I take a deep breath, and exercise the only option left available to me.
I burst into tears.
I gulp and gasp as tears pour down my face. I dread to think what kind of horrible shade of red I’ve gone. Snot dribbles from my nose.
And everyone turns and walks away.
I stand in the middle of the hallway sobbing and gulping as my fellow students move around me, not making eye contact.
I see Nina Kennan, looking like she just floated in on a sunbeam. I sniffle and hiccup and try to smile.
She looks at me like I am a smear of squished insect on a car windscreen. Something tiny and distasteful, that needs to be discreetly removed as soon as possible.
Mr Mehmet approaches. My embarrassment meter is hovering at eleven. He looks mildly frightened, as if I might start having a fit and he’d have to put a wooden spoon between my teeth. Or as if I already am having a fit, and I might get violent if he gets too close.
‘Midge?’ he asks. I swallow and try to stop blubbering.
Mr Mehmet places a hand tentatively on my shoulder. ‘I think you should come to the Principal’s office.’
I don’t say anything. I don’t really care. My life is over. Nothing could possibly make this worse.
He steers me down the corridor, and I stop outside the computer lab and stare. The embarrassment meter explodes in a shower of tiny glass fragments.
Every single computer is showing the picture of me and George. Except, on the computer screens, it isn’t just a picture. It’s a weird, disgusting, jerky animation, looped over and over again. I am in a porno. There is a porno of me on every monitor in the computer lab.
‘It’s on all the school computers,’ says Mr Mehmet. ‘We can’t get rid of it. Someone’s hacked into the system.’
Okay, so things can get worse.
George is already in Mr Moss’s office. He looks pale.
The bandage on his arm reminds me about what Tahni said last night, about the armour and the lance. Oh. My. God. I am all over the school. In a porno film. With someone who dresses up as a knight and pretends to kill dragons. I hiccup, and burst into tears again.
‘Sit down, Midge,’ says Mr Moss.
Mr Moss is a very small man. He almost vanishes behind the fancy wooden desk. I wonder if he needs a special chair.
He used to be a Maths teacher, but retired when he went into a diabetic coma in front of his Year 12 Specialist Maths class. He came back to work six months later, and they made him Principal. The secondary school system – it’s poetry in motion.
‘So,’ he says, passing me a box of tissues. ‘Do either of you have an explanation for this? Do you know who did it?’
George shakes his head. ‘No, sir.’
I busy myself with a tissue.
‘Midge?’ asks Mr Moss.
‘Yes, sir?’
‘Do you know who did this?’
‘No, sir.’
I’m not sure why I’m lying. I might be able to blame it on being over-emotional, but I know that’s not it. In fact, when I take a deep breath, I realise I’m scared.
I mean, if Ben could do this, if he could do something this terrible, what else is he capable of?
I just want it to be over. I want the universe to implode and take everyone’s secrets with it. I want to go home and watch Toy Story again under my doona with Gregory. I want to run away and become a circus freak (I’ve already got the freak part down pat). I want to become a nun. I want Mum to come home.
Mr Moss sighs. I’m sure he knows I’m lying.
‘Now, I’m confident neither one of you created this … this filth. Do you have any idea who might want to hurt you? Someone with a grudge?’ He’s looking at George when he asks this question.
George is suddenly fascinated with his knees. ‘No, sir.’
‘I know that there was an … incident,’ says Mr Moss. ‘At your old school.’
What kind of incident? I glance over at George. His face goes a funny colour, but he doesn’t say anything. I remember what Tahni said about the locker and the weapons. Maybe he is a killer. Maybe he speared someone with his lance.
‘Fine,’ says Mr Moss. ‘The teachers have removed most of the posters, but we haven’t been able to fix the computers yet. I think it’s probably best if you both went home. I’ll call your parents to let them know.’
Great. My parents get to share in my humiliation.
Mr Moss picks up a manila folder and reads the contents. After a moment, George and I realise that this means our meeting is over, and we scurry out of the room.
Thankfully, the corridors are deserted. The posters are all gone, but there’re still little paper corners and bits of sticky tape where they’ve been ripped down. I stare straight ahead when I walk past the computer lab.
‘Midge,’ George calls.
I spin around. ‘Shh!’ I whisper. ‘People will hear.’
I so don’t want to be seen with him right now. Actually, I’d be happy if I never saw George Papadopoulos ever again.
‘Wait,’ he says, and jogs to catch up. He runs like a sack of flour on legs, and wobbles in a rather unfortunate way. I hate him.
I speed to the front door and step outside. It’s quite cold, and starting to spit. So much for summer.
‘Don’t worry,’ says George, as we walk out through the school gates. ‘It’s clear they’re fakes. Nobody really thinks we’re … that we did that.’
I close my eyes and pray that no one can see us together. I imagine every student in the school, pressed up against their classroom windows, whistling and jeering as the porn stars slip off together for another session.
‘Do you think it was Ben?’ asks George.
I open my eyes in surprise. Why would he say that? How does he even know that we ‘broke up’?
George must see my panic, because he frowns and then explains. ‘I thought he might be jealous,’ he says. ‘Because you and I are spending time together.’
‘Only because of the project,’ I say. I don’t want him to think we’re friends. That would be Awkward.
George’s frown deepens. ‘Of course,’ he says.
Looks like it’s Awkward already. ‘We broke up,’ I say. ‘Ben and I. About a week ago.’
He doesn’t look particularly surprised, but I suppose he didn’t have much invested in the relationship. ‘So do you think he did it?’
I shrug. ‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘Yes. No. Maybe.’
‘Why didn’t you say anything to Mr Moss?’
‘I don’t want to make things worse,’ I say. ‘I don’t know what he’s capable of.’
George sighs.
I press my palms against my eyes. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘Just get on with our project,’ he says. ‘There isn’t anything we can do, if you’re not willing to tell Mr Moss about Ben.’
I shake my head. ‘I don’t even know for sure that it was Ben,’ I say. ‘And anyway, it’s too late. Everyone’s already seen the pictures. My life is over, no matter what happens.’
‘Look, Midge,’ says George. ‘Nobody thinks that it’s actually your body.’
I wonder if I should be insulted by this comment, but I ignore it and walk on. It’s really raining now. I wish George and his stupid long eyelashes would leave me alone.
‘That’s not actually why you’re upset, is it?’ asks George suddenly.
‘What?’
‘You’re not upset because there’re naked pictures of you all over the school.’
‘They’re not naked pictures of me,’ I say.
‘Whatever,’ says George. ‘You’re not upset about the fact that there’s a rude picture of you. You’re upset that there’s a rude picture of me.’
‘What are you talking about?’ I say. ‘Of course I’m upset there’re rude pictures of me.’
George shakes his head. ‘Not as upset as you are about being in it with me. You don’t care if people think you’re–’ he blushes, ‘… a harlot �
�� you just don’t want them to think that we’re going out. You and me.’
‘We’re not going out,’ I say hastily.
‘I’m aware of that, Midge.’
George aims a savage kick at an empty take-away coffee cup.
‘What’s so wrong with me, anyway?’ says George.
The coffee cup bounces into the gutter and then rolls out onto the road.
‘Am I that odious to you?’
I know he’s looking right at me, but I keep my eyes on the coffee cup. A car whooshes past and flattens it.
‘Would it really harm your precious reputation so much to be seen with me?’
I think about Tahni, lying on my bed, crying with laughter as she described George in his suit of armour. I think about the way he jiggles when he runs. I think about the way he wears his school shorts. I bite my lip and don’t say anything.
George stops walking. ‘You’re unbelievable,’ he says. ‘I thought you were different, but you’re just as shallow as all the others.’
I march on. I start to cry again, but I pretend it’s just the rain.
14 scourge
–noun; 1. a whip or lash, esp. for the infliction of punishment or torture.
2. a cause of affliction or calamity.
– The Wordsmith’s Dictionary of Hard-to-spell Words
Mum and Dad are waiting for me when I get home. They’re sitting at the table with cups of tea. I’m surprised to see Mum, because I thought she was still away with work.
‘Are you okay, sweetheart?’ asks Mum. She gets up and hugs me. She smells different. New perfume.
I resist the urge to burst into tears. Instead, I sniff and nod.
‘Who would do something like that?’ Dad asks.
I shrug. How can I tell them? They don’t even know about Ben.
‘How is your friend?’ asks Mum. ‘The other one in … in the pictures.’
‘He’s not my friend,’ I say. ‘Just someone I’m doing an assignment with.’
Mum pours me a cup of tea.
‘Is there anything you want to tell us, Midge?’ asks Mum.
‘No,’ I say in a very quiet voice, looking down at my mug. Doesn’t Mum remember I hate tea?
‘Because you know you can talk to us about anything,’ she says. ‘No matter what it is.’
‘There’s nothing,’ I say. ‘I don’t know why it happened. I don’t know why I was chosen. They probably just opened up the school roll and threw a pin at a name.’
Why is Dad being so quiet? This is normally the part where he makes a stupid joke to lighten the mood. Or gets furious that someone defiled his daughter’s name and stamps around the house yelling. But he’s just sitting there, staring at his hands.
Now what? Are they waiting for me to speak? Do they think that this understanding, tea-drinking family time will lead to me spilling out the truth about Ben and Tahni and George and how I’m an idiot and have no friends left in the world and am going to end up a lonely old lady with eleven cats much sooner than I imagined? Not likely.
‘Anyway,’ says Mum. ‘It’s good that we have this chance to all sit down together.’
Huh? We live together. We sit down together for dinner every night. Although we haven’t been doing that much lately. Still.
‘Midge,’ says Mum. ‘We need to talk.’
Oh. Is this where they finally tell me Grandma died?
She glances at Dad, but he’s staring down at his mug. His face looks funny.
‘Midge …’ says Mum again, and then trails off.
‘What is it?’ I say.
Now Mum looks down at her cup of tea. I think she might be crying.
I suddenly get the feeling that this isn’t about Grandma. Mum and Dad aren’t making eye contact. What’s going on? Is someone dying? Does Dad have cancer? Are we bankrupt? Is Mum a drug dealer? Is she going to goal? Am I adopted? Does Dad have a secret love-child? Or a whole other family? Are they going back to Russia to be with Svetlana? Or are they time-travellers from the future? Or terrorists?
‘Your mother’s having an affair.’
Dad says it shortly, abruptly, without glancing up from his cup of tea.
‘What?’
Mum closes her eyes. ‘I’m sorry, Midge,’ she says.
I must have heard wrong.
‘Tell her,’ says Dad.
Mum sighs. ‘You know I work very long hours, Midge,’ she says. ‘And so I’ve been spending a lot of time with Jason. And being a lawyer is so intense. And it just …’
‘Jason?’ I say. ‘You had an affair with a lawyer called Jason?’
Mum nods.
I think about the long hours she’s been working. Working late on a Saturday night and ‘falling asleep at her desk’. I remember the fancy roast dinner she cooked, and all the things she bought me on our girls’ day out. It was guilt. It wasn’t about me at all. It was about Jason.
‘When did it start?’ I ask.
‘About six months ago,’ says Mum.
Dad’s hands are wrapped around his mug. His knuckles are white. I imagine someone else’s hands touching my Mum. I imagine her kissing another man. I feel sick and shivery and very, very wrong. The smell of Mum’s new perfume is overpowering.
‘But it’s over now, right?’ I say.
Mum squirms. I think Dad’s stopped breathing. ‘No, sweetheart,’ she says. ‘It’s not over.’
‘Why not?’ I ask.
‘Because I’m not sure what I want,’ she says.
I’m sorry, but isn’t it the dad who’s supposed to have the affair? He’s supposed to turn forty or fifty and get a red sports car and have an affair with a twenty-five-year-old leggy blonde. That’s how it happens on television. The mother never has the affair.
‘Are you getting a divorce?’ I ask.
‘I’m going to go and stay with a friend for a while,’ says Mum. Her voice is squeaky. ‘While we figure things out.’
‘A friend?’ I say, with a healthy amount of sarcasm.
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Just a girlfriend.’
I swallow.
‘Midge,’ says Mum, and I wonder why she keeps saying my name. It’s as though she thinks she’s going to forget it or something. She might. ‘Midge, I want you to know that no matter what happens, I’ll always be your mum. You’re always my number one priority.’
‘Oh please,’ I say. ‘If I was your number one priority, you’d keep our family together. You wouldn’t have run out and slept with the first bloke you met like a harlot.’
‘Don’t talk to your mother that way,’ says Dad.
I look at him, and feel panic. How can I live with just Dad? He can’t cook, and he doesn’t know how to sew up the hem of my school uniform, and he won’t know when I have to go to the dentist or remember that I don’t like mushrooms or tea.
I can’t handle this. It’s all Mum’s fault. I stand up. ‘She’s not my mother.’
I walk out. I just want to go to my room and cry on my bed, but that doesn’t feel dramatic enough. So I walk out the front door.
Why couldn’t Mum have been the one with the imaginary boyfriend?
15 venge·ance
–noun; infliction of injury, harm, humiliation, or the like, on a person by another who has been harmed by that person.
– The Wordsmith’s Dictionary of Hard-to-spell Words
It’s still raining outside. Everything is grey and miserable. I run out of the front gate and stand on the footpath, under the shelter of a wattle tree.
I am totally numb. How could Mum do this? On today of all days? What did I do to the universe to deserve this?
Maybe I’ve just been given all the bad days for the rest of my life in one hit. Maybe this is it – from now on, everything will be puppies and sunshine and daisies. I doubt it.
I find my mobile and call Tahni. I know we’ve been fighting, but this is bigger than that. I need her.
‘Hello?’
‘It’s me.’ My voice is wobbly.
&n
bsp; Silence.
‘Tahni?’ I say.
‘I can’t talk right now,’ she says. She sounds weird.
‘But I really need to–’
‘See you later,’ she says, and hangs up.
I have an urge to throw my phone across the street. I want to smash it against something and see it explode into tiny pieces. I want to break something.
But I put it back in my pocket.
I think about going back inside, but I don’t want to see Mum at the moment. Or Dad. I just can’t handle it. And Tahni is blowing me off.
So I go to the one place I have left.
A woman answers the door. She must be George’s mum. She’s quite dumpy, with thick salt-and-pepper hair tied back into a bun. She’s wearing a floral dress, with an apron over the top.
‘Hi,’ I say. ‘I’m Midge. I’m George’s–. Is George here?’
She smiles at me.
‘Welcome,’ she says. She has an accent.
She turns and yells, ‘Giorgos!’ It sounds like Your-goss. That must be George’s name in Greek.
George yells something from another room. It’s not in English. His mum replies with a string of words I absolutely do not understand. Then she switches to English.
‘Your friend from school,’ she yells. ‘Midge. She’s a very pretty girl.’
She winks at me. I blush. I don’t think I look very pretty right now, all wet and tear-stained and blotchy.
‘Come into the kitchen,’ she says. ‘Giorgos will be down in a minute.’
I follow her into the house. It’s quite a big house – bigger than ours, with lots of nice old-fashioned furniture. There are delicate china ornaments on every available surface – cats and lambs and bells and shepherdesses.
Mrs Papadopoulos is a force of nature. Before I’m aware of it, she’s got me sitting at the kitchen bench, with a towel around my shoulders, sipping a cup of strong, black coffee and eating a crescent-shaped biscuit dusted with icing sugar. As soon as I bite into the crumbly biscuit, I realise it’s what I’ve been smelling on George. Nutty and sweet and a little bit spicy. The biscuit crumbles and then melts in my mouth. It’s delicious, and I help myself to another before I realise what I’m doing.
There’s a stew or soup of some kind bubbling away on the stove. The windows are steamed up from the warmth, but I can still see the rain pounding away outside. I feel incredibly comfortable and safe.
Not Quite Perfect Boyfriend Page 10
