And if I hadn’t had my bike, if I’d ridden any other route, I would never have seen the house with the JESUS LIVES!! banner. I would never have seen Jeremiah coming out of that drive on his Norton, never noticed Simeon’s wild fluorescent van.
Jeremiah would have come and gone — a nod on the beach maybe, a smile.
Good thing too, maybe.
Maybe.
Chapter Two
‘Is that what happened next?’ Miriam said. ‘You met Jeremiah?’
‘More or less,’ I said. ‘Middle of January.’
‘Where did you first see him?’
I thought of the figure on the beach, his black clothes standing out amid the colour, his slightly stooped, lanky body, his long dark hair.
‘I’d noticed him on the beach, and I’d noticed his bike, and I knew he was from the Jesus house in Parklands, but I never saw him properly till one morning in the playground before anyone arrived.’
I remembered how I stood beside the Whale Pool, holding my broom, watching from behind the bulk of the concrete whale as the boy took off his helmet. I remembered the sudden dive of my stomach when I saw his face. How beautiful, I thought, how unlikely — a face like that and a motorbike so huge. I remembered how he stood looking around and how I stared and stared at him from behind the whale. How he finally walked off towards the beach and I shook myself and headed for the changing cubicles.
I laughed.
‘What are you thinking about?’ said Miriam Wilkie.
‘I’m thinking I should really tell about the job first. About Penny and the other workers. Brighton. The Whale Pool. Sweeping out the cubicles … The Hopelessness of the Short-Term Sweeper,’ I said, thinking of Penny.
I loved the job. Second to my bike, it was the best thing in my life — the best thing for years.
‘How does it look?’ Stella asked me when I arrived home the first evening. I lay down on the couch, feeling the heat gather in my face, the sweat dripping down the small of my back.
‘Well,’ I said, after I had my breath back. ‘There’s Bob and Harris and Billy, though Billy’s real name is Geoffrey but they all call him Billy and I’ll tell you why in a minute. Bob’s in charge. And there’s two other holiday workers, Penny and Stefan, and they’re friends, special friends.’ I raised my eyebrows at Stella.
‘Oh, speshull,’ said Stella.
‘Penny’s sort of pretty-pretty, and wears flowery shorts and hair-grips.’ Stella liked these sort of details. ‘Stefan’s good-looking. They held hands at lunchtime.’
‘Ken and Barbie,’ said Stella.
‘They’re okay,’ I said. ‘They’re going to walk the Milford Track over Christmas.’
‘String me up,’ said Stella. (A classic Dix-ism.)
‘Then there’s Billy, a.k.a. Geoffrey. He witnesses to the Lord at lunchtime.’
‘Oh great!’ said Stella. ‘A fundie. Perfect. We pay the city council to look after the beaches and they let a fundie loose to annoy the punters.’ She reached for a cigarette. Ever since she went out with a Born Again she’s been irrational on the subject of Christians.
‘I told him I considered myself agnostic,’ I said, ‘though my family had Buddhist leanings.’
‘What crap!’ said Stella, laughing. ‘That was years ago.’
‘You were serious.’
‘Rubbish!’
‘I can remember,’ I said. ‘You meditated all the time.’
‘How can you remember it?’ Stella said. ‘You were only two or three.’
‘I was seven. I asked you why you were crossing your legs and being so quiet, and you said you were looking for inner peace. I remember it clearly.’
‘Trust you.’
‘It was just before you met Freddy.’
‘So,’ Stella said, ignoring that, ‘who’s the other one?’
‘Harris. Thirtyish, wears a boilersuit unzipped to the navel, to show off his lovely hairy chest. Chats up the girls on the beach. Pronounces my name Cat-tree-own-ah.’
‘A fundie and a creep. I’d be outa there.’
‘But,’ I said, stretching out, looking at the ceiling, ‘I shall love it. Fresh air, sea breeze, sun, sand, surf and colourful co-workers. Pay-day Thursday. Might get a tan. Definitely get fit.’
‘Huh. Rather you than me,’ said Stella, shuddering.
‘You planning to go back to school, Catriona?’ Stefan asked me one morning at tea break. He and Penny and I sat in the council shed, drinking Nescafé and eating Chelsea buns. Billy and Bob were checking over the holiday workers in Sumner, and Harris was sitting on the sea-wall, smoking, keeping an eye out for the spunkiest girls on the beach.
‘Probably,’ I said. ‘Unless something wonderful happens.’
‘Lotto?’ said Penny. ‘Getting talent-spotted?’
‘Exactly,’ I said. I was beginning to like Penny.
‘I’m going back,’ said Penny. ‘Stefan’s doing pre-Med.’
That figured. Stefan was born to be a doctor or a lawyer or something in a suit.
‘I’d leave if I could get a job,’ I said. ‘But I’m sort of thinking of going into the police force, so I need seventh form.’ I knew Penny would be appalled by this, people always were, but for some reason I often felt compelled to confess my career plans. ‘Anyway Stella wants me to go back.’
‘The police?’ said Penny, predictably. ‘How come?’
‘I want to be a detective,’ I said. ‘Do the tricky stuff.’
‘How come you call your mother Stella?’ Stefan asked.
‘She never wanted to be called Mum,’ I said. ‘She was only seventeen when I was born, says she didn’t want to be a stereotype. Not that there was ever much chance.’
‘It’s a lovely name,’ said Penny.
‘You’ve probably heard of her,’ I said, deciding to get it over and done with. ‘She’s a singer. Stella Coles.’
‘Stella Coles is your mother?’ said Penny. ‘I’ve seen her! She’s amazing.’
‘Yeah.’ It was true. She was an amazing singer. And sexy. And mildly famous. I was used to people’s reactions.
‘We’d better move it,’ said Stefan, just as Harris came through the door. Harris raised his eyebrows at Penny and me, a knee-jerk flirt.
‘I need help with some posts up at Waimairi,’ he said to Stefan. ‘You girls better get out in the playground, there’s a pile of big kids in the Whale Pool.’
‘Right you are, laddie,’ said Penny, sharp as a tack. ‘We’ll just hop on out there then, while you boys attend to your big posts.’
We walked out the door laughing, leaving them staring. I looked at Penny anew, at her regular profile, her little snub nose and cute freckles. She turned and grinned at me.
‘Okay, let’s get these rugrats out of the pool,’ I said, suddenly feeling enormously pleased with the world.
‘All right,’ said Penny, striding out.
It could never be said that the work itself, our limited list of daily tasks, was a fulfilling affair. Au contraire, as Freddy would say. First thing every morning Penny and Stefan and I had to sweep the accumulated sand out of the changing cubicles.
‘This is so pointless,’ one of us grumbled every morning. We had wide yard brooms with tough bristles, and by morning-tea time the sand that had banked up in the corners was gone and the floors clear. But we knew that the onshore wind (the easterly) or the northerly wind or the southerly wind — any and every wind that blew, in other words — would lift the sand and redeposit large amounts of it in the cubicles over the next twenty-four hours.
‘I suppose this happens at beaches all over the world,’ Penny said, banging her broom into the concrete walls. ‘All over the world there are desperate, lowly paid students engaged in this futile, soul-destroying task. In England and Japan, in Italy and Kenya, in Bali and Hungary—’
‘Not in Hungary,’ said Stefan.
‘How do you know?’ said Penny.
‘It’s landlocked.’ Smug was Stefan’s middle name.
After a couple of weeks, Bob decided he needed Stefan up at North Beach.
‘Aren’t you the lucky one?’ said Penny, crossly, but I preferred this arrangement. Stefan cramped Penny’s style.
‘I’ve changed my mind about this sweeping,’ I said as we walked across the playground, pushing the brooms lazily with the tips of our fingers. ‘It’s moronic and pointless of course, but at least you don’t have to think. You can just shove the broom along and doze off.’
‘Yeah, well you probably need a sleep after your exertions,’ said Penny. She couldn’t believe my bike ride.
‘You’re into fitness,’ I said. ‘You’re doing the Milford Track.’
‘That’s Stefan’s idea, I’m allergic to exercise.’
‘Like Stella,’ I said. ‘Why do it then?’
‘Dunno,’ she said. ‘Stefan was keen.’ She widened her eyes at me and shrugged. I was confused. She was a smart cookie, Penny, and usually very assertive, but she seemed to cave in sometimes with Dr Stefan. I secretly wondered why she was with him. Being Penny, she told me without my asking. She was disarmingly frank.
‘I like having a boyfriend,’ she said. ‘Stefan’s my third boyfriend and he’s sort of dull, I know, but I just like having him around. And he’s got a car. Yeah, yeah, I know. Not very sound, but don’t panic, I’m not going to marry him or anything. And he was Head Boy this year. He’s kind of reliable, you know? He’s got a nice body, too, don’t you think?’
I could only laugh.
We talked about these sorts of things on and off throughout the day. After morning tea Penny and I patrolled the playground, keeping over-twelves out of the Whale Pool, watching for bullying. In reality this meant sitting on one of the playground benches sunbathing, standing occasionally to shout something or wade into the pool to remove a scared child from the slippery top of the whale. We rubbed sun block on each other and talked and talked. I heard about Penny’s family (mother, father, two brothers) and school (Burnside, on the north-west side, my old stamping ground) and career plans (university, law probably, Japanese maybe).
In the afternoons we picked up rubbish from the beach and sand dunes. It was hot work lugging rubbish sacks and pincers. The long marram grass needles nettled our bare legs, the sun turned our backs to water. We stopped at least twice and strolled over to the dairy for an ice-cream.
‘So what are you doing for Christmas?’ Penny asked.
I dreaded Christmas. Last year we had gathered for the usual dinner at Nan’s. It was an excruciating contrast to the boisterous cheer of the year before and all the years before that. Stella sat all day in an armchair, sick with a hangover. Nan and Toni couldn’t seem to muster their usual social fervour. Freddy arrived with presents for everyone and managed an attempt at normal behaviour until Stella stood up and bellowed at him to stop pretending and being so bloody hearty and to just stay away from her and her family. I sat quietly, splitting cashews in half, feeling dull and unbearably sad.
This year Stella was working during the day but we were going to Nan’s for tea.
‘Stella’s working,’ I said.
‘She’s singing on Christmas Day?’ Penny said.
‘Her other job. Waitressing. Busy day. Singing doesn’t pay much,’ I said, by way of explanation.
I could feel Penny looking at me. ‘You’re a weird number, Catreeona,’ she said with her usual bluntness. ‘You get all this information out of me because I babble on about my life and you seem to say quite a bit, but actually you tell me absolutely nothing. All I know is that your mother is Stella Coles and that you’ve got a grandmother and that you go to Riverside. And that you want to be a detective. You’ll probably be fantastic, too. That’s a cop’s speciality, isn’t it, giving nothing away but getting a confession?’
‘OhmyGod,’ I said, throwing up my hands in mock despair, ‘she’s seen through me. Thinks quickly: divert her attention, suggest race to shop.’
She was still frowning, even as we ran along the guttering towards the dairy which shimmered, mirage-like, an oasis in the distance.
Christmas wasn’t so bad. Stella brought Mama’s Cake home from Grimaldi’s and we ate it round at Nan’s with Toni and her boyfriend, William. Dix was mercifully absent. I had a feeling Stella was going off him.
Before Christmas Freddy had rung and invited me to his parents’ place for Christmas lunch, since Stella was working, but the thought of Freddy’s family, so straightforward, so kind, was too much.
‘I think I’ll just hang out at Nan’s,’ I told Freddy.
He always understood. ‘I’ve got a present for you,’ he said. ‘Let’s go out.’
We met for Chinese after Christmas, and Freddy gave me my present, a book, Turtle Diary by Russell Hoban, and a year’s reduction at Hoyts.
I told him about work and my bicycle route. ‘Have you ever been to Parklands, Freddy?’ I asked, scooping scallops into my bowl. ‘It is weird. Sort of in the middle of nowhere, like you’re riding through countryside and all of a sudden it rises out of the wilderness, this neat-as-pie suburb, you know, Knots Landing houses in dark stone and new bright green lawns. There’s one house, very plush, it’s big, with a big front lawn, and right across the front of the house there’s this lurid banner with JESUS LIVES!! written on it, rainbow-coloured, and a picture of Christ.’
Freddy laughed. ‘Well, the Jesus people are on the march. They shall overcome, you know.’
‘But,’ I said, ‘the funny thing is — this is the weirdest part — sometimes in the mornings I see this guy ride out of there on this huge motorbike, I mean, massive, one of those big British bikes—’
‘How do you know about British motorbikes?’ Freddy asked. ‘You had a bikie boyfriend when I wasn’t looking?’
‘No,’ I said, ‘but Stella did. Before you,’ I added, as a small comfort. Freddy smiled.
‘You’re a very kind, nurturing teenager, Cat. I don’t know how you turned out so nice.’
‘Good stepparenting,’ I said, flourishing my chopsticks. ‘Anyway, this guy on the bike, he’s all in black, a black helmet, too. Don’t you think it’s weird someone like that living in a Born Again house?’
‘I suppose bikies can be born again,’ Freddy said. ‘I suppose anyone can be born again. I’ve met some Born Again lawyers, they always seem very cheerful, come to think of it. Perhaps I should try it.’ He pushed his bowl aside and patted his stomach. ‘I’ve done my dash.’ Then, ‘How’s your social life, anyway?’ he said, folding his arms, leaning on the table. I knew he’d ask me this. Freddy was always worried about my social life — like Stella, but not as grumpy.
‘Is this Born Again bikie the object of your intentions?’
‘No. I just happened to notice him. It’s amazing, Freddy, what you notice on a bicycle—’
‘No, I won’t be diverted,’ he said, sternly. ‘How’s your social life?’
I sighed. ‘Oh, you know how it is, Freddy. I’ve met girls at school and they’re nice and all that, but I don’t know, I just prefer to be by myself. It’s just easier.’
‘Why is it easier?’ Freddy asked. He looked so concerned I felt sorry for him.
‘Don’t worry about me, Freddy, honestly. I’m fine. I’m healthy, I love my bike, I love my job—’
‘Can’t help worrying, it’s habitual. What about Carla? Nicolette?’ These were friends from my old school. ‘You still see them?’
‘Sometimes, but you know how it is, we’ve changed, we’ve grown apart, I suppose. They’ve got boyfriends …’ I shrugged at him.
‘I don’t know about this being alone all the time,’ Freddy began.
‘You’re starting to sound like Stella, Freddy.’ I took a breath and made a big effort. ‘The thing is, old friends seem to know too much, you know, about everything, and new friends wouldn’t know enough and I’d have to explain it all and it’d all be too much. I just don’t want to.’ I looked at him and I knew he was thinking of Tiggie.
‘It’s be
tter to talk about it, Cat.’
‘I just don’t want to,’ I said. ‘But look,’ I smiled heartily at him, ‘I have made a bit of a friend. At work. She’s great.’
I told him about Penny.
‘So how was Christmas?’ Penny asked. ‘Did you go to your Nan’s?’
We were back in the harness — as Freddy says — sweeping out the cubicles which had a week’s worth of sand banked up, damp hillocks under the benches and smooth pyramid shapes nestling in the corners of the cold stone walls. The floor and benches were littered with ice-block wrappers, empty suntan-lotion bottles, dirty band-aids, sodden forgotten towels and undies.
‘This is very discouraging,’ said Penny. ‘I don’t understand why people can’t clean up after themselves. I blame their parents. My God!’ She nudged some panties onto the end of her broom and dropped them into a rubbish sack, her lips curling in distaste. ‘When I have children, they’re going to learn right from the beginning to be responsible for themselves. Do you know what? Stefan’s mother still makes his bed every morning. And he lets her.’
I could believe it.
It was good to see Penny. She had arrived at the beach as I was coming out of the water after my swim and had raced across the sand in her pink flowery shorts, shouting hello.
‘Excellent to see you, Cat-gut,’ she said, squeezing me across the shoulders. ‘Still exercising, I see. I thought Christmas might dampen your enthusiasm.’
‘Gotta lose Christmas pudding,’ I said.
‘Me too,’ said Penny, patting her flat tummy. She looked like Miss California 1965, slim brown legs and little white ankle socks. I felt like hugging her.
‘How was the Milford Track?’
She rolled her eyes. ‘You don’t wanna know. And anyway, I’ve got a New Year’s resolution. I’m asking the questions this month. I’m going to find out about you.’ She beamed madly at me and I smiled back, registering the challenge in her voice.
She was determined, Penny, but I liked it.
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