Stay Well Soon (12 page)

‘I mean,' says Lara, ‘if
you
had a kid in hospital, wouldn't you want to visit them?'

There's a pair of horse boots for only $32.99. That's not so much. I already have nearly forty dollars in my favourite sock. But maybe that isn't fair to Atta Girl. I know what it's like to wear cheap boots. My boots from Kmart really hurt my feet when I first got them. I wanted Blundstones but Mum said in my dreams, because they were way too expensive.

‘Mum says Dad can't cope with the fact that I'm going to die.'

The horse boots go blurry in the catalogue. I stand up. The catalogue slides off the table and onto the floor landing inside out.

‘What?' I say.

‘I said, he can't cope with me dying.'

‘What do you mean? You're not going to die!'

‘Well, I'm not getting any better. I thought you knew that?'

I didn't know that. I thought Lara was going to get better, like Rhys. But now she's saying she's going to die. Going to
die
. Lara said she was going to
die
. Everyone dies, but she means soon.

‘Are you okay, Stevie?' says Lara. ‘You're breathing kind of funny.'

She's right, it's like I'm near a cat but there are no cats here.

Lara's dad Tim comes back in. ‘Finnigan's ready and waiting.'

He wheels Lara out of the room. Some of the Horseland catalogue gets stuck in the wheelchair spokes. It goes round and round in the wheels until it comes untangled and is muddy and crumpled on the floor.

I follow them outside.

A big black horse is standing in front of the house. He is bigger than I expected. He could trample me easily.

Tim wheels Lara up to him. She reaches up and Finnigan puts his head down so she can pat him on the nose.

‘Hello, Finny,' says Lara.

‘He remembers you,' says her dad.

‘No he doesn't,' says Lara. ‘But I remember him. Stevie, come and say hello.'

I walk over. Finnigan is enormous. I put out my hand and Finnigan snorts. I take a step back. I don't want to pat him in case he bites me.

‘He likes you,' says Lara. ‘Dad, Stevie wants a horse.'

‘Have you ridden before?' Lara's dad Tim asks me.

‘No.'

‘I could give you a lesson on Buttercup.'

‘That'd be great!' says Lara.

‘I don't know how to ride,' I say.

‘Don't worry, Buttercup is a really quiet pony to start on. I'll go get her.'

Tim ties Finnigan to a post next to Lara and walks away.

‘I don't want to ride a pony,' I say. But I'm not sure if Lara hears me.

I sit down on a rock on the edge of the garden.

‘Are you okay, Stevie?' asks Lara.

‘I'm fine,' I say, but I'm not, and I don't know how Lara can act like everything is normal when she is going to die.

I hear the sound of footsteps and hooves and look up. Tim is standing beside a tan pony with a black mane. The pony is bigger than Star but not by very much.

‘This is Buttercup,' he says. ‘Don't be scared, she's very quiet.'

Tim goes away again and comes back carrying an armful of stuff, including a saddle.

He shows me how to brush Buttercup with a currycomb and then a body brush. Tim cleans her hooves.

Then he shows me how to put the horse blanket on and the saddle. The saddle has a strap called the girth that goes under Buttercup's tummy. Buttercup doesn't like it, so she puffs out her tummy. Tim waits for her tummy to go down and then does up the girth. Next we put on the bridle. Buttercup looks completely different wearing her saddle and bridle. She looks bigger.

‘Okay,' says Tim. ‘Are you ready?'

‘I guess so.'

Tim tells me to come up close to Buttercup on her left side. He holds the stirrup for me and I put my left foot in the stirrup and put my hand on the saddle. He tells me to hold on to Buttercup's mane and says it won't hurt her. To get on I have to bounce up and swing my right leg over.

Then I am sitting on Buttercup. I am riding a horse – or a pony at least.

I try to put my foot in the right stirrup too, but I can't get it in. Tim walks around to the other side and holds the stirrup out for me to put my foot in.

Then he tells me I am sitting all wrong. I should keep my heels down and my thumbs on top of the reins, and I should sit up tall.

Tim stands in the middle of the driveway with Buttercup on a long rope. He says not to be scared because he can control how fast Buttercup goes. I have to give Buttercup a squeeze with my knees to get her started. I squeeze but nothing happens. Buttercup just stands there. I try again and she starts walking in a big circle around Tim.

It is easy, but then Tim shouts at me, ‘Keep your heels down.' I had forgotten about that bit. Then he yells, ‘Sit up straight!' and then, ‘Thumbs!' I look down and see that I am holding the reins wrong again.

We walk around in a circle with Tim shouting at me, and I start to get used to it.

Tim says, ‘Okay, Stevie, that's looking better. Would you like to try a trot?'

‘I guess so.'

Tim makes Buttercup stop and explains what to do. It is very complicated. I have to look at Buttercup's outside shoulder and when her shoulder is forward I should stand up out of the saddle a bit. When Buttercup's shoulder is back I should be sitting down.

When Tim tells me, I squeeze Buttercup with my legs and she starts walking. Then Tim makes Buttercup go a bit faster. I hold on to the saddle. Tim shouts out at me, ‘Up! Down! Up! Down!'

I try to do what he says, but I'm all out of time. Maybe it is too much, too soon.

‘Look at the outside shoulder!' he shouts.

I stare at Buttercup's shoulder going forward and back, forward and back.

‘That's it!' shouts Tim. And I realise that I am going up and down, up and down in time with Buttercup.

‘Good stuff, Stevie!' shouts Lara.

Buttercup's hooves go
thud, thud, thud, thud, thud
. Lara is going to die. Lara is going to die. Lara is going to die.

‘Okay,' says Tim. ‘That might be enough for today.' Buttercup slows down and then stops.

Tim tells me how to get off, which is called dismounting. I take my right foot out of the stirrup and swing it over the saddle. Then I slide off down the left side.

Standing on the ground again, my legs are wobbly. Lara is smiling at me. ‘Wasn't that great?' she says. ‘You're a natural!'

‘You remind me of Lara when she was your age,' says her dad. ‘You look very relaxed.'

‘How old are you?' I ask Lara.

‘Fourteen,' she says.

That's a year older than Rhys. Lara is only three years older than me. Three years ago I was eight. When I was eight I couldn't imagine being eleven, I thought I would never be that old. But now I am eleven and so I bet I would think the same thing when I'm fourteen. And I wouldn't be ready to die. But maybe I would never be ready to die. Why would you want to die? When you die you go in the ground or get burned into ash.

‘We'd better go, Dad,' says Lara. ‘I have to get back to the hospital.'

Tim says, ‘I'll give you girls a lift.'

‘You don't have to,' says Lara. ‘I can call a taxi.'

‘Of course I will,' he says. ‘I'll just get Dan to take care of Buttercup.' He yells, ‘Dan!' and a man wearing very dirty overalls appears from around the corner of the house. ‘Look after Buttercup and Finnigan for me, will you?'

‘Just let me say goodbye,' says Lara.

She reaches up to pat Finnigan on the nose again and he bends his face down towards hers. Does he know too?

Lara falls asleep in the car on the way back to the hospital, so it is just me and Lara's dad who are awake.

‘What year are you in?' Tim asks me.

‘Grade 5,' I say.

We don't have much else to say to each other. I look out the window and think about being dead. I think about Lara being dead, and my mum and Dad Ben and Rhys and Mr Parks and Angel. It will happen to all of us.

We arrive back at the hospital just in time, at a quarter to three. Tim says he won't come in. Lara is still asleep. She doesn't even wake up when her dad picks her up and puts her in the wheelchair. I take Lara back to her room. We leave muddy wheel tracks on the white floor.

When we get to Lara's room she is very still. Actually, she is not moving at all. Has it happened?

I shake the wheelchair. ‘Lara!' I say.

She wakes up. ‘What?'

‘We're back.'

‘Good.' She moves a bit like she's uncomfortable. ‘Can you get one of the nurses? I need to get into bed.'

I press the buzzer and the nurse Cecilia comes in.

‘I have to go,' I say. It is five minutes to three.

‘Don't forget your parcel,' says Lara.

I pick up Morgan's present and stuff it up my jumper so Mum won't see it.

‘Thanks for everything, Stevie!' calls Lara, but I am already out the door.

I make it to the entrance of McDonald's just before three o'clock. I hope Mum hasn't already parked and gone inside because then she will find out it's not really Morgan's birthday. But then I see our car coming around the corner. Mum pulls up in front of McDonald's and I get in.

‘How was it?' she asks.

‘Fine,' I say.

‘It's a long time to spend at McDonald's.'

‘There were games and stuff,' I say. ‘In the park after.'

‘Did you win a prize?'

‘Yes, but I ate it.'

That night I do a drawing. I use a lot of black pencil, but I don't care about that now. Finnigan is a great horse, and Buttercup was a nice pony. But what's the point of having a horse if you're going to die? Though everyone is going to die anyway. I am going to die. Maybe not for a few years, but it will happen. So what's the point of me ever having a horse?

My chest starts to feel tight and I can't breathe properly again. I lie on the bed and curl up my legs.

There is a knock on my door. It's Mum, come to say goodnight. I don't look up.

She lies down beside me and hugs me. ‘Stevie, what's wrong?' she asks.

Mum is warm. I want to relax and feel safe but I can't.

‘You can tell me,' she says.

‘It's nothing,' I say. I can't tell Mum about it. I don't want to remind her that she's going to die, and that there's nothing we can do about it, and there's no point to anything, and there's nothing we can do to stop it.

I get up and put on my pyjamas and then get into bed.

Mum is standing beside my chest of drawers. The present for Morgan is sitting right there but she doesn't seem to notice.

Mum says, ‘Do you want the light off?'

‘No thanks.'

Rhys calls out for Mum.

‘Coming, love,' shouts Mum. ‘Sleep well, Stevie.'

I lie on the bed with the light still on. I don't want to be in the dark.

I wonder if Lara is scared when she goes to sleep that she won't wake up.

13

Sleep

It is time to get up, but I don't want to. I couldn't sleep last night, just like the night before, just like every night since we went to visit Finnigan. I only got sleepy when the sun started to come up and then it was too late. I don't want to go to school. I should be allowed to stay home like Rhys.

Mum comes into my room. ‘Stevie, what are you still doing in bed?'

I roll over and don't say anything.

‘Are you sick?'

‘I'm tired. I don't want to get up.'

‘Well, I don't want to go to work either, but here I am wearing a bottle-green polo shirt, and it's not because I think it looks good. Get up.'

Mum pulls back the covers. I sit up.

‘For heaven's sake, Stevie, get moving or you won't have time for breakfast.'

‘I'm too tired.'

‘Okay. I'll help you.' Mum goes over to my drawers and gets out a shirt and a pair of shorts.

‘I'm too tired to get dressed,' I say.

‘How can you be too tired to get dressed?'

‘I just am.'

‘I haven't dressed you since you were four and if I have to start again today, you will not enjoy it.'

I finally take off my pyjamas and put on the shirt she picked.

‘Hurry up,' says Mum as she leaves the room.

I have Fruit Loops for breakfast and that helps me wake up, but in the car to school I'm sleepy again. I wake up with a jolt when the car stops at school. My head hurts.

Mum looks at me. ‘Do you think you're getting sick?'

‘Maybe,' I say.

She puts her hand on my forehead. ‘You don't have a temperature.'

Everyone has a temperature; Mum means I don't have a
high
temperature.

‘I think we'll risk it,' says Mum. ‘If you feel bad, and I mean really bad, get them to call me at work.'

At the portable I am too tired to read or draw in my drawing journal. I sit on the bench and I shut my eyes.

‘Stevie!'

Morgan has arrived. I was almost asleep until she came along.

‘What?' I say.

‘I've thought of a new game! Even better than Kidnappers!'

‘What?'

‘Murderers. It will be super good. Instead of having a Kidnapper there'll be a Murderer and they have to kill someone and the person they kill has to pretend to be dead and then the Detective has to say who they think did it. And then we'll have a trial with a Judge and Jury and everything. And we can pretend to be the relatives of the dead person and be all crying and stuff.'

‘That sounds horrible.'

‘Yeah! It's heaps better than boring old Kidnappers.'

We do maths in the morning. Mr Parks frowns when he marks my sheet. I got half the questions wrong. He sends me back to my desk to try again. No-one else has to try again. I can't be bothered. I start to draw a horse in the margin of my maths book until I remember there's no point.

Mr Parks comes over and asks me if I'm feeling okay. It's no use saying that I'm sick. Mum won't come and pick me up unless I vomit or something. Mum has only just managed to go back to work at the deli because her friend, Brenda, can look after Rhys during the day now.

At recess I want to sit and eat my muesli bar in peace but Morgan won't stop going on and on about her stupid new game.

‘We need at least eight people to play,' she says. ‘We need a Murderer, a Judge, a Detective and then five other people to be the Potential Victims and Jury.'

‘If you say so.'

‘Let's go ask Teegan and that if they want to play.'

‘I thought you didn't like Teegan?'

‘She's okay.'

‘I don't want to,' I say.

‘Why not?'

‘I just don't want to.'

‘You only ever want to play Teegan's games.'

‘No I don't.'

‘Yes you do. This is typical.'

‘It is not.'

‘Then why won't you play? Murderers is a heaps better game than Kidnappers. Someone will actually die.'

‘Why do we need to play a game about that? People die all the time, you know.'

‘I know.'

‘You're going to die.'

‘I know.'

But she doesn't or she wouldn't be happy and thinking about games.

‘Well, you can go and ask people,' I say. ‘I don't want to.'

‘I don't want to anymore either. You've kind of ruined it for me.'

Morgan is in a huff again.

I lie down on the bench and close my eyes but I can't go to sleep here. What if I snored or rolled off the bench?

‘Don't!' says Morgan as something lands on my face.

I sit straight up and brush my face. April is standing next to me with a handful of bark chips.

‘I just wanted to check you weren't dead,' says April. ‘What are you doing anyway? Were you asleep?'

‘I was just resting.'

‘That's so weird,' says April.

‘She's allowed,' says Morgan. ‘Leave us alone.'

For tea that night we have fish on rice but with potatoes instead of rice.

Rhys is feeling a lot better and he is eating too, but only potatoes with tomato sauce. He is going on and on about how he wants to buy a new bike. Mum says we can't afford it.

Then suddenly I hear Rhys laughing and Mum is patting my shoulder saying, ‘Stevie, Stevie'.

I sit up straight with a jolt. I must have fallen asleep.

‘I think you need an early night tonight, Stevie.'

‘No I don't,' I say. I can never sleep anyway.

After tea it is my turn to do the dishes but Mum says I don't have to. She tells me to go and put my pyjamas on and she'll come and say goodnight.

Maybe if I get into bed really quickly I can get to sleep before it gets dark.

I run down the corridor. I do my teeth in a rush and then put on my pyjamas. I am in bed in record time. The sun has already gone down but it's not completely dark yet. I probably only have fifteen minutes to get to sleep before it is officially night-time.

‘Mum,' I call. ‘I'm ready.'

But then Rhys also yells out, ‘Mum!'

Mum goes to Rhys.

I need to go to the toilet anyway, so I walk down the corridor past Rhys's room. Mum is standing beside Rhys, who is sitting on his bed. His motorbike savings jar is on the bed with coins spread out around it.

I stand in the doorway.

‘There's only five dollars here,' Rhys says.

‘Well, how much did you think you had?' says Mum.

‘I know I had at least forty dollars. I counted it before I went to hospital.'

‘What do you need the money for anyway?' I ask.

‘For my bike.'

‘Forty dollars isn't enough for a bike,' I say.

‘That's not the point. I was saving up,' he says.

‘He can't ride a bike anyway,' I say to Mum. ‘He's always tired.'

‘That's enough, Stevie,' says Mum. ‘Rhys, are you sure you didn't buy something else? Like some magazines or something? I did find some magazines in here that I didn't know you had.' Mum turns to me. ‘Stevie, go back to your room.'

I go to the toilet and then I sit on my bed in my room. It is dark now and I will never get to sleep.

I can hear Rhys talking to Mum, but I can't hear what they're saying. I'm sure he's just going on and on about the stupid money. I don't even want it anymore. Forty dollars isn't enough for a bike so it's definitely not enough for a horse and anyway, what's the point of having a horse? The horse would go and die one day and I would die too.

Mum is not coming to say goodnight. She has forgotten about me. I get into bed and close my eyes.

I open my eyes and it is bright sunshine so I must have gone to sleep after all.

I am hungry. I will have Nutri-Grain for breakfast.

In the kitchen there is just enough Nutri-Grain for one person. Lucky. I get out a bowl and pour in the cereal. There are just dusty bits left so I put the packet in the bin and the box in the recycling.

‘How are you this morning?' asks Mum.

‘Fine,' I say. I pour some milk on my Nutri-Grain.

‘Did you have a good sleep?'

‘Yes.'

I sit at the table and Mum sits down beside me.

‘Stevie?' she says.

‘Yes?'

‘You know Rhys's money box?'

‘Yes.'

‘I think some of his money has gone missing.'

‘I know.'

‘And I want you to be honest with me.'

‘Okay,' I say.

‘Did you take the money?'

‘No!'

‘Well, maybe there's been a mistake.' Mum gets up and turns the kettle on. Then she says, ‘Unless David . . .'

‘Unless David what?'

‘Nothing.'

‘Do you think David took it?'

‘No. Of course not. He's Rhys's friend.'

I eat my cereal. It has gone a bit soggy but it is not too bad.

After school I have to go speak to Sandra again.

‘What's this picture about?' she asks. She is pointing at the drawing I did with all the black and purple.

‘It's just some horses.'

‘But why have you scribbled all over it?'

‘Felt like it.'

Sandra asks me what's been happening at school. I tell her about Kidnappers and the suffragettes and Grandparents and Friends Day. She is very interested in Grandparents and Friends Day. She asks me who my friends are taking and how I feel about not having a Grandparent.

Mum comes in at the end and we all talk about who I could invite to Grandparents and Friends Day. Aunty Janet would be good but she probably wouldn't be able to get time off from school because she is a teacher. I could ask Brenda but she is more Mum's friend than mine.

Mum calls Dad Ben when we get home. She goes into her room and shuts the door. Then Mum brings the phone to me in my room.

‘Guess what?' says Dad Ben.

‘What?' I say, because I can never guess what Dad Ben will say next.

‘I'm coming to Grandparents and Friends Day!'

‘Really?' I say.

‘Really.'

‘But don't you have to work?'

‘I've saved a bit of money. I wouldn't miss it. Anyway, I was thinking I should head back down your way. I would have come sooner but your mum . . . well, she's had a lot on.'

I won't have trouble sleeping if Dad Ben is here. I can't wait.