The Boys of Summer (5 page)

“There is no such thing as a multicultural
section in the Miss Onslow Pageant, idiot.”

Adam placed his hands up in mock
surrender.

“Sorry, Ellie. I guess I need to brush up on
my beauty pageant trivia.”

I could see this getting ugly. “So, the
break-up party tonight. What time do we rock up?”

Ellie’s head snapped around. “What are you
wearing? Do you want to come to my place first? We can pick
something out.”

“How come I never get invited to these
pre-party fashion parades?” whined Adam.

We both ignored him.

“I haven’t a clue, really,” I said. “What
time do you want to rendezvous?”

“Make it seven at my house. By the time we
get ready, we will be fashionably late.” Ellie flicked her hair
over her exposed shoulder.

Adam rolled his eyes and mimicked Ellie
behind her back. I threw him a discreet frown.

“Sounds like a plan,” I said, as I lifted my
awkward sheet to step over a wayward empty chip packet.

“So we’re not wearing the Togas tonight,
then?” Adam pressed.

“No,” Ellie and I said in unison.

“Aww, come on.”

“NO!”

Adam circled us, and chanted in his best
imitation of a caveman voice while fist pumping the sky.

“Toga! Toga! Toga!”

We were about to pummel him in a joint
beating when he tripped on the hem of his sheet and went flying in
a very inelegant fashion that had him sprawled on the concrete,
revealing his board shorts underneath.

I suppose we should have checked if he was
okay, and not mortally wounded. We would have done so, too, if we
weren’t crippled by fits of laughter. Ellie even snorted. That made
us laugh even harder, to the point that we all but forgot about
Adam who lay there, possibly bleeding to death. But he wasn’t. He
leaned back, and squinted up at us with a wry smile spread across
his face.

We bent down, offered him a hand to get up
and helped him dust his once-white sheet off. His mum would not be
happy.

“And that, my friend, is the perfect reason
why we are not going in a Toga,” I said.

***

According to Ellie, it was always important
to make a grand entrance at a party, to have all eyes turned to us.
In fact, she revelled in it. As soon as we arrived, Ellie was on
the lookout for John Medding, who was hosting the break-up gala. He
was your everyday sporty boy – popular, pretty cute. He would
usually hook up with a girl when he had some Dutch courage from a
few beers. He would then choose to never make eye contact or speak
to her again. This was my forecast for tonight, given I had seen it
a dozen times before, but Ellie didn’t think that far ahead. For
now her gaze circled the party.

I wanted to dance. I loved dancing. I wanted
to move until my feet were blistered and every time a song I liked
blared out of the speaker, my heart sank.

The makeshift dance floor was housed in an
industrial-sized shed, filled with gritty machinery emitting the
faint smell of oil. The large space was shrouded in flashing disco
lights haphazardly hooked up to a twisted extension cord leading to
God knows where. I had lost Ellie in the commute from the main
house into the crowded shed. The party was massive! Obviously not
an exclusive Year Eleven break-up party like originally planned, I
couldn’t even spot a familiar face. I busied myself with grabbing a
Coke from one of the eskies when Ellie bounded excitedly up to
me.

“I’m going for a walk with John,” she
whispered.

I didn’t share her enthusiasm.

I watched Ellie walk hand in hand with John,
until both were engulfed by the blackness of the night.

Instead of dancing like I wanted to, I found
myself doing my usual best friend stakeout, perched on the bonnet
of a car, legs crossed, staring anxiously towards the woods that
surrounded the Medding property. Worse still, I was expected to be
‘entertainment’ for Zeke Walker, John’s best mate. He caused the
car to dip as he sat next to me on the bonnet.

Having realised that we were to be left alone
together while Ellie and John went and ‘admired nature’, his
presence caused me to slide to the furthest edge of the bonnet. I
had played the friend part before, left with whatever prospective
best friend belonged to the boy Ellie was crushing on. I had even
kissed a couple to pass the time, but as Zeke skulled the remnants
of his beer can, crushed it against his head and let out an
almighty belch, I nearly fell off the bonnet in an effort to get
away from him.

Ellie, you owe me big time!

Zeke, who was quite beefy and had a tendency
to squeeze his pimples in class without apology, was one of those
vile boys that had been put on this earth to make girls cringe.

“So, do you wanna fuck?”

This time I did fall off the bonnet, shocked
at the out-of-nowhere question. He must have read the disgust in my
look as he shrugged.

“You know that’s what they’re doing.”

I ignored him. If I ignored him, maybe he
would go away?

“That’s what John said anyway, he said that
…”

“I don’t give a shit what John said,” I
snapped. Here was another one. John had clearly heard that rumour.
He assumed Ellie was a sure thing. They both did. I was angry at
Zeke and John for believing that. And I was angry at Ellie for not
caring what they thought.

“Whoa, touchy!” Zeke said.

I wanted to stomp off, to leave Zeke, the
belching idiot, to himself. But I felt uneasy and wanted to be
there for Ellie when she came back, make sure she was okay. I
wouldn’t just leave her.

Silence fell over us again, except for the
occasional belch or spit. Finally, it seemed that Zeke got bored
with my enthralling company.

“Screw this. I have better things to do. I’ll
find out later how he went.”

He walked back to the party; I glared at his
back and fought to contain my anger.

“PIG!”

He flipped me the finger without a backward
glance. I hated him, I hated him and I hated John Medding and all
his stupid friends that waited in the wings for all the details.
That was the only reason Zeke had stuck around, not out of concern
for anyone’s wellbeing, but to be the one to get the goss hot off
the press.

Jerk!

I wanted to march into the woods, and yell
for Ellie, when I heard the distant snap of twigs. My first thought
was that maybe Ellie was headed back to the party. But my eyes soon
adjusted to that of a darkened silhouette. The long confident
stride of the stranger momentarily paused as if they had noticed
me. My own form was clearly lit by the disco lights that flashed
behind me. The stranger’s walk slowed, appeared more guarded. They
continued towards me, the lights that flickered from the party
gradually lighting his face with an array of pulsing hues of
colour. My tension should have ebbed at the sight of just another
late gate-crasher to the party; instead, I sat transfixed. My heart
stopped. I knew that face; it was a face I had always known. A face
I hadn’t seen in a really long time.

My head spun at the sight and the memory of
Toby Morrison. A boy I had never spoken a word to, a boy I had
always admired from afar. He closed the distance between us. He
looked at me for what was probably the first time, though I had
looked at him constantly. I held my breath as he stopped by the
car, our eyes locked in a long moment, his lips parted with what
would be our first exchange. I breathed in deeply and braced myself
for the moment, the moment I had waited for as he finally spoke
…

“Get off my car!”

I almost toppled over as I slid off the
bonnet, mortified. He reached out to steady me as he laughed.

Was he laughing at me?

“Whoa! Easy there.” He smiled wickedly.
“Don’t stress, I’m just messing with you. It’s not really my
car.”

He steadied me with a gentle touch to my
upper arm. A scorch mark burned into my flesh even after he removed
his hand.

It was then that I realised I had a fist full
of Toby Morrison’s T-shirt gathered in my hand with a
white-knuckled intensity. I must have grabbed a hold in an effort
not to fall flat on my face and further disgrace myself.

Toby’s eyes flicked down to his bunched
T-shirt with an air of amusement. His brows lifted in a ‘Do you
mind?’ gesture that caused me to let go as if I had been
electrocuted. Being electrocuted surely couldn’t have burnt more
than my flushed cheeks at that moment. I prayed that the bad
lighting masked them.

Toby half laughed as he plunged his hands
back into his pockets and stepped to my side; he tilted a fraction
closer as if he was about to reveal a secret.

“Relax … I would never own a Holden.” He
winked and then turned his confident stride towards the party.

I watched his figure as he retreated, and
took a deep breath as if I had forgotten to breathe ’til now. My
head whirled.

What had just happened? Toby Morrison had
just talked to me. And had we just shared a joke?

Or rather he had made a joke, and I all but
fell over and stared all googly eyed at him like an idiot and not
said a word.

NOT. ONE. WORD.

I watched as his figure became smaller, but
still clear enough to see that he was stopped every few feet with
people and hand grasps and pats on the back. Everyone knew Toby
Morrison, and I seriously wanted to, too.

When Toby Morrison disappeared into the thick
of the party crowd, I took a moment to firstly move far away from
the car, whose ever car it was. I needed to analyse what just
happened, play by play, detail for detail. His smile, his look, his
laugh, and his hand on my upper arm that I swear had burned into my
skin.

My back rested against the chill of the
cement water tank. I cupped my cheeks and felt the scorching burn
of my skin.

A distant rustle interrupted my thoughts, and
I noticed two figures had emerged from the woods. John was doing up
his belt and Ellie was three paces behind readjusting her skirt,
her hair all in disarray. John walked straight passed me and headed
for the party. I guess the silent treatment began now and extended
to Ellie’s friends. I waited for Ellie, who seemed surprised to see
me still waiting for her. I plucked a twig out of her hair.

“Why aren’t you dancing?” Her voiced sounded
sleepy.

“Oh you know, I don’t have a dancing
partner.”

Now was not a good time to do the
responsible, chastising, best friend speech. I could see that she
looked past my shoulder, wondering where John had gone.

My anger had grown more like a swirling
furnace in the pit of my stomach. Ellie faked indifference,
something she always did when boys treated her that way.

“Have you seen Adam?” she asked.

I wanted to be snide and ask
how could
I?
I had been busy hanging out with foul Zeke.

Except for my run in with Toby Morrison!

All of a sudden I didn’t feel so angry
anymore.

“You know Adam. If we were fashionably late,
he’d be later.”

We headed towards the thudding of the music,
and weaved our way through the mass of bodies. I was acutely aware
of the snickers behind their hands as they looked Ellie up and
down. Guess news spread fast at the hands of John Medding. If Ellie
noticed, she didn’t let on. Instead, her head bobbed to the music
as her eyes searched for Adam. I looked as well, but my gaze also
searched for Toby, who wasn’t anywhere. I wondered what he was
doing at a Year Eleven break-up party, he had graduated from high
school years ago. And more importantly, where had he gone?

We made our way past the shed and headed
towards the house, opening the back door to be flooded by the
pounding of a stereo. We slid past the crush of bodies wandering
into what looked like a dimly lit, stuffy rumpus room filled with
sporting memorabilia.

“Ellie! Tess!”

We turned and saw Adam in the distance, his
body higher than everyone else’s as he was dancing on a billiard
table with a bunch of tarty-looking Year Ten girls. They appeared
to be wearing more make-up than they were wearing clothes, and he
wasn’t so much dancing with them as wedged between them. They all
jumped up and down which was a mean feat for that many people on
such an apparatus.

Ellie and I shook our heads at the sight.
Adam owned the platform with his bad rhythm and beer in hand,
decked out in his mangy Toga. The only one still dressed like that
at the party. Ellie and I recognised it as exactly what it had been
meant: a sign of rebellion.

“Can you believe it?” Ellie shook her
head.

I laughed at the sight. I
could
believe it, actually.

“Hey, look, I’ll be back in a minute. I’m
just going to see where John got to.”

I cringed. Sometimes Ellie only saw what she
wanted to. “Ellie …” but she cut me off.

“Back soon!” She kissed me on the cheek and
disappeared through the crowd.

I hated watching her go, watching her move
towards her impending doom. As I worried, I felt the distinct
caress of alcohol-infused, hot breath on the back of my neck. A
clammy pair of hands blocked my vision.

“Suuurpriiiseee,” a voice slurred in my ear.
I broke free and spun around to see the bloodshot eyes of Scott
Miller.

I screamed inside my head and frantically
looked for an exit.

“Hey, Tessh. You’re looking mighty fine
tonight.” His eyes moved over me with a slow caress in a way that
made me feel dirty.

“Now, I have a bone to pick with you,” he
swayed slightly as he waggled his finger at me, a dopey look of
mock anger on his face.

Why on Earth did I ever go out with him?

“Wow, with me? That’s fresh.” I crossed my
arms. I was doing the thing my mum said over and over again: ‘Never
try and reason with a drunk person’. But a part of me wanted to
know more about this bone. Another of mum’s sayings was ‘A drunk
man speaks a sober man’s mind’.