‘You’ll owe me, by the way.’ August pauses and pokes the purple Sharpie dangerously close to Beck’s nose. He lurches away. ‘I haven’t decided exactly, but it’ll probably be you giving me chocolate every day for a month.’
‘I’m pretty sure “no” is the only way to answer that.’
Maybe he would buy her chocolate as a thank you – if he had money. But if he had money he’d buy Joey an ice cream or get himself some jeans that aren’t too short.
‘Or,’ August says, ‘you agree to a friendship truce.’
‘But “friendship” implies we’re friends –’ and we’re not ‘– and “truce” implies we’re fighting.’
‘We aren’t fighting?’
‘I would call it “stiff acquaintance with a touch of hate”.’
‘I’m not stiff.’ She flings an arm around his neck. ‘And I don’t hate you.’
Beck peels away. ‘You will. Give it time.’
‘Then cut class with me.’
Beck stares.
‘Oh, don’t act righteous.’ She pulls a hairband from her wrist and knots her hair into a thick bun. ‘You showed up to school, so that’s half the battle, and I think you and your purple face could use a morale boost. I could use a mental health day.’ She stuffs her notebook back into the satchel. ‘We’ll go on a quest to find cake.’
She bounces to her feet and stretches a hand to him.
Beck Keverich doesn’t act. He fantasises. He longs. But he does exactly what he’s supposed to do.
Until he takes her hand and she yanks him upright and he somehow says, ‘It better be a big cake,’ and they abandon education and sneers and presumptions that he’s a punch bag and she’s a tree hugger, and they escape to be different people entirely.
It should be an impossible task. Finding cake? Leaving school grounds? Wearing a uniform? Beck is entirely certain someone will point and shout ‘THEY’VE ESCAPED THEIR PRISON!’ and haul them back.
Either August doesn’t share this fear or doesn’t think it’s impossible.
August probably exists in an alternate reality where nothing is impossible and no one is too mean and the sun doesn’t stop shining.
They cut across the football oval and battle their way through a small patch of scrub to the road. From there it’s a stroll to a nearby shopping complex. It’s nothing fancy. Most of the shops have bars on the windows and the ones with the most business are cheap one-dollar shops and McDonald’s. It’s excruciating bypassing the smell of hot chips and cheesy burgers. He’d eat just about anything by this point.
But August leads him to a coffee shop in a poky corner that has exactly zero customers but them.
None of the tables and chairs match, and daffodils sit in beer bottles as centrepieces. One wall is a chalkboard with a million scribbles in every colour and the other is crammed with mismatched photo frames. Dreamcatchers hang across the entrance so thickly, one smacks Beck in the face – and then swings around to smack him in the back of the head as well.
‘What exactly do they sell here?’ Beck rubs his skull and stares at a pile of bongo drums, which might be for decoration or for spontaneous costumers to thump.
August wags her finger at him. ‘When a person buys you cake, don’t question anything.’
‘Can I question the cake’s ingredients?’
‘No, you ungrateful whelp. You eat it, even if it’s made of chia seeds.’
What – what are chia seeds? Are they even a real thing? Is this his last meal on earth—
‘Beck,’ August says patiently, ‘this is an alternative café. Just sit down and keep your mind open.’ She points to a table that is probably an antique and a chair that is probably from the dump. ‘And please don’t make horrified noises.’
‘Alternative as in how?’ Beck’s voice is pitched a little high. ‘They sweeten the cake with human hearts?’
‘Um, more like alternative-as-in-the-cake-is-sweetened-with-stevia.’
Beck sits down. ‘Is the death short and easy?’
August swats him.
She slips around the register – Beck is pretty sure that’s not how you order – and disappears through a curtain of beads to the kitchen. There are distant pots clanging and panpipes droning from a single dilapidated speaker. August is only gone a heartbeat before shouts and greetings explode from the kitchen and someone bawls August’s name like they haven’t seen her in nine years.
Beck wants to regret coming – it’s just too weird – but he’s so hungry.
August reappears, clearly pleased with herself. ‘My mum’s best friend’s cousin works here. Everything is half price for me. Also he won’t tell the school or my parents.’
‘Aren’t we lucky.’ Beck’s voice is dull. ‘I have to get my sister at three.’
‘We have time.’ August’s ocean eyes settle on Beck’s face with a serious and piercing look that makes him uncomfortable. ‘I’m almost entirely certain it’d take you less than ten seconds to demolish a cake, anyway. Do you ever eat?’
‘I eat,’ Beck says, defensive.
‘My dad would take one look at you and try to fatten you up.’ August shakes her head, smiling.
It’s strange to Beck how she mentions her parents offhandedly, lovingly, like they don’t rake her over the coals on a regular basis or spit out how much they loathe her.
‘You’ll meet them when you come over,’ she says.
‘What?’
‘Oh, you will eventually. I know these things.’
Beck resists the urge to catapult out the door. Why does August make him want to run and stay at the same time? How come he can’t muster the energy to truly get rid of her? Because she pays attention to him? Because she laughs instead of seethes at his snarky quips? Because she’s buying him cake?
The last one. It’s the last one.
A server swishes out of the beaded curtain carrying a tray that looks like it was made from an old crate. He has long dark hair that hangs to his shoulders and tie-dye fisherman pants that balloon so much they look like a skirt. But his shirt says Hate On Me And I’ll Punch You, which kind of throws the chill vibe.
Beck wisely decides not to hate on him. Ever.
‘Yum, thanks, Morris,’ August says. ‘It looks delicious.’
A violent hippy named Morris?
‘Anything for our favourite August.’ Morris sets plates and mugs down and smiles crookedly. ‘Not going to snitch, but skipping school …’ He tuts. ‘Dude.’
‘I know, I know.’ August turns into a pathetically adorable puppy dog. ‘But just look at my friend – he’s practically starving to death.’
Morris squints at Beck. ‘Well, he looks your type, I guess.’
‘Um,’ says Beck.
‘You know,’ Morris says, ‘pitiful and starved.’
‘Thank you, Morris,’ August says. ‘Goodbye, Morris.’
‘All right, all right.’ He shrugs, tucks the tray under his arm and ambles back to the kitchen.
‘How many pitiful and starved boys do you bring here?’ Beck says, slightly strangled.