The swell of kids in the courtyard welcomes me. They’re so alive and oblivious. Samantha startles me, coming up from behind.
‘Hey, you okay?’ she says.
‘Yeah. Recovering from some gastro.’
‘Must’ve been bad.’
‘It wasn’t good.’
‘Congratulations on the Boland shortlisting,’ she says.
‘Thanks.’
She’s the first of many well-wishers – Ethan, Jake, and even Felicia congratulate me. This is good – no, great. This is being known for something other than being sick and absent. I search faces for Gabriella. We’re in this together. But I can’t spot her.
‘Hey!’ Riley comes out of the toilet, swaggering the way he does. He holds his fist up. I knock it. ‘Well done,’ he tells me.
The congratulations keep coming – even from the teachers, like Mr Tan in Computers, and Mrs Grady in Legal Studies. At recess, going to the canteen to grab a juice, Gabriella pulls me up. This is the closest I’ve been to her since Ethan’s birthday. I smell her, sweet and welcoming, see the whiteness of her skin, feel how soft it could be and then I can only think about that missed chance in the bathroom.
‘You all right?’ she asks.
‘Yeah.’
‘You still look a little out there.’
‘I’ll find my way.’
‘Good.’
She smiles but it lacks the usual spark. I can see now her eyes are a little red – she’s been crying. And she looks tired. They’re just little things I bet others wouldn’t notice, but I’ve become an expert at identifying small signs.
‘Are you okay?’ I ask.
Gabriella’s lips draw thin. ‘Don’t tell anybody?’
‘Sure.’
‘My parents are getting a divorce, so a lot of stuff’s been going on.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘If you knew my parents, you’d know this is overdue.’
‘You should meet my parents,’ I say.
Now she does smile, genuinely. She’s got a great smile, and she goes from looking like a sixteen-year-old girl to a mature young woman.
‘Congratulations on your shortlisting,’ I say.
‘Congratulations on your shortlisting,’ Gabriella says.
We’re unsure of what to do – should we hug, should we kiss one another on the cheek, should we shake hands? It feels so good to talk to her, to connect and to be normal – or at least normal as it’s recognised in high school.
‘I’ve got to go,’ Gabriella says. She jabs a thumb over her shoulder.
‘Don’t you have Social Studies third period?’
‘I’m going home. I’ve got to help my mum.’
‘Oh. Okay.’
‘Nice talking to you.’
‘You too.’
Third period is the best I’ve felt ever. The Boland shortlisting. Talking with Gabriella. I see a whole future untarnished by this. I can do anything. I can be anything. But come lunchtime, when Mr Baker pulls me up in the teacher’s staff room, that good feeling frays.
‘You were meant to hand in your identity essay yesterday,’ he says.
‘Oh. Sorry.’
‘I take it you’ve been sick. If you can get it to me at your first opportunity …’
I nod.
‘Congratulations on the Boland shortlisting.’
When I get home, I go straight to my bedroom and look at that one line I wrote for the identity essay: I don’t know who I am.
I put it aside and push my pen to paper and think about who I am. I write, but the essay comes out exactly as Mr Baker told us not to write it – as a dossier. I write about half a page on who I want to be, before I realise that’s wrong, too. I scrunch up sheet after sheet after sheet.
This should be meaningful but I can’t find any meaning in it. It shouldn’t be this hard. I think about the way this has debilitated me, the way I’ve felt good one moment and horrible the next. I think about today with Gabriella, and then the times I’ve felt apart from everybody else. I think about wanting to write, about Ash saying that writing might be who I am but Dr Dimmock telling me to put my writing away.
And as these things scramble in my brain, I look more and more at that single line and know it sums me up in a way nothing else can. Given the Boland has shortlisted students, this identity piece can’t be the essay they’re using to judge the fellowship. I slip it back into my folder and put my folder in my bag.
The next morning, that uncertainty unravels into the typical agitation. Ash and me don’t say much as we walk to school. I hope to see Gabriella but she’s not here. I do see Deanne, sitting on one of the benches, staring at her feet. She’s reverted to the way she used to dress, like she can reverse time to a date before all the innuendo about her. I think I should go over and talk to her, but Riley comes out of the toilet.
‘Hey!’ he says.
Ash casts a glance over his shoulder at Deanne too, but we end up joining Riley in the toilet. He takes out that cigarette case we bought him for his birthday and offers his cigarettes around. We light up, like we’re sophisticates about to indulge in some weighty discussion.
‘She’s been out there all morning,’ Riley says.
‘That stupid shit somebody started–’ Ash says.
‘Stupid shit’s being said all the time,’ Riley says.
‘Not like this,’ Ash says.
Riley waves it away.
They’re both right. Stupid shit is always being said. But Deanne was this shy little nerd who found popularity and then what she used to find that popularity – something as stupid as a makeover to look good – was used against her. Bizarrely, I think about what her identity essay would say.
When the bell goes and we hurry out, Ash calls to her just before she enters the classroom.
‘Hey!’
Deanne turns.
‘You okay?’ he says.
Deanne’s face grows contemplative. Then she nods. ‘Yeah,’ she says. A smile breaks out – she looks now like an amalgam of the nerd and the vamp. ‘Thanks for what you did.’
Ash frowns.
‘To Mickey and Lachlan,’ Deanne says.
‘It was nothing.’
‘Thanks anyway.’ Deanne heads into class.
The day tumbles onwards, and my attention turns to two things: seeing if Gabriella shows up (she doesn’t) and avoiding Mr Baker so I don’t have to personally hand over my identity essay.
Come the end of the day, I tell Ash to hang on, creep into the staffroom, and slip my one-sentence identity essay on Mr Baker’s desk.