Cassie

by Barry Jonsberg

  ‘Hey, Demi. Kari, Georgia.’

  The other two nodded, but didn’t smile. Holly tried to examine herself in part of the mirror to the right of Georgia, but the tarnish was so severe she couldn’t see a great deal. Not that it mattered, she thought. Probably a blessing in disguise.

  ‘Maths, eh?’ said Holly. It was the only class she shared with Demi who was one of the vast majority who had given up on ever understanding what Mr Tillyard was going on about. Most times Demi flicked through fashion mags under the desk or sketched her own designs on a drawing pad she brought along especially for that purpose. The teacher never noticed, so everyone was happy. Holly often spent her time examining Demi, trying to understand how she achieved the effect she did. Was it just clothes and make-up and jewellery? Or was there something else? Charisma, maybe? It was as big a puzzle as Mr Tillyard’s maths.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Demi. ‘Maths doesn’t appeal. It never appeals.’

  For a moment, Holly was puzzled. It was Friday afternoon. It was double maths. It was always double maths.

  ‘We’ve got something better to do,’ added Demi.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Shopping. To be precise, clothes shopping. There’s a new outlet at Westland and we are going to check it out.’

  ‘What? You are going to wag?’

  Demi tutted.

  ‘Such an ugly word, Holly,’ she said. ‘I prefer to think of it as distance learning. Would you like to come along? I guarantee you’ll learn more with us than with old Tillyard.’

  Holly knew this was a defining moment. She had read about defining moments in novels, so she recognised the signs. She quickly debated the pros and cons. On the one hand, this was an invitation – a second chance – and she hadn’t expected to be given another one. Turn this down and that was definitely it. Demi was making every effort. There would be no third chances. This was also the opportunity to pick Demi’s brains about fashion. And not in an abstract way. Action Plan 1 was being offered by the fashion queen herself. An image sprang to her mind. Holly emerging from the change room and Demi and the others critically examining her. ‘That colour doesn’t really suit you, Hol. With your legs you need something that will enhance your shape, slim your hips and accentuate your waistline. Try this . . .’ Maybe there would be the opportunity to impress the girls with her willingness to be moulded to their taste.

  Demi was right. It would certainly beat the hell out of going to maths.

  On the other hand, there were all the consequences of wagging school. She knew she would never get away with it. True, Mr Tillyard didn’t appear to know who she was and never remarked on her presence, let alone her work. But it was Murphy’s Law. What could go wrong, would go wrong. He would notice. He would ring her mother. And then the brown stuff would hit the fan.

  ‘You’re not scared, are you?’ said Georgia.

  ‘Course not,’ said Holly.

  And the moment became defined. Holly had her ATM card with her. The Plastic Surgery Emergency Fund was ready and waiting. And when she thought about it, that was what the fund was for. To transform her. She could see a new, bright Holly Holley emerging as if from a chrysalis.

  Yeah, her mum would be angry. If she found out. But there was a possibility she wouldn’t. And anyway, even if she did, this was something Holly was owed. She was tired of being good. Giving up her bedroom, giving up her social life. For what? It wasn’t even as if she was being treated better. Just good old Holly, you can rely on her to give up everything for nothing in return. Well, not this time.

  When Holly spoke again it was a smooth transition from her last words.

  ‘What are we waiting for?’ she said. ‘Let’s hit the shops.’

  Demi laughed.

  ‘You’re bad,’ she said. ‘Meet us in twenty minutes, okay? By the basketball court. It’s easy to slip away from there.’

  Holly nodded. As she left the girls’ toilets, she was conscious of her nerves tingling. She wasn’t sure whether this was due to fear or excitement.

  Or a combination of both.

  Cassie

  My nerves tingle.

  New school. New patterns.

  Lunchtimes are full of fear. I sit in a staffroom, surrounded by old voices. Someone feeds me. She is kind but doesn’t know the rhythms. A spoon scrapes the side of my mouth, clinks on teeth. She talks, yet all her words are fillers. They fill the gap of my silence.

  This is the hardest time.

  New school. New patterns.

  My nerves tingle.

  Amy found an unoccupied table in the canteen, tucked behind a pillar.

  She’d thought about taking up her usual spot on the bench outside, but couldn’t bring herself to do it. She needed space.

  Amy ate her sandwich and flicked through the section on quadratic equations in her maths textbook. She was so absorbed that, for a minute or two, she wasn’t aware of the girls talking. It was only the name ‘Holly’ that tugged her attention away from the symbols on the page. She couldn’t see who was speaking. The pillar hid everything. But she recognised the voices.

  ‘Well, I think it’s amazing of you to give her another chance. Especially after the disaster of the sleepover.’

  ‘I told you,’ came the voice of Demi Larson. ‘I’m bored. I need a project. And what better, more challenging project than Holly Holley?’

  There was laughter. Amy leaned back against the pillar, the book forgotten.

  ‘Take the daggiest, dullest girl in the entire school and transform her. It’s just like Extreme Makeover. Our own reality program. I wonder if we could get a TV channel interested . . .’

  ‘My parents do a heap of charity work for disadvantaged people.’ Was that Kari Williams or Georgia Glasson? It was difficult to tell. ‘And I guess this is similar. Help out the unfortunate among us. It’s kind of noble.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Demi. ‘Mind you, we can probably turn that ugly duckling into something resembling a swan through clothes and make-up alone. But I’m not sure if there’s anything that can be done with the personality.’

  Laughter again.

  ‘A character implant?’

  ‘Charisma infusions?’

  ‘What Personality Not To Wear?’

  ‘Too difficult,’ said Demi. ‘Even for me. Hey, guys, we’d better get moving. This is where the hard work starts.’

  Amy waited until the sounds of retreating footsteps faded. Then she headed quickly into the bright sunshine of the schoolyard. Her maths textbook remained on the canteen table among crumpled clingwrap and scattered crumbs.

  Although Cassie was in mainstream classes most of the time, there were exceptions and Friday afternoon was one. Fern had insisted that Cassie be treated the same as other students, with the same workload and timetable. Greg Adams had been happy to agree. But he suggested that on a few occasions during the week, usually when students were doing practical subjects like sports or home economics, Cassie would benefit from one-on-one tuition.

  Greg wheeled Cassie into a computer lab. They had it to themselves. He positioned her at a series of desks in the centre of the room, away from the monitors lining the walls, and put on the wheelchair’s brakes. Then he sat opposite.

  ‘Cass,’ he said. ‘I rang your school in Darwin, just to get a bit more information about the learning programs you’ve been on. They send their love, by the way.’

  Images – faces, places – flashed before Cassie’s eyes. They made her wince. Greg tilted his head at her expression.

  ‘What do you say we ring them next week?’ he said. ‘You could have a chat, catch up.’

  Sounds bubbled in her throat and her right arm moved in a sawing motion across the arm rest of the wheelchair, but Cassie’s reply was in her eyes.

  ‘Good. We’ll do that, then. Now for work. Your school told me you have some experience with smart navigation software. Is that right? Okay. But you had difficulty with it. What I suggest, Cass, is that we try again. I have the latest equipme
nt – which you can borrow so you can practise at home – and I’ve designed some software to go with it. Do you want to give it a go?’

  He nodded again.

  Greg brushed back his long, thinning hair and wheeled Cass to a computer terminal, applying the brake once more when she was squared in front of the monitor. Then he opened a briefcase and took out a laptop computer and a small device that looked like a webcam on short tripod legs.

  ‘This is yours to borrow, Cass,’ he said, pointing to the laptop. ‘I’ve installed the software, which is also on this machine in front of you. I’ll just plug in the sensor and we’ll take it from there.’

  He placed the camera-like object on top of the monitor and then knelt to insert a cable into a USB port on the tower. His knees cracked and Greg winced.

  ‘I’m getting old, Cass,’ he said. ‘I used to run five k a day. Now, when I squat, my joints go off like firecrackers.’

  They waited while the computer registered the new hardware. Then he used the mouse to open a couple of programs.

  ‘You will be familiar with some of this, Cass,’ he said. ‘But there’s some learning to do. Mainly, my software. Of which I am incredibly proud, by the way. So if you have difficulty with it, it’s all your fault, okay?’

  Cassie smiled and her head rolled from side to side.

  ‘As long as we understand each other,’ said Greg. ‘What we have here,’ he continued, ‘is a smart navigation device that operates the computer without a mouse. This will take time to master. There’s also an onscreen keyboard facility linked to a Realtalk program. It converts text into speech. Now, in the past, such programs were . . . well, lousy if you want the plain truth. But there have been huge improvements recently. We can choose a voice you like the sound of, one that matches as nearly as possible your own internal voice, and the computer will speak what you write – with emphasis and intonation. You’ll be amazed at how realistic it is.’

  He opened more windows on the screen.

  ‘But we don’t want to get ahead of ourselves. Today we’ll stick to brushing up your mouse skills. Now I’m told your head is where you have most control. Is that right? You can’t move your head to tell me, by the way.’ He grinned. ‘Just kidding.’

  Greg took a thin plastic sheet from his briefcase. The sheet was covered in grey dots of varying sizes. He peeled one off and, bending down, stuck it firmly to Cassie’s forehead, directly above her nose. There was a loud crack from his knees as he got up. He rubbed his right leg, took a step back and tilted his head to one side.

  ‘Suits you, actually,’ he said. ‘All eastern and mysterious. Now, as you know, Cass, this sensor emits a laser beam that’s reflected by the dot on your forehead. The device picks up the reflected beam and operates the cursor on the screen. There! See? As you move your head, the cursor moves. Excellent. Ready to rock and roll. How about we start with a boring exercise to knock off the rust flakes? What do you say?’

  Cassie

  He is starting to read me. Sometimes he stumbles over my words, moves his finger under my expressions. But he is getting better.

  My skills are as rusty as his knees. But we will find oil together.

  Holly

  My name is Holly Holley and I am terrified.

  I’ve been coming to Westland for years and it’s never been a scary experience, except for the time I accidentally noted the price tags in one of the more exclusive stores. But now I see security guards everywhere we go and I break out in a cold sweat. I keep expecting one to challenge me. I am wearing my school uniform and it feels like there’s a flashing neon sign over my head – a purple arrow and ‘WAGGER’ in bright, bold caps.

  Demi and the others don’t seem to care. In fact, they make heaps of noise, almost like they want to be noticed. I slink along behind, practising invisibility. Every time a woman comes out of a shop, I flinch. Even though I know Mum is doling out lentils in a store ten kilometres away, I can’t get rid of the image of her looming up in front of me, her expression morphing from surprise to disappointment.

  But she doesn’t show and after half an hour I start to relax. A little.

  Then we hit the new clothes store and I forget about everything else. A couple of people at school have raved about it, but I am not prepared for how amazing it is. For one thing, it’s the size of an international airport and every available space is crammed with racks and racks of skirts, dresses, tops, belts and accessories. I stand in the doorway for a while, doing a very reasonable impersonation, yet again, of a rabbit caught in headlights. My mouth drops open but I’m fairly certain I don’t drool.

  Demi and the others stroll casually along aisles. Occasionally they feel the fabric of a skirt or lift a top from the rack and hold it up against themselves or each other, testing it against their complexions. I force my mouth closed and follow. There is a way of doing this, I realise. Look bored, hold up a pair of jeans or a dress and scowl endearingly before putting it back. I practise the routine on a stunning dark blue top with a ruffled neckline. I hold it up against my torso and look in a mirror. I try to get the corner of my mouth to turn down in a charming fashion, but it just looks like I am constipated.

  ‘What do you think, Hol?’ Demi’s reflection appears next to mine in the mirror.

  What I want to say is, ‘I’m on the verge of wetting my pants,’ but I decide that won’t strike the right note. And I don’t know what to think. I mean, I love the top. But I don’t know if I should love it. It would be so easy to make an idiot of myself.

  ‘It’s okay, I suppose,’ I say, putting my head to one side and making a slightly better attempt at cute mouth-drooping.

  ‘The style is . . . interesting,’ says Demi.

  The faces of Georgia and Kari hover over my left shoulder. Their mouths droop perfectly.

  ‘Depends on what goes with it,’ says Georgia. ‘But it’s definitely your colour.’

  ‘It could work well,’ says Kari. ‘With light pants. What do you think, Demi? White jeans?’

  ‘Cream,’ says Demi. ‘And not jeans. Light-weight cotton. Come on. It’s time to get this girl a wardrobe.’

  I try not to smile. That won’t strike the right note either. But inside I am beaming.

  The monitor was filled with lines of hearts in boxes. Each box was outlined in black.

  ‘It’s simple, Cass,’ said Greg. ‘Position the cursor over the centre of the heart. The heart will disappear when you hold the cursor there for a couple of seconds. Then you move on to the next one. But you must do them in order; top row first, left to right. Once you’ve popped all the hearts, the computer will tell you how long it took you. That way, you can work on beating your personal best. Ready? Go for it.’

  Cassie was almost still in the chair. Almost. Her head shook slightly and there were spasms along her arms and legs. But her face was set, deep brown eyes fixed on the screen. Greg pulled up a chair to watch. He knew the mental discipline required to control that cursor, to position it over an area of the screen and keep it there, even for a second or two. Greg knew about cerebral palsy. About how, in a case as severe as Cassie’s, the muscles in the body were dancing to their own tune, divorced from the brain that tried to control them. Simple movements, like lifting a hand or moving a foot, were obstacles as high as Everest for Cass.

  Greg knew all this, intellectually.

  But he also knew that he didn’t truly understand the physical reality of it. Only Cass could. And he suspected it was much harder than he imagined. Probably harder than he could ever imagine. He put his hand over hers and watched.

  On the screen a heart popped.

  Holly

  Demi put a finger to the side of her mouth and tilted her head.

  ‘No,’ she said after ten or fifteen seconds. ‘It doesn’t work. I was thinking that maybe with her hair up . . . but, no. The cut is wrong. Try this.’

  Holly’s head was spinning with colours, shapes and designs. She had tried on a bewildering variety of clothes and was st
ill no nearer understanding what worked for her and what didn’t. And what did Demi mean by ‘cut’? How could a cut, whatever it is, be wrong? Holly thought some of the pieces she’d tried on were fantastic, but the girls would shudder as if she was modelling a plastic tablecloth from a greasy-spoon cafe.

  It was all so confusing.

  But the more she thought about it, the more Holly realised she wasn’t qualified to make proper judgements about her appearance. It wasn’t like she’d done a good job when left to her own devices. And Demi was a guru of fashion, whereas for Holly it was as mysterious as quadratic equations. Trust the expert, she told herself. When your computer crashes you don’t seek advice from a pizza delivery driver. So she took the outfit Demi held out and prepared to change again.

  Maybe being at the centre of attention had warped her sense of time, but when she glanced at her watch she nearly had a heart attack. It was only five minutes to end of school and she had to meet Aunty Fern for a lift home. Even if she ran all the way, she’d still be ten minutes late. Panic bubbled up inside and she pulled back the curtain of the dressing room.

  ‘Guys,’ she said. ‘I’ve gotta go. I had no idea of the time. My aunt is expecting to give me a lift home.’

  Kari sniffed.

  Georgia snorted.

  Demi smiled.

  ‘Oh come on, Hol,’ she said. ‘It’s Friday. Late night shopping. You can’t bail out now we’re making progress. There’s still so much work to be done. Once we’ve finished here I want to take you to a couple of other stores. Then there’s make-up. And shoes, obviously. Can’t you ring your aunt, tell her you’re going to make your own way home later?’

  Holly had no idea if Fern even owned a mobile phone, let alone the number. Even if she ran back to school, how could she explain why she was coming in the school gates, rather than exiting them? And then another thought flared inside her, caught and burned brightly. Holly Holley. Quiet, dependable. Girl least likely to do anything vaguely bad. Predictable. And taken for granted. So maybe it was time to shake up people’s views of her. Build on the wagging. If she was getting a fashion makeover, she should also try a personality makeover.