Escape from Year Eight Read online

  ‘You’ll get used to it,’ I say.

  ‘No way! I’m gonna miss you every single minute till I get over there to visit you.’

  ‘Me, too,’ Jazz says.

  ‘Yeah, but you haven’t got any money for the plane fare,’ Amy points out to him. ‘I’ve already saved nine hundred and twelve dollars.’

  Guess I better get a story ready about what happened to my koala twins that do tricks…

  Mum and I fly to England tomorrow. I don’t want to leave. The kittens are nearly as tall as Poppet now, with long, elegant legs. They were so funny this morning when we let them out into the yard. They’d never walked in snow before and at first they kept lifting up each paw really high and shaking it off before they’d take another step. Finally they saw that Poppet just ploughed through, so they did, too. Nadine said she’ll make sure they don’t starve till new tenants show up, but it makes me feel lonely to think of life without them.

  At the same time, I can’t wait to see Eve and Will. And especially Rick! Mum has decided Alex the Eye Candy was good for a treat, but not for a steady diet. I think it also helped that she found out Rick got a new girlfriend while she was gone. But, of course, he preferred her, and him and me and Eve have arranged for him to come to England as a surprise.

  We’re going to spend Christmas in Kent, then Eve is going to close the cafe and we’ll all travel around Britain for a couple of weeks. That means I’ll still have some time to see Dad and Sarah and the kids in Canberra before I have to go back to school.

  I’ll be in year nine! I wonder what Matthew and Stephen are like now. Vi sat the exam for MacRob, that school that only takes super-smart girls, and she got in – the traitor! She swears we’ll be as close as ever, but I’ve got my doubts about that.

  Nadine has insisted on driving Mum and me to the airport in her pick-up. ‘I haven’t had the heart to tell Spot you’re leavin’,’ she said when she called this morning to confirm arrangements. ‘Maybe you could come down tonight and break the news to him.’

  I promised I would. I also promised I’d write to her, the old-fashioned way, with paper inside an airmail envelope.

  ‘There’s nothin’ like the mailman bringin’ you a letter from a real person,’ Nadine said. ‘It gives you somethin’ to hold on to.’

  I know about that, I think, as Jazz and Amy and I let go of each other and head towards the house. After Leon ran away and Nadine and I rescued him, all sorts of rumours were flying around the school. They said Leon had tried to kill himself, that he’d tried to murder me and Nadine and that he was on drugs and was going to gaol for the rest of his life. The truth is, he got an official caution from the police. If he stays out of trouble, it’ll be expunged from the records when he turns eighteen.

  Meanwhile he’s gone to stay with his dad in Kansas City. Apparently he’s going to an alternative school. Carrie told Nadine the fresh start has been really good for him. ‘He ain’t turned into no chatterbox,’ Nadine said. ‘But he’ll say a word or two if he has to. They reckon they’ve decided at that school that he’s a real talented cartoonist.’

  I could have told them that. And he doesn’t just draw Indians any more. He sends me a new lot of cartoon strips once a week or so. They’re like little stories of what he sees and hears in the city. Some of the stuff he puts in the speech bubbles is really funny. Maybe I’m supposed to stick the cartoons on his wall, but I don’t. I’ve got them packed in my suitcase and when I get home I’m gonna start my own collage.

  ‘Has your mom got anything decent to eat?’ Amy asks as she takes off her boots in the mud room. She’s been here often enough to know we mostly exist on Weight Watchers products.

  ‘We’ve got heaps,’ I say. ‘Mum cleaned out the freezer and took out all the brownies and peanut butter cookies and apple turnovers Nadine gave us.’

  ‘Yum!’ Jazz kicks a boot off with such enthusiasm it skids across the floor.

  I laugh but my stomach hurts like it did when Shelly ditched me in grade six. I don’t want to lose Jazz. Or Amy.

  We go into the kitchen and Amy pops a half-thawed-out batch of cookies in the microwave. She grins at me. ‘Hey, Kaitlin,’ she says. ‘Now you’re going back Down Under, next time you run into Heath Ledger, get his number for me, okay?’

  I nod. If I say anything, I’ll cry. I’m about to look around for Jazz when I feel his arms around my waist.

  ‘Hey, you,’ he says.

  ‘Hi,’ I say, feeling a smile creep across my face. There’s no way I’m like I was in grade six. Even when Jazz and Amy are on the other side of the world, they’ll still be in my head. It’s like I’ve got this collection of people who love me, plus the odd dog and cat and hermit crab, and they are gifts I can carry with me anywhere.

  I pull Jazz’s arms closer around me. ‘I’m going to email you guys every week, okay? Maybe even call you sometimes.’

  Amy murmurs affirmative through a mouthful of peanut butter cookie. Jazz says, ‘You better. Otherwise I’ll send Simone over to sit on you.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to call the flying doctor,’ Amy says.

  Mum breezes into the kitchen and asks jauntily, ‘Anyone for hot chocolate?’

  I burst out laughing.

  ‘What?’ Mum looks put out.

  ‘You sound just like Bree from Desperate Housewives!’

  ‘I don’t know if that’s a compliment,’ she says doubtfully.

  ‘Sure it is,’ I say. ‘Bree’s skinny as.’

  I go over and give Mum a hug, thinking that her half-brained plan for an adventure hasn’t turned out too bad after all.

  About the Authors

  Anna Pershall

  I’m weird – there’s no denying it. I’ve never fitted in, but I think that’s the secret to being a good author: you spend more time observing people than actually being involved in their conversations. You learn a lot this way. I love learning and writing about people. I’m studying psychology, and I’ve also started writing a solo novel! It’s about something pretty complicated and for now the plot details are sealed (but let’s just say it’s not going to be along the lines of the Kaitlin series). I still have four guinea pigs, and my sister Katie is doing great as well. Hope to write lots in the future, and also work my way up to owning my own psychology practice (only seven years of school to go!).

  To all junior writers out there, keep reading and writing heaps and don’t be afraid to show your work to other people. My friends (people I occasionally hold hostage) have given me some constructive criticism which has helped me a lot. Never say die (I stole that, I know), and good things will come to those who work!

  Mary K Pershall

  When my parents first moved onto the land where my sisters and I would grow up, they loved to tramp the timbers in spring, hunting for morel mushrooms. One afternoon, searching amongst a bed of bluebells, Dad found something he would treasure until he died at the age of 89 – an arrowhead chipped from stone. For us this was a tiny, pointed reminder that before farmers arrived to turn most of that black soil between two mighty rivers into cornfields, other people had lived and hunted there.

  At school in the ’50s and ’60s, we were taught little about native Iowans. Yet on summer evenings my sister and I thought we saw tall, strong people with long hair looking into the windows of our farmhouse. We were scared of them and drowned out their soft voices by turning up the television. It was only in our dreams that the original inhabitants of our land could demand our attention. I thought it would be cool for Kaitlin to experience some of this, plus meet a few of the neighbourhood characters I loved so much when I was her age.

  As for now, I’m working on stories about a girl who’s not as afraid as I was to listen to shadowy people who others can’t see.

 

 

 
are this book with friends