by Fiona Wood
Lying down flat on my back, my arms stretched out in a T, I can see two things that make me uncomfortable. The first is dust balls that have been mating in captivity under my bed. Nestled in the herd’s midst is an unopened present from my dad.
It seems that getting used to my dad being gay would be a lot easier if he’d bothered hanging around so I could talk to him about it. But I straightaway know that’s not exactly fair. He’s been ringing me since he left. So technically, it’s me not being available to talk.
Howard is the only one I can discuss it with. I’m beginning to think that getting used to my dad being gay is something like going into the ocean. It’s freezing to an unbearable level for a while, then once you’re in it feels fine and you wonder what the problem was. Unfortunately, I’m still only in up to my ankles taking chicken-shit steps.
Lifting the two weights is a gut-straining debacle. As much as I heave, I can barely get them off the floor. Lifting one, with both hands, at chest level is more manageable.
The second thing I cannot avoid seeing as I lie here is the ceiling. Straight through that ceiling is the attic, and next to that attic is Estelle’s attic.
I’m obsessing about Estelle. It’s killing me knowing how much we have in common but being unable to convey this burning fact due to severe social disability. (How I know we have so much in common is in a category of worry I can’t even discuss with Howard.)
When I think about the gaffes-to-date list, it seems unlikely I’ll ever be friends with Estelle, let alone even approaching a romance.
Estelle has seen me:
1 Answer to ‘dickhead’ – whale of a first impression.
2 Forget to bring Howard home.
3 Fail to answer a simple maths question.
4 Nearly vomit in class.
5 Faint in class.
6 Act like a prize idiot in the laneway.
Could I be making a worse impression?
When is the tide going to turn?
In my churning inadequacy I lose count of the reps and accidentally let the weight crash into my face.
12
MY MOTHER OBVIOUSLY DOESN’T hear my agonised moaning over Radiohead’s agonised moaning or I’m sure she would have been upstairs in a flash. As it is, I self-administer first aid. It’s easy to make a cold compress when the water comes out of the taps like ice. I think I’ve done a good job, so it’s surprising to see how swollen my nose and left eye are in the morning. I look like I’ve been on the receiving end of a serious thumping.
While I’m doing some tough-guy gangster talk into the mirror – you ought to see the other guy, etc – I notice that I really need a shave. Like really overdue need. Exactly how to go about that is the sort of thing I would have asked my dad if I’d had a clue he was going to leave us. Even though everything else on the bathroom shelf, from paracetamol to tampons, has detailed instructions and warnings, razors don’t. I don’t want to risk slicing off my top lip, but there’s no way I can ask my mother, that’d just be rubbing salt into the absent-father wound. Maybe there’s a product along the lines of ‘my sucky little first razor’ with step-by-step illustrations for klutzes. Or maybe not. I’ll just add straggly, raised-by-wolves facial hair to my long list of charms.
Well used to my clumsiness, my mother gives an absentminded, ‘Oh, darling’ when she sees me. She guesses – ‘tripped over your pants’, ‘fell out of bed’, ‘opened the window in your face’ – and nods when I tell her what happened. ‘Full marks for originality there,’ she says, ruffling my hair on her way out.
When I arrive at school Mr Pittney takes one look at me and asks me to follow him. After I finally convince him that I’m not being bullied, he assumes a more gentle expression and starts asking me how things are at home. I tell him the truth: as well as can be expected in the pretty dire circumstances, which include our sudden loss of fortune, my mother’s growing Radiohead habit . . . But he cuts me short. Ushering me out, he assures me that listening to the radio is quite safe, and that his door is always open. He closes it on me while I’m still wondering if I can ask such a moustached person about shaving without it seeming like I’m having a go. ‘Do you know how to use a razor, Mr Pittney?’, ‘Got any tips on shaving, Mr Pittney?’
Nah, it’d never work.
In the classroom corridor at the end of the day there’s a new mad energy zipping around like a snitch. People are yapping, whooping, laughing, yelling. Talking about limos and dresses and dates. A notice about the Year Nine social has just gone up. I search the crowd for another unexcited face: Lou. Thank you. She comes over.
‘It’s the first school dance for two years. Thus the hysteria level,’ she says. ‘The last one got busted when someone tipped off the police about drug use in the school.’
‘What did they find?’
‘Not much, but we got a dodgy rep anyway. And the local paper ran an “underage drug-fuelled orgy” sort of headline, so that was pretty funny.’
‘Will you go?’ I ask.
‘Not unless they make it compulsory,’ she says.
‘Same,’ I say. But I’m thinking, not unless I can go with Estelle.
And tickets are twenty bucks – another reminder that I need a job, in case I do end up going.
My locker has been tagged again. That’s another group I’m growing to know and love: the would-be homies who never have a fat texta far from their grimy paws. But it’s just about impossible to get mad with people dumb enough to leave their brand name at the crime scene. The ‘FBK’ crew guy gives me a reserved nod. I reserve-nod him back.
Reaching into my locker there’s an alarming amount of wrist and forearm emerging from my grey shirtsleeves and jumper. I could do with a couple of sizes up, but when we bought this in the holidays it fitted fine, with room for growing. I look down. Pants much too short as well. This is good. Facial hair, swollen nose, black eye, clothes that don’t fit – the whole cool thing is coming along nicely.
When I let myself in the front door, I can hear muffled shouting coming from the back of the house. I drop my bag and head for the kitchen. As I open the door ready to spring into attack, if necessary, my mother holds up her hand in a ‘wait there’ sign. Amnesiac is playing in the background and a young woman is pointing at an empty kitchen chair, sobbing ‘. . . and this wedding is not just about me, and my dress, and my cake, and my mother. Thank God I found out what a petty monster you are before it was too late.’ She glances up at my mother, who is nodding her calm approval. Then the woman stands up and kicks the chair over. ‘Bastard!’
I gather the empty chair is her soon-to-be-ex-fiancé. She bursts into tears and flings her arms around my mother.
Another one bites the dust.
Howard and I turn into the Edinburgh Gardens for a few laps of the big oval. He’s dragging his paws a bit but managing to keep up.
We’ve been running for nearly an hour and I still can’t figure out how to persuade my mother to stop putting her clients off the idea of marriage. She’s shooting herself in the foot but who am I to lay down the law? Isn’t it obvious that people have to go through with a wedding in order to need a wedding cake?
When I get home, my mother is happily singing along to ‘No Surprises’, possibly her favourite Radiohead song.
‘Did she change her mind? Is she ordering the cake?’
‘Oh, no,’ she replies vaguely.
‘Then how come you’re singing? Haven’t you just lost another customer?’
‘Yes, but she was going to order the Rambling Rose.’
The Rambling Rose is the most expensive cake in the range. Three tiers, covered in hand-made pink chocolate roses and marzipan ribbons.
‘But not any more?’
‘But only because she’s not getting married any more. She loved it!’
‘That’s . . . great.’
I go upstairs for a shower. She’s deluded, maybe in need of professional counselling. What should I do? My dad would know what to do. But if he were her
e, she wouldn’t be having the meltdown. And he’s not, so it’s up to me. I don’t want to go back down there and be the grown-up. I prefer being the kid with parents doing the hard stuff.
Stirring the stew, I try to channel my dad’s tone: firm but humorous. I take a deep breath of the tomato-y, garlicky steam, and leap in.
‘You can’t keep talking people out of getting married.’
‘I just want them to consider the pros and cons.’
‘You’re going overboard on the cons. It’s not your job. Your job is the cake.’
‘I need to get to know them so I can plan the right cake. And then how can I give them an ethical cake if I think they’re making a huge mistake?’
‘You’re dumping a whole anti-marriage thing on them.’
‘No, I’m not.’
‘All you need is the date of the wedding, the number of guests, and get them to choose from the cake pictures which one they like.’
I’m speaking to her back.
‘And that chair business – give me a break – you’re not some daytime TV shrink.’
She serves the rice. Expression: neutral. She’s thinking; it’s sinking in. I hope.
13
WHEN I GET HOME from school the next day, she’s had a stack of promotional flyers printed up at the Officeworks around the corner. I breathe a sigh of relief. Something I said last night must have got through. She’s back on board the sane train.
But only for a minute. She wants me to take a bunch of flyers to the staffroom at school. Is she kidding? No. And it’s hard to argue with her logic. Teachers are always getting married. It’s like their number one hobby or something.
I’m pretty sure being the PR boy for a wedding cake business is another rung on the social suicide ladder, so I make sure I’m in early the next morning to jam some flyers under the staff-room door. And that’s it. I’ll try to get rid of some more at the shops after school. Relief at getting the job done without being spotted is short-lived when Jayzo grabs a handful of flyers from my bag at the lockers.
‘Are you having a party, jerk-off?’ he asks. But then – proof that he can actually read – he says, ‘What’s this lame-arsed cake business got to do with you?’
I try ignoring him. Great tactic in theory. Practical success rate? For me, about one in twenty. He uses a flyer on me like a face-washer. It really hurts my bruised and battered face. ‘I asked you a question.’
‘It’s my mother’s business,’ I say through gritted teeth.
‘Is that right?’
He folds the flyer carefully and puts it in his pocket, sneering.
As he walks off, Lou says, ‘I think he likes you.’
I have to introduce Lou to Fred.
On the way home, I stop at all the likely shops and drop off flyers. When I get to Phrenology the bald guy, Ali, is sitting on a bar stool in the window talking to an old guy. So I go in and wait.
It’s a comfortable, homey café. Red concrete floor, long marble counter, biscuits in huge laboratory jars, wooden chair all-sorts, cakes on tiered stands, mismatched flower-patterned cups and saucers in a pigeonhole grid mounted on the wall, yellow tulips in a blue enamel coffee pot, blackboard menu, light-bulbs hang ing from long looped cords, a deep wooden crate painted lettuce green and half full of baguettes. I want to work here.
Two cool mothers sit deep in conversation while their little kids turn cake into a spitty mess – wearing some, eating some and smearing some around.
Ali notices me and throws an impatient look at the girl behind the counter washing glasses. ‘How can we help you?’ he asks, catching her attention. I recognise the dark red hair before she turns to me with a glare of recognition. It’s Estelle’s friend, Janie. She wipes her hands on the black wrap apron.
‘What can I get you?’ she asks with a smile that’s polite on the surface but flipping me off underneath.
I fake concentration on the cakes and pastries, piled in a glass display cabinet on the counter. ‘They look good.’
Janie rolls her fierce black-rimmed eyes. ‘Would you like to choose one?’ then dropping her voice, ‘Or would you prefer me to read your mind?’
‘I’ve come about work,’ I say. If I’d had any money on me, I would have chickened out, bought a cake, and run.
‘He’s here about a job,’ she calls in Ali’s direction, turning back to the washing-up area.
Ali is about thirty-five. Black jeans, black jumper, black stubble. Tall, tough-looking. He’d be a perfectly believable bouncer. He looks at me with such focus as I head over I feel as though I have a large sign hanging around my neck that says:
CLUMSY
INEXPERIENCED
DON’T HIRE ME
‘Hi, I’m Dan,’ I say, as a dad-imprint reminder floats to the surface: make eye-contact, shake hands. His grip is like a tourniquet.
‘How old are you?’
‘Nearly fifteen.’
‘Come back after your birthday.’
I’m expecting this one. ‘I’m prepared to be trained free of charge until I turn fifteen. I really need a job.’
‘Have you got any experience?’
‘Not in the area.’
My only job has been an abortive paperboy round when I was twelve, where Dad ended up driving me half the time.
‘What makes you think you’re suited to working in a café?’
‘I love food, and I’m interested in the service industry.’
I’ve rehearsed all this, but it comes off sounding like something out of ‘First Job Interviews for Dummies’. Is he buying it?
‘Can you handle a boss who shouts occasionally?’
It’s more like ‘all the time’ according to Mrs Da Silva, so I’m prepared for this too.
‘I’m used to it. My dad used to yell quite a bit.’
‘But he’s stopped?’
‘Kind of. He doesn’t live with us anymore.’
His considering look makes me babble on. I hope he doesn’t think my dad’s inside or something. ‘So it’s just me and Mum now. Mum and I. She has a food business, too. Wedding cakes.’ I pull a flyer from my backpack. ‘Maybe . . . would it be okay if I put this up in your window?’
He looks it over. ‘Sure. Okay, I’ll give you a trial – paid work-experience. If you handle it well we can talk about some part-time work when you turn fifteen. Breakages get taken out of your pay.’
I’m coming in for the morning shift on Saturday, seven until twelve-thirty. Fantastic. When I tell him I can help out by taking home any leftover food, he just smiles and heads out the back.
As soon as he’s out of range Janie comes over. Foolishly, I smile, imagining she’s going to congratulate me on getting a job. But she says, ‘Stop staring at my friend all the time in class. She thinks you’re a creep.’
Today is winter solstice. It’s nearly five o’clock and the wind is scribbling the trees’ bare branches against a darkening sky. Following my dragon-breath home along the puddled footpaths, I worry about the frequency of my Estelle glances in class. I honestly thought I had a lid on that. Does she really think I’m a creep or is that just Janie’s helpful take on the situation? Has Estelle actually called me a ‘creep’? Or has she said something like, ‘It’s a bit “creepy” when people look at you in class’ . . . ? There’s quite a difference.
When I get home the phone is ringing and my mother’s not home. Despite my jostling worries I remember to answer the right way. ‘I Do Wedding Cakes, how may I help you?’ The voice at the other end sounds like someone my own age, ‘How may I help you, dick brain?’ There’s the sound of two people snorting with laughter. And they hang up. Thank you, Jayzo.
My heart is racing, my face burning. The phone rings again. ‘Yes?’ I bark down the line. It’s my mother.
‘Dan, how many times are we going to go over this? Please answer with the business name. You’re so keen on telling me how to run the show, but you have to do your bit, too.’
She’s ringing to let me know
she’s at a small business seminar at the library and there’s some food in the fridge for dinner.
When the phone rings again ten minutes later, I figure it’s her checking up on me. But no, it’s another prank call. ‘You may help me by walking under a truck,’ a girl sputters. More laughing and another hang up. A few minutes later another call – gee, the gang’s all there. ‘You “do” wedding cakes? That’s disgusting.’ The high-end wit keeps on coming. Four more calls in the next hour and that’s it. I put on the answering machine. Surprise, surprise, my amusing classmates’ calls peter out. I’m fuming. I’m embarrassed. I need to talk to Fred, but when I call, the Gazelle tells me he’s at debating.
Before I get ready for bed I work out some anger with a good weights session. Why was I persisting despite my aching arms and aching face? Getting stronger and looking better is now imperative. I want to be able to stand up to Jayzo – and his prank-calling band of hyenas – including thumping him, if it comes to that. Also against all odds and any likelihood, I keep imagining the unimaginable – that I will somehow go to the social with Estelle. Despite knowing it is utterly stupid and I am utterly stupid, given the latest ‘creep’ update, images of us together keep invading my thoughts.
I hear her moving in the attic, push on through the pain barrier, and re-enter the shame zone as I remember my second visit to the attic.
14
THE LAST WEEKEND OF the holidays we moved in, Estelle and her parents were going away. She and her mother were fighting, as usual – Estelle didn’t want to go.
I waited until they’d left, and then another hour in case of an essential-item-forgotten return trip, before I decided the coast was clear.
She hadn’t replaced the box of books over the hatch cover so I knew my first visit was undiscovered. I pushed the packing boxes away from the hole between my side and Estelle’s side of the attic, putting the cord in my pocket to reposition them on my way out. I was being sneaky and deliberate.