The two tall girls walked along the busySydneystreet: the fair one, Leonie, with superb natural grace, looking neither to right nor left; the dark-haired girl, Janie, self-consciously in her first pair of high-heeled shoes. She turned now and then, when speaking, to look at Leonie, but Leonie’s head never turned. The straightness of her gaze, the elegance of her bearing, seemed almost unnatural to Janie.
Janie was sixteen and a half, and had been at work in an office for exactly one day. This evening, saying ‘miracle of miracles’, instead of going straight home to tell her mother of the intricacies of the switchboard and tea-making, she was going out with beautiful Leonie, sophisticated and seventeen-and-a-quarter and well-made-up Leonie. It was Janie’s coming out into Sydney nightlife; it was her growing up.
This is the first time I’ve walked through the main streets at night, she thought.
“I never knew the city had so many lights,” she said to Leonie, who smiled.
They passed an air-conditioned cinema, and the coolness cut a swathe through the soft night. The strong sweet perfume of frangipani blossoms was fanned through a florist’s doorway and hung suspended, a subtle advertisement.
Janie sniffed appreciatively. She caught the tang of fresh-ground coffee, too, and felt hungry.
“We’re nearly there,” Leonie said in the round drawling accent she had acquired since leaving school, the shield for her self-consciousness.
“That’s good,” Janie breathed, dazzled by the brightness and the crowds of young people who looked as if they knew where they were going, and what they would do when they arrived; dazzled by their clothes, and doubtful for the first time about her new blue dress.
Sophistication and assurance everywhere: it was a relief to be inside at last, at a table for two with Leonie, and the waitress ready with her pad, gazing at herself in the mirror while they studied the menu. Until they had decided on grills and sundaes, and the waitress left, their manner was cold, serious, blas.
Then they were alone, exposed, the eyes of the other unavoidable and uncomfortably close across the small table.
Leonie’s hands were smooth and creamy, the nails long and polished. She broke her roll and buttered a piece. Janie looked in her bag for a handkerchief, and blew her nose, although it didn’t need it.
“I think it’s…”
“How did you…”
They laughed awkwardly and pressed one another to speak first.
“I was just going to ask if you’d enjoyed your first day,” Leonie said at last.
“Well, it was all so new…” Janie’s voice trailed off; remembering that she had met Leonie in the office, she added, ‘But I think I’ll like it very much.’
“I hate it,” Leonie said calmly. “The other girls don’t like me and I don’t like them. Did you see that today?”
Her straightforward manner made Janie feel abashed and enchanted and partisan.
“Yes, I thought something was wrong,” she said.
She had mentally declared herself on Leonie’s side even before her incredible invitation to go out after work: partly because the odds were three against one, partly because the other girls had frizzy hair and ingratiating manners.
Janie stared unseeingly at her plate, where a chop, a ring of pineapple, green peas, and Saratoga chips waited, while her intuition brought forth a judgment. ‘It’s just that you’re different,’ she said, forgetting to feel embarrassed. ‘That’s why it’s like that at work.’
She was about to go on when Leonie cut in. “They told you I am Lithuanian?”
“Yes, but that isn’t what I mean.”
Her untrained mind struggled to define the difference she had felt. It was something more subtle, more elusive than Leonie’s attractiveness, her cultivated accent, her foreign birth; something more fundamental.
Leonie was pleased and interested. “Whatdoyou mean?”
Janie floundered. “I don’t know,” she said helplessly, “but I know I’m right.”
“Are you different, too?” Leonie asked without malice.
“Yes, I suppose I am,” she said, picking up her knife and fork.
“That makes two of us then,” Leonie smiled, a wide unsophisticated smile, showing even white teeth.
Janie smiled back and felt immensely happy. Leonie was so friendly. She seemed really to like her. She must, or she wouldn’t have asked her to come out. And, now that they were out, she was nicer than ever.
Leonie buttered another piece of roll, and asked, ‘Have you always lived in Sydney?’
The biographical question had come; the first step in the ritual of making a friendship, as when children say, half boldly, half shyly, “What’syourname? Where’syourhouse? What school doyougo to?”
“No,” Janie said. “I came from the country when I was thirteen. We’ve been living in Manly ever since. When did you come here?” she asked, interested in Leonie’s foreign background, but doubtful about mentioning it. She wondered how it must feel to be foreign.
“When I was one,” Leonie said, “so I don’t know much about my own country. I can hardly speak the language.”
Janie listened as she ate, and registered the fact that Leonie wasn’t shy about her nationality, so it was all right to talk about it sometimes.
They were both suddenly excited and eager, wanting to know, wanting to tell, but remembering still to tread warily, and trying to hide it.
The waitress cleared away their plates, and Leonie’s manner changed. She seemed almost bored.
“I suppose you know a lot of girls in Manly if you’ve been there for a few years,” she said, raising her finely arched eyebrows.
What’s happened? Janie thought, chilled by the difference. What have I done? She hesitated before answering. It made her miserable. People hate people who haven’t got friends, she thought. She won’t want to come out with me again.
The return of the waitress with their caramel sundaes gave her time to cover her dismay to some extent. When the waitress had gone Janie said with a laugh, “Well, no, I don’t know many.”
Leonie just said, “Oh?” on a note that demanded more explanation.
“I was sent to school at Kingslake, you know it, miles out of Manly, and there weren’t any other girls from my district there.” Her voice rose unconvincingly, and she laughed again. Afraid of a silence, she went on, “I just didn’t seem to meet any until I went to business college a little while ago.”
Leonie was relentless. “So you’re friendly with the girls from college now?’ she said coldly, digging her spoon into her caramel sauce.
Tears pricked Janie’s eyes, and she looked angrily at her ice-cream. She couldn’t lie; she’d never been able to. Even at a moment like this, the weak, dull, sickly truth had to come.
“Well, I saw some of them on the ferry this morning…” She ate silently until a latent flame of spirit made her ask, “I suppose you have lots of friends?”
It had been intended to sound careless, indifferent. She would go down fighting, she thought. But her voice was all wrong. She glanced up at Leonie. A calm mask had replaced her bored coldness.
She said in a level tone, “No, I haven’t any friends. I didn’t like many of the girls I knew at school, and my best friend went away to Queensland with her family three years ago.”
Wonderful, wonderful Leonie! How can she admit it like that? Because there are two of us? Or because she doesn’t care? Or is it just the way she acts when she does care and doesn’t want anyone to know?
Janie allowed herself to relax a little. “My best friend lives way out in the country, too. I hardly ever see her.”
The waitress brought a tall silver coffee pot to their table, gave them a check and took the dishes.
“Do you like this restaurant, Janie?” Leonie asked as she poured the coffee. Her blue eyes had a new expression, unguarded and vulnerable.
“Oh, yes, I do. We must come here often,” she said, recklessly showing her hand in turn.
For no reason that they could have explained, they both started to laugh, and they looked round at the other diners hoping that they would notice the two attractive girls laughing together, the two friends enjoying each other’s confidence, the two lonely Martians meeting unexpectedly on Earth.
The strange silent world of adolescence had exploded, the eggshell walls had collapsed, proclaiming,You are not alone. Eyes alight, cheeks flushed, voices bubbling: the questions and answers flew.
“Do you like swimming best?”
“I do!”
“I like nice clothes. I like to read. I like to see plays.”
“The very things that I like.”
“What do you think of grown-ups?”
A sigh, a frown.
“I know. I think so, too!”
No family secrets barred, no holding back from one so close, they thought, and talked and talked, each the best friend of the other.