Sierra and I are in my bedroom. I'm on my iPad and she's on my laptop, so even though we're together, we're not. Sierra's parents have banned her from the internet, but we're figuring our mums will be chatting downstairs for hours, so they're not going to catch us.
'I've got one,' Sierra says.
I look over. She must be bored because she's on Mysterychat.
an s 1, the message asks.
'Can I pretend to be you?' she pleads.
'No, Sierra. Don't you dare.'
'We'll just see where it goes.' She turns and taps
at the keys. 'I'm doing it real, though. Just in case it's a guy and he's cute.'
I laugh. 'Since, when are we going to meet a cute guy on that site?'
'Well, he says he's eighteen, a guy . . . Oh my god! And he lives in Melbourne!' Sierra squeals.
I sit up on my bed and take notice of what she's doing. She taps madly at the keys.
We are two. Both 16. Both f. In Melbourne too! You can call us S and T.
'Sierra! We're not sixteen!'
'He doesn't know that. We gotta make it legal,' she says.
'Yeah, but if he's actually nice and anything ever happens - which it won't, it never does - but if it did, you've already lied!'
'Oh, chill. One year is nothing. And it's not even a year. We're almost sixteen.'
Hi S and T. U can call me J. Nice to meet u.
'At least he didn't ask to see our boobs,' Sierra says. We both giggle.
Sierra types.
Where in Melbourne?
A reply comes back instantly.
Brighton
'Oooh, Brighton. He must be rich,' Sierra says.
'Yeah, or he might be a thirty - year - old sleazebag from Craptown.' I shudder at the thought and look back to my iPad.
'What are you on?' Sierra asks.
'Facebook. Talking to Riley. She broke up with Joel over the holidays.'
Sierra rolls her eyes. 'Again? She needs to listen to Taylor Wolfe. Have you heard her new song?'
Sierra stands up and sings into a pen. 'Never go back, I told you so, once it's over, let it go.'
She actually sounds just like Taylor Wolfe, but I hold back telling her. She doesn't need any more encouragement. She has the same blunt fringe as Taylor Wolfe, wears the same clothes, talks like her and sings just as well as her. And even though Sierra's just spent the six weeks of the summer holidays in the North American snowfields, her long slim legs are tanned, just like Taylor Wolfe's.
'These are the same shorts she wore on Ellen,' Sierra says as she does a three-sixty to show me her bum.
'Yes, I know, and yesss, you look just like her.'
I roll my eyes but she knows I don't mean it.
'Well, you got her name. I wish Mum had called me "Taylor". Imagine that.'
'Oh, yeah, because "Taylor Gray" is such an interesting name,' I say, sarcastically. 'At least "Sierra Carson - Mills" sounds . . . sophisticated.'
