The Yearbook Committee (6 page)

‘Ryan?' I ask. ‘Hmmm, I liked you so much more as Pervert-from-the-Hallway.'

His friend's head swings up and she looks from him to me.

‘She thinks she saw something that she didn't,' he explains.

‘He was watching girls undress in the hallway,' I whisper to her knowingly, loud enough for everyone to hear.

‘I didn't even see those girls,' he says, raising his voice. ‘I WAS WATCHING THE BOYS WITH THE BALL.'

I bite my lip to stifle a laugh. I could heckle this guy forever.

‘And she still doesn't believe me,' he says, putting his arms out then dropping them to his side. ‘Not that it matters, so let's move on. Tammi, what can you bring to the yearbook?'

‘I don't know,' she says. ‘Ask Lauren.'

‘Come on, Tams, anything,' he pleads.

She shrugs. ‘I'll let you know,' she mutters.

‘Why? Do you need to ask someone's permission?' I ask her.

‘My best friend,' she says, not looking at me. ‘She kind of made me do this. No bad pictures of her, favourable coverage, you know.'

Gillian scoffs and Tammi immediately turns around, narrowing her eyes at her.

‘Problem?'

‘She can't control everything,' Gillian says, her voice slightly trembling. ‘It has to be fair.'

‘Don't talk to me about fair,' Tammi replies, shaking her head.

‘So we just have to ignore the fact that she's been a snob for six years?'

‘You're not the only one on the team, Gill,' she snaps. ‘We're all contributing. We all have a say.'

Gillian looks away. I almost feel sorry for her, but I don't want to say anything. I'm not here to make friends.
No roots
. I pull my phone out of my pocket and text my friend Katy — anything to make the time pass.

At ten minutes to four, we still haven't done anything besides clash. Ryan looks at us all from his perch on the teacher's desk. By now, Tammi has her head on the desk, Gillian has forgotten about her minutes and is looking out the window, I'm giving Ryan a blank stare and Matty is still lost in his music.

‘Why do I have a feeling this is going to be more trouble than it's worth?' he asks as his phone alarm beeps. ‘Meeting over,' he yells out. ‘Next one in a month. Same time, same place. Bring friendlier attitudes.'

I'm all the way down the hall when I hear a door slam. I turn around to see Ryan, sunk down to the floor, back against the wall, head in his hands.

         
Matty Fullerton
is sick of being bothered by the same old crap.

‘The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round, round and round . . .'

For Christ's sake
, I think, as the father and his three-year-old son in front of me go for it a third time. Couldn't they pick a less repetitive nursery rhyme? I sigh as loudly as I possibly can, hoping that they'll get the hint. But they don't, and with every bus stop that they don't get off at, it's looking more and more likely that I won't get home. Because I'll probably wind up punching Dad in the face and handing myself in to the police, because I'm a loser like that. A loser with a conscience.

Across the aisle, an old lady smiles at the performing duo and I realise that it's only me who's bothered by the sight of a father sharing a nice-yet-ordinary moment with his son. I wonder if there were similar moments between my own dad and me.

I strain my brain trying to remember something, anything — even the smallest fragment. An image of work boots in the hallway,
a manly scent, the feel of stubble. But there's nothing. Instead, the reminder of my very blank past and my uncertain future sits in my backpack, waiting for action: another reminder of where I am (posh private school) and what I lack (a home environment worthy of being at one).

I get off the bus, pull the hoodie low over my face and start walking home. I'm checking the weather on my phone when I walk straight into a tall, hard body.

‘Watch where you're going, dickhead,' the body's owner says.

I look up, and grin.

‘Mo,' I say, clasping his arm. ‘If your parents knew what your language was like . . .'

He laughs. ‘How you been, Matt?'

I nod, smiling. ‘Not bad, brother. And you?'

He shakes his head. ‘Yeah, same old, same old.'

‘Still loving those job sites?' I ask. ‘Or are you sick of laying bricks?'

‘Just you wait till I finish my TAFE certificate, man. Tradies make heaps of money. Your posh private school shoulda taught you that.'

‘As if I'd listen anyway,' I tell him, smirking. ‘How's Billy?'

‘Still out, which is good. My dad watches him like a hawk.'

‘You can't blame him,' I say. ‘He put your parents through hell.'

‘All of us, bro,' he says. ‘We had to move from a nice house to a two-bedroom unit so my parents could pay his bail, you know? My sisters have nowhere to study, and Zeina's school captain. She's smart, she needs the space.'

‘You don't need to tell me, man, I remember.'

‘Want to come eat?' he asks. ‘Mum made stuffed vine leaves today. I know you love 'em.'

I laugh. ‘Tell your mum I miss her, I'll be round soon. I can't believe I haven't seen the new place. Been buried under homework and stuff.'

He shakes his head. ‘Nothing to see anyway,' he tells me. ‘We moved, but everything stayed the same.'

I pat his back. ‘Some things do,' I agree. ‘Catch you later.'

I continue walking. Back before I got the scholarship to Holy Family, Mohamed and I were best mates at Strathfield South High School. Now, his twin sister, Zeina, is the school captain, and his younger sister, Sarah — who put on her hijab at thirteen and didn't let her father's protests about discrimination change her decision — will probably be premier one day. And my best mate was making the kind of money I desperately needed, while I was stuck in a school where the people had about as much depth as a kiddie pool. Mo's home life — so traditional, so nuclear — was so different to my own. Their biggest problem was with elder brother Bilal's drug problem.

I duck into the corner store for a bag of pasta and a jar of sauce. If my life was like Mohamed's, I think, I wouldn't be cooking my own dinner. And I'd probably know something about my dad.

But it's not.

I didn't think that my attendance at Holy Family was going to improve my life in any way, but every time I doubted my presence there, I remembered Mo's parents' enthusiasm when I told them that I had got a scholarship. Those people were the biggest champions of education.

‘We came from nothing,' his father would tell me. ‘Bombs dropping on our homes all the time. Our own government used us as human shields. We couldn't trust them, couldn't trust the Israelis. We had no one. Here, my children have a life. They study, they get
jobs. This country — Allah shower his blessings upon it — gives us so much. You get a scholarship at fancy school, you take it. My Sarah already talks about applying for uni scholarships,
Inshallah
.'

As if I could let the bloke down. So I took the scholarship. And not just for him, but for my mum too — I don't know if it was the grand building and immaculate gardens, or its rich history, but she was obsessed with the place. She once told me that when she was young she would walk past it every day on her walk to her own school, and see the girls in their blazers and hats, and dream of giving her children a better life than she got. A life that would start at this school, a life that would be filled with promise. Go figure.

I walk into our flat and the darkness is hard to adjust to after being outside.

‘No miracles today, I see,' I say to the limp body on the couch. She sighs and I feel cruel, but I remember reading that you should try to maintain some normalcy, and this is the way we've always spoken to each other.

‘Did you move at all today?' I press. ‘Because I swear that was the position you were in when I left this morning and you were watching
The Today Show
.'

An empty bottle of cheap red wine is next to her, and a cockroach is feasting on some shards of chocolate that have fallen to the floor. She sees me eyeing it.

‘I got hungry,' she mumbles, ashamed.

‘You used to make proper food when you were hungry,' I tell her. ‘What happened?'

There's a long pause. Then she says, ‘Don't get frustrated at me.'

‘Well, what do you expect? You won't even talk to someone. A professional, a friend. Me, even.'

I shake my head, then start towards my room.

‘I just can't get up any more,' she says, quietly.

‘Yeah, well, lucky I can get up for you,' I mumble.

I take my bag to my room and throw it against the wall, putting on Linkin Park's ‘Numb' at full blast. A retro choice, I know, but a song that definitely sums up the situation.

I take the letter out of my bag and stare at it. Parent–teacher night. How would I get out of this one? Mum's obviously not in any condition to go, and if she didn't, Mr Broderick would come down on me. The guy was waiting for me to stuff up. Again.

Don't get me wrong, parent–teacher nights were fine at my old school. We fit in, Mum and me. I don't need to go into how different we are from the families at Holy Family, and parent– teacher nights are just a fraction of the reason. My classmates have the best lives: parties, the latest phones and tablets, promises of cars with good HSC results, plans for schoolies in Thailand and aspirations to move to London after a probably guaranteed university education that their parents paid for.

My mum couldn't even afford to pay her phone bill right now. And even without her current mental situation weighing her down, she would feel like crap next to all those glam mothers that are outside the gates every day.

I crumple the letter up and throw it against the wall, watching it fall into my garbage bin.

Later, while Mum sleeps, I walk through the flat and open the windows. The fresh air is nice, so I head outside to sit at the top of the stairs. We live in a unit block on the Hume Highway bordering Enfield and South Strathfield, and our flat has outside access. These buildings are red-brick, old, and usually filled with even older residents or housing commission bogans. Mum paid
off the place with her inheritance when I was younger; looking at her now, it's hard to believe she once managed to support herself and a child and buy a place in the process.

I glance at the time on my phone and realise that it's late, and I haven't eaten yet, so I head back inside. I'm stirring pasta sauce while reading
Hamlet
when I hear her get up. She walks over slowly, and sits at the little kitchen table we got from a garage sale when I was six. I helped her paint it on the front lawn; seeing it every day reminds me that we're a team. So I decide to keep dinner diplomatic.

‘What's my handsome little man doing?' she asks after a moment.

‘I'm not a little man any more, Ma,' I say.
But I want to be. I want to be a kid again.

‘No, you're not, are you?' she replies, ruffling my hair as I place a plate before her. ‘And you take such good care of me. My alpha and omega — my beginning and my end.'

I shrug at her affection and add some parmesan to her plate, then sit opposite her.

‘Tastes nice, but this is more than I can eat,' she says.

‘It's from a jar, it's certainly not as nice as your one with the real tomatoes and the fresh basil.'

She gives me a half-smile and continues eating her dinner, taking super small bites. After some minutes of quiet, she pushes her plate away.

‘Sorry,' she says, looking at me. ‘I don't have much of an appetite.'

‘It's fine,' I reassure her. ‘I'll just put it in the fridge. You should reheat it for lunch tomorrow.'

‘Oh, I don't know if I —'

‘Mum, it's better than chocolate and red wine.' I look at her pointedly and she purses her lips, like a chastised child.

Is this what my life has come to?
I think, as I place the cutlery in the sink, realising more than ever that I need a father — someone — just so I don't feel so alone.

‘Mum, there's parent–teacher night in two weeks, and I was wondering . . .'

‘Matty, you know I'm not up to it right now,' she says, waving me away. ‘I can't even go to work.'

‘Actually, I was wondering . . . about maybe reaching out to my father.'

She widens her eyes. ‘You've never asked about him before.'

I shrug. ‘Well, I guess the time has come.'

She stands up from the table in a huff.

‘No, Matthew,' she says, tossing her arm behind her as she walks out of the room. ‘Take my word for it. We don't need him.'

I drape the teatowel over my shoulder, turn on the taps and sigh.

That's where you're wrong, Mum
, I think, as I lean over the sink.
I need him.

After I'm done tidying up, I sit at the table and try to do some homework, but my mood gets the better of me and I go to my room and hop online instead, checking out my favourite music blogs. Facebook pings a chat notification and I cringe.