The Beauty Is in the Walking (16 page)

That did it. The twin ‘p' sounds shot bubbles free from my lips.

I turned towards Chloe, to see whether she'd noticed, and found her shocked, right enough, although not at my lip-lapse. It was the look in her eyes more than anything Svenson might have said that made me limp away at warp speed, aware for the first time that we'd been standing in the mugball court. Just the place for a bit of argie-bargie, I decided. There wasn't a mark on me, but I felt as battered and bruised as if I'd ridden on Dan's back after all.

I was too stirred up to worry about going the long way round behind the library. There were still kids in the quad between me and the gate, milling in loose circles, laughing, so light with relief they might have floated away. To avoid them I detoured via the picnic table where my group had met so often. Only too late did I discover they'd gathered for a nostalgic farewell, two on one side, two on the other, making me wonder if there'd ever been room for me at that table. All I could do was stop, turn aside, find another way. Dan and Bec had their backs to me, but Amy caught sight of me. Stared. If she'd whispered to the
others,
Oh shit, there's Jacob
, the others would have turned, so when they didn't I knew she wanted me to vanish as much as I wished I'd gone a different way. Well, we both got our wishes, didn't we?

I backtracked into the quad where my classmates recounted the exam or plans for Schoolies, more likely, or remembered teachers' antics from last week or last term, or maybe they were simply dusting off twelve years of school. Despite what I'd said to Svenson I didn't know if I was one of them and they seemed content to peer straight through me. Would I have stopped even if a voice had called me over?

I escaped through the school gate at last and made for town and in my unhappy imagination the townsfolk seemed to turn away from me here, as well. Had they heard about the Facebook page? Whenever I saw two heads dipped together in conversation I worried they were saying,
That O'Leary boy's been saying things
.

I'd planned to walk home, proudly, with my new cane to add a little swagger, but seeing Amy had drained the pride I'd need to carry it off and those turned-away faces evaporated what was left. When a twinge in my back warned me against more heroics I retreated to Merediths, hoping Mum would drive me home. She was busy with a customer, though, and I had to wait in the same empty chair near the door, this time without the glow of victory.

I replayed my rant at Svenson and especially the stunned look on Chloe's face. I'd lost a friend, there.
Bloody idiot, just when I was really starting to like her. Not that it mattered, of course. Once she was gone from Palmerston I wouldn't see her again.

Only that morning I'd decided to stay and now I'd cut myself off from everything that made me part of my home town. Sitting in that chair, wearing my CP like a shroud of eternal childhood, I was utterly alone.

For three days I barely left the house. I wouldn't let myself think about Amy and did anyway. The scene in her bedroom seemed on permanent loop in my mind until I imagined ghoulish ways to cut open my head and take it out with my bare hands. I'd hoped for so much out of the two of us together. Time and again through those three days I'd sit on the edge of my bed with phone in hand and her number on screen, daring myself. I'd say how sorry I was for being clumsy, sorry I'd even tried to kiss her. I just wanted things to be the way they'd been.

Boredom began to crust on my skin like barnacles. I found myself wondering what course Chloe would choose for next year and turned it into a little game using the websites she'd shown me before the first exam. Since my laptop was open, I logged into
Mahmoud Rais is Innocent
and checked the wall for new comments. There was nothing new to say, or maybe I just couldn't bring myself to say it. The third attack on the unfortunate horse near the sewage works had proved Mahmoud's innocence and I was done with getting out in front, anyway. I'd tried and fallen in a heap no different from my tumbles in the
school yard. I took down the page – the right thing to do, I assured myself, as I sat staring blankly at the final message saying it was gone. So why did I feel like I'd killed off part of my soul?

Years ago, before I took any notice of such things, muck-up day at Palmerston High used to get ugly and the next morning there'd be graffiti, smashed windows, plants yanked out of the ground. I know because Tyke told me how things changed soon after he moved up from primary and since then the last day for Year Twelves had had kids dressed up as clowns, banners everywhere, pictures of the graduating class projected onto a big screen in the gym, tearful speeches, group hugs, the lot, and by midday the Seniors streamed out through the gate so high on memories they wouldn't dream of trashing the place. I'd seen it myself every November and now it was our turn, my turn – only I'd switched the day back into a muck-up, hadn't I?

When I arrived, a little late out of reluctance, the gym was decked out like a circus tent and the whole school was already seated, watching the slideshow of faces in respectful silence until a snapshot from the swimming carnival or the formal was tossed in among the portraits
for a laugh. I shuffled to a seat among kids I'd been friendly with for years without ever knowing them, kids I talked to between classes about nothing much. It wasn't where I wanted to be.

About to sit down, I spotted Mitch three rows back and halfway across the gym. He was signalling to me, not quite a wave, but he was sitting up deliberately as though he'd been watching for me while Amy and Bec and Dan stared ahead at the screen. He nodded to a spare seat near him in the same row.

I'd have joined them. No doubt about it. Once I saw Mitch calling me over I wanted to be with them the way a thirsty man craves water, but the amplified voice of Mrs Schwartz knocked me into the nearest seat and to get up again now, to move so obviously when the entire school had settled to silence, was impossible.

‘Students, our departing Seniors especially . . .' she began.

I stayed where I was. More than that, I told myself to enjoy the occasion. This was my last day of school – forever! The assembly and the parade afterwards, the speeches, the clowns – they were for me along with the rest. My other self seemed to listen and for a while it worked, especially when the band played the best of its repertoire.

Having the band play on graduation day was a tradition not so much for the music, but for how it ended. While echoes still played in the far corners of the gym, the band members got up out of their seats and began to hug
the Seniors among them. I'd seen the same thing last year and the years before and I never quite understood. Now I did. Those Seniors had played in the Palmerston High School band for the last time and no matter how much they'd enjoyed it, no matter how much they wanted to keep playing, their time was up. The lingering embraces had me fighting tears. I was a Senior. My time was up, too.

Sergeant Wallace sat in the front row. He had no kids at the school and he wasn't asked to speak. Just being there sent the warning he'd come to deliver: enjoy today, guys, but step over the line and I'll be waiting.

His uniform meant something else to me. Bloody Palmerston Case. If there'd been no Palmerston Case I wouldn't have got so puffed up and made my friends follow me up the steps of the police station to make gooses of themselves. I wouldn't have imagined I was something I wasn't and I'd be sitting in a different part of the gym, content to rub thighs with my secret girlfriend. If there'd been tears in my eyes they'd be from laughter and hope, not the sorry-for-myself loneliness I fell into for the rest of the morning. Bloody Palmerston Case, I repeated silently, letting the anger take hold of me. I should never have got involved. I shouldn't have cared the way I did. What good did it do, what difference did I make? By now everyone knew Mahmoud hadn't slashed those animals and not because of anything I'd done.

I fought this anger for the rest of the ceremony and the parade that followed, which ended among the teachers so
we could say goodbye. Another reason to be furious with myself. Anger was a wall I was putting up just to get me through the day, because once it was over and we were free to go, it came tumbling down and I felt exposed, vulnerable again and so alone. I'd pissed them all off, hadn't I? Amy, Dan, even Mitch, despite his gesture in the gym. I had Mum, of course. I'd always have Mum, but I needed more than her. Even Svenson. Seeing him avoid me while the teachers waved us off through the gate completed my isolation.

I watched the able bodies stride off down the street, noisy and as happy as they were ever likely to be. I'd never envied a bunch of kids so much in my life, not for their easy walks, but because they could enjoy this day while I had given up pretending that I could.

When only stragglers like me remained I moved off. Whether I was going to Meredith Street or straight home, the direction remained the same.

On the main road, a car passed me, arms and heads protruding, waving and hooting. I raised my walking stick and waggled it above my head, drawing louder cheers. Yes, sir, my cane was a hit. When they were gone I slashed at the gravel with it, sending grit and stones flying savagely and almost knocking myself off balance.

‘Dickhead,' I sneered at myself. ‘If you hadn't mucked it up, you could be hooning like that with the others instead of walking home by yourself.'

I wedged the cane under my hand to take my weight and thought of the agony in my back after the long walk
from Kibble's paddock. How much easier would that walk have been with this cane? The Palmerston Case again. It seemed threaded through my life now – a piece of clothing I couldn't take off.

Another car had rounded the corner from the school, something big judging by the growl of the engine. I didn't turn, waiting instead for the excited stabs at the horn and the cheers and the pretense I would repeat with my cane. But the engine slowed and I heard the crackle and pop of gravel under its tyres as it coasted to a halt beside me. It was Mitch in his father's Landcruiser with Marissa his new girlfriend in the passenger seat.

‘You want a ride, Jacob?' he called, pulling himself forwards so he could see past her.

I checked the back seat, already knowing who I would find. Dan and Bec with Amy on the far side, watching me sheepishly and hoping it didn't look that way.

Then she smiled, an open, friendly smile matched by the others and in an instant I was back in the gym watching those band kids hug in farewell and aware of tears welling treacherously under my eyes. It wasn't just Mitch, then; they were all inviting me back into the fold, on the last day of school, the best day of school. Like so many times before we'd squeeze four across the back seat and Sergeant Wallace could go stuff himself. Walking sticks didn't seem to matter anymore. I passed mine to Dan through the window, expecting him to open the door.

But once he had hold of the cane, he turned and called, ‘I've got it. Drive on, Mitch.'

Nothing happened, not right away. I thought it was a joke and, of course, it was, whichever way you looked at it.

‘Drive on,' Dan said again and this time the smile dropped away from his face. He was staring out at me through the window when he said it a third time, more sharply.

Mitch had flopped back in his seat where I couldn't read his face, but he was reluctant. I was certain of that.

‘Go, go!' Dan called, this time an insistent command.

Mitch shifted the Landcruiser into gear and rolled it forwards while Dan went on eyeballing me, his face as hard as the rocks in Kibble's paddock.

For a few moments I could hear Amy and Bec calling for Mitch to stop even as they squealed and laughed. It was a joke, right, and jokes deserved to be laughed at. But the Landcruiser didn't stop.

I watched it slowly pick up speed, aware of myself alone on the roadside and too stunned to believe they would do this to me. Not even Svenson could come up with the word for how I felt.

Down the street, the Landcruiser began to turn, a big U-turn I saw as I stood unmoved. Mitch accelerated until he had passed me on the other side of the road then turned again and let the heavy four-wheel drive roll up beside me.

The girls were laughing openly now. Not at me. It was the laughter of relief because they hadn't been part of something cruel after all.

‘We weren't really going to leave you behind,' Amy
called, her voice washing over the others as the words fought their way out to me.

Dan opened the door. ‘Sorry, mate. Just a little joke. Couldn't help myself. Get in.'

Yeah, good one, Dan. I could see the funny side. Last day of school – a time for pranks – and when your mates made you the victim it was proof they really cared about you. That was how it worked, wasn't it, only I'd seen something different in Dan's face as they drove off. He'd been marking his territory like he always did.

I stood staring into the Landcruiser, at Mitch turned awkwardly in his seat so he could see me, at Dan ready to step out so I could shove in beside Bec, and at Amy on the far side smiling like nothing had ever been said between us. Inside the car things were as they had always been and if I climbed in now my life would go on that way. They were offering me the space I used to take up, which wasn't much, after all.

‘No, thanks anyway. Think I'll walk home.'

I spoke without the anger that had taunted me all morning. There was no edge of defiance in what I'd said either, no in-your-face refusal, no triumph. The opposite, in fact. I simply didn't want to get in the car, and knowing that left me hollowed out so completely it was a wonder I didn't blow over in the breeze.

I expected them to shrug and drive off with a wave, but friendships die harder than that.

‘Don't be a dill, Jacob. It was just a joke,' said Mitch from the front seat.

‘Yeah, you can't take things seriously on muck-up day,' added Amy from deep inside the car. The smile on her face was forced.

‘I need my stick,' I said to Dan and held out my hand.

‘Oh, come on. Get in the car,' Bec moaned in exasperation.

‘Yeah, walking hurts your back, anyway.' That was Amy again.

I didn't look at her. It was Dan's face I stared into. The hardness that lived so close beneath his skin had already broken through, all the pretending swept away. A harsh world lived in that face, one that had come looking for me at last, one I'd have to get used to. My arm remained outstretched between us, but he made no move to return my cane.

He closed the door to announce a lift was no longer on offer.

‘My stick,' I said again.

Dan showed the wolf's head in the open window. I took a step closer, but when my fingers were almost touching, he tugged the cane down out of reach. The oldest tease in the book.

Don't let him do this to you, I told myself. I'd walked all my life without a cane until Chloe cared enough to search one out for me. If my mother was here she'd tell Dan to break it in two. I could turn away and end his fun in an instant, could even pretend it was a victory. But it wouldn't be a victory and Dan would know it as much as I would.

I liked walking with the cane and not just because it kept me steady; it had style, it drew the eye of strangers away from my legs and my limp and turned me into something different in their eyes. In my eyes! It made me happy to hold it in my hand. I wanted that stick back because it was me.

I shuffled back a step from the window and held out my hand.

Dan showed the head of the stick as he had done before, but when I didn't take the bait a second time he fed half of the cane through the window, leaving a gap between the wolf's head and my outstretched hand.

I wasn't falling for that either. He would always be faster than me. I'd lost that game on the day I was born.

‘Give me the stick, Dan,' I said calmly, for despite the tension that steadily grew between us, I
was
calm.

Did Dan sense as much? He was certainly disappointed I wouldn't play his game, but if I'd hoped to glimpse doubt in his face, he quickly set me straight with a glare as muscular as his grip on my walking stick.

‘Cut it out, you two,' Mitch called. ‘Give him back his bloody stick, would you, Dan, and Jacob, get in the bloody car!'

‘Yeah, today's for fun,' said Bec through tightened lips that suggested she wasn't having much fun at that moment. ‘Come with us, Jake. Dan's just being a dick.' She whacked him on the shoulder. ‘Get in the car and he'll let you have your stick back.'

Bec's words stirred that discomforting emotion I'd come to name restlessness. He'd
let
me have the cane. Was that what bugged me? No, it was more than that. I found myself thinking of Mahmoud. I hadn't been able to explain why I got involved and I still couldn't explain it now, but I wasn't getting in that car and they weren't leaving with my walking stick.

I stepped up to the door and, of course, Dan withdrew the cane, as I expected him to. Slowly, deliberately, I extended my hand through the window. He made no effort to move the cane out of reach, but when my hand closed over the wolf's head, he tensed and wouldn't let it budge. Our eyes hadn't lost contact since I'd demanded my cane back, although how long that had been I couldn't tell. A lot more than words had passed between us and we weren't finished yet.

In one respect I was no closer to retrieving my stick and yet I was utterly sure I would get it. Maybe that showed in my face. I kept up a gentle pressure, knowing the more force I used the more he would resist me. It wasn't that kind of strength I needed. I met Dan's gaze with everything I had until the wolf's head edged towards me, a few centimetres.

I wasn't fooled. I'd learned not to trust people as I once did. The hard world again. My eyes remained locked on Dan's so completely I couldn't tell if the expression on his face had changed. The cane kept moving, though, and I kept drawing it towards myself, content to let it come slowly and ready for whatever trick he might play. When it
was halfway towards me, he stopped its progress to show that he could. Fine, I said to myself. Play all the childish games you want, but the stick will be mine when you're finished.