We'd become news addicts. We watched every TV bulletin that was on and when a new controversy began to brew all three of us would hang around the house the whole day just waiting for the half-hourly bulletins on the radio. We collected vast numbers of newspapers and magazines. At one stage it got to the point where there was so much in print we'd just quickly read the Malone article out to each other and then throw the lot into the living-room. We only cut out and kept articles which actually created new information. We learnt that in one way or another Malone had intimate connections with almost every place in the country. The living-room slowly filled with newspaper.
Somehow I'd managed to keep my job. I'd taken dozens of sick days but had told Mr Easton I'd contracted a rare stomach illness—Tristan had forged a doctor's letter—and he accepted my absences with a gruff resignation. It had been easier for the others. Tristan had left his job in the spring—not that he'd ever gone to work that much anyway—and Megan had been able to skip lectures whenever she wanted.
Megan was unemployed for the summer. She'd been homesick when she'd first come down and I'd expected she would go back to Auckland for the holidays, but she said she thought of us as part of her family now anyway. She couldn't bear the thought of more Malone controversy without the three of us being together. I thought the real reason was that she was in love with Tristan.
The market was booming like never before and Tristan was talking of borrowing a hundred thousand to cash in while the going was good. He had a friend who could jack it up no problem. I could be in if I wanted, he said, and Megan too. We should form a company: Malone Enterprises. It didn't matter, they couldn't catch us now. We'd just be like everyone else riding the Malone wave.
He was drunk all the time now. He didn't go out at all, except to walk down to the bottle store. He was looking tired.
Megan and I had established a good friendship. Many evenings we went out for long walks around the city and up into the Botanical Gardens. She liked to talk about her family. Her brother John was a pilot for Air New Zealand—she'd felt bad about Khmer Air, she told me—and he was planning to buy an old run-down mansion and do it up. He was married to Barb, who was pregnant. Megan thought it would be wonderful to be an aunt. She had two sisters: Katherine and Sally. Katherine was a nurse in Australia and Sally was at Auckland University doing her second degree. Sally was the smartest. Megan was the youngest.
Her father was an architect and her mother a lawyer. They only worked part-time now because they'd bought a farmlet in the Bombay Hills. Her father loved practical jokes. One time he'd organised a policeman friend to come round at teatime to arrest him. Her mother was kind and clever. She didn't know why she'd come down to Wellington. She'd thought you should leave home properly; it had to happen some time.
She was doing law at university but wasn't sure whether that's what she really wanted to do. Like all of us Malone had taken away her interest in everything else. She'd passed her finals but only just. She thought she might give it one more year and if it didn't work out she'd go to Australia. Katherine wanted her to go over anyway.
One day early in the new year I took my camera on one of our walks. I hadn't taken a picture in months. It was warm and still. I thought I'd take a picture down the motorway from one of the overbridges, and I asked Megan to pose in front. As I focused I suddenly realised I'd really only wanted a picture of her and zoomed right up to her face. I deliberately mucked about and took my time as if I was a photographer from early in the century. I said say cheese, things like that. I kept taking photographs. She was laughing, right up close. There was only the camera between us.
I developed and enlarged the photographs of Megan and kept them hidden under my mattress. Each one had caught her in a different way. I looked at them in bed at night and sometimes at lunchtime when I got home from work. There was a latch on my door so I could keep it locked when I had them out.
A story grew to accompany them. When I looked at them I'd imagine her seducing me. The scene was either my bedroom or a secluded part of the Gardens. It was always sudden and unexpected. She'd run her fingers down my arm and then pull me towards her with both hands. There'd be a soft first kiss, many more, and a slow, gentle undressing. Over and over she'd tell me she loved me. I could look at her laughing eyes as she said this, I could trace her falling hair with my finger. Slowly we'd start to make love; only near the end of it would the pace start to build. It was the slowness I desired, the small tugs of breath, lips just apart. I love you, she'd whisper, I love you.
One day I smuggled the photographs downstairs to the yard my bedroom overlooked. There was an incinerator in the corner of the yard and I shoved the photographs into it and burnt them. For a while I'd been building up to this and as soon as they were gone I felt relieved of a great burden. I was able to talk with her again free of guilt.
A week later I developed them again, this time even larger. I'd realised it didn't matter a damn as long as she didn't know; I desired our moments together too much to be deprived.
Two weeks later I burnt them again, but again I kept the negatives and several days later they were back under my mattress once more.
This was the time of Naylor Island. Naylor Island was our plan to follow Malone even though we realised it would never happen—for a start we no longer had access to a fax—but this only gave us the freedom to imagine ourselves the things that might have come of it. All we knew for certain was that Naylor Island was slowly sinking. We imagined it to be at the top of Canada; there were so many islands up there nobody would know the difference. We told each other the stories of the people who lived there, the way they were responding to this crisis. They were strange shadowy people, never in our stories for long.
Tristan wanted an appeal for the victims, a New Zealand-based worldwide appeal. It would do wonders for tourism and the music industry. The media would love it: all their ugly mooshes beamed via satellite to the entire world. Since the place didn't exist we could simply pocket the millions that had been raised, go and find ourselves another island—one that wasn't sinking—and holiday away the rest of our lives together.
Megan and Tristan started going out. They didn't tell me; I discovered it one night by accident.
I'd woken up suddenly in a heavy sweat. My sheets were soaked through and I went to the bathroom to get a towel. As I went back down the hall I heard a low soft moan. I felt a stab of panic. I recognised that sound.
I tiptoed slowly up to Tristan's room. Newspapers spilled out of the living-room into the hall. His door was just slightly open and the light was on. They were on the couch, two grappling monkeys, no different than the people on the videos I'd once watched nights on end with Wayne and Gavin out at Miramar. I waited until they were finished before I left and crept back to bed.
I found another flat in Johnsonville. I realised I preferred the quiet streets of the suburbs. It was much closer to work than my other place. Business improved and Mr Easton put my work up to full time. He started letting me do some of the portraits. He was good; he didn't interfere.
Malone reappeared from time to time, usually as the classic example of sporting administrator incompetence, sometimes to endorse a new product, although his shyness prevented him from ever doing so in person. I waited for the exclusive interview but gradually he became too forgotten for anyone to want to bother. There were newer, more palpable heroes.
I met Tristan on the street one Friday afternoon about three years after I'd moved to Johnsonville. He wanted me to go for a beer but I lied I had someone to meet. He was dressed well. He told me he was still in the same place; they hadn't got round to demolishing it yet. He was thinking of making the landlord an offer himself. He and Megan had split up after a couple of months. She'd moved out too. It was nothing in the end, he said.
Sometimes at night I'd lie out on the grass in our back yard. I'd stare up at the sky, the stars whose names I'd once known well, the vast black-hearted expanse of space I'd wanted to go to so badly. No
w it didn't matter. I knew I was there already.
HOW ST MARCUS STARTED THE GAME
The bishop's thin pale fingers tapped on the oak of his chair, the slow rhythm of one who awaits an answer. Well scrubbed and almost hairless, he wore a carefully arranged robe and a large silver cross. His mouth was drawn up into a taut frown, and he gazed without blinking at a younger man who sat opposite him. They were in a large room with stone walls.
The younger man, Father Marcus, was less manicured. There was dust on the parquet around his chair, and he looked as though he had walked a long way. He sat forward, head down, leaning his elbows on his knees, his hands knotted together. He had been biting at his lip and there was a dribble of sticky blood down his beard. He sat this way for some time, quiet, while the bishop watched and waited.
I don't think I can tell you, he said finally, without looking up.
The bishop maintained his gaze. I see. Are you quite certain?
Marcus nodded. He was quite certain.
The bishop waited in silence. After a moment he sat forward and bent down towards the priest.
Well then, let us play, he said, putting his hands down to the low table between them. He spoke with more force than before, and his voice echoed, like a messenger returning to double-check the message. Let us play.
Marcus looked up. He was almost crying.
But I can't. I've never played.
The bishop did not seem to hear this. He took up all the white counters in one long hand, with the other rolled two black dice across the table. Double ones stared up at Marcus, full of accusation.
But what is wrong? You have to play. You have no choice.
I can't. I've never played. It's not right. Please don't do this to me.
Right? Marcus, you have already sinned. A sin is a debt to God. How can an unatoned sinner preach the Kingdom of Heaven? No, Marcus, you must repay your debts.
But I have no money. I can't pay if I lose.
The bishop picked up one of his dice and rubbed it carefully on his robe. Then, with a sudden violent wrench of his wrist, he flicked the polished die down onto the table so deftly that it spun on one corner for over a minute, finally toppling down, a six.
He smiled at Marcus, and the priest could see for the first time that the bishop had no teeth. He spoke softer, as if now to a child.
In that case, my friend, you must play to win.
The rest, as they say, is history. Father Marcus became diocese champion, undefeated for fifteen years, and eventually St Marcus, as we all now know and love him.
The bishop, who had himself been champion for over a decade, was found a month later face down in the garden by a monk planning a vegetable plot. With the proceeds of the silver cross he was able to leave the priesthood forever.
VIRGIL AND THE DRAGON
Beside my bed is a green, stumpy-winged dragon (not a real one, thank God, and for that matter all those other wonderful deity types sitting pretty up there in the sullen sky. God gets thanked often for such things, and as I offer my supplicative humility to Him, He is, rather conveniently, sitting at home with Mary and Jesus. He has scored the La-z-boy chair tonight and His fat sphinx legs rest up in the air. He is playing backgammon with Jesus, and He ponders each move with deep concentration. There is a jar of honey beside Him, and into it He absently thrusts His arthritic fingers, licking them snortily between throws of the dice.
Jesus lolls back on the couch, playing idly with His earring. A cigarette hangs from His bottom lip, the smoke curling away into nothing. He has on a walkman, and even with the TV going God and Mary can still hear the music—The Fall it is tonight—though God prefers to call it something else.
You can't even hear the words, He whinges whenever the subject comes up.
Jesus contemplates moves with an easy disdain, and throws His dice from way back on the couch so that half the time they bounce onto the floor and away under the couch, little mice dice, frightened, perhaps, in the presence of their equals.
Mary is watching The Young Doctors. She sits forward on the couch, hunched and quiet. Her thin red fingers trace weft and warp with a tea-towel. She wishes She had married Dr Shaw.
Empty wine bottles litter the floor. An alsatian sleeps by a two-bar heater, snoring softly.
I think, says Jesus far too loudly, that Mike Newman is a real dick.
We can hear You without yelling, says God.
What? yells Jesus.
We can hear You without yelling! yells God back.
Jesus turns down the tape.
What? He says.
I said, We can hear You without yelling, hisses God, a fine spray of honeyed saliva shooting into the air like insecticide.
Shhh, says Mary. The alsatian wakes for a moment, looks about blinking, discovers itself in heaven, yawns, and returns to its snoring.
Look at him, says Jesus with contempt. What a jerk, and that Tanya nurse. She's lost all her credibility since that Mobil ad. I think …
Shut Your trap. Your Mother's watching television.
Jesus offers God the double. He accepts.
You shouldn't have done that, laughs Jesus.
Of course I should have. I'm perfect, remember?
The phone rings. No one moves. On and on it rings.
You get it Dad, says Jesus finally. It's always for You.
God sighs. For a moment He gazes glassily into space, a weary prop after the championship game, then struggles out of His chair, cursing the gravity He Himself once created. He picks up the phone.
It's me. I use my best telephone voice.
Is God there please?
Speaking.
Is that God there?
Yes.
Well, God, I'd just like to thank You. I hesitate.
What for?
Well, You see, I've got this dragon, right by my bed, and, well, it's not real, as You Yourself probably already realise, being God and all, and I was just calling, You know, to thank You.
Is that it?
Yes. So thanks anyway, God.
The phone clicks off. God walks back to His chair, stands over the board as if it is the world. Jesus has thrown a double four, and the six-point block is in place. God has five counters back. The backgammon is on. Recklessly, God offers Jesus the double. Jesus accepts with a brief nod.
Why did You double? He asks, feigning interest.
Who cares? asks God. He slides back into His chair like a Big Mac down the stainless steel—warm, round and doomed) called Thunderdragon II. Silent, motionless, he looks out across my bedroom floor, waiting for his time.
GRAVITY
I'm losing it. Too many beers, too much hash, a fierce greed, and puritanical dice: just went down 128 points. That's a dollar a point. I've found $6.15 in my pockets so far.
I stand up to go outside and get some fresh air, but the room starts to spin: 33, 45, 78. My creditors speed by several times in a second. A glass falls from my hand and smashes; the wall blurs into carpet. A lamp on a low table in the corner of the room is the moon. I suddenly realise it is moving in closer, heading straight in our direction. Our former best friend has turned into a meteor.
Naturally it is of the greatest concern, the moon moving in like this. It's probably the biggest news of all time. Every TV station runs a round-the-clock Moon-Watch, stopping only for the ads. Newspapers scream: It's the End of the World!
Scientists cluster. It's a simple matter of mathematics. The moon will crash into China next Tuesday. It might land in the sea. It will hit Antarctica in three weeks. We don't know. We don't know what's going on.
Stay in your homes, advises the radio.
But the moon is too loyal. Like a sleeping kitten nestling up to its mother, it simply settles in a closer orbit.
Half the day it is above us, an enormous rock in the sky, big enough to block the sun for an hour or more if their paths cross. When it is directly above us it is like we are underground and the moon is the roof of our cave.
It has a gr
avitational pull on us. When it is on the other side of the earth we feel weighted down. We are irritable and depressed and sleep if we can, even if it is a bright and sunny day.
When it is on our side the gravity of the moon cancels out some of the earth's. We are freed, light as children. We can take enormous leaps, throw a ball for miles. Sports records fly out the window.
We can travel great distances and climb mountains easily. We have parties and laugh all the time, and everyone thinks up wonderful ideas. We bounce together in the air, almost flying.
People want to buy the moon. A black limousine pulls up at the White House. A Lada pulls up at the Kremlin. McDonald's want to beam a giant yellow M on its side and rename it McMoon. The Vatican counts its hilltops. The Windsors count the jewels.
I'll write a cheque, I say.
Don't worry about it, forget it, someone replies.
No, it has to be a cheque. I haven't got the cash.
It's okay. You hit your head. Don't worry about the money. Someone leans over me.
He's okay, she says.
But it's true, I say.
Don't worry about it. Just rest your head.
I rest my head. It is true.
THE LOST DIE
There's been an accident up ahead, you can see the flashing lights in the distance. For a while things went in a crawl but now they've stopped altogether. At first people left their motors running but one by one they've turned them off. You lean against the door and drum your fingers on the wheel. You were due in town half an hour ago.
There's a sense of waiting in a supermarket carpark. Any minute your family will appear with the shopping.
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