Waiting (29 page)

Though he had not intended to visit his aunt June, now that he has threatened it the obviousness of the idea embarrasses him – that he might not have. Of course he will see her.

And he does, finding her as ambiguous as ever, she too being a mother who made a hard call on her own offspring. June and Julie, what a pair. Having single children, only children, then treating them as lesser beings, as if to counter the high-achievers most only-children we hear about from their mothers clearly must be.

Even if they're not, that is. Their mothers make bigger claims than most mothers do, that is all, yet somehow in this one family of Angus's and Little's live two only-children and two fairy-tale mothers who are too ready, too unhappily quick (the impossible contradic­tion) to find themselves disappointed. This one word, so cruelly thrown, to maim the child and claim sympathy – for the parent.

June is neither very well nor very ill, as far as he can judge, removed somewhat from the routine and the undulating life around her in the home.

Her attitude to Little is changing. She is no longer putting her down. Angus is very pleasantly surprised. There is some genuine empathy in her. Empathy has been something of a problem in the sisters. Perhaps the father long gone who was cool, distant. June and Julie, yes. Who can tell with May: she lives in the country and is rarely seen these days. Vicki is warmer, but then she's the youngest. Their mother, in her own late-onset guilt for getting the rest so wrong, spoiled her shamelessly.

There is even a sense of remorse, when June tells Angus she has been unable in the past to appreciate the medical difficulties that Agnes must have been affected by. Only now that she too is ailing in health and dependant on professional advice, or the professionally-hidden lack of it, and on prescriptions and, increas­ingly, on frownbynumbers threats of worsening symptoms, only now from within all this chaos of health-care, can she appreciate what her poor little Agnes must have been suffering all her life. Of course it has stymied her, of course, she has lost much, more than health, peace-of-mind, she has lost opportunities in life… The inheritance must go to her.

So… it's not just inheritance, she says as if to herself. People think inheritance is a windfall. This is far more, and will help her get by. Don't you agree?

June begins to weep when Angus tells her of the rooming house and the men there, not that he means to worry her. It does, though. Yes, she says, the money will let her live in her own modest home. Can he see to it? Angus has told her about the fight with Julie. God, what a tough, intimidating lot these sisters are. He makes all the noises we associate with promises.

Which is a truly strange place to be, considering. And considering is what he is doing, and a lot of it: he was expected to obey, he was by blood of the mother, ‘made' to obey her, surely, all those pre­disposing little genes, and here he is standing by the bed-side of an old woman who is not his mother and pledging to hold the faith. To uphold Little (Agnes). For the first time, he considers Agnes as the echoey sound of the martyred girl, slain for disobeying her elders.

Back in Melbourne he Googles St Agnes. Now here was a saint worth her salt. Unlike the contemporary search to find two Catholic miracles, i.e. recoveries after illness, survivals… Basic random statistics should actually deliver such recoveries in less than a day or two (if all cancer sufferers pray to Angus, and anyone who recovers is tallied as a miracle cure. Given the 5% occurrence worldwide of unexpected, ‘unmedical' recoveries… OK, make that a week, he will be St Angus).

Agnes was a twelve year old girl condemned by the prefect Sempronius for the sin of refusing a forced marriage to his son. But as a virgin she couldn't be executed, under Roman law, so to rectify that, under Roman men, they dragged her off to a brothel to rape her… ‘and then'… as they dragged she prayed and as she prayed her hair grew, and by the time she arrived she was covered in hair from head to toe.

She was a mass of hair.

The Mass of St Agnes. Anyone who touched her went blind. That's something to crow about. Saints need to be inventive. Their chroniclers are. Anyway, Christian and virgin as she was, they found ways to execute her. Authorities are inventive too.

St Agnes is the patron saint of chastity, and thus also virgins, rape victims, engaged couples, girls and… gardeners?

Bloody hell, St Agnes was his saint. He submits to the skid-track of the internet. Not a natural, Angus, at online digressions. Straight-ahead kind of guy he is, and yet he is also a poet and stone-breaker – he likes images that break open. He abhors the blog-worn gaucheries, the self-love, the needy claims and requests, and the clerically listy pedantic.

Never was a saint more easily placed – in his imagination, in his smile of eccentric and possibly uncertain ‘facts'. As a virtual (not a vestal) virgin. In his grotto down by the Lakes. The Sunless Sea is a far more brooding presence. Or, standing between a rock and dark place. Little. Her mother's keeper.

Return and Return

Angus cannot determine where the church bells come from even as they clang through in brassy waves. As hard as locating the distance of fire in bushland, or forward distances over deeply repeating ridges and valleys – the clang and the die-out. The day feels bright and positive, a clear blue scape in his mind but a nervousness in his throat for the words and the will.

A big sulphur-crested cockatoo screeches like a shovel scraping up sand on a concrete floor.

The man-shape of Dazza appears as usual, and like all large people with little core-strength he does not sit down but simply lets himself fall back into his huge chair.

Yeah, mate, who ya-rafter?

Little. If she's in. You remember me from last time, I suppose. Coolie bleeding on the floor.

Yeah I do. Shops mate. Think they are. Back soon.

He coughs and bends forward.

Back soon ‘cause they don't go for long. Gotta have a ciggie. Bit hard not ta remember, mate, the blood and all. The chick with the stuff.

And to deny all even half-sensible medical science he drags out a fag from his pocket and lights it. It sits sagging from his lips as he contemplates the sky. Nife day. Umm.

Nothing to do but wait monosyllabically with the emphysemic hairy one, or ring Jen on the mobile to check the job and avoid sitting in his ute twiddling his thumbs, or wander down the street in the direction of the shop, unless they tram it back and come from the other direction. He asks Dazza and Dazza stops to think, puffs his fag a bit, which is still hanging in his mouth, then mumbles.

Fit's hot they tram it.

Angus considers it is hot. He'll walk down towards the tram stop.

Is Coolie back from hospital yet?

The man drags the ciggie from his lip and stares at it.

Dunno mate. People round here a bit hard to keep track of, if you know what I mean.

Unmistakeable. The two different shapes: one of great width, height, low hem, and another of thinness, shortness, jeans. Big and Little and Big trundling his granny trolley in front of him. Ginger wig on today, flaring in the blue of sky and white of tree and brightness of light. Clarity and eccentricity, what a combination. Angus walks on down towards them giving a silly lame wave when close. Little waves back in a tight little wristy movement as if flicking away a fly and Big keeps both hands on the trolley.

Angus waits and turns to walk beside them, so their three figures make one: of Big down to Little up to Angus, like a fleshy dumb-bell rolling up the street towards the rooming house.

I may as well tell you here, he says, being more private.

Big looks around at the houses and then at him: What, in the street? Very bloody private.

Big clearly won't warm to him as he did to Jasmin.

I had a fight with my mother, says Angus to Little, and she even chased me, well, pretty slowly, out to my car and smacked the roof a lot as if it was my kid's bottom. I had told her I was going to see your mum, that's what got her going, that and knowing I wasn't in favour of her ridiculous carer claim. So your mum, who seems pretty together I have to say, your mum, knowing as much as there is to know, has sworn…

Yes? What did she say? What? What did…? I'm so excited!

… that the house is yours no matter what.

Little can't stop it, shrieks of happiness.

Really! She promised? She said so? Whooo!

Yeah, and she said Julie won't see any of it. Even if that means the fabulous caring… stops. Which it probably will. She understands, she probably wants me to say it to you… Your mother understands now what you must have been through. The illness and pain, the loss of opportunities. The inheritance will be your sort of safety net and insurance policy.

Big grunts in a low key, happily though hardly as shrieky as Little, who can't stop gabbling. The three of them turn in towards the front door, the smell of cigarette smoke still there.

Just as they get there Coolie comes out asking Dazza for a fag and suddenly sees Angus, his eyes boggle and he stutters before rushing back inside. Dazza, humphs towards Angus:

Ya gotta winnin way about ya mate.

Me, or Coolie?

Before he leaves, Angus wonders about it for a while, delaying, then tells Little and Big.

I don't, um, your mum looks really well. This will of hers is one thing, I mean I don't want to suggest you're waiting, you know, for her to keel over. Just that… I reckon she won't. Not yet.

Their two faces are very still and very different and carry very complicated expressions. It would take a better man than Angus to read them.

Ah, says Big. Ah.

We're going house hunting, just to get an idea, says Little. We don't know anything about real houses. Not any more. Thanks for that about mum.

Again Big makes noises like someone scribbling with a wide graphite pen.

Again their place reminds Angus of Coolie. A feeling of low dread. Jasmin has just emailed him asking who Jackson is, or was. He will have to tell her. Time, now, to leave the odd couple to their plans.

But look at the prices, says Big. This st-stupid little workers cottage is only two bedrooms. It's marked at 700 thou.

They both ignore his vague stutter. It must be over what she has asked him to do. The small amount of guilt she feels about this is bettered by her feelings of pride, and defiance. This is something she is going to do no matter what. Each advertisement has a photo, usually of no help whatsoever. This one has lights on at night for the golden effect.

Big, we're not looking at that one. I only put it there to show you how the rest of the houses are… This one, say, is only $350,000 so it's…

Cheap. And… totally tacky.

No, not tacky, cheap.

A wreck. And cheap. Look at the photo of the kitchen, forget the dodgy lens and think about it, it's no bigger than three frigging fridges and the skirting boards are rotting, look, you can see they are. You want me to pretend, you want me to dress in pants just to look at this sort of sh-sh…?

There cannot be many men who are reduced to speech impediments by having to stop wearing women's clothing. That he will do anything for Little is not the question. But he has actually used totally as an adjective! No, no.

Thank you Big, You are so understanding. We have to look at them. How else will we find a nice little place for us?

The sounds he is making are no longer recognisable as speech. Not as common speech, not even uncommon speech – he is doing the kiddie thing of hoping it will all go away, trying to re-jig reality by a droning sound set up between the world and himself. It begins deep inside his diaphragm and with his eyes shut it vibrates up through his chest and into his sorry neck muscles, and rattles the inner shelves of his head. Things are bouncing on them. On and on.

Then it stops.

I suppose I have to go through with this like a man.

He stands up and squints, morphing into melodrama as if the buzzing, huddling Big had never been.

Act like a normal person, placating a woman who has set her heart upon a dream. Accompany her out into mad land. Even if there is no cottage that we can afford. Nevertheless.

Big, look at this place, she shouts, ignoring him and turning the pages of Domain. Shouting is quite alarming from her. His eyes open even further.

Look how run down it is.

You are happy enough to live here.

Big is horrified and will not hide it.

But this is our home.

Home? We can find somewhere like this, no trouble.

We can?

And of course he does not, not, want to leave the rooming house at all, he cannot tell her he does not not want to find any house for any price. It's not the house, surely she realises, it is not the bloody building.

What if we want… children, she wails.

Children!

And then, crazily, she recalls him once talking exuberantly to her in the street and when she nudged him and laughed he'd said: good lad. Good lad. He called her that.

They have arranged to borrow a car and a trusty, perhaps the only trusty, person they know, has been talked into organising this. Who else but the worldly Sheriff. They ask him as he stands outside twiddling a smoke and looking like death back on two legs. He is not happy, he has been feeling liverish lately, not his normal self, and he does not like it. This might cheer him up and so they feed him like a big bird. Their hard man, The Sheriff. Yes, he tells them, you guessed right, you fuckers, yeah, sure thing, he used to be a driver. And that means get-there, turn off the key, go inside, hurt the man, get back in and get-away fast without even nodding to the suit in the back seat, the neck and wrist with gold and rings, and the mobile phone murmurings to some bigger boss man of the job done.

The Sheriff can drive a fast car through a slow street like a dose of salts through a dimwit.

They stand on the kerb looking at the vehicle: a white Holden Commodore that seems to sit lower down than cars usually do, especially lower down on the left side. Big will have to sit in the front and therefore the car will sag even lower. This is what Big is thinking, as he stands there dressed in a voluminous Hawaiian shirt (his own) and a pair of towering black trousers (borrowed from Dazza) newly washed, obssessively, by Little. The big man looks neat and clean and he has, under orders… shaved. He is a shock of normality. All the blokes are standing out at the front just to stare at him. Even the neighbours are staring at him. He feels alarmingly ordinary.