Stay Well Soon (7 page)

‘Do you want to do a drawing?' I ask.

I get out my pencils and we both draw. I draw what I think Cinnamon would look like.

‘We'll just have to think of something else,' says Lara. ‘We'll get you a horse somehow.'

Lara draws a picture of Finnigan.

‘Do you miss him?' I ask.

‘Every day.'

Maybe it is even harder to have had a horse, and lost it, than to have never had one at all.

When we pull into the driveway at home, Mum says, ‘Do you want to get the mail, Stevie?'

I jump out of the car and go to the box. There's a parcel! I look at the back. It's from Dad Ben.

I run into the house.

‘There's a parcel from Dad Ben!' I say.

‘Oh, right,' says Mum. ‘He said he was going to send a present for Rhys.'

I am not interested in the parcel now. I put it on the kitchen table and go to my room.

Mum comes to my door, ‘It's addressed to all of us,' she says. ‘Why don't you open it?'

The parcel is a big white envelope with bubble wrap on the inside. There is lots of sticky tape holding it together so it is quite difficult to rip open. In the end, I have to use my craft scissors.

I tip the wrapped presents out on the bed. There are three of them.

One of the presents has an envelope stuck on it that says
Rhys
, but there is another present that says
Miranda
and one that says
Stevie
.

My present is a rectangular shape, and it rattles, so it's not a book. I take off the paper carefully so I can use it again. It is a new set of pencils – really good pencils.

‘Hey,' says Mum. ‘Don't be greedy – read the card.'

I open the envelope. There is a postcard with a picture of a group of wild mustangs. The postcard says,
So you can keep drawing wonderful horses like these. From your Dad Ben.

I am going to draw a horse for Lara.

I take my new pencils to school to show Morgan. She says her cousin had some like that and now her cousin is at the Victorian College of the Arts.

Morgan wants to have a go, and I let her. Morgan draws a cat and she presses really hard. The black pencil will need to be sharpened again. My pencils were so perfect and new yesterday and now they're already being used up.

At the end of the day Mr Parks says he has an important announcement to make. Everyone in the class starts trying to guess what the announcement is, which is stupid because Mr Parks won't tell us until everyone is quiet, so if we want to know what the announcement is, then we should be quiet.

Brianna starts shushing and eventually we are quiet again. Mr Parks says we are going to have a Grandparents and Friends Day. Everyone in the school will bring a Grandparent or Friend to school so they can see what we've been working on and buy things from our craft stall.

People start talking about who they're going to bring.

Mr Parks is standing up the front of the room being very still except for his eyebrows, which are going up and down. That means he wants us to be quiet.

Brianna starts shushing again.

Brendan James says, ‘All my grandparents are dead,' just as the room goes quiet, so everyone hears him really loudly.

I don't know why, but it is really funny. We all laugh, even though it is not funny for Brendan.

Mr Parks yells. Mr Parks says it seems like we can't handle the pressure of Grandparents and Friends Day so maybe he will call the whole thing off. He says, ‘Can you behave sensibly about Grandparents and Friends Day?'

We all say, ‘Yes.'

Mr Parks seems satisfied with that. He tells us that the theme of the day is Australian history. We are all going to do a history project and present it to the Grandparents and Friends.

April says, ‘Can we choose our own topics?'

Brendan says, ‘Are we working in groups?'

Teegan says, ‘Can I do bushrangers because I'm related to Ned Kelly?'

Mr Parks says that calling out is exactly the sort of thing that would make him cancel the whole day because he would be embarrassed if the Grandparents and Friends had to witness that kind of behaviour.

He looks up at the ceiling and says
, ‘Will this day never end?'

Finally, when everyone is quiet, Mr Parks tells us about the history project. We have to work in pairs. Luckily, we are allowed to pick our own pairs. Last term we did a school project and we weren't allowed to pick our own pairs. And even worse, we were all paired up boys with girls. I had to do a project on koalas with Julian. He can't even do bubble writing so I practically had to do the whole poster myself.

Morgan looks at me and I nod. We are a pair.

The bad thing is that we can't choose our own topics, we have to do the ones Mr Parks has picked. Only one pair can do each topic so Mr Parks is going to draw our names from a hat to decide who gets to pick their topic first.

Mr Parks writes the topics on the board and we have five minutes to work out our pairs and decide what we'd like to do.

Morgan and I decide on our order of favourites: World War II first, obviously, because it was so tragic. Our next choice is the First Fleet. Our final back-up choice is the Gold Rush because Morgan really likes Sovereign Hill.

April and Charlotte are pulled out of the hat first.

They choose World War II. April smiles at us. She knows we wanted that one.

Julian and Tim get to choose next. They pick the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. That is because Julian wants to go to the Olympics because he thinks he's a really fast runner.

Morgan and I wait and wait. Finally, there are two groups left and two topics: the Depression and the Suffragettes. They are the two most boring-sounding topics ever. Morgan and I look at each other. She mouths, ‘Depression', and I nod. At least I know what the Depression is, and maybe we could beg for money from the Grandparents and Friends.

Mr Parks pulls out the second-last pair: James and Deng.

James and Deng choose the Depression.

That means we have to do the suffragettes.

‘Noooo . . .' says Morgan, putting her head down on the desk.

‘Who even are the suffragettes?' I ask.

‘I hate history that's not about wars,' says Morgan. ‘How is it even important if nobody dies?'

‘If you don't settle down,' says Mr Parks, ‘I will take a marble out of the jar.'

We have worked too hard for those twenty-eight marbles to lose them now. But other people in the class won't shut up.

Mr Parks says he has had just about enough. He takes a marble out of the jar.

What a nightmare.

Lara is on one of the beanbags in the Kidz Space when I arrive after school. I sit down beside her.

‘I've drawn another horse,' I say. I show Lara the picture.

‘Wow, you're really improving,' says Lara.

‘It's for you,' I tell her.

Lara takes the picture. ‘Thank you so much! It's fantastic. I'll stick it up next to my bed.'

‘I've got new pencils,' I say. ‘Will you draw another one for me?'

‘Nah, I'm not in the mood for drawing horses today.'

I guess if you used to ride horses all the time, drawing them isn't as interesting. Maybe Lara is missing Finnigan again and it is too painful to think about horses.

‘Maybe I'll do a drawing of something else,' says Lara. ‘Can I borrow your pencils?'

I say yes, but I hope she doesn't press too hard.

Luckily, Lara's drawing is just a few lines and she doesn't do any shading. She draws the nurse who is sitting at the desk outside the Kidz Space. She draws her with a really big nose (the nurse's nose is big, but not that big) and a sticking-out forehead. It is very funny. The black pencil is even more used up, but this time it is worth it.

‘That's great!' I say. ‘Are you going to be an artist when you grow up?'

‘I doubt it, I'm not good enough. I wanted to be a vet.'

‘Me too!' I say. Actually, I want to be a vet and a horse breeder and a chemist. ‘Are you still going to be a vet?' I ask.

‘Nah.'

‘Why not?'

‘Just can't see it happening. How was your day anyway?' asks Lara.

‘
A nightmare
,' I say.

‘Why?' she asks.

‘We have to do history projects.'

‘Don't you like history?'

‘I love it. But me and Morgan got the worst topic.'

‘What's the topic?'

‘The suffragettes.'

‘But that's great!' she says.

‘Is it? I don't even know what it means.'

Lara sits forward in the beanbag. ‘The suffragettes were brilliant. They fought for women's rights. Can you believe that a hundred years ago women weren't allowed to own a house or vote or have a job after they were married?'

I shake my head.

‘It was so unfair. Anyway, the suffragettes were
awesome
ladies. Some of them went to jail and went on hunger strikes.'

Lara lets me borrow her iPad to look up
suffragette
on the internet. She is right, they are very interesting. Some of them even died. Fighting for women's rights was like a kind of war. I can't wait to tell Morgan.

When I arrive at school the next day I hurry over to Morgan, who is sitting on the bench. ‘I found out about the suffragettes!' I say.

At the same time Morgan is saying, ‘It turns out the suffragettes are great!'

We are both excited to tell each other about it.

‘They went on hunger strikes!'

‘They were force-fed!'

‘One of them was trampled by a horse!'

‘They were in
Mary Poppins
!' says Morgan.

‘What?!' I say. I used to love that film when I was little.

‘You know the first song, where the lady marches around with a sash? She's a suffragette.'

‘Oh. I just thought she was mad.'

We both can't believe that women weren't allowed to vote. It is so wrong. Morgan says just thinking about it makes her angry.

When we go into class we do silent reading first thing, but we get no marbles in the jar because of Brendan James's silly behaviour with a pencil sharpener. After silent reading Mr Parks gives us time to work on our history projects.

Morgan and I are very busy doing internet research. There are so many interesting websites. Unfortunately, it turns out that the Australian suffragettes didn't throw bombs or go to jail. They wrote letters and signed petitions.

Morgan says we could get everyone in the school to sign our petition for women's rights and then chain ourselves to the basketball ring. We'll see.

Charlotte and April are using the computer next to us. They are not even researching the Second World War like they are supposed to. They're looking at saddles. The saddle on the screen costs $879! I don't even know if Mum earns that much in a year.

Morgan says, ‘Stevie, have you finished reading this page?'

‘No,' I admit.

‘Stop daydreaming,' she says. ‘We have work to do.'

‘We've got heaps of time.'

‘Don't argue. There's only a few weeks to go.'

‘Okay, okay.'

‘We could work on the project on the weekend,' Morgan suggests.

‘I guess so,' I say.

‘Could I come to your house?' asks Morgan.

I don't say anything.

‘Or you could come to my house again?' she says.

‘Okay. Can your dad pick me up though?'

‘Sure.'

This will be better. Morgan would have too many questions if she came to my house.

After school I am back at the hospital as usual. When the lift doors open I start to walk towards the Kidz Space but Mum calls me back.

‘Where do you think you're going?' she asks.

‘To the Kidz Space,' I say.

‘Forget it. We're here to visit your brother, you know. I'm sick of you running off.'

So I have to sit in the room with Rhys. He eats some custard. I don't get any. Mum says Rhys has to have an operation, so the custard will be the last thing he eats all day and he can't have breakfast tomorrow morning. I would be starving if that happened to me.

‘Why is Rhys having an operation?' I ask Mum.

‘To make him better.'

I've never had an operation. I would not like to have people cutting into me, even if I was asleep. I wonder if Rhys is scared but I don't want to ask him in case Mum gets mad.

I try to use the time productively, thinking of ideas to get money for a horse and horse equipment. But I can't think of any.

On Saturday we meet Morgan and her dad in the supermarket car park. Morgan's dad says it is no trouble because he always comes into town on Saturday morning.

Morgan and I talk about the suffragette poster all the way to her house. The poster will be purple, green and white because the suffragettes really liked those colours. I have brought my new pencils. There are six shades of purple and eight shades of green. That should be enough.

At Morgan's house we spread out on the red rug in her bedroom. I can see under her bed where she keeps all her shoes. We have already decided that we will have three sections on our poster: ‘Who were the suffragettes?', ‘Australian suffragettes' and ‘Achievements'.

Morgan is typing up some information on her dad's laptop while I draw the headings on the poster with my pencils.

I sharpen the black pencil. Then I draw a big black umbrella to symbolise Mary Poppins. After I've finished shading it I have to sharpen the black pencil again. The black pencil is going to be used up ages before all the other pencils.

Morgan's dad comes in to tell us that lunch is ready.

‘That is great work, girls!' he says, looking at our poster. ‘Your presentation is going to rock!'

On the way to the kitchen we go through the lounge room. The room is basically a building site with bits of wood everywhere and a ladder. Morgan tells me it is slow progress on the renovations and her mum is getting sick of it.