The Gaps by Leanne Hall (classic literature list .TXT) 📕

leaving the exhibition opening early. If the others weren’t here I’d ask her straight out.

The bell rings and Marley sidles up to me. ‘I feel very disturbed, Chloe,’ she sighs, with a hand on her heart and a smile on her face.

In fourth period English we troop down to the main corridor and view the exhibition as a class. Mr Purdy wants us to use the artworks as writing prompts, which I’m pretty sure is a convenient way to keep us busy so he can play Solitaire on his iPad.

‘Devices away!’ he shouts. ‘I want you to try writing by hand. It’s good for your brains.’

‘Can I do a graphic novel?’ calls out Teaghan.

‘No.’

Mr Purdy always wears brown suit pants that are too tight. It means that when he’s standing in front of us, with his legs apart and his hands on his hips, we all have to look away.

Audrey raises her hand. ‘What about poetry?’

Purdy is more irritated by us than he should be. ‘Sure.’

‘No fair.’ Teaghan slams her folders down.

I ignore my entry and spend my time looking at the other work in the exhibition. A Year Eight girl has made some surprisingly good felt toys, mushrooms and fungi and moss. The Year Nines have obviously been working on still life recently, because there are several paintings of flowers, vases, jugs and fruit. Up the far end is a mannequin dressed in an amazing Marie Antoinette-style costume made from recycled rubbish by a Year Eleven.

I sit down in front of Bochen’s entry—her pencil portrait of Mercury Yee. Bochen has rendered Mercury’s face with painstaking detail in orange and blue and pink, showing her sucking on a bubble cup with her mouth twisted comically to the side. Her style is exaggerated and realistic at the same time. The drawing must have taken hours and hours to complete. She’s incredibly talented.

I write a few stiff lines in my notebook and then cross them out. They’re so bad I would rather cut off my hands than have anyone read them. I am not in the headspace for creative writing.

‘I don’t get it,’ Petra says to Audrey. They’re directly to my right, ignoring me and looking at the felt mushrooms. Audrey is lying on her tummy, already scribbling furiously. ‘What are we supposed to be writing about?’

Audrey waves her away. ‘Express yourself, P, I don’t know.’

‘Excuse me, Chloe?’

Bridie and Sunita crouch next to me.

‘I want to write about your photo,’ Bridie whispers, ‘but I was wondering, what does it mean?’

I answer truthfully. ‘I’m not one hundred per cent sure.’

‘Is it meant to be scary?’

I let out a breath. How am I going to explain the book covers and Devil Creek and the other things and how it didn’t turn out precisely as I wanted it to?

‘I want to write about it too.’ Sunita has her pen poised over her notebook, ready to take notes. ‘Is it about Yin?’

‘Not really.’ But that’s not totally true either. It isn’t about Yin directly, but it does have something to do with her. Sort of.

‘I think it’s a story where two schoolgirls get murdered,’ Sunita says. ‘So the title Someone’s Watching means that there’s a guy we can’t see and he’s about to attack them with a knife.’

‘I guess?’ I don’t want to reject her idea, especially as this is the first proper conversation we’ve ever had.

‘Sunny, that’s completely wrong. Look, she’s already bleeding, so he’s already attacked them.’

Sunita writes in her notebook. ‘Shhh, babe, I’m feeling it.’

I notice Mr Purdy looking at us, so I keep my voice low. ‘If you look closely you can see the red’s actually feathers. It was more about the colour.’

‘I’ll have to look at it again.’ Bridie seems disappointed by my response. I rack my brains for something Ms Nouri might say.

‘It’s not my meaning that matters anymore. The point is what happens when you look at my photo. It’s yours now. You get to make your own meaning.’

Sunita stops writing for one moment. ‘That is literally the one of the deepest things I have ever heard, Chloe.’

‘Thanks,’ I say, and they retreat.

Next to me, Audrey is on her third page of notebook, filling the space up with lines and lines of words, but Petra is getting more and more restless. By the amount of deep huffs coming from her direction, I’m guessing she likes creative writing about as much as I do.

Eventually she puts up her hand.

‘Mr Purdy, I don’t get it. What themes are we supposed to be writing about?’

Even though you can tell he doesn’t want to lift a finger, Purdy comes over. I cover my mostly empty page with my arm, and turn away.

‘Why does there have to be a theme?’ Purdy says. ‘Break some rules. Let your imagination run wild.’

‘I’ve tried, and I can’t. I don’t like any of them.’

Both Petra and Purdy sound more annoyed than you’d think anyone would be about a minor task.

‘Year Tens,’ Purdy raises his voice and both his hands. ‘The exercise is very simple. How about less whingeing and more independent thought?’

‘How can he say that?’ Petra says, low and furious to Audrey. ‘Who does he think he is?’

‘Work independently, ladies,’ whispers Teaghan, doing her best deep-voiced Purdy impersonation, ‘and let me get back to watching my porn.’

DAY 59

Tuesday morning is quieter, but girls I don’t even know are still coming up to me in the hallway to compliment me on my photo.

It’s regular, standard-issue Balmoral, just with one major change, as if we’ve slipped into a parallel universe where people know my name.

I have a spare for second period, so I go to my usual table in the library. Petra is already set up there, tackling statistics, by the look of it. Thanks to art dominating my holidays, I figure I’m at least a month behind in my maths homework.

‘Room for me?’

Petra looks annoyed to be interrupted but nods and continues hunching over her books and poking at her calculator.

I sit down and