I don’t know how to feel. The History’s over. Most of it destroyed, and the last one ripped out. I thought there would be at least one more left. Now it’s just … over.
So where is the real one? The one that fell in the Thames. The one Chloe fished out.
On the way to school on Monday, we walk past Mrs Moran on her veranda, drinking tea with Cornelius. She waves and calls out, ‘Morning, dears!’
I want to scream at her, WHY DON’T YOU REMEMBER?
Or maybe she does. The vacuuming at night. The dead husband. Maybe it’s all a ruse.
Theodore’s away for another week. Word about his mum gets around school and some kids cry. I don’t feel angry at them as I did before. I try to distract myself. I search for books on the British Museum and the frost fairs, but don’t find much. Wikipedia says the Thames hasn’t frozen since 1814. Something to do with London Bridge. But Archie freezes the Thames in 1895, so Wikipedia is wrong again. You can’t trust everything you read on the internet, that’s what Mrs Harper says.
I look into Lou and Chloe again too, wondering how they hunted down the History after it escaped the Paris siege. I feel silly that I didn’t notice that Lou’s history was A. Mischief the Two-Hundredth, while Bezawit and Archie were A. Mischief the One-Hundred and Ninety-Eighth and One-Hundred and Ninety-Ninth. I wonder what other things I’ve missed.
When Theodore returns, he comes in with a late pass after the bell goes. He gives it to Miss Sparrow and sits down at his desk. Everyone looks at him. He starts crying straight away. Mrs Armstrong takes him outside for a walk.
At recess, kids ask if he wants to play with them. Kids who teased him weeks ago come up and say, ‘Hey, Theodore, wanna play footy?’, ‘Hey, Theodore, I like your bag’, ‘Hey, Theodore, do you want my lamington? It’s really nice.’ Theodore eats the soggy lamington and cries. There are kids who seem frightened of him too. They don’t say or do anything.
I don’t know how to make Theodore stop crying. After lunch, when he cries again, this popular Year 6 boy holds his hand and walks with him around the oval.
All I say to him is, ‘You okay?’
He shakes his head.
‘You wanna come over later? Broom and Stephanie can come.’
He shakes his head. He goes home early.
The next day, Theodore comes late again, and the day after that. When he starts coming early again, like he used to, he sits down next to me. He doesn’t have his iPod. He doesn’t dance or sing.
One day, out of the blue, he says to me, ‘I’m a different thing now.’
I remember what I said when he asked what it feels like when your mum dies, about becoming another thing, a sad, angry, lonely thing.
‘I know,’ I say. ‘But I still like you.’
He smiles. I feel warm. This is what Archie must’ve felt when the sparrows came back to life. I need to remind Theodore that even if he’s a different thing, he’s still Theodore.
I plan my mischief. I ask Kay to help. When I tell her the idea, she says it sounds great.
‘You and me, we’re doing mischief together!’ she says.
‘No, just me. But I need you to take me to the shops.’
‘Okay. But I’m still helping.’
‘Yep.’
‘I’m A. Mischief too.’
She’s trying to annoy me on purpose.
‘You’re only A. Mischief like Archie, keeping the book for yourself!’ I say.
She shrugs. ‘I’m fine with that.’
We buy a cheap set of earphones that has a long cord. I watch YouTube all weekend in preparation.
On Monday, Theodore comes late, so I can’t do my mischief. On Tuesday, he’s early, and there’s no one else around. He sits in the corner of the courtyard, next to the green door that’s always locked. I go over and smile at him. He smiles weakly back for a second, then looks away.
‘Stand up,’ I tell him. I try to say it nicely.
He stands. I take out Kay’s iPod and put one earphone bud in my ear and one in his. I turn the iPod on. Theodore looks confused. It’s playing his favourite song, the POW POW POW one.
I bob along. I hate dancing but I try to do Theodore’s moves. I take his hands and swing his arms about. It’s only when I start singing the Korean rap part that he smiles. He tries not to, I can tell. But he can’t stifle his smirk at how wrong I’m getting it all.
‘Sing the Korean bits!’ I try.
Limply he sings.
I sing the English echo back to him, ‘We ain’t playin’, no!’
His smile gets bigger. He sings the Korean part a little louder.
I sing my part loud and stupid and over the top. ‘We ain’t playin’, no!’
He smiles a proper Theodore grin now. We do the ‘Ready! Set! POW POW POW!’ move together. When we get to a part that means ‘Friends, put your hands up!’, I swing his arms up and he laughs. More kids arrive and a teacher walks past. No one says anything.
Then we get to the part where someone sings in English, ‘We can never die!’
Theodore stops smiling. His eyes fill with tears. I try to sing the Korean bits really badly to make him laugh, but the ‘never die’ part repeats. He bursts into tears and pulls the earphones out.
I feel terrible. ‘I’m sorry.’
He just cries.
When Kay picks me up, I return her iPod and tell her I’m a terrible mischief. But the next day, Theodore comes early and sits with me on the bench outside the office. He smiles and shows me his iPod. We listen together. He wiggles his shoulders a bit. I sing with him. He stops it before the ‘never die’ bit. The next day, we finish the whole song.
In the mornings, sometimes, Mrs Lornazak puts on music in the undercover area before school starts. Usually the Year 6s practise their graduation dances. I give her Theodore’s iPod and ask her to put on our song instead of her (stupid) music.
‘Sure,’ she says. ‘But you have to start participating in dance classes. As of next Wednesday, no more sitting on the bench.’
I stare at her, annoyed. She smiles. I look back at Theodore. I agree.
Theodore and I dance around the undercover area to the song. Some little kids from pre-primary join us.
He’s still sad. I don’t know if the mischief really helped. But he’s talking more now. He tells me about the new space documentary Stephanie bought him and asks if I know the life cycle of the butterfly. He says how sad he is that his grandparents have gone home because he has no one else to speak to in Korean (‘Dad’s almost as bad as you’). He asks me what I do when Kay cries.
I feel guilty. ‘Nothing. She cries in her room.’
‘Dad cries in his room too. When I went in to hug him yesterday, he pretended everything was okay.’
I don’t know what to tell him but we keep having little chats. Theodore still cries a lot, and I miss Mum and Dad every time. I think this is how it’s going to be for a while. But that’s okay.