Tuesday was the first time I managed to catch Tess alone. I hadn’t thought it would be so hard, considering we flatted together and were in the same medical class, but clearly she’d been avoiding someone.
‘Come for coffee,’ I said at lunchtime, steering her down the large staircase and out of the front doors of the med school. ‘My shout.’
Tess stuffed her hands in her jacket pockets. ‘Three guesses as to what this is about.’
‘That’ll make it easy then.’ We walked a short distance to Refuel, my favourite café, which did good coffee plus a muffin for five dollars. ‘What do you want?’
‘Triple latte and a blueberry muffin.’ She sat on a stool, twisting her corkscrew curls into a ponytail. ‘If you insist.’
‘Triple? Things must be bad.’ I ordered and sat opposite her. ‘What’s going on between you and Jack?’
‘Nothing, as you might have gathered. It was a mistake.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, I’m sure. I broke my own golden rule. Don’t get with your friends, especially when they’re also your classmate and flatmate.’ She groaned and rested her head on her arms. ‘I’m such a doofus.’
‘You must have been kind of attracted to him,’ I persisted, if only for Jack’s sake.
‘No. I mean, kind of, but I’m not going there,’ she said in a muffled voice. ‘At least not until we’re no longer flatting together.’ She raised her head. ‘Don’t try to convince me otherwise. We’re just going to be awkward for a while.’
I smiled at the waitress as she placed my coffee in front of me. ‘Fair enough. Are you going to tell him that?’
‘Maybe. I don’t know. Um, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.’
‘Me?’
Tess tipped a packet of sugar into her cup. ‘Yeah. Look, for the past while I—’ She glanced over my shoulder. ‘Hey look, there’s Ashleigh.’
‘Oh, hey.’ Ashleigh perched on the stool next to me. ‘This looks very cosy.’
‘We’re having an affair,’ I said. ‘Can’t you tell?’
‘That’s all I need,’ Tess said. ‘A love quadrangle.’ Her cheeks had gone pink.
‘I assume you’re referring to Jack?’ Ashleigh leant towards her. ‘You must have been really, really drunk.’
Tess blinked. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Nothing. But you have to admit Jack’s a bit of a sloth compared to my black belt here. Each to their own, I s’pose.’ Ashleigh tore a corner off my muffin. ‘Are you almost done there, Xan? You can walk me to class.’
I gestured at my coffee cup, which was still three-quarters full. ‘Ten minutes?’
‘Get a takeaway cup.’ Ashleigh picked up the muffin. ‘Nice to see you, Tess.’
‘Pleasure.’ Tess’s expression said otherwise.
‘What’s got up her nose?’ Ashleigh asked once we were out of earshot.
‘No idea,’ I said.
‘She’s put on heaps of weight since last year, have you noticed?’
‘Can’t say I have.’ I sipped on my coffee. ‘But you know, love is blind. Since Tess and I are having an affair and all.’
She smiled, took my hand. ‘Very funny.’
‘That’s why you’re with me,’ I said. ‘Because I’m so funny.’
‘I mean, would you really go out with someone with thighs like that?’
‘I’d love you whatever size your thighs were,’ I said, and Ashleigh gave me a look of disbelief.
‘You should know I’d never let myself go like that. Hey, I need to talk to you about something.’
‘Fire away.’ Did anyone not need to tell me something?
She smoothed her hair. ‘I think Nisha’s taking drugs.’
‘Yeah, no kidding.’
‘I mean, in our flat. And I don’t just mean a joint here and there.’ She dropped my hand. ‘Why are you not more alarmed about this?’
I stuffed my cup into an overflowing bin. ‘It’s hardly a revelation. Who’s she hurting, apart from herself?’
‘What if someone comes to claim drug money off her? With machetes or whatever?’ She scowled at me. ‘What, you think that kind of thing doesn’t happen here?’
‘So, what are you going to do, kick her out? She’s one of your best friends.’
‘Sure, but someone needs to tell her that she can’t bring that shit into our flat anymore. Can you give me some back-up on this, Xander? I’m a law student. I can’t have this sort of thing on my record.’ We’d reached the union building. The wind was swirling through the trees. My gut had scrunched into a ball.
Clutching the buzzing phone in my pocket, I said, ‘Do you have any evidence that she’s actually got drugs in the flat?’
Ashleigh dug a lipstick out of her bag. ‘I bet I wouldn’t have to look too hard. Is that what you want me to do?’
‘I just think you shouldn’t jump to conclusions.’
‘Fine,’ she said, after applying candy-pink lipstick, using the wing mirror of a nearby SUV. ‘I’ll let you know.’
I watched her stride off, took out my phone.
Ronnie: I finish at 3. How about you?
See you then. Pick you up in the usual spot.
‘Don’t tell me you’ve never committed a crime,’ I said. Ronnie and I were sitting on a bench at the end of the St Clair promenade, watching surfers line up for the waves. Ronnie was wearing a puffer jacket done up to her chin and a long skirt that almost hid her cast.
‘I’m sure I have.’ The wind whipped her hair around her face. I brushed it aside, kissed her earlobe.
‘Someone might see.’
‘They might.’ I drew away, crossed one leg over the other. ‘Go on, I’m waiting to hear about this crime.’
She rolled her eyes towards the sky. ‘Let’s see. I’ve broken the speed limit.’
‘Ooh.’ I touched one of the studs in her ear. Maybe I should get my tongue pierced. I’d heard it was good for certain … activities.
‘And … I’ve eaten lollies out of the pick’n’mix bin at the supermarket.’
‘Everyone does that.’
‘Do they?’ She clasped my knee. ‘Do impure thoughts count?’
I laughed. ‘Definitely. Tell me more.’
‘I used to fantasise about having sex with my piano teacher.’ Her mouth quirked up on the left, the way it always did when she was trying not to smile.
‘Male or female?’
‘Male of course.’
‘OK. But that’s not illegal. Or was it?’
‘I was fourteen and he was, I don’t know, twenty-four or something. So yeah, definitely illegal.’ She gazed into the distance. ‘He was hot.’
‘OK, good.’ I dipped my fingers into the small of her back. ‘Is that all?’
‘No. When my best friend hooked up with the guy I had a crush on, I wanted to kill her.’
‘Dark.’
‘Yeah. I used to imagine pushing her in front of a bus or a truck. Isn’t that crazy?’
I grinned. ‘You must have really liked this guy.’
She nodded. ‘Thomas Butler. He was hot. He had long blond hair, a surfer kind of look.’
‘You like blonds, don’t you?’ I tossed my hair, model-style, and Ronnie smiled properly this time.
‘Some of them.’
‘So, are you still talking to this friend?’
‘Nah, we kind of grew apart.’ She shrugged. ‘And obviously you have your kleptomania. Are you really over that?’
‘I think so. Apart from the pick’n’mix bin, but that doesn’t count. And lots of impure thoughts.’ I touched my lips to the spot behind her ear, darted my tongue out to taste the salty tang of her skin.
‘You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t. What’s your most impure thought?’
‘You don’t want to know.’
‘Oh, come on. I gave you mine.’
‘Sex and murder. You’re tame.’ I traced the angle of her jaw, placed my finger on the rapid pulse in her neck. ‘I thought about choking Ashleigh once.’
‘I don’t blame you.’
‘Settle down,’ I murmured, concentrating on the rhythm of her heart, the arterial jet through her carotid. ‘She’s not always like that.’
‘Why did you want to choke her?’
‘I don’t know. One of our arguments. She threw a vase at me, gave me this scar.’ I touched my brow-line.
Ronnie went very still. ‘Why do you stay with her, Alex? Putting me aside and everything. And don’t say it’s complicated.’
I dropped my hand; turned towards the waves, the salt spray, the churn and whirl of the surf. ‘She used to be …’ I shrugged. ‘She’s done a lot for me. Her family too. They practically adopted me.’
‘What’s wrong with your family?’
‘Well, apart from my dad, who abandoned us when I was a kid, they’re OK. But Ashleigh’s family are like …’ Everything I always wanted to be. Until I realised that I was never, ever going to measure up. ‘Anyway. Five years is a long time.’
‘Not quite ready to let go of your seven-year cycle, huh?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘It’s what you don’t say that’s important,’ she said softly.
For my seventeenth birthday, Ashleigh gave me cologne. I hadn’t heard of the brand, but when I looked it up on the net, the price had scared me. How was I going to afford an equivalent present for her sixteenth birthday, which was only one month later?
‘If someone was giving you perfume for your birthday, what would you like?’ I asked my sisters.
‘Black Opium,’ Lauren said.
‘Coco Mademoiselle is classier,’ Emma said.
‘Why don’t you try The Body Shop?’ Mum suggested. Yeah. Right.
As it turned out, the local pharmacy had neither of my sisters’ suggestions. I caught the bus to the city and went to the duty-free, but the sales assistants were far too attentive. Next on my list were two department stores, the second of which didn’t have a security guard posted outside.
‘Do you have a tester for this one?’ I held up a bottle of something called Poison. When the sales assistant turned her back, I pocketed the Coco Mademoiselle tester, which was nearly full.
‘Here,’ the assistant said, spraying a strip of cardboard.
I raised it to my nostrils and inhaled. ‘That’s good,’ I said. ‘I’ll show it to my girlfriend, see what she thinks.’
The assistant showed me her teeth. ‘Can I help you with anything else today?’
‘No, I’m good.’ I was halfway to the door, counting footsteps to freedom, when I heard her say, ‘Excuse me sir, but I think you forgot—’
I nearly ran. Nearly, but forced myself to turn. The assistant passed me my phone.
‘Oh, whoops. Thanks.’ I took the phone. ‘Have a nice day.’
Never mind that the perfume was minus its box. I wrapped it in silver paper and tied it with a pink ribbon that I’d found in our kitchen junk drawer.
‘Oh my God, you shouldn’t have,’ Ashleigh said the following day. ‘But … I’m glad you did. How did you know exactly what I wanted?’
‘Well, I guess I’m psychic.’
‘What happened to the box?’
‘Um, I threw it away.’ I gave her a bashful smile. ‘I spilt my milkshake on it. Sorry.’
‘You’re such a doofus.’ She kissed me. ‘Better luck next time, huh?’
When I got caught stealing a watch for her Christmas present, her dad got me a lawyer. All I ended up with was several hours of community service. He said, ‘Xander, you’re the best thing that ever happened to Ashleigh, but you’re no good to her if you end up with a criminal record. If you need anything, just tell me, all right?’ He got me a job coaching judo, made sure I’d have the same when I went away to university. ‘You’ve got a bright future ahead of you,’ he told me. ‘I’m going to make sure you’re the first one in your family to go to medical school.’
Geoff showed me how to study, hired me a tutor. And when I failed at the last post, when I got fifteen per cent less than I needed for med school entry in my final exams, he took away the post. Turns out he’d pulled some strings for the dean a few years ago, helped defend him against a case of medical misadventure. So, the dean did the same for me. If you’re bumped to the top of the waiting list for medical school, there’s a chance you’ll get in — and I did.
Ashleigh was right. Without her, without her family, I was nothing. No, less than that.