Sweet Charity

the four girls, getting them ready. As it turned out she hadn’t needed to bring anything from the charity shop. There’d been plenty
enough in her own wardrobe. They had tried on different outfits with great enthusiasm. Patricia had been called in to help with the make-up and had done an appropriately terrible job. Margaret had
helped with their hair.
    If Lola had had any lingering doubts about telling Emily and the other three the truth about Kane’s invitation, they’d been short-lived. As soon as the four girls had arrived at the
motel, she knew she’d made the right decision. She’d seen instantly that Kane had picked on four of the most vulnerable girls in the school. Karlie with her stutter, but with such
beautiful eyes. Lisa, overweight certainly, but what a bright mind. The fourth girl – the one who had been the hardest for Emily to track down – was Shana. Poor little Shana, with her
buck teeth and her sweet nature. And of course there had been Emily, shy, blushing Emily.
    Lola had called over to speak to Emily three days earlier, just as she was finishing her waitressing shift. She’d wrestled with her decision for days before she’d finally made up her
mind. Yes, there were times when young people had to learn from their own mistakes. But she’d decided this wasn’t one of those times.
    She went straight to the point. ‘Emily, you might think I’m interfering, but I’ve become privy to some information that might concern you. I don’t want you to be hurt,
but you might want to check it out, and if it’s true, perhaps you would tell me. There might be a way we can fix things.’ Then Lola had told her all she’d heard in the charity
shop.
    Emily did check. It was true. Kane had invited the four of them, in exactly the same way. Sidling up to them at lunch-time. Stressing the importance of punctuality. Swearing them to secrecy. And
each had accepted.
    By the time Emily reported back, Lola had hatched her plan. Luke was drafted in to drive the girls. It was a way of introducing them to him, and him to them, and, as he said himself, he had the
perfect car for a bad taste party.
    ‘Such a shame you couldn’t have gone in there with them,’ she said to him now.
    ‘Oh, they’re not staying. They’ll be out in a minute. That’s why I’m waiting here.’
    ‘They’re not staying?’ She hadn’t known about this. That was the whole idea, for them to have fun in the party together, in front of everyone and especially in front of
Kane and his cronies.
    ‘No. They decided on the way here they only wanted to stay for one song. We all thought it would be much more fun to go out for pizza together instead. That’s all right, Mum,
isn’t it?’
    ‘Of course,’ Patricia said.
    Lola decided she was even more pleased with the new plan. She pretended not to be. ‘You’re going to be seen in public with the four of them? In those clothes? What will people
think?’
    ‘That you had something to do with it, probably,’ Margaret said drily.
    ‘We were actually wondering if the three of you would like to join us,’ Luke said.
    Lola sounded shocked. ‘What? With those four dressed like that? And you, in that car?’ She turned to the other two women. ‘What do you two think?’
    Margaret, sporting one of Lola’s chiffon ponchos and silver eyeshadow, nodded enthusiastically. Patricia, resplendent in a purple crimplene kaftan with dangling moon-shaped earrings, did
too. After a glass of champagne at the motel, they’d been more than happy to dress up as well.
    ‘What about you, Lola?’ Luke asked.
    She paused as if giving it some thought, quickly adjusting the draped scarf on her tiger-print pantsuit and slipping her feet back into her gold rope sandals. She wouldn’t miss it for the
world. It was just a shame she hadn’t had time to get dressed up tonight too. Never mind. With luck no one would notice her ordinary outfit among the others. She gave the fake orchid pinned
in her hair a final tweak and then beamed across at him.
    ‘I’d be honoured,’ she said.

Monica McInerney grew up in a family of seven children in the Clare Valley wine region of South Australia. She has worked in children’s television, arts marketing, the
music industry, public relations and book publishing, and lived all around Australia, and in Ireland and England. She is the author of seven previous novels, including, most recently, The
Alphabet Sisters , Family Baggage and Those Faraday