Page 8 of Unnecessary Drama

I sit down and he sits down next to me. I get the sense he’s regretting the fake accent. I would be. I vow not to speak to him, to hold firm, but not speaking to someone is much harder when you are sitting right next to each other. We’re not touching, but I’m acutely aware of every inch of his body beside me. My mind keeps slipping back into memories of us chatting and laughing on the bus in high school. No. Do not think about that. The silence stretches on, and I stare resolutely out the window. Do not make small talk. Do not look at him. Do not.

Jesse clears his throat.

‘I know we’re supposed to ignore each other when no one else is around,’ he says. ‘But I have to tell you—’

My heart catches, just for a second, as I wait for him to finish his sentence. Maybe he’s feeling nostalgic too. Maybe he’s going to try and rekindle our friendship. I brace myself for an emotional confession. To coldly remind him we are not friends and can never be again.

‘That your foot is touching something disgusting,’ he says, pointing at the floor.

Oh. I look down and he’s right. Under our seat is a discarded McDonalds bag and my shoe is resting on what appears to be a squashed junior burger, the sauce squirting out and onto my sneaker. I lift my foot, and a sticky mess follows it, with the burger wrapper and a pickle now stuck to the sole of my shoe. I wipe my foot against the wall, but the wrapper won’t come off. Jesse watches on as I struggle with the mess.

Finally, he leans down and grabs the dirty wrapper off my shoe with his hand.

‘I didn’t need your help,’ I say huffily.

‘Sorry. I will never help you with anything again,’ he says. He doesn’t visibly roll his eyes but I can feel a sarcastic eye-roll in his tone.

‘Good,’ I say, folding my arms.

‘Glad we’re agreed,’ he says, folding his as well.

We don’t speak again for the rest of the ride home.

7

It’s the night of our housewarming party and I am in the kitchen, chopping fruit into decorative shapes and artfully arranging cheeses and jamming toothpicks into rolled-up salami slices with what I am sure an outside observer would describe as a manic energy. I told Harper and Jesse I would prepare the food for the party, because it calms me to have a job and because I like to make things special.

They thought I would dump a few packets of chips into bowls, but I have created fully stylised grazing platters. This just seemed nicer than a tub of hummus and a few packets of water crackers. Although now I take a breath and stand back and look at it all, I’m starting to worry I might have gone overboard. I am putting the finishing touches on my kiwifruit cut into flower shapes when Harper and Penny walk into the kitchen.

‘Oh wow!’ Harper says, smiling. ‘You’ve really gone all out.’

I can’t tell if she thinks that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

‘It’s no big deal,’ I say, hoping they can’t tell from looking at me that I spent all morning watching instructional YouTube videos on how to create charcuterie platters. I want people to be deeply impressed, but I also don’t want anyone to know how hard I am trying for their approval. It’s a complicated balance.

Penny is carrying a bottle of champagne, and wearing an adorable jumpsuit and bright lipstick. Her chestnut hair is spilling in every direction, and her chunky heels are so high I want to study the mechanics of how she walks so effortlessly in them. Harper is wearing high-waisted black jeans, Converse sneakers and a cropped red top with the word ‘cheese’ on it in blocky white type. I don’t know if the word ‘cheese’ is an obscure reference or if it’s completely random, but I do intuitively know that it makes the top very cool. I don’t know which outfit I wish I could pull off more. I’m wearing a loose black dress that feels very dull in comparison, and now I’m worried I look like a waitress.

‘You should start a catering business,’ Penny says, which makes me definitely want to get changed. ‘You have talent.’

Harper laughs and grabs a carrot off my platter. ‘Stop telling everyone they should start a business,’ she says to Penny.

‘I can’t help it. I see potential everywhere I go,’ Penny replies.

‘She listened to one podcast episode on young women launching startups and now she’s unbearable,’ Harper says, and I laugh. I resist asking which podcast, because I don’t need the pressure of trying to think up a successful business idea right now.

Penny picks up a strawberry and looks at me intently. ‘How are you settling in?’ she says. Her voice is kind, and I worry I am giving off out-of-my-depth-small-town-girl energy.

‘Good, good,’ I say. ‘I love it here. It’s—’ I pause and try to think of something very Melbourne to say, something worldly, chic, cultured. ‘It’s a really nice area,’ I finish.

‘Brooke is so organised,’ Harper says to Penny, still chewing on the carrot. A very ambiguous statement. Is that a good thing? A bad thing? A neutral thing?

Harper and Penny smile at me, and my heart is beating very fast in the silence that follows. I feel personally responsible for the lull in the conversation. Why am I suddenly so bad at this? Without the structures of school, the security of a minor leadership role and the safe haven of my family, I am struggling. I actually had the sad thought the other day that I miss my school uniform. Now I spend hours scrolling through social media to find girls of my body size and type (tall, wide hips, strong thighs, a non-flat stomach, hair that swings between mousy brown and dark blonde depending on when I last went to the hairdresser and if I am under flattering light, pink-toned skin with a tendency towards eczema and extreme dryness but that will turn oily as soon as moisturiser touches it) who dress well, so I can copy their style. Penny is tall and about my size, but she’s operating at three fashion levels, at least, above me.

I hear the front door opening and voices in the hallway.

‘Oh, someone’s here,’ Harper says, and she and Penny go to see who it is. It’s their second year of uni, they grew up in Melbourne, and they’re part of a whole interconnected social group. Harper said she has twenty or thirty friends coming tonight.

Within minutes of people arriving, it’s clear that Harper’s friends and Jesse’s friends are very different types of people. Harper’s friends are artsy, politically engaged, sitting in our lounge room like a big clump of intimidating coolness, drinking wine and debating the merits of a French TV show that I have heard of but didn’t realise anyone my age actually watched, and they all have great hair, somehow, which seems statistically unlikely, but there it is.