Over It (The Kiss Off #2) (5 page)

“No tension,” Mads said with a bright smile. Nikki raised her eyebrows, her obviously faux relaxed smile fooling no one, it seemed. She scoffed, and then glared at the containers of motor oil like they had personally insulted her.

“Seriously?” Hamish turned to me: “Is this how they always are?”

Oy, with the tough questions today.

“They’re not ‘always’ anything,” I said. “They’re not friends, but they should be, so here we are.”

I defied Little Miss ‘No Tension’ to contradict me. She didn’t.

“…Okay then,” Hamish said.

“I don’t know about you girls,” he said, “but I’m starving. Think they’ve got nachos?"

"I know where they are," Nikki said, with a pointed smile at Mads. "Come on, I'll show you."

If Mads's eyes had been a bow, the look she was shooting Nikki's back was filled with nothing but needle–sharp poisoned arrows. They didn’t seem to be very effective, though, as Nikki ignored every single one of them, took Hamish’s hand in hers and pulled him away.

Oh boy.

I grabbed Mads's wrist and hauled her toward the door. "We'll see you in the car!"

The idea of this being the best trip ever was becoming more and more of a pipe dream.

And we weren't even there yet.

Mads started singing to herself as I pulled her firmly toward the door. She sang loudly:

“
Goodbye,

You cheated on me,

But I’ll get even you see,

I’m telling you to JUST KISS OFF.”

Nikki glowered at Mads as we walked out.

Hamish looked over at us, confused.

When I got back in the car, my cell beeped with a new text from Ty. The
real
Ty:

Sorry about Gordo. He’s a bit of a prankster. I think he regrets messing with you thoug
h

Before I could reply, there was another text.

Sound check was horrendous, but I think it’ll be okay. Next up is interviews for the press junket. Ugh. Press day. Answering the same questions over and over and trying not to give the same answers every time. What’s Nikki doing there? Where’s Van? Even with the fighting, bet you’re having a much better time road tripping than me.

Somehow, I doubted it.

Munching on his nachos as he pulled the car back onto the highway, Hamish asked the question I was, to be honest, pretty surprised hadn't come up yet. "So Poppy, is it true you're like some famous internet celebrity?"

"No," I said, at the same time as Mads and Nikki said, "Yes."

"Semi–famous, a teeny–tiny bit famous," I said. "For like a second. I'm old news now."

"You wish," Mads said.

Yeah. I really did.

"...Right," Hamish said. "I get that. It’s not like famous people on the internet are… you know.
Actually
famous.”

It felt like an insult, but I wasn’t sure.

He continued: “So you wrote a song or something?"

"Yeah," I said. That was the gist of it. He didn't need to know about my now defunct YouTube channel. Or my internationally circulated sexting debacle. "Yep, I wrote a song."

"Not just
any
song," Nikki said. "
The
song. You've gotta know
The Kiss Off
, right? It was everywhere a couple of months ago. Still is, sorta, but their new one
Blades of the Sun
’s taken over."

I blinked a couple of times, not quite sure how I felt about Nikki chiming in so enthusiastically, considering she was the bitch–whore boyfriend stealer
in
the song. She was being a supportive friend, I guess?

"You're screwing with me, right?" Hamish said, glancing across at me. "You didn't write that."

I shrugged, a smile pulling at my lips.

"She did," Mads said, bouncing in her seat like a five–year–old, "she totally did."

Hamish looked at me for a long moment, almost 'Hamish get your eyes back on the road!' long. Though I couldn't tell what he was thinking as half his face was covered by his sunglasses.

"Huh," he said. "Fuck me.”

I didn’t quite know how to respond to that. It made me smile, though.

“That's good shit, cuz. I heard that at every party last semester. Every single one. And my little baby cuz wrote it? How did that happen?"

So, it seemed he was not surprised, but impressed–surprised. He ruffled my hair like a proud dad and I slapped his hand away. He'd pulled half of my hair loose from its pony tail so I yanked the elastic free and shook my blonde waves out where they sat in a mess to my shoulders. That pony had been really cute, too.

"And you're also seeing some seriously famous guy or something, right? That's what my sister said but I forget who."

"Just the lead singer from the band, that's all," Mads said, grinning from ear to ear.

"
You're
dating one of the guys from Academy of Lies?"

"Look at the road," I said.

"Academy of Lies?" Hamish said.

"Yep."

"Academy of Lies."

"They weren't 'Academy of Lies' then," I said, “they were just, you know. Academy of Lies.”

"They became 'Academy of Lies' because of Poppy," Nikki said.

"Nice work, Douglas." Hamish nodded his approval. "Respect. Do I get to meet them? Are we hanging out in the VIP lounge with champagne and caviar and stuff?"

"No," I said and any smile inside me vanished. "No. Because you're not hanging out with us, remember?"

"Oh come on."

"You've got your own friends," I said, "hang out with them."

"He can hang out with us, Poppy," Mads said quickly.

"Yeah, it's fine with me," Nikki added.

"Totally fine here, too," Mads said.

"Hear that?" Hamish said, giving me a smug smile. "It's totally fine. Thank you, girls."

I turned in my seat and looked at them both. I wanted to slap the sweet, angelic smiles off their faces. One at a time, I pointed my finger sharply at each of them.

And I meant it.

"So what's college like, Hamish?" Nikki asked.

His expression tensed for half a second before he smiled. "Insane," he said. "The parties are… well I don’t think I’ve been to one that hasn’t been broken up by the cops."

"Are they better than high school parties?" Mads asked.

"Uh,
yeah
," he said, "way better."

Like he'd know. Hamish had spent his high school years in his basement, building robots and rockets. Don't get me wrong, it was amazing seeing the robot he built from scratch walk around and follow voice prompts, and it was insanely impressive when his rocket blasted straight up through the clouds and practically into orbit, but none of this was cool to his high school party throwing peers. So he didn't get invited to any, at least not that I knew of.

“Though no party has ever topped the one at Wendell’s house in eighth grade when we filled his mom’s car with A–B foam because we thought it would be funny.”

“What’s A–B foam?” I asked. “What’s it do?”

“You don’t know A–B foam?” Hamish asked, surprised. “Polyurethane? It’s amazing stuff. Like shaving foam but it expands something like 25 times. The stuff filled the whole car and then set rock solid,” he said, smiling fondly at the memory. I exchanged glances with Mads and Nikki in the mirror. Mads bit her bottom lip, trying not to laugh.

“That’s pretty bad ass, Hamish,” I said with my best straight face.

Hamish was oblivious. “It was epic. Wendell was grounded for two months, of course, but it was worth it.”

With that, the party conversation ended. I guess they lost interest in hearing about cousin Hamish’s high school shenanigans. He was just too wild for them.

We all cheered when we drove over a rise and saw the ocean all the way to the horizon stretched out before us. The road wound around along the shore, past a couple of small strip malls packed with cars and pedestrians. Vacation homes, from shacks to mansions, lined the ocean drive toward Tallulah Bay. The beaches were packed with surfers and waders and sun bathers laying out on the beach. We drove past a beach volleyball match and some people playing touch football. Off in the distance on the ocean were half a dozen yachts lazing the day away, being circled by jet skis that were kicking up sea foam.

I buzzed the window down and everyone complained as the car flooded with heat, but I didn't care; I breathed in the salty, ocean air, enjoying the feel of it on my skin, no matter how hot it was.

For a minute, anyway. Then I buzzed the window back up and cranked the air up to max.

We cheered again a couple of miles later when a frangipani–decorated sign on the side of the road in a welcoming, cursive script announced:
Welcome to Tallulah Bay
. It was shortly followed by another advertising Bay Fest.

Each house – be it shacks, townhouses or blocks of condos – had at least two cars in the drive, or parked on the grassy strip by the curb. The closer we got to the festival area, side streets and parking lots, cafes and shops were filled to capacity and the sidewalk to the left of us and jetty on the right became thick with pedestrians, cyclists, rollerbladers and dog walkers strolling along on this most beautiful summer's day.

It seemed Bay Fest was very, very good for business. I couldn't believe so many people had arrived already, but I guess it made sense – the first acts took the stage tomorrow at noon.

The traffic slowed to a city rush hour pace. The traffic heading
into
Tallulah Bay, that is. If you were heading out of town to get away from the influx of music–loving city folk you had the road to yourself.

For a ways, as we rolled slowly through the main drag, Hamish followed the signs toward the camping ground, but considering the cars in front and behind us were filled to the brim with tent poles and pillows, he stopped looking out for signs and just followed the bumper in front instead.

After forty–five minutes of inching our way along the shoreline, the town was long behind us, beach houses were becoming scarcer and land opened up from front lawns, to empty lots, to fenced off fields in the process of filling with tents and camper vans. I breathed a sigh of relief as turn signals started flashing ahead of us and slowly, cars, minivans and trucks started turning in under a two–lane–wide metal arch pronouncing our arrival at
Tallie's Camping Ground
. A couple of men in orange high–visibility vests stood by the arch, directing arrivals.

"Finally," Nikki said, squirming in her seat.

As we all peered out the windows at anything and everything, Mads mumbled her agreement. I pulled a handful of paper that I'd secured together with a bulldog clip from my handbag, read through the booking receipt print out and flicked over to the map. I'd booked two sites and colored them in yellow highlighter on the map.

"We're on the right," I told Hamish. He nodded and rolled down his window when we reached the front of the queue of cars and a man in orange.

"Hellooo!" I said cheerily, leaning toward Hamish and the center console to peer up at the man.

His hair sprouted coarsely from his skull in graying tufts, his skin was leathery from years spent in the sun, and his smile was non–existent.

"You here for the festival?" he grumbled.

"Yep," Hamish said.

The man muttered something under his breath and sneered at us. My smile wavered. Guess he wasn't a fan of Bay Fest.

"Got your booking?"

"I do, it's right here," I said, waving the papers at him. Hamish swatted them out of his face. "Says here we're Row A, Sites 26 and 28 which are-"

All of a sudden the old guy reached through the window past Hamish and snatched them from my hands.

"Dude," Hamish said, “uncool.”

The old jerk held the booking sheet to his face, squinting at the print. With a grunt, he threw it back into the car, the pages fanning out and hitting me in the face. He Frisbee'd a parking permit at the dashboard and pointed his thumb to the first dirt track on the right, where a can't–miss–it sized sign proclaimed in block print
Row A, sites 1–30
.

"Over there," he said and stepped back from the car.

"Really?" Hamish said. "Over there?"

"Shut up and just drive," I muttered under my breath.

Hamish plastered a fake smile to his face and we rolled forward, gravel crunching under the tyres. "Thanks, mister," he said, "you have a great day."

We rolled slowly down Row A, carefully going past holiday–makers and festival–goers as they unpacked and set up their tents, stoked fire pits (in this heat?) and lounged in lawn chairs. We passed a shower and toilet block (
that
was a relief to see), and kids and dogs that ran around in hyperactive (unsupervised) circles and across the gravel and dirt track between the odd and even numbered sites; the track we just so happened to be driving down.

Hamish swore and leaned on the horn, flipping kids the bird until I grabbed his hand and put it back on the wheel.

"Do you have to be such an ass?"

"They’re in the road."

"This is us," Mads said, pointing to the patch of grass between two already erected tents. The site was split in the middle by a metal pole with an electricity socket in the bottom and a white metal placard that held nothing but the number
26.
Twenty feet further along was another pole, designating camp site 28.

We were here.

Hamish pulled the car in close beside the back of the tent in spot 30, and as we climbed stiffly out of the car, Mads and I had to manoeuvre around the empty beer cans, cigarette butts and chip packets that littered the grass.

The air was a good ten to twenty degrees cooler here than it had been at home, and on the balmy breeze I could hear waves crashing soothingly against the beach. It was so loud it sounded like it would only be a short walk through the trees and bushes behind our camp site.

“This is brilliant,” I said with a happy sigh. I stretched my arms out wide and bent forward, stretching out my calves and my back from the long trip. Peering past the tent next to us, I spotted half a dozen canvas camping chairs pulled up around an extinguished fire pit; a card table with a cooler underneath and a clothesline strung between two four–man tents which was heavy with beach towels and board shorts. Music played softly from one of the tents, and I guessed one of the occupiers was having a chilled out afternoon after what, judging from all the beer cans, looked like had been an epic night before. On the other side of us was the opposite picture: a minivan parked next to a family–sized tent, some toys and a couple of bikes lay abandoned outside. Guess people didn't really hang around the camp site during the day. I was cool with that.

Hamish lifted the trunk, pulled out one of the tents and loaded it into Nikki's arms. She baulked for a second at the unexpected weight, but then gave Hamish a flirty smile and walked away. He smiled to himself as he turned back to the trunk and unloaded more stuff.

This was bad.

Mads looked around the camping ground, holding her cell out in front of her. I heard the artificial click of the lens as she took a photo of something.

"This is so great," she said. She flapped a hand in front of her shoulder, then slapped the back of her neck. "This is mostly great," she corrected. "Hey Poppy, smile!" she aimed the camera phone at me and before I could blink, let alone smile, she took the picture.

I'm sure it was a keeper.

Mads turned her attention to Hamish. "Hey hot stuff, smile for the camera," she said. She waited for him to give her his best lazy grin – he must have practised that since I’d last seen him – before she took it. Mads glanced at Nikki, but then put her phone back in her skirt pocket.

Hamish dug through the trunk until he reached the other tent and, carrying it under one arm, started unpacking it as he stepped over to site 26.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," I said. "What are you doing?"

"What's it look like?"

"But that's your tent."

"Yeah..."

"You're not staying with us, remember. This is
our
site. Thanks for the lift, we'll just get our stuff and you can be on your merry way."

"Nah, man," Hamish said.

"No 'nah, man',” I said, “
yeah,
man."

"What's going on?" Nikki asked. She dropped her tent in the middle of site 28 and wandered over. Mads dropped her sleeping bag, pillow and handbag beside the tent and joined us as well. "Yeah, what's going on?"

"Hamish isn't staying here, Hamish is going to his own camp site with his friends," I said. "You have a camp site, right?"

"Yeah, the brothers booked it," he said. "But it's way in the back. This is better."

"No."

"You said I could hang out with you."

"You did say, Poppy," Mads said.

"Hang out," I said, "meet the band, not share a camp site with."

"I'm supposed to be your chaperone, Douglas," Hamish said. "You heard your mom, I think she'd be very disappointed in me if I didn't stick to my word and watch out for you. Make sure you don't do anything stupid."

"I'll take you with me when I go see Ty, if you promise to go away until the end of the festival."

He laughed. "If I hung out with you, you'd take me with you anyway."

"That’s what
you
think."

He twirled the car keys around his finger at me. "How you planning to get there?"

Dammit.

I clenched my teeth together. "Go. Away. Hamish," I said. “Go find your frat brothers.”

"Don’t listen to her," Mads said, “stay.”

"Yeah." Nikki smiled, flicking a glance at me. "Stay."

"Aw," Hamish said. He crossed to them and wrapped an arm around each girl's shoulders. "Aren't they the sweetest?"

I looked from Mads to Hamish to Nikki and scowled. "Argh. Fine!" I pulled my cell from my pocket and strode away from them.

"Well
you're
setting the tents up."

I walked absently along the gravel track for some privacy, staring at the screen of my cell phone. I opened a new text and sent one straight away to Ty.
We're here! At the camp site. Where are you?

Then I called home like the dutiful daughter I was.

Sometimes.

"Yello?" The Pest answered.

"What are you doing home?" I said. "I thought you were at that red headed kid's house tonight."

“Oh, it’s you,” he said. Nice. "Everyone was sent home, his little sister got chicken pox."

"Oh," I said. "Did you get chicken pox?"

"I dunno," he said, "I am kind of itchy."

Brilliant.

"Stay away from Becka. Is Mom there?"

"Nuh. But Dad is," and then I winced as he shouted – still next to the phone – for Dad. Like he didn't have newly cast–free legs and could walk it across the house by himself.

"Is that you, Popster?" Dad said.

"We're here," I replied. "All safe and sound."

"Good–good," Dad said. "Your mom'll be pleased to hear that. Traffic okay?"

"Brutal," I said, "but we made it eventually. The others are setting up the tents as we speak."

"Your mum says Hamish has...changed somewhat from how she remembered him."

"I'll say," I said.

"Don't let him..." Dad trailed off.

"What?"

"Give you girls a hard time."

I groaned. "It’s not easy, but I'm trying."

I heard a bell chime somewhere at home. "Gotta run, sweetie, or I'll burn the lamb shanks."

"Tell Mom I called."

"Will do. Have fun, kid, don't do anything I wouldn't do."