Call Me Evie

by J. P. Pomare

  ‘You’ve been eating everything I make?’ he asks, speaking loudly to be heard over the din.

  ‘Yes,’ I reply.

  ‘Good,’ he says, killing the juicer, holding the glass out to me. ‘Let’s see how much weight you’ve put on.’

  We go to the bathroom and I stand on the scales. He leans over my shoulder to read the number, then scribbles it into his notebook.

  ‘You’re getting better, Kate. That’s almost four kilos. Soon, when you’re feeling up to it, we can talk more about what happened that night back in Melbourne.’

  •

  It’s dark when I wake. I have no idea how long I have slept for, but I know it’s still night-time. The light is on in the hallway; a voice comes from the lounge.

  ‘It needs to happen sooner rather than later.’ A murmur just clear enough to make out. Slowly I rise from my bed and press my ear against the crack between the door and the doorframe. ‘I’ve got her with me. But does anything change, I mean the longer it takes?’ He’s on the phone. ‘What will they do with her?’ His voice is steely. ‘Then what? I mean what legal options do I have if things go pear shaped?’

  I ease my door open and creep up the hall. He sighs. ‘She’s healthy, I’m keeping her healthy. It’s her brain that’s the problem.’ One more step and the floorboard creaks.

  He turns, his eyes widening when he sees me. ‘Let me call you tomorrow. I’ve got to go . . . Yep, will do. Bye.’ He hangs up.

  ‘Kate,’ he says. ‘What’s going on? Can’t sleep?’

  ‘Who was that?’ I ask. ‘Who was on the phone?’

  ‘Just settling some affairs, nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Why are you up so late?’

  ‘Late?’ He glances at his phone screen. ‘I guess it is getting late.’ The cold weight of his eyes falls on me. He’s not wearing his glasses. ‘I suppose you’re not the only one losing sleep these days.’

  I lean against the dark wood-panelled wall in the hallway. ‘I want to use the internet. I want to see what they’re saying.’

  ‘You can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It’s too soon. You’re not stable.’ Annoyance is visible on his face now. His brow creases. ‘You don’t even remember what happened.’

  ‘I know, but I just want to see what they’re saying.’

  He sighs. ‘You have to see things for yourself. It’s not enough that I tell you, is it?’

  I don’t know how to answer so I stand there until he waves me closer, turning towards his desk. He opens the laptop, and I watch his fingers punch in the password. There is a P and an E but his fingers travel too quickly for me to pick up anything else. He opens an anonymous browser. I watch him as he chooses a city from a list; if anyone could see this search they would think we were in São Paulo, Brazil.

  ‘I give up, Kate. I don’t know what is working and what’s only making it worse.’

  He clicks on a message board with hundreds of messages. The title is Kate Bennet. I take a breath to quell the nerves before sitting down on his office chair. I was convinced he wouldn’t show me and now I’m here, with the screen loaded before me. I can’t look up.

  ‘You don’t have to do this, Kate. I don’t think you’re up to it.’

  He doesn’t want me to look and so I must. I swallow, a tension coiling in on itself inside. I exhale and look at the screen.

  If I encounter this virus, I would love to dispatch her. One bullet. That’s all it would take. Hundreds of likes.

  She’s pretty hot, but clearly crazy. I’d still fuck her, but then again she’d probably consume me like a praying mantis after.

  Lol.

  So true.

  Let’s start crowdfunding a PI to find her. She can’t have disappeared.

  Does anyone know where she is?

  She won’t have gotten that far. Maybe Sydney – it’s not hard to hide.

  Can someone share the tape? It’s been taken down . . .

  Try this: http://www.vilefile.com/share/kate-bennet-leaked or if you have a Tor browser you can buy the HD version on the dark web.

  I’m shaking. My inner organs have plummeted. In their place is a cold vacuum. Jim only shows what he wants me to see.

  ‘Click it.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The link,’ I say, steadying my voice. ‘Click on the link. I want to see it.’

  He closes the lid of the laptop, stands and wraps me in his arms. ‘It’ll be fake. The video has been taken down.’ He gazes into my eyes, his jaw firm, his nostrils flaring.

  I scream so loud that he covers my mouth.

  ‘Shh,’ he croons. ‘Let’s go to bed.’

  ‘No!’ I yell. ‘Don’t you tell me what to do. You’re not my father!’

  I collapse to the floor and he comes down with me. He holds me like he’s sinking and I don’t have the energy to push him away.

  ‘You’re being nasty,’ he whispers. ‘You don’t want me to get angry.’ We stay like that until I have nothing left, no energy, no tears, just a trembling in my chest, in my limbs, in every cell.

  before <

  THIRTEEN

  WAS IT SOMETHING I said?

  That was the first message I read from Thom in two weeks. I had other messages from Willow and school friends too. Thom and I had exchanged texts for the better part of a month, the flirtation gradually growing. At first it was the inclusion of a single ‘x’ at the end of each message. Then he began to call me babe. We hadn’t seen each other again but did it matter? We realised that we lived within walking distance from each other, it was only a matter of time, then Dad confiscated my phone.

  I’d been keeping a plastic water bottle under my bed half filled with liquor I had skimmed from the bottles in the hallway cabinet. I got the idea from Willow. I’d originally gone to her house to confront her; I wanted to know why she lied to me about Thom and Sally, but I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. I didn’t even tell her about bumping into Thom and the text messaging that followed. Instead, up in her room she pulled the alcohol out from beneath her bed. We sat against her bedhead watching The Bachelor on her iPad and passed the bottle back and forth. With a buzz in my chest and the alcohol’s lacquer-like effect on my thoughts, we cackled at the desperate contestants. I was confused and annoyed about the lies she told but I knew that I wasn’t ready to have that conversation with her. It was, after all, through Willow that I had made so many of my other friends and without her I wondered if I would still have any of them. Besides, I was just happy that Thom was back in my life.

  When Dad found the liquor cabinet open, he realised the seal of a previously unopened bottle had been broken. I’d only just got full-time phone privileges, which meant I could Facetime Thom late into the night and fall asleep as if he was there, beside me. Then my phone was gone again.

  How could I lose Thom so soon after all this time? I nagged for him to give it back, reaching for it in his hand. I wouldn’t leave him alone until he snapped. You want it that bad? Here it is. He took it in his fist and pitched it across the room so hard it shattered against the marble splashback in the kitchen. I rushed over and took all those broken pieces to my chest so my fingertips bled from the broken glass. When he came home from work the next day, he had a white box. Inside was a brand-new phone, the next model up from my old one. ‘I’ll give it to you in two weeks but only if you behave yourself and it comes with two conditions.’ He counted them with his fingers. ‘No passcode on the phone, and you talk to me if you ever want to drink alcohol or anything like that, okay? You’re growing up, I get it, but there’s a right way and a wrong way to do things.’

  After two weeks, at the breakfast table he handed me that white box. I opened it up and plugged my SIM card in. That’s when the messages I had missed from Willow and Thom came through, but it was Thom I cared most about.

  OMG Dad took my phone. He found out about the booze stashed under my bed. I’m so sorry! I missed you.

  He replied almost in
stantly. I saw you hadn’t posted on Instagram or Facebook so I thought something was up. I knew you wouldn’t just blow me off ;) I was tempted to walk up your street and try to guess your house but thought that would be too stalkery.

  I was grateful he hadn’t. I didn’t know what I would tell Dad if Thom knocked on the door.

  His next message popped up before I could reply to his previous one.

  Glad you’re back online, even if you did set my plans back two weeks.

  Plans, huh?

  Well by now I would have asked you for a date. But I guess that’ll just have to wait.

  I considered my next message carefully. I couldn’t help but wonder why he had chosen me. I imagined the way his body had changed since our swimming days.

  That’s lucky because I probably wouldn’t have said yes so soon. Out of curiosity what would this date involve?

  I was thinking we could take a walk.

  Something was blooming inside. I smiled.

  A walk? Really? I think I might almost be ready for that. Almost.

  Dad came into the room carrying two plates. ‘Eat up or you’ll be late to school.’

  We sat together at the table. I felt the phone vibrate in my lap.

  Do you think you will be ready this weekend?

  Dad cleared his throat. ‘Not while we’re eating, please, Kate.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  I put the phone back in my lap and felt it vibrate again. I couldn’t do anything but scoop my omelette into my mouth and chew faster.

  My school friends were candid with their parents about boyfriends and parties. But it wasn’t like that with Dad; I felt a kind of shame. Maybe it was because we only had each other. Would it have been different if Mum were still alive? My closest family members were Grandma up in Wagga Wagga and my mum’s sister, Lizzie, in England. I hadn’t seen Aunty Lizzie since the funeral when I was only five, although we had Skyped sometimes on birthdays. After Mum died, Aunty Lizzie flew over and stayed with us for a month. There were times when Dad and Aunty Lizzie would begin talking and gradually their voices would rise until they were both yelling and I would block my ears and bury my head beneath my pillows. Then she went back to England.

  ‘Look after your new phone at school, Kate. It’s not cheap, that thing.’

  ‘I will, Dad.’

  Squares of light fell through the window, rising part way up the fridge. It was a clear day and the jagged angles of the cityscape stood out stark against the September sky.

  I took the steps back up to my bedroom two at a time, tense with anticipation. I opened Thom’s message.

  So?

  I messaged back.

  Where and when would said walk take place?

  My suggestion for said walk would be this Saturday in the city.

  It had been six weeks since I’d seen him, so surely a few more days wouldn’t matter. But I already knew that Saturday couldn’t come soon enough.

  •

  When the day came it was blustery. Leaves worked themselves into gutters, blocking drains so puddles crept up onto the road. I had settled on jeans, dark flats, a white top beneath my good black coat. I did my hair, ironing out the flicks and curls at the tips, but spent the most time on my face: foundation, Willow’s eyeliner, a pale lipstick, the mascara I had bought with my pocket money. All just to make it look like I hadn’t given it much thought at all. Dad cocked one eyebrow when I came down the stairs.

  He drove me into town, pulling in near the gallery Thom had named. I had told Dad I was meeting Willow and a few others. The girls. I guess he was just happy it was a gallery and not the mall.

  The street bustled with the standard Saturday fare: women in yoga pants, men with groomed beards. A homeless man thrusting his cup out towards the passing crowds.

  The exhibition looked quiet from outside. A few people floated from one piece to the next. Then I saw Thom. He stood alone near the window, gazing at something on the wall.

  I moved in beside him and spoke in a French drawl. ‘Hmm, the angles and light, it’s magnificent.’ Leaning in, I added, ‘If you look closer, you will find this piece pays homage to the impressionists.’

  He didn’t turn from the picture, but his grin crinkled his eyes. ‘You know if that wasn’t so ludicrous you could pass as someone who actually knows what they’re talking about.’

  ‘Who says I don’t?’

  Now he turned to face me. ‘Maybe I just hope you don’t. Otherwise you wouldn’t need me to teach you.’

  He was dressed in black skinny jeans, a black T-shirt and brown boots that had lost their shine. Over the T-shirt he wore a dark tweed coat with the collar up. He didn’t dress how most teenage boys did. He dressed like the guitarist of an indie band. I hadn’t known I’d be into that kind of look.

  ‘You made it.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘That accent was a thing of beauty,’ he said.

  ‘I take French.’

  ‘You would get on with my mum then. She was born in France.’

  We walked around the gallery looking at the work of a famous photographer from Ankara, Turkey.

  Stopping before an image of an old man, we stood side by side, my hand so close to Thom’s that my fingertips tingled. I could feel his warmth, a sort of energy between my skin and his. I looked down at his hand, then up at the image again. The colours were saturated. The creases in the old man’s skin were dark, as though filled with grime and his individual facial hairs stabbed through his skin like a thousand blades of grass.

  Thom tilted his head and I wondered what he was seeing. His parents had bought him a real camera and his Instagram account was stocked with hundreds of photos he had taken. Some were abstract – a blue sky bisected by a plane’s vapour trail. Others documented his trips through India, Japan and Europe with his parents.

  As if reading my mind, he said, ‘Great photographers can take something ordinary and find a way to make it beautiful.’ I expected him to be joking, but he wasn’t smiling; he looked earnest. ‘I want to take photos like that.’

  I smiled, wishing he would take my hand as we continued around the rest of the exhibition. I stood close to him and when it came time to leave, he touched my lower back, guiding me towards the exit. When he took his hand away again, my skin tingled with warmth.

  ‘What’s next?’

  ‘Gelato, of course.’

  He led me along Flinders Lane to a tiny shop. Inside, we sat by the window and shared a bowl of gelato. The rain had stopped, although the wind was still strong. A newspaper flapped in the gutter like an agitated swan. Thom pointed out couples passing by the window, putting on funny voices as he invented their conversations. When I tilted my head back to laugh, he raised his phone and took a picture.

  ‘Show me,’ I said, still laughing at the voices he had given the strangers outside.

  He held the phone behind his back. ‘It’s good,’ he said. ‘Very photogenic subject.’

  I took another scoop of gelato, then reached past him for his phone. Our faces were almost cheek to cheek. He tried out another voice and I clamped my lips together to keep the melting gelato from dribbling down my chin and onto my white shirt. Instead it erupted out of my nose. Fuck. Then he was laughing too. I buried my face in my hands, tears of laughter pricking the corners of my eyes.

  ‘That was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.’

  I was aware that I would probably never look more ridiculous than I did now, with passionfruit gelato dripping from my nose, but part of me didn’t care. He’d called me cute. His hand landed on the back of my own before I realised it. When I looked up he was watching me, his smile travelling from his lips to his dark eyes. It hurt how badly I wanted him to kiss me.

  We headed to Flinders Street station, and on the train home he took my hand in his and I rested my head on his shoulder. He walked me to the corner of my street but I wouldn’t let him come any further. I didn’t want Dad seeing us.

  ‘We live so close,’ he said.
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  ‘I know.’

  ‘Here, I got you a souvenir.’ He pulled something from the pocket of his coat – a postcard. On the front was the photo of the old man from the gallery. I hadn’t seen him buy it. We’d been together the whole time.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, holding it to my chest. ‘How did you get it?’

  He gave me a wink. The idea of him stealing something was exciting. I should have given it more weight, but the hammering of a smitten heart is so much louder than the conscience.

  Our first date established the pattern for the next few: Dad dropping me at the movies or the mall, Thom walking me home afterwards and presenting me with some small token – a snow globe, a pen, a torch – when we parted at the corner of my street. ‘It’s easy,’ he would say of his new-found hobby, producing a keychain still in it’s plastic. ‘Like magic.’

  •

  Walking home from school that next week, I stopped to take some photos of myself in front of the city skyline, faded blue in the spring light, thinking I would choose one to send to Thom. I’d found that when he took photos or short videos of me, it gave me a surge of confidence. I’d hated the idea of selfies until we started going out.

  A car pulled up to the kerb beside me. I didn’t look at first, just resumed walking, plugging my earphones into my ears, my gaze fixed ahead.

  The window on the passenger side slid down. ‘Kate, is that you?’

  Willow’s dad. Had he seen me taking selfies?

  ‘Hi,’ I said, my cheeks burning. I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. ‘Where’s Willow?’

  ‘She’s at home. You need a lift?’

  ‘That’s okay – it’s not so far.’

  ‘Come on,’ he said, pushing the door open. Poking out of the sleeve of his linen shirt, on the inside of his forearm, I saw a small black tattoo of a heart. A real heart. A beating human heart. His arms were tanned and thick with hair. I wondered if he had any more tattoos hidden away.