Lisdalia

by Brian Caswell

  “Thay, Nanh, I’m real thirthty. Howth about sharing thome of your drink.” And without waiting for a reply, he grabbed the unopened can from where it stood on the seat.

  He had his finger inside the ring ready to open it when it all happened.

  It was so quick that it took me — and everyone else, I guess — by surprise. I had closed the distance between us, and I was just behind the Ferret’s shoulder, when all of a sudden, I wasn’t behind his shoulder at all. In less time than it took Chris Walker to scream, Nanh had made it to his feet, grabbed the wrist of the hand that held the can, swept the Ferret’s feet out from under him, and lowered him almost gently to the ground.

  Nanh stood over him with one foot planted firmly on his chest, while his eyes ran wamingly over the rest of “the Shadows”. Then he looked down at Chris — that “cat-and-mouse” look that Tanja had described to me — and spoke, so quietly that I could barely hear him from two metres away.

  “You thirthty, I … share drink. But …” he paused as he spoke, pulled the ring on the can and took a sip. ‘You don’t take. You never take.”

  Then he crouched down, and with one movement pulled off the Ferret’s right shoe. It was a white Adidas hi-top that looked like he’d been wearing it for the best part of a year — without once taking it off. Nanh straightened, looked at it, sniffed at it slightly and pulled a face.

  “You want drink … I share.” He took a couple of huge swallows. “Half me … Half you.”

  For a moment, I thought he was going to pass the can down to Chris Walker, who hadn’t moved a muscle — nobody had — but at the last moment, he stopped, as if he’d changed his mind, and poured the remaining drink into the Ferret’s boot. Then he leaned over and placed the boot into his would-be tormentor’s hand.

  “Now you drink … pleathe … Or I get —” he looked across at me, as if he was searching for the right word — “how you thay … I get offending.” It was a gentle threat, but a threat, just the same.

  “Offended,” I corrected him, and smiled. He smiled back.

  Chris Walker wasn’t smiling. He looked terrified. He held the boot out in front of him like it was full of toxic waste. I suppose, considering what might have been inside that shoe, mixing with what came out of the can, it could well have been. His eyes looked for help from his mates, but they were frozen. “The Pain”, their protector, was in the canteen, looking for a lunch to steal, and without him they were nothing.

  By now, the brown liquid was seeping out through the stitching of the boot and dribbling down over Chris Walker’s hand, and I was wondering if he’d really put it to his lips and drink. If Nanh would really make him.

  I never found out, because at the moment, Shane Thomas came around the corner of the MPC, out of the canteen.

  Nobody realised that he was there until he yelled out: “Hey, you!”

  Nanh held his position over Chris Walker, but he turned his head slightly at the sound of the shout. I could see the muscles tense just slightly in his shoulders, and I noticed that look again in his eyes. He didn’t answer.

  Thomas pushed past me, and stood about a metre from Nanh, facing him.

  “Maybe you don’t know the rules around here, seeing how you just got off the boat …” He paused, but no one laughed, and suddenly he seemed to become aware that there was something more going on here than he’d realised. He nodded towards the Ferret, and continued, less certainly, “Let him up … now.” There was a threat in the tone that anyone in Year Seven would have responded to immediately, but Nanh just smiled. A cold smile.

  “You let him … finish drink. He thay he thirthty.”

  Thomas’s answer was to lean forward with both hands, intending to push Nanh away from the kid on the ground, but he never made contact. Moving even more quickly than he had before, Nanh swayed to one side, grabbed his opponent’s right wrist with both hands, then twisted around, somehow, and turned that wrist behind Shane Thomas’ back while he took the legs out from under him, so that “the Pain” ended up on his knees with Nanh behind him, holding his arm painfully up around his shoulder-blade.

  Securing it there with his left hand, he grabbed a handful of hair with his right one and pulled Shane’s head back — not viciously; almost gently, in fact. Then he looked down into those confused eyes, and smiled again.

  “Pleathe, no try push … I no like it.”

  Then, placing a foot in the centre of Shane Thomas’s back, he gently nudged him over onto his face. He looked down at Chris Walker, only to find that in the commotion, the bootful of toxic fluid had been knocked out of his hand, so that he was sitting there on the floor, with a huge brown stain soaking into the front of his school-shirt.

  “I thorry … You thtill thirthty? I get you more drink …”

  But Chris Walker was on his feet, and hobbling backwards across the quad, leaving his boot behind on the ground next to Shane Thomas, who was sitting up now, more than a little confused.

  Nanh bent down, picked up the boot and dropped it in Shane Thomas’s lap, upside down, so that the dregs of the liquid spilled out all over the front of his trousers and made it look like he’d had an accident. Which, I suppose, in away was true.

  Then, as if nothing had happened, Nanh returned to his place on the bench, picked up his lunch and continued eating.

  By the time Michael and Tanja arrived from the canteen, it was all over, Shane and his Shadows had disappeared, and so had most of Nanh’s lunch, but there was still a buzz around the place.

  Michael handed me a pie and a packet of those disgusting cheese-ring things. For a future Olympic athlete, he has no idea about good nutrition.

  “What’s going on?” he asked. At least, I think that’s what he asked; the words had to escape through a mouthful of half-masticated meat and pastry. He has no idea about good manners either, sometimes.

  “Oh, nothing,” I looked across at Nanh, and winked. “Nanh was just showing us how they share things in Cambodia. Could you do me a favour, get me a can of drink from the machine? I’d ask Nanh for a sip of his, but he’s already shared it around …”

  18

  APPEARANCES

  It was through Nanh that I finally got to know Maddie.

  She didn’t need E.S.L., of course; she’d been here practically her whole life; she was more “Australian” than Terry Dickson — if that’s possible. But a lot of her friends were in Mr Dunford’s group, and she had met Nanh through them. After the incident with Chris and Shane, Nanh hadn’t needed any help “fitting in”, and my job — and Michael’s — of buddying was over. We were still his “good friends”, of course, but he was on his way. He didn’t need us to introduce him.

  In fact, there was even a bit of the opposite happening. He started introducing us to a few of his new friends — and so I got to know Maddie.

  I’d known her before, of course — everyone knew Maddie — but not to talk to. And when I started talking to her, I realised that I really didn’t know her at all.

  I had this picture of Maddie in my mind. Miss Popularity, not a worry in the world. Bright, but not too bright, pretty, without having to work too hard at it, and fitting in — in a way I’d only ever dreamed of.

  But Maddie was hurting.

  Not for herself, but for Minh, her brother. The misfit. The rebel. It was hard to believe that two kids from the same family could be so different. But they were, and listening to Maddie talk, it made me wonder what it is that makes us turn out the way we do.

  Michael had said something similar about Shane Thomas. He said that no one really knew what made him tick, and that it was like there were two people inside of him. One of them was the bully we all loved to hate, but the other was someone who was scared; scared that one day we might all find out that apart from what he could do with his fists, or in the swimming pool, there was nothing else to him. He also said that if we could find out what had made “the Pain” feel like that about himself, we’d understand why he tried so hard to make us all sca
red of him.

  The way he said it, I got the feeling that Michael might have an idea about what that cause might have been, but he never mentioned it. Sometimes, Michael can be really deep, even though you wouldn’t know it by reading anything he writes for school.

  Anyway, Maddie became my friend. Not on the same level as Tanja, naturally — “sisterhood” is something special — but a friend, just the same.

  I could just imagine Miss Vegas sitting back in her staff-room, patting herself on the back, and congratulating herself on her extreme cleverness. Good luck to her. It’s not often you try something that actually works.

  19

  THE WORDS BEHIND THE WORDS

  “Okay, what’s black and brown and would look good on Shane Thomas?”

  I didn’t have a clue.

  “A pack of Rottweilers!”

  Tanja was in her usual mood, and to tell you the truth, I needed it.

  Dad had gone in that morning for the second operation, and I didn’t really want to be at school at all. Mum was being all logical about it, pointing out that there was no point in sitting around the hospital all day, when there would be no news before about four anyway, but I noticed that she wasn’t being too logical when it came to herself. I had to spend the day at school, but she spent it sitting around the hospital, waiting for news.

  Mothers!

  “All right, what’s the difference between Shane Thomas and three dollars worth of horse manure?”

  I just looked at her. I’d heard that one before. Everyone had heard that one before. She finished it anyway.

  “Shane Thomas doesn’t come in a plastic bag!”

  I couldn’t help smiling, even though I knew it encouraged her.

  “So, how’re you feeling, kid?” She wasn’t looking at me as she spoke, she was staring off somewhere in the distance, past the shopping centre over the road.

  I didn’t answer for a few seconds. I was trying to figure out exactly how I did feel. It was nothing I could explain, but I felt … scared. Like there was some strange force building up against me; as though something terrible was about to happen.

  “Okay, I guess. A little bit worried. Still, the last op turned out fine, so …”

  But saying it didn’t make it true.

  I spent the rest of the day walking around with my mind somewhere else.

  Aunt Grace was waiting at home when I got back. Her real name was Gracia, but no one except family ever called her that; to me, she’d always been Aunt Grace. She was my father’s sister, a few years younger and a few centuries more up-to-date, and we’d always got on really well. I guess that was why they sent her to be with me.

  There were none of the usual smiles today.

  “Dalie —” Somehow, her pet name for me sounded different this time; strained. And the sound of it sent an icicle of fear through me.

  “Dad …?” I tried to speak, but my throat locked. She didn’t reply, but her face said enough.

  I forced the words out. “What is it? What’s happened?”

  She sat down. “They don’t know. The operation went fine, but then …”

  “What? Then what …?”

  “In recovery. He stopped … breathing.” She was trying to sound calmer, and almost succeeding. “You remember last time, the trouble he had breathing afterwards?”

  I nodded.

  “This time it was worse. By the time they got him breathing again, it was three or four minutes … He hasn’t woken up yet, and they —”

  I was still holding my school bag. I let it drop to the floor. “Take me there.” It was not a request, it was an order.

  For a moment, my aunt looked at me, I could see her mind working.

  “I’m not supposed —” But I cut in.

  “I want to be there!”

  She nodded, and we made our way out to the car.

  P.R.T., they called it. Post-operative respiratory trauma.

  Sometimes, I wish I didn’t remember every damn thing anyone ever tells me. That is one phrase I never wanted to hear, and one I’d be more than happy to forget. But that’s just the trouble; I can’t forget. Anything.

  Not the smell of the hospital, not the look on my mother’s face, when she turned around and saw me there. Not the way my father looked when at last they let us in to see him.

  He was attached to a bank of monitoring devices and machines that hissed and beeped like something out of a science fiction film. The doctors said he was breathing on his own, but they kept the machine on to help him for a while. He was in a kind of shock, they said, and he might come out of it at any time.

  Or he might not.

  You could catch the words behind the words. The one thing they didn’t want to say.

  I moved over and stood beside the bed.

  Even with all the tubes and wires, he looked so peaceful. No anger, no orders. No need to put on that show of strength and toughness he thought was so important for a father.

  I touched his hand, and whispered his name, but the sound of it was lost in the hiss and thump of the machine.

  20

  WHISPERS

  It was a simple operation. What happened was just one of those things that no one can foresee, like being hit by lightning out of a clear sky. You could do the procedure a thousand times, with no problems, and then …

  Somehow, it was no comfort to know that what had happened to my father was rare and unexpected.

  I sat by his bed and spoke his name, and talked to him about anything that came into my head. While he just lay there. They had switched off the machine that helped him breathe, but they kept all the monitors working, and my words were accompanied by an electronic beeping, like some kind of bizarre answering machine. I didn’t like to speak too loudly in that room, so I whispered; words, encouragements, anything that came into my head.

  “I have to go to the University on Friday. They’re announcing the winner of the writing competition. You know, the one Mum told you about. They’ve asked me if I’d mind reading my poem on the night. I don’t know if that means I might have won or not, but it can’t be too bad …”

  I was just talking. Making sounds, trying to fill up the emptiness of that room. I hadn’t really thought about the poem and what it meant to me for … ever.

  Even when I wrote it, I’m not sure I really had a strong idea of what it meant to me.

  She calls his name in whispers …

  It was the sound of the words that I’d liked. The way it might feel to … lose touch with someone. To feel them slipping away, and sit there helpless.

  Like now.

  I looked at my father, lying there. What dreams were passing through his mind? What creatures lived deep down in his imagination? Could he hear what I said? The doctors seemed to think he might, but all they really knew was that they didn’t know enough.

  The scary thing was that when I tried to remember all the fights we’d had, all the things he’d done to set me off and get me so mad, I couldn’t. They didn’t matter.

  The thing that stood out was something I hadn’t thought about in years.

  I was four, maybe five, and the silent dark had me trapped. It was closing in from the shadowy corners of my room, and I was wide awake and watching it coming to get me. I couldn’t move; I could feel it coming closer …

  And then it was gone, and he was holding me in his arms, whispering comforting words in Italian, and carrying me back to his room, to where my mother, sleepy-headed, was sitting up in bed.

  Just a nightmare. A silly, babyish fear. But my father had driven it back.

  He wasn’t just a selfish, out-of-touch Calabrian, making my life hell because I was a girl and he had the power to do it. He wasn’t just anything.

  He was my father.

  And he still saw himself driving back the shadows, even if I no longer saw them. Even if the things that still scared him no longer worried me.

  And if his demands hurt me, what had mine done to him?

  I reached acr
oss and touched his forehead. It was warm.

  He didn’t move.

  21

  INTO THE LIGHT

  I watched my mother as she picked up the phone. She looked terrified.

  “Hello?” She sounded like a little girl.

  She said nothing else. She didn’t need to. The way she nodded her head, and the look of incredible … relief that spread across her face said it all.

  “Right away … thank you.” As she hung up the phone the tears started.

  “Mama —” I began, but she cut me off.

  “He is awake. Just a few minutes ago, he opened his eyes … and spoke.” She leaned against the kitchen work-bench. Her eyes were streaming, but that smile; I had never seen …

  “What did he say?” My mouth asked the question, not my brain. My brain was racing off on a track of its own.

  “They don’t know.” She giggled. “No one there speaks Italian!”

  At that moment, Miss Vegas arrived at the door. She was supposed to be taking us to the University; Dad had always distrusted women drivers, so Mum had never learned, and Miss V had said it was too far to go by train at night, so why didn’t we go with her?

  Before I knew it, they’d had everything arranged.

  Obviously, there was no way that Mum could go with us now, but she and Miss Vegas insisted it would be better if I still went. It was my big night, and … on and on.

  I didn’t want to go; I wanted to be with Mum. And Dad. But sometimes, it’s better not to fight the inevitable.

  She needed to see him. To see how he was. Alone.

  Miss Vegas packed me into the car and headed off, leaving my mother on the doorstep, waiting for the taxi. As we turned the corner, I watched her out of the rear window. The light over the door was shining down onto her black hair, and it shone like a halo. And as we rounded the curve, moving down the hill towards Elizabeth Drive, just before she passed from sight, I saw her shoulders droop, and she leaned her tired head against the doorpost.