Tall Story - Candy Gourlay [52]
And BANG.
He banged it in.
The ball shot through the basket and Jabby grabbed the ring, hanging on with a big grin on his face, swinging like a monkey, back and forth, back and forth. And then I realized that the whole stadium had begun to swing too, back and forth, slowly at first and then faster and faster and faster and faster, and then Jabby couldn’t hang on any more and let go of the ring, and then he was falling, falling, falling.
‘Nardo! Help! Help!’
I opened my eyes.
‘Jabby?’
Even as I said his name I knew it was just a dream.
Andi’s basketball duvet had fallen off her bed onto my face. Michael Jordan leaped high above me on the wall poster. Sunshine streamed in through the gap in the curtains.
‘Andi?’ I called up to her bed. But when I sat up to look, it was empty and the door was ajar. Andi was already up.
Slowly, morning noises drifted into my awareness. The TV’s chatter from downstairs. The trickle of water in the bathroom. Birds singing outside the window. There was a buzzing noise, like a saw. Uncle Will – Dad – was sleeping off the night shift in the next room.
I sighed and lay back, my arms under my head. A dream!
It was Jabby’s ambition to do slam dunks even though he was just five ten and not much of a jumper. He could list the names of all the NBA players under six foot who managed dunks on a regular basis and he spent hours practising and jumping around like a pogo stick. Maybe this was a portent of good things to come. Maybe Jabby was about to make a breakthrough.
I grabbed my cellphone from the side table and thumbed a text message to Jabby.
DREAMED U CD DUNK.
Then I remembered. The Souls game. It was today!
My stomach contracted and I sat up, my back suddenly cold with sweat.
The door opened. Andi was already in her school uniform. For a moment the amber eyes looked serious but it must have been a trick of the light because she bellowed cheerily, ‘Mum says get up, sleepyhead, today’s your big day!’
I was in and out of the bathroom and down the stairs in less than ten minutes.
The TV’s drone cut off abruptly when I got to the bottom of the stairs. Ma appeared in the living-room doorway.
‘Good morning, darling!’
Her hair was mussed up, and there were tired lines around her eyes, which were red.
‘Oh.’ I searched her face. ‘What’s wrong, Mama?’
She rubbed her eyes. ‘It’s hay fever.’
‘Hay fever?’ I had never heard of hay fever. Perhaps she meant high fever?
She rubbed her eyes again. ‘It’s an allergy. I only get it here in England. In the summer. Never get it in the Philippines. Oh, I can’t believe I’ve got hay fever now. It’s not summer any more, for heaven’s sake. My eyes are so sore!’
She led the way to the kitchen and put some eggs out to fry for breakfast.
Andi was already sitting at the breakfast table.
‘Hey, Bernardo.’
‘Good morning.’ There was something overly bright about her smile. And the way she directed her gaze back to her cereal bowl was just a little bit too quick. I looked from Ma to Andi.
No! Stop it. What was wrong with me? Yesterday was a breakthrough! It felt like Andi and I had finally connected. I felt so close to her after we talked. So why was I now mistrusting everything I saw?
My Darth Vader ring tone began to play. I couldn’t believe it. Somebody was actually calling!
I’d had a few text messages of course, but in all that time no one had phoned – all my phone contacts were from San Andres … and nobody in San Andres could afford overseas calls. It was so pointless having the phone that I’d left it on a shelf in the kitchen and forgotten about it.
I picked it up and did a double take.
Mum eyed the phone.
‘Is it from the Philippines?’ she said.
‘I had a missed call last night. From Jabby!’
‘Is that so?’ Mum turned towards the kitchen sink.
‘And look, another call!’
‘Jabby again?’ Mum’s voice was muffled. She was bent over the sink.
‘Yes.’ I frowned. ‘Two missed calls from Jabby.’
But Mum was no longer listening, throwing water on her eyes and mumbling something about hay fever.