Floundering Read Free

the ocean.

    What are you looking at, dipshit? says Jordy, slapping me on the back of the head.
    None of your beeswax, I say and go stand near the front passenger door of the car. I can see the blonde of Loretta’s head through the dusty windows of the servo. There’s tinsel strung on the inside, hanging in arches. Gran had put up a plastic Christmas tree in the corner of the lounge room. She hung it with silver snowflakes and fairy lights that flickered on and off. The cards from all her friends, hung on a string across the front window, blew off every afternoon when the wind turned onshore.

    Shotgun, I say and look triumphantly over at Jordy.
    Nah, he says, you’ve got to call it in the morning. I’ve got shotgun for the rest of the day.
    I called it, Jordy, I say.
    Nah, you’ve got to call it in the morning.
    That’s not fair. You said if I call it I can have it.
    Yeah, if you call it in the morning, you can have it. It’s totally fair.

    I look around for Loretta. She’s walking fast towards the car.
    Get in the car, she says from still far away.
    But Mum, Jordy won’t let me have a go. The mum slips out of me, strange in my mouth.
    Get in the car.
    She’s wrenching on her door and then she is in the frontseat. Jordy pushes me out of the way and gets shotgun fast. Loretta starts the engine.
    Get in.
    I open the back door and have to jump in as she accelerates. I close the door, watching the tar blurring in the open bit before I can get it shut. I fumble for my seatbelt and click it in. Safe.
    Loretta pulls two pies in plastic sachets from inside her hoodie. Breakfast, she says and chucks one back to me. The pie lands on my leg, burns my bare skin. I pick it up by a plastic corner. It hangs inside it, steam coming out the little plastic holes.
    Thanks, I say.
    Don’t be rude, she goes.
    You burned my leg.
    What’d I say? Don’t be rude. Looking at me in the rearview. Yesterday she looked neat but today her eyes are all smudged black. She looks away from me, and I look out the window. The paddocks go past, the same as before. I put the pie down on the seat beside me and wait for it to cool. Little flakes of pastry inside the bag look as thin and gross as flakes of skin. I start kicking the back of Jordy’s seat.
    Hot, isn’t it, says Loretta.
    She tries to get her hoodie off. She is holding the steering wheel with one hand and trying to inch the jumper off with the other. I’m so sweaty my legs are sticking to the seat. I move around to try and unpeel them.
    Jordy, can you hold this for a sec?
    He looks at her, Really?
    Just hold it steady, hey.
    Jordy leans over the gearstick and grabs hold of the wheel with two hands, his pie, half eaten, like a big brown smile, resting on the dash. Loretta has her left arm out and is wriggling her right when I look up and notice we’re on the wrong side of the road.
    I see the sun reflecting off the windscreen of a car driving straight for us, a bright star of light. I think of the star of Bethlehem, ‘cos I was learning the Christmas carol about it for the end-of-year school performance. I see Loretta look up and take her foot off the accelerator. Jordy takes his hands off the wheel and no one’s holding it for a second. The car beeps a long beep at us and Loretta grabs the wheel and swerves at the last second. Her hoodie hangs off the end of her arm, forgotten.
    I look over at the car as it passes and I can see the woman driving. Her face is a cartoon drawing of frightened.
    Shit, says Loretta. We almost come to a stop. There is nothing now, no cars behind us or in front of us. Are you stupid? Do you want to get us killed?
    He just looks at her, not saying nothing.
    So fuck–ing stupid, she says and shakes her head so that for a moment her hair goes everywhere. She bangs the steering wheel. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
    Jordy looks away and I touch the back of his shoulder. He shrugs my hand off. His pie has fallen into his lap.
    Loretta looks up and I see the fan of