Cracked

by Clare Strahan

  ‘Might want to stock up,’ he tells me. ‘Mum and Dad are selling. It’s going to be a 7-Eleven with a petrol station.’

  There’s a new wooden fence dividing Fernwood Reserve from the almost-completed roadworks. There are still trees up to where the new wall blocks out the future traffic noise and the creek disappears under tonnes of tar and concrete. I itch to set to work on that pale wood, unadorned except for a few familiar tags, which are slowly developing style. People don’t understand tags. A good tag is calligraphy and calligraphy is a meditative art. The fracture shifts like a shark under water. Maybe I’ll paint the Nguyêns’ milk bar on there so it won’t disappear without a trace. But all I feel like writing is ‘CHO’ in mile-high letters, and then burning them.

  ‘You all right, Clover? You look like you’re about to kill something.’

  Cho. On bike, naturally. Have I called her with my thoughts? Aunty Jean told me that whatever you think about passionately, good or bad, you bring into your life. I said at the time that I guessed in my mother’s case either Rudolf Steiner or Jimmy Page were bound to turn up soon then, and how amusing if they arrived together. Now I wonder if she’s on to something.

  Cho sits back and crosses her arms. ‘Aren’t you talking to me?’

  ‘Sorry. I was miles away.’

  ‘Are you coming to the bowl?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  She’s pretty, even with a helmet on. And smart. And a champion bike rider. Why am I being such an idiot about Keek? He has the right to have a girlfriend if he wants. Doesn’t he? And why wouldn’t he go out with Cho? It doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with me. Does it? But I still don’t feel like seeing him. ‘Is your boyfriend down there?’ I try to make my smile genuine.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Congratulations, by the way.’

  ‘Thanks. Are you gonna come down?’

  ‘Yep. Later. I said I’d meet someone over at the oval first.’

  ‘Right. Seeya then.’

  Cho rides off, smooth as cream.

  It’s packed at the footy oval, but Katie’s still the first person I recognise, leaning on the fence with Natalie and Ellen, all rugged up against the cold, cheering. They have their backs to me. I could leave. But then the pack rumbles up close and I’m distracted.

  The superbrain blocks my view. ‘Clover. What are you doing here?’

  ‘Alison, hi.’ It crosses my mind to ask her to corroborate my alibi. Maybe she could pretend to be her mother? But then I remember who it is I’m talking to: the girl who blushes from head to toe even when she tells the truth. I don’t think lying to parents is in her repertoire. ‘What are you doing here?’ I ask.

  ‘My cousin plays in the juniors and he wanted to hang around for the Under 18s. My aunty asked me to watch him.’

  ‘Fun for you.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t mind.’ Alison shifts sideways to shout, ‘Stay in the reserve!’ at a knot of twelve-year-old boys running by in fits of devilish laughter. ‘Trung’s coming after work,’ she adds, airily.

  ‘Oh, right.’ Alison Larder with a boyfriend is strange. In a weird way, I feel almost jealous. ‘You and Trung. That’s . . .’ Bloody hell, what am I trying to say? Gee Alison, and I thought you were a lesbian. ‘Great,’ I finish, lamely.

  ‘Well,’ she meets my eye steadily, though her face has gone its signature beetroot. ‘You know what Oscar Wilde said.’

  ‘No, I don’t.’ Who the hell knows what Oscar Wilde said?

  She closes her eyes to recite. ‘Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden where the flowers are dead.’ As if that explains everything. Or anything.

  God, she’s weird. So is Oscar Wilde.

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Are you going to jail?’ she asks me.

  ‘I hope not.’

  ‘Ellen said you were.’

  ‘Yeah, well, Ellen says lots of things.’

  ‘Are you here to see Robbo?’

  I spot Rosemary near the scoreboard and trudge toward her. ‘Gotta go, Alison.’

  Rob runs by on the footy field, face gritted with determination and legs splattered with mud. My pulse races as he picks up the ball and the pack thunders towards him. Jase shepherds him brilliantly, a few others collide and Rob manages to kick it on, long and accurate. A bunch of them swerve off, chasing the play with Rob hard on the ball. He’s there in time to receive a short pass and just escapes a mighty tackle that makes me scream with the tension. He kicks towards goal. Yes! The exhilarating roar carries my voice into the buzz. Rob’s swamped by teammates. I imagine him as a real AFL player and my heart swells with hope that he’ll make it to the Essendon Reserves next year.

  Rosemary is all smiles. ‘So you came?’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  ‘Does Robbo know you’re here?’

  ‘Don’t think so. He looks pretty occupied to me.’

  ‘See ball. Kick. Run. Punch. Ug.’ Rosemary laughs and steals the smokes from my pocket. ‘Want one of your cigarettes?’

  ‘Don’t you like footy?’

  ‘God no. Do you like bikes?’

  ‘Not that much, I suppose. But I do like football, actually. Mum thinks it’s a seething cesspit of violent male chauvinism, so I have to go watch it with my old-lady neighbour.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ she says, thinly disguising her disinterest in the details of my football appreciation sagas. ‘Are you going to Josh Eldrich’s tonight?’ Rosemary adjusts her fringe and regards me sideways.

  ‘Mum’s gone away, so I might. Are you?’

  ‘After last weekend? No way. My dad’s freaking out. He found a used condom in the garden.’

  ‘You’re kidding?’

  ‘Thought it might be yours.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, you and Robbo were gone for a while . . . there’s a rumour going around. Katie’s mad as hell.’

  ‘A rumour going around? About me?’

  ‘You make it sound like no one ever talks about you, vandal girl.’ Rosemary takes a swig on her water bottle. ‘I hate smoking,’ she says. ‘It tastes like – hey, where are you going?’

  But I can’t answer. The Herbs and everybody in the world are staring at me. I walk as fast as I can without running, my throat aching with tears. It’s a long horrible way home and when I get there, Lucille has pissed on the rug. I ring Aunty Jean’s mobile, but she won’t get my mother.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ she wants to know.

  ‘Nothing. I just want to talk to her.’

  ‘Listen Clove, I can hear you’re in the throes of one of your dramaramas, but your mum deserves a break, don’t you think? Talk to me. What’s wrong?’

  I hate Aunty Jean. ‘Nothing’s wrong.’

  ‘You better be telling me the truth. Is there something wrong?’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong, I just want to talk to her.’

  ‘Well, she’s not here.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Having her hair done courtesy of my company. Then we’re going out. Is Mrs T all right?’

  ‘Yes, she’s fine.’

  ‘Is the dog all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  Hate her guts.

  ‘Are you all right, Clover?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Shall I get her to call you at the Larders’?’

  ‘No.’ God, I hope I don’t sound as desperate as I feel. ‘We’re going out. Some church thing.’

  ‘Lucky you. Well, be good, stay safe and keep out of trouble. I’ll tell her you called and you’re fine. Unless there is something wrong?’

  ‘Thanks a lot,’ I say.

  The television is in my room and Lucille has figured out that’s where the food is too. I curl up in my pyjamas. What if Mum calls the Larders? What if she never comes back from Queensland? What if Aunty Jean has opened her eyes to everything she’s been missing, stuck with stupid, criminal, idiot me? Lucille sits up and stares, no doubt hoping
this latest bout of tears will mean she gets the handful of Cheezels I’m sobbing into. I hand them over.

  ‘One of us may as well be happy,’ I say.

  Then I hear a knock, and I scream. Lucille barks and falls off the bed in her race to the front door. I creep to the lounge room. Whoever it is knocks again.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Me.’

  I startle, then open the door a crack. ‘Rob?’

  ‘Cute pyjamas,’ he says. ‘Who’s that again?’

  ‘Snoopy.’

  ‘That’s right. Snoopy. And who’s this?’

  ‘That’s Lucille.’

  ‘You and Snoops and Lucille going to let me in or what?’

  I open the flywire. Rob Marcello. In my house.

  ‘Far out, how cool is this?’ He makes a beeline for my mother’s record collection. ‘Zeppelin. No way.’

  ‘My mother thinks Jimmy Page is her boyfriend.’

  ‘Mmm, milf.’

  ‘Robbo!’

  ‘Don’t call me Robbo, Jones. You’re the only one who doesn’t.’

  ‘Don’t you like it?’

  ‘At home they call me Roberto.’ His grin is almost shy. ‘I don’t like that much either.’

  ‘Roberto.’

  ‘It’s my real name. Roberto Ercole Marcello.’ He gives it an Italian flourish.

  ‘Ercole?’

  ‘After Hercules.’ He shows me his muscles and they flex under his skin and it’s as though they’re turning in my stomach. He reddens, as if he’s afraid of his secret name. ‘But don’t tell anyone.’

  ‘I won’t. Do you speak Italian?’

  He turns back to the albums. ‘My dad thought it would be better for us if we spoke English. Mum and Dad speak it to each other sometimes. I know a little, from my Nonna. I wouldn’t mind going there one day though. Italy.’ His hands rest on Mum’s records, but he looks up at me. ‘You wearing Snoopy to the party?’

  ‘I’m not going.’

  ‘Yes you are.’

  ‘Say something in Italian.’

  ‘A buon intenditor poche parole,’ he says. ‘Nonna’s favourite saying.’

  I am enchanted. ‘What does it mean?’

  ‘Sort of . . . don’t talk too much. I dunno. It’s more about listening than talking. I’m hopeless at translating. Can I put a record on while you get changed?’

  ‘I guess so. Be careful.’

  ‘Are you kidding? These are like gold.’

  ‘Have you ever used a turntable before?’

  ‘No, but how hard can it be?’

  So here I am, madly throwing on clothes in my bedroom while Rob Marcello scratches my mother’s fourth-favourite vinyl album in the lounge room.

  I opt for the safety of black.

  ‘It’s emo-girl, returned,’ says Rob. ‘I love this song.’

  Yep, good old Stairway to Heaven. But with Rob sitting there surrounded by album covers and Lucille waving her legs in the air in a back-scratch of ecstasy, it doesn’t sound so bad. Mum’s right – it is a monster guitar solo.

  ‘Do you want a drink or something?’ I ask.

  ‘I have beer and Cruisers,’ he says.

  My stomach turns in a different direction. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘How about a joint, then?’

  And before long, it doesn’t seem weird at all to be playing air guitar and falling onto the couch for an acoustic Going to California cuddle. The kiss comes as a surprise and I clam up like a snail poked with a stick.

  ‘Relax, Jones. I won’t hurt you.’

  ‘I . . .’ Embarrassment rolls over me like nausea. ‘I’ve gotta go to the bathroom.’

  ‘When the levee breaks, heh heh.’ Rob laughs at his own joke, but I’m a blank.

  ‘It’s the name of this song,’ he explains.

  Sitting on the toilet, the room spins. In the bathroom, I hunch over the handbasin for a few minutes, wash my face with cold water and have a long drink straight from the tap. Mum’s record is clunking away and I stagger out to rescue the needle.

  ‘It’s not like a CD player,’ I explain before collapsing into the armchair. I can’t move.

  Rob puts the album back in its sleeve.

  ‘I’m starving,’ I manage. ‘If I don’t eat something right now, I’m going to chuck.’

  ‘Where’s the kitchen?’

  I can hardly raise my arm, but manage to point. ‘Through there.’

  He returns with a thick, badly cut piece of bread that’s more gouged than spread with butter. ‘Not very exciting,’ he says. ‘But it’s all I could find.’

  I feel better when I’ve eaten it.

  ‘I think we should get going,’ Rob says. ‘They’ll be getting started.’

  ‘How are we going to get there?’

  Rob brandishes his phone. ‘Taxi.’

  I’ve only been in a taxi a few times in my life and in the arms of Rob Marcello, the trip is a perfect forever until it’s over and we’re stepping over bodies strewn on Josh Eldrich’s lounge room floor. Thrash music blares, but everyone seems half in a coma.

  In the kitchen things are more lively and, though I’m wary, I say yes to a Cruiser, but ask for water as well. It goes down quite nicely and I accept another. Rob talks cars and footy with his mates and a bunch of older people I don’t know.

  I’m bored.

  But at least Rob has his arm around me.

  A guy called Arvo says, ‘Never seen an umpire with tits before.’

  ‘What difference does that make?’ I say.

  ‘Oops, look out,’ says Arvo, nudging me with his tattooed arm. ‘The little lady’s getting riled.’ His forearm tattoo reads ‘Levington’ in big ugly letters; in case he forgets his surname, I guess.

  I wave my water at him. ‘Men umpire women’s sport, don’t they? Why not the other way around? What’s the big deal?’

  Arvo snorts, ‘Women’s sport,’ and there’s a general snigger.

  Rob says, ‘How about those bloody Magpies?’ and they turn their shoulders to me, ever so slightly.

  Idiots.

  I lean into Rob and ask, ‘Where’s the loo?’

  ‘Just down there.’ Rob kisses me. ‘Don’t get lost.’

  On my way, I see Katie coming in from the backyard. I can hardly push the pee out quickly enough, and sure enough, by the time I get back Katie’s sitting on the kitchen bench next to Rob, flirting for all she’s worth.

  ‘Hi, Katie,’ I say.

  She looks embarrassed. I probably do too. Rob kisses her cheek, then grabs me by the hand. ‘Come on, Jones, let’s see what’s happening up here.’

  Leaving Katie behind, I let myself be led up the dingy hallway and into a bedroom with spectacularly ugly brown-and-orange curtains. Sagging boxes stacked by the window leak clothes across the grotty carpet. Rob kicks them out of the way. A sports bag has been dumped on a chest of drawers, the fake-woodgrain veneer peeling off the chipboard.

  ‘Spare room.’ Rob grins wickedly, patting the double bed. He switches on a lamp and turns off the main light and the room is instantly nicer.

  We smoke a joint, but after a few puffs, I have to lie down. I watch him, then he lays next to me, half on top of me, and we kiss.

  It starts off with the giant Fruit Tingle effect, but when he moves his hand down the front of my jeans, I push his hand away. He kisses me again and I relax. Then he puts his hand up my top and I panic. He’ll think I’m a fool. I try not to tense up, to relax into the kissing, but it’s like my body acts independently and before I can stop myself, I scrabble backwards up the bedhead and shove his hand away as if it were a spider.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say.

  ‘Are you frigid, Jones?’

  Am I? How am I supposed to know?

  ‘No,’ I say. But what if there is something wrong with me?

  ‘Good.’ And he kisses my neck. His hand on my skin, cupping my waist, feels good. He pushes at the waistband of my jeans, but they’re tight, so he undoes the button and the zip sl
ides down. I am relieved and disappointed when his hand goes back up under my top.

  ‘I saw you today, playing footy.’

  ‘Yeah, I know.’

  ‘You saw me?’

  ‘For a second. Then Nat told me you’d gone home and . . .’ he grins, ‘. . . that you told Rosemary your mum wouldn’t be home.’

  ‘Did she tell you about the condom?’

  ‘Yeah, I heard.’ He props himself on an elbow and smiles at me. His hand slides down my body and he runs his finger under the elastic of my undies. I suck in my breath, my stomach shuddering of its own accord.

  ‘Everyone thinks I’ve popped vandal-girl.’

  ‘You didn’t tell them it wasn’t us?’

  Rob acts like telling the truth had never occurred to him. ‘Nup.’ He kisses my collarbone. ‘So we may as well do it now – seeing as everyone already thinks we have.’ And tugs down my jeans.

  I sit up, pull up my jeans, zip them and cross my arms. ‘I can’t believe you didn’t say it wasn’t us?’

  ‘What are you getting pissed off for?’

  ‘Are you kidding?’

  ‘Heaps of girls would kill to have everyone think they’d been with me.’

  ‘What? Like Katie?’

  ‘Katie is a cocktease.’

  ‘Don’t say that.’

  ‘As if you like Katie Marshall?’

  I roll away and sit on the edge of the bed. ‘That’s not what I mean.’

  ‘If you’re frigid, Jones, just say so.’

  ‘I’m not. I mean—’

  ‘Mean what?’

  ‘Don’t you think we should . . . you know.’

  Rob’s eyes light up. ‘Use a condom?’

  ‘No. I mean . . . I mean go out for a while. First.’

  ‘Sure, we could go out. Why not? I like you, Jones.’ He reaches over and undoes my jeans again. ‘But come on. You can’t say no now. My balls are going to drop off.’

  I push his hand away. ‘Say no? You haven’t even asked me.’

  ‘Asked you?’ He grabs my hand. ‘Feel that.’

  I hear scuffling, like rats in the wall. ‘There’s someone in the hall. At the door.’

  Rob gets up. He almost loses his balance getting to the door to check and I realise how drunk he is. ‘Nah,’ he says. Fall-sitting back down, he puts his arm around me. ‘I do like you, Jones.’

  He pulls me down and pushes up my top, rubbing himself against me while I babble on about, of all things, my mum. Could I be any more embarrassing? ‘Mum reckons at our age we should go out for at least a year before . . .’ Oh yes, good one. Shut up. Shut up. But I can’t shut up. I don’t want to do it with Rob. Not here. Not with Katie sitting out in the kitchen. It’s too weird. Not without being his girlfriend. I mean, I’ve heard how they talk about the girls they’ve slept with at parties. But I don’t say any of that. I continue to blather on about my mother, instead. ‘After a year of “going together”, as she calls it – pathetic, I know – she’d let me go on the pill if I wanted to.’ A year? What am I even talking about?