Tuesday 9 August
Mum-and-Dad Skype is just Mum this week. But excruciating – she wants me to model the new bathers. ‘Seriously? How old do you think I am?’
Iris fails to hide her smirk. I feel like kicking her; if I was wearing something tougher than my Peruvian slippers maybe I would. She starts blathering about the Winter Fair.
‘I wish we could see it,’ Mum says.
‘It’s dumb,’ I tell her. ‘All we’re doing is swimming in a loop.’
‘Muuuuum,’ I recognise Iris’s wheedling voice, and push my chair back a bit to give her the screen. She’s after money so she can get her hair styled before the formal. I let out a groan of disgust. Iris glares at me.
I look across at Kate’s pinboard above her desk. She has some interesting items on it: a picture of a man at a piano on an ice-floe; a list of band names, hastily scrawled; there’s also a photo of her and a boy – it must be from her old school in the country, because they’re standing in front of a tractor. He’s cute. I wonder if he’s her boyfriend. I swing back around to Iris, and Mum on the screen. Unbelievably, Iris is talking about Theo. ‘He said I had “good form”, and then he said, “A bit of advice – if you don’t mind: I’ve noticed you stay on the sides a bit too much.” And then he said, “In chess and in life”.’
‘Goodness,’ Mum says politely.
I mime sticking my finger down my throat and Iris’s eyes turn to slits.
When I get back to my room Jinx is writing in her Wellness journal. She sucks on the end of her pen and says, ‘Hey Clem, are you a follower or a leader? Do you take the path less travelled?’
I lie down on my bed. ‘I’m not a follower or a leader.’
Jinx makes a wrong buzzer sound.
‘And I don’t feel like I’m on any path.’
Jinx points her pen at me. ‘You’re on the path to Canberra! To Victory!’
‘Maybe,’ I say. Then I turn to face the wall.
‘Do you believe in fate?’ Jinx asks, not getting the hint.
I think about Stu, the accident, the flowers.
‘Maybe,’ I say again. I don’t feel like doing the Wellness work this week. It hurts when you have to be so conscious.
