Forever Geek

  One of my front teeth is minutely crooked, my eyebrows are fair and sparse, and there’s already a faint line between them from where I scowl when I’m studying hard.

  (Which is something I haven’t done much of in the last few weeks, come to think of it. I should probably look into drafting a Catch-Up Timetable asap.)

  From where I’ve been scrubbing it, my forehead is rosy and shiny: there’s a large, angry spot forming on my chin, and a few more erupting on my cheeks because of all the thick make-up.

  Carefully, I untie my hair from its tight bun and it pings out: a riot of frizzy red curls. With a tiny smile, I pull Bunty’s slightly wilted daisy off a tendril at the back and put it in my pocket.

  There’s faint music and laughter coming through the door from the garden, but the room I’m in is totally silent.

  But then, with a rush, I can suddenly hear them all: every single unkind word I’ve ever been called.

  Circling in the air above my head like angry flies: buzzing and buzzing, as if they’re desperate to find somewhere to land.

  Ugly. Freckles. Nobody. Boring. Loser. Spotty. Carrots.

  GEEK.

  But for the first time, they can’t seem to settle or stick on me.

  There’s nowhere for them to go.

  Still smiling, I reach a hand up and start batting at them: hitting the words, one by one, until they’re dead on the floor. Empty ghost words that have no meaning, no use, no purpose, no truth in them.

  Definitions that aren’t in my dictionary any more.

  Because from this point onwards, nobody gets to choose the vocabulary I use for myself but me.

  Smiling, I lean forward and give my beautiful, flawed and irreplaceable face a quick kiss in the mirror. After all, none of those social-networking statistics said that my sixth best friend couldn’t be myself.

  That’s not cheating at all.

  Then I stand up and take a deep, brave breath.

  Because – as we all know – this is normally the point in my story where everything starts unravelling: where my lies come home to roost.

  Except this time I’ve only told one.

  So I guess I’d better make sure I’m there when it does.

  salamander can breathe through its skin.

  And it’s a shame I can’t, because the second I step into the garden party I’m being hugged so tightly I’m not sure my lungs will ever be useful again.

  “Harriet!” Nat yelps, squeezing me a bit tighter. “Where were you? I’ve been waiting out here for ages! Oh my God, wasn’t that just the most magical, amazing, breathtaking—”

  She stops and holds me at arm’s length.

  “Aww,” she says in disappointment, looking me up and down. “Didn’t they let you keep that dress, at least for the party? You should have said and I’d have brought another one with me.”

  I look round at five hundred people, milling around the garden in insanely stylish clothes: holding glasses of champagne and looking a million Australian dollars.

  Then I look down at my old, crumpled T-shirt, long, baggy shorts and trusty purple flip-flops.

  At a total of about fourteen dollars fifty.

  “Nope,” I say, beaming and linking my arm through Nat’s. “I’m actually a lot more comfortable as I am.”

  “Even though the diplodocus is standing in the wrong position,” Nat points out. “Because its neck should be held parallel to the floor and not up like a giraffe, right?”

  “Right,” I laugh. “It’s an atrocity. The company didn’t even answer my letters.”

  “How many did you send in the end?”

  “Five. Royal Mail sacked Postman Pat in 2000 so I just can’t trust them any more.”

  We both giggle and commence a slow turn around the garden, like recovering ladies in a Victorian convalescence. I’m subtly looking for Yuka and/or Nick, but they’re nowhere in the glittering crowd and I’m not exactly sure how to track them down.

  Or I am, but I’ve done quite enough of that over the last few days.

  Frankly, I’ve used up my stalking allowance for the decade.

  “Where’s Silva?” I ask instead, picking a tasty-looking morsel of puffed pastry off a gold platter held by a waitress in a gold waistcoat.

  “She went off to write her blog,” Nat says, grabbing three cocktail sticks of cheese and olive from another passing waiter and ramming them in her mouth simultaneously. “Newawatospadiseninwau.”

  I laugh and wipe my face. “You might want to try that again without covering me in dairy-flavoured spit, Natalie.”

  My best friend swallows with a grimace. “I said: Anyway, I want to spend the rest of this evening with you. Although if you’re going to be all hoity-toity I might change my mind.”

  “Well, that phrase comes from the now-defunct verb hoit, which meant to indulge in riotous, noisy mirth. So maybe I will, Natalie. It is a party, after all.”

  “I stand corrected,” Nat grins. “As per freaking usual.”

  Smiling, I stick my hand out to take another pastry flight in the wind, then abruptly stop with it hovering in mid-air.

  Somewhat – you know, appropriately.

  “What?” Nat says as my eyes go very round. “What are we looking at?”

  “Over there,” I whisper, nodding to a space under the huge oak tree. Bunty and Yuka are standing close together on the other side of it, talking quietly but earnestly. Yuka is rigid in her black lace, and my grandmother is fluttering in rainbow tie-dyed cotton.

  The orchestral music is glorious but I wish they’d stop playing for a minute: it’s very hard to eavesdrop properly over a grand piano and full accompaniment.

  As subtly as we can, Nat and I inch silently towards Yuka and Bunty, like conjoined twin cats.

  “Do you think they’re making up?” Nat whispers.

  “It’s hard to tell,” I frown, edging closer. Yuka’s face is as impassive as always: a perfectly formed piece of carved white granite. Bunty – as usual – is beaming and there are several leaves in her hair.

  On the upside, at least Nick remains nowhere to be seen.

  Which means there’s still time to confess.

  “Is she … giving her a daisy?” Nat says doubtfully as Bunty holds out a tiny white flower.

  “I don’t think that’s going to help much,” I agree as Yuka stares at the daisy in the exact way my cat Victor regards celery. “I mean, Yuka’s not exactly known for—”

  “Whoooa,” we both say at the same time.

  Because in one stiff movement, Yuka has just taken the flower, leant forward and kissed my grandmother firmly on the cheek.

  “Blimey,” I say as Bunty gives Yuka a warm hug and wanders off down a garden path. “I thought for a second she was going to bite h—”

  Then I stop, mid-sentence.

  Oh God.

  No. No. No no no no no no –

  Because Nick is striding out of nowhere across the grass directly towards Yuka with a huge, confused frown on his face.

  Sugar sugar sugar sugar sugar sugar –

  “Quick,” I say to Nat, glancing around. “Hide.”

  And before my best friend can respond, I grab her arm and drag her behind the tree.

  hat can I say?

  Tortoise by name, tortoise by nature.

  According to an article in New Scientist magazine, they’re actually much smarter than anyone thought: outwitting rats in a memory-maze-running test, and showing cognitive social skills nobody previously believed they had.

  I think they may even outsmart me.

  Given that in any emergency I just try to make my surface area as small as possible and hope nobody sees me.

  “Harriet?” Nat whispers as I squat on my haunches with my arms wrapped over my head. “Did you lie again?”

  I nod, peeking out from under my elbow.

  “Oh, Harriet,” she sighs as we lean out from behind the tree and watch Nick approach, his frown deepening even further. “What are we going to do with y
ou?”

  “I don’t know,” I whisper back honestly, although something tells me we’re about to find out.

  “Yuka,” Nick says urgently, stopping a few metres away from us. “What’s going on? None of us knew. The family, I mean. Mum doesn’t know. You’re retiring early? Why? Is everything OK?”

  In a panic, I grab Nat’s hand tightly.

  Nick’s normal laid-back nonchalance has disappeared and his cheeks are flushed: every line in his body is tense, ready to pounce.

  “I’m fine, Nicholas,” Yuka replies, lifting her eyebrows. “You’re being melodramatic. Don’t make a scene.”

  Nick’s eyes go very wide. “I’m making a scene? Me?” He looks around him at the lights and gold confetti and hundreds of people.

  I mean, he does have a point.

  “This is neither the time nor place,” Yuka says firmly. “Please keep your voice down and we will talk about the situation later.”

  People are starting to stare in their direction.

  My hand squeezes Nat’s again and – catching up via Best Friend Telepathy – she squeezes silently back.

  “Yuka,” Nick says, in a much lower voice. “If something’s wrong … If you’re not … We’re your family. We should know. Is …” He pauses. “Is this why you asked me to be here this evening?”

  Oh God. Oh God oh God oh God –

  “Excuse me?”

  “The apology message you sent through Harriet. Is that what this was about? Do you need to tell me something? Should I call Mum?”

  There’s a short silence, then Yuka’s eyes flicker determinedly round the garden: clearly looking for me.

  Quickly, Nat and I pull our heads back behind the tree.

  Bat poop.

  “Harriet?” Yuka says with infinite slowness. “Manners?”

  For a second I assume she’s spotted me, and then I realise she’s just clarifying the depths of this round of my eternal fabrications.

  “Yes,” Nick frowns. “She came all the way to Byron Bay to tell me she’d seen you and that you’d apologised for our fight and asked me to come tonight and it was important … and …”

  He draws to a confused halt and I know it’s all over.

  In one second, Nick’s going to know I lied. I’ll be the crazy stalker again, and any remaining connection between us is going to burst straight into flames.

  Oh God oh God oh God oh –

  “Ah,” Yuka says, finally. “I asked the girl not to say anything, although I should have realised that was an inherently impossible request. But yes.” She pauses. “I apologise, Nicholas. I should have put your happiness above your contractual obligation to me. Sorry.”

  I blink three times. What?

  Obviously, I haven’t seen Yuka in months. We never bumped into each other or spoke; she didn’t pass a message on, or apologise. In fact, this is the first time I’ve ever heard her apologise to anyone.

  So why did she just lie for me?

  Either this is some kind of weird loyalty, or we actually did have a conversation that I’ve completely blacked out of my brain: right now I’m so bewildered that either seems perfectly possible.

  Nick looks almost as confused now as I do.

  Frowning, he stares hard at his aunt – clearly trying to piece it all together – then his face abruptly relaxes with relief.

  “I’m sorry too,” he says with a wide grin.

  And before I can register what’s happening, Nick bends down, wraps his strong arms round tiny, pale, fragile Yuka and picks her up in a hug so enthusiastic her feet physically leave the floor.

  She winces, and I shoot up in a bolt of horror.

  Humans have 0.9 thoughts a second, and I can tell you exactly what my not-quite-complete one is right now.

  And not even Nat’s hand on my arm is going to stop it.

  “Stop!” I yell, jumping out from behind the tree and running towards them both as fast as I can. “Put her down! You’re going to hurt her! Nick, she’s sick!”

  K: I could have done that days ago.

  If my Big Plan was to break this sensitive, devastating news to Nick by yelling it at him across a packed garden, I could have saved myself a whole lot of meddling, surfing, awkward conversations and uncomfortable bus journeys.

  Except … obviously, it wasn’t.

  Blinking, Nick swiftly puts Yuka down and turns to me. “What?”

  I stop on the lawn, breathless.

  It’s hitting me now what I’ve just done.

  “She’s … umm.” I swallow as they watch me with wide eyes. “Yuka’s not very … I overheard this conversation … It’s quite a …”

  Nope: it turns out that yelling is the only way I can actually divulge delicate information.

  Instead, I turn to Yuka with wide eyes.

  “Please,” I beg as Nat appears from behind the tree and stands quietly behind me. “Please just tell him. I know I shouldn’t have done that, and it wasn’t my place, but he needs to know, and … you need someone to be there and look after you.”

  Nick looks at his aunt, stricken. “What’s going on? Yuka?”

  But Yuka’s still staring directly at me with a look on her face I’ve never seen before: as if the marble has somehow softened.

  Which should be technically impossible as the melting point of calcium carbonate is 825 °C, but maybe the required heat is coming from my face.

  “I’m not sick, Harriet,” she says quietly.

  “You are,” I insist, cheeks burning hot enough to melt zirconium (1,852 degrees). “I overheard Bunty saying that she needed to see you …” I swallow. “You know, before you …”

  “I’m not sick, Harriet,” Yuka says again firmly.

  What?

  I’m now blinking rapidly, trying to work out what is going on.

  Because once more I must have overheard wrong, again, constructed an entire narrative in my head that wasn’t true, again, and jumped to my own ridiculous conclusions.

  That were totally wrong, again.

  “Harriet,” Nick says as I stare at them in bewilderment. “Is that why you chased me round Byron Bay like a crazy person? Because you thought my aunt was ill?”

  I nod, flushing even harder.

  Tungsten has the highest melting point of any element at 3,422 °C, and is used in bulb filaments, rocket nozzles and reactor linings. From the heat radiating in my cheeks now I’d still be able to destroy it from a hundred metres away.

  “I-I just wanted to be there if you were sad.”

  Nick opens his mouth and shuts it again.

  There’s a long silence: the kind of silence you could disappear into, if it were possible to make a black hole out of silences.

  Then Nat quietly slips her hand in mine.

  Because Yuka’s still staring at me, and her face is still melting, and her eyes are soft, and her mouth is gentle, and all the heat in my body is beginning to disperse. Slowly dropping from my cheeks, then my stomach; my arms, shoulders, legs and feet; my toes and my fingers.

  Back down to thirty-seven degrees – the temperature of a living human body – then plummeting further. To caesium: twenty-nine degrees at freezing point.

  To krypton (–157) and argon (–189).

  To oxygen (–218) and fluorine (–220) and neon (–249). Until I’m so cold it’s –272 degrees and I’d freeze solid if I was made of helium.

  “I’m not sick,” Yuka says gently for the third time, and I finally hear it.

  I’m not sick.

  I’m not sick.

  I’m not sick.

  “No,” I say, taking a step back. “No.”

  “I’m so sorry, Harriet,” Yuka says gently. “She wasn’t ready to tell you.”

  “No,” I say again as Nat reaches for me: pulling away and stumbling blindly through the garden.

  But it doesn’t matter how hard I look: there’s no pink hair, no sparkles, no flowers, no floating rainbow clothes, no warm smile, no little chats about daisies.

  Ju
st flashing blue and red lights: rounding the corner.

  Because it looks like I finally got something right after all.

  It just wasn’t Yuka I was right about.

  It was Bunty.

  eople are like glass.

  Some you can see straight through; others shine bright lights and iridescent colours everywhere they go. Some you look at and see parts of yourself reflected, and you look into some and see nothing but darkness.

  Some people magnify so that everything around them seems bigger and more beautiful, while others can make even the largest things seem infinitely smaller.

  People can be cracked or chipped, fragile or scratched, and still stay in one piece: even more precious and loved for all of their broken parts.

  But sometimes … people shatter.

  Bunty is released from Sydney Hospital two days later.

  We fly straight home.

  “I’m sorry, darling,” she says blurrily as the air-staff wheel her on to the plane and Nat and I carefully tuck her under three blankets. “I ruined the end of your beautiful evening.” She flickers a smile. “Yuka must be furious.”

  “Yuka’s not furious,” I say quietly, kissing my grandmother’s soft cheek. “She didn’t mind at all.”

  Which is a total lie.

  Judging by the way she sat abruptly on a bench and turned so she couldn’t see the ambulance, Yuka Ito minded very much indeed.

  Just not about the party.

  “Naughty cells,” Bunty says sleepily as the drugs start to kick in again and she rests her head gently on my shoulder. “Such terrible timing, darling. I did try to tell them that I am on holiday but they would not listen.”

  There’s a scientific name for “naughty cells”.

  They’re damaged oncogenes that are encouraging cells to replicate and multiply at an uncontrollable rate: a condition currently affecting one in two people in their lifetime.

  Otherwise known as cancer.

  I’ve had plenty of time to think things over during the last forty-eight hours, sitting in the hospital waiting room with Nat still holding my hand.

  Bunty’s sudden reappearance in my life – moving into our house a fortnight ago; Annabel’s stress and exhaustion and forgetfulness, her weepiness and inability to turn off a simple kitchen tap or remember a basic date. The random urgent “spa” trips and “candle shopping” escapades that never made anybody look or feel any better.