‘You’re shaking,’ Billy said, laughing. ‘What is the matter?’
‘Remember what Mum and Daniel said about not leaving the camp?’ I whispered.
‘Ah.’ Billy waved his hand. ‘They don’t care as long as we leave them alone.’
I thought about that. On this trip at least, that did appear to be the case. ‘I guess you’re right.’
He laughed again. ‘Usually am.’
We stopped in front of the river and started picking up stones.
‘I’m glad we did this,’ Billy said.
‘Me too.’
‘I think you’re awesome, Rose.’
I felt my cheeks turning crimson. I continued to collect stones. ‘Thanks. I think you’re pretty cool too.’
I snuck a look at him. He was grinning. I found myself grinning too.
‘Right,’ he said, standing. ‘Shall we skim?’
I nodded.
Billy picked a stone and lined up the arc. He shifted on the rocks so his legs were hip distance apart, and practised the skimming motion. Then it was time for the real thing: one, two . . . but on three, instead of releasing the stone, he turned suddenly and kissed me full on the mouth.
The air vanished from my lungs.
It wasn’t a kiss out of the movies. Our teeth knocked. He said, ‘Ow.’ We laughed. Billy pulled back. ‘Smooth, right?’
‘The teeth knocking especially,’ I agreed. ‘Did you practise that?’
‘Only in my head.’
We smiled at each other. The next time he kissed me, our teeth didn’t touch. It was slower. Better.
‘Rose?’
Billy and I leapt apart, blinking into the darkness. It took me a moment to recognise the voice.
‘What are you doing?’ Fern said.
‘Just skimming stones,’ Billy said, withholding a smile.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Billy is hopeless.’
Fern looked at us. There was something about her expression. Fern always saw more than people thought. I had a feeling she knew exactly what we were doing. She didn’t look happy about it.
‘Let’s go back to camp,’ I said.
Fern waited until Billy disappeared up the track and then fell into step beside me. I waited for her to inundate me with questions, but she didn’t. She didn’t say a word. Back at the camp, Fern went straight to bed without a word and I lay awake, thinking about Billy. It wasn’t until later that I thought about the way Fern had looked at Billy down at the lake. Like she was angry. Like she hated him. It actually looked like she wanted to kill him.
FERN
At eighteen weeks, while setting up chairs for the Toastmasters group, I feel the baby move for the first time. It doesn’t feel like much – barely anything at all. Like someone is tapping me from the inside. A small, rather benign, experience and yet, at the same time, the very definition of pleasure. It is, I suspect, what happiness feels like.
After that, I am aware of the baby every second. I spend hours reading books and googling. Is it cold when I am cold? Hot when I am hot? Does it hear my heart beating loudly from the inside? I pay attention to its movements to try to intuit its likes and dislikes. Judging from its movements, he or she is a little like me, because the one time I can guarantee movement is at night when it’s quiet, and I am lying in bed. I find myself looking forward to that time all day, when I pull up my nightie and watch the little elbows or feet or shoulders bumping around under my skin. I love that time because Rose isn’t around to see it. It’s our time. Just the baby and me.
I’ve always enjoyed my job at the library, but as the months of my pregnancy pass, work becomes even more of an oasis. Carmel is part of it. Since our shadow day, she’s given me a lot more freedom, but she’s also asked for a few things in exchange. Greeting people as they enter the library with eye contact is one of them, so I’ve devised a system where I look at the patch of skin between people’s eyebrows instead. Delightfully, everyone is none the wiser, and the results of this pseudo-eye contact are surprisingly good. Now, people smile and wave to me as they enter the library. Some pause to tell me how much they enjoyed a book I recommended; others compliment me on my fashion choice of the day. Once, I even became engaged in an impromptu discussion with a group of women who’d all read The Secret Life of Shirley Sullivan by Lisa Ireland. I’d suggested they start a proper book club at the library, and Carmel gave me permission to host it in the training room and order fruit and cheese (not as good as cake, but not bad). All in all, with my new eye-contact trick, I find the front desk is no longer the fearsome place it once was, and I have Carmel to thank.
One day, as I am taking my place at the front desk, I become aware of Gayle hovering nearby. Her eyes flicker here and there. She looks quite bizarre.
‘Is everything all right, Gayle?’ I ask her, as I lower myself into the ergonomic chair at my desk.
‘Fine,’ she says. ‘It’s just . . . may I ask you something?’
I wince as my lower back hits the seat. ‘You may.’
‘I just wondered . . . if you had anything to tell us.’ She glances demonstrably at my burgeoning belly. ‘An announcement, perhaps?’
I notice Linda, a few metres away, listening. When she sees me looking, she glances quickly at the bookshelves.
I am perplexed by the question. I am six months pregnant now, and it is, quite frankly, obvious to anyone without vision impairment that I am pregnant.
‘If you’re asking if I am pregnant, I can confirm that I am. Nearly six months along,’ I add, as people (including the nurses at Sun Meadows, the lady I’d passed at the bus stop yesterday, and the sales assistant at the pharmacy where I buy my prenatal vitamins) seem
