The Year Nick McGowan Came to Stay Read Online Free Page A

‘Say No To Cigarettes/Bag The Fag’ commercials Mrs Michaels made us watch three billion times in Year 9 Social Education.
    That’s when I notice the young women next to me. One is dressed in army pants and a black tank top. She looks like Lisa Bonet from ‘The Cosby Show’, long dark dreadlocks, a pierced nose. The other has reddish plaits and is wearing a long floral dress and Doc Martens. They look like uni students. I watch Lisa Bonet pick up a CD by the Housemartins, turn it over, put it back.
    â€˜Christ, this is the best album,’ she says to Plait Girl. Plait Girl agrees. Then they move to the R section – so I casually follow them. They flip through some CDs. Stop. Comment on how good the Riptides were in concert at the UQ Refec last year. Keep flipping. Then one of them says, ‘It’s not here. ’ The other says, ‘Go ask.’ Lisa Bonet goes to the counter and asks the guy if they have Halfway to Sanity by the Ramones.
    The Ramones. Nick McGowan’s Ramones.
    â€˜If it’s not there, it means we don’t have it,’ says the guy behind the counter. ‘We have it on cassette.’
    Lisa Bonet shakes her head.
    â€˜Okay, well I can order you one in. You know their new one is out later this year? Do you want me to add your name to our pre-order list?’
    â€˜Yeah,’ she says. ‘Ta.’ I watch the sales assistant write down their details. Then Lisa Bonet and Plait Girl wander away and I immediately know what I’m looking for.
    Ten minutes later and I’m at the counter with two Ramones posters and Halfway to Sanity on cassette.
    The sales assistant looks at my haul, then up at me.
    â€˜Bit of a Ramones fan, hey?’
    â€˜Fuck, yeah.’
    He looks somewhat surprised. Then I hear someone go ‘tch’ and I turn around to see a grandmother-type person shaking her head and clicking her tongue at me in disgust.
    â€˜Sorry,’ I say to the nanna. And to the guy behind the counter. And to anyone else who heard me drop the F word at two fifty-eight on a Friday afternoon.
    â€˜That’ll be $28.31,’ says the sales guy a little suspiciously.
    â€˜Ta,’ I mumble.
    I hand over thirty dollars, sheepishly take my change and head out the door just as I hear the nanna asking the sales assistant for directions to the Shingle Inn. As I walk back along Adelaide Street I begin to cheer up. Today I’m a Ramones fan. And as I head back to Central Station I can’t wait to listen to their music.

I hate the Ramones. I spend Friday night listening to them and I make myself listen to every song on the tape. I find myself looking longingly over at my Bangles and Eurythmics tapes. Huey Lewis seems to be looking down at me from my bedroom wall with a look that says traitor . But I persist, telling myself that it’s good for me. That I need to change. That I’m going to like the Ramones if it kills me.
    By Saturday, listening to the Ramones nonstop has practically killed me. So I stop listening to them and instead I put on my Phil Collins No Jacket Required cassette (first lip-syncing in the mirror to ‘Billy Don’t Lose My Number’) and resign myself to just memorising the names of as many Ramones songs as I can. At least I can sound knowledgeable – look like I have something in common with Nick McGowan.
    Dad walks past my door and reminds me that I can now officially move bedrooms. Caitlin is going to spew. We’ve been fighting over this room for years. Mum’s always kept it as a guest room – mainly for my nanna, who comes to stay from Sydney for a month every year. It’s the ultimate bedroom. Bigger, quieter, away from the rest of the house. And, the piece de resistance , it has its own ensuite.
    I spend the rest of the morning moving my stuff. Books, cassettes, all my clothes. It takes me an hour to move all my stuff downstairs and another four hours to reinvent myself via my