“The only thing they get right in these things is just what arseholes the rich kids are.” She harrumphed. “And I know that to be a scientific fact.” Verity did indeed have first-hand experience that ending up with someone well off was never a good idea, and neither of us had the best time at school at the hands of the more well off kids.
Me, Verity and two other kids – Stubbs and Divvy – all lived on a road that linked our outer city estate to one of the “nice” parts of town. The way the school places worked meant we were the only four kids from our estate to go to St Veronica’s. People said we were lucky, but we were anything but. The other kids from our estate mocked our school uniforms and the kids at St Veronica’s pretty much ignored us. When things were going well, they ignored us, but when things weren’t, we were teased about charity shop shoes and school bags and threadbare uniforms patched up to last longer than they were designed to. So I did everything I could to stay under the radar.
“Blane is boring,” said Verity.
“He’s not. He’s perfect,” I said.
“Okay. Pick the next film then.” She fanned out the DVD cases for me to make our next selection.
“Breakfast Club,” I answered quickly.
“Really?” she asked. “Why?”
“Because I like the idea of spending Saturday morning in detention with Judd Nelson instead of sitting in a shop with no customers being surprised by processed pork products. And I like how they all know what they are.”
“What?” Verity asked taking the disc out.
“Yeah, you know, like you have the arty one or the brainy one. Must be nice being brainy or arty or athletic instead of just being average.”
“Average?” said Verity.
“Yeah. My thing is being average, always has been, always will be. That and talking to 80’s movie stars because I haven’t got any customers. Pretty sure I’m more like a basket case than any of the others in this film though,” I said.
“It’s probably more interesting talking to cardboard cut-outs than talking to my two all day. Do you know how many conversations I have had about Frozen today? A million. Two million probably.” Verity started chugging her wine back. “Bloody Frozen. Christ.”
“And you see in The Breakfast Club, they don’t have to pick what they want to be when they grow up. They already know. How am I meant to know what I am supposed to be?”
“They’re not real, Cara. It’s just all stereotypical. Hate to break it to you but it’s all fictional this, you know.”
“Yeah, but how do you know what you’re meant to do in actual real, real life?”
“You don’t. You just accept your lot and get on with it. I don’t believe in all this controlling your destiny business. Shit happens and then you get on with it. Simple as.”
I didn’t agree with Verity on that one. Surely we could have everything we wanted in life, just the same as everyone else. I wasn’t sure I was happy to give in and accept my lot.
“Yeah, I know they’re fictional, but at least they have a clue where their life is leading. I haven’t got the foggiest! I’m not academic; I’m not sporty. I never once got an A in anything and was never picked for the netball team. So what have we got left after The Brain and The Athlete? Oh yeah, The Basket Case and The Criminal.”
I contemplated whether a career in the pirated DVD sector would suit me. Okay, yes, it was highly illegal, but the pirate DVD lady always looked so happy, it was clear she had an enormous amount of job satisfaction. It might almost be worth going to prison for. Something will come up, I thought to myself. I’d find another job, one I liked and one that wouldn’t get me arrested.
“Then there’s Princess,” said Verity.
“Come off it. We are too skint for that. And we couldn’t really be any of the other Molly Ringwald characters in any of the films because we were crap at art and we didn’t like The Smiths, plus we hadn’t even heard of sushi in those days – let alone take it into a detention. What I would have given for a Saturday morning in detention with Judd Nelson!”
“We’re the skint ones,” said Verity. “That’s who we are.”
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to watch The Breakfast Club any more. It made me think about what school was really like. I’d often landed myself in detention, but it was nowhere near as fun as a detention in Shermer High School, Illinois. I’d never had a gun in my locker or taped Larry Lester’s arse cheeks together or any of the other things I aspired to do. I was just often late for registration, which meant spending first break picking up litter on the playing fields while Sister Mary Margaret shouted at us. I didn’t try as hard as I could not to be late, as it meant I didn’t have to spend much time in the social areas where the popular girls like April Webster and her cronies would mock my charity-shop and hand-me-down clothes.
At primary school April and I had been friends. Mum used to take me with her in the school holidays when she cleaned houses in the nicer parts of town. April’s mum was one of her customers and me and April would play for hours in her garden while Mum cleaned and did the laundry. Her mum was kind and brought us out jugs of orange squash with ice while April and I played on the swings or shared secrets in her tree house. April had an older sister and when it was time for secondary school to start, April’s mum gave us her old school uniform and school shoes. It was like new, and no one would have known except April must have told her friends. On the first day at school, every time I walked past one of April’s friends, they would whisper about my shoes and my second-hand clothes. April wouldn’t say anything, but she went along with her friends laughing.
I couldn’t tell Mum how they teased me or ask if I could have new clothes, but I cried on the way home, walking ahead of Verity and Stubbs until they caught me up. Stubbs made us laugh in between kicking a ball about between him and Divvy, so by the time I got home I had stopped crying. By second year, I’d had enough of the taunts of “bag lady” and I did everything I could to make myself invisible. I didn’t put myself forward for anything. I didn’t speak up in class to avoid drawing attention to myself and I didn’t try to make other friends. I just stuck with Verity, Stubbs and Divvy. I missed out on so many moments: the school plays, the discos, the school trips, as I did everything I could to be as inconspicuous as possible.
“Imagine if we’d had a high school prom like that,” I continued.
“We did have a prom, sort of,” said Verity. “The leaving disco.”
“I didn’t go to the leaving disco, not after the awful Christmas disco we had the year before,” I said. I hadn’t gone like I didn’t go to most things.
“Yeah, well you didn’t miss much. All we did was drink squash from plastic cups in a school dining hall that smelled of gravy and onions. I don’t think anyone even actually danced. It was hardly like a John Hughes film.”
I wondered where my perfect moment was and if it would ever arrive, and I began to bristle thinking about that school disco.
“Shall we go to the social club, then?” I asked.
“I’ll get my coat,” Verity said. “Think we’ll find your Blane or your Judd Nelson in there?”
“Doubt it very much,” I replied and laughed.
“That’s good. Because you don’t need a Blane; you need a Duckie. Everyone does,” Verity said as we left the flat.
I shook my head. I still had hope I’d get my happy ending. I’d find my perfect job, one where magic happens, and if my Judd Nelson came along, all the better. I still believed I could find the job of my dreams, creating little moments of magic for people. I just knew I would be able to create events