Am I Right or Am I Right? (15 page)

Chapter 24

Many miserable returns

The clock flicked over to midnight. I watched, fascinated, as it ticked off the minutes, relentlessly, remorselessly. Nothing could stop it. Even if I turned off the power, time would click by nonetheless, taking me step by step into the future. I stared at the glowing green digits, divided by a pulsing colon, and realized another year had turned over.

Seventeen.

There was no excitement in the word and I wondered why. Then a zero flickered and was destroyed by the appearance of a one. It felt like a countdown, my life flicking on and on while I lay on my side, powerless to prevent it.

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

You look like a monkey

And you smell like one, too.

All I could manage was a stupid rhyme. A silly chant from primary school. No, I didn’t feel excitement. I felt sad. Even as I watched another digit clocking up, I knew I was bathing in self-pity. The trouble was, it felt good. I clung to it like a birthday present.

Eventually I fell asleep. I don’t know if I dreamed, but when I woke my head felt thick and woolly. The morning hadn’t brought any answers. But it had brought an idea. Even as the Fridge bustled into my bedroom with a cooked breakfast, a card, and forced cheeriness, I turned the idea round and examined it from every possible angle. It didn’t shine. It didn’t glitter with hope. The more I looked at it, the duller it seemed. But it was the only idea I had.

The Fridge explained that she would hand over my present at the restaurant, a small Thai place on the riverfront. She had booked for four people, which came as a relief. I’d had this horrible feeling she’d been planning to unveil the slimeball over the beef massaman and tom yum goong. True, it would have given me the opportunity for a few choice words.

Waiter:
Can I interest you in the phat prik sod?

Calma:
I doubt it. But bring him over anyway, will you?

But on balance, I wasn’t prepared to sit there all evening, head down, while Nessa’s dad leered at us and inhaled rice noodles. I wouldn’t have gone. Maybe the Fridge realized that and felt it was a confrontation best avoided. Whatever. I was to meet her there at seven. She would go straight to the restaurant from work. I’d tell Vanessa and Jason the arrangements.

I turned down the offer of a lift to school, claiming it was the perfect day for a bracing walk. It was a sign of the Fridge’s distraction that she swallowed this. She drove off to destinations unknown and I walked in the opposite direction. And I don’t mean the opposite direction from the Fridge. I mean the opposite direction from school. The time had come to put my idea to the test. I didn’t hold out any great hopes, but fate had crapped in my back pocket—it was my only chance.

When I eventually arrived at school, about ten minutes before lunch, prospects had brightened. No guarantees, mind, but the whole thing had gone much better than I had dared hope. Now all I could do was wait.

There was no point trying to catch the last ten minutes of class, so I hung around the canteen, waiting for Vanessa. This took time, since she doesn’t exactly race from class. Some species of amoebae could give her a head start in the hundred-yard dash and still ooze over the line first. But she finally turned up and I explained the evening’s arrangements while she eroded yet another banana. There was barely time to get through this simple procedure before the warning bell rang for afternoon classes and we wandered over to the English block.

What a lesson! We discussed the poetry of Dylan Thomas, the roly-poly Welshman with the pickled liver of an alcoholic and the voice of an angel. If you never read another poem in your entire life, read “Fern Hill.” It uses words in ways I’d never dreamed possible. It’s language you can taste and feel. The ending brought a sharp swell of tears, an absurd mixture of happiness and pain. Quite literally, it took my breath away. I was still in my seat minutes after the lesson ended, my jaw scraping the desk, when Miss Moss came and sat opposite me. I had a study period next, so I wasn’t in any hurry, and she must have had a free period too because there weren’t any boys with sloping foreheads and non-opposable thumbs gibbering at the windows. I was hoping she wouldn’t bring up my own attempts at poetry, which in comparison seemed pathetic, stale, and lifeless.

She didn’t. She sat, head inclined, as if gathering her thoughts. I tried to blink back my absurd tears.

“Calma,” she said finally, “I thought you’d want to know. I’m leaving the school at the end of term. I’ve been offered a job at another school and I can’t afford to turn it down.”

The tears I’d been trying to keep at bay returned with reinforcements. I shouldn’t have been surprised that Miss Moss was leaving. I’d anticipated it. Nonetheless, the news hit me like a fist. I hung my head, and my eyes sought the poem, but the print was too blurry to read.

“I’m sorry,” she continued. “If it’s any consolation, the only reason I’ve even given any thought to staying on here is because of you. I’ll miss you, Calma. It’s not often you get a student who loves English like you do. And you have real talent. But I’ve got to make a living and there’s no guarantee of permanent work here.”

I lifted my head and brushed impatiently at the corner of one eye. It was ridiculous to spout like this.

“Why not?” I said.

She cupped her face in her hands, elbows fixed on my desk. I looked her in the eyes and there was sadness there.

“The only option here is another ten-week contract. Even then, assuming I get one, there’s nothing to say I’ll be teaching English. To be honest, the prospect of teaching IT or drama to a bunch of Year Nine boys full of testosterone doesn’t appeal.
This
is what I love, Calma. Teaching English.” She nodded toward the poetry book on my desk. “And I’ve been given a wonderful opportunity. Sanderson has offered me a full-time, permanent post. In English. I can’t turn it down.”

I closed the book slowly and reached for my bag. Never let it be said that Calma Harrison doesn’t know the right way to behave, that she can’t see the big picture. Although I felt like something had dropped beneath me, my voice was surprisingly strong and even.

“I’d be disappointed if you even thought about staying, Miss Moss,” I said. “You are, by a long way, the best English teacher I’ve ever known. To stay here would be like asking Van Gogh to paint by numbers or Ian Thorpe to wear floaties. The only thing that surprises me is that you weren’t snapped up long before this.”

Miss Moss smiled and touched me gently on the arm.

“Calma, you’re a remarkable student and a remarkable young lady. Promise to keep in touch. I want to help you in your studies, your poetry. We can’t let that slip away.”

I stood up and slung my bag over a shoulder. My smile wasn’t even forced.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “You don’t get rid of me that easily.”

Bloody oath,
I thought as I left the classroom.
No way.
I was ready for a change. Nearly five years at the school and it hadn’t got better in all that time. Not really. The only thing that worried me was whether I could insist, when I enrolled at Sanderson next term, that they put me in Miss Moss’s English class.

Jason sounded strange when I rang him after school to let him know the arrangements for my birthday bash. Even though I don’t have a wealth of experience in matters of the heart, I understood the nature of the problem. And I couldn’t blame him. When he wished me a happy birthday, it was with a brittle edge of insincerity, as if what he really wanted to say was,
Eat excrement and die, you bald loser.
I knew I would have to build bridges with Jason. When I considered it from his point of view, I realized I would have been frosty as well. So many incidents, so many dramatic episodes in our short relationship, and had I explained any of them? Not one. I hadn’t even returned his calls after the flight from the Fridge’s love nest. He deserved answers and I vowed I’d give them to him. I was lucky he didn’t chuck me there and then. But he didn’t. He told me he would pick me up at six-thirty and then we’d collect Nessa.

Maybe after the meal we’d have a chance to talk.

At least I had some time to think about it as I showered. I kneaded my scalp into a foamy lather, idly wondering how much money I was saving the Fridge on shampoo and conditioner. When it came time to towel off, I noticed my head was left with little speckles of red lint where the material had caught. I wiped off the condensation from the mirror and looked more closely. My hair was growing back. True, I was still bankrupt in the flowing locks department, but there was a dark stubble all over. My head was turning into Velcro. I brushed off the snagged fibers and went to work on my makeup.

I was ready by six and, if I say so myself, fairly resplendent. I’d gone for discreet glasses (I was tired of eyeballs that felt as though they’d been marinated in household bleach), black cargo pants, and a black cotton blouse. Chic, I thought. Plus, if my country needed me, I could be parachuted behind enemy lines to assassinate a tin-pot dictator without having to change. As the evening turned out, I’d have probably had more fun doing that.

Jason arrived right on time and I did my best to be upbeat and charming. He kissed me on the cheek (not a good sign—it was one of those air kisses Hollywood stars have perfected) and told me I’d get my present at the restaurant. I toyed with the idea of having a brief word then—you know, a quick apology and a promise that all would be revealed later on—but he was back in the car before I could open my mouth.

We drove to Nessa’s in silence. The rush of air and the roar of the engine made conversation impossible and I didn’t feel he was in the right mood for my mouth pressed intimately against his ear. We parked in Nessa’s drive and I jumped out. Vanessa opened the door. I bobbed my head around her shoulder but couldn’t see her mum. I didn’t know if that was a good sign or not. Nessa looked stunning in a paisley caftan with matching headband. While I was slitting the throat of an imperial guard in the shadow-filled corner of a third-world palace, she could light candles for universal peace and sing “We Shall Overcome.” Jason, meanwhile, could do the stern-faced, uncommunicative role of government spokesperson.

Nessa struggled under the weight of a gift-wrapped package of annoying dimensions—the sort that makes it impossible to guess what’s in it. She also told me that I wasn’t getting it until dinnertime. I know I should be more mature, but presents make me go all gooey with anticipation.

As we drove over the river, water sparkled and flashed with the reflections of lights strung along the banks. People moved lazily in front of shops, cafés, and restaurants. Night-market stalls were being assembled and a couple of early buskers had taken up positions, tuning their guitars and arranging their open cases expectantly. A few stars gleamed above the palm trees and the air was sweet with spices. It was peaceful.

From:
Miss Moss
To:
Calma Harrison
Subject:
Villanelle

Calma,

It’s time to try the villanelle form. This is a very rigid poetic structure and the basic rules are: sixteen or nineteen lines; iambic pentameter; four (or five) stanzas of three lines and a concluding four-line stanza; the first line of the poem is repeated as the final line of the second and fourth stanza; the third line of the poem is repeated as the final line of the third and (possibly) fifth stanza; the first and third lines come together as a final rhyming couplet; the rhyme scheme is
aba aba aba aba abaa.

Couldn’t be more straightforward!

Don’t worry. It is a very difficult form and often used simply as an exercise in rhythm and rhyme. Very few villanelles are actually any good because the structure is so prescriptive. The magnificent exception to this is Dylan Thomas’s
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night.
Read it and weep!

Good luck,
Miss Moss

Villanelle for Jason

Don’t think this silence speaks—that I don’t care

For you, and draw dark shutters of the mind.

Look in my eyes and read the message there.

The spur is sharp, but not enough to dare

Those words my tongue just cannot bear to find.

Don’t think this silence speaks—that I don’t care.

I cannot tell you all, I cannot tear

Up stillness by its roots, but stumble, blind.

Look in my eyes and read the message there.

I think you sense a rift beyond repair,

And to our parting have become resigned—

Don’t. Think! This silence speaks that I don’t care?

That is absurd. Trust grows, in time (like hair!)

And bald resentments will be left behind.

Don’t think this silence speaks, that I don’t care—

Look in my eyes and read the message there.

Chapter 25

Thai died

The Fridge hadn’t arrived when we got to the restaurant, but the waiter showed us to our reserved table. Jason still sported a mouth like a cat’s bum, so I took charge of the drinks order. I went for the house chardonnay. Okay, I was still a year away from the legal drinking age, but it was my birthday, and anyway, the waiter’s eyes were so transfixed on my chest he wouldn’t have thought to ask for ID. Vanessa was in a good mood, because she ordered something like a tropical rainforest. I half expected David Attenborough to peep out over the rim of the glass, parting fronds and speaking in hushed tones. Jason had a beer.

All well and good. But conversation wasn’t exactly zipping along. Nessa, as you know, wouldn’t have been out of place in a religious order bound by a vow of silence. She blinked occasionally over the foliage of her drink, doing a remarkable impersonation of a potted plant. Jason’s eyes slid all over the place but managed to avoid mine. We had the animation of three paving slabs. I went for a subtle icebreaker.

“Come on, you buggers,” I said. “Give me presents.”

But that didn’t work. Jason and Nessa refused to hand anything over until the Fridge deigned to make an appearance. They didn’t know her like I did. I just hoped they hadn’t got me anything perishable. My cheery gambit spurned, I opted for humility. Or maybe it was simple begging.

“C’mon, guys,” I said. “It’s my birthday. I know I’ve been strange lately, but…well, it’s my birthday.” Lame, I admit, but the silence was getting to me. “Good cheer is customary. Animated conversation, the spontaneous carrying of the birthday girl in a chair around the restaurant to the lilt of amusing birthday songs. Frankly, at the moment, this could be the annual meeting of the local undertakers’ association. Perhaps we could start with a smile and, if no one dies, see where that gets us?”

Jason finally looked at me. He had an I’ve-been-treatedin-a-very-shoddy-fashion-so-I’ve-the-right-to-behave-like-an-anal-sphincter air of grievance, but my words had clearly chipped at his resolve. I could see a flash of light soften his eyes and it wasn’t just the reflection of candlelight. Once again, I felt a lurching in the pit of my stomach like the one I’d experienced when I first set eyes on him.

Fact File

Common name:
Jason Evans

Scientific name: Hunkia britannica

Habitat:
Originally from England, the
Hunkia britannica
is a rare example of a successful foreign invader. It has flourished in the climate of Australia and is regarded by all observers as a particularly magnificent example of non-indigenous fauna. Can be enticed from its regular habitat into the arms of human beings by careful maneuvering and encouraging remarks about soccer.

Mating habits:
Devoutly to be wished.

Appearance:
Tall, rangy, and athletic in appearance, the
Hunkia britannica
is a splendid physical specimen. Beautiful skin tone, finely toned musculature, deep brown eyes liquid with sensitivity and eroticism, dribble, dribble, dribble.

Toxicity:
Nontoxic. Pleasurable feelings of well-being can be achieved if rubbed against skin.

Status:
Divine.

Jason opened his mouth—and then the Fridge materialized dramatically at his side.

She took off her jacket like it was an unaccustomed action. Her fingers were shaking and her face was so lined it looked as if it had been slept in. There was a small tic near the corner of her right eye and her mouth was pulled down. She got rid of the jacket and didn’t even glance in our direction. Jason was on his feet, showing manners more at home in the late nineteenth century. It was clear the Fridge didn’t know who the hell he was. She even gave him the jacket, probably expecting him to exchange it for a wine list. Jason arranged it carefully on the back of her chair.

“Hello, Mrs. Harrison,” he said. “It’s good to see you again.”

The Fridge blinked. I could see her summon her willpower in an attempt to occupy the time and space the rest of us filled. It was as if she was returning from some place far away.

“Jason,” she said. “Yes. You too.” Her voice was overly cheery, with little fault lines at the edges. In that moment I felt intensely sad. It was silly. I knew what had happened. It was written all over her. And it was what I had been praying for. Yet sudden tears stung my eyes.

The Fridge sat down and pulled her chair toward the table. She smiled, but it was nothing more than a series of muscle stretches.

“Hey, birthday girl,” she said, finally making eye contact. “Sorry I’m late. I…I had to make a phone call. Have you ordered? Ah, drinks. Yes…Jason, be a love, will you, and attract the waiter’s attention. How are you, Vanessa?”

But she didn’t take her eyes from me.

The Fridge ordered a bourbon and Coke and didn’t stop chattering. I took the opportunity to get another glass of wine. I had a feeling I was going to need all the artificial courage I could find this evening. A large part of me wanted the silence back.

“Well, seventeen. Who would have thought it? It seems like yesterday…Oh, by the way, your present. I hope you like it.”

She reached into her bag and pulled out an oblong package. She handed it across the table and it felt solid and heavy in my hands.

“I didn’t know what to get you. It’s so difficult. I mean, you’ve reached the age where I can’t get you clothes. I have no idea what kind of music you like—it all seems foul-mouthed nowadays and chanted by large people with an unhealthy interest in drive-by shootings. That’s if you can have a
healthy
interest in drive-by shootings. Anyway, if they haven’t got a criminal record, they just record one. Hah! Calma, don’t just sit there like a brick. Open your present!”

I wanted to get up and hug her. Instead I pulled away the wrapping. It was a book. A leather book, with gilt on the edges.

I could smell its age. I opened it to the flyleaf.
The Complete Works of Shakespeare,
dated 1821, with a foreword by the Reverend Bowdler. It was perfect.

“Oh, Mum,” I said. For once, I was lost for words. I ran my hands over the leather binding and put it carefully on the table, well away from the pools of condensation puddling by the water carafe. Then I got up and the Fridge stood and we hugged. I squeezed hard, my arms around her waist, my head on her left shoulder. She smelled of Givenchy and defeat.

“Mum, I’m so sorry,” I whispered. The words felt like something solid lodged in the back of my throat.

She increased the pressure of her arms around me before putting her hands on my shoulders and stepping back. Her smile was small and broken.

“Me too, sweetie,” she said. “Me too.”

ReWND™

Mrs. Aldrick was surprised to see me, which I suppose was understandable. She’d seen Vanessa off to school. She knew I should have been there too. Maybe, as we faced each other on the doorstep and I stared her straight in the eye, she knew why I had come. I suppose I’ll never know.

At first she didn’t want me to come in. She made excuses, but I was having none of it. She was the only solution. For Vanessa’s and Mum’s sake, I needed her to listen and I wasn’t leaving until I’d given it my best shot.

We sat in the unnervingly spotless kitchen. She looked at me as if I was the manifestation of all her fears—a past that she hoped was dead and buried but which had quickened and returned to haunt her. As I talked, she ran her fingers over the polished surface of the table, her eyes darting around as if for aid.

I told her everything I suspected and, even as she tried to deny it, the doubts gnawing at me disappeared. Her words were nothing compared to the way the sinews in her arms moved, the slump of her shoulders, the relentless flickering of her eyes. It was all true.

When I got to the marks I’d seen on Vanessa’s body, she inhaled sharply and her face twisted. I got the impression she’d hoped against hope that what had been in the past had remained there, that her daughter was safe. Wishful thinking. Maybe deep down Mrs. Aldrick knew, but it was a knowledge she was desperate to avoid. I forced her to face it.

I begged her to keep Vanessa at home from now on, to stand up to her ex-husband for her daughter’s sake. I explained the research I had done on restraining orders and the process by which you could apply for one. It seemed bizarre—I was barely seventeen, yet I was advising someone over twice my age on issues that left my tongue coated with distaste. Neither of us wanted to have this conversation. Yet I floundered on, pushing words through the barrier of her silence. I told her about the Fridge, that there were two people she could protect if she summoned the courage. I gave her Mum’s shift times for today. I’d got them by calling the casino. I couldn’t force her to do anything. I didn’t try. I just gave the information, sprinkled the seeds, hoped for germination.

When I left the house, she was sitting at the kitchen table, dragging her fingers over the surface, eyes fixed on the pattern of smudges she’d created. Mrs. Aldrick had made no promises. She had barely spoken. But I felt an irrational hope and it warmed me all the way to school.

FastF™

At least the Fridge’s handing over of her present liberated Jason and Nessa from their smug self-discipline. Vanessa passed me her package, a lumpy and appallingly heavy object. I nearly pulled a muscle as I took it from her. For a moment, I thought she’d bought me a boulder. But it turned out to be a sandstone Buddha, intricately carved and full of tranquil flowing lines.

“Put it in your bedroom, Calma,” said Vanessa. “In the corner where the chest of drawers is. It should counteract the strong yang energy in the room, as well as dissipating the shar chi, the killing breath, caused by the inauspicious juxtaposition of your wu xing.”

“You couldn’t run that by me again, could you?” I replied.

“Feng shui.”

“That’s a relief,” I said. “I thought there was something wrong with you. It’s lovely, Nessa. Thank you.”

“And here’s mine,” said Jason. At least his present was small and didn’t look like it might induce a hernia just opening it. I moved the Buddha to the edge of the table, where it threatened to tip the whole thing over, catapulting the water jug into the laps of diners over my shoulder. I ripped at the packaging on Jason’s gift. I’m not the kind who patiently peels back sticky tape and methodically unfolds wrapping paper. I’m more the rampaging rend-and-shred-with-the-nails type, scattering paper like confetti.

It was a cell phone. A lovely, shiny cell phone—the kind that flips open. There was a small lens at the back. I’m not technically minded, but it looked like a phone with a still-image manipulator, video capture card, wireless Internet and espresso-making facility.

I was stoked.

Now I could do what everyone else did at school—develop weak eyes by fiddling with the settings or installing ring tones of execrable taste.

“Thought it’s something you could use,” said Jason. “You can be a very difficult person to get hold of.”

“It’s brilliant. Thank you. I don’t deserve it, Jason.”

“Too right. You don’t.”

He didn’t say it in a nasty way, though, and I knew we’d be all right. Later on, when there was just the two of us, I’d explain. I’d explain everything. And he’d kiss me and tell me he understood and that he thought I was a brilliant girlfriend and a wonderful friend and caring daughter, and we’d download ring tones until our fingers ached. I wanted to use it right away, but he explained I’d have to call the service provider to activate the SIM card.

“How can I do that?” I asked. “I don’t have a working phone.”

He took out his cell and gave it to me.

“There you go, Miss Impatient,” he said. “Follow the directions on the card.”

It took a while to work out how to turn his bloody phone on, but I managed to get through all the steps for activation. The service provider guy told me it would take a minute to do whatever he had to do, but basically I would be connected almost immediately.

“Course, you need to charge the phone up for about two hours before you can use it,” Jason chipped in.

“What?”

“I’m pulling your plonker! I’ve already charged it. Calma, I think you’re ready to join the world of electronic communication. Who you gonna call?”

I realized there wasn’t anyone. The only people I cared about were sitting a foot away. Jason suggested I call him, but that was just too sad. Anyway, I had a better idea.

I punched in the number and there it was. My first call. Someone picked up after three rings.

“Hello?”

“Hello. This is table twelve. Any chance of someone taking our order?”

There was a puzzled pause, but it did the trick. A young man was over before I could flip my phone shut. We ordered and I took the opportunity to get another glass of wine. Despite the expression on the Fridge’s face, a strange combination of happiness and misery, like she’d been violently sandbagged from behind in the middle of a wedding party, I was feeling fine. And it wasn’t only because of the alcohol suffusing my bloodstream and buggering around with electrical impulses in my brain. It was good to be with these people.

Once we’d ordered, Jason showed me how to use the camera on the phone and I snapped away happily. I took pix of the three of them, the Fridge in the middle with her arms around Jason and Nessa. I took pix of my presents. I even got Jason to take one with his phone of my phone. I balanced it up against the Buddha so it appeared that the divine one was ordering a pizza. Boy, this wine was strong.

My father arrived halfway through the appetizers.

I was dipping the last of my fishcakes into a small puddle of sweet chili sauce when I became aware of someone standing next to the table. He ran a hand over his scalp and glanced nervously around. I swallowed the final morsel and took a sip of chardonnay. I was cool.

“Can I help you?” I said.

His eyes flitted everywhere and I saw more clearly than ever what a weak, contemptible creature he was.

“I’m going,” he said. “Back to Sydney. Thought you’d want to know.”