Fifteen Love (9 page)

Renata looks puzzled. Yorick looks lost. Then Vanessa does the parrot voice and Will falls about laughing. ‘
Polly
want a Tim Tam?
' ‘
Polly want a Wagon Wheel?
'

If it doesn't sound very funny, that's because it isn't!

I pick up my schoolbag and limp off up the street. When I look back, Vanessa and Will are still at it, imitating each other like two stupid parrots, laughing uncontrollably.

WILL

To relax after training, Dave and I go to the pool. Ken and Lyn thought Dave would never swim again after his accident. He knew how to swim before the accident, but for almost a year after he wouldn't go anywhere near water. Even having a bath would upset him. But then slowly Dave learned to confront his fears. He started off in the baby pool, then graduated with a lifejacket. Now Dave is nuts about swimming. He'd swim every day if you let him.

Dave gets into the pool unassisted. He grabs hold of the handrails, pulls himself up out of his wheelchair, lowers himself into the water and away he goes.

‘Hey, Will! Look at me! I'm the Thorpedo!'

With his head up out of the water, his arms splashing wildly and legs trailing limply behind, Dave swims lap after lap without stopping. Dave could swim for hours – he's amazingly fit and strong in his upper body. Getting him out of the water, though, can be a challenge.

‘I don't want to, Will! Just five more minutes! Ten more, at least!'

‘But there are chips, Dave. Remember?'

Afterwards, I sit in the café and watch while Dave studies the vending machine, reading out loud while he tries to make up his mind. ‘A1: plain chips . . . A2: chicken chips . . . A3: salt-and-vinegar . . . A4: Texas barbecue . . . Hey, Will! Are those too spicy for me?' Dave considers his options carefully, before choosing his trademark packet of Burger Rings instead.

‘Would you go on TV, Will? Would you talk to Rove?'

‘Only if I'm really famous, Dave.'

‘Would you move out of home, Will? Would you have your own swimming pool?'

‘I'd live by the beach, Dave. In the Caribbean.'

‘You're not going to live in a caravan, are you, Will?'

‘Car-ib-be-an, Dave. We can sit around all day, drinking pineapple juice.'

‘Can I come to the Caribbean, Will? Except I don't like pineapple juice. Would there be other types of juice, Will, in the Caribbean?'

‘Any juice you want, Dave.'

‘Will there be chips, Will?'

‘Chips
and
Burger Rings, Dave.'

‘But there won't be drugs, Will?'

‘No drugs, Dave. And no Year 7 girls, either.'

MIA

At morning recess, Renata makes her big announcement.

‘Guess what!' she says. ‘I'm going to Europe!'

Renata starts talking about Europe as if Australia is somehow kitsch now. She uses the words
exquisite
and
sophisticated
. She talks about the exchange rate and the euro. The political situation has changed, she says. Her family is going ‘home' to see their beautiful country. For years, Renata has avoided the subject and now she won't stop talking about it.

‘Europe is the safest place on earth,' she says. ‘The fashions. The nightlife. It's much more chic than Australia.'

By the end of recess, Vanessa and I have had enough. It's stupid, but I feel betrayed – as if Renata is going away at a time when I really need her.

‘Who does she think she is?' I say, while Renata goes off to get a drink.

‘She's such a leech!' says Vanessa. ‘Her family came here to make money, then they go back home to spend it.'

‘Don't say that!' I snap. ‘This is Renata's home, as much as it is ours.'

For a moment, Vanessa almost looks hurt. Then her face changes.

‘You are
so
predictable, Mia,' she says. ‘No wonder you can't get a boyfriend!'

WILL

THINGS TO DO

1) Design website, including a short biography, fan club details and advice for young players. What inspires you? What do you eat? How do you maintain fitness? Hobbies? Interests? Who would you most like to meet?

2)
Phone Mia.
Approach publishers re autobiography: ‘Will Holland – Tennis Ace'.
(May need a ghost writer to do this.)

3)
Send Mia some flowers.
Approach corporate sponsors, i.e. Adidas, Nike, etc. No tobacco companies!
(May need an agent to do this.)

4)
No more viola jokes!
Photo for website?
  (May need new roll of film.)

5) Begin legal proceedings against
   Ricki the barber.

MIA

It's official. Vanessa and I are fighting. It wasn't the boyfriend comment
per se
, so much as the lack of concern that followed. What was just a flesh wound had been left to fester. The pus was not squeezed, the rot had set in. Vanessa
was
my best friend, but now she is my enemy for all eternity.

The next day, to avoid Vanessa at recess, I sit on the grass in the place where Will used to sit, before the Year 7 girls came and offered their bodies on a plate. Sports stars are notoriously sleazy, but I thought Will Holland was different. I thought he was inspired by soaring eagles. I thought his heart was as clear as the clear blue sky, but I was wrong . . . When I lie back and look up into the sky, the clouds all look like clouds to me. It's even a challenge trying to make them look like woolly sheep.

Am I really predictable? Am I boring?

At lunchtime, in orchestra practice, we work on our bowing. It's not enough just to know all the notes and when to play them. They have to be played the right way with the right tone, which means all the viola players bowing up and down at same time. Ms S shows the first viola how to play the passage, then the first viola explains to the rest of us how to mark the score. A lot of our time in rehearsal is spent marking the sheet music with little hats and arrows. It's an important part of playing music, but it can be pretty dull.

Maybe Vanessa is right. Maybe my whole life is boring.

I remember back to that day Will came to watch the orchestra – how he made us all laugh, then returned to take a bow. Maybe, just for fun, I should buy Will a conductor's baton for his birthday. I will have to find out when his birthday is. Knowing Will's birthday will tell me what his star sign is, and whether we are compatible, not that I really believe in astrology. Does Will believe in astrology, I wonder? Is he much older than me? Would it matter if I was older than him? Maybe Will is an earth sign – practical and good at tennis. Or maybe he is an air sign – always looking up at the sky. Would people of certain zodiac signs be better at kissing, I wonder? Would others expect to have their toes sucked?

I hear Ms S's fingernails drumming impatiently on the back of my chair.

‘Mia Foley!' she says. ‘What on earth are you daydreaming about?'

WILL

When Dave comes to watch me train, he does the line calls. He yells them loudly, the way people do in the tournaments: ‘Let!' ‘Fault!' ‘Out!' The calls come fast and clear and they're always right. You'd never want to argue a line call with Dave. He'd run you down!

Usually, Dave and I have a hit together after training. Sometimes we even play a set. Dave is surprisingly fast around the court and he can hit these mighty ground shots – hard and deep. Dave plays on the baseline, a lot like Bjorn Borg – he never comes up to the net. According to the rules of wheelchair tennis, he's allowed two bounces and I'm allowed one. Dave wants to win, of course, but he doesn't want charity. He's deadly serious and he never shows any sign of how he's feeling. The Ice Borg on Wheels, I call him.

It's deuce – forty all. Dave's shot hits the net and topples over. His advantage. He serves the next ball straight and hard down the middle of the court. It's just outside the line, but both of us see it go in.

‘Ace!' I shout. ‘That's your game, Dave!' Dave goes insane. He spins around in circles, punching the air and whispering, ‘Yes! Yes! Yes!'

‘You beat me, Dave!'

‘I whipped you, Will!'

‘You creamed me, Dave!'

Dave laughs loudly. ‘You know who I am, Will? I'm Federer!'

I act dumb. ‘Who's that, Dave?'

‘Roger Federer The greatest. Fifteen Grand Slams. Six Wimbledons.
Slam, dunk, smash!
And you know who you are, don't you, Will?'

‘Andre Agassi?'

‘That's right, Will! The Bald Badger! The Choker! Remember what Dad said?'

‘Once a choker, always a choker.'

Dave spins his wheelchair in circles again.

‘Once a choker, always a choker! Once a choker, always a choker!'

Andre Agassi was one of those tennis players with a near-perfect technique. His ground shots were brilliant, both forehand and backhand. His volleys and serve could do with some work, maybe, but according to Ken, his main weakness was in his head. A choker is someone who can't perform under pressure. When the going gets tough, he falls apart.

‘But you're not really a choker, are you, Will?'

‘No, Dave. And neither was Andre Agassi.'

‘But I
am
Roger Federer, aren't I!'

MIA

Will Holland is standing by the gate after school, talking to the Year 7 girls. Doesn't he have anything better to do? Hasn't his felt-tipped pen run out of ink yet?

‘Hey there!' he says as I limp through the gate. ‘How's your ankle?'

‘Getting better,' I say curtly.

‘What's the difference between a viola and an onion?'

I don't answer.

‘Nobody cries when they chop up a viola.'

‘Is that supposed to cheer me up?'

‘Sorry, I just thought . . . ' ‘You could have told me, you know.'

‘About the tennis game? I tried to tell you.'

‘Why didn't you tell me
before
the game?'

‘I wanted to surprise you.'

‘You wanted to
impress
me, you mean. You're just like all the other boys, Will Holland. If you want a girlfriend who sits in the crowd and cheers for you, then lets you write your name all over her body, good luck! Girls are like cattle to you, aren't they, Will? You think if you see your name on them, you must own them. Maybe you should start using a branding iron, to save time!'

WILL

Dave loves me taking him to the park. He loves it almost as much as going to the pool. It's not the grass and the trees that Dave loves. It's not the playground or the little lake with the children feeding the ducks. It's not the winding gravel path where he can race ahead of me or the girls jogging past in their skin-tight pants. What Dave really loves about the park are the chin-up bars. And the reason Dave loves them so much is that he can do more chin-ups than me.

After pushing a wheelchair for four years, Dave's arms and shoulders have beefed right up. He positions the wheelchair under the lowest bar, pulls himself up off his seat and away he goes:
‘Ten . . . twenty . . . thirty . . . '

Dave insists that I stand by and watch him. He has a terrifying look of determination on his face and his tongue sticks out slightly from the side of his mouth.

‘ . . . Fifty-five . . . sixty . . . '

As Dave gets closer to one hundred he breaks out in a sweat and slows right down. It's like watching a champion weightlifter psych himself between lifts.

‘Ninety-two . . . ninety-three . . . ninety-four . . . '

Mostly, when Dave gets to a hundred, he quits. More important to Dave than a new personal best is to see me on the chin-up bar, trying to make forty. As anyone will tell you, doing forty chin-ups is no mean effort, but that doesn't stop Dave from laughing at me.

‘Thirty-four . . . thirty-five . . . thirty-six . . . '

‘Come on, Will! We haven't got all day!'

‘Thirty-seven . . . thirty-eight . . . '
‘What are you, Will? A weed?'

‘
Thirty-nine!
That's it, Dave! I give up!'

‘That's hopeless, Will! You didn't even make forty!'

I get a drink of water, then sit down on the grass to rest. I don't know if it's the endorphins or the testosterone, but after Dave beats me at chin-ups, he always wants to talk about girls.

‘Are you still in love with her, Will?'

‘Who, Dave?'

‘You know who, Will. That girl who doesn't like horses.'

‘Her name's Mia. I never said I was in love with her, Dave. I said I liked her.'

‘Isn't she your girlfriend anymore?'

‘She never was, Dave.'

‘But you still like her, Will, even if you don't love her?'

‘I dunno, Dave. There are girls you have as girlfriends and girls you have as friends, I guess.'

‘Will you get a
new
girlfriend, Will?'

‘I dunno, Dave.'

‘Do girls like boys for their muscles, Will?'

‘I don't know what girls like, Dave.'

Dave looks up at the trees. ‘What
is
love anyway, Will?'

According to
The Encyclopedia of Tennis
,
love
is a zero score and a
love game
is a blitz.

I sigh. ‘I don't know, Dave.'

MIA

My father is working late, so Mum and I eat dinner without him – fish and chips again. Mum's always been a pretty good cook, but lately she's been losing interest. The carpet needs vacuuming, too. There are coffee cups in the lounge room, and the laundry basket is overflowing. Harriet has started digging up the garden.

My father is having an affair with a woman half his age. Will Holland is signing his name all over Year 7 girls. Is it possible to still be interested in someone even when they're not interested in you? Is it possible that I am like my mum?

After dinner, I go to my room to practise my viola. The viola is a forgotten instrument and tonight I feel like a forgotten girl. In fifty years' time, my bedroom will look like Miss Havisham's. All the clocks will have stopped and everything will be covered in dust and cobwebs. I will be an old spinster with cold, flaky skin and a broken heart, sitting here playing my viola in my faded bridal gown while rats devour the wedding cake. I will play the same sad song –
tranquillo e molto triste
– over and over, thinking about the young man who came to my window and how I told him to go away.