Swap Over

by Margaret Pearce

  She tried to breathe in and out and calm herself down. She felt like Maddy Matson at her nastiest. If only she was at her own high school and able to behave like Maddy Matson, the toughest kid in school, she and her gang would teach those kids to pick on someone as defenceless as Roland!

  They would puncture their bike tyres; scrawl their innermost secrets on the shelter-shed walls; kick their shins, trip them up, and throw dye bombs at them. It was just awful to have to remember not to do anything to embarrass Jennifer in case they ever swapped back.

  Yet, surprisingly enough, Jennifer did have a temper. What she saw as injustice or bullying always set her off. What would Jennifer do in her position? Maddy looked at the sticky glasses in her hand. She suddenly felt more cheerful.

  She might be in the wrong school, but she still had a gang who was prepared to back her up. She whispered to Linda, one eye on the darkened wall where their teachers stood and watched.

  Linda nodded. Maddy scraped off some of the chewing gum and passed the glasses on to Linda. Maddy then relaxed and concentrated on the film, rolling the chewing gum over and over in her sticky hands until it became more flexible. There was a dark head right in front of her knees!

  Just as the credits of the film were rolling, the pair of glasses ended up back in Maddy’s hands. They twinkled with cleanliness. Someone had done a very good job of removing the rest of the chewing gum. Maddy gave them to Linda. Linda crouched lower, leaned forward and slid them into Roland’s shirt pocket.

  Roland’s hand went to his pocket. He took his glasses out and put them on. The lights went up. All the boys stood up. The back row of boys started to file out. There were whispered exclamations, as the boys noticed the garlands of chewing gum on each other’s heads. The mutter got louder as the boys tried to pull off the chewing gum.

  Maddy noticed with interest that the artistic garlands of chewing gum had set and gone hard. She remembered once when she had chewing gum in her hair. Once it had set it was very difficult to get out - very difficult indeed. It was a lovely thought!

  The boys glared at each other and then glared at Roland. Roland, looking blank-faced behind his gleaming, clean glasses, was the only boy without chewing gum in his hair.

  “Guess there are morons and morons,” Maddy heard him whisper.

  “Stop talking,” a teacher called.

  The boys filed out, then the front row of girls and then the rest of the hall. Every single girl in the front row signaled to Maddy as she ran off. Maddy grinned. They were an all right bunch, every one of them.

  “Tell you what, Linda,” she said as they strolled towards the back fence. “It’s not a chocolate medal you deserve but a solid gold one.”

  “It was a pleasure,” Linda said. “See you tomorrow.”

  The big, dark, square car drew up by the gate. Linda wiped the happy smile from her face and walked towards it, eyes lowered and face grave.

  “Have a nice day, my darling?” Mrs. Walton asked as Maddy swung into the front seat of the red car. This afternoon she looked better. Her face was pink again and the black circles had gone from under her eyes.

  “Terrific!” Maddy said. “Did you have a good rest?”

  “I slept all day. We’ll have to stop off while I do some shopping for dinner.”

  “Do it tomorrow,” Maddy said. “We can have a boiled egg or something easy, can’t we?”

  “I suppose it won’t hurt just this once,” Mrs. Walton agreed doubtfully.

  “Or twice or any other time you don’t feel up to it,” Maddy said. “A tired mother is no good to any family.”

  This was one of Mrs. Matson’s favourite sayings, but Mrs. Walton looked as surprised as if it had been the first time she had heard it.

  “I suppose you are right, Maddy. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  They turned into the side street that led to their street. Maddy spotted the old-fashioned cottage.

  “What happened about old Miss Estenbury?”

  “In a coma, poor old thing, and sinking fast.”

  Maddy’s heart sank. So she wasn’t going to be able to beg the old lady’s pardon and be swapped back. She really was stuck forever as Maddy Walton! She changed without pleasure into her good quality jeans and tie-dyed tee shirt and did her piano practice.

  After that, Jennifer came around with her sisters. They played in the tree house. For a while Maddy actually forgot about the swap. Jennifer was her favourite friend and they enjoyed playing together and having Milly and Merry in a good mood made it even more enjoyable.

  Milly said it was her turn to clean the rabbit hutch. Jennifer and Maddy offered to help, so they all walked back to the Matson’s place. Milly and Merry had run on ahead. Maddy and Jennifer were strolling along more slowly while Maddy told Jennifer all about the incident at the school film during the afternoon.

  “If I had been in your position, I would have done exactly the same,” Jennifer said indignantly. “What pills, what disgusting creeps!”

  Suddenly, a white rabbit shot across the path. Maddy scooped it up almost without even thinking.

  “The missing mystery rabbit.” Jennifer’s voice seemed to come from a long distance. “I wonder where it’s been hiding?”

  Maddy clutched the plump, white rabbit with pink eyes. It was definitely the same white rabbit! She was almost too stunned to think properly. Now she was going to be able to make her wish to swap back to her own life, her own family, and her own good health.

  “We can put it back in the hutch with the others,” Jennifer was saying.

  Maddy looked at Jennifer. She looked so happy and contented and healthy. She had the rounded pink cheeks of all of the healthy Matsons. The raggy shorts showed her sturdy, well-muscled legs.

  Maddy started to feel sick. If she swapped back, the pain-filled nights would again become Jennifer’s dreadful secret. It just wasn’t fair! Maddy clutched the rabbit more tightly. She would rather stay Maddy Walton!

  She would never be the sort of a creep to wish that dreadful illness back on her dearest friend. Yet, she was so homesick for her own family and she wanted to swap back so badly and now she couldn’t!

  And the old lady’s last words mocked over and over in her mind. “Have to change that, won’t we? Won’t we? Won’t we?”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “It’s just not fair,” Maddy wailed. “I want you to stay better.”

  “What’s the matter?” Jennifer asked.

  Her voice seemed to come from a long way away. Maddy couldn’t answer. She felt awful! Despite the warm afternoon sun she was icy cold and giddy, and everything was spinning around. The rabbit jumped out of her suddenly weak arms.

  “Oh!” she wailed again.

  Now she didn’t have a choice anymore! Not that it mattered! It would have been nice to be herself again, but she didn’t want Jennifer to have her secret illness. It was too unfair.

  “Maddy,” Jennifer said.

  Maddy opened her eyes. The icy coldness and giddiness were gone. So was the rabbit. Jennifer, Merry, and Milly stood in the street looking at her with identical worried expressions.

  “I caught that white rabbit and then it got away,” she explained.

  “It only ran across the road into Miss Estenbury’s place,” Jennifer said. “Are you really all right? You looked so sick for a few seconds.”

  “Of course I’m all right,” Maddy said. In fact, she realized, she felt wonderful. She had all this energy surging through her. Her stupid wish wasn’t that important anyway. “Come on, we’re helping Milly clean out the rabbit hutch.”

  “Maddy,” Mrs. Matson said as they came around into the backyard. “You’ve got a visitor in the kitchen.”

  “In the kitchen,” Maddy repeated.

  Why would she have a visitor waiting for her in the Matson kitchen?

  “I'll help Milly clean up,” Jennifer promised as she and the two little girls went down the backyard towards the rabbit hutch.

  Maddy paused at
the kitchen door. Roland Townsend looked up from the book he had in front of him. He looked anxious.

  “You did say to come around this afternoon for us to work through a chapter together?”

  “I did,” Maddy repeated.

  Everything was getting muddled. Of course she had intended to ask Roland to come around so she could help him, but she didn’t remember she had already done so. And why was he at the Matson’s house and not at the Walton’s?

  “That’s okay,” Maddy said. “We’ll go through a chapter every night.”

  They had only worked their way through half a chapter by the time the others came back inside. There was the usual noisy afternoon tea of fresh bread and homemade blackberry jam and everybody talking at once. Roland, surprisingly enough, seemed infected by the Matson’s noisiness and talked as loudly as everyone else.

  They found out he could sail a catamaran and was sometimes allowed to crew on the big yachts. It sounded very exciting and much more interesting than skateboarding or playing football. After a while, he looked at his watch and said he had to go home.

  “We can finish the chapter tomorrow night,” Maddy yelled at Roland over the noise.

  “Not tomorrow. It’s Saturday and I’m going sailing,” Roland yelled back.

  “Tomorrow can’t be Saturday,” Maddy said. “Today is only Thursday.”

  “No it isn’t,” her mother said. “It’s Friday. Are you sure you are feeling all right, Maddy?”

  “I’ve just lost a day,” Maddy grumbled.

  She was spreading her third slice of bread and jam when the jam dripped from the brimming knife and on to her bare leg and across her raggy shorts. She started to scrape it off with the knife and then stopped. She shook her head in disbelief and her hair tumbled over her face like it usually did.

  She looked across the table at Jennifer in her tie-dyed tee shirt and her neatly plaited hair.

  She had gained a day, not lost it! She was Maddy Matson again! Everything was back to normal!

  The warmth and happiness swelled. She was really home! She would never, ever complain about her life again. She loved being a Matson twice as much and that included having sisters as well.

  The warmth dimmed. She was being a selfish pig being so happy about being herself, when it meant poor Jennifer would have to endure her awful secret again.

  “I’ve got to stop stuffing into afternoon tea,” Jennifer said with her usual chuckle as she stood up. “I’m out growing all my clothes.”

  Jennifer’s face still glowed with happiness and contentment, but it didn’t have that colourless look to it any more. It was pink and round and her eyes sparkling. Also she suddenly had a nice solid sturdy body like the rest of them.

  Maddy studied Jennifer and realized how healthy and strong she still looked even dressed in Walton clothes.

  “Your mother said your health has been improving,” Mrs. Matson said.

  “That it has,” Jennifer said cheerfully. “See you later.”

  There were a babble of good-byes and the door slammed behind her.

  “Did her mother really say her health was improving?” Maddy asked.

  “The Waltons are so delighted. They say it’s a miracle.”

  “It must be,” Maddy agreed dreamily.

  “What’s a miracle?” Milly asked.

  “Everything is,” Maddy said. “Like having a friend like Jennifer, and living in the nicest family in the world. I wouldn’t swap my life for anyone’s.”

  About the Author

  Started off my writing life as a copywriter in an advertising agency, and took to writing instead of drink when raising a family. Completed an Arts Degree as a mature age student at Monash University, and lurk in an underground flat in the Dandenongs, still writing.

  Also from Margaret Pearce:

  Chapter One

  It was love at first sight.

  I felt myself falter and go weak at the knees as soon as our eyes met. He had beautiful soft brown eyes, intelligent, loving, caring eyes. I gravitated towards him. He tipped his head on one side and watched me. I knew that what I felt so instantly for him was mutual by the way he looked at me.

  “Simone Henderby,” Mr. Townsend blared. “Haven’t you finished hosing out those pens yet?”

  “Just finished,” I reported.

  I had this job as a kennel maid at the local animal shelter for six hours a week. Having thrifty parents, I needed spending money. Every Saturday morning, I plaited my hair tightly, pulled on my gumboots and oldest jeans and slaved for six hours. I liked animals so I coped all right with being treated like a serf by old Townsend.

  Ebon Harris, my best friend, had managed to edge me into the job when the last kennel maid--that is what all us serfs at the kennels were called--up and told old Townsend where to get off.

  Ebon is badly named. She is so fair, she looks like an albino, but someone said she was born with black hair and got christened Ebony, by which time the black hair had rubbed off and her fine silver-white hair had come through.

  Ebon was blow-drying a poodle and grinned as I trudged over. The animal shelter was actually boarding kennels and a Cattery, a hospital section for sick animals, and a pen for the strays, either up for adoption or death row.

  Despite the fact we had to work so hard, it was a terrific job if you liked animals. I felt sorry for all my unfortunate friends who had to peel spuds, iron, weed or wash cars to get their pocket money.

  “Where did the gorgeous pup come from?” I asked out of the side of my mouth. Mr. Townsend didn’t like us talking to each other on his time.

  “Dumped stray,” Ebon whispered back. “Cross Shepherd Labrador. It’s an uncool combination for its chances of acquiring a new owner!”

  “How old?” I whispered.

  Ebon sometimes worked in the office, and didn’t miss much.

  “Ten weeks,” she reported.

  I upended my bucket and rinsed out the scrubbing brushes. One thing about working at the animal shelter, I learned about how much dogs should eat, and Shepherd cross combinations need a kilo of meat a day. Nobody wanted a household pet you had to work two jobs to feed.

  It was only coincidence of course that I spent that whole day near him. After I swept, hosed and cleaned the vacant pens, I was ordered to rake the gravel over the paths, and then repaint the stones edging the path. I felt his eyes on me the whole time. To myself, I called him Pete. He sort of looked like a Pete.

  Every time I sneaked a look at him, his tail thumped with pleasure. As I said, it was love at first sight. By the time I finished at four o’clock that afternoon, I was practically drooling. Pete was the most beautiful pup I had ever seen.

  I thought I was hardened against cute pups that ended up at the animal shelter, but he was extra special cute. His plump healthy little body was covered in the softest fur and you could see how responsive and alert he was to whatever was going on. He was shorthaired, with the typical black and gold markings of a proper Shepherd. He had the long ears of a Shepherd only they flopped over, giving him a vaguely spaniel look. With the blunt muzzle of a Labrador and the broad-domed intelligent head of a Shepherd, and of course the most soulful brown eyes he won my heart.

  Beautiful as he was, Pete was still sitting in the strays’ pen when I turned up for work the following Saturday. His plump back-quarters wriggled like a sausage trying to do the hula when he recognized me. I went over to say hello and patted him.

  “Thought he would’ve been gone by this week,” I said to Mr. Townsend.

  “With those feet?” Mr. Townsend scoffed. “He’s going to end up the size of a pony and have an appetite to match. I don’t know why people let animals breed so wastefully.”

  My heart plummeted. This oft-repeated grumble meant that the beautiful pup was destined for death row if he didn’t find an owner by the end of the weekend.

  “He’s only been in here a week,” I protested.

  “Eight days,” he said shortly. “If people can feed themselve
s and their kids these days it’s something. No one’s got spare money for a big breed of dog.” He changed the subject. “Those long-haired Persians in the Cattery need to be brushed, and after that, exercise the boarding dogs around the compound.”

  I didn’t see Ebon until our lunch break. She had been cleaning out the hospital section. It was a sunny day, and we sprawled under a tree and ate sandwiches. I kept thinking about Pete. He might have been in the shelter eight days, but he was so gorgeous! Why wasn’t Mr. Townsend allowing a bit more time for someone to take him?

  “Mr. Townsend doesn’t approve of cross breeds,” Ebon said as if she had been reading my thoughts. “He would prefer to put them down rather than risk them multiplying.”

  “He sure is beautiful,” I sighed. “Wish I could have him?”

  “He wouldn’t fit in too well with your mum’s allergies to animals and your dad’s prize layers,” Ebon reminded me.

  “Mum thinks that fresh hen eggs are important,” I agreed gloomily.

  I finished my sandwiches and shared my fruitcake with Ebon. She had said it all and there was nothing left to discuss. Over the years, I had been allowed to have a pair of guinea pigs, a budgie and a white rabbit, but that was it. I had outgrown them years ago. They were little kid pets! I’d look a bit stupid exercising them down in the park.

  Dad grew roses in between lectures in English. Mum worked two days a week typing at the university. My older sister Serena alleged she was allergic to animals as well, and floated around in a sterile environment that contained only her succession of boyfriends.

  If only someone had turned up before we finished that afternoon and took Pete, or old Townsend had changed his mind about him being destined for death row immediately, the incident—or was it an accident?— wouldn’t have happened.

  All the animals had been fed, brushed, and exercised, and all the pens were spotless. It was a slow week, and we didn’t have more than two or three dogs and cats boarding.