Isaac Coleman.

What I Know.

Friday 20th September.

I leaned against the window sill in the art room and waited. It was lunchtime, and Cole and Luke were with me. All around us these canvases, with black and brown screaming faces, sat on easels. It felt like being in a forest of tortured trees, and, up front of the room, a print of the same sort of shattered face had been stuck to the whiteboard.

Cole propped up the wall, and Luke hung over Tessa.

He waved at the agony fest. “Which painting’s yours?”

Tessa untangled herself, took his hand, and led him across the room to the best copy of the picture.

Luke studied it. “Cool,” he said.

Then Tessa pointed at the canvas beside hers. Different, still black and brown, but it looked like the face hadn’t been painted. “And this is Jess’s picture.” Jess had painted everything around the face, and this familiar face watched from the canvas with no scream.

Luke sat on a desk and pulled Tessa close, so she was standing between his knees. “Not bad either,” he said about the painting then turned her head and kissed her. Her hair fell over their faces like a veil, Tessa’s hair blonde, Luke’s even blonder. A couple of days ago, he’d had his hair bleached white.

I’d seen the Tessa/Luke thing before, so I watched Jess.

That’s what I do. Watch Jess with her eyes the green-brown of a bush stream and her hair a sort of peanut butter and dark honey colour, flowing and curving softly.

I watch her constantly. Yearningly. Thirsting.

Jess’s hand touched her lips. Then she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. When I’m anywhere near her, or even anywhere not near her, I think about what it would be like to have her touching me in that slow way. I feel her fingers in my hair, and her palm on my cheek. In my mind, I reach out and touch her, and she touches me back. I can feel her fingernails run down my chest.

But, that day in the art room, I was invisible as usual. Jess and Tessa were meant to be in there. They’d been cleaning up. We weren’t. We were meant to be in the music room practicing.

“Come on, Luke.” I pushed myself away from the windowsill. “Adam and Noah will be waiting for us.”

Luke didn’t make any moves to leave. It was Tessa who pulled away, teasing, her hair and skirt flicking.

“We’ve got to go too, don’t we, Jess? We’ve got netball.”

Luke pulled her back. “Skip it. Stay here with us.”

“No,” said Tessa. “You shouldn’t be here anyway. We’ll get in trouble. I’ll see you after school.”

“Stay.” Luke ran his hand up Tessa’s leg.

Tessa looked tempted.

“We really have to go, Luke,” Jess said quietly. She’s always quiet. “The team will be waiting for us.” She walked to the door like she was drifting. She waited while Tessa disentangled herself again, but Jess still didn’t glance my way.

Yep, that’s the way it always goes, I get blanked by Jess.

After Jess and Tessa had gone, Luke hauled a joint out of his pocket. “You could try talking to her,” he said as he lit up. He’d mentioned that before. He took a puff, then handed the smoke over to Cole. “She likes you as much as you like her.”

He hadn’t mentioned that before. Maybe Tessa told him, and maybe that’s why the face in Jess’s painting looked familiar.

Cole was just about to pass the joint to me when Collins came into the art room. Collins is the school’s music teacher, and he didn’t look too pleased to find us sitting there.

“Mr Coleman, Mr Reilly and Mr Davies,” said Collins. “May I ask what you’re doing here?” Cole palmed the joint. Even Collins must have been able to smell the smoke, but he chose to ignore it. I’ll give him that. Collins can be cool. Instead of a lecture about dope, we got an earful about loitering.

“I’ve left the music room unlocked for you lot.” Collins has entered us in this battle of the bands, Smokefree thing. Smokefree. Bit of irony that, considering.

Then he turned on me. “And you, Isaac, if you want to do something, do it.”

I wasn’t exactly in a receptive mood after being blanked by Jess. Again. Despite what Luke thought or that painting with the familiar face. “Do what, sir?” I asked.

“If you want to write, start writing.”

“Write what, sir?”

Collins walked to the door, irritated. “Write what you know.” Trust a bloody teacher to come out with a cliché.

Luke eased himself off the desk. “Okay. Practice time.”

I followed Luke and Cole out of the room. What had made Collins pick on me like that? Usually he was all right. He looks old and stuffy with a chicken neck and balding head, but, if you talk to him, he listens and doesn’t give advice until he’s thought a bit about the problem.

It had to be that careers advice thing we’d all just been to. That questionnaire about our future careers. We all put rock star. I added ‘write lyrics for rock stars as my second choice.

Teachers talk. I can imagine them in the staffroom.

They didn’t take it seriously.

Create an elite. What do you expect?

They’ll get a shock next year.

Put them out in the real world.

Etc.

Etc.

But despite what the teachers might think, the rock star thing isn’t all fantasy. I’ve been having music lessons and doing music and theory exams for years. We all have. We can all play at least a couple of instruments. Well except for Cole. He can’t, but he plays those drums by instinct.

After a couple of months together, we aren’t too bad. That’s probably why Collins was so tetchy when he found us loitering when we were meant to be practicing. He thinks this year he might have a chance of winning.

“Improving,” he says on a good day.

But the question is, if those teachers had Sonny Bill Williams in their classes and he’d put professional league player would the reaction have been the same?

Some dreams you’re allowed. And if I want to do something, I get to do it. If I‘d wanted to fly to the moon, by age six I would’ve been taking astronaut lessons. Now I can make the violin weep, the guitar sob, the piano talk of lives unfulfilled.

And the music makes everything tolerable. Even the way I feel about Jess. Like she could have my soul if she wanted it.

But she can’t see me. Total invisibility.

“Try talking to her,” Luke suggested.

“Easier said than done,” I said. “Maybe tomorrow.”

When we got to the music room, Luke left his guitar leaning against a chair and just stood there. Cole’s drum set glistened at the back of the room. We could hear the other kids outside. The silence inside closed around us like you could shatter it with a note, a chord, or a drum beat, and it hovered over us, threatening, like slivers of glass.

Adam and Noah were sitting on a couple of desks mucking around with their guitars. Noah’s got red hair and has freckles. Adam is dark-haired like Cole. They were settled in and didn’t look like they were up for a real practice. I got my violin out of its case and started making sure it was in tune, but no one else moved to do anything.

“We need somewhere to practice,” said Luke. It was a good idea.

“There’s a shed at home no one uses much,” I suggested.

“How big?” asked Luke like he had plenty of options to choose from.

“Huge.”

“Would your olds let us use it?” asked Cole.

“I’ll ask. Let you know tomorrow.” I put the violin back in its case. Lunchtime was almost over anyway. Too late to practice.

“Anyone up for a practice after school?” asked Luke.

“Nah. Gotta work,” said Cole, and that was the end of that idea.

After school, I was waiting for the bus, and Collins was on his way to the crossing to do road patrol. He must have been planning on finding me because he came over and gave me a DVD and a notebook he’d been carrying around.

“Have a look at this.” Collins nodded at the DVD.

It didn’t look promising. For a start it was a DVD, and who bothers with those these days? And on the cover an old guy in a black hat and crumpled suit leaned into the microphone like he was making love to it. The title said, Leonard Cohen, the London Concert.

“Who’s he? Never heard of him,” I said.

“One of the greatest poets of this generation. And use that.” Collins nodded at the notebook.

I flicked through the pages. Just lines, not a word written on them.

The bus dropped me off at the gate, and Mum was in the kitchen. “How was school?” She was really asking how practice went. I’m living her dream.

“Great. Do you think Dad would let us use the old shed to practice in?”

“I’m sure he would.” Mum smiled like all her dreams were coming true.

I went to my room, put the journal on the desk, found a pen. And here I am, writing what I know.