It turns out that he was in the SAS, which is a really top group of soldiers. And they were fighting in Afghanistan. His fiancée, whose name was Fifi – or Fiona, I think – was also in the army, in the Engineers. She was in Afghanistan too. They were helping build schools or bridges or something like that.
Something bad happened to her. J.T. didn’t tell me what, and I didn’t press him because it was making him sad.
I did ask him about Dopey. “That hunter we met who was in the army reserve,” I said. “I thought you were going to make fun of him, but you didn’t. He was just a part-time soldier, and he seemed quite full of himself. You’re a proper soldier. But you were real nice to him.”
“Listen, Egan,” J.T. said. “That guy was a fancy pants lawyer or stockbroker or something like that who spends one weekend a month trying to be a soldier. Exercising, training, learning … stuff like that.”
“Yeah?”
“So who’s better?” J.T. said. “Him, or some fancy pants lawyer or stockbroker who doesn’t spend one weekend a month doing training and exercises and trying to challenge himself?”
“I guess,” I said.
“What’s number nineteen on your code?” he asked.
“Don’t judge other people,” I said, without needing to think. “Oh. Right.”
“You don’t know anything about that guy,” J.T. said. “His mother could be dying of cancer. He might have just got divorced, he might have just lost his job. Everybody has stuff like that going on in their lives, but they don’t talk about it and it’s not tattooed on their foreheads. So take your mum’s advice. Don’t judge.”
It was the first time #19 had ever meant more than just one of Moma’s rules.
It put a totally different perspective on things.
Then J.T. asked me where I lived when I wasn’t camping in the bush. I wasn’t going to tell him but he said that members of the CSC shouldn’t have secrets from each other.
He had me there.
I was squirming around on my seat and staring at anything except him, but he kept looking at me without speaking.
So eventually I had to tell him about Moma and my dad and everything else. It took over an hour and he kept asking lots of questions as if he didn’t quite believe it.
Then I asked him to promise not to tell anyone what I had told him, and not to do anything about it and he promised he wouldn’t. Just to be safe, I made him repeat the oath of secrecy for the CSC.
J.T. looks at me a little differently now. I am not sure why.
I hope he doesn’t think less of me because of what I told him.
I’ve been thinking about this some more. J.T. said something strange. He said we had something in common. I asked what it was and he said that we were both hiding away in the bush from something we were afraid of.
I don’t think that makes sense. J.T. can go back to the outside world anytime he wants to.
Moma’s Code #19
Don’t judge other people.
You don’t have that right. And they don’t have the right to judge you.
Thought for the day:
There’s more to people than what you see on the surface.
Another thought for the day:
I don’t know how I can be a great writer if I don’t know what love is. I love Moma, but that’s a different kind of love. What I have never experienced is romantic love, like in books. And there’s not much chance of that, stuck here in the forest. When I am eighteen and leave the forest I must look for great romantic love, the kind that makes your heart sing and your blood race. I need to know what it feels like so I can write about it honestly.
Word of the day:
FANCY PANTS
Ha!
PS: I finished my story.
Of Mince and Men
By Egan Tucker
(A true story about my mother and me.)
Just north of Auckland the bustling suburbs taper off into farmland, into which the city is slowly seeping. Soft green fields and patches of native bush are segmented off into neat divisions by harsh new wood and wire fences.
Here the houses are less meddlesome than in the ’burbs where they peer over each other’s back fences and block each other’s sunlight. Here the houses sprawl on lifestyle blocks. Rich men’s micro farms, where a few head of cattle or sheep is a status symbol, a sign that you are actually living the life, and not just wearing it like a badge.
A river runs past many of the blocks, providing irrigation where needed, occasional danger, and an extra zero on the property prices.
Not far from the little township called Coatesville, on the low side of the main road, at the end of a long, winding, gravel driveway, lies a property like many of the others. A large white house with pillars along the front to make it seem important, although they don’t hold anything up. A barn: shiny iron and dark painted wood, architecturally designed to look old and rustic. A pond near the front door with an old hand pump that actually works although nobody ever uses it as the house has a town water supply.
Wild geese sometimes wander up from the river that runs behind the house, honking and chasing any humans that dare to inhabit what they regard as their territory.
The winter chill of a clear blue June sky seems to freeze the tableau, even the leaves on the weeping willows that line the driveway, and that get agitated in the lightest breeze.
Then, movement breaks the perfection of this Constable-esque painting. A car on the highway, slowing as it approaches the driveway.
The driver gunned the engine unnecessarily as the car wound down the gravel lane that led to the house, sliding to a halt in front of the house, spraying stones into the carefully tended flower beds.
A man emerged. He did not seem to be in the hurry that his driving had suggested. He wore stylish designer jeans, carefully distressed by the manufacturer to look old and worn. His shoes were brand name running shoes and his shirt was tailored to show off the muscles of his shoulders and upper arms.
He was tall, and moved with the co-ordinated ease of a professional athlete. His chin was broad and strong, but scarred. His nose had been broken, more than once. His ears were mashed into the shape known as cauliflower ears. There were no smile lines around his eyes although he was old enough to have earned them.
He picked a jacket out of the back seat of the car and pulled it on against the cold. He looked around at the property, nodding his head lightly in approval, before making his way to the front door of the house.
Inside was the smell of food, spiced meat, vegetables and the tang of melted cheese. The man sniffed as he entered and what little smile there had been on his face faded to a tight-skinned blankness.
A glass of wine sat on the dining table. Next to it a bottle of wine, chilled, rivulets of condensation running down and pooling on the placemat. There were lipstick marks on the rim of the wineglass and it was half empty. So was the bottle.
The woman that greeted the big man did so with affection, wrapping both arms around him and pressing her body into his. It seemed too much, as if she was trying too hard to be loving – and to be loved.
She was an attractive woman in her thirties. Light brown of skin and a little wide of nose thanks to the percentage of Maori blood which flowed in her veins. Her long, black hair hung down over one shoulder, held together by a loose ribbon.
He endured the hug for a moment then pulled away and crossed to the faucet at the kitchen sink, not bothering to use a glass, just lowering his head and drinking from the stream. Water flowed down his chin and splashed onto his jacket and onto the kitchen bench, but it did not seem to bother him.
“How was your day?” the woman asked.
The man ignored the question. “Whatcha cookin’?” he asked.
“Food,” the woman smiled. “Old family recipe. I think you’ll like it.”
/> “I asked whatcha was cooking, Moana,” the man said.
“Ray, you’ll love it,” Moana said cautiously. “It’s my mother’s shepherd’s pie recipe. It was my favourite meal growing up.”
“Mince,” Ray said dangerously, his voice had become a low, threatening growl.
“There’s mince in it,” Moana said, throwing a bright smile at him. “But – ”
“Mince an’ potato an’ cheese,” Ray said. “That’s what you cooked me for my dinner.”
A baby, lying on a blanket in a wooden playpen by the television, began to cry.
Moana was genuinely frightened now. It showed on her face and in the small darting movements of her hands. She wiped her palms on her apron and crossed to the playpen, picking up the baby.
“You know ow much money I earn,” Ray said. “I’m not some dumb-ass factory worker like me old dad. I’m important. You get that? We can afford steak. We don’ need to eat mince.”
“Wait till you try it,” Moana said. “You’ll like -”
She never finished the sentence. Ray crossed the room in two quick steps and his huge hand slapped the last words out of her mouth.
She didn’t make a sound, just raised a hand to her reddened cheek. She turned a little, putting herself in between her husband and their baby.
“You stupid bitch,” Ray said, shaking his head. “Gimme Egan.”
The cowering stance straightened. Her head raised up and she stared him straight in the eye. “No,” she said.
“Gimme my son,” Ray said.
“Leave him alone,” she screamed. “Leave us alone!”
That earned her a back-handed slap on the other side of her face and her grip on the baby loosened for a second.
“You almos’ dropped him,” Ray said. “Stupid bitch. Gi’m ta me.”
“No!” Moana shouted. She turned, heading towards the door that lead to the bedrooms, but his huge hand closed on the back of her neck and jerked her backwards. At the same time he grabbed at the baby’s arm. The baby slipped from her grasp and dropped, hanging by just one tiny arm in the maw of the big man.
There was a snapping sound and the baby started to shriek.
This was no hungry cry. No, ‘where’s my mama?’ seeking of attention. It was not a ‘can’t sleep’ wail or a ‘colic’ howling. This was a primal scream of pain and both mother and father looked in horror at the unnatural angle of the baby’s arm.
“You crazy bitch!” Ray shouted. “Look what you done!”
He wrapped his other hand around the baby, cradling it, tucking the dangling useless arm across its chest.
“You bastard!” Moana shouted. “I’m going to kill you!”
She rushed at him, but he fended her off as though she was an opposition rugby player, sending her crashing into the television set.
By the time she disentangled herself, he was in the car, the baby shrieking hysterically in his lap, and the wheels sprayed gravel again as he spun around and headed back up the driveway.
The emergency department was bright and white. A clock on the wall with a large white face had two black hands and a sweeping red second hand. It ticked relentlessly.
Around the walls sat a variety of people with the stunned look of people who did not expect to be sitting in this place at this time. Some had bandages, or were clutching at parts of their body. Others looked uncomfortable, concerned, worried; these were friends and family.
A nurse sat behind a counter: a stout woman with sensible makeup and blonde hair cut in a tidy bob. She was talking on the phone and shaking her head. She had a light Scottish accent. A dark-skinned orderly sat on a plastic chair in a corner, waiting for instructions. A gurney sat against another wall in a specially marked spot.
Double swing doors at the rear led into the depths of the building and two more to the left opened onto the main hospital reception.
The second hand on the clock ticked relentlessly. The friends and family murmured comforting things to their sick and injured.
Sliding glass doors hurried open as a big man ran inside, a baby enveloped in his huge arms. The admitting nurse looked up. Her eyes widened with recognition then narrowed in concern at the sound of a baby screaming from somewhere in the midst of the man mountain.
Around the outside of the room the quiet conversations changed. Hey that’s that guy … He used to play … Isn’t that Ray Tucker?
An emergency doctor, a slender Pakistani woman entering through the swing doors at the back of the admitting room, was first to reach Ray.
“What happened?” she asked, wincing as she gently touched the swollen, broken and discoloured skin of the baby’s arm where a white spear of bone protruded through.
“Arm’s broke,” Ray said.
“How did it happen?” the doctor asked.
There was silence for a moment.
The orderly hurried over with the gurney, many times too large for the baby, and the doctor carefully plucked the baby out of the giant man’s arms and laid him on it, examining him further.
Those seated around the room had either the horrified awe of a bystander at a traffic accident, or the pained indignation at being subjected to the inconvenience of the baby’s screaming.
“My wife,” Ray said at last. “She dropped ’im.”
“She dropped her baby?” the doctor said sceptically.
“She’d been drinkin’,” Ray explained. There were genuine tears in his eyes.
“This’ll have tae be reported,” the nurse said, earning a sharp glance from the doctor. Not now.
“It was just an accident,” Ray said with tears rolling down his cheeks. “She din’t mean ta do it.”
“Aye, but it still has tae be reported, Mr Tucker,” the nurse said, knowing his name despite him not having mentioned it.
“I’ll take him into the surgery,” the doctor said. “You’ll need to fill out the admitting forms. The nurse will bring you through as soon as they are done.”
“She din’t mean ta do it,” Ray blubbed, to sympathetic and disapproving nods from the audience in the chairs around the room.
* * *
(To try and write like Steinbeck I needed all the tiny little details so I quizzed Moma for hours. She didn’t want to talk about it at first, but she eventually agreed, and when she read the story she cried. There’s a lot of stuff in this story that I don’t really understand, but Moma says I got it all right, and it’ll make sense to me once I get out in the world.
I don’t think my father actually speaks like that, but I wrote it that way to make it more like the way Steinbeck wrote.)
Thought for the day:
“The ancient commission of the writer has not changed. He is charged with exposing our many grievous faults and failures, with the dredging up to the light our dark and dangerous dreams for the purpose of improvement. Furthermore, the writer is delegated to declare and to celebrate man’s proven capacity for greatness of heart and spirit – for gallantry in defeat, for courage, compassion and love.” —John Steinbeck
If I can figure out what he means by all that I think I will be a better writer.
Wish List #2
Things I am going to do when I turn 18 and can go out into the world.
1. Be a famous author, like John Steinbeck
2. Fall in love
3. Eat ice cream
4. Ride a motorbike
5. Join the SAS
December 15th
Today Moma saw a cloud in the shape of a canoe. This is a big problem. She pointed it out to me and asked me if I saw it too. It did look a little like a canoe.
I said, “Yeah, nah.”
“Which,” Moma asked. “Yeah or nah?”
“A little bit,” I said. (I must be careful what I say to Moma in case she asks me where I heard it.)
Moma definitely thought the cloud was a canoe.
The old Maori lady who runs the general store in the town with her husband, has been very ill. Moma found that out when she last went to get supplies a couple of weeks ago.
Moma says that the canoe in the cloud means that she has died. Moma says there will be a tangi, which is a Maori funeral, up on the marae at Kennedy Bay. She says we both need to go.
But tomorrow we had our club activity planned to see the partial eclipse. J.T. knows I was really excited about it. If I don’t show up, he will wonder why. He’ll be worried about me and might even come looking for me.
I don’t know what to do.
Moma wants us to travel all the way up to Kennedy Bay, which is a two-day trip, risking meeting hikers, hunters and campers, all because she saw a cloud in the sky.
But I can’t say anything, and I can’t argue.
I bet when we get there, there won’t even be a tangi, and the old lady will still be back serving ice creams behind the counter of her little store.
Things I am afraid of:
Missing the eclipse.
J.T. thinking I’ve deserted him.
December 16th
We walked halfway to Kennedy Bay today.
I was really angry with Moma because of missing the club activity and letting J.T. down. But I couldn’t let Moma know any of that. So I had to pretend to be nice, even though I was feeling really angry.
We walked all day. We didn’t talk much.
In any case, the eclipse was a big disappointment. It was cloudy all day and I never got to see anything. It did get a bit dark around the time the eclipse was supposed to happen, but that was just like a heavy cloud going across the sun. It wasn’t exciting at all.
A Maori tangi is a long affair, according to Moma. The old lady’s body will lie ‘in state’ on the marae for at least two nights and people will come from all over New Zealand to see her. They will address her body, talking to her and reminding her of things they did together. Sometimes they will sing to her.
Shooting Stars Page 6