The Beginner's Guide to Living (3 page)

Dad stops at the lights. People cross the road in front of our car but they don't see us, father and son, side by side. Eight days beyond Anna's death. On my leg is a CD Taryn slid into my hand as I left. I try to read the song titles in the unpredictable light, to work out which one will give me an answer.

6. How many questions does it take?

THE ULTIMATE TRUTH

T
HE WIND IS WARM
and it feels good to be out walking; at home the walls and floors are made of glue. It's not far to the local library but even the birds seem to be doing Saturday morning slowly.

As the doors whoosh open, I remember the last time I was here, with Mom, her walking ahead of me, her red hair, just dyed, clashing with her coat, a stack of books in her arms. I almost decide to go home, but picture Dad still ruminating over his cornflakes and decide to stay—besides, last time I checked there were no answers scrawled across my bedroom wall.

There's a computer free in the center of the library and another one taken hostage by a couple of kids perfecting their vocabulary on sex. I hear them talking about looking up
orgasm
as I type
death
in the subject box and hit
enter
. There are 457 listings—on the first page, some graphic novels and abstractly linked titles, before I find the number that I need: 155.

I look around and remember where things are. Down by the long windows that drop into nowhere, I work my way along to 155, the books on grief, some devoted to dying, some written for kids. I pick one out because of its yellow cover, its plastic spine warm from the sun. The book lists the stages of mourning, each phase spelled out in detail with headings, all so precise, the anatomy of grief, and I have an urge to tear it into tiny, precise pieces, but a lifetime of respect for books works against my desire for revenge. I return it to the shelf, lean against the cookery books opposite, and wonder what to do next. If only there was one titled
A Thousand Recipes for Dealing with Your Own Mortality
, but chocolate seems to be the main theme here.

The sun through the windows warms my feet through my shoes. Above the books on grief are some on philosophy—by names like Plato, Bertrand Russell, Marcus Aurelius, the same book as Mom's. Next to it, there's one called
On the Shortness of Life
. I pull it out and flick through it till I find this:
It is better to conquer our grief than deceive it … But the grief that has been conquered by reason is calmed forever.

This is better—I prefer the sound of
conquering
to squeezing the havoc in my head into a neat little box. I sit on the carpet and pull out my notebook, with its spiral binding and black cover, about the same size as most of these philosophy books. On the first page,
Will Ellis
is written in big letters like a title.

I turn to where I wrote my questions and copy the sentences opposite them, the ones about grief, and with each word I feel a part of me loosen, smoothing the jaggedness of my thoughts. The cover of
On the Shortness of Life
is white, the lettering all embossed, good to run your finger over, and according to the blurb on the back it's by a philosopher called Seneca. He's talking to a friend of his, Paulinus, explaining to him about life:
It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it.

Waste. This afternoon I was thinking of having another listen to that CD Taryn gave me, to get past the music and into the words. Maybe go around and see Seb. Is that
waste
? And how do you deceive grief?

I riffle through the book to see what else Seneca has to say—the problem is he keeps getting off the track, talking about gladiatorial contests and someone called Scipio. An old guy reading a newspaper over by the window tilts forward and farts, turns the page, doesn't even flinch. Man, the bravado of the old. Here it is: you deceive grief by distracting yourself, says Seneca, by turning your back on the big questions. A man after my own heart. What you need instead is philosophy and reason.

Philosophy and reason.

And I know as I read this that he's talking about more than one book from your local library, even if it is his. I'm going to need shelves of them, a whole world of ideas to arm myself against ignorance, the kind that lets in pain. That's if you believe a guy who's been dead for two thousand years.
For only philosophy … can divert from its anguish a heart whose grief springs from love.

Behind me a woman calls out to her daughter who's tipping books off the shelves, watching them flap like paper birds. She must be about two, the kid, and she's ecstatic, as if she's finally discovered why everyone's so enchanted by books. Her fingers are fat and unruly and there's chocolate bracketing the corners of her mouth. She hauls out a hardcover book,
Mastering Philosophy
, and holds it up to me, grinning as she drops it on my leg with a thud. It falls open and halfway down the page it says:
The study of ultimate reality.

“Riana.” The woman grabs hold of the kid's shoulders, and spins her around.

“It's okay, I'll pick them up,” I say, rubbing my knee.

“Thanks.” The woman whips her daughter up into her arms and the kid kisses her on the nose, cheeks, eyes and makes her mother laugh. Little but smart. I guess I was smart like that once, when things were simple and life was all about chocolate and keeping out of trouble.

Maybe it still is.

*   *   *

Dad's working in his study, Adam's out for lunch, so I grab a Mars bar and leave a note:
Back for dinner, Will
.

*   *   *

At the train station, there's a guy harvesting dropped tickets, hoping to find one he can use. Hate that—he looks about my dad's age; he should have the cash. He's still searching as the train pulls in, and out.

There are a couple of kids I know with skateboards, and we nod, but I don't want to talk. Instead I look out the window of the train and lose myself in the rattling past of things—people's backyards, their washing, some woman's red undies flailing in the wind. I half imagine how that woman might look as I close my eyes, think of Taryn, and that knife, a red Honda crashing into Mom. I open my eyes to a sign nailed up on somebody's tree:
Jesus is coming soon. Prepare for His return.

At the next station, a woman in a bright orange sweater gets on carrying a silver bag in the shape of an egg. She shuffles over to the window across from me, so I have to fold my knees in. On her foot, a tattoo. It says
serendipity
, which I remember from that film where they fall for each other but leave meeting again to chance.

When I stare at her foot, the woman smiles at me. “Do you believe in fate?” she asks, and for a minute I think she's coming on to me, but what are the chances of that?

“Fate?”

“Yeah, you know, if things are meant to happen, they will.”

“Don't know,” I say, looking out the window.

“It's all about watching out for the signs.” She pulls her bag in closer to her stomach. I can see her reflection in the glass; her nose is pierced and the stud keeps catching the light.

“Signs?”

“Haven't seen any today,” she says, turning to look at a tall woman who's shouting down at the other end of the car, shouting at herself. “What about you?”

They keep slapping me in the face,
I think, staring at fences, though I'm not sure what you're meant to do with random pages, a poster about Jesus, and a foot about fate. Where's the equation? Maybe you need to throw something in sideways, see what comes out. “My mother died. Nine days ago.”

Her hand goes to her mouth, “Oh, really.”

“Yeah, really. Where's the serendipity in that?” I'm being an asshole, I know, but maybe I can jolt her into some truth.

“I … I'm not sure.” She's getting up, pulling that bag in closer, its silver strap dangling over her wrist. “Um, this is my stop. Wow, I'm sorry.”

She stoops toward me for a second, and then she goes, steps out onto the platform and keeps walking without looking back, till that tattoo of hers blurs into a smudge. A black cat sitting on a wall watches the train pull out.

*   *   *

Flinders Street Station is manic, even considering it's the center of Melbourne. People dodge each other as they go where they need to be, but I can't get into the flow. I bang into three people, all wearing suits, all women. “Sorry,” I say, “Sorry,” and one more time. “Sorry! For Christ's sake!”

My ticket gets stuck in the machine on the way through and some Indian guy in an orange vest has to help me out. I push past the guy selling flowers, buckets of nature lined up against the gray, and then out into the light. People pour down the steps but I let them flood around me—I don't even know where the State Library is, so there's no rush. Saturday afternoon and I'm on my second library. Loss does strange things.

It's hot, hot on my face, on my chest, and the warmth feels good; it's evaporating something that doesn't belong. I find a spot on the steps out of the traffic but still in the sun. Below me, there are some emos huddled in as much shade as they can manage, a flock of them all in black like suicidal crows. One of them's standing up and he's thin and pale and so vampirish I almost laugh out loud; he's even wearing a black cape. Wonder if he sleeps in a coffin, bites chicks on the neck. He certainly has them enthralled, with their fishnet stockings and black lipstick smiles. He's their god, no doubt about it as they watch his every move, the flop of his hair over his left eye, his long fingers that twist and dive as he speaks. He breathes confidence like fresh air. He's almost wonderful—I want to hear what he's saying, but don't want to catch his eye.

And then he flinches. It's instantaneous, but there's a glitch in his calm, as if he suddenly remembered who he is and, for a split second, let the world in. He leans back into himself, flicks his hair out of his eyes, revealing his T-shirt underneath the cape. And on it is written:
God is dead.

A man going past in a dark suit scoffs, “What would a punk know about Nietzsche?”

The sun steals behind a cloud. One of the emo girls laughs.

*   *   *

I enter the stream of bodies, make for the pub across the road and exit the heat. As I'm tall for my age, people think I'm older, so I shouldn't have any trouble getting served. I've never tried before but I don't feel like going to the library yet; I feel like parking myself beside a bunch of guys and drinking beer—making some sense of the signs, if that's what they are.

Downstairs it's smoky and there are mostly men, not men in suits, but casual Saturday afternoon gear. The guy behind the bar is shorter than me, but he's got arms like trunks. “A beer, please.”

“Got any ID?”

“Not on me,” I say, touching my pockets, half believing I can conjure one up.

“No ID, no beer. Sorry.”

“No worries,” I say, hoping charm will get me through, except I'm a bit short on it today. The guy pulls out a rack of clean glasses, wipes the few that aren't dry, lines them up inverted on a green mat. He moves fast, his fingers hefty, but nothing breaks. Once he's finished, he turns back to me and grins. “You still here?”

I spin a coaster on the bar, and each time it lands the same way up. Half the world must walk through this bar, talk to this guy, tell him stuff, so I figure I'll try my luck. “Do you know who Nietzsche is?”

“Do I look like I might?”

“Maybe.”

He looks at me out of the corner of his eye as he checks a glass and serves a beer to a guy wearing a beret. “You should go,” he says.

“I'm waiting for a friend.”

“Look, kid, maybe you'd be better off waiting outside.”

“I'm eighteen, you know.”

“Like hell you are.”

I think of the Jesus sign impaled on a tree, the vampire guy and the woman with her stupid tattoo, all so bloody random. “Why don't you just fuck off.”

“Go now before I get you thrown out.”

He's got his chin thrust at me. I can tell he's dying to hit me, and I want to punch him back, smack him straight in his red moon face. “If you lay a hand on me I'll sue you,” I grin.

“You little prick.” His nostrils flare. Those fists could pulverize me, no question, but I need to see how far he'll go, how much he can hate somebody he doesn't even know. If I'm worth his job.

“Pussy.” Something inside me cringes.
This isn't you, Will
, it says, but there's no way in hell that I can know that, if I never put myself to the test. The guy's swallowing back his fury, his veins bulging trails across his temple. The clingy smell of old beer.

“Lyle, what's the story?” A young guy comes over, his eyes roving between the barman and me. He's not happy. “I think you'd better go, kid. Take your shit somewhere else.”

So I do. I pick up my backpack, and me and my shit, we head for the door, away from barmen who know nothing about Nietzsche, who won't serve me beer. And I take with me one thought. If God is dead, who killed him?

I might find the answer at the library, but I'm not in the mood for books anymore. Not much in the mood for anything. Right now, I reckon I've got as much chance of finding what I'm looking for on a T-shirt. Or somebody's foot.

*   *   *

Back on the steps outside the station, while the emos squint in the sun, I pull out my notebook and write:

7. What is my life worth?

On the way home on the train there are no signs, or if there are I decide not to look. Instead I study my hands because I know them and they've never revealed anything to me before. Except there's a cut on my left thumb and I stare at it, trying to remember when I did it, whether it was before or after Mom died.