THE next day, Rainey tanked when I told her about my week of detention heaven with Michael. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. I’d been kinda ignoring the way her shoulders slumped whenever I mentioned his name. I felt like if I just pushed on through and kept talking about him, eventually she’d get used to it. But I couldn’t ignore the deep sigh that was letting out right now.
It scared me a little. Reminded me of how she was with Fi. I made friends with Fi in the first week of Year Seven. I really liked her but Raine hated her. She put The Freeze on me until I stopped talking to her. The Freeze is when Raine will do everything as normal with me, but she won’t talk to me freely and she keeps herself all zipped-up and blank-faced. Like a zombie. It’s hard to explain because she’s not yelling at me or anything, and she’s not even giving me the silent treatment, because she will respond if I ask her things. She’s just severed her connection to me. That’s the best way I can put it.
And she can do it for weeks and weeks. And the worst thing is that when she’s like that, she won’t tell me what’s wrong, so I can’t even make it right again. I just have to guess and guess and guess until I push all the right buttons and she turns herself back on. Ugh. I hate it so much.
It makes me feel so lonely. I live in fear of it. She hasn’t done it for ages but I still panic when she doesn’t answer my texts straight away now because I worry that she’s put The Freeze on me.
And even now, I have to be careful not to mention Fi’s name, so I’m scared that she’s going to be the same way about Michael.
‘Hey hey, what’s up Rain Man?’ I said sympathetically, giving her shoulder a rub. She gave a half smile at my insult with a little shrug of her bony shoulders.
‘Oh. Nothing.’
Uh oh. I felt my bubble turn on. I had this invisible energy wall around me that I made when I was little, just with my imagination, but it really works! Its one-way, so it keeps all the bad energy out and lets only love in. It’s pink! I’ve had it since forever.
And right now, it had switched into overdrive. Bzzzzz!! I could almost hear it. I took a deep breath from inside the bubble. Switched my conversation into deliberately-casual mode.
‘Hey, I know you. This is not nothing. Tell me. What’s the matter? Are your parents ok?’ I enquired, sounding like I didn’t care much.
And yeah - I knew it was nothing to do with her parents. That was a tactic of mine. I play dumb and say the exact wrong thing so she has to correct me. Gets her talking every time.
‘No, no... no. They’re fine now, Dad’s got a new job and yeah.. they’re fine.’
Dern. Didn’t work. And, oh crap! She was doing this little tongue thing she does when she gets mad. My Mom does it too. Like a little lizard, her tongue pokes in and out and rolls around. I knew it well. Her eyes flashed dark at me. This was way worse than I thought.
My animal senses went up. Heart pitter-pattered. I took a breath and calmed myself. I knew that I could push her the wrong way here.
Make a joke, Jo.
Yeah. Alright.
I wound up my sleeves and mimicked a boxer, started stabbing the air with my girly fists.
‘Ok, well... what is it? I know... Madame Duclois giving you trouble again? I swear, you just tell me, if that bish is getting in your visage, I’ll put her nez into the back of her tête!’ I said, comically bouncing around, shoulders up round my neck, Mohummad Ali style.
Rainey looked at me cynically for a moment, but then she giggled and my heart jumped for joy. It was working! I did a little boxing dance for her, my fists up close to my face, skipping around her on my toes like I was ready to king hit our stylish French teacher.
