Being Kalli (21 page)

She doesn’t even pretend to smile
, just stares off. Then she says, “Goodnight, Kalli,” kisses my forehead and walks towards her bedroom.

“You can’t honestly tell me you haven’t seen Nate in a week and a half!” Scout cries as we hang in the lecture theatre until the lecturer starts.

In cas
e you don’t know, lecture theatres were built with one purpose: to allow noises to travel loud and far, and to reach every inch of airspace in the damn room. So in case you still aren’t getting a visual, knowing that all fifty or so students who have arrived and are waiting isn’t good for my situation right now.

“
The hell?”

Scout attempts to clamp her palm over my mouth
, but her words are long gone.

“
Sorry?” Scout shout-whispers once we’re several feet from the door outside.

“I’m not embarrassed;
I don’t give a shit about that,” I say. “I do, however, care that Nate’s mates are in our lecture.”

Yep, it dawns on her the massive naïveté of her actions
, in that little O that forms from her mouth.

“Well
… well, it’s your fault.”

I give her a look. She fidgets a bit before finding a bench
at the wall and I stand my ground for a moment longer, then seat myself as a little act of defiance.

“How’s that
?” I ask, uttering very, very slowly. I give her another look.

“Because.” She flips a bit of her hair
that’s sticking out behind her ear. “You practically said you guys hadn’t spoken.”

“I have a feeling you’re not listening to a word I say.”

“Huh?” Her eyebrows stiffen along with her confused expression.

“I said we hadn’t
seen each other.” I drop my palms on my thighs and let out a breath. I begin, “We’ve talked on the phone, texted, Skyped. He’s been supportive about Mum, asked how my meeting with Geoffrey and his team went. In fact, he’s asked how cold I think it is, how the twins are, and we’ve chatted about my awesome concert performances, about his photography. Ya getting me?”

Scout nods.

“I don’t even believe I’m saying this, but we’re both avoiding saying I love you. We talked a lot about me and us on our date. I still feel all naked. I dunno, I’m embarrassed with him saying all those truthful things about me, some of which I didn’t know.

“
I’m the one who’s scared here, aren’t I? Nate’s felt this way for much longer. We can talk for ages, but I find myself planning in my head as we talk what I can bring up next to stay on the phone, and then we both say bye and linger with pointless chat until we hang up as cowards.”

“
Nate isn’t as confident and pig-headed as he can appear sometimes, but we both know that. I really think he’s assuming saying the big ILY is a step too far. If I had to pretend to be him, you ran away pretty damn fast last time he tried to make a move on the next level.”

“
Everything
has changed!”

“
The only other thing I can think of is that you’re—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I say. “I’m intimidating to guys. I know.”

“Exactly.”

“Trust you to feel sorry for him and not me.”

“You don’t want me to feel sorry for you.”

I lick my lips and tighten
them but a giggle escapes anyway. “Touché.”

“I’m cutting you a deal.”

“I like deals.”

“First, class. How many have we skipped recently?”

“Doesn’t matter to me.” I grin. “I’m deferring. You know that.”

Having marked my wish to withdraw from the course,
I’ve been told it’ll be finalised within a day or so now and I’ll be free, only having wasted a lovely sum of money paying for my tuition thus far. I don’t have to be here but Scout is here all day, and I wanted to hang with her. Scout, being the nerdy girl she is, wanted me to walk her to the lecture, as if that would matter if I snuck in one more information session before leaving.

“Whatevs. Okay.” Scout sighs.
“You get it together with Nate and I’ll tell my parents and sister about being gay.”

Staring at her eyes, she seems too into this “deal” considering she’s got more to be anxious about, more to lose
, than I do. Yet here she is, eyes wide and face glowing. I feel happy vibes from her, as if she’s looking forward to it.

“Sc
ou
t.” I turn and drag her inwards by her upper arms. “What happened with you two?”

“Dad and I?”

“No, you and your girlfriend, Steph. You look post-orgasm every time she comes up in conversation the last few days.”

“We’re just really happy, and I want to share that
, finally.”

Well, that makes sense. But
still, it just clicked how glowing Scout looks, inside and out. I wonder if she’s in love, too, since she’s ready to blow open her biggest fear and face possible rejection by her parents.

“I swear this isn’t me worming my way out of the deal, but can we—you and I, side by side—have di
nner with your parents and test the waters? We can invite Steph the next time. You know,” I say. “In case—”

“
You’re worming your way out!”

“
No, I just have no idea how they’ll react and I want it to be perfect for Steph and you.”

Scout stares at me. And stares
.

“
This doesn’t sound like you, Kalli.”

“
No, Nate and I will get it together. Took me ages to see it, but it’s me who’s afraid of me, and this all seems too good, you know? Like someone is handing me all this wonderful karma all of a sudden and I can’t tell if everything’s turning up after what’s happened or if I need to approach carefully. I guess I’m just stalling.”

She smiles like she completely understands
then nudges me.

“
Fine, so we’ve got a dinner meeting to organise, then, and we’ll bring Steph and Nate. Kill that procrastination bug.”

“You sure?”

“You know you deserve happiness as much as the next person, Kalli.”

• • •

The dinner came together quickly with a phone call to Steph, Nate, and Scout’s parents. Scout’s at my house soon after, fiddling with the short ends of her hair at her neck. She’s wearing cotton tennis shoes, jeans and has a top hanging off her shoulder, all slashed. She runs circles around the bit of hair at the back then changes to swipe her fringe bit across her forehead differently.

“I should change. Do you have any knee-length skirts? Any silk blouses?”

I give her eyes. “Do I look like a middle-aged woman, Scout?”

“Okay, right.”

It takes twenty further minutes of constant pestering. Tonight will go fine, but of course she’s worried otherwise. We Googled restaurants and found this nice one a bit further away than we’d usually go, because it’s closer to the city and the pictures of their food look like they’re whipped up by Nigella Lawson herself. It calmed Scout a bit since it’d surely put her parents in a good mood.

Earlier t
oday we drank Long Island iced teas and she rolled around on the rug in my living room with Seth and Tristan. Now, being off my high, the throbbing in my head makes me feel I went too far saying I’d invite Nate to come along with me, too. It seemed like such a good idea at the time, but my nerves are eating me up.

Plus
: I’ve only spoken to Nate using electronic devices for eleven days and I’ll finally be forced to see him.

Minus:
it may be awkward.

Plus: I’m so anxious to see
him, I barely care about much else other than getting to be in a close radius to him.

Basically, if tonight screws up
and her parents flip, or that great “I love you” goes sour, Scout and I have organised it so it’ll all happen in an upmarket restaurant with us all together. Poshness always makes things more cordial.

Fretting,
I head into the other bathroom and straighten my hair. I never used looked my best for anyone other than myself. Tonight, I’d deliberately make myself look ugly, in my opinion, if Nate thought I looked beautiful like that. Am I that desperate to impress him?

Yes. Yes,
I am.

Last night, I
remembered the time at the party when I gave him head. I remembered thinking I needed to win the bet, needed to make him want me that bad. Needed the feeling of power? Desire?

Then on the piano in the field
, when he got me off. That was when I started becoming undone, all because I let myself be a puppet to him. Plead for him to stop the pain. Plead for him to make it hurt more. And finally, plead to release the build up making me stiffen my legs and curl my toes, and making my mind and body feel like they were going to explode. When he did, I was all his.

We both had stripped down our desire and begged. And people who beg no longer have power. They
’ve stripped that armour, they lose that strangeness, and become altogether cosy.

I’m glad Nate slowly broke down my
defences because I’m loving getting to know him like this. I’m anxious, yet relieved to know I can and should tell him when the old me is trying to bottle issues up and handle them by herself.

Later
, when we arrive at the restaurant, Nate and Steph meet us outside. Scout’s mum, dad and sister are already seated, waiting, but at the sight of Nate I just want to run up to him and have him twirl me in the air like I’m a little girl, and Scout probably wants to do the same to Steph. If only we could stay outside forever.

“Hey, Kall Bell,” Nate says.

Like that.

In three words I’m this girly girl who wants to impress him and make him happy. My actions are immediate, without thought, and I
find it hard to hide my smile. I look down to my heels and stupidly giggle at my feet, but he gets his hand into my hair and pulls it back from my face so he can get a better look at me.

I smile openly then and for the whole
of forever we stare at each other. I can’t wipe it, can’t think of anything, swept up in this light-headed feeling. I slide my hands up his forearms, feeling his sinewy muscles tense at my touch. “Fuck, I missed you,” I say, when my fingers separate to grip around the inside of his elbow, around the top of his forearm, and my lips a whisper away from his ear.

“Me too, baby.”

Here, I’m wondering why neither of us had the balls to just see each other face-to-face.

“Hey, Nate!” Scout barges in and kisses him hi.

On the way to our seats, I nudge her and she almost topples over. We serious-up before getting to our table and sit down. Small talk starts up right away.

Naturally, Scout’s parents are curious why we nineteen-year-olds want to have dinner with her parents on a Friday night. Scout tries to quell their curiosity by saying “to properly catch up and for a small announcement later” which is the exact point our small talk tu
rns into death stares and her mum tries to hide whispers to her husband. Scout’s sister is fifteen and just proud to get an expensive meal for free since her McDonald’s wage doesn’t suffice.

The restaurant is
packed. Meals take forever, and at one point Scout’s dad blurts out, “Scout, your mum is having a right old heart attack here waiting to know. You know how she gets. Since we’re waiting, why not just tell us now?”

Of course, there’s not much anyone can say back to that. We’re at our table, at the organ
ised dinner, waiting. Scout draws a blank.

“Um,” I cut in, “
I hate to be a pain but my bra clip is about to come undone. We won’t be a sec.”

I know this moment isn’t about me, but I am proud to be subtle.

In the bathroom, I show Scout some deep breathing exercises. In effect, it actually looks like we’re imitating elephant trunks swishing, but she does start to calm to a point where I can talk and she hears what I say.

“Vomit.”

“What?” she says, freezing with her hands an inch away from combing through her hair—again.

“It’s like vomit. It’s going to come up, and you don’t want it while you’re running and screaming around like a headless chicken, trying to stop the unstoppable. Just say it. It’s your prerogative, and you
want
to do this, remember? Think of Steph and you. You both deserve to feel free and accepted.”

“If they don’t? Accept me?”

I answer with a thoughtful look.

I walk back to our table with Scout under my wing
, me rubbing a bit on her back. It seems corny but I actually feel her muscles relax by the time we arrive.

I didn’t expect it to happen like this.

Scout rolls ahead so fast I don’t even manage to take a polite sip of my water as she says, “I’m gay. I’m a woman-loving lesbian. Steph is my girlfriend. Before you ask, I’ve always been gay. Um, that’s it.”

There’s always one kid in
school that doesn’t handle shock well. His mouth will drop as if it’s a hinge hanging on by the last screw. His body will shut down and he’s as good as a non-living statue.