Spurt (21 page)

Nats blinked. ‘Did you just say I should pretend to be your
girlfriend
?’

‘My hot older girlfriend.’ Jack shrugged, as though he’d suggested nothing more controversial than ordering a side of garlic bread with dinner. ‘Just an idea.’

Nats’s face soured into a look of distaste. ‘I don’t think so, Jack.’

‘You’re right,’ he sighed. ‘
Bigwigs
is going prime time this season, there’s going to be so many people watching it, all across the country … I guess it’d be hard to make
all those viewers
believe we’re really a couple. You’d need to be, like, a really awesome actress to pull
that
off.’ Jack could see Nats processing what he’d just said. He waited a moment before playing his winning card. ‘It’d be like … what do they call it when you do an audition in front of a camera?’

The sourness seemed to fade slightly. ‘A screen test?’

‘That’s it. It’d be like doing a really big, important screen test.’

Nats hooked her thumb inside her necklace and ran it up and down the length of the chain as she pondered. ‘Well, when you put it like that … I guess if I thought of it like an acting job …’

Jack nodded encouragingly.

‘And I
am
between boyfriends …’ Nats went on.

‘Does that mean you’ll do it?’ His voice rose up on the words ‘do it’ and wavered out of control for a second, like he’d swallowed a theremin. He put it down to nerves.

Luckily, Nats didn’t seem to have noticed. She narrowed her eyes. ‘How girlfriend-y do I have to be?’

Jack tried to look nonchalant. He made sure to pitch his voice low, to keep those nerves from making themselves heard again. ‘Just … you know. The usual stuff.’

‘Like what?’

Jack realised he had no idea. He pictured a pair of ‘His’ and ‘Hers’ bath towels, for some reason. ‘I don’t know … Just enough to make it look convincing for the cameras, I guess.’

Nats seemed to steel herself. She glanced up and down the mall, then dragged an unresisting Jack around the corner into an arcade. When she seemed sure no-one was looking, she put her bags down on the ground and draped a slender arm over his narrow shoulders.

Holy crap
, thought Jack.

Nats turned to face an invisible, imaginary camera in the distance somewhere.

‘This is Jack,’ she said brightly, pulling him closer. ‘He’s my boyfriend. We’ve been together for … how long now?’

Jack became a fountain of sweat. ‘Um … a month?’ His face was fully smooshed against her now. Through the thin layer of her cotton singlet he felt the underwire from her right bra cup dig into his cheek. Not even the realisation that something as exciting and mysterious as a bra was held together by something as boring and unsexy as wire could keep his pulse from racing.

‘Let’s make it two,’ whispered Nats. She turned back to the imaginary camera. ‘Two whole months we’ve been together!’ With her free hand, she patted Jack gently on the head.

Jack glanced up apologetically. ‘Um, maybe don’t do the head-patting thing when we’re on camera for real?’

‘Sorry.’ Nats closed her eyes and went very zen for a moment, as though collecting herself for a Shakespeare debut. With the hand she’d used to pat Jack on the head, she grabbed Jack’s left hand and placed it around her waist. His hand came to rest on her left hip.

Jack’s instinct was to lift his hand away and run. Just run. Instead, he kept it frozen where it was, not moving a muscle, worried a sudden spasm might cause him to accidentally goose Nats and break the spell.

Nats shook her head in response to an imaginary question. ‘No, the age gap isn’t a problem. Jack’s very mature. He’s not like other boys his age. Most Year 7 boys –’

‘Um, Year 8?’

Nats blinked. ‘Most Year 8 boys would be too embarrassed to be in a relationship like this. They wouldn’t know what to do, or wouldn’t respect certain boundaries.’

‘I … definitely respect your boundaries,’ said Jack. He looked up at Nats, wondering if she was likely to notice the damp, sweaty handprint he was almost certainly leaving on her leggings.

‘That’s why we’re so good together,’ she finished.

Wow
, thought Jack. Nats was really getting into character. Maybe she
did
have talent as a performer. And maybe, just maybe, this whole ‘older girlfriend’ ploy had a chance of succeeding. Maybe he was going to be able to keep up with the Amit Gondras of the world after all.

‘You’re a really good actress,’ said Jack.

Nats shrugged. She picked up her bags from where she’d left them on the ground.

‘Or … maybe there really
is
something between us?’ Jack gulped.

Nats locked eyes with him.

‘No. I was acting.’ She glanced down at her shopping bags and then looked up at Jack again. ‘People like me? We’re always acting.’

Jack frowned. What did she mean by that? And people like
what
? Popular people who everyone wanted to be friends with, and who had everything they wanted?

‘So it’s a deal then? You’ll come up on stage with me at the festival? You’ll pretend to be my girlfriend for the cameras?’

Nats passed her phone to Jack. ‘We should swap numbers. So I know where to be on the night.’

That sounds like a yes
, thought Jack. He handed Nats his phone, hoping she wouldn’t notice the sweaty residue he’d left on it.

They entered their numbers and passed the phones back to each other. Jack still couldn’t quite believe what had happened. He now had a little part of Nats to carry around with him, and Nats had a little part of Jack to carry around with her too.

At least until after the balloon festival, when Jack was ninety-nine per cent sure she’d delete his number and never speak to him again.

Or maybe the TV cameras would show just how well-matched they were, and they’d become a celebrity power couple for real and forever.

Nats slipped her phone back into her bag. ‘Bye, Jack. Enjoy the rest of your time at the top.’ She smiled weakly. ‘I’ll see you on the weekend.’

‘Y-yeah,’ said Jack, his grip tightening around his phone out of fear of it slipping from his hands. ‘See you then. B-babe.’

‘What?’

Jack shook his head. ‘Nothing.’ He stood and watched his newly minted fake girlfriend walk off into the distance. As soon as she was out of sight, he jabbed at his phone, making sure her number really was in there.

It was. It really was. She’d even put a smiley after her name.

A. Smiley
.

It was almost enough to make him forget about the other new entry in his list of recently added contacts. But there it was, directly under Nats.

Oliver Sampson.

Jack stared at the name. He was starting to realise he’d been carrying a little part of
Sampson
around with him for way too long. The part that made Jack feel like the smallest kid in school. Now he was the biggest man in town – and he actually felt like it. Not only that, but he had his own bachelor pad, and his very own mega-hottie to go with it.
Bigwigs
was sure to want him back. He was a completely different person now. Jack Sprigley: bigger and better. It almost didn’t matter that he didn’t have pubes yet. Everything else had fallen into place.

He’d faked the big time.

Flushed with these strange new feelings of conquest and triumph, Jack hit ‘Dial’.

Sampson sounded confused when he answered. ‘Um, yeah? Who’s this?’

Jack cleared his throat. ‘It’s Jack. Jack Sprigley.’

There was a pause. ‘What do
you
want? Aren’t you busy being Upland’s Incredibly Junior Mayor?’

Jack ignored Sampson’s jibe. He wanted to strike the right balance between victorious and generous.
Magnanimous
, he thought. That was the word he was after. Like a tennis champion shaking hands with a crushed and broken rival. ‘I just wanted to see if you were coming to the balloon festival on Friday night. It’s the last bit of filming before I fly down for the live show, and –’

‘And you just wanted to remind me how great you are?’

‘No, I just thought you might want to be part of it. The whole
Bigwigs
thing. You know, get yourself on camera a bit more –’

‘So, basically hang around in the background like a Jack Sprigley fanboy?’

‘It doesn’t have to be that. You could help unveil this balloon I’m racing in –’

‘Nah, thanks.’ Sampson’s tone changed completely. He sounded weirdly casual. Almost friendly – but with an undertone that Jack couldn’t quite figure out. ‘I’m good.’

Jack didn’t want Vivi thinking he hadn’t tried hard enough. ‘I just thought, since everyone else is going to be at the festival, you might as well be there too. Part of the gang.’ He hoped Vivi appreciated how much it pained him to say that.

‘Oh, don’t worry,’ said Sampson. ‘I’ll definitely be there.’ He paused, and the silence on the other end of the line was as bad as any embarrassing changing room put-down. ‘Catch you later, Sprogless.’

Jack’s phone beeped three times.

Call ended.

Delilah unclipped her seat belt and leant across to Jack. ‘Here we are, Mr Mayor for a Week. Your big moment.’

They’d pulled up in the VIP area behind the grandstand at the Upland Showgrounds. Jack, Delilah, Todd and Brett piled out of the minivan. On the other side of the grandstand, the 14th Annual Upland Hot-Air Balloon Festival was bobbing into action. Food stalls and sideshows ringed the edge of the Number 1 Oval. Hundreds of people milled about, and more were arriving every minute. In centre of the oval, Jack counted twenty or thirty hot-air balloons floating ten feet above the grass, tethered to the ground by thick white ropes. Festival-goers took rides in the baskets, posing for selfies or waving to their friends and families below. Occasionally a jet of flame lit up a balloon from within, accompanied by a roar like that of a caged animal straining to be set loose.

Over on the Number 2 Oval, festival staff in fluoro vests checked wind direction and communicated with each other via walkie-talkie as they cordoned off an area for the Mayor’s Balloon Race. Jack had discovered it was more of a timed flight than an actual race. The challenging team – chosen by lottery, and this year flying in a balloon sponsored by Avocado World – would make a short flight from one side of the oval to the other, where they had to land as close as possible to a painted ‘X’ on the grass. The mayor’s team, also chosen by lottery, had to make the same flight and beat the time the challenger had set.

‘Okay,’ said Delilah. ‘We’re going to go and film some local colour. We’ll meet you back here in half an hour. The limousine should have arrived by then. Then we’ll get you into your robes and chains and film your big entrance.’ Delilah looked Jack in the eye. ‘With Natsumi.’

‘With Natsumi,’ said Jack. He should have been sounding confident. It was all sorted. And he’d done it on his own. He’d made Nats his pretend girlfriend all by himself. But it wasn’t Nats he was worried about.

Jack watched Delilah and her crew head through one of the gates and out into the festival, then scanned the oval for any sign of Oliver Sampson. He’d said he was coming. He’d said he was definitely going to be there.

And he’d sounded like he was up to something.

‘
Someone
’s looking jittery,’ said a voice behind him.

Jack turned to see Vivi standing there, armed with an access pass and clipboard. She was supposed to spend the opening night stationed at the marquee, helping Jack get organised for his speech. It was the only job anyone had been able to think to give her. Jack saw the woman from the council stationed at the organisers’ marquee as well, keeping an eye on things.

‘You’re not
nervous
, are you?’ said Vivi. ‘Didn’t you tell me you’ve done this kind of thing before? Isn’t that why you’re so much more qualified to be Mayor for a Week than I am?’

Jack wasn’t nervous about his launch speech. Public speaking had never bothered him, he knew where he had to be, and he’d memorised his script. He’d make his grand entrance (arm-in-arm with Nats, if everything went to plan), then get up on the grandstand to declare the festival open (again, ideally arm-in-arm with Nats), then pose for the news cameras and
Bigwigs
camera as his hot-air balloon design for the Mayor’s Balloon Race was unveiled.