Lucky she’d be busy tomorrow. Keeping her at arm’s length and his job safe might not be as easy as he thought. By the time he unsaddled the horses, rubbed them down and made sure they had feed and water, it was getting close to midday. He’d head for Isaac’s place.

A couple of the apprentice jockeys wandered past him carrying their saddles. He didn’t like those two. They had dirty minds. He’d known them since primary school, and now they worked here too.

“Hey, Cole. So what’s she like?” asked Gary.

“Grow up,” he said.

“Does she know where you’ve come from?” Gary moved the saddle to the other hip.

“Or where you’ve been?” Ewan smirked.

Any time Milly got him to help her they came up with this shit.

“Get a life,” he told them. But, if Milly Gaisford had been ugly, or unpleasant in any way, life would be a lot easier.

Cole parked the ute in the driveway at Isaac’s place. Isaac’s parents had one of those huge gardens with sweeping lawns and plenty of trees. Even the driveway and parking area were big. He saw Luke’s father’s truck parked right up by the door of the shed. Luke must have borrowed the truck for some reason. Noah had parked his car under trees at the side. Adam usually caught a ride with Noah, so he’d be here too.

He went inside and saw Luke and Isaac carrying a couple of pallets to the end wall.

“You finally made it,” said Luke. He flicked his hair out of his eyes. They already had a heap of pallets laid out in a square. Luke directed Isaac over to the side, then they lay the pallets down carefully, starting a second layer. Luke had Adam and Noah on brooms, sweeping out the dust.

“What are you doing?” Cole asked.

“Making a stage.” Luke, tall, skinny and blond, and not bad looking, pushed the corner pallet hard with his boot. “Dad had a heap of these lying around the workshop. He said we could have them.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Take your ute back to school and pick up the drum kit. Collins said we could borrow it. He’ll be there to let you in.”

“Okay.” Cole yawned and stretched. To give Luke credit, he might be domineering, but he knew how to organise people.

“Take Adam with you.” Luke looked over at the sweepers. “Adam, go with Luke to get the drums. Tre can finish the sweeping.” Everyone else managed to call her Tessa, but as soon as Luke found out his girlfriend’s real name was Theresa, he shortened it to Tre, and stuck with it.

She pushed herself off the sawhorse she’d been perched on. She went over to Adam and took the broom off him.

Typical Tessa. She did whatever Luke told her to. Cole had known her all his life. They’d been friends since kindergarten. She had the same sort of home life he did, except she had a mother, a useless one, as useless as his father.

Adam and Cole picked up the drumkit and it didn’t take long to get it back to the shed and set up.

It looked like they were ready to start practicing. But if they found the music room daunting, try a whole shed. Menacing. A huge empty space filled with cobwebs and muteness, and sunlight filtering through the cracks in the old wooden doors. Dust sat on the windows, just a curve on the glass, like curtains.

Then Luke did this rock star thing. He bounced, knees bent, boots apart, back arched, half turned then flicked his head and played a few chords on an air guitar. His own guitar still leaned against the workbench.

Interesting to see Luke intimidated by the shed too. Not much stopped him. Then he sat on the edge of the pallet stage.

“What are we called?” he asked. There had already been a bit of discussion about this.

“Arena?” Cole suggested again. For some reason he wanted Arena.

“Nah, already taken. I checked.” Adam, as dark-haired and dark-eyed as he was, played a few chords on his guitar and checked the tuner on his phone.

“What about Stadium?” asked Noah. Tall like the rest of them, Noah had freckles and a shock of red hair that seemed to stick out all over the place if he didn’t tie it back. “It’s the same sort of thing.”

Luke nodded. “That’ll work.”

“Yep,” says Cole. “I can live with that.”

They practiced a couple of numbers and then got onto Stardust. Isaac and Collins had written it. As music teachers go, Collins wasn’t a bad guy. Over the last few months Collins had taken Isaac under his wing and had been teaching him how to write lyrics and set them to music. This was the first one Isaac had been willing to let them try.

Isaac played the introduction on the violin then Luke came in with the vocals. He sounded the way he always did to Cole, but Isaac stopped playing and made that cut it gesture with the bow.

“Nah,” he said to Luke. “Come in under the violin and then I’ll fade back.”

“I thought I did,” said Luke.

“Nah, do it like this.” He handed the violin to Noah, one of those kids, like Isaac, who could play anything. He’d been taking lessons from the age of six and was one of Natalia’s protégés. Cole couldn’t figure out why so many of the boys in his class wanted to do the violin, until he saw Natalia. He might even have considered it himself if he could afford it.

“Play me in,” Isaac said to Noah, then took the microphone off Luke. In a brown-haired, grey-eyed way, he looked as good as Luke did.

The violin wailed. Isaac came in with lyrics not sounding a hell of a lot different to the way Luke sounded but with a few changes. Then Luke tried it.

This could go on forever.

Cole put the drum-sticks down. “Just getting a drink,” he said.

He went over to the bench and got his water bottle, and then joined Tessa on the sawhorse and watched Luke, Noah and Isaac try to get the introduction the way Isaac wanted it.

Tessa had been watching too. “Nice scenery,” she said and nodded at the stage.

He snorted. Trust Tessa to say something like that.

Tessa grinned. “Do you think Collins picked you all for the way you play music or for the way you look?”

He took the lid off the bottle, had a drink and thought about it. Everyone in the band looked good, but different. Maybe Tessa had a point.

“And who do you think Noah is getting so buff for?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” Noah looked like he always did to him, a mane of red hair, freckles.

“Look at him properly,” said Tessa. “He looks like a viking now.”

Cole studied Noah again. Okay, he’d gained weight, heavier shoulders and chest. He looked bigger all round, even his thighs. The other three just looked skinny beside him. Small waist and bum though, that triangle shape some guys get from working out.

“Must be going to the gym. Getting fit?”

“No. He’s trying to impress someone,” said Tessa, “but I’ve never seen him with anyone.”

“He’s always with Adam.”

Tessa shook her head. “No, Adam likes girls. And he’s really nice to them.”

“How do you know?”

Tessa raised her eyebrows at him.

“Jesus, Tess.” He knew Luke cheated on Tessa. He didn’t know about the other way around. “If he’s so nice, why aren’t you still with him?”

“It’s like being wrapped in a blanket all the time. I like a bit more excitement than that.” Tessa grinned.

“Does Luke know?” he asked.

She shrugged. “He suspects, and that’s good, because the only way to keep Luke interested is to make him jealous.”

“Crazy.” If he bothered with a girlfriend, he wouldn’t stick around if he suspected she cheated on him.

Finally, the others were happy with the introduction to Stardust and they could get on with the practice.

“Now,” said Luke, after they finished. He was hanging all over Tessa again, hand on her waist, bodies touching, in that he’s entitled to because he’s having sex with her way. “We need a look.”

Cole watched Tessa. She seemed happy about being hung on, but then she was pretty much as out there as Luke.

Tessa was different to Milly. Milly was small and slender and a bit shy, with dark hair, and eyes that looked like chunks of amber with a few dark flecks. Tessa was curvy and had blonde hair that always seemed be over her face or being flicked back over her shoulders, and she was noisy and bouncy like Luke.

Luke liked her, she liked him. Even if they were both cheating it seemed to work.

“I’ve got a look.” He never bothered much about what he wore. Boots, jeans and black t-shirt suited him. Who looked at the drummer anyway?

“Not me, I’m not dressing up either,” said Noah.

“No,” said Adam.

So basically, Luke’s idea got shot down by everyone, except Isaac. But Isaac never tended to say much.

They spent the rest of the day practicing.

“Now we need a gig,” Luke said, when they had finished.

“There’s the school ball.” Noah got a collective groan for that.

“They’ve got a band booked already.” Luke gave the impression he had hoped for something cooler anyway.

Noah shrugged. “They’re not going to let us play the Vector Arena until we’ve played somewhere else and at least we don’t have to cart instruments anywhere, except the drums. We might have to take them back.”

“Nah, we’ll get Collins to buy another drumkit.”

“Okay,” said Luke. “I’ll see if I can swing it. Do you want to practice tomorrow?”

“No. Got to work,” said Cole. Brilliant. Tomorrow he got to spend the whole day with Milly and get paid for it.

When he got home, he started to get dinner ready. His dad wouldn’t be in until late. He had to cook dinner if he wanted to eat tonight. Before he left for work he’d got sausages out. Not very exciting but not much left in the freezer. While the sausages were cooking he hung out the load of washing that he put in the machine in the morning, peeled the spuds and got some peas out of the freezer.

By the time his dad turned up he had it all ready to eat.

“Are we sitting at the table?” The two plates were on the bench. He dished up the food.

His dad opened the fridge and hauled out a six pack.

“Nah. We’ll turn on the TV see what the world is doing.”

He looked even more tired than usual. This new truck driving job took it out of him. How long would he stick with it this time?

Cole handed his dad his plate and knife and fork. They both went into the lounge and settled in front of the TV.

His dad opened the first can. He’d be through all six by the end of the meal and would move straight onto the next six.

It would have been good if he’d had the chance to grow up the way Milly did, having everything he needed without having to work for it. Luke, Noah, Adam and Isaac had that. They had parents who worked, who cared if things were clean and tidy, who lived in nice houses, and who did the looking after instead of the other way around.