I Lost My Mobile At the Mall

by Wendy Harmer

  So I surrender and forgive myself. For all the dumb and stupid things I do and say. For all the mistakes I make. For just being who I am.

  'I love you, Elly Pickering' is what I tell myself and my poor battered heart says: Thank you, Eleanor. Thank you for loving me.

  I'm surprised to feel tears sliding down my cheeks and I find that hollow part of me inside and try to fill it up with thoughts of peace and happiness.

  Then I'm startled by the fierce cry of two long musical instruments blown by the monks. The cymbals crash and subside, crash and subside, like the waves breaking on the shore of Gummy Beach.

  Gen Lama circles the table ringing a bell and then he leans and takes a little metal object called a dorje – 'the sacred thunderbolt' – and cuts through the sand, dividing it into eight parts.

  There's a gasp from everyone in the room. It's almost painful to see the sand mandala sliced and ruined. There must be a hundred people here and no-one dares move.

  Then the monks take soft brushes and sweep the sand into a glass jar.

  We all tumble from the Surf Club after the monks and watch them gather on the cool, pale beach sand. It's a bright spring morning. There's a chilly breeze about and the waves are small and choppy.

  'This is the best, Elly. It's so exciting! Truly,' says Carmelita as she reaches her arms around my waist and hugs me hard.

  Tenzin is beside me and both of us know we are taking the first steps on a journey of a thousand miles of friendship.

  Now we hear the sound of bells ringing out across the ocean.

  'That's the dorje drilbu – the tantric Tibetan bell!' exclaims Tenzin. 'We should hear more cymbals, drums and dung chen trumpet and Gen Lama will go down to the water's edge with the mandala sand.'

  I love to see his black hair bobbing, his brown face so full of passion.

  We watch the monks parading down the beach as they play their instruments. I have to laugh when I realise they're wearing the colours of the Gummy Beach Surf Life Saving Club – intense saffron yellow and deep red – but in their long robes, sandals and tall curved headdresses they're the strangest sight that's ever been seen on this stretch of sand.

  The brightly coloured Tibetan national flag, which Tenzin explains is forbidden to be flown in Tibet itself, is fluttering freely on a pole above the surf safety flag.

  Then Gen Lama stands with his toes in the water and tips all the sand of the mandala into the ocean. A bright smear of colour floats on the surface of the water for a moment and, with the tumble of just one wave, is gone forever.

  Tenzin lifts his bowed head and smiles.

  'And so we have it,' he says. 'The entire mandala was created from memory and as long as the wisdom is passed on it will be recreated.'

  'I'll never forget this moment,' sings Carmelita. 'For as long as I live, I never will.'

  I'm thinking the same. There is something in me that is being reborn in this ancient ritual on this fine morning. The wind and sand are peeling off my old skin and I feel like I'm brand new.

  'I have to go,' says Tenzin. 'We have a prayer meeting now and my family is waiting for me. But I'll send a yak for you this week if you'd like to go out to the pictures, Elly.'

  I laugh and I can already feel that Tenzin is my friend. He came to the Palace at 8 am – like he promised – and we took the long walk up over Winchester Headland and then along the sand, past Hammerhead and on to Gummy.

  We didn't stop talking the whole way. It was amazing to be with someone who really listens to what you are saying instead of fidgeting and texting and calling someone, somewhere else, about some other thing.

  Tenzin doesn't have a mobile phone or a computer. He's never had them because his parents are saving all their money for a deposit on a house. But that's not to say that he wouldn't love to have all the latest technology.

  'The Students for a Free Tibet slid down the Great Wall of China on ropes and unfurled a banner that read: "One World. One Dream. Free Tibet 2008" and the video was instantly posted back to New York using the internet,' he says. 'Millions of people saw it on YouTube in minutes.

  'The World Wide Web is one way we can overcome the censorship of the Chinese authorities. And when I get my computer I'm going to join in the campaigning to set my country free!'

  I told Tenzin that there are probably also a lot of people in Tibet who would love to hear the daily agonies of Bianca Ponsford – like when she can't decide which shoes to wear to the mall.

  Tenzin laughed. He laughs at all my jokes and I think this is a very good quality in a human being!

  He told me he works stacking fruit down at the Britannia Markets before school and on the weekends. Soon he'll have enough money for his computer. Soon.

  Now, as he looks out to sea, I see two morning suns reflected in his dark eyes. I reach for his hand and he takes mine without hesitation.

  I promise to write him a letter. I'll send it to his house via Australia Post and Russell Crowe.

  'Then, until I see you again – keep your heels down while riding your horse!' Tenzin steps back into the sand and slaps his chest with his fist.

  'Is that an old Tibetan saying?' asks Carmelita.

  'Maximus Decimus Meridius! From the Gladiator movie. Der! Anyway, gotta go, there's my mum.'

  And with that, Tenzin is off and away, leaving me laughing like a loony. I fall back into the sand and look up at the bright blue sky and feel that my heart is being healed, reassembled, fragment by fragment.

  Carmelita falls down beside me and holds my hand.

  'I have to go too, darling girl,' she says. 'We're off to the airport soon. Back home to the macadamia nuts, Viscount and Mr Pineapple Head Henry. I don't want to leave you because I adore you so much, but I have to go.'

  Then we stand and brush the sand from our clothes and I step into Carmelita's open arms and we hold each other. I know we are both wishing this moment could last forever.

  I'm watching her skirt and dark curls fluttering in the breeze as she runs up the beach, and with the tumble of just one wave, she's gone.

  Sunday. 1 pm.

  PM. AW. PPC.

  'Now, now, now, Libby! It's my money and I'll do what I like with it. And this is what I've decided to do,' says Nan.

  'But . . . but . . .' Mum protests.

  'That's enough. Thank you, dear. All comments dutifully noted,' says Nan firmly. Mum swallows her next comment and is quiet.

  I'm standing in Nan's tiny dining room with an embroidered linen serviette tied over my eyes. I can't see a thing.

  'Are you ready, Eleanor?' Nan whispers in my ear.

  Well, it's hard to know what she's asking. But I trust Nan with all my heart, so . . .

  Yes, I'm ready!

  'Ta da!'

  The serviette is whipped from my eyes, and there on top of the table are two huge boxes. I see in a heartbeat that they contain two whopping computers! Gasp!

  'The boy at the mall told me they're the very latest. All the bells and whistles,' says Nan proudly. 'One for me and one for you, Elly.'

  I am stunned. Just . . . utterly . . . totally . . . stunned.

  'I'm told that if I get it set up I can be on the line in minutes,' says Nan. 'Then I just have to play these thingies here –' Nan holds up a couple of CDs – 'and by this afternoon we'll both be on FacePlace and email. What an excitement!'

  I still can't get my mouth to form One. Single. Word.

  'Of course, you'll have to share with Matilda. With all her exams coming up, she's going to need a new machine. But think of the fun we'll have, darling. I'll just go and get the camera and we'll be able to offload the pictures.'

  Nan scurries off to the oak dresser in the sitting room and I can hear her pulling out the drawers and rummaging madly.

  'It's upload, Mother,' calls Mum. 'Not offload. And you'll need a digital camera.'

  'A what?' Nan calls back.

  'A digital camera. Dad's old camera takes film. I'll buy you a new one for your birthday. In the meantime,
come back here and let me take a couple of snaps on the mobile.'

  Nan comes back again and herds me into shot in front of the table. She pulls me close.

  'Stand straight, Eleanor dear.'

  Mum snaps away.

  Later, when I look at the four pictures I see:

  1. I am so shocked – as if I have discovered a funnel-web spider in my slippers.

  2. I am burying my face into Nan's bosom with gratitude and she's trying to peel me off her and make me face the camera.

  3. I am bawling my eyes out and the light through the window catches a shiny trail of my snot.

  4. I am grinning like a total idiot.

  In fact, Jai could get hold of these pics and put them on FacePlace and I wouldn't care . . . That's how sublimely happy I am.

  Later I stand with Nan in the driveway as Mum packs my new computer into the back of the car.

  What about our letters, I ask my Nan. I've just discovered letters and I want us to keep corresponding by snail mail.

  'Oh, we must keep writing to each other!' says Nan. 'And by the way, your handwriting tells me you are a wonderful, precious girl – thoughtful, strong, independent and loving – but then again, I didn't need to be a graphologist to know that, did I? You are everything your grandfather could ever have wished for.'

  Sunday. 8 pm.

  PM. AW.

  My brand new computer is now set up, sitting in pride of place in The Dungeon.

  Dad and Mum stand back with their arms around each other and admire it as if they have just brought a new baby sister home from Prince John Hospital.

  'She's a good, big size,' says Dad.

  'Very smart looking, the latest operating system, lots of applications. I think we'll have her for a long time,' Mum smiles.

  I get online and go to FacePlace and see there are eighty-seven messages on my mirror. I'm about to read them all when it dawns on me that not one of them can really change my life in any way – the good, the bad, the ugly or the anonymous.

  I have to remember what Will said: anything on there's not really real, although it sure feels like it sometimes.

  Then I spy a message from Nan123. How about that? (The time I spent this afternoon teaching Nan about FacePlace seems to have paid off.)

  It reads: 123yhsajhsa795nb.

  Too funny! Obviously it's going to take a little while for Nan to get the hang of things.

  I trash everything.

  I'm considering emailing Karen Crenshaw and getting her to send me the Posh Post documents so I can get up to speed for this latest edition (which is due to be distributed in three days. Yikes!) and then I have a brilliant idea.

  I get out my pens, ink and some clean sheets of paper and I write: MY LIFE BY YAK – A JOURNEY THROUGH A POST-TECHNOLOGY LANDSCAPE.

  I write four hundred words about this past two weeks, dipping into the inkwell – all the things I've heard, seen, considered, rejected, learned. Then I scan it, save it in a PDF and email it to Karen so she can knock up a layout for the Posh Post pages. (Hey! No point in being a compete cavewoman.)

  I'm almost off to bed when Tilly barges into The Dungeon and asks if she can see my new computer. She's got just a few hours left before her first HSC exam tomorrow morning.

  'It's a good unit, Els,' she nods. 'Hope you're not thinking of using it for the next few weeks. Consider it the first instalment on my ruined shoes.'

  To the sound of slurping coffee, the crunch of Cadbury Milk Tray and low strangulated moans of frustration, I drift off to sleep.

  Monday. 12.30 pm.

  PM. AW.

  All of Year Twelve is off at exams today at the Exhibition Hall in Old Oldcastle and there's an air of mourning about the school – like we've waved our best and brightest off to Afghanistan to fight the war and we await further news from the front line.

  I haven't seen Will about today, but then again, I haven't been looking for him. If he wants to see me, he can find me.

  There's something that Nan told me yesterday in her tiny kitchen that I can't forget – that if Will had been desperate enough to give me the ring Lily made and tell me he loved me, even the impenetrable winter passes of the Snowy Mountains wouldn't have stopped him.

  I'm back in the school library in the same sunny spot by the window and loving reading more of Jane Eyre. Our lives are so different, of course, but I do admire her determination to have love on her own terms. It was Tilly who first told me not to be a doormat – and I'm not going to be.

  I look up and spot Mr York peeping through some shelves. He peers at me over his glasses, smiles and sallies forth.

  'Eleanor, I was told I'd find you here. Lovely spot.' He sits in the chair opposite, fiddles with his navy school tie and begins again with a small 'Ahem'.

  'Firstly I want you to know how grateful Mr Battenburg and I are for your efforts on Saturday night. And for Carmelita's as well. Your evening was certainly ruined and we are sincerely sorry. Mrs Ferguson should never have left you in charge of an intoxicated person. She's having some, er, counselling about all that. I hope you'll accept our apology.'

  I nod graciously. Very Jane Eyre. Most Inscrutable. Deeply Venerable. Hah! I think I'm going to enjoy this convo.

  'Secondly, I want you to know that Jai won't be returning to Oldcastle High. His parents have elected to move him to Britannia Boys' High, and of course his brother Jayden will be leaving us after the exams. I can only think that's a good thing.'

  Good? It's genius!

  'Thirdly, Bianca Ponsford's with the school principal as we speak and we shall soon be learning her fate.'

  Oooh! Confiscating her hair spray and teasing comb would be a good start. At least the rest of us will be spared the daily horror of her hairdressing travesties.

  'Fourthly, I can't overestimate how much the whole teaching staff values you as a good influence on Bianca. There is, of course, a rogue element at this school – I'm sure most schools have the same experience – but we think Bianca's more misguided and impulsive than anything, so . . . if you could . . .'

  Don't worry, I assure him. I'm stuck with Bianca. She's like a bungee pal and will keep bouncing back at me for the rest of my life. Don't ask me how I know. I just know.

  'And finally . . .' says Mr York, exhaling mightily and pulling at his tie with relief. 'I just had to find you and tell you how much I enjoyed your article for the Posh Post. It rocks, dude!'

  He holds his hand to my face in what I'm guessing he thinks is a funky high-five. I slap him back.

  'On this one article alone I'm happy to give you an "A" for English this term,' he says. He does look genuinely thrilled.

  'Keep it up, Elly. You're a clever girl. Put your head down and get as much as you can from Oldcastle High. Don't be distracted and, like I said, I'll be reading those articles and books one day that say: By Eleanor Pickering. I'll be the proudest old English teacher in the world.'

  Do you believe that? Do you believe what just happened? Just goes to show, the daggy old library is now where the action is at Oldcastle High.