Happy as Larry

by Scot Gardner

  Denise nodded, though she’d visited very few of the places Mary talked about. Without a car, much of the country around their home remained a mystery to her. For the first time in her life she thought her existence hidebound. The wild adventures she’d had at the heels of her missionary father seemed distant enough to be from another life.

  The children had been amusing themselves in the other rooms. Larry and Jemma ran down the hallway and into the kitchen, arm in arm.

  Larry was wearing a fine straw hat with a purple ribbon and a short floral summer dress that brushed the floor as he clomped along in black shiny women’s boots. He had a black handbag looped on his elbow. His lips were closed, but they were bent in a wry smile.

  Jemma wore fawn suit pants and a pink shirt, with the trouser cuffs and sleeves roughly rolled to fit.

  ‘Oh my,’ Mary offered. ‘Don’t you two look beautiful?’

  Denise could only laugh and clap her hands.

  The other children came in from the lounge. The little ones laughed, but Tim scowled.

  ‘Don’t they look gorgeous?’ Mary asked.

  ‘No,’ Tim said. ‘Larry’s a poof. A poofy poof poof.’

  ‘Timothy!’ Mary squeaked. ‘That’s enough.’

  Her kitchen chair scraped as she stood, and Tim hightailed it out the back door.

  Larry wanted to take his dress-ups home but Denise helped him back into his shorts and sandals and packed the old suitcase under Jemma’s bed before they left.

  Larry broke the silence as they rounded the corner into Condon Street.

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘Yes, darling?’

  ‘What’s a poof?’

  Denise’s face flooded with blood. ‘It’s nothing. It’s not a nice word. It’s nothing, okay?’

  She looked straight ahead and didn’t see her son’s brow furrow.

  That night, when Larry was tucked up tight in bed, Denise told Mal what Tim had said. Mal laughed and Denise chastised him.

  ‘Where does a boy . . . he’s probably only seven or eight . . . learn that kind of language? How can a child already be so loaded with stereotypes and prejudices?’

  ‘Probably straight from his parents.’

  ‘But Mary is so . . . I don’t know. Mousy.’

  ‘You’ve got to watch the quiet ones. What’s the husband like?’

  Denise shrugged. ‘He drives a truck for the council.’

  Mal nodded knowingly, but said, ‘School is where I learned to swear.’

  Denise looked at him, puzzled. She’d never heard him swear, not even when the Fishburn Street house burned to the ground. She wasn’t so naïve that she thought the Sundays at the jetty and the times drinking in his shed with his friends were without swearing; now she wondered if her boy was being damaged by the less-than-elegant company her husband kept. There were only two ways of dealing with that worry – she could either keep Larry with her at all times, or trust her man.

  And trust her man she would. She sat on the arm of his chair and kissed his forehead.

  ‘I missed you today,’ he said.

  ‘Oh? Why was that?’

  Mal shrugged. ‘Everywhere I went to make a delivery, people were playing happy families.’

  She kissed him again, and saw an opportunity. ‘Poor love. Would you ever consider taking us with you?’

  ‘Would you do that?’

  She nodded. ‘I was thinking today how much fun that might be.’

  Mal scoffed. ‘Fun?’

  It was Denise’s turn to shrug. ‘You never know.’

  There’s a whole world out there, she thought, waiting for us.

  EARTHQUAKE

  VILLEA LOST THE last of its postal foot soldiers when Mal Rainbow became a bicycle postman early in 1995. Nettie Firmin still pushed a cart through the commercial centre of town, but bikes now ruled the suburbs. When postman Ben Heany officially retired on the seventh of January, he wasn’t replaced, and Dominic Evans, Stan Ward and Mal took up the slack on their bikes. Mal and his body ached and complained about the changes.

  Denise saw a movie that moved her to tears. Anita had brought a video of Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Monogatari (Tokyo Story) to club night and nobody got through it dry-eyed. Denise borrowed it to try and work out why it made her sad. The plot was simple – ageing parents leave their coastal village to visit their married children in Tokyo, but the children’s lives are busy and they have no time for their parents. There was no plain reason why the movie undid her, but its subliminal wrath haunted her dreams for days. On Tuesday 17 January, while buying shoes for her son to wear to kindergarten, Denise watched a news report on a wall of televisions at the back of the department store. Apparently, while she’d been sleeping that morning, another earthquake had rocked Japan. Measured at 7.2 on the Richter scale, the quake shook the city of Kobe and killed more than five thousand people, with whole families crushed by debris as they slept.

  She couldn’t take her eyes from the wall of screens.

  ‘Mum?’ Larry shouted.

  She blinked and became aware that he’d been tugging at her hand and calling her name. It took a few seconds for her to realise where she was. She apologised under her breath to nobody in particular, and marched Larry from the store, without the shoes.

  That night, as Mal drank his beer in front of the graphic footage on the evening news, Larry pulled at his elbow.

  ‘What is it, Larry?’

  He beckoned for his father to lower his head so he could whisper in his ear.

  ‘Mum’s crying.’

  Mal shot out of his seat.

  Larry pointed a stubby finger at the kitchen.

  When Mal wrapped his arms around his wife, she sobbed into his shoulder.

  For some reason the visions of the earthquake had slipped past her defences and reminded her of the sad things in her life. There was her father, the seven miscarriages before Larry, and leaving her baby in the supermarket. There were the times she’d been short with Larry, times when she felt like the worst mother in the world, a mother so despised by God that it seemed they’d never be able to have another child.

  The sadness came in a rush and left a few tissues later. It didn’t register on seismographs, but the Rainbows all felt it.

  Larry stood in front of the TV and watched rescue workers drag bloodied bodies from the wreckage of Kobe. He realised that what he was seeing was not a cartoon. They were real people. It was real blood. The boy he saw being lifted on the stretcher into the back of the ambulance might not be okay.

  He eventually realised that like Hundred the goldfish, the toadies on the jetty and Jemma the rabbit, the boy was dead.

  WET

  BOTTOM

  WHILE KOBE TREATED its wounded and shivered in the winter cold, Villea sweltered. For the three days that led to the weekend, the mercury burst through forty degrees Celsius. On Thursday night it clouded over before the air had a chance to cool and gave the town its hottest night since records began in 1863. The coolest it got was just over thirty degrees and everyone in the neighbourhood tossed and turned.

  Muriel Hammersmith’s ranting reached fever pitch that night. Maybe it was just that every window on both houses was open. Maybe she was shouting from the kitchen – the closest room to the Rainbows’ house. Mal and Denise could hear her bellowing over the sound of their own television and, while there were pauses for breath, she didn’t really stop for ten minutes. Most of it was indecipherable and Mal pretended not to be listening. One word cut through, though, again and again.

  She.

  Mal wondered if She was the dog but secretly hoped that She was Vince’s lover. For one crazy breath, he wondered if his own wife was She. Sometimes he noticed the paired teacups in the dish rack when he got home from work. The thought came, and the thought went, burned to a crisp in the light of their innocence.

  Mal shifted in his seat. ‘Is Muriel still going?’

  As if on cue, Muriel’s tirade shifted up an octave. Her voice distorted with unint
elligible rage, and then something smashed. The silence that followed was immense. Then there was another smash, and another and finally, a single word uttered in Vince’s powerful tone.

  ‘Enough!’

  Mal and Denise looked at each other, eyebrows raised, but the sound of Muriel losing it had become part of the soundtrack of their lives. There was a fatal sort of familiarity about it. They’d agreed, months before, that there was nothing they could do to help.

  The discussion in the Rainbow household for the rest of that long, hot night was about the things that could be changed.

  ‘My heart goes out to the people in Japan, it really does,’ Mal said. He’d set up a salvaged pedestal fan beside the TV. It rattled quietly and created a warm breeze that smelled faintly of his sweaty feet. ‘But short of getting on a plane and flying over there, there’s nothing much we can do.’

  As soon as the words had passed his lips, a message flashed on the screen: the Red Cross Hanshin Earthquake Appeal. There was a number to call and Denise wrote it down.

  Malcolm melted further into his chair.

  Denise held the piece of paper high and pleaded with her eyes.

  ‘How much?’ Mal asked.

  ‘A hundred dollars. Just a couple of hundred dollars.’

  Mal bit a sigh in half and raked his fingers through his sweaty hair. ‘There’s no guarantee that the money will get there . . .’

  ‘Just one hundred.’

  He nodded and exhaled, and after Denise finally got through on the phone and gave their credit-card details, she slumped beside him and the night didn’t seem as hot.

  Maybe the part of the world he could change was bigger than he’d thought.

  There was talk of a thunderstorm that weekend, but Saturday morning showed no mercy.

  Someone had backed into the passenger-side door of Stan’s truck during the week, and Denise had to slam it three times before it would close properly.

  Mal shook his head. The truck was a bit of a joke. Like a bus, it had no seatbelts, and in places the stuffing of the single bench seat burst out as if the seat had been gutted with a blunt filleting knife. The clutch squeaked like a lonely kitten every time it was pressed, and there were hills up behind McAllister Weir that the truck flatly refused to climb, even without a load.

  Thankfully, the Rainbows got the joke. Larry giggled with every press of the clutch. With the windows down and the accelerator to the floor, the truck rattled along the Cradle River Road at its top speed (when loaded) of seventy-nine kilometres per hour. They made a delivery, then picnicked beside the weir in McAllister Park. Lazy bodies sprawled beneath umbrellas along the sandy beach. Kids floated and splashed and paddled.

  A whole mob of kangaroos from the national park lay in the shade of a huge willow, motionless in the heat as if they were spectators at the weekend regatta. They became active when Mal sat down on the picnic blanket and Denise began to unpack lunch. They didn’t hop towards the blanket, just reached their taloned forelegs forward, pressed them to the ground and levered their powerful hind legs and heavy tails in behind them.

  Larry gripped his father’s leg as the first of the group approached and stopped just out of arm’s reach, sniffing at the air. Denise talked to them in a soothing voice, peeled off a crust and threw it onto the grass. A brief but fierce scrimmage ensued until the crust had been eaten. Emboldened, the roos pressed closer to the blanket.

  ‘Maaaal,’ Denise said, and shuffled towards her husband.

  Larry was holding so tight he was tearing the hairs from his dad’s leg.

  Mal drew himself to his full height and growled as he shooed them off.

  The largest of the kangaroos, inflamed by the small victory of the crust, stood its ground.

  Mal surged at it and waved his hands.

  The roo reared onto its hind legs and tossed its head defiantly. Its lungs filled with air and it emitted a sound that made the hair on Mal’s neck stand up. It was somewhere between a contemptuous cough and a guttural growl.

  Standing upright, the beast was eye to eye with Mal. They stared at each other for three seconds that felt like a full minute to Mal. There was no expression in those mahogany eyes, no barometer of intent, but its sickle-like claws and posture of sheer indignation made Mal doubt the kangaroo’s commitment to vegetarianism.

  He was ready to run when the roo turned on its tail and bounded off towards the willow tree.

  Mal puffed his chest and dusted his hands. Denise and little Larry applauded and they ate their lunch in peace.

  Larry took the last quarter of his sandwich to the edge of the lake.

  ‘Don’t go near the water,’ Denise called.

  The beach at McAllister Park was sandy and shallow. It would have been perfect for a swim, but there were deliveries waiting and they hadn’t brought swimming costumes.

  Larry nodded his understanding, and Denise stretched out beside her husband. She knew Larry would be safe. He listened to what she said. He’d never been smacked. Mal and Denise agreed that smacking would be a last resort and they’d never found reason. Denise had never been hit by her father. Mal’s mother had smacked him raw every other day since the age of two.

  As a father, Mal had decided to do it differently.

  Thankfully, Denise thought, Larry was a good kid. Or maybe not being smacked had made Larry a good kid.

  Mal sat up suddenly and Denise got a fright.

  ‘Larry?’ Mal called.

  Larry’s familiar figure was not among the crowd on the foreshore.

  Denise was on her feet and running, scanning the water for a floating corpse. ‘Larry?’

  Children stopped and stared. Parents leaped from their towels to join the search. Before the panic had sunk its teeth in, Mal heard a muffled squeal and found him.

  Larry was in the phone booth beside the carpark, crying. Outside, pressed against the glass panel of the door, was the big kangaroo. It was scratching at the hinges. Mal scooped up a handful of gravel from the carpark and pelted it shotgun-style at the beast and roared.

  The roo levelled an arrogant stare at Mal before it bounded into the scrub.

  For a frustrated second, Mal couldn’t work out which way the door opened, then he was inside the booth with Larry sobbing and clinging to his neck. He’d wet his pants.

  ‘Shhh. It’s okay, Larry. He’s gone now.’

  Denise forced a frown over her smile of relief and stroked Larry’s hair behind his ear. ‘Nasty kangaroo wanted to eat your lunch.’

  They washed his pants and his little bottom in the weir and bundled into the truck. As Mal pointed it towards the exit sign, another big kangaroo dragged itself into their path. Mal tooted but the animal showed no sign of having heard. Mal revved the engine and feathered the squeaky clutch.

  He looked at his boy. ‘Should we run him over?’

  ‘No!’ Denise yelled, and grabbed the dash.

  Mal made the truck lurch again and Larry had to grab the seat to avoid sliding into the footwell.

  ‘Hang on, Larry, I’ll get him.’

  Mal beeped a rhythm on the horn and surged forward again.

  Larry was laughing now and standing with his fingers curled into the vent. He chuckled through his tears as the truck hopped out of the carpark and up to the roundabout.

  Mal looked in the cracked side mirror as he swung through the corner, keeping an eye on the kangaroo, which had stopped to watch him.

  ‘We showed him, didn’t we? Hey?’

  Larry was patting Mal’s knee.

  ‘Yes. Nasty kangaroos won’t bother us again.’

  Larry was slapping him now, insistent.

  ‘What?’

  Larry pointed to the vacant seat beside him.

  Denise was gone.

  Mal stomped on the brake. The passenger’s door bounced against its hinges and shut, revealing an image in its side mirror. An image of his beloved wife stumbling along the roadside, frantically waving her arms above her head.

  ‘Woops
.’

  Denise tore open the door and hoisted herself into her seat. She slammed it with an almighty heave that set the cab rocking.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Denise,’ Mal said, almost under his breath. ‘Are you hurt?’

  Denise tried to look at her elbow. She rubbed her knee and poked out her bottom lip for sympathy.

  Larry chuckled.

  It was just a little ripple of laughter to begin with. It washed over his mother and she snorted. She smiled and shook her head, and Larry was off: great cackling, pulsing waves of mirth that rolled from squeal to red-faced breathlessness and back again. Whenever the belly-laugh seemed to slacken, Larry would glance at his mother and be struck by a new attack.

  Sometimes, for Larry at least, life was a cartoon.

  A PEG AND

  A PENIS

  THE HEAT WENT on but the thunderstorm did eventually arrive. Pent-up towers of cumulus appeared over the hills to the west. Initially honest and white, the closer they got to Villea, the more sinister they became. Cadaver-grey, they brought a premature evening that bellyached with thunder.

  ‘Come on, Hughie, send it down!’ Mal prayed from the kitchen window. He was gripping his third beer and he felt the thunder in his chest.

  The first raindrop hit the roof like a stick. Mal shed his sweat-soaked T-shirt.

  Denise chuckled. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Having a shower.’

  ‘In the kitchen?’

  Mal nodded at the back yard. ‘Coming, Larry? Get your gear off.’

  Larry stomped his shorts and undies into a pile on the floorboards. Denise helped him out of his shirt.