Gracie Faltrain Takes Control (13 page)

‘We're the only team everyone hates. What does that tell you, Faltrain?' I ask. ‘It tells me we're better than everyone else, Martin,' she answers. ‘Faltrain, they should measure your head for science. I reckon it's the biggest I've ever seen.'
Martin Knight

‘Stop telling me what to do, Martin,' I yell during warm-up on Saturday. ‘You're in goal, not on the field. You don't know what it's like.'

‘I know you're better than this. It's embarrassing watching you out there.'

‘Embarrassing?'

‘I used to love seeing you play. I remember once, you were blocked in on all sides, and you spun around and did an overhead kick. It was absolutely amazing.'

‘You're still going on about that boy I took down, aren't you? I've told you a million times, I couldn't have made it any other way. I would have missed. We would have lost.'

‘So? Who cares? The old Faltrain didn't even know the meaning of the word missed.'

‘Well the guy next to me in hospital explained it, you idiot. And he threw in a few more words, too, like humiliation and loser.'

Part of why I'm angry at Martin is because I know he's right. I'm not playing like I was before. None of us are. But we can't. The Firsts is a whole different game. With no space for risks.

We win the toss. Coach signals for us to take our positions. I don't feel excited like I usually do. I haven't felt that in weeks.

Coach calls time about twenty minutes into the first half. He's a walking heart attack. ‘What are you playing at? It's a bloodbath out there, and you're all splashing around. You,' he turns to Flemming. ‘The next time you aim for some guy's head and not the ball, I'm aiming for you. That goes for everyone.'

I'm learning a few lessons about human nature today. Lesson one? People have a survival instinct hard-wired into their brain. It takes over at the first hint of attack. Sometimes it takes over before. There's no space for sympathy out here. That path leads to the bench, or worse, hospital. There's only room for three things: run, hit, win. And, sometimes, duck.

Francavilla soars past number nine from the opposition, arms half out. He runs like a chicken all the time now, his elbows bent into bony wings, ready to belt anything in his flight path. He keeps them at the perfect height: not high enough to get red-carded but high enough to hurt. Number nine stumbles like he's drunk but keeps running.

No one sees that hit, though, because everyone's looking at Corelli. A striker from the opposition is trying to rip him apart at the shoulders. Corelli's discovered a new talent. His neck can spin almost three hundred and sixty degrees. ‘My head's double-jointed,' he says, and then he passes out on his face.

‘I hope his nose is double-jointed as well,' Flemming says,
watching him fall. After Corelli gets carried off, we play on, harder than before.

Flemming walks away at half time, so he's not there for Coach's speech. It's a good thing. His voice is so loud it dints my skin. ‘Where the hell's Flemming?' he says, angry spit flying from his mouth. ‘Find him, Faltrain. I want to talk to him before he goes back on and kills someone.'

I see him behind the change rooms, slamming his fist close to number seven's face, the guy who took Corelli out. Flemming stops short of punching him. A fight like that would lose him his place on the team, and he's too smart for that. He's out to scare. Or get revenge. Or both. ‘You try that again and I'll find you,' he's saying. His face is twisted like a fist.

When the game's moving, it's easy not to think about what you're doing, I guess. A push here. A kick there. Everything gets lost in the rush, in the noise. It feels right because the ball goes into the goal. But there's no crowd around Flemming today. There's nothing for him to hide behind. It's one moment, picked out from all the rest. And it's wrong.

I wonder what my moment would have looked like, picked out from all the rest, slamming that guy in the balls to make the goal. If it were just him and me on the field alone, if I wasn't hidden in the crowd, I would have looked exactly like Flemming. I don't want him to catch me looking. I leave without making a noise.

‘I don't know where Flemming is, Coach.' And I don't. There's no one back there that I recognise.

‘You're doing well, Faltrain,' Flemming says when he reappears on the field. ‘Keep playing to win.' Number seven walks past us. There's the smallest bit of blood on his cheek.

I nod my head towards him. ‘What happened to their striker?'

‘No idea.' Flemming's playing a dangerous game. What's to stop that guy telling the ref? If the truth comes out Flemming'll be off the field for the rest of the season.

I can't help thinking that there's a whole team of us out here. And only Martin playing soccer. I don't look at Coach or Martin when I walk off at the end. I keep thinking about Flemming's face. And wondering if it looks like mine.

Martin, Flemming and Alyce come back to my place to celebrate. ‘Did you see the way we thrashed them,' Flemming keeps yelling on the way home. His voice is too loud for Saturday afternoon. It belongs in the game.

‘We were there. We saw it,' Martin says. He only puts up with Flemming these days because he knows that Alyce likes him.

We have a break after the first DVD. Martin and I stand outside. ‘Be careful, Faltrain,' he says when we're alone.

‘I can handle myself.'

He shakes his head. ‘I didn't mean that. Mum told me once that you become who you set out to be.'

‘So I'm setting out to win.'

‘Does it feel like we're winning?'

Sort of. Maybe. I mean, I'm not in hospital after every game. I'm alive. Dad told me once that life's not black and white. It's blurred at the edges. So Flemming threatened a guy in the break. That guy hurt Corelli.

‘Do you really think we should let them run all over us, knock us down, Martin? Is that how you want me to play the next game?' Half of me wants him to make it easy, give me the answers like he always does.

‘The old Faltrain would never have played like this, that's all. She'd have found another way.'

‘There is no other way. I'm not good enough. I'm not strong enough.'

‘Then maybe the answer is that we walk.'

‘Quit? Flemming would never agree to that.'

‘I didn't ask
him
to walk.'

‘You said you knew I'd always vote to fight. You told me that before we started playing like this.'

‘Fight, fair enough. But not dirty. Not for the fun of it.'

‘You think I'm having fun out there?'

‘I think you're having the time of your life.' He's looking at me the way I looked at Flemming today. Like I'm ugly.

‘Last year I would have trusted you with anything, Faltrain. And now I watch you play and you're like a stranger.'

It feels as though Martin's edging his way to a place I don't want to go, like he's about to tell me we're over. ‘I'm the same person I always was,' I say.

‘Are you?'

‘Yes.' I say it louder so he believes it. I say it that way so I do, too. I try not to think about the ad and the letter and his mum. Martin has a way of reading my mind and the way he's talking tonight, I have a feeling that if he finds out what I've done, I'm dead. I have to change the subject. Quick. After a few minutes goldfish Martin will swim in and I'll be safe.

‘What do you think Alyce and Flemming are talking about in there?'

Martin shrugs.

‘Flemming's laughing. That's a good sign, right?'

‘You and your stupid signs. You want to know how he really feels?' He picks up the soccer ball lying on the ground and
launches it at the window. It smacks against the glass so loud Mum yells from the front room, ‘Gracie Faltrain! Stop playing near the house.' I guess I've got my answer. Alyce and Flemming don't even look up. They just keep right on talking.

‘He wants to walk me home,' Alyce whispers quickly when Flemming is out of the room. I should be happy for her. You take a chance and deal with whatever happens later. And if you don't take chances then you may as well be dead, right? But seeing Alyce happy makes me scared. Because the way Flemming's playing the game lately, I'm pretty sure she's not going to win.

When they walk off down the street, they're two shadows almost holding hands. That's meant to be the most exciting bit, the almost part, when nothing's happened but you're hoping it might. For the first time in my life, though, I think it might be better not to play. I can't bear to watch Alyce almost win the game she's been waiting to be picked for almost all of her life.

One bad pizza and you're vomit boy for the rest of your life.
Freddy Jabusi

‘Alyce,' I say, pulling the doona over my head. ‘It's eight o'clock in the morning.'

‘I'm just so excited.'

‘Why?' I push the covers off my face so I can see her. ‘He asked you to the dance after you left last night, didn't he?'

‘Yes,' she squeals. ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes!' Alyce looks like she has swallowed the sun. Not the hot and burning, middle-of-the-day sun, just the warm, end of afternoon one. I think I can actually see pink shining from her edges.

‘So Alyce Fuller is about to score.'

Her eyes practically explode. ‘Oh no . . .'

‘Calm down. We'll get to that part later.' What was I thinking? Alyce has to crawl before she can walk.

‘I think maybe he does like me, Gracie. Can you believe that?'

‘Of course I can.' Good for you, Flemming. So you're not the biggest idiot of all time. ‘We need to get you a killer dress, so you look hot at the dance.'

‘I was thinking about something pink with long sleeves.'

I drag myself out of bed. Even on Sunday, my work is never done.

Jane and I always talked about what we'd wear to the Year 11 dance. ‘You'll go with Nick,' she said. ‘And I'll go with some mysterious guy from another school. We'll stay the night at your place and get ready together.'

It just goes to show that no one can predict the future.

‘So I can't wait to see Annabelle's face when you tell her Flemming's your date,' I say to Alyce while we're looking at dresses.

‘You can't tell her, Gracie.'

‘Why?'

‘Andrew asked me not to say anything. He wants some time to break the news to people.'

Sure he does. He wants, like, two years, until you're not in high school.

‘I can't believe that idiot. He wants you to lie? What, does he expect you to wear a bag over your head so Annabelle doesn't know you're his date?'

‘He's going to tell people, Gracie, when the time is right.'

The time would be right, right away. But if Flemming can't see that then we'll just have to show him. ‘What about this one?' I pull a long black dress off the rack.

‘I don't know, Gracie, it's a bit . . . revealing.'

‘Just go and try it on, Grandma.'

Alyce comes out of the change room slowly, checking to see there's no one in the shop but me.

‘Wow. You look fantastic. You've got boobs.'

She tries to stretch the top higher.

‘Don't touch it. You look perfect.'

‘I won't be comfortable.'

‘It's the price you pay for fashion. Buy it.'

‘He's taller than me.' She leans in to whisper. ‘He'll see right down my top.'

Exactly. ‘No he won't. Stop worrying so much.' And of course, as soon as I say that, in walks a reason to worry.

‘Well, Alyce, buying a dress for the dance? It's so brave of you to go on your own.'

Annabelle: one. Opposition: zero.

‘Alyce has a date, actually,' I answer.

One all.

‘That's right. I did hear that Freddy Jabusi was looking for a partner.'

Let me explain just how nasty Annabelle is being here. Freddy Jabusi took Anita Fleck to a dance in Year 7. He was so nervous he vomited on her dress. In front of everyone. He'd had pizza for dinner. Annabelle Orion is suggesting that my best friend, Alyce Fuller, go to the dance with pizza vomit boy.

Annabelle: two. Gracie: one. But not for long.

‘Alyce is going with Andrew Flemming. Susan must be so disappointed.'

Two all.

‘Alyce and Flemming?' She starts to laugh. ‘No way.' I can feel the advantage slipping away. Annabelle isn't upset. She's ecstatic. I've given her the best piece of gossip she's had all year.

It's not me who lost, though. It's Alyce. Up until I saw her face, white next to Annabelle's smile, I'd completely forgotten she was playing. Alyce hangs the dress back up as Susan walks in. Annabelle is going to love spreading this news.

‘I'm sorry,' I say when we're sitting at the bus stop. ‘But she would have found out sooner or later.' Alyce doesn't answer. The sun has disappeared from her face.

‘Don't worry. People like Annabelle always get what they deserve.' I watch them walk out of the shop as the bus appears in the distance.

‘Susan was crying,' Alyce says on the way home.

‘What?'

‘When they left the shop, Susan's eyes were all red.'

‘Good. I hope she bawled her eyes out when Annabelle told her about you and Flemming.'

Alyce looks at me. ‘What's the difference between her and me, Gracie?'

‘You want the obvious answer?'

‘No, really. She must have been so disappointed. She'll have to tell her mum that Andrew is going to the dance with someone else.'

‘So, you're saying Flemming is the bad guy?'

‘Sometimes there's not a bad guy, Gracie. Sometimes there's just another side.'

I'm a dog?
Alyce Fuller

‘Heard you're taking Fuller to the dance,' Jason Newman says in the tuckshop line on Monday.

‘So?' Flemming asks.

‘So look at her, she's a dog.'

‘Come on now,' Annabelle says, and for a second I think she's had a heart transplant. ‘Even dogs don't have hair that bad.'

This is about the tenth time today I've heard some idiot make a comment about Alyce. Who do they think they are, the love gurus? If Flemming wants Alyce instead of Susan then it's none of anyone's business.

‘I think she's cute,' says Corelli.

‘Yeah, well, coming from the guy who had his head readjusted on the weekend, that doesn't mean much,' Jason laughs.

‘Shut up, Newman.' Flemming should have been the one to say that, not Martin. But the second Flemming bought his sausage roll he ran.

‘Good one, Martin,' I say.

‘There's nothing good about this, Faltrain.'

He's right. Even I can see that Alyce has lost the game. Now we just have to get her off before she breaks something –

‘I give it two more days,' Annabelle says to Susan.

– like, say, her heart.