Dr Boogaloo and the Girl Who Lost Her Laughter

by Lisa Nicol

  Blue had imagined she would be fed up with listening to music after five days of continuous treatment. But as the weekend rolled around, she wondered how on Earth she was going to get through two whole days without it! It was as if a fire had been lit inside her and music was its fuel.

  Back at home, Blue stared at herself in the mirror in bathroom two. She examined every inch of her face. Although she had no idea what she was looking for, Blue hoped she to find some sign that the treatment was working. Her mother was due back this morning from her overseas trip, and Blue knew she’d be wanting cold, hard proof of progress.

  Blue smiled, throwing her head back in one of her old fake pirate laughs in the hope of kickstarting a real one. Nothing. Blue tried not to worry. She reminded herself that laughter was a spontaneous thing and not something you can really do on command. And although Blue hadn’t had so much as a ‘ha’ or a ‘ho’ or a ‘hee’, she felt sure on the inside something was different. The hard part would be convincing her mother of this.

  BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

  ‘Park it there, will you, boys? I’ll get Melvin to unload. MELVIN!’ screeched Blue’s mother.

  Melvin, sitting in the steel white chair where he sat when he wasn’t driving or polishing the family limo, rocked himself up. It took two or three rocks before he could launch his tired old body into an upright position – well, as upright as Melvin could go. By the time you get to eighty, gravity has often done a pretty good job of making you droop – a bit like a wilting sunflower on a hot sunny day. Melvin shuffled outside. Blue’s mother was standing beside a huge truck parked in the driveway.

  ‘Welcome home, madam,’ said Melvin.

  ‘Unload this truck for me, Melvin, would you? It’s my shopping from Europe.’

  Melvin shuffled to the back of the truck and opened up the doors. There were boxes stacked from floor to ceiling. ‘Oh gawd,’ he muttered under his breath.

  ‘Don’t drop that one – that’s my precious white lamp!’ barked Blue’s mother, before hurrying back to chat with the shirtless young truck driver.

  After Melvin had lugged a few boxes inside, he noticed something extremely odd in the back of the truck. It looked very much like a horse’s hoof. Melvin moved some boxes out of the way to get a better look. Sure enough, there, standing in the middle of the truck, was a huge … white … horse.

  Not a live one, of course. A stuffed one.

  ‘Orh, bacon-shakers-foodle-pop!’ said Melvin, who made up his own swearwords so as not to corrupt the ears of his grandchildren. The sides of his mouth drooped like the rest of his body. He shuffled up to the front of the truck, where Blue’s mother was still chatting with the young truck driver. It was a horror of a sight to behold, her lightbulb-white teeth blinking as she laughed like a hyena and furiously batted her eyelids.

  ‘Excuse me, madam. I’m not sure I’ll be able to lift that horse.’

  ‘That’s a present for my husband. Get Luz and Tracee to help you. I’m going to see Blue. I’m sure that doctor must have fixed her up by now.’ Blue’s mother walked off and headed inside.

  ‘Darling, I’m home.’

  Blue bounced down the stairs. Although she was nervous, she was also excited to see her mother and tell her all about the week she’d had with the Boogaloos.

  ‘Mummy!’ she said, running to give her mother a hug and a kiss.

  But to tell you the truth, hugging Blue’s mother was a bit like hugging a robot. Straight-armed, she struggled to give Blue even a pat on the back. Blue’s mother had never been the huggy type. And ever since Blue’s father had left on his last business trip, her mother had done her best to avoid hugs and kisses completely. They seemed to upset her.

  ‘Now, anything you want to show me? Like a great big belly laugh, by any chance?’ said Blue’s mother, her eyebrows dancing with anticipation.

  ‘No, Mummy, I’m only halfway through treatment, but I’m sure it’s working – I can feel it.’ In an effort to look jolly, Blue smiled her biggest smile and made her eyebrows dance too. But instead of looking jolly, she looked kind of psycho.

  Blue’s mother examined her closely. ‘Hmph. I might have known. You don’t look any different to me. Still your old sad-sack self, I see. You’d think by now you would have at least cracked a giggle.’

  Yet again, Blue felt like a disappointment. Just as she was about to explain how musical medicine worked, Blue’s mother’s attention evaporated. Her eyes shifted to the front door.

  ‘Careful with that, will you!’ she screeched. ‘Your three wages combined wouldn’t cover the cost of a nostril.’

  Blue turned to see what was going on. Nudging open the front doors was the head of the horse, and barely visible beneath its huge abdomen was Melvin, Luz and Tracee. Bent over, each holding a leg, they were struggling to manoeuvre the enormous stuffed animal inside.

  ‘Go left … now right, Melvin,’ instructed Luz, from the back flank.

  ‘I bought that for your father. Beautiful, isn’t it?’ said Blue’s mother. ‘Put it down here, Melvin, in the middle of the hall. It’ll be the first thing he sees when he walks through the door. You know how he loves animals. Well, dead ones, anyway.’

  ‘Put front leg down first, Melvin, me and Tracee stuck! This not part of horse I like to spend much time up close with. Nor you, either, Melvin. Your mabungo right in my face!’

  ‘Sorry, Luz, beg your pardon. I thought it was down. Hang on …’ Melvin tried to bend his knees a little more to get the horse’s hoof onto the floor, but as he did, his left knee gave way beneath him. ‘Oorrhh, possum droppings!’ groaned Melvin, as he crumpled in slow motion onto the ground.

  The horse wobbled, dipped, leaned to the left and crashed to the floor.

  Luz and Tracee went with it. They were both trapped beneath the horse’s rump. Blue rushed to help them. Blue’s mother rushed to check the horse.

  ‘BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!’ laughed Blue’s mother. ‘You lot are better than Funniest Home Videos! At least you cushioned the horse’s fall. It seems to be in one piece, thank god. I need a glass of bubbly; the stuff they served on the plane was not to my palate. And if there’s even a scratch on that horse, Melvin, you’re the weakest link – it’s coming out of your wages!’

  Blues mother click-clacked off to the kitchen in her high heels.

  ‘Are you okay, Melvin? Luz, Tracee, are you hurt?’ said Blue, scrambling to help them out from under the horse and back on their feet.

  ‘Life is like a wheel, Blue. Sometimes you up, sometimes you down,’ said Luz, dusting herself off. ‘You know why horse is always happy? Because they not try to impress other horse. Ha ha ha! Maybe having horse is good role model for your mumma, Blue. Come on, Tracee, we better get back to bathroom five.’

  Luz and Tracee disappeared upstairs. Melvin shuffled off, rubbing his left hip and muttering one of his own made-up swearwords.

  All weekend, Blue’s mother couldn’t stop moaning about how devastating Blue’s lack of progress was for her. How she’d been expecting to arrive home to the glorious sound of a house filled with laughter. How a mother loves nothing more than a good laugh with her daughter. How every day without laughter was a day wasted. Blue tried to tell her about the throat singer from Tuva who sounded like he’d swallowed a metal detector and a didgeridoo. She tried to show her the way the Doctor danced as if the bones in his legs were made of rubber. And she tried to tell her about plasmaphones and cities made of instruments and music that made your hair stand on end.

  But Blue’s mother didn’t hear any of it. All she could talk about was how difficult and unfair it was for a mother not to hear her child’s laugh. ‘I feel like I’ve been robbed, Blue. Robbed! This is grand theft on an unimaginable scale! Your laughter has been stolen from me,’ she said.

  Blue’s mother droned on and on about the unfairness of it all, yet she never stopped once to think how Blue might feel. Blue being Blue, she felt extra terrible. She hated making other people feel bad. She wished she could laug
h as much for her mother as she did for herself.

  The clock ticked above the rumbling low sshhh of her mother’s white noise. After consulting Bernice, the acoustics counsellor, Blue’s mother cranked it up even louder to ease her distress. Without music, Blue felt as though the weekend went on forever. She counted down the hours till she could return to the Boogaloo Family Clinic of Musical Cures. Forty-eight, forty-seven, forty-six …

  CHAPTER 10

  Leonard

  ‘Now, you can swim, can’t you?’ said Bessie, as she zipped Blue up into a full-length wetsuit.

  ‘Yes.’

  Bessie hung a towel round Blue’s neck. ‘Right then, let’s go, luv.’

  Blue followed Bessie out of the music lounge and into the sprawling gardens. Although humans like to think they invented music, there are of course plenty of animals who can hold a tune. And the Boogaloo Gardens were full of them!

  That morning, the birds and beetles were singing up a storm.

  After such a terrible weekend, the throb of their song was like a massage. Blue felt every muscle in her body relax.

  ‘Where are we going?’ yelled Blue, above the din.

  ‘To the lake. There’s someone I want you to meet.’

  Bessie led Blue along a path towards a forest. Inside the forest, the throb of beetle- and birdsong changed to a quiet thrum, like a choir in a church. As if knowing where they were, Bessie’s pygmy possums tumbled down her skirt and ran along the forest floor. They chased each other up trees and rolled down humps and bumps on the path. After a time, the deep blue of the lake became visible through the trees. As they got closer, Blue could see a small hut. On the far, far side, past a narrow strip of land, Blue could just make out the ocean.

  Blue and Bessie went inside the hut and found a small dinghy. Bessie loaded it up with scuba gear, and together they pushed it down the bank and into the water. Bessie held on to its nose as Blue wobbled her way to the back and took a seat. She couldn’t imagine who they were going to meet in the middle of a lake, but she’d been with the Boogaloos long enough to know she could trust them. Blue was just so glad to be back at the clinic and away from the crushing weight of her mother’s disappointment.

  With one stripy leg in the boat and one on the shore, Bessie shoved off from the side. The boat drifted out into the lake.

  ‘Don’t we need oars?’ asked Blue.

  ‘Oh yes, they might have come in handy. Never mind, luv,’ said Bessie. ‘We’ll just have to wait.’

  The dinghy drifted out towards the middle of the lake. Blue dangled her feet over the edge, dipping her toes in the cool water. The morning sun tingled on her cheeks. Bessie lay back along the seat and pulled out a bag of pistachio nuts.

  ‘Nut?’

  Blue and Bessie began munching their way through the bag of pistachios, tossing the empty shells into the lake. Every now and again, Bessie flung an arm over the side and tapped the surface of the water as if it were a piano. Enjoying the sunshine, Blue lay back and began to doze. She was in a half-sleep when she felt the boat vibrate beneath her. She looked at Bessie. Bessie didn’t stir. Blue thought she must have imagined it. She closed her eyes. Then it happened again. This time, it was more of a wobble than a quiver. Blue sat up.

  As she did, an ancient-looking black-and-white snout emerged from the water right beside the dinghy.

  And it was HUGE!

  Blue screamed.

  Bessie sat up. ‘Leonard!’ she said. ‘Hello, you gorgeous old fella!’ She leaned over the side and rubbed the creature’s nose. ‘Leonard, I’d like you to meet Blue.’

  ‘Oh … my … g-g-goodness!’ stuttered Blue. She had never seen an animal of that size. To be up close to one was overwhelming. ‘He’s the most magnificent thing I’ve ever, ever seen, Bessie.’

  ‘He is grand, isn’t he? He’s a gentle giant, our Leonard. Bit of an over-emotional big lug, aren’t you, luv? Go on, stroke his nose. He loves a pat.’

  Blue reached down and touched his knobbly snout. On the underside was a cluster of barnacles.

  ‘Right, let’s get you in the water.’ Bessie wobbled towards the scuba gear.

  ‘What! I’m not getting in the water, am I?’ said Blue, pale-faced from fright.

  ‘Don’t worry, he won’t hurt you,’ said Bessie.

  ‘I can’t!’ said Blue. ‘He must be forty tonnes! I can’t get in the water with a whale!’

  ‘Well, not just any whale, luv. I like to think of Leonard as one of the greatest blues singers in the world. His whispers and clicks can unlock any heart, no matter what the combination. It’s his calling. Otherwise, he’d be out in that ocean, heading north with his mates for a bit of fun. Whale song is extremely powerful, Blue. It’s not just hippy-dribble talk, you know.’

  Blue’s heart pounded. She tried to talk herself through what was going on, but there were two voices yelling at her in her head.

  ‘You call yourself an animal lover!’ she chided herself.

  ‘Yes, but that doesn’t mean you’d get in a cage with a lion or swim with piranhas, does it!’ the other voice argued.

  ‘I thought you said you’d do anything to get your laughter back?’ the first voice reminded her.

  ‘Yes, but swimming with a humpback whale? It’s a wild animal. It could crush me! I mean, Leonard is the size of our school bus! There’s got to be another way!’

  While Blue argued with herself, Bessie just got on with it. She pulled out huge reins and lassoed them over Leonard’s snout. He slid under the water and surfaced about ten metres or so away from the boat. Rolling onto his back, his ridged white underbelly faced the sky. He turned onto his side and stuck a surfboard-sized white flipper straight into the air.

  ‘That’s Leonard talk for “come on in”,’ said Bessie.

  ‘I can’t!’ said Blue. ‘My mother won’t even let me pat a dog without my gloves on!’

  ‘Well, it’s up to you, luv,’ said Bessie, tossing a pistachio into her mouth.

  Blue had to make a decision. It wasn’t really about what her mum would or wouldn’t let her do. That was just an excuse. If Blue really wanted her laughter back, she knew she had to get in that water. To summon her courage, she tried to imagine herself surrounded by her old friends in fits of laughter. If she was honest, she couldn’t even remember what laughter felt like anymore.

  ‘All right. I’ll do it.’

  ‘GOOD GIRL!’ said Bessie. ‘Here. Put on these goggles and breathe through this.’ Bessie heaved a scuba tank onto Blue’s back and hung a three-step ladder over the back of the boat.

  Blue climbed down into the water, her legs shaking with fear. Slowly, she swam towards the whale.

  ‘Just hold on to those reins!’ yelled Bessie. ‘You’ll be right, luv. You’re in for a real treat. There’s nothing our Leonard loves more than an audience.’

  Blue grabbed hold of the reins. Immediately, Leonard plunged beneath the surface. Blue held on as tightly as she could. Terrified, she could feel the whale’s immense power as he pulled her towards the bottom of the lake.

  Eventually, Leonard stopped pulling and began to drift. It was completely silent and still beneath the water. And cool. Shafts of light beamed down like moonlight shining through holes in a roof. Leonard gently rolled as he drifted. His white flippers glowed in the soft buttery light. Stretched out wide like wings, Blue couldn’t believe how birdlike this giant creature felt.

  Then Leonard began to sing.

  First came a single note, deep and low, not dissimilar to the sound a bottle makes when you blow across its neck. Blue held on tight. Then another note, this time high. It was eerie. And pure. Like a drop of rain caught on a leaf. More notes followed – series of trills and moans and whispers that built into a haunting melody. Blue could feel the song as it travelled through her body. Although she didn’t feel like laughing, Blue felt immense happiness. Unlike anything she’d ever felt before.

  After a time, Leonard’s song was done. In a fizz of bubbles, he brought Blu
e back to the surface. Leonard shook the reins from his snout.

  Blue didn’t want it to end. She put her head against Leonard’s and left it there for the longest time. Then she kissed his knobbly snout to say thank you, and swam with his reins back to the boat. A flotilla of empty pistachio shells bobbed around it. Bessie, with her feet in the water, was snoozing again. Blue climbed up the ladder and crawled onto the boat. She felt as if she had run a marathon. Her arms ached. She took off the scuba tank and lay down next to Bessie, who was snoring ever so politely. Blue closed her eyes and quickly fell asleep.

  CHAPTER 11

  An Ultimatum

  ‘You what? Swam with a whale?’ said Blue’s mother, barely looking up from her paint chart.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking. I thought it was a bit crazy too at first, but it was the most incredible experience, Mum.’

  ‘I hope you kept your gloves on. It was probably crawling with sea lice. Now I’ve seriously got doubts about that clinic. I was hoping they’d just give you some medication. I mean, really, swimming with a whale? That’s ridiculous! The Boogaloos are clearly loco, dear, you do know that? This is your second week of treatment and not so much as a ha ha! How hard can a ha ha be? Ha ha … I should have known. I mean, as if music could change anything! And a singing whale? What rubbish! I’ve already sacked that hokey decorator who recommended them. You should have seen the white she was considering for the hall – Moon Mist! I mean, it’s so last year!’

  Blue’s mother shook her head and rolled her eyes. She patted the coiffed curls around her ears in case her disgust had wobbled them out of place. ‘You’re not going back to those loons. You can just stay a miserable sad sack. Your father and I will manage. We’ve managed so far. No one gets to choose family, after all. It’s always a risk. We’ll just have to spend a bit more time overseas to compensate for our distress.’