I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes

by Jaclyn Moriarty

  Unless it was one of those short spells, of course. She took the book from under her pillow, and picked up her reading torch from the caravan floor.

  In her sleep, Cath waited, hopefully.

  Fancy looked up from her novel and remembered one of her favourite conversations with the Canadian next door. It had happened just after the snow storm.

  ‘Did I tell you my mother swept up all the snow on her front porch with a dustpan and broom?’ she had said to him one morning. ‘She tipped it into the kitchen tidy bin.’

  The Canadian laughed. ‘Wait till I write home about that,’ he said.

  ‘Where is home anyway?’ she asked.

  ‘Canada.’

  ‘No, but where in Canada?’

  ‘Where is Canada?’ He looked concerned.

  ‘No, no! Where in Canada?’

  ‘Oh!’ He was relieved. ‘I grew up all over, but most recently Montreal.’

  ‘Montreal? Does it snow in Montreal?’

  The Canadian laughed again. ‘Does it snow in Montreal?’ he repeated to himself, quietly, affectionately.

  ‘Okay, then,’ said Fancy, ‘what’s it like, in Montreal, when it snows?’

  Obediently, he reflected. ‘Sometimes,’ he said, ‘you get as much as a two-metre snowfall. That’s not just decoration when that happens. That changes everything. It changes the terrain.’

  ‘The terrain,’ agreed Fancy, pleased: ‘it changes the terrain.’ Then, since this reminded her: ‘I made a chocolate terrine last night. Would you like some with your coffee?’

  He was surprised, but agreed, and they each ate a piece of chocolate terrine, sitting on their own front porches, watching the melting snow.

  Of course, that was back when Radcliffe was having an affair with a woman in purple daisy socks. All that was over now.

  She returned to her novel: she was on the last page. The book was about an old married couple, and there was a moving final line, in which the old man declared his love for the woman, despite her senility, and she, in a rare flash of sanity, replied that she loved him too.

  It was a sad and beautiful moment, if you knew the characters as Fancy did.

  She stood up and walked across the room, not looking at Radcliffe on the couch. She could hear him breathing very deeply tonight, using up everybody’s oxygen.

  Cassie got out of bed, switched on her bedroom light and took her exercise book from her school bag. She wrote the end of the class play lying on her bedroom floor, the cranky noises gathering around her pencil as it moved its way across the page.

  Marbie fell asleep again, thinking, unexpectedly, of sharp little bird beaks, thumbtacks and pieces of cuttlefish bone.

  She sneezed and clicked her throat in her sleep.

  A Spell To Make Someone Catch A Cold!

  Simply place this Book under your Pillow, and Think, inside your Head, of Three Small Sharp Objects.

  You can do the Next Spell – the Final Spell – tomorrow morning!

  Listen did as the Spell Book said, just before the clock flicked to midnight. Then she fell asleep, thinking: bird beaks, thumbtacks, cuttlefish bones, bus seats, cabins, free time, night time, bird beaks, thumbtacks, cuttlefish bones.

  11

  FANCY ZING

  Shortly after her father returned from Ireland, Fancy’s family went to the seaside for a month. They stayed in a house on the hill.

  Each morning, the family gathered their towels, buckets, spades, suncream, T-shirts and beach umbrella, and tumbled down the hill to the beach.

  Each evening, Fancy stood with her back to the mirror and turned her head to see her shoulders. She wore a purple sarong, which she tied in various ways: between her legs, over her shoulder, or around her waist so it flapped low against her silver ankle chain. Her shoulders, as she watched, turned golden brown.

  But one day, Fancy’s parents told her to take her sister to the beach on her own. ‘We’ll just be doing some cleaning here in the house,’ said Mummy, ‘don’t worry about us.’

  ‘Only swim between the flags,’ said Daddy.

  ‘Or in the rock pool?’ said Marbie.

  ‘Right,’ agreed Mummy. ‘And I’ve made you some buttered sandwiches, so you can buy hot chips for your lunch. Give them some money, David.’

  ‘Stay at the beach until they take the flags down,’ Daddy reminded them.

  Two lifesavers in yellow-red caps marched past the girls, flagpoles on their shoulders, and Marbie said, ‘Are the flags down now?’

  Fancy, who was making Marbie’s towel into a shepherd’s veil, agreed, ‘Yes. Let’s go.’ She frowned at her golden shoulders, which were peeling.

  ‘Can I peel some of your skin?’ said Marbie, swinging her shepherd’s veil.

  Fancy allowed her to take three pieces of skin.

  They washed the sand from their feet and ankles, and walked on the gravel road home. Fancy was carrying the suncream, the flippers and the beach umbrella, and Marbie was carrying her thongs.

  ‘Put your thongs on,’ said Fancy, ‘or you’ll kick your toe.’

  ‘No,’ said Marbie, ‘because my feet are wet and that makes the thongs slippery. Whose car is that?’

  From the bottom of the hill they could see their house, but it looked strange and unfamiliar. A long silver car stood in the driveway. They approached slowly, and saw that the car was shiny, its windows dark. A sticker on the back window said: ‘SEA LION’. Another sticker, on the bumper bar said, ‘If you can read this sign, back off ’.

  They ran up the stairs to the verandah and paused at the living room window. Inside, they could see their mother, sitting on the couch with a straight back and a small, interested tilt to her head. Next to her was their father. And seated in a row of kitchen chairs, their backs to the girls, were three men dressed in black. One of the men, Fancy saw, was tapping a polished black shoe on the floor.

  Fancy and Marbie stood at the window and watched as Daddy coughed into his fist, Mummy laughed, and the three men in black each picked up a briefcase from the floor. There was a scraping of chairs and a shaking of hands, then the front door opened so that voices and light spilled out onto the verandah.

  ‘Oh!’ said Mummy from the front door, seeing the girls.

  ‘We waited till the flags came down,’ said Marbie.

  The three men stepped out and lowered their heads. One of the men said, ‘Girls,’ with a nod at Fancy and Marbie, but the others did not appear to see them. One man unlocked the car with his keys, and opened three doors, politely. The men got into their car.

  Then the Zing family stood in a mosquito-slapping row on the verandah and watched as the car slid away.

  ‘Who were they?’ said Fancy.

  ‘Nobody,’ said her father.

  MARBIE ZING

  Shortly after her father returned from Ireland, Marbie’s family went to the seaside for a month.

  Each day, Marbie’s sister Fancy made Marbie’s beach towel into a turban, a crown, or a shepherd’s veil. She had to hold her head straight or the towel fell into her eyes, making the world a soft, speckled white. If she shivered slightly, it brushed against her shoulders like long hair.

  One day, Fancy and Marbie were allowed to go to the beach on their own until the flags came down. Another day, they woke up and their mother was gone.

  Their father was sitting at the head of the table waiting for them. He had placed the box of Coco-Pops in the centre of the table, alongside the milk. He had laid the table with three bowls, spoons in straight lines beside them.

  Formally, he explained: ‘Mummy had to go away for a few days. She will miss you very much.’

  ‘Has she gone to Ireland?’ said Marbie, and her father chuckled.

  The three of them went to the beach, as usual, and had fish and chips for lunch. Daddy wanted to participate in their beach games: he helped with a sandcastle, but wanted to build it higher than was necessary, and also wanted to decorate the castle with sea-grapes and Paddle Pop wrappers. The girls grew bor
ed and went for a swim.

  As they walked home together that day in the cooling light, Marbie said, ‘Will Mummy be home when we get there?’

  ‘No. Just a couple of days and she’ll be back.’

  In the kitchen, Fancy set the table for dinner while Marbie spun in circles. She bumped into a chair, spun away from the chair, and landed with her feet apart for balance. Then the room spun itself, the windows tipped, the couch capsized, and the clothes hanger draped in swimming costumes jumped.

  She fell against the chair, which crashed to the floor.

  ‘Marbie!’ cried Fancy.

  Daddy stood at the kitchen door and said, ‘Stop it, Marbie. You’ll make yourself sick.’

  But it never made her sick.

  They had sausages for dinner, which Daddy fried with smoke, a tea-towel and a frown. They pulled out their chairs and sat down, quietly. Daddy took a fork and put sausages on each plate, then cut a tomato into three chunks. Fancy and Marbie looked at each other about the tomato.

  That night Marbie lay in her bed and thought that the sound of the waves on the beach was the sound of the silver car bringing Mummy home. Daddy was out in the kitchen, clanking the plates, rinsing the knives and forks, sweeping the floor, and switching off the lights to go to bed.

  The next couple of days were similar. At the beach, they were allowed Splices, Chocolate Hearts and Chiko Rolls. Daddy built his sandcastles higher and higher. The girls swam between the flags but returned occasionally to admire Daddy’s castle.

  Mummy came home in a taxi, at breakfast time one day.

  Fancy and Marbie ran outside in their nighties, and Daddy emerged slowly behind them. The taxi driver was more excited than they were. He was chattering, laughing, and opening car doors.

  Mummy’s voice came from inside the taxi.

  ‘Girls,’ said Daddy, ‘wait a moment.’

  He leaned down to Mummy. When he stood back up he was holding something like a pink shopping bag. Marbie thought it might be presents.

  ‘Here we go!’ cried the taxi driver. ‘Look what we’ve got! Look, girls, look what your mummy’s brought home for you! Here’s your bag, and here’s the box, here it is. Look what we’ve got!’

  Fancy took one step and said, ‘It’s a baby.’

  ‘Not just any baby!’ cried the taxi driver, but he had to stop as Daddy wanted to pay him the fare.

  ‘Whose baby is it, Mummy?’ Marbie said. ‘Where did you get a baby from?’

  ‘Just a moment, precious one,’ said Mummy.

  The taxi driver talked his way around to the driver’s door, ‘. . . congratulations! . . . All the best! . . . You take care of Mummy now!’ He seemed to continue talking as he drove away.

  Daddy said, ‘Do you think you can manage that box between you, girls?’

  Fancy and Marbie carried the box, Daddy carried the baby, and Mummy carried nothing.

  Inside, Fancy and Marbie sat on the couch and took turns holding the baby. Marbie grew a little bored: the baby simply lay in its blanket and you couldn’t scratch your knee. But Fancy crinkled her eyes and sang, ‘Hello, little baby, hello, little cutie baby, hello, little baby.’ Mummy sat beside her, leaning over, watching.

  Daddy and Marbie opened the box and it turned out to be a new basket for the baby. Daddy found baby sheets and nappies in a cupboard which Marbie had never noticed.

  ‘I didn’t know you were pregnant, Mum,’ said Fancy, grown up and casual, twelve years old.

  ‘That’s because I’m quite plump already,’ explained Mummy. ‘It doesn’t show so much, see? Nobody knew, darling. Don’t worry.’

  ‘Is it our baby?’ Marbie said.

  ‘Well,’ said Mummy, ‘it is and it is not. This is where you have to listen carefully, now.’

  Fancy was on the couch with the baby in her arms. Marbie was sitting by the empty box on the floor, and Daddy was standing at the kitchen door with his arms folded.

  ‘This baby,’ said Mummy, looking closely at the girls, ‘is a secret baby. Do you understand?’

  Fancy and Marbie said they understood.

  ‘No,’ said Mummy. ‘It’s more important than that. It’s more important than anything ever before. It’s a special Zing family secret. Okay?’

  Fancy and Marbie nodded.

  ‘This baby,’ continued Mummy, ‘can only stay with us for one week.’

  ‘No!’ cried Fancy. ‘Only a week!’ She kissed the baby’s forehead.

  ‘I hope you will help to take care of her this week,’ said Mummy.

  ‘Of course,’ said Fancy.

  ‘Okay,’ said Marbie, thinking: what about the beach?

  ‘What’s her name?’ said Fancy. ‘What’s the new baby’s name?’

  Mummy looked at the baby and straightened the folds of the blanket. After a minute, she said, ‘I have decided to give this baby the gift of a normal life. So her name is Catherine.’

  ‘Is it?’ breathed Fancy.

  ‘Yes,’ her mother replied.

  12

  THE HOT AIR BALLOON

  Maude was making pastry when her husband, David, announced that he was leaving.

  It was not surprising that she was making pastry: she was always making pastry in those days. She had become the official pie chef for the local cake shop, three nearby coffee shops, and two city restaurants. She could no longer look at a circular object without thinking of its use as a pastry cutter: teacups, breakfast bowls, steering wheels, balloon baskets.

  ‘Hmm,’ she said, vaguely, when David made his announcement. She was rubbing the butter into the flour, her favourite part of pastry making, fluttering her fingertips as fine crumbs emerged, neither flour nor butter.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ said David, softly. (It was after midnight and the girls were asleep.)

  Now Maude paid attention. ‘You can’t leave,’ she cried.

  He explained that he had no choice, and as he talked – about how he needed time alone to figure things out; how he hoped it would not take long, the figuring out; how he also hoped, when it was done, that she would take him back, but he understood she might not – as he said all this, Maude slowly sank into a kitchen chair, and thought: of course.

  Her pie-making must have distracted her. Her husband was fading into nothing. Where was the vibrant, vivacious boy with excited expectations of invention? She recalled how he used to spring down the aisles of department stores, looking for inspiration; then how he took to wandering, more slowly and thoughtfully. The wandering grew listless, and now he never wandered, except down the hallway of their home. Now and then he picked up one of Fancy or Marbie’s toys, turned it over distractedly, and put it back down on the carpet.

  He had never lost his gift for electronics and gadgets, nor his thoughtful approach to life. He used the gadgetry skills to repair the girls’ clock-radios or install deadlocks on the doors. As for the thoughtfulness – just the other day, when Maude had been ill with the flu, she had woken to find a note in David’s handwriting on the carpet: ‘THIS WAY FOR BREAKFAST’ with an arrow pointing to the bedroom door. She followed the arrow to the hallway, where several other ‘THIS WAY’ notes directed her to the kitchen. ‘THAT’S RIGHT!’ said a note on the kitchen floor, ‘YOU’RE ALMOST THERE.’ And then a triumphant ‘BREAKFAST!’ alongside a tray on the table, which contained a boiled egg, a saucer of strawberries, and a little note explaining that orange juice was in the fridge door.

  David’s talent had been consumed by his family life, Maude saw now. And here he was, a grown-up Zing who had never invented a thing. His parents and relatives commented on this now and then, but were friendly and forgiving. The inventiveness had to stop somewhere! they said. Why not with David? He had, after all, created two lovely girls. That was enough for them!

  But David spent hours watching TV, or playing Fancy’s Donkey Kong game. His vertigo grew worse instead of better – these days, he could not even go to the movies. The seats were at such a steep gradient, he said, he feared he would fall into t
he film.

  As David talked and apologised, Maude considered all this, and played with her flour-dusted wedding band. Eventually, she pulled it off her finger and dropped it on the table between them. David breathed in sharply, and buried his head in his arms. Maude regarded the wedding ring, imagining its use as a pastry cutter. Thousands of tiny pastry circles for thousands of tiny pies.

  ‘Well,’ she said, surprising him with the kindness in her voice. ‘Well, I understand you have to go. But we’ll say that you’re going to Ireland. We’ll say that you plan to paint pictures or write poems, or maybe a novel.’

  Why Ireland? David wanted to know.

  Maude thought it was the romantic sort of place where people ran away to do creative things. ‘That way,’ she explained carefully, ‘if you happen not to invent anything, you can come back to us, without –’

  ‘But people will ask me about Ireland when I get back,’ David pointed out, changing the subject.

  ‘You can look it up in a library book,’ suggested Maude. She stood up again, and returned to the counter where her pastry was waiting. Then she changed her mind and sat down on the kitchen floor to have a cry.

  As a goodbye present for the girls, David hung a swing from the highest branches of the scribbly gum out the back. This tree had no low-lying branches. He stood a ladder against it to reach the closest branch, and then climbed the rest of the way up. This was the bravest thing he had ever done.

  Fancy, who was a formal little eleven-year-old, waved him off in the taxi, wishing him the best of luck on his trip to Ireland. She hoped he would write a good novel. She hoped he would come back soon. She would miss him very much. But Marbie was only five, and didn’t wish him anything.