Henry’s Daughter

by Joy Dettman

  She blows her nose again, sucks air. ‘It was probably true. I don’t know if it was true or not but it was in the will, written in black and white. That crazy old bitch had been determined to get in one last punch from the grave.’

  The kids are standing quiet. Nothing they can say to that. Can’t say it’s probably not true, so can’t say anything.

  ‘Eva told me and Henry the details that night, and she laughed while she was telling us. Her mother tried to drown me in the kitchen sink the day I was born. She’d dug a hole for me in the garden, but my father came home and caught her. He made that pair of mad bitches raise me. Bought the house in St Kilda, moved them down from Brisbane, moved his business.’

  She shakes her head, lifts her chin, looks at Vinnie and laughs, laughs and drips tears. ‘As big as a god, he was. I thought he was God when I was a kid.’ She bites at her trembling lip, swipes at her tears, then that chin lifts again. ‘I had to take what love I could get in that bloody house, and I loved a perverted, child-raping bastard.’

  ‘You weren’t to know,’ Vinnie says. ‘He didn’t do nothing to you, did he? So how were you to know?’

  ‘I should have known. They hated him. There had to be some reason. But they couldn’t make a move without him, the pair of whingeing, clinging, dependent bitches. They swallowed their pills, gave their parties, and greeted their guests with him at their side.’

  She’s drowning in tears now, they’re running down her face, the wads of toilet paper building on the table. ‘I didn’t know I shouldn’t love him. Nobody told me.’

  ‘Because it probably wasn’t true. That’s why they didn’t tell you,’ Lori says. ‘They couldn’t lie about him while he was alive to defend himself, could they?’

  ‘I’ve got his red hair. I’ve got his height.’

  ‘So has Vinnie, and his father was a quarter Indian and a sixteenth Aboriginal. You’re out of your brain, Mavis, believing one word that Eva said. She was a total nutcase.’

  Mavis puts her head down then, bawls all over the new plastic tablecloth, bawls so hard she’s shaking everyone up with her tears. The little kids get scared and start howling in sympathy. Mick nods to Jamesy, a sort of get-rid-of-them nod. This stuff isn’t G-rated.

  He, Lori and Vinnie have heard most of this tale before and they know there’s worse stuff to come. Like how Mavis slept with anything in pants, how she’d had two abortions by the time she was seventeen. They know that Eva and her mother accused her of sleeping with Henry too, when all they were doing was playing chess. And if they lied about that then they’d lie about anything, like Eva lied in that letter – which Lori has still got; she had it laminated, and stuck it on the wall in Mavis’s bedroom, and she’d better get rid of it before Mavis reclaims that room.

  Lori steps back, glances at Henry’s photograph. That’s probably pretty much how he looked when he first slept with Mavis, how he looked when he came home early from the club and found out about Eva and Alice. He left the house that night and so did Mavis, but not together. She was living on the street until she was three months’ pregnant with Martin, then she went to Henry’s office, wanting him to help her get another abortion. He wouldn’t let her do it. All life was precious to Henry – except his own.

  There is a lot of R-rated material in Mavis’s past and maybe it all has to come out sooner or later too, but this isn’t the time or the place to release it. Lori walks fast from the room and the little ones follow her, and follow her back to the kitchen when she returns with the maroon dress. They don’t know what is going on here, but the bogyman is out of that brick room and she’s crying and it’s scary. They don’t want to be too far from Lori’s knee; even Neil is tailing her.

  She’s got the op shop bra and some brand-new stretchy knickers from Kmart. She’s got a clean towel. ‘Do you reckon you might feel better after a hot shower, Mavis?’ she asks.

  Mavis lifts her head, bawls some more, but she’s not moving. Lori takes her arm, tenses for that well-remembered elbow jab.

  No jab. Mavis stands, allows herself to be led.

  They walk to the passage door and Vinnie makes way, steps into the bunk room. Mavis thinks she still has to sidle through the doorway sideways, but Lori keeps hold of that arm, a soft thing above the elbow. Maybe the cells are still young enough to find a new shape. Maybe the skin is elastic enough to get a new memory. Maybe Mavis is young enough to –

  Together they walk into the lemon bathroom with its stencilled black and gold pattern around the top of the white tiles. Eddy did it; he said the white tiles were boring. It’s a big bathroom and it looks surface posh, even if the black and white checked vinyl does run downhill and shake a bit underfoot. They bought a new shower curtain and hung part of the old plastic lace tablecloth at the window, which looks like really expensive curtain material – as long as you don’t touch it.

  Mavis isn’t seeing any of it. She’s standing looking at the floor she last saw wooden, wet. She’s not doing anything. Tears are still running.

  Have they broken her, killed the inside of her?

  Lori sets the shower. ‘Do you reckon you can manage by yourself, Mavis?’

  She shakes her head, shakes out more tears, so Lori waits while the shirt comes off. She puts it in the laundry basket. Mavis sits on the edge of the bath to take off her tracksuit pants and boxer shorts. She’s not modest, never was, never will be. Lori’s face is turned away, but Mavis takes her arm as she steps up and into the bath. Steps up and over. Just like that, like anyone else would do it. Doesn’t even use the metal handles the people fixed up for her that time. She’s sort of surprised that she’s done it too. She looks at the bath then and at the heavy plastic shower curtain that cost heaps but works well – doesn’t stick to you while you’re trying to wash. She sniffs, lifts her determined chin and looks at the window while the water is running all over her. Lori pulls the curtain across and stands outside, passing in the shampoo, picking up the soap, passing the cloth, passing more shampoo.

  Mavis stays in the shower a long time, longer even than Eddy. Maybe she doesn’t know how to turn the taps off. In the end Lori reaches in, turns them off, passes a towel, tries not to look at the clean, the pink, the new. She gets a second towel for Mavis’s long hair, then offers deodorant, baby powder, offers the bra.

  Mavis looks at it. It’s big, but she shakes her head. Lori keeps offering it. They are not talking. Perhaps Mavis has forgotten how to put a bra on, but Lori is familiar with them, so they get it on and tighten the straps, lifting up what hasn’t been lifted up in years.

  The stretch knickers stretch to fit, but they fit. Lori wants everything to fit, prays everything will fit, but when Mavis looks at the offered dress, she frowns. It’s got fancy maroon and gold buttons to below the waist, and she stands there undoing them, six of them, like she’s scared too that it won’t fit. Scared to try it. Lori helps lift it over the wet hair, and she lifts the hair free, she finds a sleeve, guides a soft arm in. It’s not so hard to do, like dressing a big Matty. She does up the buttons, scared the second one won’t do up across the bra, but the dress is big, it’s plenty big and, God, how fine it looks, and how good the shape of Mavis in a bra.

  The dress falls straight from the shoulders, hangs straight over Mavis’s stomach. It’s longish and the material is classy, good enough for a wedding – or a funeral. Lori wishes now that she’d bought shoes for her hope chest, but shoes are harder; shoes have to be walked in, they have to fit. Mavis looks at her flattened filthy slippers, walks away from them, barefoot.

  There is only a small mirror in the bathroom, a shaving mirror, but it’s fogged up. Mavis catches a glimpse of face and dripping hair, of the maroon collar. Stares.

  ‘Want to have a look in the bedroom mirror? You look good.’

  No. A shake of her head, and they walk back to the kitchen where Mavis sits again at the table. Mick makes more tea, he makes Mavis three diet crackers with Vegemite. Mavis eats one while Lori towels and combs the long red
hair.

  ‘I could cut a bit off for you. I cut the little ones’ hair. Only if you like.’

  ‘Ta.’ Mavis nods, eats another cracker. Slowly. She never used to like Vegemite but she seems to like it okay now.

  A dry towel around her shoulders and Henry’s haircutting scissors snip-snip. Twenty centimetres of red hair fall to the tiles, then Lori combs the hair, combing it up instead of down. It wants to lift, to stand tall again; it’s trying to come alive. It’s looking hard for a life. There is some new grey at the temples, but not much. She cuts a fringe clump to hide the new grey, cuts it like she cuts her own fringe clump. Mavis’s curls up, like her own curls up.

  It’s vibrant hair. It wants to curl, to stand tall. Every strand is in there fighting to curl, so Lori cuts a bit more at the top, keeps cutting, keeping each cut level with the last. She cuts it all the way down, layering it like Henry did, cuts a bit more off the length. Maybe it’s not as good as Henry’s cuts, but curly hair is kind to amateur hairdressers. The curls spring up, spring back, cover any faults.

  They are all watching that hair come alive. They got used to it daggy, draggy, dull and dead, but most of them can remember when Henry used to wash it and cut that red hair, just like Lori is doing. Henry used to get that hair curling and standing tall.

  There is a pile of red growing on the floor and still Lori keeps snipping and talking, like the hairdressers on television always talk, just any words so there won’t be that awful silence.

  ‘That colour suits you. I bought it a while back at the op shop, but I could buy you a black dress for the funeral – if you like. We’ve got plenty of money again. Haven’t had to buy anything for ages . . . except food. I saw a really nice dress in Kmart the other day. It was black, and it had a white trim on the front and the sleeves. It would be slimming and good for the funeral. I could get it and some new shoes and pantihose. That’s if you like.’ Then the comb is on the table and her fingers are lifting that hair. And it’s bouncing, it’s turning into wildfire beneath the light.

  ‘What size shoes did you used to wear?’

  ‘Nine, or nine and a half.’

  ‘Do you reckon you could wear heels? Not big ones. I saw a pair of black sandals in that little shop beside the restaurant – not too strappy. They had heels, not tall ones, just sort of square, a bit blocky.’

  ‘I used to wear four-inch stilettos.’

  ‘They’ve come back into fashion again, but they look seriously excruciating.’ She finger-combs, doesn’t want to stop. Maybe she should stop, but it’s beautiful hair; it feels good and it smells good, and she’s trying to get some life force flowing between them, trying to push some of her life force directly into those strands of hair.

  It’s been a long time. The wall has been up a long time and the life force has been hitting it hard and bouncing back hard for even longer. Still, they’ve taken a lot of the old Mavis away. Maybe they have to try to replace what they took away.

  Everyone is looking at Lori. Looking at those hands playing the comb, the fingers lifting curls, scrunching them. Lori isn’t a bit scared of Mavis; it’s like she’s petting her. Like they put a bear with a sore head in a cage and she’s come out a kitten who Lori has got almost purring with each stroke.

  Hypnotising, the rhythm of those hands. The kitchen is so quiet. Everyone is too quiet. Then Alan puts the little ones in the bath and Eddy starts unwrapping the meat for the stew. Jamesy goes out for onions.

  ‘Grab a bit of silverbeet, Jamesy,’ Mick says. ‘Give the bugs a good hose off before you pick it.’

  ‘Yum-yum, bug stew,’ Vinnie says.

  Mavis watches. Watches everything, her eyes distant things, but not scared and shaky any more. Lori keeps combing while the boys go about the normal business of doing things and looking occasionally at the new presence being cared for, but better than being cared for, being cared about.

  Lori cares about her and they know it.

  And Mavis knows it. She’s just sitting, statue still, having her hair done.

  A shudder travels down Mick’s spine. He’s scared of how he’s feeling. He’s scared Mavis will scream, ‘That’s a-bloody-nough,’ and Lori’s face will get that old hard, hurt look she used to wear, that she doesn’t wear any more. But he’s feeling hope too, he’s feeling the life force working in him and his eyes are stinging.

  Lori sees the shudder. She has been away in her dreams, combing her mother’s hair. Okay, so her mother isn’t wearing tight jeans and dangling earrings like Wendy Johnson’s mother, but she . . . she looks like a mother. She’s sitting here at the table and she’s real, not some photo, not some middle-aged twit trying to look sixteen. She’s big but she’s real, and she’s got beautiful hair and beautiful eyes and that’s a fact.

  Then the life force starts flowing. It starts jolting Lori’s stomach. It jolts so hard that she steps away.

  Mavis’s shoulders shiver. She turns her head, as if something wonderful has been taken from her. Then a powerful thump of Mavis’s life force hits Lori like a wave from the speedboats hits the bank. It nearly swallows her, sort of draws her back to the red hair. She touches it, lifts it up from the collar of the maroon dress, runs her fingers through it again, lifting it high.

  ‘It’s just gorgeous hair. It always was.’

  ‘Everything has changed,’ Mavis says. ‘Everything has changed, Lorraine. Everything.’

  ‘You just wait till you see our posh lounge room. Just wait till you see what we did to the outside. We look as good as Nelly, over the road. You just wait, Mum.’

  Mavis stands up, so easily, so fast. Alan thinks she’s going to head for the chook-house and hang herself like Henry did when he called him Dad. He jumps up too, his heart racing like their new second-hand lawn mower. ‘Do you want to see the lounge room, Mum?’ he says. ‘We’ve got the classiest fireplace in Willama.’

  Hit her with it solid. Hit her with it hard. Make the real go in. Make her accept change. Mavis was a total failure, so make her be Mum.

  Mavis looks at him, looks around her, then she shakes her head and howls. ‘You mob of silly little buggers. You’re just like your father.’ And she walks out to her brick room bawling, and she closes the green door.

  Mick’s worried. ‘What made her suddenly do that?’

  ‘She’ll be better tomorrow. We have to let her do it slow,’ Alan says. ‘We hit her with too much, all at once. She’s in shock. She’ll be better tomorrow.’ Eddy is saying nothing; he’s standing quiet, stirring the spitting meat.

  ‘Did you see how she didn’t even want that sweet biscuit? She wants to be on a diet. I bet we can get her down to fourteen,’ Jamesy says.

  ‘If she goes to the funeral, we could all go,’ Alan says.

  ‘All of us? You mean we’ll go too?’ Jamesy says, looks from one twin to the other. He can’t remember ever being further than Willama West.

  ‘If Mave goes,’ Eddy says. He adds curry, stirs. ‘It would let her get used to seeing strangers before she has to front all the neighbours. Take her to her father’s grave and let her work her way through it slow.’

  Lori nods. She knows what it’s like to have family trust broken. Like with Greg that night. Okay, she knew he was pretty rotten, but she hadn’t known he was pure depraved rotten. Like, what might have happened to her if she hadn’t had Martin and Donny to run to? Poor little Mavis – and maybe poor little Eva too. She had no one to run to, whether she was running from her father or someone else.

  ‘I’m not staying at that house,’ Alan says. ‘We’ll stay at a motel.’

  ‘It’s probably rented out, anyway,’ Eddy says.

  ‘I suppose Mr Watts will sell it.’

  Eddy looks off into space, stirs the meat. ‘One day we might . . . some of us might feel like living in Melbourne.’

  ‘Like, if Mavis chucks a killing, eating fit,’ Vinnie says. They stare at him, like, don’t you dare even think that.

  ‘I don’t think she will. She’s stir-crazy, that
’s all. I was too when I first came home. Didn’t know who I was, what I was supposed to be.’ Eddy shrugs. ‘I found out, and if she doesn’t, then we’ve got a place to go – if we don’t sell the house.’

  ‘All of us? All of us would go to live there?’ Jamesy asks. He wouldn’t mind leaving on the morning bus.

  ‘You mean you’d give up on her,’ Alan asks, ‘just like that?’

  ‘If she starts stuffing again,’ Jamesy says.

  ‘She won’t,’ Alan says. ‘Her eyes look different. She’ll be better tomorrow. We won’t take any more meals in so she’ll have to come out and – ’

  ‘Mmm,’ Jamesy says, just like the social worker says ‘mmm’ when she doesn’t yet believe, but doesn’t want to not believe either.

  Adrenalin is flooding them, flooding the room. They don’t know where they’re going, but they’re all going somewhere, and they’ll all go together, because they are a family. They’re heading into something over the horizon, but they’re not ready for it yet. Maybe in a year they’ll be ready. Maybe it has to grow on them. This last year has been crazy stuff and they’ve all grown so fast. Growing up is better when it’s done slow.

  But there is a future out there for them now, even if they can’t quite see it. It’s out there and they know it and it’s something bigger than they have ever known before, and it’s something far, far better than they have ever dreamed of.

  It’s the more! It’s Henry’s more!

  Lori hasn’t said a word. She’s thinking of the feel of that hair, and the smell of it, and being close to Mavis. She’s thinking of that black dress in Kmart and the nine and a half shoes. And she’s thinking of the sandals the op shop lady brought that night in her box. They are too big for Lori. Maybe they’ll do Mavis until tomorrow.

  Tomorrow.

  She’s looking at the photograph on the wall and thinking, tomorrow. Now, just maybe it was the way the late afternoon light caught the glass of Henry’s photograph, but she knows it wasn’t, because she saw Henry sort of turn his head, smile right at her.