Louis Beside Himself (15 page)

‘Yeah, well, that was just plain embarrassing. I was ten by then, for god's sake. Whose father says
sleepy tighty
? What if someone had heard?'

Dad came back, his shoulders slumped.

‘Who was that?' I said.

‘The End. Wants an early morning appointment for tomorrow.'

‘Hey, did you talk to the lady who works at Meals on Wheels?' Rosie tapped Dad on the wrist to get his attention. ‘You know that client of yours? Is she still supervising the kitchens?'

‘Oh yes,' said Dad, his face lighting up. ‘Maisie. She said the Meals on Wheels people could drop in on Agnes during the day and bring lunch to her – at least then we'd know she was eating, and not out getting lost. And Maisie said Agnes can come and help in the kitchens sometimes. Even if it's just washing up.' Dad turned to me. ‘You know, Agnes just loves to wash up. She can't always remember how to cook, but her washing up is perfect. Of course there are dishwashing machines, but Maisie said it doesn't matter – whatever Agnes washes can always be stacked in there later. So this is a good outcome for the moment, I think – there'll be an eye on her at home and she'll be keeping busy too.' Dad leaned back in his chair. ‘You know, Agnes is a lovely woman. Even when she's muddled, she's cheerful. At the slightest kind word, she just blossoms. Like a little kid. You can tell she has a good heart. That's what Doreen says. It breaks
her
heart to see what's happening . . .'

Rosie nodded. ‘Miles too. He loves his grandma. She helped bring him up, really. I guess that's why he's in such a bad mood lately, what with his grandma really losing it, and his mother so worried. He won't talk. Nothing cheers him up. Not even me. '

Rosie was looking down at her plate. I think I saw a tear splash into her spag bol.

‘Talking of dishes,' I said, ‘I'll do them tonight if you want, hey Rosie?'

Rosie gave me a grudging smile. ‘Okay, thanks. Washing up's not
my
favourite thing, that's for sure.'

The phone went again. ‘I'll get it!' Dad said, running into the bedroom.

‘If that's Doreen, ask her if Miles is home,' called Rosie. ‘And remember to tell her what Maisie said.'

But I don't think Dad needed to be reminded about the last part. We heard him cry ‘Doreen!' as if she was an ambulance arriving at his heart attack, and straight away he started in on the last hundred-year history of Meals on Wheels.

I put a hand on Rosie's shoulder as I picked up her plate. ‘Sorry.'

Rosie shrugged and disappeared into her room. At the sink, I let the warm water run through my fingers. For a moment I could see Agnes's point of view, I really could. It might be hard to choose the right ingredients for a meal, but washing away whatever had been cooked up was easy, and satisfying.

Washing up was something you could do to perfection, without a word.

13
BESIDE OURSELVES

On the way home from school on Wednesday, Singo and I didn't say much because it was too hot and humid. Plus we were trying not to listen to the
T
UMULTUOUS
river of talk sweeping Hassan and Elena along in front of us. Their voices got softer and softer as their heads bent together closer and closer.

The heat hung grey and heavy on our shoulders. You wanted to take it off like a jumper. The air tasted of bushfire, stale and gritty. I was carrying the chilled bottle of mineral water we'd bought from the Welcome Mart. I pressed it to my cheek, sliding it up and down my neck, spreading the coolness.

‘Stop
doing
that,' said Singo, his face wrinkling in disgust.

‘Why?' I moved the bottle to the other cheek.

He grabbed it from me. ‘I don't want to drink from a bottle that's covered with your neck-sweat germs, that's why.'

‘Well,
before
,' I said in a reasonable tone, ‘it was covered with my hand-sweat germs. So what's the difference?'

He shrugged. Singo wasn't big on logic. He just felt things very deeply, and had to express them straight away. This was a good quality, because once he'd finished expressing the things, no matter how illogical they seemed, he tended to move forward, just as a prime minister once recommended.

‘After we've seen Cordelia and stuff, I have to go,' he said now. ‘There's basketball practice again this arvo.' He cuffed me on the arm, dodging back and forth, behind and in front, as if I were a challenging member of the opposite team. I nearly fell over his foot.

‘
You
stop doing that,' I said wearily as we reached my place. ‘It's too damn hot. Check this out.' And I opened the gate.

‘Hey, nice work. Cordelia?'

I nodded. ‘I let Dad think it was me.' I made a face. ‘What else could I do?'

Hassan and Elena trooped in. They were still caught up in their river of talk, spluttering and waving their arms about. They didn't notice the gate.

We found Cordelia at the flowerbed, watering the new begonias.

‘Hey,' said Elena. ‘That looks beautiful!'

‘Whah that's right sweet of you, honey,' drawled Cordelia in a rich Southern accent. ‘Now whah don't y'all come and set yourselves down here a spell, while ah fetch us a pitcher of lemonade.' Cordelia pushed back the gardening hat she'd found in the garage and put her hand on her hip.

‘Make mah day! Make mah day!' shouted Singo, pointing a gun at the begonias. But nobody could do it like Cordelia. I noticed she was eyeing the cold bottle in Singo's hand.

I organised glasses of water for everyone, and we sat around the outside table. Singo whispered, ‘neck sweat', so I drank his glass for him. Elena produced a package of aluminium foil from her school bag. Inside were little quiches and separately wrapped pastries.

‘Sorry they're a bit squashed,' she said.

‘Poor things,' I whispered.

‘They'll taste just as good,' said Hassan, gobbling a quiche whole.

‘Mm,' murmured Cordelia, her mouth full. ‘Amazing – is that apple inside?'

Elena nodded. ‘I helped Mum make them last night. You simmer the apples first, with a cinnamon stick and cloves.' Cordelia smacked her lips. ‘Delicious. You sure are lucky, honey chile, havin' a mamma who cooks up a storm, yessirree!' Elena rummaged in her bag again, then held out a book to Cordelia. It was a thick paperback with a picture of a red-haired girl with plaits leaning on a picket fence. It looked like something your grandmother might have read when she was a girl.

Cordelia's eyes widened for a moment. Then she quickly looked away, as if she'd seen something slightly disgusting on the cover, like neck sweat or earwax.

Elena flushed. ‘
Anne of Green Gables
,' she said in a high voice. ‘It was my favourite last year – the only place I've ever seen the name Cordelia. Have you read it?' She dropped the book on the table. ‘Stupid of me, it's too young for you, isn't it? It's just that, well, I loved it and I thought . . . It's about this orphan, Anne, who longed to have real parents and a home of her own. She pretended her name was Cordelia instead of plain old Anne. She pretended lots of things . . .' Elena finished in a choke of embarrassment and did her laugh-snort.

There was silence around the table. Hassan shifted his feet, Singo scratched his head. Elena fidgeted with her bracelet. Then, like a brave little boat, she headed out again into the ocean of quiet. ‘See, Anne thought Cordelia was such a romantic name, and she used it when she made up happy stories for herself . . . I guess she lived in her imagination. And then, in real life everything did turn out pretty much as she'd hoped, and that felt so good . . .'

‘In the real life of the
book
, you mean,' said Cordelia. It was almost a sneer. Her eyes were dull and narrowed. I hadn't seen her look quite like that before. As if she was very old inside, and mean. She shrugged. ‘But yeah, I read it years ago, didn't finish it. Thanks anyway.' Cordelia took a last gulp of her drink and walked back across the garden, towards the gate. She left the book lying on the table.

SINGO
left for practice soon after that. Elena helped me clear up, rewrapping the leftovers in foil and putting them in the fridge. ‘Cordelia could have that for supper, maybe . . .' Her voice tapered off uncertainly.

Hassan touched her arm, just lightly. ‘She'll like that,' he said, and her frown cleared. ‘We'll talk tomorrow,' he said to me, nodding towards the tent.

After they'd gone, I sat down at the table and picked at the bird poo with a stick. It came off easily, dried to brittle white clumps. I flicked it at the lawn.

How good would it be if you could flick off a mood as easily as that? Sitting there, I felt my mind was wrapped in fog. I tried to pick my way through the afternoon. Obviously Cordelia was bored by Elena's offering. Cordelia preferred real-life stories, she'd told me so, and maybe the book
was
too young for her. But knowing Cordelia for these past few days, I'd have expected her to be polite about it. After all, Elena was only trying to be friendly.

Remembering Cordelia's face as she walked off, I felt myself close against her. In my mind Cordelia detached herself, like cutting a string from a balloon. She floated far away, leaving plenty of air between us. For a moment that made me feel less guilty about her, and it was a relief.

But as I walked back inside, the unease came flooding back. Something else was going on, I knew it. Cordelia didn't really belong to another species. She was just complicated. That's what Mr Mainprize said about Bobby when he was sprung for giving his friends small shocks with an electric device hidden in the palm of his hand.

Weren't we all complicated? Look at Rosie last night, slumped over her spag bol, Dad transforming, Agnes bewildered, me turning into a lie-addict. And where were the words to get to the bottom of it all? There was only fog now where there used to be clear roads of thought, roads with words like little cars zipping along, equipped with efficient GPS systems inside making sure you'd arrive at interesting destinations with a good clear view.

FOR
English homework that night I had to edit my speech on prejudice and include a few other books besides
Gus
Attack
, like
To Kill a Mockingbird
, which is a very cool book. Have you heard of it? It's about an amazing father, Atticus Finch, who is also a lawyer, who defends an innocent black man in the American South of the 1960s.There was terrible prejudice against Negroes, back then. It took Mr Finch a lot of courage to do that, and also
I
NTEGRITY
, which means
standing up for what you believe in
. That's what I was planning to say in my speech, plus how Atticus thought words were incredibly important and you should use them with care and flair, which he always did when having dinner with his children and teaching them never to judge someone by their colour or personal appearance.

Harper Lee was the author.
To Kill a Mockingbird
was a bestseller in her lifetime. But she never wrote another book. Isn't that crazy? To have so many words, so many magnificent words, and then suddenly dry up. Why would that happen? Maybe a burglar invaded her kitchen one night just as she was finishing the book, and she froze and wasn't able to help the burglar, who ended up camping in a tent in her back yard. Maybe that stopped her writing. I wish she was still around so I could ask her.

Thinking about Harper Lee took up quite a bit of time and helped me to forget my other troubles. I actually reread the last few chapters of her book and felt excited and afraid and furious and sad and wise all over again.

I must have fallen asleep reading, because when I woke up at 1:11am my neck ached where it had been scrunched up against the wall, and I was still in my school shorts. I rubbed my eyes – they were dry and sore.

I crept out of bed to get a glass of water. Rosie's bedroom door was closed, with no crack of light underneath, and snores rumbled from Dad's room. I tiptoed to the kitchen sink. Moonlight drifted in through the window, making lakes of silver on the floor. Out on the lawn, the tent pitched a dark shadow against the night, but deep inside was a faint lemony glow. Torchlight.