by Rawah Arja
Maybe it was because they carried pocket knives?
Mr Ahmed opened the main gates and walked with the blonde reporter – without her camera crew – to the front office. We all pushed and shoved to see what was going on. They spoke for about ten minutes and then she left. Mr Ahmed walked back into the hall and sent everyone to class except for PJ, Huss, Ibby and me.
‘You four, in my office now!’
Oh shit. We knew we were dead. He slammed the door so hard that our ears rang. The last time I saw Mr Ahmed this mad was when we egged the girls’ high school down the road.
He sat down with his jaw clenched. ‘Everything you ask, I do for you. You wanted new grass for the oval so you could play a proper game of footy? I do it. You wanted to meet the Bulldogs, I get them here. So why is it hard for you to do something for me?’
I watched as Ibby tried his best not to laugh and keep his cool. It wasn’t that Ibby found the situation funny, but whenever he was nervous or scared, he’d laugh. I think it was some weird coping mechanism. He sounded like the air that came out of a balloon when it deflated.
Mr Ahmed continued to speak over Ibby’s stifled laughter.
‘All the staff are trying their hardest to turn this school around, but you all think it’s fun and games. Our school is in some serious shit, but you think it’s a joke.’
I decided to speak up. ‘Sir, it was just a dumb bet. Why are you so angry?’
He stood up. ‘You’re seriously asking me that as the so-called BBL? Well, Tariq, that reporter I was talking to told me that they got footage of the fight.’
Apparently, the gigantic windows in our school hall were enough to capture everything.
He walked around his desk and opened the door. ‘They’ll be running the story on the news tonight. Can’t wait for the new principal to see this.’
And it was in that moment that I remembered, if there was anything my dad loved more than his own children, it was the nightly news.
May God have mercy on my soul.
Chapter 2
A quick rundown of my family.
My dad Mustafa and my mum Ronda broke all the rules when they decided to marry each other. They weren’t cousins and even worse, they were from different villages in Lebanon! It’s practically unheard of for Lebanese people not to marry their relatives. They came to Australia in the eighties and, like good Lebanese parents, popped out five children. None of us have been to jail – yet. Another break with Lebanese tradition, I guess.
My mum was slightly taller than my chubby dad, and even in her hijab, she catches the attention of the coffee-drinking old men in Punchbowl cafes. They’d hound her to help her carry the groceries to the car until she finally gave up and let them.
My dad worked with the railway and rarely had any days off, but when he did, the beach was always the place. He wanted to live the Aussie dream and do what he thought most Australians did in their time off. It was his idea of blending into a country ‘that gave me chance to work and give good life for my children’.
My mum’s brother, Uncle Charlie, stayed with us, and lived in the shed out back with his pet bees. He sold honey to anyone who walked by, and without fail, almost every day, got stung by one. He had a thick moustache and a full head of black hair at the age of sixty-five. He claimed that he had never had a grey hair, but we’ve all caught him using my sister’s mascara to cover them up.
Uncle Charlie wore the same pinstriped brown pants and white Bonds singlet with a black bum bag around his waist, no matter the weather. Oh, and I know what you’re thinking. Charlie? Well, when he first came to Australia, he wanted to blend in, and apparently changing his name was the best way to do that. Not, you know, wearing normal clothes and hanging out with humans rather than bees.
My brother Saff is twenty-three with his own mobile mechanic business and is a super-skinny, tall guy. My brother Abdul, on the other hand, is a year younger, short and sturdy and known for his evil tricks. Though they are both epic shit-stirrers and love to start fights around the house, they aren’t very good at it and most of the time only end up burning themselves. Like once, Abdul told my dad that Saff had gotten a speeding fine, only to cop it for opening up Saff’s mail. Or Saff would drop hints to my mum about Abdul talking to some girl on the phone, only to have his phone suddenly ring with the name ‘Cassandra’ flashing bright on the screen. It was of course Abdul changing his contact name to a girl’s one on Saff’s phone and knowing when exactly to call.
Without fail, almost every day, Abdul and Saff had the same two arguments. It was either about Abdul stretching out Saff’s Gucci shirts, which he always denied, or about Saff hiding Abdul’s keys to get back at him. In reality, Dad was usually the one to hide the keys to teach Abdul a lesson about something, but he always forgot he had them. He would even start to help look for them until he’d realise they were under his mattress.
My sister Feda is the unmarried twenty-seven-year-old, and pretty much argues about anything and everything. We tease her that she was adopted because she was the only fair, blonde person in the family. If you ever reminded her that she was single, she’d erupt like a volcano, flaming everything in her way. She was in her final year of her medical residency, and my dad couldn’t be more proud of her.
Then there is me, always chasing after my eight-year-old sister Amira and making sure she doesn’t accidentally demolish the house. She is wicked smart and has a fascination with tools and building things in my dad’s garage. We call her Bob the Builder. She even dresses like a tradie with her denim overalls and checked shirts. With the massive age gap between them, Feda was basically a cross between an older sister and a mum to Amira. She’d take Amira shopping for Eid clothes and book her in for her six-monthly check-ups with the dentist, who was one of Feda’s friends from med school. She supervised her reading every night and made sure she slept in her pyjamas and not her school uniform.
Amira was born premature and spent her first three months in hospital. Her oesophagus wasn’t fully developed and they had to do emergency surgery to make sure she could breathe. I spent every day with her and watched her tiny body, wrapped by so many wires and tubes, slowly grow. I remember one night, when my mum was asleep, I saw her move her hands in the air. She turned her head towards me, softly smiled and then held my finger until she shut her eyes. She’s had me wrapped around her finger ever since.
I know lots of people say they have a crazy family, but I think we’d win any competition if there ever was one. You could just see it on Sunday, aka Market Day aka Buying Crap Because It’s Cheap Day aka Hell. My mum would rush into my room at the crack of dawn like an army commander and rip off my blankets. She never bothered to wake anyone else up because she knew I could never say no to her.
The drive to Sydney Markets was always the same. My mum would shout directions like my dad hadn’t been there every other Sunday. She’d wave her hands left and right in a panic, blocking his vision, worried we wouldn’t get parking. We’d get there, and it was only then that she’d realise I was wearing thongs.
Big mistake.
‘Hajj, go and get the plastic bags,’ she’d say to my dad.
See, before I was born, my mum had two miscarriages and her pregnancy with me was tough, so she’s overprotective. As a kid, I also almost sliced off my toe with a shopping trolley, and so ever since, she made me wear plastic bags around my feet whenever we were at the shops.
People thought I was contaminated.
I mean, it’s not like the plastic bags actually helped, but I had to be kept perfect, especially for marriage. If there’s one thing you need to know about Arabs, it’s this: our parents spend their whole lives preparing us for marriage. It’s expected that we’re in tiptop condition, with no faults, so that when the exchange is made, we can’t be returned.
At the markets, I’d try to keep up with my parents as they rushed through every aisle to get the best bargains while I dodged the phlegmy spitballs from the market men. Fitting everything
in the car was a challenge because my parents always forgot to leave my seat free. My dad, sweating and out of breath, resorted to impractical solutions, especially if we were in a rush. ‘Just go in boot. No one will see. Yallah.’
Somehow, they’d squeeze me in between the junk, with my head down just in case the police pulled us over. Trust me, every Arab kid knows what that feels like.
After the markets, my family, including all my cousins in the area, headed down to Sans Souci Beach – one of the only places in Sydney where I reckon white people feel like outsiders. Dad smoked his shisha and lectured us about how grateful we should be to live in this country. We’d light up our barbecues, smoke up the beach and set up our fishing rods.
Sans Souci was the perfect place for some footy, even though half the time our ball ended up in the water. Uncle Charlie umpired our games and made up the rules as he went.
‘Uncle? You can’t catch the ball and score!’ we’d all say.
He’d get so pissed off that he’d pick up any big stick he could find and chase us around the beach. We’d usually run up the grassy hill over on the other side of the beach while my uncle would wait below. We used bits of cardboard to sled down the hill that always stuck a million bindis in our butts. One time, my brother Abdul couldn’t stop and took out my uncle at the bottom of the hill. They both flew into the water near the crossing bridge. That was the only time I saw Uncle Charlie truly scared.
Maybe it was because we all screamed that a shark was going to eat him?
So now that you know a little about my family, you’ll understand why I didn’t want them to be around when the news story broke. They made everything into a big deal and any sign of sibling weakness was taken advantage of until you pretty much wished you hadn’t been born.
Only the strong survive in my family.
Chapter 3
4:42 p.m. Time left until I’m murdered by Dad: one hour and eighteen minutes.
PJ, Ibby and I had been outside Em Zaid’s Manoush shop, near Punchbowl Station, for about an hour and still had no ideas. I knew my dad was going to hit the roof if he saw my face on TV. I needed to come up with something fast, but my brain decided it’d rather enjoy watching me die. Unfortunately, Huss was nowhere to be seen. If anyone could get out of a murder scene, it was him.
‘Where is he?’ I asked the boys, but they were too busy stuffing their faces with manoush.
PJ and Ibby were back to normal like nothing had ever happened. See, that would never work with Huss and me. If we ever fought, it was like Israel and Palestine. Huss was easily ticked off and I knew which buttons I could press. His dad left when he was a kid and he was raised by his mum and grandma, Big Haji. She was basically an Arab granny gangster whose corner shop sold everything you didn’t need, like glass portraits of cats or expired lolly packets. She was one of those tough old-school women who didn’t need a walking stick but used one anyway, mostly to push in line or knock people out.
‘All ready for you, Tariq,’ Em Zaid said, smiling from ear to ear. ‘I even put extra cheese.’ She was always nice to me because her niece in Lebanon needed a visa.
All the boys in the area hung out here every day after school. It was the perfect place for a front-and-centre view of all the action in Punchbowl.
The Muslim and Christian private school kids hated it when their bus stopped in our area. We’d yell out stuff or give them the finger because they walked around with their noses in the air as though we were beneath them. We knew by their stares and smirks that they thought Punchbowl kids were like animals that needed to be tamed or put down. They were always the ones being praised by local newspapers for some crappy robotics machine they built or were showered with gifts by the local councillors at special student achievement dinners while we were left to the gutter. Kids like that – kids with money – didn’t have graffiti on their walls or have to worry about bad reputations.
Any situation that needed sorting, the Wolf Pack would meet here amongst the shops in Punchbowl. It was our family outside of our family – the shop owners were always a friend of someone’s dad or cousin or best mate. Some were even ex-Punchbowl boys and always helped us out, with free sausages for our school fundraisers or donations to our GoFundMe page.
We basically had this pact that we’d buy from the shops on the condition that if our parents asked around, the shop owners saw nothing, heard nothing and certainly knew nothing.
Nick from Nick’s Chicken Shop sold the best hot chip and gravy rolls and gave us tips on how to pick up girls. He was about ninety years old, so not only was his advice outdated but he also spoke in Greek no matter how many times we reminded him we were Lebanese.
Walid, an ex-cop, owned the tobacconist on the corner, where all the boys bought cigarettes with their dodgy IDs. Bashir, Ibby’s third cousin, was the barber who cut our hair. He only knew one style, which meant we all looked like we were part of some really weird cult. PJ’s cousins, Ginger and Pete, owned the fish and chip shop where we stuffed our faces with overdone scallops with extra chicken salt.
Abu Habra, a butcher who covered his shop with pictures of Lebanon, gave us extra pieces of chicken or lamb cutlets. He was Mr Ahmed’s uncle and thought that giving us freebies was some sort of bribe to stay in school. He’d also lecture us about how we should do something with our lives and get jobs that give back to the community. We always listened an extra few minutes to get that added piece of meat.
Moey and Abz, two of Mr Ahmed’s ex-students, helped us train at Broadway gym, especially before any big footy game we had. At Shadia’s Chemist, she threw in some Panadol on the house if she knew our families were travelling to Lebanon, because our parents always travelled with a mobile pharmacy in case anyone got sick on the trip. Then there was Beirut Blockbuster, where our parents got cheap prices on DVDs of Turkish shows dubbed with bad Arabic voiceovers. We also had the same group of old men who drank coffee at Sahara’s Café and sang Arabic serenades at any random woman who walked past, particularly my mum.
Our area always made the news for some robbery or drive-by, but never for Em Ahmed, cooking food and donating it to the homeless, or Ming the baker, leaving bags of bread by people’s doors. They never showed how the mosque collected blankets and clothes for children, or how the church sold halal sausages on their open days. Punchbowl didn’t have the best reputation. Nobody outside this suburb thought it was worth anything. But we knew better. It was our hometown and we were proud.
5:20 p.m.
Huss finally showed up, out of breath like he had run a marathon. He took the few slices left of my manoush and sat on my chair.
‘Bro, where were you?’ I was annoyed. ‘What the hell am I going to tell my dad? He’s going to see my face on the news and kill me.’
‘Relax, bro,’ PJ said. ‘He probably won’t even notice.’
Everyone looked at PJ, who stopped short of taking a bite of his manoush.
‘It’s Tariq’s dad?’ Huss said blinking a few times. ‘The White Arab?’
PJ slowly chewed his food, still trying to figure out why we were staring at him.
Huss shook his head. ‘Bro, the guy watches the news 24/7 and makes us sing the national anthem every time we come to his house.’
‘Oh yeah,’ PJ nodded. ‘Yeah, Tariq, you’re dead.’
‘Yeah, thanks,’ I replied. ‘Real helpful.’
Ibby stood up, buckled his pants and put on his shoes. ‘Alright, boys. I’m out. Tariq, if I don’t see you, Allah Yerhamak and Insh Allah I’ll see you in heaven.’
Huss shook my hand. ‘Just man up. Whatever happens, happens.’
‘Yeah bro. God be with you,’ PJ said and left.
The boys were gone and it was just me. They’d been of no use and now my head was spinning thinking about what my dad was going to do. It was either going to be the ‘I came from the poorest part of Lebanon to give you a better life’ lecture or a size 12 shoe to my head.
Both were going to be equally painful.
&
nbsp; I walked home and decided to go through the back gate. It was starting to get dark and I could see the light on in the garage, which only meant one thing – Amira. I opened the door to see her covered in white clouds of dust, surrounded by a bunch of tools, with streaks of dirt across her face. Her big brown eyes behind her bright pink glasses were wide open as she held an IKEA manual towards the light. I watched her hammer a few more nails into a bee box she was building for Uncle Charlie. They had recently decided to go into business together and had started their own company called Bee My Honey.
‘You know that business contract you made Uncle Charlie sign doesn’t count for anything?’ I said to her now. The contract basically read that Amira was the King of the World and that Uncle Charlie was her slave.
She looked up at me over the top of her glasses. ‘Why not?’
‘Because you tied him to the tree and wouldn’t let him go until he signed. I think they call that coercion.’
She picked up the hammer and thumped a few more nails in the box. ‘Nobody can prove that.’
‘Yeah, true. Yallah Bob, we need to go inside. You still have that farm diorama project I have to help you with and you need to wash up.’
‘See, that’s why you’re my favourite person in the whole wide world.’
She finally finished and jumped onto my back for a ride to the back door. It was oddly quiet. That’s never happened before in my home. Amira climbed down and as soon as her feet hit the ground, she took off like a wind-up toy.
I walked over to Mum, who was washing the dishes, and kissed her on the cheek. She turned and pointed to the plate of food on the kitchen bench. ‘I made lubya bi zaat especially for you, albi.’