Chapter Ten
Tuesday 21st January
A few days later Jess and I were on the beach.
“I need to go back to the bach and use the toilet,” said Jess.
“Okay.” I started walking back with her and saw Laura sitting on her own on the sand hill watching Jess and me together. She wasn’t a mouthy pain in the arse anymore. You could tell she’d curled up inside herself and was just waiting to leave here too.
And I remembered that wanting to curl up and be invisible and leave the world feeling. “I’ll stay here with Laura,” I said.
Jess looked at me a bit strange. I bet that’s something she’d never expected to hear me say. “Okay. Back in a minute.”
I climbed up the sandhill and sat beside Laura.
“Fuck off, Isaac,” she said. So, some of the mouthy, pain in the arse was still there.
“Nah, Murphy. I want to tell you something.”
“Here it comes.” Her hair flew around her face the way Jess’s does and she pushed it back. The shirt slipped off her shoulder and the bruises showed. She pushed it back in place too. “You still think I have to get help?”
“Nah,” I said.
“What then?”
“I know some of how you feel.”
“Have you been raped?” she asked real sarcastic.
“Nah,” I said. “Never been forced to have sex.”
“That’d be every boy’s dream, anyway wouldn’t it?” muttered Laura.
“Nah. Not me, but I know Logan’s an arsehole.”
“How?”
“Personal experience.” I sat there beside her, elbows on knees playing with a shell, not looking at her and told her about Logan and his mates making my life a misery for the whole of years 9 and 10. She listened to this list of beatings, getting tipped off my bike and breaking my arm and getting pissed on if they caught me in the toilets.
“Jesus, Isaac,” she said.
Then I told about getting jostled and getting my stuff stolen and wrecked. And shit smeared on my bag and the name calling and having to watch out for them all the time. That’s why I was so wary of them on the ute at New Year’s Eve.
“Fuck,” she said and slid her arm around my waist. “When did it stop?”
“It’s still there. But I’ve got mates now and it’s harder to beat up a group of people.”
“Why did they do it?”
“I’m a fag apparently.”
“So, you decide to wear makeup all the time?”
“Some of that is, fuck them.”
“I can understand that.”
“Yeah, but all that stuff just made me want to hide from the world.”
“Did you tell?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I put the shell down and chose another. “I did at first, but it just made Logan and his mates madder, and it doesn’t take long for the teachers to get sick of dealing with that stuff and they start blaming you.”
“I’ve seen that happen.” She looked at me with eyes so much like Jess’s. “So, we’ve both been fucked by Logan.”
I gave a snort. She might be as tough as she acted.
“Yeah, Murphy, I guess so.”
“Have you told Jess?”
“Nah, I don’t want Jess to know. I don’t want her to look at me that way. I don’t want anyone to know actually.”
“But you’ve told me?” Laura looked puzzled.
“Yeah.”
She gave a nod and rested her head on my shoulder. I tilted my head enough to rub my cheek on her hair.
We sat there for a moment, just quiet.
“Jess is so lucky,” she said.
I turned and there was her dad on the front lawn watching us. “Isaac, Laura, come inside, it’s lunchtime.” He stayed at the bottom of the sand hill, watching me and Laura stand up and brush the sand off ourselves. We walked down the hill towards him. Then he herded us back into the bach.
After that, Laura was still pretty quiet. The bruises on her arm started to fade but I don’t think the bruises on her soul did. She never said anything, but she didn’t join in either.
She was just there. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Until she could leave I think.
Sunday 26th January
Mum was coming to pick me up. I’d packed up and was sitting on the steps of the sleepout. I’d been getting the journal up to date. Laura came over and sat beside me. Jess had gone inside to get us something to eat.
“What are you writing?” Laura nodded at the journal. I shut it. A fair bit of what I’d been writing lately was the whole Laura/Logan thing.
“Homework.”
Laura rolled her eyes. “School’s over.”
I shrugged. “Collins is teaching me how to write lyrics. I’m making sure I’ve got something to show him when I get back.” It was only half true, Collins never looked at the journal, but it was where I got ideas for the lyrics he was helping with.
Laura looked at me like I needed studying. “You write songs?”
“Yeah.”
“Play one for me.”
I gave my cheek a scratch. “Just like that?” Laura had never shown any interest the music before. In fact, when I first arrived, the whole guitar/music/ band thing, was part of the weirdest kid in the school scenario.
“Yeah,” she said.
“Okay.” I got up and took the journal over to my gear and zipped it away in my bag. The guitar was leaning against the wall of the sleepout with the rest of my gear. I grabbed it and went back to her.
“What do you want to hear?” I sat down again.
Jess came out of the back door, a plate of sandwiches in her hand. She joined me and Laura and offered Laura a sandwich.
“Play Shadows and Lace.” It was still Jess’s favourite.
“Okay.” I checked the guitar’s tuning then played the opening chords. I sung it quietly. I’m not too sure about the lyrics now. I liked them when I wrote them. Now I know more and I think they’re a bit obvious.
But Laura and Jess listened, munching through the sandwiches. At the end I put the guitar down and grabbed the last sandwich off the plate.
Laura hadn’t said anything.
Jess stood up. “It’s good isn’t it,” she asked Laura.
Laura nodded, and she looked like she was going to cry. I realised I’d just played her a song about having sex. I probably should have chosen something else.
Jess grabbed the plate. “I’ll take this inside and get some more. Mum’s made heaps. Do you want something to drink Isaac?”
“Coke?”
“Okay. Laura?”
Laura nodded, and Jess bounced off to the bach. Laura brushed sandwich crumbs off her singlet top and her legs then looked at me. “That’s what it is meant to be like isn’t it?”
I shrugged. I’m no expert on making love, but that’s what it’s like for me with Jess. It touches my soul.
Laura wiped her hands on her legs. “Jess said you’re going to university in Auckland to study music this year?”
“Yeah.”
“And you want to be a musician?”
“It’s the dream.” I don’t say it out loud to too many people. It sounds a bit up yourself.
She tipped her head to one side. Her hair swung around those breasts she’s got that Jess hasn’t, and she studied me again.
“Are all your songs like that?”
“Like what?”
“About sex?”
“Yeah.” I picked up the guitar again and picked out a few chords. “I’ve got other interests, but water skiing is bloody hard to write a good lyric about.”
And a laugh burst out of her. It was the first time I’d heard her laugh since Logan left. We hadn’t talked about what happened to her since that morning on the sandhill when her dad came and got us.
“Are you all right now?” I asked, and for a moment it looked like she was going to pretend she didn’t know what I meant. Then she shrugged and nodded. Jess was coming out the back door again, sandwiches and two cans of Coke in her hands and another tucked under her elbow.
“Coming right, I think,” said Laura. Mum’s car turned into the driveway. “It will be better when I get back to Auckland.”
Can you really run away from something like that?
“We’ll both be there.” It hadn’t occurred to me before.
“Yeah,” said Laura. “We’ll have to catch up for coffee some time.” She sounded sarcastic.
Jess handed me my can of Coke. “Time for you to go home, Isaac. I’ll see you next week?” Jess’s family were staying on a few more days, then Jess would be home too.
I got my gear and stuck it in the boot of Mum’s car. “See you.”
I go to get in the car.
“Hey, Coleman, a bit of advice,” said Laura.
I turned back and she’s grinning.
“Yeah?” I asked.
“If Dad ever wants to hear something you’ve written, sing the one about water skiing.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Wednesday 29th January
Jess just rang. Fuck. I need to go and see her. Right now.