his bag slung over his shoulder.

  ‘Back in your seat, please,’ Jeules barked, pointing at Brody with a manila folder.

  ‘I’ve got to go to the counsellor,’ Brody said.

  ‘Do you have authorisation?’ asked Jeules.

  ‘Permanently,’ Brody said, not even looking at Jeules as he strode towards the door.

  Jeules flapped the folder in his hand.

  ‘Are you going to show it to me or—’ Jeules began, but Brody slammed the door shut.

  The classroom rattled. No one spoke.

  ‘Outrageous,’ Jeules said, eyeballing the class. ‘Don’t think he’ll get away with speaking to a teacher like that, Year 11. This class earned a bad reputation yesterday and I will follow up all misbehaviour with detentions. Someone tell me that boy’s name.’

  The class was silent.

  ‘His name,’ repeated Jeules, opening his manila folder and scanning the list of names on the roll.

  Still, no one said anything.

  Gretchen coughed. Jeules eyes were on her immediately. ‘You,’ he said, ‘tell me that boy’s name.’

  ‘That’s Brody Meine, Mr Jeules,’ said Gretchen, clearing her throat.

  Jeules made a mark in his folder. ‘Right. And what’s yours?’

  ‘Gretchen,’ she said, unwillingly. ‘Gretchen Eighfield.’

  Jeules eyes widened and I gripped the edge of my desk.

  ‘Gretchen,’ he purred, ‘I’d like to see you after class.’

  11

  Jeules read out the roll and I was so careful to keep my head down that I didn’t even answer ‘Here’ when my name got called – I just limply raised my hand. I survived the rest of the class only by staring so hard into a textbook that I thought I’d go blind.

  By the time the bell rang and I was walking to Ancient History with Nikki, I wondered if it might be sensible to try not to speak for the rest of the week. Sitting next to Nikki in Ancient was a good idea: she prattled so much about ‘Jeules the Jerk’ that it was actually impossible to get a word in.

  When that class finished – me being no wiser about Roman Corn Laws at the end of Ancient than I had been at the start – Nikki and I lined up in the canteen and bought snacks before heading down to the Technology labs.

  We encountered not one group in the sunny midmorning light, but two. In one circle sat Michelle, Fran and Kylie, their expressions concerned, tense and suicidal respectively. In the other, Belinda sat with the boys. I noticed that Steve’s eyes were as red as Kylie’s. Rob and Garth, flanking him, wore wide grins. Belinda was cackling, Matt was smiling without showing his teeth. The group was passing around a blue book, a pen and a piece of paper.

  Ryan, the diplomat, was sitting between the two groups. He was on his feet the moment he saw Nikki and ambushed us metres before we had to decide which group to join. He threw his arm around Nikki’s neck and kissed her on the head before speaking. It made me jealous.

  ‘Let’s never break up,’ he said, pushing Nikki’s face into his armpit.

  ‘Okay.’ She pinched his shoulder until he released her. ‘What’s the latest?’

  ‘Very frosty between both parties. There is, however, a plan being formulated which could lead to a thaw.’

  Garth held up the passed-around book and guffawed like an evil baboon.

  ‘Gonna tell us what it is?’ Nikki asked.

  ‘Oh, but, baby, I know how much you love surprises,’ said Ryan. ‘Speaking of which, you’re going to love what the guys are doing for Gretchen’s party.’

  Nikki let out a happy squeal. My eyes followed Garth as he exchanged the blue book with Belinda for the piece of paper and the pen. There was something cruel in the way Garth was smiling that made me reach for my pendant.

  ‘I don’t like surprises,’ I said to Ryan. ‘So you should tell me what you lot are up to.’

  ‘Sorry, Sophie,’ Ryan said, ‘I can’t wreck Nikki’s fun like that.’ Nikki reacted to this with another approving squeal; Ryan wrapped both arms around her and gave her a tight squeeze.

  Their embrace delineated the existence of a third group behind the Technology labs, and it clearly wasn’t recruiting members. I wandered over towards Michelle, my eyes still scanning Garth, Belinda and the others, trying to discern their business with the book.

  I was distracted when my phone rang. Presuming it was Lauren, I answered it without even looking at the caller ID.

  ‘Yo,’ I said, taking some steps away from all three groups. ‘What’s shaking, sister? You wouldn’t believe—’

  ‘Hey, ah – Sophie – are you free at lunchtime?’ asked a male voice.r />
  I quickly checked the screen of my phone. JOEL.

  ‘I was planning to catch up on some work at the library …’ I fudged.

  ‘And avoid making a choice?’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Whether to sit with Kylie or Steve. Looks tense over there.’

  I did a three-sixty turn, looking for Joel. He’s always somewhere, Fran had said. ‘Joel, where are you calling from?’ I asked.

  ‘I bet you can’t guess.’

  ‘You’re right.’ There was something in his tone that supported accusations of creepiness. ‘Come on, tell me.’

  ‘Can you meet me alone in the Senior Quad?’

  ‘What do you want, Joel?’ I asked, searching him out again.

  ‘I want that favour you owe me,’ he said, voice light. ‘Stop turning around, Soph. You’ll get dizzy.’

  ‘Joel?’ I asked, looking up towards the windows of the main building.

  But the windows were dark, and Joel wasn’t on the phone any longer.

  12

  In English, Mrs Fendy insisted on discussing Macbeth with the whole class, so I didn’t get a chance to talk to Michelle until the bell had rung.

  ‘What was that business with the book and paper at recess?’ I asked her as we ducked and weaved juniors in the corridor on our way to Art and German.

  ‘What book?’ she replied.

  ‘Garth and those guys,’ I said. ‘I’ve never seen Garth with a book before. It stood out.’

  ‘I wasn’t paying attention to them. I was just trying to support Kylie.’

  ‘Did she tell Steve she had a car accident and concussion?’ I asked. ‘He couldn’t hold that against her.’

  ‘No, she told him the truth, about the peppermint icing and everyone getting sick,’ said Michelle.

  Personally, I thought the story about the car accident was more believable, but the girls were so addled with lock-on-mouth spells and memory loss I was slightly amazed they could recall their own story at all.