Authors: Margaret Clark
‘Mum,’ I say. ‘See these arrows? They’re pointing at
us
. We’re in a one-way street.’
‘Shit,’ says Mum.
‘Don’t swear,’ go Leanne and I together, as Mum changes from fourth to reverse in one swoop. We go boring backwards with an oncoming car’s lights looming up fast. Mum screeches round into the next street, grinds more gears, then charges off up the other way.
I lean forward, lift up a mane of hair and speak into Leanne’s ear.
‘With a bit of luck we might get killed and not have to wear the grape gear,’ I murmur. Mutual agony and embarrassment has made us allies. Temporarily.
‘We should be so lucky,’ she says, as Mum whips round a corner and screams to a halt outside the wedding cake-maker’s house.
We go up the path and knock on the door. The cake-maker opens it. She’s tall and thin with this amazing postbox red hair. Two hyper dogs with bared fangs the size of Jaws II rush out past her and start trying to chew our bodies.
‘Buffy. Muffy. SIT!’ the woman yells.
Buffy and Muffy? They should be called Attack
and Destroy. She hauls them away by their collars and tells us to follow her. Shoving the dogs outside she takes us into the dining room where there’s the most amazing creation sitting on the table.
‘Here it is,’ she says proudly. ‘It’s the most difficult cake I’ve ever made, but I managed.’
I look at Leanne. She looks at me. Then we look at Mum. She couldn’t have ordered this disaster. But she’s gazing adoringly at it with stars in her eyes.
‘Oh. Steve will just love it,’ she gushes.
It’s a big white cop car with “Police” written on the front and back in Cop Blue, and these Ken and Barbie clones on the top. One blonde Barbie looks like Leanne, even down to the grape dress, the very same material. The other grape-Ken’s supposed to be me.
No one makes Barbie dolls that look like Mum. There’s no call on dim sim-shaped dolls with greying hair, so it’s a pretend Mum-Barbie bride, and a Ken-cop doll in a uniform. The bridal party on the roof of the police car is fenced in with squirly Cop Blue and Grape roses.
‘Friggin’ hell,’ goes Leanne.
I can’t say anything. I’ve never seen such an awful cake in my life. I feel a sneeze coming on. The place seems to be full of dog hairs.
Mum pays a small fortune for the cake and I carry it carefully on its silver board to the car.
‘Will I put it in the boot?’ I ask, blowing a couple of stray dog hairs off Mum-Barbie.
‘Sam. Of course not. That would be unhygienic. And the boot reeks of two-stroke.’
Mum spilt the lawn mower fuel a week ago and the boot still smells like a petrol station.
‘Put it on the seat next to you. And be careful.’
‘I’ll have to put the wedding gear in the boot, then.’
‘No, that’s no good, our clothes will smell of two-stroke. Put it on the front seat so I can tie the seat belt round it, and Leanne can sit in the back with you and hold the clothes.’
I put the cake on the front seat and Mum pads it with a towel and puts the seat belt round it.
Leanne gets in beside me and squashes the clothes by sitting on them. Maybe we won’t have to wear them if they’re un-ironable, so I don’t say anything.
‘Off we go,’ says Mum.
She drives like a snail with arthritis.
‘Mum, you’re doing 40 k in an 80 k zone,’ I go. ‘Can’t you speed it up?’
‘I want to get this cake home safely,’ she says. ‘Woops! I think the lights are going to change.’
She puts on the brakes gently. There’s a screech then a thump. We’re jerked forward, then back again. Some idiot’s ploughed into the back of us. The cake’s thrown violently against the seat belt. The bridal party gets chopped off at the knees as the bottom slides under the belt and hits the dashboard with a thump.
‘My cake!’ screams Mum.
‘My neck,’ moans Leanne.
‘My nose,’ I yelp, blood squirting all over my T-shirt.
‘Are you all right?’ asks the young guy with blond dreadlocks, peering in at us. ‘Sorry. But I was only doing 80 k and suddenly there you were, right in front of me, stopping at a green light.’
‘Amber,’ said Mum, gazing with tears in her eyes at her cake. ‘Here, Sam. Use this towel. Are you all right, Leanne?’
‘My neck’s broken,’ says Leanne.
‘Whiplash,’ I go.
But it turns out it’s just been jerked a little bit and after we drive onto the side of the road Mum gives it a massage to make sure it’s okay while we wait for the cops. I lose the plot after that. Our boot’s bashed in like a squashed sardine can, but
the old Falcon’s drivable.
‘She was drivin’ too slow,’ says Dreadlocks.
‘And you were driving too fast,’ says the cop, who’s gazing in our window with an awed look at the mangled cop car cake and the headless bridal party.
‘Are you the … er … woman who’s marrying Steve Ransome on Saturday, by any chance?’
‘Yes,’ quavers Mum. ‘And that was our cake.’
‘Er … I’m sorry,’ says the cop, trying not to laugh.
‘Er … I’m sorry, too,’ says Dreadlocks, ‘but you were stopped at a green light.’
‘I’ll let the insurance company do the arguing,’ says Mum tiredly. ‘Let’s just go home and have a nice hot cup of tea.’
Leanne and I get back in the car. I look at her, she looks at me. At least there won’t be a Cop Car Wedding Cake to die for on Saturday!
We roar up the driveway. Leanne and I lug the wedding gear inside while Mum gets down on her hands and knees and tries to scrape bits of cake and icing off the carpet and dashboard.
‘Maybe you could glue the heads back on,’ I say, as she comes into the kitchen holding our headless bodies in her hands. Tears plop onto the Barbie bride.
‘Oh, Mum,’ says Leanne. ‘Pass them over here.
Where’re the heads? Sam, go get the heads.’
‘Why me?’
‘Just do it.’
I find the heads and bring them inside. Leanne’s waving a tube of superglue in the air like it’s a magic wand.
‘Simple,’ she says as Mum snuffles into her mug of Earl Grey tea. The headless dolls are lined up along the sink and Leanne’s glued their heads on. ‘You can’t even see the cracks where they’re joined.’
‘Yeah,’ I go. ‘It’s totally unnoticeable that you’ve got Steve’s head glued on back to front.’
‘Oh, LEANNE.’
‘Stressing
not
’, says Leanne and gives it a twist. She’s probably wishing it’s the real Steve’s neck. Leanne likes him okay but she doesn’t really want a cop for a stepfather. It’s a full-on embarrassment.
‘There. His head’s right now. Just leave them all to dry.’
‘But what’ll I do about the cake?’ sobs Mum. ‘There’s no time to bake a fruit cake and get it iced. And Delmonti’s want four hundred dollars to do a wedding cake and you have to book at least three months ahead.’
‘We could buy a Woolies Wonder,’ says Leanne.
We all look at each other and shudder. Once Mum was in a hurry to buy me a tenth birthday cake. In the cake department of Woolies she saw this fantastic basketball court cake with plastic players on it, so she rang the bell for service. No one came so she grabbed the cake from behind the display case and rushed up to the check-out.
The check-out chick looked up the price from her list and rang it up, no problems. The hassle came when we tried to cut it and found it was a cardboard dummy.
‘Gee, Mrs Studley, I thought my mum was a rotten cook,’ Cooja had spluttered with his mouth full of icing-covered styofoam and cardboard. ‘This is worse. This is the driest cake I’ve ever tasted!’
I sigh, remembering that buying a cake in a hurry is a good idea,
not
.
‘I’ll ring up Bin’s dad at the hot bread shop,’ I go. ‘He can probably whip up a big sponge cake, whack a heap of cream all over it, and the plastic bridal party can stand on the top.’
‘Oh,’ wails Mum. ‘It sounds awful.’
‘It sounds coooool,’ says Leanne, who’d agree to anything so Mum’d shut up.
Let’s face it, anything sounded better than a cop car
cake. Anything’d look better than a cop car cake. But the taste was another thing. Bin’s dad makes great bread but the Strachans’ hot bread shop is not famous for its sponges and cakes unless you like them chewy. The eclairs are like gobstoppers and the jelly cakes tend to bounce if you drop them accidentally. Still, we need a cake in a hurry. A cheap cake. Mum’s already wasted a fortune on the smashed version. Which reminds me. I go back to the Falcon with a baking dish and dump the shattered cake into it. I take it back into the kitchen, munching on a chunk.
‘It tastes okay,’ I say. ‘Here, have a piece.’
‘Oh,’ says Mum, and starts bawling again.
I have to cheer her up. I ring the hot bread shop and Bin answers.
‘There’s been a major disaster,’ I say. ‘The wedding …’
‘Steve’s jilted your mum,’ shrieks Bin. ‘I just know it.’
‘No, Bin, it’s …’
But, too late. She’s screaming it out all over the shop and it’s packed with customers because it’s ten to nine and they’ve got this Clear the Oven Sale at a quarter to nine every Thursday night.
‘Will you shut up and listen?’ I yell into the phone.
‘The wedding cake got smashed accidentally. Can your dad whiz up a cake, iced and all, ready for Saturday?’
‘I dunno. I’ll ask.’
Mr Strachan comes to the phone and I give him the details. He seems to be thrilled by the challenge. No problems: he’ll do a lovely double-decker sponge, creamed, with white icing. I hang up.
Then I go back into the kitchen. Mum’s blubbering over the food blender. She’s whipping up her Health and Vitality Slimming Drink of brewer’s yeast and fruit juice. Leanne’s disappeared, probably to go and get her hair done.
‘It’s okay, Mum. Mr Strachan’s making another cake.’
She starts bawling even louder. I’ve heard that brides get pre-wedding nerves. I can’t leave Mum like this: she just might try and stick her head in the blender. I sigh and tromp back to the phone and ring Strapper to tell them I can’t make it. I’ll be glad when this wedding’s over!
Outa home-hell to the hairdresser’s. I’m only getting a quick trim: the fancy hairdo’ll be on Saturday. Mum won’t let me wear it down. She says I’ll look like a tart. It’s got to be piled up, and she’ll be there beside me getting her hair done and watching every move.
Why my mother feels the need to get married I’ll never know. Steve’s a nice enough guy I suppose, but he’s going to
move in
. Living in the same house as a cop will be the pits. Maybe I’ll move out and get a homeless kid’s allowance and all. It’d be great.
I haven’t got time to change, or I’ll miss the bus.
It’s the usual non-event trip into town. I sit up the back and look out the window. Rows of houses, all
the same. Cars with different brand names, but all looking the same. This city’s a terminal hole. Nothing to do, no one worth getting to know.
I wish I was back on the run to Noosa. It was exciting, hitch-hiking with the surfers, meeting up with this Koori girl, Alicia, who helped me find my dad (who was a waste of space), then driving back home with Danny and the crew.
Danny’s a great guy. He was Victoria’s Most Wanted, did car burgs and all sorts of stuff because he was really mixed up, but then he started going straight. He met me up in Noosa and we just clicked. Then when we came back he stayed at our place for a while. But he decided the only way he was going to get it together was to go up north to the elders to learn about his roots and his culture. I write to him nearly every week but he never writes back, except for one postcard when he got there. He mightn’t even get my letters.
But at least my life’s better than Sam’s. What a serious loser!
I wheel into Andrea’s salon and skim-read a couple of
Cleos
while I wait. You can learn a lot of life stuff from
Cleo
, certainly more than Mum ever tells me. She probably thinks oral activity’s some kind of dental
check-up. I read about how to get a man to commit, why males don’t bond, what to do when he doesn’t notice you, why he never comes back after the first date, and ten ways to lose five kilos in a week.
Then I get shampooed and get my ends trimmed as Andrea blabs on about some new guy she’s tuning, Barton Someone. He sounds a like a first class gooba. She’s not sure whether she’s going with him or not: he’s told her he’s got four other babes hanging over him. Well, I wouldn’t stand for that. I’d have to be number one, special, not number five in some harem. Andrea’s lost it.
As I leave I shove the article about “How to get your man to commit” under her nose. It sounds like she needs it! Although I don’t know whether Danny and I are still hot. But then guys don’t seem to like writing letters. According to this article in
Cleo
I just read, guys don’t like phoning for a casual chat, either. It said, “Males use the phone as an investment to further their careers or sports networks. They mainly talk about work. Females, however, use the phone to extend their friendships and feminine bonding.” I guess that’s why Danny hasn’t phoned, either.
I don’t really care, do I. Do I?
Right now there’s these five guys trying to click
onto me. There’s Jake, he’s kinda cute, but a bit short, and Bruno, but he’s a bit too up himself. Toby’s okay, but a bit too serious. Lynton’s full-on into basketball, and everything else comes second, including any girl he goes with. And Darren’s tall, sporty, a bit of a pirate: he’d be a real look except that he’s got crooked, yellowish teeth and bad breath.
Cleo
hasn’t said anything about tactfully telling a guy he’s got bad breath.
Bit of a shame they’ve all got major faults. If I could wrap all their good bits together in the one package I’d have the perfect guy.
I must sound like I’m up myself, but guys do like me, it’s a fact of life. And I like being liked by them. I’m not gorgeous looking, but I guess I’m okay. I work at the blue-eyed, dumb blonde look, trying hard to hide the fact that I’ve got brains. When I nearly won the Young Achiever Award by growing gigantic lupins for a science project it was the worst moment of my life. That, and discovering that my dad didn’t want to know me, or my Koori friends.
Unbelievably, Mum was cool when she met Danny for the first time: it blew me away.
But is he still my boyfriend? Am I supposed to wait forever? I guess we didn’t have a firm understanding:
he left, didn’t really say if and when he’d be back. He hasn’t contacted me. I guess he
isn’t
my boyfriend. This means I haven’t
got
a boyfriend.
Nearly everyone I know’s got a boyfriend at the moment. I’m nearly sixteen and no boyfriend.
Help
!
But then if I did some serious spadework on Lynton … I’m sure I could get him to forget about basketball and footy and running for a while. I’ll be the only girl in history who’s able to get his mind off sport and onto sex. Anyway getting Lynton to toe the Leanne Line’ll be a snap!
Okay, Lynton’s the go. That’s it, I’ve made up my mind. I’ll click onto Lynton.
I stroll out of the hairdresser’s and run into Fern, my best friend. She’s looking particularly gooby in white jeans and a blue top. Pear-shaped girls should
not
wear white jeans. Should I tell her? No, it sounds like I’m being bitchy, especially as I’m wearing white jeans myself.
‘Thought you had to baby-sit,’ I go.
‘Er … it got cancelled.’
‘You could’ve phoned, but.’
‘Well … I didn’t have time.’
I frown. Something’s not quite right here. Fern’s been my best friend since primary school. I can read
this babe: she’s keeping something from me.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘Your hair’s nice.’
‘Come on. What’s going on? You’ve got this suss look about you, Fern.’
‘Nothing.’
‘Okay, then, if you insist. Let’s go have a Coke or something.’
Fern looks at her watch. Now I
know
something’s up. Fern never looks at her watch, which is why I wonder why she wears it at all, except that it’s expensive and her father gave it to her. (I call him her ex-father because he doesn’t live with Fern and her mum, same as my father, and
he’s definitely my
ex-father as far as I’m concerned!!)
‘Aw, stop stuffing about and come on, will ya?’ I say, grabbing her arm. ‘I have to tell you about a big decision I’ve just made. I’m going to click onto Lynton.’
‘What?’ Fern stops and stares at me. ‘I thought you liked Toby.’
‘I told you, Fern, he’s too …
dead
.’
‘But … yesterday you were doing a full-on rave about him. And Darren.’
‘Darren? Knock-’em-dead-with-one-breath Darren?
Imagine kissing him. Yuck. Reality check, Fern. No, it’s Lynton. I’ve made up my mind.’
We keep walking. Fern’s scurrying along at a fast pace, which is unusual for her. She’s built short and chunky which is a major bummer: we can’t swap clothes. Not that I’d want to, mind. She has pig-awful taste. (I can think this because I’m her best friend.)
‘Slow down,’ I go.
But we’ve reached Bruisers and we motor inside.
There’s the usual crew hanging, so we do the “Hi” bit and grab a table. The air’s steamy with hot food and hot hopes. Bruisers is the local hang-out, and if you’re not seen there at least three times a week you might as well be dead in a coffin as far as your social life goes.
‘Betcha I can get a date with Lynton for Sunday,’ I say, as we order the Cokes.
‘Betcha you can’t,’ says Fern, looking at me with her dark eyes. ‘Well, leastways not after two.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because he’s taking me to a basketball game.’
‘
What
?’
I gaze at Fern, my so-called best friend, as the waitress puts down two Cokes.
‘When did all this happen?’
‘He rang me. That’s why I’m not baby-sitting. I’m meeting him here for a Coke. And like I said, on Sunday we’re going to see the Super Cats play the Devil Dogs.’
‘Well, talk about pulling the moves,’ I snap. ‘You
know
I’m keen on Lynton. You
know
I was just acting cool. You
know
he was just waiting for me to say “Yes”. And while I’ve been flat-out with this wedding bit, you go and spade him from under my nose. Some friend!’
‘You said you didn’t like him, he was too much of a sports freak.’
‘I didn’t say I …’
‘Hi, girls,’ says this male voice.
Lynton.
I look at him. He’s wearing blue Levis and a navy rugby top with a blue and white checked jacket. His blond hair flops over one eye. I always think he looks a bit like a sheep dog. Now that Fern’s got this date with him, somehow he looks more appealing.
Maybe it’s the hassles at home, maybe I’m tired, maybe I’m just a born-again bitch, but I can’t help it. I saw him first!
‘Hi, Lynton,’ I coo, and flutter my eyelashes at him.
He does a double take, because I’ve always more or
less ignored him. Well, I didn’t want to play second fiddle in his sports orchestra, did I? But this is different. This is full-on
war
.
‘Hi, Leanne. Hi Fern.’ He sits down.
‘We’ve ordered,’ I say, ‘but then I could always go another Coke. And I wouldn’t mind some nachos.’
‘I thought you had to go, Leanne,’ says Fern in this “I wish you were dead” voice.
‘Soon. Soon. I can spare some time,’ I go, looking sideways at Lynton.
Fern nudges me under the table. I ignore her. Lynton looks puzzled.
‘I hear there’s a really good basketball match happening on Sunday,’ I go.
Fern kicks me so hard with her Blundstone. She nearly breaks my ankle.
‘Do you want to see it?’ he goes.
‘You’re taking
me
,’ snaps Fern.
He looks from one of us to the other. Fern scowls. I smile very sweetly.
‘I can take
both
of you,’ he says.
Over my dead body. Fern can take a hike up a high hill.
‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Except that I thought Fern was going to be really busy on Sunday afternoon.’
I’ve always been able to boss Fern.
‘I
am
going to be busy,’ she said. ‘I’m going to the basketball game with Lynton.’
‘Looks like we’re all going, then,’ says Lynton as the Cokes and nachos roll up.
‘Maybe Darren would like to come too?’ I suggest.
‘Okay. I’ll ask him.’
Good. I’ll make sure I pair with Lynton and Fern can have Dog’s Breath Darren. I slide a smile at Fern and she glares back.
‘You’re no friend of mine, Leanne,’ she hisses, as Lynton excuses himself and goes over to another table where there’s a heap of guys, including Dog’s Breath Darren.
‘No loss to me,’ I say. ‘
You
were the one who spaded Lynton: you’re just getting what you deserve.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah!’
‘Hi, girls.’
It’s Darren standing beside Lynton, who’s grinning like a laughing clown. A waft of his breath tugs at my nostrils, and I widen my eyes. He smells … breath-fresh! Darren smiles at me and I gasp. He looks … gorgeous. Darren with pearly white capped teeth is quite a hunk!
‘Darren, we have a small problem,’ says Lynton. ‘I can’t handle two gorgeous babes at the basketball on Sunday afternoon on my own.’
(Oh,
please
! I’m gonna spew!)
‘I’ll take Leanne,’ says Darren.
‘I thought I’d take Leanne and you can take Fern,’ says Lynton, leering at me.
How did I ever think he was a hunk?
‘I’ll have to see how I feel after the wedding,’ I reply. ‘My mum’s getting married on Saturday, you know. I might be too tired on Sunday to go anywhere.’
Now I’ve got two of them after me I don’t want either of them. There must be something seriously wrong with me. I guess I want Danny and he’s in the middle of Australia somewhere doing Aboriginal stuff.
‘I’ve gotta go. I’ll see you tomorrow at school, Fern.’
‘Not if I see you first,’ she says. She’s still mad at me.
‘I’ll ring you,’ I go.
‘Don’t bother,’ she says, as I walk off.
Great. Now I’ve got two guys I don’t want and I’m fighting with my best friend, I’ve got a gooba for a
brother and my mother’s marrying a cop. What else can go wrong?
I go out into the street and it’s raining. Great. I’m going to get soaked and I’ve just had my hair done. Not a bus in sight.
Over it. I’ll have to hitch. Mum’s always raving about the dangers of hitch-hiking but this is an emergency. I stand under a shop verandah and when I see a car approaching I slightly raise my thumb. I don’t want to look too obvious in case some maniac pulls up.
The first car that stops is driven by Dracula’s grandfather. No way will I get in this car.
‘You want a lift?’ he says, leaning across and opening the passenger door.
‘No thanks.’
‘Why did you signal, then?’
‘I didn’t.’
‘You had your thumb up.’
‘You need your glasses changing, Grandpa.’
He swears at me and shuts the door with a bang. Creep. I wouldn’t get in his car if it was the last one on earth.
The next two cars don’t stop. Then a white panel van pulls up.
Oh, no. It’s Steve the Super Cop. He leans across and winds down the window.
‘What are you doing, Leanne?’
‘Cleaning my teeth,’ I go.
He waits. Mum’d be yelling and screaming by now. Steve drums his fingers on the steering wheel.
‘Okay, okay, I’m waiting for a bus.’
Steve raises his eyebrows then looks pointedly at the bus stop ten metres down the street.
‘Get in, Leanne.’
Well, it’s a free ride, but.
‘You were hitch-hiking!’ he says as I pile in beside him. ‘How many times has your mother told you never to hitch-hike?’
‘Millions.’
‘Well?’
‘Well what? I wasn’t hitch-hiking. I was … er … biding time.’
(I heard that expression on an old movie. Biding time. I like it. I’m going to use it a lot from now on, especially when Mum wants to know why I’m not zooming round helping her clean the house. “I’m biding time, Mum.” It sounds cool.)
Steve sighs as he changes gears. I glance sideways at him. I don’t know what Mum sees in him really.
Okay, so he’s nice enough, but he’s got grey hair going slightly bald at the back, a fat stomach, wrinkles that’d make a tortoise look like it was using expensive collagen cream to good effect, and age spots all over his hands. He does have nice eyes, a sort of greenish grey. But otherwise, forget it. Mr Universe,
not
.