Free Saving Jazz by Kate McCaffrey Page B

something bad.’ She nodded and passed me a tissue.
    â€˜The school is aware of some circumstances leading to this situation. But what do you know, Jasmine? What can you tell me?’
    I shook my head. ‘I can’t tell you.’ I realised that if I said anything they would go after Jack. Tommy could die for all I cared — he had no remorse. But Jack. And what about me? My part in it?
    â€˜I had a fight with her and ignored her last night.’ I started crying. It wasn’t as if that was my only crime, or even my worst one. But at that point it was the only thing on my mind. If I had responded to her messages, maybe she wouldn’t have done this. ‘I need my mum,’ I said. Miss Jones nodded.
    â€˜I’ll call her,’ she reached for the phone. ‘Jasmine,’ she said as she punched in the numbers, ‘it’s all going to come out. Mr Fletcher is going to want to speak to you.’
    I nodded, but there was no way I was talking to the principal, or anyone else, until I had spoken to my mum and dad.

Post 20: A mother’s disappointment
    The thing about parents is they can shout at you, ground you, take away your phone and internet, make you do chores, but when they say ‘I’m so disappointed in you’ it’s a killer. It cuts deep, worse than anything else — or so I thought. My parents didn’t even utter those words. My mum just cried and cried, and my dad, well, he didn’t even come to the interview. After, my dad wouldn’t look at me. I knew then that something was broken forever.
    â€˜What’s happened?’ Mum asked as she rushed through the door of Miss Jones’ office. I looked at Miss Jones, who stood up.
    â€˜I’ll leave you two,’ she said, closing the door behind her.
    â€˜Jazz,’ Mum sat opposite me, ‘talk to me. You’re scaring me.’
    I sniffed and wiped my eyes. ‘Things have got out of control.’
    â€˜Things, what things?’ Mum sounded panicked.
    â€˜A party, last week,’ I said.
    â€˜Whose party?’ Mum ran a hand through her hair. I wasn’t making this easy for her to follow, but the real words I needed to say were blocking my throat.
    â€˜At Lily’s,’ I said.
    â€˜Were you there?’ Mum frowned.
    â€˜Yes,’ I nodded, facing the first glint of disappointment in her eyes. ‘I told you I was staying the night at Sim’s but I went to a party instead.’
    Mum sighed, ‘Oh Jazz, what happened?’
    â€˜It got a bit out of hand. We got pretty drunk.’
    â€˜You? You got drunk?’
    I thought, you haven’t even heard the half of it.
    â€˜Not just me, everyone. Annie the worst.’ Suddenly the words started rushing. ‘She passed out. She got drawn on and she got …’ I gasped for air, ‘drawn on with texta and then she got … touched, by some boys.’
    â€˜What?’ Mum shook her head. ‘What?’
    â€˜They touched her,’ I pointed to my own body — I couldn’t say those words to my mother. It was like we were a bunch of depraved perverts — which I was realising we had been — but I couldn’t say the words ‘they fingered her’ to my own mother. It made me shudder in revulsion.
    â€˜What?’ Mum was white. ‘They did what?’ She stood up and moved around the room. I sank further into the chair. I wanted it to swallow me whole, so I didn’t have to say anything else. ‘Some boys sexually assaulted Annie? You were all drunk? You drink?’ She looked at me as if I’d suddenly grown horns out of my head, as if she had never seen me before in her life. ‘I’m in shock.’
    â€˜I know,’ I felt like the adult explaining something elementary to a three-year-old. I watched as my mother’s awareness of the world she lived in slipped away. I saw the fear and disorientation on her face as if she suddenly