by Markus Zusak
At the bottom of the page, in the left corner, there's the symbol for spades, drawn in black. Next to it are the words Nicely done, Ed.
I collapse back onto the couch in triumph. It doesn't get much better than this. No stones. No violence. It's about time this all became civilized.
Now I go straight to The Clowns of God and flick through. I can't believe I didn't just do this to begin with. It's definitely much easier than trying to find the clues in every word on every page. Simpler than you think, I remind myself.
This time it's on page 23. Just the symbol. And in The Bell Jar, it's page 39. I have the addresses, and I have exhaustion.
The digging's over.
I sleep.
It's Tuesday evening and we're playing cards at my place. Ritchie's complaining of a sore collarbone from the Sledge Game, Audrey's enjoying herself, and Marv's winning. He's unbearable, as usual.
I've been to Glory Road, and I've seen number 114. It's a Polynesian family with a husband bigger than the guy from Edgar Street. He works in construction and treats his wife like a queen and his kids like gods. When he gets home from work he picks them up and throws them in the air. They laugh and carry on and look forward to him arriving.
Glory Road is long and isolated. The houses are all pretty old. All fibro.
I don't know what to do there yet, but I'm pretty confident by now. It'll come to me.
"Looks like I win again," gloats Marv. He's in good form, with a cigar jammed into the side of his mouth.
"I hate you, Marv," says Ritchie. He's only summing up what we're all thinking at times like this.
Marv's quick to organize a Christmas game.
"Who's turn is it this year?" he asks, though we all know it's his and he'll try to get out of it. Marv could never cook a Christmas dinner. Not because he's hopeless. He's just too tight. He wouldn't pay for a turkey to save his life. Breakfast on the day of the Sledge Game was a oncer.
"You." Ritchie points straight at Marv. "It's your turn, Marv."
"You sure about that?"
"Yes." Ritchie's emphatic. "I am."
"But you know, my folks'll be there, and my sister, and--"
"Stiff shit, Marv, we love your parents." Ritchie's in fine touch. We all know he couldn't care less where the party's on. He's just loving getting stuck into Marv. "And we love your sister, too. She's hot as summer sand, boy. She's raging."
"Summer sand?" Audrey asks. "Raging?"
Ritchie slams his fist on the table. "Damn right, girl."
The three of us laugh as Marv fidgets.
"It isn't like you don't have the money," I say. "Thirty grand, isn't it?"
"Just hit forty," he replies. This triggers a discussion of what Marv intends to do with that kind of money. He tells us it's his business alone and we don't give it a lot more thought. I guess we don't give many things a lot of thought.
After a few more minutes, I relent.
"We'll just have it here," I say. I look over at Marv. "But you'll have to put up with the Doorman, mate."
Marv isn't happy, but he agrees.
I go for more.
"All right, Marv," I say. "I tell you what--I'll have the Christmas game right here under one condition."
"What?"
"You have to bring the Doorman a present." I can't help rubbing it in a little. With Marv, you have to get mileage, and I must say, this is turning out better than I'd hoped. I'm delighted with myself. "You can bring him a nice juicy steak, and"--this is where it gets even better--"you have to give him a big Christmas kiss."
Ritchie clicks his fingers. "Brilliant idea, Ed. Perfect."
Marv's stunned.
Outraged.
"That's disgraceful," he tells me, but still it's better than paying for a turkey and going to the effort of cooking. He finally makes up his mind. "All right, I'll do it." He points a finger at me now. "But you're one twisted bastard, Ed."
"Thanks, Marv, I appreciate it," and for the first time in many years, I find myself looking forward to Christmas.
Depending on my cab shifts, I continue going back to Glory Road, and though it's obvious this family is working hard to make ends meet, I still don't know what I have to do. One evening, when I'm standing behind the bushes, the father comes over to me. He's a very big boy and could strangle me with one hand behind his back. He doesn't look happy.
"Hey," he calls out. "You there. I seen you before." He moves fast toward me. "Get out of those bushes quick smart." His voice isn't loud. It sounds like it would be gentle and quiet in most situations. It's the size of him that concerns me.
Don't worry, I calm myself. You need to be here. It'll take what it takes.
I step out and face the man as the sun sets behind the house. He has smooth dark skin and black curly hair and eyes that threaten me.
"You been spying on my kids, boy?"
"No, sir." I lift my head. I need to look proud and honest.
Hang on, I remind myself. I am honest. Well, pretty much.
"Well, why are you here?"
I lie and hope.
"I used to live in this house," I say. Shit. Good thinking, Ed. I've actually impressed myself. "A lot of years ago--before we moved closer to town. Sometimes I like to come up here and look at the place." And please, I beg, let these people not have lived here long. "My dad died not long ago, and when I come here, I think of him. I think of him when I see you with your kids, throwing them in the air and over your shoulder...."
The man softens slightly.
Thank you, God.
He comes a little closer as the sun falls on its hands and knees behind him.
"Yeah, it's a pretty shoddy old place"--he motions with his hand--"but it's the best we can do right now."
"It looks all right to me," I say.
We go on awhile longer, and in the end, the man asks me a surprising question. He moves back, thinks, then says, "Hey, would you like to come in to look around? We're about to have dinner. You're welcome to stay."
My gut instinct is to decline, but I don't. The harder decision is to go in.
I follow the man onto his front porch and into the house. Before we go in he says, "My name's Lua. Lua Tatupu."
"Ed Kennedy," I respond, and we shake hands. Lua crushes nearly every bone in my right hand.
"Marie?" he calls out when we're inside. "Kids?" He turns to me. "The place just like you remember it?"
"Sorry?" Then I remember. "Oh. Yeah, it is."
The kids come pouring out of the woodwork and start climbing all over us. Lua introduces me to them and to his wife. Dinner is mashed potatoes and frankfurts.
We eat, and Lua tells jokes and the kids laugh and laugh, even though they've heard the same jokes a thousand times, according to Marie. Marie has wrinkles under her eyes and looks worn down from life and kids and putting food on the table each night. She's got milder skin than Lua and dark brown wavy hair. She was beautiful once--even more beautiful than this. She works in one of the supermarkets.
There are five kids. All have trouble eating with their mouths closed, but when they laugh, you can see the world in their eyes. You can tell exactly why Lua treats them like he does and loves them that much.
"Can I have a piggyback from Ed, Dad?" one of the girls asks.
I nod to him, and Lua says, "Of course, darlin', but you have to put something else in that sentence." It reminds me of Father O'Reilly's brother, Tony.
The girl smacks herself on the forehead, smiling and saying, "Can he please give me a piggyback?"
"Sure, baby," Lua says, and I do.
I've given thirteen piggybacks by the time Marie rescues me from the youngest of the boys.
"Jessie, I think Ed's all tuckered out, okay?"
"O-kaaay." Jessie gives in, and I fall backward to the couch.
Jessie's about six, and while I'm sitting there he whispers something in my ear.
It's the answer.
He says, "My dad's putting up our Christmas lights soon--you hav
e to come and have a look one day. I love those lights...."
"I promise," I say. "I'll come."
I look around the house one last time, almost convincing myself that I used to live here. I even conjure up a whole lot of great memories with my dad inside these walls.
Lua's asleep when I leave, so it's Marie who sees me out.
"Thank you," I say, "for everything."
She only looks at me with her warm, genuine eyes and says, "No worries, Ed. Come back anytime."
"I will," I say. This time I'm not lying.
On the weekend, I go past during the day. The Christmas lights are up and they're very old and faded. Some of the lights are missing. They're the old-style lights. They're not the type to flash. They're just big bulbs in different colors, strung along the eaves above the front porch.
I'll come back later, I think, to have a look.
Sure enough, in the evening, when the lights are on, I see that only half the ones that are still there actually work. That translates to four globes in operation. Four globes to brighten up the Tatupu house this year. It's not a big thing, but I guess it's true--big things are often just small things that are noticed.
The first chance I get, I'll be back, during the day, when everyone's at school and work.
Something has to be done about those lights.
I go to Kmart and buy a brand-new set of lights, exactly the same as the existing ones. Nice big globes of red and blue and yellow and green. It's a hot Wednesday, and surprisingly there are no questions from the neighbors as I get on the Tatupus' front porch and stand on a large overturned pot. I dismantle the original lights, bending back the nails that hold the power cord. When the whole thing is down, I notice the plug goes inside (as I should have expected), so I can't do the job completely. Instead, I put the old lights back up and leave the new ones at the front door.
I don't leave a note.
There's nothing else to do.
At first, I'd wanted to write Merry Christmas on the box somewhere, but I decide against it.
This isn't about words.
It's about glowing lights and small things that are big.
I'm eating ravioli in the kitchen that same night when a van pulls up in front of the shack. The engine growls to a halt, and I hear the car doors slam. Next I hear the sound of little fists on my front door.
The Doorman barks for a change, but I calm him down and open up.
Standing there are Lua, Marie, and every kid from that family.
"Hi, Ed," says Lua, and the rest of them echo him. He continues. "We looked you up in the local phone book but you weren't in it, so we rang all the other Kennedys around here. Your mother gave us the address."
There's quiet now as I wonder what Ma might have told them. Marie breaks it.
"Come with us," she says.
Riding in the van, squashed between all the kids, I sit there, and for the first time with this family, everyone's quiet. This, as you can imagine, makes me considerably uneasy. The streetlamps flick past, like pages of light, each coming toward me and then turning away. Closing. When I look forward, I catch Lua looking at me in the rearview mirror.
We arrive at the house within five or ten minutes.
Marie takes charge.
"Right, inside, kids."
She goes with them, and this leaves Lua and me in the van together.
Again he looks in the mirror and lets his eyes reflect back ward to mine.
"Ready?" he asks.
"For what?"
He only shakes his head. "Don't give me that, Ed." He gets out and rams the door shut. "Well, come on," he calls in through the window. "Get out, boy."
Boy.
I didn't like the way he said that. Kind of foreboding. My big fear is that I've insulted him with the new lights. He might be taking it as a sign that he can't provide properly for his own family. He might think I'm saying, This poor, inadequate fool can't even get a full set of lights to work properly. I don't dare to look at the house as I follow him to where he stands at the edge of the road, looking back. It's dark there. Very dark.
We stand.
Lua watches me.
I watch the ground.
The next thing I hear is the sound of the flyscreen door opening and slamming several times. The kids come sprinting toward us, followed by Marie at a fast walk.
When I count the kids, I realize one of them's missing.
Jessie.
I search all the faces before looking again at the ground. The loud call of Lua's voice almost makes me jump.
"Okay, Jess!" he shouts.
A few seconds collect and fall, and when I look up, the old fibro house is lit up. The lights are so beautiful that they appear almost to hold the house up by themselves. The faces of the kids, Lua, and Marie are splashed with red, blue, yellow, and green. I can feel a red light shining over my own face and my own relieved smile. The kids are cheering and clapping and saying this will be the best Christmas ever. The girls start dancing together, holding hands. That's when Jessie comes running from the house to have a look.
"He insisted on turning the power on," Lua tells me, and when I look at him, Jessie's smile is the biggest and the best. The most alive. This is his moment, I think, and Lua and Marie's. "When we got those new lights, Jessie said he wanted you to be here when we turned them on. So what else could we do?"
I shake my head, looking into the colors shining across the yard.
They swim through my eyes.
To myself I say, The power and the glory.
As the kids dance around the front yard under the night sky and the lights, I see something.
Lua and Marie are holding hands.
They look like they're so happy, just inside this moment, watching the kids and the lights on their old fibro house.
Lua kisses her.
Just softly on the lips.
And she kisses back.
Sometimes people are beautiful.
Not in looks.
Not in what they say.
Just in what they are.
Marie makes me come in for a cup of coffee. At first I knock it back, but she insists. "You have to, Ed."
I give in, and we go inside and drink and talk.
It's all comfortable for quite a while, until Marie's words stop and stand in the middle of the conversation. She stirs her coffee and says, "Thank you, Ed." The wrinkles around her eyes become a little unsettled and her eyes seem filled with sparks. "Thank you so much."
"For what?"
She shakes her head. "Don't make me say it, Ed. We know it was you--Jessie couldn't keep a secret if we glued his mouth shut. We know it was you."
I surrender completely. "You deserved it."
She's still not satisfied. "But why? Why us?"
"That," I tell her the truth, "I have no idea about." I sip the coffee. "This is all very long and almost unexplainable. All I know is that I was standing outside this old house and the rest just happened."
Now Lua walks in among the words and pushes them forward. He says, "You know, Ed, we've been living here close to a year now, and nobody--absolutely nobody--has ever lifted a finger to help us or make us feel welcome." He drinks. "We expect no more these days. People have enough trouble getting by on their own...." His eyes hold on to mine for just a second. "But then you come along, out of nowhere. We just don't get it."
That's when a moment of clarity takes shape in front of me.
I say, "Don't even try--I don't understand it myself."
Marie accepts my statement but still takes it a little further. She says, "Fair enough, Ed, but we do want to thank you."
"Yes," says Lua.
Marie nods to him and he stands up and walks over to the fridge. Stuck to it with a magnet is an envelope. The name Ed Kennedy is on it, and he comes back and hands it to me.
"We don't have much," he says, "but this is the best we can do to thank you." He places it in my hands. "Somehow, I think you'll like it. Just a feeling."
/> Inside is a homemade Christmas card. All the kids have drawn on it. Christmas trees, bright lights, and kids playing. Some of the drawings are shockers, but still excellent. Inside are the words, also written by one of the kids:
Dear Ed,
have a happy cristmas! we hope you also have some beautiful lights like the ones you gave us.
From all the Tatupu family
It makes me smile and I stand up and go into the lounge room, where the kids are all sprawled out, watching the telly.
"Hey, thanks for the card," I say to them.
They all answer me, but it's Jessie who speaks loudest. "It's the least we could do, Ed." And within a few seconds they're all focused on the TV again. It's a video. One of those animal adventure things. They're all glued to a cat going down a stream in a cardboard box.
"See you all later," I say, but none of them hears. I only look contentedly at the pictures again and head back to the kitchen.
When I get there, the presentation isn't over.
Lua's standing there with a small dark stone that has a pattern on it like a cross.
He says, "A friend once gave this to me, Ed--it's for luck." He holds it out to me. "I want you to have it."
At first, we all look down at it, not speaking.
My voice takes me by surprise.
"No," I say. "I can't take it, Lua."
His quiet, gentle words are calm but urgent. His eyes are wild with sincerity. "No, Ed--you have to. You've given us so much. More than you'll ever know." He holds out the stone again and goes to the extent of putting it in my palm and closing my hand to hold it firmly. He holds my hand in both of his. "It's yours."
"Not only for luck," Marie tells me. "Also for remembering."
Now I accept the stone and look at it. "Thank you," I say to both of them. "I'll look after it."
Lua places his hand on my shoulder. "I know."
The three of us stand in the kitchen together.
When I leave, Marie kisses me on the cheek and we say goodbye.
"Remember," she says. "Come back anytime. You're always welcome here."
"Thank you," I reply, and head out the front door.
Lua wants to drive me home, but I refuse, mainly because I really do feel like walking tonight. We shake hands, Lua crushing me once again.
He walks me out to the edge of the front lawn and wants an answer to one final question.
"Let me ask you something, Ed." We're a few steps apart.