by Sue Lawson
‘We won’t,’ I said. ‘We just didn’t think.’
I glanced at Dad. There was anger, and something else in his eyes. Defeat? I’d made him lie for me and instead of feeling bad, I felt strong.
Dad straightened up. ‘Are you done here? I have a meeting I can’t put off.’
‘We’ll take them home,’ said O’Brien.
Dad shook his head. ‘No need, I can do it.’
‘We’ll walk you out,’ said Dobson, watching Khaden.
It wasn’t until we reached Dad’s car that I realised John Dobson and Khaden had dropped back. They stood away from us, talking. At least, John Dobson was talking. Khaden listened, his hands in his pockets and his head bowed.
‘What do you think that’s about?’ I asked.
‘That cop looks more worried than mad,’ said Sas.
Khaden nodded, said something to the cop and walked to us, head still bowed.
‘In the car, now,’ said Dad.
As Sas and Khaden climbed into the back seat, I watched the divvy van drive away.
‘Ruby,’ snapped Dad. ‘I have a busy afternoon.’
With a sigh, I sat in the passenger seat.
Dad’s suit swished as he reached for his seat belt. He paused, his hand ready to buckle the belt. ‘What the hell is wrong with you three?’
‘You can drop us at Sas’s place,’ I said, turning away from him.
‘Ruby, I’ll have to talk to Lou and Mike.’
I twisted around to glare at him. ‘You know, Dad, we all have our secrets. Is there any harm in keeping this between us?’
Dad hit the steering will with his open hand, turned the key and slammed the car into reverse.
Khaden
Khaden listened to the hum of the wheels and the silence in the car, stunned that Stuart wasn’t yelling, but just driving, his jaw rigid.
As Stuart turned into Sas’s drive, Ruby unbuckled her seatbelt.
‘I don’t think so, young lady. I’m taking you straight home,’ said Stuart.
Now she’s gonna cop it, thought Khaden, opening his door.
‘I’m staying here.’ Ruby stepped out of the car and leant back in the open door. ‘I’m sure you won’t mind.’
Khaden raised his eyebrows at Sas. She shrugged, eyes wide.
Stuart made a strange noise. ‘It’s here or home, and absolutely nowhere else. Is that clear?’
‘Whatever.’ Ruby slammed the door.
‘Umm, thanks, Stuart, for you know…’ Khaden let the sentence float away.
‘Yeah thanks,’ added Sas. ‘And we’re really sorry.’
Stuart turned to face them, his arm resting on the back of the passenger seat. ‘Promise you won’t do it again. Ever.’
‘We won’t,’ said Sas.
Stuart nodded.
‘See you then, Mr Martin,’ said Khaden, sliding out of the car to stand with Sas.
Stuart opened his window. ‘Ruby, home by five.’
‘Maybe.’ Ruby walked to the front door.
Stoney faced, Stuart reversed out the drive.
‘What do you reckon is going on there?’ Khaden kept his voice low.
‘Beats me, but I’m going to find out,’ said Sas.
In the lounge room Sas stood over Ruby, who’d flopped in the corduroy beanbag. ‘Ruby, what gives?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘How come your dad lied for you and didn’t go off about us shoplifting?’
‘I don’t know.’ Ruby wiggled further into the beanbag.
Khaden sat on the edge of the sofa he’d slept on. ‘Something’s going on with you two, Ruby.’
‘It’s pretty obvious,’ said Sas. ‘Stuart was so mad at the vets, but today, after we’d been busted and all, he was just, well, weird. You want to explain?’
Ruby plucked fluff from the beanbag. ‘We had a fight, after Mojo, and I told him he was too strict. He promised he’d ease up.’
‘I don’t buy it,’ said Sas, frowning.
Ruby shrugged.
‘We came to an understanding, okay?’
‘Nuh,’ said Sas, sitting on the sofa beside Khaden. ‘There’s something you’re not telling me, I can feel it.’
Ruby wiggled her fingers in front of her. ‘ Ooooh, Psychic Sas.’
Khaden shook his head. ‘I’m with Sas, Ruby. Your dad just straight-up lied for you to a policemen. It doesn’t make sense, plus, you’ve been different lately.’
‘Yeah, right, it’s all about me,’ she said, folding her arms. ‘How about the stuff you two aren’t telling me, like how come Sas stole a man’s bracelet and you stole earrings?’
Khaden leant back and laughed.
‘Psychic Sas and Paranoid Ruby. What does that make me?’
‘Kissable Khaden,’ said Sas.
‘Gross, Sas.’ Ruby shivered.
Sas and Khaden burst out laughing.
‘It wasn’t even funny,’ Ruby said, sounding sulky. ‘Tell me about the jewellery.’
‘Duh!’ said Sas wiping under her eyes with her index fingers. ‘It’s nearly Christmas. I stole the bracelet for Dad, and Khaden stole the earrings for me to give Mum.’
‘Oh.’ Ruby wriggled out of the beanbag. ‘Gotta pee.’
Khaden and Sas didn’t speak until they heard the bathroom door close.
‘Do you believe her?’ asked Sas.
Khaden shook his head. ‘No way.’
‘So what do you reckon is really going on?’
‘Beats me.’
Sas sucked on her bottom lip.
‘There’s something she’s not telling us.’
‘Yeah, well,’ said Khaden, ‘there’s something we’re not telling her, so we’re even.’
They heard the flush of the toilet.
Sas stood. ‘I’ll bring in my dock so we can listen to music.’
Ruby
When I returned from the bathroom, Sas had set up her iPod dock on the coffee table and that music they loved, the indie, grunge stuff, filled the room. Sas lay on the floor, her calves resting on the seat of the armchair, feet tapping to the music. Khaden slouched on the sofa, eyes shut, playing air guitar.
I wiggled back into the beanbag and flicked through one of Lou’s House and Garden magazines, but instead of looking at the pictures of perfect homes, I tried to decide if I trusted Sas and Khaden enough to tell them about Dad.
The chorus of the song repeated:
You stood and watched while I fell,
Sinking, shrinking into a living hell.
‘Who sings this? I asked.
‘Over Reaction,’ said Khaden.
The lead singer’s husky voice seemed to linger in the still air. I shivered and shut the magazine. ‘Let’s go do something.’
Khade opened his eyes. ‘Nope. I’m staying here. And for the record, I am not, EVER, going shopping again. Got it?’
‘Good luck with that,’ said Sas, grinning. ‘Especially with the way you eat.’
Khaden pulled a face and leant forward to turn down the volume. It was a relief when the husky voice faded away. ‘I’m just saying…’
‘I didn’t mean shop. I meant hang out.’ I sat forward, the beanbag beans squeaking underneath me. ‘You know, go to the park, or the pool.’
Sas frowned. ‘Ruby, Stuart said—’
‘Stuff Stuart,’ I snapped. An uneasy silence settled between us. ‘So, what’s the plan?’
Sas leant back against the armchair. ‘I don’t know. We could go for a walk, I guess.’
‘No way, Sas,’ said Khaden. ‘Ruby, after everything that happened before, and with your dad—’
‘Like I said, stuff him.’ I stood and slung my bag over my shoulder. ‘Let’s walk.’
As we wandered up the gravel path to the playground overlooking the railway line, I stumbled.
‘Good trip?’ asked Sas, giggling.
‘Stupid slip-on shoes.’ I took off the right one and examined the toe.
‘Why wear them?’ asked Khaden, clim
bing the top of the monkey bars.
‘Because they’re cool.’ I sat on the swing and pushed back until I was standing on my tiptoes.
Khaden shook his head. ‘I don’t get why you’d wear stuff that hurts.’
‘And we don’t get why you wear wrecked Volleys.’ Sas tapped Khaden’s feet dangling from the bars.
‘They’re comfortable.’
‘And wrecked, but that’s right, you’re never going shopping again.’ Sas winked at me.
I pushed off the ground, pumping my legs to make the swing climb higher and higher. The chain looped and clanked. Eyes shut and hair trailing down, I leant back until I was almost lying flat, and soaked up the feeling of freedom. When I opened my eyes, Sas was sitting on the monkey bars with Khaden, not talking, just sitting there. I had to move, needed Khaden and Sas to move.
I jumped to the tanbark. ‘Coming?’
Khaden looked up. ‘Where?’
A train roared along the tracks to the city.
‘Let’s play chicken.’
‘Are you serious?’ said Khaden. ‘After Mojo?’
‘Are you in or out?’
Sas grinned and jumped from the top of the monkey bars. ‘In.’
Khaden scratched his head and stared into the distance.
‘Too chicken for chicken, Khade?’ asked Sas.
He jumped down. ‘Not a challenge. I’ll beat you two, easy.’
‘Is that right?’ I play-punched his arm. ‘Twenty bucks says you run across the tracks before me.’
‘The train tracks?’ Sas’s voice was high.
‘Yep.’
Khaden shook his head. ‘Come on, Ruby, the road is one thing, but trains? They can’t swerve or stop quickly.’
In the distance a train horn blew.
‘I figure you have two minutes to make up your mind.’ I jogged across the street and up the rise separating the road from the tracks. A twig jabbed me in the heel. Balanced on one leg, I brushed it from my shoe.
Sunshine flashed off the windscreen of the train charging around a bend in the distance.
Sas and Khaden caught up with me. I didn’t look at them. ‘So, last one to the other side gets twenty bucks from the other two. Each.’
‘There’s gotta be an easier way to make money,’ mumbled Khaden.
‘We on?’
‘Prepare to pay,’ said Sas, tensing beside me.
Khaden groaned, sighed and swore all at once.
The train horn blasted as it thundered through the level crossing towards us. The ground rumbled under my feet and the noise of the train pressed against my skin.
Khaden moved first, his feet skidding in the dirt as he sprinted down the hill.
The roar and rattle of the train mixed with the sound of my racing heart.
Sas swore and ran.
A second after her, I sprinted down the hill, gravel slipping beneath my shoes. As I reached the tracks, I fell. Rocks tore my legs and palms and the rail slammed into my chest, knocking my breath from me in a whoosh.
The rhythm of the train pulsed through the rail.
‘Ruby!’ screamed Sas. ‘Move!’
The train horn sounded—once, twice, the third time longer, more urgent. The train’s brakes squealed. Sparks flew onto the rocks.
Khaden gripped my shoulders and dragged me out of the train’s path. Pain streaked my knees. I stumbled to my feet and lurched forward, engulfed by noise, heat and the reek of metal on metal.
‘Run,’ yelled Khaden, dragging me by the arm.
‘My shoe—’
‘Stuff your shoe!’
He sprinted over the rocks and through the native shrubs. I glanced over my shoulder. The train had stopped. Faces peered out of the carriages. I looked away from them and saw my slip-on shoe lying in the middle of the track behind the train.
Eyes fixed on Khaden’s Volleys, I ran after him and Sas, down a street, a lane, across an oval. Somewhere in my brain, I realised we were running in circles but closing in on Sas’s place.
With each step, my terror transformed into raw energy, and laughter bubbled in my throat. My whole body felt light.
‘Khade, slow down,’ panted Sas. ‘I’m going to spew.’
‘Too bad,’ snapped Khaden, turning down another street.
Sas was power walking. ‘Khaden, seriously, we’re k’s from the train line.’
‘We stop at your place.’
Sas groaned and slumped against a brick fence, sweat staining the armpits and back of her shirt. ‘Enough.’
I stopped beside her and let out a massive whoop. ‘How. Much. Fun. Was. That?’ I gasped for air between each word.
Khaden marched back and stood over us. A drop of sweat fell from his forehead to the pavement at my feet. ‘Fun?’
‘Yeah. Massive! Did you see those randoms staring out the train window?’ I straightened up, laughing.
‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ asked Khaden, his face twisted with rage.
I looked from him to Sas and back. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘That sucked, Ruby.’
‘Oh, come on, it was funny.’
‘Funny? You were nearly killed! I was nearly killed. What’s funny about that?’
I stepped back. The brick fence dug into my thighs. ‘Yeah but—’
‘This whole competition thing between you and Sas is stupid.’
The world heaved under my feet. ‘What competition thing?’
Khaden clicked his tongue. ‘The always having to be better than Sas—beat her at chicken, steal more than her.’ He was waving his arms around. ‘It never used to be like this.’
‘Khaden, I—’
But he wasn’t done. ‘Isn’t it enough your stupid competition killed Mojo? Do you have to try to take me out too?’
My throat tightened. ‘Mojo escaped because of the gate,’ I whispered.
‘But if you hadn’t run in front of the traffic…’ He shook his head.
‘That’s not fair.’ I turned to Sas. ‘Is it?’
Sas picked at the moss growing on the fence.
‘Sas?’
‘Ruby, you’ve—’
‘You too?’
Sas growled then lashed out, her words tearing chunks from me.
‘You think you have it worse than anybody else, that your life is the worst ever. Your mean parents, painful brothers, your horrible life, boring job, but you don’t get it, Ruby, you have it all—your parents are together, you have a cool house…’ She stared at the leaves of the magnolia tree and sighed. ‘You have no idea what our lives are like, and you don’t care. You only care about yourself, Ruby. We’re over it. Over you.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘You work it out,’ said Sas, her eyes hard. ‘Shouldn’t be too hard—you think everything is about you anyway.’
My hands balled into fists. ‘Me? You’re the one who encouraged the stealing, made us do a runner, had us slaving over your stupid room.’ My voice was strangled by the fury lodged in my throat. ‘The whole friendship, if that’s what it is, is about you, Sas.’
‘What it is?’ Sas scoffed. ‘What it was.’
The anger rushed from me in a soft hiss.
Behind us, a security door slammed. An old woman shuffled across the verandah and down the concrete path, holding a broom in front of her like a knight’s lance. Her stockings, wrinkled around her ankles, made me think of elephants.
‘Get away from my home,’ she yelled, aiming the broom at Sas. ‘Go on, move!’
Sas raised both her hands and backed up to the nature strip. ‘We’re just talking.’
‘Hah! I watch the news. Planning to rob me, more like. Shoo, go on, go away.’
‘We were—’
She cut me off with a flourish of her broom. ‘Scoot. I’ve called the police.’
‘Come on,’ said Khaden. ‘The last thing I need is to see that cop again.’
‘We’re going,’ said Sas. ‘Old witch.’
‘Sorry, really, I’m sorry.’ I said, backing away as though the woman was a rabid dog.
I trudged up the street behind Sas and Khaden.
‘Hey,’ I called. They both stopped and turned to face me. ‘That thing you said…’
‘You know what, Ruby,’ said Khaden. ‘It’s probably best if we take a break.’
It was as if I’d walked into a glass wall. ‘What?’
‘Do stuff apart,’ said Sas.
‘Apart, or just you two without me?’ I said, trying not to sound as pathetic as I felt.
‘Whatever,’ said Sas. ‘I have to go pick up Grace and Eliza. Let’s go, Khaden.’
‘Actually,’ he said, without looking at either of us. ‘I’m going home. See you around.’
‘Khade,’ Sas called after him.
He lifted his hand to dismiss her.
Sas scowled. ‘Happy, Ruby? You’ve ruined everything.’ She stalked off.
The world closed in on me. I stared at down at my one bare foot and my blood-streaked shins. For the first time since falling, my legs, right foot and chest hurt and my head pounded. Worst of all, the rush of energy, that feeling I could fly, do anything, was gone. Now all I wanted to do was cry in the middle of the lonely street.
Khaden
Khaden had tried to outrun the anger and frustration, but just ended up sweaty and tired. He stopped opposite his street and waited for a break in the traffic, sweat dripping down his back and pooling at the waistband of his skinny jeans. Every part of him felt tense, even his skin. The image of Ruby falling on the train tracks was tattooed into his mind. What the hell had she been thinking. Had they been thinking?
Khaden didn’t know who he was maddest with—Ruby, Sas, or himself. When had everything become so stuffed up? Sure, he and Sas should have told Ruby before now that they were together, but there had to be more to what was going on between the three of them than just that. Something bigger had changed and it scared him.
On the other side of the road, a police van coasted towards the highway. Khaden recognised the cops, John Dobson and Nathan O’Brien. He hoped they hadn’t seen him. When the divvy van didn’t slow, Khaden let out the breath he’d been holding and crossed the road. He kicked a stone off the footpath and watched it skid onto the road. A police car pulled up behind the stone and John Dobson stepped onto the nature strip.
Khaden’s heart dipped.
‘Khaden, how’s it going?’ asked Dobson, leaning on the top of the open door.