You Don't Even Know (7 page)

I knew he meant Michael Kolo.

“How could you be so stupid?” Dad's words buffeted me like a gale.

“I was trying to pull him up.”

“Not according to De Jong.”

“Like he'd know. You and Wortho are always crapping on about what a loser he is, but you listen to everything he says about me. Ask Michael, he'll tell you. Or Ethan. He was there.” Who'd have thought I'd ever look to Ethan for support.

“I phoned your brother,” said Dad.

“At school?”

Dad nodded.

“So you know what happened then. No big deal.”

“Ethan said the boys were having a bit of fun. The kid would have been fine if you hadn't interfered.”

“Serious?” My voice was hollow.

“What's wrong with you?” Dad's wolf eyes narrowed. “Boys do that sort of stuff all the time. At least normal boys do. Always have, but you're too stupid to realise that.” His nostrils flared. “De Jong's suspension will give you a chance to think about what it means to be a mate.”

Dad's mobile buzzed. He flipped open the case. “Travis, what's the problem?” He hurried to the study.

My head was spinning. What was normal about hanging a kid headfirst from a second-storey balcony?

Mia burst out of the family room, her face twisted with anger. She was about to rush past in her pink-socked feet, but skidded to a halt on the tiles. Her face lit up.

“Alex! You're home.” She wrapped her arms around my knees. “Can you play with me?”

I dropped my bag and scooped her up, hugging her tight.

Mia squirmed. “You're squeezing my bones, Alex.”

I released her and forced the words past the tightness in my throat. “What are we playing, Mia?”

A physio, all perfume and hips, has left me sitting in a vinyl chair with armrests to eat lunch.

The most embarrassing thing ever happened.

Not the dizziness, the hobbling or even the fact I'm wearing white stockings with holes for my toes. The most embarrassing thing is I have a tube sticking out of my dick, a catheter she called it, and that tube links me to a bag of piss. My piss.

And she, this perfumed, pouting physio, carried the piss bag while I shuffled along like an old dude in a nursing home.

Freaking hell. Could it get any worse?

I try to distract myself from the frustration balled in my chest by checking out the lump lying in the opposite bed. The physio and a nurse moved my roommate right before my dignity was crushed. From the chair I can see a head swathed in bandages and a girl's face. Even though she's asleep, she's frowning like she's trying to solve a math's problem.

I strain to read the name above her bed.

“Mackie Oliver.”

Mackie. Cool name.

According to the texta scrawl beneath her name, she was admitted the same day as me and we have the same surgeon. That must have been a big day for Mr Dobson.

For a moment I wonder how she ended up in here. I've barely formed the question when I am distracted by my icy toes.

I need socks, a rug or something. Even a towel to wrap around them. I don't know if I have any socks here, and even if I did, there's no way I'm staggering around carrying a bag swilling with piss to find out.

Frustration explodes into fizzing balls of panic.

What the hell am I doing here?

How come I'm sitting like an old dude, waiting for death?

How come some of the nurses grunt and avoid looking at me?

How come I need help to dress, eat, even piss?

What if when the tube comes out my body forgets how to piss, or worse, I can't stop and end up like a mouse, with no bladder control, constantly weeing?

Every muscle is rigid. My ribs ache and my head throbs. My arm itches under the plaster. Sweat trickles from my hairline.

I tense and release my hand and try to roll my shoulder to stop the raging panic.

The lunch trolley rattles to a stop outside our door.

I swallow and nod at the scowling man who carries my tray …

I took the tray of dirty glasses and stacked them into the industrial dishwasher. Behind me, standing in the middle of the huge kitchen, Mum issued orders.

“Table four with those mains, thanks, Heath. Andy, have the entree plates been removed from the tables in the back corner? Well, do it now, please.”

Mum had asked Ethan and me to be waiters at the charity auction for her latest cause “Books 4 Refugees”. Like we had a choice. She asked us in front of Dad and followed up the request with “All the other girls' sons are helping.” Mum talk for “Don't make me look bad.”

So instead of kicking back watching a movie or hanging out with Tilly, I was stuck in a nightmare of frenzied bidding for plants shaped to look like balls on sticks, tickets to the opening night of a new musical, framed and signed football jumpers, an Olympic swimmer's signed bathers and other weird stuff. Seemed to me people were more concerned with outbidding each other than what they were bidding on.

Every time Ethan returned to the kitchen, he was full of who had bought what, like it was a news flash or something. I didn't give a stuff.

“That Spencer guy, you know the one who used to be a politician? He bought tickets to the footy. Should have seen Kelly Matthews' face when he was outbid.” Kelly Matthews was the current state member of parliament, who according to Dad, wasn't worth a cold pie.

“Fascinating,” I muttered into the dishwasher.

Ethan elbowed me as he placed dirty dishes on the sink. “Shut up, loser.”

“Good comeback. Work on that for long?”

He glowered and bumped into me on his way to the door. I slammed into a dishwasher tray I'd half-filled with glasses. “Idiot!”

“Alex,” said Mum. “I need you to take meals to table five.”

“I'm filling the dishwasher.”

“Now, Alex.”

I banged the machine's metal handle and slouched to where meals were lined up to be taken out.

“Chicken first, then beef. Serve from the left.”

“You've told me this before.”

“And don't bang them down.
Place
them.”

“Want me to do this or not?” I snapped.

The guy drizzling sauce around the plates grinned at me.

I rolled my eyes and picked up plates.

“Table five,” repeated Mum, so close she was practically in my back pocket. As I moved away, she brushed my shoulder and tutted. “You're a dirt magnet, Alex.”

“Add it to my list of failures,” I said, pulling away from her. The moment I stepped through the kitchen door, I was impressed all over again by what Mum and her committee had done to the dowdy city hall. They'd draped purple and red material from the centre of the ceiling to the corners, where it fell to the floor, changing the hall into the interior of an Arabian tent. Silhouettes of camels and palm trees dotted the material and cushions in rich reds, oranges and golds were scattered beneath a gazebo lined with fairy lights. On the tables, brass lanterns glowed golden. The design and colours were repeated on the stage, only on a smaller scale.

“Hurry up, idiot. Table five is waiting,” hissed Ethan, brushing past me to the kitchen. It took an effort to stop the dishes balanced on my arm from falling.

Meals delivered, I weaved back to the kitchen.

Ethan returned to the hall holding meals. Instead of going straight to table five, he scanned the room. When he saw me, he headed in my direction.

I sped up, trying to make it to back to the kitchen before he reached me. We met in the open space between the tables and the door. Ethan smirked as I passed and stuck his foot out. I crashed to the polished wood floor.

Ethan's laughter echoing in my head, I scrambled to my feet and into the kitchen. I stood by the serving bench, knees and palms stinging, and brushed dirt from my pants. Enough shit from Ethan.

The door swung open and Ethan and Andy strolled into the kitchen.

Ethan imitated my fall. “Klutz. No wonder he spends so much time in the water.”

Andy laughed.

Something clicked in my head. Next thing, I had Ethan pressed up against the serving bench. His head thudded against a steel rack. Dishes crashed to the floor.

“Oi. Cut it out,” yelled one of the guys plating up.

Andy tried to separate us, but I elbowed him away.

“Stay away from me, you tosser,” I hissed into Ethan's face and shoved him. His head smashed the steel rack again.

“Stop it, Alex,” yelled Mum.

My hands dropped to my sides.

“Outside, both of you.” Mum pointed to the door.

Under the streetlight in the car park, Mum stood in front of us, hands on her hips. “What the hell was that about?”

“He tripped me.”

Ethan folded his arms. “Bullshit. He fell. Ask anyone.”

I turned to Mum. “You're not going to believe that crap, are you?”

“Shut up. Both of you.” Her voice quivered. “I have never been so embarrassed.”

“Oh, come on.”

Mum raised her hand. “Don't say another word, Alex.” She bit her bottom lip. “I don't understand you. In front of my friends.”

Ethan sneered at me.

“What about him?” I asked, pointing.

Mum kept talking. “What is your problem, Alex?”

My thumbs dug in to my palms. “Shove your charity. I'm going home.”

“Great job, Alex,” says Brent, the physio. “Need a break?”

“Yeah.” All I'd done was walk from my bed to the corridor and back. Hardly a marathon, but I'm knackered.

“Big effort, buddy,” says Brent, helping me back into bed. “You're a fit young bloke. Your strength will return quickly.”

“I was fit.”

“You will be again. Good news is it looks like everything is working okay. We weren't sure how you'd be.”

“Just lucky, I guess.”

“Mate, I know it's tough, but you'll be out of here in no time.” Brent glances at the bed opposite. “Not everyone is as lucky.”

My face burns.

“Right, this afternoon I want you to walk across the room a couple of times, okay?”

“No worries.”

“Good man. See you tomorrow.”

As he walks away, I call, “Brent. Thanks.”

He smiles. “Not a problem …”

“Problem, Alex?” Mum's question cannoned around my brain. Even face down in bed, head under the pillow, I could still hear her voice and see her twisted, angry face.

I'd slept all I was going to, so stumbled out of bed.

Mum and Dad were sitting at the kitchen bench, drinking coffee. Their faces were grim. No prizes for guessing what they were talking about.

“Morning.”

“Is that all you have to say?” snapped Dad.

I shrugged, which only made his face redden.

“Okay, how about, good morning, Mother? Good day to you, Father?” I took a bowl from the cupboard.

Dad slapped the bench. “Stop being a smart-arse, Alex.”

“Dylan,” said Mum, her voice soft.

“Don't Dylan me, Christina.” Dad's voice battered the windows. “Apologise to your mother for last night's debacle.”

Mum clasped her mug with both hands.

Debacle? “Mum, I'm sorry about last night.” I opened the pantry door and grabbed the Weet-Bix box.

“Like you mean it,” Dad growled.

I slammed the pantry door. “I do mean it.”

“Words to shut me up.”

My hand tightened on the cereal packet. “Look, I'm sorry. All right? But … Ethan started, and –”

“Ethan?” Dad snorted. “Your brother is a great kid who works hard at everything.”

Great kid? Two-faced, sly, slimy bully that was Ethan, not that Dad could see it. And I'd given up trying to point it out. “Yeah, especially being a complete twat.” I banged the cereal onto the bench.

“What?”

When I didn't answer, he launched into his favourite speech. Attitude, respect and hard work.

“… time to harden the hell up, Alex.”

Dad's favourite expression.

I glared at his pointed finger. “Nice one, Gramps.”

His eyes narrowed. “What?”

“You sound like an old fart from the fifties. So what's the deal? Sign me up for the army? Who knows, Dad, maybe I'll be sent to Afghanistan and die in a suicide bomb blast and then you can rave about being a war hero's father, because it's all about you, isn't it?”

“Alex,” gasped Mum.

“Too far,” bellowed Dad, standing. “Time this crap was knocked out of you.”

“Gonna hit me now?” Every drop of anger was seeping out of me. “Just because I'm not a freaking carbon copy of you, like Ethan, doesn't mean I'm crap. Hell, two of you in the world are more than enough.”

The vein in Dad's temple was purple and bulging. “I will not be insulted by you.” He stabbed the stone bench with his index finger. “I am proud of who I am and what I've achieved. What have you accomplished, Alex? Hey? Apart from stumbling from one stuff-up to another?”

Mia skipped into the family room, arms full of paper and pencils. She dumped them on the coffee table. Hands on her hips, she assessed the three of us. “Are you fighting?”

“No, Mia,” said Mum. “Dad, Alex and I are talking.”

“Loud talking.”

“Nothing to worry about, pumpkin.” Dad pulled the chair under him. “Alex, you're grounded. You will go to school and come straight home. You will not go anywhere else.”

“But I have water polo Monday and Wednesdays. And I have two work shifts this week.”