Blue Water High (8 page)

Finally she got through. She heard her mother's voice and was about to let loose with her flood of questions when she realised it was the answering machine.

‘Hello. This is Sandy!'

Fly had always got a kick out of her mother's name. Her mother hated the beach more than life itself, and yet her name was Sandy. Today Fly only cared that it wasn't her mother's real voice on the phone. She paced some more, waiting for the message to play through.

‘You've reached the Watsons. You can leave a message for me …' There was a pause while Sandy passed the phone to Fly's dad, George, who said his name in that soft, gravelly voice she knew so well, and then on to each of Fly's sisters to do the same. First Kate, then Josie, then Liz, then Jen, then Nell, in chronological order – oldest to youngest.

Fly remembered the first time they did it. She remembered the scuzzie answering machine they picked up on the street on hard rubbish day. Her sister Liz had fixed it, though the messages they got always sounded like they'd come from aliens. The phone was in the kitchen and there was a patch of worn lino the exact length of the phone cord. Her mum was a pacer. The minute she opened her mouth, Sandy's legs would take off. One length of the phone cord in one direction, then back the other way … until the lino had worn down to the boards. They knew there was no point replacing it, Sandy would just wear the new stuff down with her talking too.

Fly waited impatiently for the phone message to end.

‘Hi. It's me. It'd be really good if someone picked up the phone … Mum? … Dad? … You said it was urgent. Is anyone hurt? Can you call me back, please, as soon as you get home? I'll be right by the phone.'

She hung up and just stood there. She didn't know what else to do. In the so-not-dramatic Watson house, ‘urgent' was one of those words not tossed about lightly.

She turned around and saw Heath dripping in the kitchen. Jilly would have a fit at the amount of the Pacific Ocean the two of them had invited into the house. Heath just looked at her questioningly, wanting to know what was going on. Fly's head was ramping forward like a freight train, so fast that she failed to start at the beginning …

‘They took my name off the answering machine.'

Heath frowned. ‘That was the emergency?'

Fly shook her head. She didn't know what the emergency was, she just knew they'd taken her name off the answering machine and it didn't feel right.

‘You're not there. You don't live there anymore.'

It was true, but after today, after feeling like maybe she was way, way out of her depth, Fly didn't want that to be true. Nothing seemed to be going right here, and something was clearly wrong at home and she just wanted to be back there. Right now.

She looked at the phone, willed it to ring. But the phone didn't care what she wanted. Fly slid down the wall, ending up sitting in the puddle of water she'd just dripped onto the floor. The clock ticked loudly. It ticked … and ticked … and ticked some more.

It kept right on ticking until it was dinner time. Fly hadn't moved an inch – even when Jilly threatened to mop right over the top of her. She sat there on the floor watching Bec and Edge arguing about the best way to cook sausages. They were rostered to cook in pairs and these two were off to a feisty start.

At 6.45 the phone rang. Fly sprang on it like a cobra.

‘Hello?' She could hear how desperate her voice was.

It was for Perri, who lounged at the kitchen table flipping a fashion magazine. As soon as Perri heard it was for her she started frantically pointing at the fluoro pink list tacked to the noticeboard. Perri had been very specific
about how they were to handle her messages. If Jason rang, she was home. Mark Fisher – she was out. Derek – she'd moved interstate. It went on and on like that. She knew it looked complicated, but if they just followed the chart it would be fine. Fly didn't understand why she'd given out her number to people she wasn't sure she wanted to talk to in the first place. To Perri, it was completely obvious – she wanted to keep her options open.

This call was from Aaron, someone who made it onto the list of people Perri was home for. Fly told Aaron that he'd have to make it quick because she was waiting for an urgent call.

Perri took the phone and gave Aaron her mobile number.

Bec shot Fly a look. ‘Aaron must be something really special to get the mobile number.'

When Bec and Edge brought their smouldering plate of sausages to the table, Fly was still pacing around the phone. As she put the plate down Bec announced to them all that Edge reckoned they could cook the sausages in half the time at twice the temperature – she would let them be the judge of whether he was on a winning idea there or not.

Heath picked up one of the sausages and snapped it in half. ‘Wow. That's quite a feat.'

‘Someone told me eating burnt stuff gives you cancer,' Perri added.

‘I mean,' said Heath, ‘to cook them to the point of being snappable without actually causing a fire … Amazing, really.'

Edge glared and shoved some more of the black sticks of meat into his mouth. Fly could actually hear the sausages crunching in there.

Bec clearly wasn't going to touch hers. She was sending a text instead: an emergency call to home. They needed something decent to eat, and they needed it now. Fly wished that the emergency going on at her house was the same level of importance, but she doubted it.

The phone rang again at 7.30. This time it was for Anna. Fly could hear a leathery old woman's voice, but she couldn't tell what she was saying … She stared at the noticeboard again. She saw the word
Grossmutter
and put two and two together. It was Anna's grandmother calling from Germany. Anna didn't want to talk to her caller either; she loved her dear granny, but that didn't mean she wanted to spend an hour on the phone every day assuring her that she was looking after herself.

Fly peered at the note Anna had left and clumsily started to speak the German words. Anna gave her a smile, and a thumbs-up.

‘Um … Anna est im … bahn wahn! ‘

And then Anna's face changed, she was waving her arms in alarm. She jumped up and grabbed the phone from Fly, talking away in high-speed German.

Fly looked to the others – she just said that Anna was in the bath, didn't she?

Matt shook his head. ‘You said
bahn wahn
not
bad wane
… Anna's in the railway for mad ideas.'

Fly just nodded slowly. Everyone was staring, waiting for her to say something. ‘I just don't understand why they're not calling back!'

Jilly marched through. ‘Why don't you have a shower, Fly. If they call, I'll come right up and you can wet my floor all over again.'

She could see them all feeling for her. And it was
enough to send her up the stairs. If she was going to cry she didn't really want an audience.

Heath came and sat on her bed after she got out of the shower.

‘Thought you might like a wrestle.'

‘A wrestle?' It was the weirdest suggestion Fly had heard in a while.

Heath bounced on the bed a bit, like he was warming up.

‘Always helps me when I'm feeling a bit toey. Or a pillow fight. Excellent for getting rid of some antsy energy.'

Fly let herself think about it for a moment. Her and Heath, rolling around on the floor … She didn't think so …

She was about to politely decline when she copped a pillow – BAM! straight in the face. It shocked her into a laugh.

‘See? You look better already.'

He was right and she suddenly liked him enormously for it. It seemed that Heath was going to be an excellent friend to have.

Jilly appeared in the doorway. ‘Your mum left a message on the phone while Anna was talking to her grandmother.'

Fly could feel the laughter falling away fast.

‘She doesn't want you to panic. Your sister Nell has glandular fever. Maybe also hepatitis …'

Fly's stomach sank. ‘She's in the middle of doing her final exams!'

She was off the bed in a flash, headed back to the phone, but Jilly barred the way.

‘They're at the hospital. The results will come back at nine and they'll call you as soon as they know anything.'

Fly was already doing the maths. There was a three-hour time difference between Sydney and Western Australia. Nine o'clock there would be midnight here. She was going to die waiting. But unless she could work out a way to reach up into the night sky and give the world a bit of a spin, she was just going to have to wait.

Those snail-paced numbers, slowly ticking over, were all Fly could think about. She knew every time she looked at the clock she was making it worse but she couldn't help herself. She tried to eat. Bec's emergency call had delivered excellent results. Within half an hour Bec's little brother Ben appeared in the doorway with a basket from Bec's mum. There was a seafood bonanza, including crumbed prawns and calamari and the sweetest little pieces of fish – all those critters the Tangaroa was supposed to be protecting. For dessert there was a blueberry crumble and ice-cream. Jilly pretended not to notice, but as they were finishing up she passed by the dining table and let them know this was a oncer. She hoped they'd enjoyed it, because tomorrow the chef's hats were on Perri and Matt. Bec's mother was
not
going to be taking over cooking responsibilities for a year.

Bec's mum rocked up after dinner to pick up the plates. She was a carbon copy of Bec, just a little bit worn around the edges. She was wearing shorts and a tank top that Fly
wouldn't have been surprised to see on Bec. She was sure there was probably a fair bit of wardrobe swapping in the Sanderson household. It made her miss her mum, standing there watching Bec and her mother gossiping about family affairs. Not that she'd be seen dead in anything she'd raided from her mum's wardrobe. Sandy Watson was seriously addicted to beige. But it didn't matter, Fly missed her all the same.

By 10.30 she was exhausted with worrying and crawled into bed. She knew she wouldn't sleep till she'd had the phone call, but at least her body could pretend. Anna headed in, toothbrush still in her mouth. She put her mobile phone down on Fly's bedside table.

‘Call the hospital and leave them the number.'

Fly hesitated, she wasn't used to taking favours, especially ones that cost money, but Anna insisted.

‘I've got cheap rates at night. And let's face it, I don't know anyone here yet to call.'

Fly smiled. ‘If I had a mobile, you could call me.'

Anna smiled back. ‘Better get you one, then.'

Fly left the message and then, too restless to stay in bed, got up and wandered the house. She didn't turn any lights on in case she woke the others. After that morning's torture session with Deb and Simmo, Jilly had been proved right. No-one needed to be talked into the sack that night. Even as she thought that, there was an explosion of boys' laughter from upstairs. She couldn't help herself, Fly found herself magnetically drawn to it. As she moved up the corridor she could hear a truly awful sound.