Haunting of Lily Frost (8 page)

8

an outsider

There's no roomy cafeteria at this school. No smelly canteen. Not even a vending machine. Clearly they all bring their lunches and eat outside under the pine trees. I don't trust pine trees. They're far too secretive for my liking. They hide things and people and although I like secrets, I like it when
I
have them and keep them – not other people.

No one else seems aware of this as they sit at their little wooden tables and laugh. I'm not sure where to sit. There's no sign for newbies, so I'm loitering with my plastic lunchbox that makes me feel about nine. My brother's vanished, meaning he's already found some friends – so I can't even use him as someone to talk to.

At my old school, Ruby and I always ate – or more often didn't eat – our lunches at the park. Sometimes there was a group, but mostly it was just the two of us. I knew it was going to be hard to leave Ruby, but I didn't realise that without her, I'd feel like I had no centre. Like the whole inside part of me had gone. I hope Ruby feels that too.

‘Hey, Lily, over here.' It's Danny. Maybe Mrs Jarvis asked him to be nice to me. My teacher once assigned me to look after the new girl at school and it lasted about an hour before she decided she'd be better off trying to find some cooler friends. I'm happy with whatever dregs I find, though, because it beats eating alone.

Breathe, Lil, I can hear Ruby whispering. I do try, but sometimes when I'm nervous or spinning with anticipation, I forget and then nearly choke trying to get enough air. He's sitting with some other kids from the class, and of course Julia's right there by his side. He slides along the bench seat to give me some room, and I tuck myself in between them.

‘We were just talking about you.'

‘Great.'

I hate it when people say that, but don't actually bother to tell you what they were saying, leaving you to guess instead, which of course is always dangerous. He does smile, though, like he knows I'm imagining the worst and he thinks it's funny. I could watch his face all day.

‘This is Evie and Lex and Harry.'

‘Hi,' I manage to say.

They sort of smile at me like they know they should, but they don't actually say anything. Then Danny points to Julia. ‘And this is Julia,' he says, introducing her, even though she already did that in class.

‘So what do you think of our school?' she asks instead of saying hello.

I'd love to tell her the truth, but that's best left for a later date. ‘It's great.'

Danny's leg bumps against mine. I almost drop my sandwich and a bit of the sliced apple sticks in my throat. It's not that I'm unused to boys brushing against my leg under the table; it's just that when it happens it's always a bit of a surprise. And to be honest, it's usually Max or my dad, and they move their leg away pretty quickly. Trying to stay in control, I rearrange my legs so they're out of reach and concentrate on Julia, who's eating her salad sandwich without dropping a shred of lettuce.

‘Gideon seems interesting.'

This gets a laugh from Danny, but it wasn't supposed to be funny. I was being polite.

‘Interesting? That's for sure. It's also a bit of a hole. But I guess holes can be interesting.'

‘It's not a hole, Dan.'

‘Yeah, Jules, it is.'

‘You should watch out for Dan, Lil. He loves anything that's not from here. He's desperate to escape.'

Usually I'm really good at avoiding girls like Julia. I can read the threat on their faces and make sure I'm never in their way. But this isn't a school with room to hide.

‘And Julia loves small, because it means less competition.'

‘Piss off, Dan.' She doesn't look like a swearer and I'm a bit surprised to hear it roll out so easily.

‘Are you guys – together?'

Danny snorts, Julia glares at me and there are laughs around the table, but no one answers my question. When Julia turns to me, I know something's coming. Something she knows that I don't, and that she's going to tell me slowly and publicly because it's her idea of fun. If Danny wasn't sitting so close that I could feel his shoulder when I turned, I'd run now. But he's strangely comforting.

Before anyone can make me feel even more uncomfortable, I grab the hoodie out of my bag and try to get my arms into the sleeves without bashing against Danny. I need another layer of protection. As I try to zip it up, the zip sticks. And then for the first time I see a little badge pinned onto it. It's like a Japanese manga girl with big eyes and cool coloured hair. As I notice it, Danny notices it too, and before I can even look at it closely, he leaps up off the seat, knocking what's left of my lunch onto the ground.

‘Where did you get that?'

‘What?'

And then I see all their faces. They're staring at me, at the badge, the hoodie, in such a weird way.

‘What's wrong?'

Julia's staring at me so coldly. ‘That is not funny.'

‘What are you talking about, Julia?'

I don't understand what's happening, but suddenly everyone clears the table, leaving me, my cheese, apple and sultana sandwiches, and a whole school of faces looking over to see why Julia and her friends have just bailed on the new girl.

Fighting back tears that will totally ruin me if they come out now, I stuff all the bits of sandwich back into my box and, before I know what I'm doing, I leave. I can't be here, at this school, with these people. I hear the bell go behind me and a few scattered laughs and voices as kids start returning to class. I stop at the gate and close my eyes to try to decide what to do. If I step outside and leave, my parents will be called in to school and Julia will feel like she's won. I'll be more on the outside than I already am.

And I realise I don't care.

I step out onto the path and as my foot hits the concrete, the rain starts again. The rain's coming straight down like those heavy monsoonal downpours that drench you in seconds. I jump back, like it's burning me, safely inside the gate and into the schoolyard, and as I do, the rain stops. Just like that. Like it was only there to stop me leaving. I hurry back down the path to the classroom, freaked because there's no rain now, and my leg isn't really wet. Maybe I imagined it after all.

Even though my seat in the class hasn't moved, I feel further away from the rest of them than I did this morning. Looks are shot in my direction whenever Mrs Jarvis is busy.

I play back what happened at lunchtime. It was all okay until I pulled this hoodie out and tried to zip it up. I just assumed it was Ruby's hoodie and that she'd left it when we came to see the house that first time. But I've never seen the badge before and if that was Ruby's, I would have remembered. I'll have to check to see if it's hers.

As I'm pulling everything out of my locker at the end of the day so I can escape this school as quickly as possible, Danny sticks his head in. ‘Where'd you get that badge?'

‘It was on the hoodie.'

‘Where did you get the hoodie?'

‘I found it in my room.'

‘Come with me.' He grabs my arm and starts pulling me down the corridor. I think he's trying to get me out of there before any of his friends appear. But he's holding me really hard.

‘You're hurting me.'

‘Sorry. But can you hurry?'

‘Why?'

‘I need to talk to you.'

Deciding to follow him is a no-brainer because where else am I going to go? But before we get very far, Julia and her friends block the door.

‘Danny? You coming?'

‘Um – I'll meet you there.'

Julia stares at me. I try to stare back, like she's a dog that I'm terrified of, but she's much better at it than I am. She leans across and whispers something to Danny. His face changes and he steps away from me. Whatever he was going to tell me is obviously not going to happen now.

Before Julia can stare me down anymore, Max bounds up with, of all things, a basketball. It's so totally ludicrous, that despite being terrified of Julia, I start laughing as he tries to dribble it down the corridor. I think Danny laughs as well, but Max doesn't notice and bounces the ball to me in some sort of gesture of solidarity. Normally I'd either ignore him or pick on him in public, but beggars can't be choosers, and he represents the perfect escape tool. Together we bounce the ball up to Julia and her friends until they have to move aside and let us past.

Outside, away from them, Max takes the ball back. ‘You really know how to make friends, Lil.'

‘I know.'

‘What did you do to them?'

‘No idea.'

‘Maybe you should try showering next time. It might be the smell.'

As lonely as I feel, hanging out with my ten-year-old brother is no substitute. So I try Julia's death stare. Max just shrugs.

To avoid conversations with my family and the inevitable interrogation about how school was, I've been hiding out in the attic, pretending to do homework. Actually I'm standing on my bed, watching out the window and waiting for Ruby to text me. She never takes this long to respond. I bet she's already found a new best friend, and now she's texting them instead, or she's at their house, or they're down the street together. As I look out over the streets of Gideon, I see him, framed in the circle of my little window, sitting on his bike, staring up at me.

Without thinking, I duck out of sight, horrified that he might think I'm watching him. Then it hits me. He's come to see me. He's come to tell me what he couldn't tell me at school. I bolt downstairs.

There's a good chance that Max will intrude if I try to talk to Danny right out the front of my house or, worse, that Mum'll go all maternal and invite him in. So I walk past him, hoping he's smart enough to realise I want him to follow me.

I walk to the end of Simpson Street and turn left, away from the direction of school and the centre of town. I can hear Danny's bike wheels turning as he coasts along behind.

As I reach the kids' playground, I push open the little gate, pleased there's no one else here. The park is tiny, fit for only one or two children. Nothing like the large adventure playgrounds near my old house. I duck under the wooden slide, hoping at least I'm out of sight of anybody walking past. Danny drops his bike on the tanbark and walks over. ‘Lil –'

‘Yeah?'

He smiles at me and I see how green his eyes are.

‘Sorry about today.'

Stealing a gesture from Ruby, I shrug at him.

‘It's just –'

‘What?'

‘That badge.'

I look down at the badge that's still on my hoodie, and I unpin it. ‘It's all yours.'

Placing it on the little ledge, I remember when I used to play shops with my dad, pretending the bark was money and the leaves were cakes and coffee.

Danny just stares at the badge. ‘Where did you get it?'

‘I told you. It was on the hoodie that was in my room. That I put on this morning because I was cold.'

‘It's just that it belonged to someone.'

‘Who?'

‘A girl. She lived in your house.'

‘Matilda?'

He frowns, then he looks up, something like anger flitting across his face. ‘You know?' he says.

‘Know what?'

‘About Matilda.'

‘What about Matilda?'

He relaxes and I realise I'm not asking the right questions. There's something he's not telling me and I'm playing it all wrong. I try to change direction, pretend that I know what he's talking about. ‘Yeah, I know all about her.'

‘Well if you did, you'd know she hated that name.' Then he smiles again and reaches out to pick up the badge. He holds it in his hand, flipping it over and over in his fingers, like a coin in a magic trick. Then he stops and it's gone. His hand's empty and he must have pocketed it without me seeing.

‘See you tomorrow, Lil.'

‘Wait –'

But he ducks out from under the slide and starts walking away.

‘Danny!' I call out.

But he waves over his shoulder. ‘Gotta go.'

After Danny's gone, I sit on the swing in the park for ages. I want to swing really high, like I used to with Ruby in the park near our houses. But somehow it doesn't seem like that would be much fun in Gideon. This swing's too narrow for my hips and it hurts to even sit on it. And there really isn't much to look at.

As I leave the park, a little girl is pushing her doll in a pram. She gets stuck in the tanbark and yells for her mum, who's pushing a baby up the road in a real pram. I reach out to help her, but she looks at me with enormous, unblinking eyes, like I'm going to hurt her or something. So I just keep walking.

As I pass the mother, she nods at me, like she knows she should be friendly because I'm only a kid, but she won't go so far as to say hello.

I wonder when the residents of Gideon wheel out the welcoming committee. As I walk past the milk bar, I decide that I need something sweet. If there's one thing the milk bar at Gideon does well, it's the range of teeth, milk bottles, black cats and bananas. The lady smiles at me as she hands over the little white paper bag, and takes my two dollars. ‘How are you liking Gideon?'

‘It's fine.'

‘It gets better.'

‘Really?'

‘Yeah. I've been here ten years. Almost a local.'

‘Do you like it?'

‘Yeah. I do.'

‘Why?' I don't mean to be rude, I'm actually keen to know if there's something I'm missing and, luckily, she laughs. One of those big, open-mouthed, toothy laughs that make you want to join in.

‘It'll get better.'

‘Okay. Thanks.'

‘See you, honey.'

The bell on the front door rings as I go out. It's one of those country milk bars that stock everything you'll ever need. And out the front they've got a whole window of notices advertising all sorts of things. As I eat my lollies, I stop and read the handwritten sign about guinea pigs for sale. There's a notice advertising cow poo, another one for babysitting, one about netball practice being cancelled due to a shortage of players, and there's one trying to sell an old car.