Mistification

by Kaaron Warren

  "I found your postman," said Marvo. Andra did not look surprised.

  "What did he say?" she asked.

  "The postman said, 'He was a rotten old bastard, that one, and the way he treated that little girl made the townsfolk weep. Shouting and screaming like she was some sort of idiot, and her cringing like a whipped dog.

  "'He's dead now, so I can tell you this; the copper in town asked me to open a parcel once. See, the bloke's wife had gone to live with her sister, he said, but no one had heard from her. And the copper had this idea that the guy was mailing off parts of her. So we cracked open a box and all that was in there was a bloody flower.' I gave him a balm for his tired old postman's feet."

  Marvo had great trust in Andra. He had no fear she would betray him, either inadvertently or deliberately. He knew this, even though she didn't tell her true story. "When I was a child," she said often and he envied her that. He had no true stories to tell of that time.

  He gathered knowledge of childhood in the room watching TV shows. He saw kids living on farms, on mountains, in small houses and large. He created his own habitat.

  To Marvo, his early life was so simple and uncomplicated it would appear unreal to listeners. Sometimes the simplest things are disbelieved. He thought that because he had no odd little stories, no funny tales of sibling rivalry or how the family pet died, no tales of the trip north or holiday to the beach, no comment on Mother's cooking, Father's smell in the toilet, or this funny kid at school nobody liked (ha ha, it was me). To Marvo, this made his life simple and plain. He did not tell it that way. He embellished it the way a child does, adding excitement to impress the audience.

  "He didn't like your father. I wonder what it would have been like, to have one. Even a bad one," Marvo said.

  Andra suggested he talk to fathers, hear the stories they tell about their own children. Find some background, some depth. "You'll find fathers in the playground," she said.

  Fathers were not always talkative, but Marvo found one red-cheeked, laughing man, pushing three children at once on a swing. He told the man a story in the hope he would receive one in return.

  A Piece of Green

  I was brought up by my mother. We were very close. We lived in a small flat in a big city, and I was allowed to go and play on the streets because I couldn't stand being cooped up. My mother wrote my address on a piece of paper and pinned it to my underwear.

  "You won't lose your underwear," she said, "but you might take your jumper off and leave it somewhere. So you'll have to put up with it being uncomfortable."

  I had to spend my days with crackling underwear.

  In the centre of the block of flats was a small green playground. Here, the other children and I played and grew up together. I don't know where those people all now. They were my greatest friends and now they're gone. There was Robert, the lucky one. He had a father. The father came down sometimes to watch us play, and he let us take turns sitting on his knee. It was comforting, sitting on a man's knee.

  Robert's father was very generous. He was kind to us all. But it was lucky Robert who got to walk home with him, have dinner with him. Get presents. Everyone else only had a mum.

  My mum had to work in a shop to keep me happy. One year she saved up and bought a magician's set. That's where I learnt my magic.

  I lived for the time when I could meet with my friends in the playground, and show them my latest trick. I practised for hours and hours, while they played and talked, smoked later on and drank later than that. Some people got new fathers. Robert's stayed around. He didn't get us on his lap any more though. But he brought us cigarettes, sometimes, and told us about sex. Things our mothers and stepfathers did not tell us. He told us what a sixty-niner was, how to avoid having children, where to go to get booze.

  I think he helped a lot of us.

  Finally the day came when I needed to move away from the protection of my mother and my friends. I didn't move far away, but it was a world's distance.

  I had to meet people for communication. I spent a lot of time in my room practising tricks I learnt from a book. I learnt how to vanish and disappear. I learnt throwing my voice, a thousand coin tricks, two thousand card tricks. I toyed with rabbits, pigeons and mice. Eggs, apples, oranges and Ping-Pong balls. Long silk scarves and quilts of black velvet, white cane and black hat, black cloak and white face. I practised my stage voice and practised my stage name. I nearly called myself Misto the Magician, but that seemed to give too much away. Then I met my assistant and she completed the act.

  #

  This was pure fantasy. He didn't even have one parent (a grandparent is not the same). He didn't give himself two parents; he felt the story was fantastic enough with one.

  It was true about the magic book and the practice.

  Marvo closed his eyes and imagined what these childhood friends would have been like.

  "Robert's father sounds like Father Christmas, with the whole sitting on the knee thing," the father in the park said. Marvo was not sure. He had never sat on Father Christmas' knee, nor had a photo taken, a smiling innocent on the knee of a wonderful man. "Yes, Father Christmas," Marvo said. "We all have different ideas of Father Christmas."

  "Ya reckon?" the father said. "Not sure about that."

  "Ask your son," Marvo said. He thought he might have discovered real mist. The son, rugged up in a purple jacket too big for him, came to his father and was happy to answer the question. Marvo had to repeat it; he still forgot how quiet his voice was.

  The Story of Father Christmas

  Father Christmas is a great big man who lives in the snow. He has to live in the snow because he likes things cold, he might even melt if he gets too hot. That's why you should never have the fire lit, if you've got one, or even the heating on – that's what my daddy said happened, anyway.

  He stays home with me most days cos he doesn't go to work. He's pretty good. He makes Vegemite sandwiches with no Vegemite cos I hate it and he lets us watch the old people's stuff on TV. Mum goes to work at night, she's a nurse in uniform. She has to sleep in the day and we have to be quiet.

  I was waiting for my mum to give me some money so I could buy Christmas presents for everyone. She said I had to make them this year, but she had all cool stuff to make them with.

  I made Dad's old socks into new ones by sticking on some felt pictures. I made my sister a coloured cardboard box to put her swap cards in and I made Mum a squashy ball in a pantyhose so she can play at work when she gets bored.

  I couldn't wait for Christmas Eve, because Father Christmas would come. I wanted a new bike and my sister wanted a swimming pool which she said I could use.

  We couldn't get to sleep on Christmas Eve. The man on the news said, "I hope Father Christmas brings you what you wished for," and my whole insides went excited. Some kids said Father Christmas wasn't real, but the man on the news said.

  But when we got up when the sun did on Christmas Day, there was this enormous puddle on the floor, water covered half the kitchen. In the middle were two tins of yummy lollies.

  "Mum! Dad!" we yelled at them to get up.

  Dad saw the puddle and he said, "Oh, dear. Must have been a bit too hot for Father Christmas. He melted before he could bring all your presents down."

  "Nice lollies?" said Mum. She gave the tins to us and they were nice.

  Dad got the sponge and a big bowl.

  "We'll freeze him up and send him to the North Pole. The elves will be able to fix him up."

  And they did. This year was good, even though Dad works most of the time now. This year I got Nintendo and a bike and my sister got a pool and some books in a set.

  #

  Marvo felt he had been given a wonderful story. He gave the boy a mist for himself and his sister, so they could believe a while longer. Marvo pulled a rabbit from his front pocket. The rabbit was pale blue.

  The father had very long fingernails. Marvo wanted to clip them and take them home to Andra. He drew a small mist down and
took the man's hands gently. He snipped the fingernails using his pocketknife and he wrapped them in a piece of newspaper he found under the park chair.

  "We'll see you next time," the father said as Marvo said goodbye. "Nice talking to you."

  Another man had been watching them from under his eyebrows. His child was in a wheelchair and the other children sometimes came and deposited small gifts in her lap. The father always smiled, said thank you in a loud voice.

  "Your daughter?" Marvo said.

  "Yes." Marvo drew a mist over the man until he felt like he was alone, talking into a mirror.

  The Magic of Münchausen

  I didn't plan it this way, but it ended this way anyway. I was a good father to that child, even though she didn't belong to me by blood. I sacrificed everything for her. Freedom, money, sex, space; everything. I'm not saying she didn't appreciate it.

  My wife worked and I stayed home with our daughter. Someone needs to sacrifice career to be with her, we decided.

  My wife made the money. And whenever she took a holiday she was edgy and bad to be around. So I turned into home daddy and it was good. I got nothing but positive feedback all the time when we went out and I felt popular and pleased.

  But that faded. I think people got used to me being around. Playground, playgroup, library, long walks. I stopped getting congratulated or told how clever I was, what a good father. You know mothers don't get told that, don't you?

  What happened next wasn't deliberate.

  One evening, when my wife was working back and wouldn't be home till past midnight if that, my daughter wouldn't go to sleep and would not stop crying. We'd been to the doctor and there was nothing wrong. She was just being a bitch.

  I picked her up out of her bed a bit roughly and that made her quiet for a second but then she started up again, louder, right in my ear.

  I held her at a distance and gave her a little shake. Tiny little one. Then more and more till I was shaking her so hard my arms hurt. I felt sick, nauseous deep in the pit of my stomach, like I'd eaten a box of liqueur chocolates or drunk beer after wine. But it felt good, too. The power of it.

  She was quiet. I put her in bed and didn't think of it until the morning when my wife said, "What's the matter with Ginny?"

  I couldn't answer her. You understand that. "She was fine when I put her to bed. Quiet," I said.

  Permanent brain damage. My wife stays home a lot now, what with the medical insurance. And the kindness I get? The praise? That will never go away. I know how my life goes from her. I can see it. My daughter sacrificed her future so our future would be assured.

  #

  Marvo looked at the twelve year-old in the wheelchair. She was full of mist already. He could do nothing for her.

  Marvo clipped this father's nails as well and gave him the gift of not reporting him to the police.

  Andra was thrilled with Marvo's gift of the two fathers' fingernails. She was fascinated by bodily waste – skin, sweat, semen, pus. Nails, teeth, hair. She cut and snipped his bits for him, sucked and drank and squeezed his bits, collected and studied and sniffed. He found it incredible that someone should love him so much as to love all his bits; all his waste and bits and the things other people wouldn't touch. He thought she loved his semen, skin, hair. As she combed his hair in preparation for a show, saving all the strands, she said, "Success can be found by touching things no one else wants to touch. Money can be made and power increased. I love my job at the Body Shop; loved the collecting, the minutiae of it. I have always been attracted to discards.

  "No one knew what I was doing when I went around school buying people's fingernail clippings for five cents apiece. I made them clip their nails in front of me so I knew who they belonged to. I had many little envelopes with people's names written in thick, careful hand on them.

  "I collected nails from every person in the school. I took toenails or fingernails. It didn't matter. I kept the envelopes in my locker.

  "When I had nails from everyone, and everyone had some coins from me, had spent or saved lollies or comics or placed it in a stash, I began to sell the little envelopes. Each was sealed and signed.

  "I quietly walked the playground, offering my wares. Some I tried to sell back to the owners, some to their enemies. Depending on the person. A boy who was timid and unable to evoke emotion of any kind happily bought his envelope back for ten dollars. He was flattered that I thought anyone could feel so strongly as to perform magic on him, and he didn't want to risk it.

  "Others bought their own envelope and that belonging to someone else. One girl wished the owner to love her; another wanted the owner to be last in class.

  "Others disdained buying anything. They were sometimes surprised by the result of this. One found her father gone when she got home that night.

  "Others were not given the chance to buy their envelopes. Some had already been bought; it was terrible for those people, not knowing what spell would be cast.

  "I was fair in my prices. Some paid a month's pocket money; some paid more, some less. I always charged so that it would hurt a bit but not too much.

  "It was the only time I could use the trick, but I had achieved what I needed to. I had money and I had the respect of the other children.

  "I was asked a few times to take the clippings of a sibling.

  "I always asked how old the sibling was. If it was less than a year, I could not help them. If cut before then, the child may grow up to be a thief, or at the very least dishonest.

  "I'd say, 'Come back in three months, or six, and we'll arrange something.'"

  Marvo ran a bath as she laid out the clothes for their show. The thin body suit she wore to protect breasts and genitals, the black dress threaded through with gold. Her jewellery took the longest, and he never tired of watching her put it on. She wore the ruby ring he'd had reset on her forefinger and displayed it, hand in fist, pointed down, only the forefinger to be seen.

  "Are you scared of me?" asked Marvo.

  "Why?"

  "You're always gesturing and using charms to ward off the evil eye. Do you think I'm evil?" Andra drew the last finger into her fist.

  "Of course not. It's habit."

  She was truly adorned against evil. Dangling around her wrist was a charm bracelet with a hand, a horn, the moon, a wheel, a ladder, a club, a knife, a hook, a serpent, a snail, a lion, a pig, a dog, a frog, a lizard. Around her neck, between her breasts, nested a silvered sprig of rue, the herb used to sprinkle holy water. This was her cimaruta – an ancient charm from the Etruscans. Rue was esteemed and admired, sacred to Thor and the druids, who said it had occult virtues and only gathered "when the dog star rose from unsunned spots." Rue was the herb of grace. Like all of her jewellery, it was worn for success or protection; the rue protected against fascination. Not only that, it acted as an antidote for snakebite and sting of wasp, scorpion and hornet. She'd told Marvo that she'd once won the love and respect of an elderly would-be seducer when she saved his son's life, during an ill-prepared walk through the bush.

  "I feel great strength when the rue is against my skin; I feel a rope of strength stretching thousands of years. The rue was used in magical rites, especially as protection against witches. I know that anything believed by the ignorant to act as protection merely acted as a strengthener."

  Other charms hung off the rue: a snake, a snail, a weed. She shook the jewellery in his face, made it ring in his ears until he grabbed her arm to make her stop.

  "Some people call me a pagan," she said, challenging him to agree.

  "I don't even know what that is," Marvo said. He didn't know everything yet.

  Andra enjoyed paganism. She liked the way it mixed magic with religion. "Paganism is a religion of nature, of the earth, the original religion of humanity. Five thousand years ago everyone was pagan," Andra said.

  "That justifies nothing. Just because it's old, it's not necessarily good," Marvo said. He abhorred her logic.

  "Paganism is the environmen
tally and ideologically sound religion because it honours the earth, the body and women. That's why I accept it."

  She wore the pentacle representing earth and magic. It was a symbol for witches. Marvo told her that she was not a witch, she was a magician. She failed to see the distinction.

  "I thought I was a witch," she said. "A witch and a magician are the same. There is no difference. One is not male, one not female, both are the same. To imagine otherwise is ignorance. To believe this is more ignorant."

  "There is a difference between witch and magician. A witch creates change, makes spells. A magician creates illusion. In some ways the magician is more powerful than the witch, because words and illusion can be so powerful and people can be convinced to change for themselves if they think everyone else is doing it, or they can ape what they see and hear."