The Origin of Me

by Bernard Gallate

  ‘A hundred per cent.’

  The first three smoothies went smoothly. But making the fourth, a Boomberrytastic, I got distracted by the customer banging on about her nut allergy and pushed SURGE before securing the lid. >FWOOSH!< A crimson geyser hit the ceiling and splattered my shirt in pulped berries and frozen yoghurt.

  ‘Berries go boom!’ the twins said in unison. The customer looked like she’d witnessed a drive-by shooting.

  I was still mopping up when Pericles returned and said, ‘I leave you for ten minutes and you’ve destroyed the joint.’

  ‘I forgot to secure the lid.’

  ‘Obviously, malaka!’ He cuffed the back of my head.

  Despite the spill, Pericles was more chill than he was at school. When Sam took his extended break and left Pericles and me to make the drinks, we fell into a rhythm. The last two hours flew by. At 8.45, Sam told me I wasn’t required for close but I offered to stay and help anyway.

  ‘You won’t be paid for it,’ he said.

  ‘Not a problem,’ I said, and winked at Pericles. It was the least I owed him.

  Dad had gone to bed by the time I arrived home, exhausted. Unusually, he’d left a message on a post-it note, saying that he was proud of my initiative and Pop Locke would’ve been too. Brushing and flossing my teeth, I felt a sense of relief that things might be settling at last.

  I climbed into bed and felt a heavy drowsiness, the reward for performing physical labour. Then, right on the threshold of sleep, Homunculus whispered, ‘Your shirt needs to be washed, Stavros.’ I dragged my arse out of bed and carried my satchel to the laundry. Reaching in for the shirt, I felt something soft and fleshy. I tipped over the satchel. A mottled pink-and-grey thing resembling the bastard spawn of Alien dropped onto the tiles with a >THWAP<.

  The sight and not-exactly-fresh smell of the amorphous, hairless creature instantly triggered dry-retching, propelling me to the balcony for fresh air. While out there recovering, I became concerned that the creature, though it lacked any obvious means of ambulation, might slither away and conceal itself somewhere in the apartment like an air-conditioning duct. Recalling that a liberal sprinkling of salt can kill a leech, I armed myself with a box of pink Himalayan crystals and returned to the laundry. But the thing hadn’t moved. It was still there, stuck to my shirt on the tiles. I prodded it with a mop handle and there was no response. Thinking it was dead, I knelt for a closer inspection.

  It looked like a tongue – definitely not human, possibly bovine. I googled ‘cow tongue’ and it matched the images. Identification brought no relief. Fearing it might’ve come from a mad cow, I washed my hands with soap then antiseptic gel. How long had I been toting it around for? And how the hell had it entered my bag? I needed somebody to help me deal with it. I could hear Dad snoring. Maybe Pericles was still up? I turned my phone back on and found an SMS from an unknown number:

  THIS IS WHAT WE DO TO INFORMERS!

  My life had turned into a psychological thriller. Who’d sent the message? Probably Nads, or Starkey following his orders. He’s like a trained dog that occasionally bites its master. But how had he slipped the tongue in without being seen? Everybody knows he’s suspended. There’s no way he’d been anywhere near Crestfield. And I’d had my satchel with me all day.

  The message was sent at 7.47 pm. I thought back over my shift. At 7.30 I’d gone for my break at Hungry Jack’s and later left my satchel under the table to refill my drink. I remembered it feeling heavier when I left. Where did he get the tongue? It was too big for a can. Do butchers sell fresh cow tongue? Maybe they’re back in fashion because of a MasterChef challenge? Who do those three think they are – the Crestfield fricking mafia? They were probably at Nads’ place now, having a laugh about it.

  ‘Or maybe Starkey followed you home?’ Homunculus said.

  ‘There’s no way Vince would let him in, and the lift wouldn’t work if he did.’

  ‘So stop panicking.’

  ‘Fear can only survive if you feed it.’

  ‘Correct. It must be confronted and destroyed,’ he said. ‘Go downstairs and check if there’s anybody lurking outside the building.’

  I took the lift down to the lobby. Vince was on night shift. He asked why I was heading out so late and I told him I was buying milk. As I walked around the block, I saw nothing more antisocial than a businessman pissing against a wall in Pennys Lane, which hardly qualifies as unusual behaviour in this hood.

  ‘You forgot the milk,’ Vince said with a wink.

  ‘All out,’ I said and took the lift back up.

  Defying my squeamishness I picked up the tongue, which was surprisingly rough, wrapped it in the real-estate section of the Sydney Morning Herald then dropped it down the garbage chute. I calmed myself with a breathing exercise and remembered that I still hadn’t washed the shirt. I returned to the apartment’s laundry, threw my shirt in the machine and selected HEAVY DUTY to kill any residual bacteria.

  I got back into bed about 1 am. Three seconds after my head hit the pillow, Homunculus piped up yet again. ‘How dare that slimy little nicotine-stained-fingered shady shithole try to intimidate you with a cow tongue! Get up and call that number and don’t listen to any bullshit alibi.’

  Without fully considering the wisdom of doing so, I called the number. It rang and rang. I was just about to cancel when somebody answered.

  ‘HELLO?’ he said.

  ‘I KNOW YOU PUT THE TONGUE IN MY BAG.’

  ‘WHAT THE FUCK? WHO IS THIS?’

  ‘DROP THE FAKE VOICE – I KNOW IT’S YOU. IT’S NOT MY FAULT YOU GOT BUSTED. I DIDN’T TELL ANYBODY.’

  ‘WHO IS THIS?’

  ‘WHO IS THIS?’ I mimicked his deep, gravelly tone. ‘WHO DO YOU THINK IT IS? MARY FRICKIN’ POPPINS? YOUR SCARE TACTICS HAVE FAILED AND IF YOU EVER PULL ANOTHER STUNT LIKE THAT, I’LL CALL THE POLICE.’

  ‘DON’T THREATEN ME YOU LITTLE ****!’ He called me a name that wasn’t Chester Hunt but started with a C and ended with U-N-T. ‘I DON’T KNOW WHO THE HELL YOU ARE, TALKING CRAZY SHIT AND WAKING UP MY WIFE. NEVER CALL THIS NUMBER AGAIN. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME, CHESTER HUNT?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘SO HELP ME, IF YOU DO I’LL TRACK YOU DOWN AND RIP BOTH YOUR BALLS OUT OF THEIR BAG AND FEED THEM TO THE DUCKS. CHESTER HUNT!’

  He hung up.

  That hot-head needed anger management counselling, pronto. It definitely wasn’t Starkey on the other end – so who was it? Maybe Starkey had swiped someone else’s phone so that I couldn’t trace him? It wouldn’t be his first crack at phone theft.

  At 1.30 am, still in a state of high-alert paralysis, I watched a televangelist called Benny Hinn banging on about the end of the world, and even though I agreed that it did indeed seem nigh, I didn’t give him any money. If Armageddon really is that close, my meagre financial assistance won’t help reverse it.

  Friday was the last day of the goons’ suspension so I didn’t have to deal with them at swim clinic. To practise executing efficient tumble turns, we spent an hour in the pool doing forward rolls over the lane dividers.

  Afterwards, Pericles and I headed to the Westfield food hall to eat before our shift. The massive videowall suspended in the atrium was showing footage of beautiful girls in flowing dresses running through a forest in slow motion. The leader turned back and smiled with perfect gleaming teeth, her dewy face taking up the entire screen. She held up her fingers in a peace sign, and the words appeared:

  V: THE PRIVATE COLLECTION, BY VIENNA VORONOVA

  Pericles was mesmerised. ‘Vienna Voronova!’ he said. ‘The world’s most perfect woman.’

  ‘I know. Mum’s bringing her out for a launch.’

  ‘Shut your mouth right now! Do you think she could get us in?’

  ‘Maybe,’ I said.

  We bought some Turkish food and found seats outside. Famished after clinic, Pericles scoffed his kebab then eyed my half-eaten pide. ‘What’s up?’ he said. ‘You’re looking all around the place like somebody’s
after you.’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ I said. Then, realising that the mere threat of having my tongue cut off had effectively silenced me, I told him about my grisly discovery last night and the ensuing phone call.

  ‘Ohmygod, that’s fully sick in the most literal sense. You have to report them.’

  ‘They put a tongue in my bag on the assumption that I’d blabbed. Imagine what would happen if I actually reported them and they found out.’

  ‘Maybe a horse’s head?’ He looked again at my plate. ‘Can I have your pide?’

  ‘It’s yours.’

  Pericles took a massive bite and with his mouth full said, ‘We’ve got to beat them at their own game – intimidation. My cousin Angelo could have a little man-to-man talk with Starkey. Advise him to back off.’

  ‘Don’t tell anybody about the tongue. I’m going to act like it never happened and deprive them of knowing it got to me.’

  ‘It’s too late.’ He wiped the sauce from his mouth. ‘You made that mad-arse phone call last night.’

  I remained on edge for the entire shift, imagining that I was being observed by one of the goons or maybe a stranger. Instead of offering to help Sam to close again, I left as soon as the clock hit 8.45. I didn’t want to stay a second longer than necessary.

  I got the train back to Kings Cross Station and warily made my way back home. It was only a minute’s walk from there, but a lot can happen in a minute.

  Swallowing my last minuscule portion of pride, I returned to Signal Bay on Saturday morning and apologised to Mum for my erratic behaviour and stubbornness. She was still simmering about Starkey’s offensive text, so I placated her with the news that I hadn’t seen him for a week – conveniently neglecting to mention that it was because he’d been suspended for terrorising a senior citizen. She said I could demonstrate my remorse by mowing the lawn. Out of all possible chores, it was my most dreaded.

  Last year when my beloved staffy, Gus, died of heart failure, I pleaded to have him buried in the backyard. Dad eventually gave in and helped me to dig a grave, and I rested my little buddy there in a pillowcase. Watching Dad cover him with earth and tamp it down, while Dougal, the Harrises’ foxhound, was crying on the other side of the fence, tore my heart open. Venn had to read my eulogy because I couldn’t speak.

  The grass now grows brown in a circle above Gus’s resting place, and whenever I reach that spot with the mower, Dougal starts howling again. Today I first mowed alongside the decking and then around the Buddha statue. I mowed in straight lines across the yard, avoiding the brown circle – leaving it till last. And the very second that the mower’s wheels crossed the demarcation line, Dougal started crying. Today the keening was so loud and high-pitched I couldn’t bear it. I cut the engine and finished the job with secateurs. It took me over an hour.

  Venn, appreciating the degree of trauma I’d just gone through, poured me an ice-cold glass of organic ginger-and-lemon kombucha. I took it up to my room, thinking that perhaps a little stress-relief session was in order. But before I could even get started, the words from the phrenologist’s booth that William and Esther had visited at the Market Carnival appeared in my mind’s eye:

  DESTRUCTIVE AND HABITUAL BEHAVIOURS INSTANTLY ALLEVIATED

  I didn’t think rubbing one out was destructive – maybe habitual, but definitely not something I wanted alleviated. Nevertheless, I put it on hold and began reading the next chapter of the book instead.

  Dr Eisler was reading a newspaper and smoking a pipe behind an olive gauze curtain. His silhouette revealed a pate as bald as the ceramic bust he used for consultations. ‘Shall we rescue him from indolence?’ William said. ‘Employ his scientific expertise to delve into the workings of my mind?’

  ‘Phrenology is a carnival act performed by tricksters obliged to give glowing assessments of the fools who line their purses. What would you do if he told the truth and exposed some deficiency in your character?’ Esther said.

  ‘I’d relieve you of my company immediately and attempt no further contact. Granted, that would be a most disagreeable outcome.’

  The curtain was suddenly whipped away.

  ‘Please step inside for a professional consultation,’ Eisler said. ‘All will be revealed for the modest fee of a shilling, fully refunded if the customer isn’t satisfied.’

  William removed his hat and reclined on the chaise. Eisler rubbed his hands and performed a preliminary palpation of the patient’s cranium. ‘I’ll now take measurements with my callipers,’ he said, opening the steel arms of the instrument to form a teardrop shape and positioning the points above William’s ears, causing Esther to laugh.

  ‘Excuse me, but the patient looks utterly ridiculous,’ she said.

  ‘The young lady has a point, but please hold still, sir. Accuracy is of the utmost importance.’ Eisler measured the twenty-seven regions of William’s skull matching those marked on the ceramic bust. He wiped his hands and said, ‘Sir, you have a prominent brow, indicating an appreciation of fine art and an aptitude for mathematics.’ Working his way from the front of the skull, Eisler gave a positive evaluation of each sector, finally reaching the back. ‘The organ of amativeness lies here beneath the occipital bone, and as it is highly pronounced, indicates proficiency in the art of love.’

  ‘Is there any field in which the patient may not excel?’ Esther said. ‘If those regions are all so prominent, he must have an exceedingly large head.’

  ‘There is one anomaly I haven’t mentioned for fear of causing alarm.’

  ‘Fear not,’ William said. ‘You must reveal all as promised.’

  ‘Very well. The patient’s head is long relative to its width. His skull is dolichocephalic, bearing a closer relation to the hound’s head than the average man’s would.’

  ‘You’re not suggesting my ancestors were dogs?’

  ‘Not I, but your own bone structure. Let me demonstrate.’ As Eisler reached out to touch his face, William suddenly barked, snapping at the man’s hand. Esther cried out in fright.

  ‘Mr Eisler, your science is at best unsound,’ William said. ‘Nevertheless, I shall forfeit my shilling for an entertaining diversion.’ He deposited the coin in the phrenologist’s palm and guided Esther out of the booth, checking his fob watch. ‘What a dreadful waste of time that was. Your poor brother will be wondering where in the blazes we are.’

  Back then my mother gave no credence to the possible scientific merit of phrenology. But years later, during her search for the origin of my affliction, she recalled this story to me. And in a rare instance of wild conjecture, she expressed regret for not having heeded what she suggested might’ve have been a warning of some bestial peculiarity in my father’s form.

  So William, the author’s father, apparently had a head with similar proportions to that of a dog. I would’ve asked the phrenologist to specify a breed, because there’s a huge difference between the heads of a whippet and a bulldog. And what exactly was Edwin’s own affliction? Why was he dragging it out? I remembered nothing dog-like about his appearance in the photographs I saw at the exhibition on my birthday.

  Later, in the afternoon, Mum told me that she was heading out at seven and there was zucchini frittata in the fridge.

  ‘Where are you going?’ I said.

  ‘Your gorgeous mother is going on her first date.’

  ‘Mother’s don’t go on dates.’

  ‘Apparently we do.’

  ‘If it’s some random meatball you met online, I hope you’ve worked out a signal to identify each other because he won’t look anything like the pictures he’s posted – they never do.’

  ‘Thanks for your advice but I’ve known Grant for eight years. He’ll find that amusing.’

  ‘You won’t be laughing when that con artist steals your money and you end up talking to Tracy Grimshaw on A Current Affair with his seven other victims.’

  ‘Grant doesn’t need my money. He’s a banker.’

  ‘Of course he is.’

 
; On Sunday night Nana Locke came over for dinner with Tippi. Aside from some whimpering and nervous yaps, Tippi and Oscar both behaved themselves, maintaining a wary distance from one another. I showed Nana the photo of my first foray into yarn-bombing.

  ‘It’s lovely,’ she said. ‘You must’ve used every ball I gave you.’ She squinted at the photo. ‘And who’s the pretty thing on the other side of the pole? Is she your girlfriend?’

  ‘Definitely not.’ I took the phone before she could pass it on to Venn, who had her hand out. ‘It’s Isa Mountwinter. We’re collaborating on the project, and for the record she really annoys me sometimes.’

  ‘The right ones always do, darling. Pop Locke drove me around the bend, God bless him.’

  Over crab cakes and scallops I got the impression that Nana Locke knew nothing about Mum’s date the night before, so naturally I couldn’t resist the urge to drop a few oblique references. ‘They say the bank’s latest interest-rate hike could mean hard times for struggling families. Possibly even tear them apart.’

  Venn glared. ‘Since when have you had an interest in finance?’

  ‘Oh, I’m not the one showing interest, am I?’

  ‘Darling, come out and help me in the kitchen for a moment,’ Mum said. Out of view, she pincered my cheeks, her manicured nails almost piercing the flesh. ‘Button up right now, mister!’ Not quite the calibre of a slap in the face, but still highly effective. I didn’t speak for the rest of the meal. And it was a long bus ride back to the city, with nothing on my phone capable of distracting me from the dread I felt about Nads, Mullows and Starkey’s impending return to Crestfield.

  On my way to school I imagined the various methods the Brotherhood might employ to remove my tongue. Strangely enough, though, they kept their distance all morning, acting as if I was invisible, which was unnerving in its own way. As if their mind games weren’t enough to deal with, at lunchtime Tibor Mintz cornered me in the café queue and asked me point blank why I didn’t like him.