Crush

Four

"What have you done this time?" Jo took Maddie's arm and draped it over her shoulder, leading her into the kitchen.

"You say that like I injure myself all the time," Maddie said, limping beside Jo.

"Tripping down the steps of a caravan," Jo said. "Running into a glass door at a motel. Catching your toe on the corner of a coffee table. And that's just in the last month. Should I go on?"

"No," Maddie replied.

"So? What happened?" Jo asked again.

"I was running," Maddie.

Jo didn't look like she believed it but she said, "Come and sit down and I'll have a look."

"I'm fine," Maddie said, trying not to wince as she hobbled along the hallway using Jo as support. She dropped down onto a chair at the table and Jo sat down across from her. She lifted Maddie's leg onto her lap and examined her ankle.

"There's a little bit of swelling," she said, turning it carefully in her hands. She moved Maddie's foot sideways, making Maddie wince. "It doesn't look like it's enough to be broken though." She stood up, pushed her chair closer to Maddie and placed her foot down. She took some ice from the freezer, wrapped it in a tea towel and wet it under the tap. "Hold," she said, placing it on Maddie's ankle.

Maddie did as she was told, and Jo sat down on the other side of the table. She folded her arms across her chest and though Maddie wasn't looking at her, she could feel Jo's glare.

This was one of Jo's tactics. Sit and stare and not say anything until Maddie got too uncomfortable and just had to say something. Maddie didn't give in this time though, because she was too focused on her sore ankle. She moved it a little and sucked in a breath. The cold got too much so she moved the ice pack to the other side of her ankle.

Finally, Jo uncrossed her arms and asked, "Who's the girl?"

"Her name is Tess and she lives up the road."

"And why was she bringing you back here on the back of a motorbike?"

"Because she's nice."

"That still doesn't explain what happened."

Maddie sighed. "I was running and not paying attention and I ran out in front of her. She almost ran over me but-"

Jo slapped her hand on the table. "Jesus, Maddie. You know I have to take you back in one piece, right?"

Maddie rolled her eyes. "It's just a sprain."

"We'll let a doctor decide that I think."

"I'm fine," Maddie said. "Really."

"You don't have a choice," Jo said.

"Fine," Maddie said. "But it'll have to be after my hair appointment."

Jo shook her head.

"What?" Maddie took the ice pack off and put it on the table. Jo raised her eyebrows and Maddie placed the ice pack back on her ankle.

"Don't you think that's going a bit too far?" Jo asked.

"Doing something I want with my hair instead of what someone else thinks I should do? Why is that a bad thing?" Maddie couldn't remember the last time she'd had a say over her 'look'.

"You won't be getting the same type of service up here. Not like the salons in Sydney."

It was Maddie's turn to shake her head. "I don't care. This," she said, holding out a handful of her bleached-blond hair, "was not my choice. I never wanted to be blond. But oh no, image is everything, isn't it? And no-one pays attention to the girl with mousy-brown hair." That's what her own mother had said to her just over a year ago. It had been easier then to just let her mother have her own way, but she wasn't going to let either of her parents run her life any more.

Jo held her hands up in surrender and said, "Alright, alright. You're talking to someone who gets a twenty dollar haircut from whoever can fit her in. Just understand that when your father goes ballistic, I'm not stepping in this time to help you out."

"Fine," Maddie shrugged.

"Speaking of your father, he called again."

"And?" He'd called Maddie's phone too and left messages that she'd deleted without even listening to. She didn't need to hear him telling her what he thought she should be doing anymore.

"And, you should talk to him, Maddie. He's worried."

Maddie snorted.

"Regardless of what you think of him, he's still your father, and he just wants what's best for you."

"What's best for him, you mean."

Jo didn't counter that point and instead changed tack. "Freya has left a heap of messages too. If you just do one thing, can you please call her? She doesn't deserve to be left in the dark."

"She knows what's going on," Maddie said, though she knew that wasn't exactly true. All Freya knew was that Maddie had had a massive fight with her father. She had no idea what it was about, and if she told Freya the truth, she'd be devastated. Besides, Maddie hadn't decided what she wanted to do yet, so it wasn't fair for her to dump everything on Freya without a solution. And there was Andy to think about too, though he'd probably just shrug and get back to his surfing.

"I'll call her later," Maddie said. Though it was to pacify Jo, she did think Freya deserved to at least know she was okay.

"Good," Jo replied, apparently satisfied. She pushed away from the table and walked over to the fridge and started pulling food out. "I thought we'd do hot dogs for lunch."

Maddie smiled. "Really? I thought they were full of crap?"

Jo laughed. "You're on holidays, so a little bit of bad food won't hurt."

Maddie decided against telling Jo about the cream bun from this morning. That would count as her bad food allowance for the day, so hot dogs would be off the lunch menu. Thinking about lunch, she thought about what Tess had been talking about with her Pop earlier. "Hey," she said. "What do you know about the Crush Festival?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Tess mentioned something about it."

"I didn't know it was still going," Jo said.

"What do you mean?"

"The Copeland's use to burn the last block of cane for the district and I think they just put on a bit of a party for whoever wanted to come."

"Oh," Maddie said. "So it's not very exciting then?" She was mildly disappointed. Though Tess's Pop had said it wasn't much at all, Tess seemed to be excited by it.

"It was when I was little I suppose, but I left when I was five or six so I don't remember too much about it." Jo turned and leaned against the bench. "I haven't been back in a long time, Maddie, so it could've changed since then. Did Tess say when it's on?"

"Next weekend."

"We can go if you like."

Maddie nodded.

"But," Jo said, pointing at Maddie with the cheese grater, "only if you stay injury free."

"Deal," Maddie replied.

Jo smiled and returned to making lunch.