A clamour came from inside my parents’ wardrobe. The door burst open and out ran Mama Cat. I looked at my mother, who was intent on the cupboard door, rather than on her husband. I got up and followed the cat out.
✾
It is hard to explain sadness. It is not like pain. Pain is a cat’s claws digging into your skin as your try to pat her to soothe the tears. Pain is surprise. A betrayal. There was some pain there for me. I knew that my father often got his words wrong, that he often said things without meaning them. But a large part of me felt like he meant it. It was easier to blame all of it – their problems, what seemed an inevitable solution – on me. No matter how much Nana tried to convince Mama how good the single life was, no matter how much Aisha drained their wallets, no matter how many fights Baba got in with Mohamed, it was my fault, all mine.
They needed a reason, and I gave them one. I could play this part, even if it was painful. Sadness is different. Sadness is not sharp. It’s heavy, the way it sits on your chest, filling your throat every time you try to breathe. Sadness is not understanding how to get up. But I could take the sadness, because right now, I could bear it more easily than they could.
✾
Mama knocked on my open bedroom door. She sat at the end of my bed. ‘You need to change your sheets,’ she said. ‘When was the last time you changed them?’
‘I don’t know.’
She dusted cat hair off my duvet.
‘So,’ she said, ‘what’s your decision?’
‘What’s yours?’
‘It’s our choice. If we choose not to go, it will just be … different.’
I knew my mother needed me to do this for her. She would never do it on her own.
Baba always said that he and I had the same personality. That we follow our anger. That we are driven by what we think is right, and it leads us to rub people the wrong way. We see things in black and white. But I wasn’t doing that here. I saw the grey. I saw that my parents were not evil or saintly. I saw that they were capable of harm and love at the same time, and worthy of care. I saw them as they were – two people half a world away from their true home, saddled with three kids and a recalcitrant mother. Two people who had no idea if they still loved each other, and perhaps did not, but were terrified to admit it. My parents were together because they were married in the eyes of God. All it would take was someone to call it quits. And right in front of us was an opportunity for me to make that call.
✾
Baba went to Cairns alone, and Mama ordered a KFC bucket. Baba hated chicken on the bone. Mama said if there was one food she could eat for the rest of her life, it was chicken.
We ate until we felt sick. No one brought up anything about divorce.
We visited Baba in Cairns. Mama came too. It was a humid trip. We were only gone for a weekend, so we left Mama Cat in the house with a mound of food. She must have found comfort in our absence, because when we came back she had given birth – six little kittens licked clean of gunk, sitting at the bottom of my parents’ wardrobe. Three of the babies didn’t have tails. That was the Manx trait, from their father, Chaz. Baba’s missing clothes had given Mama Cat enough room to make her own little safe haven.
✾
When Baba came back after two months, having not clicked with the people at his new job, all the kittens had found new homes. Early one morning, as I was leaving for school, I opened the front door and noticed a little tabby body lying in the middle of the road. I screamed. Our poor Mama had been hit by a car.
‘At least she had her babies before she went,’ said Baba. ‘At least she has her legacy.’
RULE #15
AVOID ABORTIONS
Nana announced to the sweaty living room that she had had two abortions. The air-conditioning units were still sitting, uninstalled, under the stairs, where they had been since we moved in.
‘You should do it, Soos,’ she said to me. ‘Do abortions. It’s much more interesting.’
‘No,’ said Baba, by now settled uncomfortably back at home. It was a half-scream. ‘Haram. Do not.’
They were talking about my Grade Eleven English assignment. We were to write a soapbox speech. My teacher, Ms G, had told us to pick a topic we could talk about with passion. A controversial issue that we could really get into. Something sexy, she said. We didn’t have to believe what we were saying, we just had to be persuasive.
‘I’ve had plenty,’ Nana said. I wanted her to stop, but I also wanted to see how far she would go. ‘I can tell you all about them. It will be a good example for your speech.’
I could see the veins in Baba’s forehead about to breach the skin. He addressed her but was looking at me. ‘Stop,’ he said. ‘Enough. How dare you?’
In a blue-and-green classroom with posters on the walls reading Bad grammar makes me (sic) and Shakespeare is everyone’s cup of tea, we worked on our speeches the next day. Carly tapped my desk softly with her fingers, as thin and white as paddle-pop sticks.
‘Have you chosen yet?’ she asked.
‘I’m still tossing up between dole bludgers and abortion. You?’
‘Yeah, I’m still thinking too.’ Carly had topped the grade in English last year, and I knew she was going for a streak. She said she was thinking, but she had probably already shown a draft to Ms G for notes and a pat on the back.
‘Miss!’ boomed a voice from the back. It was Jason. He was a six-foot-five egomaniac who referred to himself as ‘The Fridge’ and coined his own catchphrase: ‘Say it to my neck.’ In Grade Nine he had held a kid up against a wall by the throat because the kid was wearing gloves in winter, and Jason determined that being cold made him a pussy.
‘Hand up, Jason. Don’t call out to me like I’m your servant,’ said Ms G. ‘What is it you want?’
‘Can I write my speech about how I hate Brett because he’s a faggot?’ He elbowed his friend Brett hard in the arm.
‘Oi, fuck off!’ said Brett.
Ms G rolled her eyes.
Tom, on the other side of the room, called out, ‘Can you not? That word is fucking offensive.’
‘That’s enough,’ said Ms G.
I started typing.
Have you ever been raped?
I backspaced.
Have you ever had to carry the baby of your rapist?
Deleted.
Watch out, ladies. The government wants to control your privates.
Not it, either.
I thought about how mad Baba would be if he found out I was still talking about abortions at school. Even if I argued against them, the fact that I had entertained such a topic was enough to be a source of protracted disappointment.
Did you know that your hard-earned taxpayer dollars are going to waste on lazy old Bazza, who drives a Commodore and has never worked a day in his life?
‘But wait, wasn’t your family on Centrelink?’ said Carly when I read it out. ‘You said you were on Centrelink when you came here, right?’
‘Yeah, but it doesn’t matter. Ms G said we don’t have to believe what we say.’
‘So you’re happy saying something you don’t believe?’
‘Sure. It’s just an assignment.’
✾
The night before we were due to present, I practised my speech on Nana while I brushed her hair. It was matted at the back. It took effort to get out the knots. I sat on the back of the chair, my feet on the arms.
‘You should have done abortions,’ said Nana. ‘No one cares about Centrelink.’
‘Some people do.’
‘Who? No one.’
‘Then why are they called dole bludgers? Obviously, someone cared about them enough to give them a name. And besides, I don’t want to upset Baba.’
‘Am I considered a dole bludger? I get a pension.’
‘Maybe. But I don’t really believe what I’m saying. I just have to say something.’
‘Okay, I see. Like propaganda.’ She sipped her hot tea. ‘You can’t go through life not doing thi
ngs out of fear of upsetting your father, you know. I will tell you now, you will upset him. Everything you do will upset him. You have to be prepared for that.’
‘Not if I do what he says. Not if I don’t upset him on purpose.’
‘Even then. You will upset him.’
Nana didn’t take care of her hair the way she used to. She’d started having trouble lifting her arms. She couldn’t reach the back. She said it was arthritis.
‘Why did you say you’ve had abortions?’ I said. ‘When you had miscarriages?’
‘I would’ve had three girls, not just one. You would’ve had two aunties.’
‘Yes. But you said abortions when you were talking to Baba.’
‘Well. Maybe I did have abortions. None of his business, anyway. Men like him don’t always know the difference.’
‘I think he does.’
‘Well. Then I upset him on purpose.’
✾
On presentation day, Carly volunteered to go second. I didn’t know volunteering for second was something we could do, but Ms G accepted. Second was the best spot. Not first, not breaking the ice, but early enough to get it over with quickly.
Overconfidence in hand, Jason went first. His bigotry was well publicised, mostly by Jason himself, so it was anyone’s guess what he had picked to talk about. I suspected he still had his heart set on homophobia, but there was nothing stopping him going after anyone. I hoped I wouldn’t be his target.
He started with a grunt to clear his throat.
‘All gays,’ he said, ‘are pedos.’
For the next ten minutes the class watched as he spat his vitriol, all while Ms G marked him on a criteria sheet. Half the class were sunk in their chairs. Jason’s mates were sniggering. And no one said a word until he was done.
‘I have a question,’ said Tom. ‘Do you really believe all that?’
Jason cleared his throat again but did not look at him. ‘Yeah, man. Every word.’ He sat down in his seat next to Brett.
Carly was getting ready for her turn – I could hear her tapping her palm cards on her desk – but it was hard to take my eyes off Tom. His face was red, and he was rubbing his lips together. In his hands were his own palm cards. He was ripping the corners off them bit by bit.
‘Alrighty,’ said Ms G. ‘Carly, you’re up.’
Carly stepped to the front of the room. I hoped to God she hadn’t picked homophobia too, but I knew it was unlikely. As much as I thought she was a sellout, I knew she wasn’t a bad person. I couldn’t help but feel a little pride in her. That was my friend.
As Carly set up her PowerPoint, I started to sweat a little. Maybe dole bludgers was a bad idea. Maybe there was someone on Centrelink in the room. Maybe this was a set-up to make me look like a bad person. I didn’t believe a word of what I was going to say in my speech, but I was going to say it anyway. I didn’t want to be Jason.
She took a deep breath, and with her first words, came alive like a puppet on crack. She was a different person. She didn’t look nervous at all. I could tell by the way she spoke that her speech was memorised. She didn’t need the cards; they were just a prop.
‘Australia,’ Carly said, ‘should not allow Muslims into the country.’
She didn’t look at me while she spoke. The class sat and listened to every word. Ms G offered encouraging nods while she made scribbles on the criteria sheet. Once Carly was done, everyone clapped. She sat down and I smiled at her. I assumed she didn’t mean it.
BABA
I follow my father into Jimmy’s. We come here sometimes when he’s sick of Kofta Burger. Baba claims to have invented the kebab pizza that is now on the Jimmy’s menu.
‘I felt like pizza one day,’ he says, ‘but I also felt like a kebab. And I said Jimmy, can you make me a pizza with kebab meat, and Jimmy looked at me like I was crazy. It had never been done before. Never. I made it. It is my invention. And now look.’ He points to the menu.
The shop is not called Jimmy’s, but Baba calls it Jimmy’s because that is what he calls the owner. I am doubtful that Jimmy is the owner’s name, because every time Baba comes into the store and calls him Jimmy, there is a look of confusion on Jimmy’s wife’s face, who also works there. Perhaps Jimmy thought it would be too much effort to correct my father.
‘Jimmy is so successful, all thanks to me,’ my father says.
We order two large pizzas. Baba has to have the kebab pizza every time. I order prawn with anchovy. He eats some of mine anyway. He explains the program he’s on. It’s called maintenance.
‘They use something called Rituximab. They say it acts like a lock. You can imagine the cells like a pizza.’ He picks up a piece. A chunk of kebab meat falls off. I pick it up and eat it. ‘But there’s a slice missing from the pizza. The slice is missing because the cancer affected this slice. And the chemotherapy I had killed this slice. It took it away. The Rituximab goes to the area of the missing slice and puts itself there to lock it. So, the cell will not grow in this space. Maintenance is all about locking the bad cells so they don’t grow.’
‘So the bad stuff is gone?’ I say.
‘For now,’ he says. ‘I’m now on six months, every six months, locking in the missing piece.’
I take a bite of the mixed meat. ‘I wish I could make good pizza like this at home,’ I say.
‘One day you’ll learn, habib,’ he says, ‘and you will have a husband and you will make pizza for him. And you will have a little baby and make pizza for the baby.’ He always finds a way to bring it up.
‘Why can’t I just make pizza for myself?’ I say.
He pinches my cheek. ‘You can’t eat pizza with me forever.’
He complains of a stomach-ache. Jimmy comes out to our table to clear our plates and my father complains some more. Jimmy disappears into the back and returns with a cup of tea. ‘Drink this,’ he says. ‘It will make your stomach better.’ It is hot and milky.
Jimmy says his brother would make this tea all the time because he had stomach issues, and it would always help him. My father asks Jimmy if his brother still has stomach issues, if the issues are ongoing, because his are ongoing, and he doubts tea will help much – though he sips it as he says this. Jimmy says his brother died four years ago. I cover my mouth because a laugh is trying to escape. My father laughs. And Jimmy laughs. We all laugh together.
RULE #16
TRUST TOYOTA
I tried to stand still as the lady in the Department of Transport took my photo. She had big glasses that slid to the tip of her nose. She looked over them to see the computer monitor, defeating their purpose. The room was musty, full of people stuck to plastic chairs and holding paper tickets, waiting for their turn. I stood against a blank backdrop while the lady clicked around on the computer. I couldn’t remember if I was allowed to smile or not. I decided to smile with my eyes. Smize, as Tyra Banks would say. I was still in my school uniform. I had my gold ribbon tied high on my head, and the wispy bits of hair that framed my face positioned just so. When I saw the photo, I was satisfied.
It was my sixteenth birthday, and I was going to learn to drive.
Baba said one’s choice of car was a matter of life and death. He took me out for my first lesson in his Toyota Hilux, with its hard bench seats and narrow stick shift. Baba swore by Toyota. He said it was the safest brand there was, and he would never buy anything else.
I had never driven a manual before. He drove me to an empty carpark behind my old primary school. No one would be there on the weekend. He parked and pulled the handbrake, but didn’t get out of the front seat.
‘I’m going to show you. Watch very carefully.’ He let the handbrake down. ‘Brake off,’ he said. Then he pushed the stick shift into reverse. His knees moved as he worked the pedals.
‘What did you just do then?’
‘Don’t worry. That’s reversing. We will get to that. Watch now. Are you watching?’ He straightened the car up and pushed the stick shift forward. ‘First gear,’ he sai
d.
‘What does that mean?’ I said.
‘It’s the first gear of the car.’ He moved his knees. ‘Clutch on while you do it.’
‘Is that the other pedal?’
‘Yes. And then go.’ He repeated the same thing multiple times. Finally, he stopped and pulled the handbrake. ‘Yalla,’ he said, as he got out of the driver’s seat. I shifted over into it. My legs weren’t anywhere near the pedals. I felt for the lever to adjust the seat.
‘Stop,’ he said, before jerking the seat forward for me. ‘Do the mirror – but make sure to put it back when you’re done.’
He got into the passenger side and fastened his seatbelt. ‘You don’t have to learn this. Auto is more easier. There is no reason to drive manual here. Not like Egypt, where all cars are manual. Here, everyone drives auto.’
‘Then why do you drive manual?’
‘Because I need to have this car.’
I put the car into first gear.
‘You need to press down harder on the clutch,’ he said. He was holding onto the door handle. ‘You need to push harder.’
‘I’m pushing hard,’ I said.
‘Not hard enough. Do you hear that noise the car is making? Not hard enough.’
We never left the parking lot that day, and Baba never took me for a lesson again. I tried not to take it personally, though part of me did. Learning to drive was a rite of passage, and he didn’t want to undertake it with me.
When Mohamed learned to drive, my parents booked an Armenian-Egyptian-Australian guy to teach him. His name was Tov and they found him in the Yellow Pages. He looked a lot like my father. He had an accent that sounded like an Australian mocking a Lebanese accent – real thick, like he was speaking with a blob of yoghurt on his tongue at all times. He would answer the phone, ‘Hullo, this is Tov from Lively Learners,’ and he would do that even while he was instructing. He never wore shoes in a lesson and texted feverishly while his students tried to enter roundabouts. If they did the wrong thing, he’d stomp on his pedal control from the passenger seat, say ‘watch it’ and continue to text. It truly was Lively Learning. It was only natural that my parents employ Tov for me too.
Muddy People Page 14
