Something More (Girlfriend Fiction 11) (5 page)

I'd never heard him use my name before. He pronounced it ‘Is-la'. I didn't think now was the best time to remind him that the ‘Is' part should be said like in ‘island' or ‘isle'. Isle-la. Dumb, Scottish pronunciation. I'd be happy to change it for him.

He inched towards me. My heart thumped.

‘No problem,' I confirmed, backing away. ‘I'm staying in Cronulla after Emma's party on Saturday, with…er…someone.' I tried to sound intriguing.

It must have worked because he moved closer. ‘Oh, I'm going to that too.'

I took a step back, fearing that he would notice the red rash crawling up my neck.

He stepped forward and frowned. Damn, he'd seen it. I grew hotter.

‘Oh, right. I didn't think you were going. It should be fun.' I edged back. It had reached my face.

He advanced again. I'm sure he'd never seen a talking beetroot before.

‘Well, perhaps we can meet at about ten on Sunday morning, at North Beach?'

‘Good…yeah…right.' I stepped back into a wall. ‘Oh sorry,' I said hurriedly, not initially aware that I was apologising to bricks. Panicking at my mistake, I sprang onto his toe. ‘Oh sorry,' I said again, laughing nervously.

I think he motioned he was okay just before he limped off.

When I focused, I saw with horror why he'd seemed a bit suss throughout our entire conversation: apart from the ridiculous blushing, I'd managed to back my way across half the schoolyard. Thank goodness the wall had stopped me or we could've ended up back in Glasgow, one idiot dancing the paranoia shuffle, while her bewildered partner was just trying to hear what she was saying.

I groaned. My neck was aching.

Bad, bad day.

I left school as quickly as I could after the last bell rang, before I could embarrass myself any further. I headed to the camera shop near the train station to pick up the photos.

A frog croaked as I crossed the threshold. I looked down and was relieved to see it was one of those dumb alerts that tell the shopkeeper someone's come in.

‘It's new and annoying, isn't it?'

I recognised that voice. Of all people, Sam was waiting at the counter.

‘Hi.' Rob smiled at me. ‘Do you like my frog?' He didn't wait for a reply. ‘Your film is ready and your dad's too. Do you want the lot?'

I lost the power to speak and couldn't answer either of them. Neither seemed to mind.

‘My toe's a bit better,' Sam said.

I recovered my wits. ‘Oh, I didn't stamp hard enough then?'

He smiled.

Yummy!

‘You've got a lot of photos there,' I commented, just for something to say, nodding at the five or six sets of print-wallets in his hands.

Yes, that's me, a master of the obvious.

‘Yeah, I've been busy,' he said politely.

The door opened again, and the sudden croaking startled me so much that I dropped my photos. Sam moved to help me, but he stumbled over the school bag that I'd left at my feet. In an attempt to steady himself, he dropped his photos too. Thankfully the actual prints didn't slide out or we'd have been there all day, neither of us able to escape from our camera-shop nightmare.

‘Here,' I said, returning his wallets.

‘Oh, thanks.' He grabbed them quickly and escaped.

‘Croak, croak, croak.'

‘Shut up,' I said crossly. I didn't need a stupid frog to tell me that he was gone.

At the station my train was waiting. I rushed aboard, found a seat and began flicking through my photos. I was still captivated by them when I reached my destination, forty minutes later.

Some of them weren't mine.

They were Sam's. They took my breath away. They were beautiful, haunting portrait shots, all of the same subject, all in black-and-white, and all taken from a variety of angles without the person's knowledge.

Of this last fact I could be absolutely certain, because they were all of me.

When I got in I checked out the fridge for any changes since breakfast, but there was nothing to distract me so I climbed the stairs to my bedroom.

The house was quiet. Kicking my shoes off, I flopped onto my bed.

This was bad. No, it was good.

Bad! No, good!

My stomach flipped. The minute Sam flicked through his photos and found that this set was missing, he'd realise I'd seen them.

That would be embarrassing for him. Perving in class was one thing, but it wasn't normal to take secret photos of someone, was it?

Gran McGonnigle knew a pervert once. He lived in her street when she was about my age, and he used to run around the place stealing all the girls' underwear off the washing line. The day he snuck into Gran's back garden, he took her mum's knickers and not Gran's. She reckons it was one of the biggest insults of her life, being rejected by a sleazy pervert in favour of her mother.

Surely Sam wasn't a sleazy perv.

I went through the photos again. They made me feel special, not creepy. In a couple of them I was even…

‘Isla, did you pick up my photos?' Dad was shouting from the bottom of the stairs.

No!

I hadn't even bothered to check the last lot of pictures.

‘Isla?' Footsteps on stairs.

I sorted through them hurriedly. My film. Sam's film…my film. I'd given Dad's prints to Sam in the mix-up.

‘Did you hear me, Isla?'

I scooped a pile of clean underwear into my arms and opened the door.

‘Did you get my pictures?' He hovered cautiously on the threshold.

‘Oh,' I said as evenly as I could, ‘Rob, at the camera shop, said there would be a slight delay. You'll have them tomorrow.' I smiled over the top of my bundle.

‘What!' It wasn't a question.

I dropped a bra on his shoe.

We both looked down.

‘Can you get that, Dad? My hands are full. Just tidying my room.'

Honestly, you'd think I'd asked him to pat a red-back. He paused mid-bend, hoping for a reprieve, but I stood and waited patiently, so he swooped up the offending garment and hurled it at me as he turned and fled. He didn't even notice that it had landed on my head.

Mission accomplished: missing photos forgotten.

I untangled the bra hooks from my hair and picked up Sam's snaps again. They had been taken at school, in the yard, on the oval. That could hardly be called stalking; we had to be in the same places together each day.

The last picture in the wallet was slightly different. It was a close-up, but the background was fuzzy and unfamiliar. Taking it over to my desk, careful not to leave fingerprints on it, I reached for my magnifying glass. I love desk gadgets, although I don't think of the magnifying glass as a gadget because I rely on it regularly to check out my proofs. I peered through it now.

I was vaguely aware of a door slamming somewhere, announcing Terry's return. My heart began to race as I tried to comprehend what I was seeing in the top right-hand corner of the shot.

It may have been slightly obscured by my head, and it may have been out of focus, but it was definitely there – big black letters on a white background – the sign for Coledale Railway Station.

So, Sam Doyle had followed me home?

Now that was a bit creepy!

‘Too many cooks spoil the broth,
but if you're doing the cooking,
Isla, one will do just as well.'

(Gran McGonnigle)

I didn't have time to dwell on the whole mess because I had to get dinner started.

Downstairs, Terry was in the kitchen slowly peeling a potato. Dad was nowhere to be seen.

‘Careful,' I said, nodding at the other three, ‘you might peak too soon and be so exhausted you won't be able to finish the carrots.'

‘Shouldn't you be slaving over a hot stove?' she countered. ‘Dad says he feels like chicken. There's one in the fridge.'

I pulled a face. I hate touching raw chicken. You have to stick your hand right up inside the bird to get those extra bits out before cooking it. Gross! I can't stand doing that.

‘Well, go on,' she said, watching slyly, ‘take the yucky bits out.'

‘They're giblets,' I snapped, opening the bird, which had to be the biggest chicken in Australia; it swallowed up my whole arm. I rummaged around in growing alarm until I finally located the little plastic bag.

Terry was laughing so hard that snot came out her nose.

‘Great look,' I said viciously.

‘So is that,' she snorted, pointing to the chicken on the end of my wrist. And you're going to have to get faster. They pay you by the bird at the chicken factory.'

‘Shut it!'

‘I can just see you in a few years time,' she laughed, ‘meeting some guy in a club and telling him you're a…chicken stuffer.'

‘What a foul job,' I said, and we both grinned.

‘How come you were so late tonight? Did you miss the train?' I asked.

She blushed and scrutinised the veggies like they were the most interesting things on the planet.

My brain made one of those lightning connections. ‘Did you meet some guy?'

‘No.'

‘You did too.'

She turned away.

‘Who is he?'

She continued to ignore me.

‘It's Jake Say-and-Spray, isn't it?' I deliberately plumped for the most ridiculous kid in her year, Jake Tobin, who had so much twisted steel on his teeth he could have swallowed the Harbour Bridge.

‘It is not!'

Just then Dad appeared, thumping a bag down on the bench. ‘What's going on?'

Terry threw me a warning glance.

‘What's in the bag?' I asked.

‘It's the barbied chicken. Didn't your sister tell you I'd gone to get one?'

‘
Terry!
' I spun round. She'd disappeared.

Dad laughed when he saw what she'd done. ‘She got you. That's funny.'

No, it wasn't.

‘Never mind, cook that one up anyway and it will do for our lunches.'

I waited until he wasn't looking and shoved it back in the fridge. There was no way I was having chicken sandwiches all week for lunch.

‘How's the case going?' I asked later as I served dinner.

‘It isn't,' he said glumly.

‘Never mind, you'll bust him in the end,' Terry said, appearing at the door.

I agreed. ‘Just keep at it, Dad.'

We ate together and talked about random stuff. It was nice.

‘Hi, you three.' Mum popped her head round the kitchen door. We hadn't even heard her come home. It's those sneaky nurse shoes. They may be daggy, but don't be fooled; if your mum ever acquires a pair, you'll need a stronger Parent Coming radar, I can tell you.

‘Hi, toots.' Dad hugged her. ‘How was your day?'

She looked tired. ‘Awful.'

‘Why?'

‘I lost a patient today,' she said sadly. ‘Poor old Mrs Sweeney.'

‘You were kind of expecting her to pop off though, weren't you?' Terry was getting some ice-cream out of the freezer. Talk about tactless. I held my breath, waiting for Mum to jump on her. Oddly enough, she didn't.

‘Yeah, but she'd been much better recently. Then today she just went…eating her custard.'

‘I hope I die doing something a bit less ordinary than scoffing dessert,' Terry said.

‘That can be arranged,' I said. ‘So, what killed her?'

‘They'll have to do an autopsy. I suppose it could be any number of things at that age.'

‘It's terrible,' Dad said. ‘There are people dying now…'

‘…
who never died before
,' we all sang in unison.

‘Ah, I miss your Gran McGonnigle's wonderful logic,' Dad said, smiling.

Me too. I do. At the sound of one of her funny sayings, I'd felt a sharp stab of homesickness so acute my hand had reached automatically to rub it, hovering helplessly between my throat and my chest.

Just what is homesickness, exactly? If it only exists in your mind, how come it can feel so physical? Like a pain gripping your heart. Or a lump that swells in your throat.

I swallowed hard and pretended the tears, which had flooded my eyes with astonishing speed, were tears of laughter.

‘I love it when Gran says that.'

Everyone smiled fondly, except Terry.

‘If you think about the new diseases that kill people nowadays, she is kind of right,' I said.

‘And she's still kind of bonkers,' Terry observed.

Dad poured himself some tea. ‘My father, your Granddad McBay, died shaving, didn't he, love?'

Mum nodded.

‘He always hated shaving,' sighed Dad. ‘I like to think that his last thought was, “Oh well…at least I won't have to bother with the other side of my face today.”'

Mum chuckled. We all did, even though we'd heard the story a million times. ‘This is a fine topic of conversation,' she said. ‘Let's change the subject, shall we? Tell me about that maths test result, Isla. Did you get it back?'

Dad eyed me closely.

‘Hey, I thought we were going to stop talking about people dying,' Terry quipped.

‘I didn't completely die! At least I passed. I got fifty-two per cent.'

‘What was the top mark?'

‘Er…ninety-nine.'

Dad whistled. ‘Who got that?'

‘Oh, some girl called Molly Phillips,' I said grudgingly, not wanting to think about her. ‘She's a maths freak.'

‘You'd be a maths freak too if you had a dad like hers,' Terry said.

‘What info have you got about Molly Phillips?' I demanded. ‘Oh…just what I've heard around school.'

She didn't fool me. She knew something.

‘What's wrong with her dad?' Mum asked her.

Terry was squirming now. ‘Oh, he's a bit…you know, strict about homework and stuff.'

‘That's not that Allen Phillips, the builder who lives up on Morrison Avenue, is it?' Dad asked.