“I think I better keep out of Eddy’s way.”
“Don’t worry about Eddy.”
Taleb plucked a few notes on his guitar.
Velvet remembered something Drago had said the previous term.
“Do they give you a hard time about this play, the others in the band?”
Taleb groaned. “Yes. Nonstop. About the play, the music, the company I keep.”
“They don’t like me.”
“Especially you. Mostly they give me a hard time about you.”
“What did I do?”
“You don’t have to do anything. They find you threatening.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re smart, rich …”
“I’m not rich. I used to be. Not any more.”
“… and stuck-up.”
“I’m not stuck-up.”
“They think you are.”
“Do you?”
“You used to be.” Taleb smiled again. This time he looked at Velvet, just quickly, but long enough to make her heart thump.
That’s when Jesus arrived, clinking and rattling with his latest collection of percussion “instruments” – three coke bottles with different levels of water in them, an empty Milo tin and a lunchbox containing a handful of dried peas. Hailie followed him in, carrying the saucepan lids that Jesus had been using as cymbals.
“Let’s get to work,” Taleb said. “Velvet and I have written some lyrics for the coronation song.”
They all turned to him. “What, together?”
Roula was behind them. “I just saw Eddy,” she said. “He says we wants his keyboard back.”
“He was limping. What happened? Did you have a fight with him, Taleb?”
“Not me. It was Velvet.”
“Go, Velvet.”
“It was instinct. I just did what you taught us, Jesus. I thought you were exaggerating when you said it’d make boys cry.”
“I taught her everything she knows,” Jesus said proudly.
“Yeah, it’s terrific, but now we haven’t got a keyboard.” Taleb wasn’t smiling anymore.
“I’ve got a keyboard at home. Dad bought it at an op shop,” Velvet said. “It’s not very good.”
“It’ll have to do.”
CHAPTER 20
Hailie and Roula looked up when Velvet entered half-way through humanities class. She’d been absent all morning.
“Where’ve you been?” Hailie asked.
“I had a doctor’s appointment.” Velvet was lying. She’d been to sit the Endeavour High entry exam.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Period problems,” Velvet said. She knew that would shut Hailie up.
Velvet sat with them. They were working on a mapping project. Theirs was a map of France. Roula had drafted it and was now drawing a picture of the Eiffel Tower straddling Paris. Roula was very good at drawing. She made it look three-dimensional, like it was coming up out of the paper. Hailie was drawing red dots where the towns were. Velvet was writing information about the regions in boxes. Her mind was only half on the project. Not even half.
“I’m telling you something really important, Velvet,” Hailie complained.
“She’s not listening.”
The door was open and from where they were sitting they could see into the classroom across the corridor, where 10F had French.
“You can take your eyes off him for a minute. He’s not going to disappear.” Hailie was only happy if she was getting all the attention.
“I wasn’t looking at anybody in particular. I was just staring into space.”
“Space is straight up, Velvet.” Roula pointed at the ceiling. “Not across the corridor.”
“I’m trying to tell you about this tragic event and you’re drooling over a boy.”
“I am not drooling, Hailie. Don’t be gross.”
“How can you still be interested in him when he’s always so mean to you?” Roula asked.
“Yeah. I don’t know what the attraction is. It’s not like he’s good looking or anything.”
“Don’t you think so?” Velvet was surprised.
“He’s got bands on his teeth, wears glasses and his nose is too big. And his clothes! He’s daggy. Jesus is much better looking than Taleb.” Hailie was still going out with Jesus. She turned to Roula for support. “Isn’t he?”
“He’s not my type.”
“Me neither,” Velvet said. “I’m not into muscles.”
“Yeah, you prefer skinny, wimpy boys.”
They pretended to work on their project as the humanities teacher walked past their desk.
“How do you know if a guy likes you, Hailie?” Velvet asked, when the teacher was out of earshot.
“Easy. I ask him out. If he says yes, he likes me. If he says no, he doesn’t.”
“I think Taleb almost asked me out. He said I should go to a Toxic Shock gig on Saturday.”
“That’s not exactly a date.”
“Yeah, I’m kidding myself, aren’t I?”
The teacher came back down the next aisle. Roula drew some mountains where the Alps were, covering them with tiny skiers and pine trees. Velvet wrote snowfall statistics and heights of peaks. Hailie coloured the sea blue.
“Good work, girls,” the teacher said.
“So what’s this tragedy you were talking about, Hailie?”
“Maurice died last night.”
“Who?”
“My mouse. The cat got him.”
Velvet made sympathetic noises while she thought about what nice eyes Taleb had and how strange it was that two people could look at the same face and see something completely different.
“It’s a good thing really,” Velvet said to no one in particular. “All part of a cosmic plan I suppose.”
“My mouse dying?”
“No, I was thinking about something else.”
“Seriously, Velvet.” Roula was losing her patience. “You’ll wait forever if you wait for Taleb to ask you out.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because of Jessica Saatci.”
“What about her?”
“Taleb was going out with her for two whole terms last year,” Hailie said. “She dumped him for Nick Papadimitriou.”
Velvet stopped writing. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“Everybody knows. Taleb was cut. He hasn’t been out with anybody since.”
“Hailie, I wasn’t here last year!”
“Sorry.”
“What about Sofia Ritano?”
“She doesn’t count. She’s a groupie.”
“There are hundreds of boys at school, Velvet,” Hailie said. “Why stress yourself over Taleb?”
Velvet had stopped listening again. This new information put a whole new light on things. It was all clear to her now. If Taleb had been traumatised by a previous relationship, she would have to make the first move. She knew she would never be able to bring herself to actually ask Taleb out, but she could summon the courage to go to Yarrabank Plaza on Saturday morning.
Velvet’s mother was going through a mother–daughter bonding stage. She was always planning things they could do together – an op shop crawl, a craft afternoon, an Eighties romantic comedy retrospective. When Velvet said she was going to Yarrabank Plaza on Saturday morning, her mother wanted to go with her. Velvet was no longer tying her hair back. She had spent nearly an hour in the bathroom scrunching her hair until she was happy with it.
“It’s your father’s birthday soon,” her mother said. “We could look for something really nice for him.”
Velvet had to do some fast thinking. “We can’t afford it, Mum. We’re poor.”
“I know, but we might get some inspiration for something that we could make ourselves.”
“Like what?”
“Some wool. We could knit him a beanie.”
“Dad doesn’t like wearing hats.”
“We could make him some brownies, he’d love that.??
?
“Last time you tried to make brownies, he called them blackies. Remember?”
“You’re not being very helpful, Velvet.”
Fortunately, the phone rang and her mother got involved in a deep discussion with an old friend and Velvet was able to slip away. She left a note saying she’d be home for lunch.
Velvet went to Kmart first. If she did some shopping, it would look like she just happened to pass by as the band was playing. She bought a pair of socks and some highlighters with money that her grandma had sent her. Then she bought her first lipstick, not blue or blood red, like Roula and Hailie’s, but a modest shade of pink.
Most of the shoppers were ignoring a terrible rap band playing in the mall. Only a small group of teenagers and what looked like the band’s mothers were listening. Velvet had to wander back and forth while three more inept teenage bands played before Toxic Shock came on. Maybe she wasn’t quite as conservative as she had been back in first term, but they did seem to have improved, though she still couldn’t understand a word the greasy singer was shouting. She stood where she was sure Taleb could see her and listened to all of the five songs they played.
When they’d finished, Velvet waited for him to come over and talk to her, but he didn’t even acknowledge that she was there. Sofia Ritano was down the front. Eddy sneered in Velvet’s direction. She went home.
She’d been thinking that she shouldn’t have bothered sitting the Endeavour High entry exam. Now she was glad she had.
CHAPTER 21
“We should open a bank account and put the costume money in it.”
“You’re so sensible, Velvet,” Hailie said. “You make me want to puke.”
“It’s only a hundred and fifty bucks,” Peter said. “We’ll get about five cents interest if we’re lucky.”
“Yeah, and we’ll be spending it all in a few weeks. What’s the point?”
“Well it’ll be safe there. What else can we do with it? Give it to you to look after, Jesus?”
“It’s totally illogical,” Peter said. “Can’t we give it to Mrs Mangalis to keep in the office?”
Mr MacDonald intervened. “I think it’s a good idea, Velvet.”
“Yeah, someone get the elephant stamp.”
“Whose name will we put it in?”
“You can call a bank account anything you like. You’re a drama company. What do you want to call yourselves?”
Jesus and Drago refused to be members of a group called the Drama Queens. Velvet liked Dramatic Irony, which according to the dictionary on her phone had something to do with the characters on stage not understanding what was going on. They all agreed that was pretty appropriate, but eventually settled on Stagefright. It might have been tempting fate, but it had a good ring to it.
“To open an account, we’ll need two people who are over sixteen to sign,” Mr MacDonald said.
“I’m sixteen,” Drago said.
“As if we’re going to give you the money!” Hailie said.
Mr MacDonald ignored her. “We need another volunteer. Mei, you’re sixteen aren’t you?”
Mei nodded.
“You’ll need a letter from the school. Ms Mangalis has them on file. We go through this all the time with sports clubs.”
“We’ll probably never see Drago again,” Roula said after he and Mei had gone to the bank. “Why did you give it to him?”
“I wanted Drago to know that we trust him.”
“You might.”
“This play has been good for Drago,” Mr MacDonald said. “He hasn’t been in trouble for quite a while.”
“What about when he threw a desk out of a first-floor window?”
“Apart from that.”
“And when he put Gladwrap over the toilets in the teachers’ loo.”
“Was that him? Anyway he’s only been suspended twice this year. That’s a record. And his grades are improving.”
“Yeah, he’s getting straight Ds now.”
“And that’s only because Velvet’s helping him with reading.”
“I brought my keyboard,” Velvet said.
“Fantastic,” Taleb said, smiling at her. “At least someone is focused on this play.”
Velvet felt her cheeks burn. She plugged in the Casio keyboard. It was bright red.
“Matches your face, Velvet,” Jesus said.
Velvet played a few bars of “Country Gardens” and “Amazing Grace”.
Taleb winced. “That’s not a musical instrument. It’s a toy!”
“Sounds like elevator music.”
“It’s all we’ve got,” Velvet said.
“It’ll do for practice,” Peter said. “Perhaps we can find something better later.”
Taleb picked up his guitar. “Okay, let’s run through the overture first, as a warm-up. Then we’ll work on the coronation song.”
They played the overture almost without a mistake.
“The sax sounds good, Hailie. And you’ve improved, Velvet.”
“I’ve been practising my improvising,” she said proudly.
Drago and Mei came back from the bank and everyone admired the Stagefright bank book.
“We couldn’t get a debit card,” Drago said. “We have to withdraw money over the counter.”
Taleb sang the coronation song. Velvet played the keyboard part flawlessly, but it was supposed to sound like a big church organ. On the Casio it sounded like something from Play School.
“That sounds like crap, Velvet,” Taleb said. “Can’t you make it sound better than that?”
She’d been working hard on the piece all week at home. Velvet felt her eyes start to prickle and fill with tears. The last thing she wanted was to cry in front of everyone, so she got up and walked out of T6 as fast as she could.
Velvet was angry with herself for letting Taleb affect her, and sick of her roller-coasting emotions. One minute feeling happy, the next devastated. She hid behind the bike shed, wiping her eyes and her nose on her sleeve. That’s where Taleb found her. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.
“I know it wasn’t your fault it sounded bad.”
Velvet blew her nose.
“The lyrics are good. The song will work well.”
Velvet sniffed.
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”
“You’re always yelling at me.”
“You don’t usually get so upset.”
Velvet bit her lip to stop it quivering pathetically. “It’s my birthday.”
Despite her efforts to stop them, the tears welled up and started running down her face again. She hadn’t minded that all she’d got for her birthday was a badly crocheted scarf from her mother, a box of chocolates past their use-by date from her dad and the twenty dollars from her grandma. But this was too much.
Taleb put an arm around her.
“You should have told us.”
“And I went to Yarrabank Plaza on Saturday and you ignored me.”
He put his other arm around her. “I didn’t see you.”
“I was right there.”
“I wasn’t wearing my glasses. It stops me getting nervous if I can’t see the audience.”
“Really?” Velvet looked up at him. His arms were still around her.
“Yeah.”
Velvet wiped her nose again, on the hankie this time.
“We better get back to class.”
Taleb leaned forwards and kissed her on the mouth. His lips were soft and his skin smelled spicy and male.
Velvet forgot to breathe.
“Happy birthday,” he said.
When the others found out it was Velvet’s birthday, they talked Mr MacDonald into going over to Hades for the rest of the afternoon. Taleb promised he wouldn’t yell at anyone and Mr MacDonald promised he’d try to find a better keyboard.
Velvet spent a lot of time pondering her new relationship with Taleb – if it was a relationship. He walked Velvet to the station after school (taking the long way to avoid
running into Hailie and Roula). They talked about the harmonies for the coronation song, what they would use for a backdrop and the latest home ec. disaster. Did that mean they were going out? Or was the kiss just meant to be a birthday present? A first kiss was a major milestone in a girl’s life, even more important than her first period or her first bra. But it was over and done with before she’d had a chance to realise what was happening.
“What was your first kiss like, Hailie?” Velvet asked during maths the following day.
“It was with Giancarlo Wong. Remember him, Roula, in Year 7? He left.”
“Yeah, he was cute. But, you know, not my type.”
“What was it like?”
“He was a bit too keen. He banged his teeth against mine and chipped a piece off my front tooth. I had to tell Mum I did it playing hockey.”
“My first kiss was wonderful,” Roula said.
“Yeah?” said Hailie and Velvet together, waiting for the crunch.
“It was this gorgeous boy in Greece. He was seventeen and I was only thirteen. Seriously. He was very passionate … on the beach … with the sun setting.”
“Was he your type?” Velvet asked.
“Not really.”
“What about your first kiss in Australia, Roula?”
“That was my cousin Con. I paid him two dollars to see what it was like.”
Velvet decided that her first kiss hadn’t been so bad after all.
Taleb rang Velvet on the weekend, late at night. He was the only student at Yarrabank who didn’t have a mobile phone, and as Velvet’s wasn’t reliable he used the landline. Velvet took the cordless phone to her room and they talked for nearly two hours without her having to worry about using up her phone plan or getting a brain tumour. She learned more about Taleb over the phone than she had all year in cultural studies class.
He told her about his family. He was the youngest, and the only one born in Australia. There were more than fifteen years between him and his eldest brother, who had just gone to Syria to support the rebels. His sister was married and there were two other brothers in their twenties still living at home. His sister and brothers all spoke English among themselves. As far as Taleb was concerned, Arabic was a language for speaking to parents and grandparents.