‘You’re not old,’ I protest. I ignore the fat part. ‘You and me are still a team.’
She smiles a little. ‘That’s good. But …’ Her voice erupts into anger. ‘I wanted another baby. It’s not fair he refused to have a second one with me and he went off and had two more with that … with her!’
I don’t know what to say. It never crossed my mind that Mum wanted another kid. She’s always been so obsessed with her work. It makes me feel funny to think my own mother might be full of wishes she never tells me about.
When I get out of detention, my friends are waiting for me on the steps outside B corridor. Just like we agreed.
‘Were there are a bunch of bad kids in there?’ Tiffany asks eagerly.
‘Only one besides me. A year ten boy.’
‘Cool!’ Olivia smiles wickedly as we walk towards the canteen. ‘Was he cute?’
‘Yeah, he was hot.’
Mrs McBain was a little late for the detention so the year ten guy and I were waiting outside the door. He told me his name was James and asked me what year was I in and did I like high school.
‘What was he in for?’ Tiffany wants to know.
‘He didn’t do his homework. He said he worked too many shifts at Macca’s.’
‘She gave him a detention for that? What a cow.’
‘What’d she do to you?’ Charlotte asks hopefully. We’re nearly at the canteen now. At least the lines aren’t very long since we’ve come so late.
‘She just talked to me.’
‘For a half hour?’ Tiffany asks. ‘What is she, a yakking machine?’
‘She didn’t talk the whole time. She did some corrections, too.’
‘What’d she say?’
I don’t want to tell them how much Mrs McBain reminded me of Eve. I don’t want to describe the concerned way she looked at me when she told me year seven is very important because it’s when kids make a lot of decisions about who they want to be. I only tell them one thing. ‘She said she couldn’t let the rest of the class see me get away with being rude to her.’
‘God, she’s tight,’ Olivia declares. ‘Can’t she take a joke?’
Nicole and Tom: Ten Secrets for a Blissful Marriage.
I’m at the dentist, leafing through a prehistoric copy of New Idea. It’s like a magazine museum in here. Probably if I dug deep enough into the pile on that little brown table, Princess Diana would come alive.
I don’t know why Mum bothered to drop me off on time. Dr Geraldine, who I’ve been coming to ever since I can remember, always makes me wait at least half an hour. I’ve got these teeth on each side of my mouth, the pointy ones, that used to stick out like fangs. She’s going to check them to see if I need braces. I’m pretty sure I don’t. That will be a relief for Mum, Dad and Sarah. One less bill to pay. When I was younger I kind of liked the idea of a sparkly smile, but now I’d be happier without a mouth full of metal. I’ve got enough invisible things that set me apart, without adding one people can see.
I’m flicking through the pages without really seeing them when suddenly an ad catches my eye. There’s a skinny woman in a pink leotard, her hand on her hip, smiling like she’s just won Tattslotto. To her left is a small blurry photo of a sour-looking fat woman bursting out of a floral dress. Underneath it is printed, From size twenty-eight to size eight: I lost half my body weight.
She’s advertising Weight Watchers. There’s a coupon which lets you join up and go to a first meeting free.
As I gaze down at the former fatty, I think of Mum. Yesterday she was so upset about turning forty that she took the afternoon off and went out for a long lunch with her friend Margaret. They must have discussed a lot of stuff about me because last night Mum was really nice. She said I could go to Canberra, that she understood why I need to see Alice. She even got on the Internet and booked a flight for March first, because it’s cheaper if you arrange it in advance. Then she called Olivia’s mother and they talked for ages about ‘testing the limits’. It was embarrassing but at least they agreed that we could go to the city by train on Saturday.
The woman in the leotard looks so pleased with herself. It says in the small print that she’s the leader of her own Weight Watchers group. Even though Mum said her lunch with Margaret was really good, she was still sad. I wish I could make her as happy as this grinning woman. Not that Mum needs to lose half her body weight! A quarter would do.
There’s only one other person in the waiting room, an old woman who’s only got about five teeth. Guess they’re so precious she wants to do anything humanly possible to keep them. I tear the coupon out as softly as possible, hoping she’s deaf. Just my luck. She raises her eyes from her own ancient Woman’s Weekly and gives me a disapproving look. But I can stand disapproval from a ninety-year-old. I keep on tearing.
Every morning when I walk in the school gate I feel weird. I mean I’m so glad that I get to go to a nice spot around the back and meet up with my friends. Friends that other people look up to! And yet something makes me glance left along the fence, looking for Matthew and Stephen, even though I know they don’t wait for me here any longer.
I don’t want to think about them anymore! It’s not like I did anything really bad to them. I straighten my shoulders and head towards the cool spot that’s mine now, too. It’s way out past the portables and not many year sevens have discovered it. Tiffany knew about it because she’s got a sister in year ten.
The first time the cool girls took me there, I was really surprised. There was this veggie garden, all laid out in rows with a fence around it, a lot bigger than Will’s. ‘It belongs to the year eleven veggie class,’ Tiffany told me with a chuckle, ‘the ones who are too dumb to do VCE.’
‘Did they come here over the holidays to look after it?’ I asked.
The others gave me this look like, ‘Who cares?’ I thought they might kick me out of the group right then. Since that day I’ve tried harder to keep from blurting out my thoughts.
I’ve reached the spot now, and as usual the others are already here. Sitting in the shade of the toolshed. There’s this nice thick grass that’s really comfy, because I think it gets accidentally watered when the year elevens do the garden.
I sit down beside my friends. It’s obvious they’ve been talking about our trip to the city, because the first thing Olivia says is, ‘We thought we’d catch the 10:09. That okay with you?’
‘Sure.’ A train to the city with me and my friends! Fizzy excitement races through my brain.
‘What are you gonna wear?’ Tiffany asks me in an eager voice, ‘I’ve got this hot new top from Jetty Surf.’
‘Uh …’ what am I going to wear? Nobody who buys me clothes believes in brand names.
‘Hello, Kaitlin.’ I look up to where the deep voice came from. It’s the year ten boy I met in detention!
‘Hi, James.’ His eyes look even bluer in the sunlight. He gives me a wink and walks past.
‘He likes you!’ Olivia and Tiffany squeal at the same time.
‘You’re so lucky,’ Charlotte says wistfully.
Their words, and the way they’re looking at me, make me feel full of yellow light. If only I had something good to wear on Saturday, I’d be totally happy.
As I trudge out the front gate of the school, my uniform dress is already stuck to my back with sweat, wedged between my burning skin and my ten-kilo backpack. They should have a rule that we don’t have to do homework if the temperature goes over thirty-five degrees! And why does it have to be uphill most of the way to my place? As I stick my thumbs under the straps to ease the weight on my shoulders, I wish one of my friends could walk with me. But Tiffany and Olivia live in the opposite direction, and Charlotte has to take a bus.
‘Katie! Wait!’
I turn, and there’s Matthew galumphing up the hill towards me. I’m so glad to see him! But I shouldn’t be. I remind myself severely that he belongs to my old, daggy, primary school world. My friends haven’t come right out and said that Matth
ew and Stephen are losers, but lately they’ve been dropping a few hints.
‘Hot, eh?’ Matthew pants as he draws up beside me. I don’t want to have to talk to him. I want him to disappear. But when I imagine that, I feel suddenly lonely. God, I’m stupid.
‘Where’s your schoolbag?’ I ask him crossly.
‘Too hot,’ he answers.
‘How come you going this way, anyway? You don’t live near me.’
‘Doesn’t matter. I wanna walk further than I have to. I’m tryin’ to get fit.’
‘You do look fitter then you did last year,’ I admit.
‘I do?’
‘Yeah.’
‘How?’
‘How what?’
‘How do I look fitter?’
Sweat is trickling down my sides and I’m sick of this topic, but Matthew is looking so eager that I have to reply. ‘You’re taller,’ I say, ‘and thinner. And you seem … I don’t know … firmer.’
‘So do you!’ he says admiringly, his eyes running from my head down to my feet.
‘Jeez, Matthew,’ I mumble.
‘Oh, sorry.’ He looks at the ground.
At least it’s impossible for my face to get any redder. We’re walking downhill now, through the little shopping centre that leads to the train station. As usual, there’s kids from school hanging around the milk bar. How do they get here so fast? They’re drinking Cokes and eating ice-creams. Some of the older ones are smoking. I want to say to them, ‘I do have friends who are girls. They just don’t walk this way.’
‘Here,’ Matthew says, tugging at my schoolbag. ‘Let me carry that.’
‘No, thanks.’
‘Why not?’ he asks in his wounded voice.
‘Because you said it was too hot to carry your own bag.’
‘But I wanna carry yours!’
I don’t want him to. I mean I’d like not to have to lug my bag under the tunnel to the other side of the railway line and then up the last hill to home, but it feels like if I let him carry it, I’ll be giving him something though I don’t even know what it is.
He pulls at my backpack again, really hard. I don’t want to make a scene, because we’re nearly at the station and there’s even more kids around. It’s easier just to slip my arms out of the straps and let him take it. I feel ten degrees cooler and so light I could fly. Matthew looks extremely satisfied as he settles the pack on his own back.
We walk down the station ramp and into the sudden dimness of the tunnel. Matthew says in a quiet voice, ‘I guess you need to do girlie stuff at school now.’
‘What?’
‘That’s what my mum said.’
‘You talked about me to your mum?’
‘Only a little.’ That makes me feel creepy, to think of Matthew telling his mother stuff about me. Like I used to tell my mum when Shelley hurt me.
We emerge from the tunnel, making the sun seem harsher than ever. Matthew turns to me and asks earnestly, ‘Is that why you don’t want to hang around with me and Stevo anymore? Cos you need to do girlie stuff?’
This isn’t fair. When people dumped me in primary school, I never followed them home and asked them why. Anyway, I haven’t even dumped Matthew and Stephen. Not really.
‘I don’t know. It’s just …’ I hesitate.
‘What?’ Matthew prompts, as though my answer is really important to him. Which makes me remember the times I would have liked to ask people why they dumped me.
I glance around quickly to make sure no one can hear us, then tell him, ‘I guess your mum’s right in a way. I do want to have girls as my best friends. But that doesn’t mean I hate you and Stephen.’
He looks a little relieved. But not happy.
‘Don’t you and Stephen still hang around together?’ I ask.
‘Yeah,’ he says, ‘but he goes to chess club every lunchtime.’
‘Why don’t you go, too?’
‘I’m no good at chess!’ He kicks a discarded Solo can into the distance. ‘I’m no good at nothin’ where you have to use your brain.’
Suddenly, an image pops into my head. Of Matthew sitting on a log, behind the canteen at our old school. I went to find him there, the morning of the first trivia quiz. When I invited him to be on my team, he insisted I have a bite of his Mars Bar. I can still remember how, when I took the chocolate, it was melting from the heat of his hand.
‘You knew which team in the AFL won four premierships in a row,’ I remind him.
‘Only cos it’s on my dad’s stubby holder.’
What can I do so he won’t look so sad? ‘Well,’ I say in an encouraging voice, giving him a little shove on the arm, ‘at least that proves you can read!’
I can’t believe I’m up this early. Saturday’s when I sleep in till at least ten o’clock, but this morning my eyes popped open when the birds started chirping and every nerve was instantly awake. Now I’m at the kitchen window, staring out at the garden. I feel like there should be a huge banner hanging from the Hills Hoist proclaiming, KAITLIN IS BECOMING NORMAL. If I have to let go of a few things from primary school, I reckon it’s worth it. Who’d have thought I’d be heading off to the city with my three friends, all by ourselves in a big silver train?
I wonder if it’s too early to make Mum a cup of coffee. Probably. I heard her come in from her bungalow office at about two o’clock this morning. Bet she got through about ten bowls full of Barbecue Shapes and M&M’s. Which reminds me! I still haven’t given Mum that Weight Watchers coupon I pinched from the dentist. If I just hand it to her, she’ll give me this look like, ‘Gee, Kaitlin, you must think I’m about as attractive as a mother walrus.’
It’d be better if I hide it somewhere, a place where I know she’ll find it after I’ve left on the train. That way she’ll have time to think about it before I get back. I mean she’s the one that’s been moaning all week about how fat she is. I’m only trying to help.
I know where to put it! I’ll stuff it in with her M&M’s stash. She keeps an assortment of packets in an old shortbread tin on top of the fridge. I’ve told her she can just buy the bag with three kinds mixed up, but she likes to create her own ratios according to how she feels on the night. For example, if she’s in an angry mood she’d want three peanut ones to every plain so she’d feel that satisfying crunch between her molars.
‘Call me as soon as you get to the city,’ Mum says as I get out of the car.
‘I will,’ I answer in a very patient voice considering it’s the fifth time she’s reminded me.
‘You remember the homelink number?’
‘Yes!’ I’m a tiny bit impatient now. ‘Probably Olivia will let me use her mobile anyway.’ If Mum wasn’t such a cheapskate, she could keep track of me on my own phone.
‘Okay then.’ Mum’s voice wavers a bit. ‘Have a great day.’
I will, I think as I walk up the ramp to the platform. At least I hope I will. If I can just keep my mouth from emitting any dork remarks.
‘Hello, Kaitlin!’ Two excited voices greet me. I’m wearing my plain black T-shirt and my jeans. It’s kind of hot but they were the best things I could find. I guess they’re ok because Tiffany and Olivia are looking at me approvingly. I feel like a girl on TV: out with her friends, no adults in sight.
‘Where’s Charlotte?’ I ask.
Olivia wrinkles her nose and sighs. ‘Her mum wouldn’t let her come. She called me this morning and she was crying like anything.’
‘She’s been trying to convince her parents all week, but I guess they’re just too tight,’ Tiffany says.
Charlotte was crying? It makes me feel funny to imagine that. Satisfied and guilty at the same time.
The train pulls into the station and we get on. Thank goodness it’s air-conditioned. Tiffany runs in front of an old lady to grab a window seat. ‘Sit here, Kaitlin,’ she calls out, pointing to the seat next to her. Olivia sits opposite us.
‘Charlotte’s such a baby,’ Tiffany says.
‘Yeah,’ Olivia
agrees, ‘she’s gotta stand up to her parents sooner or later.’
I can’t believe they’re talking like that about another cool girl.
The train stops at the next station. An Italian nonna gets in, pushing a black shopping trolley that has a bunch of carnations and a breadstick poking out the top. Behind her there’s a slim guy with a skateboard, about fifteen. He sits way down the other end.
‘He’s hot,’ Tiffany whispers.
‘Not as cute as James,’ I say. I hope that wasn’t a stupid comment. But I can’t just sit here like a lump saying nothing.
‘You totally like him, don’t you?’ Tiffany nudges me with her elbow.
‘Maybe.’ I giggle.
‘Your taste has improved heaps since you started hanging around with us,’ Olivia says.
‘Yeah,’ Tiffany agrees. ‘How come you used to be friends with nerds anyway?’
For some reason that makes me giggle harder. ‘I found one behind the canteen and one in the library,’ I explain. ‘I felt sorry for them.’
Not a great joke, but Olivia and Tiffany are laughing. And I’ve got no reason to feel guilty, I tell myself. Matthew and Stephen don’t ever need to know I was making fun of them.
‘That looks really good on you,’ Olivia says.
Tiffany is standing with her hand on her hip, just outside the change rooms at Espirit, trying on tight black jeans and a black tank top with a silver logo. The matching beret makes her blonde hair look paler than ever.
‘You could be a model,’ the sales girl tells her. Olivia and I exchange glances, and giggle because we know a secret.
I tried on a pink off-the-shoulder top before which they said looked good on me, but I know I’m not half as pretty as Tiffany.
‘Come on,’ Olivia says, ‘I’m starving.’
So am I. This is the sixth shop where we’ve tried on clothes, plus we walked through Myer and sampled every perfume, lip gloss and nail polish we could find. Olivia got a red jacket that looks gorgeous with her black hair, and Tiffany is seriously considering buying the jeans she’s got on. Mum only gave me fifteen dollars to spend, but that doesn’t matter. All morning, I’ve been imagining the thoughts of sales assistants and other shoppers, especially ones my age with their mothers: look at those three cool girls. I bet they’ve been best friends for years.
Term in Year Seven Page 7