He grinned. “You watched it?”
It was almost six in the morning on Sunday, and Luke and I were standing out on the point where the surf was most commonly at its best. He’d already been in the water and was dripping wet as he stood in front of me. I was in my swimming costume, since I didn’t have a wetsuit that fit me anymore, with my father’s old Billabong board under my arm, the leash strapped to my ankle, ready to go and give this surfing thing a try again. I’d been struggling to sleep last night and after catching only a couple of hours shut eye then waking up as if I’d slept for eight hours, I’d remembered Luke suggesting I surfed again, so I figured, why not? I wasn’t punishing my dad by not going out, I was punishing myself.
“Yeah, I watched it.”
“And?”
“And…it was kind of cool,” I admitted. “For a film in colour.”
He laughed, a rumble that seemed to come from his belly and bubble out of his throat. “You’re such a film snob.”
“I like the simplicity of black and white. I like the dialogue, and those over the top accents they used. But, I did like The Lost Boys. It was fun. I might even expand my repertoire a little.”
“Dude, if you want more 80s and 90s classics then I’m your guy. Those decades were my time. There’s a lot of great stuff from back then. And it was all before cinema became more about effects than about a good story.”
“Did you just call me ‘dude’?”
With a chuckle, he ran his hand through his salty wet hair. The early morning glow of the sky illuminated the highlights developed from a lifestyle of saltwater and sun. “I think I did. So, are we surfing, or what?”
“Yeah. We’re surfing. Let’s see if I remember how to do this.”
“It’s like riding a bike,” he said as he ran with me into the water. All the while, excitement bubbled low in my stomach and filled my chest.
It kind of felt like I was having fun…
***
“Daddy!” A small boy came barrelling into Luke as an older woman with wispy blonde and grey hair stumbled over the sand, calling after him.
“Sam!”
“Hey buddy,” Luke said with a smile, picking up the sandy haired boy and spinning him around in the air. The boy, Sam, wrapped an arm around Luke’s shoulders and looked over at me with a scrunched up face.
“Who’s that?” he asked as if I wasn’t even there to hear him.
With a grin, Luke answered. “Her name is Dawn. She’s one of daddy’s friends.”
“She’s real pretty.”
I totally blushed. A five-year-old paid me a compliment, and I blushed.
Luke chuckled. “Yeah, mate. She is. But she’s out of our league, I’m afraid. She’s heading off to the city in a couple of months to go to university and be somebody really important.”
I blushed even harder. He was just being nice, I knew that, but it was nice to have a man say those things, even if they weren’t true.
Sam’s eyes widened. “Really? Like someone on TV?”
“Maybe.” Luke set him down on the sand.
“It’s nice to meet you, Sam,” I said, holding my hand out to shake his tiny one. He placed his palm against mine and gave my arm a hard pump.
“Nice to meet you too, lady!” he shouted. Then he ran off toward the woman who I assumed was Luke’s mother who was keeping her distance by sitting a short way away in the sand.
Sam threw himself at her.
“He seems like he never runs out of energy.”
Luke reached up a hand and undid his wetsuit, pulling it down his arms and revealing that ripped torso that secretly may, or may not have been part of the reason I’d found myself drawn to this part of the beach so early in the morning.
God, he had a good body.
“No, he’s like the energizer bunny on crack,” he joked – but in a nice way. I could tell he loved his son very much, and I could also see the sadness in his eyes over the loss of his wife. It was all there, swirling about in the green and brown flecks that coloured his irises. I found myself wishing I’d known him before she died and wondered what he was like when they were together. Was he the same Luke he is now? Was he different? Did he grow up as an outsider like me, or did he fit in like the Wannabes? Did he have dreams of being something more than a bartender before? What were they? I found myself really wanting to know him - him, down past all the surface stuff that I already knew, beyond our mutual enjoyment of a good horror film. I wanted to know his joy, his sorrow, and even his secrets. I wanted to know him.
“He must keep you very busy.”
“He does. Mum’s great with him though. They’ve got an understanding, I guess – he behaves, she lets him choose what he wants to eat.”
I looked over at Sam who was lying against his grandmother and eating some sort of sandwich while he looked out to the surf.
“They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. So I guess it works.”
Luke laughed. “Yeah. I guess it does. Listen, I need to get going. But, today was fun. If I see you here again, I’m not going to hate it.”
I smiled, pulling at my bottom lip with my teeth to stop myself from laughing. “Oh, dude, that kind of burns. Was that a compliment or something else entirely?”
“Did you just call me ‘dude’?”
I couldn’t stop the laugh this time. “I think I did.”
“You did good today, Dawn.” His voice softened, as did his expression as his eyes swept over me.
I laughed. I’d wiped out about ten times. But, I was getting my legs back toward the end of it.
He began to walk away when I stopped him by calling out. “What do I watch next?”
Looking up at the sky, he thought for a moment, his thumb and his index finger on his chin. “Goonies.”
“OK.” I smiled, watching him walk over to his son and his mother. I saw him pick up Sam and hold him laughing in the air, and I saw his mother speaking to him, her eyes on me, disapproving. I wondered if she’d heard the rumours about me. I wondered if she believed them. Luke shook his head, whatever she was saying, he was telling her she was wrong. His faith in me lightened my heart as I picked up my board and towel then spent a moment surreptitiously watching him play with his son without further comment to his mother. Then I went home, and before I even thought about eating or going for a shower, I set up a new download.
***
Halfway through the Goonies, I almost wished I had a mobile phone so I could text Luke while I watched it. It was funny, I was on the edge of my seat, and the story was great. Heading downstairs with my iPad in hand, I hit pause and slid my headphones off my head, setting them both on the benchtop so I could get something to calm the growling that was nagging in my stomach.
As I reached for the handle on the fridge I stopped, noticing my mother sitting at the table staring out at the backyard pool with a lit cigarette balanced between her fingers and an untouched coffee sitting in front of her.
Her hair was a mess. She’d obviously gone to sleep with it still coiffed, and it was sticking out in bleached tufts while her makeup was nothing more than dark circles under her eyes and a faded stain on her lips. Her skin seemed a little sallow. I wondered who the lucky man had been last night and hoped it wasn’t Noa again, because the idea of them together totally creeped me out.
“You’re smoking in the house now?” I waved my hand in front of my face to advertise my disgust for her polluting the air inside.
She turned and blinked at me as if I’d just snapped her out of a daze. “What?”
I pointed at the offending item. “You’re smoking inside. Since when did that happen?”
Looking at her burning cigarette, she scowled and looked as though she didn’t realise it was even there. Frowning, I cocked my head to the side and studied her more closely. “Are you OK? Mum?”
She sucked in her breath as though I’d frightened her, even though she knew full well I was standing in front of her. Reaching out, I placed m
y hand on her forehead to check if she had a fever. But she felt fine.
“Maybe you should go back to bed,” I suggested, concerned that something had finally happened to her. As much as I hated the way she behaved, and wished that she’d return to the mother I’d known before my dad left, I still cared that she was OK. See her this way scared me.
Moving the cigarette to her mouth, she inhaled deeply as she shook her head and reached into the pocket of her robe. “He’s cutting us off,” she said through her exhale. Smoke billowed out of her mouth, coating the words in their ashen stench as she slid a folded envelope onto the table between us.
“You mean dad?” I picked up the envelope and slid out the letter, unfolding it and seeing that it was covered in a mess of creases, indicating she’d obviously scrunched it into a ball then smoothed it out again.
“You’re eighteen. Legally, he doesn’t have to pay anymore. We’re on our own.” She sucked back on the cigarette again then dropped it into her coffee, the smoking tip hissing as it hit the milky liquid.
I scanned the letter. It wasn’t even from my father. It was from his lawyer. It was written in a formal language outlining my father’s decision to cut off his financial support. “What about university?” I asked, knowing that if he didn’t help pay for my housing, fees and supplies then I wouldn’t be able to go.
“Doesn’t say.” A fat tear formed across her left eye and fell down her cheek. “I’m so sorry, petal. I never thought he’d do this.”
Clenching my teeth, I fought my own urge to cry and took a steadying breath. That money coming in was the very last link I had to my father, and in some messed up way I’d thought it meant he still cared. But I was wrong, so very wrong. It was simply an obligation. He didn’t care enough to stay. He didn’t care enough to visit. He didn’t even care enough to call. He’d walked away because he didn’t care at all.
“Well, we didn’t think he’d take off with a girl half his age either. But it turns out he’s just a cunt.”
“Don’t talk about your father like that,” she snapped. But, I think it was more out of habit than a true reprimand, because the moment she said it she began to cry. “What am I saying? You’re right, he is a cunt.”
Stepping forward, I wrapped my arms around her, feeling so sorry for her in that moment. She’d given my father the best years of her life, and the moment things got hard he traded her in for a younger model. She felt robbed. She felt discarded. This letter was the final nail in her coffin, and mine too; he didn’t care that he was taking away my chance at a bright future, he didn’t care that he was ruining my carefully laid plans. He was just waiting for the right moment to be rid of us.
“I’m so sorry, mum,” I whispered, saying both to her and to myself as I held onto her, and she held me back.
“We can’t do this without him, Dawn. I’ll be forced to sell the house. I need talk to him. I need to get him to reconsider.” She pulled back and lightly touched my cheek with her well-manicured hand. “We’ll sort this out, petal, I promise.”
“OK,” I whispered, hugging her again while knowing there was no point. It was all so clear now. Just like that day on the beach, I understood that it was over, and there wasn’t anything we could do about it. We’d just gone from having everything provided for us to dirt poor in the matter of moments, and it was total utter bullshit.
13
“Is Zeke in?”
Zeke’s mother answered the door when I’d knocked, and shook her head. “He said something about taking some lessons at the lookout. You might find him up there. I could call him for you if you like?” She knew I didn’t believe in mobile phones, but I knew calling him wouldn’t make a difference. If he was up at the lookout, he’d be doing his hang gliding training and would have his phone switched to silent.
“It’s OK. I’ll just talk to him later.” I pressed my lips together in a smile and began to step away.
“Is everything all right, Dawn?” she asked, her dark eyes glowing with concern. They were the same colour and shape as Zeke’s, and her hair was just as dark as well. He got his height from his father, as well as the rest of his physical features, but the eyes and hair were all his mother.
“Yeah,” I lied. “I’m just tired is all.”
“OK, I’ll let him know you stopped by.”
Thanking her, I left and returned home, heading up to my room and reading the letter from the lawyer over and over again. Each time, my anger and frustration grew to a new level. As if it wasn’t bad enough that he’d taken off all those years ago without a backward glance, now he was ending his financial support right when I needed it the most.
How the hell was I supposed to go to UTS now? The fees and books alone would cost more than a part time job could net me. He’d completely ruined my life – again. Part of me wished him dead. Part of me wished he’d never existed. Part of me wished I’d never existed. It was all becoming too hard, and I didn’t know what to do. The Dawn Tucker story was supposed to start in Hargrave Cove then pick up pace when I moved to the city and immersed myself in the world of art and culture, creating a name for myself in the film industry as a great visionary of my time. But I couldn’t see that happening anymore. Now that I was legally an adult, and my dad didn’t want anything more to do with me, my story was going to begin and end right were I was, in a town that never wanted me, in a place that never felt like home. Well, that was great. Thanks a fucking lot, dad. He just officially became a sperm donor in my mind. Arsehole.
I balled the letter up tightly in my hands and threw it in the waste paper basket beside my desk. Then I went over to the other window in my room, the one that looked down to our backyard where my mother was pacing up and down beside the lap pool we hadn’t used in years with the phone pressed against her ear as she yelled down the line. Her hand gestured wildly as she demanded to know what we were supposed to do.
“She’s you’re daughter, Kevin.” She reminded him of that fact over and over again. But I could tell by the increasing frustration in her voice that he wasn’t budging, we were seriously on our own. “Shit!” The phone call ended and she dropped the cordless in the pool, letting it sink to the bottom as she crossed one arm across her middle, put the other to her face, and covered her eyes. “Shit!”
Heading downstairs, I went to the sliding door and pushed it along its tracks, stepping out onto the warm concrete to comfort her. Now, more than ever we needed each other. Now, more than ever, I needed to make sure she didn’t spiral out of control. We’d never survive if her drinking got any worse. We’d never survive if her desperation got any worse either.
When my father left us, I’d cried for days. I’d begged my mum to try and get him to come back. I’d yelled and told her that love didn’t just end. I’d held so tight to the memory of their love – the quiet moments in the kitchen when I came home – and I’d sworn that that was the way it was supposed to be. I’d been angry at my mother for giving up. I’d been angry at my father for walking away. I’d felt betrayed, let down, lied to. But none of that was anything compared to the hot seething burning blackness in my gut that made me wish I was anyone’s child but theirs. I knew it was wrong to think like that. I knew there were many that had it worse than me, but in that moment, I had nothing but rage in my heart. My father had left me with a mess of a mother who was more dependant on me than I ever was on her. Now he was taking away his only saving grace, leaving me yet again with an unskilled mother whose only skill to list on her resume was that she was once voted the prettiest girl in school. She hadn’t gone to university. She’d never worked a day in her life. My father had swept her off her feet, promised her the world then took it all away. Now he was taking it all away from me too. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to shake him. I wanted to scream in his face and call him a cunt.
As I watched my mother cry helplessly, a lump formed in my throat. The worst part of all of this was that I knew she still loved him. She still cried for him in her sleep, and rambled about h
im when she was drunk. She couldn’t let go. In all honesty, if he came back and begged her to try again, I’m sure she’d say yes.
I guess that’s why all of this hurt so much. He’d broken her heart and the wound wouldn’t close. Then he’d left me, his only daughter, to pick up the ruined pieces. He’d robbed me of my happy life, and now he was robbing me of my happy future.
In that moment, I promised myself I was never going to be dependant on a man to take care of me. I was never going to be like that. I was always going to be my own person. I didn’t want to end up like my mother. I was too smart for that.
“We’ll be fine, mum,” I said, coming up behind her and sliding my arms around her waist, resting my head on her shoulder. “We never really needed him anyway.”
Reaching back, she pet me softly on the side of my head. “I need a drink.”
I watched her walk inside and rummage through the pantry, my heart sinking when she emerged with my hidden bottle of Jack Daniels.
Please don’t spiral out of control, mum. Please. I need you to be the grown up now.
The moment the thought entered my mind, I knew it was pointless. There was no way she was going to be of any help. She’d never coped without him when we had money. There was no way she’d cope without it.
Even so, I watched, willing her to stop even as she pulled down a glass and filled it until it almost overflowed then gulped the alcohol down like it was water. Disappointment filled me as I envisioned my night ahead. This wasn’t going to be pretty.
When she finished, she filled the glass again. Well, at least she’d thought to use a glass instead of necking the bottle. That was something, I guess.
***
“And he never even made me orgasm.”
Luke was onto something when he said that alcohol brought out the truth. My mother had finished the bottle of Jack Daniels then moved onto a bottle of Wild Turkey I didn’t realise she’d had hiding underneath the sink in the laundry. She’d also moved on to drinking straight from the bottle, and for a small woman, she had a grip on that thing like a fucking vice. I couldn’t take it away from her, even though I’d tried multiple times.
In the Wind Page 9
