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“What the hell was that, Fitz?” he asked, trying to regain his breath.
“Grappa. Got it from the Italians next door. Burns your insides out.”
“And the enjoyment is?” Jude said, taking a swig, his eyes instantly tearing up and his breath coming in gasps.
“I reckon if I put a match right here, you’d see fireworks,” Fitz continued, taking out his matches and breathing heavily into the air.
Still trying to recover, Jude stared at him. “Why would you want to do that, dickhead?”
“Live on the edge, GI Jude. That’s my motto.”
Fitz took out a cigarette and Jude grabbed it out of his mouth. “You’re going to set us all on fire, you homicidal feral fruitcake.”
“Hand it over,” Tate said, taking a few deep breaths before swigging from the bottle. She stared at Narnie in shock and started coughing out of control. Narnie fa
“Can we stay focused?” Webb asked, taking out a purple leather book.
“Mate, no one is going to take you seriously with a book that looks like that,” Jude said.
“Yeah, Chairman Mao and his little purple book,” Fitz said, laughing at his own joke.
“It’s Chairman Meow to you, and I’ve got a system set up that’s going to blow your mind.”
“I wouldn’t mind other parts of me bl—”
“Fitz!” Tate said. “Grossed out. Majorly.”
“Is anyone listening to me?” Webb asked, a
“I am,” Narnie replied.
Webb leaned over and grabbed her face. “Then I can die happy.”
Narnie patted the space next to her and Fitz sat down obediently.
“Okay, we play skirmish,” Webb said. “Cadets, Townies, us. We split this area into territories and anyone who tries to invade loses ground. We have rules of engagement, diplomatic immunity, and one or two fisticuffs.”
“What part of this are we going to enjoy?” Tate asked, pointing to Narnie and herself.
“The part where we take you hostage and ravage you,” Fitz said.
“You’re an animal.”
Fitz did gorilla impersonations and Narnie shushed him gently.
“Fitz, you head the Townies, Jude heads the Cadets, and I’ll get the Houses together back here. We need to get the six Houses working, so we need rules.”
“No fraternising with leaders of other Houses,” Tate said. “Rule number one.”
Webb looked taken aback.
“What happens if you do?” he asked, jumping on top of her and trapping her with his arms and legs.
“The two leaders get placed in exile…together. For the rest of their lives.”
“Okay,” he said with enthusiasm, jumping off her. “I’m writing that rule in. ‘No relationship between leaders of opposite Houses’.”
“I’ve got one for the territory wars,” Fitz said, his eyes bloodshot from the spirit. “If trespassing occurs, there’s payback.” He jabbed at thin air. “One to the jaw, two to the gut.”
“So what does the wi
“They get to sit around with the losers and say, ‘I am King Xavier of the world.’ Repeat after me.”
“And me?” Tate asked.
“You get to be my queen.”
Tate looked pleased with the idea.
“How come you’re the leader of the community?” Narnie asked, almost smiling. “Why can’t Tate be?”
Webb looked at his sister, gri
Fitz leaned his head on Narnie’s shoulder. “And I’ll be your queen?”
“You can be the eunuch,” Jude said, shoving him out of the way, “and I’ll be her prince.” He bowed and took Narnie’s hand, kissing it, and their eyes met. It was awkward for a moment until Narnie looked away.
“So how long will it take to get your troops in gear?” Webb asked him. “We’re serious here, you know.”
“Mate, we’ve been ready for years.”
“By the time you come back next year, we’ll be ready—tu
“If it’s going to be like The Great Escape, make sure there are trail bikes,” Jude said.
“So you’re in?”
He shrugged. “As long as I get to play Steve McQueen.”
Spending days with Santangelo and Griggs becomes a habit for the rest of the holidays. Most of the time the Mullet Brothers, Choi, Ben, Santangelo’s sisters, and Jessa McKenzie come along as well. We end up either at Santangelo’s place or Raffy’s, but mostly the former because Raffy’s mum and dad teach the Townies and keep on asking them for overdue homework.
The Santangelo home is like a madhouse. I’m not quite sure how his mum finds time to be the mayor of the town as well but she manages. She’s the only person who gets away with calling Santangelo a “little shit” and once in a while she’ll go for the collective and refer to both Griggs and Santangelo as those “two little shits.” Most of the time the “two little shits” take it on the chin but sometimes Santangelo says, “I’m fucking out of here,” and his mum warns, “Don’t you dare swear, you little shit.” The Santangelo sisters, Griggs, and Raffy ignore it all, but Jessa and I are fascinated and frightened at the same time. We wait for a showdown but it tends not to happen and then everything’s all calm again and the only two left in a mess are Jessa and me. Sometimes we are very relieved to escape it all.
It’s during those moments that I notice how similar we are. Both Jessa and I have spent almost half our lives brought up by people other than our parents and neither of us have siblings. She has no recollection of her mother, who died of cancer when Jessa was two years old, and I have too much recollection of mine. Jessa lived with her aunt but hero-worshipped her father, who died when she was nine in some apparent freak accident, and my only memory of my father is of being on his shoulders and touching the sky. Though after Santangelo’s revelation about the boy in the photo, I’m not too sure anymore. More than anything, we have Ha
“Do you think of Ha
All the time, I want to say.
“Sometimes.”
“Do you think something’s happened to her?” she asks quietly.
All the time, I want to say.
“Sometimes.”
“Taylor, just say the seri—”
“Don’t,” I say, irritated, turning over, away from her. “Jessa, forget the serial killer. There are enough other things to worry about.”
“She’d never leave us, so it can only be the serial killer.”
I grit my teeth and count to ten so I won’t yell at her. “He only takes teenagers,” I say, not so reassuringly. “She’s in her thirties.”
“But I read on this website that, in the townships stretching from the Sturt to the Hume Highways, there have been eleven attempted kidnaps and three actual kidnaps of women over twenty-five in the last ten years.”
“Can I suggest another website? It’s www-dot-shutupabouttheserialkiller-dot-com.”
She is silent for a moment and I feel guilty about the aggression.
“If Ha
I reluctantly turn to face her again but looking at Jessa’s face always has this sledgehammer effect on me, so I lie on my back and stare at the ceiling.
“Ha
“My aunt. But she has my cousins and I know she likes me, even loves me, but it’s not like I felt as if I belonged. Until Ha