The Beauty Is in the Walking (10 page)

Chloe was a full-on kind of person and I guessed she'd be like that in love, too. The downside would be
the pain when things got in the way and that was what had happened. I'd be cut up pretty bad if I couldn't see Amy and, so far, no one else even knew we were together.

‘Must have made it especially hard to leave Brisbane,' I said.

‘Yeah, and the stupid thing is, if I hadn't acted so desperate Mum and Dad might have let me stay.' For a moment I thought she wasn't going to explain, but she'd dangled that news in front of me knowing I'd want the rest, so she was always going to tell me.

‘My closest friend had come up with a plan, you see. She talked her parents into letting me move in with them so I wouldn't have to change schools for Year Twelve. Had them convinced it was a BFF thing, but Mum and Dad knew what we were up to. Without them to watch me, I'd spend every minute with . . .' She was going to say his name, but decided against it, covering her hesitation with the perfect distraction.

‘It's not just Muslim parents who have to watch their daughters,' she said and for a moment her eyebrows danced wickedly.

Sometimes you freeze every muscle and still print what you're thinking all over your face better than any felt pen could manage. Watching me, Chloe laughed in a way I'd never seen before. ‘Released' would have been my word if Svenson had been there demanding clarity of expression. Whatever the word, she thought I was hilarious. ‘Oh, Jacob, to you I'm the hard worker in class,
the see-through girl with nothing hidden inside. You don't think I could ever be reckless or willful, do you?'

No, I didn't – not until then, anyway.

She leaned close and put a hand on my forearm, just the briefest touch. ‘Do you want to know the rest of it? The boy I was so in love with lost interest after a few weeks. He goes out with my best friend these days – my former best friend would be a more accurate description. I unfriended them both months ago.'

At morning tea I headed for our picnic table with as much apprehension as I'd had on my ride to school and wouldn't have been surprised to find the seats deserted. Everyone was there, though, and I was soon lowering myself between Dan and Amy, who let her hand rest briefly on my thigh.

‘I guess it didn't look so good in the paper this morning, eh?' I began.

‘Were we in the paper?' Mitch asked.

‘You mean you didn't look?' I called across the table. ‘That's why we wanted the reporter to be there.'

‘I didn't have to look,' Bec moaned. ‘My father woke me up with it. Ranted all over breakfast. I could bloody kill you, Jacob.' She shifted her gaze to Amy beside me. ‘What about you?'

‘My face is half hidden in the photo. Mum and Dad didn't notice.'

‘You didn't tell them!' Bec wailed and if she'd been sitting where I was she'd have shoved Amy right off the bench.

‘Hey, guys,' I said, drawing attention back on to me so I could get something straight. ‘If I'd known about the flick-knife, okay . . .' Did I need to say any more? ‘I didn't mean to put us all on the spot like that.'

‘It wasn't all of us, though, was it?' Dan broke in sharply. ‘I'm the one with my picture in the paper, holding up the bag like the whole thing was my idea. I'm the one who looks like a fool,' he added more forcefully, poking savagely at his chest with an index finger.

He
had
stood out in the photos – that was true – but it hadn't occurred to me that anyone who simply glanced at the picture would think Dan was the leader. He was really steamed and, when Amy said something about the picture to the others across the table, he leaned in close and said, ‘What did I tell you up at Kibble's place? I don't like people putting shit on me, Jacob. You'd better bloody learn what that means.'

The menace in his voice shocked me and I was immediately back in the darkness beside Mitch's mum's Barina, where he'd unleashed that voice on me before. What had he said just now.
Putting shit on me
. I began to understand what made him so furious.

Oh Dan, get over it mate
, I wanted to say, but the others were calling to us by then, wanting an answer.

‘What?' said Dan, his temper still on show.

‘The Muslim kid,' Bec replied. ‘He's bunked off to Sydney, right, so do you still believe he's innocent?'

‘Whether he's innocent or not, damned if I'll stand up again for some Leb with a flick-knife,' said Dan.

There it was, as honest as I could expect, and hadn't I felt the same as we'd left the police station, anyway? That bloody knife. Bloody Mahmoud. The silent stare we'd shared outside Mrs Schwartz's office would only carry me so far. If I hadn't given up on him entirely, then something else had to be driving me, the restlessness that had lived deep in my gut all year, maybe, yet I could carve myself up like Charlotte and still not find what it was.

‘What are you going to do, Jacob?' Bec asked.

‘Not sure, but I'm not giving up. Mahmoud didn't do it and I'm going to make people understand that. You're still with me, right?'

‘You don't get it, Jacob,' said Dan. ‘We don't care anymore. It's over as far as this mob are concerned,' and he drew a sort of circle in the air with his hand, taking in each of the bodies around the picnic table, me as much as any of them. ‘We did our bit and we ended up with shit on our faces. End of story.'

‘For you, maybe,' I said immediately. ‘Doesn't have to be all of us.'

‘I'm still with you, as long as we don't have to front the police again,' said Amy, and heartened by her eagerness I tried the others.

‘What about you, Mitch?'

He flicked his eyes towards Dan. ‘Er, look . . .' He didn't want to come right out and say it and only at the last moment did he remember the handy parachute sitting beside him. ‘Bec's in enough trouble with her father already, eh? I don't think we should make it any harder for her.'

I don't know who was more surprised, me or Bec.

The music started up over the PA, and with more eagerness than he usually showed Mitch was on his way, with Bec and Dan not far behind him, leaving Amy alone to wait while I went through the usual elegant manoeuvres to regain my feet.

‘Hey, thanks for taking my side,' I said. ‘It's better than having Mitch and Dan as my bodyguards, you know what I mean, it's like I have two good legs.'

Amy's face shone. ‘If everyone wasn't watching, I'd kiss you for saying that.'

‘Why don't you?' I said, opening my arms, but she pulled away before I could move close enough.

‘Not here,' she whispered.

I was disappointed. A hug wasn't so much to ask when we were becoming closer each day and it would have added the warmth of touch to the support she'd given me – a two-way thing, both thanks and reward for both of us.

Just as well we hadn't hugged, though, because Mitch and Dan had stopped at the end of the playground for a word about something, with Dan especially staring towards us as we set off for the classrooms.

I was suffering from exam guilt, which is when you think every minute you're not studying is wasted. Stuff it. At eight-thirty I brought up Google on my laptop, switched to Images and typed in ‘red roses' because they were the most romantic. Wow, a screen full of luscious crimson! I picked three impressive bunches and sent them one after the other to Amy, who'd been posting little messages of boredom to my Facebook page all night, each signed with a pink heart.

For this to work, though, I needed some artificial flowers so I added words to the search box and found a bunch that was obviously plastic. I shot that off to her as well, then waited.

Three minutes later she replied.
Beautiful but how come the last lot are fake?

My fingers went at the keyboard like pigeons after a packet of corn.
Because I'll keep thinking of you until the last flower dies
.

Nice
, she responded.
Bec saw that on one of those reality romance shows last year
.

Sprung! Served me right for copying something I'd seen on the Net myself, I suppose.

I went back to my maths book, which reminded me of Tyke because he preferred subjects with numbers instead of words and thinking of Tyke conjured up the night we'd stood together outside the garage.

I grabbed my phone and called Amy.

‘Hey!' she said, sounding pleased.

‘Go outside and take your phone with you,' I told her.

‘What?'

‘Do it. Just walk outside.'

‘Why?'

‘I can't tell you why until you're outside.'

She kept the phone in place as she walked, so close I could hear her breathing. The sounds of her large family drifted into my ear and her mother called, ‘Where are you going at this time of night?'

‘Need a lungful of air to help me study,' Amy replied. ‘Back in a minute,' and then a whisper: ‘Mum thinks The Ripper's going to get me.' The sound of shoes on steps followed, then, ‘Okay, I'm outside. Now what?'

‘Look up,' I instructed.

‘Yeah, so there's hardly any moon and the sky's black.'

‘What else do you see?'

She took the task seriously. ‘Um, stars, I suppose.'

‘Really look at them. It's important. How many are there?'

‘God, Jacob, there're too many to count.'

I stretched a few seconds like elastic bands so she'd be hanging out for what I said next. ‘Amy,' I told her in a slow, gentle voice, ‘that's how many times I think of you every day.'

I expected her to say something girly like, ‘Oh, Jacob, that's so sweet,' and I'd have been cool with that since it was a game after all, played on the phone for fun when you didn't want to get serious.

The long pause before Amy spoke made me think my trick with the stars had sunk deeper. ‘Did you think of that yourself?' she asked.

‘I didn't read it on the Net, if that's what you mean. Can't be sure I'm the first guy to come up with it, though. The stars have been there a long time, Amy. Maybe a caveman beat me to it.'

‘A very lovely caveman.'

For a moment I thought she'd said ‘loving' and wondered if I really deserved that word.

‘I've got something for you,' said Amy. ‘Give me a minute. I have to hang up.'

Soon after my phone pinged with an Instagram of Amy's pouted lips and then a text.
UR the perfect boyfriend, Jacob O'Leary
.

I replied with similar words, but the kiss I was going to deliver in person, first chance I got.

‘It's not what you think,' Amy called to me as I approached an almost-empty picnic table the next morning. ‘Bec's
having a day at home and the guys are doing something for Lambert in the gym.'

Should I care? I wouldn't have, if Amy hadn't seemed so keen to convince me. Oh, to hell with it, I decided. Things would be awkward with the other three until they got over their embarrassment, but we were all friends and in the meantime I'd have Amy to myself. I'd found the right words for her last night and my reward was the warmth in her face as she watched me shuffle towards her. It brought a pleasure I hadn't known before, the pleasure I had deliberately set out to take for myself by putting my arm around her in the car that night. I didn't worry about dribbling anymore, or about my legs.

I thought about kissing her, and more than a quick smooch, too, right there in the school yard. Kids our age were up to a lot more in private if half of what they hinted at was true, yet I wasn't thinking that far. It was the affection. I liked the sound of that word in my head where it swirled around all kinds of sensations I was eager to make real at last.

I levered my way into place beside Amy, wondering how we could get together this weekend, just the two of us, and somewhere she could forget about prying eyes. Morning tea is never long enough, though, and I hadn't managed to plan anything with Amy when we were parted by the musical call into class. I spent the next two periods working out what we'd do and how I'd ask her, which was why I was so eager to get down the stairs at lunchtime.

Then I was flying, with head and shoulders tilted downwards and my arms outstretched to take the impact. Forget the slow-motion sensation that movies play with; one minute I was upright, the next I was a sack of bones on the landing and afraid I'd broken every one. My wrist throbbed painfully and, as a crowd gathered around me and hands helped me sit upright, I nursed it in the cradle of my other palm.

‘Are you all right?'

‘Where does it hurt?'

Slowly I began to take in those faces, concerned to a fault and keen to help. ‘I'm okay. Yeah . . . I'm fine. Just give me a moment.'

I needed that moment to rewind the tape in my mind, like that other movie-maker's trick, until I saw my body unsprawl itself and rise feet first back onto the step. Had I tripped out of clumsy eagerness? Maybe I had, but only with the help of a nudge in the back.

I stared up again at the worried faces lingering above me. None of them was apologetic and, as more of the moments after my fall settled into line, I remembered how they'd all come
up
the stairs to help me, not from behind me.

In the infirmary, I lay with my wrist on the cushion of my belly while the calls were made – more than one because Mum wasn't in the office. Dad appeared soon after.

‘You're in the wars, mate,' he said, helping me to my feet for the drive to the surgery.

‘Sprained, not broken,' was our GP's verdict, but we had to go up to the hospital for an X-ray just in case and by the time that was done there was no point in Dad going back to work.

‘Slow day, anyway,' he said as he created a bed of ice for my wrist, something he'd done a hundred times tending to Tyke's strains and sprains.

‘I can't remember you ever picking me up from school like this.'

‘No, it's always been your mum's job, but she's getting busier all the time; practically runs the office these days. Her brothers are good at the blokey bluster with clients, but she does the hard-nosed business. S'pose that was how she browbeat all those doctors and therapists into going the extra yard for you, Jake.'

He was right about that. I'd been too young to notice through most of it, but occasionally I still had to see the same people in Brisbane to check on my legs and last year it had been obvious. ‘Dr McCreedy just about saluted Mum last time we were there,' I said.

Dad's face broke into a wry grin which spread to mine. We locked eyes for a moment wondering if we laughed too openly, would it seem like an insult? Without a word we decided it was fine.

‘Your mum was determined you'd get the same chance in life as everyone else, Jacob. When they started talking wheelchairs before you were even out of the maternity ward I saw the steel take hold. Not my boy, she was saying.'

I knew all this, of course. We'd had the same conversations many times, in different words, and I didn't mind how often he reminded me. I still shuddered at what school would have been like in a wheelchair, and worse, with a tongue that flopped about in my mouth like a fish. But on that Friday afternoon, it wasn't school I pictured from a wheelchair; I tried to judge my chances with Amy if I had no proper legs at all and didn't like what I saw.

Close to four Mum turned up, full of apologies and concern for my wrist which had barely bothered to swell thanks to the ice.

‘How did it happen?'

Good question. If I even hinted at a push, Mum would be ranting at Mrs Schwartz before the words had faded from the room. Besides,
somebody pushed me
was the wail of a seven-year-old.

‘Got careless on the stairs,' I answered and for my lie I had to endure a glare of motherly exasperation. In some quarters I
was
seven years old, apparently.