3. JESSICA
Omigod! Omigod! Why does the compound turn purple when you add sulfuric acid? Omigod! Omigod! Oh my freaking god! Which one is it? Oh no…I’m gonna fail Year 12. I’m going to be a failure my entire life, I’m going to drop out here and now, I’ll never go to university and I’ll bum around and smoke dope and I’ll never become anything and then I’ll be that crazy lady who talks to walls. Oh god why does it turn purple?
And that pretty much sums up my entire exam experience. But muck up day made up for it. Despite my promises (Mwahahahaha!) I got Bailey with eggs and flower and Sav with shaving cream all over her summer dress and in her bag. They both freaked out big time and Ant got them with his water pistol. It rocked a fair bit. Ant, Jennifer and I attacked the principal’s car at lunchtime with toilet paper, streamers and shaving cream. And at the end of the day, we hid behind the oval fence while Mrs. Caruthers came out to drive home and watched her freak out big time. Then she sat down on the sidewalk and laughed her ass out and told us to come out so she could personally thank us for the best laugh she’s had in a long time.
I grinned to myself as I hugged Ant goodbye at the airport. I was heading off to Sydney with Bails and Sav, but later, after Bails’ shoot was finished, I’d be meeting up with Ant, Jennifer and the others for schoolies in Surfer’s Paradise.
Have I ever mentioned that I’m kind of terrified of heights? Yeah, not such a great a thing to remember as you’re taking off from Tullamarine Airport. I freaked out the whole way until I finally asked the cute flight attendant Kevin, for a strong, short black. Kevin was cute and made great coffee, the kind of guy that I could fall in love with if I wasn’t so mad for Ant.
Anthony Gellar, oh my freaking god, even his name is hot! I guess that I’d never really noticed him until about Year 10. You know the kind of guy, always quiet, smart, kind of dark, mysterious. Then about Year 10 he became this guy…this really great, cute, intelligent guy. And suddenly, I was noticing him, the way his eyelashes curled to is cheeks and the way he stared out the window when he was bored.
Of course, nothing happened between us until late last year when we got together at Jennifer’s party. Up until then, I was kind of inexperienced with guys, anytime I had a boyfriend, he ran as soon as he met my step-dad who always took the poor guys out to the barn to show them the sawn-off shotgun that he had made himself.
But he liked Ant for some reason. And so did mum, and my brother, and Bails and Sav. In fact, he’s the kind of guy that everybody loves, you know, he talks to you all the time, no matter what time it is, what you’re doing, he’ll stop and have a chat. And when he talks to you, he makes you feel like you’re the most important person in the world. He’s a really special person.
So I spent the rest of the flight plus the taxi ride to our motel mooning over Ant. But then I caught sight of the motel. I nearly shit myself it was like a gazillion stories high and beautiful. Like the motels in movies that you wish you could but know you never will stay at. A porter (here that? A PORTER!) met us at the door which was opened by a doorman and took our luggage as Bailey’s agent checked us in. Because I was over eighteen, I was acting as Bailey’s guardian for the next couple of weeks.
The lobby of the motel was amazing, all marble floored with red carpets and stuff…it was so cool! We were shown to our rooms by the porter (Who Sav thought was kind of cute) We had three suites in a row, all inter-linked through a series of doors.
I was kind of tired, but that night Bailey was going out to dinner with her agent (who was kind of cute in a fortyish kind of way) and some SONY guy who could make or break her future and she had to look perfect. We had to sedate her, make her go take a bath and then lay out her clothes for her. Bailey threatened to kill me if I let Sav near her face, so she did her own make-up and Sav twisted her hair up, trying to remain angry at Bailey’s jibe about make-up.
In the end, we had a gorgeous blonde bombshell in a beautiful blue dress. We hugged her goodnight and settled in for a night in front of the TV, feeling like frumps whenever we thought about where Bailey was and what she was doing.
In fact, the first couple of days in Sydney were uneventful. And I expected that they all would be. Bailey was always off at preparation meetings and Sav and I spent all our time in the room. And then, one day, I came up with a brainwave.
“Hey Sav…”
“Mmm?”
“Let’s go shopping!” She stared at me with wide eyes.
“You mean l…l…leave the room?” I nodded and she jumped up from her position on my bed. “I’m there let’s go”
We spent the day shopping at cheap shops, pretending like we could afford to buy GUCCI if we really wanted to and ignoring nasty glances from snobby shop assistants. We splurged and caught a taxi back to the motel, and laughed our way into the lobby, must’ve been that extra moccachino!
Bailey was standing in the lobby with a group of several people.
“Jess! Sav! Where’ve you been? I thought you were in the room”
“We broke out!” Sav gasped. I laughed for no reason at all.
“What? I would’ve been worried”
“Oh excuse me so very freaking much” I replied in a Russian accent. Sav cracked up and sobered as Bailey frowned.
“Ok…well, you guys know Christopher, but I would like you to meek Mr. Calahad, Tony Christof, Gina Louise and, Isaac, Taylor and Zac Hanson”
I remember turning bright red, and then feeling light, kind of like I was floating, or that feeling you get when you laugh so much that you can’t breathe and you sort of half faint?
I was going to be charming. I was supposed to be beautiful, witty, intelligent. Yeah, well somehow, lying on the ground in a fit of hysterical laughter, isn’t exactly the way I planned on meeting my favourite ever band.
CHAPTER 4.
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