by Wendy Harmer
'Oh, Elly. This is the third time you've lost your mobile,' he exhales. 'I just can't see how we're going to find the money to replace it, what with the Global Financial Crisis and everything.'
Dad is a driver for a fleet of courier trucks here in Oldcastle called (wait for it) Ascot Couriers! He works really long hours and keeps saying everyone is worried about losing their jobs, but it seems to me that this so-called Global Financial Crisis hasn't actually reached the Oldcastle part of the globe yet. Everyone is just doing what they always have. In the meantime, the GFC is the best excuse any parent has ever come up with for saying 'no': No, you can't have a sleepover/holiday/birthday party/new shoes/school excursion/ concert tickets etc. etc.
Taking a look out my window tonight, the queue through the London Tavern's drive-thru bottle shop looks as long as it ever did. Seems as though no-one in Oldcastle is saying 'no' to another drink.
And what, I have to ask, does the 'everything' mean in the phrase 'the GFC and everything'? What's Dad talking about? The GFC and the fact that Mum is never home to cook his tea? That my sister's boyfriend has a better car than ours? That Dad's going bald? That our lemon tree's got stink bugs? That the earth's polar ice caps are melting?
Under questioning, Dad has to admit that no-one's been laid off at work – yet. But he says it's the question of What if?
I googled that too: What if? I came up with 304,000,000 mentions. Again, no real answers.
What are these mysterious everythings and what ifs hanging off the end of every sentence, as if everyone's paralysed by hideous possibilities? OK then, what if?
How would it have been if Frodo had said, 'No way am I taking the ring to Mount Doom. Not with the orcs and everything. I mean, what if?'
GRRR! Anyway, then I asked my father if I could borrow his phone to call Bianca and Will.
'I'm on call for work, Elly,' he says. 'It's only seven hours since you lost your phone. I think you'll survive until you see your mates at school on Monday.'
Dad shuffled out of The Dungeon, and then my sister Tilly barged in bringing me a bag of chicken chips and a Diet Coke (AKA bread and water). She hurled my favourite pink stuffed pig at the wall and put her purple suede boots on my white pillowcase.
'Oooh, El, you know they're not gunna get you a new mobile, don't you?' she smirks. 'You're stuffed. You should staple your mobile to your forehead, you lose it so often.'
V.v. funny. It's OK for her. She's almost eighteen, in her last year at Oldcastle High, and has a part-time job as a waitress at The Earl Bistro. More than that, her boyfriend Eddie plays football with the Sovereigns and has tons of $$$ (I could point out that they are also both royal names, but frankly, by now, I am over it). Eddie will buy her a new phone any time she wants.
'Oh, poor you. You want to borrow my mobile and call Prince Charming?' laughs Tilly.
This one hundred and first joke about my relationship should make me want to ram that stuffed pig down my sister's throat. But instead I am so grateful that I could kiss her. I dial Will's number with nervous, rubbery fingers.
'I'm not able to get to the phone right now, but leave a message,' says pre-recorded Will.
I gabble that I don't have my mobile and that he will have to contact me though FacePlace.
Then I ring Bianca. The line's busy. So I text: HLP!No phone. Go FacePlace. LuvU. Me.
'Come on now, hand it over,' says Tilly, and I reluctantly give her back her phone. Just the weight of it in my hand made me feel better for a bit.
When she leaves an eerie silence descends on The Dungeon – apart from the muffled sound of Mum and Dad watching some crappy TV quiz show in the lounge room.
Sunday. 11 am. PM.
Still nothing from Bianca or Will. I've been sitting at my computer in The Dungeon, looking at my FacePlace, since nine o'clock this morning. It's about as busy as Victoria Square, Oldcastle, at nine o'clock on Easter Monday night, i.e. it's deserted.
The fact that I was wide awake at 8 am should indicate how stressed out I am. The only time I wake up this early is on Christmas morning.
Now, hours later, I've posted and poked everyone I know and it looks like I am the only human being awake on the entire planet.
I'm so desperate for human interaction that I have even replied to a two-month-old post from my cousin Anne in Toolewong. She wants to know if we might come to visit this Christmas holidays. Groan! Toolewong has won the nation's Most Boring Town Award ten years running.
I wrote back that she and Auntie Margaret should come and stay here with us in Oldcastle. The people who live here might have their strange habits, but at least we're close to the beach. Hammerhead, Wobbegong and Gummy are the names of the most popular beaches in Oldcastle. Yes, another very amusing joke. They're all named after sharks! Sometimes you have to wonder about the founding fathers of Oldcastle and their bent sense of humour.
Like the hilarious idea of putting a huge coalloading terminal right in the middle of one of the most beautiful stretches of beach in Australia! These days the port takes huge container ships and oil supertankers. The place is always noisy and blazing with lights. Any self-respecting health-nut shark would have racked off years ago.
But the thing is, once you get away from the port and up on top of Winchester Headland, the wharves could be a million miles away. You can see all the sandy beaches looping in and out for miles to the south, like a petticoat with a trim of frothy white lacy surf. It's so, so pretty and when I stand up there on a sunny day I think that Oldcastle is the best place to live in the whole world.
That's where I first kissed Will – on Winchester Headland. He usually stands there with his slick black wetsuit rolled down to his waist, his board under his arm, shading his eyes against the sun. Searching for a wave. This pose is now so familiar to me because Will is always on a hill or a rock or a roof looking out to sea. And if he's not there, he's in or under the water. I swear that if it wasn't for me his feet would hardly touch the ground.
Maybe he's not an elf or a water sprite. Maybe he's an angel.
Whatever he is, he's not talking to me on this sunny Sunday morning. I guess he's gone out for a surf. I need to hear his voice. What did he do last night? Where was he? Who did he see? This blackout is driving me insane.
I haven't been able to call anyone because Dad went out at dawn for a day's fishing with his mates and Mum went to the farmers' market in Victoria Square and they took their phones with them. Tilly's still sleeping and she keeps hers under her pillow. Then I hear the familiar rustle of shopping being dumped on the kitchen counter.
'Elly. Get yourself ready. We're due at Nan's in half an hour!' yells my mother.
I scramble to get dressed and belt down the hall because I know there's something waiting for me at Nan's that will rescue me from the bottom of this dark well – a telephone.
'You got yourself ready quickly this morning,' says my mother as she slams the car door.
I tell her something about looking forward to Nan's roast dinner. How it's great to do something with her and Nan – three generations of the one family enjoying a traditional Sunday meal together. As we drive I lay on the enthusiasm as thick as gravy.
I need to get to that telephone.
'Aren't you gorgeous?' beams Mum. 'I've loved my mother's baked potatoes ever since I was tiny!'
And then mother dear starts a lecture on homecooked food in the Days Before Instant Noodles Were Invented. (YAWN!) Usually on the trip to Nan's I'd have my mobile to get me through.
Im bng hld prisner.
But today I am forced to look out the car window and listen to the radio. (Mum has banned me from listening to my iPod in her exalted presence.) I punch the buttons and accidentally end up hearing the team of so-called comedians on the CASTLEROCK 64.5 FM Sunday breakfast show. It reminds me of that pinhead Jai. And then I realise I'm reminded of Jai because he's ACTUALLY on the radio! What's he saying?
'So, Jai from South Oldcastle, we're talking about your best sneaky reven
ge this morning. What you got for us, bro?' asks the host of the show, the utterly painful Bad Mickey B.
'The revenge is on my girl's best friend,' Jai sniggers. 'She hates my guts, so I got a special mirror on my FacePlace called "crap pictures of Elly" and all my mates log on and have a laugh.'
'Ha ha ha! Whoa! Good one! Two tickets to the Majestic Movieplex and a month's supply of Palatial Pizzas for you, my man.'
'Thanks Bad Mickey B. WAY TO GO CASTLEROCK FM!' screeches Jai.
And then it's on to an ad: Beefeater Bangers – fit for a King!
OMG! OH. MY. GOD!
I turn to my mother. Did she hear that? That was definitely Jai! He lives in South Oldcastle and that was his dweeby voice. That has to be about ME! Bad pictures of me? Where did he get them? I can't believe it. My mind goes into total panic. I can't remember Jai ever taking any pictures of me.
Unless he got them from Bianca! From Bianca's phone. We're always mucking around taking stupid pictures of each other on our phones. I've got one of her in a bikini we made out of silverbeet leaves. She's got one of me with a yellow rubber washing glove on my head, looking like some demented chicken. That hideously embarrassing photo couldn't be up there for the world to see . . . COULD IT?
Yes it could. I wouldn't put anything past that weasel Jai. I've never thought he was good enough for Bianca, and I've told her so. She hated me telling her, of course, but it was for her own benefit.
I yell at my mother to turn the car around. I have to get home and get on FacePlace. RIGHT NOW!
'I am not turning around, Nan's expecting us,' Mum says calmly. 'And if there are silly pictures of you on the internet then it's a lesson to you. All this technology you love so much is wonderful, but it also has its downside. You have to realise that it brings good and bad things into your life. Maybe you should just turn off your computer.'
I want to yell at her, WHAT? What are you talking about?
If my mother didn't have her laptop and mobile, Regal Events would be dead and finished inside a week. She cannot be serious!
She, of all people, should understand how bad this could be. Libby Pickering is the sort of woman who goes through our digital camera and erases every single picture of her that makes her look fat, or old or even a bit squinty. (Once we went to Bali for ten days and there were only two pictures left after she'd got to the camera – even then, she was mostly hidden behind a coconut palm.) When she has finally uploaded the photos she approves of, she edits them to blur out her wrinkles and remove the red-eye. And this is for photos only the family will ever see! Not for totally excruciating shots that could be seen by THE ENTIRE WORLD! Aaargh!
I have to ring Bianca. I beg my mother for her mobile.
'Not while I'm driving. You know we have a rule about taking calls in the car. It's just rude to be prattling on and ignoring your fellow passengers.'
She is not a 'fellow passenger'. She is my mother. She's driving, but I know for a fact she can drive and listen to me talk at the same time. My mother is the Queen of Multi-Tasking. She could perform brain transplant surgery, launch the Space Shuttle, fold table napkins, head peace talks in the Middle East and make spaghetti bolognaise all at the same time. Except when it suits her. Then it's: Please be quiet, Elly. I'm trying to think.
Doesn't she realise THIS IS AN EMERGENCY?! I seriously consider jumping out of the moving car and then, mercifully, I see we have pulled up outside Nan's house. I hurtle up the steps and Nan's already standing at the front door.
'Eleanor!' exclaims Nan. 'Aren't you looking beautiful this morning. Come in, darling, come in.'
I kiss Nan's cheek and speedily admire the vase of pink hydrangeas on the hall stand. Then I edge past her to the oak dresser in the sitting room and grab the phone. I dial Bianca's number (which takes ages because Nan's still got one of those prehistoric telephones with the holes for your fingers. The kind you see on Antiques Roadshow).
'Hey, what's happening?' yawns Bianca, even though it's now midday.
I put Bianca through the full interrogation. Has she ever shown Jai the pictures of me on her phone? Has she ever let Jai upload pictures from her phone onto his computer? Does she know he's got this hideous mirror on FacePlace? Is it about me? Has she ever seen it? Who else knows it's there? Did she hear Jai on the radio?
'Really? A month's supply of Palatial Pizzas!' gasps Bianca. 'We better not talk too long, he's probably trying to ring me.'
After more intense questioning Bianca admits:
Yes, she did let Jai see the pics on her phone.
Yes, she did lend him her phone last week after his got run over by the school bus – but only for a day until he got a new one.
No, she didn't know his FacePlace mirror had the pics on it.
Then I wait until she gets out of bed, boots up, logs on and . . .
'You don't have to worry, El. They're cute,' giggles Bianca. 'The one of you sticking out your tongue with the chilli prawn on it is hilarious! And this one of you in the shower cap! You look like a button mushroom!'
I tell her down the phone, as loudly as I dare, that the entire population of Oldcastle, Britannia, New South Wales, Australia and The Planet Earth is now viewing these pictures of me and thinking I am the Dork of the Universe! WHAT IF WILL SEES THEM?
There is a silence during which I swear I can hear Bianca scratching her head and then I hear a ding on her computer and I'll bet it's someone posting on her FacePlace mirror saying something like: Hey, check out Elly Pickering looking like a fungus!
'Do you think the free pizzas will include the cheesy crust ones, or just the plain crusts?' asks Bianca.
There's one thing that I've come to appreciate about Nan's ancient phone: you can bang down the handpiece really hard in someone's ear. It's much more satisfying than pressing a red button. I start to dial Will's number when I hear yelling from the kitchen.
'Eleanor! Come and speak to your grandmother,' calls Mum. 'We didn't drive all the way over here just so you could run up a phone bill.'
I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that because I have to talk to Will. My mother will have to prise this phone out of my cold, dead hands.
'Hey, Elly? What's up? I'm down the coast with my dad this weekend,' says Will.
Phew! His dad won't have turned on the radio. They will have listened to Jack Johnson CDs in the car. Will sounds lazy and relaxed. I can tell by his voice that he's been for a surf. I could tell him about everything happening back here in Oldcastle and the exploding supernova disaster in cyberspace, but I hear his voice and none of it seems to matter. It's like the cool incoming tide that sweeps the sand smooth again at the end of a crowded day on Wobbegong beach.
Instead I just tell him how I'm without a phone now and I'm not sure when I'll be getting a new one.
'That's no biggie. I'll see you at school tomorrow,' says Will. 'Anyway, you know I'm not much good on the phone. I like seeing your beautiful face when I talk to you.'
And I am imagining Will's face now – his suntanned cheeks sparkling with diamonds of dried salt. His dazzling white teeth and wide smile. His soft grey eyes and those long black eyelashes – maybe still glistening wet. I imagine the sun on his curls picking out threads of pure spun gold.
'Well, I better go, but I'm glad you rang,' says Will. 'I just wanted to say . . .'
I finish the sentence for him in my head: I love you Elly, with all my heart and soul.
'. . . that it's good to hear your voice. Don't forget, you're the one that keeps me paddling back to shore.'
And then he's gone and I think that maybe he did just tell me, in his own way, that he loves me! And it's like I've bobbed to the surface again and I'm floating on a piece of driftwood in a warm and endless sea.
