by Aimee Said
I got out the list of characteristics and began to fill in the columns. Hair and eye colour were easy since we’re both blond with green eyes, but I paused at “widow’s peak” – since Larrie cut her hair she had a fringe, and I couldn’t remember what her hairline looked like without it. I needed my photo album to refresh my memory. Mum had given me and Larrie identical ones for Christmas the year I finished primary school, so that we each had a piece of our childhoods. I pulled it out from under the bed where I’d shoved it after a fight with Larrie about which of us had worn the pink cardigan with yellow buttons, and which had worn the yellow cardie with pink buttons the Christmas I turned four. (The photographic evidence showed she was correct.)
Flicking through the pages was like going back in time. Starting from the first photo, where I’m in my bassinette and Larrie’s kneeling beside me and kissing my forehead, to the year Larrie made us both T-shirts that said “Sisters rule” in puffy paint. Then Larrie started high school, and the matching T-shirts changed to a Regional Junior Toastmaster sash (her) and a second-place ribbon for the sack race (me), and the differences between us became more and more obvious with each passing year. Last year’s Christmas portrait could’ve come straight from www.awkwardfamilyphotos.com – we were standing so far apart we’re almost out of frame; I’m scowling and Larrie’s smile’s so fake only a parent would fall for it.
Who could have predicted that the little girls with the identical smiles would end up so different? I blew my nose and put the assignment aside. I’d finish it when I wasn’t so tired.
Al Miller is on a sentimental journey.
20
Maz met me at the bus stop the next morning. I think she was worried that I wouldn’t make it through the school gates if someone didn’t force me. She may have been right. My stomach felt like it was being twisted in a vice that tightened with every step we took towards assembly.
“It’s going to be fine,” said Maz, although the waver in her voice suggested she wasn’t so sure. “Chances are, something even more gossip-worthy happened over the weekend, and everyone’s already forgotten about Larrie and Beth. Hungry beast and all that.”
For a nanosecond I let myself believe it was possible. But the fact was, even somewhere that claimed to be as broadminded as Whitlam, the most popular girl in school hooking up with her nerdy gal pal was about as high as the gossip stakes got.
Maz said I imagined it, but I could have sworn that when we walked through the hall the usual pre-assembly chatter was replaced by an unnatural silence in our wake. I prayed my cheeks weren’t as stoplight red as they felt and kept my eyes on the floor until we got to our seats. It was hard to believe that a week ago I’d been sitting in this hall celebrating the start of my new Larrie-free life and now, thanks to her, it was over.
“You can’t spend the rest of your school life avoiding everyone,” said Maz, dragging me out of the locker room at lunchtime. “Besides, these are your friends. You’ll see, it’ll be like any other day.”
Despite Maz’s assurances, it didn’t feel like any other lunchtime at all. Usually on a Monday there’d be loads of talk about what everyone did on the weekend, and moaning about what homework didn’t get finished or how far away the next holidays were. But when we sat down between Prad and Simon, the group went quiet. Finally, Tracy broke the silence.
“Josh Turner was looking for you. He wanted to make sure you’re going to the match against Parkville High tomorrow. Something about you bringing him luck.”
I smiled for the first time since Saturday night.
“Have you forgotten that Mr Masch is letting us rehearse in the hall tomorrow?” asked Maz. “You promised you’d come.”
“But that was before I told Mr Dempster I’d cover the soccer for Whit’s Wit – I can’t let him down. Besides,” I added quietly, “I thought I’d blown my chances with Josh. Now I might have another shot.”
Maz’s shoulders slumped. “Fine. If you’d rather play cheerleader to a guy you barely know than support your real friends, that’s your choice.”
“Who’s cheerleading?” asked Simon, taking out his earbuds as the bell sounded the end of break.
I whipped round to face Maz to be sure she spotted my raised eyebrow before she answered. She sighed in acknowledgement. “No one, we were talking about a hypothetical situation.”
Simon nodded, accepting everything at face value, as usual.
It was awkward going to the game by myself but there was no way I was going to miss an opportunity to see Josh, especially since I hadn’t heard from him since Saturday’s regrettable text exchange. And I figured that if he’d gone to the trouble of making sure I was going to the game, he either didn’t care what people were saying about Larrie or – even better – he hadn’t heard.
I timed my arrival for just after kick-off, to give people less time to notice me. Thankfully, there was a big crowd of Whitlam students for me to blend into, and they were more interested in shouting down Parkville’s supporters than they were in me. I shuffled past a large group of Year Nine girls to get to the last empty seat in the front row so that I could get some photos of Josh in action.
By half-time Whitlam was winning 3–1. Josh spotted me and winked as he ran back onto the field, which made the Year Nines crane their necks to see who’d caught their idol’s eye. Including Rochelle Sullivan, who, if the graffiti on our school bus was to be believed, was a) tough, and b) skanky. She nudged the girl next to her and whispered in her ear, then the second girl nudged the girl next to her and did the same thing, and so on. When they reached the end of the row, the whole group swivelled their heads in my direction.
If Maz had been there, she would have tried to convince me that they were staring because they admired me, or because they knew Josh liked me. But Maz wasn’t around and I knew there could only be one reason for them to be so interested. By the time the whistle went and Whitlam was declared the winner I felt like some sort of freak. I’d take my place in sideshow alley between the bearded lady and the mermaid: behold, Sister of a Lesbian! (Not that it was true.)
I wanted to congratulate Josh after the game but he was surrounded by a sea of admirers, including Rochelle and her skank posse. I figured hanging around would leave me open to attack in front of Josh, so I decided to send him a message while I waited for the bus instead. There was already a queue at the bus stop.
I’d got as far in my texting as:
Congrats on the game, sorry I didn’t get to
when I heard the Year Eleven guy in front of me say to his mate, “That’s her – the lezzo’s sister.”
I didn’t need to lift my eyes from my phone to know who they were talking about.
I rummaged in my bag so that I could make an obvious show of going back to school to get whatever it was that I hadn’t found. My cheeks and eyes stung. I couldn’t go back to the sports field, so I stopped halfway, at the car park, to consider my next move.
“Need a lift?” asked Simon, who must’ve come straight from rehearsal. “Mum’s picking me up for a driving lesson in five minutes.”
My first instinct was that I’d rather walk the thirty minutes home in the dark than spend five making polite conversation with Simon, but I figured the less time I was out on the streets of Kingston, the fewer chances for people to point and stare, so I went against my gut and accepted.
I’d hoped our wait for Mrs Lutz would be in silence, but Simon didn’t take the hint from my crossed arms and refusal to make eye contact that I was in no mood to chat. “Tough week, eh?”
I grunted in response, which he misinterpreted as an invitation to keep talking.
“Maz told me you’re worried about what people are saying, but I reckon you should throw it back at them. I mean, Larrie’s gay, not a terrorist or a murderer. Who cares what she and Beth do together, right?”
Wrong. So wrong.
“Anyway, I want you to know that it doesn’t make any difference to me. I mean, to what I think of you.”
> “Thanks,” I replied flatly, stopping myself from adding that he was the one person at Whitlam whose opinion of me I couldn’t care less about. “But Larrie’s not gay.”
Simon carried on as if I hadn’t spoken. “If anyone hassles you about it, just let me know. I may not be a tough guy like Mitch Doherty, but being this tall does have its advantages when there’s a point to be made.”
The thought of Simon rushing to my side like a ginger-afroed knight in shining armour made me shudder. “I know you’re trying to be nice, but you have no idea what it’s like to have the whole school looking at you funny because of something that’s completely outside your control.”
“Um – hello, I’m six-foot-four and my hair has been compared to Ronald McDonald’s. I think I have some idea what it’s like to be looked at funny.” Simon paused, waiting for me to laugh. When I didn’t, he continued, “Besides, you said you wanted all of Whitlam to see what Larrie’s really like.”
Was it possible for someone to actually be so clueless or was this an act Simon put on to annoy me?
“What Larrie’s really like is a selfish, overrated diva,” I said. “As proven by the fact that she’s left me to deal with this mess while she’s conveniently on study leave.”
Simon shifted from one (ginormous) foot to the other. “I get that you’re upset about finding out about Larrie and Beth and everything, but it’s just gossip. People will lose interest in it soon enough. I mean, no one talks about Prad streaking at the athletics carnival any more, do they?”
“That was different,” I said. “Besides, Tracy and Lily set up a fan page for Prad after those photos came out, so it didn’t exactly hurt his reputation, did it?”
Simon sighed. “Okay, you’re right. I don’t get it.”
If Mrs Lutz was surprised to see me again, she didn’t show it, perhaps because she was so wound up in anticipation of Simon’s driving lesson. I slumped in the back seat in case anyone from school saw me in the Lutzmobile, peeking up as we drove through the village. Say Cheese’s lights were out, but someone was using Jay’s nemesis payphone. It astounded me how many people didn’t have mobiles. How did they survive, having to hunt down public phones all the time?
When we got to my house I made sure I said thank you for the lift, knowing if I didn’t it’d get back to Mum before you could say “mind your manners”. I took a deep breath before turning my key in the front door, preparing myself to march straight up to Larrie’s room and force her to sort out the mess she’d made of everything.
“Hello, love,” said Dad when I walked in. “Do me a favour and go help Mum with dinner. She and Larrie had a tiff this afternoon and your sister stormed off to Beth’s.”
Al Miller is sick of picking up the pieces.
21
I may have managed to avoid Rochelle and her skankettes after the game but, short of performing a stunt deathroll out of a moving school bus, I couldn’t get away from them the next morning. Rochelle’s evil grin greeted me when I got on the bus. I didn’t have the energy for a face-off, so I took the first empty seat I came to, directly behind the driver. I gazed out the window, wishing I had my iPod so I could block out the whisperwhisperwhispers behind me.
I tried to distract myself by playing Maz’s favourite game, Lucky Cats. The rules are pretty simple: you count the number of (live) cats you pass and it determines how good your day will be. 0–3 cats = not good, 4–6 cats = quite good, 7–10 cats = excellent, 11+ cats = lottery win. I’d only spotted a couple of stripy tabbies when something landed with a soft thud near my feet. When I checked to see what it was, I couldn’t find the missile, but I did see the graffiti written at knee height on the back of the driver’s capsule:
Larrie + Beth = lusty lezzos 4 eva
Cornflakes rose threateningly in my throat. This bus may have been the School Special in the morning and afternoon, but between school runs it was the 592 from Kingston to Parkville Metro. All it’d take was for one of Mum’s patients to sit in this seat and word would get back to her by lunchtime.
The ink looked fresh but it wouldn’t rub off, even with spit. I took the thickest, blackest marker from my pencil case and coloured in a solid rectangle over the words. You could still read what it said if you really tried, but it’d do until I could get back with some sort of solvent to do the job properly.
The look on Maz’s face when I told her about the graffiti told me it wasn’t the worst thing written on a wall about Larrie.
She quickly changed the subject. “I think the banner needs more glitter – we’ll see how it comes up under the lights at the stage rehearsal on Friday. You are coming on Friday, aren’t you, Al? We really need you there.”
After the week I’d had, the thought of turning up to Whitlam outside of school hours, for an event I wasn’t even participating in, was about as appealing as being shut inside Prad’s locker on PE day. I was about to suggest we compromise and Maz take photos of the banner set up onstage so we could review it on the weekend when Josh approached us.
“Hey, Al. I looked for you after the game, but you’d disappeared.”
My cheeks flushed with pleasure. All those girls lining up for his attention and Josh was looking for me. Still, I couldn’t tell him I nicked off because I was scared of a few Year Nines. “Sorry, I had to get home straightaway.”
“More slaving for your sister?”
“How did you guess? It was a great game, though. You were the man of the match.”
Maz made kissy faces behind Josh’s back. I concentrated on his blue-grey eyes to stop myself from laughing. It wasn’t that hard.
“As your post on Whit’s Wit this morning said – thank you. Anyway, I came over to ask if you’re going to the SkoolDaze rehearsal. I was hoping maybe we could hang out.”
I weighed up the risk of going to the rehearsal resulting in my utter humiliation versus the opportunity to spend a few hours with Josh. Josh won. “Sure, I’ll be there. I’m helping Vertigo Pony with their backdrop and stuff.”
Josh grinned. “Great, I’ll see you then.”
My eyes followed him as he walked away. How was it possible for someone to look that good in knee-length grey flannel shorts and long socks?
Maz put her arm through mine and steered me towards rollcall. “I never thought I’d see the day when I’d be grateful to Josh Turner, but if that’s what it takes to get you to the rehearsal.”
“Of course I’m coming, Mazzle. I’m the president of your fan club, remember?”
“Oh, right, I forgot your dedication to Vertigo Pony,” said Maz before her face dissolved into laughter.
The thought of spending time with Josh at the rehearsal was a welcome distraction from thinking about Larrie constantly, but not enough to make me forget that she (and I, as her proxy) was still the centre of attention at Whitlam. So when Prad spotted Mitch Doherty heading for the canteen at lunchtime on Thursday, I ducked my head. The last thing I needed was for him to spot me and come over to ask after “Larrie the Lesbonator” (as she was now being referred to, if the conversation I overheard in the lower girls’ toilets at recess was anything to go by).
“What’s Mitch doing at school during study break?” asked Nicko.
“It’s his punishment for leading the muck-up day pranks,” said Simon. “I was updating the anti-virus settings in the office on Monday and I overheard Mrs Turner saying he has to sign in every day and study in the Year Twelve common room during school hours.”
“Poor guy,” said Prad. “First his girlfriend ditches him for a chick, then he has to come back to this dump while his whole year’s at home – ow! Watch it, Nicko, you almost kicked me in the goolies.”
Nicko and Simon both glared at Prad. I kept my eyes fixed on them to avoid making eye contact with Prad myself.
“What? Oh, whoops – ixnay on the esbian-lay, I forgot. Sorry, Maz, my bad,” said Prad. “Still, now that it’s out in the open, why don’t you fill us in on the gory details, Al? Do they ever let you watch?”
I picked up my bag and walked away with as much dignity as I could muster under the circumstances. I could hear Prad’s cries of “What’d I say?” most of the way to the Learning and Leadership Centre.
Simon found me in the library, where I was searching the internet for schools within a ten-kilometre radius of Kingston.
“Maz and I have been looking for you everywhere.”
“Well, I’m here, so you can call off the search party,” I muttered as I clicked on a link to Our Lady of Sorrows, which sounded like the perfect school to match my current mood.
Simon didn’t take the hint. “Are you okay?”
“What’s not to be okay about? I mean, besides the fact that the whole school’s talking about me behind my back? Except for people like Prad who prefer to humiliate me to my face. I couldn’t be better; thank you very much for asking.”
“Ahem,” Maz faux-cleared her throat to announce her arrival shut me up. “I see you found her, then.”
“Yep. And she seems like her usual self to me.” Simon walked away with his head hung.
I could tell Maz was preparing to give me a lecture. “What did you say? I haven’t seen him that sad since they cancelled the remake of Battlestar Galactica.”
“I know, I know. I’m mean. I’m a bitch. I should be punished.”
“Yep. But first you should apologise. I know Patchouli says we take out our anger on the people who we know love us unconditionally, but I think I just heard the poor guy’s heart snap in two.”
My face grew hot with rage. “You may not have noticed, but I’ve got bigger things on my mind right now than Simon Lutz’s heart, broken or otherwise.”
“You’ve got to get off the tragedy train and get a grip, Al. Yes, people are talking about your sister and, yes, they’re talking about you, too, but that doesn’t give you the right to treat your friends like dirt. And for your information, Simon almost decked Prad after you ran off.”
