Invincible (Invisible 2)
Page 17
I can hear her words echoing around in my head but I’m not processing them. There’s something wrong with what she’s saying. I just can’t figure out what it is. I look over at her closet, clothes falling out of it as usual; the pile of books standing scruffily next to her bed; her shoes dashed off and left around the room.
And then I know what’s wrong.
She’s wrong.
I smile at her. Broadly. She’s not expecting it and I can see surprise in her eyes.
I shrug, happily.
“You’re wrong.”
She flinches. “What?”
“I said you’re wrong.” I throw my arm around the room. “Look. Nothing’s changed. You’re still a messy slob. You still leave your stuff around. You still like them.” I gesture to the smiling boys on the wall, hair all flicked and collars up like they’re trying to impress.
Gabby follows my hand. “So?”
“So, I’m saying, your room’s still the same. You’re the same.” I put Wally down next to me. “And you’re lying about not caring about any of us.”
She pouts and her face looks angry but it’s more of an embarrassed anger than anything.
“You stood up for me at school when you could have just ignored me. You hung out with me after school when you didn’t have to. You gave me your mum’s cupcakes and stuff to eat. Plus you did something totally nuts that just proves it.”
Gabby chews on her mouth and narrows her eyes. “What?”
“You got suspended for me, doofus. You stormed right up to Angela and slapped her on the face. I saw it. You can’t pretend you didn’t.” I’m laughing as I say it. “I’m sorry, Gab. I just don’t buy any of it.”
For once Gabby doesn’t seem to have any words and inside I’m giving myself high fives. Quiet boring Jazmine has made loud, extroverted Gabby speechless. I’m on a roll, so I keep going.
“So, where do you go to school now?”
She looks down at the carpet and I have to listen super closely to hear her quiet mutter. “Private school. Half an hour on the bus.”
“Have you got any friends? I mean, apart from those girls today?”
She meets my eyes. “Just them.”
“Nice?”
She shrugs. “Okay. Not as good as…”
I pounce on her words with a grin. “Not as good as what?”
“Not as good as you, okay?” She makes a face. “Happy now?”
I roll my shoulders. “Happier. Are you going to give me your phone number? I presume you’ve got a new phone.”
Her face clouds over and her shoulders drop. “Why?”
“Why would you not?” My voice is incredulous. “I’ve just found you again. Why would I want to walk away from my best friend without at least a phone number?”
“I don’t do that,” she says. “I don’t stay in touch with people when I leave.”
I sit up straight and hold Wally in my lap. “Well, that’s totally stupid,” I say, in an imaginary Wally voice, sitting him upright and using his paw as a pointer in Gabby’s face. “Very, very dumb.”
She looks defensive. “Well, I never have before.”
“Did you have friends before?”
She thinks. “Some. Jessie in Year 5. And Daisy in Year 2. They were the ones I liked the best, anyway.”
“And you just dropped them?”
She shrugs. Looks away. Then she stands up, stalks over to the window and looks out. “It’s just too hard, okay?” But her words are blurred and I can’t hear the rest.
“Can you turn around, Gab?” I say. “I can’t hear you properly.”
She swings towards me, fast, furious; curtains blowing out behind her. The light from the window makes her face dark, but there’s a tiny diamond glittering on her cheek.
It’s a tear.
“I said it’s too hard.” Her fists are clenched, mouth is tight. “We pack up, we go, it all starts all over again. And I’m just left.”
She stops talking and looks away. “Left on my own.”
We’re quiet for a moment. I can feel my breath, air in, air out, on my tongue.
“My grandma lives here.” My voice is pleading. “I’m going to be coming here during school holidays. Probably a lot because my mum has a boyfriend.”
Gabby smiles, even though she probably doesn’t want to, with more tears rolling down her cheeks. She looks up at me. “Serious? An actual boyfriend?”
“I know, right?” I look at her with mock horror.
“What’s he like? Is he creepy?”
I think for a minute. “Not creepy. Actually, not too bad. I mean, not that I know him yet. But he seems okay.” I shake my head. “The whole thing is just, like, weird.”
Gabby wipes her eyes with the back of her hand and sniffs loudly. “Give me your phone.”
“Why?”
“Duh. I’m going to put my number in it.”
I smile. “I’ll be here every holidays.”
“You’d better.”
Grandma’s still waiting in the car with Adrian. I have to go. But I have one more question for Gabby.
“I just need to know: what was it like to slap Angela?”
Gabby looks at me like she’s holding in the most delicious secret and then she grins bigger than I’ve ever seen her grin before.
“Totally, completely amazing.”
In the car an old Beatles song is playing. It must be classics hour on the radio. Adrian eyes me curiously but Grandma turns to the back seat and says it straight out.
“Things sorted out?”
I nod. My chest is warm inside and I’m sitting straighter than before, taking up more room in my seatbelt. The corners of my mouth keep creeping up on my face, even though I’m deliberately trying to stop from smiling.
“Thanks for taking me.”
“Is she happy too?”
“I think so,” I say. “We’ll probably hang out next time I come here, if that’s okay.”
Grandma turns back to face the front. I can see a satisfied smile flash between her and Adrian. “That’s fine,” she says. “Perfect.” She reaches down to the volume button and turns up the music and we sing along to Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band all the way home.
Chapter 28
Mum stopped tucking me into bed, like, two years ago, so it’s cute that Grandma does it for me, even though I’m nearly fourteen and taller than she is. I like the feeling of being a little kid again, all snuggly in freshly washed pyjamas (thanks Grandma!) and new sheets. At home my doona is light and fluffy and sits on top, but here Grandma uses blankets and tucks everything into the mattress so the bedding feels heavy and tight.
“Goodnight, sweetheart,” says Grandma, sitting on the bed beside me.
“Thanks for taking me,” I say. “You know, to Gabby’s.”
She flicks her head like, hey, no problem. “Will you be okay?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, I think I will.”
She smiles and kisses me and turns the light off and I lie there, all sleepy and weighed down with wool and comfort, and−something I haven’t felt in a long time−proud. If I’d brought my journal I would have drawn a picture of me in it with hands in the air, triumphant. A winner. All I wanted to do all night was tell Grandma how I’d talked to Gabby, how I’d fixed the problem, how I’d understood what she was really saying and called her out on it.
For once, when my eyes close, I’m happy. Tonight’s dreams will be about flowers and meadows and unicorns and butterflies. I’m sure of it.
I go to sleep.
They are not.
When the first evil green thing shows its face through the trees of the forest I’m apparently hiking in, my stomach jumps with the usual fear, dread and loathing. When the second one peers from a cave, the tip of a knife blade glints in the sunlight and I know that the fantasy is over. I’m on my way again, running and stumbling to find a miracle hiding place where I can keep myself small and silent and wait out the danger and the terror.
I put on a burst of speed. The pain of sprinting is bursting, spitting, bruising. My legs are burning, my chest is heaving, my stomach is in my throat. Get out, get out, get out, I tell myself, but then it’s too late. A hand pulls on my ankle and I’m tripping, falling, tumbling into spiky grass. A thistle gets in my mouth and I spit it out, angry. Above me, the sky is purple and the trees are red and I know without looking that I’m surrounded.
This time they are going to kill me.
I’m marched to a hut in the middle of a clearing and pushed through the wooden door onto a filthy mud floor. Light flashes through tiny holes in the walls and roof and it almost looks pretty. Until I remember how scared I am.
Fear eats me. It starts at my feet, gnaws the strength out of my knees and thighs and travels up to my midsection where it slashes my stomach with a knife, cutting my muscles to ribbons. My arms become playdough and my neck collapses under its hand. I think that I should call for help but when I open my mouth, my voice is frozen.
In the corner, squatting on large, bony feet, is one of my captors, with cruel, bored, almost machine-like eyes that glow in the shadowed light. It’s sitting, watching. Biding its time. Letting my own fear kill me off before he finishes the job.
I pull myself into a ball in the opposite corner and watch out of the side of my eye. It’s flicking its knife over creepy, claw-like nails, making an irregular cling, clang sound. My neck tightens. The knife seems sharp; bits of nail and claw are flying off, landing on the muddy floor. One piece hits my foot and pricks my skin. Tears creep up to my eyes. They want to escape but I need to keep them in. No need to draw any more attention to myself than necessary.
This always happens, I think to myself. It’s so unfair. They’re always trying to get me.
And then it hits me, rolled up, terrified, pushing back tears.
It’s a dream.
It’s not real, even though it feels real.
I can choose the ending.
And sometimes I need to fight.
The fear feels like fear, but it’s only a dream. It feels like evil is winning, like it’s going to kill me, but it’s only a dream. The dirt is cool under my fingers; the pinpricks of light are shiny and starry in the darkness; the pain in my legs is stabbing and sharp. But it’s all only a dream.
And I can choose the ending.
I stand up, on my fearful, trembling feet. The green thing shakes its head at me in surprise and stands up as well. The blade of its knife is out, pointed towards me.
Time to fight.
Inside I know that I have to kill this evil or it will kill me. There’s no doubt. There are no options. The time for running and hiding is over. The time for pleading and begging and hoping and whimpering has passed. Now it is time for me to stand up for myself. Or accept defeat.
And I know something else, something strong and powerful inside me. I don’t like defeat.
I step towards the creature. It steps towards me and we circle around the hut, staring each other down, willing the other to lose nerve.
It doesn’t speak but I can hear its voice anyway. You’re scared.
With a still-frozen voice box, I can’t speak either, but I can think loudly. Of course I’m scared.
You can’t do this.
I have to do this.
And I step forward so quickly that I knock it off balance and it falls to its knees on the ground. I kick its hand; the knife skims across the floor to near the door opening. It screams and I yell, voice unfrozen and I dive to pick it up. And then it’s me, on my knees, back to the door, knife in hand, threatening it as it scrambles to its feet again.
You can’t kill me, it says.
I have to, I say.
There are more of us.
I make a face. I’ll do one at a time.
My heart is a softball, being thrown again and again at high speed in my chest cavity. The walls seem closer, the ceiling lower. I take a deep breath. Launch myself at my enemy. Aim the knife for its chest. I’m slashing and stabbing with all the strength I can find but its hands are trying to find my neck. It’s throwing punches and grasping at my arms but I have to keep going. I’m gagging, heaving, willing myself to keep going. Willing myself to destroy it. To destroy the force that wants to destroy me.
It doesn’t die easily. And even at the end, it still kicks and claws, feebly, but with hatred.
There are more of us. It whispers it in a gurgle. Then, finally, its arms and legs fall to the floor, its breathing stops, and its blood forms itself into glistening, stagnant, green-black pools.
I throw myself down so I’m sitting with my back against a wall, panting and crying for breath. I’ve killed something. The words fly around and around my head like manic, attacking magpies. Guilt and terror start to pour in with the light through the cracks in the wall, but I push it back out.
It would have killed me. And I never started this thing.
I know there are two more out there. It’s time to finish the job. I creak the wooden door open slowly and peer out into the clearing. No sign of anyone. I back out of the door, pulling the dead creature with me.
Still nothing.
I drag it heavily right out of the hut and dump the body a few metres from the door. It’s in full view of the surrounding trees and bushes.
I clear my throat. “Hey,” I yell. “You’re not going to win. You’re not going to destroy me.”
There’s a rustle of branches and a flock of black cockatoos rise noisily out of the trees. I wait for their cries to subside.
“Come and get me now,” I yell, turning to face the opposite direction. “Now’s your chance.”
But there’s nothing. Just a stir and a shake of leaves in the distance and then a still, echoing, silence. And I know, like you just know in dreams, that I have won. That no one else will bother me now. That no one is coming after me again. That I can leave here in peace. I put the knife down on my enemy’s body, look up to the sky and the light and the birds, watching from far above, and then turn on my heel and walk away.
Chapter 29
When my eyes open in the morning sunlight, I’m crying.
Strange. I think to myself. I’m not sad. I wipe the wet away with the back of my hand but more and more tears slide down my nose and hit the pillow, creating damp, darkish patches in the pattern of the pillowcase.
Am I leaking?
I swing my legs out of bed, pull on a jacket and head outside to the roses. Grandma is already there with her gloves and tools and bucket. She looks up and her smile quickly turns to concern.
“Good morning Jazmine. Oh. Are you alright?”
My cheeks are wet, my eyes are drippy and my hands are moist from wiping. But for some reason, the tears won’t stop.
“I think so,” I say.
She stands up quickly, at least, as quickly as an old person with a sprained ankle can stand up. “You need a cup of tea.” I don’t want to disturb her gardening time but she insists. “A person who wakes up crying needs tea, no question.”
She walks me into the house, puts me on the couch and wraps a throw rug around me so I’m warm. Then she hobbles into the kitchen and puts the kettle on. With the cozy rug and the warm room and the promise of tea, something goes click or bing or some other kind of little noise inside and it’s like a traffic light has turned green and all the cars are going at once because the trickle of tears turns into a flood that I can’t stop, no matter how many times I wipe my eyes.
Waaaaah.
A sob escapes my chest, pops up into my mouth and lets itself out all over the room.
“Hang on there,” yells Grandma. “It’s on its way.”
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br /> She hobbles back in with steaming cups which she puts on the table. Then she throws herself on the couch and sticks her arms out.
“Hug.”
It’s not a question. I fall into her arms and cry. Quite loudly. And for quite a long time, with all the usual sniffling and snotting and snorting that goes along with it. Because I don’t actually feel sad, it’s a funny experience. Yes, it’s overwhelming and carries me along like a river, tumbling over rocks. But it’s also like the tears are scrubbing me clean from the inside. Exfoliating my heart.
And when I finally put my head up and hiccup for the last time, I’m actually peaceful enough to taste, truly savour, every single sip of my tea.
Grandma says nothing the whole time. She’s just with me, kind, warm and slurping. It’s a strange thing that a person who loves her gourmet food so much would be such a messy tea sipper. I open my mouth to make a joke about it but the words are pushed out of the way by a completely different sentence that forces its way out of my mouth and explodes into the universe.
“Liam is mean to me.”
Grandma sits back. She raises her eyebrows. I sit back too, and open my eyes wide.
“I didn’t mean to say that,” I begin but Grandma stops me.
“Is this the problem you’ve been having at school?”
I nod. The movement seems easy. Relaxed, even. Yes. That’s the problem.
“I like him though,” I say. But it’s not in a defending kind of way, like I’m standing up for him. It’s like I’ve got two objects in my hands and I’m just looking at each of them, wondering how they fit together.
I like him. He’s mean to me.
How does that even work?
“Why do you like him?” Grandma asks. Her voice is simple, clear. She’s holding her warm cup in her good hand.
I think. It’s not hard. “He’s funny. He knows sign language.”
He also has the most beautiful blue eyes ever in the whole world, I think. But I don’t say it out loud.
I add something else on. “And he looks after me.”
Grandma’s eyebrows go higher.
“And how is he mean to you?”
This one’s harder. I mean, I know, kind of. When we’re together I end up feeling bad, but then somehow I get to the point of thinking that maybe I’m the mean one, that maybe I’m the one hurting him.