Eleven Weeks (28 page)

“Okay, so I have printed out the labels for the exhibition as requested.” I gesture to the box. Of course I had offered to help with Lachlan’s exhibition however I could, and hence getting stuck with label duty. Still, we hadn’t spoken seriously since … since everything.

“How are you feeling?” I ask. I lift up her legs and sit down underneath them.

Kate’s face blanks to neutral, and I wonder how many times she’s practiced the response to this question, or if she’s just hiding this part of herself away from me. Away from all of us.

Kate is silent. She shakes her head. “Not … great.”

We sit there for a moment, silently together, miles apart. It’s a good kind of quiet. It’s one we both understand.

“I’m … you know, Lachlan’s brother, Johnny, he has this so tough. You know both their parents are dead, right? And he’s … he’s—” I rub my hand on her back as she hiccoughs down a sob. She presses her forefinger and thumb together as she whooshes out a breath. “I’m fine. He’s a really strong person, and he’s got it so much worse than I do.”

“You’re allowed to be sad, Kate,” I whisper. “Just because you think he has some worse scenario—it doesn’t mean your life isn’t pretty average, too. For what it’s worth though … I’m so sorry.” And I am. But I know that when it comes to death, sorry doesn’t mean shit.

“It’s … you don’t have to say that.” She pulls her legs from my grasp, but they graze my ribs, and I hiss in a sharp breath, clutching at them again.

“Stace, what’s going on?” Kate narrows her eyes.

I press my lips together. I still haven’t told her. She’s had so much on her plate, I didn’t feel right unloading—about any of it.

“Well, um, a few things have gone on.” I nod, keeping my eyes fixed firmly on the bright green grass outside of her house. Seriously, that shit looks like it’s on steroids. “The most recent being, I chased after Michael to confess my love to him, and I got hit by a car and fractured my ribs.”

“Stacey!” Kate launches herself at me this time, and I inhale sharply as she touches my ribs. They’re still a little tender. “Sorry! Sorry, ribs, sorry.” She flies back, hands in the air, and I have to laugh at the fact that my best friend, whose lover died, who could be facing death herself, is apologising to me.

Only, of course laughing hurts.

Damn it!

“It’s … Kate, compared to what you’re going through, it’s nothing,” I choke out.

Kate giggles, and she grabs my hand and squeezes it. “Whoever thought we’d be in a ‘Whose life is shittier’ contest, right?”

“I know. Do you feel like a Mack Truck ran you over and then reversed for good measure?” I try for a smile.

I earn one. “Like I got pushed off a cliff and then eaten by a whale.”

This time, I grin. “Like you got frozen to death, only to have someone set fire to your ice cube?”

Kate giggles, but it peters out into nothingness as she sighs. “It’s hard, you know?” She stares into the distance. “Losing someone like that … missing them, it’s … it’s really hard.” She presses her lips together and a tear snakes from her eye. I pull her legs back up and rub her feet, run my hands over her ankles, giving them a soft massage. “I know it must be hard for you with Michael, too.”

“Light years apart,” I whisper. I know what I’m going through has nothing on her.

“How are you feeling about your results?” I ask. It’s four days before my best friend finds out if she’s inherited Huntington’s disease; if she’ll turn out like her father.

Kate closes her eyes, and for a second I worry that she’s going to cry.

“I don’t think I’m where I was before,” she says. I lean in closer to catch her words. “I used to … I used to think it was definitely going to be positive for Huntington’s. But weirdly enough, since Lachlan … well, you know … For some reason, now I’m thinking it could go either way. It could even be …” She shrugs. “… negative.”

“Of course it could.” I smile, and I know what she means. Sometimes, it’s how humans work. We believe the worst could happen, because when so much bad stuff is going on all around us, why the hell wouldn’t it? Why should we be the lucky ones?

A single tear creeps from the corner of Kate’s eye and she bats it away with her left hand, shaking her head. “Now, tell me about this Michael business. So …”

I bite my lip. Do I tell her about the pregnancy thing?

I look around the lounge room, at the tissues still screwed up next to the tissue box, the purple smudges still very much under her eyes.

It can wait.

“I just … I won’t bore you with the details, but I screwed up. I really liked him, but guess—no, I know I didn’t show it,” I correct myself. “And now he’s all going to be a rock star, or something.”

“Coal?” Kate asks, and I nod.
If she’s reading the news, she must be better than I’d thought
.

“So have you tried to talk to him?” Kate asks, tilting her head.

“Yep. Well, I sent him a message. He didn’t reply.”

“Maybe he’d rather say it in person.” She shrugs.

I snort. “Yeah, like when? When he comes home next Christmas? Or if I run into him at some party? I’ll be there, maybe having landed a gig handing out snacks, and he’ll be the rock star coming in to launch the new product, getting paid the big bucks.”

Kate shakes her head, and swats me on the arm. “You’re not going to be handing out snacks at a party.” She settles back into her seat. “Besides, isn’t this the year of Stacey? Aren’t you just going to take it easy and party?”

Hearing my own words from thrown back at me makes me grimace. Ugh. I’m so far from that person right now. Come to think of it, I don’t know that I ever was her.

“No. I have a job working at a pet psychic.”

“Ha!” Kate doubles over, mirth escaping from her lips. “You’re … you’re what?” She screws up her nose as she laughs. It makes me smile. I love seeing her happy.

“Yeah, I know. It’s a thing. Pet psychics.” I nod.

“Oh my goodness, Stacey! Only you …” She trails off, and looks at the ceiling. “Wait, you’re not tricking people and giving them readings, are you?”

“I’m not evil,” I say, thinking of poor old Mrs McIntyre. “I mainly just take bookings and make sales. I would never tell someone something I didn’t believe was true.”

Fact
.

“So is this you now? You’re a pet psychic booker?” she asks.

I think about it. I think about reassuring Mrs McIntyre that time. About studying the pet psychic tome. About meditating, and taking control of my life. About falling, and trusting someone would catch me.

I smile. It’s a bigger than Ben Hur number.

“Actually, I think I want to enrol to study drama teaching.”

L
ATER THAT
night, when I’m lying awake in bed, I send Michael another message. I know he hasn’t replied to my last one, and this may make me look desperate, but I decide I don’t care.

Me:
So, I hear you’re about to be a big famous rock star, or something :) That’s awesome. I’m so happy for you. I know you’re going to be good at that, and you deserve it. You’re a good person, M. The best.

I have some news, too. I’ve applied for a mid-year intake to get into TAFE. I’m doing a bridging course, so I can hopefully get high enough marks to study teaching next year. I want to be a drama teacher. I’ve even paid for a ten-pack of classes in that acting school you took me to.

What’s weirder? I’m actually I little bit excited about it. And Amon even said he’d be
excited
to have me back. You better watch out. I could replace you as favourite.

It’s made me think … I don’t think I was ready to become a mother. You already know that, right? It wouldn’t surprise me. You’re freaking smart sometimes.

But I … I don’t know that I did.

Well, now I do.

Hope your life is awesome.

I hit send. For weeks, I’ve been writing letters to people who can’t reply; who won’t reply.

This time, it’s only one hundred and fifteen words. But damn, they feel weighty.

February 5

I
WAKE
to the sound of a drill-saw attempting to channel through a concrete pylon right next to my head.

“Ughhh,” I groan. I reach my hand out and slam something in front of me, presumably the drill-saw, most likely the clock radio. Regardless, the action made the noise stop, thank hell.

Hell. While the blast of noise had stopped, there was still a ringing in my head of dizzy-making proportions. Not to mention that my tongue tastes like I’ve been eating road kill. Yuck.

Harsh yellow light screams through a window framed by black, floral curtains. What fresh hell is this? Who has opened my—

Shit.

I don’t have black, floral curtains.

Wait.

Again?

I shoot upright in bed, my heart slamming against my ribs and—

“Surprise!” Mum squeals. I grasp my chest, clutching at it as my heart does triple somersaults worthy of an Olympics gymnast.

“Wh … what?” I’m breathless all of sudden.

“Well, we thought since our youngest daughter has enrolled to do a bridging course, it was time she had an update to her room.” Mum’s hands give tiny claps of excitement.

“You got in late last night, and we tried to show you, but you were a little like a zombie.” Dad purses his lips.

“Oh yeah.” My mind flashes back to last night. I’d stayed up late again with Kate, printing out programs for the guests at Lachlan’s showing tonight. When I got home, I’d popped some pain meds and passed out on the couch. I guess at some point I must have seen Mum and Dad and they helped me up to my room, which I now did not recognise.

Instead of the chipped yellow-paint desk, there is a shiny new black Laminex one. My school books have been lined up neatly in one corner, a matching pencil tin acting as the book holder. The tacky stickers have been scraped from the ceiling, and Mum’s old exercise bike has finally been moved out of my room, and in its place a long cabinet fronted by a mirror.

“You can put your jewellery inside it.” Mum rushes over to demonstrate, opening the cabinet door and showing me all the little slots and hidey holes.

Even my quilt cover has changed. Gone is the hot pink print, and in its place is a plain grey surface. Simple. Elegant. Not ridiculous.