With My Body

by Nikki Gemmell

  ‘As I explained before, your bike’s waiting for you. In the shed,’ your man from last night says brusquely, standing up and brushing himself off. ‘I’ve got work to do. And I might as well do it.’

  He turns on his heel and stalks off to his study without looking back, everything in retreat.

  The two of you stare after him.

  Gone, just like that.

  Lesson 65

  A human being should be improving with every day of a lifetime

  So. Alone. With this new person. In a room vibrating with the charged absence of someone else. The atmosphere as swiftly altered as a power cut in a night club.

  ‘I should be going.’

  ‘Do you have to?’ His eyes are resting again on your hammer. ‘It looks like you could be of some use. What’s Mr Grumpy roped you in for? Is he paying you? What does he want from you? This place needs all the help it can get.’

  You step back, your arm slipping across your waist, don’t know why all of a sudden, what’s changed.

  ‘I’m a good … girl,’ you trail out, don’t know what you’re saying anymore, it’s all wrong, you just feel intensely awkward and out of your depth. You pick up a book and flick through it, reading nothing, as if it’s a text you’re studying and your lesson’s about to commence. ‘I’m learning,’ you mumble, embarrassed, turning away; speaking without thinking, mortified.

  The man chuckles, astounded, at the thought of it.

  ‘About what? Him in there—’ he shakes his head with the sheer hopelessness of it all—‘I haven’t been able to get a single thing out of him for an entire year … more.’

  ‘I—I … want to know things.’

  The conversation has run away from you, you’re not in control, don’t know where it’s going anymore. This new man looks at you sideways, your cheeks are burning, you feel so young, redundant, foolish; want out.

  He plucks the book from your hands: ‘Sheep Husbandry of the Highlands,’ he reads. Great. Trust it to be that one. ‘Um, lessons about … what?’

  You just look at him, stricken. How can you explain? That you want lessons in how to talk, to be, to act, not from people who covet gold American Express cards and Porsches but from those who read books and who’ve been to university and watch the ABC and read Tolstoy and Proust. Who drink wine and coffee, say supper instead of tea and eat at ten o’clock instead of five and go to Italy and France instead of Jindabyne and the Gold Coast. People who fall asleep at 3 a.m. and wake at ten in the morning and read half an hour of poetry, every morning, before getting up to drink absinthe or whatever they do and, and—all that. Men who live, seize life in the way that you want, who talk. Not shut themselves down from being eager beaver, sparky little lads, only to enter a world of muted inarticulacy, dampened down by adulthood, their conversation slipping into grunts and put-downs and awkwardness. No, these ones are different. And you want to be a part of it.

  But of course you can’t say any of this.

  ‘I … I like it here.’ Looking around, at your hammer, their newspapers, books, rubbing your head like it hurts. ‘It’s different. A different … class … ’ you stumble, barely a whisper.

  But he caught it. He is stepping back, squinting as he’s looking at you, smiling; as if you’re the most peculiar mix he’s ever come across. You feel stripped.

  ‘There’s no class in this country,’ he says gently.

  ‘You say that. Your lot always say that.’ You hold your head high, cheeks flaming. ‘I don’t.’

  The man looks at you and looks, and then nods.

  With new, what?

  Respect.

  Yes, that.

  Lesson 66

  Such a life is not to be pitied

  ‘Tell me about your yourself. Who do you belong to?’

  ‘Nobody,’ you protest.

  ‘But where’s your family? What does your father do? Beddington, eh. So, a miner? A tradie?’ He smiles, warming you up. ‘A dole bludger?’

  You giggle. ‘You don’t need to know. You’ll never be meeting him, believe me. He’d take one look at you and it’d all be in his face—pah, couldn’t change a tyre, or fix a radiator, or spark a plug. That’s what he’d be like. Horribly rude and terrible to you, like you’re not worth the effort.’

  ‘And he’d be absolutely right. I can’t do a bit of it.’

  You both burst out laughing.

  ‘Well I can.’

  ‘I bet you can.’ The man picks up his friend’s leftover glass of wine and raises it in a toast. ‘And hooray to that. I’m so glad you’ve found us in Woondala. I think you’re a breath of fresh air. Just what the doctor ordered.’

  ‘What’s his name?’ Your head flicks to the study door. ‘He never told me. Is this his house? How long has he been here?’

  ‘That man who stormed out on us both is extremely rude,’ he says loudly, ‘and there is no point in learning anything from him for he has nothing useful to impart and too much work to do for anyone—or anything—else.’ His voice drops. ‘But if you must know—and I think you do—his name is Tolly.’

  You blink. ‘Tol … ’ The word fills up your mouth.

  ‘He hates it. You must call him it instantly.’

  You chuckle. ‘Maybe he’ll be nice to me then.’

  ‘Oh, don’t count on it. He’s not good at noticing anyone at the moment. Including me, his oldest friend.’

  ‘Really? I notice everyone.’

  ‘I know you do. I can tell. No, young Tolly in there is quite impossible. A man full of secrets. An exile, by nature, an exile from life; but I am extremely fond of him—when he’s not driving me around the bend. Admire him, to be honest. And don’t I hate saying that.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he does what so many of us dream of doing and never, actually, manage.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘He’s always been very good at constructing precisely the life that he wants. With no compromises. And crucially, sticking to it.’ He sighs. ‘And few of us have the courage to do that.’

  ‘So who are you, by the way?’

  ‘Julian.’

  ‘Julian! What kind of poncy name is that? You’d never get a Julian in Beddington.’

  He roars with laughter and polishes off his glass.

  ‘But that’s why I’m staying in here, cowering behind the big fence.’

  Lesson 67

  The illiterate village lass, who thinks it’s so grand to be made a lady of

  Your fingers run the length of a wallpaper strip that’s falling away to reveal its horsehair and plaster underneath. You could fix it in ten minutes, you tell Julian. Tell him that Tolly touches everything so lightly in this place. That if it was yours you’d be cherishing it quick smart before it’s completely beyond repair—which is not far off. Can’t he see it?

  ‘Is this all his?’

  ‘Yes,’ Julian grimaces, in pity for the house. ‘His grandmother left it to him—much to the annoyance of the rest of the family—and he hasn’t done a thing with it since. The lazy bugger. Well, he’s working through it, apparently, but it’ll never get done at this rate. It’s a poisoned chalice to be honest; too big a task. Arsenic was used in the original paint. The roof’s falling in, window frames are falling out, ants are starting to investigate and the bush is taking over the paddocks. There are convict nails in the joins and they’re not holding anything, anymore—everything is full of rust. Their revenge, I think. The walls need stripping. The wallpaper was made using child labour way back in England; it’s all very Dickensian, in a most horrible way. It’s cotton flocking, which gave all the little Oliver Twists a life expectancy of about seven years. Buggered their lungs. This place has many ghosts.’

  ‘It needs a lot of love.’

  ‘Tolly’s also—extremely—protective of it,’ Julian says carefully. ‘It’s his sanctuary. No one comes to it, except me. Or so I thought.’ He sighs. ‘And now, of course, we have you. The, what was it? Annoyance.’ He chuckl
es warmly.

  ‘I can help here.’ You spin around, assessing bowed ceilings and peeling paint and wall cracks. Julian smiles as if he knows exactly what you need right now. His finger swirls around the empty glass and is popped in his mouth.

  ‘Come on,’ he says conspiratorially.

  You are grabbed by the hand, you are led out.

  The flutter of your belly.

  Lesson 68

  The notion of keeping a balance sheet with heaven for work done to our fellow creatures

  You are led to the door of the workroom.

  Julian raps smartly with the back of his knuckles.

  ‘Hey, you. A handyman awaits. Sorry, woman.’

  ‘What’s my payment?’ you whisper, giggly. ‘I’m not doing this for free you know.’

  Julian narrows his eyes and surveys, turning you slightly this way and that, as if he is setting a prized piece of porcelain on the mantelpiece to catch the best view from the door. He holds your chin, puts his palm flat on your back to stand you up straight, tilts your shoulders, correcting.

  ‘Payment. Better posture. A new life. Lots of new words. New experiences. And, er, numerous lessons about livestock husbandry.’

  ‘Cheeky!’

  From the locked room, silence.

  ‘She might be good for you,’ Julian teases to the firmly shut door. ‘Get you working again, along with the house. Yes? Any takers?’

  From the room, silence.

  ‘Come on, mate. Do us all a favour.’ Julian winks at you with an enormous grin.

  A fist thumps onto a surface, probably the work bench.

  ‘Something’s got to change, Tol.’ Deadly serious.

  ‘I have work to do. This is a child.’ The voice dismissive.

  ‘Really?’ Julian puts on his glasses and examines you close, up and down, as if it’s the first time he’s properly noticed you.

  ‘From the valley,’ the voice adds. Pointed, as if that explains it all and concludes it all.

  ‘I bet she’d scrub up beautifully. Why don’t you take her on? Make it your project. Have a bit of fun. Get things moving again.’

  ‘What needs to get moving?’ you ask.

  ‘See? Enthusiasm! And we could all do with a bit more of that,’ Julian laughs.

  ‘The bike is in the shed.’

  ‘Hey, wait,’ you wail, not wanting this to stop just yet.

  ‘Let her help around the house. She’s up for anything.’ Julian lifts out your arms as if sculpting you for a dance then spins you around.

  ‘What’s going on here?’ you ask, stepping back, it’s a game veering too far.

  ‘It’s a most frightful situation,’ Julian explains, putting his arm around you and shaking his head sorrowfully. ‘My poor young friend has become quite the recluse up here. You see, his heart was broken most cruelly some time ago and since then he’s just shut himself away, hiding from all the world—’ his tone darkens dramatically—‘not being productive in any way. It’s utterly crushed him. He’s never recovered. We all despair. His mother most of all.’

  ‘Julian … ’ The growl is furious from the other side.

  ‘The situation is completely hopeless,’ he sighs in mock despair.

  ‘The shed. Now.’ The voice roars. You jump. Julian ushers you hurriedly away.

  ‘Well, it was worth a try.’

  He shakes your hand firmly in farewell, and winks.

  ‘Good luck … Annoyance.’

  Lesson 69

  That cleanness of soul which is not afraid of anything in earth or heaven

  The joy roguish through you as you retrieve your bike, slip out the new tube from your pocket, fix the tyre and leave the old inner tube looped jauntily over the handle of the shed door and ride off tall, knowing they’re both watching; zinging with life, and power, and light.

  Your difference.

  You’ll be back. Oh yes.

  V

  ‘ … [Eros] made Helen’s heart fly like a wing in her chest and she went out of her mind for a Trojan man and followed him over the sea … ’

  Alkaios

  Lesson 70

  Well, the man may come, or he may not

  Just as you know that you would never be attracted to a Julian, you also know that Tol has snared you and the trap is now binding your heart. And a flicker of something from him, too, in response; yes, no, surely? It is how he looked at you when you came back—how he didn’t look—how he talked to you and how he couldn’t. You are sure. You have no idea.

  How he left the gate open when he said he would not.

  Everything a sign, everything a signal and you fever it all in your head, over and over, trying to make sense of it.

  Only one way to find out.

  You return two days later. Around your waist is a leather tool belt worn to the softness of pelt. It is from your father’s shed, with its precise walls of sized screwdrivers and spanners, the most ordered pocket of his life. A skewer has worked through another hole in the belt so it sits perfectly across your hips.

  The gate is ajar.

  As you knew it would be.

  You walk your bike up Tol’s driveway. He is sitting on the verandah with his dog beside him; running his hands through the fur and looking for ticks. He glances up. He blushes, in annoyance or shock or something else, you can’t read it. He is looking at your tool belt. You come right up to him. He doesn’t say anything. He stands.

  He does not say to go away.

  Everything a sign, everything a signal.

  The heat of that afternoon weighted with it. As you stand, face to face.

  Lesson 71

  The heaven-given honour of being the workers of the world

  ‘I’m going to help you.’

  Because you can. Because you are better at this than him. Because he has no idea, he’s never been taught, it’s all in his hands.

  ‘I don’t need help.’

  ‘You so do.’

  He still doesn’t say to go. He walks inside. You don’t know what it means. You brush past him to thin carpet half-heartedly lifted in the hallway, it is curled over, abandoned, ripe for a tripping. With one vigorous rip you lift away the tiny studs holding it down.

  ‘Stop,’ he barks.

  It needs to be done, says your determined face as you turn and stare in response. You know how to do this, you have watched your father your entire life, his energy is yours: the worker who will die working and who gets affirmation from it. You have watched your father smooth cement in great fans the length of his arm and slice away fillings from bricks like icing from a cake, his eye, always, on the taut string; you have watched him rip away wallpaper like a sheet from a lover and plug pipes whose water threatens to crash through a bowed ceiling. And now, in this waiting house, you use your blunt, bush hands and work with vigour and expertise and grace, and Tol no longer tells you to stop.

  Assaulted by his stare.

  Suddenly, within it all, he is beside you. Your sweat, and soon his—the smell of work rising off your bodies. The clumsy, awkward city hands with their too-clean nails and pale wrists. You are ripping up the carpet in strips, shoulder to shoulder; you are ripping away sheets of tin from great windows and flooding stale rooms with dust-crammed air, anointing them with light.

  Saying nothing. Saying everything. In the shining silence.

  As his hand brushes yours, a crisis of touch.

  You are sure.

  Lesson 72

  We are actually ‘possessed’; cease almost to be accountable beings, and are fitter for the lunatic asylum than for the home circle

  No staying away now.

  Love has made you hopeless.

  It is as if a great fist has wrenched the heart from your chest and the sense from your head.

  The gate is still unlocked. Every day, and every day you expect the opposite.

  Everything a sign, everything a signal.

  Several days into the rhythm of this new life he corrects the fallen brace of your overal
ls as you drill a hole for a mirror. You are using your grandfather’s ancient, manual drill with its pleasing mechanics, intrigued by the precise, clockwork beauty of how the cogs work. He flits by and corrects that fallen brace with the lightest of touches. Flipping the strap up and you barely grunt your thanks. Without looking at him, without talk.

  The simplest of gestures, the simplest of responses.

  But your skin. Alive with possibility.

  Lesson 73

  Beautiful is youth’s enthusiasm

  You are arriving earlier, leaving later. In command, working strong, this is your domain in terms of skill and he is allowing it—it is as if your whole life with your father has been in preparation for this task. Everything you have gleaned over the years; you feel you know nothing about anything else. You caress the bones of this beautiful Woondala—built by convicts in 1842 with Georgian economy—marvelling at its simplicity and its strength. These valley houses are deep in your bones, the familiar sandstone and flagstone and timber and tin. You recognise this wood crying out for moisture, its groan and creak at the valley’s high winds; the persistent soundtrack of your childhood has been a tin roof, just like this one, warping and cracking in the heat. And then the release of nourishing, thundering, dancing rain.

  Barely able to look at him as you bury yourself in the work, the only way you are comfortable, no eye contact. It is like your father in the car—with distraction you can connect. If you were forced to talk to Tol over a dinner table, in formal dress, you would be blunted by awkwardness as if your mouth was broken. But painting and sawing and ripping and tacking you are strong—teaching this man your energy, to work farmers’ hours, first light to last, hauling him into your rhythms. If your father stops working he will die, he’s always saying that and you want to impart something of that to Tol, the energy of it.