Page 67 of Summer, in Between
‘He’s helping me get this frame up,’ says Dad.
‘I thought you weren’t working today?So Paul has to work 24/7 like a work-a-holic too, Dad?Is he contractually obligated?’
‘It’s okay, I’m happy to help.’Paul frowns.
‘Cat, go calm yourself down,’ says Dad, ‘you’re acting like a baby.’
‘Funny, your wife just said the same thing.’I turn and walk back out into the rain, yanking my hood down over my head.
30
AMESS of cut out newspaperarticles are scattered across my desk chair.I’m sorting them into piles; anything even slightly related to asylum seekers sits on one side of my desk, on the other is anything about the climate crisis.Right in the middle are stories about sexism and that’s just too depressing for words.What a downer of an assessment.You’d think they’d want us all uplifted and positive leading into Year Twelve.It should be all peace and calm yet only this morning I yelled at Matty for stealing my pen which was stuck through my top knot.
‘What was all that about?’
Paul leans in my bedroom doorway, his shoulder against the door jam, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans.There’s a fine layer of sawdust in his hair and a dirty mark across his white t-shirt.
‘I’m just sick of my dad being such a workaholic which means you are too.’
‘I don’t need you to talk for me and I really don’t need you to embarrass me in front of your dad like that.’
‘Sorry for sticking up for you.’I turn back to my articles.
‘When I need you to stick up for me, I’ll let you know.I’ll give you a hand signal.’He smiles, trying to diffuse the tension coiling inside me.
‘I know the perfect hand signal,’ I say.‘You want to see it?’
‘Don’t even think about it.’He moves into my room, and I watch him take it in.It’s disconcerting and discombobulating.
Discombobulating.I scribble that down on a sticky note.He meanders across to my bookcase and picks up a framed photo.
‘Who’s who?’he asks, and I point out Em and Sal.His hands move over the collection of tiny paper cranes Em gave me, the leftovers from her art folio assessment.He holds my jar filled with sea glass to eye level and twists an abalone shell against the light, its mother of pearl shimmering.
‘Can I have a go?’He gestures towards the delicately painted Venetian kaleidoscope that Nonna gave me from an Italian trip.‘This is supremely cool.’He turns it slowly against his eye.The glass beads clink – he’s so tall I can see their colours shifting in the light of my bedroom window as he holds it aloft.The boys got gift after gift after gift from that trip.Seriously, Nonna had three suitcases, two of which were filled with crap for my brothers.All Nonna bought me was the kaleidoscope and the world’s ugliest earrings.He stands in front of the open door of my wardrobe, his eye caught by what Mum calls my gallery, with its art posters, collages I’ve made from images I like, photos of my friends, my family.
‘Man, you look so beautiful here.’He points to a photo of Sal, Em and me.I’m wearing a long black dress, a split up one side revealing my thigh and the most painful heels that should never have been invented, let alone bought.I grit my teeth just thinking about how much they hurt that night.‘Was that your formal?’
