ninety-three : gummi bears (part two)

I was thirteen, and suddenly I had no friends.

Mid way through my final year of primary school, my parents decided to move, and the next year they had sent me to the secondary college closest to our new house. Being so young, this separation from my two best friends of the preceding six years was difficult to stop. Though we still lived in neighbouring towns, it felt as though we were much further than that. Without seeing each other every day, we gradually drifted apart, though we had each promised we wouldn’t. They were both lucky enough to go to the same high school as most of the other kids we knew. As for me, there were only three other students from my old school who ended up being sent to the same place.

One was a boy who had been a part of the group that beat me up regularly throughout grade five and six. The other two were girls; one so shy that becoming friends with her was about as likely as discovering kryptonite, and the other too spiteful and mean-spirited to make eye contact with. Most of the other new kids at the college were from the adjoining primary school, so despite being at a new school they already had close-knit groups.

I was an outsider, and horribly shy, so mid way into the first term I was still spending the majority of my lunchtimes on my own.

This lack of friends, combined with what was at the time my major ambition, performing, led me to audition for the school musical. It was Little Shop of Horrors that year. I got in, only in the chorus as year sevens were considered too young for the lead roles, but with a small speaking part in one scene. In this scene I was paired up with another year seven girl, and we had to carry flowerpots given to us outside Mushnik’s Flower Shop from stage left to stage right.

She was tall and skinny, awkward as I was, and equally shy. We didn’t speak much at first. We practiced the songs, stood on the stage in our places and waited for our cues.

Then one afternoon, during the mid-rehearsal break, we walked to the supermarket together. Neither of us had much money. We pooled our change and bought a bag of gummi bears.

At the time of course, I had no idea what this meant for the rest of my life. But in that one small act, everything changed. The next rehearsal, we pooled our money again. And the next, and the next. Walking to the store together during the break and sharing a bag of gummi bears or m&m’s or skittles became a regular part of the rehearsal routine. I found out that she too didn’t really know anyone at the school. We talked about everything and discovered that we liked the same songs and movies and classes. We agreed on most things we talked about.

Soon after, we were spending our lunchtimes together. And then going to each others house on the weekend to watch a video or play a game or sing along and dance to the Grease soundtrack or talk about boys.

And before I knew it, I had a new best friend.

From that point on, the years flew by, and we grew up together. By the time we were eighteen, and in our final year, we had both changed a lot — but somehow this had made us even more alike than before. In the six years of knowing each other, we never had a single argument. We told each other everything, even the things that would have anyone else running to find a psychiatrist, without fear of it getting out. We encouraged each other through our moments of self-doubt. We took most of the same classes, and gave each other feedback on our work. Her photos and my photos. Her designs and my stories. She kept my secrets and I kept hers. There was never any mention of the possibility of drifting apart after high school.

She went on to further her study of Photography, and I went on to study arts, majoring in Filmmaking and Animation. She graduated. I dropped out. It was during this phase, when I was at a loss for what to do, and she had a clear focus, that the second major life-changing event occurred. She was offered a job as a photographer on a cruise ship in Alaska, and accepted it. I was simultaneously happy for her and sad for myself.

A month or so later, her parents picked me up at some horribly early hour of the morning, and I went with them to see her off at the airport. After she was gone, I didn’t know what I was going to do. I had a job at a photo lab, which I enjoyed, but I knew it wasn’t what I was supposed to be doing. I decided to take two weeks leave, and travelled three days on the train to Queensland, where half of my extended family live. I spent my holiday trying to figure out what on earth I was going to do with my life. I knew I wanted to work in some creative environment, but had no idea in what capacity. On the train home I wrote a lot of short stories in my notebook. Stories about the water, travel, music and random people I saw along the way. I still had no idea what I wanted to do.

When I got home, the first thing that happened was that I received a phone call from my boss to tell me that the photo lab was being closed down in a month, and that I would need to start looking for a new job.

I looked. I applied. I got nowhere. Then one day, I typed ‘Photo Lab’ into the keyword box of the job search website, and accidentally hit enter before I had selected Melbourne as the city. Dozens of jobs appeared. Jobs on mountain ski resorts. Jobs in rural towns. Jobs on tropical islands.

And there it was. A Photographic Assistant position in the Whitsunday Islands. On Hamilton Island. Rent included in the wage. Editing photos. Two regular days off each week. I was qualified, and I suddenly felt the need to get out of the town I was in. I decided that it was my location that was stifling me. I had to get out. I sent through an application on the 5th of June, got the job ten days later, and left the following Monday.

I lived on the island for six months. It wasn’t until mid-way through that sixth month, as the sun was going down on the ninth day of November, that it hit me. It was like someone had flicked on the light switch and suddenly I could see what it was that had been nagging at me from some dark corner at the back of my mind. It was that afternoon that I realised that I was a writer. Not that I wanted to be a writer. I already was one. I knew because every time something bad happened, my first response was to write about it. Every time something good happened, I would write. And during all those times in between when life was flat and bland and neutral, I would step out of myself and write about something else, someone else, anything at all. I realised that it was only when I wrote that I felt real.

So I quit my job. I moved back to Melbourne. I enrolled in a writing course. My best friend came back. It was like she had never left. Like I had never left. Only we were both more focused. We still are.

Now we live together, along with her boyfriend who moved here from Canada where they met. I work on my screenplay until the early hours of the morning. She takes photos and works at a lab to pay the bills.

We are both moving towards doing what we are meant for.

And if it weren’t for that shared bag of gummi bears, all those years ago, we might never have got this far.

Sorry I haven’t posted much lately… I’m writing a screenplay, and have producers waiting on pages, so the majority of my writing time has been spent working on that. Also, this has meant that whenever I have tried to write something else, it has been of a fairly low standard. Apparently there is only so much quality writing that I am capable of producing at once. This entry in particular deserves better writing. I’ll edit it when I get time. For anyone who missed part one, you can find it here. It’s nowhere near as long. Barely a paragraph, in fact. Annnddd…. Goodnight.