Midnight crash by Tara zlick (i can read book club .txt) đ
- Author: Tara zlick
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think he just sits by the Yarra River (his favourite fishing spot) and stews.
God, itâs hard to see your dad down so badly. Although it has made me more
independent. I donât know any other fifteen-year-olds who do the laundry, cook spaghetti
bolognaise dinners and buy the groceries every week. I just want to get on with life.
Thatâs what Mum would have wanted. I try to tell him that, but thereâs a barrier between
us. I just donât feel like talking about these sort of things. I can talk for hours about
gossip, school, TV. Just not feelings. Thatâs probably why I have a boy as my best friend.
I feel freaky talking about feelings. I like action, as the saying goes, not words.
Dad sighed. âI have to get back on the treadmill,â he said. âBack to some decent
work. I owe it to you.â
âYeah, when youâre ready, Dad. You donât need to rush things.â
This wasnât true. I wanted him to get back to full-time work. I wanted him to be
able to buy me a decent birthday present instead of a Sanity record voucher I got this
year. Iâm in year ten, but Iâm still getting primary school presents. It didnât even buy me a
full-price CD! I want to come home without seeing him staring emptily at the car racing
on the box, or staring out the window as he shovels a saucepan of baked beans around.
Most of all, I want to be able to be a daughter, not a surrogate mother. The fact Iâm an
only child makes it worse. Iâve got nobody else to help me out.
âStacey, I have to get a move on. Weâre not saving anything. Your motherâs money
isnât going to last forever,â he said.
Thatâs whatâs saved us. Mumâs life insurance. Her superannuation insurance wasnât
much, but it still paid off the mortgage so we now own our house. But the insurance, I
think, let Dad off the hook. He preferred moping around and not dealing with stuff. Two
years after she died he still only works a couple of days a week. The money has dwindled
and if this continues weâll really be stuck. I know he hurts. I know he even suffers a bit of
depression from time to time. But what sort of life does that leave me with? A dead
mother and a dad thatâs all worn out.
âThen what about looking around for another job?â I said. âThereâs some decent
stores around thatâd need full-time work.â
âStace, itâs not that easy. Iâve tried, butâŠâ
I let him trail off. Itâs always the same. Spell out the problem and then discuss why
it canât be solved.
The next day at school Topps virtually dragged me towards the Year Twelve home
room where Caitlin was most likely to be. He was that excited.
âI thought computer geeks werenât interested in girls,â I said as we walked to the
portable. It came out more cutting than I meant (both about him being a geek and being
uninterested in girls), but I was feeling uncomfortable and silly about talking to Caitlin
and I felt angry at Topps because of it. What, exactly, were we going to ask anyway?
Topps wasnât an easy boy to upset. He never had been. âCâmon Stacey, youâve seen
Revenge of the Nerdsâ he said. âRemember that line: âAll jocks think about is sport. All
nerds think about is sexââ. Thereâs an honest truth about that quote.â
I pretended to be unimpressed and told him Iâd never seen Revenge of the Nerds.
Itâs hard to say if Topps is really a geek or not. He loves computers, he has an
encyclopaedic knowledge of movies, he can ace a test without studying and he wears
glasses that donât suit him. Also, he canât play sport to save himself, except for
badminton, and prefers to listen to video game soundtracks and electronica created by
MySpace weirdos than Video Hits. But heâs confident and friendly with strangers, which is decidedly un-geekish. And heâs not a real geek because he wears Globe skate shoes
and Ever Tough shirts his mum buys him. I think heâs a unselfconscious half-geek/halfcool
sort of guy, a bit like a werewolf that uncontrollably changes at every full moon. Itâs
a fairly good personality mix.
Weâve been best friends since year seven. We hooked up in the first week during a
game of softball. We both sat on the fence at the end of the batting line trying to avoid
playing. âDonât you think softball is, like, illogical,â he had said. âIt doesnât make sense.
You hit a ball, you run around a diamond and you just end up back where you started.â
âIâm thinking of making it more interesting by just running to first and doing a
handstand on the base,â I had said.
âIâll give you a can of Sprite if you do.â
âYouâre on.â
But I never got the chance. I got struck out and the ball was thrown to first base
before I took a step. I wouldnât have done it anyway. It takes a lot for me to do something
that makes me look ridiculous.
From then on we clicked. Weâd been through a lot together: the infamous
shepherdâs pie food poison outbreak at school camp, the school bus crash last year that
broke Trevor Gilchristâs nose; Helen Dudleyâs birthday party where Topps ignored me
after Iâd replied âtrueâ when asked the question: âYouâd rather kiss road kill than Peter
Topolski, true of false?â, and as a result we didnât speak for the rest of the night. And of
course, my mumâs death.
So heâs been a good mate.
We found Caitlin reading over school notes. Year twelves seemed to do nothing but
exams and homework. One of her friends â Becky someone, I think â was with her. They
both looked up at us in surprise.
âHi Caitlin,â said Topps. âI was wondering if we could talk to you for a minute?â
âWhat about?â she asked hesitantly. Obviously she had no idea who we were.
Topps looked at Becky and back to Caitlin. âItâs private,â he said. âItâs about the
Video Saloon.â Caitlin gave Becky an exasperated look. Becky turned up her nose at us and left,
obviously annoyed.
âWhat about the Video Saloon?â Caitlin asked, but before Topps could answer she
looked at me. âSay, donât you work there? You took over my job.â She didnât sound very
happy about it.
âYeah, I thought it would be good if Stacey apologised,â grinned Topps. âAnd while
weâre here, I was just wondering, did anything funny go on before you decided to leave?â
âWhat do you mean funny?â
âLike, anything that was perhaps not one hundred per cent normal?â
âWhy do you want to know?â
âStacey just has this feeling about the place, you know, that things are a bit weird.
Like that guy, Robert Keppler. We wanted to know a bit more about him â like, he freaks
Stacey out a bit, and I was sort of wondering, is he dangerous or what?â
âI only worked there Friday and Saturday evenings,â Caitlin said, âI donât remember
every customer.â
âHorror movie fanatic,â said Topps. âLikes the freaky stuff. Looks like that old
wrestler, The Undertaker, if The Undertaker had gone on a Subway diet.â
âOh, yeah, him. Robert Keppler. I sort of remember. I dunno, I was only there six
months. He seemedâŠharmless. I wouldnât worry about him. Nah, heâs just a bit weird,
thatâs all. Why, has he been hassling you?â
âNo,â I said, wanting to tie this pointless conversation up, âI just wanted to know.â
âHey Caitlin, why did you leave anyway?â asked Topps as I took his arm and
turned to leave.
âMy dad knows the manager of the new Blockbuster store. Iâm going to be working
there over summer.â
Which didnât answer the question because the school year wasnât over for a month
and Caitlin left the store around four months ago. I surprised myself by speaking up again
and asked, âHow did you find Vince and Colin?â I wanted to know if sheâd seen either of
them getting up to mischief down in the basement with the pirated discs, but I didnât want
to spell it out yet. I still didnât feel I could trust Caitlin enough.
âOh, I dunno, I wasnât there long, soâŠâ
The morning bell interrupted us. Caitlin seemed relieved. She told us she had to go
and quickly picked up her notes and rose from the bench. I saw Topps glance at her legs
as she did. I gave him a nasty look and he shrugged his shoulders, as if to say, ââSheâs
wearing a really, really short skirt, what did you expect me to do?â
âThanks Caitlin for your help, weâll see you round,â Topps called after her. She
ignored him. He seemed reluctant to leave but I dragged him away.
âSeems a bit strange,â I said to Topps as we walked to our homeroom. âCaitlin
wasnât telling us everything.â
âLike what?â
âI dunno. But she seemed uncomfortable, like she didnât want to talk about it at all.â
âPerhaps she was dazzled by my wit and charm?â said Topps.
âNo, Iâd reckon it was more freaked out.â
âWhy donât we just tell her about the pirated gear?â
âBecause we donât know all the facts yet. And that little discussion didnât help at
all. We didnât even ask her about the free rental credits. Besides, I donât feel comfortable
talking about it with her.â
Truthfully, I was almost ready to ignore the pirated discs anyway. If Topps hadnât
been so pushy about talking to Caitlin, I would have never gone near her.
Later that afternoon during lunch I left Skye (Topps had gone off with his mates to
the IT room) for a toilet break. As I walked into the toilet block with its harsh antiseptic
smell and faded graffiti half-heartedly rubbed off by the cleaner I bumped right into
Caitlin. She gave me a fright. âOh, sorry,â I said, a little shaken.
She ignored me. Instead she looked around, as if she didnât want anyone to hear.
She leaned over to me. I could smell sweet perfume and tangy shampoo on her skin.
âListen, I just want to add one more thing about that store,â she said, almost whispering now. âI didnât want to say anything in front of your friend, but watch yourself. Just keep
your head downâŠâ
Before she could finish her friend Becky called her from outside the toilet block.
âJust watch yourself,â Caitlin said hurriedly. She started to leave but stopped again,
turned to me and said, âAnd donât ask me anything about that store again, because I donât
want to talk about it.â
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