24
THE FIRST PASSIONFRUIT I roll along the check-out conveyor belt at IGA the next morning doesn’t get the response I was hoping for.
‘Welcome to IGA’ Jacinta says, weighing and bagging the fruit without looking up. I glimpse one headphone in behind her hair. Her name badge says ‘Tracey’.
I somehow managed to drag myself out of bed this morning, and right now Jacinta feels like my only hope for helping me stay out of it. Please. I let the second passionfruit go, skin like a bruise under the supermarket’s fluorescent lights.
Weigh. Bag. No reaction.
I decide to release the rest of my ammunition as one. Eight purple balls roll haphazardly towards her.
Jacinta finally looks up. She frowns, like she’s not exactly thrilled to see me, but then her expression softens slightly.
‘L.’ She picks up a passionfruit and holds it up. ‘I mean, obviously. Look, I’m kind of—’
‘No more life bombs,’ I say, moving up so there’s just the cash register between us. ‘And I’m not asking you to ditch your shift. I just want to talk to you on your break.’
Jacinta glances at the customer who’s appeared behind me. A speaker crackles and someone asks for a clean-up in aisle six.
‘Twenty minutes. At the bakery,’ she says, before gesturing at the pile of passionfruit. ‘You actually going to buy these?’
I scrunch my nose up in apology. ‘I’ve got a lot at home.’
Jacinta rolls her eyes, but a small smile crosses her lips as she deletes the fruit from the transaction on her screen.
Twenty minutes later Jacinta sits down next to me on the bench seat. I hand her a paper bag.
‘Chocolate and strawberry doughnuts,’ I say. ‘I didn’t know what your flavour of choice was, so I got both. You don’t have to eat them though if you don’t—’
She takes the bag. ‘Calm down. It’s not like you ran over my puppy. I forgive you, okay?’
I feel my eyes bulge. ‘You have a puppy ?’
‘What? No, it was just—’
‘Right. Sorry. It’s the sugar.’ I jiggle my knee. ‘I’ve had two caramel slices.’
Jacinta laughs and opens the bag, taking a bite of the glistening chocolate iced doughnut. ‘Well,’ she says after swallowing a mouthful. ‘I’m sorry too. For calling you a crap friend. You’re not.’ She lowers the bag to her lap. ‘You’re just dealing with a monumentally crap thing.’
I shrug. ‘Thanks. But I was being a tiny bit crap.’
She tilts her head to the side, thinking. ‘Just a tiny bit . ’
‘Okay.’ I turn towards her. ‘Tell me what you wanted to tell me on New Year’s Eve.’
Jacinta glances around the shopping centre at the people buying sushi and lottery tickets and groceries. ‘Now?’
‘Yes. I mean, if you want to. I promise I’m on this planet and I’m listening and not about to drag you off to go diving with great white sharks to escape my bad feelings.’
‘That would be pretty cool though.’
‘Agree.’
Jacinta looks down at her doughnut, shoulders slumping slightly. ‘Okay. So…I don’t think I want to do nursing. I think I want to do beauty therapy.’
‘Oh,’ I say, not really understanding what the big deal is. ‘Well, that’s really cool! You’d be amazing at that. Do you still have time to switch or…?’
Jacinta glances back up at me with a pained expression. ‘It’s not that. It’s like…’ she sighs. ‘I think I’d actually make a really good nurse. I’m great with my dad, you know. Everyone at Eden Gardens is always saying that. And I just feel really guilty and selfish wanting to play with makeup and wax eyebrows instead of helping sick people. But I think I’m good at both, you know?’
I nod, because she is.
‘But I think I like beauty stuff more,’ she continues, leaning back in the bench seat, doughnut forgotten. ‘It’s way more fun. Except…I feel bad having fun when my dad’s getting worse.’
My chest crumples for her and I nod again, because I can relate to that last bit. Grief, or whatever you call what she’s going through, makes everything so complicated. I open my mouth to tell Jacinta I get it, and everything else I think about her dilemma, but she beats me to it.
‘I know,’ she says. ‘Feeling guilty and selfish for not taking on a caring role I don’t really want and referring to the beauty industry as just “fun” is totally sexist, and I need to get over my internalised misogyny.’
I laugh a little. ‘I mean, sure. But I was going to say that maybe your dad would want you to have fun?’
She looks torn. ‘I guess. Probably.’
A beat of silence passes. ‘I’m really sorry he’s getting worse.’
‘Yeah. Thanks. It sucks.’
‘So…what are you going to do?’ I ask.
She shrugs. ‘Not sure yet. Flip a coin at the last minute?’
‘And if you don’t like the result, flip again?’
‘Exactly.’ Jacinta takes another small bite of her doughnut then scrunches the bag shut. ‘In other news though, Dinesh and I have been messaging. And I’m going to see his band tomorrow night.’
I squeal, which startles a small child in a pram nearby and hides my heart-cramp of Ben-related sadness and jealousy. ‘I am going to send you so many videos of mating animals!’
‘Go for it. But I’m warning you, it will completely stuff up your algorithm.’
I laugh, but bringing up animals has made me think of Ninja.
‘Hey,’ I say after a bit. ‘Remember that one transcendent thing theory I told you about?’
‘That we’re all unique and talented snowflakes destined for a specific type of greatness and our mission on earth is to discover it or be doomed to a life of mediocrity?’
‘Ha. Yeah. That one,’ I say. ‘So, it turns out Ninja was literally born transcendent.’ I explain about how unique her species is, how she matters to the world simply by existing.
When I stop talking, Jacinta narrows her eyes at me. ‘Um, L? Are you jealous of a bird ?’
I snort. ‘Honestly, yeah. I think I am.’
She shakes her head but she’s smiling.
‘It was Charlie’s theory too,’ I say then, softly, almost to myself. ‘He would have hated dying like that. For no good reason, not even attempting something adventurous or amazing. A random, non-transcendent death that means nothing.’ I so badly want what happened to Charlie to mean something. For there to be a reason. But maybe there isn’t one. Or maybe I’ll never know what it is.
Jacinta puts her hand over mine and squeezes. I see darkness at the edges of my vision, but I tense myself and somehow manage to push it away. I know it’s coming for me, though. Soon. Without life bombs to distract me, without much strength left to fight it, I know it’s only a matter of time before I tumble into the black hole and never come out.
Finally, I glance at the time on my phone. ‘Hey, isn’t your break almost over?’
Jacinta releases my hand and shakes her head. ‘Nope. Not until you tell me what happened with Ben.’
‘Ugh.’ I’m not sure I can distil the mess into one sentence, but I try. ‘Basically, he thinks I’m using him just to make myself feel better. Things got awkward.’ I recall the way he shut down, and realise how hurt he was. How maybe it was a hurt that was already there, like a bruise, and I just touched it.
‘Huh. A life bomb incarnate,’ Jacinta says. ‘Well, were you? I mean, using him to make yourself feel better?’
I wince. ‘I mean, yes. Kind of. But not in a bad, superficial way like he took it. I thought it was a compliment.’
She gives me a look that says I may not understand how compliments work. ‘ Riiight . So, honestly, you probably need to rethink your wording on this one…but maybe you should tell him that?’
I shrug. ‘I’m not sure he thinks we’re a good idea. In fact, his literal words were “this whole thing is a bad idea”.’
Jacinta looks sympathetic. ‘Okay, well…how about coming to see Dinesh’s band with me tomorrow night? They’re letting people in underage with wristbands. Pretty sure Ben’ll be there. You can find out for sure.’
I hesitate, torn between the possibility of making up with Ben and being humiliated by another rejection. ‘Yeah, maybe.’ But then a thought occurs to me. ‘What if Lockie’s there?’ I tell Jacinta what happened the other day. Lockie hasn’t messaged me again, and I don’t expect him too. I think it’s all done between us. But now I can picture him there, half watching Dinesh’s band and half bonding with Ben over what a total and complete mess I am. The girl-shaped bullet they both only just dodged.
‘Just come,’ Jacinta says. ‘And if it doesn’t work out, I’ll be there.’
I chew my lip for a moment but, finally, I agree.
That night I do the thing I’ve been psyching myself up to do for two days. I message Rach.
Um have we met? If you were four cats in a school dress, in what world would that make me not want to talk to you??? I’m sorry for not writing back and being a bitch Want to hang out so I can explain? Dinesh’s band is playing at the pub tomorrow night and I might be one of only three people going
I lie on my bed and wait for a reply. Two hours later there’s still nothing.