Whole Wild World

by Tom Dusevic

I sat on my winnings for years, earning 3 per cent per annum. David was the youngest in a big family, the only one at home, his mother a widow. He used the cash to help with household expenses. Tony was the eldest of three and needed to assert a standard of material wellbeing for his brother and sister to aspire to; he blew his dough on a long, marvellous spree at the tuckshop and made small, strategic investments, buying both the double- LP soundtracks to Saturday Night Fever and Grease and was among the first to own a pair of disco boots, which he wore to school, ahead of our semi-formal ‘night of nights’ with the girls from MacKillop.

  12

  Night fevers

  I’d lost touch with the girls I’d known at St Joseph’s, even though most of them had been hiding in plain sight at the school next door since Year Seven. Boys who caught the train or bus, or those who had sisters, had mastered the art of ‘going round’ with girls. There was no step-by-step guide in the Book of Lists on these matters. A few guys I knew were in the fast lane, cruising over the speed limit, acting out methodically the positions in the Joy of Sex. With girls.

  Apart from cousins and neighbourhood girls, I didn’t even know how to begin the conversation. Just wanting to hear girls talk was a desire I shared with singer Dave Edmunds, and Elvis Costello, who wrote the song. Year Ten was my chance to see girls up close and get in the game. On Friday afternoons we went to St Therese hall to learn ballroom dancing. Because there were more girls at MacKillop than boys at St John’s, the girls were split into two groups; at St John’s, we did a rolling rotation, dancing two out of every three weeks.

  Our male instructor wore a multicoloured silk scarf year-round, presumably to signify he was an artist among adolescent ruffians. Hand on hip, he paced the hall and called the steps. In practical demonstrations, a neat, silent blonde, who may have been his wife, partnered him. For an hour at Camp Dance, orientation was fluid, the pupils not so much.

  One, two, three, kick,

  Back, two, three, together.

  Side close, side close,

  Side close, side close.

  Step and a hop,

  Step and a hop,

  Step and a hop,

  Step and a hop,

  Change.

  This was the drill for the Progressive Barn Dance, a movement we’d do perhaps a hundred times in an afternoon as the boys stayed in position and the girls moved clockwise to the next partner.

  ‘Hi, I’m Tom,’ I’d say with a smile, putting my arm around a girl’s back.

  ‘Hello, Tom. I’m Eve.’

  ‘Hi Eve, how are you going?’

  I had a good memory for names and tried to greet each girl I’d met on the next rotation. I’d take mental notes of which ones had scuffed shoes, hairy arms, prefects’ badges or blue eyes. I’m not sure why I did this, except that I was close to them, found girls fascinating and my neurons just fired that way with details. There were other stimuli I was open to, particularly when the MacKillop girls wore their ‘zip at the front’ summer uniforms.

  After several weeks I knew faces and names, which girls were stiff dancers and which ones were up for a chat. I’d become infatuated with a leggy blonde – there is a consistent pattern here, though, I swear, not an obsession. I’d see her every morning on the landing of a building across the playground. Dancing was a chance to hear her voice. I placed a high value on voice, thinking of it as a direct line into the soul, an idea that must have taken root during recoveries from eye operations when I listened keenly to the person speaking to me and to what was going on around me.

  We walked for fifteen minutes to and from the hall in mixed groups. While the girls were locked into their fortnightly cycle, the boys gamed the rules to attend when their girlfriends were dancing. One group of girls was more popular, containing many Anglo-Irish blondes and redheads; the other was overwhelmingly Lebanese and European.

  I had crushes all over the place and wanted to dance as often as possible. I found the second group friendlier. The trading of places on the boys’ side was a racket. I insinuated myself into the dance mix, swapping with guys I knew would be happy to miss out completely because they were even shyer than I was or thought the dance frolic a waste of good study time. Over several months we perfected the Barn Dance and added the more difficult Cha Cha and Pride of Erin to the dance card. We were building up to a semi-formal dance at St Felix’s in Bankstown, a few suburbs away. The hall was a large, round space, seemingly built for progressive political shindigs and industrial-scale bingo.

  It was a biting cold winter evening in Sydney; some boys wore jumpers. The spontaneously uniform look for boys was dark pants and brown disco boots, with some of the guys going the extra step and opting for a chisel toe. Seeing us all dressed the same was incredibly comforting, precisely the opposite of what girls wearing the same outfit would feel. We travelled as a loose pack of one hundred, like Twisties – all the same, but different. The idea was to dance with as many girls as possible that night and make sure no one was left out, given the ratio of girls to boys was 4:3. In shades of bovine brown, our herd of corduroy steers reared when a girl named Sharon entered the parade hall. Wearing a low-cut, cleavage-enhancing wrap dress, tossing back a mane of free-range Farah Fawcett locks, Sharon was out of everyone’s league. During breaks in music we’d compare field notes.

  ‘I had a solo dance with Sharon,’ said Mick, who had a twin sister and therefore MacKillop-insider status. ‘You know, she’s going out with an older guy. What about her dress?’

  Sharon had been one of our quiz cheerleaders at the Raindrop Fountain and I had permanently pressed an image of her in tiny shorts in my visual cortex. At times this mind picture would return whenever I saw Daisy from the Dukes of Hazzard on TV or met a new Sharon. Here I was dancing with her. One, two, three, kick!

  ‘I saw you on TV again,’ she said, a dazzle of white teeth and red lips, eyes gleaming under bright lights.

  I nodded, palms sweaty. Mute, smiling. Face to face, her hair swaying, we side closed, side closed, first left, then right, her voluptuousness impossibly more glorious at close range. My picture of Sharon can’t be any clearer. Dave Edmunds was in my head. And Daisy. Tiny shorts, too. We stepped and hopped, stepped and hopped, and then Sharon was out of my feeble clutch forever.

  A youth group from Lakemba parish had begun organising discos on Friday nights at St Therese hall. I’d missed them all because of basketball but they had earned a reputation among adults for getting out of hand. I was quizzed by Brother Paul, our new principal, about the alcohol and the ‘pashing-off ’ that went on at these novice debauch-fests.

  ‘I’ve never been, Brother,’ I said. ‘But they sound like good, clean fun. They’re strictly supervised and for members only.’

  It was the answer of a budding lawyer, almost 50 per cent true, when you unpack the five ideas there. He fixed me with a stern look, trying to get under an impromptu mien of pure ignorance and innocence.

  I was naïve in these matters, although more than willing to be corrupted. I played spin-the-bottle one Saturday night at a dinner party for six – how bourgeois! Teresa, who was friends with Maryanne, a girl I was keen on, hosted it. Teresa’s parents were out. We sat down to a dinner she’d prepared, drank the sparkling wine that we all chipped in to buy, then afterwards sat on the carpet in the lounge-room to play the kissing game.

  The green Summer Wine bottle spun like a chopper’s rotor; the length of time between turns was killing the passion, rather than raising the frisson. Fate said my first partner was Sam, a guy, so that called for another spin. My first actual ‘pash’ in this staged event was with a girl equally new to the tongue-kiss caper. She bit down on her own tongue, denying me entry into her metallic-braced mouth; she moved her head from side to side, understandably, as if saying ‘no-no-no, not you’. This was peasant dentistry, teeth-cleaning without the swarthy romance of Boris, cigars and antiseptic, more like ‘plaque-ing’ off.

  Then I kissed Teresa, the light taste of wine in her open mouth, he
r kiss womanly, revealing a slippery tongue of largeness and generosity, a ‘warm fire and plush slippers in a strange house’ kind of caress, if you were a reviewer for Pash magazine, in an ideal world of niche publishing. My third opportunity came when instead of spinning the bottle Maryanne grabbed it and pointed the neck at me.

  ‘Let’s go outside,’ she grabbed my hand and led me away.

  Maryanne seemed a lot older, although she dressed in the teen outfits her friends also wore. Maryanne had a boyfriend who had finished school; she was on and off with him. I managed to catch her in the between times. Maryanne was MacKillop’s captain, upfront and super-confident; she was serious when required but had a cheeky streak. We never dated as such, but got together at parties and dances, cuddled up on late afternoons in the pinball parlour.

  When the new library opened, a joint project of the two Catholic schools, Maryanne and I greeted the dignitaries at the gate and escorted them to a VIP area. Representing the federal Opposition was Paul Keating, the thirty-five-year-old member for Blaxland, the adjoining electorate to ours. Keating, a DLS Bankstown old boy, was identified as a top escort priority. An election was due the following year and Labor was a chance to win; this guy was on the way up.

  ‘He’ll be well dressed, plus he’s younger than you’ll expect,’ cautioned one of the teachers. ‘Mr Keating can be, how can I put it, fussy. So please look after him properly.’

  I knew what Keating looked like from his campaign posters in Georges Hall and Bankstown, where we had cousins and family friends. Having become impatient for Keating to show up, Maryanne and I disappeared for several thrilling minutes into one of the MacKillop classrooms. We ended up not greeting the man who would become Treasurer a few years later, and eventually, Prime Minister. Another prefect spotted Keating wandering free and roped him into the VIP holding pen.

  I introduced Maryanne, whose parents were Italian migrants, to my parents at a school event and they sensed a bit more was going on. I wished a bit more was going on, but it wasn’t.

  ‘She’ll be married and have children before you even start shaving,’ Teta Danica said. ‘She’s already a woman, developed, too much for you to handle.’

  I was crushed and resentful. What would she know? I held that slight against Teta for years, although the tally of grievances on my side was long, and growing.

  But Teta was, on this lone occasion, not far off the money. Maryanne and I were finding our way into the world in different ways.

  Manhattan had Studio 54, the only place to dance. London’s calling was decidedly post-punk. At St Therese hall in Lakemba, we were disco spunks and pre-stressed head-bangers at the mercy of a MobyDisc DJ. The parish priest and parents patrolled the murky space at first but their vigilance would wilt as the noise and heat ascended; smoking and alcohol consumption were done outside or pre-disco, in parks. For girls, it was the year of tight, colour-blocked jeans in bright green, blue, red or pink, teamed with loose blouses.

  This was my first encounter with the light magic of coloured bulbs, mirror balls and strobes and the pitiless carpet-bombing of Top 40 tunes. Guided by Sam and cousin George – as likely to listen to Abba as Zeppelin – I preferred rock, all kinds, especially the Rolling Stones, local bands you might one day see in a pub like the Angels, and British new wave acts such as the Police. But once the hall was dark and the volume soared above a low-end thump, the floor moved like a carnival ride. Hold on, because disco grabs you by the belt and wedgies you skyward, like the ridiculous falsettos of the Gibb brothers in ‘Night Fever’.

  The night’s first hour is a blaze of Bee Gees tunes from the Fever soundtrack, ‘Knock on Wood’, ‘Born to be Alive’, ‘Hot Stuff ’ and ‘Heart of Glass’, as well as songs from Michael Jackson’s Off the Wall, which everybody has, except me. Disco here is not just the preserve of girls and Lebanese dance-star boys. Not a single person more can fit on the floor when Tina belts out ‘Nutbush City Limits’, the dancers controlled as if by an imaginary drill sergeant in drag or on a dictator’s whim. We’re pulling off moves two levels more precise than the waltzes we’d practised in this hall that afternoon. The DJ swings into the power synth-pop of UK Squeeze’s ‘Cool for Cats’, ‘Rock Lobster’ by the B52s, ELO’s ‘Don’t Bring Me Down’ and ‘Let’s Go’ by the Cars, before shaking loose the hall’s disco refuseniks with ‘I was Made for Loving You’ and ‘My Sharona’. Some of us can lip-sync or sing the entire playlist, acting out videos seen on Countdown or Sounds. Friends drift out of sight, coupling in the dark-dark at the back of the hall or, more dextrously, in the playground. A bittersweet hint stirs within, happy for those boys and girls, wishing it were you.

  Two hours in, a requested tribute to the Angels sees boys leaping, manic arms and legs to ‘Shadow Boxer’ and ‘Mr Damage’. Soon, every gear-lugging DJ in the land will pause the song each time Doc sings the money line in ‘Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again?’ No way …

  Vintage AC/DC marshals a platoon of Angus pretenders clutching air guitars, as if they’d been hiding out in the jungle with a pretend weapon for years. No one plausibly imitates Bon, but when Back in Black comes out the following year without him, every shy white boy cranks up the raspy vocals of Brian Johnson on ‘Hells Bells’ and is knocked sideways by the wondrous idea of ‘American thighs’ in ‘You Shook Me All Night Long’.

  Like the sudden, falling exhilaration after a wild ride at Luna Park, the night decelerates into slow numbers; hungry hands cradle bottoms and slender arms surround necks. The house lights inflict an injury; doors fly open, filling raw lungs with night air. Disco fever breaks. What seems like a commotion of tempos and tastes hides a natural, democratic order. This raging sonic virus infects us all.

  So it goes for nineteen-year-old Mohammed, a moustachioed, wiry tough. He’d been in fights and warned off, but he just can’t stay away from this Friday-night scene for fifteen and sixteen-year-old school kids. Mohammed, with his rudimentary English and jingle-jangle strut, is tenacious. Must be the music. Among the first Muslims we notice in the area, he’s a preening mantis around Lakemba, an all-weather irritant clad in a black nylon jacket, skinny pants and zip-up boots. Whatever he’s jigging – prayers, language classes, a job – he’s not missed. Lebanese Christians are wary, but tolerate him. He’s forever a party of one.

  Mohammed talks to himself in a mangle of sweary Arabic and newly acquired street talk. I once sold him a Coke at St Therese. Instead of pushing down the pop-top – there was a small and big hole – he pulled out a knife and jammed it into the can in a showy way. I found the ploy hilarious rather than threatening.

  ‘Why did you open it like that?’

  ‘Anybody fuck with Mohammed, Mohammed kill,’ he said, stabbing the side of his can with the 10-centimetre blade. The deep wound in the offending aluminium oozed liquid sticky.

  Coke was on notice: do not fuck with Mo. I once saw this man-boy at Lakemba station running down the stairs for the train, jumping the rail with a dozen steps to go, landing like a cat, spray jacket puffing out like a saggy hot-air balloon. The story goes, a P-plated ute, full of punchy apprentices, once chased him down a street in Lakemba. Rattled, his back arched, slinky Mohammed outran the mob, leaping the fence behind a block of flats to get away.

  During English I am summoned to the principal’s office in the front room of the Brothers’ house, a routine request that year as I am often required for duty at short notice.

  ‘I think this is meant for you,’ Brother Paul says, handing over a bulging blue, letter-sized envelope and catching me off guard with a grimmer look than seems necessary.

  ‘Okay, thanks Brother.’

  It’s addressed to ‘Tom D (the cute one from It’s Academic)’.

  I blush, but puff out my chest. Fan mail, from J.W. Russell, who lived in Emerald in Victoria. Although we’d finished the show months earlier, the episodes are now being shown on TV. I’m not going to open it in front of Brother Paul so I excuse myself and leave.

  The cute on
e. Me. Wow! Wait till I show Wally. There’s no private space to read it so I stuff the envelope under my jumper and go back to class, where the MoD is flogging 10 Gold with Lord of the Flies. I’m unable to think of anything except the fat letter sitting in my bag. Why so thick?

  At the end of the day, alone in the classroom, I open it. There are a dozen glossy-paper cut outs from magazines; flesh, pubic hair, pink bits. Whoa! I can’t be caught with this stuff at school. I zip it into my bag.

  ‘So, who’s the letter from, Wombles?’ Supercoach asks when I pass him at the gate. Word has spread, Mick forever at the crossroads of executive power and teen gossip.

  ‘I haven’t opened it yet,’ I reply, feigning an urgent need to get to an appointment. ‘Too busy. I’m saving it for later. At home, Sir.’

  As soon as I’m a decent distance from Lakemba shopping centre, I sit and sort through the letter’s contents. There are pages from pornographic magazines, folded into a wad, nude women cut in the shape of Saturn rockets, or maybe penises, with due respect for scale. I’m not a prude about classified material, but this is too ribald. Over six or seven blue sheets, the writing is not easy to read. I’m shaking, confused, but also excited to see what J.W. Russell has to say:

  Dear Tom,

  My name is Jane. I saw you on It’s Academic on Saturday night and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. We watched it with the boarders at my school and we all thought you were the cutest one on the show. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to catch your surname because Andrew Harwood said it so quickly …

  Do you like the pictures I sent you? Do you sometimes buy Playboy or Penthouse? Do you touch yourself when you look at the girls? Will you think about me the next time you are holding your … [Here she expends many, many words speculating about the anatomical characteristics of my penis.]

  I bet you have a lot of girlfriends. Have you had sex with any of them? I’d like to have sex with you. I’m 16. How old are you? I’ve got big boobs and … [Now she vividly describes her own secret places and the pleasures we could enjoy exploring each other]