Panic flutters inside my chest. ‘I googled it. It works even a few days after, but you have to go to a pharmacy and they interview you, get you to fill out forms. Sign something. I couldn’t do it.’
‘It’s too late for that now then?’
‘There’s another pill I could get. If I need to. I mean, if I want to . . .’
What I want, so very badly, is to erase this terrifying thing inside me if it exists. Rewind, undo, pretend it never happened. But I also don’t want to make that decision.
Alex squeezes my hand. My eyes grow hot. That’s one of the best things about Alex. She’s never self-righteous or judgey. I could tell her I’d done anything and she’d try to understand why.
‘Your period will come,’ she whispers. ‘It will. But in the meantime, maybe we need a plan. Just in case.’
I squeeze her hand back. ‘How about this for a plan: we go live on an island filled with women. Only women. Maybe for a hundred thousand years.’
She laughs then, a clear, pretty sound. ‘Oh, Ruby, I think you forget you came from a man.’
I’m mortified by the thought. Such a foreign concept.
Nothing about my own conception has ever felt scandalous to me, but I suddenly want to know how Mum handled it. Fielding questions about who my father was when she didn’t really know. Did the world throw daggers at her for being slutty? Did they gossip about her being a single mother?
I thought I knew everything about Mum, but in the last month I’ve realised how little I seem to know. How few questions I’ve asked.
She must have been strong. Could I follow in her footsteps? Me, so scarred and fragile.
We reach the art room, with its large windows and sun-drenched tables. The room smells industrial, like paint and concrete. It reminds me of Grandad’s hangar and has the same safe-house feeling.
A couple of people are painting on easels against the left side wall of the studio, while along the opposite wall a group is huddled together on a worn lounge, eating their lunch and laughing. I recognise Lucy from our grade, yellow-rimmed glasses contrasting against her dark, shiny hair. She’s laughing with a couple of the guys.
Alex steers me into the kitchenette to heat her lunch. She hits the kettle.
A handful of seniors trickle into the room. They’re boisterous, and I see Zach from our year laughing as he gives Finn’s bag a friendly shove. They make for the same worn lounge as the others.
‘Hey, Al!’ Finn raises his hand to Alex. ‘Gotta ask you something later.’
She gives him a salute, and we carry our mugs of tea across the vast space of the art room towards the crowded lounge. My stomach clenches and the mug grows sweaty beneath my grip. Crowds are no longer my thing, but Alex leads me straight for this one.
She’s more relaxed than she was with the old group. Nobody here has the stamp of sameness they have in Joey’s group . . . some of the girls aren’t even wearing make-up. Tori has her head shaved and Macca has his long hair tied up in a bun. Not a single girl is draped over one of the guys. None of them are whispering in small circles, and the boys aren’t shoving or trying to one-up each other.
It’s like stepping into an alternate universe. One where everyone is unarmed. Where there’s no need to pretend and it’s safe to just laugh and share stories and be. It reminds me of the feeling I used to get with Mum’s muso friends in Newtown. The feeling of freedom.
Alex grabs a cushion from the lounge and sits on the floor. I copy her.
Then it’s like I’m not there, but in a good way. I’m certain they’ve all seen me humiliate myself in that clip, but nobody seems to care about that and, for the first time in a year, I feel the tiniest bit sheltered.
‘I think I totally messed up my portrait yesterday,’ Finn says to Alex. ‘How do you make the light look realistic on your guy’s face? At this rate, the portrait of my mum’s gonna look more like The Scream.’
‘There’s a technique – wait, I’ll show you.’
Alex puts down her lunch and goes to the racks at the back of the art room. She comes back with a canvas the size of a small window and holds it to one side before the group.
It’s Grandad.
Alex’s brush strokes are bold in a way that reminds me of Artemisia Gentileschi’s but, despite the bold strokes, Grandad’s face looks soft, his eyes shiny and warm. In Grandad’s face, with just the hint of a smile, I see kindness. But beyond that, a certain grit and courage too. I don’t know how Alex captures so much with just a few tubes of colour. It’s another kind of magic.
‘That’s amazing,’ I say.
Alex cocks her head to one side and studies it. ‘I really hope I can do him justice.’
‘I think you already have. Does he know?’ I ask.
‘No – and you can’t say anything. It’s my present to him for his seventieth – actually he asked me the other day if I thought you and your mum would come to his party. Will you?’
A party. Fear runs through me.
I haven’t seen Alex’s family since our fight. Awkward would be an understatement.
I bite my lip. ‘Maybe.’
Everyone in the group is scrutinising her painting.
‘I love the contrasts of light and shade,’ Tori says. ‘Gives it attitude.’
I glance at Alex, wondering how she feels about that – having her work judged. When the clip of me was shared online for all the world to see, it felt like my soul was being torn into tiny pieces.
I think a cat just died.
Just coz you can sing, doesn’t mean you should.
But Alex has found a space to share, safely. I didn’t even know that possibility existed. What else have I missed?
‘Finn, can you see the way the light angles across his cheek there . . .’ Without touching her painting, Alex traces Grandad’s cheekbone. ‘See the shape it makes? But under his eyes, there are dark crescents. I just break the image down into dark and light shapes.’
‘You’re painting him from a photo, right?’ Zach says.
‘Yeah, but the initial set up of the photo is crucial, getting the lighting exactly right before you paint a single stroke. There’s this Australian artist Andrew Tischler who talks about it on YouTube. I’ll send you the link.’
For the rest of lunch, I sit with this group I’ve never sat with before. I don’t say much, but it seems nobody expects me to, so I get to listen instead to their banter and laughter – Zach’s story about his little sister packing for their holiday to Sydney and declaring ‘my soupcase is all ready for Cindy’, and when his mum opened it, all she’d packed was one high heel, a cup and a teddy. Lucy’s story about her brother trying to jump the creek this morning to make it to the bus stop and falling short. Literally falling, she said. She couldn’t stop laughing as she described the mud smeared up the back of his pants. But the laughter isn’t cruel, and I find myself laughing along with her for a moment, then stop. I don’t know Lucy very well and really have no right to be joining in as if I do, but nobody else seems to notice or care.
After the final bell, Erik’s waiting at the car park. As Alex and I approach, he opens the back passenger door for me.
‘I drove,’ I say, relieved that Erik hasn’t asked about last week. That I don’t need to explain anything. ‘Thanks anyway.’
I get into my car. Erik shuts the door of the ute and his tyres kick up gravel as he powers out of the carpark. I follow a safe distance behind, glad for once in my life to be turning right, instead of left where the rest of the traffic goes.
My heart picks up when I pull around the corner and see the house. Robbie’s car is out the front again. For the first time, I’m glad to see it.
I park the Colorado, grab my bag and push through the front door.
Mum is at the piano, warming up. Starting slow and ominous in the lower octaves, and working her way up the keys with increasing pace.
‘Ah, the lady of the hour,’ Robbie says from the lounge. ‘Your ma was just talking about you. About this
voice of yours.’
‘Oh.’ My bravado shrinks. ‘Well, yeah, I sing a bit.’
‘A bit?’ Mum rolls her eyes. ‘This is a girl who could sing before she could talk.’
I’ve never heard her brag like this about me to anyone. Not since we lived in Newtown and Mum would tell me to sing: ‘Let it out, Ruby! Set the bird free!’ Is this what life would have been like if we’d stayed there?
‘She writes her own music.’
I shoot Mum a look. ‘I mostly sing covers.’ My cheeks burn.
‘How about your ma warms us up, then you can show us what you’ve got?’ Robbie rests his guitar against the lounge.
Mum locks eyes with him for a second, like he just issued her a challenge. Then she takes a deep breath and starts in a slow tempo, low and menacing with her notes.
It’s the Liszt Sonata. One of the hardest pieces a pianist can play.
Robbie sits back, arms folded, studying her. Suddenly the piece picks up tempo, and her fingers are running fast, then slow, then in raindrops up and down the full length of the piano. He’s watching her fingers.
But I watch her face, now completely focused, the small furrow between her eyebrows, her body swaying in and out as her fingers blur across the keys making a million sounds come together at once.
Nan used to tell me about the philosopher Thomas Carlyle who called music the speech of angels. At times like this, I understand why. Watching Mum making not a single error with her fingers despite all the different notes and intonations, despite the crossing over of hands, despite throwing every bit of herself into it, I also understand why music might be superior to song. Mum has always believed that.
This piece needs no lyrics to convey its meaning. It needs only my mother. And Mum doesn’t need my voice to light up her music the way I need her music to light up my voice.
The sonata lasts a full half hour, but Robbie’s attention doesn’t waver. When she finishes, there’s a short silence. Then he claps. I can see by the slump in Mum’s shoulders what the performance has cost her. Can Robbie see it too?
‘Imagine playing that to a packed auditorium again,’ he says. ‘Celeste, you’ve forgotten the rush of playing for a crowd.’
‘I haven’t forgotten.’
I glance briefly at Mum and realise my fists have been clenched, hoping she didn’t mess up a single note, knowing what it would cost her if she did. The damage to her pride. The self-shaming.
‘Think about it. You’ve lost nothing . . .’ he marvels.
Shit. Worst thing he could have said. He must notice, because he quickly changes tack.
‘Okay, your turn, Ruby. I’d like to hear one of your originals. Do you write story songs?’ Robbie leans back, crosses his arms over his chest and surveys me with interest.
‘Is there any other type?’
‘Of course,’ Mum says. ‘Music tells its own story.’
Even though she just demonstrated her point perfectly, I need to defend the value of song.
‘But without lyrics, there’s no context for the music,’ I say.
Mum smiles wryly. ‘You live in the modern age, Ruby. For thousands of years, music existed without a voice. Have you not heard of a lament? Look at “Spring”, one of the most famous pieces. It has no need for words, the sorrow’s in the notes.’
She doesn’t mean it to be callous, but it’s an axe to my heart when she talks like this. Her music always reigns supreme over my voice.
‘That’s not to say,’ Robbie says, ‘that music isn’t lifted to higher places by a voice. Voices weave music into song.’ He smiles at me. ‘I happen to be a song man myself.’
My wound heals a little at his words.
‘Each to their own,’ Mum says stiffly. Ever loyal to her music. Her first and last love.
‘I’ll go put the kettle on,’ I say.
Delaying tactics. I’m not ready to sing for anyone again. Let alone Robbie. So I head to the kitchen, hit the kettle, my fingers drumming on the bench top.
Robbie’s playing his guitar by the time I bring the tea across. He’s strumming it lightly, lazily, effortlessly, and making the most earthy, mellow sound. With his head bent low, eyes closed, it feels like a private moment. But Mum is playing too. The notes float out the back door, across the yard and into the forest.
I place the tea down gently, quietly, careful not to break the reverie of their music. Mum is staring at some far-off place beyond the forest, beyond the stretch of the Old Ghost Road. My arms prickle. I love her so much when she’s like this. My ethereal mother.
She doesn’t see me. She’s not here at all.
With Robbie strumming his mellow notes and the hint of a smile playing on Mum’s lips, the house feels full. Fuller than it’s been since Nan died.
Robbie has brought something I can’t give to Mum. And I can tell by the way her eyes are half closed that it’s the best thing that’s happened since we lost Nan. Nan played for her. With her. Singing isn’t the same. Learning the piano requires discipline, but a perfect voice isn’t earned. It’s almost lazy.
I will never be what Mum was. What Nan was. I’m built of different springs. I want to give Mum music, but I want to give it to her in my own way.
If I could hit pause on life, I’d stay in this moment forever and not miss the future. I wouldn’t have to worry about being pregnant, or the sick feeling I get when I think about the party or about seeing Lukas and Joey and the others at school. I could stay in this bubble and be safe forever.
Suddenly, Robbie stops playing.
‘Okay, Roobster,’ he says to me. ‘This one’s yours.’
I burn my lips on my tea. A prickle of panic up my spine. I see myself in the clip, standing before the crowd, swaying slightly as I serenade Joey.
‘I don’t sing to a crowd.’
He laughs. ‘I’ve played at Wembley Stadium to a hundred thousand. That’s a crowd. This? This is three misfits and a forest full of trees. How serious are you about music? Is it something you want to do?’
I shake my head and the answer comes without thought. ‘It’s something I need to do.’
Something I can’t stop, even if I wanted to. It’s the thing I do to make everything feel okay. I don’t understand a single experience in my life until I’ve written it into a song. Sung it into a sound.
‘Then no excuses. Let’s hit it.’
He unhooks his guitar and holds it out to me.
‘You play, right?’
I stare stupidly at his guitar, but can’t bring myself to touch it.
‘Ruby, take it,’ Mum says.
I want to. I want to show Mum that if I can do this in front of Robbie, she can do it in front of a crowd again. Maybe she’ll say yes.
If I can just push past the fear. . . But it means baring my soul. Cracking open my fears and dreams and scars. It didn’t pay off the last time.
I feel sick, and my hands are shaky, warning me they may not play along.
But I can’t be a coward in front of my fierce little mother. So I drag out whatever courage is left inside my battered soul, and against every instinct, every better judgement, every fear of failure that has ever screamed at me, I get to my feet.
I don’t look Robbie in the eye as I take his guitar. Sling it over my neck. It’s painted a bright, swirly orange, heavier than mine, older too. Inside the timber are a thousand secret yearnings that are not mine.
‘Show me your stuff,’ he says. ‘Don’t be shy – one of your favourites.’
I suck in a breath. In my head is a library of stories told in song. To pick one is tough, but I decide on a safe song.
‘This one’s called “Forest Bird”,’ I say. Infantile, but it won’t hurt.
When I’m strumming Robbie’s guitar, the strings are different. Beneath my fingertips, they sound deeper. And even though I’m not making eye contact, I can see Robbie in my peripheral vision, smiling, eyes crinkling at the sides as I pick up tempo. I try to get comfortable with his strings, work mysel
f into the music.
Mum gives me a you’ve-got-this-Rube smile. But I haven’t got this. Not at all.
I see myself back at the party – my confidence, a chemical illusion. The way everyone cheered me by night and mocked me by day.
I stop playing. ‘I’m sorry, I just – I don’t think I can.’
I look at Mum, eyes pleading with her to make an excuse for me. Find me a way out of this, but she’s just watching me. Judging me, maybe.
Robbie taps his foot against our worn-out timber floor. ‘I’ll count you in,’ he says.
I look from him, to Mum and back again. I close my eyes, as Robbie counts me in.
Except something happens in those counts. The music doesn’t feel right. ‘Forest Bird’ doesn’t fit anymore, and my fingers won’t play it. They change the chords, begin playing something new. A song that chooses me. The most painful song I own. And before I can do anything about it, ‘Beautiful Mess’ is pouring out from a deep place inside me.
‘Little girl, swirly dress,
Green forest, we would rest . . .’
My voice is too quiet, too shaky.
‘But then you left, and the forest,
It grew dark.’
Robbie watches me intently. I ignore him, ignore Mum, sitting back with her arms folded. The doubts break through, mocking me. Having a voice is nothing special. Millions of people have one.
But I do my best to block them out. Each moment is mine for one strum in the eternity of time. So I open the cage door all the way.
‘Maple tree, green knit shirt,
Rough bark, filthy dirt,
He didn’t ask, he didn’t
Check with me.’
Then it obeys. It comes out like nobody is there to hear me or judge me or watch me fall. I close my eyes and slip away, to a place where I’m singing just for me. Losing myself in my words, in my story. In my voice that never lies. I let it take over my body, until my voice is an instrument for my soul. Until my song rides the swell made by the guitar.
‘Now the forest is thick and old,
And you’ve come home, but I’ve grown cold
From the monsters kept inside
These gritty walls.’
Ruby Tuesday Page 12
