When Charlie had shouted at me in the street, I had felt so bad. I instantly decided to ignore what my mother had said and be Charlie's friend again. Although she would never admit it, she needed someone to talk to. I could see her face light up when she was telling me a story. I loved her smile. It was the most beautiful thing. I knew that the teacher would've told my mum by now but I didn't care.
As soon as I walked through the door I knew something was wrong. Dad was home. He never came home in the afternoon.
"Jasmine, come here for a minute please." He said in a voice that left no room for discussion. I walked into the kitchen and saw both my mum and dad sitting at the table. My dad motioned for me to sit down.
"Now, your mother said that she told you to stay away from the aboriginal girl. And she had a call today saying that you were sitting next to her and wouldn't move."
"So what." I knew that I should've stayed quiet, but I couldn't help myself.
"Jasmine! Don't speak to your father that way." Mum frowned at me. I scowled back at her.
"We don't want you mixing with people like her." My dad said in a firm voice.
"I don't care what you say, she is my friend. Anyway, I don't want to be seen as someone like you." My mother gasped at this bit. I grabbed my bag and walked up to my room, feeling happy to have gotten the last word in.
Later that night I overheard my parents discussing what they were going to do with me. My mother wanted me to change schools but my father disagreed. I think he had sensed that it wasn't Charlie that was making me act this way, it was my mother. I crept away, hoping that for once my mother would listen to someone else.
My mother had been an only child, like me. She had grown up wth all these ideas about how to raise an only child well. The only problem was that many of her ideas were unreasonable and when I told her this she would get mad which would make me mad. I had a much better relationship with my father who was the youngest of five kids and would sometimes help me to stand up to my mother. Most of the time though, he sided with her. Hopefully he could make her change her mind about Charlie.
The next morning, mother didn't speak to me or my father. I presumed that meant that father had won the argument and I was staying at the same school.
The one thing that I was confused about was that people had told me that when Charlie spoke, before I came, that it was halting and slow, but when I talk to her she sounds fine. When I asked her about it she just said that having me around was giving her more practise. I laughed and told her that she could have more practise if she told me about when she came to Sydney. She went quiet and I started to say that it didn't matter when she stopped me.
"They came in black cars," she was so quiet that I had to move closer to hear her, "We ran, into the woods. Everyone was terrified." She paused her eyes becoming wet. She spoke in short sentences, as if the pain was too bad to speak for too long.
"I couldn't climb so I hid behind a bush. They...found.....m...me and took me away. Away from everything!" Charlie said this last bit with so much anger, anger and bitterness. She then broke down and cried. I hadn't seen her cry like this before. It was unsettling, seeing someone as strong as Charlie, break down like this. I helped her stand up and hugged her, I didn't say anything, I just hugged her. We stayed like that until the bell rang.
"You ok?" I looked at her carefully. She nodded, wiping her eyes. As we walked to class she muttered something under her breath, I only just heard it. I wasn't sure exactly why she said it. Her voice was gravelly and rough after crying but I understood.
"Thank you." She whispered