Little Bird (12 page)

‘What's going on?'

I saw a look pass between Mum and Stefan. Then Mum said, tiredly, ‘Let's watch the movie.'

My insides felt like they'd grown too big for my body, my bones nobbled uncomfortably in my spine. Tears welled in my eyes as Babe ran away, but I knew that everything would work out for the little pig: Farmer Hoggett would find him, Babe would win the sheepdog competition and he'd live another day to make a sequel I'd never seen. But it seemed to me that we were all a bit like Babe: me, Maisy, Shandra, Damien, Colette, Annette, Spence, Mum, Dad, Stefan, Paula, baby William. We were all alone. All betrayed by our disappointing futures and by the people we loved.

I remembered my English assignment, the one I still hadn't done. What is love? It's a hoax, it's a con, it's a trick. Because it makes us think we're not alone, but really, for all of us, alone is exactly the sum total of what we are.

I didn't see Shandra before school the next morning. Her bedroom door stayed shut. I heard Mum ring the real estate office and tell them Shandra would be needing a few days off. I hesitated outside her bedroom door before I left the house, listening to her silence, but I was too scared to knock.

I climbed the steps onto the school bus with a heavy weight in the pit of my stomach. Tegan was sitting by herself on the window side. She looked tight and nervous. I wondered if she'd had a fight with Blake. I summoned up the courage to talk to her.

‘Hi,' I said.

She glanced up. ‘Hi.'

‘Can I sit here?'

She shrugged. ‘It's a free country.'

It wasn't exactly a gilded invitation, but I sat down anyway.

‘How's your sister?' she asked me.

‘Shandra?' I asked surprised. ‘Um, okay. Why?'

‘I heard the wedding's off. I heard Damien dumped her.'

‘She dumped him.'

‘Oh. That's not what I heard.'

‘Well, that's what happened,' I said.

Tegan shrugged and stared out the window again. And that was it – for some reason she'd shut down on me. Anything I said was met by monosyllabic grunts or shrugs. I sat there, going over our brief conversation, trying to work out what I'd said wrong. It was a long, prickly ride to school. As the bus pulled into the driveway, Tegan reached into her bag and pulled out a neatly folded piece of paper. She shoved it into my hand.

‘What's this?' I asked.

‘It's a letter. Read it later.'

‘Okay.' I smiled. Tegan and I used to write each other letters all through high school, about our feelings and stuff. Neither of us had written one for ages. Back in those days, when me and Tegan had a fight we nearly always made up through letters. ‘I'll see you in English,' I said.

Tegan still looked strained. ‘Read the letter, okay?'

I sat down on ‘our bench' under the peppercorn tree to read it before class.

Dear Ruby-lee
,

We've been friends a long time. This is hard for me. I've thought about this a lot and there's no easy way to say it. Lately I've felt us drifting apart. Since we've come to College I've grown up heaps. I've got a boyfriend and new friends. Things are changing in my life. Things I'd usually share with a best friend. But I feel like I can't talk to you about anything.

I've changed but you haven't. At first I thought you were serious about Spence but now I've realised the truth. You live in a fantasy world Ruby-lee. You're not ready to grow up. And that's why I think we should admit to ourselves that our friendship has come to a natural end.

I've tried to carry you at College, but I can't do that anymore and it's not my job. I just have to be selfish right now and think about myself and my own needs. I know you think this is all about Blake but Blake is a symptom not the cause.

One last word of advice. You should be careful about what you say about you and Spence because people could get hurt
.

Thanks for all the good times.

Tegan

I sat in shock. I couldn't believe it. After twelve years, Tegan was ending our friendship. I mean she'd stopped talking to me before, quite often actually, but after she cooled off we always took up where we'd left off.

I read the letter again. Maybe she was right. Maybe we had grown apart. She had Blake, she had Cadets. What did I have? A sister who I was too scared to talk to. A confusing kaleidoscope of feelings for Spence. And what about Maisy? I had Maisy, didn't I? Every Sunday I was responsible for another whole human life. Didn't that make me grown up?

I drifted to my first class in a daze. It was Indonesian and I let the soothing sounds of a foreign language wash over me. I think the teacher, Trish, took pity on me, because she let me sit there for the whole class without contributing anything. Every now and then she'd write words on the whiteboard and I'd dutifully copy them into my exercise book, without having a clue what I was writing.

Suddenly everyone was standing up. I stood too automatically and looked dully around me. My classmates were gathering their books, slinging their bags on their shoulders . . . What was going on? Was it a fire drill? A bomb threat? Oh, right. The class was over. I packed my books and my pen in my bag.

‘You look like you could do with some fresh air, Ruby-lee,' Trish said.

I blinked and nodded. I couldn't look at her, in case I started to cry. Crying in front of a teacher would be as mortifying as the time my tracksuit elastic broke at the primary school running carnival and everyone saw my Strawberry Shortcake knickers.

I wandered outside. I didn't know where to go. All those weeks that Tegan hadn't been talking to me I'd hung out at our bench, hoping every day that she'd sit down next to me and start yakking as though nothing was wrong. But it felt, I don't know, desperate to go there now. It would show how incapable of change I was. I marched around the school buildings, trying to keep up a pace that would seem to anyone watching me (as if anyone was) that I had somewhere to go. But the problem with walking faster is that you get nowhere faster and nowhere ends up being back where you didn't want to be. Halfway around the school for the second time, I swivelled on my heel and strode towards the cafeteria instead. Tegan sat at one of the central tables, cosying up to Blake. Before I could swivel again, Blake and Tegan saw me too.

13

All the colour drained out of Tegan's face. My hands started shaking. Blake put his arm around Tegan and murmured something in her ear. (As if I'd done something bad to her!) They were with a group of Blake's friends. Tegan's friends too, I suppose. Girls all dolled up in make-up, looking like they'd stepped out of a Sportsgirl catalogue; a couple of Cadets guys, one huge, the other skinny with an enormous Adam's apple.

And all of them were staring at me, waiting to see what I would do. In fact it seemed like the whole cafeteria was staring at me.

I closed my eyes for the briefest moment, shutting the whole world out. There was temporary relief in the darkness, but then I had to open them again, and the world, Tegan – they were all still there.

One of Tegan's friends snorted, ‘What is she on?'

‘Hey, Ruby-lee!' I saw a blur of red hair, a long lanky arm waving in the air.

‘Oh, Ed. Hi.' My voice was shaky, though I was enormously relieved to see him. Ed seemed oblivious of Tegan and her crowd. He even looked pleased to see me.

‘Are you all right?' he asked, studying my face.

‘Would you do me a favour?' I asked. ‘Would you walk out with me? Pretend, you know, that we're . . .'

I was going to say friends, but I didn't get to finish the sentence. Ed put his arm around me, kissed my cheek and steered me out of the building as if we were a couple.

When we were safely out of view I pulled away, embarrassed.

‘What was all that about?' he asked. ‘I'm not going to get my nose broken by a jealous ex-boyfriend, am I?'

‘Ex-boyfriend? Hardly. Ex-best friend. And no nose-breaking. At least, I don't think so. Actually, she is kind of tough. She's in the army.'

‘I've got good defences.'

‘Yeah? What kind of defences?'

Ed waved his arms in the air, ran around in a small circle, his long limbs flailing about. He threw his head back and cried, ‘Eek, eek!'

I snorted. It felt good to laugh after the morning I'd had. ‘Very manly.'

He dropped his arms. ‘What can I say? I'm a lover not a fighter.'

‘Well, you're a saviour, anyway. Thanks.'

‘You know, I have to go back in there.'

‘Oh, your friends, I'm sorry . . .'

‘No, doofus. My bag's in there. Will you wait for me?'

I nodded. Ed disappeared. On my own I felt suddenly vulnerable again. Ed couldn't really save me from Tegan. I mean, we had classes together, we caught the same bus, we lived in the same suburb. I was going to have to face her, over and over, all on my own. Ed was sweet and everything, but he already had his friends.

I swear my skin was prickling just before Spence bowled around the corner. Before I could avert my eyes, he saw me and for a moment everything else faded away.

He froze, as if he wasn't quite sure what to do. He took a step towards the music rooms. Then he altered his course and headed straight for me. I looked up into his face, at his crinkling eyes, his grains-of-sand complexion, and I saw uncertainty.

‘Ruby-lee, can we talk for a minute? Somewhere private?'

‘I'm waiting for someone,' I said.

A group of students gathered on the stairs behind me. I glanced back. Tegan stared coolly at me. I turned away from her, but I was aware that she was there, watching.

‘Come on, Ruby-lee,' Spence murmered urgently. ‘It's important. It'll just take a few minutes.'

‘I
can't
.'

‘Please?' His eyes were just like Maisy's when she wanted something.

I glanced around for Ed, but there was no sign of him yet. There was only Tegan and Blake and their posse, standing watching me and Spence as if we were a show. Tegan had said I lived in a fantasy world. I'd show her.

‘Sure,' I said to Spence. ‘Let's go.' I could feel Tegan's gaze in the back of my skull. I glanced around at her triumphantly, but it was Ed I saw, slowing to a stop on the wide concrete steps. His arms went up, as if they were asking me a question. I felt instantly ashamed to be seen leaving with Spence. I tried to say sorry with my eyes, but Spence caught my elbow and propelled me away.

‘No one will disturb us in here,' Spence said, leading me into an empty classroom. ‘Why don't you sit down?'

I sat, my arms crossed in front of me, my hair sliding over my face. He perched on the desk up the front. For the first time in ages, I remembered he was a teacher and I was a student. Looking up at his face, his warm blue eyes and his soft blonde hair, made my blood churn faster. I hid behind my hair again.

‘I wanted to talk to you about what happened at the park yesterday.'

‘It's fine.' My voice sounded cold, even to me.

‘Mum was very upset.'

Annette
was upset? I glared out the window at the gum trees that surrounded the sports fields. ‘She scared me. She scared Maisy too.'

Spence ruffled up his hair. ‘I'm so sorry. Things are . . .'

‘I know.
Messy
.
Complicated
.'

‘Wow, Ruby-lee. When did you get so bitter? I thought we were on the same side. What's Colette been saying to you?'

My voice shook. ‘I'm not on your side. I'm on Maisy's side. Someone has to be.'

Spence pulled up a chair and sat opposite me. ‘Please don't hate me, Ruby-lee,' he said softly. I wished I
could
hate him. ‘I've made some mistakes. I'm trying to fix them. When you started babysitting Maisy, I thought it wouldn't hurt anyone if I arranged for Mum to see Maisy on the quiet. Colette would never have to know. Everyone would be happy.'

‘I don't understand why you have to sneak around behind Colette's back. You're Maisy's father.'

‘I didn't
ask
to be a father. Do you think I want to be stuck here for the rest of my life? Do you think this is the sum total of who I want to be? A music teacher in a ditchwater school that's so far off the rock'n'roll map it may as well be in Uranus?' Spence smiled, as if it were meant to be a joke, but there was an edge to his words, a sneer at the corner of his mouth.

‘It's not fair,' I said. My voice cracked and I pressed my fingers into the corners of my eyes in a vain attempt to hold back the tears. ‘You and Colette have so much going for you. You're both talented and gorgeous and smart. And the only thing I've got . . . the
only
thing I've got going for me is Maisy. And she's yours. Neither of you seem to care that you have her, and I'd give anything . . .
anything
. . .' I grabbed my bag. The tears spilled out.