‘Argh, Gillian – if you’re gonna murder me, can you at least have the courtesy to let me sleep through it?’ I croak, tugging the blankets over my head.
Gilly yanks my doona down again. With a scowl that contains no small measure of panic, her tiny hands form two fists and unleash a flurry of thuds onto my forehead. She’s kneeling on top of me in her school skirt and tights, still paired with her Bikini Kill pyjama T-shirt, her cropped hair smushed into a structure like a piece of abstract art. She’s reminding me more and more of a punky pixie, or an evil sprite from one of those confusing Japanese horror movies. Narda turns in a few circles on my pillow before flopping down with a huff, fluffy arse in my face.
I haul Narda down beside me. My cat yowls plaintively, and my sister makes a sound that’s almost the same. I close my eyes with a moan, but sleep is obviously not going to be returning anytime soon. With my eyes still closed I pat Gillian on the head. Her crunchy hair clumps under my fingers. ‘Why do you even bother with this stuff?’ I say with a yawn. ‘Y’know Mum’s just gonna make you wash it out.’
Gilly pulls her legs beneath her, sitting cross-legged on top of me. ‘Yeah, well, unless she’s planning to use the garden hose, not much she can do about it, innit?’ She crosses her arms. ‘Pretty sure enforced showers aren’t legal. It’s in the Geneva Convention. Ratified by the United Nations and everything.’
I can’t help but laugh. ‘And somewhere, Mum is ruing the day she introduced you to TED talks.’
Gilly gives me a grin, part sweet-fourteen-year-old, part obnoxious-demon-child. ‘She did say she wanted me to “focus my intellect onto less destructive channels”. Knowledge is power, Joshie.’
I chuckle, and yawn again, scrubbing the sleep out of my eyes. I fumble behind me for the glasses on my shelf and blink myself properly awake before peering up at my sister. ‘Lemme guess. You and Mum have already gone three rounds, and now you want me to run interference?’
Her eyes slide sideways. ‘Nah. Not yet anyway.’ She fidgets with the hem of her skirt. Minuscule Sharpie writing, song lyrics chock full of curse words, weave between the tartan. ‘See, there’s this party on Friday, and I know Mum’s gonna freak if I ask …’
I shove my hands under my neck. ‘Our mum? The person who’s been trying to get you to socialise since you made your last playdate cry so hard he vomited?’ I narrow my eyes suspiciously. ‘Why would she freak, Gillian? And since when have you even been interested in parties? I thought year eight was, and I quote, “a soul-sucking vortex spewed from the depths of Hades”, unquote.’
She shrugs sheepishly. ‘Right, but it’s not one of the losers in my class, is it?’ She steels herself, jaw tightening. ‘Okay, so I might have made friends with some really cool people, these girls … who might be in year ten …’
I burst out laughing. Narda yowls indignantly and scarpers up my bookshelves. ‘And there it is. Dude, there is no way I’m convincing Mum to let you party with – what – a bunch of sixteen-year-olds? You think I’ve developed powers of hypnosis overnight? Anyway, why is this even important?’
Gilly flops onto the bed beside me with an affected, world-weary sigh. ‘It would be important to you too if you went to my school,’ she says dejectedly. ‘Everyone sucks, Josh! And hello, did I mention that they’re all super boring? These are, like, the only interesting people in the entire school.’
I reach blindly over my head again, fingers scrambling for the lowest shelf behind my bed. Gillian flips onto her knees and grabs my hands. She is surprisingly strong for someone who could probably fit inside my satchel. ‘Joshua Bailey, if your solution to my problems is a fricking Hindu shuffle, I swear to god I will shove that deck of cards up your –’
‘Argh, okay, let me go, I need those hands,’ I say, laughing. Gillian sinks back on her heels, glaring viciously. I prop myself on one elbow and peer at my sister over the top of my glasses. ‘So, what exactly will this party involve, Gillian? Blood sacrifices and Japanese death metal? A drunken Bacchanalia with the entire soccer team? No, wait, the soccer team’s mascot? Bumpy Tony was looking exceptionally fine last sports day –’
Gilly grabs my face and squeezes. ‘It’s gonna be a bunch of people hanging out with Thai food and French movies. Godard, Josh, not even the dirty French ones!’
I snort. ‘Yeah, cos that doesn’t sound pretentious –’
It speaks volumes about my sister’s keenness that she doesn’t deck me. ‘Look, it’s going to be tame. Fun, and cool, but tame. Help meeee!’
When it comes to my mum and my sister, I reckon I’d have better luck trying to negotiate, say, a peace accord between Stalin and Trotsky, or Queen Elizabeth and Mary Queen of Scots, after Lizzie had, you know, beheaded her. But Gilly is looking at me with her pleading baby blues and I can feel my resolve crumbling. Still, since it’s my job to mess with my little sister, I can’t help but ask, ‘So whatcha going to do for me?’
Gillian narrows her eyes. ‘Oh, cos I do nothing for you? I’ll remember that next time Dad starts up at dinner.’ She lowers her voice to her best impression of Dad’s cheerful tenor. ‘Josh, how’s that exam prep coming? Josh, you gone through that course info yet? Josh, you know we’ll be proud whatever decision you make, but you gotta make a decision, tick-tock, tick-tock, yak yak yak.’ She snorts. ‘You think I mentioned getting kicked out of Italian cos I wanted Mum on my arse again? I am not that masochistic.’
I sit up, suddenly feeling this urge to get out of bed and sprint down the road in my PJs. ‘You got kicked out? How come? And why is this the first I’m hearing about it?’
She shrugs, not even a tiny bit shamefaced. ‘Maybe cos you tend to drift off when Dad’s on your case. And, you know, I got booted for the usual. Talking back, being a disruptive influence. Same crap. It’s only for a week, unfortunately. It’s freaking tedious, Joshie. Not my fault the morons in class need six months to learn how to ask where the toilets are.’