Short Story Competition!

Winner

Opal

by Bronte (Year 10)

The heat shimmered over the plain and dust billowed behind my old truck. Running away was never something I’d condoned, let alone pictured myself doing. But what else was there? Red plains of sand surrounded me and my practically conked out Holden, and the Stuart Highway stretched on like a huge roll of duct tape (like the strip keeping my passenger seat together). The air was humid, hard to breathe, and the open window wasn’t helping in the slightest. I brushed back my stupid brown-blonde hair and pushed my sunglasses further up my nose.

Behind me was everything. Home, family, friends.... ahead? God only knew and that scared me more than I’d admit to anyone. Well, anyone except –

“Opal?!” her voice had cracked that morning like ice in the Antarctic. We’d watched a big film about it at Imax once, and the sound had my ears ringing for days. “What Melody?” she hated her full name, preferring Mel above all others, and I, as her best friend of seventeen years, was perfectly entitled to calling her whatever I wanted just to tick her off.

She huffed stray strands of black hair off her face. “I don’t understand how you can be so calm. Your George was making out with Clarissa! Aren’t you pissed?”

“No.” I’d lied. The first one of the day. Mum was next; “Why are you bringing in that washing? You don’t need that shirt until Monday, don’t you?” I’d looked into the blue-green eyes identical to mine and forced a grin.

“I’m just getting it now before I forget. You know what I’m like...”

“Of course I do, Opal Eyes.” My stomach churned as my truck, rusted to perfection, jolted on the road. I felt horrible at the thought of leaving my mother alone in our little underground house in Coober Pedy, but what could I do? What could I do...

“What could I do, Opal?” his words beseeched me, singlet a stark white against the sand above his place. George had been my magic, my own kind of... eraser, or drug, blocking out memories of a past with a father that hurt to the core.

“I never meant to hurt you.”

“Then why’d you do it at all?” I challenged him with my eyes, grey t-shirt sticking to my back with sweat, car keys singing my name in the pocket of my shorts. He stood his ground, surprisingly.

“Opal, please...”

When he said my name like that, it made everything go away. It wouldn’t go away, though. Like everyone else, he’d let me down. He’d broken his promise, just like my Dad before him. I wouldn’t let myself be broken like that again. I was eighteen, an adult, and capable of deciding what I could and couldn’t take.

“Fine.” I shrugged so easily. “Meet me at the creek tonight.” Third and final lie; my final words to George...

I didn’t feel as bad as I thought I would about that. The creek had always been our place; even when we were in year seven and didn’t really hang out much, we were happy to share the space. He’d fish and set traps for yabbies, and I’d swim or read under one of the scraggly trees. One day he’d actually asked me what I was reading, and we were both surprised to find we’d not only read but liked the same book. George wasn’t just my first boyfriend; he was my first friend who was a boy. I suppose that’s why it hurt so much, to have him go behind my back with Clarissa, whose hair was the colour of the sand that surrounded everything here.

Trusting him had been hard, after Dad left... “I’ll always be here, Opal Eyes.” Yeah right. George, though, he’d said it with meaning...

I let go of a breath I hadn’t realised I was holding. The sun glared down, as if it remembered setting last night when I slung a duffel bag, and my bag with my wallet and phone in the back of my truck (or ute, for want of an Aussie term) and screeched out of town. I hadn’t looked back; the dust kicked up by the wheels left nothing to be seen. A clean cut.

I’d been driving since then, and wasn’t tired enough to stop. A little part of me yelled it was because I was about to turn around, go home and go back to being Ordinary Opal. My hands clenched the wheel; no, I wouldn’t go back to that. Melody had helped me (well, dragged me kicking and screaming) out of my shell. By this time last year I wasn’t afraid to laugh out loud anymore; I wasn’t shy around new people, and I met any and all of the boys’ taunts head on.

I’d started living, and it had rubbed off on Mum too. She’d finally served Dad divorce papers, even though he was long done before I was five, redecorated our place, and joined a book club.

One day she’d pulled me aside and pressed my forehead to her cheek in a hug; “Opal, be who you are and reach your dreams; you shine brighter than any diamond in the rough.” She whispered. Melody had texted something along the same lines after graduation:

It’s nice 2 c the Opal I luv bn loved by evry1 else. Well done babe! cya xoxo :D

Even George, who had proved me wrong, said something like that yesterday morning: “I count myself lucky to have a hold on you; a spirit like yours, girl, it doesn’t wait for anyone.”

The road ahead shone in the afternoon light, stretching to the horizon where terracotta sand met powder blue sky. I might not have known what waited at the end of that dusty road, but I knew who I was.

I wasn’t running away from Ordinary Opal. I was just continuing in my quest to show everyone else (yeah, even you George) how extraordinary she could be.