The Things We Promise

  First published by Allen & Unwin in 2017

  Copyright © J.C. Burke 2017

  The moral right of J.C. Burke to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the United Kingdom’s Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or ten per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.

  Allen & Unwin – Australia

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  Allen & Unwin – UK

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  A Cataloguing-in-Publication entry is available from the National Library of Australia: www.trove.nla.gov.au.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN (AUS) 978 1 76029 040 5

  ISBN (UK) 978 1 74336 953 1

  eISBN (AUS) 978 1 95253 565 9

  Cover and text design by Astred Hicks, Design Cherry

  Cover photo by Alexey Kuzma/Stocksy

  For Ned,

  REACH FOR THE STARS

  Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  1

  MARCH

  33 weeks to formal

  THERE ARE TWO THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW about me. The first is that I remember life by what I was wearing. The second is that I think too much.

  I know that night, the night when it all began, I went to bed wearing Billy’s black-and-white INXS T-shirt. It was my total favourite to sleep in. The cotton was soft and it was big and baggy. When I was cold I stretched it over my knees and watched Michael Hutchence’s face elongate as though he were staring into a trick mirror at an amusement park.

  I was trying to balance a cup of tea and a Cleo magazine on my lap when I spilt my tea everywhere. It kind of served me right because I didn’t even like herbal tea. I’d only convinced Mum to buy some because, according to Andrea, everyone was drinking chamomile tea at bedtime. It turned out that the tea was a greeny yellow colour – if I’d known that beforehand then I probably wouldn’t have tried to be a herbal trendoid – but at least it didn’t leave a stain on Billy’s T-shirt. Still, it was wet so I’d changed into the first one my hand grabbed off the shelf.

  Saul had bought this T-shirt for my brother but it was my least favourite. Obviously Billy didn’t like it either or he would’ve taken it back to New York, not left it on my bed for me to add to my sleepwear collection.

  Silence = Death. The big black letters stood out against the white fabric. How impressed would my English teacher be? I was wearing irony. Or rather it was wearing me.

  But that’s the thing about irony – you don’t always know it at the time.

  It was almost 10 p.m. and I desperately needed to call Andrea because after nearly three weeks of searching, I’d found the perfect hairdo for her. But the problem was that Mum had been on the phone for hours and Andrea would be going to bed any minute now because Elizabeth Taylor recommended eight hours of beauty sleep – and what Elizabeth Taylor said, Andrea did.

  Andrea had nominated me to find her a hairstyle that Billy could do for our formal, which wasn’t till the middle of October, but was pretty much all we could think about. It wasn’t just about the dress and the hair, we’re not total empty heads. It was also because my brother, Billy, Aussie from unknown suburb Down Under, had become one of New York’s ‘up-and-coming’ hair and make-up artists, and last Christmas he had made me a promise. A promise that no matter what, he would come home especially for my formal, because, in Billy’s words, he was going to ‘create magic’ on me.

  As soon as he’d made the promise, I’d asked Billy if he could do Andrea’s too.

  ‘As if I didn’t think I would be,’ he answered. ‘I mean, you two are virtually joined at the hip.’

  Andrea had been my best buddy since Grade 3. Or the ‘wind beneath her wings’ as she’d started calling me last holidays after we saw the movie Beaches. Bette Midler sang it about her best friend who dies at the end. Andrea blubbered so loudly that the usher shone a torch in her face asking her if she was okay.

  ‘How about you, Andrea …’ Billy suggested, then said, ‘and one other friend?’

  The second friend hadn’t been decided on. Justin said not to waste a position on him. He didn’t need Billy, because he could create his own magic with a jar of hair gel. Andrea wasn’t convinced we needed a third person. She reckoned the formal should be our moment to shine. Our turn to shove a couple of the up-their-bum prissy girls out of the way. Watch their jaws drop and their skin go green as for once everybody turned to look at us.

  But word somehow got around Year 11. According to Andrea, that was the reason why we suddenly found ourselves with a new ‘friend’. Louise Lovejoy.

  Louise Lovejoy had been one of those prissy girls until last year when she got off with Bronnie Perry’s boyfriend Simon Finkler, aka ‘the Fink’. Bad move.

  The following Monday, Louise Lovejoy turned up to school with a black eye and a nose that sat a bit flatter on her face. Within twenty-four hours she’d lost her looks and her popularity. Everyone still called her Louise Lovejoy to her face, but there were other names that I’d heard muttered along the school corridors.

  ‘Louise Lovejoy is definitely hanging around like a bad smell,’ Andrea had said a couple of weeks ago. ‘But you know what’ – when Andrea began to speak out the side of her mouth you knew she was about to deliver a whammy – ‘I don’t even know if Billy can save that face.’

  No one could hit the truth like Andrea and that’s why I loved her. I had seven minutes left to call her about the hairstyle I’d found. But Mum was still gasbagging on the phone – plus her bedroom door was closed. That meant she was talking to Billy and they could chat for hours. Lately he seemed to call every night.

  When I couldn’t wait any longer I knocked on the door. Mum didn’t say the usual, ‘Oh Billy, I hear the ears on legs.’ There’d always be a few seconds of silence as Billy replied. Then Mum’d answer, ‘Yes, it’s little sister Gemma. Shall we let her in?’ That was my cue to walk in and say a quick ‘hi’ to Billy. I was only ever allowed about thirty seconds because Mum would stand there mouthing, ‘This is costing a lot of money,’ even though Billy was the one who paid our phone bill. But this night, the night I wore the Silence = Death T-shirt, there was nothin
g when I knocked. Not a sound. So I knocked again, louder.

  ‘Piss off, Gemma!’ Mum shrieked, which had me scampering back to bed.

  I sat on top of the covers, trying to pull the T-shirt over my knees. That wasn’t Billy on the phone. That must’ve been my father.

  Andrea’s verdict was that the hairdo wasn’t right. Too Madonna and she’s more Cindy Crawford, which I interpreted as meaning it wasn’t ‘big’ enough. Billy had told me ‘big hair’ was over in New York but that he didn’t expect home to catch on anytime soon.

  I had a free period before lunch so it was back to hairstyle research. Hamlet, photosynthesis and World War I could wait at the back of the queue where they belonged.

  I sank into one of the library’s beanbags and started on a stack of magazines. They were mostly from last year, but Andrea wasn’t up with the latest fashion – even though she thought she was.

  Just as I’d got myself perfectly moulded into the beanbag, with just the right amount of beans on either side, Vanessa Harding walked in.

  The best thing about Vanessa was her twin brother Ralph. He was a major spunk on two legs. I’d only said about two hundred words to him and that was mostly in Literature Circle, which had ended last year, so it was unlikely I’d make it past two hundred and fifty by the time we’d finished high school.

  Vanessa was a model but she wasn’t one of the prissy girls. She didn’t really hang out with anyone, probably because she was away for half the school year and now she was repeating Year 10, which would seriously suck.

  For some reason, Vanessa seemed to be making a beeline for me. I tried not to look at her but it was hard not to have a quick peek. She didn’t walk like a model, her big glasses took up most of her face and the gap between her front teeth was wide enough to hold a cigarette (I’d seen this firsthand). But she had amazing thick dark hair and was very, very tall.

  ‘She’s not a natural beauty.’ That was Andrea’s opinion. ‘Vanessa’s look will date and she’ll be washed-up and out of business before school’s over.’

  ‘Hi, Gemma.’ Vanessa was standing right in front of me. It was a strain on my neck to look all the way up at her. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Oh, hi, Vanessa.’ I acted surprised. I didn’t want her to think I’d been watching her.

  ‘How are you?’ she asked again.

  ‘Good. You?’

  ‘Yeah, good.’ She was still vertical and I was wondering how long my neck could support this position. ‘Although Pride and Prejudice is so hard to read. It’s killing me.’ Vanessa groaned. She flopped into the beanbag next to mine, her legs spreading out in front of her. I looked at them thinking that apart from being ridiculously long, her legs looked just like mine. Not like a model’s. She had bruises, mozzie bites and knobbly knees that were dry on top.

  Vanessa pointed at one of my folders that was lying on the floor. ‘I love that picture of Madonna!’

  ‘It’s from Interview—’

  ‘Yeah, Interview magazine! That’s my total favourite.’

  ‘My brother sends them to me from New York.’

  Vanessa was nodding like she already knew. ‘Did Billy tell you we were hanging out last month? In New York, at a fashion shoot. It went for days and days,’ she said. ‘It was so boring except for Billy being there.’

  ‘You saw Billy?’

  ‘Just a few weeks ago,’ she said. ‘Cool, hey! You didn’t know?’

  I was shaking my head.

  ‘I love your brother. He’s become my family away from home.’

  My brother had told me when he’d met Vanessa for the first time last year. But I hadn’t really taken much notice because every time someone mentioned Vanessa all I did was think about Ralph.

  ‘As soon as he heard my accent he came up to me and said, “I bet you’re Vanessa.” ’

  Straight away my brain went into overdrive, flicking through all the things I’d probably said to Billy about Vanessa. She doesn’t have any friends. She has a hunky twin brother called Ralph. And I was sure I’d borrowed Andrea’s lines: She’s not a natural beauty. She won’t last. The list was incriminating but the only thing I desperately hoped Billy hadn’t let slip was the line about Ralph. The rest I could live with.

  ‘Billy was telling me how he’s flying in later this year for the formal. That’s so nice.’

  ‘I know,’ I agreed. ‘He promised.’

  ‘Does he ring home much?’

  ‘These days it’s pretty much every night.’

  ‘He’s probably lonely.’

  ‘No, it wouldn’t be that. Billy has a boyfriend, Saul. He’s a lawyer, or an “attorney” as they say in America. You know they’ve been together five years? They’re like a married couple.’ I didn’t know why I was telling Vanessa this. All I knew was that I couldn’t stop. ‘Saul comes home with Billy every Christmas. Except last Christmas. Last Christmas he couldn’t.’

  ‘I know,’ Vanessa answered, collecting her long limbs out of the beanbag and disappearing into the nonfiction shelves.

  I watched her, wondering why Vanessa Harding suddenly thought she was some expert on our family.

  After we’d eaten lunch, Andrea, Justin, Louise Lovejoy and I lay on the roof of the gymnasium, soaking up the last rays of summer and arguing over what length a formal dress should be.

  Andrea was convinced on long. I was fighting for short, and Justin’s all-important ‘guy opinion’ was that short was great but only if you had good legs. Louise Lovejoy didn’t seem to have anything to add, which was predictably boring of her.

  ‘Which one of you stinks of garlic?’ Andrea whined.

  ‘Guilty, your honour,’ I said. ‘Mrs C’s lasagne.’

  ‘That woman makes a totally wicked lasagne,’ added Justin. ‘I’ve only eaten it once and I still dream about it.’

  Of course Louise Lovejoy asked, ‘Who’s Mrs C?’ because she was still too new to the group to have heard any of my Mr and Mrs Carpinetta stories. Like when I was thirteen and I moved upstairs to their flat for two weeks while Mum and Aunty Penny went overseas to visit Billy. Mrs C made Mr C take all the soccer posters off their son’s old bedroom wall and replace them with Boy George posters because she knew I was obsessed.

  Even after Mum returned, I spent most of that year upstairs in their flat stuffing my face with lasagne or cannoli and watching Dallas while Mrs C plaited my hair, threading through ribbons of every colour. Just like Boy George.

  Mr C wasn’t sure about my idol. ‘I no understand this Bob George.’ He could never get his name right. ‘Man or woman, Gemma? He no decide. One day in dress, next day in trouser.’

  Some days when Mr C was on a rave about what the world was coming to, or as he’d say, ‘what the world gone to’, I’d catch Mrs C shaking her head at him. I knew what that meant. It was Mrs C’s warning to her husband not to let the ‘P’ word slip.

  Poofter. It wasn’t such a bad word. I never cared when Mr C said it. I’d heard worse from my father’s mouth. Phrases that had me imagining things I hadn’t known I could imagine. Poofter was fine with me. In fact, I rather liked the soft sound my lips made when I said it.

  ‘Hey, newsflash,’ I said, suddenly sitting up and giving Andrea’s leg a whack. ‘Vanessa told me she was hanging out with Billy at a fashion shoot in New York. Can you believe it?’

  Andrea sat up too and started speaking in the posh voice she adopted whenever Vanessa was the subject. ‘Ooooh, on the catwalk? How soooper. And what did Vanessa have to say about our Billy?’

  ‘Not much,’ I replied. ‘He told Vanessa he’s coming back for the formal.’

  The posh voice spontaneously combusted and Andrea was squawking. ‘Vanessa better not be expecting Billy to do her make-up and hair! That’d be so, so unfair because, because …’

  ‘… because she’s so pretty she doesn’t need any makeup,’ Justin managed to slot in. I shot him a you’re an idiot look and he grinned back.

  ‘You are mental in the head,’ Andrea began. A sn
orting giggle escaped from Louise Lovejoy, who hadn’t quite acclimatised to Andrea’s acts of tough love. ‘Do you really think someone like Vanessa …’ Andrea’s lips had narrowed and she had started to speak from the side of her mouth. I wanted to block my ears, or rather block Justin’s, because I feared what was to come. ‘… would actually notice a five-foot-two, fuzzy-haired boy who still plays Dungeons & Dragons?’

  Justin started laughing because he loved getting a rise out of Andrea.

  ‘Let’s go,’ I said, climbing off the roof. I didn’t want this to turn into one of Andrea’s hissy fits. Andrea could be a bad sport and I could feel a storm brewing around her.

  I have always been able to sense ‘bad’ coming. Not just with Andrea, with life too. Mum reckoned I was born a pessimist. ‘Polly Pessimistic’ she called me. She joked that the first expression I ever pulled was a frown. But it’s true, I can feel it. Sometimes I sense it early. Sometimes it’s not till it’s almost on top of me.

  At the moment a little bit of ‘bad’ was lurking at home. Why had Mum been talking to my father last night? My birthday was ages away and that was usually the only time Mum called him. ‘It’s just a gentle reminder, Garth,’ I’d hear her say. ‘No need to jump down my throat.’

  But Dad was a professional ‘jumper down the throat’. Whatever we did, it was never good enough. ‘How many times have I told you not to do it like that!’ was his all-time favourite line.

  When I was ten and Billy was eighteen, Billy’d take shelter in my room. He’d lie on my bed, flicking through the pages of his bankbook, calculating how long it’d be before he had enough money for an airfare to America.

  ‘Then I’ll be out of his hair forever,’ he’d say about Dad.

  But just before my eleventh birthday, Dad removed himself from our hair. He quit his job at the hardware shop and took a job up north, on an oil rig. I hadn’t seen it coming, not one little bit. At the start, I was mad. Then I began to miss him.

  The first year he came home for Easter and Christmas. Easter was bad but Christmas was really, really bad. That was when Dad had called my brother those horrible words that had me doing acrobatics in my mind. Limp-wristed, pillow-biting, doughnut-punching bum bandit. There were more, but I tried my hardest not to remember them. I didn’t miss him again after that.