Coming Home to Roost

by Mary-anne Scott

  Lena was nowhere to be seen.

  The whole incident was over as far as Elliot was concerned. Lena had her payback and hopefully they were finished with each other forever. He had a new life in the city, which suddenly seemed appealing with its busy days and comparative isolation.

  But Mum couldn’t let it go. She was finally allowed to say all the stuff she’d bottled up and she went on and on about ‘my boy’ to anyone who crossed her path.

  Dad was philosophical. ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,’ he trotted out to Mum. ‘Elliot dumped Lena and this is her revenge. Can we let it go now?’

  Elliot thought of his exit as an escape rather than a dumping, but he agreed the subject was best left alone.

  He went back to Wellington with a heap of good intentions. He would work hard, save his money and head off to explore the world. He would never speak to Lena again.

  Arnie had a work-base in a dilapidated building in the industrial part of town, which he rented off an electrical supply company. He used to joke that he paid for two storage rooms, one parking space and a quarter-of-a-secretary.

  Dorice, his quarter-secretary, was an enormous woman with enough bosom and bottom to represent at least two smallish secretaries. She and Arnie were pretty tight and Arnie said she was ‘a mighty fine girl’. As far as Elliot could see, Dorice was the only person who could tease Arnie or reprimand him.

  ‘How was your break, Elliot, dear? It’s a long way, isn’t it? I haven’t been up that way for years. I imagine it was lovely to see your family again. And your friends — have you got a young lady at home?’

  Elliot had learned to wait out Dorice’s string of questions; he knew by her voice inflection when she’d reached the last one. This time he saw Arnie prick his ears up as Elliot struggled to answer. ‘Well, no. Not really. I’ve got girls — well, I haven’t got girls.’

  ‘I think the answer is no, Dorice.’ Arnie said. ‘In electrical terms, he’s been affected by electromagnetic coupling — the transfer of energy by means of a varying magnetic field. He got scorched.’ Arnie laughed as he tapped pipe residue into Dorice’s rubbish tin. ‘Haha. Unintentional inductive coupling, I’d say.’

  ‘Don’t listen to him,’ Dorice said. She leaned across the desk as if to exclude Arnie. ‘Now, I’ve been thinking we’ll have an early Christmas party in a little while and I’ll send out invitations to get a few young ones along.’

  ‘Who’s paying for that?’ Arnie’s laughter dried up.

  ‘You are. It’s not good for Elliot to be alone with old people all the time.’

  ‘I don’t want to pay for a whole lot of young fellas to get boozed on my premises.’

  ‘I was thinking we could invite young ladies too,’ Dorice said. She winked at Elliot. ‘It won’t hurt you to get your wallet out, Arnold.’

  ‘In electrical terms,’ Elliot said, ‘it’s called tapping the wire. It makes you the tap connector.’

  Arnie gave the rubbish tin a kick with his toe. ‘Like hell,’ he said, but he grinned at Elliot. ‘Touché.’

  Elliot’s mother rang frequently for a while to check that Lena wasn’t bothering him or to report her latest victory in ‘clearing your name’.

  ‘Mum, she doesn’t ring me, okay? She sent a text and apologised for the photo thing and that’s all I’ve heard,’ Elliot said. ‘It’s done. Can’t you forget it?’

  ‘Well, if she bothers you, I want you to tell me straight away.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’ As if.

  Rick rang every few days for a while, too. He kept tabs on Lena and updated Elliot on her movements. ‘I saw Lena on Friday, bro. Her hair’s white now and short. She looks like a dandelion.’

  ‘I don’t care.’

  ‘She was at Ray’s and said to tell you she’s sorry. I told her you hate her guts.’

  ‘Don’t say anything to her. And don’t talk on my behalf.’ Rick was his younger brother, not his life coach.

  ‘She was at The Hive last Saturday—’

  ‘Do the olds know you’re going there? That’s a dirty bar.’

  ‘Don’t be like that.’

  ‘You’re too young, Rick.’

  ‘Whatever. Anyway, I saw Lena there and she was all over Kevin Beere.’

  Kevin Beere was a petty criminal at fourteen and now, five years later, he was one of the most feared local guys around. ‘Kevin Beere? She wouldn’t.’

  ‘Zach said they’re going out.’

  ‘What would Zach know?’

  ‘He’s been doing filing for his old man at the courts. He saw Lena there holding Kevin’s hand.’

  ‘This is bullshit, Rick, and Zach is a dreamer.’

  ‘He’s not. He knows stuff.’

  And later, ‘Lena’s back with Sonny — Kevin might be going to have a little stay inside. Zach looked up his records and said he’s got it coming.’

  ‘Look here, Rick, and get this into your thick skull: I don’t want to know about Lena. If you mention her name again I’m gunna come up and deal to you, okay?’

  Rick got the message. He stopped phoning.

  The day of Dorice’s Christmas party, Arnie was in a bad mood. He blamed Elliot for things that were out of their control, for not moving fast enough and then for moving too fast.

  ‘See this here?’ he said holding the task book open on Friday’s page. ‘We’ve got all this to get done today and knock off early, and now you’ve gone at this surveillance job like a bull in a china shop. You don’t drill holes in a building until you’ve got the all-clear from me.’

  ‘You said—’

  ‘I said assemble the bracket.’

  ‘I thought—’

  ‘You’re not here to think. You’re costing me a fortune with mistakes like this and as for this bloody party, I don’t know why I agreed.’ Arnie dragged the ladder, making it shudder and bounce.

  ‘The bloody party was Dorice’s idea,’ Elliot said, ‘and I don’t care if we don’t go.’ Mentioning Dorice made Arnie calm down a bit, but they worked in sulky silence for the rest of the day.

  Dorice delivered on all fronts. The food was good, there was plenty of booze, and best of all there were people his own age. The big tearoom was packed with workers from the supply company, their partners and friends.

  ‘Come and meet Zeya,’ Dorice said to Elliot when he’d only been there five minutes. ‘I’m so pleased she’s here; such a lovely girl.’ Dorice had her hand in the small of Elliot’s back pushing him forward.

  ‘No. Soon. I’ll have a couple of drinks first.’

  ‘Rubbish. Be introduced; it’ll put you forward about an hour. Otherwise half the night’s wasted.’

  ‘No, Dorice!’ Elliot felt himself steered, with remarkable ease, towards a small, Asian-looking girl in the far corner.

  ‘Zeya, I’d like you to meet Elliot,’ Dorice said from a considerable distance. ‘He’s a young electrical prodigy Arnie’s snaffled up. And Elliot, this is Zeya. She’s here with her dad tonight, aren’t you, dear? I’ll leave you two to chat.’

  Elliot was horrified as well as delighted to see Dorice turn in the cramped corner and make her exit. Zeya, though, frowned and rolled her eyes as if she was already bored.

  Her skin was flawless and her eyes were black and intense. She was beautiful and exotic, and she looked at Elliot from under her thick shiny fringe as if to say, ‘You have one minute.’ Her voice when she did speak was posh, classy and scornful. ‘So you’re a prodigy and an anarchist?’

  The crowded room pushed them together and Elliot knew this was a no-win situation. Zeya Up-Herself had already made her judgments. ‘Prodigy’s a bit generous. I’d just go with your average sensation.’ Zeya tilted her head in a weary way and Elliot shrugged. She was so lovely to look at that he couldn’t bear to wander off. He gave it one more shot. ‘The A on my neck may look like the anarchy sign but it’s actually a medical thing. I get asthma, angina and acute aches around my ankles and abdomen.’

  She didn’t crack a s
mile.

  ‘And my arms.’

  ‘It may be funny to you, but where I come from, anarchy is a matter of life and death — not a joke.’

  ‘Really?’ At least she was speaking. ‘Where are you from?’ Elliot was sure it would be a place he’d never heard of.

  ‘Burma.’

  He’d never heard of it. ‘Burma?’

  ‘It’s in South East Asia.’

  ‘Anything to do with cats?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why don’t you tell me three facts that I should know about Burma?’

  She actually gave a hint of a smile. ‘Just because we’ve been introduced, you don’t have to,’ she waved a hand, ‘hang around.’

  ‘Am I bothering you?’

  ‘Well umm — not really.’

  Elliot decided to go with the ‘not really’ part. ‘I’d like to know,’ he said. He did want to know anything he could about this unusual girl. ‘Please?’

  She studied her drink for a while. It looked like lemonade in a wine glass. ‘Burma has two names: Burma and Myanmar.’ She held up her thumb as if to count off the facts. ‘Burma has eleven times the population of New Zealand and we are only twice the land size of your country—’

  ‘That’s pretty squeezed up.’

  She gave a shrug. ‘You have plenty of room here.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Umm.’ She looked around the room as if for inspiration.

  ‘What does Zeya mean and how do you spell it?’

  ‘Z-e-y-a,’ she spelled, ‘and it means successful.’

  Elliot nodded. He supposed she was successful, whatever that meant. He wondered why she was at the Christmas party and remembered Dorice mentioning her father. He couldn’t think of anyone connected to the supply company who could possibly have such a beautiful daughter, but as he looked around the room he saw the owner frowning at him. Mr Rashim’s dark skin, brooding eyes and slight accent suddenly made sense.

  Elliot tried out his theory. ‘So how come you’re here?’

  ‘I’m driving my father.’ Zeya looked over at Mr Rashim too and said, ‘I’ll have to go soon. He won’t like me talking to you.’

  Elliot couldn’t bear to ask why that would be. He decided to ignore ‘Old Man Rash’ as Arnie called him and risk everything. ‘Would we be able to catch up again?’

  ‘Catch up?’

  ‘Yes. Do something, you know — go somewhere together.’

  ‘A date?’ She looked as if she might choke.

  ‘Maybe. Yes.’

  ‘I don’t know you.’ She spun her glass by the stem and glanced over at her father again. ‘I have to go.’

  ‘But it’s just started.’

  She gave a short sharp laugh. ‘I still have to go.’ She offered her hand. ‘It was nice to meet you.’

  Elliot touched her tiny hand and said, ‘I wasn’t trying to be creepy. I live with Arnold Cashwell; I’m new and sometimes, well, it’s lonely.’

  ‘I don’t think you’re creepy; I just can’t go out with you.’ She smiled. ‘I’m sorry. Goodbye, Elliot.’

  ‘Bye, Zeya.’

  The rest of the night ahead suddenly seemed bleak.

  The rest of the night was bleak in a rowdy, debauched way. The workers in Mr Rashim’s company drank the bar dry. Elliot had arm wrestles with anyone who would take him on, and Arnie got mothered on a bottle of his own home brew, which he’d hidden behind the makeshift bar. It was a long hard trek from the road up to Arnie’s, when they finally arrived home.

  ‘You’re a good boy,’ Arnie said as he slipped and struggled up the path. ‘A good boy and a good worker. We need to find you a lady friend, that’s what Dorice says.’

  ‘That Zeya was kinda nice.’

  ‘Haha. I said a lady friend, not the bloody Queen of China or wherever she’s from.’

  ‘Burma.’ Elliot gripped the thick rope that looped up the side of the path. Arnie was wheezing in a scary way. ‘It’s a country with two names.’

  ‘Course it is; everyone knows that. It’s a country in a bloody mess, if you ask me. No, what you need,’ Arnie said and he stopped and leaned on the high wall, ‘is a nice, normal girl—’

  ‘Zeya was nice.’

  ‘Well, she ain’t normal — her father’s not anyway. He’s got plans for her and they won’t include you. He’ll be looking in Burma for her husband.’ Arnie put his rummy face up to Elliot’s. ‘She’s not the girl you want.’

  For some perverse reason she was exactly the girl Elliot wanted, but he shut up and gripped Arnie’s arm. ‘Come on, let’s get going. You’re getting soaked standing out here.’ Elliot guided and pulled Arnie up to the house, through the door and downstairs to his room. ‘Can you manage?’ he asked, silently begging the gods to spare him from undressing Arnie or taking him to the toilet.

  ‘I’ve managed for seventy-nine years without you and I’ll do it again tonight.’ Arnie held onto the bathroom door and looked at Elliot. ‘Can you manage? That’s what worries me.’

  It was Christmas Eve when Elliot was next at home and he arrived to see the house decorated with tinsel and a real Christmas tree wilting in the front lounge.

  He added his gifts to the pile, hugged his parents and grandmother and bent down to pet the dog.

  Nana struggled up to greet him, her big St Bernard’s tail cutting swathes in the air as she tried to lick his face. ‘Good girl, Nana. I’m home, huh? I’ve got ten days with you.’ She lifted her feet as if dancing and made her funny wheezy noise to show she was happy.

  There were preparations underway for Christmas dinner and Elliot was pleased to see the fridge door could hardly shut on all the food. There would be parties and fun and presents and even the air smelled like Christmas with pungent lilies in vases.

  Deeks came around to Brunswick Ave as soon as he heard Elliot was back. ‘Man, you’re ripped!’ Elliot said, noticing Deeks’ new body. He poked at his chest through the athletic black string singlet he wore. ‘When did you get off the couch?’

  ‘I’m sculpted,’ Deeks said. ‘A body like this would be worth a fortune in the States.’

  Elliot didn’t think so, but it was certainly an improvement on the fast-food shape Deeks had carried previously. He used his upgraded biceps at every opportunity and insisted on helping Russell and Lou lift things that didn’t need moving. ‘I’m having a beach party for New Year’s,’ he told the family as he sucked in big mouthfuls of air. He’d dragged a heavy outdoor table into a sunnier spot beside the clothesline.

  ‘We’ve heard,’ Rick said. ‘We’ll help you sell tickets.’

  ‘Good. Twenty-five bucks each, to cover the marquee, DJ and mini-tanker.’

  Christmas slipped by as Elliot, Deeks and Rick planned the New Year’s party. The site was a spare section next to Deeks’ grandmother’s house, on the beachfront. The people who owned the section were overseas and wouldn’t know about the party until it was over, as everything was going to be brought in and set up on the day. ‘A flash-party, in the true sense of the word,’ Deeks said.

  Deeks’ grandmother didn’t want him using her bach but she was happy for Deeks to pitch a little tent on her lawn and she gave him access to the outside loo and her power supply. ‘You’ll need a light and a fridge, dear,’ she’d said.

  He certainly did. It seemed a small matter that the lighting was for a marquee and the fridges were chilling the beer for hundreds of partygoers.

  The boys got to work on the afternoon of New Year’s Eve setting up and securing their boundaries. They’d hired a bouncer for the door; Deeks was torn between doing the job himself and enjoying his party.

  At three o’clock, ominous black clouds began to march across the sun as if to say, ‘We’ll wreck it if we want to.’

  The DJ came out to check the site and threatened to quit if his rain protection wasn’t better sorted.

  ‘You agreed to play in a marquee,’ Deeks said. He folded his arms in an intimidating way.

  ‘Yeah, but t
his bloody thing’s cheap. Look at the holes.’

  So Elliot and Deeks spent some of their profit buying a tent for the DJ, which they set up inside the marquee.

  ‘You need to provide food, and you can’t be supplying alcohol to minors,’ the local policeman said. No one had briefed him and he was pissed off. ‘I’ll get this thing shut down at the first hint of trouble, I’m telling you.’

  Dad was stringing up lights and making sure the power connections all had circuit breakers. He came over to give the boys a hand. ‘Come on, they’re good lads and they’ve been planning this for ages. Give them a break.’

  ‘Yeah, well, New Year’s bloody Eve, and no one bothers to inform the local cop? Great. Just great. How many tickets have you sold?’

  ‘I’d say about two hundred, wouldn’t you, Rooster?’

  ‘That means you’ve sold at least three hundred and we’ll get maybe five hundred. Bloody marvellous.’ The policeman took out a black handkerchief and wiped sweat off his top lip. ‘I’ll call in reinforcements; there’ll be roadblocks. We’ll check every car.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Deeks said, when he’d gone. ‘We’ll text a few people and warn them; the message will filter through.’

  At last it was a decent hour to crack the first beer. Elliot and Deeks sat on crates to survey their patch. The wind was gusting at some crazy speed but the marquee was holding. Some girls had come out to hang streamers and they’d tied them so the coloured strips floated like seaweed in the wind.

  ‘Cheers, boys — you’ve done well,’ Dad said. He opened a beer, too, and sat on one of the speakers. ‘I’ve decided to leave my ute here for you to sleep in tonight. Your mother’s coming out to pick me up and she’ll bring sleeping bags and pillows. There’s a few basic tools in the back for any electrical emergency, but otherwise look after my car as if your lives depend on it.’

  ‘Yeah, cheers, Dad.’ It was a big offer as Dad’s black work vehicle was his pride and joy.