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Life has a way of giving you stuff you barely knew you appreciated, snatching it away and then going see that was what it was all about.
“Let’s do this. This squidgy end is the pointer.” I spun the squashed plate.
“It’s you! Good! Tell me something funny.”
I pulled a face. “About?”
“Hmm.” She wriggled her feet, with her hands on her ankles, looking every bit like an excited teenager. “Your childhood?”
“Okay. Let me see. One morning, when I woke up baboons were in our kitchen. Somehow they’d gotten in through an unlocked door. My mother had to shoo them out with a broom.”
Jaz giggled. “Baboons?”
“Yes.” I nodded, trying to look wise. “The mess in the kitchen was so smelly our dogs went crazy.”
“Baboon shit. I’ll never beat that.” Her grin was big and infectious and I could’ve watched her forever.
Being creepy again. Even if it was in a good cause.
I spun. “Your turn to cough up a secret.”
“Jeez. Rigged. I get to spin next time.” She peered down.
Good. If she did that she’d be halfway on the floor. At the least I’d get to look down her cleavage, and why that was appealing when I’d just seen all of her was a baffling secret of female attractiveness.
“Rule. When you get a question it has to be connected to the last one. So tell me something from your childhood.”
“Ugh. No baboons there. I got lost on the way to school. My mum sent me off on my bike in Grade five. New school in an outback town, middle of Australia.”
How old was she in Grade five? Eleven? “Where’d you end up?”
“The library. I was playing hookie. I hated new schools.”
When they came to get the breakfast leftovers, we’d likely get to keep this plate, and maybe the paper cup of coffee dregs. I needed that too. Writing in the dark was going to be hard to do, but I’d manage.
I’d thought a long while last night and this morning. It all depended on the cleaning lady. What I planned could save us or it could bring Gregor’s anger down on us.
Giving Jazmine hope had been my first gift. Even if I did have a plan, it was by no means as sure as I’d told her. It had been worth the lie to see the brightness transform her face. Lies to me were like payments to the devil. Hated them. A lie had killed my brother.
My second gift to her was to do everything to keep her well. I wanted to earn some gold stars for my poor battered soul. I was so fucking tired of hating myself. I’d told her that I could forget things but it wasn’t true. Short term, yes. Later, no. The past came back and chewed me over, made me feel like every part of me was so wrong, so bad, and that I’d never be a good person again.
Enjoying what I’d done in the Room had guaranteed a year of guilt.
We went through more questions and I slowly gave her more of me and began to doubt how much of her I was really getting.
It was unfair but...if she was lying, I guess I understood. I still hated it. I wanted her, not lies.
“Tell me something that you regret.”
Ah. Now that was a nasty one. I felt compelled to tell a truth, if not the whole truth. “When I shot a man in the face, and killed him.”
“Oh.”
She looked as if her stomach was as sickened as mine.
I’d said a stupid answer, but I’d have done it again. Killing the boy guard was more recent. Funny how that made me numb more than sad.
The pointer was on her again. “Tell me something about being a librarian. Something cute, funny, amazing.”
