Nine Letters Long by J.C. Burke Page B

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    â€˜To what?’ She is walking away. ‘They told me about you.’
    â€˜Paris, stop,’ Evie begs. ‘Please. Just stop for a minute.’
    Paris’s steps are faster. Evie follows, her slippers flapping on the concrete.
    â€˜Please, just listen …’
    Now, Paris is running. ‘Go away,’ she calls. ‘Leave me alone.’
    â€˜No – please.’ But Evie stops dead in her tracks.
    Paris’s spindly legs fly behind her, almost hitting her shoulder with each stride. How can Evie chase her? At any second, they look like they will snap in two. So, instead, she watches her flee.
    Just as she disappears around the corner, Paris turns to look behind, and, for the first time, Evie meets her face. Her eyes are hollow and frightened, and her mouth is twisted with a shame that guards her silence. For Evie, it’s like seeing her from the inside out. A foreboding filled with such darkness and fear lands on Evie’s skin and wraps itself around her.
    â€˜Oh my god.’ Evie leans against the wall covering her mouth. The bile tastes bitter on her tongue. ‘What have they done to you?’
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    Evie sits on her bed, picking at her toenails. A magazine lies open on her lap. She can’t even be bothered looking at the pictures. All she wants is to sleep and disappear, but she can’t. The irritation nibbles at her skin. It feels like ants crawling all over her. She rubs her face and pulls at her hair, saying over and over, ‘I stuffed up. I stuffed up. How am I going to face her again? What am I going to do!’ Evie jumps off the bed and begins to pace the room. ‘Tell me, someone.’ She makes a fist at the ceiling. ‘Tell me what to do. When I don’t want to hear from you, you bug me, and now when I do you’re silent! What can I tell Paris to make her listen? Eh? What can I tell her?’
    â€˜Evie?’ Her father taps on the door. ‘Who are you talking to?’
    â€˜Oh, I’m just … practising a poem, Dad.’
    Silence. Evie holds her breath.
    â€˜Sounds dramatic.’ Then his footsteps fade away.
    â€˜Get it together.’ Evie runs her fingers through her hair. ‘I can’t lose it. Not here. Especially not here.’ She sits back on her bed and hugs the pillow. ‘There’s got to be a way through this.’ She buries her face in the feathers. ‘There’s got to be. I’ve just got to …’ She breathes into the pillow, suddenly pulling away. The scent of the down has thrown her. It’s dry and dusty. It wants her to remember something. But what? She sniffs it again but it’s gone.
    â€˜It must be nothing.’ A tiny white feather sits on her top lip. She picks it off and studies the fineness of each strand on her fingertip. ‘It’s nothing,’ she tells herself as she flicks it off. ‘Nothing. Come on; get a grip, girl. Not everything has to mean something.’
    From under the mattress, Evie pulls out her diary and begins to write to Athena. ‘You got me into this,’ she tells her. ‘So the least you can do is point me in the right direction ’cause I don’t know where to go next.’ Evie pulls the doona over her. It’s almost six-thirty and a southerly is rustling the tree outside her bedroom window. Its branches scratch the glass. ‘How am I meant to help someone who won’t even talk to me? I feel like I’m back where I started, not that I even know where that is. All I do know is that I need something more to tell Paris. And I need some strength to face her. There’s something really wrong with that girl. I have never felt the way I felt when I saw her today and I’m not sure I know how to handle a feeling like that again. So what am I going to do?’
    Evie taps the pen on the page. ‘I need some help ! I actually need someone to help me . There’s nooooooo way I’m