The Vintage and the Gleaning

by Jeremy Chambers

  So it all happened because of this Florence trip. And it was at the end of Year Ten when they told us about it, our Italian class going to Florence for a semester, and it wasn’t like I really wanted to go to Florence in particular, it was just because all my friends were going and the idea of going overseas and getting a semester off. So it’s not like Florence itself was important, I mean, I didn’t even know anything about Florence or care, really. But I did want to go.

  So I gave my father the forms when I came home for the summer holidays and then the next day he asked me to come into his study. And he started talking about the drought and these big warehouses full of wool that they couldn’t sell and the price of wheat and I honestly didn’t know what he was going on about, or why. I just didn’t understand, because my father had never talked to me about money before, I mean his money, the problems with the farm. I had no idea, none. And he told me that he was borrowing every year, from the bank, just to keep the farm going. That every year he was getting further and further in debt.

  But one thing he didn’t tell me, and he didn’t tell me this until much later, after everything with Brett, when we really, finally actually had it out, the last time I ever spoke to my father, what he didn’t tell me was that he’d taken out a mortgage on the farm and it was to pay for my school fees. He really couldn’t afford to send me to that school and for me to stay at the boarding house, but I had no idea about it then. I had no idea that he’d done that, mortgaged the farm, for me, just so I could go to that school. I didn’t have a clue, I just took it all for granted. Because I thought we were rich, or well off at the very least. The idea that we might not be able to afford something had never really crossed my mind.

  And so when I gave him the form for the Florence trip I just assumed, I never thought it would be a problem, I mean, my father had never said no to me before, not for anything. So, when I finally realised what he was saying, that he was saying I couldn’t go on the trip to Florence, I mean, I just didn’t understand. I didn’t believe we couldn’t afford it, I really didn’t believe it. I thought we had all this money and my father was just being mean, stingy. My poor father. I just went off at him. I was horrible. I said the worst things to him. I can’t remember exactly what I said, but I know, I remember the look on his face, I’ll always remember that look on his face. It was like he was ashamed. Ashamed that he didn’t have the money, that for the first time he couldn’t give me something I had asked for, this one thing. It was like he’d failed me, just this look of absolute defeat.

  So I was throwing this massive tantrum, crying and screaming, and then my mother came in, and of course she just made things worse. And I stormed out of the house. I just kept walking and walking and I didn’t know where I was going and I didn’t care. I must have walked for miles, I can’t remember, but somehow I found myself in town and it didn’t even feel like I’d walked all that way, but I was just in this absolute rage, this blind fury.

  It must have been a Friday or a Saturday, because the pubs were open, even though it was dark by then, and I went into one of them, because my father hated pubs, and beer, and, I suppose, the sort of men who went there. He’d always warned me off going into pubs, so that’s why I went in. Just to spite him. But as soon as I was inside, all these sleazy old men started coming up to me, offering to buy me drinks and I got scared.

  And it was Brett who came to my rescue. He was sitting down at the other end of the bar, and he just walked over and told all the men to piss off and they did. And at the time, there was something about that, it seemed brave or noble or something, and I think it was then, already way back then, I think that’s when I was first attracted to Brett.

  Because people respected him, or that’s how it seemed at the time, anyway. Of course now I know that it wasn’t respect at all. It was because they were afraid of him. It was fear, not respect. But, I don’t know, maybe I knew that even back then. I mean, I knew Brett’s reputation, everyone did. And to be honest, that might have been what attracted me to Brett. That people were afraid of him. Maybe I liked it, and I’d like to say that wasn’t the case, but to be honest, I think it was, I think it was that. And I’d like to say that I don’t like it about him anymore, and it’s a terrible thing to say, but when I’m with him, around town, I think I do like it, knowing it, that feeling. Seeing the way people act around him, knowing that they’re afraid of him. That’s not good, is it. But I can’t help it. It’s just how I am.

  Anyway, after that, after he had got rid of all the old men, Brett stayed at the bar with me and he bought me a drink and talked to me and I was surprised, meeting him for the first time, talking to him. I mean, everything I knew about him, just from people talking, all the things I knew or thought I knew about Brett Clayton, all the stories, they just didn’t seem to fit. He was friendly and laid back and he listened to me. He was nice, he seemed really nice. And then he offered to drive me home and I said, yes, and I thought, I just assumed that, well, something would happen, on the way home, and I remember thinking it would serve my father right if I ended up getting raped by Brett Clayton, because of him, because of my father. That it would all be his fault. I mean, I can’t believe I would actually think a thing like that, but I remember it. That’s exactly what I thought.

  But Brett didn’t try anything at all, and that surprised me too. He even offered to walk me to the door and I suppose that’s when I realised that all the things people said about him, well, they were actually true, most of it was true, but even so, Brett was still so different from what I expected.

  And so that’s when it all started. I hardly talked to my father at all that summer, I was still so angry at him, and I started hanging around with Brett and his friends. I think at first it was mostly just to get back at my father, but then it was because I enjoyed it. I liked them and I especially liked Brett. Not that we were together or anything, not back then. I didn’t even think Brett was interested in me, I mean, not in that way. I thought if he had been, then he would have tried something that night, that first night I met him at the pub. But he hadn’t and he never did, not that summer. I still liked him, you know, although a lot of the other girls did as well, in the group. But it wasn’t just because of Brett that I hung around with them. I sort of became part of the group. And I really remember that summer.

  So I suppose that summer was in the middle of it all, when some things had changed, but before everything really changed. Even so, I suppose that was part of it, part of things changing already, for me, being with Brett and his friends, that summer. I was just really happy when I was with them, because with them I felt like I could be myself and it was such a relief. It was so different to being with my friends at school, I mean, with them I could never be myself, and I don’t think I realised that until I got to know Brett and his friends. At school we were always trying to outdo each other, like we were in competition with each other all the time, always bitching about friends behind their backs, bitching about each other and then changing friends and someone would be on the outside and then it would all change again and it would be someone else, and we were just awful to each other, as bad as we were to any of the other girls, well, worse really, much worse, because we were meant to be friends. And it was exhausting, always trying to be better than everyone else, better than your own friends, worrying about what they might be saying behind your back. There was something wrong about it, just plain wrong. They weren’t real friends, they weren’t friends at all. But I don’t think I’d realised that before.

  Because with Brett’s friends everything was so relaxed and it was all completely different and it was so nice, just being with them, going down to the river and sitting around talking, lying in the sun, going for a swim and everyone laid back and easygoing and no pressure, none at all. I never felt like I had to impress anyone, or be anything except myself and it was just nice and I had never been with people like that before. And I was happy. That summer I was happy.

  But my parents, I mean, they
acted like it was the end of the world, me hanging around with Brett and his friends. Like I’d gone completely off the rails. And I remember fighting with my mother constantly, all that summer. My mother kept saying I was throwing my life away, and even my father, I mean, I wasn’t talking to my father, but he still suggested, through my mother, that I invite one of my school friends to come up and stay. And how could I explain, I didn’t even try to explain, because I knew they would never understand.

  And Brett’s friends never treated me as any different from them, I mean, because of me going to a private school or because my family had a farm and money. And they’d listen to what I’d say. You know, they were interested in me, as a person. And I don’t think I’d ever really had that before. And sure, it’s true they weren’t perfect. They smoked a lot of dope and drank a lot and they did get into a lot of strife, with the police and shop owners and other people in the town, you know, they could get a bit wild and start making trouble, just for the hell of it really, and they always talked back to people, in town, but that’s because the people, you know what they’re like, they’d say stuff, make comments, tell us off, when we were hanging around the fish and chip shop or on the steps of the bank. I mean, there was always someone who’d make some comment, tell us off for something small, something petty, especially older men, you know, RSL types, just because they were old and bitter and didn’t like seeing us hanging around doing nothing, having fun. So Brett’s friends would give them lip and then of course they got the police called on them, but really nobody had any real right to tell them off in the first place, because they weren’t doing any harm, they were just hanging around, being teenagers.

  And a lot of them had pretty tough lives already, growing up, and maybe that was part of it, maybe that made them more mature, you know, like it had made them grow up fast, and maybe that’s why they looked out for each other like they did, because a lot of them had it really hard at home. I mean, some of the stories they told me, especially the girls, some of the things that had happened to them, with their fathers or their fathers’ friends, uncles. I could hardly believe some of the things they told me, I mean, I’d never heard of things happening like that before.

  And you’d think all that would have made them worse, and it’s true a lot of them had problems, drugs and alcohol, and some of the guys could get really violent, and it has got worse for a lot of them since. I mean, some of them have ended up junkies or in prison, that sort of thing. But at the time, when I was listening to them, when they were telling me about themselves, I felt like I’d lived such a sheltered life and I suppose I had. And, I mean, I felt so lucky compared to them, but at the same time I felt like I didn’t have any real experience of life, I mean, nothing real, nothing like the things they’d been through. I felt like I hadn’t lived, like I hadn’t lived at all.

  And Brett never had it easy either. Not that he ever talked about it back then, but after, when we were together, when he told me about his life, and I’m not making any excuses for him, for what he’s done or how he is, but he’s never had it easy. And sometimes, when I think about it, it seems like he never really had a chance, not much of a chance anyway, and really it’s no wonder he’s turned out like he has, and that’s not an excuse, it’s just how things are.

  I mean, when Brett was growing up his father was never around, so he was pretty much raised by his stepmother. And she had her own two boys and they were horrible to Brett all of them. His stepbrothers bullied him, picked on him, and the stepmother, I don’t know what her problem was, maybe it was something to do with his father coming and going all the time and everything, but it was Brett she took it out on and none of that was his fault. I mean she essentially kicked him out of the house. He used to sleep on a bed on the verandah, even in winter. I mean, can you imagine that? And he says that he was scared all the time, when he was a little boy, he was always scared of doing something wrong, because his stepmother would beat the hell out of him at any excuse. He says that sometimes he didn’t even know what he’d done wrong, and now he thinks that maybe those times he hadn’t actually done anything at all, that she was just taking things out on him. His father was the same too, when he was around. And Brett was only a little boy, for Christ’s sake.

  So yes, Brett had it hard too, growing up, but he knew it wasn’t so bad, not compared to a lot of his friends, but it was this thing that happened to him when he was a teenager, before I knew him. And Brett says I’m the only person he ever told about it. I mean, I can’t even bear to think about it, what he must have gone through and what it must have done to him. I don’t know, sometimes I even wonder why he’s not worse than he is.

  He must have been about fifteen, sixteen and he’d gone down to the beach for New Year’s Eve with his mates. They were drinking on the beach and Brett passed out and his mates went off and left him there on the beach, sort of as a joke. But when he came to, there was this group of men, and, I mean, even today it’s hard to believe it actually happened. These men, they were holding him down, and one of them had a belt around Brett’s neck and he was strangling him. They were trying to kill him. They were actually trying to kill him. And Brett says that while it was happening, while they were trying to strangle him, none of the men said anything, not to him, not to each other, and he says that was one of the strangest things about it, the silence. And the man who had the belt around his neck, who was trying to strangle him, this man’s face was right up close to his and Brett says he had this really foul breath and he says he’ll never forget that, the man’s face and his breath. He still has nightmares about it, even now.

  Anyway, so Brett blacked out and he says the next thing he remembers he was in a caravan park, in the shower block, lying on the floor with the shower running on him. And a man found him and he asked him what had happened but Brett says he couldn’t speak, and it wasn’t because he’d been choked, there was no actual damage to his throat, he just couldn’t speak, couldn’t say anything. He was in shock, I suppose. So this guy went and got help and someone called an ambulance and they took him to hospital.

  But what Brett told me, the really strange thing about it all, what he said is that, for years after, he still had these problems talking to people. And, like I said, there was no actual injury to his neck or his voice box, it was something else, but it was something that happened after those men did what they did, and Brett said it lasted for years after. He’d try to say something, but the words wouldn’t come out right. And people, his mates, his father, people at school, used to make fun of him, because of the things he said, because everything always came out so strange, when he tried to talk. And he says that because of that he just stopped trying, he barely talked at all, not to anyone. The problem went away eventually, but still, Brett says it lasted such a long time that he thought it would never go away.

  And Brett says that during that time, because he couldn’t talk, or wouldn’t talk, or when he did talk it came out wrong, he always got angry when he was around people. He says he’d never had a temper before, but it was because he was just so frustrated, not being able to talk and everything. And he started to get violent, lashing out at people. He’d get into fights all the time, at school, on the street, or he’d just beat people up, turn on them, and he says sometimes it was because they made fun of him, but most of the time there wasn’t any reason at all, he just wanted to hurt them. He says it’s something he still doesn’t understand, but he really wanted to hurt people, hurt them really badly, and he didn’t know why. He says it didn’t actually have anything to do with the whole thing about not being able to talk properly, or because of people laughing at him when he tried to talk, or even because it made him angry all the time. It had nothing to do with that. He says it was a completely different thing, something else that happened to him after what those men did. He just wanted to hurt people, really hurt them. And he did, he seriously injured some guys in those fights, he could get really vicious. And Brett says he knew that he was going too far
, he knew that at the time, and he was scared that he’d actually kill someone one day, he was sort of scared of himself, what he might do. But he says it was like there was something inside him, making him do it. He just couldn’t stop himself.

  And everyone thinks that Brett got kicked out of school for punching out a teacher. I mean even I knew about it, before I ever met him or knew who he was. I’d just heard this story about some guy who got expelled for punching a teacher. But he never actually got expelled. The thing was, even before what happened to him on the beach, the teachers all thought Brett was a troublemaker anyway, which he probably was, but different, before that. He says he just had a smart mouth. He didn’t get into fights and that sort of thing, not before. But afterwards, everything changed and things got so much worse, you know, getting into fights nearly every day and then the teachers used to get on his back because he never said anything in class, or when he did he said weird things and they thought he was being a smartarse, or on drugs. They used to search his locker for drugs because the teachers thought he was stoned all the time, because of the way he was in class, the things he said.

  But there was this one teacher who gave him a particularly hard time, who was always on his back about something. A maths teacher. And Brett says he’d give him a hard time for nothing at all, he’d just pick on him. And so one day Brett was in the hall, at his locker, not doing anything, and this teacher came up and started abusing him, again for absolutely no reason at all. I mean, Brett thinks that it was the teacher who was the one with the real problems, more than him. So this teacher was right in his face, yelling at him, and Brett just punched him out. Dropped him. Brett says it was almost a reflex thing, he didn’t even think about it, it just happened. So Brett took his stuff out of his locker and walked out of the school and never went back. People say they expelled him, but that never actually happened.