Clancy of the Undertow Read online

  ‘I know you don’t like talking about this stuff, but I worry.’

  ‘I know you do. But I’m fine.’

  ‘I’m not talking about psychologists or interventions. I just want to know that you’d come to me if you ever felt bullied or having…dark thoughts.’

  ‘Dark thoughts? Jesus, Mum.’ My face flushes as I think about the night before, holding the pillow over my face, willing my body to override its safety controls.

  ‘Don’t be flippant, Clancy. What Nancy went through…That’s why she tells someone when she has a problem, and it gets sorted out. Like a trust bridge.’

  Oh God, trust bridge. This so-called child psychologist came to our school at the start of the year, part of some government program to help struggling TV personalities sell more copies of their books to desperate parents. Mum went to the seminar and came back with nothing more useful than new buzzwords to torment me with. Trust bridge, needless to say, was one of them.

  ‘I’m really fine,’ I say. ‘Really.’

  ‘It’s just that you never have any friends over, anything like that.’

  ‘I don’t need to have…I’ve got plenty of friends.’ I’m a good enough liar if I keep my voice quiet.

  ‘Anyway, I just want you to know that I’m always here. Whatever’s going on. I can listen, or talk, or anything.’

  ‘Thanks. I’ll keep it in mind.’

  I’ve had friends before, obviously. They were the sort of bright and short primary school allegiances that meant everything in the moment, but not much beyond. And it’s all supposed to transform when you get to high school. You’re expected to put play and fun behind you and enter a world where friendship means an intense, hormone-fuelled connection. My former friends became all too quickly exactly the type of people I liked the least. It wasn’t their shallowness or selfishness exactly, nor their vanity and desperation. It was their acceptance that there was only allowed to be a single type of person, and any variation was something to fear or hate.

  ‘We could invite Reeve over on Sunday,’ says Mum.

  ‘For our traditional Sunday lunch?’

  ‘It could be nice for you, that’s all.’

  ‘Not sure if that’s his scene, really.’

  ‘You could invite some of your science friends.’

  ‘God no.’

  ‘I think it would be nice to have other people there, so it’s not as daunting for the DeRosas.’

  I’m about tell Mum to invite her own friends, but manage to stop myself. ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘I’ll ask Reeve.’

  ‘You’ll ask him today?’

  ‘Yes. Today.’ Reeve and Nancy would probably get along well, but the thought of everyone I like in my house together is stressing me out. Actually, shouldn’t we be home by now? I realise too late that Mum’s taken a different turn, leading us back through the quiet wide streets in the old part of town. All the well-kept gardens of old people waiting to die, green blooms of watered lawns among the brown stippled nature strips. The dreaded Long Way Home. Designed to allow more time for an inescapable Proper Talk. I sink lower in my seat, like just wait till I can drive myself around, lady.

  ‘So,’ she says. ‘Dad said you talked to him last night.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I’m not having a go. He really appreciated it. You making him dinner.’

  ‘Oh. Right. Yeah, well I had extra burgers.’ I straighten up in my seat. ‘He was doing…legal stuff,’ I say. ‘He had all these papers on the bench.’

  ‘Probably just boring adult paperwork,’ Mum says. ‘You’d think it would all be done on computers these days, wouldn’t you? But there’s still all this paper.’ She laughs, but it’s not convincing.

  ‘Is something going to happen to him?’

  Mum doesn’t say anything, just narrows her eyes like she’s driving through pouring rain.

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘I’m not sure, sweetie. There’s a lot of procedures to go through.’

  ‘What do the police say?’

  ‘Not much, to be honest. There’s an investigation. They have go through things in a certain way. Nothing to worry about yet.’

  Yet.

  ‘What if something happens to him?’

  Mum stops the car at an intersection, checks each side of the road twice. The road’s empty, but she doesn’t move forward. She lowers her head towards the wheel. ‘He didn’t do anything,’ she says, ‘so why would anything happen to him?’

  ‘But you can’t—’ I’m about to argue with her, but the sight of her knuckles, blanched white with pressure, stops me. ‘I’m sure everything will turn out okay,’ I say.

  If I keep my voice quiet, I’m a good enough liar.

  30

  By the time we get home, Mum has scrubbed any trace of emotion from her face and the tiny drops of water on the windscreen have turned to steady rain. She switches off the ignition and smiles at herself in the rearview mirror.

  ‘Here we are, then.’ She keeps staring ahead, until I get out. The rain’s pretty heavy, so I run to the porch without looking back.

  Angus is lying on the old couch with a crocheted rug across his knees. He’s reading a busted-up paperback with pictures of pyramids and galaxies on it. I don’t have to read the title to know it contains the word Conspiracy or Secret or Prophecy.

  ‘Working hard?’

  ‘Research.’ He waves the book at me. The Hidden Keys of Secret History. The cover designer clearly fell into a vat of LSD as a child.

  ‘Is that a unicorn?’

  ‘Unicorns are a powerful sign in some cultures.’

  ‘They’re a powerful sign you’re crazy.’

  Angus puts the book down. ‘How was the first leg of your apology tour?’

  My face goes red, betraying me immediately. ‘What?’

  ‘Never thought you had the bone density to be a bully.’

  ‘I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘She dost protest too much.’ Angus laughs. I suspect he’s already a few beers down. ‘Dad said you had to go and say sorry to some kid you shouted at. Did you really pick on someone at nerd club?’

  ‘It’s doth protest,’ I say. ‘The lady doth protest.’ A weak comeback at best.

  ‘It’s true, isn’t it! One day out with Sasha Strickland and you think you’re hot shit.’

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘Language, Clancy.’ Mum’s teacher voice sounds right behind me.

  Angus struggles to tamp down a grin.

  ‘What’s going on, then?’ says Mum.

  ‘Nothing.’

  She narrows her eyes at Angus. ‘Nothing?’

  Angus does another shrug. ‘I was just trying to read.’

  ‘Yep,’ I say. ‘Great. Obviously everything is always my fault, so why bother to think otherwise?’

  Angus pretends to cower under his blanket. ‘Don’t let her hit me!’

  I give it serious consideration. The look of shock on my brother’s face would almost be worth it. Instead, I deploy an offended heel-swivel and stalk off.

  I’m heading up to my room when I realise I want to email Nancy straight away. Having someone to tell things to is addictive, as it turns out. I go into the kitchen, but of course Titch is on the computer, playing some ridiculous game.

  ‘Are you nearly finished?’ I say, channeling a Loving Sister Who Just Doesn’t Want You To Ruin Your Mind With Too Much Computer Time.

  ‘No.’ His eyes don’t move from the screen. His fingers tap on the keyboard seemingly independent of reason. Virtual Titch creeps down a shadowy hallway. ‘I’m on here,’ he says, blasting away the head of a teeth-baring monster.

  ‘All day?’

  ‘Gotta finish this stage.’

  ‘How long’s that going to take?’

  Titch shrugs. ‘Have to get enough achievements.’ He smashes the space bar and a giant spider explodes in a wash of green blood. ‘And awards.’

  ‘And then you get your Advanced Diploma?’r />
  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’ I stare at Titch’s disgusting unwashed hair, flecked with what I really hope is dandruff. ‘When did you last have a shower?’

  Titch just grunts. After only a week of parental neglect my brother is devolving into a unicellular organism.

  Mum comes in, face reset again, like nothing’s ever been wrong in history. ‘So you’ll call Reeve, then?’ she says.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Yes when?’

  ‘Soon.’

  ‘Today?’

  ‘Yes, today.’

  ‘You’ve got his number?’ Mum gives me what she probably thinks is a knowing mother–daughter look, but comes out like I’ve just got lemon juice in my eye.

  ‘Yes. I’ll do it now.’

  Titch makes a kissing noise without ever moving his face further than a few centimetres from the computer screen.

  Mum’s still got the weird half-grin on her face as I walk over and take the phone. Thank God for cordless technology, I think, and then it hits me that I’m a fricking idiot. I could have given Nancy our home number. I could have taken the phone into my room. I really am the absolute worst at making friends. I haven’t even got her number. And then my mind races ahead and I think of Sasha calling me. I wouldn’t want anyone knowing she was on the phone, and I get a little thrill at the thought of it. I bound up the stairs.

  The weather’s made my room dark and gloomy, the rain tapping against the window. My favourite weather. I find my work pants in the highly organised clump of clothes beside my wardrobe and grab Reeve’s business card from the pocket. Angus’s old driving manual lies open on my bed where I’ve left it, dog-eared to hell but mostly memorised. I throw it aside and lie back on my bed, kicking off my boots. I dial Reeve’s number and wait, hoping he won’t answer.

  He picks up, of course, on the third ring.

  ‘Clancy! What is happening?’

  ‘Hello?’ I say, because my brain hates me. And then, ‘How do you know this is me?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How did you know this was me calling?’

  ‘I know what your voice sounds like.’

  ‘But…you answered…’

  Reeve explodes with laughter. ‘Caller ID, Sherlock.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Right.’ I hate using the phone. Like, really hate it.

  ‘What’s cracking?’ Reeve says.

  ‘Are you at work?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘How come you’re answering your phone, then?’

  ‘Because I’m at work. It’s not exactly a hotbed of crime today.’

  ‘What if someone ram-raids Classic Cuts while you’re talking to me?’

  ‘It would be Barwen’s worst ever case of Skankicide.’

  I laugh, but then smack my head, like Car-crash jokes, Clancy. Just perfect.

  ‘Anyway,’ says Reeve, ‘nice to hear from you. How’s, you know, everything?’

  ‘Everything’s okay.’

  ‘You all holding up? Your family, I mean? My folks send their best.’

  No they bloody don’t. ‘We’re getting there,’ I say. ‘What’s new in town? What have I missed?’

  ‘Not much. Dan Cryer locked himself inside the Boystown Raffle car. Said he wasn’t getting out until they gave him a thousand tickets. It was pretty funny.’

  Dan Cryer is one of the football-playing mouth-breathers that went to school with Angus. ‘Surprised he figured out how to open the door in the first place.’

  ‘Or that he knows how many a thousand is.’

  ‘How’s Eloise? Business any better?’

  Reeve’s voice disappears for a second and I hear the unmistakable squeak of food-court chairs. ‘Sorry,’ he says. Then, ‘Thanks,’ to someone else.

  ‘I sense donuts.’

  The crinkle of a paper bag. ‘How dare you,’ Reeve says through a mouthful of what I know is plain cinnamon, extra hot.

  ‘How’s Eloise, though?’

  ‘Oh, she’s great. Well, not great, but she’s good. Think she’s looking forward to you getting back.’

  This news fills me with a weird pride. I want to ask Reeve if people still hate me, my family, my name, but I’m too afraid of the answer.

  ‘So listen,’ I say. ‘The reason I’m calling,’ is that my mother forced me to, ‘is that we’re having, like, a lunch here on Sunday. Apparently. I don’t know what it is.’

  ‘Okay,’ he says. ‘It’s usually the meal between breakfast and dinner.’

  ‘Sorry. I’m fucking this up. Do you want to come over for lunch on Sunday? I’ve got a friend—some friends—um, coming over.’ This just sounds weird but I press on regardless. ‘Anyway, my family will also allegedly be attending, but I will try and convince them not to.’

  Reeve laughs. ‘What time?’

  ‘Um, lunchtime?’

  ‘Can I bring anything?’

  ‘Just yourself!’ I smack myself on the head again. ‘Did I just say that?’ How do people do this all the time? The invites, the details, the phone calls. It’s the actual worst. ‘But yes, I don’t think you need to bring anything.’

  ‘What’s the dress code? Will you provide soup forks, or should I bring my own?’

  ‘You know where you can stick your soup fork.’

  ‘Okay. Looking forward to it!’

  We say our goodbyes, and I hang up. This friends thing is bloody exhausting.

  31

  When Dad rolls up the garage door he’s got his old school jumper on. It still fits him, somehow.

  ‘They don’t make quality like this anymore,’ he says. The same line he uses every time he fetches it from the back of the cupboard.

  ‘It’s not that cold,’ I say.

  ‘Maybe I just felt like wearing it.’

  ‘You felt like smelling of mothballs and itching?’

  ‘You came out here just to critique my fashion sense? What time is it?’

  ‘Couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d visit a weird guy in a shed.’

  Dad smiles. He points his thumb behind him. ‘Come on, then.’

  Inside, everything looks different. All the paperwork is gone from the workbench, and there’s a bunch of cardboard boxes stacked against one wall. ‘Spring cleaning?’ I say.

  ‘Something like that.’

  I hear the familiar grumble of the radio. ‘We still in the match?’

  Dad tips his hand from side to side, like not really. ‘They’ve only got to get a hundred and forty-odd. They’re none for twenty already.’

  ‘Bugger.’ I settle into the bucket seat. I don’t even fall out of it straight away now.

  ‘You know what the Aussies need?’ Dad says.

  I groan.

  ‘They need a raw-boned fast bowler to shake up the top order.’

  ‘You don’t say.’

  ‘I’ve told you about the semi-final, haven’t I?’

  He has me cornered now. ‘Only a few hundred times.’

  Back when he played cricket, Dad sometimes filled in for the A-grade team whenever one of their fast bowlers wasn’t available. He’d only done it a few times when he got a call one night from the captain. Half the team were down with food poisoning, on the eve of a semi-final against Toowoomba. Just about the biggest match the Barwen team—perennial easybeats that they were—had ever played. He drove up that night and played the next day. Came on first change, and went for twenty runs off two overs. Only given a third because they had no one else to relieve the opening bowlers. Took two wickets in the over, and then another six. He kept bowling until the last batsman was out.

  ‘Eight for seventy-three,’ Dad says. ‘Fourteen overs, one maiden. Shook them up deluxe.’ He moves his hand out in front of him, pushing an invisible cricket ball away down the centre seam. ‘Nearly won the game. If it wasn’t for our batting lineup, we would’ve.’

  It’s a script I can repeat word for word.

  ‘The glory days, they were.’

  ‘Maybe they’ll call you up fo
r the next test.’

  ‘Not much use with my back.’

  ‘Once you’re better, though. You could reinvent yourself as a crafty spinner.’ I rock back and mime a Shane Warne delivery. ‘Maybe you could play locally again.’

  Dad sits down. ‘Think it might be a while before that happens. Not exactly flavour of the month.’

  ‘It’ll blow over.’

  Dad leans back in his chair, runs his hands through his hair. ‘Not from the look of that stuff they sprayed on the house.’

  I must give Dad a shocked look, because he adds, ‘I know about it, Clance. Bit hard not to, really.’

  ‘Oh. Okay.’

  ‘Thanks for helping your mum clean it up.’

  ‘That’s all right.’ I don’t know what made me think Dad wouldn’t have known. ‘Did you tell the police about it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It’s not worth it, really. In the long run.’

  ‘But they sprayed those…horrible things on the house.’

  ‘Paint comes off.’

  ‘What about my bike, though?’

  ‘Your bike?’

  I tell Dad about Angus driving me home. The bogans outside the Cri. Lightning Lady, mangled up in the yard.

  ‘I didn’t realise, Clance,’ he says. ‘I honestly didn’t know. We’ll get you a new one.’

  There’s a look Dad’s had on his face ever since the accident that I haven’t been able to place until now. My fearless, stubborn, pig-headed father. He’s scared.

  This thought frightens me. Dad has always taken things in his stride. Even when his back got so bad he could hardly sit up. Even when the council screwed him with his compo, even when all he was left with was a shitty job with traffic control, he’s always been so matter-of-fact about it. Things will turn out fine. Everything will be okay. Eventually, everyone believed him. Except now, I don’t.

  He brings his seat back and looks straight at me. ‘People aren’t always on your side, Clance.’

  ‘Yeah, I know.’ Preacher, I think, meet the converted.

  ‘But you can’t let them get to you. You’ll always know what’s right and wrong. You will.’ Dad pokes me in the shoulder. ‘Some people spend their whole lives working that out. God knows I have. You, you’ve already got it figured out.’