New Boy (6 page)

When Mom turns up for the fashion parade at lunchtime the next day, she brings her plate. I meet her at the gate, since she doesn't know where anything is. I'm even going to go along to the parade with her. If we'd had one in Bergvliet, I would have been nowhere near the building, but she would have been backstage keeping everything in order. She would have been in charge then. Here she might go rogue with a pen if there are menus mentioning a certain kind of lime leaf.

I can't guess what the next issue will be, but I know I don't want it to be here. I have to make this school work for me five days a week. I have to be normal here as soon as I can, and for that I need normal parents.

She's holding her plate in both hands, looking past me, trying to work the school out.

‘I would have had signs,' she says. ‘For new people.'

Halfway to the hall with its cactus fan, Max sees us and comes over. As always, his hat's pulled down hard and his hair's bursting out from under it.

‘Fashion parade,' he says, nodding, working out why she's here. Then he looks at her hands. ‘What are you . . . ? What's the plate for?'

Mom turns the plate over, as if it might not be one if you look at it from the other side. ‘They said to bring one.'

‘Are you sure? I thought they'd have . . .' He stops. He stares at the plate. ‘Did they say, “Bring a plate”?'

‘Exactly that.' Mom shrugs her shoulders. ‘So here's my plate. Where do you think I should take it?'

Max looks at me as if I should know something. ‘Um, I think people are taking them to the catering area at the back of the hall . . .' He points vaguely into the distance. ‘But you don't have to. You really don't have to. You could just go into the main area and say nothing. That'd be cool. Nothing at all. Just bring the plate in and then' – he moves his hands around, like someone weighing up options and settling on a good one – ‘take it home. That'd be good.'

‘Well . . .' It's not the answer Mom was expecting. ‘Would it? Thanks for your input Max, but I think I have to show them I've got the plate. It was on the invitation. “Gold coin donation” and “bring a plate”.'

‘Sure. But I heard they've got loads of plates already.' We're closing in on the hall and Max is talking faster and faster. ‘Too many probably. They were going to send out another email telling people. They've got so many plates it could get really confusing.'

I hold up my hand to stop him. We're at the doors. ‘Max, they told Mom to bring a plate. We want to fit in here. So she's brought a plate.'

Mom pushes the door open with her plate-free hand and Max follows us in. There's a long steel-topped counter with people on both sides of it, unwrapping food. In the same moment, I notice two things.

Number one: the food that's being unwrapped is all on plates. Plates of all different kinds. Plates brought from home. Plates
piled high with food
. ‘Bring a plate' isn't about the plate at all. It means bring
food
. Nightmare. Total nightmare. Right in the middle of school. Mom watches the cling film being peeled from the plates, her teeth clenched.

Number two: Mr Browning is coming towards us with a beaming smile, reaching out to shake Mom's hand. Which is holding a perfectly clean definitely unused plate that has without doubt brought no food at all.

‘Hello,' he says, as Mom takes her right hand from the plate to shake his. ‘It's great to see you here. How are you all . . .' That's when he notices the empty plate Mom is now trying to hide behind her back. ‘. . . fitting in?'

Awfully, I want to say to him. As badly as you could possibly imagine. Right now, I would be fitting in better if I had blue hair, a reptilian tail and jet boots.

‘Mostly good,' Mom says, glancing around for anything else to talk about. ‘We have our ups and downs.'

He's still staring around Mom's side at the plate. He's definitely moved from looking to staring now. He leans in a little closer.

‘If you need food,' he says, almost in a whisper, ‘we can sort that out. You're part of a community when you're at this school.'

Oh no. It's worse. It's got
worse
. I'm an alien with blue hair, a reptilian tail and jet boots, and I only talk in high-pitched farts through a flap in my pants. And my mom is something far worse that I can't even imagine.

‘Oh, no, no.' She lets out a nervous laugh as I check to see how many people are onto us. She hugs the plate to her chest, with her arms folded across it. ‘I just . . . found this plate. Outside. And it's a good plate. New. I thought it might be useful. Might have gone astray from in here, so . . . And that community thing, I like that. We have far too much food. Far too much food at our house. I'm always cooking far too much, right, Herschelle?' I'm only expected to nod, not speak. ‘So let us know any time we can help out.'

Max is staring down at the floor, as if someone's scratched some amazing secret into the floorboards just in front of his toes. Mr Browning's stuck leaning slightly forward, like someone straining to hear something quiet that actually makes sense, instead of Mom's mildly crazy ramble. She's nodding, putting on a look that says they've come to some kind of understanding about banding together to do good work for people who need it.

‘Good,' he says slowly. ‘Good.'

Nothing's good, not for any of us, but he knows how to do a calm voice.

‘I'm sure you're very busy,' Mom says, in a fake happy voice. ‘I'm looking forward to the fashion parade.'

‘Yes.' He looks towards the stage, where nothing is happening. ‘Oh, yes, we all are. Well . . .' He takes a step back. ‘I'm very glad you could make it.' He raises one arm in the direction of the stage, where someone has just arrived with a broom. ‘Enjoy.'

The three of us watch him take another step, half turn and immediately find himself in two new conversations. That are probably totally sane.

‘Eish,' Mom says. ‘I feel like such a moegoe.'

‘Moo . . .' Max starts to say, and then stops and nods. No translation necessary. Moegoe equals idiot.

‘That's the last thing you need your mom doing, eh,' she says to me, ‘when you've got yourself so ready to fit right in here.'

‘Don't worry,' Max says. I think it's to me, but it could be to Mom, or both of us. He's still too embarrassed to make eye contact. ‘My mum does ridiculous things all the time. On purpose. She does roller derby and one time they raised money for the school. She roller skated into assembly in her roller derby gear to hand over the cheque. Warpaint on and everything. Her name's Michelle, but her roller derby name's Bomb Shelle and that was on her back. I try to make sure she doesn't get notices about school events now.'

‘Roller derby gear?' Mom smiles. ‘I'll make a note never to do that. You're a good guy, Max. Bring a plate, eh?' She holds it up and waves it around. ‘Bring a plate.' She shakes her head. ‘We're going to take this country one crazy phrase at a time, Hersch, just you watch.'

Here we are, on the same team. The awfulness dials itself down a bit. At the counter, cling film is being ripped off more and more plates and the food is being moved to tables. That's what people are concentrating on.

Max tried to stop our disaster. He tried to head it off. We pushed through with our crazy wrong plate, but he did his best. Mom's right. He's a good guy.

The fashion parade is exceptionally boring, but we survive it. I come nowhere near disgrace the whole time, and I'm happy with that. Mom leaves straight afterwards, with her plate, but plenty of people are carrying plates by then and she looks like she fits right in.

There's ten minutes of lunchtime left and, after a toilet stop, I plan to spend as many of those minutes as possible playing handball.

On my way out of the toilets, someone blocks me. It's Lachlan Parkes. I step aside, figuring it's an accident, but he moves to block that move too.

‘You're the foreign kid, aren't you?' he says. His hand is in front of me, not touching me but stopping me moving. ‘Say something.' He's taller than I am. He has a grinning friend on either side of him, Josh and Ethan.

‘What do you mean?' It's out of me before I realise that the best thing to say is nothing.

‘What do you mean?' Lachlan Parkes says, in a ridiculous version of how my accent sounds to him. ‘Is that supposed to be English? Hilarious.' His friends laugh.

‘Hilarious,' Josh says, this time in the accent, and Lachlan and Ethan both laugh.

And that's it. That seems to be enough for them. They turn and walk away, but I'm stuck to the spot. I want to knock the smug look off Lachlan's face. I want to hit him with some brilliant comeback and take him down in front of his friends. But what would I say? Whatever it was it'd sound wrong, the moment it came out. One of them would repeat it in that accent. And all three of them would laugh.

‘Hey, Herschelle,' Max says, waving one of his hands in front of my eyes. ‘Earth to Herschelle.'

He's holding up a tennis ball.

‘Sorry, I was in a dwaal,' I tell him.

He bounces the ball. ‘Well, we need you over there.' He points to the marked-out area. ‘Harry and Ben are up for doubles.' He bounces the ball again, and turns to walk to the others before saying, ‘What's a dwaal?'

The first thing I feel is annoyed.

‘How can you not know “dwaal”?'

It's Max I'm talking to, but Lachlan Parkes I'm picturing. And even now all I can hear is my accent and how dumb it sounded coming from Lachlan and Josh. All I can see is them and their stupid grins, Lachlan's big head rocking from side to side as he did his stupid version of how I speak.

And now dwaal's a problem in this country. It's another word I've never thought of as South African, another word to laugh at, another stamp on my forehead that says, ‘Alien'.

But Max isn't laughing. He's frowning and not saying a thing.

‘Sorry. It's like a daze,' I tell him. Max isn't Lachlan Parkes. He's done nothing wrong. He asked me a question, that's all. ‘It's probably Afrikaans, but everyone says it. In South Africa.'

‘Dwaal,' Max says, and not in a mean way. He's just trying it out. He bounces the ball my way, and I catch it. ‘Well, snap out of it, whatever it is. Less dwaal, more handball. Ben and Harry reckon they can take that shot of yours, so we need to kick some butt.'

Part of me wants to tell Max about Lachlan Parkes, but I don't want to look weak. I'm not used to being pushed around, and I don't want to look like someone who can be. I don't know what happened with Lachlan in that moment, why I didn't sort him out. Although I don't know what I would have done at home if it had happened there.

It wouldn't have happened there.

Max's dad's bakkie is parked in front of our car when we get out of school. His dad is talking to Mom. They're standing under a tree. Hansie's leaning up against Mom's leg, playing a game on her phone.

Mom sees me and waves. Hansie looks up and smiles and then goes back to the phone. Max's dad looks past me, searching for Max, but he's back at the classroom checking something with Ms Vo about his Moreton Bay presentation. As I head towards them, Max's dad starts checking his phone.

‘I've just asked Craig – Max's dad – if they'd like to come over on Sunday for a barbie.' Mom says the last word slowly and carefully, putting in a massive effort not to call it a braai. We talked about that one, but I didn't think she'd remember.

‘Nice one, Mom,' I tell her. ‘A barbie would be good.' I give it emphasis too, to let her know I've noticed her good work with the language.

‘I reckon we can do that,' Max's dad says. ‘I'm sure Michelle'd be keen and I know Max would. Diary looks clear. Let's book it in.'

He looks over my shoulder and waves. Max is on his way.

‘Mate, barbie at their place on Sunday,' his dad calls out, pointing to Mom and me.

‘Excellent,' Max says. ‘Herschelle can show me how to get that low-down handball shot right.'

‘And don't bring a plate or anything,' Mom says, because I haven't yet had the chance to make it totally clear she's never to raise that subject again in my lifetime.

Max looks at the ground. I look into the distance, wanting the conversation to move away from plates quickly.

Somehow, from the expression on his face, what she's said is not what Max's dad was expecting. ‘Oh,' he says, ‘has all your stuff arrived from South Africa then?'

Eish! Same words, different meaning. What can you do?

‘No, it . . .' Mom starts, before finally making the smart choice and deciding not to make things worse by explaining. ‘No. But we have plates.'

‘Great.' He grins. ‘Looking forward to it.' He puts his hand on Max's shoulder and says, ‘Better get you home.'

As I'm doing up Hansie's seatbelt, Mom's watches from the driver's seat as their bakkie drives away.

She starts the engine and we pull out from the kerb. At the far end of the school, we pass Lachlan Parkes putting his bag into the boot of a blue car. Before I can stop it, I've pushed myself back in my seat, so that I'm behind the side of Hansie's booster.

I just want Lachlan Parkes out of my day, that's all. I don't want to see him or think about him. It's one thing for me to feel different, it's another to be told I am, and in a way that suggests I'm totally inferior.

I can't even fix it, because it's not really about me. I didn't make this accent up and I can't change it overnight. Then I realise why it feels so wrong – it's like racism. Only it can't be, can it? It can't be racism because I'm white.