Red Samurai

by Tiffiny Hall

  ‘What animal would you be?’ Elecktra used to ask everyone when she was little. Some adults would play along and say a giraffe or a penguin, others wouldn’t play at all or remind her that they are humans, so already animals. One day Lecky asked a lady at the supermarket checkout. The lady leaned over Elecktra and said, ‘I’m not an animal. I’m a ferocious monster who likes to eat little girls.’ Elecktra stopped asking after that. But still to this day, she is the best I know at shaping animals out of clouds. She’ll see an echidna hiding behind a hippopotamus when others would only see a bird. It’s a gift.

  I turn to look at Cinnamon. Her face is serene as she watches two teams of kids delicately drive their kites on invisible strings. The kites are so powerful, flying against the strong wind, but grounded too. They’re like my powers — wanting to fly free, but held back by strings. Strings of self-doubt perhaps. Strings of uncertainty. I wonder if I’ll ever be able to cut the strings and sail freely as the White Warrior.

  As if waking from a nap, Cinnamon blearily turns to me and asks, ‘Should we go?’

  The warm afternoon sun tugs heavy on our eyelids. I stumble to my feet, shake out my legs, then kick off my bike stand. We ride around to the other side of the golf course, where there is a lake protected by water lilies. Kids are playing on the bank and kites now crowd the sky in a vibrant flock.

  We pull up next to a kite team who is preparing to launch an orange kite the size of a couch. It’s in the shape of an eagle and has two spread wings, a tail and a white papier-mâché beak.

  ‘I love your kite,’ I tell a kid who looks about eight years old. A smile pins between two blonde pigtails.

  ‘The grown-ups have to help us bring it down because it’s so humongous,’ she says, ‘but if we can launch it, I think we’ll win today.’ She tilts her face up to the sky to observe the competition. ‘The kite championships are coming up.’

  ‘What do you have to do?’ I ask. I’ve never seen kiting taken so seriously.

  ‘You have to fly the biggest kite the highest and keep it the most still,’ she says, then turns her attention back to her team. They encircle the kite and hold it gently between their fingers.

  ‘On the count of three,’ the little girl instructs. Together they chorus, ‘One, two,’ and then on ‘three’ they all run in the same direction. I cross my fingers and Cinnamon holds her breath. After a few steps, the kids let go of the kite. At first it sails close to the ground, but with an expert tug on the string from the pilot, the eagle swoops once, then glides up into the sky. The boy holding the string unravels more slack and the kite lifts higher. The kids cheer as the eagle kite soars into the clouds.

  ‘Look!’ the little girl yells and points at the kites.

  I blink up into the blue. A section of kites drifts off into the distance like lost balloons. Screaming kids run to the trees where their kites are anchored.

  ‘They’re coming!’ the little girl shrieks and her kite team races to create a protective formation around the pilot.

  ‘Who’s coming?’ Cinnamon asks, but before the kids can reply, we see them. Hero, Krew and Bruce ride along the path, Hero wearing his usual black belt under his school jumper and boxing boots. The group of kids with the eagle kite is nearest to them and Hero holds something that makes them scream — a pair of silver scissors. His eyes flash to me before he rides straight at the kids, splitting them apart and cutting the string. The eagle flies away. The kids begin to cry. Their kite is lost forever. The little girl with the blonde pigtails yells at Hero, but there is nothing she can do. He’s too big for them. Hero laughs at her, then skids off with Bruce and Krew.

  ‘It took us weeks to build that kite after the last one he cut away,’ the little girl whimpers. Cinnamon wraps an arm around her.

  I try to control the blistering anger rising within me, but it is too ferocious, like trying to cage a tiger. Before I can think it through, I summon the wind with a single exhaled breath. The wind builds in a strong reaching hand over the golf course, then blows all the loose kites into a bouquet with one big gust. Kids snap their heads backwards in amazement as their kites entwine together above them. I direct the wind to carry the kites gently down to the grass. The kids cheer, then rush into the pile to unpick their precious kites from the bunch.

  ‘That was lucky,’ Cinnamon says, her ruby eyebrows arching towards me.

  The little girl rubs away her tears and runs to join the others. ‘The wind changed!’ she calls to her friends. No one questions how it happened — they are too happy to have their kites back.

  Up ahead Hero screeches to a stop and glares at me. I’m not afraid to glare back at him. He’s a bully and the White Warrior isn’t afraid of a bully. Cinnamon and I swing our legs over our new bikes and continue our ride through the abandoned golf course.

  Soon the kites are back in the sky and kids are retying them to the trunks of the palm trees and posting guards to keep watch. I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help summoning the wind to strengthen so the kites can dance. I make a mental Post-it to tell the little girl to place nails on the ground around their pilot. Nails will blow Hero’s tyres if he ever shows up again. He really is so mean, preying on little kids with kites. But I guess that’s why he does it. Picking on people smaller than him makes him feel bigger. A guy who wears his black martial arts belt under his school jumper obviously has something to prove.

  Finally the golf course fills with kids’ laughter again. Coasting along, the reality of being the White Warrior spins into the wheels of the bike and for the rest of the ride, I enjoy being a normal kid.

  By the time I arrive home, Elecktra has already left for Ballet Fu. It sounds more like a disease than a workout. I hunt around her room for her cape. If I can hide the cape, she won’t be able to perform in the talent quest tomorrow — Elecktra would rather die than not be properly costumed for a performance. I search her walk-in closet, under her bed, her wooden chest, in her school bag, but the cape has disappeared. I flop down on a pile of Elecktra’s magazines. I’ll try to speak to her, to make her see common sense, but unfortunately Lecky hates anything common. If she’s this much trouble now, I can’t imagine how much trouble she’ll be once she’s fully ninja.

  SEVEN

  The next day at school I find Elecktra out the front of the assembly hall with a gaggle of her girlfriends. She sits on the steps as Chantell and Brandice shimmy around her. I notice straight away Stephanie Blankenangel is crying. As I approach, I hear Chantell yell at Lecky, ‘We’re sick of your stupid magic!’

  Elecktra’s face drops.

  ‘Yeah!’ Brandice chimes in. ‘You’re totally deluded. You’re not magical. You’re totally av-er-age.’ She emphasises each syllable of the insult to drag out the abuse.

  The girls huddle over Stephanie and stroke her hair. Elecktra’s lips quiver. If there is anything in this world that Elecktra hates, it’s being normal or, even worse, average.

  Brandice looks over her shoulder at Elecktra and thrusts her nose in the air, then steers Stephanie and Chantell away.

  ‘What do you want?’ Elecktra says when I arrive by her side. Her voice is strong, but her eyes glisten. She has just experienced what it’s like to be Gate Two. Year Ten looks tough.

  I branch out my arms to hug her. Elecktra jumps off the steps and out of the way.

  ‘Stephanie has a dog called Ralph,’ she says. ‘I thought it would be funny to make a tennis ball fly through the air and say it’s Ralph’s playing ball. How was I supposed to know he died yesterday?’

  I try to put my arms around Elecktra again, but she shrugs me off and fastens her hands to her hips.

  ‘I’ll show them! Blankenangel is my sixth best friend anyways. And she’s still auditioning!’ Elecktra shouts.

  ‘No, Lecky! Showing anyone anything is a really bad, bad idea,’ I tell her, but she shoves past me.

  ‘I need my cape,’ she calls over her shoulder.

  Oh no, not the cape!

  Every year we have
a talent quest to raise money for charity. The local community is invited and sits on chairs at the back of the hall while we sit on the floor in our assembly lines. I am so nervous about Elecktra’s performance. Even when her friends turn on her, she still has the confidence to get up on stage and remind them of her awesomeness. Lecky’s toughest competitors are Elena and Emily with their ‘So You Think You Can Table Tennis’ routine — choreographed table tennis to music is always pretty hard to beat.

  The gold curtain parts and Elecktra walks out on stage wearing her school uniform, kitten high heels, knee-high socks and multicoloured sequined cape. She has tucked a pink gerbera flower into her shirt pocket. I really hate that cape. It’s the same cape she made me wear to casual clothes day last year and I ended up on the school’s worst-dressed list.

  ‘Hello. Today I will be performing magic and the best song you’ve ever heard in your life,’ Elecktra announces. She disappears off stage for a moment. Then her bottom appears out of the wings, followed by her shuffling legs and her arms dragging a small card table covered with items. Elecktra centres the table, then stands behind it. She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, then addresses the audience again. ‘I would like to sing “My Favourite Things” from The Sound of Music, with a twist from The Sound of Elecktra’s Shower.’

  There are murmurs of giggles and the school pianist begins to play the melody.

  ‘Flawless fake tan and extensions on lashes. Statement necklaces and pop colour clashes,’ Elecktra sings. She lifts her left hand and a statement necklace of pink crystals leaps off the table and into the air. Elecktra twirls in her ritzy cape while the necklace hovers. The audience gasps. The necklace drops back onto the table, then she presents her nails to the audience. ‘Rosy nail polish for a brand-new ring. These are a few of my favourite things.

  ‘High heels, handbags and zebra-print bikinis.’ Elecktra shakes both her hands like presenting a prize on a game show and a bikini rises into the air.

  ‘You’re using string!’ a kid calls out.

  ‘Floral teapots that have chai tea and genies.’ Elecktra pretends to take a sip from a teapot that floats past her lips. ‘Parrots that speak and fluffy angel wings. These are a few of my favourite things.’

  She holds the back of her hand to her forehead. ‘When the heart breaks, coz friends are fakes.’ She glares down at Brandice and Chantell. ‘When I’m feeling sad.’ She juggles chocolate balls around her face with no hands. ‘I simply remember my favourite things. And then I don’t feel so bad.’

  She turns to the audience with a stapled-on smile, to no applause. They probably think it’s some kind of elaborate puppet show.

  ‘Bring back “So You Think You Can Table Tennis”!’ a kid shouts.

  Elecktra bows and exits the stage with a flick of her sparkling cape, dragging her tokens of failure.

  In Elecktra’s room, pop music is blasting.

  ‘Lecky, look at this graph,’ I say, pointing at her maths textbook. ‘Explain what an asymptote is.’

  ‘Daisies,’ she replies, twirling in her pink Ballet Fu tutu.

  ‘Elecktra, stop being silly! You asked me to help you study so I’m trying to help!’ I think she wanted to avoid talking about the talent quest.

  She levitates into the air and continues to twirl. She hits her head every now and then on the ceiling, but luckily it’s still covered with mattresses. They were for Lecky all along. Mum’s always one swift step ahead; she knows every ninja turns out different.

  ‘Okay. Let’s try biology?’ I suggest.

  ‘Is there an app for that?’ Lecky asks.

  I sigh. ‘I don’t know why I bother.’ I switch off the music.

  Elecktra slides down to the floor like a banana peel. ‘Well, aren’t you Miss Perfect Powers. Got everything under control,’ she snaps.

  ‘You can have everything under control too. But you can’t show off. Ninjas are meant to be stealthy, remember? The invisible warriors, secretive and always in the shadows — not the spotlight!’

  Elecktra slouches down onto her doona. It’s not often you see her with rounded shoulders. Lecky believes in good posture and likes to walk around the house with books on her head.

  ‘Lecky, don’t you see? It’s not normal to move things with your mind,’ I say gently.

  ‘I know,’ she whispers, tracing a heart on her tights with a red-polished nail. Her cheeks begin to tremble and her eyes water.

  I squint. Is she …?

  Lecky blinks and tears start streaming silently down her face. It’s amazing — Lecky never shows her weak and vulnerable side. Seeing her in tears is like seeing one of your teachers at the supermarket — suddenly they become a real person.

  ‘Lecky,’ I whisper. She grabs my arm and pulls me into her for a hug. I sit on the bed and stroke her hair as she sobs into my shoulder. Lecky is always so full-on with everything she does that it doesn’t surprise me she’s a full-on crier too.

  ‘Cat,’ she sobs. ‘All my friends hate me. I might as well be Gate Two.’ She lifts her head, blinking through hair soaked with tears.

  ‘I know the feeling,’ I tell her.

  Elecktra sits up and wipes her tears onto her wrist. ‘I guess you do,’ she says, then more tears stream down her face. I go to hug her, but she pushes me away and hides her face.

  ‘You’re an ugly crier,’ I say lightly.

  Elecktra laughs through her tears. ‘No, I’m not.’ She brushes the tears away with the palms of her hands, then looks at me intently. ‘I’m sorry I’m such a toad to you.’

  I’m so taken aback by her apology I can’t breathe; it’s as if I’ve been punched in the chest.

  ‘I know you get teased at school. I know Hero gives you hell and I don’t do anything to stop it. I’m your older sister. I should stop it.’ Lecky’s eyes begin to water again. ‘But I’m so scared people won’t like me if I say something. Who’s going to talk to me then? I don’t have skills like you do.’

  ‘Skills?’ I ask.

  ‘Like numchuck skills, concentrationing, understanding Shakespeare, having real friends that like you coz you rock, not just coz you’re pretty,’ she explains.

  Rain begins to slosh against the window. Lecky wipes her face again. I pinch the corner of the doona on the far side of the bed and wrap it around her shoulders. She opens it up and invites me into the folds. I snuggle next to her. She smells of peaches and coconut.

  ‘I’d rather be Gate One,’ I say.

  She turns to me, her face restored to its flawless complexion, like a still lake after a skipping stone. ‘No, you wouldn’t. It’s overrated. Roxy, you’re smart, gutsy, fast, people are still talking about the way you saved that kitten. You’ll always have friends because you know who you are, you don’t just adopt your friends’ personalities.’

  I sink deeper into the doona and the warm embrace of my sister. I’ve never heard my sister speak like this before. I feel like I could conquer anything.

  Lecky laughs again, shaking her hair out of her eyes. ‘It must be these powers. They’re making me drop truth bombs.’ She pauses, then says, ‘I’ll let you help me with my powers now. And if you help me, you could end up in my favourite things song.’

  ‘I’d like that. As long as I don’t have to listen to it again,’ I say. ‘It was catchy, but you can’t sing.’

  ‘I know,’ she admits and we burst into laughter.

  ‘Hey, I almost forgot,’ Lecky says. ‘I’m having a viewing party in the living room for the Teen Choice Awards red carpet after school on Monday. You want to come?’

  My heart does a gymnastic leap. ‘Cool! Do you want me to bring anything? I’ll wear whatever you want me to.’

  ‘Come as yourself.’ Lecky smiles. It’s the first time she hasn’t tried to style me.

  Mum knocks on the door. ‘This is new,’ she says, pointing to the two of us under the blanket. ‘May I?’

  We open our arms and Mum jumps under the doona with us. Then we gossip in the glowing warmth
of each other’s company until we gently fall asleep.

  EIGHT

  ‘Thanks for coming with me, Lecky. This is my favourite place in the world,’ I say.

  Elecktra is quiet as we walk along the tree-lined street on Saturday afternoon. Jackson walks just behind us. He found out about the motorbike attack and insisted on coming for extra protection — I’m not complaining.

  ‘Don’t you love trees?’ I ask as they rustle in the biting breeze.

  Lecky is lost a million miles away in thought. ‘Hmm?’

  ‘Trees are so positive,’ I say.

  ‘What’s negative?’ Elecktra asks.

  ‘Trucks and whipper snippers.’

  ‘True,’ she agrees.

  ‘We’re here!’ I sing.

  In the front window of the pet shop, puppies pad the glass with their miniature paws. Elecktra leans her face against the glass. A puppy rushes up to lick the window and she giggles.

  ‘I can’t believe you’ve never been here,’ I say.

  Elecktra traces her finger along the glass and the puppy follows it. ‘Neither can I.’ She giggles again.

  ‘Cute,’ Jackson says. ‘I’ll wait out here.’ He parks himself on a bench in front of the shop.

  Inside there are cages of kittens curled in paper, parrots on perches pecking seed bells and fluorescent aquariums filled with coral, fish and teacup-sized turtles. I run to a box filled with my favourite pets and scoop up a white rabbit. Ted looks up from the counter where he is feeding a parrot on his shoulder and I wave. Ted is a Gate Two in Year Eleven. I come here a lot with Cinnamon and he allows us to hold the animals. I think Ted is Cinnamon’s secret crush.

  ‘Here.’ I hand the rabbit over to Elecktra. At first she is awkward trying to find the right position for the fluffy parcel. She crosses her legs and sits down on the spot so she can better cradle the animal. The rabbit burrows into her lap and she gently pats its head and threads its ears through her fingers.