Future Girl Read online

  I change the image to a close-up of Organicore’s most popular meal, the ice-cream burger. Suddenly everyone turns to Alyssa – she must have said something, because scorn spreads across the room. I check Lisa’s face, which is stern. She addresses Alyssa, but the only words I catch are ‘Piper’ and ‘health’. She nods at me to continue.

  ‘At first,’ I go on, louder than before, ‘Nutrium Sustate was mixed with wheat or rice, but it was too complicated to create perfectly balanced meals that way. So they developed BioSpore. The second generation of recon, with preventative medicines, wasn’t released until Adhya had sold the company.’

  Now everyone’s stopped paying me any attention at all – even Lisa, who’s fiddling with her wristlet. I suppress a sudden urge to shout what Mum told me about Karen Kildare to them all. That’d get their attention.

  The bell saves me. I might not hear the class chanting, but I always hear the bell – a devastating, whirling sound that obliterates all else.

  I check the battery on my wristlet – still only half full. I’ve been trying for quick top-ups at the desk charger in as many classes as I can. At least school is good for something.

  It’s dark outside in the hallway without the lights. I stand against the wall to avoid being crushed by throngs of Mary Magdalene’s ‘ladies’ and call Taylor. She appears on my wristlet screen standing in a field of brown grass. Huh?

  ‘Where are you, Tay? You coming to school?’

  She shakes her head and says something I can’t make out.

  ‘What? It’s loud here.’

  She bites her lip and I watch her type with one hand. ‘In Seymour. Not coming.’

  ‘What are you doing in Seymour? How did you get there?’ I hold the wristlet close to my mouth when I speak.

  ‘Train,’ she types back.

  ‘But it’s so expensive!’

  ‘Beau can afford.’ She’s always abrupt when she has to type.

  ‘Is his family super-rich?’ I ask.

  But Taylor’s looking away, talking to someone offscreen. Something dodgy is going on.

  When she looks back at me, I ask, ‘Did Beau pay for your implant? How did you get your parents to agree?’

  She laughs and types: ‘He paid. Not shown parents yet.’

  ‘Tay, what?’ If her parents didn’t authorise the implant then it’s totally illegal. And if they haven’t seen it yet, she mustn’t have been home in ages. ‘Are you living with him now?! You’ll end up in trouble!’

  ‘Do I look like I’m in trouble?’ She moves her wristlet down and I see she’s wearing another new outfit – a gorgeous black velvet jacket and soft white shirt with a high ruffled neck. Then she says, ‘Gotta go,’ and disappears from the screen.

  ‘What about the conclusion for our assignment?’ I message to her, but she doesn’t answer. I was going to ask if she wanted to come to the food-growing workshop, but there doesn’t seem to be much point.

  I hate lunchtime without Taylor – I never know what to do with myself, and it’s even worse now I don’t even have any lunch to eat. I trudge past the art room and glance inside longingly. Alice, my art teacher, is in there. She gives a friendly wave and gestures for me to come in, so I do.

  ‘Yanno yacacami do arta lish times, if you’d like.’

  Lish? Nope. Yanno? Maybe you know?

  ‘What did you say?’ I ask.

  She faces me more squarely and speaks again, slowly and clearly this time: ‘You know you can come in and do art at lunchtimes, if you want.’ It’s a bit too slow and embarrasses me – I’m not stupid! But at least I understand her this time.

  Art at lunchtimes? I thought we all had to go outside! I help her clear away the mess from the previous class. ‘What are they for?’ I ask, pointing my head at a bunch of tiny knives of assorted sizes, some with odd-shaped blades that form little Vs and Us.

  ‘Rubbastum.’ She holds out a thick sheet of rubber.

  ‘Rubber stamps?’

  She nods.

  ‘Wow. Cool. How do you make them?’

  Alice draws a circle on the rubber and shows me how to carve around it, first with a little V tool and then with a bigger V. I’m to clear away excess rubber with the U and trim the edges with a small normal-shaped knife. I picture my journal filled with images from rubber stamps. I could make all sorts of textures, shapes … maybe some flowers?

  Alice hands me a fresh sheet of rubber and motions for me to have a go. I draw in a diamond pattern – it’s simple, but I think it will look great in my journal. Alice goes off to the staffroom, and I flip out my hearing aids and carve, and while my hunger doesn’t disappear, my headache does. I start to feel better inside.

  Buying processed and health-checked wild food is one thing, but growing it is another thing entirely, so I tell Mum I’m going for a walk up High Street rather than admit I’m off to a food-growing workshop. I’ll ease her into it, once I know what I’m doing. We only received half a cupboard of recon again, and I’m over it.

  ‘If you see gas, message me and I’ll send you the money to buy some,’ Mum instructs.

  We don’t have tenants in our house yet, so she goes in every morning to make her coffee. I tell her we should move our stuff back in and live there until she finds someone to rent it – or at the very least go in there to shower – but she’s showing people through every day and says it has to be ready to rent at the drop of a hat. And she turned the hot water off last Wednesday when she shifted us into the shed.

  So, I haven’t washed for a week and a half. This morning I finally heated a pot on the stove and gave myself a sponge bath in the kitchen. I need to be clean in case I bump into Marley today. At least Mum still lets us use the kitchen stove inside.

  I wheel my bike up the driveway, staring longingly at our empty house. Who will sleep in my bedroom? I push the thought away and pedal hard, all the way up the hill to Preston. I imagine Marley riding beside me, our eyes meeting now and then with little knowing smiles, as if we share some secret.

  On my way, I pass three separate people with their heads under their car bonnets, retrieving engine parts. Will they sell them, or repurpose them somehow?

  I thought the workshop venue would turn out to be a School of Horticulture or similar, but when I arrive, warm and breathless, it’s just a private house – one of those old brown brick ones that Greek people used to build when they first arrived in Australia. A woman at the gate waves me inside.

  I pick my way down a path to the side of the house through a horde of people – way more than I was expecting. I guess they’re all hungry and worried too. My stomach rumbles as if on cue and I force myself to ignore it. I can’t help scanning the crowd for Marley. Is he here? He said the teacher was his mate. But maybe he already knows how to grow food. Would he even recognise me? Should I remind him, if he doesn’t?

  I near the end of the path and the crowd isn’t moving. All I can see is the back of a tall guy in front of me and the woman in front of him – no teacher. I wait, polite. If class has started, I can’t tell.

  This is pointless. If I’m going to learn anything I need to be more assertive. I ease myself forward through the crowd, whispering, ‘Excuse me, excuse me,’ until I’m in the backyard and can see the teacher, who’s standing on a plastic crate. He’s maybe twenty-five or so, Greek, and he talks fast, his hands emphasising his words.

  I attempt to tune in, but lipreading when you start in the middle is just about impossible. He could be saying anything. He gestures to a garden bed behind us and I catch the words ‘tomato’ and ‘we need’ and ‘important’. I turn the volume of my hearing aids to full, but it doesn’t make any difference. His voice booms in, but the words don’t.

  My eyes drift around the garden. Marley isn’t anywhere to be seen. I swallow hard to squash my disappointment. There are plants – a great tangled mess of them, leaves and vines everywhere – but whether they actually equate to food is beyond me. What does wild food look like on a plant? I think of pictures
I’ve seen of fat red apples bulging from trees, but there’s nothing like that here. I can’t imagine a meal of leaves being very appetising.

  What about water? How do they get enough water, with the restrictions and it being so expensive and all that?

  Girl! Concentrate! The guy is excited now, talking passionately: ‘Compost eeda funday a fillily.’

  I repeat the sounds to myself, but nothing besides compost comes to me.

  ‘Dessata guffa eedebe compost,’ he says.

  He reminds me of Marley, but I can’t quite think why. I glance around again and notice a green corrugated plastic water tank against the house. I think you’re allowed to use as much water as you want if it comes from a tank – but it’s hardly rained this year, thanks to El Niño. Have they still collected enough water in their tank to sustain this garden?

  I check out the crowd. There’s such a mix of people, like you’d never find at school. I don’t see anyone with an implant. I guess these people are more into doing things naturally. There are older people who look conservative, with heavy faces and crossed arms, plus lots and lots of people in their twenties, who mostly look more alternative. One girl, who’s wearing a long, scruffy skirt with another skirt over the top of it, stands like she owns the world: feet apart, confident, relaxed. Her skin is clear and her eyes are bright. She’s beautiful. I wish I was like that. I feel small and awkward next to her.

  Come on! Focus! This is important. No more distractions.

  ‘I allus lika make sure I write …’

  Always like to make sure I write … But now I’ve missed his next words.

  ‘Laree seeds that are gooquan an supplant yourself …’

  Supplant? Transplant? I’m going in overdrive here, but nothing makes sense.

  A lump swells in my throat. I swallow hard. If I’m not careful, I could cry. But no, this is all wrong. I accept being deaf. I know it’s my lot in life. It doesn’t bother me. I’d rather be deaf than perpetually ill or academically slow or allergic to recon or whatever. So … why the hell am I sniffing like mad, tears snaking down my cheeks?

  I rub furiously at my eyes, willing my chilled-out attitude to return. But it doesn’t. This matters too much. I abandon my lipreading efforts and channel all my energy into holding back the wave of desperation threatening to consume me.

  And then it does. Right here, in front of everyone. I’m bawling – and I must be making noise because people are turning to me, concern on their faces. I push them away, shoving through the crowd until I finally stumble out the gate. I grab my bike, but the numbers on the lock are a blur through my tears. I hunch over it, sobbing.

  Why, why, oh WHY can’t I just take it all in like everyone else? Why does it have to be so DIFFICULT?

  It’s not just about being deaf. I mean, it is. But it’s also about being hungry and cold and living in a horrible, dingy shed instead of at home, and Taylor not coming to school for days, and me not knowing who she is anymore now that she wears fancy clothes and has a boyfriend and hangs out in Seymour, of all places.

  I finally get my lock undone and I pedal furiously, the world lurching blurrily through my tears.

  Art class is the only time at school that I don’t wish I was someplace else. Right now, I don’t even care that it’s been a week and Taylor’s still not here. I dab a bit of red paint onto the lips of the girl in my painting and stand back to look at it critically. Not bad. I like the messy effect – but somehow it’s still a bit prissy.

  Someone touches my shoulder and I turn. It’s Alice.

  ‘I said, youcoo go furth wathi, Piper,’ she says. ‘More lays, more texta, build up depth.’

  I think she’s telling me to go further with this. More layers, more texture.

  I nod. That might help with the prissiness.

  ‘Remember you told me your favourite at woks were the ones that have been dirtied and dammy?’ Alice asks.

  This is art class, so I presume she means artworks. Dammy? Maybe damaged?

  She’s still talking. ‘Don’t be afraid to’ – I’ve missed something – ‘carve into them, scratch them up, add paint so that underneath layers are party hidna hevasutty to them.’

  ‘So that underneath layers are what?’

  ‘PART-I-ALLY HID-DEN and have a SUB-TLE-TY to them.’

  I’m mortified that she has to over-enunciate these words for me to get them. ‘Do you think she looks prissy?’ I ask.

  ‘Ista mou.’ Alice points to the mouth, and when I look at it I miss her next words.

  ‘What about the mouth?’

  She indicates her own face, fingers framing her lips. ‘It needs to be wider.’

  Yes, I see it now.

  The end-of-day bell blares, ending our conversation. I take my time packing up, smearing some leftover paint on empty pages in my journal. Then I flip to random pages and add dots and stripes.

  Eventually Alice touches my arm again. ‘Sorry, Piper, but I havtaloggap.’ She’s holding the key.

  I quickly wash my brushes and put them away while she waits. She locks the door behind us, then turns to me and says something. But it’s noisy and dark in the hallway and I don’t catch a single word.

  ‘What did you say?’ I ask.

  She repeats it again, practically shouting, but I still have no luck. I tell her not to worry, but she’s determined. Eventually she types on her wristlet: ‘You are starting to find your style.’

  I smile, thank her, and bolt before she can say anything else that will require a hundred excruciating repeats. I’m still raw from my meltdown at the food-growing workshop. This stuff is getting to me in a way that it didn’t used to.

  I’m carried outside in a throng of other girls, and as soon as I hit daylight hunger slams me again, this time in the form of a desperate craving for apple pie and cream – sweet, rich, heavy. I rip my hearing aids out of my ears and poke my fingers into my ears to scratch them, but they don’t reach far enough. I can never, ever satisfy the itch my hearing aids create. At least my headache isn’t too bad today – just a dull throb.

  I make my way to the bike rack, only … where’s my bike? I cast my eyes around, but I don’t see it. Where’s my bike?!

  I locked it here this morning. I know I did. No!

  Could I have locked it at the other rack? But I didn’t.

  I check anyway. No bike.

  No bike no bike no bike. I NEED my bike!

  I know I should tell a teacher, but it’s home time and the thought of wasting time searching offices for someone who’s still here, explaining to them what’s happened, waiting for them to get the cops here, explaining myself again … I just don’t want to do it. I decide I’ll report it to the police directly and update the school tomorrow. I check my wristlet for the nearest police station.

  Luckily there’s one only a few blocks out of my way, but when I get there it’s crowded, the queue stretching well out the front door. I take my place and wait. And wait. And wait.

  It’s freezing now that I’m not walking. I stomp my feet to keep warm, and message Taylor: ‘Hello, remember me? That strange girl you used to know back in the days when you attended school? Guess what, my bike’s been stolen!! Do police ever recover bikes? Where are you?’

  She doesn’t reply. Again. I flip back through my other messages, checking to see if there’s anything I’ve forgotten to answer, but there’s just the one Mum sent me yesterday saying tenants have applied to live in our house. She’s jubilant. I’m not. I delete it and tuck my fingers under my armpits to warm them up.

  My wristlet vibrates and it’s a message from Cesspool. ‘Congratulations, you have been shortlisted!’

  It directs me to another test, and yet more details that I need to supply to them. I spend an hour answering their pointless questions in ways that hopefully don’t reflect the true, pathetic nature of my personality, and looking up results from my last three medical check-ups. Is this all really necessary?

  A bunch of people ahead of me suddenly s
eparate from the queue and leave. What’s going on? I look around but there’s no clue, and the thought of trying to communicate with a stranger in the queue is too much. I turn back to my wristlet.

  Eventually I make it to the front and the officer behind the window glares at me when I tell her I’m here to report a bike theft. She says something dismissively, looking down, and waves me away.

  I don’t leave. ‘What did you say?’

  She mumbles again, and when I ask again for a repeat she finally looks at me.

  ‘My bike’s been stolen,’ I tell her, loud and clear.

  This angers her. I don’t catch a single word of what she says, but clearly it’s a telling-off. She waves me aside again and stares pointedly at the person behind me, who comes to stand beside me. This new man and the police officer get talking, and the officer isn’t dismissive of him.

  Confused, I swallow hard and turn to go. On my way out, an older woman wearing a hijab grabs me. She speaks slowly, clearly, and gestures to my ears. I gather that she saw my hearing aids and figured out I’m deaf.

  ‘They made an announcement,’ she says, looking at me expectantly.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘They don’t have the reasus to pross petty crimes.’

  Reasus – reason, rhesus … maybe resources?

  Pross – procedure? Process? A shortened version of prosecute?

  They don’t have the resources to process petty crimes.

  ‘Are you telling me that they won’t look into bike theft?’ I ask.

  She nods. I miss a few words but catch what I think might be ‘too many bikes stolen …’ Then something ‘major problem …’ She’s speaking slowly, clearly, looking intently into my eyes.