Into My Arms (4 page)

‘Fitzroy,’ she corrected him. ‘You’ve left out the “t”.’

Zia didn’t respond, continuing to stare at his hands. Skye flicked through the remaining drawings and found they were almost all recurring geometric patterns, some taking the shape of tiny, intertwined flowers.

‘These are very good,’ she said. ‘I think they’d be a bit complex for what we’re doing, though.’

‘They are not meant for here,’ murmured Zia. ‘I made a copy from the picture at home.’

‘Of the mosque—the one in Shiraz?’ asked Skye. Zia nodded. ‘I’d love to see it,’ she said, tracing the precise designs with her finger while she worked out how they fitted into one another. Then she looked up. ‘Have you ever seen it? The mosque, I mean. For real, not just a picture.’

‘No,’ Zia replied, then frowned and corrected himself. ‘Yes, as a child, but I was too young to remember. My father told me that he took me there—that he held me on his shoulders so I could see the colours on the roof.’

‘You were born in Iran then? When did you leave?’ He was too thin, Skye found herself thinking, his dark skin pulled taut across his bones, stretched as tightly as one of her mother’s canvases.

‘A few years ago,’ he said, ‘when I was ten.’

‘How old are you now?’ Skye asked, confused. The rest of the class were only ten, and he looked much the same as them.

‘I am twelve,’ Zia said quietly, finally glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. ‘Thirteen in two months. I did not know English when we came to Australia. The school held me down.’

‘Held you back, you mean? Repeated a class.’

‘Repeated, yes. I repeated grade three, and repeated grade four. I would like to get through grade five in one year.’

He smiled shyly and Skye couldn’t help but laugh. ‘That’s a great aim, Zia. Seriously, do you need any help? Are you getting extra tutoring?’

He shook his head. ‘In grade three, but not now. The school said there were worse than me.’

Skye sighed. He was probably right.

‘Mr Cunningham is very helpful, though,’ Zia continued. ‘I can tell him if I do not understand, and he will explain to me.’

‘Do you speak English at home?’ asked Skye. ‘You need to use it as much as you can, so it comes easily.’

‘A little. Not much. My mother has no English. My father tries to teach her but she will not listen.’

‘Why not? Surely she wants to fit in.’

Zia shrugged and looked down at his hands again, his face blank and closed. She’d overstepped, thought Skye, and just as she was getting somewhere. Keen to keep the conversation going, she tried again.

‘Zia’s a lovely name. What does it mean?’

‘Light,’ he said softly.

‘Light,’ Skye repeated. ‘It’s nice. A bit like mine.’

He peeked up at her from underneath long eyelashes. ‘Like yours?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘My first name. Skye. It’s Scottish, not Arabic, but they’re similar, aren’t they? Sky and light. Sky, like in your design.’ She took up his sketchbook again and opened it to the drawing of the soaring bird. ‘This is good too, you know,’ she said. ‘Maybe we could include something like this in the mosaic. What gave you the idea? Is the bird for freedom, like your family coming to Australia?’

Zia looked at her levelly. ‘The bird is flying away so it can eat the frog it has just caught. See?’ He pointed to a detail Skye had failed to notice: two spindly legs dangling from the beak of the bird, no doubt belonging to the creature in his previous design.

Skye blushed. ‘Right,’ she said, ‘we need to find you a group to work with. Who are your friends in the grade?’

‘There are none really,’ Zia admitted, with what Skye thought was practised nonchalance. ‘The ones I had moved up classes, while I stayed behind.’

Skye scanned the groups now huddled together, looking for a place where Zia would fit in. The trouble was that he
didn’t
fit, not with any of them. He was older and quieter; he probably knew nothing of their football teams or the pop singers they liked or the latest PlayStation game. In all the ways that mattered in primary school, Zia was different, and to be different meant to be left alone.

‘Rowena!’ Skye called out. The girl looked up obediently. ‘Zia is going to work with your group, OK?’

A flicker of defiance crossed Rowena’s face. ‘But we’ve already got five, Miss Holt. Can’t he go with Charlotte? There are only four of them.’

‘I chose you because I know how good you are at helping others,’ Skye said. To sweeten the deal, she added, ‘Plus you can have twenty house points, and your group can be the first to choose the section of the wall you want to work on.’

Rowena gave a small nod. ‘OK then. You can sit next to me, Zia,’ she said, moving her chair over to make room for him in the circle. Then she looked back at Skye. ‘You won’t forget to tell Mr Cunningham about the house points, will you? Make sure he marks them up on the board.’

4

Meat, thought Arran, as he closed the gate behind him and negotiated the familiar uneven path to his mother’s front door. He hoped Nell had cooked meat—a roast, maybe, or a steak, thick-cut, marbled with fat, still oozing blood. His mouth watered as he fumbled in his pockets for the key. He should request it, he supposed, but that would only give her more ammunition. Nell already disapproved of his diet, and when he only visited once a week a lecture was the last thing he felt like.

Arran let himself in and paused in the hallway to sniff the air. Garlic, onion, and something else that he couldn’t quite place. Chickpeas? Oh God, he hoped not. He was so sick of chickpeas.

‘Hey, you,’ said Skye, emerging from her bedroom. ‘I thought I heard the door.’ She reached up to kiss him on the cheek, her hair against his face, soft and smelling faintly of shampoo. He should have a shower while he was here, Arran thought. The one at the squat was broken again.

‘What’s for dinner?’ he asked.

‘Hi, Skye, beloved twin, it’s nice to see you too,’ Skye responded, lightly punching him on the arm.

‘Hi, Skye,’ he parroted. ‘How’s work, it’s nice to see you and what’s for dinner?’ Then he added, ‘I’m really hungry.’

She laughed. ‘You’re always hungry. Carbonara. Mum’s trying to fatten you up a bit.’

Arran sighed. ‘I’m fine. Do I look as if I need fattening up?’

‘You look as if you need a haircut, but I won’t start on that either.’ She returned to her room and he made his way to the back of the house. Carbonara was OK. It wasn’t steak, but it had bacon in it at least. That would do.

‘Hello, Arran,’ said his mother as he came into the kitchen, where she was leaning over the stove.

‘Nell.’ He nodded. He’d called her that for as long as he could remember, and she’d never objected. Years ago, she’d been as alternative as she seemed to think he was now. He took a beer out of the fridge and went to sit at the table, then, walked over and kissed Nell on the top of the head.

She looked up and smiled. ‘Your dad used to do that when he got home from work,’ she said, turning back to stirring the sauce.

Arran was glad he couldn’t see her face. ‘How’s things?’ he asked, twisting the cap off the bottle. ‘Are you sleeping any better?’

Nell shrugged. ‘A bit. Maybe. I’m trying not to let it bother me when I can’t, just get up and do something else instead.’

‘Painting?’ Arran asked.

She shook her head, still with her back to him. ‘Not yet. I’ve been sorting the photos, though—they’re in such a mess. Boxes and boxes of them . . . I have no idea why we didn’t just put them into albums at the time.’

Arran laughed. ‘Because we were always travelling and because you couldn’t be bothered. Plus I can’t imagine there was any space for albums in the kombi.’

Nell reached for the colander of pasta, draining in the sink. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘Organisation was never our strong suit, but we saw a lot, didn’t we? And that van—you couldn’t turn over in bed without everyone else having to swap positions as well.’

‘You couldn’t go to the toilet without everyone knowing if dinner had agreed with you.’

‘OK, OK, I don’t necessarily want to remember every detail. But they were good days . . .’ Her voice trailed off, then resumed with an effort. ‘I’m going through the Scotland photos at the moment. There’s a lovely one of you and your dad at Inverness. You were—’

She was interrupted by the sound of the doorbell. Skye called that she would get it.

‘Why don’t you give him a key?’ Arran asked. ‘They’ve been together, what, two years? He’s practically a member of the family.’

Nell stirred the pasta into the sauce. ‘I offered, but he wouldn’t take it. That’s a bit too relaxed for him. Hamish prefers to do things by the book. I’d say he was brought up quite differently to you two.’

‘Properly, you mean?’ asked Arran.

‘Enough of your cheek,’ said Nell, flicking her tea towel at him. ‘Get off your bum and set the table.’

After dinner, Nell cleared away the dishes and then brought out the box of photos she had been working on.

‘God, Nell, don’t bore Hamish with those,’ protested Arran.

‘No, I’d love to see them,’ said Hamish, reaching across the table. He seemed genuine, but Arran wasn’t sure. Why on earth would he want to spend one of the rare evenings he allowed himself off looking at faded happy snaps from two decades ago? Wouldn’t he rather whisk Skye back to his flat for some time alone? Arran still didn’t understand the man—Hamish never really let his guard down—though he did like him.

‘These are great,’ said Hamish, flicking through shots of Skye and Arran in front of lochs, in front of castles, perched smiling and freckled on the bonnet of the kombi. ‘I really like this one.’ He held up a photo of a pigtailed Skye gingerly patting a Highland cow. ‘How old were you then?’

Skye looked to her mother for confirmation. ‘Seven, I’d say? I was terrified it was going to step on me.’

‘God, you were cute,’ said Hamish, still looking at the picture. Then he leaned across and kissed her. ‘Still are.’

Arran stared at the table. There was an old red wine stain that had leached into the wood near the salt shaker, and he rubbed at it uselessly. He was happy for them, really he was, but right now he could do without the couple stuff.

Nell fished through the box. ‘Here’s another one, Hamish,’ she said, passing over a tattered picture of Skye perched on her father’s shoulders. ‘That was in Ullapool. Do you remember, Arran? We were there for a
ceilidh
.’ She turned to Hamish. ‘It’s a dance—all the traditional reels, everyone in their family tartan. Charlie bought a tin whistle there, and learned to play it so quickly the locals invited him to join in.’

Hamish nodded. ‘He liked his music, didn’t he? Hey, Skye, I don’t suppose you still have that kilt?’

‘I’ve still got mine,’ lisped Arran in a deliberately camp Scottish brogue. ‘Do you want to see me in it?’ He liked Hamish, but it was fun to unsettle him. What was it Mark had always said? That the heteros needed to be shaken up now and again, reminded that they didn’t have the monopoly on sex.

Hamish looked away. ‘You’re such a wanker, Arran,’ Skye sighed.

‘Oh, look, Arran, here’s you on your island,’ exclaimed Nell, clearly eager to dispel the tension. ‘Charlie was crazy about the Scottish islands, Hamish,’ she explained. ‘Our first trip to Scotland was our honeymoon, and he was so enchanted by them that as soon as we got back home he bought a labrador and named it Hebrides. Skye and Arran came later.’

Hamish smiled politely, though he must have already heard the story from Skye. ‘What were the options?’ he asked.

‘There weren’t many,’ replied Nell, scowling as she tried to remember. ‘Harris, Raasay . . . Lewis. Mull.’

‘Mull,’ laughed Skye. ‘That would have been an appropriate one for Arran. Or is there an Isle of Freegan?’

‘Oh, stop it, you two,’ Nell said, then added unexpectedly, ‘Charlie was already unwell when you first met him, Hamish, but I know he had a good feeling about you, because of your name. He liked that it was Gaelic—it made him feel that you fitted us, that you were a good match for Skye.’

‘I liked him too,’ said Hamish simply, and the room fell quiet. Arran glanced across at his sister. Was she thinking that Charlie didn’t even recall their names at the end, couldn’t have found Scotland on a map? That was what he remembered, much as he tried not to—not the man who’d patiently enticed the Highland cow over for a photograph, or danced with Skye at the Ullapool
ceilidh
, but the one who raved and shat himself and didn’t know his own family. It was the end that stuck, when the end was so bad. Same as with Mark, in a way. Arran felt his stomach contract, sweat spring from his palms, and he wiped them on his pants. He wasn’t going to think about that. He was finished with Mark, the slut.

‘I’m going to go wash up,’ said Nell, rising from the table.

‘Don’t, Mum,’ said Skye. ‘We’ll do it.’ At first Arran assumed she meant her and Hamish, then realised she was looking at him.

‘Good idea,’ said Hamish, reaching back into the box of photos. ‘I’m going to sit here and go through the rest of these with your mum. Come on, Nell,’ he said. ‘We’ve seen Arran’s shot—now find me Skye on Skye.’

‘How’s she doing?’ Arran asked once he and Skye were alone in the kitchen. Skye ran hot water and soaked the plates, just as she had always done when they were growing up. To Arran’s disgust, their parents had never bought a dishwasher. They were trying to keep their lives simple, they said. People didn’t need all the things they thought they did, the appliances and the multiple cars and the glossy magazines. At the time Arran had thought them hopeless hippies, but in the last few years he’d started to come around.