Amelia Westlake Was Never Here

by Erin Gough

The high-pitched ringing has started up again. I hope this isn’t another one of my migraines. I breathe out slowly. “There’s got to be a way to get them to reverse their decision or, I don’t know, change their minds somehow.”

  Edie takes her hair out of its ponytail and makes a higher one. “If it would be easier for me not to come…”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I said, if it’s easier if I don’t come to your formal…”

  “That’s not the point.” I struggle to keep my voice calm. “I’ve been dreaming about the school formal ever since year seven. What’s more, I’ve organized the whole thing, practically by myself!”

  Suddenly I’m thinking of Will again and imagining how she would react. She would use crass language, absolutely. She would say something along the lines of “we’re being crushed,” far too loudly, before miming (badly) getting violently crushed by some form of heavy machinery. Then she would formulate a plan to do Rosemead over once and for all.

  Not that it helps matters to be thinking about Will right now.

  “You and I have bought complementing dresses,” I remind Edie. “And what about your ballroom dancing lessons? We can’t let them go to waste!”

  “Then let me know if I can do anything.” Edie smooths her hair with a palm. She stands up and straightens her dress. “And about those public speaking notes. Any chance they might be ready by lunchtime on Saturday? I’ve got this family lunch to go to on Sunday, and it would be good to look over them on Saturday afternoon.”

  I line up my teeth carefully. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  chapter 27

  WILL

  At four thirty on the day of our planned break-in, I’m standing outside the gym entrance, my whole body thrumming, taking in the heady scent of rubber, talcum powder, and sweat. I’m in a tracksuit and sneakers, trying to look like wearing sports gear is the kind of thing I do all the time.

  The tracksuit I have on, its pocket heavy with Liz’s staff room key, is Harriet’s. I’m not going to lie: It’s a turn-on. Despite all the talks I’ve given myself, I’m having an extreme amount of trouble getting her out of my head—or getting anything else in there, for that matter. Right now, my cranial real estate is pretty much wall-to-wall Harriet.

  What was I saying again?

  That’s right. My outfit.

  I’ve borrowed the sneakers from Nat, who can’t be here due to a Messenger deadline and whose feet are the same size as mine. As long as no one who actually knows me wanders past, I look no more out of place than a Rosemead alumna in the halls of an uptown law firm.

  It’s the perfect time in the afternoon because most of the staff have left for the day but security hasn’t yet locked the building. Soon, thanks to Liz leaving her key taped beneath a basin in the PAC bathrooms as Amelia Westlake asked her to, I’ll have the details we need about the printing company. Then we can pull off the prank to top all pranks. The Domestic Violence Australia Network will have cash for their cause. Amelia Westlake will reign among the gods.

  I think through the plan again.

  We know from Harriet that the Sports Committee meets at four, which means Hadley will be out of the gym staff room for at least another half hour before returning for his things. The only teacher still around is the head of netball, Miss Kinton. As soon as she’s gone, I’ll go in.

  I peer through the heavy glass doors. My eye is drawn to the school banner hanging on the foyer wall. I grin, remembering that Harriet and I had the French motto removed and another phrase stitched in its place. So far, nobody seems to have noticed our handiwork.

  Suddenly there is movement. Miss Kinton appears carrying a sports bag and a pile of netball bibs. She leans on one of the heavy glass doors until it opens. The air fills with the stench of sweaty athlete.

  “Hello…” she says when she sees me. She looks uncertain, as if she’s never seen me before in her life. This makes sense. Two years ago I managed to wag our entire semester of compulsory netball by feigning a condition called labyrinthitis, which I thought I’d made up but, it turns out, actually exists.

  I’m glad she has no idea who I am. “It’s Wendy,” I say cheerily.

  She gives an embarrassed smile. “Of course. Good night, Wendy.”

  “Night, Miss Kinton.”

  I wait until she’s disappeared down the path before messaging the others.

  Coast clear. I’m going in.

  Nat messages back with a thumbs-up. Harriet’s reply comes through soon after.

  Thank you, Will. Much appreciated. Coach

  Hadley is here with me at the Sports

  Committee meeting. Standing by for further reports.

  Harriet.

  Have I mentioned she’s killing me?

  Once I’m inside I make a beeline across the foyer for the gym staff room. It takes three seconds to lift the key from my pocket, slot it into the door, and turn the handle.

  The door swings open and I step inside.

  I’m in.

  Man, it stinks in here. I guess jocks are immune to the reek of stale perspiration. I scan the room for what I’m looking for. Not the stacked hockey sticks in the corner. Not the regulation Rosemead sports caps in a pile on the desk. Not the halved oranges in a Tupperware container on one of the chairs. If the printing company details are going to be anywhere, they’re going to be with the paperwork on the bookshelf.

  The problem is, the shelf is full of paperwork, spewing out of rows and rows of plastic binders, many of them unmarked. It could easily take me hours to sift through it all.

  My gaze drifts to a corkboard hanging by the window. It’s worth a look.

  I walk over and scan the notices pinned to it: some class rosters, a list of emergency phone numbers, and an invitation to Miss Watson’s thirtieth birthday party (no thanks). Then I see it.

  There, on a tiny square of paper sharing a pin with a flyer about the swimming pool fund-raising dinner, is a handwritten note:

  Newsletter printer: Peak Printing. 9828 7354

  Bingo.

  From outside the door, I hear the sound of the heavy glass doors creaking open.

  Shit. I grab the note, pin and all, and make a dash for the door. In my rush I clip the chair with the container of oranges on it; the chair spins. The container slides off and lands on its side on the carpet.

  There’s no time to pick it up. I can already see Miss Kinton walking across the foyer.

  I slip back through the staff room door, close it behind me, and quickly stash the note and Liz’s key back in my pocket.

  Just in time.

  I try to look casual as I walk toward the head of netball.

  “Hello, again,” she says when we reach each other, her voice loaded with suspicion.

  “You’re back.” I shoot her a friendly grin, as if the opportunity of seeing her twice in the space of ten minutes has made my day.

  “I forgot the oranges for my evening game,” she says.

  I nod. “Orange you glad you didn’t leave without them?”

  She doesn’t laugh.

  The oranges belong to her? That means as soon as she sees them on the staff room floor she’ll know I’ve been in there.

  I’ve got to get out of here.

  But Kinton is standing in my path. “What are you still doing here, Wendy? All on-campus training has finished for the day.”

  “I’m—I’m looking for the sign-up boards, as a matter of fact,” I say. “You see, I’m really keen to join one of your netball teams.”

  This piques her interest. She considers me. “Have you played netball before?”

  “Oh, I’ve been playing for years. But not for Rosemead. I play in a, er, highly competitive local competition.”

  The head of netball pivots to face me properly. “We’re looking for a new player, as a matter of fact. What position are you?” She fiddles with the whistle around her neck.

  “I’m in a great position. I’m fit, and I’m available pretty much every weeknight.”
/>
  “I meant what position do you play?”

  Dammit. “Left wing?”

  Kinton levels a stare at me. “Left wing is field hockey.”

  “Wing attaché, sorry.”

  “You mean wing attack?”

  “That’s the one.”

  She purses her lips. “Perhaps you should be getting home.”

  “Good idea.”

  As soon as I’m past her, I hurry toward the glass doors at full speed. If I can get away before she realizes I’ve been in the staff room, maybe it will be okay. She hasn’t a clue who I am, after all. I turn my head to see her slot her own key into the staff room door. I turn back just in time to see the heavy glass doors an inch from my face, but not in time to stop myself from ramming straight into them.

  Time dissolves. I feel the imprint of a cold, hard surface. I see a tint of green. I hear the sound of vibrating glass: an endless, bassoon-low note. I taste saliva, sour, in my throat.

  I don’t know how long I’m out for, but I know it’s the pain that brings me back. My head aches where it collided with the doors. My right hand, which I raised too late in an attempt to protect my face, throbs like an electronic dance beat.

  The first thing I see when the fog parts is the ripple of a cream silk shirt. A pair of sheer stockings dazzles in the late-afternoon sun. French perfume clogs my nostrils. A shadow slips across me and I startle.

  “Hello, Wilhelmina,” says Croon.

  chapter 28

  HARRIET

  At Sports Committee, the first item on the agenda is the new swimming pool complex. Coach Hadley waits for everyone to take a seat, then draws a diagram of the complex on the whiteboard.

  “This boundary line will flank the second oval,” says Coach, drawing a straight line with his marker.

  I text Will to let her know I have him in my line of sight.

  “And this one will meet the side of the gym where the staff room is.” He outlines the swimming pool, the lanes, and the bleachers. He erases parts of the boundary lines and draws squiggles to represent the gates. He caps his marker. “Any questions?”

  Giddily, I think of asking him how many legal-advice clinics, social worker salaries, and health services could be funded with the money we’re raising for the pool. But I don’t. We will find out soon enough.

  “Will the new complex have its own change room?” asks Zara Long.

  She is sitting at the front beside Kimberley Kitchener. I’ve noticed Coach Hadley has been paying both of them a fair amount of attention lately. Last month, he appointed Zara captain of the softball firsts when Eileen Sarmiento had to pull out of the season after breaking her wrist. As for Kimberley, she has become his student trainee coach for the middle school swim squads. I have seen the way he walks along the edge of the pool with her, his arm draped loosely around her shoulders, intermittently whispering in her ear.

  “What would be the point of a change room?” Coach Hadley says. “We’re all friends here,” he adds with a wink.

  Zara and Kimberley laugh raucously. The rest of the committee members give uncertain smiles. I feel a heavy weight in my jaw. Coach sees my expression and mimics me with an exaggerated pout. “It’s a joke, Harriet,” he says. “Of course there will be a change room.” He uncaps his marker and draws a rough box in the corner of the whiteboard, like he was planning to all along.

  I blush, but it’s not embarrassment I feel. There is a granite-hard lump of outrage in my throat. I wish I’d never agreed to be on this committee. When Coach Hadley first asked me, it seemed like such a privilege, but what is so privileged about doing administrative duties free of charge that the sports staff should be doing themselves?

  There is a knock at the door and Natasha Nguyen bursts in. Never have I been so pleased to see anybody in my life.

  She crosses the room swiftly without even a glance at anyone else and bends at my ear.

  “You’ve got to come,” she murmurs, low enough so that no one else can hear. “There’s been an accident. They’ve called an ambulance for Will.”

  “An ambulance?” I cry out.

  Everyone in the room turns.

  Coach Hadley clears his throat. “What is the cause of this unexpected interruption, Miss Nguyen?”

  “Family emergency,” says Natasha smoothly.

  Coach Hadley nods at me. “We’ll catch you up on the minutes later, Harriet.”

  Natasha ushers me out.

  “She crashed right into those bloody gym doors,” Natasha tells me when we’re safely up the hall. “Gave herself a concussion. Looks like she’s broken some fingers as well.”

  “Oh my God.” I stop dead beside a bank of lockers. At the thought of Will prostrate on a gurney, I feel faint.

  “But that’s not all. Croon was on the scene.” Natasha reaches out beyond the railing and yanks roughly at a tree branch. Yellow leaves rain down. “When Will slammed into the door, Miss Kinton was there. She must have called Croon. She was there within minutes.”

  I lean heavily against a locker door. “What do they know?”

  Looking around, Natasha lowers her voice. “Nothing specific. Only that she was up to something in the staff room.”

  “Where are they taking her?” I ask, steadying my shaky hands.

  “Royal North Shore.”

  “Someone should have gone with her.”

  “Why do you think I’m here?” says Natasha, reddening. Suddenly she won’t look at me. “I offered to go, but she said that she wanted you.”

  I find her on a bed in the emergency holding area. At first I almost don’t recognize her—someone has tied her hair up in a strangely symmetrical knot. There is no mistaking her hand, though, wrapped in a bandage the size of a sourdough loaf and propped on a tower of pillows. Her face is pale, her skin damp. I feel a trembling in my chest.

  I draw the curtain around the bed and put down my school bag. “Are you okay?”

  “Dandy.” She looks glazed.

  “Does your mum know you’re here?”

  She nods. “She’s out getting takeaway and then she’ll be back.” She glances over. “You don’t have to stand, you know.”

  I pull up a metal chair.

  I can’t remember the last time I was in a public hospital. It was probably when Arthur had his guitar injury. That was only twelve months ago, but I had forgotten how much I hate these places—the linoleum, the lighting, the smell of illness and despair. I have a sudden urge to get Will out of here. Then I remember it is not my place to want anything for, on behalf of, or in relation to Will.

  She sees me eyeing her bandage. “Don’t worry. It looks far worse than it is. Just two fractured fingers and some bruising.”

  “Are you in much pain?”

  “Not anymore. They’ve got me on morphine.” She nods at the drip cord, grinning, but her grin abruptly vanishes. “I should warn you that Croon grilled me. She even asked if the accident had something to do with an Amelia Westlake prank. Don’t worry, I denied everything. But she knows from Kinton that I was in the staff room, and she didn’t waste any time exacting her punishment.”

  “Her punishment?”

  Will nods. “It’s funny, really. It’s the opposite of a punishment as far as I’m concerned.”

  “What is it?”

  “She’s banned me from going to the formal.” Her voice is flat.

  “Oh, Will.” I reach out my hand.

  “Like I give a shit about the formal,” she mutters, drawing her hand away. “It’s not like I had anyone to go with.” She stares hard at the bedsheet.

  “The formal has been ruined anyway,” I tell her with a sigh.

  Will looks up. “What do you mean?”

  “Principal Croon has prohibited girls from inviting other girls as their dates.”

  Will sits forward with such violence that the drip needle almost dislodges from her hand. “That bigoted bitch,” she growls.

  I try not to smile.

  “Where the fuck does she get of
f?” Will continues. “Hasn’t she heard of the Anti-Discrimination Act? We should take her to court.”

  I give her good hand a gentle tap. “You should probably keep it down,” I whisper.

  Will draws up her knees, making a mountain of the starched white hospital sheets. Her bread loaf of a bandage rolls miserably on the pillows. “This gives us all the more reason to screw Rosemead over.”

  I reach around to the back of her head.

  “What are you doing?”

  I find the elastic band and wrangle it out so that Will’s hair falls back into its usual lopsided position. “It looked wrong the other way.”

  She smiles at me curiously.

  My phone buzzes.

  Starting work on my NPS speech tonight and still waiting for those notes, Bubble. Currently looking for 3 examples of famous poor-but-happy people. Any ideas? Thx

  “Edie?” Will asks.

  “My, ah, brother.” I put my phone facedown in my lap. I fidget with my fingers. “Will. You know what this means, don’t you?”

  “No. What?”

  I bite my lip. “We have to put Amelia Westlake on hiatus for a while.”

  We look at each other as the truth of it sinks in.

  “I suppose you’re right,” Will says eventually. “Talk about a bloody cock-up,” she adds, her tone bitter.

  “A hiatus may even be understating it,” I say carefully. “Principal Croon is squarely on the Amelia Westlake trail now. She’ll be watching you like a hawk.”

  Instead of disagreeing, Will moans. “It’s not fair. We’ve got so much unfinished business.”

  My stomach sinks as I realize it’s true. We put an extraordinary amount of time and effort into the charity prank, only to leave it incomplete. If only it hadn’t been such trouble finding out the details of the printing company! I think of all the ways the money could have been used had we managed to pull it off—the lives improved, the help given. I imagine the other pranks we could have done had we succeeded with this one.