I went into my and Wally’s room. Wally was still on his bed, finishing off a snail. I sat on the ground and watched him.
‘Stop looking at me,’ he said after a minute.
His fingers were quick as bees as he moulded the clay in his palms. I wondered whether it was coming from his hands or from his brain, whether he didn’t even have to think about it, if it just poured out of him like magic.
‘I said stop it.’ He put down his clay and untucked his foot to kick me away.
‘Did you have any strange dreams last night?’ I said, grabbing his foot.
‘No,’ Wally said. He jerked his foot, trying to kick me in the face.
‘Really?’
He let his foot go slack and looked down at my hands, which were clasped around his ankle. ‘What’s on your fingers?’ He was staring at the nail polish.
‘What does it look like?’ I said.
Wally leaned in closer, curled up his lip. ‘Looks like your hands are dead,’ he said.
Ian came over later that night. He beeped the horn and waited for Cassie at the top of the driveway, then they crunched off into the mist. I fell asleep while Wally was still hunched over his animals and the headlights woke me up hours later, a sparkling yellow light that exploded through the window. I listened as Cassie thumped up the verandah and went into the bathroom. The toilet flushed and I could hear him gargling into the sink before his bedroom door clicked shut. The light from outside didn’t disappear though, not for ages, and everything was still and bright until the sound of tyres scraped over the gravel and the light faded out and became dark again as Ian’s car slunk off down the driveway for what I hoped would be the last time, like I hoped every time.
Dad noticed Mango was missing the next day, when she didn’t paw at his face in the morning asking to be fed. He walked around the house shaking a box of cat biscuits shaped like little fish, and then stood on the verandah calling her name and making noises with his tongue and his teeth.
‘Well,’ Dad said, putting the biscuits back into the cupboard.
I went on the verandah and called for Mango, but I knew if she didn’t come for Dad she wouldn’t come for me. Dad said she’d probably turn up, that she might have gone out into the yard last night or early this morning and found a grasshopper or a mouse to eat, and would come back when she was hungry again.
But she didn’t turn up that day, or the next. Dad stood on the verandah with Mango’s biscuits, made the sound with his tongue and teeth.
‘Where do you think she is?’ I asked. ‘Do you think she’s got lost?’
Dad yanked on his nose. ‘Dunno, mate.’
‘Do you think she’s dead?’
‘Best to put it out of your head. She was just an animal. No use getting upset over an animal.’
‘Who knows?’ said Mum, trying to sound cheerful. ‘She might wander home.’
‘No use in hoping that,’ Dad said, turning back towards the house. ‘Little thing won’t survive out there for that long.’
Dad was right. Mango didn’t wander back home again, not that day or the day after.
‘Tilly has her,’ I said to Wally as he flossed his teeth in front of the sink. ‘She’s taken her.’
Wally pulled the floss from his mouth, inspected the string. ‘Taken who?’
I went outside, crossed the yard. Helena’s car was in the driveway but I didn’t care. I didn’t care if she thought I was rough as guts. I wasn’t wearing shoes, and gumnuts and spindly twigs ground into my feet, but I didn’t stop until I reached the back door. I jiggled the handle and it wasn’t locked so I opened it wide and headed straight to Tilly’s room. Her door was open a crack and I pushed on it. Tilly was sitting on her bed. She looked up from her notebook, pushed her headphones around her neck.
‘Where’s Mango?’ I said.
‘What?’
‘You took her, you stupid idiot.’ I picked up the blanket scrunched on the mattress and shook it. All the books and clothes and textas flew from the blanket in a wave, landed on the mattress and the floor. A container of glitter spilled open, shimmering the carpet mermaid purple. I opened the cupboard and rummaged through her boxes and drawers, yanking on the dresses that were hanging from a plastic rod. The rod was thin as a twig and snapped, tumbling everything down from the coat-hangers and onto the cupboard floor.
‘I didn’t take anything,’ Tilly said, standing up.
‘She’s not yours,’ I said. ‘Where’ve you hidden her?’
‘You’re nuts,’ Tilly said. ‘Get out of my room.’
‘I know you’re just jealous ’cause you don’t have a cat. Doesn’t mean you can just steal someone else’s. Just because you think you’re better than me doesn’t mean you can be horrible all the time. Whatever Ian did, it’s not my fault. It’s your fault, for sucking up to Ian and Cassie all the time. Your fault for always hanging around like a bad smell.’
Tilly came towards me and tried to close the cupboard. I nudged her away with my elbow but she wouldn’t budge. I lifted my hand and scratched my fingers down her arm. I hissed at her, just like Mango would. She jumped back as if she’d been stung. I was surprised by how deep the scratches were, how sharp my nails were.
As Tilly moved across the room and leaned against the wall, Helena appeared in the doorway.
‘She scratched me, Mum,’ Tilly whined, crouching down on the mattress. ‘She tried to kill me.’
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Helena said, looking at the mountain of clothes lumped on the cupboard floor, at Tilly, now crying, her face ugly and slimy. I couldn’t believe I’d ever thought she was special, beautiful.
‘She stole Mango,’ I said. I looked down at my hands and saw the polish on my fingers. I bunched them into fists to hide my nails.
‘I think it’s time for you to leave,’ Helena said.
‘But she has my cat,’ I said.
‘She doesn’t have anything,’ Helena said. ‘You need to go now.’
I took a breath, felt my face start to burn. Of course Tilly didn’t have Mango. I was embarrassed, knew I’d made an idiot of myself. I felt like I was going to spew, could feel vinegar in my throat. I didn’t know why I’d done that. It was like something had snapped in my brain, everything gushing out of me. It didn’t even feel better, though, to have all those rotten feelings out in the world instead of boiling under my skin. I felt worse than I ever had.
I walked out of Tilly’s bedroom and into the hallway, didn’t look either of them in the eye. When I got to the kitchen, there was Wally, standing on the other side of the back door. The flyscreen was closed and his outline was fuzzy. Helena pushed past me, flung open the door.
‘What’s going on?’ I heard Tilly say. She’d crept out of her room and stood in the hallway. Her face had puffed up. The scratches on her arm were swollen and white. ‘Mum, make them leave.’
I looked up at Helena. The teeth at the sides of her mouth were yellow and pointy, like fangs, and before I knew what had happened Wally stepped inside and the flyscreen banged shut, trapping us in. He opened his mouth, sucked up all his spit and hawked it. It landed on Helena’s chin, a frothy puddle.
Helena paused for just a second, and then raised her arm and slapped Wally hard across the face.
‘Get out,’ Helena said, holding the flyscreen wide. ‘Fucking animals.’
My heart was beating like a rabbit’s. I wanted to get out of there, but Wally didn’t turn towards the door. He ignored Helena and looked in Tilly’s direction, but when he spoke to her his eyes were at her feet and he said it slowly, calmly. ‘When your dad drove into the dam he was trying to kill you. And if we’re rotten then you’re ten times more rotten than us. At least out parents haven’t tried to murder us. At least our mum isn’t a cripple slut.’