The Only Friend You’ll Ever Need

written by

Clayton Zane Comber

illustrations by

Daniel Hill

Sydney Story Factory

Pen to Paper Challenge 2019

Copyright 2019.

 

‘You’ll never do it,’ Bubble said. ‘You’ll miss me too much.’

I held the pin in my hand, shaking.

The wind was howling.

‘Remember,’ he said. ‘I’m the only friend you’ll ever need.’

Bubble showed up about a month ago completely out of the blue. One morning, I came downstairs from my room and there he was, sitting on our lounge eating a packet of doritos. I mean, he was sort of eating. The corn chips were just kind of going straight through him and spilling all over the carpet. 

‘Mum,’ I said. ‘Who’s sitting in Dad’s chair?’

Mum came in from the kitchen.

‘Where, honey?’

‘There,’ I said. ‘In Dad’s chair, that bubbly looking thing dropping doritos all over the carpet?’

Bubble let out a loud burp. 

‘Oh,’ Mum said. ‘Him.’

Bubble wasn’t really a he or a she. But I called him he because Mum did.

‘Where did it come from?’ I asked.

‘He just shows up,’ she said. ‘I’ve met him before.’

I was surprised Mum was being so casual about Bubble, because she hadn’t let anyone else come over yet.  But Bubble seemed to be different. He made himself at home and didn’t appear to be leaving anytime soon.  

 At dinner, Bubble sat at the head of the table but didn’t eat anything.

‘Aren’t you going to eat?’ Mum said.

Bubble didn’t respond, he just pushed the peas around his plate making some kind of pattern.

‘You must’ve filled up on all those corn chips.’

Bubble took up a lot of space those first few days, mum and I had to tip toe around him to make sure he had enough room and nothing was pressing too hard on him. Sometimes I couldn’t even go into rooms because we both wouldn’t fit. Mum had been spending a lot of time with her colouring-in books that her friend Paula made for her. Sometimes Bubble sat and coloured-in with her, even though he was hopeless and could never colour between the lines. One time Mum threw her pencils and broke down crying with her head on the table, her tears smudging all the colours on the page like a rainbow. I wanted to go into the kitchen and give her a big hug, but Bubble was taking up all the space again.   

Bubble didn’t look like anything I’d ever seen before. He wasn’t like a soap bubble that you make in the bathtub or anything. He kind of kept changing, like those toys where you blow on the stick and bubbles form, but the shapes and sizes are always different depending on how hard you blow on it. Sometimes Bubble was shiny, sometimes he was transparent. Sometimes he was enormous, and sometimes he was so tiny you could barely see him, but that wasn’t very often.  He smelt of so many familiar things, like mint toothpaste and Tom Ford aftershave. Sometimes his face felt like week old stubble, not long enough to be called a beard because he didn’t want to look unruly. For a few weeks, Bubble and I spent most of our time watching cartoons on the lounge. And then the night before I went back to school, Bubble said to me in a sharp and familiar voice. ‘I’ll never leave you. I’m the only friend you’ll ever need.’

When I went back to school, I was really glad that Bubble came with me. Mum drove us the first day. She only had a small car and I didn’t think Bubble was going to fit, but he didn’t want to catch the bus in case anything pressed too hard on him and he would burst.  Bubble also didn’t have to enrol at the office or wear school uniform or anything like that, he just walked straight into class with me.

At first, everyone stared at him, including Miss Diana my 5th grade teacher, but then she told everyone that ‘It wasn’t polite to stare’ and everyone pretended to turn around. Even though Isla and Maria called me over to sit with them, there wasn’t enough room for Bubble, so we sat at the back by ourselves. During the lesson, I caught everyone glancing back at Bubble sitting next to me, which made me feel really uncomfortable. He didn’t really fit into the desk and was getting annoyed because he was almost touching Scott and John, who were sitting at the desk in front of us.

‘Everyone,’ I said. ‘Meet Bubble. He’s my friend.’

It was lunchtime in the playground. I stayed away from the play equipment because Bubble didn’t like the swings. With enough push you could swing so high you’d fly away.

Isla was the first to accept him.

‘Hi Bubble,’ she said. ‘It’s nice to have you back.’

Then Rebecca gave me a hug, followed by Etta and Kristie. They started to show me a dance routine that Miss Tracey, our PE teacher, was teaching us for an upcoming recital. I loved PE and was good at it and for a while it was really nice and I forgot Bubble was even there. Then when I remembered, I felt really bad that I’d forgotten him for a moment, and even though I thought he was gone he’d just become real small like a marble I could fit inside my pocket. He went back to his regular size real quick though.  

After the first meeting, everyone accepted Bubble. Just like me, they’d never met anyone like him, and Bubble even smiled because everyone made plenty of room for him. He liked Maria the most, she helped him when he didn’t want to walk inside the toilets because he didn’t like the linoleum floor and the bright fluorescent lights.

‘Come on,’ she said, taking his hand.

‘See,’ I told him. ‘It’s just like Mum said. Everyone is really nice.’

A few weeks went by and everything was becoming a little more normal. I mean, a new kind of normal. Then came the day of Miss Tracy’s dance recital that we’d been rehearsing. They even saved a special part for me.

Parents were allowed to come and watch too if they wanted. Mum didn’t come because she wanted to finish her colouring, but Etta’s mum was there, and so was Rebecca’s dad. During rehearsals, Bubble always waited outside the hall for me and gave me loads of room to practice. But now that it was the real thing, Bubble was big again. Really big. I didn’t want him to be so big because I wanted to concentrate on the dance, but instead I had to focus on guiding Bubble around the room and making sure he wasn’t in anyone’s way.  It was impossible. I looked at Bubble and knew what he wanted me to do.

‘But I want to dance,’ I said.

‘There’s not enough room.’

‘But won’t I let the others down?’

‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I’m the only friend you’ll ever need.’

Things were different after the dance recital. I mean, Isla, Etta and Rebecca weren’t as kind to Bubble anymore. Maria never held his hand and asked if he needed help going to the bathroom. I guess everyone was kind of over him, like a new toy that everyone gets sick of playing with. I couldn’t really blame them, Bubble had been real big for a while and it was hard for everyone to keep tiptoeing around to make sure he didn’t burst. In class, I had to sit right at the back, and I didn’t get to play with everyone at lunchtime. There weren’t many rooms left in the house that he wasn’t filling up either.

Then came Isla’s 11th birthday party. All our friends had been invited, but I knew that Isla didn’t like Bubble anymore. Neither did Etta. Neither did Tom or John. But Isla and I had been best friends since pre-school, so I guess she felt she had to invite us still.

At first everything was kind of okay. Mum dropped us off around 6pm, right after the pizza had been delivered.  Bubble didn’t like pizza, he didn’t like the delicious smell of ham and pineapple and pepperoni, which used to fill the lounge room every Saturday night when Dad’s friends came around to watch the football.  

Everyone was laughing and having a great time. Sam and Leah were there, and so was the new girl Kayleigh who Sam had a big crush on. I lost Bubble for a bit, but then he called out to me when we were in the kitchen. Something was beeping and he didn’t like it. There was always something beeping in Isla’s house, her dad said everything was ‘automated’ because he owned a Platinum solar company.  

‘What’s beeping?’ I asked.

‘That’s just the timers on the oven,’ Isla’s Mum said.

‘Bubble doesn’t like it,’ I said. ‘Could you turn it off please?’

‘Sure,’ she said, pressing some buttons on her phone.

Once the beeping stopped, I went back to the lounge room where Isla had called everyone around to play pin the tail on the donkey. Etta had the blindfold on and she didn’t get the pin anywhere near the tail. Then everyone laughed when Scott tripped over and nearly ripped the donkey off the wall.

When it was my turn, I got up and put the blindfold on. Isla handed me the pin and the tail. Everyone started chanting.

But I couldn’t move.

All I could think of was the darkness. The black hole that could stretch on forever and ever. Even though I couldn’t see, I could feel Bubble standing next to me. Surrounding me. Pressing on everything around him. I pulled off the blindfold and stuck the pin in my pocket.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I can’t.’

‘What’s wrong?’ Etta said.

‘It’s Bubble,’ I said.

Isla shook her head. ‘Not again.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘You know how Bubble is.’

Isla looked at Etta, who looked at Maria, who looked at Tom. And that’s when Isla made a horrible comment that made Bubble shriek and run towards the bathroom. I started to cry, but before I followed Bubble into the bathroom I turned and said to everyone, ‘Bubble is the only friend I’ll ever need.’

I locked the bathroom door and drowned out the party. Bubble reminded me that he was never going to leave me. He was a giant. So big that I had to squeeze myself into the corner of the shower to make sure he didn’t press against the porcelain of the toilet or the sink. I couldn’t stop crying, crying like my eyes would burst, crying like I was at the hospital again curled up on the linoleum floor listening to the beeps and whirs of all the machines, beneath the bright fluorescent lights.

‘I love you, Dad,’ I said. ‘Please don’t go.’

‘I’ll never leave you,’ he said.

I don’t know how long I stayed in the shower until Mum’s familiar voice called out to me. Bubble shrunk down to give me enough room to open the door, before Mum drove us both home.  

Isla’s Mum called the next morning. Mum put down her colouring pencils and answered the phone, before calling me over. Bubble didn’t want me to speak, but Mum insisted.

‘Hello?’ I said.

‘Hello, dear,’ Isla’s Mum said. ‘Isla’s got something she wants to say to you.’

Isla’s voice came on the phone.

‘Hello,’ she said.

Bubble was sitting on the lounge, listening carefully.       

‘Hi,’ I said.

‘I’m really sorry,’ Isla said. ‘We all are.’

I took Bubble to the park across the road. I knew I couldn’t do it in the house, not with all the familiar smells of mint toothpaste and Tom Ford aftershave, the doritos stains on the carpet that Mum could never bring herself to vacuum. Also, Mum got along really well with Bubble, and I didn’t know whether she was ready to let him go yet.

 ‘Where are we going?’ Bubble said.

I didn’t answer, but I held onto him with one hand, and the other tucked inside my pocket holding the donkey-tale pin.

We stopped in front of the swing set where Dad used to push me.

‘Hold on,’ he said. ‘Or you’ll fly away.’  

I took out the pin so Bubble could see.

He didn’t shriek or run away. His voice was clear. ‘You need me,’ he said. ‘I’ll never leave you.’

The wind was howling.  

With my hands shaking, I shut my eyes and stuck the pin into Bubble’s chest.

I screamed so loud I hoped Dad could hear me.

‘I know,’ I said. ‘But I’ll need others too.’