The Life

by Malcolm Knox

  Yeah!

  You had a bear trap outside your window and posters of Hawaii on your bedroom wall: Pipeline, Sunset, Haleiwa. The famous right-hander at Laniakea called The Boat, where they lined up in the water off a big wreck and paddled into perfect eight-footers. Sunset, field of dreams, hardest wave in the world cos it comes from all different directions and peaks from flat to eight foot in half a second. The Pipe, ‘the meanest slab of water on earth’ your poster said, which no-one rode till the year you turned twelve, the hollow tunnel steaming over Banzai reef, a picture of Butch crouching in that tunnel hoping like hell he’s gunna make it out alive. Cos so many didn’t. That Pipe ate men.

  You lay in bed looking at them posters, hours pumping into hours. Hawaii. The waves more than the surfers. The waves that started up in some country-sized storm in the north Pacific, gallop across the world nothing to stop them, get bigger and bigger and piling on water, till they hit The Rock, the north shore of Oahu, jack straight up on them reefs into thirty-foot blue-green monsters . . .

  Them Hawaiian surfers were the old gods, the calm cruisers, the water poets. Everything about Hawaiian surfing was relaxed, let the wave steal the show. When you looked at them posters you get in a fight with yourself. The Hawaiians were gods. But they wasted them waves. Didn’t leave a mark on them. Didn’t subdue them or demolish them or rip them or carve them. Not that you could ever say this but you hated the Hawaiians. Any kook could understand a big wave. These Hawaiians, all pose, all grace, surfing sculptures, glorified kooks on longboards too busy looking pretty to take any risks and get involved with the wave. They danced with the wave like the handbags who danced with the birds at Danceland

  yeah didn’t do that much.

  You hated that you really did. What a waste. They were only one step up from Californians who pretty much stood on surfboards and modelled clothing. You saw them in the surf movies they showed down the civic centre on Friday nights, Californians and Hawaiians, none of them was surfing like you, doing stuff with the wave every second, ripping it up, squeezing it dry, big part of you wanted to step in them posters and movies and tear the whole joint to shreds.

  Didn’t matter that you were a teenager who hadn’t been out of Coolangatta yet . . .

  You were already better than all of them. Hawaiians, Americans, even Midget and Nat.

  With your mind you surfed past them, you done what they couldn’t do.

  •

  And then in the water:

  Rod, did I look like Nat on that one? Was that wave like ten-foot Sunset or what?

  Yeah nah in yer dreams Den.

  Didn’t matter what you really looked like. Rod had a job to do. Keep your feet on the ground. In your wax.

  Done a lot of talking with this girl. A lot for me anyway.

  But now the hotshot BFO wants to go away again couple of days. She’s in, she’s out, she’s in, she’s out. Just when I’m getting warmed up.

  ‘Where you goin?’

  ‘Score some waves.’

  ‘You’re kidding,’ says The Great Man.

  Her: nothing.

  ‘Birds don’t surf eh? What ya really doin?’

  Her: nothing.

  ‘Suit yourself. Yeah nah don’t tell me then.’

  She rolls her eyes but not for show, not that kind of rolling, the other kind she can’t hold down. Doesn’t know if I was taking the mickey or not. Getting sick of me already.

  I watch her get in her ute. She drives a ute. It says ‘Rip Curl’, like it must be half car, half wetsuit.

  Next morning me and Mo tootle off again down The Other Side. Onshore, cloudy, rainy, miserable. Figure I got to find somewhere.

  There we are: Mo behind the wheel of the Sandman panel van sprayed purple and orange. DK squashed in the passenger seat. Mo’s white hair bouncing round.

  Big-game hunter signature DK stick up against the back window, down the middle, jammed between us into the front.

  Aviators on me nose.

  Mouth opening closing.

  Poor poor chopper somewhere in the bush.

  Mo can’t use second or fourth gears: no room for the gearstick with my gun in there.

  Off we go over the causeway down The Other Side, all me secret spots. Not saying nothing. Butterflies in my stomach. Need to do a poo.

  That nervous.

  We stop at all the secret spots.

  Wearing my boardies. Me sleeping boardies.

  All set and ready.

  But always someone out.

  Every secret spot:

  Someone out.

  Or someone in the car park.

  Or someone going for a walk.

  Or someone with a camera taking holiday snaps.

  Always someone.

  ‘I want to go home Mo.’

  Mo says nothing. Cranks the Sandman panel van sprayed purple and orange in reverse and we’re home in time for morning tea. I go down Bob’s.

  Sign autographs.

  No rumours here: no parents to spread them or give you the stink-eye.

  No BFOs on the case.

  Yesterday, the last day I was with that BFO, we had a blue.

  She had her notebook out. Here’s how this blue went: Her voice tight like a rubber band about to break:

  ‘So Dennis, when you gunna start telling me about Rodney?’

  Rodney/Sydney/Hate me/Rob me cut it out man—

  ‘Rob me,’ I said.

  ‘What?’

  That face of hers, like I’m just another bloke come to lead her up the garden path and drop her stone cold.

  I went in my room and shut the door.

  Then this morning she decides to go on a surfing trip.

  Yeah that was the blue but that’s always

  Yeah, forget it.

  Lot of things been said about you and Rod.

  Only Mo knew the truth.

  And Mo didn’t know the half of it.

  But she was the only one knew that much.

  Except for you.

  Rod didn’t.

  Rod was a pretty good surfer you had to give him that. Better than Tink, better than FJ, the ‘world champions’. They were kooks next to Rod eh.

  But Rod was not good enough to wax your board.

  That’s how good Rod was. That’s how good you were.

  Rod was the only one ever, out of all of them really, the only one who liked you.

  Even when you was in the water Rod got plenty of waves. You didn’t hate Rod the way you hated FJ and Tink and the others. Not to mention kooks and blow-ins and wave-wasters.

  There’s no word for what you thought about surfers from other clubs. Other beaches. Anyone you didn’t know.

  You knew no limits.

  Rod was better with money than you he always had this magic way of coming up with coin.

  This night on the beach at Rainbow. You and Rod often slept on the beach, or The Pit, or Greenmount Hill. On a warm night you collapse in your Levis and T-shirts so you’ll be there at sparrow fart. Local cops and business owners didn’t go much on it. You were all meant to be part of the Youth Rebellion and whatnot. Queensland brought in these laws where if you didn’t have any coin in your pocket, didn’t matter who you were, you get took in as a vagrant. When Wayne Lynch come up from Victoria to Coolie, best surfer in the world, he had nowhere to stay so he crashed on the beach. Pigs drug him in a Black Maria and cos he looked like Jesus and didn’t have no coin they dump him over the border in New South.

  Queensland! Best surfer in the world turns up, they chuck him out for being a vagrant! Barbarians them police.

  Yeah and

  and but so this one night you woke up in The Pit with a size-14 in your ribs and a copper saying empty your p
ockets. Rod been asleep beside you last you looked, now nowhere to be seen.

  You emptied your pockets. Triumph!

  There yers go, I got nothing. Can’t rob me, ya maggots.

  All right son, you’re coming in.

  I’m shaking them off me elbows.

  What yers doing?

  Vagrancy Act, you’re under arrest son, no money.

  They’re dragging you off to their van, the Black Maria everyone called it on account of it was black. You were about to do your block when out of nowhere Rod appears. Hands full of silver change.

  Here, he cacks, here we’re not vagrants, we’re millionaires sleeping rough!

  Pigs couldn’t take us in for vagrancy now. Instead they swipe the coin and give us a boot up the arse and bark at us to go home or they tell our mum.

  Can’t tell my mum eh! I shout at them.

  Rod looking at me and shaking his head like I’m a drongo.

  Well they can’t can they, I go.

  Got to come in useful sometimes, the no mum thing.

  Rod never did tell me where he got them funds from. Someone’s wallet eh, I reckon.

  But even though Rod was the only one who liked you he was the one who copped the worst of it. From you. For you. One day at Kirra he had the squirts for some reason and kept fading you. It was a sunny day and he stayed out longer than usual and got sunburnt.

  When you caught up with him in the rat cellar under the house you bound his face in duct tape. Like a mummy. All except his eyes. But then you saw the way he was looking at you, like he finally twigged you were some kind of psycho, like for real, and he’s thinking you’re really truly gunna kill him.

  Accidentally?

  On purpose?

  Didn’t matter:

  Accidentally on purpose.

  But he was your brother, good as, and so you ripped the duct tape off him.

  Second-best part of it was seeing his relief: you might of been a psycho but you weren’t a total fruitcake.

  Best part of it was seeing his skin: you ripped off all his peeling sheets of face with his sunburn and him now pink and wet and slimy as a newborn dog.

  He went round with ointment on him for days. Couldn’t go out in the sun. Couldn’t go out in the water.

  Couldn’t fade you.

  But you needed him:

  Rod, did I look like Nat on that one?

  Yeah nah in yer dreams Den.

  Once you got Rod good. You were sitting out the back at Snapper and felt something on your leg. You shook it round then looked down and saw something make your heart stop:

  A squid, wrapped round your leg.

  Size of a doormat. You pulled off one tentacle and it starts wrapping itself round your hand. All them little suckers, you felt every one of them. Sucky feeling, totally freaked you. You start gasping, panic attack, wrestled with the big slimy purple thing.

  Few yards away, Rod laughing so hard he fell off his board. He broke his mouth. Making sure everyone else was looking at you in your life-and-death combat with this fricken squid.

  You were bugging out now, off your board, but still got your head on your shoulders. Squiddy hadn’t sucked everything out of you.

  Rod . . . ROD YA BLOODY—!

  He got on his board and paddled over to you, still cacking himself. You were wrestling with squiddy underwater. Rod’s face a little concerned by now, you might be in proper trouble, which was your cue . . .

  Faaaark!

  Suddenly Rod’s gripping his face and falling off his board. Squiddy’s shot up out the water and wrapped himself round Rod’s ugly mug. Rod’s screaming. Now everyone’s pissing themself. They’re all distracted from the new set rolling in. You turn and paddle and catch a ripping barrel while everyone’s watching Rod get eaten by squiddy.

  But nah it wasn’t all one-way traffic.

  Dennis loved making jigsaw puzzles. Was good at following instructions. Lego, Meccano, Airfix, anything with numbered steps and exact pieces: he never made a thing that wasn’t from the plan. Genius at jigsaw puzzles.

  Had to have them just like they were on the picture on the front of the box, and then he tape them up flat and stick them on his wall. Regular art gallery in there. Only ever done each puzzle once. Art yeah

  and he’s this is the thing I’m telling and she’s not listening

  for revenge Rod grabbed a piece from this 5000-piece jigsaw you were doing and hid it. You never suspect him. You never suspect your worst enemy of hiding a piece of a jigsaw puzzle. Naïve that way yeah

  but nah and you opened the box and shut it.

  Looked underneath.

  Round the sides.

  Lifted up all the furniture.

  Searched every drawer.

  Every corner.

  Through your clothes.

  Done it all again.

  Through the box a hundred times.

  Ready to explode.

  Shouting at Basil: Yav eaten it haven’t ya ya greedy mongrel!

  Rod watched it all till he felt sorry for you. But brothers don’t feel sorry for big little brothers. Brothers let it ride long as they can before the roof is hit and the top is blown and the block is done.

  Yeah like we really was brothers now, this is how I knew we was.

  Rod watched your torment for two days. Three days. Couldn’t hold himself in no longer nor could you.

  Sadistic your brother.

  His revenge.

  He put the piece back in the box and the hundred and first time you searched for it, you found it.

  Looked at it and went, I thought I looked there. Then you got on with your business.

  You never suspected a thing.

  Naïve that way, yeah always assumed the best of people.

  When he was seventeen Rod got his driver’s licence. Keiths couldn’t afford a car, but this is Coolie in the sixties and everything was everyone’s and Rod just rock up on the doorstep with this car from some neighbour and the back of it full of sticks and some of the boys, and if it was blown out at Snapper or Kirra you hop in and Rod hook the nose of the station wagon or panel van or family sedan south or north and yous’re off, the mob of yous, Rod, you, FJ, Tink, couple of others if they showed, jabbering away, typical hens night.

  You claustrophobic in the back seat with too many people.

  Could of murdered a wave.

  Needed to get out that bad.

  In a barrel, where nobody could see you.

  Rod drove like a wingnut. From day one. You didn’t want to drive, didn’t want the complication in your life. Cars no, too many instruments, too many things to go wrong. No cars no go.

  But even though you were scared of driving you go with Rod who was a whole lot worse. He should of been scared of driving yeah but he wasn’t. That was the problem. He wasn’t scared enough. You never knew what he’s gunna do. You watched him. Seemed to only make his mind up at the last second. He was off with the fairies or looking at the waves or the bikini girls or talking his head off and then he suddenly pull a stop at a traffic light or a right turn or a U-turn. Hair-raising. But not enough to make you go get a licence yourself. No cars, no go.

  Yeah but having a driver broadened your horizons. Nobody gets good surfing the same wave all their life, especially mechanical right-hander like Snapper or Kirra. You lay awake worrying you couldn’t surf back-handers. You had this one bad day on left-handers at the beachie at D-Bah and drive Mo crazy with your all-night fretting and talking, sit on the end of her bed going through every wave you wiped out on. You were like a caged bull. You could surf right-handers in your sleep but your back to the wave you were kookarama. An embarrassment to yourself and your family.

  Mo said, You learn back-handers there won’t be nobody
in the world’ll stop you winning.

  So you made Rod drive to all the left-hand breaks up and down the coast. FJ and Tink whinged and moaned but knew not to argue. You had to master your back-handers. You wanted barrels on your back hand. Back to the wave. Tuck in behind the silver curtain. Where they couldn’t see you.

  We’re a big show me and me Mo, cruising down the coast highway to all the secret spots first thing in the morning or last at night, the seventy-five-year-old lady in her pale yellow house dress in her Sandman panel van sprayed purple and orange with her fifty-eight-year-old Den squashed in the passenger seat and the car can’t do second or fourth cos the big DK gun is jammed down between the seats . . .

  ‘Gunna go out today,’ I go.

  ‘Gunna go in, right?’

  Mo’s never been able to figure the right words, with surfing. I tried explaining it to her years ago.

  In means in, on land.

  Out means out, in the water.

  Deep means inside the peakiest part of the wave.

  Wide means out on the shoulder.

  Inside means closer to the shore.

  Outside means further from the shore.

  Don’t matter how many times I explain it she always gets it wrong-end up.

  Don’t matter how many times.

  This is your conversation, in the car. Most you’ve ever talked at once. Mo’s in your corner, she is. Gets you copies of Surfing and Surfer and Tracks and whatnot, and just now and then she looks at them pictures and lets drop a little stinger, like:

  ‘They’re still not as good as you Den.’

  Or:

  ‘Thirty years and they’re still trying to match you.’

  Or:

  ‘You go in the world tour now Den, they won’t know what hit them.’

  •

  But someone’s always out there. Twelve days, twelve drives and you still haven’t been out.

  Someone always out there.

  Sam died that year. Nineteen sixty-five or six. Basil’d used him up and wore him out. Now our only dog was Basil and Basil was a different kettle of fish. Unpredictable. Only cared about number one. Basil ate pretty much anything. All food, for a start. But also other stuff. Once he ate batteries. Once a packet of ciggies. Once a wooden box that used to have chocolates in it. He wasn’t fussy. One thing he had in common with Sam was when you took him down the beach you didn’t have to tie him up. He loved sitting there watching waves.