I open the taxi door and vomit into the gutter.
The terminal boardwalk is crowded with people, most of them pulling bags on wheels. I don’t look up to see if any of them have noticed. Instead, after wiping my face with the tail of my shirt, I undo my seatbelt and make a beeline for a concrete pillar. I lean heavily against it, shielding my eyes with a hand.
Harriet rushes out of the taxi. She puts a hand on my arm again. ‘Are you okay?’
I look at her for a long moment.
‘What the fuck does it look like, Harriet?’
‘Oh. I –’
It takes willpower not to retch again. I gulp it down. ‘You think it’s easy, do you? You think you can fix this “problem” of mine with a set of note cards? Like my fear of flying is some sort of public-speaking exercise? Is that it?’
Her eyes widen. ‘I just thought –’
I press my hands to my knees and lean forward, panting. ‘Don’t you think if it was that easy I’d have done it already? Sucked it up and gone to Perth? He’s my father! Of course I want to see him. What is wrong with you?’
‘I was only –’
‘Do me a real favour and stay the hell away from me.’
I stumble past her to the taxi rank.
It’s not until the taxi’s winding back through the warehouses of Sydenham, leaving Harriet Price in her little bubble of ignorant perfectionism far behind, that my muscles finally unclench. My heart rate settles. We drive past a neighbourhood park where the early sun’s turning dew into mist and play equipment into molten silver, and the whole foggy, glittering scene is like the Yosemite Valley of a Californian impressionist, or even better – those dreams where an angel comes down to tell you your destiny, his wings backlit by Heaven’s high beams.
Only this isn’t the Destiny Angel but the Angel of Revealing the Bloody Obvious.
I should never have started a hoax with Harriet Price. There are so many reasons it was a bad idea. I tick them off.
She’s a meddler.
She’s patronising.
She’s snobbish.
She’s uptight.
She’s straight-laced.
She’s overly ambitious.
She has zero personal style.
She’s clueless.
She’s as half-baked as a bloody lamb roast.
She chooses half-full over half-empty every bloody time.
She’s a joiner. Joiners are the worst.
She’s unbelievably repressed.
She has a grating enthusiasm.
She says meaningless things like, ‘Everything happens for a reason’ and, ‘There’s no “I” in team!’
She wears a weird-smelling moisturising cream.
By the time I get back home I regret having given her my number. Eighteen missed calls. I add ‘obsessive’ to my list of her negative personal characteristics and go to my room.
Screw Harriet Price and the prestige car she rode in on.
What I need to do is get back to the things that matter, like my major work. I take out my oversized canvas and rule a line down one side. With the stolen Stanley knife I slice the canvas with the precision of a micro-surgeon. Now all I have to do is decide what to paint.
I consider my ideas one by one. A stalling aircraft – but how do you pictorially represent that? The toxicity of the smoke spiralling from the burning upholstery of first-class seats: again, difficult to draw. I finally settle on a jet engine ingesting a flock of Canadian geese.
Somehow though, I keep picturing a confounded Harriet Price standing by the automatic doors at the domestic terminal of the airport.
Clearly the best thing is to avoid Harriet from now on. I’m calling an end to Amelia Westlake. We’ve achieved a lot, but continuing it isn’t worth the hassle of dealing with the prefect from hell. I begin by blocking Harriet’s number from my phone and deleting it.
At school on Monday, I steer clear of the year-twelve common room, the staff foyer and the PAC storeroom. Given the number of times Harriet has cornered me outside the newsroom, I decide to avoid that, too.
‘Rotten tooth,’ I explain to Nat during English while Fowler is defending Ernest Hemmingway’s sexism.
‘Huh?’ Nat says.
‘I’ve been visiting sick bay for painkillers. It’s why I haven’t been around to the newsroom at lunchtimes lately. For some reason the pain always kicks in at noon.’
‘Sounds awful,’ she says, her gaze drifting.
Since when does Nat lose focus when I speak to her?
She turns back suddenly. ‘Listen, I’ve been meaning to talk to you.’ She sounds serious all of a sudden.
I sit up.
‘I think it’s best if we put a pause on the … extra-curricular stuff for a while,’ says Nat. ‘Things are getting busy with overdue study, and deadlines are tight at the Messenger …’ She trails off, watching for my reaction.
This is unexpected, but to be honest I’m relieved. I suspect she’s reached the same conclusion as I have – that there’s simply no chemistry between us. It’s her gentle way of saying as much, and coming from Nat, who is usually the opposite of gentle, I’m especially grateful for it.
I smile to reassure her. ‘That makes sense.’ I pause.
‘Really?’ She gives me an apologetic grimace.
‘Totally.’ I nod. ‘I’m really busy right now, too.’
‘Okay, great,’ Nat says. ‘I mean – that works out, then. For both of us.’ She looks embarrassed.
I try to think of something else to talk about. ‘Hey, random question, but did you know Harriet Price had a girlfriend?’
As soon as the words have left my lips I regret them. Nat snaps to attention. ‘Why are you asking me about Harriet Price?’
I think fast. ‘I heard recently she’s dating the captain of Blessingwood, that’s all,’ I say.
Nat studies me broodily for a while, and then her expression relaxes. The dreamy look she wore a minute ago returns. ‘Everyone knows that,’ she says mildly. ‘It’s just that you happen to live under a rock.’
‘Right,’ I say, feeling a pulse in my throat. ‘If you say so.’
As Fowler and Nakita Wallis lead an open discussion on the albatross as a metaphor, I steal glimpses at Nat. What’s
