To Become a Whale

by Ben Hobson

  They finished their shift in the early evening, the sun recently set, and joined the night shift team in the mess hall for dinner. Not since the beginning of the season had all the men been gathered so. They were not served more whale. The boy lined up and a heap of steaming spaghetti and sauce was put into his bowl. The boy sat beside his father and listened to the chatter of the men around them.

  Harry stood up halfway through dinner at his table and held aloft the white bone of the shark’s jaw. It was enormous. The men cheered and clapped and most raised their glasses in a gesture of respect.

  ‘Don’t need to glorify killing things,’ his father said, as the hall returned to its normal volume of chatter.

  ‘But you kill things every day.’

  ‘I process things. And no part of those whales is wasted. Not a scrap. Butchering animals for fun ain’t right.’ He shook his head. ‘You kill an animal for food or for your work. What an arsehole.’

  The boy remembered he had promised Phil that he would go hunting and now felt hesitant. ‘But I said I’d go hunting with Phil.’

  ‘You do what you like, mate. Better you learn by doing sometimes. I don’t know the truth to everything,’ his father said. ‘You want to hunt?’

  The boy thought. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Or do you want to feel like you’re one of the guys?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ the boy said. ‘Probably.’

  His father smiled and in a sad way said, ‘Do what you reckon’s right.’

  The boy thought about what his father had said as he ate. He said finally, ‘I don’t like how you treat Albert.’

  His father smiled and took his time before he answered. ‘Yeah? In what way?’

  ‘You’re too mean.’

  ‘How am I mean?’ his father said. His voice had gone quiet.

  ‘You threw him into a tree.’

  His father stopped spooning spaghetti and sighed. ‘When?’

  ‘Before we left.’

  ‘Well,’ his father said, and appeared to consider this for a moment. ‘You’re right. I shouldn’t have done that.’

  ‘Why did you?’

  ‘Was I drunk?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Then that’s why.’ This admission of guilt, not coupled with any sign of significant remorse, angered the boy. His father added, ‘But I don’t think I’m mean to him otherwise.’

  ‘You are.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘You want him to learn stuff he can’t learn. You want him to attack people. He’s not like that.’

  ‘He can learn it,’ his father said. ‘That’s the problem. Let me ask you this: what’s better for him? Pushing him a bit, cuffing him when he gets it wrong so he learns? Or letting him grow up half the dog he could’ve been ’cause I was bloody soft? The dog doesn’t know what’s best for him. I do.’ ‘But you don’t have to do it like you do.’

  ‘And how would you train him, mate?’ A hard edge to the mate. ‘He wouldn’t get trained. He’d bark and get into stuff he wasn’t supposed to. You gotta be hard sometimes on your loved ones. Things gotta have a use.’

  They finished the rest of the meal in silence. The boy was trying to remember how his parents had been before his mother had fallen ill. They had blamed one another for slights both perceived and real, normally at night-time, once the boy was in bed. His mother would sit up and wait for his father to return from the pub where he worked when he wasn’t flensing. The boy had heard their voices through the walls, his own name mentioned often. It was difficult to work out what positive effect his father thought being hard on his loved ones had, because whenever he’d spoken harshly to the boy’s mother, she had screamed back and the resentment between them had only grown. Or maybe this man was just a man who often grew angry and after his anger justified his behaviour, hiding behind imagined ideals.

  When his father was away working at Tangalooma his mother had been warm and kind. She’d walk home with him sometimes after school, and dawdle with him as he daydreamed. While his father had been working here, the boy realised, his mother had been fulfilled, happy, respected. The marriage was sturdier without the people.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  They shuffled their plates into the plastic tubs and stood outside in the darkness as men ambled from the mess hall. His father rubbed his hands over his skull and looked up at the stars and then back at the boy. Without a word he pointed to the theatre and the boy obediently turned in that direction.

  When he pushed open the door, instead of a movie he saw Phil standing in front of the screen holding his guitar, the strap draped across his shoulders. He was lit by a single spotlight. A microphone stood before him and cast a shadowed line down the middle of his face. He was dressed differently: flared jeans and a purple shirt that was too tight around the shoulders and the gut. Most blokes in the audience would have laughed if he’d walked on deck dressed in such a manner, but here in this different place it would seem he was appreciated. The atmosphere was solemn. The men chatted quietly among themselves and kept glancing at the stage, waiting. Phil looked nervous and kept shifting his feet and looking down at the guitar strap, fiddling with the end of it. The boy sat down beside his father. He smiled at Phil through the darkness but Phil gave no sign of having noticed.

  Phil stepped forward and said, ‘G’day, boys.’

  This was met with loud applause and the chanting of his name.

  Phil waited for silence before he continued. ‘Cheers. Just got a few songs, that’s all.’ He looked as though he might say something else and the pause before he did so was awful. Then he stepped back and strummed his guitar with a sweep of his hand.

  He strummed a few chords too quickly and the sound became distorted. The trembling of his hands on the neck was easy to see in the harsh light. He fingered a chord and switched to another and said loud enough for them all to hear, ‘Oops,’ which generated quiet laughter. He kept moving doggedly onwards.

  Soon he started singing. His rough voice suited his songs, giving them an air of integrity. He seemed more comfortable singing than playing. The boy was struck with the realisation that this was what Phil loved to do, was how he wanted to express himself, but even so he remained mediocre. It seemed that all the will in the world could not make up for a lack of talent.

  After five or six songs of variable quality, Phil announced that he was done and the men stood and cheered as though they were drunk. Phil was clapped on the back as he walked offstage and the boy could hear the men congratulate him and proclaim this gig his finest. Phil nodded and smiled at their praise.

  The boy went outside when the movie started, leaving his father still seated inside. Phil soon walked out with his guitar case swinging and lit a cigarette before he noticed the boy. He grinned and walked over.

  ‘Sam,’ he said and shook the boy’s hand formally. He leaned back against the wall and propped up a leg behind him. ‘What did you think?’

  ‘It was good,’ the boy said, and decided quickly to be honest, because he liked Phil, and thought he deserved the truth. ‘I think it could have been better, though.’

  Phil raised his eyebrows. ‘Really? How? What could be better than that?’ He laughed.

  ‘You know it could have been better,’ the boy persisted.

  Phil sat down on his haunches with his back against the wall. He sucked on the cigarette. ‘Yeah, I know.’

  ‘You just gotta do it more, I reckon.’

  ‘That wasn’t my first time.’

  ‘I know,’ the boy said. ‘I just think you got to get more confident playing, that’s all.’

  ‘I know I do,’ Phil said. A drag on the cigarette. Then he stubbed it out in the dirt. ‘But you liked the songs?’

  ‘I liked ’em alright.’

  ‘And they felt real?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Alright, good. I appreciate that, I do. I appreciate you being honest.’ Phil cocked his head to the side. ‘You reckon I just gotta gig in front of people more?’


  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘But the songs are good?’

  ‘I think some bits could be worked on. But yeah.’

  ‘Alright,’ Phil said. He seemed content.

  The boy said, ‘Can I ask you a question?’

  ‘About music?’

  ‘About marriage.’

  Phil really laughed at this. When he was finished he said, ‘Yeah? I’m not married, you know. Nor likely to be anytime soon.’

  ‘But do you think it’s good?’

  ‘Is marriage good?’

  ‘Yeah. Would it be a good thing to do? Or aim for?’

  Phil exhaled. ‘I guess it’s like any other thing, mate. It is what it is. It is what it is to you. What do you think of marriage? Your opinion is worth as much as mine.’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Then maybe that’s what you gotta answer for yourself.’

  They stood there together a moment, the man and the boy. Eventually Phil extended his pack of cigarettes and raised his eyebrows at the boy and jiggled them. The boy shook his head.

  ‘I gotta shower, mate. I stink like I been working all day. I’ll see you in the morning, though, yeah? Hey …’ He paused to light a cigarette. ‘Maybe if we make our quota early tomorrow we’ll go hunting after? I’ll tell the boys.’

  The boy nodded and Phil walked away, leaving him alone in the dark beside the theatre, which hummed behind him with film-speak. The boy thought about what Phil had said about marriage, thought too about his father’s vows to his mother on their wedding day and how little that aligned with his actions over the years, and then realised that men can say one thing and do another. This thought struck the boy with its profundity. He had to sit. Startled he had not thought it sooner.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Phil, Steve and two others walked along the beach towards the giant dune with shotguns slung across their shoulders. The boy did his best to keep up.

  One of the men in front of the boy turned to Steve and said something low in what sounded like Norwegian, but the words were carried off by the breeze before the boy could be sure. The water beside them was brilliant blue and the setting sun made the light dim enough so that the boy could see through the surface to the shifting sand beneath.

  They stopped near the giant dune, shrugged off their rifles and sat. A couple lit cigarettes.

  Phil called the boy over to him with a wave of his hand.

  ‘You know what this is?’

  ‘A gun.’

  He laughed. ‘What sort of gun, dickhead?’

  The boy smiled at the insult, hiding his fear. ‘A shotgun?’

  ‘That’s right. You ever handle one?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You ever shoot any type of gun?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You know how it works?’

  ‘You pull the trigger.’

  ‘That’s right. You pull the trigger. You point it at what you want to kill and you just pull the trigger.’ Phil smiled and ruffled the boy’s hair, and the boy was reminded of his father, who now sat alone in their room. ‘It’s a twelve-gauge Browning, and it’s new.’ He nodded at the other men. ‘The ones these boys are carrying are liable to go off accidentally at any moment given how old they are.’

  ‘Shut up,’ Steve said. ‘You’ve been bloody going on about it since we got here.’

  ‘Worth going on about.’

  Steve shook his head and smiled and went back to rolling his cigarette.

  ‘Brownings are made in Belgium,’ Phil said, ‘which is sort of right across the North Sea from Norway, where Gazza here is from.’

  The man he indicated towards looked like he exercised regularly, the shirt he wore much too tight and stretched over his arms like cling wrap. He nodded at the boy.

  Phil continued, ‘The twelve has a hell of a kick on it, so you want to hold it up to your shoulder or it’ll leave a bruise, let me tell you. You can load rounds in the bottom here.’ He inserted a bright red shotgun shell into the chamber and the click it made was somehow satisfying. ‘And you’re ready to go.’

  ‘Can you show me?’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘We don’t have many rounds, mate. Wait till we’re out there, yeah? And if we don’t see nothing I’ll still let you shoot it. Don’t worry about it.’

  ‘Can I hold it?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Phil un-chambered the round by hauling back on a silver lever on the right side of the weapon. It was spit out onto the sand and he was quick to grab it and brush the sand off with his fingers. He gave the shotgun to the boy, who was surprised at how heavy it was.

  Phil said, ‘You can load five rounds at once. The extra four that aren’t in the chamber sit there.’ He pointed at the wooden grip.

  The boy wondered how loud the weapon might be and if it would sound at all like the rifle Harry had used to shoot the shark. He wondered how much damage it might inflict. A growing excitement in his fingertips he felt ashamed of. He thought about what Albert would look like at the end of it, what his little dog body might look like all spread out over the floor of the small shack he and his father now called home. Plastered to the crappy door. He shook his head free of such thoughts, but they kept on. Who he had been was so different from who he was now. Such violence had never before been a part of him. Why had such an ugly thought crossed his mind? Why did he not feel worse about it?

  The men stubbed out their cigarettes, then they rose and continued on down the beach. The water lost its brilliance as the sun sank lower. Soon it was black and without form, there was just the sound of it percussive beside them. The men laughed and talked about all manner of things and the boy tried to listen but found he was more interested in the waves. The stars above him were bright but weren’t reflected in the water. In full dark the division between sky and ocean was only visible through this difference.

  They came to a point – Comboyuro Point, Phil called it. Far out to sea the boy could see red lights drifting over the water, what might be a chaser. He pointed it out to Phil and Phil said, ‘That’s Kos Seven probably. Long way out, too.’

  The boy nodded, satisfied with his eye.

  Phil switched on his torch and swung it back into the bushland. There was a concrete structure a short distance away.

  Phil wriggled the beam. ‘We’ll eat in there.’

  The men walked towards it, the boy trailing behind.

  The concrete hut had a small lip that overhung a slit window. There was an entrance around the back. Inside reeked of possum and other animals. Spray-painted on the wall the name Dan. The boy was amused to imagine the Fisheries bloke had been here before them and, like a child, had scrawled his name on the wall. There was a swear word near the floor. The men sat on the dirtied concrete, which was dense with leaves. They pulled their sandwiches out of the backpack Steve had carried and ate.

  ‘What is this?’ the boy asked.

  ‘The sandwich?’ Phil said.

  ‘The place.’

  His eyes took in their surrounds. ‘It’s called a loop control hut. The government put it here during the war.’

  ‘Which war?’

  ‘The second one.’

  ‘Why?’

  Gazza spoke up. ‘They run big cables beneath the ocean to Bribie Island, over there.’ He waved an aimless finger. ‘Three big cables in a big loop. They used it to detect enemy submarines. If they attacked Brisbane they’d come through here. They wanted to be ready.’

  The boy nodded. He finished his sandwiches before the other men, who seemed in no hurry. He stood, shuffling leaves, and looked out the slit. Bribie Island was lit up in the darkness. He looked left towards the mainland, tried to see his own home and maybe his boat in the darkness. He knew it was hopeless, but he looked all the same. He imagined slinking through the waters in a black submarine and what it would have meant if Brisbane had been attacked in his father’s lifetime.

  They soon left and headed further inland
on no discernible trail, slogging uphill through thick bush.

  One of the torches soon lit on an old dirt track and they turned onto it. Both sides were walled in with foliage. The constant sound of insects squealing. There were cane toads lining the path, small breathing lumps of wart. The men kicked them viciously. The men stepped silently and the boy did his best to tread quietly with them. The stars completely shrouded by canopy. There were all manner of animals in the night making sounds, rustling leaves. None of these sounds gave the other men pause, but the boy wished he too held a torch, sure he’d be emboldened by its clarity.

  They walked for a while before heading off the trail again and finding an old fallen tree with which Phil seemed familiar. The men squatted behind it and looked out over the top. The boy mimicked them and waited to be instructed but no instruction came. They waited. Before them, down a slope, sat a waterhole, serene and placid. The moon reflected in the surface of the water became muddied and lost its power. Hard to see much else. The men took occasional glances over the top of the log but otherwise remained still.

  After what felt a long while the boy asked in a whisper, ‘Is this all we do?’

  ‘Yep,’ Phil answered. Implied in his tone was the instruction to stop speaking.

  The boy obeyed and concentrated on the grass beneath his boots. There was a stick by his feet and he picked it up and turned it over in his hands like it was some ancient relic. He knew there had been Aborigines on the island at one time and he wondered if any of them had handled this stick, if it had any history at all. He drew dinosaurs in the mud between his legs, drawing on memories of his youth. He used to pride himself on how straight and even the ridges were on his stegosaurus. He was not as capable in the dark.

  They waited a long time.

  A sudden movement made him sit up straight and look.