Twenty-two-year-old Jessica Davidson started writing when she was fifteen and tore her knee cartilage, ending a future career in ballet. She decided to do a degree in Primary Education instead.
Jessica’s father claims he's the inspiration for her writing as he used to make up wonderful stories when Jessica and her sister were little.
What does blue feel like? is Jessica’s first novel.
WHAT DOES BLUE FEEL LIKE?
jessica davidson
For those who heard
First published 2007 in Pan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited
1 Market Street, Sydney
Copyright © Jessica Davidson 2007
The moral right of the author has been arrested.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in Publication Data:
Davidson, Jessica, 1985– .
What does blue feel like?
For senior secondary school students.
ISBN 978 0 330 42307 6.
1. Teenage girls – Juvenile fiction. 2. High school seniors – Juvenile fiction. 3. Depression in adolescence – Juvenile fiction. I. Title.
Internal design by Melanie Feddersen, i2i design Typeset by Midland Typesetters, Australia Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group, Maryborough, Victoria
Papers used by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests. The manufacturing processes conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin.
These electronic editions published in 2007 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd
1 Market Street, Sydney 2000
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
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What Does Blue Feel Like?
Jessica Davidson
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Acknowledgements
To my wonderful husband Shanon, thank you for enduring the countless nights when I kept you awake well past midnight tapping on the keyboard. And thanks for putting up with being neglected while I was writing. Love you always.
To my parents for your unconditional love – thanks.
To my girlfriends, past and present, for the fun during the good times and support during the bad.
To Andrew Beiers, thanks for listening to my piercing theories. And all the rest. I owe you a box of tissues.
To my senior English teachers for fuelling my passion for writing, and for telling us it was okay to swear in our pieces if it was appropriate to the character!
Thanks must go to my editor Claire Craig for her unending patience and enthusiasm for the book. Thanks for leading me through the process. Thanks to Anna McFarlane who read my first ever submission and told me to keep writing. And thanks to Julia Stiles who helped me make every word work. To Melanie Feddersen who made the book look so fantastic – thanks.
Lastly, to the inventors of energy drinks – thanks.
Char/falling
It’s New Year’s Eve.
Should be one of the best,
most hopeful times of my life.
New Year —
Year 12 coming up
turning eighteen later on.
You know, clean slate and all that.
But —
I feel as if
I am falling
into a chasm
or sinking
into the mire.
I can’t escape
and I
don’t know if I really want to.
I want it to
be over, my whole life.
Extinct.
Mooching
‘Stop mooching, Char,’
Mum says impatiently
when I laze around all day
watching videos.
Mum doesn’t get it.
It’s the holidays
and that’s what you’re supposed to do,
at least that’s what I tell her
and myself
refusing to contemplate
that this bleakness
within
has started seeping
outwards.
She’ll be relieved
when school starts again
because
being surrounded by friends,
assignments to write,
study to do,
I’ll stop
mooching.
Growing up
One day, to relieve the boredom,
Mum takes me to get my learners.
I’ve been reading the book,
but not that much.
To my surprise,
I pass.
Mum nearly has a teary,
and starts worrying about me driving a car,
and the photo makes me look
like I’m drunk.
I think it’s funny,
and laugh when Mum asks if they’ll take the photo again.
They say no, of course,
it’s expected to have a bad photo.
Dad lets me drive up and down the street that night
while Mum stands on the driveway in her dressing gown.
And worries.
Friends at school
are concerned,
visit guidance counsellors secretly in their lunchtimes,
talk about ringing someone
but
don’t know what to say.
There is a black hole draining
all their energy
away
and they think of what they’ll say
to make it better
that doesn’t sound like a weak excuse.
They didn’t expect
to have to deal with dramas
at the beginning of the school year
but at least
it gives them something to do
during Maths.
Julie/feeling guilty
Char’s mum, Julie,
knows something is
wrong.
She wants her
normal
well-adjusted
beautiful
happy
smiling
child
to reappear.
She feels guilty and wonders if
it is her fault.
Bronwyn/sand
counts her calories,
watches her weight,
thinks she could stand
to lose a few
(imaginary] kilos.
Can’t wait to finish school
end the surreptitious nagging
about
assignments, books and tests.
Sometimes she thinks about running away.
But she doesn’t know from what.
She and Char are friends.
Except for recently, when Char is like
the outgoing current,
drifting, pulling, sliding away.
And you can feel the ocean trying to hold
on to the sand and stay where it is.
Sometimes Bronwyn is the sand.
Web of technology
Char tries to analyse her feelings,
be scientific, factual,
cool and detached.
The internet is a ‘valuable information resource’,
say her teachers.
But what she reads about how she feels just makes her
confused.
Tangled up in the World Wide Web.
And tired,
so very tired.
Char’s pillows
are just like sponges.
Night after night they soak up tears
and she doesn’t know
why she’s crying.
Char’s mother
lies awake down the hall.
Staring vacantly into the darkness,
listening to her eldest child cry
into her pillow at night.
Unperturbed
So what is this meaning of life stuff?
Char asks. Seems to me
we are born,
learn what we need to know,
and then we start thinking,
There must be more to it than this!
Search for answers.
Find none.
Fall in and out of love
and die,
leaving the rest of the world
unperturbed.
Ashamed
After several endless, drifting, garish days
she still feels nothing. Nothingness —
a lonely companion to have.
When you feel nothing.
And you do not care.
And the nothingness is still there.
Sometimes,
at night, she wishes she would
never wake up.
Friends
see Char spinning out of control
like on a merry-go-round
that makes you dizzy
if you watch long enough.
Higher powers
shrug their shoulders
and sigh
blaming it on
takeaways,
television,
glossy teenage mags,
consumerism.
And hormones.
Supermarket lines
At the supermarket,
among the canned goods,
the thought comes back,
comes back and goes away.
It niggles at her.
She wends her way around the grocery maze,
following her mother
who sends her to get celery.
She holds the cold, pliable vegetable to her cheek
and whispers the thought
to the celery: I wish I was dead.
It shocks her to hear it out loud.
The celery doesn’t reply.
Makes you feel better
At night, Char daydreams —
thinking of ways to do it.
She has read statistics stating the most
successful methods
(an accidental DIY journal)
of suicide.
Such a bitter-sweet-bitter word.
Like medicine. But, sometimes,
thinking about the medicine
you are going to take can
make you feel better.
Char’s dad
likes his golf, beer and his tattered old
commando-style pants.
He hates his job (don’t most people?),
figures Char is having boy issues
(what teenager doesn’t?),
or self-confidence issues (that’s growing up!).
And he does care, but she can handle it by herself.
And if he
tried to help, she would probably say,
‘Shut up, Dad, and mind your own business.’
Better just to stay on the lounge.
Uninvolved.
Bronwyn and Char
talk.
About nothing.
But they are talking
and the mere effort
is exhausting them both.
Remember?
Char and her mum cuddle on the couch, pressing together
miles apart.
Her mum says,
‘Remember when you changed your name from
Charlotte to Char?
You wouldn’t answer to Charlotte. Your teachers, confused,
sent notes home.
Remember when we went to the sea when you were seven?
A red-haired boy tried to borrow your shovel and
pail and you slapped him. His mother was
horrified when she saw the red mark on his waxen cheek.
Remember when you tried to cut your doll Sally’s hair?
We had to stick some more on, made of wool.
Remember when you got your first period?
We gave you
a glass of wine
and you were so proud of being grown-up.
Remember when you moved into your treehouse?
You came back into the house as soon as it got dark.’
Stupid
I am stupid, Char thinks.
I am failing at least two subjects.
I’m not going to get the marks I need
to get into uni,
to move away from here
to have a career
to have a life.
Virtual reality
Char’s brother is obsessed with
Nintendo,
Game Boy Advance,
PlayStation,
GameCube
and Xbox.
He sits there,
second after second
minute after minute
hour after hour,
eyes glazed to focus on fake people, palm trees, racing
cars and friendly monkeys.
He says, ‘Why go outside and play? Then I’d have to amuse
myself. Get sweaty, dirty, sunburnt.
And it’s boring. This is cool.’
Julie worries that he plays too many video games.
But at least she knows where he is,
at home
in the suburban quiet.
Envious
Char has lost her appetite.
Her uniforms are baggy,
the pleats sag limply in the breeze.
They seem almost sad.
Bronwyn is quietly envious.
Her pleats are straight and proud
and she resolves to
work harder at being thin.
Stopper my tears
she wants to cry.
At the stars, at God, at herself.
She cries every day
and night
and it’s during the
long
long
long
long night
that she plans
how to die.
Classifications
At the family barbecue,
when Char, in her own world, is seen to be ‘sulking’,
Gran calls it ‘a mood’,
Auntie Glenda says, ‘It’s “an attitude”.’
Uncle Bob says, ‘It’s teenagers.’
Cousin Em says, ‘Perhaps it’s drugs.’
Cousin Paul says, ‘Maybe it’s cool nowadays.’
Great Auntie Joyce says, ‘Maybe it’s that
time of the month. You remember how cranky
you used to get, Glenda.’
Her brother Tim says, ‘I’m hungry. Someone pass
the sauce.’
And Uncle Simon, who was dropp
ed on his head as a baby,
and therefore is regarded as a bit peculiar, says nothing.
Just gives her a cuddle.
And wipes away an embarrassed tear on her cheek.
Inside her mind
I want to die but I don’t have the energy
(be careful what you wish for)
she thinks.
I am never going to get anywhere so why try?
I am no one special anyway.
I am a drain on my parents’ money and time.
I have nothing to offer the world.
I have no destiny.
I am just a statistic.
I am going to die one day.
I am going to die one day soon.
Oasis
Her friends say,
Char is like an island, she is all alone.
Char is like a pit bull, she will bite if you try to get too
close.
Char is like a treasure chest, she is locked up.
Char is like a wanderer in the desert.
She needs a place of rest and nourishment.
She needs an oasis.
The best things in life are free
Especially for my parents, thinks Char. The thought is
sour, rotting, forbidden.
They are fighting again
about money
and Tim.
Their subjects of choice when
it comes to arguing.
I am not going to miss this when I’m
gone,
thinks Char. Gleefully, the thought tumbles around.
And when her mother checks on her that night in bed
she is smiling.
Deadly concoction
The parents are out. They have taken the beast-child
known as Tim.
Feeling brave, I scribble on a piece of paper.
Goodbye, Mum.
Goodbye, Dad.
I couldn’t take it any more.
I pick up our carving knife. It is a
dead weight (ha ha).
What Does Blue Feel Like? Page 1
