by Julie Fison
‘I like your friends,’ Persephone said as I hobbled alongside her on our way back to the Paradise Point.
I glanced over my shoulder to see if Izzy and Mia could still see me. When they disappeared from view, I dropped my hand from Persephone’s shoulder and sighed. It was a relief to be able to walk without a limp again. ‘Glad that’s over.’
‘That was really scary,’ Persephone said.
‘Yeah,’ I agreed. ‘I was worried they’d work out what was going on.’
‘No, Kitty.’ Persephone stopped and stared at me. ‘I meant you. You’re such a good liar it’s scary. You could teach a class on lying and even Tori would have to take notes.’
I flinched at her words. Being told that I was a better liar than Tori was harsh. I had tried to do the right thing by lying about my ankle to protect my friends’ feelings. But Persephone had a point and now I was really feeling guilty.
‘I should have told the truth, huh?’ I asked Persephone.
She shrugged. ‘What do you think?’
I sighed. I’d really screwed things up now – not only with Izzy and Mia, but also with Persephone. She was too nice to get mad at me, but I could see she was looking at me differently.
‘I feel so, so bad,’ I said, looking out to sea. ‘I just panicked. I should have told them the truth. But, I don’t know, the wrong thing came out.’ I turned to Persephone. ‘Sorry I put you through that. Thanks for being, you know …’
‘A good liar?’
‘Yes. I mean, no. Not a good liar …’ I tried to think of the right words. ‘I mean someone who can keep a secret. Oh, it’s all coming out wrong.’ I put my hands over my face, taking a moment to get my thoughts in order. Then I looked at Persephone again. ‘Thank you for being a good friend. Sorry I lied, and sorry you had to lie, too. You’ve got to believe me. I feel terrible about that.’
Persephone was smiling. ‘I take it back,’ she said. ‘You’re not like Tori at all. Look how confused and remorseful you are! Tori would have me believing I started the lie. Then I’d be the one apologising and feeling bad.’
I smiled, relieved that Persephone had forgiven me. And I was really glad to hear that I was nothing like Tori, after all.
‘When we see Izzy and Mia tomorrow, I’ll tell them everything,’ I promised her as we continued our walk across the rocks.
Persephone nodded. ‘Yeah, we should do something nice to make it up to them. We could go to the new sushi train.’
‘I still can’t believe they told me I was going to have to dig my own toilet, just to surprise me,’ I said, shaking my head.
‘They were really sweet doing that for you,’ Persephone said. ‘I don’t know anyone who’d do that for me. I never get surprises.’
‘Not even from your brother?’
Persephone frowned. ‘What?’
‘He never comes around the corner and screams SURPRISE?’
My yell must have really surprised her because she lost her balance, slipped and fell onto me. Unfortunately, it happened just as I was trying to negotiate a tricky section on the rocks. I stumbled backwards and fell off a boulder. I howled. It felt like a shark had bitten off my leg! I looked down and realised my ankle was trapped in a crevice. Persephone helped me wriggle it free, but then the pain got worse.
‘Oh, no!’ Persephone said, peering at my foot. ‘It looks like you’ve sprained your ankle.’
‘I feel so bad,’ Persephone said when we finally made it off the rocks and back to the beach. It was about the fiftieth time she’d said it.
‘It’s not your fault,’ I said, also for the fiftieth time. ‘I shouldn’t have surprised you.’
‘I think you should go to the hospital,’ Persephone said.
I shook my head. ‘Come on, the guys are waiting for us.’ I wasn’t being a martyr, I just didn’t think it was that bad. I knew it wasn’t broken.
‘You sure?’ Persephone said, looking worried.
‘Well,’ I said, smiling. ‘I could do with a bit of help.’
Persephone waited while I put my arm around her neck. I instantly felt relief at getting some weight off my ankle. Maybe I really had sprained it. I’d have to find a doctor tomorrow if it hadn’t settled down by then.
In the meantime, I hobbled along, dreaming of Rio to keep my mind off the pain. I was trying to visualise him in the ice-cream shop, his hair all scruffy from surfing. He’d smile when he saw me and ask which flavour I liked.
I turned to Persephone. ‘Do you think it sounds corny to ask for a “single serve of Rio”?’
She laughed. ‘Kitty, I think the pain’s getting to you,’ she said. ‘Do not ask for a single serve of Rio. Just be yourself. Don’t try too hard.’
I nodded, exploring some other options in my mind. I needed to come up with an opening line for Rio – one that looked like I wasn’t trying too hard, but was actually going to knock him over. The name Rio seemed like a pretty obvious place to start. It meant ‘river’ in Spanish and Portuguese. It was the capital of Brazil – Rio de Janeiro, which meant the River of January. (Yes, I had done my research.) I was just about to run another idea by Persephone, when, out of nowhere, Rio and Jordan appeared.
‘What happened to your leg?’ Rio asked, pushing his hair away from his face.
I was all ready to explain about my sprained ankle when something happened. As I gazed into Rio’s concerned eyes, I forgot my injury and my worries about opening lines. Even the nerves that I’d been carrying from watching him on the bus for the past few months all drifted away with the sea breeze. It felt like Rio and I were the only people on the earth.
I opened my mouth but no words would come out. There was a sickening knot in my stomach. I dropped my eyes to the sand and froze.
We stood there not talking, until Persephone saved me from myself.
‘Kitty’s in a lot of pain!’ Persephone said. ‘She caught her ankle in the rocks.’
I glanced up at Rio. He was looking at me, with a slight smile on his face.
I dropped my eyes to the safety of the sand again and shuffled uncomfortably, still clinging to Persephone’s shoulder.
‘Maybe you should get that checked out,’ Rio said, bending down to inspect my ankle.
‘It’s nothing,’ I mumbled, staring down at his messy hair. I just wanted to get away. I didn’t need him poking around at my purple foot. ‘Really, I’m fine.’ I unwrapped my arm from Persephone’s neck and took a step sideways to prove my point. ‘See.’
Instantly, I toppled and landed in the sand, face first.
‘Ew!’ I groaned, spitting out gritty sand, but I was in no hurry to move. I just lay there with my eyes closed. Maybe if I stayed really still, the others might leave me to my humiliation and go for an ice-cream without me. I waited, hopefully, for a few moments. Then I heard Rio say, ‘Do you need some help?’
I rolled onto my side, wiping sand from my face. Rio was kneeling beside me, but I ignored his offer of help, and shuffled onto my bum. I just felt too embarrassed to even look at him.
‘All good, thanks,’ I said, managing a tiny smile.
Persephone rolled her eyes. ‘Kitty, I think you’re the most accident-prone person I’ve ever met,’ she said with a smile. ‘But, hey, it could have been worse. A seagull might have flown over and pooped on your –’
‘Please,’ I put my hand up to stop her finishing the sentence, ‘don’t even say it.’
I got up on my elbows to look at the sky and make sure it wasn’t actually going to happen. Seagulls were flapping all over the place, but thankfully none were flying over my head.
I wondered how I had turned a perfectly normal injury into the second-most embarrassing moment of my life. Or was it the most embarrassing? Either way, Rio must have thought I was a total idiot.
‘So, who’s for an ice-cream then?’ Persephone asked, getting to her feet. She was obviously trying to get things back on track. The guys both nodded. But I’d suddenly lost my appetite.
I wasn’t
sure if it was the fall or the humiliation that came with it, but my ankle was throbbing.
‘I think I might need to see a doctor after all,’ I told Persephone. ‘But you go ahead. I’ll call you when I’m done.’
Persephone looked at me, worried. ‘Don’t be silly. I’ll take you. We can see the guys tomorrow.’
I saw Jordan’s face fall. He was probably hoping for a very different afternoon to the one that was playing out. ‘Yeah, tomorrow –’
‘I can take Kitty,’ Rio interrupted. He stood up and stretched out his hands to me. ‘There’s a medical clinic right across the road.’
I stared at his hands for a few seconds, before I felt brave enough to look at his face. ‘No, it’s fine. Thanks, Rio,’ I said. ‘I can go on my own.’
But Rio didn’t seem to hear. He grabbed my hands and pulled me to my feet. Then, before I had time to work out what was happening, Rio had my arm around his neck and I was hobbling awkwardly towards the doctor’s office.
I glanced back over my shoulder. Persephone and Jordan were smiling and waving from the ice-cream shop.
Rio released me into a chair in the busy medical centre. He handed me a magazine, gave my details to the receptionist and then sat down next to me.
‘All right?’ he said, smiling.
‘Much better,’ I said, trying to work out what was going on behind his smile. Surely he thought I was a major loser, and was annoyed about having to spend the afternoon waiting to see a doctor. I searched his face for signs of irritation, but he looked quite content as he reached for a fishing magazine and started flicking through the pages.
‘Thanks,’ I whispered. ‘You’re really sweet.’
Rio looked up from his mag. Our eyes met for no more than a second or two, but it was long enough. I felt myself falling, my heart racing, my mind spinning. Who would have thought that a sprained ankle could be romantic?
I glanced away to compose myself, watching a boy who had just walked in. He had blood on his face from a gash on his forehead. My euphoria vanished. ‘What a way to spend the holiday.’
‘Yeah. Hopefully you’re fine,’ Rio replied, ‘and it’s nothing too serious.’
I nodded. ‘Hopefully.’
Rio glanced back at his magazine for a second, and then closed it. ‘I was out for most of the soccer season with a broken foot last year,’ he said.
I winced. ‘Sounds painful.’
‘It was. And really, really annoying.’ He hesitated. ‘Even though it was actually my own fault.’
‘Why? What happened?’
Rio looked away for a second and then told me the whole story. It was the first game of the season and he’d ‘taken a dive’, which apparently meant making a tackle look worse than it was by falling to the ground. He’d been trying to force a penalty in front of the goal mouth. He ended up getting the penalty, but by diving he’d also managed to break his foot. ‘I guess I got what I deserved.’
I was surprised; it was almost exactly what had happened to me. I glanced at Rio, wondering if I should share my story, too. But I pushed the idea away. He’d just get the wrong idea about me. It was one thing to fake an injury on a soccer pitch to help your team out. It was another to lie to your friends. So, instead, I focused on soccer.
‘Big fan of Real Madrid, are you?’ I asked, making use of the bit of intel I’d picked up from his folder in the bridge-building session.
Rio raised his eyebrows. ‘Is it that obvious?’
I smiled coyly. ‘The sticker on your folder at school gave you away.’
Rio laughed and then talked more about soccer, his friends and his brother, who were all as mad about soccer as he was. Rio lived and breathed soccer from the sound of it. Not that he really had a choice, he said. Because his dad was Argentinean, football was basically in his blood. That explained Rio’s slight and very cute accent.
‘Shame I didn’t inherit my dad’s artistic skills, though,’ Rio said, sighing. ‘He’s a graphic artist. He’s got an amazing imagination.’
‘What sort of work does he do?’
‘Really modern stuff. Totally offbeat. A bit like him really. It’s hard to describe. I’ll have to show you sometime.’
I felt my heart skip a beat as he said the words. Rio was inviting me to see his dad’s work. I could barely believe what I was hearing.
I couldn’t help a smile spreading across my face. ‘That’d be cool.’
Rio glanced at his hands. ‘You’re going to think I’m a complete stalker,’ he said slowly, ‘but remember that bridge picture you drew with the dragon?’
I laughed. ‘How could I forget!’
‘Well, I rescued that picture out of the bin and took it home to show it to my dad. He thought it was really good. You’re really good.’
I felt myself blush. ‘It was nothing. Just a doodle,’ I said. ‘I’m not that good. Anyway, you’re not a stalker. I’m the one …’ I took a deep breath to stop myself from saying any more. I was just about to blurt out my own stalker story. I knew Rio would run for the exit if he knew I’d been studying him on the bus practically every day. I scrambled for something sensible to say. ‘I haven’t told you the whole story about my ankle,’ I said before I’d had a chance to work out if now was the right time for a confession. And then it all just came out. Every last terrible detail. ‘Probably got what I deserved, huh?’
I waited for Rio to judge me, feeling totally exposed. I’d probably made a terrible mistake telling him that I’d lied to my friends. He’d think I was completely two-faced. But he just shrugged.
‘Don’t beat yourself up. We’ve all done it. You were just trying to protect your friends’ feelings.’
‘Yeah, I was,’ I said. ‘But I guess I got what I deserved.’
I looked down at my ankle. It was still throbbing, and looked worse than ever. Somehow, though, it didn’t really feel like a punishment anymore. I felt like I’d won first prize in some cute-guy lottery. I was sitting centimetres away from Rio, the guy I’d been dreaming about for months. I knew everything about his face, his hair, the way he moved, and the way he laughed from watching him on the bus. But now I was actually getting to know him.
I glanced at Rio’s face. He caught me watching, but instead of looking away, he just smiled.
‘What?’ he asked, even though he must have known exactly what I was thinking.
‘Kitty MacLean,’ someone called.
I looked up, startled. I’d almost forgotten where I was until I stood to walk. Oh, the pain!
Rio helped me into the doctor’s room. She checked me over, squeezing and prodding my foot and ankle. She didn’t think it was broken but she told me to have an X-ray if it didn’t get better in a couple of days. She sent me on my way with a bandaged ankle, crutches, instructions on painkillers and a stern telling off for playing around on the rocks.
I felt like a naughty three-year-old. I glanced at Rio, who was trying to hide a smirk. I elbowed him, but it only made him snort, which gave me the giggles. The doctor frowned as I thanked her and shuffled out of the surgery, trying unsuccessfully to keep a straight face.
I was still smiling right up until the moment that the receptionist cleared her throat, and I realised that I had to pay a bill.
‘Seventy-five dollars for today’s visit, thank you.’
This was exactly what my mum had in mind when she gave me an ‘emergencies only’ stash of cash. Just a shame I had spent most of it on bikinis. My heart was in my mouth as I pulled out the last of the money from my purse. Thirty-five dollars. I unzipped the change section and counted out my coins.
The receptionist stared at me and tapped her pen. ‘Is there a problem?’
I scrambled through my purse one more time. And then I saw a bulge in a side pocket that I never used. I opened it up and pulled out a roll of twenties and a note. It read ‘ABSOLUTE Emergencies Only’. Thank you, Mum!
‘No problem,’ I said, smiling at the receptionist and handing her the cash.
Rio gave me a cheeky smile as he opened the door to the medical centre so I could hobble out on my new crutches. ‘Thought we were going to have to wash the floors to get out of there. What a first date!’
I almost fell off my crutches. First date? Rio thinks this is a first date?
I looked up at him, smiling, trying to play it cool. ‘Oh, I really know how to have fun. I never stop.’
‘So,’ Rio said, as we stood on the footpath still looking at each other. ‘We should find the others.’
‘Yeah, totally.’ I nodded, but neither of us moved. It was like we were held in a date spell. If we moved, the magic would all be over. I studied Rio’s face, unable to do anything, until I heard someone calling me.
‘Kitty, is your ankle okay?’
I managed to drag my eyes away from Rio and saw Persephone and Jordan running across the street. They looked so cute, hand in hand.
‘I’m totally okay,’ I said, feeling dazed. ‘Amazing. Couldn’t be better.’
It was true, but I wasn’t talking about my ankle. I’d never felt so good inside.
‘What’s it like to be in love?’ I asked Persephone as we lay in our beds that night.
She sat up, fluffed her pillow and then looked at me with a sly smile. ‘Do you think you might be in love with Rio?’
‘I’m not sure. I hardly know him. And every time I see him I’m doing something really stupid like flashing my knickers or falling flat on my face in the sand.’
‘That doesn’t seem to bother him. I think he finds you intriguing.’
‘So you think he thinks I’m weird?’
Persephone smiled. ‘Maybe, but in a really cute way.’
She lay back down on her pillow and stared at the ceiling fan whirring slowly above us.‘Tori says being in love is like a disease. And sometimes it nearly kills you. But I don’t know. I’ve never been in love.’
I rolled over on my side and stared at Persephone. ‘No way.’
She shrugged. ‘I think I’m falling for Jordan, though. When I see him, I get this excited, anxious, sick feeling, all at the same time. Do you know what I mean?’