Gracie Faltrain Gets It Right (Finally)

  Term three is the beginning of the end for Year 12 students.

  Year 12 Survival Guide

  I can confirm. It feels like the beginning of the end.

  Gracie Faltrain

  58

  GRACIE

  It’s not possible to avoid Kally once school starts. It seems like everywhere I turn, she’s standing there with Annabelle. I go to the toilet and both of them are washing their hands at the sink. I’m at my locker and so are they. ‘They don’t say anything to me. They’re just there,’ I tell Jane.

  ‘It’s phase two of the giant conspiracy,’ Jane says. ‘Next they’ll be in the tuckshop, waiting silently in line. Have you taken notice of how quiet it’s been this week, Faltrain?’

  ‘Not especially.’

  ‘I mean, no one’s giving you crap about what you did at the movies. Not Susan, no one.’

  ‘It happened before the holidays.’

  ‘That sort of rumour’s like fire. It leaps the holidays and keeps right on spreading. That is, unless no one tells, Faltrain. Kally and Annabelle haven’t said a word.’

  ‘Sure, throw their niceness back in my face.’ It’s been hanging around me all holidays, that feeling that I’m actually more in the wrong camp than the right one. ‘You think I’m bad.’

  ‘You’re still not getting it,’ she says, standing up and brushing the last few crumbs from her sandwich away. ‘Let that little light in your head come on. It’s been flickering all holidays. I need to go to the toilet before class. See you after school.’

  ‘What? You’re walking off without telling?’

  ‘Faltrain, this is like telling you that the sky’s blue. It’s not a ground-breaking revelation.’

  In the last ten minutes of lunch I walk down to the oval. I’ve played here since Year 7 and all around me are the ghosts of Gracie Faltrain’s stupid past. I’ve had so many theories about how people should live and love and act and in the end, it’s like my dad always told me. There are no easy answers, baby. And it’s never black and white.

  I like black and white. They’re good, solid colours. You know what to wear with them. Maybe you don’t have to accept that life’s grey, though. Grey’s a high school colour, too. Maybe life’s a range of every shade imaginable. It’s all that choice that makes it exciting. And it’s all that choice that makes you hover around the wardrobe, confused about what top goes with what skirt.

  On the bright side, I think today, leaning back on the grass, I passed all my mid-year exams. Mrs Young says doing well in the final exams is a strong possibility for me. Who would have guessed that passing school would be the fairly easy bit? It’s everything else that’s hard. All around are memories of Martin and me. Last year, before we broke up, he mentioned taking a road trip. And I dreamed that he and I would go together.

  But the truth is Dad’s right. My pride is hurt. It hurts like a dislocated butt after rocketing off a walking machine at the gym. I don’t want to go on a road trip into the sunset with Martin. I don’t actually want to go on a road trip into the sunset with anyone. I want to focus on the World Cup and study at uni next year, which is an even stranger development than Alyce cheating on Brett. While I’m studying and training, I want to hang out with Dan. But after the long time it’s taken for me to work that out, it’s about as likely as seeing the Brady Bunch walk onto the field again. Hands up if anyone else feels like they’re in a strange life-looping door that keeps swinging back to hit them on the butt?

  I have to say sorry to Annabelle and I have to mean it. It’s ugly, and I don’t like admitting it, but I knew her dad had died in Year 6 and I still did all those things to her.

  I have to say sorry to Kally, too. It’s strange how when I’m the closest to getting what I’ve most wanted I’m the furthest away from it. We’re almost down to the last twenty players at state trials. It means something, but it doesn’t mean as much as it did at the start of the season. I guess there really are more important things than soccer. Or at least there are things that are as important. Like my friends. Like promises I’ve made. Like making up for the past.

  A lot rests on the practice match this Sunday. The final training session tonight counts. I’m going. It’s time to get on with things, Gracie Faltrain. If there’s one thing that is clear after this season, it’s that you back up your team. You finish what you started.

  As if a reward for my good thoughts, Martin sends me a text: Faltrain, can we talk? I’ll come to your house after school. He’s meeting me more than halfway, I think, and I text him that I’ll be there.

  ‘I should have told you about me and Annabelle,’ Martin says, sitting on my step. ‘But I knew it would hurt.’

  ‘Did you like her while we were going out?’ It’s the question that’s keeping me up at night.

  ‘When we were together I didn’t even look at another girl.’

  ‘Because I would have punched you.’

  ‘Because I didn’t see them, Faltrain.’

  ‘So when did you start seeing them?’ What I really want to ask is when he started seeing Annabelle, when he started kissing her. But I can’t. That question hurts too much.

  ‘On the first month of that road trip I couldn’t think about anything but you. I wrote postcard after postcard. But Faltrain, we’ve changed since Year 10. I knew all the while I was missing you that it wouldn’t work.’

  I’m crying now. I know he’s right but there’s a part of me that wants it all: I want Dan as well as Martin even though that’s not fair.

  ‘You’re still my best mate. You’re still the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen on the soccer field.’ The anger in me gets quiet after he says that. I don’t need him to love me like he did. I need to know that the years behind us matter.

  We talk for ages. It’s late when he leaves. ‘Here,’ he says, and hands me a packet of postcards. ‘I thought you might want to read them. I did miss you, Faltrain.’

  ‘I missed you, too.’

  I read through Martin’s trip after he’s gone. I’m there at the start, walking beside him, talking and laughing. And then I slowly fade out so there’s just the whisper of me. It makes me sad, sure. But that’s the way it happened when I started to like Dan. That’s the way it should have been.

  My feeling of calm nostalgia doesn’t last long, though. It’s replaced by panicked current time. I remember where I was meant to be tonight. Crap. Double crap. I try to ring Kally but she’s not answering. Her phone doesn’t even go through to message bank. Now that I’m not gripped by insane jealousy, I can see that Kally might not have been in on a plan orchestrated by Annabelle since primary school to steal the boy I love. Okay, when I say it like that I see that I’ve been a bit unreasonable. I’m going to show up tomorrow and win that bet. She’ll have to forgive me if I save her hair. Right?

  59

  GRACIE

  At least she would have to forgive me if I was on time. Crap, crap, crap, crap. ‘I’m late,’ I yell across the house. ‘Someone get up and drive me to the practice match.’ I lean over Dad who’s snoring. ‘GET UP!’ I yell into his face. He springs out of bed like I’ve thrown cold water on him. ‘Today, people. It’s an emergency. Forget showers. Jane, get in the car. Mum, grab the breakfast bars. Dad, actually you can get changed. I’m not taking you out in those pyjamas.’

  ‘Can’t this thing go any faster?’ I ask.

  ‘I’m doing the speed limit, baby.’ I look past Dad to the clock. I’m twenty minutes late. I’ll miss the first half. I’m out of the car before it’s fully stopped. I run across the ground in time to hear the whistle. Oh no. ‘Five goals? We’re five goals down?’

  ‘I’d punish you and keep you off but we’re dying out there,’ Coach Adelaide says. ‘Warm up. You’re on after the break.’

  ‘I slept in,’ I say to Kally. ‘I wasn’t at training last night because I spoke to Martin. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Tell it to my hair,’ she says.

  ‘Okay.’ I lean close to
her head. ‘I’m sorry.’

  She tries not to smile.

  ‘I can fix this. Don’t worry. Okay, everyone get over here.’ The team crowds around. ‘Give me the run-down. Why are they beating us?’

  ‘We’re playing like crap,’ Char says.

  ‘Okay, that was a quick run-down.’

  ‘They’re not breaking the rules. They’re rough and fast and we can’t keep up and it’s scary out there,’ Kally says. ‘And we needed you in the first half to get a lead.’

  ‘I know. But blame isn’t helping. I want you to remember what we talked about at training. I want you to run as hard as you can.’ I’m actually at a loss after that. I don’t know what else to tell them. They’re good. It just might be that today, the boys are better.

  It’s lucky for all of us that Flemming swings over. ‘Faltrain, tell them to stop backing off when the guys run with their arms out.’

  ‘Spoken like a man without boobs.’

  ‘They have to hold their ground. You see the ref who’s on?’

  I look across. ‘It’s Hoover.’

  ‘He red-cards at the drop of a hat and Truck knows it. The guys haven’t actually broken any rules yet.’

  ‘I think it’d be good if you told them that.’ I know it helped me to hear it from Flemming all those years ago.

  He calls to them and goes over his Hoover theory. And then he says, ‘It’s not about girls and guys. The only player I’ve ever seen who’s as good as me out there is Faltrain. So beat the crap out of them in the second half.’

  Who knew he had a sensitive side? ‘That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said about me.’

  ‘Keep your hair on, Faltrain. You haven’t won yet.’

  He’s right. I need to fix that. Kally kicks to me and I pass the ball to Esther. Truck runs alongside but she moves faster. Go, go, go, I think as she moves towards goal. Their defence nearly has her but she’s quicker. She shoots. She makes it. I see the confidence building on her face. I hope the rest of the team sees it. I hope it’s catching.

  We start again. Truck gets the ball this time and moves down the field. I run after him. He puts his hands out but I’d rather lose a boob than my hair. I want Dan back and nothing dints a girl’s confidence quicker than a close encounter with clippers set at number one. I take the ball and kick to Kally, she kicks to Sophia, who loses it to their midfielder and the whole thing starts again. This time I see, though. Their centre forward doesn’t shoot well with his right foot. He gets the ball and I force him to switch feet. When he does the ball is mine. I’m not taking any chances. I sail straight down the midfield and send it through to goal.

  I run past Dan. He doesn’t say anything but he looks relieved. Corelli gives me a nod. Francavilla waves from the bench. Take a look, Truck, I want to say. Not everyone’s dying to give us a buzz cut.

  There are twenty minutes left and we need to kick at least three more goals. It takes us ten minutes to score the next one and six to score the one after that. That leaves us four minutes to tie and get out of this thing on a technicality.

  I take a breath. I see my path. I can do this. I have the ball at three minutes to go. I fly. I make it past their defence with two minutes to spare. No one can stop me. I kick. The whistle goes. Actually, that should be the other way around. The whistle goes. I kick.

  Did I make the most amazing run down the midfield? Yes. Did I kick the ball through to the back of the net? Absolutely. Did I do it after the whistle? Unfortunately for us, yes.

  The boys are going wild. They’re yelling about the clippers they have in their bags. My team looks, well, panicked. ‘No one could have come closer to making that shot, Gracie,’ Kally says. The team nod.

  Adelaide pats me on the back. ‘Amazing second half.’ But that’s the thing. I always come through in the second half and for the first half I’m an idiot. And someone always loses something because of me. It doesn’t matter that I thought the bet was stupid. I agreed to it. I promised to be here and I wasn’t.

  The boys gather around. Dan, Corelli, Singh and Francavilla aren’t the only guys who look uncomfortable. ‘No one really wants to do this,’ Dan says. ‘They played a great game out there.’

  ‘A deal’s a deal,’ Truck says, and turns on the clippers.

  Looking at him, waving those things, I get scared. But that passes and I get angry: at me for stuffing up and at Truck for being such an idiot. ‘I’ve played on a boys’ side for six years,’ I say. ‘They didn’t care that I was girl. They backed me up. I think you’re a great player, I think I’m a great player. So why do we have to do this?’

  ‘Just because you really annoy me,’ he says.

  I guess you can’t rely on the light being switched on in someone else’s brain because it’s finally switched on in yours. Fighting like this gets you nowhere. But truthfully? It’s hard to blame Truck for being so stupid when I’ve been stupid for the past three years. I like stupid people, some of my best friends are stupid people. You’ll notice at this point that I’m babbling. That’s because I know what I’m about to do.

  Sometimes, you have to take charge. You have to stop caring what other people think and do what you want. ‘I was late,’ I say. ‘I’m their coach. I let them down. And what’s more, after six years of high school, I’m really tired of following the who-hates-who rules. I take full responsibility for the bet. I shave my head and the girls are off the hook. Agreed?’

  ‘Agreed,’ Truck says.

  I act fast. It’s the right of every idiot who agrees to have their head shaved to shave it themselves. I snatch the clippers out of his hand before he realises what’s happening. Dan watches me with his mouth hanging open as I shave my hair off. I guess I won’t be having those cascading curls at the end-of-year formal. Kally gets the parts I can’t reach. I run my hands over it. ‘Smooth. There’ll definitely be less wind resistance when I run at the state finals.’

  Char looks at me with her hand over her mouth. ‘Don’t worry. The back of my hair never sat right, all through high school.’ And when things don’t work out right, sometimes you just have to start all over again.

  HELEN FALTRAIN

  ‘That’s our Gracie. That’s the girl we raised,’ I say to Bill. ‘I never realised what a lovely shaped head she has.’

  GRACIE

  ‘I’m buying Gracie lunch,’ Kally says. ‘Anyone who wants to come is welcome.’ The only person who doesn’t come is Annabelle. I want to say something to her before she leaves but there are too many people crowding me, feeling my head. ‘Talk to her later,’ Kally says. ‘Celebrate now.’

  Kally sits next to me at the café. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I know why you didn’t tell me about Annabelle and Martin.’

  ‘You came through when it counted. You sorted everything out with him?’

  ‘We’re talking again, which is good.’

  She looks across at Dan. ‘You might want to put him out of his misery soon. He decided it’d be a sign if you called him.’

  I know better than anyone that if you wait for the signs all your life, you’ll never get what you want. I catch Dan’s eye and he follows me outside.

  ‘Before you say anything, the girlfriend/boyfriend rules clearly state that boyfriends have to like all new haircuts.’

  ‘This is taking it to the extreme, though.’ He runs his hand over my head. ‘It feels weird.’

  ‘You’re telling me.’

  ‘I don’t know if I can be your boyfriend. I’m not saying we can’t be friends, but if you’re still thinking about Knight, there’s not a lot of point.’

  ‘I know it looks that way. I was hurt that he’d kept such a big secret from me. But I don’t like him like that anymore. I don’t know what’s going to happen next year. I’m hoping for the Young Matildas and I want to study. For now, I want to hang out with you.’

  ‘That’s what I want,’ he says. ‘But if we do ever break up I’m going to expect you to run over me with a bus or I’m going to think you never
loved me.’

  ‘I’m more mature now. Maybe I’ll just hit you with a bike. So, tell me the truth, do you really like my hair?’

  ‘I think you’re gorgeous.’

  ‘That’s the right answer.’

  ‘You remind me of a ripe summer melon or a peach.’

  ‘Okay, let’s stop there.’ A few secrets between friends are absolutely fine.

  JANE

  ‘Would you like me without my hair?’ I ask Corelli.

  ‘Of course. Would you like me if I waxed my legs?’ he asks.

  ‘My love is unconditional.’

  FLEMMING

  Before you ask, yes, Alyce. I would like you without your hair.

  60

  GRACIE

  Dan pulls up at the Orions’ house after our celebration and I get out of the car with Kally. ‘I need to talk to Annabelle,’ I say, and follow her up the path.

  I’ve never been inside this house before. Her kitchen looks the same as ours. There are notices on the fridge and dishes in the sink. After hating her for so long it’s weird to realise she goes home to a place like mine.

  I follow Kally down the hallway. I knock on Annabelle’s door. ‘Can I come in?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she says, and clears a space on her bed for me to sit. It’s even stranger for me to be in here than in the kitchen. I’ve only ever seen Annabelle’s face, never the things she’s interested in, never the things she loves.

  ‘I like your picture.’ I look at it, splashed with colour above her bed.

  ‘She was my dad’s favourite artist. Angela Brennan,’ she says, and I listen while she talks about her. You have to hear the details of people, I figure, because in the big picture, when they’re far away, they’re way too easy to hate.

  I look at Annabelle and try to see her as someone who Kally and Dan and Martin love. ‘I’m sorry about the things I did to you in Year 6, when your dad died.’ It’s unknown territory, being nice to Annabelle. It’s like in Year 7 Drama when the teacher made us improvise a play. I’m not exactly sure what our next lines are going to be.