The Origin of Me

by Bernard Gallate

  My mother learnt of my father’s addiction to gambling only after his untimely death. Ah To, a.k.a. Johnny, his friend of seventeen years, came to pay his respects and share his account of the last few hours of my father’s life. Since their goldmining days, both men had been keen players of fan-tan, a devilishly simple game of chance wherein the operator inverts a bowl of coins on the table and the players bet on how many will remain after being divided into lots of four with a bamboo hook. Johnny and William’s favourite venue was located on the top floor of a warehouse in Chinatown. One wet June night the operation was raided.

  Spotting two policemen scaling the roof, Ah Jung, the lookout, raised the alarm. Sergeant Hale, walrus-like both in stature and appearance, got momentarily stuck in the skylight, affording the gamblers and operators precious time to hide the evidence. By the time he and the younger Constable Maclean stormed into the hall, most of the men had taken up books. Hale approached my father, the only Caucasian player, whose head was buried in a Chinese newspaper, and told him to read the headline.

  ‘Rabid dog bites man on Liverpool-street,’ my father replied, without missing a beat.

  Walking across the room to examine a ceramic urn, Maclean trod on a loose floorboard and lifted it. He ferreted between the joists and discovered a gaming mat, then declared the entire company under arrest. But whether it was a case of racial prejudice or William being known to him, Sergeant Hale offered clemency to my father. ‘You’re surely not acquainted with these Oriental heathens?’ he said. ‘Stumbled in here to escape the rain, didn’t you? I suggest you stumble back out quick smart, or your name won’t be worth the stink of shit on my boot.’

  My father gathered his jacket and hat and walked to the stairs, leaving Johnny at the table. But before descending he said, ‘My apology for contradicting you, sergeant, but I do know one of these men very well.’ He indicated his friend with a nod. ‘Johnny is the hardest working, most honest man I’ve ever had the fortune to meet. If you’d kindly overlook this one indiscretion and allow him to accompany me, we would both be eternally grateful.’

  Despite his subordinate’s protest, Sergeant Hale permitted both men to leave without further questioning. Instead of demonstrating the sort of caution one might expect after a close call by heading straight home, my father and Johnny celebrated their exemption from arrest at the Light-house Hotel. After downing three pints, my father farewelled Johnny and rode a tram towards Bridge-street, intending to catch the last ferry from Circular Quay back to Mosman. But as the tram approached the terminus, with three pints of false confidence under his belt he leapt without looking, into the path of an oncoming engine. The south-bound tram smashed my father’s spirit clear out of its physical home forever.

  I felt an almost physical blow to my chest that knocked the wind out of me. I recalled that, earlier in the book, Edwin had written:

  Bloody arrival to bloodier departure, my father William’s life was punctuated by accidents – some grave, others fortuitous.

  So I should’ve been in some way prepared for it. But William’s sudden death by tram resonated heavily with Pop Locke’s demise by 4WD. I’d only known William through the book, and yet reading the account of his death made me exceedingly sad. I threw off my quilt and hid Percy and the Chinese coins in the guest room, hoping that would prevent them from seeping into my dreams.

  I expected Consumer Mathematics to bore the living shit out of me but as Mr Monaro began explaining the finer points of compound interest, credit cards, mortgages and loans I became engrossed. Not because I could see myself ever having any of those things, but because it helped me to understand Bert’s dire situation. How could you get so old and still be paying off a mortgage? In French, Miss Moreau had taught us that mort means death. Appropriate. Bert couldn’t make the payments and now he’d lost his place on Earth.

  Fifteen minutes before lunch the electronic glockenspiel sounded and the Dash announced a special assembly for Years 10 to 12. Everyone filed into the auditorium buzzing with speculation, which turned to disappointment the second Heather Treadwell took the stage. ‘Another recruitment drive for the debating team or God Squad,’ Phoenix said.

  But instead Heather started talking about Fergus Martin, the kid I’d seen on Extreme Medical Intervention who’d lost both legs after catching meningitis. An image of an older Fergus standing on prosthetic legs was projected onto the screen behind her.

  I nudged Isa and said, ‘That’s the guy I was telling you about.’

  ‘I figured.’

  ‘You might be feeling sorry for Fergus,’ Heather said. ‘But he needs something more practical than sympathy. An expert in advanced biomechanics has nominated Fergus as the perfect candidate for bionic legs with powered knee and ankle joints, but they cost over one hundred and thirty thousand dollars each. I thought Crestfield should do something to help and came up with a fun idea that involves every single one of you.’

  ‘Here we go,’ Phoenix said.

  Heather announced a ‘Dance for Fergus’. Tickets would be fifty bucks each, or eighty for a couple if you invited someone from outside Crestfield. Volunteers for the organising committee were asked to meet after the assembly.

  ‘What a great idea,’ Isa said on our way out. ‘I hope everyone goes.’

  ‘Doubtful,’ Phoenix said. ‘It’ll be something ultra-nerdy like square dancing.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Pez said. ‘Have a look at who’s joining the organising committee.’

  At the foot of the stage Cheyenne Piper, the Petersen twins and two Year 12 girls were holding each other’s hands and jumping up and down in a huddle around a glowing Heather.

  This afternoon in English I learnt that Mary Shelley began writing Frankenstein when she was eighteen. What messed-up stuff was swimming around in that girl’s head? Messed-up enough for her to release a monster that still lingers in our collective psyche 200 years later. I also learnt that the monster himself had no name. Frankenstein was the scientist who built him from a selection of body parts he’d gathered from the slaughterhouses – a little bit of everything thrown in, like the meat tray Nana Locke often wins at Dee Why RSL. When Mr Field called on me to explain what I thought the book was about, I said that when you’re hell-bent on fulfilling a vision, you can easily lose perspective. Like Dr Frankenstein, your dream can turn into a nightmare that will eventually consume and destroy you.

  Mr Field said, ‘Very interesting, Mr Locke.’

  ‘Very interesting, Mr Locke,’ Starkey echoed twenty minutes later as I was unchaining my bike from the rack, before flicking his cigarette butt at me. ‘Looks like you’ve become a Field mouse.’

  ‘That’s ripe coming from someone who looks like a rat.’

  ‘You’re coming very close to having your face smashed in.’

  ‘Can I quote you on that?’

  ‘Fucking squealer!’

  ‘I didn’t squeal. You copped the punishment you deserved for harassing a defenceless man. Why do you do that cruel shit anyway?’

  ‘Are you talking about the Nang-Nang?’

  ‘Starkey, there is no Nang-Nang. There’s just a lonely old guy called Bert McGill.’

  ‘You’ve gone there again.’

  ‘No, I haven’t.’

  Starkey grabbed my collar and pulled my face towards his – eyes burning with hatred. ‘Funny, I could’ve sworn I saw you there.’ His rank breath hit me with force.

  ‘Why do you care if I visit him? It’s got nothing to do with you.’

  ‘Oh yes it does, and this is your last warning. Stay away or you’ll be the one needing someone to wipe your arse for you.’

  Tuesday afternoon, I invited Isa to knit at my place instead of hers. Reaching level twenty-seven, I told her to stay in the hallway so I could tidy up a little. I ran to my bedroom, threw my stray undies in the drawer then ran back to let her in. ‘Welcome to Locke Tower,’ I said with a sweeping gesture.

  ‘Is your dad, like, a billionaire or something?’
<
br />   ‘Not even something. The bank owns it.’ I gave her the grand tour and she couldn’t resist touching surfaces: the engineered-stone kitchen bench, wooden coffee table, soft leather sofa. She knelt on the lounge-room floor and caressed the carpet. ‘Grading the wool?’ I said.

  ‘I’m a very tactile person.’

  ‘Oh, I can see that. Come and check out the view.’ I led her out onto the balcony and instead of expressing awe she asked if I spied on the neighbours.

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘I would,’ she said, and gave me a wry grin. ‘Show me your bedroom?’

  ‘All right, but you can’t touch anything.’

  She walked in and said it looked like an IKEA showroom.

  ‘Try out the POÄNG,’ I said. ‘It comes with a ten-year guarantee.’

  Isa sat down and bounced. ‘Why haven’t you put up some pictures or anything?’

  ‘I wasn’t planning on staying long so I kept it devoid of personality.’

  ‘Funny – that’s exactly the impression you gave when you started at Crestfield. You never spoke to anybody and never smiled. I thought you were completely full of yourself.’

  ‘Now that is funny,’ I said, holding up a finger. ‘Because I thought the same about you. You acted like you’d never seen me before when I was waiting to see Dr Limberg.’

  ‘Point taken. That was unfair and I apologise. This is no excuse, but it was all about self-protection.’ She went on to tell me about her experience doing school service, which was similar to Tibor’s. Cheyenne Piper and her friends had started calling her Nurse Betty when she worked in Student Welfare, and Dawn Sparrowfart when serving in the café. Cheyenne would order ten things and keep changing her mind, then say she forgot her purse and walk away. Dee told Isa they were jealous because Isa had earnt her way into Crestfield while their parents had paid their way in. She suggested embracing the personas they’d foisted on her – make fun of herself before they could, to take their power away.

  Isa and I talked and knitted for a couple of hours, both lowering our guards more than ever before. After a period of silence, she asked if I was going to the Dance for Fergus.

  ‘Haven’t thought about it,’ I said. ‘What about you?’

  ‘I haven’t stopped thinking about it. It’s an honourable mission but could so easily turn pageant. Last year Tiffany Chaney wore a Prada gown to the Year 12 formal that cost three grand.’

  ‘You made that name up.’

  ‘Unfortunately her parents did.’

  ‘So are you going?’

  ‘Maybe, but the whole “who’s going with who” performance annoys me. You can go alone of course, but it’s not a good look. I hate feeling like I need a guy to validate me. If nobody asks me I might invite Phoenix.’

  ‘And fuel the rumours?’

  Isa looked to the ceiling and groaned. Then, without warning, she pounced onto my bed and started tickling me. ‘Stop!’ I said, unable to push her away with the knitting in my hands.

  ‘Wee bit ticklish, are we?’ Her fingers dug between my ribs and one of my needles dropped. She tickled my stomach, causing my tail to flick rapidly and my right leg to shake like Gus’s used to.

  ‘Please stop!’

  ‘Sorry, I can’t hear you.’ Isa’s nails were grazing me all over, driving me into a frenzy of involuntary laughter.

  ‘Oh God, please stop! Think of the project.’

  Isa was drunk with power, oblivious to my pleas – sadistic Nurse Betty, probing to discover my sensitive regions.

  ‘What about here?’ she said, yanking and twisting my earlobes. ‘Or here?’, fingers burrowing under my arms then behind my knees. The knitting was a lost cause – almost completely unhitched. Then she ran her fingers down my vertebrae.

  I had a flashback of the fateful night with Nicole Parker, terrified Isa would touch my tail. ‘NO!’ I yelled and pushed her off.

  ‘Whoa. Overreaction much?’ she said, propping herself up. ‘I thought we were having fun.’

  ‘You were,’ I said, but my tone was too harsh. Isa looked confused and hurt.

  ‘I guess I should be going then?’ she said, fixing her hair.

  ‘You don’t have to.’

  ‘Said with such conviction.’ She fetched her bag, slung it over her shoulder and walked to the door. I followed her.

  ‘I’m really sorry that I snapped. It’s just – it’s just that I have this really stupid thing about people coming into my personal space and—’

  ‘No need to explain.’ She was almost at the front door when it flung open and Dad walked through.

  ‘Oh – hello there,’ he said. ‘I’m Lance. I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure?’

  ‘I’m Isa. Your son and I have been working on a project together and I was just leaving. Nice to meet you, Mr Locke.’ And she was gone.

  ‘Wowee!’ Dad said, pulling a beer from the fridge. ‘I knew you were knitting with a friend, but you didn’t tell me what a stunner she is.’ He opened the bottle and flicked the cap into the bin. ‘You’ve been up to something, haven’t you, eh? Son of a gun.’ He tousled my hair. ‘Just like your old man after all.’

  ‘You mean creepy?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  It probably wasn’t the ideal time for a confrontation – there rarely is – but his comment about Isa had lit the fuse.

  ‘Did you fool around with Maëlle Beauvais in your den on the night of Mum’s fiftieth birthday?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he said with a crooked smile.

  ‘Venn showed me an email from Maëlle where she confessed that you’d kissed.’

  Dad placed his beer on the bench too carefully, as if he was trying not to smash it, and looked directly into my eyes, defying me to continue. With a wavering voice I told him everything that I’d read in the email. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t speak. He just shook his head. Then he walked out to the balcony and back, slapped his palm on the seat of a stool and told me calmly, in an even voice, that she’d made it up.

  ‘Bullshit,’ I said. ‘One of the other guests told Mum she’d seen you in the den with Maëlle.’

  Dad fake-laughed and said, ‘I’d invited her to come and sign the card. I told her I was stressed and she gave me a neck massage. Nothing more.’

  ‘I know that you kissed her but I don’t want to believe it. So if you keep denying this, it’ll do my head in.’ Tears welled in my eyes and my voice wavered. ‘The sad thing is that you’ve already done that to Mum. You made her feel like she was going mad.’

  Instead of admitting his guilt, Dad reeled off a list of excuses for his behaviour. Mum had been remote for months, she was going through menopause, she was making him feel unwanted, he’d been stressed at work, he felt like a failure, Maëlle had seduced him. I stood there listening to it all, irritation bubbling inside me, and when he reached the point I feared he was heading for and used Pop Locke’s death as an excuse, I lost all respect for him.

  ‘As I told you, our last talk was an argument,’ he said. ‘We never had the chance to mend our relationship. The grief of losing my father was compounded by the bad timing. I felt like a lost and confused child.’

  ‘Then imagine how ashamed he’d be of you right now,’ I said. They were the cruellest words I’ve ever spoken to my father, and before my eyes he crumpled beneath the weight of them.

  ‘You’ve broken me,’ he said, chin quivering, holding back tears, leaning on the kitchen bench for support.

  ‘No. You managed that all by yourself.’

  I left him alone in the kitchen and hated myself for it. And hated even more that such a small moment between two people had caused so much harm for everybody.

  We gave ourselves twenty-four hours to settle down. Then on Wednesday night Dad and I talked for hours about the Maëlle incident, covering territory that was painful for both of us. At the start it was difficult listening to him express the shame and humiliation he felt, as though he was a hapless victim of his own ‘sli
p-up’ or ‘weakness’ or whatever else he called his behaviour. But eventually he admitted full responsibility for his actions, and we were able to move on to the ramifications for the family. Finally he was able to express remorse, and committed to seeing a therapist. I should’ve charged him for our lengthy session.

  Concerned that holding on to Percy and the Chinese coins was giving me bad juju, I walked down to Bert’s on Thursday arvo to return them. Bert was sitting on his pink rubber ring on the armchair nutting out a crossword, and shushed me before I could speak. ‘I’m concentrating,’ he said. ‘Sit on that.’ He kicked the arse-cutting milk crate across and pinned me with his good eye.

  ‘I brought Percy back.’

  He snatched the bag and pulled the bird out. ‘I missed you, little fella.’ He scratched his chest then glared at me. ‘You think I’ve got bats in the belfry. I know full well that he’s stuffed.’

  ‘My biology teacher told us that Governor Hunter sent a platypus pelt back to England and they were so confounded they thought it must be a duck and a mole sewn together.’

  ‘Clever-dick poms thought he was a counterfeit, eh? I’ve got one of them down in the bunker.’

  ‘An Englishman or a platypus?’

  ‘Neither, smartarse. Two different creatures sewn together. Come down with me and we’ll find him.’

  ‘I’m claustrophobic.’

  ‘Don’t you worry about that. There’s enough room to swing a cat and everything needed to skin one. Talk to the bird while I fetch a torch.’

  The moment he was gone, Homunculus said, ‘Don’t go underground with the Nang-Nang. You won’t come out alive.’