Deeper Water (7 page)

Staring at the cane toads, Hamish lifted his arm and ran his hand across the top of his head. His elbow bumped against my arm, and he stepped a little away from me.

‘She was probably just having a shit day.’

‘Maybe,’ I answered, but I didn’t really think so.

Hamish pressed his hand against the back of his neck and then ran it forward, over his head and down across his eyes. He wouldn’t look at me. I watched his hands, admiring their shape. If you looked too long at something it was hard not to ponder its uses. I started thinking about what it might feel like if he swept his hands across my head and down against my eyes. I’d never imagined that before, not with anybody’s hands. He pressed his fingers against his eyes and made a low sound. Not a word, more a hiss.

‘Alright.’ He turned and looked at me finally. ‘No cane-toad killing today. But I’m not showering with the buggers. You’ve got to get them out.’

I handed him the clothes I’d been clutching and went to get the broom. It was a pretty inelegant business, sweeping toads. They rolled right over onto their backs, legs dangling in the air, soft pale bellies exposed. After a bit of jiggling around they’d right themselves and then try to jump away into the corners, but I was used to that. A couple of brushes and they were gone. Swept out onto the grass. But I knew they’d be back.

‘It’s not much of a victory, Mema,’ Hamish said quietly, looking down at the floor.

I leaned on the broom a second, watching his shuttered face.

‘I’m not playing to win,’ I said finally, thinking of all the squashed toads on the road. I didn’t think I was playing at all.

While Hamish was in the shower I had a scramble around in the fridge to see if there was enough stuff to make us all sandwiches. The stand-off about the cane toads had left me uneasy. I guess I was looking for a distraction.

When Mum got working in the shed, sometimes she forgot to eat, so I usually tried to take her out something. The bread was a bit stale. I popped it in the toaster to freshen it up. Found some tomatoes, some cheese, picked a few lettuce leaves from the garden. That’d have to do. I wondered about what we could make for dinner. We’d been trapped in for a few days now and our supplies were getting low. I’d have to investigate what was at the back of the pantry. No one in my house was too good at cleaning things out, so sticking your hand into the depths of the cupboard was a bit of a lucky dip. Sometimes you might come out with something—a laksa paste and some rice stick noodles or a nice-looking tomato pasta sauce that wasn’t out of date. Anything was possible. Shopping was a haphazard activity for us, not a regular one, so it was a bit hard to keep track.

Out at the shed Mum was spanning the whirling pot in her arms, its final shape solidifying. I stood on the threshold with the sandwich, watching her, appreciating how she knew the precise moment when it was ready. When I threw pots I was always unsure. Could they use a little more? Should they be a little thinner? Thicker perhaps? It was all indecision, but for Mum there was a precise moment. I watched her hands waiting for the moment. It wasn’t anything she could describe in words, though I’d asked her many times. Maybe it was the simple knowledge of when something was done that made her the master and me the novice.

When the pot was finished she glanced up at me, smiling at the sandwich.

‘Thanks, Mema.’ She always emerged from throwing pots softer than when she went in, like it offered her some private solace. ‘You’re such a good girl.’

‘There’s not much left in the fridge,’ I said. ‘So don’t get too excited.’

She took one last look at her giant creation and then moved across to wash her hands in the sink.

‘You go down to the creek and do some ochre painting?’

I could see her checking out my face. I’d tried to wash it off in the water, but I guess it needed a good scrub with soap.

‘Yeah, Hamish was getting stir-crazy. He started talking about
computers
.’ I didn’t want her to know we’d gone creek-riding.

‘He’ll be gone tomorrow.’ She reached out and took the plate. ‘Back into the world. He’ll be happy.’

‘He thinks you don’t like him.’

I didn’t mean to say it, but suddenly it was out of my mouth. My mum studied me a moment and then took a bite of the sandwich, chewing it slowly.

‘He’s alright,’ she said finally. ‘Just one of those guys, Mema.’

I wondered what exactly she meant but I didn’t feel like asking. She took another bite of her sandwich and looked across the paddocks. In the photos from when I was little, there was only the faintest hint of the furrows that now lined my mother’s face. I studied them, wondering how she could have got so lined in such a short time. Maybe that’s how time worked—left you alone for years and then hit you with a big bang. It didn’t seem to bother her. I’d never even caught her glancing at her reflection in the glass. She only seemed to see herself in terms of her function. Always in the midst of some action. She never sat still.

‘You didn’t make me kill the tadpoles, even when they turned out to be toads.’ I said. ‘I know you could have.’

She put the last bite of the sandwich in her mouth, chewing for a bit.

‘You played with those things for hours. You loved them.’ Mum always knew exactly what I was talking about. I never had to explain. ‘You did the same with snails and slugs. You and Anja. How could I tell you which things were okay to love?’

I smiled, thinking of the snails. How their eyes would tentatively glide out on the ends of those strange tentacles. How slow and gentle they always seemed. The trail of silver they left in their wake.

‘We’re all weeds here, Mema.’ She handed me back the plate. ‘We’re all just weeds.’

When I got back inside, Hamish was on the phone. I thought I’d better give him some privacy so I went into my room. One of the dads used to go to the auctions and buy up old furniture. It meant that all the rooms in the house had these giant old beds, dark and wooden. Mine was really pretty, with carvings on the corners, but it wasn’t the most comfortable. It was missing some slats, and the mattress didn’t seem to hold its shape anymore. I’d slept in it ever since I could remember, but it was only starting to bother me now. Even though I hadn’t grown an inch since I was twelve, the bed seemed suddenly too slack and small. Lately my insomnia had got so bad that when I lay down on it my heart started to race, like it was preparing for the stress of not sleeping.

I had a funny bunch of things in my room—collections of sticks, odd shapes, pieces of wood that I’d picked out as having a pleasing form, stones of all varieties, mainly from the creek. They were all so familiar, but with Hamish here it made me look at them anew. It would be hard to explain what it was about the stones that Anja and I prized. They had to feel a specific way in the hand. They had to be a certain weight, have a certain texture. We didn’t speak about it, we just knew. Then there was my nest collection. Nests were my favourite things. I didn’t steal them from the birds. These were ones that had fallen out of the trees. I would come across them, perfectly formed, made from all manner of things—grass, sticks, leaves, moss. Sometimes their outsides would be made of long strips of grass, precisely worked into a hollowed-out circle, and the inside would be lined with moss. Such acts of devotion, such tenderness. I liked to bring them inside and sit them on my desk. They would start out immaculate, not a strand out of place, but eventually over time they would disintegrate. I liked that too. Liked to watch them decay. It was the world in motion.

I had a few old toys. Things I’d been given and didn’t know how to throw away. A pile of books beside my bed, stories I was part way through. And a big rack of clothes. Mum sewed, and I wasn’t too bad with the Singer either. We’d always made our own clothes. Well, we didn’t make our own undies or anything. Still went to the shops for those. Mum had a whole storeroom of fabrics inherited from her grandma, plus lots of other pieces she’d picked up along the way. It was hard to give away clothes you’d made with your own hands, so I had a stack of them hanging on my rack. I didn’t have a wardrobe. They just hung on a piece of dowel, against one of the walls. It was kind of nice looking at them, seeing how many outfits we’d made, how bright and pretty they all were, although there were plenty of things I never wore.

I wondered what Hamish would think of my nests. I wondered if he’d ever come into my room and see them. Tomorrow he’d be gone. Back into the world. I started thinking about what it might be like out there. What
did
the world have to offer?

I made old-fashioned French toast for dinner, which was funny ’cause it was usually a breakfast thing, but we didn’t have much else. Around Mum, Hamish was quiet again. Between the two of them I was beginning to feel stifled. While we ate, I half wished Anja or Sophie would arrive and bring back a bit of chaos. Throw Rory into the mix.

The ratbag cat always seemed to sense when things were about to go awry, and he would start acting up. His name was Thor, on account of his tough exterior. He was very handsome, in the way some cats are—symmetrical markings and giant soulful eyes—but he couldn’t abide much affection. Sometimes he let me touch him, but only if I stayed an arm’s length away, reaching out with the tips of my fingers. He’d always been odd, but since Isis was strangled by the snake he’d got worse. Jumpy and highly strung, but attention-seeking too. Sometimes if we were all busy he’d sit behind the stereo and knock the CDs from the sideboard to the ground, one by one. Eyeing us off to see what we’d do. It drove Mum crazy ’cause the music was precious to her. Privately, I wondered if that was why he did it.

He was stalking around in the background, tail swinging from side to side. Mischief on his mind. While I was washing the dishes he jumped up onto the table, catching Mum and Hamish by surprise. My hands were all soapy, otherwise I would have reached over and given him a stroke. He walked towards Hamish, looking purposeful.

‘What’s he up to?’ Mum asked no one in particular, narrowing her eyes.

Hamish tapped his fingers on the table and Thor came closer. The cat—my unfriendly, temperamental cat—leaned his head down and smooched it across Hamish’s fingers.

‘No way.’ I wiped my hands on the tea towel.

‘What?’ Hamish scratched Thor behind the ears.

The cat started sliding the length of its body against the back of Hamish’s hand. I’d never seen him behave like that, except occasionally with the dog. Those two were great pals. Hamish moved his hand away, like patting the cat wasn’t his idea of fun.

‘He’s never affectionate with anyone. I’ve been trying for years to get a cuddle out of him.’

‘He’s a ratbag,’ Mum said, on the verge of a smile.

‘He’s really trying to mess with my head.’ I moved towards the table.

‘I don’t even like cats.’ Hamish held his hands up out of reach.

‘He’s probably trying to mess with your head too, then,’ Mum said, chuckling a little. ‘What a rascal.’

Then Hamish leaned back away from the table and we watched the cat reach out a paw and place it on his chest. Mum laughed then, almost snorted. ‘All the years Mema’s been loving you, and now you throw yourself at a stranger,’ she said to the cat, shaking her head.

Thor put his other paw up and started doing that pawing thing they do—claw in, claw out—right on the top of Hamish’s chest. I couldn’t believe it. I just stood there and stared.

‘Where’s your dignity, Thor?’ I finally asked, laughter creeping into my voice. Thor looked ridiculous, but Hamish was so still and stiff and shocked, his response seemed comical too.

‘Okay, that’s enough,’ Hamish said, pushing his chair back further out of Thor’s reach.

I laughed aloud then, but I stretched out and smoothed my hand across the cat’s head. He sat there looking insulted. You see something new every day, I guess.

‘Mema, you reckon you could show me how you make a pot?’ Hamish asked and I knew he wanted to get out of the kitchen.

The shed was set back a little way from the house, off to the side. It used to be a garage but we’d never used it for that. Nowadays, it was just three rickety wooden walls and a tin roof, the front wide open to the elements. The walls slanted at slightly strange angles, making the whole thing seem like it might fall over, but even though it looked precarious, it was never going to tumble down. It was so overgrown with vines, thick, wooded things, they’d become its structure. Mum said it would outlast the lot of us.

It was evening by then, but it stayed light for so long in summer you could still see when you were inside. The shed was neater than you’d expect, all Mum’s pottery stacked on shelves in varying states of completion.

‘Wow.’ Hamish looked around. ‘This is cool.’

‘Yeah.’

The house could be in complete disarray, but Mum kept the shed well organised. She needed things to be ordered to be able to work.

Hamish put his hands in his pockets, as though he was afraid he might knock something over. ‘These are amazing.’

‘Specially when you consider what they began as.’

‘What?’

‘Lumps of dirt, you know?’

I pointed out my little shelf, the place I stored the cups and things I’d made for the market.

‘You did these ones?’ He gingerly picked up a mug. It was a deep-blue colour, the firing leaving some darker flecks.

‘They’re fairly hardy,’ I said, ’cause he was handling it so delicately. ‘You’d have to drop it on the ground for it to break.’

He turned the mug around and inspected its speckled surface.

‘They’re really pretty, Mema,’ he said, placing the mug carefully back on the shelf. ‘If I had any cash I’d buy some.’

‘Yeah?’

I didn’t see that was much of a compliment, but I knew what he meant. He had lost everything in the flood. Not a cent on him.

‘Maybe you’ll come to the market one day.’

‘Maybe. I’ll be around for a bit. Week or so, at least.’

I didn’t realise he’d be staying longer. Something inside me surged. Excitement maybe. It was disconcerting. I turned to switch the lamp on.

‘Maybe we can hang out.’ He smiled sideways, just outside the rim of light. ‘I don’t know … do whatever you do around here?’

He said these words easily, as though they cost him nothing, but I couldn’t help feeling that there was some kind of invitation in them. My heartbeat clattered around inside my chest. I wasn’t sure if I could reply. I just nodded and started setting up the wheel.

The lamp was one of those old metal things, on a big stand but plugged in at the wall. It created a circle of light around the pottery wheel and made me feel like I was in a spotlight, up on stage. Hamish was watching me so carefully my heart wouldn’t slow. At least the process of throwing a pot was routine enough that I could do it with my mind distracted. I leaned down and sawed off a chunk of clay with the string then I got the wheel turning.

The wheel was old-style, the top plate attached to a heavy flywheel down the bottom that I kicked with my feet. I built up momentum and then it would go on its own for a bit. The whole thing was a stop–start process. Kick-work, kick-work. It had its own tempo. The flywheel made a soft, rhythmic clunking sound that, under the circumstances, I found quite soothing.

‘So it spins just by you pushing that bottom wheel?’ Hamish asked, squatting down to see how the motion worked. ‘You don’t use any other energy?’

‘Nope. It’s the momentum. Centrifugal force … whatever that is.’ Mum had described it all many times, but sometimes it felt like the explanations got in the way of the pleasure.

‘What a great machine,’ he said, staring up at me from where he crouched. ‘So simple.’

I wasn’t usually worried about my wonky foot, but it felt like Hamish was peeping beneath my skirt, checking out the workings of my legs.