Self-Portraits - 3. The Longest Weekend

Friday’s a little better, because I arrive at school knowing I’ll be alone all day. I am prepared to ready to take on my new role as the Ghost of Crampton Collegiate. I hear whispers about what parties everyone’s going to this weekend. Girls giggle about boys, boys grunt about girls. I don’t see Nicholas anywhere and, of course, nobody else invites me to anything. Nobody else even speaks to me, including Darren Park. Maybe he doesn’t feel like calling me a mean name today.

On the bright side, I had a lot more sleep last night, so I can actually concentrate in class. Concentrating still doesn’t save me in English, because I still haven’t started reading David Copperfield but Mrs Bristol doesn’t pick me for any questions today.

When the lunch bell rings, I shove my sandwich into my mouth, while people are still filing out of the classroom, then I head to the library.

The library is about five degrees colder than anywhere else on the school grounds, but at least it’s one place that doesn’t smell like lunchboxes or feet. The only person I recognise is Harriet Hayes, but she has her nose in a book and doesn’t see me.

I dump my backpack on a table in the foreign language section and, without anything better to do, I start my homework. I open David Copperfield. On the first page, someone’s scrawled:

DAVID C

SUCKS

DICK

I doubt that’s included in the plot. I use my pen to change it:

DAVID GETS

SOCKS

(DUCK-PATTERN ONES)

Although I’m not sure that’s part of the plot either.

Mrs Bristol promised us it would be an amusing read, but that first line really depresses me: Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. It makes me think about my own life right now – and I am definitely not the hero. I’m not even the main character. That “station” has always been held by Nicholas. He’s been the centre of my world.

But after that sentence, it gets better. I’m meant to stop reading after Chapter 2 but I’m halfway through Chapter 3 when the afternoon bell rings. For the first time, I’ve done more homework than I need to. Soon, Harriet Hayes will have some serious competition.

At the end of the day, Vicky is waiting for me at the gates again. I’m scared that today she’ll want to go to the hospital to confront Dad, but she’s only waiting to tell me that she’ll be staying at her friend Katie’s house tonight.

When I get home, Mum’s not there either. The house is dark and silent. I pull my phone out of my backpack to check for a text message from her – she usually sends me one if she’s not going to be home – but there’s nothing.

Of course there isn’t, I realise. It’s Friday. She’s not expecting me to be home. Nicholas and I always go out together after school on Fridays. We go to Moxies Café or the movies or we just hang around the shops being idiots.

I can’t remember the last Friday night we spent apart.

Without thinking, I start tapping out a text message to Nicholas.

Hey, what are you doing tonight?

Luckily, I stop myself before I hit send. I delete the message and shove my phone back in my bag.

In the kitchen, I open a packet of potato chips and pour myself a glass of lime cordial. The fridge stops humming and everything’s suddenly so quiet. The owl clock ticks. The chips crunch between my teeth. I start wandering from room to room. I’ve become the ghost of my house, as well as my school.

I decide to read one more chapter of David Copperfield. It is amusing – Mrs Bristol was right – but it’s not amusing to imagine what I look like right now. A sixteen-year-old boy spending a Friday night on the sofa, reading Dickens. I slam the book shut and decide to run a hot bath. I pour in some lavender bath oil, light a scented candle, and turn on Vicky’s portable speaker. I wallow in the bath listening to pan flute music.

This doesn’t look much cooler, but at least now I’m relaxed.

*

Mum comes home at eight o’clock carrying shopping bags from her favourite boutique. I’m sitting at the kitchen table eating eggs on toast in my dressing gown and slippers.

“Where have you been?” I ask.

Mum jumps out of her skin. “You gave me a heart attack!”

It’s official – I am a ghost. I calmly chew my eggs on toast while Mum gets her breath back.

“Cheryl and I went late night shopping,” she says, her hand still on her chest. “I didn’t know anyone was home, I thought you’d be out with Nicholas. Why haven’t you turned on more lights? Or turned on the heat? It’s freezing in here!”

“I’m still warm from my bath.”

Mum turns on the lights and the central heating, then shows me her new purchases. Most of them look like her nice normal clothes, but I can tell her friend Cheryl has talked her into buying a few things that are not her style at all. There’s a low-cut top – and a dress with a slit up the side.

While Mum goes to her bedroom to hang up her new clothes, I boil the kettle and make us cups of tea. We spend the rest the evening in front of the TV. Bridesmaids is on Netflix. The movie usually puts me in a good mood, but I’ve never watched it without Nicholas before. Mum cracks up at the food poisoning scene, but for the first time I find it depressing, because the last time I watched it, Nicholas was sitting beside me. I keep thinking of his cute grin and his machine-gun laugh.

Mum has a nice laugh, but it’s not the same. She’s Mum. She’s not Nicholas. Nobody is.

*

On Saturday morning, I’m lying in bed, dreading the long two days ahead of me. I think about last Saturday and my chest twists. I woke to Nicholas laughing at the enormous patch of drool I’d made on my pillow. We could hear Mum cooking breakfast, so we went downstairs. Vicky was there, scoffing chocolate biscuits from the pantry.

Last Saturday, Dad had already gone into work when I came downstairs. He’s been working a lot of Saturdays lately. Except, of course, now I know that he probably hadn’t been working at all. He was probably at 14 Chrysanthea Place, rubbing his girlfriend’s belly and talking to the baby. How long has Dad been living a double-life? Is he in love with that woman? It’s so weird to think of him being in love with someone. Even with Mum, he always seemed more like a business associate. Now that I think about it, most of their conversations were about things like organising a plumber or who could pick Vicky up from Katie’s.

But even with Dad at “work” last Saturday morning, the house still felt nice and full.

This morning, there’s no Nicholas, no Vicky, and even less Dad than there was before.

Downstairs, I can hear the bacon sizzling on the pan and I can smell coffee. This gets me out of bed but when I walk into the kitchen, I feel like I’ve gone crazy.

Because it’s not Mum at the stove. It’s Dad.

“Hi, mate,” he says.

I’ve never seen him cook a thing in his life, except when he uses the outdoor barbeque. He’s also never called me mate before.

I’m not sure what to say. “Where’s Mum?”

“She’s gone to pick up some milk, and your sister,” he says, in that order. Then he adds, “Bacon and eggs.”

“Is that a statement or a question?” I ask.

“We’re having bacon and eggs,” he says.

“Oh, okay.”

“Is Nicholas up?”

It’s a fair question, because I can’t remember the last time Nicholas didn’t stay over on a Friday night. Mum and Dad thought we’ve been top-and-tailing, but, for the past four Fridays, we’ve lain together, side by side, our limbs all criss-crossed, until it got too warm.

“He’s not here,” I manage to say.

“Well, there’ll be plenty!” Dad’s never sounded so upbeat before. “How was school this week?”

It was the worst week of my life, I think, but “It was okay,” I say out loud.

I pour a coffee and sit at the kitchen table, conversing in bits and pieces with Dad until Mum comes home with Vicky.

“You’re AMBUSHING me!” we hear Vicky screaming, followed by the car door slamming shut. “I DON’T want to talk to him! I don’t even want to talk to YOU!”

Vicky stomps up the stairs, to my bedroom, and slams the door. She slams my door more often than her own. Dad looks justifiably scared.

Mum comes into the kitchen with the milk. “She’s in quite bad a mood. She wanted to stay at Katie’s for the whole weekend. I told her she can’t very well move in with them. She said, well, maybe she could, then tried to make Katie’s poor mum litigate the whole thing for us.” She sighs. “But long story short, she’s agreed to come down for breakfast. She just needs a moment to gather her thoughts.”

Gather her thoughts really means punch Richard’s pillow.

Breakfast is served and Vicky comes down to face Dad. She’s changed into my Pepsi t-shirt and Hawaiian shorts. Her hair looks like a rat’s nest and her face is thunderous.

“Morning,” Dad says.

“Hello, father,” she says coldly, “if that is your real name.”

“Er, pardon?” he says.

“With all the lies you two have been telling us, I wouldn’t be surprised if you revealed that I’m adopted. Richard and I are ready for you to send us back to our Scandinavian families, who I’m sure won’t lie to us half as much as you have.”

“You’re not fair-coloured enough to be Scandinavian,” Mum points out.

“What would you know about Scandinavia, woman?” Vicky demands.

“I’ve made bacon and eggs,” Dad offers.

Vicky laughs, without a trace of humour. “Frying your way to forgiveness?”

“Vicky,” Mum says in her warning tone.

Vicky looks at me accusingly. “Nothing to say, Richard? Just sitting there polishing your halo?”

“Let’s just have breakfast,” I say diplomatically.

We sit around the kitchen table eating our bacon and eggs. It’s mostly Mum and Dad talking, their usual planning and house-focussed discussion. None of us are talking about what’s really going on.

Vicky has thirds of bacon and eggs. I pour a second cup of coffee, which makes me jittery.

The closest we come to talking about anything real is after Dad’s stacked the empty plates.

“So,” Mum says, “now that you two have had a few days to think about everything, do you two have any – questions – for us?”

“No,” I say as quickly as I can.

Vicky’s nostrils flare at Dad. “I have one question. How does it feel to be a total home-destroyer?”

“I think the phrase people use is home-wrecker,” I correct.

Dad frowns at the stacked plates.

I quickly say, “Not that I think that!”

“It’s what he is,” Vicky seethes. “A home-wrecker.”

“There’s been no home-wrecking,” Mum says.

My stomach clenches around the bacon and eggs. I assumed Mum must’ve known about the pregnant woman – but is it possible she doesn’t?

“It’ll take a while for us all to adjust,” Mum continues. “I think after a bit of time, you’ll find we’re all in a very comfortable routine.”

Vicky rolls her eyes. “Can I be excused from the table? I’ve got a headache from all this bullshit.”

Mum smiles tiredly. “Of course, darling.”

That woman deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.

*

Mum goes to do some work, so I help Dad do the dishes. After everything’s clean and dry and put away, it gets awkward. Dad hangs the tea towel over the oven door, then takes it off again and refolds it. Then he looks around the kitchen, thoughtfully.

“Ah. Well. Hmm.” He makes a series of noises, then claps his hands. “I might be off.”

Back home to his pregnant girlfriend that he doesn’t think I know about.

“Okay,” I say, awkwardly.

At the front door, he calls out, “Vicky, I’m off!”

“I don’t care!” Vicky shouts back from my bedroom.

Dad looks so miserable that I feel sorry for him, even if he is a home-wrecker. I watch him get into his car, do a ten-point turn, and drive away.

“That was so weird!” Vicky says when I go upstairs. “Worst family meeting in history. Worst family in history.”

Vicky spends the rest of the day in my room, complaining about Dad, bringing crumbly food in my bed, and napping. But I don’t object; I’m pitifully grateful for the company. During her naps, I keep reading David Copperfield. I absolutely despise Mr Murdstone. Dad’s behaviour pales in comparison. Well, actually, no, Dad’s behaviour is still quite bad.

In the afternoon, Mum comes upstairs to ask if I have anything for the washing machine.

“I do my own laundry,” I say.

“Yeah, he doesn’t want you touching his undies,” Vicky says.

“I also thought we’d go out for dinner tonight,” Mum tells us. “Have a bit of a treat?”

Vicky grumbles. “Why would I go anywhere with YOU, woman?”

“Well, I was thinking about Sizzler’s,” Mum says.

Vicky perks up at the thought of buffalo wings, steak and fries, and a toffee cheesecake. I perk up at the thought of actually doing something tonight, even if it is with my mother and sister.

“Should I book for Nicholas?” Mum asks me.

“Um … ” This has been the longest time Mum hasn’t seen him. “No, he’s got a thing with his grandparents this weekend.”

“As if Nicholas wants to hang out with his friend’s Mum on a Saturday night,” Vicky says.

“He’s lovely company!” Mum says. “Well, either of you are welcome to bring a friend. Rosemary and Cheryl are coming.”

Vicky groans. “They’ll both get drunk, won’t they?”

Rosemary and Cheryl are Mum’s best friends. They work at the university too. Rosemary’s loud and tells lots of rude jokes. Cheryl’s stick-thin and always looks like she’s just stepped off a red carpet. They both go through men like toilet paper.

Does that mean Mum’s going to go through men like toilet paper, now that she’s single? She’s only a tiny bit overweight – skinny compared to Rosemary – and she’s not all lipstick and eyeshadow like Cheryl. She looks okay. Well, she looks like a mum.

I push that icky thought out of my head and start thinking about what I’m going to order.

*

Rosemary and Cheryl are waiting for us outside the restaurant. Rosemary pulls Vicky and I into a big, rib-crushing hug that lasts too long.

“Poor chicks,” she says to the top of my head. “Poor, poor chicks.”

“Let us go!” Vicky’s voice is muffled in Rosemary’s enormous chest.

“Yes, yes,” Cheryl says, “loosen your grip, they’re turning purple.”

Rosemary eventually releases us. I gasp for air but then end up choking on the scent of Cheryl’s perfume.

“How are you both doing with everything?” Cheryl asks.

“Good, thanks,” I say, through watering eyes.

“Right now, I’m just hungry,” Vicky says.

“Oh, you poor, poor chicks,” Rosemary says again, going in for a second hug, but Vicky and I manage to duck underneath her arms, and get inside.

Sizzler’s is a wild west-style restaurant. You walk in through saloon-style doors, you sit on hay bales instead of chairs, and the waiters wear cowboy boots. Our waiter is a guy my age with spiky blonde hair and a big smile. His nametag says Hi, I’m STU.

“Hi, Stu,” Cheryl purrs, as he takes us to our table.

“Do you like stew, Stu?” Rosemary asks.

They giggle like it’s the funniest joke they’ve ever made. (They had already been drinking champagne when we picked them up.)

“Actually, I don’t like stew that much,” he grins. “Luckily they don’t have it here.”

Stu leaves us with the menus. As he walks away, Vicky elbows me and whispers, “Check out his ear.”

I look up and see that Stu’s ear is glinting. It’s an earring. You might see men with pierced ears in big cities, but not in our crappy town. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a guy with a piercing outside of TV and movies.

“Let’s get a round of daiquiris!” Rosemary declares.

“Can I have one?” Vicky begs Mum.

“You can have a small taste of mine,” Mum says.

“Let the poor sausages have one each,” Cheryl says, checking her reflection in her phone. “They’ve had a big week and, anyway, they’ll have to start training their livers eventually.”

Mum does not agree. Stu comes back to take our drinks order.

I just ask for a coke. As Stu nods, the diamond stud in his ear twinkles.

Cheryl notices it, too. “What an interesting piece of jewellery,” she says. To my horror, she reaches out with her long fingernails and touches it.

“Very cool,” Rosemary agrees.

“Thanks,” Stu says. “I might have to take it out. I’m starting Crampton Collegiate on Monday and there’s a pretty strict dress code.”

Mum brightens up. “Oh, that’s where these two go!”

“Cool.” Stu grins at me. “I’m glad there’ll be some friendly faces on Monday. I just moved here with my folks – my dad’s taking over a freight company.”

As soon as he’s out of earshot, Cheryl and Rosemary start gushing.

“What a polite young man!”

“That earring – so exotic—”

“But it suits him, don’t you think?”

“Poor thing – ending up here—”

“Oh, it’s not that bad.”

Then Cheryl turns to Vicky. “What do you think? Rather handsome boy, isn’t he?”

Vicky’s attention is fixed on the menu. She’s practically salivating with hunger. She looks up vaguely. “Huh?”

“I think he liked you,” Rosemary tells Vicky. “Imagine that. A handsome boyfriend with a pierced ear.”

“I’m getting chilli chips and buffalo wings as my entrees,” Vicky informs us.

Food has always been more important to her than boys.

*

The rest of the evening is predictable.

Rosemary and Cheryl order daiquiris until they’re drunk enough to get up and dance in the middle of the restaurant.

Vicky eats her weight in meat, chips, and a dessert big enough to feed an entire dinner party.

Mum is her usual chirpy self. It’s as if nothing’s happened at all. But then I realise, for the last year, Mum’s been taking Vicky and me out for dinner a lot without Dad. He’s either been “working”, or “travelling”, or “having a migraine”. Was he with that woman all along? How did I not notice his absences earlier?

Rosemary and Cheryl drag Mum up to dance with them. The three of them try to line dance, but bang into each other. Rosemary trips over a hay bale and tumbles to the ground. Mum laughs and laughs. She must still be in the denial stage of grief. Oh well, at least it’s more fun than anger.

As we’re leaving, Stu calls out, “See you on Monday!”

I go red. Stu seems like a nice guy, but now he knows I spend Saturday nights with my mother and her embarrassing friends. How excited can he possibly be about being friends with me?

“See you on Monday,” I echo, because I can never think of anything original to say.

*

I’m home and in bed before ten, but my sleep is rudely interrupted at two in the morning.

It’s Vicky, shaking me awake.

“What?” I moan.

“Something’s happened between you and Nicholas, hasn’t it?” she says.

I’m still half-asleep. “What are you talking about?”

She turns my bedside light on, blinding me.

“You and Nicholas. I just realised. I was having this crazy dream about trying to pack this parachute in my schoolbag, except then I realised it wasn’t a parachute, it was Nicholas, and he was shouting at me, like, why are you trying to pack me into your schoolbag, and then I woke up and it hit me. Nicholas hasn’t been here all week and you haven’t been hanging out with him at school. That’s why you were walking around at lunchtime the other day, isn’t it? What happened? Did you guys have a fight?”

It still feels like a knife’s being twisted in my guts.

I tell her everything. No, it’s not a fight. It was my fault, I got the wrong idea. We need some time apart.

Vicky’s reaction is not what I expected – she bursts into tears.

“Oh my god! I’ve been so caught up in what’s been happening with Mum and Dad, thinking the whole world was ending, but you’ve also been going through that and you got dumped, and you’ve had to go through it all alone!”

Vicky cries until she’s soaked through a pillow, then she rolls over, and falls asleep on the dry side of the bed.

*

In the morning, Vicky’s more depressed than ever. At breakfast, she inhales four slices of toast, then slumps her head on the table.

Mum proposes that we all go on a nice walk.

“I hate nature,” Vicky mumbles into the placemat. “All the species keep rejecting each other.”

“What are you talking about?” Mum says.

“She’s not talking about anything,” I say quickly. “I’ll come for a walk.”

Mum and I leave Vicky with her broken heart-by-proxy, and drive out of town, to the Saddle Track. It’s quiet and muddy. We squelch up the track, not saying much, except for comments about the mud and the birds. It’s a nice type of cold, that burns your lungs but feels fresh. We don’t see another person the whole time.

We’re nearly at the top of the track, when Mum says, “Poor Vicky.” She says it quietly so I almost wonder whether she’s talking to herself, but she’s talking to me. “She’s not like you,” Mum says. “She won’t just potter along happily with things. She gets quite upset, really.”

But once again, Mum’s got it all wrong. Vicky has plenty of friends and, despite all her grumpy storming around, she’s actually a happy person. I’m the unhappy one right now, but she has no idea.

We get to the end of the trail. There’s no stunning view, just a little waterfall, trickling into a small pond, in a quiet green glade. It starts raining, so we sit on a rock under a tree. Mum peels a banana, feeding me little chunks of it like I’m a trained monkey. We sit in silence for a couple of minutes and my mind drifts.

I wonder how Mum found out about Dad’s pregnant girlfriend. Was it a dramatic scene, like on TV? Did she find the other woman’s earring? Did she detect the scent of unfamiliar perfume? Was there a big fight where she threw wine in Dad’s face? I imagine asking Mum about it, right here, right now. But then I remember her comment at breakfast yesterday. There’s been no home-wrecking. Maybe she doesn’t know – and the big fight hasn’t even happened yet.

Then I can’t stop thinking of all the other things I could blurt out to Mum, but never would. I could tell her about Nicholas. I could tell her how I don’t have any friends and how I’m not the happy-go-lucky boy she thinks I am.

I could come out to her. Mum, I imagine myself telling her, I’m fruity. I’m a little gay banana.

“This is so lovely,” she sighs happily. And I have to admit that she really does sound happy. I wonder whether it’s possible for someone to skip all the stages of grief and go straight to acceptance.

But is this still just denial? Or is there really a chance she doesn’t know the whole truth?

And, if either of those things are true, is anger right around the corner?