Chapter Nine #2
Emmett shrugged and went somewhat red. Luna couldn’t help but notice that he seemed taller this year.
She wondered if she’d still be bigger than him.
‘I just said I might. I thought it would be cool to like help people. And you can be a doctor anywhere, once you’re trained.
’ He looked out at the sea, his voice quiet.
‘I could have helped you with maths,’ he told Luna.
‘Oh, she hasn’t had the time to be studying, that’s all,’ Mae announced. Tanya’s eyes bounced between Emmett and Mae. The Man Plan didn’t feel like a good idea at all.
‘She’s been busy with boys all year. Taking virginities left, right and centre.’ Mae finished proudly as Tanya spat her drink on the floor and Cadence shrieked with laughter.
‘I think I’ll go and help Earl.’ Tanya stood up, her legs so thin, so small. Like a little deer.
‘Good job, Luna. Never realised you had it in you,’ Zadie said.
Luna wondered as to the logistics of swan diving off the edge of the cliff.
It wasn’t exactly high, and there was a sandy beach below, but at least she wouldn’t be here anymore.
With a bit of luck, an unexpected wave would come in and sweep her out to sea.
‘You know we could also…’ Ahmed waggled his eyebrows at Zadie. They were pretty substantial eyebrows, not as massive as Eyebrow Clive’s obviously, but still.
Zadie ignored him.
Everyone was laughing. Aside from Emmett, that is. Emmett looked furious. There were red patches high on his cheeks and he was looking away from them all.
Earl reappeared with a tray of cherry muffins. ‘How’s work going, Earl?’ Luna asked loudly over all the sniggering.
‘Sold a piece last week.’
‘That’s amazing! Which one?’
He settled down into his chair again as everyone made grabby hands for the cakes.
‘The Weight of Light.’
Luna knew exactly which painting it was that Earl had sold.
‘River one,’ Mae shouted, making a snapping sound with her fingers.
‘I think you’ll find it’s the Seine, Mae,’ Ahmed said.
‘That’s one of my favourites. Where’s it gone?’
‘Gregor came and took it for the same buyer who bought Longing for Human Connection last year.’
Longing was one of Luna’s favourites. It was a carousel horse, just one.
Sebastian was riding it and it was beautiful, super colourful and happy, but just a tiny bit sad.
It was the sort of thing Luna wished that she wanted to draw.
Earl’s paintings always seemed to her like proper art, the sort that people would hang in a gallery one day.
Luna had spent a whole week in January drawing a rotten apple she’d pulled out of the bin.
Each day, as it decomposed, she’d sketched it again.
No one was ever going to hang decomposing fruit on their wall.
‘Do you have anything to show us, Luna? We missed you sending us your work, didn’t we, Emmett?’
Emmett shrugged. ‘Suppose so.’ Cadence kept stroking his head, which made Mae roll her eyes.
To Luna though, watching them felt like physical pain. For a horrifying second, she worried that she was about to start crying, right here in front of everyone. Then she really would have to swan dive off the cliff.
‘She’s been super busy, you know what with all the…’ Mae did an exaggerated wink. That’s it, thought Luna. The Man Plan stopped tonight.
Luna coughed to clear her throat and hoped that no one noticed that her eyes were glossy.
‘I made a sculpture for Art. We used clay and recycled materials. It was on the theme of environmentalism, so I made a carp because they’re going extinct, and we’d learned about them in Geography. I have it eating a plastic bag.’
Luna had been able to tell, at the time, that other people in the class thought her sculpture was strange.
She’d purposely made it as ugly as possible, since global warming wasn’t exactly something nice.
Everyone said it was ‘interesting’ but they said it in a way that made her think that interesting was code for awful.
People always said her stuff was interesting.
She was trying to think about her sculpture some more, but it was hard to think clearly when Cadence was busy walking her fingers up Emmett’s arm.
‘What did you think about them as materials?’ Earl tried to bring her around. He always asked her opinion, and talked to her like a real adult.
Her mum had started to suggest it was strange that Earl wanted to hang out with Luna and the others. But Luna didn’t feel like that at all. Earl was like family.
‘They were steadier, I think, than paint. It felt more like they’d do as I asked them to.’
‘How interesting. Perhaps I like the element of surprise.’
‘You like the element of colour.’ Luna smiled because Earl’s art was always so colourful.
‘What are your plans for the rest of the summer?’ Tanya asked. She never talked much, and when she did her voice was always quiet, like she’d worn it out somehow. Emmett was looking at Luna, even as Cadence stroked his hair. It made her want to squirm in her seat.
‘Well, aside from all the kissing we hope to be doing, Tanya,’ Mae answered before Luna could stop her. ‘Not with each other, obviously, though if I wasn’t her sister, I’d be all over that.’
Not for the first time that night, Luna wondered if she could simply disown Mae as her sister.
‘I mean kissing other people.’ Everyone laughed – everyone except Emmett. Luna really wished they’d stop; they only encouraged her.
‘But, yes, aside from that we’ll just be tagging along with whatever you’re doing. Plus, Dad wants to see the birds again, he freaking loves those puffins.’
‘We were going to go to the dunes tomorrow,’ Zadie told them. ‘If you’re up for a walk?’
The dunes were a couple of miles away. Big sandy hills that led down to a great beach.
‘Sounds good. Are you coming, Mae?’
‘Sure,’ Mae said, taking another cake. Luna thought that she could probably relax now, since Mae’s mouth was full of cake.
But she should have realised that Mae was not averse to talking with her mouth full.
Normally she did it to annoy their mum, but it meant that she got a lot of practice in.
‘And hopefully Emmett will be in a better mood tomorrow. Because you know, Emmett, if I had someone as hot as Cadence sat on my knee, I don’t think I’d be looking quite so pissed off about it. ’