Chapter 12: Defence

Thursday 26-Apr 2007

After school, Chris had a second round of trials for the First Eleven soccer team. With everything else that was going on, he'd almost forgotten, but David reminded him, since they both looked like they had a real chance of getting into the team. As he made his way to the trial, he was suddenly confronted by a rather aggressive looking Lisa.

She poked her finger into his chest, and pushed him back. "What are you thinking, going after Shahia like that?"

Chris looked at her in surprise. What was she on about?

"I saw you there with her. What's this? You flame out with me, so you figure to go pick on the weakest girl in the class? You're scum."

Oh? Chris guessed that he could understand why Lisa had thought that. It was probably how it looked. To his surprise he realised that he hadn't even once thought of Shahia like that, though he was probably already closer to her than he'd ever been to another girl.

"Lisa, it's not like that at all. I've never once thought of Shahia being my girlfriend. Anyway, there's no way she's got any space in her life for anything like that. None at all."

She looked at him suspiciously. "Why not? What's up with her?"

"Shahia's business is..."

" ... is Shahia's business," Lisa finished for him. "I know."

She looked at him with an accusing glare. "How can I trust you?"

Chris winced again, and then suddenly he was mad. How did he get himself to this point? Did no one trust him? Well, damn, that was going to change. He suppressed his anger, and shrugged. What could he say about that to Lisa?

Lisa poked him again with her finger. "I know there's something badly wrong with Shahia, but she won't say a word to any of us. Except you, now. If you hurt that girl, I'm going to cut your balls off and shove them down your throat."

Chris nodded. "If I hurt Shahia, I promise that I'll give you the knife! But there's two conditions.

"The first is that if you think I might be hurting her, you come talk to me about it straightaway. The second is..."

Chris poked his own finger into Lisa's chest, the exposed skin above the top of her dress, and pushed back.

" ... that you help her too, or it might be me with the knife. Got that?"

Lisa looked at him in surprise. "Yes. Fair enough."

Then she gave him a long look. "I just hope you know what you're doing."

Chris agreed. "I sure hope so too."

"So, just how am I supposed to help unless you tell me what's going on?" Lisa's expression left no doubt that she intended to hassle Chris until she found out.

"Lisa, please understand, I promised Shahia that I wouldn't talk to anyone about her."

"Come on, it's just me, I won't tell anyone, and I can really help."

"I know you can, but what can I do?"

"You can tell me."

"No! I promised, and it is important. When the time's right, I'll encourage Shahia to tell you herself, but I never will."

Chris's mood was fey after that, but it turned out for the best. He had a chance to run into a full match and convert all that passion into action, and he ended up playing a blinder, completely shutting down the school's main striker. At the end of the trial the teacher announced the squad, and Chris was in it. He breathed a sigh of relief.

Chris waited until Jay and Bec had gone to bed before going to talk to his mum and dad. They were watching TV, but they turned it off as soon as he came into the room.

"I talked to Shahia today."

Straight away, he had their complete attention. They were riveted as he described the conversation he'd had with Shahia. He was actually quite proud of the outcome, and he was quite chuffed when they agreed that he'd done well.

It was his Dad who provided him with the opening he'd been waiting for, when he warned Chris that he'd only opened a huge can of worms, that he had committed to a great deal of work and heartache and he had no way out. Chris just stared at his dad, waiting for him to stop.

"Dad, I know all that. The question is what comes now."

They nodded.

"Well, that guy from St Joseph's told me that Shahia loves to dance. So I'd like to invite her to the year eleven dance. But, of course, the problem is her brother and sisters. I was hoping that I could convince both of you to babysit them for us."

Chris had been expecting a little reluctance, but instead, to his considerable surprise, his parents were rather dismayed, even shocked. He could see that they really didn't want to do that.

"Is that a problem?"

His parents seemed rather reluctant to answer him.

"Umm..."

Chris really didn't know what to say. Just what was going on here? If he didn't know better, he'd think that he'd had a role reversal with his parents, and he was the one trying to find out what they'd done wrong.

His dad looked around rather pointedly at his mum. They shared some look between them, and then his mum looked back at him and said, "We can't just say yes to that, Chris."

Chris sort of understood that. "What if they come around one day after school next week, and we can get to know them, and see if would be okay?"

His parents shared another look, and then his dad said, "All right, you can invite them around, and we'll see."

Later that night, Chris lay in bed pondering his parent's response. There was something not quite right about it. As if they were somehow reluctant to get involved with Shahia? Yet his mum had all but shoved him into doing something about Shahia. So which was it? Maybe she'd thought it would be Chris's problem?

Well, screw them. They'd pushed him this way, and they were going to get dragged along with him too.

Friday 27-Apr 2007

Shahia walked in a minute late, like usual, but as she sat down she did something she'd never done before. She looked at Chris, gave him a big smile, and said hello.

Such a small thing, and yet Chris was so pleased.

She hadn't wanted to talk as they walked between periods, and Chris had to tell himself to be patient. But as much as he could, he kept her in sight. Same when lunch started. Instead of running as fast as he could to the field to grab the best area for their soccer match, he walked there at her pace, though not actually with her — just as long as he could keep an eye out for her.