The Midnight Dress(10)

They have interviewed Maxine Singh, Shannon Fanelli and Mallory Johnson. They have all been asked the same questions. They all return again and again to the dress.

‘It was deep blue, so blue it was almost black,’ said Mallory, ‘and it had all this lace in it and all these bits of glass. Do you want me to draw you a picture?’

‘It was magical,’ said Maxine. ‘I mean it must have been.’

‘It hurt your eyes to look at it,’ said Shannon. ‘I mean it made whoever wore it turn completely beautiful. But . . . ’

She paused. Bit her bottom lip.

Glass raised his rumpled face to wait. Only she said nothing. She buried her head in her hands and began to cry.





Murray Falconer has size-twelve feet. Rose looks at his muddy footprints on the bus floor and marvels at how small hers are in comparison. He has dyed his hair blue and it’s caused a commotion with all the younger boys. They’re shouting with glee, ‘Now you’re going to get expelled, Falco.’ He takes his position in front of Rose and jiggles his leg nervously. He’s done a bad job. There’s still a lot of dark hair along his neckline. She can tell he wants her to say something, but she sighs and looks away from him instead.

Murray lives just after the turn-off to the bay, through the cane. There’s a creek that runs across his land and sometimes, when it’s running high, he can’t get to school. Rose tries to see his house, but all she can see is the roof behind the crop. She has a strange fascination with how other people live, even though she wouldn’t admit it. Has he always lived there? Ever since he was just a baby in a cot? Does he know every part of that house, all the cracks in the walls and the way shadows fall at windows?

‘I like your nails,’ he says.

Rose ignores him.

‘What’s it like having the word love in your last name?’ he asks, pronouncing love in a stupid voice.

‘Shut up,’ says Rose.

‘I’m only making conversation.’

‘Well, don’t.’ She touches her hair to make sure no curls have escaped.

‘I went fishing with my old man at the bay on Saturday,’ he says. ‘I saw you there on the rocks.’

‘So,’ she says. There were boats everywhere on Saturday.

‘You looked like a mermaid.’

Wildfire breaks out on her cheeks.

‘Do you like fishing?’ he asks.

‘No.’

‘Do you like long walks on the beach?’

‘No.’

‘Do you want to go out with me?’

‘Shut up, Murray.’

‘I’m only joking,’ he says.

Murray’s reception at school is rowdy. He tries to appear like he doesn’t care, walks with his hands in his pockets, pretending not to hear, but he looks at his hair in all the glass windows. He smiles happily when Mrs Bonnick suggests that he accompany her on a little visit to Mrs D.

The hullabaloo is only outclassed by the arrival of Jonah Pedersen, who is home from a rep football tour of New South Wales. He strides into the school flanked by the lesser demigods Peter Tuvalu and Ronnie Cartwright. Jonah Pedersen is still wearing his rep tracksuit jumper, even though it’s high summer. He is tall and muscular, it’s true, good-looking in a homogenous toothpaste-ad way. He has impossibly smooth brown skin, walks as though he’s about to break into a sprint, walks as though he’s about to score a try, all tensed up and vibrating. People can’t help but look at him.

Rose sees Pearl grow quiet. She shrinks back inside herself. She bends down outside the science block and pretends to be very interested in finding something in her bag. Jonah Pedersen passes like visiting royalty.

After he’s gone Vanessa whispers in Pearl’s ear.

‘He looked at you,’ she says, which makes Pearl smile.

‘I’ve started learning Russian,’ Pearl says to Rose in modern history while Mrs Bonnick sorts her handouts. Her alter ego, Madame Bonnick, has been put away. She is no-nonsense in modern history, Mrs Bonnick.

‘It’s for when I meet my father,’ says Pearl.

She takes a pocket Russian dictionary from her backpack.

‘I’m going to write to the B. Orlovs in Russian. Do you think that’s a good idea? I mean I wrote to all the As but maybe they couldn’t read English.’

‘What if he doesn’t live in Moscow?’ says Rose, which seems a more practical question.

Pearl ignores her.

‘I think the Bs are going to be lucky,’ she says. ‘I’m translating this little book. I think it’s about two brothers.’

She holds up a Russian novel. Rose isn’t sure about Pearl Kelly. Sometimes she seems really, really dumb, then the next minute she starts reciting the names of Russian Metro stations, writing them at the same time in pink highlighter pen. It’s strange that she is so pretty and weird at the same time.

‘In Russia you can get your legs stretched if you like,’ adds Pearl. ‘They take extra bits of bone from your ribs and put them in your legs and then all these metal screws and stuff. A lot of the models get it done. It’s very gruesome. Sometimes it goes wrong and they can never walk again.’

‘Now you’re talking,’ says Rose.

A type of dark fairytale story is lurking there. She’ll write it down in her notebook when she gets home.