The lollies were lined up next to the counter in cloudy containers with their prices written on the lids in permanent marker. Once we’d picked our lollies Wally turned to Tilly. ‘How much money did you bring?’
Tilly took a coin purse out of her bag and emptied it onto the counter. It was all silver, mostly ten-cent pieces and not that many of them. Wally touched each coin with his index finger, slowly mouthing the numbers under his breath as he counted. Halfway through he lost count and had to start again.
‘Is that it?’ Wally said once he’d finished. He looked annoyed. ‘I thought you were rich. You go to a fancy school.’ He pushed the coins towards the man behind the counter, who added them up with his finger the same way Wally had. Wally reached into his sock and pulled out the note. ‘This was for emergencies,’ he said to Tilly. ‘In case we needed medicine or to call the cops.’
We took the short cut back through the park. Tilly sucked on a jawbreaker, shifting it to one side of her cheek. When we passed the skate ramp we saw a few of the dropkicks gathered under the big tree in the middle of the park. They were a few years older than Cassie, and some even older than that. Proper grown-ups. They were all drinking from cans or paper bags. They were scrawny as skeletons.
‘Who are they?’ Tilly asked.
‘Dad says they’re all druggies,’ Wally said quietly. He was scared they’d hear him. A few months ago, when we were wheeling our bikes up the highway, some of them egged us out of a car. One of the eggs hit Wally on the neck and he got a bruise that swelled up like a bite right away. He had to hose off in the yard and have two baths before he could get the egg smell off him.
‘They look pretty weird,’ Tilly said.
‘They egged us once,’ I told her.
Tilly stopped on the grass and turned towards the skate ramp. She took a step towards them. They didn’t notice us, and Tilly took the jawbreaker out of her mouth.
‘What are you doing?’ I said.
Tilly narrowed her eyes like she was concentrating hard, and then she threw the jawbreaker right at them. She missed, and it landed in the grass a few metres in front of the tree. The one who had stringy hair tied back and pants that came halfway down his bum turned to us. He looked at the jawbreaker and gave us the finger, then flopped back onto the grass.
‘Let’s go,’ Wally said. He clutched his paper bag of lollies under his arm as though it was an important parcel, didn’t slow down until we were back on the road.
‘That was so cool,’ Tilly said. She was puffing and her neck was splotchy. She looked like a piglet.
‘They could have bashed us, you know,’ I said. ‘They once threw an egg at us, for no reason. Just because they wanted to throw an egg at someone, probably.’
‘I heard you the first time,’ Tilly said.
She didn’t look at me when she said it, but there was something mean in her voice that I didn’t understand. If she thought Ian was lying about Les then there was nothing strange about us, and she has no reason not to want to be my friend.
When we reached the driveway, Wally slipped his soggy lollipop stick into the letterbox slot and turned to Tilly. ‘You can come to the dam with us tomorrow, if you want,’ he said, looking at the ground, at Tilly’s feet, which were caked in orange dust.
She smiled and I could see her teeth clashing together. I looked away before she could tell me to stop staring.
The next Thursday afternoon Ian came home with Cassie after school. They looked liked they’d just run a race; their faces were red and they kept looking at each other and laughing, but laughing in a strange, nervous way, giggling like girls.
‘What’s so funny?’ I asked. I was in the yard, but they ignored me and went out into the paddock.
When Cassie got back he wandered around the house before dinner. He wasn’t laughing anymore. I watched him from the couch as he looked in the fridge, in the pantry, and then the fridge again, before coming into the lounge where Wally and I were watching a video.
‘What’s wrong with you?’ I asked.
‘Nothing,’ said Cassie.
‘You’re being weird,’ I said. ‘Did you and Ian have a fight?’
‘Piss off,’ Cassie mumbled. He stood there for a moment longer, staring at the screen, before going into the bathroom. He was in there for ages, and when I went to use the loo after him the mirror had fogged up and the wooden walls were sweating. He’d written his name onto the mirror in bubble letters.
We had casserole for dinner, the news on while we ate, and before the first ad had even come on Cassie got up and put his nearly full plate next to the sink.
‘Didn’t you like it?’ Mum asked.
‘I’m not hungry,’ Cassie said.
‘You should eat your dinner, love,’ Mum said. ‘Look how skinny you are.’
Dad sipped his beer, not taking his eyes off the TV, but I could tell he was paying close attention to Cassie. There was something off about him; something wasn’t right and Dad could tell.
An hour later Cassie came out of his room and went into the bathroom.
I could hear him heaving all the way from the kitchen. I pressed my ear to the bathroom door, scrammed to my room when the toilet flushed. Once he’d gone to bed I went into the toilet. There were bright yellow chunks skimming the water even though I’d heard him flush twice. The whole room smelled like sour cream.
‘Are you sick?’ I said, going into his room.
‘No,’ he said.
‘There’s spew in the toilet.’
‘Wasn’t me,’ said Cassie. ‘It was probably Wally. Probably sick from all those lollies he eats.’
‘But I heard you,’ I said.
‘Just leave us alone, would you?’ He chucked a pillow at my head. ‘Why are you so obsessed with everything I do? You’re so weird sometimes.’
‘So you admit it,’ I said. ‘It was you.’
‘Just rack off, alright? And shut the door behind you.’
I watched Cassie closely the next day. If he wasn’t going to tell me what was wrong, I was going to have to find out myself. I bet that he and Ian had had a fight, and that was why Cassie was acting so strangely. I hoped so, anyway.
Ian didn’t come over that afternoon, and Cassie was still in a sooky mood. As long as Ian had racked off, I didn’t care how sad Cassie was. He could be sad forever, I didn’t care, as long as Ian was gone.
But that night the phone rang. I knew it had something to do with Cassie right away, because Cassie jumped a mile and then slunk off to his room and locked the door.
I pretended to watch TV. When Dad hung up he kept his hand pressed to the phone on the wall for a minute, and then went to the fridge and opened another beer. He sat down at the kitchen table and drank his beer in gulps. When Mum finished her bath, Dad called her name and she shuffled into the kitchen. She was wearing her woolly slippers and the nightie me and Cassie and Wally had given her for her birthday the year before. They spoke quietly to each other and I concentrated hard to hear but the TV was too loud. Mum held one hand to her throat and other towards the fridge, like she was searching for something to grip on to.
Dad called for Cassie. I tried to turn down the volume but Wally snatched the remote from my hand and turned it up even louder. I moved to the couch, peeked over the back.
‘What?’ Cassie said, stopping in the doorway. His skin looked wet. ‘What’s wrong?’
Dad took a sip of his beer. ‘What’s this about you interfering with a girl?’