by Alan Duff
Over to Boogie’s top bunk above Grace’s, for some reason being reminded of Grace’s request for her own room and Beth asking her daughter where the extra was going to come from, as it was a three-bedroom house and was gonna stay that way like it or not, Grace telling Beth that she could apply to the Housing Corporation for a bigger house, she knew other kids’ parents had done that, and Beth telling Grace she’d think about it.
But nothing done. Nothing done, story of my life: too much the thinking not enough the doing. Right, soon as my face is healed up I’m applying for a four-bedroom. (Can’t blame the girl, she’s nearly a woman now even though she’s only twelve, close to thirteen.) Startling, and cocking her ear when she thought she heard a noise, hoping it wasn’t him getting up. Not ready to face him. Need time. To gather my strength so I can tell him where to go — oh why’d I fall for the man? Stepping over to the window, taking in the same old sight of the Trambert farm, calming herself inside. Then, better, she moved out to the next-door bedroom, Nig’s and Abe’s.
Stood in the doorway looking at the walls covered in posters of boxers and karate men, and Abe with a few pop stars amongst his similar fighting posters. And this thought welling up in her mind of: My Nig. I just love him so much. My first-born, and I wanted a son for my first and so did Jake. Remembering how they used to make such a fuss of him, spoiling him rotten, sitting up together with him whenever he was ill. Ah, those were the times when your father and I were close, and when I never even thought that he wouldn’t want to share my dream of, you know, our own house, not a state rental, and family togetherness. My Nig. Managing a little twitch of a smile despite the pain.
Stepping inside, noticing that all the boxers were Negro. Fancy that, never noticed that before. Now they’re what you call real niggers. Not like a Maori nigger. They’re often called that, some Maoris, it’s a common nickname and given out of affection not contempt.
One of the black boxers took her eye. Yuk. Bald. And his pate shiny with sweat, or something shiny, and muscles rippling all over. Reminds me of him, Jake. Oh fuckim. I hateim. But still looking at the Negro boxer and comparing to her husband, the build, the meanness of face, the eyes … the eyes, searching for something she could see but not put her finger on; as if the fighter’s eyes were giving away something of the exact same look in her husband’s eyes, almost a hurt. Yes, a wounded hurt. As if he’s saying, I’m gonna punish you, not because I’m bad but because you hurt me. Then the thought went away as Beth remembered immediately her beating and what she’d done to deserve it. You made a fool of me in front of all my mates! he’d yelled at her before he started on her with his fists.
A headache came on. Must be getting my mate. Hah, some mate, dunno why we call our period a mate. Not as if it’s something to look forward to. Jake, he hates it; only have to tell him I’m close to getting it and he won’t touch me. Good way of keeping him off when a woman don’t want him, like when I came to bed and him saying sorry and wanting to make up, and his way of making up is sticking himself inside me — thrusting at me, like I’m some damn dog bitch down the street. Think he gets a buzz, a you know, a kick from doing it so soon after he’s beat a woman up. Still, a woman’d had her moments of that being the very thing she wanted: to fuck. For relief, I spose.
A smoke. Need a smoke. Off downstairs, careful-careful on the threadbare carpet not as if you walking on six-inch-thick shagpile over at the Tramberts’, lady. Magine her, Mrs Trambert, tiptoeing around her own house afraid of waking her husband in case he felt like starting on her again. Or woke wanting to fuck her — not make love. Fuck. Jesus. Then realising she was in her nightie, but that’s alright, I’m a clever girl, I got spare changes of clothing everywhere.
And she went to the linen cupboard where the hot-water cylinder also was and she pulled out from under it a plastic bag containing a dress, a change of underpants, and casual shoes. Out in the backyard shed (unused, naturally) Beth had another change of clothing, and underneath the house yet another. Bastard’ll never throw me out on the street naked again with a woman’s privacy exposed for the whole — waiting — world to see.
Changed. Just like that. Pleased with herself, her forethought. The kitchen. Fridge. Oo, my face hurts. Hope there’s some beer left, and licking her lips with immediate regret. The pain. Bastard. Lifting — one good and one swollen shut — eyes to the ceiling. I hate your guts. Peering into the noisy old refrigerator for the familiar headrise of quart beer bottle. Ah, yes. Counting them: one, two, three, oh good, four ofem. Four of the lovely sweet things.
Over at the table, pouring the first glass and the sun streaming through the windows behind her so warm. Ah. So very nice and warm. Oh, now look at that. Smiling — and to hell with the pain — at the sight of foamy white head atop her beer. Smokes. Must have a smoke to go with it, not the same having a beer without a smoke. Horse and carriage, love and marriage, smoke and beer. (Beer and fists. Beer and personality change. Beer and …) she went over in her mind as she went out to the wash-house to fetch a packet of cigarettes from her hiding place in the cardboard box where the potatoes were kept. Cunning, cunning, clever clever, Beth. (Beer and happiness —?? happiness? For me it is. Beer and culture. Culture? Beer and Maori culture. It’s our lifeblood. We live for our beer. My parents did, and as for Jake’s, the stories he’s told me about how they drank. Any wonder he’s half mad.)
Back to the table, having the first mouthful, just a taste. Lighting a cigarette. Ahhh. Nother taste. Just a sip. Tease myself. A deep pull at her fag. The hit at the back of her throat. Another swig, but this time a decent one. Ah, now that is nice.
Sun warm — warm — on her knees. Pulling her dress up — Oh, that is so good. The sun’s heat like an intimate caress, reminding her. Up your black arse, mista, thrusting two fingers at the ceiling, pushing aside a wisp of hair fallen over her forehead. I used to be beautiful. Well, maybe not beautiful, but everyone used to tell me I was spunky. Or I’d hearem: See Beth over there, she’s a spunk. That’s what the boys used to say. Made a girl come over all funny, except she didn’t know what it was that felt funny, but now knew it as sex. Sex-u-ality, Beth. Get it right. Hahaha, gotta laugh, eh. And the first quart bottle going just like that.
Nother one, madam? Aloud to herself with a giggle restricting itself to her throat so as not to aggravate the cut lip. Don’t mind if I do, thank you. Getting another bottle. Looking at the beads of condensation running slowly down its brown glass sides, and the sun rays, how they let you see right through the liquid, see the label in reverse. But her face pounding with a gradual rise in pain, a regular thumping, throbbing ache. Must be the first effects of the beer. Have another glass. Mmm-uh. Thank you. Downing it greedily, like medicine. Or love. Or maybe they’re both. She wondered about that thought. And up your arse, Jake Heke, she every now and then gave the two-finger insult to the ceiling.
Boogie, pictures of him, of his face and the look of having been let down by her dancing into her mind and being shoved away as soon as they appeared. (I couldn’t help it.) The third bottle. Easy, easy, Beth, not as if you got your own brewery. But knowing she could borrow from next door, nor having to worry about no one being home because someone was always home next door. If one went out, the other made sure he/she’d stay. You’d think they had a treasure in there to look after stead of a usual Pine Blocker’s miserable possessions. To hell withem. Though Beth needed them. And they both knew it.
Music. I need some music. That’ll keep my thoughts off Boogie, my blues, him still asleep up there because that’s what happens to half these Pine Blockers when they’re out of work, they sleep. And when they wake up they drink. And money doesn’t come into it because they find it, or they have it from keeping back a good part of their benefit meant to feed a whole family on. It’s beer first with a Pine Blocker. He’d run a mile for a sniff of the stuff. Beth’s swigs getting healthier as the throbbing pain subsided. Beer.
Music. Sitting room. Look at it. Oh you good kids. Must buy you
all something next payday. Or soon as I get a good win on the cards. Though it’d been some weeks since Beth’d won at poker. Boogie. No! She touched her face for reassurance that she could not have appeared on his behalf today. Knowing that Grace’d got the morning off from school to go give her brother some support because he was like that, he needed it, and so was she, Grace, she had it to give. Good kid, even if a woman had no idea where her daughter was at, coming from; such a mysterious, quiet thing that she was. Good kid, though. Specially with her brothers and sister. She’ll make a good mother one day. She’s a good one now: whenever a woman’s too drunk or too beat up to do the household chores, Grace’ll step in. Good old young in years Grace.
Beth sorted through the variously owned and collected records; single and long-players, spanning several decades, from the forties, inherited from her parents’ generations and retained because those times they had melody, and harmony, and romance in the songs, the fifties and sixties, and not this modern stuff the kids liked, soul and reggae and rap. Not that a woman didn’t hear the music in the new, just that it lacked romance and sentimentality for her. We’re a musical people, us Maoris. Comes natural to most of us; plays a bigger part in our lives, I think. Though Beth couldn’t be entirely sure on that, since she hardly knew a European, not to talk to go to their house see how they lived.
They’re like strangers — they are strangers, to most Maori I know. May as well be from another country the contact the two races have. Oh but I can’t blame em half the time when you see all the crime, or too damn much of it, is committed by us. Hell, I dunno, must be something in the Maori make-up makes us wilder, more inclined to breaking the law. Yet we’re a good people. Basically, we’re good. We share things. We’d give our shirt off our back to another. (Till you’d lived in Pine Block a while, that is, and then you’d grow hard along the way, most of you.) And we have this … Beth thinking hard, trying to match up instinctive understanding with a suitable word — passion. We got passion, us Maoris. Or maybe it’s style. But not like that Negro style you see on the TV of being swank, hip, cool, moving with their black rhythmic groovin, not that kind, but a cross between that and the less showy whites. Oh, and humour, we got humour. Chuckling to herself. But things, we ain’t got things. Meaning possessions. Material possessions. And who needs em? No Maori I ever knew ever lusted after having things. It’s here — Beth patted her heart area — it’s here where we want for ourselves. Patted her belly, And here. Laughing. Food. We love our food. Even when we know it’s bad for us, killing us early even. We say what the hell, it don’t matter, it was sweet while it lasted. What they call it? Laid back, that’s the term. We’re a laid-back race. Cept when we’re drunk. Then we lay out. Other people that is. Lay em out as soon as look atem. Half our trouble: beer and fists and having passion. They don’t mix.
Aee, my Maori people, for you this woman sometimes despairs. But have another drink in the meantime, Beth.
Oh, and we’re shy. Musical, good dancers, natural born entertainers, yet we’re shy. Like him up there, Jake the arsehole: can sing the pants off anyone — when he’s drunk. Sober, he won’t sing a note. Drunk, and every Maori’s a star. Go to any party you can see em with heads back, eyes closed, singing to their hearts’ content. And so good. But when the party’s over, so are they. Such a shame.
Dancing. Jake when he dances it’s like he’s got air under his feet. Such a tall man too. He flows — flowwwwws. And when he twirls you he does it so gently and with perfect timing and his white teeth flashing on his dark handsome face, and … Beth remembering better days. (Of when he’d pull me close to him and I could feel his manly strength, the muscles, the security it gave me. And soon that other feeling’d come on … of wanting him … of wanting him inside me — Oh, but I could never tell him that. Never.)
The fourth bottle going down fast. And no music yet because she was afraid of waking him. So back up to the kitchen to check the time and glad to see school’d soon be out. She could send one of the kids next door to borrow more beer, or pay for it if they went that way, which they occasionally did just when they knew a woman needed em most the bastards, that bitch.
Number four finished. I’ll smoke while I’m waiting. Good time-filler, smoking. Good full stop. Don’t wake up, Jake Heke, not yet, not yet … The pain not so bad now. Feeling a little sleepy, or like sleeping. They’re different. Lighting another smoke. Ahh …
Kids home. Ooh, Mum, look at your face, it’s — Yeah, yeah, I know what it looks like. Think I can’t look in a mirror? So how was school? And where’s Grace? Her two youngers’ horror at her facial injuries not lasting long, as she knew it wouldn’t. They were very experienced kids, and hungry kids. What’s to eat? Fresh air, you can’t even give your mother a hug. Hugging em. Oh, it’s such a good feeling this love. And telling em: Love, it’s the only thing counts on this earth. A tear in her good eye. Yeow, Mum, love and food. So what’s to eat? I’m starving.
Feeding em something, shooing em off, go play, be happy, grow strong, know love. Yeah, yeah, Mum: love.
No Grace. No Boogie. Means the worst. Shit.
Abe home: Abe, go next door and ask to borrow some beer. Four bottles. DB if they got it. I’ll pay em now if they get shirty about it. Abe going next door, not asking about her injuries, returning with the four bottles, Where’ll I put em, Mum? His attitude changed: Pine Block surliness growing on him. Like moss. Like that green slime on the Barton woman’s old washing-machine wringers. Or a disease. He’s caught the Pine Block teenage boy disease: he’s starting to scowl at the world, just look at his lips the way they’re shaping. (Can’t you give a mother some medicine, doctor, for her ailing children?)
They cold? Nope. Warm as. Not like you, eh son? Huh? Warm as. Huh? You’re not warm as. So? So? Beth went in imitation of her sullen son. So? she repeated to make her half-drunk point. G’won, get yourself something to eat and go do whatever it is you young fullas do that you never used to dream of doing when you were young (and hope was still with you). Kids. What’s the use?
Sticking the bottles in the freezer section of the fridge. The sounds of Jake finally risen. We’re up, are we? The night-shift drinking starting soon, eh? Giving him the fingers. Up your black arse, mista. More out of bravado than anything, and tensed for him to come downstairs and start on her again. Gritting her teeth in anticipation. Fuckim. I ain’t backin down. Wishing the beer would hurry up and get cold. Can’t stand warm beer.
Grace. How’d — What’s the use in asking? I can tell by her face. They send him away, Grace? And Grace standing there and Beth thinking her daughter had no feeling for her, then suddenly Grace bursting into tears. It’s not fair! And a mother finding herself holding her daughter, and being held in turn, and though sad and upset for Boogie, Beth aware that she and Grace had not done this kind of thing often. Not holding each other. So feeling uncomfortable. As though in the arms of a stranger. A stranger. It’s always strangers. We humans are all strangers to each other; not just them over the fence and over dale yonder in the big house, but even a mother to her own children. Look at Abe: I may as well’ve been his teacher, his worst most hated teacher at school. And there’s my Nig, who’s itching to get into the Brown Fists. And now it’s Boogie, my own son taken from me and likely to have become a stranger to me on the spot because I didn’t appear as a good mother should and say good things about him so he might have a chance, and then there’s this girl in my arms who I don’t even know. Thirteen years and I don’t know her from Eve.
We’ll visit him. Alright, Grace? I’ll save up and we’ll go visit him. In a rental. How about that, Grace? Mum, but you can’t save up. We never save anything. No one in this place does. Grace crying. And for more reason than just Boogie, Beth realising. But what could a woman do?
Look at me, Grace. Look at me. Stepping back from Grace to show her her face. Mum, why can’t we leave here? We will, Beth patting her girl’s back. We will one day, I promise. Just like a scene from a TV movie. Now off you go,
honey. Here, go buy you and the kids a treat, giving Grace a ten-dollar note, but Grace refusing. Save it, Mummy. Save it what for? Beth quite forgetting the promise of only a minute ago, just something she’d said. For the rental to go visit Boogie. Oh, that. Well, you take it anyway. No. Save it. Grace leaving. Save it, save it, save it … She’s right you know. I should save it. I should make this my very first ten towards that trip. So hiding the money in her empty plastic bag in the linen cupboard. The beer’d be cold by now.
Back in the sitting room, stepping into the room — Well, would you look at that. At her radiogram bathed in gold from a beam of sunlight centred on nothing else but the radiogram. Music. It’s telling me to play some music and to hell with him upstairs. Putting on an old Sam Cooke: I’m in a Sad Mood Tonight.
A smoke. A coldish beer. And music. Wanting no more, for the moment, than that.
Jake poking his head in, a ready scowl on his dial. (I know you, mista.) Beth ready for him with a defiant look of her own. Him appraising her through those wild brown eyes, that flashing look in em. Coming into the room a few steps. You wan’ somemore, woman? Drawled out. (Fuckim) Go ahead, mista. If it makes you feel good, go ahead. Standing up from her seated position on the floor — a little shaky on the ole legs. (Ooops. Must be drunker than I thought.) But I ain’t backin down to him. Offering her jaw to the several paces distant Jake. Here, if you can find a spot untouched. He narrowing those eyes, and she knowing he was trying to work himself into that hurt state, where he felt anything he did was justified. But reasonably confident in herself that he’d see the damage done already was enough.
She was right. He marched out. Slammed the door when he left. The front one. I know it was the front because I heard the sound of breaking glass. And she checked: sure enough, the bottom pane of glass was in pieces from the force of Jake slamming the door. Breaking glass. Seemed like she’d heard that most of her life.