Ada arrived home from the windmill and raced in to tell Martha the altered version of story. Her mother hadn’t killed the fox after all. Ada sang it to herself as she skipped down the hall. But no one was there. She flopped on Martha’s bed, flat and wide as a star. She had rehearsed how she would say it: Mama, I looked everywhere but there is no dead fox in the garden, so he must have got up and run away after all. He was only playing dead. Ada had been looking forward to declaring it because there was the force of God’s thunder in it. Ada would deliver fate a blow, swerve destiny back on course. She could save her mother from the universe’s plans because she had undone life and done it up a better way. Her mother now had not really killed anything. Maybe Ada had outsmarted God. Just in case he should hear this impertinent thought, she began to sing a song very quickly to drown out her uncoverable thoughts.
Hey, ho, nobody home,
Meat, nor drink, nor money have I none
Yet I will be merry
Hey, ho, nobody home.
But Ada couldn’t save the day if she couldn’t tell Martha. Ada was cross with her mother for not being there, for jeopardising the important moment. She lay very still on the bed. Maybe she could pretend she was dead. How still could she be? Almost immediately her nose itched. God was testing her.
‘Ada?’
It was Tilly. ‘What are you doing, Ada?’
Ada heaved a sigh. ‘I was pretending to be dead. A dead star. But you ruined it.’
Tilly lay down on the bed too.
‘Where’s Mum?’
‘Gone to the hospital, I suppose. Anne Dresden was coming to take her.’
‘Poor Mum.’ Tilly sounded worried.
‘Don’t worry. She won’t die,’ Ada said with the kindly knowing tones of a doctor. But Tilly hardly noticed. She was already wearing a dreamy smile. It was as if she hadn’t heard a thing. Ada remembered she was still cross with Tilly but she didn’t know exactly why—it had something to do with this love spell she was under. She didn’t want to ask in case it made her feel lonely again. And, anyway, what about dinner? Ada was hungry. Who would make dinner if Martha wasn’t home?
‘Are you pretending to be dead again?’ Tilly asked.
‘No,’ said Ada carefully. ‘I’m worrying about dinner.’
‘We’ll just probably have baked beans,’ Tilly said. She sat up suddenly. ‘Actually, I’m going to cook something for dinner, but first I have to call Alice.’
Ada frowned. She didn’t believe Tilly could make dinner. Dinner was Martha’s job. Tilly was hopeless. Martha always said she was.
Tilly went to ring Alice. Ada picked up the receiver on the phone by their parents’ bed quickly before Tilly picked up the other end so that she wouldn’t hear the click. She lay on her back and crossed her feet. She liked listening to phone calls. It was like going to the movies.
Tilly said, ‘Guess what,’ and then Alice said, ‘What?’
‘We pashed,’ Tilly said. Ada frowned. She wasn’t sure what this was, and it annoyed her that she didn’t know. Without knowing she couldn’t be properly disappointed.
‘Wow. You and Raff?’ Alice said.
‘Yes. He came over.’
‘Did you like it? Is he a good kisser?’
Now Ada knew.
‘I guess so. What would I know?’
‘Well, you should be able to tell. Bad kissers are all mouth and tongue. Good kissing comes in slowly, like nudging…’
Ada didn’t like this talk of kissing. She closed her eyes and imagined cheesecake.
‘When did you become the kissing expert?’
‘Did he try anything else?’
‘No. He just told me he was moving to Melbourne next week. Maybe I didn’t kiss him back properly.’ Tilly sounded pained.
‘Maybe he was shy,’ Alice said.
‘He’s not shy. He probably thinks I’m frigid.’
‘Oh, who cares what he thinks.’
‘I do.’
‘Are you scared?’
‘No. I don’t know what I am.’
‘Do you trust him?’
‘Trust? I don’t even know. I don’t know about trust.’ Tilly laughed, but it wasn’t funny.
This was sex, thought Ada. This is where it was going. Sex wasn’t one bit funny and neither was trust. Ada knew what it was. Why didn’t Tilly? You could not trust a fox. You could not trust the headmaster, or the windmill. You could not trust the weather. You might not be able to trust Raff Cavallo, just like you might not trust Ben, or their dad—even he couldn’t be trusted. But you could trust William Blake. You could trust PJ. Ada suddenly wanted PJ. She hung up the phone and went to find him.
Ben was in the kitchen. He was drinking a can of beer and reading the newspaper—the sport section. Ada forgot about PJ because she realised that Ben was just sitting there and that he didn’t know what she had just found out. In fact, he didn’t know anything. She leaned into the bench and began to hum. He didn’t know what they’d done with the fox. He didn’t know that Tilly was going to have sex with Raff. She liked the feeling of having a secret that Ben didn’t know. If there was anyone to keep a secret from it was Ben, because he was the one who always knew everything.
‘Mum went to hospital with Mrs Dresden because she got bitten by the fox.’
Ben looked up and took a swig of beer.
‘Seriously? How the hell? That dead fox?’
‘You swore.’
Ben wiped his mouth.
‘Okay, well, what happened? Were you there?’
‘Nope. Tilly and I put it down the windmill hole, so we can tell Mum it just ran away.’
Ben shook his head.
Ada realised she had given too much away. She sat down on her hands.
‘Ada, why do you want to tell her that?’
‘I know something else, too.’ Ada took her hands out from underneath her and leaned forward. She wasn’t going to explain about the death coming in the garden. Ben wouldn’t understand. She was going to taunt him instead with her other secret.
‘I bet you do.’
‘It’s about Tilly.’
‘Uh huh.’
‘And Raff Cavallo.’
Ben jiggled his beer can to see what was left. He leaned forward, grinning.
‘Are you going to tell me? Tilly was showing off wasn’t she?’
Ada wasn’t going to tell. No way on earth. She shook her head and pressed her lips together. Shut. But then she couldn’t help saying just a little bit.
‘It’s to do with sex.’
Tilly walked into the room. They both turned and stared at her.
‘What?’ said Tilly.
‘Nothing,’ said Ben.
Ada shouldn’t have told Ben anything at all. She wished she could take it all back. Now that she saw Tilly standing there, looking so scared and so happy with her eyes so wide open anything could sail into them. What if Ben said something, something that would crush her, because that’s how she looked, as breakable as glass. Tilly wouldn’t trust Ada again. And Ada wanted to be trusted.
Where was PJ? She jumped up and flung the flywire door open, calling to him. Inside the phone was ringing. Everything seemed so urgent all of a sudden—as if Tilly was about to do something terrible and Ben was about to say something crushing, and the fox was dead in the forever hole. PJ hobbled up to her. She bent down and put her face close to his.
‘PJ,’ she gulped. She pressed herself close. She was going to have to tell him her big secret. Because it had all accumulated within her and now she had to get it out of her. But she didn’t know what to tell him. Actually, she didn’t want to tell anything anymore. She just wanted to be Ada and PJ. And nothing else.
Tilly came out and stood looking at the sky. It wasn’t yet dark but the day was in shreds, the blue drained away, the shimmer of the evening welling up. Why would she stand there and stare at the sky?
‘What are you doing?’ Ada dreaded the answer, but she had to ask.
Tilly turned. She blinked. Her hands just seemed to drop down as if she had let them go.
‘Well it’s so strange. Mum just rang and she isn’t coming home tonight. She is staying with Anne Dresden. Of all nights.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Nothing. It’s just such a strange hot night.’
Tilly felt it too. This was so wonderfully reassuring that Ada wriggled out of her turmoil and sank her head onto PJ and listened to his body heaving. This always made her sleepy. The cicada chorus had started up. The strange hot night was underway.