Wildlife (20 page)

friday 16 november

Mum came to school, met me at the bus, and took me home. Biff has a long surgery scheduled and won’t
be home till dinnertime. We’re going out to our local Japanese, Japonica, where we go every Friday if we’re around and there’s nothing else on, and I’m looking forward to it. Gyoza and spicy tuna roll, it’s been too long.

So, the counselor’s happy… Mum said. Classy communicator, leads with an open-ended observation.

I live to serve.

Not that she can give us any details, of course, she said, slight increase of pressure.

Of course, I said.

Want to talk about it?

I shook my head.

She held my hand and smiled the tired-eyed smile of someone whose kid has had a very hard time.

More time has passed, and more time will pass, she whispered into my hair. It’s all I’ve got, Louie. Not much, but it’s the only thing that doesn’t feel like a lie or a platitude. I rested my head on her shoulder and breathed in the faint comforting smell of her Chanel Cristalle. Home. My mum. Understanding.

Harriet’s pregnant, she said. She looked at me in the assessing way: will it make me any sadder?

Harriet is/was Fred’s stepmother, Plan B, and she works in the history department at Melbourne University, right near where Mom works in the fine arts department.

Were she and the Gazelle trying before…?

They’ve been hoping for a few years, and they were just having the IVF discussion when it happened.

Poor Fred’s mum, I said. Because even though it is a happy thing, surely this might make her feel even more alone.

My mum nodded.

She put the kettle on for a cup of tea. She’d made my favorite orange cake, and soon I was in the shadow version of the old zone, making her laugh by telling her about Annie’s “literallys,” making her grimace with recognition over stories of the Sawtooth Spur on a windy day, making her jealous with descriptions of food that is so so so much better than it was in her day, and the work schedule that is so so so much slacker than it was in her day. (They had to chop their own wood for the boilers, or there’d be no hot water. So, quite a lot worse, really.)

You were right, I told her. It was the best thing to do. Different place, different people.

Back at school, brooding.

Having completely wimped out of the first “talk,” i.e., a full, mature, and unembarrassed discussion with Ben
about sex, should we, shouldn’t we, pros, cons, when should we, what are the alternatives—?

Without even discussing it properly
with myself
, I went with: okay, I seem to be having sex right now, yes, thanks very much; which means that I’m now in the horrible and perhaps illogical—though it feels right—position of having to have the no-more-sex-for-now-but-would-almost-certainly-like-to-be-heading-back-in-that-direction-again-soon-if-things-work-out-between-us-the-way-I-hope-they-do talk.

Is it just me who gets twisted into these tangles of my own construction?

And it’s kind of annoying that I am the one with the talk agenda in mind. Ben doesn’t seem to think we need any talking at all. What is it with boys that there’s so little hashing-over required?

He thinks it is sufficient that he looks at me with those clear, hungry eyes. And it is distracting and electrifying—which is enough in its own way—but it doesn’t get to the core of the discussion, which is—well, good question—but something like, what kind of relationship do we want together?

And I really don’t like some of his friends, and does that matter (a) significantly, it’s a deal-breaker, (b) sure, a little bit, or (c) relax, not at all?

“Training as soon as we get back, counting the days now,” said Billy Gardiner, when we were taking back our lunch trays today.

“Oars before whores, dude,” added Beeso.

“Yeah, man, back on the water,” said Ben, slotting his tray in, as though he couldn’t care less about the language.

I’ve bitten my tongue about this so many times I was ready to explode.

“That’s disgusting,” I said.

“It’s a joke.”

“It’s not funny.” I might have kind of yelled that.

“It’s just a play on ‘bros before hos,’ ” said Ben.

“I can’t believe you’re saying that as if you think it makes it better.”

“Lighten up, Sibs,” said Holly, adding to Ben, “Don’t worry, it’s time for her meds.”

Now I was being patronized in stereo?

“I’m not some nutcase. I’m the one being sane here.”

Michael heard this as he dumped his tray. “Taking drugs doesn’t make you a nutcase.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t mean you.” So everyone was looking at Michael.

“Thanks for that,” he said quietly, and wandered off. He does take medication from time to time. I didn’t mean to tell the whole world, but I was too angry with Ben to worry about that just then.

Michael will be fine. He’s always fundamentally fine, based on the convenient fact that he doesn’t care what people think. Lucky him. I wish I didn’t care that I always seem to be shooting myself in the foot in the popularity stakes.

As we reached the door, Ben tried to take my hand, but I pulled it back. “I left something in the house,” I lied.

He shrugged and headed off in the direction of the art room with Tiff, head shaking, and Holly, giving me the
bad girlfriend
look.

Holly loves being the conduit between me and Ben, smoothing things over, but I wish I didn’t need a mediator.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Beeso said as he walked off. “You’re not even hot.”

It’s a fair question, minus the gratuitous insult.

I am really sick of the people who need to tell me I’m unattractive. Somehow they feel duty-bound to put me down because I’ve been in that stupid advertisement. Surely my neon “self-esteem/appearance” sign is still visibly flickering on “below average.” Nothing has changed there.

Q: And who the hell
do
I think I am?

A: I have no idea.

monday 19 november

Hello, infernal one. It was so good being home for a few days, but it felt weirdly right to be returning to the mountains and Camp Endurance for the last three weeks of term.

It is as though only by leaving and returning could I
appreciate being here. The oldest travel cliché in the book. They don’t get to be clichés for nothing. And I did think about people when I was away from them, which I didn’t expect to do.

I wondered how Sibylla would be coping over the weekend; would she see her boy, or would all of Holly’s plotting and planning with Tiff mean something was cooked up to keep Sibylla out of the loop?

Would Eliza be able to run enough to satisfy her manic fitness requirements?

What must Annie’s family be like that she is who she is, wonderful and strange?

Would Pippa have been able to fit in all her beauty appointments and gourmet low-fat noshing?

And how would my one friend up here, Michael, have spent his three days? Was he able to restock on chess time with a worthy opponent? Restore his nine-letter-word puzzle levels? Was he able not to speak, and not get called up on it? Could he indulge all his fastidious food-that-looks-like-itself inclinations? Could he read at the table, with other family members all happily reading at the table, too?

Lovely long Skype with Dan yesterday, so good to talk to him. Estelle and Janie arrived right at the end. I promised Janie her film was nearly ready, but I have to get going with the edit.

Dan is so much older-looking. How does that happen with boys? It’s only a couple of months since our last Skype. And his voice is deeper. He walked me around his
host family’s house, and I said
bonjour
to Henri and his parents and his little brother.

We talked about Fred and missing him, and no one gave us encouraging reminders about “moving on.”

Dan told me about Paris, and I told him about mountain life. And I feel… happy, it’s true, when I think of seeing them in a month.

So, all in all I was feeling as close to okay as I’ve felt since it happened.

And this morning Michael gave me the most amazing thing. He had spent some of each day of exeat learning “Ode on a Grecian Urn” by Keats, to recite to me.

He learned a poem just for me.

This is the only quite-comforting poem I’ve read about dying young, he said by way of introducing the recitation. It’s not quite analogous; of course, he said apologetically when he finished. But the sentiment, the notion of someone being suspended, remembered at a point in time at which they were perfectly happy… to be able to remember someone at that point, always, might eventually be some kind of comfort. I hope so anyway, Louisa, he said. I am sorry to have made you cry.

He left me to be alone. And truly, it wasn’t that I particularly agreed with him about the comfort, because to me it is piteous, sad beyond imagining, that someone is forever suspended at a point in time, even if it was a happy one, and it was.

But the kindness of him doing that… the layered,
risky, painful, pleasant thoughtfulness of it quite overwhelmed me.

In fact, the only person in the world I can imagine devising such a complicated kindness is you, Fred.

So when I read “Ode on a Grecian Urn”…

Holly and I slip out of our house for a first-night-back reunion sandwich and catch up in the laundry/drying room. We had a wobbly start today, but I’d like our last three weeks of term to be fun.

I’ve barely plugged in the squasher and thrown together some Swiss cheese and bread when she starts.

“So—Ben told me all about it.”

“All about what?” I know Ben is true to his word. We agreed not to talk, and he wouldn’t.

“I used the oldest trick in the book, and he fell for it.” She is smiling, eyes shining. “I said you already told me everything, and so it was fine for him to talk—he wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know. Except that you did it twice. I didn’t know that.”

“You didn’t know anything.”

“I know how to improvise, though. I knew the sort of
thing you would say, if you still trusted our friendship. We used to tell each other everything.” She has the gall to get pouty and act as though she’s cross with me.

“I’ve never had that much to tell,” I say.

She looks nothing more than mischievous, as though great fun has been had by all.

“So you slept with Ben, and… how was it?”

I get a chill as I recognize the old Meggy MacGregor–doll look from way back: jealousy/hatred versus admiration/envy.

“You really think it’s okay to trick him into telling you? Now he thinks I’ve blabbed.”

“Listen, he didn’t mind who knew, he was just humoring you because you have such a bug up your arse about people knowing.”

“Did he say that?”

“Words to that effect.”

“He’s my boyfriend. Why do you always need to get involved? It’s like you want an equal share of his attention.”

“Whoa, don’t be so jealous. Guys hate that. Anyway, he’s my friend, too. I am allowed to talk to him. God, he needs someone to confide in; you’re so neurotic about letting him say anything up here.”

“I’m not neurotic. And I’m not jealous.” I’m lying. I am jealous. Maybe I am a clueless girlfriend, but I’m not prepared to job-share the role with Holly anymore.

As we make our stealthy way back to Bennett, it occurs to me to ask Holly exactly when this conversation with Ben happened. It was on the exeat weekend. While I was
bickering with Charlotte about what dinner
I
wanted for
my
special first night back home, and what DVD
I
wanted us to look at, Holly, Tiff, Ben, Vincent, Hugo, Hamish, and Laura had a big night out. They went to The Duke in St. Kilda to see Vincent’s brother’s band, Molière and the Bear.

“Did you think of inviting me?” I can’t help asking.

“You know you would have been more than welcome,” Holly assures me. “But I didn’t bother. Your mom never lets you do anything.”

“That’s not true.”

“Except go to lame-arse house parties. Only after she’s rung the parents.”

I feel as gutted as I would have at being left out of something at primary school. But this is all past tense, so it’s like flinching in response to being slapped days ago.

“Why are you doing this?” I hiss as we wiggle our way back through the panel behind the water heater and into Bennett House.

“What?” she wants to know, all innocence.

“Trying to come between me and Ben, trying to make me look bad.”

“I’m not—I mean, do you have a fake ID that I don’t know about?”

“No. But I can look eighteen.”

“Good luck with that one.” She rolls her eyes. “Of course, I’m not the sophisticated model.”

“Did Ben want me to come?” Gah! I’m so weak! Why am I asking her?

“He didn’t say, but I’m sure he would have. You’re in the middle of a major, passionate love affair,
n’est-ce pas
? Only you’ve made such a big deal about keeping it secret, no wonder he feels a little hurt.”

“Did he say that?”

“Just guessing. Plus, you’re all about being an independent woman, and not being a ‘girlfriend.’ ”

“I am, too, a girlfriend.”

“So maybe you’re sending mixed messages.” Holly shrugs.

Even though I’m annoyed with her, Ben didn’t
have
to go out with them. He was invited to my place any time he wanted to come over on the weekend, only he said he thought he should spend the time catching up with his own family. Or, as it turned out, doing whatever the hell else he wanted, but not bothering to include me, or even
tell
me.

It makes me feel mad at Holly, mad at Ben, mad at myself for caring, and mad at my mother for being so tight about me going to licensed places.

“You’re not mad, are you?” Holly knows me well enough to know that I am fuming. “I mean, poor guy—he deserves one night off the leash.”

“He’s not on a leash.”

“No, he didn’t act like he was.”