imogens pov
If there was one thing I’d learnt about jumpnow it was that he liked cute dates, the type of ones that involved bubbles and tea and shit. Preferably in a park. How had I learnt this? I’d spent a solid 2 hours yesterday sneaking around him and talking to the people that knew him best. Today was a new day, it was just on 8 and I was already up, that disastrous party had ended 2 days ago now, and everyone had finally left. Now the house was empty, bradie and Andy’s parents must have left for work already and dropped Chris off at day care. I didn’t know much about budgewoi, but I did know how to get a train to the city. So after leaving a letter on jumpnows doorstep I caught the train that was going straight to Sydney.
Sydney was so busy, despite the fact it was so early in the morning. But now I was here no matter how scared I was it was time to put my plan into action.
I was supposed to be meeting jumpnow at 11, and it was after 9 now, leaving only 2 hours to set this up. It had to be perfect, to show him how sorry I was. In my head I’d already decided what the day would look like.
Having grown up somewhere a lot smaller than this place it seemed so much bigger than it was. All the shops were hidden and tourists were already starting to do their tourist thing. The food was easy, practically every 5th shop was some sort of food shop, some specializing in stuff like British lollies or a zillion different types of bread products.
Alice in wonderland had seemed like a good theme at the time, but trying to find all the stuff was starting to feel like I was falling down the rabbit hole. In a way I had, the day I’d found out who bradie was I’d practically fallen head over heels down the rabbit hole, tumbling and fumbling around until I found the right door.
In fact, since that day it’d felt like I was in wonderland, tripping over things and meeting different people, all while trying to find my way home.
In the end I found a shop that sold the right sort of costume things, as well as huge bubble sticks and edible glitter.
By the time I was back on the train it was almost quarter to 11, and everyone around me seemed to know who I was. Although they stared, nobody seemed brave enough to talk to me. Until one of them, who was short and resembled what I imagined a fairy would be came over to me.
“are you Imogen?”
“yup. Why?”
Oops. Nobody had bothered to tell me that teenies could be violent towards people that knew bands, and quicker than I could regret what I’d said everyone seemed to be totally fan-girling over me.
My stop was the next one and when the train pulled up I’d never been happier to run off and blend into the crowd. Luckily for my date nobody had followed me, which left me free to go set up before 11.
The botanic gardens in Sydney were beautiful, especially at this time of year.
While I unpacked and set up this still seemed like the greatest plan in the world, especially once I had my Alice costume on. But as it got closer and closer to 11 I realized how stupid it really was, how insignificant of an apology it was. Now I was here there was no turning back, just me and myself to piss off.
Regrets were stinging at my eyes, threatening to cause tears again.
Instead of letting myself fall under the tears spell I focused on a bush, it was covered in pretty little light purple buds. A figure caught my eye, it seemed to be coming towards me. Jumpnow. When I saw him my heart started to get faster, he’d bothered to come! But when he was close enough for me to see his face my heart started pumping ice around my body.
He flopped down next to me, looking like he was about to say something. But the something didn’t come.
“I’m sorry” my voice was barely a whisper, but it caught his attention.
“don’t worry about it. Accidents happen I guess”
“why are you forgiving me?”
“why? Because ash is dead. That’s why. Shaun is so cut up over what he did to cause her to give up life he won’t talk to anyone except me. I don’t want to lose you and I don’t want you to feel guilty because if I loose you I feel guilty, and……. Bradie would murder me”
He smiled a bit before breathing in deeply, he had said that whole outburst without drawing breath. Next thing I knew he was kissing me, just lightly but I knew it meant sorry.
Now we could enjoy our picnic. Except one thing. Turned out a few teenies had followed me, and had waited until now to come out and fan-girl over us.
Shit.
