Little Sister

by Aimee Said

  The message was from Maz.

  Warning: pix on Facebook!

  My heart plummeted to somewhere around my knees. Maz wouldn’t send me a message like that at work unless things were serious. I racked my brain for any situations I’d been in that would make for a compromising photograph, but unless someone had been spying on me and Josh outside the hall last night, I couldn’t think of any.

  The clocks on the wall said it was 2.00 am in Paris, 1.00 am in London, 8.00 pm in New York and only midday in Kingston. Five hours till the shop closed and I could go home and see for myself. I considered asking Dylan if I could sneakily use the laptop out the back, but I valued my job – and his respect – too much to risk him seeing something I’d prefer to keep to myself. Besides, if Jay found out, he’d hit the roof. In desperation, I looked across the road to where Simon was stacking value-packs of toilet paper on the bargain rack by the pharmacy door.

  “I have to get something from the chemist,” I said to Jay when I’d finished serving the last customer in the queue. “I’ll be back in five minutes.”

  “What’s up? You know you can help yourself to anything in our bathroom, if you need an aspirin or something.”

  “Um, I don’t think a couple of guys have what I need in their bathroom.”

  Mortified, Jay nodded for me to go. I raced across the road, ignoring the angry hoots from the cars coming in both directions. When I got to the pharmacy, Simon was tidying the Ear and Eye Care shelves.

  “You have to help me.” I grabbed the feather-duster from his hand and dragged him to the counter. “I’ve got to get onto Facebook. Now.”

  “Al, if you’re that desperate it might be a sign that you’re addicted.”

  “Come on, Simon. I don’t have time to muck around. I know your cash register’s connected to the internet for the stock management system you developed. Please let me use it for two minutes.”

  For a moment I thought maybe he’d say no to get back at me for being with Josh at the rehearsal. I gave him the pretty-please face I knew he couldn’t resist.

  “Okay, but be as fast as you can. I’ll distract Dad.”

  The instant he was out of eyeshot of the monitor that sat on top of the cash register, I opened Facebook and signed in, trying to prepare myself for what I may be about to see. I ignored the fourteen email messages in my inbox and scanned my home page for links to new photos. Halfway down the page I found one, posted on the Whitlam High group’s wall at 6.00 am. As soon as I saw it, I understood why Larrie’s phone was going crazy all morning.

  Have you ever wished you could un-see something? Like when you walk into your parents’ bedroom to borrow a squirt of your mum’s Chanel No.5 before the Year Seven social and you’re confronted by the sight of your dad’s middle-aged bum wobbling to ‘You can leave your hat on’.

  Or when you see a photo of your sister with her tongue down her best friend’s throat.

  I stared at the screen, wondering whether they’d done it as a joke or for a dare – the only rational explanations. But neither Larrie nor Beth looked like they were having a laugh. They looked like they needed to get a room. Larrie was wearing her new “vintage” dress, so I figured it must’ve been taken at the end-of-school party. And from the way she and Beth were getting into it, this was no awkward first-kiss moment.

  My heart and brain raced in tandem. Who would do something like this? And to Larrie? The photo was posted by someone called “Camille Smith”, but I didn’t recognise the name from school and her profile was only available to her friends.

  It was no surprise that the photo had been remarked on. The list of comments below it read like Whitlam Year Twelve rollcall; they ranged from Mitch’s gang making unimaginative “lezzo” jibes, to a couple of hardcore religious types warning Larrie and Beth to “renounce sin and turn towards the light of heterosexuality”. The latest comment was from Camille herself: “Watch out, Whitlam, her little sister’s still on the loose.”

  Simon blinked frantically at me over his dad’s shoulder, which I took as my cue to leave. I logged out and closed the browser window. Simon would see the photo soon enough; there was no need for me to hand it to him on a plate.

  “Did you get what you needed?” Jay asked when I got back to the shop.

  “Yes, thanks.” I clenched my hand into a fist as if I was holding something I didn’t want him to see. “I’ll just nip to the loo.”

  “Take as long as you need,” he said. “I’m taking Doodoo to the groomer, but Dylan’s here.”

  I closed the toilet seat and sat down to think. In the thirty seconds I’d spent studying that photo everything had changed. There was no way I could deny the rumours truth any more. And at school on Monday I’d be the one who had to face the fallout while Larrie was safely tucked up at home with her study notes.

  I avoided Dylan for the rest of the afternoon. I wasn’t ready to talk about the photo and I wasn’t sure I could open my mouth without talking about it. As soon as the sign on the door was flipped to “Closed”, I gave the floor a cursory sweep and practically ran home.

  I’d spent the last couple of hours mentally rehearsing my speech to Larrie. First, I’d demand that she tell me who’d taken the photo and stop it from spreading any further. Then I’d make her come clean to Mum and Dad. I imagined how furious they’d be with Larrie when they found out half of Kingston (or at least the kids of half of Kingston) had seen a compromising photo of their perfect elder daughter. If my own reputation wasn’t being wrecked by association, I might’ve even enjoyed it a little.

  But when I got home there was no sign of Larrie. Her mobile went straight to voicemail. I left a message asking her to call me urgently, even though I knew she wouldn’t.

  I hung up and dialled Maz’s number.

  “So it’s true.”

  “At least now you know for sure,” she said, as if the fact was somehow going to make me feel better. “Why don’t you sleep over at my house tonight? We’ll be done rehearsing by 9.00 and after the others leave we can plot revenge on Camille Smith, whoever she is.”

  I wasn’t sure I was ready to face the guys, but, as Maz pointed out, the alternative was staying home with Mum and Dad and pretending nothing was wrong.

  “At least coming to my place will stop you from sitting alone obsessing about the photo,” she said. “And don’t worry about Prad, I’ll make sure he keeps his stinky foot out of his mouth.”

  Al Miller can’t believe her eyes.

  25

  Whatever Maz said to Prad must’ve scared him because when I got to rehearsal he acted as if he hadn’t even seen the photo, as did Nicko. Only Simon was insensitive enough to bring it up.

  He sidled over to me during a break and said, “Don’t worry about it, Al. Anyone who has a problem with Larrie and Beth isn’t worth knowing anyway.”

  Maz must’ve guessed from my expression that I was about to tell him exactly how much I appreciated his reassurance because she called an abrupt end to the break, clapping her hands and telling the guys to get back to their instruments NOW.

  I managed to keep it together until they started playing “You Don’t Know” and I remembered being wrapped in Josh’s arms the last time I’d heard it. Now that the photo was out, I doubted he’d ever be seen with me in public again, especially on school grounds. I slipped out of the room, hoping the others were too engrossed in their playing to notice my teary eyes or running nose.

  Maz found me in her bedroom after the guys left, lying face down on her bed with Ziggy and Major Tom snuggled on either side of me.

  “You know what you need?” she asked when she saw my bloodshot eyes.

  “To be placed in a witness relocation program?”

  “The ice-cream cure – effective in treating ninety-nine per cent of cases of stress, depression, anxiety and extreme little-sister blues.”

  I took the hand she held out to me and went with her to the kitchen.

  “I’m sorry I ditched my presidential duties las
t night,” I said, piling my bowl high with scoops of hokey-pokey and mocha fudge ripple. “Being with Josh takes my mind off … you know what.”

  Maz squeezed a stream of choc-fudge topping over my bowl. “I know. That’s why I’m trying not to tell you what I really think of him.”

  Fuelled by sugar (Maz) and anxiety (me), we stayed up for hours talking about the Josh situation, and the Nicko situation and, finally, the Larrie situation.

  “What do you think Larrie sees in Beth?”

  “Well, she’s smart, for starters – way smarter than Mitch. And she’s always been pretty nice. Remember that time she saved us when we used Larrie’s hair straightener on your old Barbie?”

  How could I forget? If Beth hadn’t thrown herself between us, I reckon Larrie would’ve gone for my eyes when she saw Barbie’s face melted onto her most prized possession. “But that still doesn’t explain it. There are plenty of nice, smart boys Larrie could go out with. Why can’t she and Beth just be best friends?”

  Maz stopped scratching Ziggy’s chin to think about it. “I guess you can’t choose who you’re attracted to,” she said finally. “Like you can’t help being attracted to Josh, even though he’s a pretty-boy jock.” She threw a pillow at my head.

  I returned fire with a cuddly toy. “And like you can’t help being attracted to a guy whose greatest ambition in life is to play Guitar Hero for a living.”

  “Touché,” she said, lobbing her teddy bear at me. “And like Simon can’t help–”

  I didn’t let her finish her sentence. “Time to change the subject, before I throw something breakable. What are you wearing for the SkoolDaze final?”

  Maz didn’t need any further encouragement to start raving about all the ideas she’d had. I was happy to lie in the dark and just listen to her. It made me realise how much I’d missed her over the past few weeks. Between Josh and Nicko and Poor Simon and the band and Larrie’s dramas, things had been a little tense between us lately, but tonight we were back to being Al and Maz, and it felt good.

  Eventually, Maz came down from her sugar high and passed out mid-sentence, but I still couldn’t sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the photo of Larrie and Beth, as if it was etched onto the inside of my eyelids. I lay staring into the darkness, trying not to think about how many other people I knew also couldn’t get the image out of their heads.

  No one was less surprised than me when Larrie phoned home the next afternoon to say she was staying at Beth’s again. Her first exam wasn’t until Tuesday, so Dad said it was okay, even though Mum had planned a roast dinner.

  For a second I expected Mum to go ballistic about it, but instead she sighed and said, “I can’t wait till these exams are over.”

  To cheer her up, I set the table without being told to and put some daisies from the garden in a vase, even though the scent of daisies reminds me of wee. It was worth it when Mum smiled and thanked me.

  “How’s school?” asked Dad as he helped himself to seconds. “Did you get that Science assignment finished?”

  “I’m, uh, still working on it,” I said, wincing at the thought of the blank worksheet that had been sitting on my desk all week. “Actually, if you’ve got time after dinner, could I ask you some questions for it?”

  While I cleared the table Dad drove to Kingston Shopping Village and picked up a tub of chocolate gelato.

  “I’m afraid we’ll have to finish it tonight,” he said with a wink, “so Larrie doesn’t get upset.”

  As we ate, we worked through Ms Morales’s list of genetic traits and variations.

  “Hair colour?” I asked.

  “Blond,” said Mum.

  “Grey,” said Dad. “But it used to be brown before I had kids.”

  “Eyes?”

  “Blue,” said Mum.

  “Two,” said Dad, cracking himself up.

  “Dad! You wouldn’t joke around if this was Larrie’s assignment.”

  Mum shot him one of her fierce scowls, and he instantly stopped laughing. “Okay, sorry. I’ll take it seriously from now on.”

  We worked through the rest of the questions about tongue curling and “mid-digital hair” (which Mum explained meant hairy fingers, ew) and earlobe shape, until we came to the final one.

  “Any known allergies?” I asked.

  “Does mowing the lawn count?” asked Dad. “Sorry. I mean, none.”

  “Nor me,” said Mum. “It doesn’t seem fair, does it? Neither of us having any allergies at all and poor Larrie suffering so much.”

  Dad patted her hand. “Come on, Colette, you can’t blame yourself. It’s the luck of the genetic draw, right Al?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said, annoyed that the conversation had somehow come back to Larrie.

  “Larrie’s lactose intolerance. She inherited it from us,” said Mum. “I couldn’t believe it when the doctor told me. I mean, when your dad and I were growing up, kids drank milk every day – they used to give it to us at school, even – and we never had any reaction to it.”

  Dad had told me before about being forced to drink milk at school. He reckoned it was always warm and usually on the turn by the time it got to the classrooms. Even now, his face screwed up at the memory of it.

  Mum continued. “When Larrie was diagnosed, after all those weeks of being such a sick little baby, the doctor told us that it was because we both carry a recessive gene for it. That’s why it’s called congenital lactase deficiency.”

  “And that’s why you thought I had it too?”

  Mum nodded. “I wasn’t taking any chances. You two were so alike in every other way – the way you looked, the way you acted, the way you thought about things – that it didn’t seem impossible.”

  Later, I thought about what Mum had said. She’d told me before that people used to ask her if Larrie and I were twins, because we both had blond hair and green eyes – and if Mum had dressed us we were probably wearing coordinating outfits – but she’d never mentioned anything about us acting or thinking alike before.

  I wondered whether it was true. And, if it was, what had happened to make us so different now?

  Al Miller doesn’t fit into her genes.

  26

  I crept into Science the next morning as Ms Morales was closing the lab door. I’d stayed in bed after the alarm went off, hoping Mum would be too busy getting ready for work to notice me, but after taking my temperature and checking my glands she forced me to get up. At least I’d managed to miss assembly – there was no way I could’ve faced the entire school knowing that most of them would’ve seen the photo. I took my seat next to Simon, who appeared unaware that half the class was sneaking looks in our direction.

  “Eyes to the front!” For once I was grateful Ms Morales was such a classroom tyrant. “Today we’re talking about behavioural genetics and whether some behaviours are inherited in the same way that physical characteristics, like hair colour, are.”

  “Is that like ‘nature or nurture’?” asked Lily.

  “It’s part of it, yes. Scientists think that, for all the traits we can measure, genetics and environment contribute about equally. Genes that affect behaviour are harder to pinpoint than ones that affect us physically, but we know that aspects of mental, psychological and personal development are at least partially heritable.”

  Jamie Butcher’s hand shot up. “Including sexual orientation?”

  Ms Morales looked worried. The only time Jamie had ever contributed to a discussion in Science before was when we were studying reproduction and he showed off his in-depth knowledge of female anatomy. I don’t think she wanted to risk a repeat of that lesson.

  “Umm … what do you mean?”

  Jamie ignored the up-close greasy eyeball Maz was giving him. “I mean, do your genes determine whether you’re attracted to men or women?”

  “Well, now, let’s see …” Ms Morales frantically flipped through the index of her teachers’ edition of the textbook.

  “I
don’t think you’ll find it in there, Miss,” said Simon, “but it’s something that came up at biology camp last year.” Ms Morales nodded to Simon to continue. “What happened was, in the 1990s this scientist announced that he had discovered a gay gene, passed down on the mother’s side.”

  “So it’s true then?” said Jamie, turning in his seat in Simon’s direction but staring straight at me. “Being a homo runs in families.”

  “Yeah,” said Sally Rechichi, “just like being a small-minded bigot does.”

  Simon kept talking as if neither of them had spoken. “When the research came out, a lot of geneticists started conducting studies of their own, but most of them couldn’t reproduce the results of the first study, and it still can’t be verified. And the study was only of men.”

  Ms Morales looked more worried than ever. “Thank you, Simon. I think the main thing for us all to remember is that sexual orientation is part of normal human variation, as I’m sure Ms Shields explained in your Health and Development classes. Now, let’s turn to page 127 of your textbooks and read the case study about intelligence genes.”

  Maz was waiting for me after class. “Where were you this morning?”

  “In bed,” I admitted. “I tried to get the day off, but it’s almost impossible to fake sickness when your mum’s a nurse. I bet the photo’s all over the school by now, isn’t it?”

  She rubbed at something invisible on her arm and nodded. “I did some digging around in the old Whitlam yearbooks before school and, from what I could find, there hasn’t been a student named Camille here since 1997. Whoever’s behind this created a fake Facebook profile and used it to join the group.”

  It was no surprise since Whitlam’s Facebook group was managed by Mrs Turner and Ms Munce. They didn’t recognise us when we were in uniform, let alone from our random profile pictures.