Miss Understood (6 page)

‘That’s the one! I think . . .’ She looked a bit confused, like she was trying to remember some really old person’s birthday, or the year some battle happened.

‘The guy you’re talking about is actually Yoda, not Yogo. And by the way, it’s a “Jedi”, not a “dead-eye”.’

Miss Huntley tilted her head to one side while she thought about it. ‘That doesn’t make
any
sense. What’s a jed-eye?’

‘It’s some kind of space soldier, I think. Uses a light-saver.’

‘Ah, so now it’s my turn to correct you, young lady,’ she said. Then she put on a funny little voice that wasn’t really much like Yoda’s at all. ‘
Correct you, I will!
You see, that thing he swings around like some kind of maniac is a light
sabre
, as in a kind of sword.’

I shook my head. ‘No, I’m sure it’s saver.’

‘Well, maybe you’re right,’ she said, which was good of her to admit, because I knew I was.

‘Well, I guess I should get back. If I’m late my teacher might give me a detention.’

‘Or six strokes of the cane.’

‘What’s the cane?’ I asked.

Miss Huntley just shook her head. ‘So different now,’ she muttered. ‘So very, very different.’

It was around then that we heard voices across the road. A man and a woman had just come out of the Greengrove 300 and were walking towards our house, their heads bowed over a brochure.

‘Watch this,’ I said to Miss Huntley. ‘I bet they’re going to try to get into our place. They think it’s a display home.’

‘Oh, yes, your parents have mentioned,’ she said. ‘That must be very frustrating for you.’

‘Doesn’t it happen to you?’

Miss Huntley turned and looked back at her house. ‘They don’t usually get any further than the Franklins’ place. Besides, how many display homes have gardens like mine?’ Or big boofy lace curtains like that, I thought.

‘People are always just arriving,’ I said. ‘One time we were eating breakfast and this whole family walked in and started looking in the oven and in the kitchen cupboards and the wardrobe with the sheets and towels and things in it. Mum and Dad get really cross. Mainly Dad, actually.’

‘Your father?’ Miss Huntley said. ‘I find it hard to believe that your father gets cross. He always seems so fun and easygoing.’

‘He is, most of the time,’ I said. ‘But just lately he’s been getting cross for no reason.’

‘I thought you said it was when people tried to get into your house.’

‘It’s mainly that, but it’s at other times, too. And sometimes he just seems sad.’

‘Such as when you got expelled?’ she asked.

‘Yeah, such as that. It’s like he’s got something else on his head.’

‘On his mind, you mean?’

‘Yeah, on his mind. Anyway, I’d better get back to school,’ I said as I saw the couple marching up our driveway towards our front door. ‘And I’ve got to tell these people that our house isn’t for sale.’

‘Very well. See you around, Miss Elizabeth.’

I jogged back across the street. ‘Hi there,’ I said to the couple, who were about to open the door. ‘Can I help you?’

The lady frowned at me. ‘No, thanks,’ she said, all snooty.

The man was even worse. He didn’t even speak – he barely glanced at me before turning back to the door and reaching for the handle.

‘We’ve got a doorbell,’ I said, because we do. And because we like people to use it.

‘
Thank
you, but we’re fine,’ the lady said, which made no sense at all, after what I’d said. I mean, it wasn’t like I was trying to sell them a doorbell. I was just telling them that if they were sure they wanted to come into our house, they could at least ring the bell and wait for a reply, rather than just letting themselves in through the front door.

‘You know, you can’t just go into any house you like,’ I said.

I knew had the man’s attention properly then, because he turned to face me, his fists on his hips. ‘For your information, we
can
go into any house we like. Besides, Derek from the office sent us down this way. Not that
any
of this is your business.’

‘That’s right,’ the lady said. ‘Anyway, why aren’t you in school?’

I thought about saying, ‘And
that’s
none of
your
business,’ but instead I decided to ignore the question about school and said, ‘What I’m trying to tell you is that –’

‘Excuse me,’ said Miss Huntley, who’d followed me up our driveway, and was now standing just behind me. ‘Is there a problem?’

Now the couple could glare at someone who wasn’t me. The man rolled his eyes and sighed. ‘Look, we’re just trying to get a look at the Hutchinson Grande, but unfortunately we were ambushed by
her
.’ As he said the last word, he kind of sneered at me, as if I wasn’t even worth pointing at!

‘Does she belong to you?’ the lady asked, and I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me, or about me.

Miss Huntley cleared her throat. ‘I think you need to know that you are now trespassing. This is not a display home, which was already clearly explained to you by Elizabeth here. That’s why I’m going to head back over to my house, and if when I get there I don’t see you walking away up the street in
that
direction, I shall call the police.’

‘So this isn’t a display home?’ the lady asked.

‘It’s not the Grande?’ the man said.

‘No,
I
live here, with my family,’ I told them.

‘Oh!’ the lady said, blushing brightly. ‘Oh, how embarrassing! We’re so sorry! You should have said so!’

‘I thought I did,’ I replied.

‘We’re very sorry – it’s just a misunderstanding. Obviously the directions we were given weren’t very clear.’

‘Obviously,’ Miss Huntley said. ‘So, off you go. Shoo.’ Then she waved her hand at them as if she was brushing away a bit of dandruff.

‘Yes, of course. Good afternoon,’ the man said, and they scuttled off down the driveway muttering to each other and not looking back, not even once.

‘Thank you,’ I said to Miss Huntley.

She gave me a shrug and a wink. ‘It was nothing. I used to be matron in a large public hospital, and you don’t put up with any nonsense in that job.’

‘It was pretty awesome,’ I said, because it was. ‘Would you really have called the police?’

She just laughed. ‘The police? Of course not. Why would I want that lot snooping around here?’ Then she adjusted her sunhat and clicked her secateurs twice. ‘Sometimes people just need a bit of a nudge in the right direction.’

Then she clicked her secateurs again, three more times, and I went inside and locked the front door.

M
um is the main cook in our house. I reckon it’s kind of weird that Dad knows so much about food but is so bad at cooking it. And yeah, he’s pretty bad. I’ve seen him turn scrambled eggs bright green and cucumber purple, and he’s set the kitchen on fire twice, three times if you count the camping cooker. I’ve also heard Mum tell people that Dad could burn water, but that doesn’t make any sense at all if you think about it. (Mind you, I reckon he would give it a go.)

And that’s why Mum does most of the cooking in our house.

The thing is, I don’t want to grow up to be a bad cook like my dad, and that’s why later that afternoon I asked Mum if I could make dinner.

‘Ooh!’ she said, her eyes going all wide and excited. ‘Of course, yes, if that’s what you’d like to do. What did you have in mind?’

‘I’ll get on the internet and find something,’ I said. And that’s what I did. I found a really interesting salad recipe that looked like it could work, so I printed it off and took it to Mum.

‘Do we have all these ingredients?’ I asked her.

‘I really hope so,’ she said, licking her lips as she looked at the picture. ‘Let’s see now. Um . . .We’ve got eggs . . . and lettuce . . . I’ll have to check that the bacon is still in date, but I think it’s okay.’

‘I don’t want to get sick,’ I said. ‘Maybe I should leave the bacon out.’

‘No, I’m sure it’s fine. Now, if we use mayonnaise instead of caesar dressing and cashews instead of pecans, I think we can do it. Yes, I think we can totally do it.’

‘Is it easy enough?’ I asked. ‘For me, I mean.’

‘Oh, you can make this so easily, Lizzie. I think it’ll be delicious.’

‘Cool!’ I said, because it was. ‘Can I start now? I just need to know how to boil the eggs.’

‘Sure – we can make it a learning experience.’

‘Oh,’ I said.

I guess I must have sounded disappointed, because straight away Mum said, ‘Or, if you’d rather, you can just make us a yummy dinner.’

‘That,’ I said. ‘I want to do that.’

‘Good. Then let’s do it.’

And it was a yummy dinner. I tried a couple of bits when I was making it, and when I’d made it, and when I was putting it in the fancy serving bowl. Mum even got out three wine glasses and a bottle of wine. (That’s what she poured into the glasses for her and dad – I had lemonade in mine.) Then she called Dad. She called him twice, actually, and eventually he came downstairs. He wasn’t really dressed for dinner, I thought – a polar-fleece top, baggy track-pants and his ugg-boot slippers.

‘Why is the dog inside?’ he growled, and put Muppet out. Then he came and sat down at the table.

‘We’re introducing a new chef in Henry Court tonight,’ Mum said when we were all settled. ‘Marty, did you hear what I said? Marty?’

‘Um . . . yeah. A new chef. Who?’

Mum made a great big flourishy gesture towards me. ‘Chef Lizzie Adams has created this wonderfully inventive menu,’ she said.

‘You made this?’ Dad said, looking at the salad like he was reading a power bill. ‘Wow, that’s great, Betty.’ But he didn’t sound very wow, to be honest.

‘So go ahead and serve yourself, Marty,’ Mum said, and Dad scooped some of the salad onto his plate.

‘Oh, thish ish great,’ Mum said after she’d taken her first bite. ‘Lizzie! Thish ish fantashdic!’ (That’s what she sounded like because her mouth was full of amazing salad made by me, Lizzie Adams.) ‘What do you think, Marty?’

‘Yeah, nice,’ he said.

‘In fact . . .’ Mum went on, but before she said anything more, she laid down her knife and fork and patted the corners of her mouth with her serviette. Then she cleared her throat. ‘Tonight I was fortunate enough to score an invitation to the grand opening of the latest in a long line of wonderful Henry Court establishments. This one goes by the name of . . .’ She stopped and raised her eyebrows at me. ‘Name, Chef?’

‘Um . . . Henry Court Good Cooking Kitchen Room,’ I said, which I know sounds pretty dumb, but she had asked me for a name, and I had to give her one without having any chance to really think. (If I’d had more time, I probably would have called it something like ‘
Yumbo-Jumbo
’ or ‘
Geschmackvoll Salat
’, which means ‘tasty salad’. But I didn’t have time, which is why I said the dumb one.)

Mum didn’t care. She just nodded and said, ‘Henry Court Good Cooking Kitchen Room blends homey family atmosphere with top-class culinary innovation. The medley salad I tried melded exotic ingredients such as cos lettuce, crispy Asian noodles and Praise mayonnaise with the more earthy notes of bacon, cashews and shaved parmesan cheese. I look forward to more from this bright new
wunderkind
of the scene, but for now I give it five stars. How about you, Marty?’

We both looked straight at Dad. I couldn’t wait to hear what he was going to say about my cooking! I’d heard him review Mum’s food so many times, but I’d never heard him review something
I’d
made. This is going to be so good, I thought.

‘Marty?’ Mum said.

‘I’m sorry, what?’

‘The salad.’

‘What about it?’

‘What do you think?’

‘I told you, it’s good.’

‘Lizzie made it.’

‘I know.’

‘I just reviewed it.’

‘Yeah. I know. Five stars?’

‘Yes, Marty, five stars. I gave it five stars. How about you?’

He stared at the plate, then at Mum, then at me, back at the plate, kind of bunched up his eyebrows a bit, and then said, ‘Four and a half stars from me.’

‘Marty!’ Mum snapped, and I looked in her direction just in time to catch her giving him this huge scowl.

‘Fine,’ he said, ‘five stars. It’s a five-star meal. It’s great. Thanks, Lizzie.’

‘Marty!’

‘What?’

That was when Mum pushed back her chair, picked up Dad’s plate, and took it out into the kitchen.

‘Hey!’ Dad said, first looking all blinky and surprised, then standing up and going after her. ‘What are you doing? I was eating that!’

I heard them arguing quietly for a while, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying, since they were arguing in voices only a bit louder than whispers. But a little later Mum came back into the dining room and lifted Richie out of his highchair, bent down and kissed me on the top of the head and said, ‘Thanks for a delicious dinner, Lizzie.’ Then she went.

Dad had followed her back from the kitchen, and with a deep sigh, he sat down at the table once more. He scooped up a huge forkful of salad straight from the serving bowl and stuffed it into his mouth. ‘Mmm, great stuff, Betty,’ he said.

‘Do you like it?’ I asked.

‘Yeah, it’s very tasty. Thanks.’

‘Mum didn’t very like it, did she?’ I said.

‘Why would you say that?’

‘She left most of hers behind,’ I replied.

Later, when I was in bed and about to turn off the light, Mum knocked quietly on my door and came in. She sat on my bed and rested the palm of one hand on the side of my face. Her skin was cool against my cheek. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked me.

‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Why wouldn’t I be okay?’

‘Dinner.’

‘Are you sick?’ I asked, feeling my stomach go droppy. ‘The bacon was out of date, wasn’t it?’

Mum frowned for a second. ‘No, it was fine. It was good. I’m talking about the way . . .’ She stopped. ‘Lizzie, your dad feels bad.’

‘About what?’

‘You know he appreciated it, right?’

‘Yeah, of course,’ I said.

But I was almost telling a lie.

I
t was early the following afternoon, and I was working on some maths questions when I heard Dad go into the garage. That didn’t mean much – he goes into the garage for all sorts of things, like to fix stuff, or to find nails to bang into the walls to hang pictures on, or to drive our car (although he doesn’t really drive the car
in
the garage, but
into
and
out of
it).