The Pencil Case

by Lorraine Cobcroft

  I just nodded. Then a random thought crystallised and suddenly became a burning question.

  “How was it, Sandra,” I asked, “that after 18 years I could walk back into your lives and for Mum and Dad and all of you it was as if we’d never missed a day?”

  “Because you were always there, Paul,” she replied. The response was quick and unhesitant, but she paused after and I noticed that her eyes were watering.

  “You were always part of us. Mum and Dad talked about you every day. Told us how much they loved you and talked about the letters they wrote you, the occasional little gift they sent. Talked about how one day you and Jen would come back and we’d be a family again.”

  Letters? Gifts? I never received any.

  Fran’s mother had told me the nuns burnt the mail in the fireplace in the living room. It was disruptive, they said, for children to stay in contact with a family to whom they could never return. My mum had sent me a little battery-operated boat once, but the nuns put it away and gave it to me months later. It was the only gift I was ever given in all the years I spent at St Patrick’s. I was never told where it came from. I found out when I was 30. Mum asked, just out of the blue one day, if I liked the gift she sent for my ninth birthday.

  The boat was broken when they gave it to me, but I’d fixed it, and I’d thought myself very inventive. Pity I couldn’t put that talent to some productive use.

  “They never gave up hoping,” Sandra was saying, unaware that I was lost in recollections. “And they never stopped trying, despite all the knockbacks. I often wondered where they got the strength.”

  I looked up, and my face asked the questions I could never bring myself to speak.

  “I remember the social workers coming to visit,” Sandra said sadly. “I was only a little kid, but I remember it so well because Dad would go quite crazy after. One time, he thought he was back in the war, so he got his rifle and laid down behind a little hill. Mum was scared he might shoot one of us. He seemed to think we were all Japs.”

  I shuddered. The tales of torture I’d heard in Singapore came flooding back. It hadn’t occurred to me that the effects, so long after, could be that dramatic.

  “There was that one time,” Sandra continued, “when they wanted Dad’s consent for you to join the army. He raged about the place for days after screaming ‘No son of mine is going in the bloody army. They’re not putting no bloody uniform on my boy, not after what I went through’. He was so angry us kids were scared to go near him.

  “He begged the officer to send you home,” she said sadly. “I think they told him you didn’t want to come. You were dead keen to join the army, with or without Dad’s consent.”

  “Lying bastard,” I said, and refilled my tea.

  “There was another time, a bit later --- ”

  “Later? Why would they come again later?”

  “I think you were being sent to Vietnam or something. That was the time Dad really went berserk.”

  My jaw dropped. “He knew about that posting?”

  “He knew pretty much everything, Paul. Mum and Dad somehow kept up with everything you did. Social workers in the early days. Later, they had a spy somewhere.”

  Uncle Bill? Why wouldn’t he tell me he was in touch with them?

  “Yet they never tried to make contact after I was grown–up,” I said, struggling to maintain an even tone. “After I could make my own choices about replying.”

  “They insisted you had to make the first move. When you made no contact, they figured you wanted nothing to do with them. They said they couldn’t blame you for that, but I know it broke their hearts.”

  “They had a shit of a life, Sandra. A real shit of a life!”

  “They made the best of it, Paul. I never heard Dad complain, and he always told us to treat every day as an adventure and a challenge. Mum always said the only real failure in life was hurting someone, but Dad said it was not having a go.”

  I smiled. “I remember them saying that stuff to me when I was a little kid, before they took me away. And one time, in the pub, after Dad ripped into me for yelling at Fran, a few beers made him suddenly very philosophical. He looked up at me and said, ‘Let me give y’ a little fatherly advice, son. I know it’s prob’ly far too little, but hopefully not too late. Young blokes have such big ambitions, and hopefully you can realise some of yours. But if y’ can get through life without doin’ anyone any harm, feed your kids, and treat your wife like a woman should be treated, you’ve done OK. For the rest of it, jus’ make the best of what fate deals out. In the end, the only real choice any of us gets is what attitude to take an’ how to treat others’.”

  Sandra smiled. “That sounds like Dad. He’s a smart man, you know? Given half a chance, he could have achieved a lot in his life.”

  “Yeah. I remember him making whips and breaking horses. He was bloody brilliant with animals, and such a hard worker. Guess he just never got a lucky break, poor bastard. And then they took his kids away.”

  Sandra reached across and put her hand on mine. “He won through in the end, Paul. He got his son back.”

  “Small compensation, though. Look at him, Sandra. Look at Mum. What reason have they got to get up in the morning?”

  “Mum would say she’s blessed. She lived to see her sons and daughters making a success of their lives and giving her beautiful grandchildren to spoil. What more is there for people like us, Paul? Different for you maybe. You had opportunities --- music school, boxing lessons, overseas travel, a chance to buy a house of your own, go into business. Mum and Dad couldn’t do more for us than feed and clothe us... and love us.”

  I studied her expression. Her words echoed, feeding my guilt.

  Maybe that’s what’s made me so discontent? I tasted a more fortunate life, but it was so plastic... so hollow.

  “Guess that’s what was missing for me, Sandra. Their love. In the end, I think that’s all that really matters. Feeling safe and cared for. Belonging.” Sandra sniffed and ran the back of her hand across her cheek.

  “You always had their love, Paul. Now you have the chance to feel it. Enjoy!”

  #

  Ian organised a barbecue on the weekend. Dad, not in the best of health of late, was settled in a rocking chair on the veranda with a rug over his knees. A thick haze of smoke hung in the air and the aroma of grilling meat competed with the smell of hops and malt as we cracked our stubbies. Fred dozed a little. When he woke, Carly was seated beside him. He reached across and touched her hand lightly, and I somehow felt, rather than heard, his faint whisper.

  “Look at that,” he said, “My six sons all together. After all those years apart, it’s near enough to make a grown man cry.” He had never seen all his children together, and this was only the second time that he’d seen all his sons together.

  Talk of the war was taboo around Dad, but he talked to me about it that day. He told me how it was in prison. He laughed about catching cockroaches and swapping them with the Japanese guards for rats, because rats were more to his taste and more nutritious.

  “You were in Singapore, yeah?” he said suddenly, turning to me.

  “Yeah, Dad,” I said, glancing at Ian with a look of concern. I wondered if I ought to be changing the subject, but remembering didn’t seem to be distressing the old man. “For some of our time there, Fran and I lived in what used to be the Changi prison camp.”

  “There was a lovely Chinese gal. Used t’ work in the prison,” he said, smiling at the memory. “Hired by the Jap guards, but she used t’ smuggle mail in and out and bring medicines t’ sick prisoners. I had shrapnel wounds in both me legs when I was captured. Real bad. Infected. That little gal brought a bottle of grubbies in and put ’em into the wound t’ eat the infection. I’d a’ prob’ly died otherwise.”

  He turned and looked at me earnestly. “Don’t y’ go telling y’ mum, but I think I was a little bit in love with that gal. She was my angel of mercy. She was very beautiful.”

  A shriv
elled and stooped old hawker bearing baskets of children’s clothing shuffled out from the depths of my memory. When I told Dad I’d bought baby clothes from his angel, a single tear rolled down the old man’s cheek.

  #

  An idea was forming in my mind as I drove back to Ballina, contrite, and determined to repair my marriage. I struggled to focus, but Sandra’s quotes of my parents’ advice played over and over in my head like a broken tape on a player with no off button. The fear demon drifted in, but I blew it out with a deep breath, reminding myself of Fran’s loyalty and tolerance over so many years. Then it drifted in again and reminded me that everyone has a breaking point. Had she finally reached it?

  Please God let her give me one more chance. I won’t blow it again.

  The guilt demon whipped me and shouted curses at me for not having my father’s strength of character, mocking me for not accepting the faith so that my prayers could be answered. I reminded God that He had deserted me when I was just a little boy, long before I knew about faith. I cursed Simms for denying me the benefit of being raised by a man who would have taught me how to treat a woman. I cursed the nuns for making me hate women, and turning me against God --- if there was one.

  I stopped the car, got out, and stood leaning against the passenger door watching the sun sink behind the hills, painting the sky around them brilliant pink and soft orange, and turning the hills from green to grey, then a menacing black. And then the yellow moon climbed into the sky and its light danced over the black hills. All my guilt and fear disappeared behind the horizon with the sun. Hope rose with the moon, and I got back into the car focused on my idea.

  My youngest daughter had given us a scare when she was very small. I found her, late one night when Fran was fast asleep, lying grey and deathly still in her cot. Thankful for my first–aid training, I revived her. For years after, I read everything I could find on sudden infant death syndrome and conceived wild ideas for devices to alert a parent of worrying changes in a baby’s vital signs. As I drove, an image of the ideal device presented itself. I began to mentally dissect it and examine the componentry. I detoured to Brisbane and a specialist electrical store, and arrived home with a supply of tools and parts and brimming over with excited anticipation.

  Fran asked no questions. She was well accustomed to me taking time out to battle my demons. When I emerged victorious, she celebrated privately and prayed my tormentors would stay away. She welcomed me home and helped me unpack. I hugged her and kissed her and told her I loved her deeply and I could never leave her. Then I told her that my sister had talked some sense into me and things would be better from now on.

  Two weeks later, she leapt for joy when I announced I’d seen a job ad of interest and planned to apply. It was casual work --- only two days a week and lousy pay --- but it was something. In fact, it was something I believed I could actually enjoy.

  I applied for the position of swab steward on the race track thinking I hadn’t a hope of success, but I had always loved horses. Although I rarely wagered money after that one disastrous experiment in which I lost the entire five grand, I was still committed to the belief that the system I’d developed could potentially win millions. I followed it religiously, calculating the winnings on paper. I know it drove Fran mad, because it became quite an obsession.

  At the job interview, I was asked three times if I could ride a horse. I hadn’t been on one since childhood. Although the men on the committee seemed unconcerned with my negative reply, I was worried it had destroyed my chances. Eventually, frustrated with the repeated questions, and rather aggro with the ugly bitch who kept interrupting an otherwise intelligent interview with stupid challenges, I looked squarely at the inquirer and said, “I thought I only had to collect their piss. I didn’t think the job involved riding the bastards”.

  There it was again --- that self–destructive arrogance that always seemed to get in the way of building a career. To my surprise, this time it impressed. The job required someone who could assert authority. That had never been me, but I fell into the role comfortably and enjoyed the job. I discovered an affinity with animals, and, like my dad, I handled the most difficult horses with ease.

  “Dad was the horse whisperer,” I told Fran. “He could break a wild horse without ever touching it. He’d just walk up to the animal and talk to it softly, give it something to eat maybe, and in minutes it would be following him around the paddock. He was a bloody good horse trainer. Had a way with them. Maybe I’ve inherited some of that talent.”

  Fran smiled, pleased to see me confident there was something I could do well.

  If only the job was full–time and paid better.

  Between race days, I worked in my shed with an intensity Fran had never witnessed before. At the end of the month, I showed her some complicated drawings and announced my desire to consult a patent attorney. The designs for my SIDS Alert --- a watch–like device for babies, intended to send a signal to an alarm device worn by a parent if a baby’s vital signs changed unfavourably --- was complete.

  I was certain this invention was destined to be a success.

  ~~~~

  41: TWO DEATHS, AND A HOPE

  1989

  I never wrote letters, and seldom received any, so it must have surprised Fran to find an envelope bearing my handwritten name in the Thursday morning mail. It was from my Ohio ‘brother’, Peter. A short note advised that his mother, Ede, had passed away a few days earlier and was to be buried in Perth the following Saturday morning.

  “I’ll book a flight for you,” Fran said, wrapping her arms around me.

  “Why?” I replied coldly, shrugging her off.

  “Your best friend’s mother just died. Surely you want to be at her funeral?”

  “I’ll send flowers.”

  “She was your mother too, for three years. You loved her, Paul. All the stories you told about her and the way she cared for you at Ohio –”

  “She wasn’t my mother. She was my carer. She was paid to look after kids who had no–one else to care about them. She did her job well and she was always there when I needed her. She was there with a broad smile at breakfast. When I came home from school, she was there with a big slice of cake. When I came in from footie training in the afternoon, she was there offering a drink, and a bandaid if I’d scraped my knee or elbow. She was there in the library at night or in the pottery shed when I felt like talking about my day or listening to her war stories. Then one day I had to move into another world, and she wasn’t there anymore. That’s not a mother. Mothers are forever. She was no more a mother to me than my birth mother. I feel sorry for Peter, but otherwise her death is of no concern to me.”

  Fran looked distressed. “You don’t mean that. It’s a cover–up. You do this when you’re hurting.”

  “Hurting? Why would I be hurting? You forget. I’m not like other people. I don’t have feelings. I learnt not to feel when I was very young --- especially not to feel upset at people going out of my life, whether by dying or otherwise. That’s all my life was. People coming into it and people going out of it. If I let it affect me --- ”

  I stood up and walked to the fridge to fetch a beer. Fran watched, speechless for a moment. “You could have written to her. From Balcombe. You could have visited in the holidays.”

  “Why? What interest would she have in me? Dozens of kids came and went from her life. She was paid to look after them for a time, that’s all. Then they went away and another kid took their place.”

  “That’s not how it was for the Ede I met, nor for the Ede you described to me when you talked about your years at Ohio.”

  “We can’t afford the plane fare. Does that reason suit you better?”

  “Why do you act this way whenever something upsets you? You’re so gentle and caring when things are going well. Then something bad happens and you’re someone else.”

  Guilt weighed heavily on me. I tried to thrust its weight from my shoulders with a shrug and a silent reminder that E
de was only a part of my life for a brief time, but a niggling little pain stabbed at my heart. I secretly longed to hear her melodic laugh and see those big breasts heaving, the abundant flesh on those warm arms rippling, and Welsh eyes dancing as she passed me a huge slice of chocolate cake.

  “I’ll order flowers,” Fran said. “What would you like written on the card?”

  “How should I know what to write? Write whatever you please.”

  I sat up late drinking and Fran knew I was grieving. I loved Ede, but, like my own mother, she had suddenly ceased to be there when I needed her, and it hurt too much to allow myself to care.

  #

  “Dinner!” I said, before Fran could ask the usual irritating question. I waved a fresh fish in her face.

  “Bet you bought that at the Fisho on the way home.”

  “Actually, our daughter caught it. Funniest thing you ever saw. I tried to show her how to cast the rod, but she flicked it into the shallows not six inches from her toe and the hook went straight through the poor fish’s top lip. Must be the unluckiest flathead this side of the equator.”

  “Did you boys catch anything?” she laughed.

  “A hundred and twenty bucks on an eight to one winner.” I drew a deep breath, waiting for the rebuke.

  Nope! Just that look!

  “It was one bet, Fran, and it was a sure thing. I don’t study form so intently for nothing. I keep telling you I could make a fortune with this system.”

  She turned her attention to the fish. I moved behind her, wrapped my arms around her and fondled her breasts.

  “How about I take you out tomorrow and buy you a sexy new dress, then take you somewhere nice for dinner?”

  “How about you don’t! Thank you for the thought, but we can’t afford it. Not even with a windfall. How about you promise me you won’t risk our hard–earned money betting on racehorses, and you’ll take the kids out more often.”

  “I’ll take the kids out more often. We had the best day, Fran. It was great.” A blanket of happiness wrapped itself around me that Saturday night as I watched Fran preparing that fish dinner.