by Cowley, Joy
For Vita and Tom, and their Mum and Mumma.
Thank you for the love you share with the world.
– Joy
The world is full of calamity: famines and wars, birds choking to death on oil spills, earthquakes, tsunamis, and Melissa – my disaster of a sister. Reading this, you’ll probably say, what’s wrong with this kid? Is he a bit paranoid? My response is that all tragedies are relative to their context and as far as domestic upheavals go, this one is about eight on the Richter scale.
Melissa might be fourteen – but fourteen what? The I.Q. of someone who thinks manga is some kind of tropical fruit? The number of times an hour she consults a mirror when she should be looking at www.hireabrain.com? Trust me, fourteen years is not an indication of her emotional or intellectual age.
The disaster all began with Melissa’s baby-sitting job. She took the job not because she likes kids, but because she wanted money to buy clothes. So it was some karmic principle, like reap what you sow, that had her walking over the Wilsons’ bouncy castle in shoes with heels like sharpened pencils.
Of course I call her an idiot. Who wouldn’t?
“He’s just jealous because I had a real job!” Melissa shouts across the breakfast table, and she reminds our parents of an incident a whole year before, when I broke Dad’s laptop (pure accident – I tripped over the cord).
I smile and exhale slowly, directing my breath over her yoghurt and muesli, which notches up her screeching by a decibel or two.
“You evil little monster!” Her hands cover the bowl. “Mum? Make him behave!”
Mum, or Mother-of-the-hundred-eyes as I like to call her, nudges me with her elbow. “Stop it, you two! I’m sick of you fighting like a couple of cats.”
“Our insurance doesn’t cover damage to other people’s property,” Dad says.
“The Wilsons must be insured,” I remind him.
“Not for third-party damage.” He has that weary old-man voice. “We’ll find the money. Somehow.”
At this point, you should know there is a fundamental flaw in my father. I’m not complaining, merely observing that while he may be a very good radiologist, a personality x-ray would show him completely lacking in survival instinct. He takes on all the family problems, regardless of whose they are, but does he try to solve them? No. He simply rolls over like a big dog, waves his paws in the air, and lets the world take advantage of him. Mum actually admires him for it. I don’t. As far as I’m concerned, if my sister is old enough to wear stupid spiky shoes, she can accept responsibility for any damage they cause. I confess, however, to disappointment that I didn’t witness the bouncy castle deflating on that little kid’s birthday party. It must have been quite memorable.
Dad runs his forefinger slowly around the rim of his coffee cup; not a good sign. I have the feeling he is going to disregard all the practical advice I’ve offered, and I’m right. He breathes deeply and Mum reaches across the table to put her hand over his in a way that suggests she knows what he is going to say.
“We’ve decided,” says Dad, “to work over the summer.”
“Apart from the holiday in Queenstown,” Melissa says quickly.
Mum looks at Dad and says, “We have to cancel the Queenstown trip.”
My sister’s spoon skids across the table and clatters on the floor. “No!”
“I’m afraid it’s true.” Dad is still trying to hypnotise his cup.
“But we have to go to Queenstown!” Melissa’s eyes are as round as plums. “It’s all been arranged! I told Herewini and Jacquie. They’re going. And the McKenzies – the whole family! You can’t do this!”
Dad doesn’t answer. It’s Mum who says, “We already have.”
“What?” I’m appalled at the injustice. Last year Melissa went to Queenstown with a netball team. I’ve never been there. The week in January – luge, gondola, jet boating – was destined to be a major part of my education. Now I am the innocent victim of my sister’s extraordinary stupidity.
I point this out to my father, who doesn’t respond but instead – predictably – leaves my mother to do the talking.
She says, “I’m sorry, Will. We have to be practical.”
I try to sound reasonable, logical even. “There is a point of family law here. You told us ‘never break a promise’, and if I remember correctly, the trip to Queenstown was actually a promise.”
Melissa dives in. “Yes! You can’t go back on a promise!”
“The promise still stands,” says our mother, “it’s just postponed for a year. Not this summer. I’m sure you’ll both find plenty to do around here.”
“Both?” I am determined to keep my voice level. “Please, Mother, do not include me in this fiasco. You may feel obliged to accept some parental responsibility since you allowed Melissa to buy shoes that turned out to be weapons of mass destruction. I, on the other hand, am blameless. I rest my case.”
“Don’t talk such rot, Will.” She gets up and starts clearing the table. “This is not just about the bouncy castle. It’s the recession. A lot of families have to cut back and frankly, for a number of reasons, we can’t afford an expensive holiday. I know you and Melissa are disappointed, but by next year we’ll have enough saved.”
“You could get a bank loan!” Melissa cries. “Like you got to build the garage.”
“That’s different. A garage is an investment. Which one of you is going to empty the dishwasher?”
Our mother always does this; when argument fails she pushes the escape button into domestic trivia, so of course Lissy and I know better than to respond.
I ask, “What precisely is the ‘plenty’ you expect us to do here when we should be in Queenstown?”
She turns the toaster upside down and shakes crumbs into the sink. “You could spend some time helping out at the shop.”
Oh yes, indeed. A fine substitute for a helicopter flight to the top of the Tasman Glacier: Mum’s book and stationery store, where it’s my job to carry heavy boxes, sort magazines and newspapers, and clean up after kids who run riot because their mothers are talking to mine, while Melissa – oh yes, my sister. Where’s she in this scenario? Out back in the toilet, reading romantic slush about vampires. No, thank you.
Dad sits back in his chair and folds his arms. “The rest of the time, you’ll have a holiday with your grandparents. They want you to stay at the bach.”
“You have got to be joking!” says Melissa.
My father never jokes about his parents, which probably explains a lot. I suppose the only way he survived growing up with those crazy people was to learn the fine art of submission. What I can’t understand is why he would want to inflict them on us. An afternoon visit, two or three times a year, is surely more than enough.
“They want to go back to their old bach in the Sounds,” Dad says. “They’re too old to look after it on their own. You can be sure they’ll give you a good time.”
Oh, absolutely, sure. Like the day we spent at their house in Timaru: a hilarious time playing cards and listening to them fight about who had forgotten to flush the toilet.
I shake my head slowly at my father, expressing disbelief that he could even suggest such a thing as a holiday with his parents.
Melissa gets up and bangs her chair against the table. “I’d rather die first!” she says, sweeping out of the room.
For the first time in my life, I find myself agreeing with my sister. Compared to a summer vacation with Grandma and Grandpa, death by slow torture would be a pleasure.
There’s something a bit weird about my eleven-year-old brother. When he was nine he started talking like a dictionary, and for no reason. It was more or less an overni
ght change from normal kid-language to using words as missiles. He has to be right about everything. Maybe it’s some kind of inferiority complex. My friends think he’s a nutcase.
This holiday cancellation can’t just be about the holes in the bouncy castle. That’s just an excuse. Bet you anything, Mum and Dad decided to scrub Queenstown long before it happened. And anyway, I only did what anyone would do, running in to rescue a kid that was bawling its lungs out. How did I know the vinyl was so flimsy? When I try explaining this to Mum, she asks, “Why didn’t you take off your shoes first?”
“Mum! If I was drowning, would you kick off your shoes before you dived in to get me?”
She thinks about it. “No.”
“Mother means no, she wouldn’t rescue you,” says Will.
I give him a bored look. “Don’t bite your tongue, little brother. You’ll poison yourself.”
“So says the queen of venom,” he snaps back.
“That’s enough!” Mum grabs some dishes off the table. “I’m glad you’ve decided not to go to your grand-parents. They don’t deserve your atrocious behaviour.”
“Way to go, Ma,” I say.
Dad comes back to life, reaching out to Mum who is already walking to the dishwasher. “They’ll be disappointed, Alice. They especially asked, and without Lissy and Will they won’t –”
“Negative!” says Will. “Subject closed.”
But Dad really seems desperate for us to go. “I think you’d enjoy it,” he says, holding out his hands like a beggar.
This is downright sneaky. Now, take my friend Jacquie’s dad, for example. He lays down the law, tells Jacquie what to do, and when she doesn’t do it, he gets mad. You can say no to a father who’s a bully. It’s a lot harder to say no to one who looks as though he’s going to cry, even if you know he’s being blatantly manipulative.
“They’re too old to climb ladders,” he says. “He’s had a hip replacement. She’s got osteoarthritis and macular degeneration. She can’t see well. They’ve both got mobility issues…”
“Dad, I’m not going.” Will throws his spoon into his empty bowl and takes it over to Mum. “That is my final and ultimate answer.”
“Me, too,” I add.
Dad wipes his unshaven chin with his hand. It sounds gritty. “I must say it’s not like you two, turning down good money.”
“Money? What money?”
“I guess I haven’t told you about that bit.” He looks at Mum, then back at us. “They want to pay you. It’s four years since they’ve been to the bach. They want a holiday, but can’t manage on their own. They need help to clean up the place, get firewood, that sort of thing.”
“How much money?” Will asks.
“Too much,” Mum says quickly. “Far too much!”
I’ve already decided no amount of pocket money is going to make me go to a run-down bach with no electricity and those two, deaf as posts, shouting at each other, their weird clothes covered with food stains, and Grandpa’s terrible driving in that old car with the window down so he can call other drivers rude names.
“How much?” insists Will.
Dad scratches his chin again. “Ten days at a hundred dollars a day.” Then he says, “Each.”
“I told you it’s a ridiculous amount.” Mum looks annoyed.
I am gobsmacked. It has to be a trick. One thousand dollars? Each? Not likely. If they have that kind of money to spare, why won’t they give it to Dad so we can all go to Queenstown like we planned? There has to be a catch somewhere. I mean, those two old hippies look like homeless people and they’re always going grumpo about the price of stuff. A thousand dollars each? To begin with, it wouldn’t even be fair because I’m the oldest – it should be more like fifteen hundred for me and five hundred for Will. But I don’t know. Maybe they have got the dosh. Grandma’s favourite quote is, “Say less than you know. Have more than you show.” Although what about their car, that rusty old heap of junk? They can’t even afford to get it painted. Is that not-showing, or proof they don’t have a cent? Nah, the whole thing has to be some kind of scam.
“I’m not happy about the money,” Mum says. “It wasn’t my idea. Children should be willing to work for their grandparents for nothing. For love.”
“They actually offered one thousand dollars each?” says Will.
“That’s what they said.” Dad smiles, sensing weakness. “You’ll be expected to work for your wages.”
I don’t say anything because I still don’t believe the money bit. One thousand dollars is about as real as bananas growing at the bottom of the sea. I mean, in the old days Grandma and Grandpa lived in a hippy commune, in something called a geodesic dome – a kind of igloo made of metal and plastic – and they made their own clothes, even sandals out of kelp seaweed, according to Dad. They got a bit respectable after that, and both became teachers, but I’ll eat mud if they’ve ever had two thousand dollars to give away.
Will looks at me. I can practically see the dollar signs in his eyes. “I decline to call it wages,” he says. “Let’s think of it as compensation.”
If I explain the system of child slave labour that operates in my mother’s bookshop, you might understand why my rigid policy regarding grandparents suddenly has become flexible. I get a microscopic four dollars an hour for unpacking books and returning the out-of-date magazines. Actually, we don’t return the entire magazine, just the cover, hence my job of tearing off covers to send back and putting the rest in the recycling.
Normally I’d describe my mother as a woman of good nature, but that aspect of her personality disappears where money is concerned. When I told her she was paying me less than one-third of the basic wage, she said I was an eleven-year-old getting perfectly good pocket money. I then pointed out that parents are obliged to give their children pocket money, regardless, to which she merely said, “Hard cheese!” Logic is not her strong point.
Ten days with my grandparents will not be a holiday but a prison sentence. I am prepared for that, and thanks to the predictable rotation of the earth, when ten days have passed, I’ll have a brand new iPad.
Melissa still insists there is no money. When Dad assured her payment would be made, she said it was just a bribe but that she would go anyway, because it was the right thing to do. As if anyone would believe that. I’ll bet she’s already made a long shopping list of new clothes and shoes.
I’ve considered the outcome at great length, and definitely, yes, an iPad is a good investment, although if I shop wisely and get last year’s model, I might also manage a second-hand skateboard. I should tell you here and now, I’ve never had either.
An iPad is essential for my education. With my own money, I can control my destiny. The future looks good. However, prison must come first.
As a condemned man, I made sure to eat a hearty breakfast of strawberry waffles and cream this morning, and I’ve packed enough milkshake lollies and biscuits to last the full sentence. I admit to a grave suspicion of food cooked without electricity by an almost-blind jailer.
Only a few hours ago, there we were at the bookshop – working, of course – with our bags in the storeroom out the back, waiting for our grandparents to arrive from Timaru. I was going through the magazines, my usual job, while Melissa showed a customer how to use the photocopier. Mum had put an orange traffic cone in the parking space outside the shop door, to save it for Grandpa’s rust bucket. He’s had the same car, a Vauxhall Velox, for an eternity and perhaps even longer.
I was wearing my usual Saturday gear. Melissa had painted her face to look sixteen instead of fourteen and was wearing one of those outfits that has a top and a bottom and nothing in-between, so boys will look at her. She never has to tear covers off old magazines. Mum lets her work behind the counter, which she loves because she can do her pouty lipstick smiles for the boys when Mum’s not looking. It doesn’t work for my mates, though.
When they come in, she just gives them the dead-fish look.
The shop is long and narrow, and I was at the back putting bar code labels on writing pads when the Vauxhall ran over the traffic cone. I missed the fuss. First thing I knew, Mum was taking the label machine out of my hand and saying, “They’re here, Will. You’d better get your bag.”
It’s actually her bag I’ve borrowed, the one with wheels, and as I got it out of the storeroom, I heard my grandparents. They are deaf, but too stubborn to get hearing aids, so they’re always shouting at each other.
“Silly old fool!” Grandma yelled. “I told him to stop. ‘You’re going to hit it,’ I said. He never listens!”
The day was warm but she was wearing a thick lumpy jumper and earrings made of peacock feathers. Her hand wobbled on the handle of her walking stick but there was no way of knowing if that was a permanent shake or just because she was angry with Grandpa.
“Oh, shut up!” he yelled back.
His clothes looked normal except that his jacket sleeves ended way above his wrists. Since he hasn’t grown lately, I assume it was someone else’s hand-me-down jacket, probably from an op shop. He shouted at Mum, “No shilly-shallying, Alice. Let’s get them in the carriage and whip the horses. There’s a long ride ahead.”
“I told him to stop!” Grandma said. “He deliberately did it!”
“Don’t worry about the cone,” Mum said. “It’s not important.”
Lissy gave me a nervous look as we wheeled our bags into the shop. I stepped forward. “Good morning, Grandma. Good morning Grandpa.”
They smiled but didn’t move. Grandma scanned us and her gaze rested on Melissa. “Cover yourself up, girl!” she bellowed. “You’ll get a death of cold in your kidneys!”
Lissy flushed red. She opened her mouth to argue, then her lips went small and round like a raspberry doughnut, and slowly made something resembling a smile. That’s how I knew my sister finally believed the money was real.
When Grandma made me put on a T-shirt, my little-creep brother smiled from ear to ear. I was furious. I know all about the 1960s. I’ve seen the film Hair. People in communes grew more than vegetables in their organic gardens and they didn’t care if they walked around naked – so what’s the problem with a bare stomach? Kidneys, my foot! As for the smirking brother, his grin disappeared when he found out he had to sit in the front of the car with Grandpa, reading the map and yelling directions into a hairy deaf ear. William might sound as though he knows everything but he’s useless at map-reading. Served him right when he mixed up left and right, and got shouted at for directing Grandpa into Christchurch airport instead of the road north out of town.