The Salt Madonna

by Catherine Noske

  ‘She isn’t our mum,’ Jade says. ‘He’s just our dad.’

  The ferryman nods. ‘I know, mate. She’ll be out, anyway.’

  Jade grabs two of the bags to push out the door and onto the ferry deck. The ambulance is creeping its way slowly down the ramp, lights flashing. One of the ambos is standing in front of it, guiding the driver.

  ‘You kids gonna meet us there?’ he asks cheerfully. ‘Haven’t got room for the lot of youse.’

  The pier and the docks all flash the lights of the ambulance back in strange echoes around them. Beyond the dark building, a car park is floodlit and empty. The ferryman appears again, Marnie behind him.

  ‘C’mon,’ she says. ‘This nice man is going to call us a cab.’

  They walk the length of the pier to the car park. Mr Mulvey is there, leaning through the window of a parked car, talking to the driver. He straightens up when he sees them.

  ‘I’m off,’ he says. ‘I’ll check in tomorrow and see how you’re getting on, okay?’

  ‘Thanks for your help,’ Marnie says. He waves and gets into the car.

  ‘Bastard,’ Jade mutters, and Sam giggles.

  Marnie looks down at her with one eyebrow raised.

  ‘Well,’ Jade says, ‘he is.’

  Marnie just grimaces. They sit on their bags and wait. Eventually the cab turns into the car park and pulls up in front of them. The driver is a fat man with a dirty shirt.

  ‘Where to, love?’ he asks.

  ‘The hospital,’ Marnie replies, piling the bags in. ‘There’s been an accident.’

  *

  Hannah stares at the boy in front of her. There was an accident, he is telling her. That’s why they weren’t at school. And Nugget is still in hospital on the mainland.

  ‘I had to stay with him,’ Sam says. ‘At the tractor. And now Jade’s home with Pet ‘cos Marnie’s still over there and Mrs Keillor can’t look after us all day.’

  Hannah reaches for something to say, trying to move the information past the sudden hollow in her chest.

  ‘That must have been scary, Sam,’ she says.

  ‘Not really,’ he replies. ‘I drank all the water. And Marnie told us to pray.’

  Again Hannah opens her mouth but nothing comes out. The children around her wait silently.

  ‘Can we go out now?’ another boy asks. His head is cocked sideways, as though he is asking something deeper, much more serious. ‘The others are already out.’

  ‘Yes,’ she says.

  There is a rush of noise, and the classroom around her empties as though it has been tilted. Hannah stays where she is. Her hands curl up to her throat. Outside, beyond the children, the sea is an angry blue line. Once, when they were young, Nugget took her to the lookout.

  ‘See?’ he had said. ‘Whales.’

  They were shadows in the water, black lines marked by the occasional spray of exhaled breath, the white flash of a fluke. He dragged her up there, practically. She was still puffing from the climb, red-faced. There was a stone with a plaque on it and he flopped down into the shade behind it then looked up at her and patted the grass beside him. She sat gingerly, could feel the heat of his arm burning across the tiny, inch-wide gap she hadn’t dared to cross.

  ‘It’s why they built Chesil, y’know,’ he said. ‘‘Cos of the whales. They hunted them. Dragged them up onto the beach and flensed ’em.’

  ‘What’s flensed?’

  ‘It’s when they get the blubber off them. For oil.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, and looked out at the small pod. Six lithe shapes.

  ‘They caught hundreds,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen the bones.’

  There was a pause, and she turned out again to the whales, the water. When she looked back again, he was looking at her, straight at her, like no one had ever done before. She stared at him. When he kissed her, she kept her mouth closed and held her breath.

  Standing at the window, the children outside laughing, she can feel the stone against her back. She lets the minutes slide by without moving, just stands there thinking about it, until the clock is past where it should be. She shakes herself, turns from the window, crosses to the doorway and leans out to ring the bell. The clanging picks up the sound of running feet as the kids come streaming from all directions across the yard. Nugget turned up once, in the schoolyard. He waited for her, waited for school to finish, so that when they all trooped out with the final bell, he was there. The other girls giggled and nudged each other as they walked past him. He was two years older, he had already left school. Hannah just stood there and watched him. He looked down at his feet when she didn’t come over straight away. He didn’t like being the focus of their attention, she could tell. He scuffed one toe in the dirt, and only looked up again when the schoolyard was empty and she was the only one left.

  ‘Comin’?’ he asked.

  She licked her lips. ‘Where?’

  He just grinned, and tugged her by the hand down across the oval, pulled her along the kids’ track to the back fence. He stopped finally at one of the giant casuarina trees, pulled her in under its canopy. It was big, soft, its feathery leaves enclosed them. It had a crooked branch which leant to one side like a seat.

  ‘D’ya wanna . . .’ he started, and she looked at him sideways. She sat on the branch and he stood in front of her. She smiled. He kissed her. It made her hot, made heat prickle up the back of her neck. He smelt of cigarettes but tasted like chewing gum. He stopped and looked at her.

  ‘D’you like me?’ he asked.

  She stared at him a moment, mute.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘Really? Like, really like me?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said again, and he kissed her for that. This time she let him push her mouth open, let his tongue in. The shock of it made her stiffen and he stopped.

  ‘Can I touch you?’ he asked.

  Hannah froze. He looked down at the branch, his hands either side of her legs. He was close enough that her legs were spread open either side of him. When she didn’t speak, he kissed her again. The words played in a loop in her head, like a tic, a fault. She let him kiss her. And then his hands slowly worked their way from her knees up to her thighs. One slipped under her school dress and she was a statue then, a statue on the branch, hot and sweating, and he stopped.

  ‘S’okay,’ he said, and smiled at her. The other hand appeared at the back of her and pulled her in to kiss him again. She tried to pull away, but he just leant with her, leant over her so that his whole weight was over hers and she was clinging to him to hold herself up. When he put his fingers inside her, her only thought was that they must be dirty. He stopped and stepped back, he started undoing his pants.

  ‘No,’ she said, but it came out as a whisper, shaky, cracked.

  ‘S’okay,’ he said again. ‘Promise.’ He smiled at her and stroked her leg, gently, softly, until she relaxed.

  ‘Okay,’ she whispered. She closed her eyes when he pulled her underwear down, but she didn’t say anything. Afterwards, he walked her home, still holding her hand.

  Remembering these things, remembering all this, Hannah feels as though she is spinning. Around her, the classroom settles, and the déjà vu makes her ill. It was here, she thinks. She flicks a glance out the window and towards the dunes. It was there. The children stare at her and wait. Hannah holds herself together and faces them.

  Slowly, slowly the day draws to an end. She feels like crying when it is over. Everything, everything is wrong. Out the window, the trees thrash in the wind and a cloud slides away from the sun, stealing all softness from the light. In the office, she grabs her bag, her notes, her keys.

  ‘About Mary . . .’ Mrs Culliver begins.

  Hannah ignores her, turns straight around and heads for her car. She only looks back once as she drives away, but the spectre of a sixteen-year-old boy follows as she winds her way up the hill.

  She calls Sophie after dinner. She thinks of the black horse out in the paddock but can’t
bring herself to say Ghost’s name, and Sophie doesn’t mention him, or bring it up.

  ‘What’s going on? Have you done anything?’

  It takes Hannah a moment to work out that she is talking about Mary.

  ‘What am I meant to do? The Department of Education wrote to Susan, the headmistress. We got it last week. I think she’s just going to ignore it.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, Han. You have to do something.’

  ‘You think I’m not trying?’ Hannah feels her own anger slowly build. ‘You do something! It’s not as simple as you think.’

  ‘What’s not simple? She’s just a child! It’s statutory rape!’

  ‘I told you what the police said. A Romeo and Juliet case, they called it.’

  ‘Which means?’

  ‘They think it was a boy her age, another one of my students. You think it helps if they press charges on him? Or on me? You think this is my fault? Technically, they were in my care.’

  ‘I’m not saying that . . .’ She trails off. ‘What about Mum? Have you spoken to her about coming over?’

  ‘Why does it have to be me who has that conversation with her?’

  ‘Because you’re there!’

  ‘I’m only here because you’re not! You try being stuck here, see how easy it is.’

  Her mother appears through the doorway, and Hannah sees her flinch. Immediately the anger is overtaken by regret.

  ‘Okay, okay,’ Sophie is saying.

  ‘I have to go,’ Hannah mumbles, still watching her mother. There is another pause. It sits between them like a body of water. ‘Mum needs a hand.’

  ‘Okay,’ Sophie says again. ‘Just give me a call when you can. We need to work this out, kid. You know I want to be there with you.’

  ‘I know,’ Hannah says. ‘I’ll call, promise.’ It is only when she hangs up that she realises that she never apologised to Sophie for Ghost. She looks across at her mother, feels tears prick.

  ‘I didn’t . . . I couldn’t . . . Ghost . . . I need to say sorry.’

  Her mother frowns. ‘Call her again in the morning.’

  Hannah nods, penitent. ‘Tea?’ she asks. But her mother has already turned away into her bedroom, has left her without saying goodnight.

  NO ONE EVER THINKS of Mary in the Bible as middle-aged. All the paintings, all the statues, she is timeless. But she must have had a life, must have lived on from the point of girl-mother, God-chosen . . . When I think of our Mary now, I try to imagine her as a woman, high cheekbones, thin lips, the feeling of a collarbone against skin. Does her face show something of what she went through? I imagine her eyes as heavy-lined, suspicious. Nothing holds still. My memories, the girl-plasticity of her resists the future like wax. Time beads like water.

  You can see it, though, can’t you – how I am to blame in this? I thought I was pulling against it, trying to face down the tide. People I talk to now tell me I am not at fault. Sophie tells me this again and again. Self-flagellation, she calls it. It scares me when she uses that term; it implies I’m more like them all than I thought. The darker secret is that I’m not really sure I do blame myself, or blame myself enough. It is just easier to articulate it all as blame or fault than to explain the emotions that would come otherwise. If I am to blame, it is neat, it is easy, it could have been redressed. There are no wider questions to ask, nothing more difficult to wrangle with in the why and the how. Nothing future in it – just past tense: forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.

  XIII

  August 1992

  The Transfiguration of Our Lord, 6 August

  Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 15 August

  Saint’s Day of Bartholomew the Apostle, 24 August

  THOMAS SITS IN THE store, hiding at the back, just sitting. He is alone. He hasn’t spoken to Picnic or Ben in days. It is quiet, empty in the mid-morning, before the lunchtime rush of housewives and small children. The floor is dirty. He stares at the cheap magnets and key rings, the crap. There are a row of tiny Jesus statues lining one side of the counter, new postcards of the church, of Jesus on the cross, a poster of the Virgin on the point. His table is sticky where someone has spilt a drink. He isn’t even sure why he is there, except that he couldn’t stay any longer where he was.

  It happens quickly, when it happens. The bell sounds, and the door opens, and Mary comes in. He feels it physically, something breaking through, something good. Like fate. She doesn’t see him. Her mother has a hand in the small of her back, propels her towards the counter. She is looking down. Watching her, he is worried she will simply melt away.

  ‘Mary,’ he hisses.

  She doesn’t hear. Her mother is talking with Sarah over the counter, who is dishing out the mail into bundles, smiling. Occasionally they address Mary, but she doesn’t speak.

  ‘Mary,’ he hisses again.

  Sarah glances over at him, but neither Mary nor her mother notice.

  The bell sounds again and Mrs Keillor appears in the doorway. The fly-streamers billow around her like a cape. She joins the others at the counter and stares at Mary. There is something almost hungry in the way she is looking at her. Thomas pushes himself further back into the corner and thinks small. Hate wells up in him behind the disgust.

  ‘Sit down,’ he hears Mary’s mother say to her. ‘Stay there.’ It is like she is talking to a child, a dog. And then he sees Mary stand, silent, and slip between the shelves towards him, running her finger over the rows of biscuits, dried fruit and flour. He stands. She isn’t looking at him. He isn’t sure if she knows he is there or not. She is only steps away.

  ‘Mary,’ he says, coming forward and stretching out a hand to her shoulder.

  She screams the moment he touches her; not a high-pitched cry but something harsh, guttural. It is the sound of utter, blind panic. She lashes out at him, fingers bared like claws.

  ‘Mary, Mary, it’s me!’ he says, gripping her shoulder, but she struggles, tears herself away, reels into the shelves. Tins fall, a packet of flour bursts on the floor. She is scrambling backwards. He is left standing there, Mrs Keillor bearing down on him. He holds a hand to his cheek. Mary has raised lines down his face. They sting, clear and sharp.

  He spins, makes for the door. Mrs Keillor’s husband is out there, standing on the steps like a possession. Thomas almost knocks him over. The man swears at him but Thomas doesn’t stop. He puts his head down and runs, doesn’t stop until he gets home.

  His father is out in the vines when Thomas comes up the driveway. He waves and Thomas pauses, panting, before walking slowly over.

  ‘Good morning for it,’ his father says without looking up. ‘They’re pretty much dry.’

  He is cutting scions for the grafting. Thomas picks up a pair of snips and turns to the next vine along. His breathing slowly returns to normal, and he can sense his father glancing at him every now and again.

  ‘Your face?’ his father asks eventually.

  Thomas just shakes his head. ‘It’s fine.’ He touches his cheek with two fingers, tries not to flinch. They come away smeared with blood. He wipes the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, and lets the wind cool the sting. It is strong, insistent, full of salt.

  ‘We’re going to get more rain soon,’ his father says. His tone is casual but his eyes are worried.

  Thomas doesn’t reply. He can feel himself still vibrating, his hands working automatically. It is strange, the grafting. It feels like playing God, changing the genetic makeup of the plant, forcing one thing onto another. His father, he knows, loves it. He is the one who prepares the vine, makes the cuts, binds the graft. It has its own strange delicacy, its own craftsmanship. Thomas can remember watching him, the intricacy and precision of his movements, the gentle touch as he bound each one with tape. Now, standing in the naked rows, Thomas blinks. The memory is so simple and easy that it almost hurts.

  Beside him, his father peers into the esky. ‘Should be enough,’ he says. ‘I’m only doing two rows this y
ear.’ He starts to gather up their things. Thomas hands him the snips. ‘This business with your friend,’ his father continues, as they gather everything. ‘Do you know what happened to her?’

  Thomas shakes his head. There is a lump in his throat.

  ‘Are you sure, mate? It’s just, your mum and I, we can’t help noticing the way you’ve been acting recently . . .’

  ‘What?’ Thomas spits.

  His father is still bent over the esky, not even looking at him. It is so casual. Something is pushing at Thomas’s chest, his eyes feel too tight.

  ‘You know we love you, Tom, don’t you? Whatever’s happened?’

  Thomas tries to hold it in, but it is no good. There are tears coming down his face, making his cheek sting again. ‘What the fuck do you know about it? What does it have to do with you?’ His voice comes out brittle, like chalk. ‘Fuck. FUCK YOU!’

  His father draws a breath then extends his arms out and pulls Thomas in, holds him to his chest. Thomas pushes against it, feels himself shaking uncontrollably within the solidity of his father’s embrace.

  ‘You know we’re here for you, don’t you?’ his father says, face down into his hair. He has one hand on Thomas’s head, cradling it. ‘We want to protect you, mate. And we want to help her.’

  They stand like that and Thomas can feel himself slowly come to a state of stillness.

  ‘You want to help her?’ he whispers, eventually.

  ‘Yes,’ his father says, pulling back and looking at him, concerned. ‘Your mum reported it to the police, and she’s been talking to people in social services. But we want to help you, too. We need to know you’re okay, mate.’

  Thomas nods. He can feel the knowledge settle, feel it resolve the strange energy inside him. Nothing else matters, he realises. He just needs to help Mary.

  ‘I’m okay,’ he says, and his father steps back. ‘I’ll talk to you more. And mum. I’m okay, though.’

  ‘Good man.’ His father puts an arm around Thomas’s shoulders and with his free hand picks up the esky. ‘Come on. Sort out your face, and you can tell us what happened.’ Together they walk up the row towards the house.