White Ute Dreaming Read Online Free Page B

honey. She’s seventeen and has already earned thousands of dollars modelling. She was on a Feral Pigs film clip but she says she didn’t get to meet the band. She’s related to Shane Lee somehow and Shane reckons she hates herself. I reckon I could live with that. Wouldn’t be Mandy Masterson. She’s not that bright. Not bright enough to write poems like that, and a bit up herself. Good for the old ego though, I must say. Six months ago, when my hand got cut off, I thought I’d be flat out getting anyone to like me. Funny thing that. People got used to it. The year sevens think I’m a bit of a freak but no-one else in the school gives a shit. I couldn’t have imagined that back then. Even the teachers have taken it on board. Like at the end of last year, Mr Hogeson gave me the biggest compliment in PE.We were doing gymnastics stuff and he was choosing people to lead on the vault and parallel bars and he said I should go on the rings. A couple of the other kids in the class just looked at me. Hogeson said, ‘Oh. Sorry, Wayne. Forgot.’ His face got all bloodshot. If you’d seen how white his hair is you’d know how funny that looked. The truth is, I forget sometimes, too. Not like I think I’ve still got a hand and that, just like I’m so used to doing stuff without a hand that someone will offer to help me and I’ll realise they’ve done it because they think I’m a bit handicapped. Losing a hand isn’t much of a handicap.
    Kez walked. I rode. She said it was safer that way. She told me that they were going up to Fishwood at the weekend to have a look at a house. She was jiggling when she told me. Not a sign of a tear.
    â€˜What’s going to happen to us if we shift?’ she asked.
    â€˜I dunno.’
    â€˜Would you write?’
    â€˜Yeah. Of course.’
    â€˜Phone?’
    â€˜I dunno. Probably cost a bit in long distance the way we go on some days.’
    â€˜The way you go on,’ she said.
    â€˜Me? You’re the one always asking about Ernie and that.’
    â€˜Would you get another girlfriend?’ she asked, straight-faced.
    â€˜I dunno. Would you get another bloke?’
    â€˜No way.’
    Yeah, that’s what I was going to say. No way. Well, that’s what I should have said. Nah, that’s what Kerry said. No way.
    I told her about being grounded for a month and that Mum had caught me having a smoke in the mower shed.
    â€˜You said you’d given up smoking.’
    â€˜I have. It wasn’t entirely tobacco.’
    â€˜Your mum caught you smoking dope?’
    â€˜Yup.’
    â€˜That hurts. So you’ve given up smoking as long as it’s no more than fifty per cent tobacco.’
    Smart arse. ‘I just felt like it then.’
    â€˜Why?’
    I shrugged. ‘I dunno. I thought it would relax me. Heaps of stuff going on.’
    â€˜Ha! What stuff?’
    â€˜You guys shifting and that.’
    â€˜Does that stress you out?’
    â€˜Yeah. I feel like I’m going to lose my best mate. And my woman. You know?’
    She took my hand. ‘You could come and visit,’ she said quietly.
    â€˜Yeah. Short pushbike ride.’
    Something changed in Kerry. She couldn’t sit still when we got home. It was like she was excited about the possibility of shifting house. Dad had already dropped Ernie off so we took him for a walk. She gave me a peck on the cheek as she was leaving.
    It’s easy to tell when I’m depressed: I do homework. Mum comes to the door and I try to hide the fact that I’m working on my maths so she won’t give me the once-over, twice. Pull out a magazine, flick the telly on. Something. It’s like I don’t even think about it. When I start feelingflat I just click into autopilot and do what has to be done. That night, my cover-up was all too sloppy and she leant against the doorframe.
    â€˜What’s the matter,