Finding Freia Lockhart Read online

  “What time do you want to come over tomorrow?” she asks me, completely ignoring Siouxsie. “I’m going to the Bs’ hockey match in the morning, but I’ll be home by lunchtime.”

  Siouxsie looks bemused but not surprised by Kate’s behaviour. She gives me a see-you-later smile before heading in the opposite direction.

  “Thank God she took the hint,” says Kate, as if she’s just averted a major crisis. “Seriously, Freia, if I hadn’t been here to rescue you, you could’ve been stuck talking to Morticia for ages.”

  Now she really sounds like Bethanee. I feel a wave of anger rising within me but remind myself that Kate’s still my best friend and try not to let my feelings show on my face.

  I look pointedly at my watch. “I’m late to meet Nicky. I’ll see you around three tomorrow.”

  5

  Nicky’s waiting for me outside school in her rusted-out baby-poo brown VW. Usually, we meet at my house for our weekly study session. But today she’s taking me to her friend’s new cafe as a reward for finally finishing Animal Farm, which has been a pretty hard slog for both of us. (Even after writing an essay on it, I’m not convinced that talking pigs were the best way to make a point about the Russian Revolution, but I guess that’s wacky old Orwell for you.)

  Nicky’s the person I admire most who I actually know (as opposed to Cate Blanchett who I think I can say with some certainty I’ll never get within spitting distance of – not that I’d be spitting at her if I did). Nicky’s twenty-five and wears cool fifties-style dresses from op shops and her hair’s a different colour almost every week due to her sharing a house with a couple of hairdressers. She’s smart, too – her Masters thesis was about medieval literature or something unfathomable like that. And she’s the only person in my life who seems to really get me, especially when it comes to my parents. (Mind you, Mum’s her PhD supervisor, so she probably knows what I’m on about there.)

  The cafe is called Switch. It looks like a cross between someone’s lounge room and an art gallery. It’s way too cool for Parkville, where the only other cafe is Edna’s Eatery (specialising in Devonshire teas and toasted ham and pineapple sandwiches). We sit on one of the old sofas covered in mismatched cushions.

  “So, what’s news this week?”

  “Not much. I auditioned for the school musical.”

  “Great!” Nicky’s always telling me that I should put myself “out there” more. “How’d you go?”

  “Let’s see–” I say as if I have to think about it. “Not well enough to actually appear onstage.”

  Nicky looks disappointed for me. “Sorry, matey.”

  “I don’t care! I didn’t want to do it anyway – I only auditioned because Kate insisted.”

  “I guess your folks wouldn’t have been too thrilled about it either, eh?”

  “Now, surprisingly, that’s where you’re wrong.” The waiter sets down our hot chocolates and a fat slice of double-fudge chocolate cake, compliments of Nicky’s friend. “Would you believe they’re trying to make me take some lame backstage job doing lighting? Apparently, Mum’s kiddie shrink approves of such things.”

  “I take it you’re not keen on the idea?”

  “Are you joking? I’d rather eat a pair of Ziggy’s footy shorts. You’re my only hope, Nicky. Please tell Mum you don’t think I should do it.”

  “Why would I do that? I think it’s a great idea. I was in the school musical when I was in Year Ten.”

  What? I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Nicky was once a school musical wannabe? Maybe I’ll have to re-evaluate my “cool” rating system.

  She gets a faraway look in her eyes as if she’s picturing herself back at the scene.

  “We did Grease. I was meant to play Pinky, but on opening night Cheryl Tooting got diarrhoea and I got to be Sandy. That’s how I met my first real boyfriend, Mitch. He was playing Danny. Talk about hot summer nights …”

  I refrain from making the gagging noise Ziggy does every time a soppy love scene comes on the telly. “Come on, Nicky,” I plead. “You know you’re my last hope. Think of all the study time I’m going to miss if I have to go to rehearsals three times a week, and I really have to nail my Pride and Prejudice presentation after only just passing the last one. Pleeeease.”

  I hope the note of (genuine) desperation in my voice will sway her, but she shakes her head. “Sorry Fray, I have to agree with your mum on this one. Besides, think of all the cute guys you’ll meet.” Oh, good grief, not Nicky, too.

  “You may not have noticed, Nicky,” I say more snappily than I mean to, “but guys aren’t really into me.”

  “That’s just because you never get to meet any, Ms My Parents Keep Me Locked in the Basement. After all your whingeing when they wouldn’t let you go to Siouxsie’s party, I would’ve thought you’d jump at the chance. Speaking of cute, check out the guy in the corner.”

  I look to where she’s indicating with a not-so-subtle twitch of her head and see a lanky Parkville High boy, whose face is obscured by a long fringe, shovelling lasagna into his mouth like he hasn’t eaten in days.

  “Clearly, I’m missing the appeal.”

  “What? Come on, he’s cute!” insists Nicky. “He looks like a cross between a young Mick Jagger and Joey Ramone circa 1983.” Now Mick Jagger (both young and otherwise) I’m familiar with, due to the fact that my parents haven’t bought any music since 1981 and they own every Rolling Stones album released before then on vinyl, but I’ve never heard of the other guy.

  “Joey who?”

  Nicky sighs. “Sorry, I forget I’m an ancient old crone compared to you. Joey Ramone was lead singer of the Ramones. When I was fifteen I thought he was the hottest thing on two legs. He wore his fringe long and his jeans tight.”

  “And this was a good thing?”

  “Trust me. I’ll burn you a CD. Now, enough cake-y indulgence and boyspotting! On with business. Pride and Prejudice: what do you think?”

  “I think I haven’t quite finished it yet,” I say, trying not to visibly squirm in my seat.

  “Haven’t quite finished it yet meaning you’re more than halfway through, or haven’t quite finished it yet meaning you haven’t actually started it?”

  After more than a year of EE tutoring, Nicky’s pretty much got me pegged. “If I say I haven’t started it yet, will you stop me from doing the musical?”

  Nicky tries not to smile. “If you say you haven’t started it yet, I’ll suggest Gene sends you to one of those junior talent schools to further your love of musical theatre.”

  I promise to start the book over the weekend.

  While Nicky’s saying goodbye to her friend, Mick/Joey glances our way. (Well, he lifts his head in our direction – whether he can actually see anything through the thicket of fringe is another matter.) For a moment I imagine that he thinks Nicky’s my older sister, which would be a cool thing for people to think. Then I realise that he probably just thinks she’s hot and hasn’t even noticed me, possible familial ties or not. Yep, far more likely.

  After dinner I google Pride and Prejudice to try to find a detailed-but-short precis as a warm-up to reading the actual book. (Yes, I admit I’m a procrastinator but, considering Dad’s been working on his first novel since before Ziggy was born, I reckon I can blame it on my genes.)

  After clicking on a few promising links I realise there are two kinds of Jane Austen nerd online:

  1. those who summarise every single paragraph, so you may as well read the whole book

  2. those who write hardly anything about what actually happens in the book because they’re so busy gushing about Darcy.

  I decide it’s time for a break and type “Joey Ramone” into the search box. Apparently, there are “about” 1 710 000 sites that have something to do with this guy. Am I the only person in the world who hasn’t heard of him?

  I click on a link at random and wait what feels like half an hour for the page to load (damn you, dial-up internet!), revealing a photo of a lanky guy with
– you guessed it – a long, thick fringe. He’s wearing sunglasses, tight black jeans, basketball boots and a leather jacket. This is the guy that Nicky lusted after in high school? I’m seriously beginning to doubt her taste in men. (Plus, the guy died in 2001, which makes him two million per cent less sexy, even if he can’t help that.)

  Mum walks behind me on her way to the fridge and I minimise the browser, cursing the complete lack of privacy in our house. I’ve been campaigning to get the computer moved out of the kitchen (and into, say, a room with a door) for months, but Mum’s read all sorts of stuff about kids who get hooked on chat rooms and get conned into believing they’re chatting with spunky boys who may be Neighbours stars lurking incognito when really it’s some pervy old fart. In our house the internet is strictly for research and writing thank you emails to Grandma Thelma, who’s moved to Queensland because she reckons the humidity makes her perm and set last twice as long.

  Mum pretends that she hasn’t a) glimpsed a photo of a guy who’s unlikely to be president of the Jane Austen fan club, or b) noticed my none-too-subtle attempt to look busy by clicking randomly on the icons on the desktop.

  “How’s the research going? Anything I can help with?”

  Now, if my mother was another kind of mother altogether, I could say to her, “Actually, mother dearest, since you lecture in English Literature and have given countless talks on Jane Austen in general, and Pride and Prejudice in particular, could you please give me a brief run-down on the main points to look out for in the book so I can underline them in the text and skim read the rest?” But Mum’s not one of those parents who’ll finish your assignment when it’s due first thing in the morning and you’ve been working on it all night and it’s really late and you really need to get some sleep. She wants to discuss everything and “let you draw your own conclusions”. It’s easier to read the book.

  “Thanks anyway, but I think I’m done.”

  I resign myself to starting Pride and Prejudice, painfully aware that I am probably the only teenager in Australia who is actually doing homework on a Friday night. I fall asleep halfway through the third chapter, by which time I’ve decided that I hate all of the Bennet sisters, their annoying mother and wet Bingley, too.

  6

  In some households Saturday is a day to sleep in, perhaps go out for breakfast at a cafe or indulge in a spot of window-shopping. At our place it’s the busiest day of the week. Chores are shared in our family, with a rotating roster of tasks to ensure that we all have to do the gross stuff like emptying Boris’s kitty litter (unless Mum catches you slacking off, in which case you get stuck on toilet cleaning for the next two weeks).

  Mum insists we all have breakfast together first, even though Ziggy and I have begged to be allowed to sleep for an extra half hour instead. Dad always makes pancakes to try to cheer us up. Dad’s pancakes taste like sawdust and have the texture of Spakfilla, complete with lumpy bits. It’s hard to tell whether he keeps making them because he actually likes them or if that’s just as good as it gets for Dad in the kitchen.

  Once we’ve dusted, polished, vacuumed and sanitised the house, we move on to the next part of our routine. For Ziggy this means playing whatever sport he’s captaining the A-grade team of that season, which Mum and Dad take turns to accompany him to. For me this means going to the supermarket with whichever parent is left. They pretend they need me to help them decide which toilet paper’s better value or whether we should have organic chops or free-range chicken for dinner, but we all know that it’s part of Mum’s regime of Family Bonding.

  “Don’t forget my Milo,” calls Ziggy as Mum’s car pulls out of the driveway. I make a mental note to steer Dad clear of the beverages aisle.

  “Ready, Saus … er, Fray?” asks Dad from the doorway, laden down by a million green shopping bags.

  It’s hard to say which is worse: shopping with Dad and watching him squirm as he makes awkward small talk, or going with Mum and having her talk at me the whole time about what I should be doing and wearing and saying if I want to be a Successful Teen.

  Dad heads down the pasta aisle. “So, when do rehearsals start for the play?”

  “It’s a musical, Dad,” I remind him for the sake of watching him wince, “and they start on Monday.”

  “Every Monday?”

  “Monday, Wednesday and Saturday afternoons.”

  “Well, I guess we won’t be doing this together for a while then.” It takes me a second to get what he means, and then it hits me: if rehearsals are every Saturday from twelve till four there’s no way I’m going to be able to fit in a trip to the supermarket beforehand! It’s hard to say at this point whether rehearsals will actually be less painful than Family Bonding, but a change is as good as a holiday, as they say (whoever “they” are).

  We make it as far as toiletries without incident and I’m just thinking that Dad’s doing pretty well for once, even if he has come out in his clogs and cardigan. I pause to look at the hair dyes (dream on, Mum thinks dyeing your hair gives you cancer of the head; it’s her excuse for letting hers go grey) when I hear Dad’s voice booming: “Do you need more tampons, Freia?”

  I feel my face turn five shades of red as I march past him, pretending that he is a crazy man who chats to himself about women’s sanitary products and not someone whose genetic material I carry. I duck into the cleaning products aisle and see Bethanee with a well-dressed woman with long, blond (dyed) hair. They’re giggling about something near the washing powders. I turn back before they spot me and find Dad trying to decide between the three-ply or extra large tissues, apparently oblivious that he is the Worst Parent in the World (or at least in Parkville Metro).

  “What do you think, Fray? Would bigger or thicker hold more snot?” I throw the three-ply into the trolley and head for the check-out.

  We unpack the groceries in silence, after a silent ride home.

  “I’m sorry, Fray. I didn’t realise how loudly I was speaking. It was thoughtless.”

  I slam the cupboard doors closed to indicate my agreement and grab my bag from the hallway. “I’m going to Kate’s to study,” I tell him, careful not to mention that we’re studying My Fair Lady.

  Kate is speechless when I tell her the supermarket story, capable only of slowly shaking her head from side to side. One thing in Kate’s favour, she knows how to appreciate bad parental behaviour.

  “That’s possibly the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever heard,” she says finally. “I don’t think my dad even knows what a tampon is, let alone that I use them.”

  The Smiths are like a proper family from the TV. They live in a nice new house with pale carpeting and a spa in the ensuite bathroom. Kate’s mum works part-time and always comes to pick her up from school if it’s raining or if we get back late from an excursion. Mr Smith works in an office in the city and wears a suit every day and plays golf on the weekend. Plus, they have a cleaner, so Kate and her sister Emily never have to do any chores except keep their rooms tidy. Mum says the Smiths are bland, but I wouldn’t mind swapping once in a while.

  We watch the DVD in the family room on the enormous widescreen TV with surround sound. With the lights down, it’s almost like being in an actual cinema. The movie’s okay, I guess. Some of the songs are pretty lame, but perhaps I’ve inherited Dad’s bias there. During the ball scene, when Audrey Hepburn’s all dressed up and looking amazing, Kate says, “Just think, that’ll be Belinda soon”, which pretty much ruins the rest of the film because all I can think about is how big Belinda’s head’s going to be after this play.

  As soon as the credits roll, Emily kicks us out of the living room so that she and her new boyfriend, Damian, can pash (even in the Smith household there’s a no-boys-in-bedrooms rule). We go to Kate’s room and she reads out highlights from her latest magazine. I think she’s addicted to them. She gets a new one every week and doesn’t seem to realise that they all say pretty much the same thing. I pretend to listen as she waffles on about whether you can get away
with sequins during the day and how often you should reapply your fake tan. There are a couple of little kids on their bikes outside and I’m jealous of them. I miss the days when Kate and I actually used to do stuff instead of just sitting around talking about the importance of accessories or whether the letters in DOLLY Doctor are real.

  Finally, she puts the magazine down. “Are you getting excited?”

  “About what?”

  “About rehearsals starting on Monday, stupid! I was talking to Belinda and Bethanee after their match this morning and they think it’s going to be the best fun. It’ll be so cool us all hanging out together so much, don’t you think?”

  “I guess so. I mean, I’ll be wherever the lighting stuff is …”

  “I’m so nervous! I’ve never even spoken to a guy who wasn’t related by blood to one of my friends or going out with Emily. Are you nervous?”

  “Well, I wasn’t till you mentioned it, but–” I’m interrupted by the phone ringing.

  “Sorry, Fray, that’ll be Brianna,” Kate says, jumping off the bed to grab the extension in the hallway outside her room. I take the hint that the phone call is my cue to leave.

  Mum’s sitting on the couch reading a book when I get home. She seems pretty engrossed in it, so I think I might be in with a chance to sneak by, but she calls me as I tiptoe up the hall.

  “Freia, I’d like to talk to you, please.” Ah good, she’s using the Lecture Voice. I go into the lounge and sit on the couch facing her. “I hear you and your father had a little scene in the supermarket this morning.”

  “If by ‘scene’ you mean that he embarrassed the crap out of me, then yes.”

  “Language, Freia! Anyway, you know he didn’t mean it. Your dad’s not the most subtle person in the world, but he means well. He’s really upset.”

  “I was really upset, too. There was a girl from my school there; she probably heard everything. Why can’t he just be a normal dad who wears polo shirts and boat shoes and cleans the car on weekends?”