Super Jack

by Susanne Gervay

  We all grab a towel and head off to the beach. Yellow sand and blue surf. The flags are flapping, marking where it is safe to swim. Two lifesavers are on patrol. ‘Race you.’ I am panting as I hit the water. It’s warm. Rob is in just after me. We catch some great waves. Rob really knows how to body surf. Leo does too. Rob taught Leo to body surf when he was little. I feel all right about that somehow. Rob runs into the swell just at the right time and rides the best waves. He gives me a few tips. I have been catching the wave too early. We ride some fast ones right into shore. I spy on Samantha, and when she’s not looking I dive for her. She splashes me. Anna joins her, but I don’t play for long. I swim after Rob. The surf is big.

  I am waiting for the right moment to catch a wave when I see it. I gulp a mouthful of salt water. Splutter, cough. I see it again. Grey fin. My heart is a beating drum. Panic. Sharks. They have been known to take a man with just one attack. I’m totally rigid in the water, bobbing up and down with the waves like a petrified twig. Don’t move. Don’t move. Maybe it won’t notice me. Quiet. Mum won’t know what has happened if I’m eaten. Mum needs me. Oh no, it’s coming my way. I am dead. Dead. Splashing. It is going for me, for sure. I’m going to make a dash for it. Breathe, breathe. Swim fast. Rob grabs me. Thank God. Rob, Rob. The thumping drum is slowing down. He is pointing to the fins. There is more than one now. Then there are flippers. Black fan tails. Diving tails and fins, jumping through the waves, somersaulting with laughing faces.

  Dolphins, dolphins!

  Gasp, pant, wheeze. I am slowly breathing again. Rob rubs my wet hair. ‘Don’t worry. I’ve taken them for sharks myself.’

  The girls and Leo are paddling towards us. We all watch for a while as the dolphins glide and leap through the water. Better surfers than we will ever be. We slowly move towards them, watching them tumble until we are there swimming with them.

  It is one of those great moments in life.

  Chapter 15

  Scrabble

  Dolphins, dolphins are all that we can talk about as we walk back. Rob stops to buy a newspaper and a carton of milk at the corner shop. Samantha tells the shopkeeper that she swam with dolphins. ‘Lucky you!’ The shopkeeper smiles. I can see he wishes he was as lucky.

  As soon as we open the door to the apartment Samantha charges into her room to find her dolphin necklace. ‘I’m going to wear it forever.’

  We bombard Mum and Nanna with everything that happened. ‘Dolphins are amazing.’ Anna’s eyes light up.

  ‘Jack thought they were sharks at first.’ Samantha runs back wearing her necklace.

  There are a few Jack jokes about sharks and dolphins. But I don’t care, because I swam with dolphins. I plunk myself next to Rob, who winks at me. I wink back. Mum heads for the kitchen, dancing around. She swishes her arms from left to right. Star jumps. Suddenly there is a crash. Mum has star jumped into the garbage bin. Her hair is perpendicular and her elbows covered in sticky orange. Everyone is laughing, but not me. This is a great photo moment. I snatch my camera. She is struggling out of the bin with an orange peel stuck to her bum. Snap. ‘Don’t take that, Jack. Pleassse.’ Snap. Snap.

  ‘Sorry.’ A photographer has to be tough.

  ‘You’ve taken some great pictures, Jack.’ Rob looks at Leo. ‘Do you have a camera, Leo?’

  ‘No, Dad.’ Leo glances at me.

  ‘Well, maybe I can fix that up.’

  I feel fine when Rob says that. I have a camera already anyway.

  ‘Chocolate cake.’ Mum is carrying the biggest, gooiest mud cake into the lounge room. ‘I baked it while you were at the beach.’ She is flushed. Mum thinks she is the best cook in the world. She puts it onto the coffee table. ‘Who wants a piece?’ Samantha sticks her finger in the chocolate frosting.

  ‘That’s disgusting. Don’t.’ I knock her hand away.

  Mum starts slicing the cake. She gives a big piece to Nanna, whose face lights up. Mum bats her eyelashes at Rob. I laugh at her. ‘It’s been a special holiday, hasn’t it?’ she says.

  ‘Yes Mum.’ I roll my eyes. I hope Mum doesn’t go into one of her gooey moments.

  ‘Except for Nanna’s accident. But Jack was a hero, so that was special too.’

  I can’t take it, even for chocolate cake. Mum, STOP. World peace is better than this.

  Anna and Samantha are nodding.

  ‘I love you all, and …’ She waits. ‘Rob …’ Then she waits some more.

  What is this about? I kick Samantha under the table. ‘Don’t do that, Jack.’ Samantha kicks me back.

  Mum lifts her left hand. On her fourth finger is a gold ring. I look at Rob’s left hand. He slips a gold ring on his fourth finger.

  What? Mum and Rob are standing next to each other now. What does this mean? I scratch my arm. Samantha is already in cuddle mode. She is squashing Rob so hard that his eyes look like they’ll pop out. Anna is holding Nanna’s hand. Leo and I stare at each other. What is Leo thinking?

  ‘We’d like to make it official when we get home. Maybe we can have a small ceremony in the park with a celebrant.’ Mum looks at Samantha. ‘Would you be my flower girl?’ Samantha is beaming. Mum turns to Anna. ‘Would you like to be a flower girl too?’

  Anna and Samantha are so excited they hug each other, then Mum. Oh no, it’s mass hug time. I have to leave. I have to think.

  ‘Jack. What do you say?’ Mum escapes from Samantha’s octopus grip.

  ‘Don’t ask me to be a page boy.’

  She laughs. ‘I wouldn’t do that to you.’

  My head is swirling.

  Rob reaches for Leo’s arm. ‘Would you be …’ Rob stops, ‘my best man?’

  I can’t swallow. I know Rob has to ask Leo. Leo is his son, not like me.

  Leo nods. ‘That’d be good, Dad.’ I wonder if he really thinks that.

  Rob looks at me. ‘Will you be my other best man, Jack?’

  My chest expands like a huge bubble of gum. ‘Yes.’

  Samantha is babbling about flower girl dresses and daisies in her hair. When Anna joins in, I escape into the bathroom. I take the longest shower ever. Sand is stuck between my legs and in my ears. I wash, then scrub my hair with Rob’s shampoo. The water beating down on me feels good. Rob will be my dad. ‘My dad.’ I repeat ‘dad’, trying to fit it inside my head. It sounds good, I think.

  Leo is waiting at the bathroom door to go in. He is still sandy too. ‘I’ve used up all the hot water.’ Leo’s faces crunches into a whinge. ‘Just joking.’

  I look into the girls’ bedroom. The CD is playing Samantha music. Anna has the SCRABBLE board laid out. Floppy is lying next to Samantha, of course. ‘Are you going to play, Jack?’

  I get my pillow from my room and crash next to Samantha. Anna starts with the first word. ‘QUICK.’

  ‘Good word,’ I say. ‘Lots of points.’

  ‘KAYAK.’ Samantha is smart at this game, even though she is younger. I like the word KAYAK because it can be spelt backwards or forwards. It’s a winner word.

  We have the board half full of words when I put down ‘GOLF’. It must be in my brain because of Rob. Then this unexpected question pops into my mind. ‘Do you ever think about our real dad, Samantha?’

  ‘No. Rob is our real dad.’

  ‘Step-dad.’ A throb zips through the back of my head. I rub my neck.

  ‘Rob is really your dad, Jack.’ Anna’s chocolate drop eyes sparkle. ‘He’s the one who’s here for you.’

  I nod. ‘But Leo isn’t my brother. He’s not.’

  ‘He’ll be your step-brother. You’ll have to see what happens, but he’s part of your family now.’

  ‘And Anna and I are going to be flower girls.’

  ‘Very interesting.’ I groan.

  There is a knock on the door. It opens and we see a bit of daisy skirt. ‘Can I come in?’ Mum has red hibiscuses in her hands. She gives one to Anna and one to Samantha and they put them behind their ears. ‘You girls are beautiful.’ She is right about that. Mum sits
cross-legged next to me on the floor. She says nothing for ages. She just watches us playing. Suddenly, she coughs so loudly we stop. Samantha rubs Mum’s back, but it is not that type of cough. Mum presses her lip, fiddles with her flower, curls her skirt, until we all laugh.

  ‘Do you want to say something, Mum?’

  She nods. ‘Yes.’ Big breath. ‘Are you okay about the gold rings?’ She pauses. ‘About Rob?’

  Samantha squeezes Floppy. ‘I love Rob even when he’s dumb and teases me.’

  ‘Jack? This won’t work without you.’

  ‘It’s okay.’ As I say it, it feels like the truth. I think I mean it. I think I do.

  Mum’s voice is soft. ‘We have to all work at it. Sometimes we’ll get angry at each other and sometimes we’ll laugh. We’ve got to forgive each other, be kind.’

  I give a nervous laugh. ‘“No terrorists.” Sorry, I couldn’t help that, Mum.’

  Mum half-smiles at my joke. ‘It’s a bigger family, with more things to fight about, more things to sort out.’ Mum takes my hand. ‘Jack, you’ve been amazing. I know how hard it is to suddenly share a room, suddenly have a father, suddenly have Leo. I know, Jack.’

  I nod. We talk for ages and everything feels better. Then Leo arrives and we get back to the game. I glance at him. Maybe one day Mum will talk to him too.

  Mum and Samantha play together. They win as usual. Anna comes second, I come third and Leo last. ‘Don’t worry, Leo. We play a lot of SCRABBLE. You’ll just have to play with us lots more.’ Mum smiles at him. He smiles back at her for the first time on this holiday.

  We are packing up the SCRABBLE when Rob announces that we’re spending the last afternoon of our holiday at Surfers Paradise. ‘Do you want to go?’

  He doesn’t have to ask twice. ‘Can we see the Believe It or Not! Museum? Please, Rob? Pleassse?’

  ‘We’ll see.’

  Surfers Paradise. Rob parks in a car park that’s close to everything, since Nanna can’t walk too far — if you call it walking. She is slower than ever. We all have to blubber along like land-locked seals. At last we stop at a café near the beach. The beach looks excellent. It is bursting with sunbakers and sandcastle builders. As we sit down at a table, street musicians wander past strumming guitars. A man sets up near our table and does a jig with a sulphur-crested white cockatoo on his shoulder. Then Rob does something generous, really generous. He pulls out four $20 notes. ‘That’s the entry fee for the museum and anything else you like.’

  That is even better than Mum’s bribery. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you.’ We all bombard Rob until he pushes us away.

  I really want to see the tallest man in the world. We don’t hang around the café for long. Mum and Rob want to talk to Nanna. So, we are off. Samantha spots it first. Water is gushing out of a tap and it’s connected to nothing. ‘There,’ she squeals.

  The museum is excellent. There are amazing galleries of human bones, skulls, the Lord’s Prayer engraved on a grain of rice, a shrunken head. It is all horrible or weird. Then we see him dressed in a three-piece grey suit, wearing glasses. He is 8’ 11” — nearly three metres tall — and made of wax. I read out aloud, ‘The tallest man of all time. Robert Wadlow in 1940 weighed 440 pounds. That’s about 200 kilos. That’s what I call heavy.’ I take a photo of everyone next to Robert. ‘You’re all shrimps. Ha, ha.’

  Samantha has to close her eyes when she sees the Lighthouse Man of China who walked the streets with a candle inserted in a hole in his skull. Anna puts her arm around her. She is kind like that. Leo finds the Human Stunts and Feats Theatre. It is screening some idiot who goes over the massive Niagara Falls in a barrel. Wild water crashes like massive demolition explosives. The waterfalls are huge and the barrel is small. It’s dark, and I squeeze Anna’s hand as we both watch in amazement. She squeezes back.

  Anna wants to shop. ‘I’d like to buy something for Papa and Mamma.’ She gets twin red flower Hawaiian shirts. They will really look good wearing them in summer in the fruitologist market. The shirts will match the mangoes and peaches. Leo buys a T-shirt for his mother. He doesn’t buy one for her boyfriend. I have to get Christopher a present, since he’s minding Hector. I notice a snake box. The snake’s head sizzles out when you open it. I buy the snake box. Then I see it. Oh no, I’ve got no money left. It is the last one, and cheap. Half-price just because one eye is missing. I don’t care about a missing eye. It is about fifteen centimetres long. I count the webbed toes. Yes, five on each foot. Four unwebbed ones on each hand. Looks all good. Anna turns her nose up in disgust. Well, she isn’t a scientist, so she wouldn’t understand.

  I seriously beg Samantha for her money. ‘Yes, I’ll do the washing up every night for two weeks.’ ‘No, I won’t make any more dog jokes’ (at least for a while). ‘Yes, I’ll be your slave.’

  Samantha laughs. ‘As if.’ I’m getting desperate, but she understands that I am a scientist and need it. She hands over money, but it’s not enough. Then Leo does something incredible. He digs in his pocket. ‘Here, take this. That’ll be enough.’

  I buy it. An original one-eyed cane toad.

  Mum waves when she sees us coming back. Everyone is amazed at my cane toad. He is a star. Not even the Hawaiian shirts can outshine Wally. That’s what I’m calling him. Wish he was alive. Since he’s not, his spirit and stuffed body will at least have a great home with me. Mum says Wally can’t sit at the table while we have our milkshakes. I put him on my lap. Don’t want anyone to step on him.

  Since Nanna can’t walk, Rob does a twilight tourist drive along the beach front, then around the rivers and lakes. Samantha and Anna point out every frangipani tree. Nanna and Mum love the tropical gardens with the birds of paradise and palms. I love Wally.

  Tonight is our last night on holidays. After dinner we pack up everything except for toothbrushes. I can’t believe it has already been a week. Tomorrow we’re dropping off Leo at Port, then it’s Sydney non-stop. I smile. Except for Rob’s two-hourly ‘Stop, Revive, Survive’ break. He is a maniac about that. There won’t be a Big Banana stop on the way back. I just know it.

  Mum puts her arm through Rob’s. ‘Let’s go for a last walk. Anyone want to join us?’

  Anna and I are ready. Samantha and Nanna are too busy playing cards. Leo is plugged into his computer game. Some things don’t change.

  We stroll along the pathway bordering the sand. Mum and Rob are talking seriously. I hear the word ‘Nanna’ whispered a few times.

  ‘Hey, can we go down to the beach?’

  ‘Yes,’ Mum and Rob say together.

  We take off our shoes, then wander down to the edge of the water. Even though it is night, the sea is still warm. ‘That was nice of Leo to give you his money to buy the cane toad.’

  ‘You mean Wally?’ I smile. Leo is all right. He will never be my best friend like Christopher, but he’s all right.

  We run towards the sea as the tide draws the water backwards. Then we run back as waves crash on the shore. Anna trips and the waves spray her shorts, but she doesn’t mind. She laughs as we flick sand from side to side with our toes. We march around a complicated sandcastle with one square tower that’s been half washed away. ‘There’s the moat and a drawbridge.’ Anna bends to look at the silvery mother-of-pearl shell pressed into the tower. The lights of Surfers Paradise are in the distance. ‘They look like stars.’ Anna runs her fingers through her licorice curls. A tingle travels through me. We wander along the beach for a while. We laugh about Nanna’s purple underpants, joke about the goanna attack, talk about swimming with the dolphins. I take Anna’s hand. It’s soft. Then I kiss her cheek. Red flushes spread over my face. Luckily Anna can’t see me. We walk a bit further, then stop to look out to sea.

  Chapter 16

  Going Home

  New day. Crack of dawn. Is it morning? The sun isn’t up yet. Oh, what a night. Great dreams. The beach. Anna. I close my eyes again. Who is shaking me? ‘Stop,’ I turn onto my stomach. More shaking. I blearily open
my eyes. ‘Mum?’ Oh yes, we’re leaving. ‘Too early.’

  ‘Come on, Jack.’ Mum’s fuzzy blonde hair tickles the tip of my nose.

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’ Moan. I clump down the bunk ladder. Everyone is up. I don’t know how it happened but it is five-thirty in the morning and we are all ready to go.

  Rob hangs his thermometer at the back of the car. ‘Checking the temperature.’ Rob advises us that the temperature was perfect on the Gold Coast. ‘Between thirty-two and thirty-six degrees every day.’ There are a few thermometer jokes about how Rob is hot except for his brain, which is still defrosting. Rob ignores them.

  We clamber into the car. I am sitting next to Anna and holding Wally. Samantha is hugging Floppy. Nanna is belted in the back seat next to Leo. I want to say a joke, but it’s dark and I’m half-asleep and my mind isn’t into gear yet. I keep thinking about Rob’s weather report. The ignition clicks and the engine starts. Mum’s music quietly hums and zzzzzz … We are all sleeping.

  ‘Breakfast,’ Mum’s voice tinkles. I open my eyes, yawn, blink. There is daylight and I’m hungry. We are all hungry. Hmmm. Breakfast. I have the works. Two fried eggs, bacon, tomato and sausages with toast.

  ‘Jack, you’d better eat that up super fast.’ Rob flashes a look at Anna.

  ‘Jack has a super appetite.’ Anna hides her dimples behind a smile.

  What is everyone going on about?

  ‘Except he likes to eat “super” backwards.’ Mum twirls a curl. ‘Super duper Jack.’

  Oh right. I get it, someone has blabbed. ‘Was it you, Leo?’

  He laughs. ‘No way.’

  ‘So who told? Who told?’

  Samantha sticks Floppy in my face. ‘None of your business.’

  ‘We might just have a look at that SuperJack boulder when we drop Leo home.’ Rob makes a right handed fist.

  ‘Great.’ I groan.

  ‘Jack, limerick,’ Mum calls out as we get back into the car. ‘A super one, darling.’