by Michael Earp
After I submitted the project, after I got a gold star and two gold ticks for it, I had rolled up the cardboard poster, tied an elastic band around it and put it under my bed. I’d forgotten it and only remembered it that night I came back from Maryborough. When I was sure everyone was asleep, I dived under my bed, found the now tattered roll; it was sheaved in a skin of dust. I carefully wiped it clean, rubbed my dirty palms into the carpet, snapped the elastic off and straightened it out. The photographs had faded, they were creased, and it was as if a wash of sea-blue had been daubed across my father. I scrapped the photograph loose from the dried-up glue, stamped it flat with my fist and placed two of my books over it. As soon as I woke up the next morning, on seeing the books, I became anxious that Mum or Sara were going to find the photograph, that they were going to search every corner of my room. I ripped a picture of Wayne Campbell off the wall, an image of him marking the ball I had torn from the Footy Record, and I made it an envelope. I folded the photograph of my father within it. And then I loosened a bit of carpet behind the wardrobe and I stuck it under there. Every now and then, if I knew I was alone, I would take it out and look at it. I took it with me when I left home. I took it from house to house, every time I moved.
Paul is playing music in the study, I can hear the precise crystalline sputters of electronic beats. I lie on our bed. I don’t have to hide my father any more. The photograph is safe now, sheltered by a glass frame, it hangs over the bookshelf on our bedroom wall. That young man, so handsome and so happy, almost a boy he is. I take my phone from my pocket. I ring Mum.
She answers on the third ring. She’s cheerful, and I tell myself I can’t do it, I can’t ask her what I need to ask. But she knows her children; she knows the secrets of our tones, our silences and ellipses.
“Jack, is anything wrong?”
I can see her, in her kitchen that overlooks the expansive calm of the Tuross River. Ivan, my stepdad, he’s probably there too. Making them dinner. It’s early spring and the white cockatoos might be swooping down from the trees, screeching for seed on the verandah.
“All good, Mum,” I say, “I’ve got some news. Paul and I want to get married.”
Her delight is immediate. She doesn’t say a word, I can hear her crying.
“That’s wonderful news, Jack,” she says finally, “I’m so very happy to hear that.”
She lets out another sob. And quickly adds, “I love that man, Jack, I love that Paul.”
I just say it.
“Mum, I want to ask Dad to the wedding.”
I haven’t thought about God for the longest time. Yet it’s like an instinct; like fear, it soars and takes over: inside, I’m praying. Lord, please, please make her not hate me.
I can hear Ivan next to her, he’s whispering, “Is everything all right?” I know his arm will be around her, I know he’ll be kissing her neck.
“I’m just thrilled to hear this news, and, baby, you invite whoever you want to your wedding.” Firmly, she adds, “I love you, son.”
I won’t cry, I won’t do that to her. I will not cry.
I make sure to control my voice.
“Sara’s pretty upset, Mum.”
“Jack.” Her voice now full of authority. “I’ll take care of that, I’ll ring her now.”
There’s a pause, I’m about to say goodbye, when she says, “I’m glad you’re forgiving, son, it’s a terrible burden when you don’t know how to forgive.”
And her voice choking, she adds, “Yeah, I’ll talk to Sara, I really need to talk to Sara.”
“I love you, Mum.”
“I love you too, Jack. Give my love to Paul.”
I’m about to say, And mine to Ivan. The line has gone dead.
I find Paul stooped over his turntables, his headphones on, trying to find that perfect segue between two snatches of music. To make something new. He unhooks the right phone when he realises I’ve entered.
“You okay?”
“I just spoke to Mum.”
“And?”
“She’s good with it.”
His grin is so wide it is bigger than all the light of all the world.
“That’s great news.”
I hate to dare shutting out that light. Still, I have to dare it.
“Paul,” I begin slowly, “I know that Sara and Ben were older than me when all that shit happened. I know that everyone was trying to protect me. But it happened to me as well.”
Paul holds out his hand.
“We know that, babe.”
I’m shaking my head.
“I don’t care what anyone else thinks. I want to know that you know it.”
He gently lifts the needle and slides the stylus back to rest. He switches off the stereo.
“I do know it.”
“Thank you.”
He grins again and pats his belly, asks cheerfully, “What’s for dinner?”
We had just celebrated our tenth month together when Paul introduced me to his parents. They were warm, embracing of me, I couldn’t have hoped for a better welcome. But sitting at that table, watching the gentle faith between Milan and his son, the ease with which they hugged and touched, I convinced myself that my relationship with Paul had no future. Milan would lean across the table, Paul had made a joke, and he would tussle his son’s hair. All I could think was, Paul’s not handsome, his teeth are crooked. Milan and Paul would argue over politics, with familiarity and with ease, with no subterranean hostility. All I could think of was, Paul’s tone is hectoring, it’s ugly, he shouts too much. On the train ride home, Paul reached across and touched my knee. I pushed his hand away.
“I want to break up.”
The sadness in him, as if he was depleted, as if I had ripped out his soul. I was glad, I was triumphant.
“Why?”
“Because.”
“That’s no answer.”
I stared out the window at the black night.
“Tell me.”
“No.”
“Speak to me!”
A group of young kids across the aisle, girls shivering in their too-flimsy clothes, the boys high on dope and beer, they were giggling at us.
“Lovers,” one of them called out in mocking distaste. Paul didn’t care.
“You have to tell me.”
He wouldn’t stop, on the train, on the walk home, in the house I then shared with Cathy and Hannah. “You have to speak to me, Jack, you owe me an answer. Why don’t you want to be with me?”
I wasn’t used to this, someone not accepting silence as a response. My previous boyfriend, Declan, our bond was based on video games and bongs. Declan never asked me how I was feeling. But Paul wouldn’t stop, Paul wouldn’t bloody stop.
“I hate your parents!” I finally shouted. “Your father trying to suck up to me, to prove what a right-on man he is, how accepting of gays he is, I hated him!”
I might as well have punched him, that humiliation on Paul’s face.
It will be over now, I thought, it will be finished between us now.
Paul had lit a cigarette. He was standing, staring out the window. I was sitting on the edge of my bed. The world was suddenly lit up by a vivid flare, and then the roll and growl of thunder. The rain started to fall, an insistent drumming on the roof tiles. He came and sat beside me.
“Where’s your dad, mate?” he asked. “Why don’t you ever talk about your dad?”
I howled. As if the storm outside was within me. And throughout my crying, when I couldn’t stop – no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t stop – Paul never once let go of his hold of me.
“My dad’s a monster,” I finally spluttered, wiping my nose, the snot all over my chin and lips and hand. Paul got up, took a singlet from the pile of dirty laundry, wiped my face, my hands. As he did, I began to tell him who my father was. When I had finished, I held my breath. The rain had ended, however the beating in my head was repeating, endlessly repeating, dirty pedo dirty pedo dirty pedo.
“Jack,
” he said, tossing the singlet back onto the pile, “thankfully I don’t remember much of the siege in Sarajevo. I do remember one time when we were holed up in our apartment. We hadn’t been able to leave for weeks, and there was a young kid from my school: the snipers shot him. The family must have run out of water, his father must have been taken. He was running across the square and they shot him.”
I was silent, waiting. If I couldn’t talk about my father, Paul had rarely talked about the war.
I took his hand.
“My mother was so upset, she wanted to go and retrieve the body. My father said, ‘No, you cannot go out there.’ The boy’s body just lay there, all that day. Then sometime in the middle of the night there was a volley of rifle fire. I shot up from my bed. Mum and Dad were at the window. I wanted to look and they wouldn’t let me. The boy’s sister had gone to get the body; they had shot her as well.”
His hand was stone, cold. I didn’t know if he wanted me to keep squeezing it. I couldn’t let go.
“His name was Kerim, his sister’s name was Lana. They both went to my school.”
He turned to me, kissed my brow, both my eyes, my lips.
“I don’t know your father, Jack, but I don’t think he is a monster.”
The next day, the very next morning, I rang my Nanna. She wept in relief when I asked if I could have my father’s number.
There’s barely a shower of rain, no more than a few sheets of drizzle, and it disappears as quickly as it arrived. The sun is back out. And as if they were hiding from behind some invisible curtain the street is suddenly full of young kids, boys and girls, European and Asian and African, squealing and running, kicking a Juventus soccer ball. There’s no doorbell so I knock again.
When he opens the door there’s a look of surprise on his face, as if he doesn’t recognise me.
I step back from the screen door. Maybe the sun is in his eyes.
“Dad,” I say, “it’s me.”
He chuckles.
“I’m not senile yet, I know it’s you. I just wasn’t expecting a visit.”
He opens the door, and he waves at the kids with one hand and hooks his other arm around my shoulder. We hug awkwardly.
It’s a two-bedroom council unit, he’s had it for seven years and it smells of him, it stinks of tobacco and something old and vinegary. He ushers me to the kitchen bench and I take a seat on a stool. As if embarrassed, he grabs the ashtray and empties it in the bin under the sink.
“You want a tea?”
“Do you have coffee?”
“There’s just instant,” he says apologetically. And then his voice brightens. “Or maybe a beer?”
“Yeah,” I answer, “I’ll have a beer.”
He’s bloated, putting on the kilos, and he’s balding. His yellow sweatshirt is frayed and torn at the collar. I can’t recognise the young man lying on top of the old Corolla. That young man seems to have completely disappeared.
Dad sits on a stool across from me. He clinks my bottle.
“Cheers. Son.”
The second word is apologetic, as if he’s not comfortable saying it.
There’s a long quiet as we sip our beers, only broken by the laughter and shouts from the kids on the street outside.
“How’s Paul?”
I wipe my mouth.
“He’s good.”
I sit the bottle on his Essendon Football Club coaster.
“That’s why I’m here, Dad. Paul and I want to get married.”
He doesn’t answer, it’s as if he hasn’t heard. Then he points to the fridge. There’s a rainbow-coloured sticker Blu Tacked on the door, the word “YES” in white emerging from the rainbow.
“The last twenty years of politics have been shit in this country,” he says, “but voting yes to same-sex marriage made me proud.”
His eyes are moist.
“And I’m really proud of you, son.”
This time the word comes out easily, unforced.
“We want you there.”
He looks confused.
“At our wedding,” I explain.
He puts down his beer, wipes his eyes.
“Do you mind if I smoke?”
“No.”
He grabs a cigarette from the packet on the bench. He lights it. When the pungent and bitter smoke tickles my nose I reach for one as well.
We sit there, smoking.
“It’s very good of you, Jack. I will never forget that you invited me. But I can’t go, you know I can’t go.”
He’s not angry, he’s not sad.
“Why can’t you?”
“We can’t do that to Sara, we can’t do that to your mum.”
The smoke burns my throat. I stub out the cigarette.
“I spoke to Mum, she’s okay with it.”
A small smile, tender and relieved.
“Really?”
“Really.”
“And Sara?”
I don’t answer.
“Sorry, Jack, I can’t go.”
“I want you there.”
My pleading voice, my little boy’s voice, the voice that once always made him scoop me in his arms, rub his face in my face, that held me tight and made me safe.
He can’t take my hand, we don’t have that freedom together. His fingers tap and dance lightly across my wrist. And then he grabs his beer.
“I’m there for you. I’ll be dancing in this shithole flat the whole day of your wedding, I promise you that. And I’ll pay what I can, whatever I can to make it one of the best parties that has ever been. However, I won’t spoil it for Sara. And I won’t spoil it for you. I’ve done enough of that.”
He clinks my bottle once more.
His voice breaking, he says, “But thank you, son.”
I’m shocked at how his shoulders heave, of how the sobbing seems to be a ruthless spirit that has entered and taken violent possession of his body. I’ve never seen a man cry like this. It’s terrifying when a man cries like this.
When he stops, when he finally stops shaking, he lights another cigarette. Above us, on the wall, there are photographs of me and of Ben and of Sara, photographs I have stolen for him. And an old wrinkled paper, faded like some ancient parchment. It is bound in clear plastic. The words “World’s Greatest Teacher” are written across the sheet, in a neat and fastidious calligraphy. The paper has been sprinkled with glitter and signed in red and black and blue biro by his students in Year Eleven Chemistry. And as I look at it, as he blows his nose in his crumpled handkerchief, it just pops out, a question I’ve always wanted to ask, one I’ve never dared to.
“Have you ever seen her again?”
He doesn’t have to ask who I mean. His eyes glance at the plastic-covered paper above us. He knows exactly who I mean.
“She called me,” he says, clutching his beer, avoiding my eye, “when I got out of jail. We met up, we had a coffee together in the Northland mall.”
A question slowly, hesitantly, takes form.
“Doesn’t that mean you risked your parole?”
His answer is immediate and curt.
“I owed her, I owed her at least that.”
His voice softens.
“I apologised to her. I’m glad I had the chance to do it.”
And his voice is now hard.
“It was shit for her, everything that happened. It is cruel what people say and it is cruel what people do. She didn’t deserve to go through any of that. It was my fault she went through all that.”
My voice is low, barely above a whisper.
“Did you love her?”
There’s no answer. I glance up. He’s staring at me.
“Yes, Jack, I did. That just makes it worse.”
He points to my near-empty bottle.
“Another?”
I’m driving; I don’t care: I want to drink with my father.
“Yeah,” I answer, “I’d love another.”
On the way back home I take Plenty Road to the cemetery. It’s be
en an age since I’ve visited and at first I am confused about where exactly the grave lies. I know it is on the slope of the hill rising east and I very quickly stumble across it. Ben is buried next to a Greek man named Thanassis, who died in his seventies and whose family are diligent in visiting, in washing the headstone, keeping the grave clean, in lighting the little candle that floats on a cup of oil in the lantern box. The flame has gone out. There are bunches of still-fresh flowers in the two memorial vases. Guiltily, and silently asking for Thanassis’s forgiveness, I take three carnations and place them carefully on Ben’s grave.
Glancing quickly around me, making sure there’s no one there, I whisper, “Ben, I just came from Dad’s place.”
Was I expecting an answer? Maybe some supernatural intervention: a gust of wind, a cloud to roll across the surface of the sun; some indication that the spirit of my brother could hear. And that possibly in such a meagre miracle, Ben could settle for eternity the question of how much is owed to us and given to us by our mothers and our fathers and how much of what we create and what we suffer is our own. The wind doesn’t change course and there are no clouds in the sky and even the crows are quiet. The dead don’t answer.
I kiss the tips of my fingers and lay them on the cold stone.
When I get home, Paul is hunched over his laptop, selecting songs to play at our wedding. He looks up expectantly.
“How was it?”
I’m standing in the doorway of our tiny kitchen. The sun is beginning to fade. I am in darkness.
“He’s happy for us but he won’t come.”