Miss Understood

by James Roy

  Bradley’s eyebrows were squeezing together. ‘Sorry – who did you say you were?’

  ‘Marty Adams. Marty. Adams.’

  Bradley gave a tiny shake of his head. ‘I’m sorry, but I’ve never . . .’

  ‘I’m a senior contributing reviewer for Cuisine Digest, Juniper’s Good Eating Guide, Top Tucker, Restaurant Review Journal, The New York Gastro-Travel Guide – are any of these ringing a bell?’

  ‘I’ve heard of those magazines, but . . .’

  Dad’s voice had been getting louder and louder, and a few of the people at the tables were starting to notice all the commotion. One of those people was Matthew Fletcher, who’d stood up and was now walking towards us.

  ‘Marty? Marty Adams? I thought that was you!’ Mr Fletcher stuck out his hand, and Dad hesitated for a second before shaking it, as if something grotty was caked all over it. ‘So, this is your family?’

  ‘It is,’ Dad said, his face going a heaps bright shade of red. ‘My wife Denise, and my kids Lizzie and Richie.’

  Mr Fletcher shook Mum’s hand and smiled at me. (I actually thought he seemed quite nice.) ‘So, I take it you’re waiting for a table?’ he asked Dad.

  ‘You could say that,’ Dad replied, throwing a cranky look in Bradley’s direction. ‘It’s a bit crowded at the moment, apparently.’

  ‘Shame,’ Mr Fletcher said. ‘Bradley, do you think there’s any chance you could find a table for my friend here? As a favour to me?’

  Bradley did that almost-bowing thing again, flashed that little half-smile at Dad, and said, ‘I’ll see what I can do, Mr Fletcher, sir.’ Then he scurried away, clicking his fingers at one of the waiters in a long apron.

  Mr Fletcher was back to talking to my dad. ‘Well, I’m sure they’ll be able to sort something out,’ he said. ‘Hey, I read your review of that new German place in the city.’ Then he frowned, and whistled. ‘Was it really that bad? Because that was caustic, my friend.’

  It looked to me like Dad hadn’t heard him, because without any warning at all, he said, ‘Come on, Denise, let’s get out of here. I’ve lost my appetite.’

  ‘Really?’ Mr Fletcher asked, his eyebrows kind of joining together. ‘You’re leaving?’

  ‘Yes, we’re leaving,’ Dad said. ‘Bye, Matthew, it was nice to see you again. Enjoy your lunch.’ And then he turned and walked out, leaving me and Mum and Mr Fletcher looking at one another, all confused.

  ‘Lunch!’ chirped Richie.

  By the time we got outside, Dad was gone.

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked. ‘Mum?’

  ‘What? Oh, he’ll be blowing off steam somewhere. He’ll be fine.’ (Her face didn’t say that she thought he’d be fine, though.) ‘How about we go and wait on that bench near the car. I need to feed your brother anyway. I’m sure your dad will come back soon.’

  Eventually he did come back, just like she’d said. We saw him coming across the park towards us, really slowly, and Mum stood up and handed me Richie’s food and his little aeroplane spoon. ‘Do you mind?’ she said to me. And then (without even waiting for an answer, which I thought was a bit rude) she walked towards Dad and put her arms around him. Usually that kind of thing is sweet, but this hug just seemed a bit sad.

  ‘Are you okay, Dad?’ I asked when they got back to the car.

  ‘I’m okay, thanks, Betty,’ he answered. ‘I’m sorry about that. Let’s go and get something to eat.’

  We headed straight home, only stopping for drive-through at Maccas. Mum and Dad didn’t say much. Not in the car, anyway. I think Dad was still angry about what had happened, and Mum was angry at him. Or maybe she was worried, because I was watching her, and she looked like she was watching him, a lot.

  ‘Matthew Fletcher,’ I heard Dad mutter once. ‘I hired him when I was at Foodies. I hired him!’

  ‘I know,’ Mum said.

  ‘And now –’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘VIP table at Beloni’s!’

  ‘I know, Marty.’

  As soon as we got home, Dad went and mowed the lawn. Then he took the whipper snipper down from the hooks he’d put up a couple of days before, and did whatever you do with one of those noisy things. And then he did something around the edges of the gardens, and he didn’t stop except when Mum went out there with a glass of water.

  We ordered takeaway pizza for dinner. It was delivered by a guy in a little red car. I ate and ate and ate until I was totally stuffed up to my eyeballs, but there was still heaps left over, mainly because Mum and Dad didn’t eat very much.

  Later, after I’d overheard him explaining to someone on the phone why he wouldn’t be able to send a review for Beloni’s, Dad went to bed. It was only about nine o’clock.

  ‘Is he really okay?’ I asked Mum later on, just before I started getting ready to go to bed as well.

  ‘He’s fine,’ she said.

  Fine. Man, was I getting tired of hearing that word!

  CHAPTER 14

  The next morning it was as if the whole Beloni’s thing had never even happened.

  I was emptying the dishwasher for Mum when Dad wandered down to make his morning coffee. To be honest, I don’t know what all the fuss is about with grown-ups and coffee. I accidentally had some once, when I thought it was my hot chocolate and picked up Dad’s cup by mistake, and I thought it tasted like someone had stirred my drink with a burnt stick. But Dad reckons he can’t get going in the morning without his ‘cup of Joe’.

  ‘Morning, Betty,’ he said, flicking the coffee machine on at the wall.

  ‘Hi, Dad,’ I replied. ‘Time for your cup of Joe?’

  ‘Yup, definitely Joe time. You know, sometimes I wonder what that even means.’

  ‘Cup of Joe?’

  ‘Yeah. I know it means coffee, but why Joe? Why not call it a “cup of Bob” or “cup of Barney”? Why Joe?’ His eyes went narrow as he thought about it.

  ‘Dad. Are you . . . How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine. How are you?’ he said as he got the milk out of the fridge and poured it into the little metal jug.

  ‘I’m fine as well. Hey, Dad, who was that Matthew guy yesterday?’

  ‘Matthew Fletcher?’

  ‘Yeah. Why did he make you so angry?’

  Dad sighed. ‘Betty, “that Matthew guy” used to work for me, back when I was in charge of the review department of Food-Lovers’ Monthly. I regretted hiring him almost straight away, to be honest. He was terrible. Couldn’t tell the difference between a macaroon and a lobster bisque. And that’s not all that unusual – there are hacks in every industry. Problem was, he wasn’t a good enough writer to even make it look like he knew what he was talking about. But then, through nothing but good luck, he got a regular spot on one of those morning TV shows and . . . well, that was it. Suddenly everyone knew him, and after a while he got on one of those cooking competition shows as one of the expert judges, and . . . Anyway, you get the picture.’

  ‘So you’re jealous of him,’ I said.

  ‘Jealous? Um . . . I don’t know if –’

  ‘It’s okay if you are,’ I said. ‘That story sounded pretty unfair. But you can’t let it ruin your day. Or your life.’

  That was when Dad put the milk down on the bench and looked at me with a crooked little smile. ‘I’m the parent here, Betty – I’m meant to be giving you that kind of advice, not the other way around.’

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, even though I wasn’t really.

  ‘Anyway, ready for a big day of school?’ he asked, sticking the milk jug under the steam nozzle and making the machine hiss.

  ‘I guess. Except I don’t go to school any more, remember?’

  ‘Oh, yeah. Well, before you ask, I’m going to call Mr Hilder today.’

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘Promise. I’ll do it.’

  As I walked out of the kitchen and headed upstairs, I saw Mum standing just around the corner near the downstairs bathroom. I guessed that she’d probably heard everything. She didn’t
say a word, though. She didn’t really have to.

  It was an okay day, I guess, for a Monday. Mum asked me if I’d thought of someone to do my project on (again) and I said I was still thinking about it (still) and she said that I’d had the whole weekend to think about it, and I reminded her that Saturday had been taken up with seeing a friend I hadn’t spent any time with for ages, and then Sunday had been full of people getting angry about people getting better tables at restaurants and better jobs on TV.

  ‘Well, put your thinking cap on,’ Mum said. ‘I’m not going to let you keep putting this off until I forget about it, because I won’t.’

  And that made me pretty cross, because that wasn’t what I was trying to do. Seriously. And you know how annoyed I get when people misunderstand me.

  Later, just after I’d finished my lessons for the day, I was up in my room playing a game on my phone when Dad called me downstairs.

  ‘Right now?’ I asked, mainly because I was playing Jungle Jangle and was just about to finish the fourth island. (If you haven’t played Jungle Jangle, you should totally do it, because it’s awesome.) ‘Can I just finish this game?’

  ‘Um . . . Okay, I guess,’ Dad called, but when he uses that tone, it means that he doesn’t really think it’s okay at all. That’s why I paused the game (even though I was still on the fourth island) and headed straight downstairs.

  Mum was sitting on the couch rocking Richie, who was sucking his thumb and was almost asleep, and Dad was in the armchair opposite. He pointed at the spot next to Mum. ‘Sit down, Betty,’ he said.

  ‘This looks serious,’ I said.

  ‘Sit down, Betty.’

  Now I was thinking that it might actually be super-serious. ‘Is everything all right?’ I asked.

  Mum gave me one of those ‘don’t worry about it’ winks, and if Richie hadn’t been almost asleep, I reckon she would have said it, too.

  ‘Well, as promised, I rang Mr Hilder today,’ Dad said.

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘The good news is that he’s happy to consider the idea.’

  When I heard that, I got the excitement-tingles again. ‘So does that mean I can go back to Sacred Wimple?’

  ‘No, I said he’s happy to consider it. Like I told you at the cafe the other day, you’ll have to make a good case.’

  ‘Huh?’ I said. ‘A good case? What does that mean?’

  ‘You’ll have to convince him,’ Dad explained. ‘Make an impression on him.’

  ‘In a good way,’ Mum added quietly.

  ‘That’s good,’ I said. ‘Thanks, Dad.’

  ‘So now you just have to decide where you’re going to do it. Or at least, who you’re going to ask.’

  ‘I did think of asking Miss Huntley,’ I said. ‘I could go and help her.’

  ‘At the Helping Hands shop? Yes, that’s a great idea!’ Mum replied.

  ‘I agree. I think that’s brilliant,’ Dad said. ‘You should go and ask her.’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘Yes! Go now!’

  ‘When would I do it? I don’t want to spend my weekends in a shop!’ I said. (I meant working in a shop, of course – I reckon spending the whole weekend in a shop buying stuff would be amazing.)

  Dad and Mum smiled at each other.

  ‘Giving up your own time is part of community service,’ Dad said. ‘That’s kind of the point. But if you committed to a Saturday morning and smiled nicely, I’m sure your lovely teacher would let you have another morning off in the middle of the week to go and do some volunteer work at Helping Hands, especially if it meant that you were developing your sense of responsibility.’

  ‘My teacher? Oh, you mean Mum. Would you?’ I asked her.

  ‘Sure. I think it would be good for you. You should go and talk to Ivy. Miss Huntley, I mean!’

  ‘But what would I have to do?’ I was already starting to have second thoughts.

  Dad shrugged. ‘I imagine you’d sort clothes, dust shelves, maybe even work the cash register. All sorts of stuff. But whatever it was, I’m sure it would impress Mr Hilder.’

  ‘Yeah, I don’t know,’ I said, because I didn’t. Would it be really fun, or a bit fun, or a bit scary, or just plain terrifying? And what if I did it, and wrote a really good letter, and Mr Hilder still said no? I really wanted to go back to Sacred Wimple, but it also seemed that maybe Mum and Dad needed me to.

  ‘I’m going to have to think about it,’ I said.

  ‘Well, I think it’s a great idea,’ Dad said.

  I went up to my room to call Jenni, so I could ask her what she thought.

  ‘Oh, I don’t reckon that would be much fun at all,’ she said. ‘Hanging out with old people in a smelly second-hand shop? That sounds boring.’

  ‘It’s not really a second-hand shop,’ I said, even though I knew it kind of was.

  ‘Well, anyway, I think it would be awful,’ she said. Then, before I had a chance to argue with her again, she said, ‘Hey, guess what?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I told Amanda about what we did to those people who came to your house on Saturday, and what I said about the high priest in the crypt –’

  ‘The high priestess,’ I said.

  ‘Whatever. Anyway, I told her, and she thought it was the funniest thing ever. She laughed heaps and heaps, and she said that she could come over as well next time we hang out at your place and we could do it to some more people, because I told her that people knock on your front door like that all the time. She should, hey?’

  ‘Yeah, maybe,’ I said. But then I had something else I needed to ask her. ‘So . . . when were you talking to Amanda Jenkins? Did you talk to her on the phone?’

  ‘Yeah, I guess. Why?’

  ‘Because she’s awful!’ I said, because she was.

  ‘You know, Amanda’s changed since you saw her last,’ Jenni said.

  ‘How can she have changed?’ I asked, working really hard to stop my voice going stringy and whiny. ‘I’ve only been gone, like, not even a week!’

  ‘Well, don’t worry about it, Lizzie. You’re still my best friend.’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘Of course! But I needed a new school friend. You know, one who’s actually at school?’

  When she said that, it was like someone had just chucked a bucket of sand in my eyes, because they started stinging like mad, and everything went all blurry.

  ‘Bye, Jenni, I’ve got to go,’ I said, and I ended the call, went straight downstairs, out the front door, across the road, and rang Miss Huntley’s doorbell.

  CHAPTER 15

  I rang Miss Huntley’s front doorbell, and I waited. And waited. Then I rang it again and waited some more. Maybe this really was a dumb idea after all, I thought. Maybe I should just go home and try to think of something different.

  But then I heard footsteps inside the house. They stopped just on the other side of the door. ‘Who is it?’ Miss Huntley called.

  ‘It’s me. Lizzie. From over the road.’

  ‘Ah, Miss Elizabeth from over yonder. Please wait.’ Then, after a bit of a fumble and a rattle, the door opened, and there was Miss Huntley in her blue dressing gown and slippers. ‘Hello, young miss. Would you like to come in?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, and I took off my shoes before stepping inside.

  There was something very weird about that house, and it was this: there was no colour. I don’t mean it was like a black-and-white movie. No, it was more like a TV show from ages ago, in the eighties, when everything was brown and tan and grey and cream and beige. There was a bit of pink, too, but even the pink was all washed out, as if it had faded in a sunny window. Really, Miss Huntley’s dressing gown and slippers were the only bright things in the room. How funny, I thought, that this lady, who likes so much colour in her garden, seems so scared of colour in her house.

  ‘Can I get you something to drink?’ Miss Huntley asked. ‘I was just making a cup of tea.’

  ‘Oh, it’s okay,’ I said. ‘We’re ab
out to have dinner.’

  ‘What are you having?’ she asked me.

  ‘Some sort of chicken pie, I think.’

  ‘Sounds lovely. With leaks?’

  I wasn’t sure what she meant. Leaks in a pie? ‘Leaks?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, like great big spring onions. They go well with potato, too, especially in a soup.’

  ‘Oh!’ I said. ‘Leeks!’

  ‘That’s the one,’ she said. ‘So tell me, Miss Elizabeth, how’s your father?’

  I kind of just blinked at her. Why wasn’t she asking me about Mum, or Richie, or Muppet? Why Dad?

  ‘He’s fine,’ I said.

  ‘Fine?’

  ‘Yep, pretty fine.’

  ‘Very well. Now, how can I help you, my young friend?’

  I had to think for a second, because with all the talk about leaky pies, I’d forgotten what I’d come to ask her. But then I remembered.

  ‘Oh yeah, I have a question for you. What days do you go to the charity shop?’

  ‘Wednesdays and most Saturdays,’ she said. ‘Why do you ask? Would you like to join me?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, and she did one of those double-look things. I guess she wasn’t expecting that.

  ‘Really? I was having a little joke!’

  ‘Mum and Dad think I should do this thing.’

  ‘This “thing”? Which “thing” would that be? I don’t see any “thing”.’

  ‘They think I should do some volunteer work, and then I could write a letter to Mr . . . to my school principal, and then he’ll see that I’m responsible, and might let me go back to Sacred Wimple. I think they might need me to.’

  ‘I see,’ Miss Huntley said. Then she pointed at one of her two big recliner chairs. ‘Please, sit.’

  So I perched on the edge of one chair and she sat on the other, then kind of slid back into it.

  ‘Elizabeth, I would love you to come and work with us. I think that you would find it stimulating, and it would be good to have some young blood down there.’ She leaned forward and lowered her voice, even though I was almost completely sure that it was only her and me in the room. ‘Can I be honest? They’re all so old down there.’