by Alice Pung
‘It’s the year of the Pig!’ exclaimed her dad.
Ha, thought Marly, my brother’s a pig.
‘The Pig is not as good as the Ox though,’ her dad said, and Marly’s ears perked up. She was born in the year of the Ox. ‘The Ox is the second animal in the horoscope, way ahead of the Pig,’ her dad continued. Marly felt triumphant.
‘Did you know that the Ox was going to be the first animal in the horoscope?’ Marly’s dad asked her. ‘The Jade Emperor in Heaven told the animals that they would be horoscope signs and that the first twelve animals to arrive on the day would be selected. The Ox, being diligent and hardworking, woke up early because he wanted to make sure he arrived first. He did arrive first, but when it was time to count the animals, cunning Rat jumped on top of Ox’s head so that Rat got counted first. So that’s why the Ox is the second animal in the Chinese horoscope.’
At least the Pig wasn’t first, Marly thought sleepily. She was about to ask her dad for another story, but her eyes became droopy and before she could say the words she fell fast asleep.
Marly was woken by a noise like water going down a drain when you pull out the bathtub plug. It was a loud glugging, slurping sound. Then she heard a whistle like a kettle. What is going on? she wondered. Is it morning already? She opened her eyes. It was still dark.
Then she heard the glugging sound again. It took a few more whistles and glugs before Marly figured it out. Oh no, she thought, Grandpa snores! It was so loud that even when she covered her ears she could still hear him through the curtain. She had no idea how Grandma slept through that every night! She tossed and turned on the sofa until daylight crept into the room.
Because of Grandpa’s snoring, that week seemed like a blur to Marly. Every afternoon, she would come home exhausted and Grandma would have a new chore for her. Then in the evenings when her dad arrived home, they would all get in the car and visit Mum.
On the second evening, the baby was awake and they all got a chance to hold him. When Marly’s dad placed the baby in her arms, she felt how floppy and soft he was. She marvelled at his tiny hands. They seemed almost magical, like the hands of a little elf. When his left hand opened, the fingers fanning out, Marly put a finger on his palm, and his fingers curled tightly around hers.
He loves me! Marly thought with joy. She hadn’t expected to like her little brother so much and so soon.
‘TIME to get up and brush your teeth and have breakfast!’ said Grandma, yanking the sheets off Marly’s bed. ‘Your mum is coming home this afternoon.’
Had a week gone by already? Marly wondered. Everything seemed to have happened so slowly and yet so fast.
Marly rubbed her eyes, and did as she was told. In front of the bathroom mirror, she peered at herself. She looked a lot like her mum, people often said. Then they would almost always follow that with some comment about how she sure didn’t behave like her mum, like a lady.
When Marly returned to the lounge room, she saw that Grandma had put the sofas back in their normal position, and all her bedsheets and pillows had been stored away. ‘Grandma, what happened to my pirate ship?’ she asked.
‘I packed it away,’ said Grandma, ‘otherwise the place will look like a pigsty, and what if guests come today to visit your mum when she returns from the hospital?’
Marly didn’t say anything, but it was as if the pirate boat had never happened. Even though she no longer had a spot in her parents’ room, Marly realised that now even her own bed would be the space of everyone else. She couldn’t help feeling upset.
‘Sorry, pet,’ Marly’s dad said, suddenly beside her. ‘We’ve got to tidy the place up for your mum. We don’t want her tripping because of not much space. It could be dangerous if she is carrying the baby.’ He ruffled Marly’s hair. ‘I’ve got to go and pick her up from the hospital now. Stay home and be good.’
Grandma had spent all morning and afternoon boiling beans with pig’s feet, cooking chicken with ginger and goji berries, and brewing soya bean milk. ‘This food will help your mum recover and gain her strength back,’ Grandma told Marly. Although some of Grandma’s concoctions smelt really foul, Marly was strangely comforted by the scents – it reminded her that her mother would be back soon.
As soon as she heard the car pull into the driveway, Marly flung the door open. They were home! Marly’s mum came into the house with the baby wrapped in a light blue blanket. He was still asleep, but everyone wanted a hold of him, especially his new grandparents. Grandma wouldn’t let go of the baby.
‘You just drink your soup and rest!’ Grandma shooed Marly’s mum away. ‘You should be recovering from the birth. I’ll take care of him.’ Grandma cooed at him and stroked his head and smiled at him in a way she had never smiled at Marly before.
Marly’s mum looked exhausted. She slumped onto the sofa, drinking her soup with a porcelain spoon, staring into space. Marly watched her run a hand through her messy hair, which had once been so beautifully permed, and sigh. ‘I feel so grotty,’ she said to Grandma. ‘I’m going to take a shower.’
‘What?’ Grandma screeched. ‘You can’t take a shower or bath for thirty days after you give birth!’
‘Why not, Grandma?’ Marly asked. That sounded ridiculous.
‘Because your mother will catch a death of cold, that’s why!’ said Grandma.
Grandma was so dramatic, Marly thought with annoyance. They had an oil column heater on wheels in the house, which could easily heat up the bathroom. Anyhow, it was nearing summer so the days were warming up. Marly was about to say this when she saw her mum slump back on the sofa again.
‘Ma, give Marly a turn of holding her brother,’ Marly’s mum told Grandma.
‘But that girl is so clumsy and impatient,’ said Grandma. ‘She’ll drop the baby!’
Marly scowled at Grandma, hating that Grandma always saw the worst in her. ‘I won’t drop him!’ she cried.
‘Ma, give her a go,’ said her mum. The she turned to Marly. ‘Marly, rest your arm against the armrest of the sofa and Grandma will pass you your brother.’ Grandma sighed and reluctantly handed the baby over to Marly.
‘What English name should we give him, Marly?’ her mother asked her.
Marly had known what she would say when her parents asked her this. Ever since she first came to Australia and heard the Jackson 5 over the radio, there could only be one name special enough for her brother, a name she didn’t even give cousin Jackie when her uncle asked her to give her cousins English names. Michael Joseph Jackson was the lead singer of the Jackson 5, before he decided to do his own music. He could also dance like a panther. Marly loved the way he dressed, with one sequinned glove and slouchy glitter socks.
‘Michael,’ said Marly shyly. She looked down at her brother. His gaze was steady and curious, and he looked at Marly as if she were the most fascinating creature in the family, not him. His fist was very tight around her finger, and when he opened his hand it was shaped like a little starfish with dots instead of knuckles. He had so much hair on his head it was like a black helmet, and his face was all scrunched up like he had just sucked on a lemon. He was adorable.
‘That’s a very good name,’ said her mother, smiling. ‘I will ask your father to fill it in the registry form tonight. Oh look! Your brother’s fallen asleep in your lap, Marly. You made him very comfortable.’
For the first time in what seemed like forever, Marly felt good about herself. Her mum was back, and the new baby didn’t seem so bad after all. Maybe he would just sleep and suck and open his eyes occasionally to stare at his new family.
‘MY mum had her baby,’ Marly told her best friend Yousra when she returned to school on Monday. The two friends were sitting at their usual bench at lunchtime, with their plastic containers of food spread out between them. They were the only kids whose parents packed them lunches that came in small plastic boxes and needed to be eaten with a fork and spoon. Today, Yousra had a tub of macaroni with eggplant and lamb, while Marly had a round container
of fried rice. They always shared their food as if they were having a picnic.
‘Woohoo!’ whooped Yousra. ‘Boy or girl?’
‘Boy,’ replied Marly.
‘Even better! My brother Awi can have a friend to play with now.’
‘Oh, but he doesn’t do much,’ Marly said. ‘He just lies there sleeping, sucking or crying.’
‘You just wait until he is up and about,’ warned Yousra. ‘Then you’d better lock up your toys!’
The thought alarmed Marly. The idea of all her stuff – her sticker book, her Pacman and Donkey Kong cards, her Etch-a-Sketch – destroyed by a crawling baby. Marly decided the minute she got home she would find a box to hide her toys.
When Marly told Yousra what she had named her brother, Yousra was even more excited. ‘That’s a rad name!’ she exclaimed. ‘So cool. Hey, that reminds me, are you going to do a performance at the end-of-year concert?’
‘Yeah,’ replied Marly, shyly. ‘I’m thinking about it.’
‘That’s rad!’ said Yousra, wriggling on the bench in excitement. ‘I can’t wait to see it!’
‘But don’t tell anyone yet,’ Marly said.
‘Don’t worry, I won’t,’ Yousra reassured her.
Marly felt a warm glow. With Yousra, she felt like a star. At home she felt invisible. Everything was about the baby. ‘Shhh! The baby is sleeping!’ Grandma would say. Or her mum would tell her off: ‘Wah! You can’t just pick up the dummy from the sofa and shove it in Michael’s mouth like that! It has to be sterilised in boiling water – it has germs on it.’
The afternoons after school dragged on. There was no way Marly could get a chance to practise her dance routine, with Grandma telling her off if she so much as skipped through the house. Marly couldn’t even watch the David Attenborough animal documentaries she loved watching with Grandpa because they had to keep the house quiet for the sleeping baby. And when the baby did wake up, everyone was busy running to wipe his bum or give him his bottle.
At the end of the baby’s first week at home, Marly lay on the floor of the lounge room with her notepad and coloured pens.
‘What a good girl,’ declared Grandma, ‘doing some studying at last.’
But Marly wasn’t studying. She was busy writing a letter to her pen friend Lauren. Marly and Lauren had met when Marly caught the wrong bus earlier in the year and ended up in a place called Parkville, where Lauren lived in a big house with her brother Bryce. Lauren’s mum drove Marly back home, but they had become friends through letter writing now they knew each other’s address.
Marly wrote:
Dear Lauren,
How are you? How is school? Do you still do Ballet?
Remember when I showed you the moonwalk in your front yard? I have a concert at the end of the year and I am going to perform it in front of the whole school. Wish me luck!
Your friend, Marly.
P.S. My mum had a baby – so now I have a little brother named Michael.
P.P.S. I named him.
Marly thought about Lauren and Bryce in their big house in Parkville with its many rooms. She got a feeling that they always had peace and quiet in the evenings, unlike night times at Marly’s house. From the lounge room Marly would hear the screeches and screams that meant her baby brother had woken up for a night feed. She had no idea how something so small could make so much noise. On top of that was Grandpa’s snoring.
One evening, Marly had had enough. She didn’t want to spend another night lying awake and fuming over the unfairness of being in the middle of it all, in the noisiest room in the house. Marly padded quietly into the kitchen to see if there was enough room under the kitchen table for her to bring her blankets and pillow – perhaps sleeping in the kitchen would be quieter. The plastic laminex on the kitchen floor was cold, so she slipped on Grandma’s slippers. She was surprised at how the slippers glided quite nicely on the kitchen floor – not as well as the shower curtain, but good enough that Marly could dance.
She hadn’t practised her moonwalk in ages, and she felt a bit rusty, but when she got into it, she realised she still had the magic. She could still glide smoother than any of the other kids at school, she could still jump higher, she could move like a panther. Best of all, because of Grandpa’s snoring and the baby’s wailing, no one heard her practising! It felt like hours before Marly crawled back into her pirate ship bed, exhausted but happy. And when she woke up the next morning, she realised that she had slept through the rest of the night!
From that evening onwards, Marly danced in the kitchen in Grandma’s slippers after everyone went to bed. She loved having this little secret all to herself in the house when everyone was asleep. It was something that the baby couldn’t take away from her. Not that she resented him being in her life. She was more angry at the adults around her, who seemed to ignore her. She vowed to practise slowly and steadily, like the Ox, to perfect her moves in time for the concert. She would show them all.
The next day at school recess, Yousra said to Marly, ‘How is your dance coming along?’
‘Great,’ said Marly. ‘I’ve been practising every night.’
‘Come on, show us some moves,’ said Yousra.
Marly was reluctant, but Yousra said, ‘You won’t even do it for your best friend? Come on, just a small peek.’
So Marly got up from the bench and started to tap her feet to an invisible tune. She pretended she had a fedora hat on, and a sequinned glove. She made her legs bend and move like magic, even though the concrete was not quite like the kitchen floor back at home.
‘Who do you think you are? Michael Jackson?’ Marly stopped dancing. It was Kimberly and her friend Kylie.
‘Yes, as a matter of fact,’ replied Yousra. ‘She’s a dancing machine.’
‘That’s so silly,’ said Kimberly. ‘A girl can’t be Michael Jackson. That’s just so wrong.’
At least I can dance, thought Marly. Your moves aren’t even original, Kimberly. Anyone can do what you do.
But when Kimberly and Kylie walked away, Marly turned to Yousra, worried. ‘Maybe I shouldn’t be performing in front of the school. I don’t want everyone to laugh at me.’
‘You’ve got to tell Mrs Louden about your dance,’ Yousra said suddenly, spotting the teacher on yard duty.
‘Miss, Miss,’ shouted Yousra. ‘Marly has something to tell you!’
Mrs Louden walked over. ‘What is it, girls?’
Marly kept her mouth shut. It was too early to tell anyone, and if she told, she would have to stick with the performance. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to do it now that Kimberly thought it was ridiculous. It began to seem more and more silly. Who did she think she was anyway? Why did she need to prove anything to anyone when she already had a super best friend?
‘Marly wants to do the moonwalk for the end-of-year concert!’ blurted out Yousra.
Shut up, Yousra, thought Marly, angrily. Maybe she wasn’t such a super best friend after all.
But Mrs Louden smiled at Marly. ‘Is that so? What a terrific idea! I didn’t know you had a hidden talent. Of course you can do the moonwalk. In fact, I’d love to see you do a rehearsal for me one day, Marly. I love Michael Jackson.’
Marly looked at the ground shyly, but when Mrs Louden walked away, she smiled at Yousra. A secret part of her felt better – at least two people would appreciate her performance.
When Marly got home, her mum was still in her pyjamas on the sofa. Marly realised that her mum hadn’t left the house since she arrived home from the hospital. And even though she seemed to sleep for most of the day, only waking to feed the baby or to eat Grandma’s food, there were always heavy bags under her puffy red eyes.
‘I’m going back to work,’ said her mum suddenly. ‘We’re falling behind.’
Ever since the baby was born, her mother had not been allowed to work in the garage, sewing clothes. Aunt Tam still came twice a week to work, but she sat alone in front of the over-locking machine.
‘No!’ insiste
d Grandma. ‘Do you care more about earning money or about your baby’s health? You can’t sit in that dark garage inhaling all those fabric dyes and then breastfeed him. You shouldn’t even be going outside. You are sitting through the month, remember?’
‘I feel so down,’ sighed her mum. ‘This is worse than being pregnant.’
Suddenly there was a screeching from the bedroom – Michael had woken up. ‘Go play with your brother,’ Marly’s mum suggested wearily.
Marly sat in front of Michael. He had stopped crying, so she tried talking to him. ‘Hello,’ she said uncertainly. ‘What’s up with you?’ She made a funny face at him but he didn’t even smile. He just sat there staring at her like a blind cat, or that cartoon character Mr Magoo. It was kind of creepy.
‘At three weeks their eyes can’t focus yet,’ Marly’s mum had explained, ‘and smiling will come later in the next few weeks.’
Marly picked up the baby and brought him to her mum for a feed.
‘Grandpa said that you’re going to do a dance for the school concert,’ said her mum, nursing the baby. ‘He said that you are going to be great.’
Marly hadn’t realised that Grandpa had told anyone. She felt touched that Grandpa was proud of her.
‘Do you want me to make you a dress for it?’
‘No thanks, Mum,’ Marly replied. She could tell her mother was dying to get back on the sewing machine, but she hated dresses. And how could she explain to her mum that the only costume she wanted was a fedora hat and a single sequinned white glove, just like Michael Jackson wore? Where would they get such expensive fabric?
Marly’s mum sighed loudly and suddenly burst into tears. ‘I feel so useless!’ she cried. ‘I’ve been stuck at home for almost three weeks and I am not allowed to do anything. I feel so down.’
This was very unexpected and Marly felt terrible that she was just worried about herself. ‘Are you okay, Mum?’ she asked.
‘Don’t worry about your mother,’ said Grandma. ‘She’s just upset for no good reason even though everyone is trying to be good to her.’ Then Grandma turned to Marly’s mum. ‘Stop that crying! You know it is bad for your health!’
