Maya’s chest tightens, and her breaths are shallow. She adds lime leaves to the curry, and the fragrant steam rises from the gulai kambing, a shroud of silk against her face. It will be all right.
The wheels of Riley’s skateboard clatter down the driveway and scrape to a stop. As he walks through the door, he pulls his sweater off over his head so that tufts of his hair stand up. ‘You have the heater up too high again, Gran.’ He grins and drops his backpack to the floor, drapes his sweater over it and goes to the bathroom, locking the door. The pipes squeak as he turns on the shower.
Maya wonders where he’s been all afternoon, but her daughter, Ina, told her not to worry about him, that they like him to be a ‘free-range’ kid. Ten days ago, when Ina and her husband left on their cruise, Riley showed Maya a video of him skateboarding in the city, flying over a set of stairs, his board skimming the handrail. She’d clutched at her chest and murmured, ‘Adu, adu.’
Maya has long enough to fold the towels and sweep the kitchen floor before she spoons the lamb curry onto steamed rice. Some of it splashes over the side of the bowl and her hand wobbles as she carries the heavy bowl into the dining room and calls Riley to dinner.
He pulls a chair out from the table. He’s much taller than Jakub was, but his wiry hair has the same blackbird sheen, and his nostrils flair when he’s annoyed, just like Jakub’s did. He takes a seat and she stands beside him. The bruising on his cheekbone has sallowed, and is no longer the colour of an eggplant. The tiny cut is healing neatly too, not telling of the fracture beneath.
Her fingers follow the line of his jaw, find the soft skin beneath his chin.
‘Makan,’ she urges. ‘This was your grandfather’s favourite meal.’
She watches him dip his spoon into the curry.
‘It’s not too spicy, is it?’ he asks as he presses his earphones back into his ears, scrolls through the music on his phone.
‘Maybe I make those pandan crepes I told you about?’ she says. Jakub used to love them too. Sweet. She always added extra palm sugar to the coconut filling when she made them for him.
He takes a bud out of his ear and raises an eyebrow. ‘Sorry?’
‘The crepes? Those green ones?’ She holds her breath. Somehow it’s important that he wants to try them but, of course, it doesn’t matter too.
He shrugs. ‘Sure.’
She smiles, pats him on the shoulder. Returning to the kitchen, she hopes weevils haven’t gotten into the desiccated coconut. Her hand rests on the plastic container as she glances over her shoulder at the boy again. The facial swelling is fading, but what of his anger at the boys who waylaid him and his friend, Kedus, last week? Worse than the phone call to collect him from the hospital had been the squall of Riley’s rage. The swearing, the calls for revenge, as he circled his bedroom, muttered on his phone. Her stomach clutches into a sick knot. She wonders again where he’s been all day.
‘Riley, how much longer do you have of your holidays?’
She has to repeat herself twice, louder each time, before he turns his head and removes his earbuds.
‘Two more weeks.’
Nodding, Maya mentally calculates her savings against airfares; wonders where his passport might be found. She can already smell the curl of smoke from a kretek cigarette and the charred lamb sate smouldering on a barbecue plate.
* * *
Only four days into their journey, and Maya’s already feeling sickly. Riley, though, is fine. Safe. When Maya had called Ina to tell her of their trip to Java, her daughter was pleased—disappointed, almost, that she was missing out on a holiday with them.
From the lookout, the ocean looks overexposed, blurred, in the afternoon light. Pelabuhan Ratu’s shoreline scallops to the north and white houses with shingled roofs rise like small anthills from the hectic foliage that covers the land from the sea to the mountain. Closer in, banana fronds wave; closer still, a scattering of sun-bleached rubbish litters the dirt directly behind the warung where they sit on a rattan mat, waiting for their black tea.
Riley crunches on krupuk chips and Maya’s gut squelches, shifts. She turns from the food, gagging. She wonders which meal in their two-day visit to Jakarta had turned on her. How foolish, arrogant even, to have eaten that bowl of delicious goat soup by the side of the road, blasted from all sides by the heat of the gas burner, the cars beetling by, the midday sun. Or was it the bubur manis she enjoyed at the hotel’s breakfast buffet that was the culprit? She can’t believe it was her niece’s rice porridge, but she’s wondered about the slices of fruit; were they washed in local water? Local. The word reminds Maya that she is no longer from here, that her body betrays her time away from this place and she feels a dip of sadness.
Maya gazes on Riley again, as he reads something on his phone. Luckily he’s a little fussy, and only eats from Styrofoam cups of Indomie, bananas, crisps.
Shops, timber shacks and makeshift petrol stalls flash by on the drive to their hotel by the beach. She wants Riley to see the chickens that scoot out of the way of the traffic, the washed clothes that are strewn across bushes to dry, the colour of the soil she is from, but he’s opened up his laptop, taps hard at the buttons as he plays a game.
When they reach the hotel, Maya holds her breath a few moments. The hotel, white and brick, looms large on this part of the coast. She’s never stayed here before. Has avoided it, in fact. But it’s the finest hotel along this stretch, and she wants Riley to experience only the best. The reception area is vast and bare of people, except for a young woman standing behind the reception desk.
After receiving their room key, Maya asks the girl in Bahasa, ‘You have a room here, for Nyai Loro Kidul, don’t you?’
‘Room 308, Bu.’
‘Can we see it?’ Her pulse quickens as she asks. She’s heard this hotel has a bedroom set aside to honour the Queen of the Southern Sea.
‘Of course.’ The girl picks up the phone and speaks to someone and, not many moments more, a man, also in uniform, joins them. His skin’s the colour of mocha, much darker than Maya’s and, although his face is sunken and lined, he has the physique of a wiry adolescent. He leads them to the lifts, and they proceed to the third floor. They follow a long balcony which overlooks the gardens and beach. And there is so much light. Maya shields her eyes. She’s feeling nauseous again, giddy. Riley stands by the railing, and peers out to sea.
The man turns the door handle of Room 308.
‘No, wait,’ she says. ‘I’ve changed my mind.’ Her heart pounds. How foolish. She didn’t realise she still believed.
‘Yes, Bu.’ The man bows and moves away.
Suddenly Maya’s tired. The joints in her fingers ache. She joins her grandson.
‘What’s in there anyway?’ he asks.
‘A room dedicated to Nyai Loro Kidul.’
‘Who’s she?’
‘A goddess, Riley,’ Maya replies, rubbing her dry hands up and down her face. ‘A beautiful goddess.’ Who stole your grandfather away. From me. From you. ‘She doesn’t like anyone to wear green. Green is hers.’
She points at the aqua flowers on his board shorts, and he grins.
After settling into their room, Maya opens the sliding doors, and a warm draft billows the curtains as she steps out onto the balcony. Sitting down on the plastic chair, Maya takes it all in. It’s been many years since her last visit. That time, her steps had been too heavy, had dragged through the sand, as her eyes sought out tiny bluebottles or familiar sand-polished stones. Now, she sees ancient fishing boats, naked and lonely, resting high up on the beach; the long shed-like buildings of the fish market. The bougainvillea, dashes of pink against the blue of the sea.
Maya’s gazing at the swelling, lava sunset when Riley pulls a chair up to hers and hooks his bare toes up against the balcony wall.
‘Can you smell it, Riley? she asks him. Can he smell the fragrance of what once was her home? She wants to clasp his hand in hers, but he’s almost a man now, not the little boy she used to
squeeze and sniff. From where she’s seated next to him, it’s too awkward to pat his shoulder, so she taps his knee.
He closes his eyes and lifts his nose to the breeze. His nostrils flare and in the half-light he looks like Jakub. ‘That curry smell? It smells like your curry, huh? That one you make me, yellow, with chicken drumsticks.’ He opens his eyes. ‘Except yours smells better.’
He’s being kind. Or maybe he means it.
When Maya finally wakes the next morning, she is curled into the foetal position. Her body has tried to cradle itself from the pains that cramp her stomach. Sitting up, she groans softly as she gets to her feet, her knees creaking in the quiet of the room. Riley’s not in his bed.
By the bathroom sink he has left her a note. Gone to the beach. There are surf lessons.
Alarm spirals through her body like a rising siren as she staggers out onto the balcony, leans over the railing. There he is, paddling through the shallows on a board, one amongst four. He mentioned going for a swim the night before, but she just said that his mother wouldn’t like it, that the surf was too rough. She thought that was enough. How can Maya tell him she doesn’t want him to go into the ocean because that’s where her husband died? How could she convince him that her fears were not unfounded?
She doesn’t bother with shoes, a comb, her bag. As she wheezes down the two flights of stairs, as she scrambles across the stark white tiles of the foyer, as she shields her eyes from the glare of the sun, she knows she will not catch him in time. Even as she makes slow purchase across the hot sand, she can see the surfers are out of calling range.
Maya wades into the sea a few steps and crouches down. Her nightie trails in the water, and the gentle waves lap at her underpants. She will wait here all day, if need be. Riley and the other surfers have paddled out far, beyond the lacy ripple of the coral lagoon. They are just dark dots bobbing in and out of sight. Her eyes take in the blue water, so dark, so bright. If she squints it’s almost as if the sea merges with the sky; a cerulean world, an underwater dome. She can’t believe that there are large waves, even past the reef break.
Maya’s gaze drops to her feet, hazy under water, half submerged by sand. She swishes her hands in the warm seawater. The skin of her arms is papery and sun-spotted above the water level, but appears as smooth as a hazelnut beneath. Like it used to be. She mutters a short prayer, not to Nyai Loro Kidul, but to Jakub.
Bring him home safely, cinta ku. My love.
A Concreter’s Heart
Mark Smith
D es Winfield was sitting alone on his porch listening to the slap and slurp of creatures in the mangroves, when his son rang with the news.
‘Dad?’ Toby’s voice sounded distant, crushed.
‘What is it, Tobes?’
‘It’s Mum.’
‘What about her?’
‘She’s had an accident, Dad. A bad one. Crashed the car. She’s . . . she’s dead Dad. Can you come home?’
Des filtered the news through a bourbon haze.
‘Fuck,’ he said.
‘Can you come home, Dad?’
‘Yeah, course I’ll come. Course I will. Jesus! Dead? How did . . .? What happened?’
‘It’s all a bit sketchy. It was a country road.’
‘Why would she be—?’
‘We dunno. We’re still trying to . . . . Can you come home?’
‘I’ll get the first flight I can. Jesus,’ he said again. ‘Beth. Dead.’
He felt his way back inside the darkened house and slumped into the recliner. His bare thighs stuck to the vinyl.
‘You there, Dad?’
‘Yeah. When’s the funeral?’
‘I’ll fill you in when you get here.’
‘Okay. I’ll call ya soon as I get a flight.’ He hung up.
Des leaned forward and ground a tight fist against his chest. The heartburn had been working its way up into a scrub fire all afternoon, and now Toby’s news had set it racing. He tried to picture his wife. His ex-wife. In the years leading up to their divorce they’d had more of a business arrangement than a marriage, yet if someone had asked him if he’d loved her he probably would have said yes. Probably. There had always been qualifiers on what he felt. In the last two years he’d only spoken to her on a couple of occasions. Both times he’d been reminded of her knack for passing judgment without uttering a word. The silences and small clicks of her tongue were enough to convey her disgust at the shambles his life had become.
Des flew south two days after Toby’s call. Sitting in the departure lounge, the fact of Beth’s death now fully formed inside him, he remembered a job he did one summer in the early days, when Caroline Springs was just being subdivided. He was working fifteen-hour days in the stinking heat with the northerlies blowing hard across the tussock grass plains. Beth drove out every afternoon with her little styrofoam chilly box full of freshly cut sandwiches and homemade lemon cordial. They’d find a bit of shade behind one of the new houses that were sprouting like mushrooms, and sit and talk and eat. Beth would leave him a thermos of tea and some Anzac biscuits to have after the sting had gone out of the day. Later, he’d sit on the tray of the truck and admire the driveway he’d just finished, thinking he could almost hear the concrete cooling and setting.
Despite everything, Des enjoyed the flight south—the static nothingness of life between tarmacs. Up here he wasn’t broke, with debtors knocking at the door. He wasn’t a man travelling to his wife’s funeral. He was just another punter in seat 22B. When they touched down, a chorus of pinging phones filled the cabin. Des had two alerts from his online betting accounts, both offering enhanced odds for this weekend only.
Toby was waiting at the arrival gate. They shook hands then, realising the situation held more gravity, fell into an awkward hug that was only retrieved by a couple of heavy backslaps. Des could see his son taking in his reduced state—his hair in need of a good cut, his polo shirt frayed at the collar and the tell-tale capillaries fanning out across his cheeks.
He avoided his son’s gaze, hitched his carry bag over his shoulder and walked out into the Melbourne night. He had forgotten how cold it could be down here, the August winds that cut at your body like a flensing knife.
When they reached the protection of the under-cover car park Des said, ‘Still drivin’ the ute?’
‘Had to get rid of it. Gearbox was shot and the diff was on the way out.’
‘I could’ve fixed that for ya.’
‘Yeah, ’cept you weren’t here.’
Toby led him to a Subaru. He clicked the keyless entry to open the back.
‘Costs a fuckin’ fortune to service these things,’ Des said.
The drive in, along the freeway, passed in silence. Des feigned interest in the new flyover at the ring road and through force of habit advised his son to get off before the tollway. Toby threw him a glance that Des couldn’t read. It was nearly a year since they’d seen each other. Toby had come up for the super-cars and they spent the day at the track, the engine noise keeping conversations mercifully short.
As they exited the freeway and ran the gauntlet of traffic lights along Bell Street, Des said, ‘You gonna tell me what happened?’
Toby looked over at his father briefly then turned his attention back to the road.
‘It doesn’t make sense,’ he said finally.
‘What doesn’t?’
Toby cleared his throat, lowered the window and spat out onto the road. The cold air made the hair on Des’ arms stand up. ‘She was driving out on some godforsaken road near Bacchus Marsh, coming up from Werribee as best we can tell.’
‘Did she know anyone out there?’
‘We don’t think so.’
‘What was she doin’, then?’
‘I dunno. The cops have asked me all these questions and I just don’t have any answers. They reckon . . .’ He paused again, his hands wringing the steering wheel.
‘They reckon what?’
‘There weren’t any skid marks, Dad.
The car just ran off the road and hit a tree.’
‘She fell asleep, they reckon?’
‘Maybe.’
‘What else could it be?’
Toby breathed in heavily. ‘They think maybe she did it deliberately.’
‘That’s bullshit, son. Not Beth. No way.’
Toby’s voice hardened. ‘No offence, Dad, but how would you know?’
‘Jesus, Tobes. I was married to ’er for thirty years. I reckon I know ’er pretty well.’
‘You’ve hardly seen her these last few years, Dad. Did you know she’d been seeing a shrink?’
‘A shrink?’
‘She spent all her time at home on her own. Even stopped going to mass.’
‘Jesus! Was she crook?’
‘Not sick crook. I looked in on her every couple of weeks. Mowed the grass, fixed the leaks, that sort of thing. She seemed okay but the house was a mess. She was taking a heap of prescription stuff. Bathroom cabinet full of it.’
They dropped down and crossed the Merri Creek then turned south to wind their way through the neat suburban streets.
‘When’s the funeral?’
‘Soon as they release the body.’
‘Release it? What’s that mean?’
‘It’s routine they reckon. Unexplained death.’
‘Unexplained? She crashed into a fuckin’ tree. What’d they think she died of, leprosy?’
‘They have to try to figure out why she crashed, if the car was faulty, if she’d been drinking. Drugs.’
Toby drew into the driveway of a neat Californian bungalow.
‘How long ya been here?’
‘Couple of months.’
‘Renting?’
‘Nah. Mortgage.’
We'll Stand In That Place and other stories Page 4