The Promise Seed

by Cass Moriarty

  The city of Melbourne was churning with people for the Olympics and I joined the throng, taking work where I could and laying my head wherever I found a soft place to fall. I knew nobody and not a soul knew me. Thoughts of the Home and the school, even thoughts of Maybelline Frost, all seemed so distant. Another world, another life. Only Emily persisted, creeping through my dreams. The memory of my father, the shadow of my mother, and Emily, observing my every move, a silent witness to my unfolding life.

  …

  At first I watched the woman in the department store from afar, but as I became braver, I hovered around the confectionery counter. Miss Edith Flower, her name tag said. I was self-conscious; children with sweet-streaked faces avoided me, and their mothers stared hard, distrustful, until I walked away.

  In appearance she was as opposite to Maybelline as you could get – polished olive skin, jet-black hair cut into a bob, and large dark eyes that seemed to absorb everything around her without reflecting anything back. Later on I’d gaze into those eyes and see nothing but a pool of black and brown, an endless whorl of chocolate. She wore a cute little uniform – a figure-hugging black skirt with a crisp white shirt and a candy-pink scarf knotted jauntily around her neck.

  I’d dawdle beside the book counter opposite, pretending to be interested in the latest bestseller, and glance up from time to time when I heard her serving customers, so she wouldn’t notice me staring. After a few weeks of that, of me reading lots of covers but never buying anything, she called me over. It was pretty funny really: she called out hey mister, and I looked around, to my left and to my right, like on a cartoon, trying to see who she was talking to. You, she said, pointing right at me. We’ve got free samples of rock candy today. Would you like to try some? And that was the beginning of Edith talking to me, although it was still a few weeks before I started talking back.

  Speaking to her blotted out the awfulness that had gone before.

  I’d never eaten many sweets ’til then, no money for them as a kid, and no inclination as I got older, but I swear I damn near became addicted to sugar, seeing as how I always felt the need to buy whatever she was recommending that day. Addicted to Edith Flower too, if I’m honest.

  One day I was at the confectionery counter, and Edith and I were involved in our usual routine.

  Morning, mister. Your usual selection? Let’s see, fruit jubes … saltwater taffy … atomic fireballs …

  But this time I opened my mouth and the word tumbled out.

  No.

  Sorry? Did you say something?

  I mean, no … no thanks. No atomic fireballs.

  I could feel my heart hammering in my chest. I wiped my sweaty palms on the sides of my trousers.

  But you always have atomic fireballs.

  I don’t really like them. They’re too hot. They make my mouth feel like the inside of a boiler.

  Edith sat back on her stool, and she shook her head in disbelief.

  Well, if you don’t just take the cake, mister. Nearly every day now for weeks you’ve been coming in here and I’ve been making you up a bag of your favourites and putting in atomic fireballs and it’s only now you tell me you don’t like them. Jeez, I didn’t even know you could talk. I had you figured for one of those mute people who can’t say nothing.

  And that’s where we started.

  14

  The boy and the old man stood side by side in the wells of dank shade thrown by the giant avocado tree. It listed crazily to one side, where its beginnings had grown under the graft twenty years earlier. Glossy leaves hid the burgeoning fruit. The boy stared up through its branches at the intricate patterns of light and shadow forming and re-forming over the china blue of the sky.

  It’s like a kaleidoscope, he said.

  The old man followed his gaze. Yep, he said, that it is.

  The chicks sure like it under here.

  Too right. Lots of leaf mulch and rotting avocados – perfect conditions for grubs and bugs and all sorts of creepy crawlies. You’d love it too if you were a chicken.

  The six chicks were busily investigating under each fallen leaf and inside every hole in the soil. The older birds were rather selfish, the boy thought, as he watched a particularly strident hen pull a reluctant caterpillar from the underside of a weed and gulp it down.

  A buxom cloud scudded across the sky.

  The man rummaged through the leaf litter, plucking out avocado seeds. He collected a handful and threw them beyond the shed and out of the hens’ reach.

  Seeds make ’em sick. Give ’em the runs. Skins too. Stupid hens’ll eat ’em though. Don’t know what’s bad for them.

  He shaded his eyes with his hand.

  Ever lie on your back and look up at the clouds?

  Sometimes.

  I used to do that a lot when I was a boy. Get away from the others for a spell. I’d lie down and stare up into that endless sky until it felt like the ocean, and I was in danger of falling right off into the depths. Used to have to hang on tight to the weeds to stop myself!

  Sometimes I see shapes, said the boy.

  Yeah? What type of shapes?

  Animals, trains, fruit … once I saw a map of Africa, I swear!

  I don’t doubt it, my boy. You live long enough, you see a lot of strange things in the clouds. In fact, you live long enough, you see a lot of strange things, full stop. I used to think that maybe there was a whole other world up there, cloud world, with cloud buildings and cloud animals and all, and little cloud people lying on their backs gawking down and thinking they could make out the shapes of people and cows and such down here on earth. Wouldn’t that be something, huh? Cloud world. I haven’t thought of that for quite some years.

  The boy watched the clouds as they panned across the sky. He thought he saw a chicken.

  Best be getting these ladies back inside before the sun sets. Remember your promise, now. The old girls’ll go in themselves with a little persuading, but these youngsters, you’ll need to pick them up. And you gotta catch them first. That’s it … gentle now, like I showed you. Cup her in your hands, that’s the way.

  The boy allowed himself a secret smile as he squatted and shuffled after the lively chicks.

  They go everywhere except where they’re supposed to! he protested. How come they don’t follow their mums, anyway?

  Well, for one, they’re not too smart. And second, I bought them direct. Those girls are no relation.

  The boy thought how lucky the chicks were to have ended up in the old man’s backyard, scratching in the dirt, watched over by a clucky group of females, none of whom were their mothers.

  At last the fowls were all back safely in their henhouse, except for the black chick. The boy was giving her one last reluctant stroke.

  Hold on there a minute, will you? said the old man. I’ll be right back.

  The boy sat in the cool henhouse, the smell of hay dust and chook poo combining pleasantly in his nostrils. He wondered if the old man would mind if he came again.

  The old man stooped as he entered the lean-to. He shuffled over to the boy, holding a small tin of something in his left hand.

  Hold her still now, he instructed the boy.

  He reached down and with a shaking finger, crooked with arthritis, he daubed a spot of yellow paint on top of the chick’s black head.

  Just hold her there a minute ’til it dries, he said.

  There. All done. You can put her back in with the others now.

  The boy lowered the cheeping chick in with her siblings and fastened the wire latch. Why the paint?

  So you can tell your chick from the others.

  The boy stared hard at the packed dirt floor. Particles of chaff floated in the air, drifting up with each flap of a hen’s wing.

  Mine? My chick?

  Sure. You like her, don’t you? I’ll make you a deal. You
come visit her regularly, any time you like. You can let them all out, give them a run around, so long as you latch that wire properly when you leave. How does that sound?

  The boy’s smile changed the countenance of his face, disappearing the anxious lines and worried features into an expression of pure joy. He grinned as he squinted up at the thin frame of the old man leaning against the rough-hewn wood.

  Shit, he exclaimed. Awesome.

  Yeah orright, watch your language. The old man lifted his hat and ran a hand through his thinning hair. When I was a lad, I lived for a time with a group of boys; there must’ve been … erm, let’s see … about fifty or sixty of us. And there was always the danger of whatever you had being pilfered by some other fellow who took a shine to it. So we took to dabbing a spot of paint on our belongings, to identify them, you see. My colour was a shade of purpley-blue that I mixed up myself so it was hard to replicate. They couldn’t copy it, I mean. Yellow was the colour of my best friend, Archi.

  The old man rested his hand for a moment on the boy’s hair, the weight of it no more than a touch. His rheumy eyes stared off at something the boy couldn’t see. He blinked, then rubbed his knuckles into his eyes and cleared his throat with a raspy sputter.

  Damn dust. Well, that’s enough of that. You mind that latch, you hear?

  He shuffled out the door as the boy lay on his stomach and touched his chick through the wire.

  But you’re different already, he said quietly. You’re the only black one.

  …

  Autumn days slid soundlessly into a mild Brisbane winter. School was out for two weeks and the boy could stay home with not a twinge of guilt. It wasn’t that he disliked his teacher or even the learning; more that, once inside the perimeter of the noisy throng of children, he felt disconnected and alone – far more alone than during the days he spent by himself riding his bike or reading. His family and his life seemed so far removed from what he heard discussed in the playground at break. He had never gone to a match at Suncorp or the Gabba, no-one read to him at night, if he wanted a clean shirt he often as not had to wash it himself, fast food was not a treat but a staple. Unlike most of the kids in his class, he regularly lit the gas and used the stove, frequently stayed home alone, and was almost never questioned or reprimanded. Sometimes he felt childlike and naïve in his estrangement; occasionally he felt a superior maturity.

  The result of this paradox was that being at school was like an unnatural confinement. He persevered because of the books and the library, the timelines and the experiments, the questions and the answers. He enjoyed the excursions, when there was money enough to attend – or when he had slipped it unnoticed from his mum’s purse. He hated the sports, despite the fact that he could catch a ball and run as fast as anyone. Whenever he started at a new school, he was always the first picked for teams, once the leaders had spotted his potential. But he quickly developed a reputation for sullenness and contrariness: he took a catch only when it suited him, and crossed the line as the mood took him. He wasn’t a team player. This strange combination of ability and reticence, skill and defiance, seemed to bewilder the others, and in response they retreated from his company.

  Which suited him fine. He was happy to wander alone or sit under a tree with a book. He knew he wouldn’t stay long anyway, and what was the point of making friends if you only had to leave them? It was an early life lesson that had proved itself to him over and over again.

  But the arrival of school holidays provided a respite from the vagaries of the playground. He was free. No-one to answer to, no-one to impress or please or accommodate.

  He had spent the day exploring the tracks of Mount Coot-tha, surprising bush turkeys, perfecting jumps on his bike, staking out the boundary of Channel Nine to see if he could spot a celebrity. He disturbed a brown snake and it slithered into the brush, the dry leaves crackling; all that remained was a wavy line in the sand. He had found more than four dollars in the vending machines and splurged on a chocolate ice-cream. On sunset he had set down his bike on the uppermost lookout and stood with a dozen tourists, draped over the railing, gazing down through the failing light at the city spread out like a quilt, puckered in places by its hills and gullies, and with the river – a silver-blue vein – flowing through its heart. Behind him a kookaburra called raucously.

  In the distance he could see the towers of the CBD. He tried to count the floors on one building but only got to twelve before his eyes blurred and shifted. Jet-black crows swooped within arm’s reach, and a cluster of cockatoos with startling yellow plumage soared forward before landing proprietarily on a tall gum, distorting his sense of space and distance. He felt for a moment that he could climb up onto the railing and – with arms wide and knees bent – spring upwards and outwards, take flight into the endless space above the city, and coast with the currents on outstretched limbs. It was a pleasant thought. Appealing. Perhaps he had been a cockatoo in a former life.

  A woman in a uniform and a red beret flourished a triangular flag and shouted instructions to a group of Japanese tourists. Chatting and pointing, cameras aloft, they followed her to their bus.

  Bye bye! they exclaimed, to no-one in particular. The boy waved.

  The bus roared away, leaving a cloud of grey exhaust in its wake. Most of the other sightseers had departed. One couple still sat in the covered gazebo at the highest point, kissing, making out as if they were alone in the entire world. A man surveyed the brass compass etched into the pavement, his cigarette a bright pinpoint in the gathering dusk. Staff left the café, their voices vanishing into the distance.

  Lights began to twinkle in the buildings far below. Streets threaded through the city, stitching together the shadowed nest of the cemetery, the steely span of the Story Bridge, the illuminated ferris wheel. Beyond, the coastal islands were shrouded in violet.

  By the time he skidded his bike to a stop in his yard, scattering gravel in its wake, it was truly dark. A single bulb burned dim from the old man’s house, while his own lay still and quiet. As he approached the back stairs, the dry leaves beneath crackled as a small shape scurried. He paused, unnerved, thinking of the snake he had seen earlier. He stared intently into the blackness but whatever had passed had dissolved into more blackness. He pounded up the steps, which vibrated under his feet. The noise – he hoped – would alert anything or anyone to his presence. He felt better as he locked the door behind him, and then went from room to room, switching on lights, chasing the shadows. In the kitchen he found fresh strawberries. He heated water for two-minute noodles and set about mixing leftover sausage and grated carrot to put on top. He opened a can of tuna and threw that in too. He heaped his plate with food and settled on the couch to eat. Deal or No Deal kept him company.

  When he opened his eyes some time later, a black-and-white western flickered on the TV, strobing the room. He blinked into the glare, confused, shivering. His plate had slid onto the carpet. A small pool of noodles sat jelly-like on the floor. He scraped the leavings onto the plate, carried it into the kitchen and dumped it in the sink, flipping switches as he left each room.

  He peed into the toilet, a long, satisfying stream, and then made his way to his bedroom. The boy slipped under the covers and jiggled his legs with the cold, his skin retreating from the clammy sheets. Gradually his body created a warm, comforting spot, and he relaxed once more into sleep.

  …

  He woke with a start. The hall light was on. He could hear his mother’s voice, laughing, faltering, thick with alcohol. He heard deeper male grunts. All of a sudden the three of them were in his room. His mother wore her tight black skirt. It had slipped around her waist so that the zip was near the front, off centre, half-undone. Her blouse gaped open and he could see her large breasts spilling over the top of her bra. Her hair had been piled up on top of her head, but now it fell around her face in untidy spirals. Her lipstick was smeared. He could smell her sour breath as she
teetered towards him and fell with a rough groan onto his bed.

  This here is my boy, she crooned. Darling … my precious baby … my best boy, aren’t you, darling?

  One of the men extended his hand in mock politeness, laughing as he overbalanced and landed on the floor. The boy had never seen him before.

  The other man’s head was haloed in a pale yellow glow from the beam behind him. He stayed in the doorway. The boy couldn’t make out his features.

  It’s the middle of the night, Mum. Get off. Go to bed. You’ve been drinking too much.

  Oh, he’s a self-righteous bastard, isn’t he? The first man got to his feet unsteadily. Not very welcoming, hey?

  The boy’s mother lifted one manicured hand and stroked her nails along the side of his face, then threaded her fingers through his hair. You leave him alone; he’s a good boy, aren’t you. Come on, she said, grunting as she hefted herself off the bed, let’s continue the party elsewhere. Let my boy get his beauty sleep.

  She clung on to the man by the bed, and the two pushed past the other man and lurched out the door. The boy pulled the covers around himself and watched the second man. He took a step forward. Where the first man was bulky and uncoordinated, this one was slight and wiry, the sinews in his arms shining like scales. His eyes were the colour of road tar. They bored into the boy, and he felt like a rabbit frozen in headlights, or a rat pinned beneath the death stare of a cobra. The boy could not say he saw the man move, but in a moment he was there, leaning over him. His glare remained unbroken. The boy stared back, mesmerised by those unblinking eyes. The man reached out his hand and touched the boy’s face, his fingertips skimming so delicately that the boy felt all the hairs on his skin tingle. Slowly, the man’s nails scratched a fine trail from the boy’s forehead to his chin.

  In a voice smooth like molten chocolate, he parodied the mother’s words.

  You’re a good boy, aren’t you … but I don’t think you need any more beauty sleep …