by Albert Wendt
The funeral director, Mailo, who’s been hovering attentively in the background, steps into the space the tide has left, and asks, ‘Do you need more time with Mr Whairangi?’ Mere looks at the others.
Ripeka and Mason step up to the head of the coffin. Ripeka starts weeping silently, as she caresses the glass and gazes down at Aaron’s face. Mason puts his arm round her. Perhaps they have changed their views of their brother, Daniel hopes.
Led by Cheryl, the rangatahi circle and lay their hands on the coffin. ‘Uncle, you were the greatest: the Bomb!’ Phillip exclaims. ‘Yeah, Uncle, you were the Man!’ someone else adds.
‘Is it all right now to lower Mr Whairangi down into the cremation area?’ Mailo asks. Mere nods once. Mailo presses a button on the barrier around the coffin. There is a barely audible whirring sound, then the elevator holding up the coffin starts moving downwards, slowly, taking the coffin with it. Daniel picks up some of the gardenia and drops them onto the coffin. The others do the same.
‘’Fa, Aaron!’ Cheryl and Laura call.
‘Haere rā, my brother!’ Ripeka cries.
‘Would any of you like to come down?’ Mailo asks. The image of the door opening and the coffin sliding into the raging fire fills Daniel’s thoughts. He isn’t going down to see Aaron being consumed by the flame. None of the others do either.
35
‘I don’t know if you want to hear this, Dad, but I think it’ll make you feel – ah, glad, hopeful,’ Cheryl interrupts his thoughts as soon as their plane reaches cruising altitude, heading for Wellington and his mother. Cheryl arranged everything beforehand, right down to the time of their visit to the old people’s village after he told her, when they got home from Aaron’s funeral, that he wanted to accompany her to Wellington and his mother. She’d been so elated she hadn’t asked him why he’d changed his mind.
‘So?’ he asks, amused by her way of wanting to appear considerate about his feelings.
‘Mum wanted to come with us,’ she starts, then pauses. Looking at him, she adds, ‘or at least she asked me if she should come with us. But I told her no because I know you two are still trying to sort out your new, complicated relationship. Having her and that as part of our luggage would have added more stress to you meeting your mother.’
‘That was very thoughtful of you, darling.’ He agrees with her logic and concern, but he still wishes Laura was there to help him cope with his dread.
‘By the way, how are you two getting on?’
‘Okay, all right, I don’t know – it’s so …?’
‘So mixed-up?’ she offers. He nods repeatedly, giving himself time to continue searching for the language to describe how he is feeling about Laura. Laying her consoling hand on his arm, Cheryl says, ‘She still loves you, Dad, despite all the painful shit you put her through.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I know, Dad; she doesn’t have to tell me. Dad, I know a little bit about love!’ She laughs. He definitely doesn’t want to go into that territory; not then, and not with his daughter. ‘There you go again, Dad: you refuse to admit there is such a thing as love.’
‘No, I don’t do that!’
‘Your poetry and novels spend a hell of a lot of time delving into love, but, in your real life, you refuse to discuss it even with yourself.’ Her laughter is now quite loud, and he hopes it isn’t attracting the attention of the other passengers. He glances round furtively: being an early morning flight, the plane is full of suited businessmen and women.
‘That’s not true, Cheryl!’
‘If it’s not true, why are you having enormous problems admitting to yourself and us that you still love your mother, Dad? And why haven’t you forgiven her?’ He struggles to find the correct refutation for her disturbing accusations. ‘You know what Mum and Mere and the others agree on about you, Dad?’ He cringes into himself, expecting another painful blow. ‘They all agree that if you don’t sort out your relationship with your mother, you won’t be able to sort out your relationship to Mum, and to your fucked-up life.’
The blow isn’t so cruel, because, at Aaron’s funeral, that was the conclusion he’d arrived at himself, and what had made him want to go to Wellington. ‘Agree?’ she asks. He nods, without looking at her.
For the rest of their flight they reminisce about Aaron’s funeral, Cheryl doing most of the talking. Just before they land, he recalls the meeting he had with Fletcher Whangarua two days before.
Another brisk summer morning. The delicious smell of bacon and coffee wrapped around Daniel as he entered the Ponsonby Green Café. Fletcher ‘Fletch’ Whangarua was waiting for him at the back corner table. He’d rung Daniel the day before to arrange this meeting. There weren’t many customers, but Daniel recognised two of Fletch’s men, who’d been at the funeral, at a table just inside the door, and waved to them. The one with the facial moko smiled and waved back. Fletch called good morning as he rose to his feet. Daniel leaned in to hongi him and sat down in the chair opposite.
‘Bloody great tangi,’ Fletch said. ‘Thanks to you and your Tribe and rangatahi, our rangatira got a fantastic send-off.’ Daniel smiled, and realised his previous apprehension about this meeting had disappeared. ‘Did you like the cover of his programme send-off?’ Fletch waited for Daniel’s laughter, and then laughed too. ‘Man, our Aaron had a great sense of humour.’
‘Yes.’ Daniel knew he had to – if not control this meeting – be an equal partner in it. ‘He was a gifted coach of our rugby team, the Tribe,’ he joked.
Laughing, Fletch said, ‘That’s good; yeah, that’s good. He was certainly a great coach of the team we formed, too.’ Daniel noticed that, though Fletch was dressed casually in jeans, a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt and sports shoes, he still exuded that expensive air that he’d noticed at the funeral, of someone who always wanted to be in control. ‘What would you like for breakfast, Dan? Great kiwi tucker here: sausages, eggs, bacon, tomatoes and toast.’
‘I’ll have that, but with one poached egg and a double-strength latte,’ Daniel told him. Fletch beckoned, and a young waitress hurried over.
Daniel ate his meal while Fletch reflected on Aaron’s tangi in flattering terms. As he got closer to describing the haka, Daniel sensed he was getting into the gist of their meeting, and his tight apprehension resurfaced. ‘You saw them, there, of course,’ Fletch pointed out, his face and whole presence contracting into a compact threat. Daniel nodded once, and caught Fletch’s eyes glinting. ‘The bastards were there,’ Fletch whispered.
‘The fucking gall …’ Daniel encouraged him.
‘Yeah, they had the fucking arrogance and gall to come …’
‘And gloat at Aaron’s tangi.’ Daniel completed it for him.
‘I was so offended – and angry – I wanted to …’
‘Pay them back.’
‘Yeah, gut them right then and there!’
‘But?’
‘I knew Aaron wanted me to talk to you first.’
Daniel nodded slowly. ‘It’s in his will, what he wants done.’
‘To the bastards who – who killed him?’
‘Yes, what he wants done.’
‘And?’ The shine in Fletch’s eyes intensified; he was so eager and hungry and urgent. ‘They betrayed him after he helped them become the biggest …’ But he stopped abruptly.
‘Feau and Bonzy are from our childhood in Freemans Bay, Fletch. And you’re right, Aaron was their friend who helped put them where they are.’
‘They’re not from my boyhood,’ Fletch scoffed. ‘Aaron and me and the boys worked with them on some deals, recently, and they …’
‘It’s best that I don’t know any more about those deals, Fletch.’
Fletch understood. ‘What does Aaron want done?’ he asked ‘Does he want what me and the boys want?’
‘What is that?’ Daniel said, look
ing into the glowing depths of Fletch’s eyes.
‘Utu, man, utu!’ Fletch whispered, out of hundreds of years of Māori history and life. Daniel nodded, once; that was all he needed to do. It was so easy. ‘Yeah,’ Fletch added. ‘It is the proper thing for us to do. They killed our rangatira.’
36
Memory, by enabling us to recall some of what has happened to us, allows us to believe we exist in the present with a past and a self that is different and separate from others. Your dread about your mother’s Alzheimer’s now grips the depths of your belly. How much memory loss has she suffered? How much of the mother you knew is left to hold at bay the total loss of self and consciousness? How is she going to react to you after twenty years of your denial?
‘When did you last see her?’ Daniel asks Cheryl, as she drives him through the slow wind and up the steep hills into Khandallah, towards Pacific Sunset Park, the sun flowing in strips across the bonnet of their car.
‘Last Easter, when Mum and I came down to see her.’ Cheryl hesitates; she’d not meant to let that revelation slip. ‘Mum wanted to come but I didn’t want to tell you in case you didn’t like that. Mum, after she saw Grandmother, immediately took charge of all her legal and financial affairs.’ She pauses. ‘I’m bloody glad she did that.’ She reaches across and touches his shoulder. ‘Dad, she’s not as ill as you are imagining her to be. Stop being such a pessimist. And she has enough money to care for herself. Not many people can afford this place.’ To reassure him further she talks enthusiastically about the facilities and staff of Pacific Sunset Park, concluding, ‘Grandma has her own self-contained apartment in the front row with a fabulous view of Wellington Harbour, and a full-time care-giver she chose. He is Samoan-Māori, and she says he’s “so unusual and loving”’.
A short while later, they are driving through the front gates of Pacific Sunset Park.
‘Your grandmother is expecting you, Miss Malaetau,’ says the manager, a short rotund man. ‘But I didn’t know Mister Malaetau was coming too.’
‘We wanted to surprise her,’ Cheryl counters. ‘How is she?’
The manager hesitates and then says, ‘Physically, she’s very fit and well. But we can now never be sure of her emotional and psychological well-being …’
‘Why?’ Daniel interrupts.
‘She now talks mainly in Samoan. Like many of our family members – everyone here is a member of our Pacific Sunset family – she is reverting to the language of her childhood. And apart from Muta, her caregiver, none of us know Samoan. But we’re fixing that deficiency. Every week, a Samoan psychologist – Doctor Aneesee – comes to talk with her, and he gives us his assessment of her health.’
‘And?’
‘There’s been no deterioration in her memory since she joined us three years ago,’ he says. Daniel’s pessimism won’t allow him to believe the manager, but he doesn’t say anything.
The manager walks between him and Cheryl as they move along the walkway, through neat beds of flowers and shrubs, to his mother’s apartment.
The manager knocks on the front door. A few seconds later, it swings back decisively. In the doorway stands a man who must be Muta, smiling, in a navy blue silk shirt, black trousers and black shoes. His stubby fingers are alive with glittering rings. ‘Cheryl, Cheryl!’ he exclaims, and then encompasses her in his large arms. Cheryl hugs him and kisses him on the cheek. ‘Wow, expensive perfume, girl!’ he cries.
‘My dad can afford to give his daughter gifts like that. Eh, Dad?’ Cheryl laughs.
‘So this is your famous Dad, eh?’ Muta says. Daniel stretches his hand out, and Muta grips it softly. ‘Welcome to your mother’s beautiful home. Ia sūsū mai, ma tala mai ‘a‘ao!’ He steps aside and Daniel enters the apartment.
It has a familiar scent: lemon and coconut oil, his mother’s signature smell. Like a truth serum, it will continue to search out, expose and detail every memory of his life with her. ‘She is on the veranda in her favourite chair, enjoying her favourite view,’ Muta informs them. Cheryl and the manager wait for Daniel’s reaction. Daniel gazes at Cheryl but she looks away, leaving it to him.
‘Does she know I’m here?’ Daniel asks. Muta shakes his head, once.
‘Do you want Muta to tell her before you meet her, sir?’ the manager suggests.
‘No, I’ll talk to her first,’ Cheryl decides for Daniel. She holds Muta’s hand and they go out to the veranda, while Daniel watches. The lemon-coconut scent grips his heart and drags it up into his throat.
Tautasi, his mother, is sitting motionless in a white armchair, with her back to him. Only her silver-haired head is showing above the back of the chair. She gazes into the large expanse of wild summer sky and harbour stretching into the haze, and Eastbourne barely visible on the other side. It is a stark, unforgettable image of her; he identifies it as symbolic of the eternal loneliness that he has abandoned her to.
Cheryl and Muta go round the chair and face her. Cheryl reaches forward and down into her grandmother’s outstretched arms. In their deep embrace, Daniel feels their unqualified alofa for each other, and he wants to flee from it. Cheryl sits down on the right arm of her grandmother’s chair and, with her left arm round her shoulders, talks to her, but he can’t hear what they’re saying.
‘I’ll leave you to it, sir,’ the manager interrupts his concentration. ‘I hope it all turns out the way you expect.’ He turns and leaves.
‘All Cheryl’s told her is that she has a visitor – someone she knows well – and she’s eager to meet you,’ Muta informs Daniel when he returns. ‘I think that’s best, sir. Some days, her recognition and memory are spot on; some days, not so good. Some days she believes you are other people from her past. O uiga lava ia o le ma‘i lea ua maua ai si ou kigā.’ Muta turns to go, then stops, and says, ‘If it’s of some consolation, she talks about you often …’
‘But may not recognise me today?’ Daniel asks. Muta nods.
When Cheryl beckons Daniel with her right arm, he sees her arm as a fishing line reeling him in, and he lets himself go with it, apprehensive but now wanting, yes, yearning to see and know. He tries to smile as he moves up to Cheryl, and she winds her arm round his waist and takes him round the chair.
Slowly, with her eyes and face enthused with the wondrous glow of recognition, his mother rises to her unsteady feet, smiling as she stretches her frail arms to him. He moves into her embrace and warmth and familiar smell and all that he has known of her and their life together, and with her warm breath surging into his ear, she cries, ‘Arona, Arona, ua e koe sau e asi mai a‘u!’ Shocked for a surprised moment by her misrecognition of him, Daniel hesitates, but when he feels her tears on his left cheek, he starts weeping too, and then sobbing. ‘Ua leva e ke le‘i koe sau. Ia ku‘u loa le kagi. Ku‘u!’ She caresses his head, which is pressed against her shoulder, consoling him, though she believes she is holding Aaron. When Daniel’s sobbing eases, she holds the sides of his face and, pushing his head back, so she can look into his eyes, she asks, ‘Arona, where is your friend Dan? Ga lua o i le aoga i le kaeao?’ He looks up at Cheryl, who nods once.
‘La e gofo Dan for their rugby practice,’ Daniel says, accepting her reality and playing along with it, though he is still alarmed – and jealous? – she is seeing him as Aaron.
‘Ou ke le maga‘o e lakapi Dan. Ke‘i ua lavea.’ She pauses and then says, in English, ‘It’s his father who want him for to play rugby. And Dan always does what his bloody father want him to do. Ask Cheryl.’
‘Yes, Granddad always gets his way with Dan,’ Cheryl agrees, though she wasn’t alive in the time period her grandmother is now living in.
‘Dan should be like you, Arona,’ his mother says. ‘You love your mother and always do what she want, eh, Aaron.’ Daniel nods repeatedly. ‘Aumai se gofoa mo Arona,’ she says to Cheryl, who brings over one of the folding chairs and puts it beside her. She pats the c
hair, and Daniel sits down on it. ‘Fai ia Muta e fai se kakou morning tea,’ she says.
Cheryl says yes, and disappears quickly into the apartment, leaving Daniel abandoned and once again exasperated by Aaron’s dominant presence in his life. Aaron had been his mother’s favourite child in their neighborhood – but then he was every other parent’s favourite too. How are you to resolve your relationship to your mother when she is seeing Aaron and not you? Daniel asks himself. Or is she only pretending? Daniel scrutinises her: as usual, she is neat and tidy, but she isn’t physically the mother he knew when he was at high school. He is shocked by how much she has aged and shrunk. Her skin has loosened and hangs from her bones, and through her pale and wrinkled skin shines a glowing fragility: a glow that will keep expanding until it has claimed all of her, at her death.
‘And how are your mother and your sister and brother?’ Daniel hears her asking.
‘They’re well, thank you, Mrs Malaetau.’
‘Always the polite Arona, eh. You should get your friend Dan for to act like you. I spoil him too much; let him get away with anything. His father don’t even try for to stop me.’ She stops, and withdraws into herself. ‘Ae, ese le poko o si a‘u kama,’ she says, surprising Daniel, and when Daniel glances at her, he sees tears in her eyes.
‘Yes, Dan is certainly the brightest in our class, Mrs Malaetau,’ Daniel says. Strangely, he doesn’t feel dishonest.
‘I force him to do the best at his schoolwork. I make him study and study, and I take him to the library and make him read all the books there.’ She thinks about that, chortling. Daniel has to agree with her: she made him do two hours of homework every night, and she marked and checked it; and though she hardly read herself, she insisted he spend three hours at the library every Saturday morning while she did her shopping. He watched three movies of her choice on TV weekly and one movie of Dad’s choice at the local cinemas on Saturday mornings, and had to do hours and hours of revision before every test and examination. The study routine freed him from all family chores he didn’t want to do: all he had to do was tell her he had homework, and she would cancel those chores.