The Whole of My World (4 page)

 

 

‘Not in your dreams!' Josh shouts, his voice whipped from his mouth as we sprint along the home straight. He's ahead of me, again, but only just. I feel the wind on my face, blood pumps in my ears, and my feet fly beneath me. I push myself so hard that my heart feels ready to explode in my chest. He's so close. I can't stand the idea of him beating me. He could never beat me before. He couldn't beat either of us.

Josh McGuire is the only friend I have left from Glenvalley High. I've known him since we were kids, even before we started school. He lives down the street, at number 39. We used to do everything together – our mums were best friends, basically forcing us to play together so they could talk about books and films and all the things they'd studied at university and never got to talk about with anyone else. I didn't mind the afternoons at the McGuires'. Mrs McGuire was always sunny and kind. She made me laugh, and Mum adored her. I try not to think about what Mum would say if she knew how long it's been since we've seen Mrs McGuire. It's not all my fault, I know. But some of it is.

Those afternoons were full of laughter and fun. Josh has always been a clown and brilliant at footy. We used to play for the Glenvalley Raiders together, and he was the only other kid who had any hope of catching me before I stopped playing. Josh never made me feel like I was less than anyone else, like I was less than a boy. He used to pick me first or, at worst, second for any team he captained in primary school, and would never let the other boys tease me, even when I beat them. Josh is the main reason I was able to stick with the Raiders for as long as I did, and his was the loudest voice protesting when I had to stop. Almost as loud as mine.

Josh is my best friend, if a teenage boy can ever be best friends with a teenage girl without hormones getting in the way. So far we've made it through okay, although recently the fact that he's a boy seems to be harder to ignore than it used to be. He's always been good-looking, like his mum, with tanned skin and curly brown hair that flops over his green eyes. A lot of girls like him. It never used to bother me. Now, sometimes, it's all I can see. He makes me blush now, too, which is
ridiculous
.

I pump my legs harder, faster, gaining pace. There's no way I can let him beat me. I thrust my chest forward, lunging in an effort to pip him at the line. It's not like there's anyone around to clock us or referee the inevitable argument, but I need to feel like the gap between us isn't as big as it looks from behind. I lunge sharply – too sharply – losing my balance. My arms flail, reaching for anything that will stop my fall, finding Josh, who, I realise, isn't as far ahead as he was. As we both trip and nearly fall – him yelling, me laughing – I can't help but grin at the ground I made up in the last twenty metres. We collapse on the grassy track, laughingly trying to catch our breath.

Incredibly, I don't hurt myself when I land, and apart from possibly straining muscles from laughing so hard, Josh seems fine too. The track's deserted, being off-season. No one's mown it in weeks. The grass is already looking tired and worn, the strange mix of wet warmth and cold dry that makes up a Melbourne autumn doing its best to ruin the only official running track in Glenvalley. We lie there, our rasping breath the only sound between us apart from a handful of birds and the occasional roar of a truck passing along Summervale Road.

I roll over, grinning.

‘I won!' Josh gloats.

I laugh. ‘Another five metres and I would've had you.'

‘Rubbish,' he says, but not with his usual confidence.

‘You know I did. You just can't admit it.' He's quick for short distances, like I am. But I have stamina. That extra distance used to be enough to take him every time.

Josh shakes his head but doesn't argue, which is as good as admitting defeat. Josh never gives up when he's right. Or when he thinks he's right.

The grass is soft against my back, the air cool on my face. I haven't been running with Josh as much lately, not like we used to, and I can feel the tightening of my calf muscles at the very idea of how much they'll kill tomorrow. But I feel good, better than I've felt all week.

‘How's St Mary's?' he asks, ruining the moment in a single shot.

‘Fine.'

Josh props himself up on one elbow.

‘What?' I say crossly. I don't want to talk about it.

‘Fine?' The arch of his eyebrow adds an extra sting.

‘Okay. It's crap. They suck. I hate it. Is that better?'

Josh sighs. ‘Have you made any friends?'

I sit up, ready to snap. ‘What sort of question is that? You're not my dad.' But the energy to be angry seems to slip away when I see the genuine interest in his face. And then I want to tell him about Tara and the invitation to go to Fernlee Park next Thursday. I want to tell him about
The Great Gatsby
and even Sister Brigid, who, while a nun – which is just plain
weird
– actually seems nice. I won't tell him about Ginnie Perkins, though. I don't want to think about her or her friends on my weekends. Monday to Friday is bad enough.

I lie back again, knowing it's always easier if I don't have to look at him. His green eyes. His floppy hair. ‘One girl, Tara, is cool. She barracks for the Falcons –'

‘Loser.'

I shoot him the required filthy and continue. ‘We're going to Fernlee Park next week – to watch the Falcons train. She says they're just walking around like anybody else.'

Josh laughed, half snort, half chuckle. ‘What, like real people?'

‘You know what I mean.'

‘Anyone else?'

‘Geez, you want blood? No, there's no one else. It's only been a week.'

Silence settles naturally then. Our usual arrangement of him being annoying and me shutting him down is reassuring. Maybe not
everything
has changed after all.

‘The kids at school asked about you.'

‘Who?' I try to sound like I don't care.

Josh hesitates a second too long, like he's struggling to come up with some names. ‘Julie . . . and Sam.'

A fly hovers near my eyes, my nose. I brush it away but it refuses to give up. ‘They didn't care much when I was there. Barely talked to them all last year.'

‘Well, they asked. They wanted to know why you left – after . . . all this time.'

He means since the accident. Why it took almost two years to leave. I shrug and push my hair off my face. ‘I have to have a reason?'

Josh shakes his head. I almost feel sorry for him. He's trying to say the right thing but there's no right thing to say. ‘The boys at the club have been asking, too.'

This one cuts like he knew it would. My heart ices over and I don't feel sorry for him anymore. The fly buzzes and hovers, its fat body slow and lethargic as I try to wave it away. ‘Bloody flies!'

‘They asked if you were coming back.'

I roll away from Josh and face the edge of the track. The way the white paint bites deep into the turf, as though the weight of the paint flattened it and not the line machine that drew it.

‘Jesus, Shell.'

‘What?'

Josh nudges me to face him, fixing me in that green-eyed stare. ‘You know what.'

‘I tried, didn't I? Gave it a year – almost two. They didn't treat me the same. Like some of me was missing or gone. Like I was less than what I used to be.' I shake my head, the memory of it sitting like a rock in my chest. ‘I'm done with them – with all of them, even the Raiders. Especially the Raiders.'

‘How can you just be
done
? That's not how it works.'

‘I've drawn a line, Josh. Between before . . . and after. Then. And now.'

‘Is that you talking or your dad?'

I sit up, tuck my knees under my chin, tight and small. ‘Me.'

‘It doesn't sound like you.'

My shoulders lift and fall almost involuntarily. ‘I've changed.'

‘I can see that.'

I ignore the wave of panic that threatens to topple me. I want to claw it back, claw
him
back to where we were. Except there's that line, and I've drawn it. We all have.

After a long minute, Josh says, ‘Mum wanted to invite you and your dad to our house.'

‘She'll have to ask Dad.'

‘I'm asking you.'

‘Why? It's not up to me.'

‘I guess she thinks it kind of is.'

I frown at him. ‘Why? When is it?'

Josh is beside me now, forcing me to look at him. ‘The eleventh.'

‘Of what?'

Josh doesn't need to answer that. I already know.

‘June.' He says it quietly, like something sacred.

It's weeks away. She's trying to get me ready for it. She knows I'm avoiding her – that Dad and I both are – and she's trying to break through before . . . it's too late.

I shake my head, no, unable to form the word, even though my whole body shouts it. Did he even need to ask?

Josh releases a dry, humourless laugh. ‘I told her you'd say that.'

Sound still won't form in my throat. I take long, slow breaths, forcing moisture into my mouth, hoping my voice will come with it.

‘So . . . what? You can't even celebrate your birthday anymore? Everything has to be different? Everything has to change?'

Yes, I want to say. Everything
has
changed. Even my birthday – especially my birthday. The idea of it, the shape of it. What it means. There's no one around and suddenly I'm conscious of the absence of noise, the emptiness of this place. The fact that it's just us.

‘You only turn fifteen once,' Josh says quietly. ‘You can't pretend it isn't happening.'

I should just go along with it but I can't. No one knows that better than Josh. ‘No,' I manage eventually.

Josh sucks air noisily, his frustration almost physical.

‘I can't,' I rasp, my voice stronger, though still a shadow of itself. ‘Everything is different, whether you like it or not. I thought it would be okay by now but it's not. We just have to get used to it and start again.'

But it's more than this. Much more. How could he ask?
How could he?

I pull myself up and brush my trackpants roughly. ‘You ready?'

But I don't wait for him to reply. I'm already headed to the gate.

 

 

A cyclone fence stretches along Leafy Crescent, rusty and broken in parts. Fernlee Park is green and overgrown, with small billboards along the boundary. A long race leads into a brown-brick stadium. No one is out on the ground yet and the whole place looks deserted.

I follow Tara into the car park behind the stadium, loose pebbles rolling beneath my feet. Dust kicks up whenever a car drives by, and there are already other kids waiting at the entrance. They all clutch notebooks and pens, and a few have cameras slung around their necks.

‘Hi.'

‘Hey.'

Tara doesn't introduce me, but no one seems to care either. Or notice. ‘Who's here?' she says to no one in particular.

A short, thick, redheaded girl, who, up close, looks much older than the others, answers with the tired voice of someone sick of having to know everything. ‘Rocky and Jury came by. I haven't seen Blackie yet but his car's here.' She points to a dark green Toyota Corolla, a hotted-up two-door with a black spoiler and dark windows. ‘I'm sure he'll come out to say hi.'

‘He's in physio,' a boy says. ‘He came early to see Barry.' He looks about sixteen and is sporting a blond-streaked mullet that I think is supposed to look like Bono's from U2, given his ‘Under a Blood Red Sky' T-shirt, but looks more like Kim Wilde's.

‘Did you see him?' The redhead isn't happy that someone knows something she doesn't.

‘No,' Bono Boy sniffs. ‘But I heard on the news he's injured, and Barry's door is shut.'

‘It's probably a hammy,' one says.

‘Might be his knee again,' says another.

Either way, they all agree Blackie is with the physio.

The redhead sticks her hands in her jeans pockets and draws a semicircle with her toe in the dusty ground. If it wasn't for her lined face, you'd think she was a kid – thirteen at most. But then she smiles and tiny creases touch her eyes, and I wonder if she could be in her thirties. ‘Buddha's had his hair cut,' she says, as if making an earth-shattering announcement – and it must have been, because she gets everyone's attention fast.

‘Really?'

‘What's it look like?'

‘I bet it was his girlfriend's idea.'

‘Yeah, Brandy must have made him do it.' They all laugh, nodding and smiling as though they're talking about their best friends.

I keep silent. So far no one has spoken a word to me. They don't look at me, not even a curious glance. I try to fight the churning inside, the frustration, even though I don't actually have anything to say.

As though reading my mind, Tara suddenly remembers I'm there. ‘We're still early. Plenty more players to arrive. Did you bring your autograph book?'

Autograph book? I can't believe how stupid I am!
Of course
I should have brought an autograph book. I don't actually own one but it's suddenly so obvious I need one that I can't believe I've managed this long without. I don't know how I would have filled it, because I've never met anyone famous before, but that's not the point. I need one now.

‘That's okay,' Tara says when I shake my head dumbly. ‘I have some spare paper. You can have a few sheets,' she offers, and begins ripping pages from the back of her Geography exercise book.

‘Thanks. If you're sure you don't need them . . .' This is the longest conversation Tara and I have had since that first day and, as I'm still not entirely sure she actually wants me here, I'm more than a bit relieved. I'd hung around her the whole day at school, waiting for a sign that her offer to go to Fernlee Park tonight still stood, or if it was something I'd just created in my head. But at the end of the day she came up to my locker and, with a shrug to suggest she didn't care how I answered, said, ‘Are you coming?'

I'm unexpectedly pleased by the offer of pages from her Geography exercise book. I blink hard and focus on the paper, the whiteness almost too bright for my suddenly sensitive eyes. I blink again, furiously. Then I remind myself I'm about to meet my heroes and suddenly I'm fine, and I decide right then that nothing else matters. I feel bigger –
stronger
– just thinking about it.

Tara holds up a Glenthorn Football Club Official Autograph Book, opening it for me to see. Apart from the pages filled with scrawled signatures, it also has a section with rows of stats under headings like ‘History', ‘Premierships', ‘Charlie Medals' (followed by a fat zero) and ‘Goal Kickers'. I decide that I will definitely buy myself an official Glenthorn autograph book like this one and that Tara is suddenly the coolest girl I know.

A car appears in the driveway and everyone scatters. Every kid lines up at the doorway to the gym as though the whole thing has been organised and everyone has – and
knows
– their place. I find myself wondering if there's room for a newcomer. And how you qualify if there is.

‘Eddie,' the redhead announces.

Tara shoves the loose pages at me and joins the others in the rush towards the new arrival. They all wave autograph books, club jumpers and brown-and-gold footballs under the player's nose, and bombard him with questions.

‘Pull up all right, mate?'

‘Not sore I hope?'

‘Good game, Eddie.'

Mick ‘Eddie' Edwards limps towards us, his left leg turned out like he doesn't want to bend it. He looks older than he does on telly, but handsome too. He is really tall. Lanky and narrow, except for his chest, which is a thick wall of muscle. His arms, too, seem heavy compared to his skinny legs. Basically, he looks like a full forward. Like he was born to be one. I can barely contain my excitement that he's playing with the Falcons this year. Of all the teams, he chose mine.

Eddie smiles and nods at the noisy fans as if this kind of thing has happened before, but also like he isn't really used to it yet and doesn't know what to say. ‘Wow, you guys are keen,' he manages eventually, although he sounds more confused than impressed. He has a point. The real season starts Saturday. So far, we've only played a handful of pre-season games that, luckily, we've won. They showed a few of them on telly. Dad always tapes them for me so I can update my scrapbook with the kinds of stats
The Sun
ignores: the goal assists, the shepherds and tackles – the selfless stuff that I'm sure wins games. Dad says the same thing.

Eddie signs whatever is pushed in front of him without slowing down, juggling pens and paper in one hand, his bag in the other, maintaining this balancing act all the way to the gym entrance. Then, giving up on any chance of escape, he drops his training bag and finishes signing everything that's handed to him. I stand back, wondering if my pathetic-looking scrap of paper will earn an autograph.

‘You were robbed, mate, in the last quarter,' the redhead says, snapping her bubble gum and nodding. We played the Panthers at Valley Park Oval on Saturday and won comfortably. Doesn't mean much for the team – some players don't even try in the pre-season. But new guys or those coming back from injury are always keen, hoping it will be enough to earn them selection for Round One. Eddie kicked two goals but missed a few too. Not ideal but not terrible either.

Eddie smiles. ‘You think?'

‘He hit you way too high. Should have been a free.'

‘Hard to tell from where I was,' Eddie says.

We all laugh. He'd ended up sprawled out in the mud.

‘Seriously. And you were right in front, too. Would have been a goal. A definite gimme.'

‘Actually,' I start, unable to keep quiet when someone's so completely
wrong
, ‘you ducked into it.' I watched that game over and over, slowed it down, played it back. It was clear as day. ‘Panoli went straight for the ball.'

‘Really?' Eddie isn't smiling but he seems more curious than upset.

No point backing down now. ‘He got you with his shoulder, not his arm. The ump was right. No free there.'

Eddie studies me, his face giving nothing away. ‘I'll check the tape tonight,' he says. And then, like a bolt of lightning, Eddie smiles at me – right into me – like he's known me for years. ‘You're new.'

‘So are you,' I shoot back, blushing so deeply I can feel it in my shoes.

He laughs. A rich, low, strong sound. ‘Fair enough.' He signs his name then pauses, his pen hovering over the page. ‘What's your name?'

‘Shelley.' I don't stutter but my brain seems to, and I'm not even sure I've spoken out loud. ‘With an “e”. Like the author.'

He looks up at me, amused. ‘
Frankenstein
fan, are you?'

Stunned, I shake my head. ‘Not me. My mum.' I rush on, so surprised by this that I know I'm blabbing. ‘It was that or Mathilde.'

Eddie laughs. ‘I'm glad she picked Shelley,' he says. ‘Probably my favourite name. I've always said that if I ever had a daughter, I'd call her Michelle. Shelley for short.' And he writes ‘Dear Shelley, Best Wishes, Your Friend Mick Edwards'. He winks at me. ‘Since we're both new here, I think that makes us friends, don't you?'

I can feel the other kids' eyes boring into me and I know my face is as red as a Sherrin. No one's ever said they like my name or have known what it means. ‘Uh, thanks, Eddie,' comes out more like a grunt than any recognisable word, but Eddie smiles again and hands back my pen and paper.

‘Call me Mick,' he says unexpectedly. I glance up to see who he's talking to, but he's looking right at me. ‘The papers call me Eddie.' He runs his hand through his hair, his smile lopsided. ‘But my friends call me Mick.'

My mouth is so dry I'm not sure I can form the words. ‘Okay.
Mick
,' I croak.

‘See you after,' he says with a wave to the group, then disappears into the gym.

I don't know what to do, so I just stand there while the others stare at me. Tara recovers first. ‘New players are always like that,' she says. ‘They try harder to fit in.'

The others nod at each other and return to their assigned posts outside the training-room entrance as another car drives towards them.

‘Killer,' the redhead announces. And sure enough, Kevin Compton climbs out of his car and makes his way to the gym entrance. He signs a few autographs and stands for a photo with Tara then says he's running late and disappears inside, all within about two-and-a-half minutes.

Bono Boy shrugs as we watch him leave. ‘When you're that good, you don't need to be nice.'

Tara hangs her camera back around her neck.

‘Cool camera,' I say, nodding at her Brownie. ‘Do you have other photos of the team?'

‘About a thousand,' Red chips in before Tara can answer.

Tara smiles proudly, the blush staining her pale cheeks. ‘I've got a few.'

‘They're all coming now,' Bono Boy informs us, as a parade of cars files into the car park. I watch the players arrive, one by one. Most of the players know the kids by name and answer questions about their post-game condition or their plans for next week's match. No one else speaks to me except to sign the bit of paper I offer them or to ask for my pen so they can sign someone else's book.

Mossy doesn't appear – he's had surgery and is still in hospital. But bit by bit, I see every other hero from the telly show up and follow the same routine. I'm in heaven. I never want to leave.

After most of the team has arrived Tara and I collect our stuff. I follow her around the outside of the gym, towards a tall pair of chain-link gates.

‘Can't we go in?' I ask Tara as we wait for Red to fiddle with the rusted bolt. It seems stupid to wait outside the gym for so long and then not actually go inside.

‘In the gym?' Tara yelps, as though I suggested we all strip naked.

‘Well, yeah.'

‘Not in the
gym
.' Tara stares in disbelief. ‘Men only. Officials.' She keeps her lips together when she talks, as if she's holding back the words.

‘Oh.' I decide not to ask any more questions in case I stuff up again. I follow Tara and the others into the stadium, where we squeeze onto a wobbly wooden bench along the boundary. The air is already cold and the sun is setting. The Fernlee Park lights are on low, but I can hardly see anything in the dusty twilight. After a bit, the lights come on full beam. The players run out onto the field, their bodies steaming in the still air, and I wonder if I've ever seen anything more thrilling in my life.

Everyone claps like they're thinking the same thing, although it isn't so much out of excitement as expectation, the way they applaud. I realise then that the crowd has grown since I first arrived. Men, women, families, people young and old have collected here like I have, numbering a hundred or so, all of them focused on the action on the ground. Some wear official Glenthorn Football Club clothes, others are in the usual supporter gear – tired-looking footy jumpers or heavy brown duffle coats decorated with players' badges, sewn-on name tags and large numbers emblazoned on the centre of their backs.