Girl Next Door (12 page)

Bryce Cole stops on the footpath, bellowing at us.

Well, I did tell him that if I could drive I would steal his car. He was stupid for teaching me.

Declan is not keen on my plan to break up his family and replace it with my own, but then he's not staring at the prospect of staying at the Plough and Peanut again tonight. He'll be staying in his nice warm neighbourhood, so he's not making an informed vote on the subject.

He's got me by the arm as I march down their hallway. If we were in a cartoon there would be smoke and flames coming from his heels as I drag him along the carpet. He's muttering objections.

Will is shuffling along behind us. He was going to stay in the car, but I think he wants to see, like I wanted to see the body.

Declan's mother is sorting flowers on the dining table. I'm going to tell her. I'm nervous and I know if I don't say it straight away I won't say it at all, so I just say it.

'Your husband is having an affair.'

She doesn't look up. She's stripping leaves off daisy stems. A few seconds pass and my heart is hammering, because this is a really big thing for me, breaking up a marriage. It's not a decision I've taken lightly, and it's not even completely self-interested because she'd want to know, wouldn't she?

Maybe she didn't hear me. I could just run away, but where am I going to run to, exactly? Perhaps I didn't actually say it out loud. I was sure that I did! There's no harm in saying it again, just in case.

'Your hus–'

She interrupts me. 'I heard you the first time.'

We're all just standing there in Declan's dining room. Willem has shrunk back against the wall. I can just imagine him with a lampshade over his head, pretending he's not there. Declan is standing next to me, holding his breath.

I don't know what to say next because I'd been expecting a bigger response. I'd pictured her crying and running out of the room to pack her stuff. Or his stuff. Somebody's stuff needs to be packed. There's enough room in this house for all of us, but it would be awkward.

Declan's mum keeps stripping leaves.

Eventually she looks up, smoothing a stray hair back from her cheek. 'It's over now.' She offers Declan a watery smile. 'Nothing for you to worry about.' She holds the bouquet of daisies up and carefully adds one flower to each side. She twists it this way and that, making sure that it's even.

'Your husband is . . .'

'
All
husbands do that, Jenna-Belle.'

And now I understand what it is about my mum and Declan's mum. The affair is the pineapple on both of their heads. Declan's mum doesn't check the phone records every month because she thinks Telstra is ripping her off; she rings her husband's girlfriends. She's always known. She lives with it because she doesn't have a job, or any skills, and she doesn't want to be a single mum living in a caravan park.

Declan's mum has decided it's better to have one person be indifferent and disrespectful to her than everyone.

Bryce Cole has just climbed out of a taxi at the front of Declan's house. He shields his eyes and looks through the window of his car, but I have the keys in my pocket.

When he sees Will and me walking down the path his lips draw into a thin line. I pull my hand out of my pocket and he snatches the keys from me. 'Get in the car!' he growls. 'In the back!' he qualifies, as Will heads towards the passenger side.

Mum's at the end of the road, waiting on the corner. She didn't want Declan's mum to see her. She's embarrassed.

'What happened with Romance Me?' Will asks.

'It won,' Bryce says.

I look at Mum.

She whispers, 'The jockey was underweight.'

'So you lost? You lost it all?'

'The horse won the race,' Bryce Cole says.

'But it didn't,' I protest. 'It was disqualified.'

'It won by three lengths! What do you know? You weren't even there!' Bryce Cole rubs his lips. 'It won by three lengths.'

We drive west in silence.

After about twenty minutes Mum lights a cigarette and ashes out the window. The ash whips back into my face. This morning I thought the least your mother could do is feed you, now I think the very least your mother can do for you is not to flick hot ashes into your face.

Declan's mobile rings in my pocket.

'Your dad was here! You just missed him!' Declan says to me. He's out of breath. 'He went to the house, and then he almost got back in his car, but I ran out there. I tried to make him stay, but he was looking for you. He's only just gone.'

'What did he say?'

'He had this whole story about how he applied for some job. I told him to meet you at the Plough and Peanut.'

'Yes, I know. In New Zealand. And we're not at the stupid Plough and Peanut!' I yell at him.

'He didn't say anything about New Zealand to me. He just said he applied for it ages ago. Where are you?'

I look at the back of Mum's head. Do I tell her? What do I do? Even if we go back to the pub, Dad will have gone by the time we get there. He might leave a message for us. But what if he doesn't? Should we drive all the way there and all the way back again just to find out something we already know?

'Why do you even care? Just shut up. Anyway, I've only got two bars of battery left.' I snap the phone shut and turn it off. I'm mad at Declan because my plan didn't work, and because of some other stuff about him, which I haven't worked out in my head yet.

It hurts that Dad doesn't want us to go with him. I need my parents to want to be with us, even if we don't want to be with them. I remember one Valentine's Day when I was about twelve, Mum and Dad were talking about going away for the weekend. They asked us if we thought we were old enough to look after ourselves overnight. Will and I told them that if they went away we'd have a party while they were gone. We were just kidding, but they didn't go. It was a joke, but I think we made it because we didn't want them to
want
to go somewhere without us.

I wonder if Tanner Hamrick-Gough feels like this every time her parents go back to Dubai? Apparently they think she gets a better and safer education here. Tanner says they can make more money over there, and that's probably true, but why can't her parents get a job here – at least until she's finished school? It's only a few more years. There must be some point at which they think the relationship they have with their kids is more important than having stuff, otherwise why would they have kids in the first place?

Unless they thought kids would be fun, but it didn't work out that way and now they're completely jack of them, which is even more depressing.

We stop at a petrol station. Bryce Cole puts in ten dollars, which takes the gauge from empty to nearly empty.

Just on dusk we pull up outside a brick house in a suburb I've never heard of. The woman who answers the door has drawn-on eyebrows so high on her forehead that she looks permanently shocked. Maybe she is shocked. She's got drawn-on lips as well. She's made herself a little cupid's bow.

This is a much cheaper option than surgery, I think. You just draw your features where you want them to be. You could change your mind, too. You could move your eyebrows to suit your mood.

She's got long fake fingernails and lots of bling, but the pantsuit she's wearing looks neat and comfortable. It's something that even my mum might have worn around the house – Sportscraft leisurewear.

'Bryce,' she says, leaning back against the doorframe and crossing her ankles.

'Hi, Mum,' he says.

As soon as he says it I can see the resemblance.

'Who's this?' she asks, looking my mum up and down.

'This is Sue, a friend of mine.'

'And did you father these?' she asks.

Bryce Cole blushes. 'No, Mum.'

Bryce Cole doesn't have to say anything. She gets it; she's just making us work for it. She raises her real eyebrows and her drawn-on ones disappear into one of her wrinkles, so then she has no eyebrows at all, and she stops looking surprised and just looks weird. She stares at us.

A woman with disappeared, drawn-on eyebrows, who lives west, is judging us.

After a long silence she says, 'You can come in for a cuppa,' then she turns around and I follow her down the hallway.

We walk though a crowded lounge room and into the kitchen. I lift a stack of well-thumbed women's magazines off the dining chair and sit down, then make a space between a variety of hideous, unfinished craft projects on the table for my elbows. There's an upright piano under similar domestic debris. It's dusty and smells like old people. I wrinkle my nose at Will.

Mum settles into a rocker in the corner.

Barb Cole spoons instant coffee into cups. She nods towards Mum, asking if she wants a cup. Mum stares at the instant coffee tin in Barb's hand. I've heard her say she would prefer to drink dishwater than instant coffee, but after a pause she sighs. 'Sure. Why not?' Mum turns to Bryce Cole. 'Where . . . um . . . where were you thinking of staying?'

'Not here, that's for sure,' Barb scoffs.

There is a long awkward pause. Will, Mum and I trade glances. That's what we're here for, right? To stay? When I look at Bryce Cole's face I can see he was going to raise it more subtly, maybe just by waiting until Barb had gone to bed and then dossing in the corner.

'Mum, it would only be . . .'

'No way,' she interrupts. 'I told you the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that.' She holds her arm up and the jewellery jangles. She glares at Mum. 'What did he say to you? "Oh, it's all right, we can go and sponge from the old lady. She's always good for a tenner." Well, I've told him!'

'Mum!' Bryce Cole pleads.

'I didn't mean to impose. We'll go now.' My mum stands up. 'I'll pay you back as soon as I can,' Mum tells Bryce Cole.

Barb arches her real eyebrows again. If she knew how it looked she wouldn't do it. 'You owe
him
money? That's a new one.' She thumps the coffee mugs on the table in front of each of us, and the thin brown liquid slops over the side. 'I've made the coffee now, so yous might as well drink it.'

'No, really. Thank you for the trouble, but we must . . .' Mum begins.

'Drink it!' Barb says.

We drink our coffees. I don't even drink coffee normally. It's disgusting, but I drink it because Barb is glaring, and I don't want to embarrass anyone.

'What did you think, coming back here?' Barb shakes her head. 'Not that I ever expected better – not from the very beginning. Couldn't find your arse with two hands and a flashlight.'

Bryce Cole rubs his face.

'Has he ever told you about his "business"? Yeah, he used to drive around the country, picking up other people's crap! No wonder he went broke.'

Bryce Cole is standing in the doorway. He drums his fingers on the frame. Why doesn't he say something? Why doesn't he just tell her to piss off?

'Good. For. Nothing.' She sounds out each word.

Mum stands up. 'I'm going now. Thank you for the coffee.' She stalks down the corridor.

We all follow.

My mum thinks Barb is a bad mother for saying Bryce Cole is good for nothing, but really, Mum always says that I'm good for everything, and that doesn't mean she knows me any better than Barb knows Bryce Cole.

But then I don't know my mum at all. I don't know my dad. I don't know Declan, either, and I thought I knew him best in the whole world.

See, the reason I was freaking out at the Chinese restaurant and why I didn't want to talk to him was, when we got to the end of what we did, Declan said, 'Shall I pay you now?'

It was a joke. He was picking up on what I said way back when we were in the alley – I said that the girls on the internet get paid to do what they do, but it also kind of wasn't a joke, because Declan knows that I don't love him that way. Besides, he was still a little bit cranky from when I said that what he did to that Aiden boy was sexual abuse, and he'd been looking for a way to get me back.

We were lying on our backs side by side on his bed, and I felt like there was a big weight on my chest, so heavy that I couldn't breathe. All of a sudden we weren't even any more. He was Declan – the same as he had always been – but I was the povvo skank from the caravan park who gives it up.

It makes me mad because I never thought Declan would buy into all that old-fashioned 'girls should be all shy and withholding' crap. If we're truly equal then girls should be allowed to have desire too. Girls should be allowed to experiment without feeling shame and humiliation, and like it's always their responsibility to stop everything.

I want to know how come in this century that part is still my job.

It also made me want to punch him, because he made me feel bad so casually. He didn't even notice that he'd hurt me.

And now I understand why, if you live in a caravan park – with no roof space and no possibility of treasure – and you see some other guy about your age looking down his nose at the way you live – some guy with designer clothes and straight teeth, who stands up straight with square shoulders because he's going to get pretty much whatever he wants without having to try very hard – you'd want to goad him out of his caravan by saying rude things about his mother and sister, and then punch the crap out of him.

Bryce Cole takes us to the Bowling Club. I've never been to a club before. It looks like an airport, with lots of glass, empty spaces, bad commercial carpet, and announcements over loudspeakers. People sit on the plastic chairs at plastic tables as though they're waiting for their flight.

In a vast alcove, poker machines trill and burble like Fisher-Price toys on steroids. There's a TV screen showing the keno numbers. Bryce Cole is eyeing off another corner where there's a TAB counter.

Will, Mum and I navigate through the tables into the bistro. There's a special on – roast beef for six dollars. Mum stands in line. When we get to the end the woman in the white smock and comically oversized chef's hat says, 'Kitchen's closed.'

'What about those potatoes?' Mum asks, pointing to the warming trays.

The humungous-chef-hat woman has this look on her face as if Mum has just asked for a rat salad.

'We haven't eaten for a while. My kids are hungry. I know it's a bother . . .'

The humungous-chef-hat woman glowers at us as she shoves the potatoes in a bowl.

'Is it possible to have some gravy? Perhaps some sauce?' Mum asks. 'I'd really appreciate it.'

The chef lady turns the lights off. 'Kitchen's closed.'

We take the dried-out, lukewarm potatoes to a table. The cutlery has been packed away so we eat them with our fingers.

Bryce Cole has been standing in front of the tellies with his arms crossed. Now he slouches over to the chair opposite Mum. 'Listen,' he begins.

No conversation that starts with that word is ever going to finish well, unless you're birdwatching. If someone had told me a year ago that I would wish I was birdwatching, I would never have believed them. Back then I thought we were happy.

I was pretty happy. I had everything I wanted, and if I wanted something more I could just throw a bit of a tantrum, or say I was thinking about being anorexic or something like that. I had no idea that my happiness was actually dependent on my parents being happy too. I'm thinking now about the small changes I could have made, say for example if every now and then I could have agreed to do the stuff that Willem is so passionate about, we could have done that as a family – like I did when we were at that Wombat Crossing place. I should have encouraged my parents to go away for Valentine's Day.

I'm not saying it's my fault that Mum had an affair and Dad left, but Will and I did make it harder for them. We always expected to be entertained. Sometimes when you get caught up in the entertainment part you don't think about what happens behind the scenes.

It's like when I went to the races. I watched those horses race for weeks and weeks, and I didn't think about them as living, breathing, alive things until I saw them tied up in tiny boxes. I let Bryce Cole tell me all about how they wanted to run. Of course he's going to say that. What would it make him if they didn't?

'I'm out of ideas here,' Bryce Cole says, drumming his fingers on the table. 'I can always sleep in the car, but . . .'

'You're dumping us?' I ask.

Mum starts crying again. Not proper crying. Her eyes are just leaking from the sides. She's not even wiping her face. The tears are dropping down and making dark splotches on her shirt.

Bryce Cole ignores me. 'I don't have kids. I've thought about it, but with my lifestyle, it's just never really been an option. Far be it from me . . .' He takes a deep breath. 'This is no way to raise kids, Sue. You really are going to have to find a way of getting it together.'

'You're dumping us because you're worried about us?
We
have to get it together? What about you?'

'I didn't sign up for this, JB,' he protests. 'I was just looking for a place to stay. I didn't even want to know you, really. It was just supposed to be for a couple of months.' He stares at me. 'I know I'm a mess, all right? But you guys are just making it worse for me.'

'How can things get
worse
for you?' I ask.

He huffs. 'I don't want to have to think about how what I'm doing might affect someone else.'

We sit in silence.

Mum wipes her eyes with the back of her hand and gives Bryce Cole a watery smile. 'Thanks for all your help. It's been a real pleasure knowing you. All the best for the future.'

Bryce Cole pushes his chair back. He stands up, pats his pocket and then he walks out of the club.

Will's not even watching. He's staring at the keno, shaking his head.

'All the
best?'
I wrinkle my nose.

'What would you have me say, Jenna-Belle?' She smiles at me. She's twisting her wedding ring, except she's transferred it to her right hand. Her engagement ring isn't there. She's sold it.

My mum's sneakers were always white. Her laces were always tied. She put on make-up every morning before breakfast. She wore mascara and powdered her nose even on a Sunday when she wasn't going anywhere – when she would recline on the lounge in her ironed tracksuit flicking through
Country Style
magazine with her manicured fingers. She always looked like a woman with a plan. That's what I want to ask her:
What's the plan, Mum?

So far we've followed Bryce Cole's plan, but it's not a very good plan. In fact, it's not much of a plan at all. We just joined his crazy conga line as he crashed from one crisis to the next, but at least we were moving.

Mum has no plan. She just has a crumpled blouse, little spiky bits of hair that stick up because there's no product in it, and an orangey-coloured lipstick that she bought on sale once, but never wears because the colour doesn't suit her. She's not wearing J'adore, she's wearing Just-Like-J'adore.

I'm starting to panic, because we have no money and no plan.

Mum's still waiting for me to answer her. I want her to stop being so polite. I want her to say,
Actually, Bryce Cole, you can kiss my butt! And you too, Mister Centrelink!
And then pull some freaky kung-fu moves. Hai-ya! That's what I want to see. Some double-you-oh-em-ay-en.

Instead I have the cloying smell of Just-Like-J'adore in my nose and it's making me feel ill.

'I just think you could have . . .'

'Could have
what,
Jenna-Belle?' she hisses. 'Lost my temper? Sworn at him? How would that have helped? Where have you seen that work?'

She's staring at me. She's so still.

All she has is us. Will and I are her Albert Bear, so I bite my lip and blink away the tears that have sprung into my eyes.