She can feel all the parts screaming for attention.
The bubaroo. It’s the animal she sees in him and the way she responds.
Snuffling up her belly to her breast, sniffing her out, bobbing up and down on it and slipping off, like trying to get lips around an apple in a bucket.
Her breasts are the size and colour of watermelon.
Her breasts are not hers.
But they are all she can see when she looks down.
In the middle of the night they transfer her in a wheelchair to a private room, even though she’s a public patient.
She can’t take him home for a few days. Diabetes.
They put a pinprick in the underside of his foot. A bolt of rage at the first hurt.
He looks like an old man when he opens his mouth. He looks like Jimmy years down the track.
She wants them to keep their hands off him.
Beñat beds down on a couch and sleeps in his underwear and the nurses look anywhere in the room but at him.
She wants them to stop coming in.
Mona can’t sleep when the baby is lying right next to her in his little plastic capsule. He makes too many noises she hasn’t heard before.
Each minute she is reborn.
A world where she no longer has the answers.
Rowland’s a man’s name for a boy but he’ll grow into it.
It was Jimmy’s favourite song. ‘Shivers’.
He just needs to learn how to grow.
Ro.
You’ll need to do exercises every day to firm that up. The pouching below her belly button. The scars around and above. The colours of poo and what they might mean. The showering every time you wee and the warm water that soothes the sharp sting. The flickering fluoro and the threadbare blankets and the constant beeps from the nurses’ station and the room that’s always cold and never quite dark. The chorus of screams. Let sleeping babies lie. Wake him up every two hours to feed. Hand express like this. Don’t express or you’ll get engorged. Women’s hands on her breasts. Rough. Sandpaper hands. Milking her. The flick of the nipple and the tackle hold and the bright red breast when she sleeps on her side. When she sleeps. The sawing razor of a delicate mouth and the never getting it right, the never getting it right in time, as the breakable body arches, no matter how many times she does it. His lips are too small. Her nipple is too big. They are clumsy dance partners. The hovering of those three words. Failure. To. Thrive. The words that hang in the air even though the nurses haven’t said them. The watching him in the blue light and the sitting by his side and the fountain that comes from the floor and up through her body and drips out her eyes because of all the things she has to be now. The monstrous love that engulfs her and wraps them both and swaddles them in layers. The fear that is always there and hovering at the side of her vision, the fear too big to name.
In the night when she wants noise she watches hours of TV that she can’t remember in the morning.
When she wants quiet she sets her computer screen to a rolling display of family. Waves of memory. Jimmy swishes past her at random and she points him out to the baby as he cruises by, backed by a digital blue sky.
It takes one hour to feed and half an hour to get him to sleep and half an hour to prepare her nipples for the next feed and then he’s back on for an hour and when did she last have a sleep and her body is so heavy and her mind is so light.
She plays the game.
If she was an artwork she’d be a Roy Lichtenstein. Bold colours, red lipstick. Fifties glamour, speech bubbles.
When the maternity nurse turns up at the bungalow, it takes Mona fifteen minutes to recall the baby’s name.
She writes it down so she’ll remember next time.
The nurse squeezes and Mona drips.
If he keeps having trouble feeding, you might need to supplement with formula in a bottle.
The nurse squeezes and Mona’s drips stop.
The room at the maternal health centre is a waffle weave of banana yellow.
A poster points out the perils of co-sleeping with your baby. Another question to remember to lie about.
Beñat holds Ro when they walk in. He’s lying facedown stretched the length of Beñat’s forearm, tummy supported, staring at the floor.
As soon as Beñat shifts him upright Ro complains so Beñat swings him back.
Mona can’t hold him that way.
The maternity nurse is busy with her hands as she asks Mona questions.
Can I see how feeding is going?
Mona fumbles the latch on her singlet and bra with one hand as she tries to work out the best position.
She attempts the footy hold but it doesn’t work this time, Ro fidgety, and probably not latched on.
She can see the nurse watching her closely.
She doesn’t know whether to keep going or stick her pinkie in his mouth to unlatch him and try again. It makes Ro cry like she’s hurting him.
Beñat looks the other way.
Is that how you always do it?
The nurse’s face is tense, a reflection of how Mona feels, and she hates her for it.
The nurse takes Ro away and lies him on the scales before handing him to Beñat.
He is putting on a little bit of weight but I’d like to see more. Bring him back in a week’s time and I’ll organise a lactation consultant to drop in on you tomorrow. He can’t afford to lose any weight at this stage.
Mona looks at his chicken-bone arms and legs.
Even when she gets the chance to have a nap, she can’t. She hears his cry even when he’s asleep.
Now, I have a questionnaire for you.
The maternity nurse hands Mona a piece of paper and a pen.
Mona looks down at the examples.
Things have been getting on top of me: (a) Yes, most of the time, I haven’t been able to cope at all; (b) Yes, sometimes I haven’t been coping as well as usual; (c) No, most of the time I have coped quite well; (d) No, I have been coping as well as ever.
She’s done tests like this before. She averages out her answers, recognising the patterns. So easy to glide over the gap between her thoughts and her actions.
I have been able to laugh and see the funny side of things: (a) As much as I always could; (b) Not quite so much now; (c) Definitely not so much now; (d) Not at all.
The nurse takes the paper back, adds up the numbers, nods. She hasn’t smiled since they arrived, not even at Ro.
And lastly, I need to know whether you’ve had any thoughts of self-harm in the past weeks since the birth.
I haven’t had time to think about anything.
Any thoughts of suicide?
Mona slows down her voice, calm. She looks quickly at Beñat.
I’ve had thoughts of suicide every moment of every day in the past couple of months.
The nurse breathes out slowly, a spark of interest in her eyes now. She leans forward.
But not my own.
Home, Ro kicks his frog legs when Beñat gives him a bath. The gentle hand behind the neck and the look on Ro’s face, the encroachment, of comfort.
So light.
And in the witching hour each night, Mona and Beñat sit in Kaz’s bathtub and talk, glossing over pasts and imagining futures, as Ro swims between them, fingers flickering in the water or lying still on his back. The baby’s eyes follow the lace curtains as they writhe in the air.
Hands reach out when Mona needs them. A rocking and a bending and a glass of water as she expresses with the machine. Beñat plays guitar and sings Ro to sleep and Kaz feeds her dried apricots one at a time. Go to sleep you little baby.
In the backyard, after Beñat leaves to work in his studio, Mona takes to the laundry each morning, armed with a poo stick. Soaking and stirring, the whites and greens and spots and baby rabbits. The little suits with so many zeros on the labels lined up in a row on the Hills hoist straining. Some dry, some wet, matched with pegs.
A pink mood in the sunshine, the garden pastels of a Mo
net, not a cloud.
WHAT’S MY SCENE?
Castlemaine, 2010
Mona’s face is shiny from the fire and she’s lying down with the iPad perched on her knees.
She stretches out on the couch and looks around the room. It’s like she’s stepped into another person’s story. This house. So unlike theirs in Sydney. Its cool lines and exposed timber beams. Beñat’s carpentry in the coffee table and chairs.
It’s like living in a church.
Her furniture is still in storage. She might leave it there.
It’s so much easier to be surrounded by new things.
She’s got a few hours before Ro’s night feed. She pours a glass of shiraz.
The opening drum beat of Countdown. A toke of Alpine menthol.
Heart flashing neon as she waited, all the girls waited, for those bands to appear like mirages.
The video quality is so fuzzy it’s hard to make out faces.
Mona gets off the couch and starts dancing, remembering the lyrics as she moves. The music seems so much slower than it used to.
She flickers her hands in front of her face like Robert Smith. It always made Jimmy laugh.
She sits down and watches closely.
Then again.
What the?
It’s him, she’s sure of it.
On screen his face is pale and puffy, dusty eyeliner under dark fringe. His body moves, beating against the guitar. As he wanders out near the catwalk the girls reach up and try to drag him off the stage. He stumbles.
She presses pause on YouTube. Hits rewind. Again.
That’s why Beñat seemed so familiar the first time they met. She can see it now. The hair. The asymmetrical cut. It was the name that threw her.
She starts clicking on all the band’s clips, fast-forwarding to find him.
When he finally comes in from the studio, he slides his beanie off onto the table and puts his wallet down, taking coins out of his pockets and piling them up as if he is about to be punished.
Jimmy used to leave them everywhere.
Beñat rubs the side of his bald head with a heavy hand.
He eyes the glass she is waving around.
Party for one? he says.
I thought I could have a couple of wines if you give Ro a bottle?
She points to the paused image. She peers close to the screen, her face bright in the glow.
I was wondering how long it would take for you to find those clips.
My friends used to dream about you. They camped outside your hotel. I can’t believe it!
Your friends?
He pretends to be hurt.
I just watched you on Solid Gold! We used to imagine we were the Solid Gold dancers.
We were zombies on that show. I don’t even remember it. I don’t want to remember it.
He goes to the kitchen and gets a glass of water.
I saw you play once. At the Myer Music Bowl with a lot of other bands. Benny and Guy!
She points to the guitarist.
He was your brother, right? He died …
Guillaume. Guy. About ten years ago.
The grog has caught up with her and she slows down, leans against the curved side of the couch.
He sits next to her.
What happened?
We were just about to sign with another record company. He never turned up to the meeting. I just knew. He was always drinking but he always turned up. I found him in bed.
He gets up to plug the iPad in to recharge.
‘Close Up’, that’s his song. It’s personal, you know. I find it hard to listen to. I stopped playing those songs when he died.
Don’t you miss being in a band?
That’s one of the reasons I came here, you know. In Melbourne, people would come up. Would I know the song? Sing it to me! It was easier to make instruments. No one knew me here. I didn’t have to talk to anyone. The last time I heard it I was in a supermarket in Northcote. It was quiet and our song came on. There was no one around and I started bopping along. I stood under the speaker until it had almost finished. I went to the checkout and I asked, Do you like this song? That’s me. The girl, she shrugged her shoulders and gave me a weird look, as if I was some kind of paedophile.
Mona grabs his hand.
I can’t believe I didn’t recognise you.
Beñat leans down and starts taking off her Uggs.
For years I’d follow Guy when he went up the street. He used to ride his bike when he was drunk. I was always getting calls from the hospital.
Yeah, I was worried Jimmy wouldn’t survive without me, you know. He would rapid-cycle. All I wanted was for him to be safe.
She rolls over and hugs a cushion.
In the end, it didn’t make any fucking difference. He couldn’t be a husband or a father. I just didn’t want to see it.
As soon as she says father, a cranky scream comes from Ro’s cot in their bedroom.
Look, I can’t do this tonight. There’s a bottle of breastmilk in the fridge. Can you feed him? Mona says.
She rubs the top of Beñat’s head.
You could still pull off that wedge haircut.
He carries her to bed and helps her into pyjamas before picking Ro up.
Only if I wore a really bad wig.
This is what he wants to tell her.
Too early.
Saturday morning.
Lighting.
Miming vocal.
Taking vocal off track.
Guillaume playing with it live.
Starting late.
Stopping early.
The girls hate it.
When we don’t pretend.
The drums mime too.
Kit supplied.
Screwed up with white paper.
Foam-taped plastic cymbals.
Wind-up toys.
Puppets.
Here comes the puppet master.
There all day.
With Plastic Bertrand.
He is the king of the divan.
What the fuck is a divan?
It’s the best meal we’ve eaten.
Potatoes in white sauce.
The colour of Connie’s hair.
Peas in gravy.
That stick to the spoon.
Guillaume flicks them at the roof.
They hang like little planets.
Small whirlpools of girls.
Everything so much smaller.
Big dreams reduced in an instant.
The girls are lethargic.
They save their screams for Duran Duran.
They shoot.
We act.
It’s like a factory.
Push ’em through.
One size fits all.
The afterparty at Molly’s.
We’re banned from his house.
He thinks Guillaume’s stolen something.
He’s probably right.
What sticks and what doesn’t.
Blondie shakes my hand.
Deborah Thomas on the back of a motorbike.
A house in Port Melbourne with Helmut Newton.
Wherever you go, Guillaume fits in.
National TV exposure.
Means shame on the streets.
Three months ago feels ancient.
Stuck in aspic on the ABC.
We are rehearsed.
Prepared.
It takes a lot of practice.
To make it look like chaos.
We pretend it’s about being real.
But talking to the audience.
It’s fake.
Fuck you and disengaged.
It’s better.
We learnt that from Iggy.
When you’re seventeen.
You haven’t made a decision.
You don’t know what shape you’ll take.
You reject your parents.
The suburb you live in.
You open wide and say ah.
You take everything.
&
nbsp; As it comes.
This is what he wants to tell her.
When Mona asks.
What’s it like to be on Countdown?
HEY LITTLE GIRL
Castlemaine, 2010
Mona takes a drive. It’s dusk and it’s been raining a little. She’s looking for where the water is collecting, the sides of the road.
Down near the caravan park, a puddle so still and the light from it. She could walk up and walk through. Could suspend the outside.
In that moment, there’s another world in there.
But when Mona drives to Barkers Creek it’s nearly gone, the light.
Off-track, where the mine shafts threaten to swallow her into the earth, she doesn’t know the language. The history, the geography, of what she’s looking at and standing on.
She can’t name the birds singing and often she doesn’t even hear them.
She carries her camera, alert to the one shot, to pin it down, to find a new way of seeing the place she grew up.
Looking for evidence, too.
In the derelict miner’s cottage where they used to sit and smoke. The tree at the Res with the rope so high only Jimmy could reach it. Launching the tyre swing up and over the lake.
But there’s empty paddock now where the cottage was and the rope is still there but has no tyre. She climbs up but still can’t reach.
If she played the game now she’d be wrapped in Christo gold silk, protected from the weather.
A building scaffolded before a razing to the ground. A blurred black-and-white photograph, a historical artefact all that remains. A computer-generated image in a neat and clean design. An architectural model of rebuild and what she might become.
She doesn’t see the ghost of him, doesn’t see traces.
They could play that game for the rest of their lives. Whose grief weighs more. Density. The mass of it.
The beat of it propels her through the day and night.
A dead weight. Like that scene in Japanese Story, dragging the wet body around.
But she doesn’t want it to solidify. This gap between what she thinks and the art she makes.
A gap captured in the minutes it takes for the polaroid to develop. Finding out exactly what she’s caught.
Holes. Holes in walls. Photographs of holes in walls. Holes in trees.
She wants to transition through them and for the people looking to come with her.
They’re not holes you can see through.
Almost a Mirror Page 11