Tide

by John Kinsella

  Nah, not really. Mind you, said the larger boy, punching his mate in the arm so he winced, but only just, I think there might be a few incest secrets in some closets. The punched boy blushed, and tried changing the subject by harping on his pet topic. How can you stand having people you know coming to your house to whinge to your dad about their personal problems?

  Is your dad a minister or a sex therapist? the other boy quipped.

  The girl shifted uncomfortably. It was always silly talk about sex. She probably wouldn’t come down to the beach again when they were there. But it was her front yard. It was where she lived. She considered it her beach. The look she’d held back came over her face, and she said with something much more cunning and loaded than a smirk, I’ve got a surprise for whichever one of you can bring me the best treasure from the bottom of the sea.

  Piss off, they said. Wouldn’t go out in that mess again. And you’re just a tease. You wouldn’t give anything. We know your sort.

  Bit like your sister!

  This was followed by an awkward silence until the slightly smaller boy said, I don’t mind having a go. Not for you, just for something to do. I bet I can come up with a neat shell or an old bottle or something. I know where everything is out there. I could find stuff in the dark.

  And then he was pulling his gear back on and, leaving his gidgie behind, waddling down the beach and into the choppy grey. The other boy hopped after him, not even looking back at the girl. He flapped over, breathless, and whispered. I reckon she’s hot for it. She’ll really give us something.

  What? asked the other boy nervously.

  I dunno. Maybe she’ll suck us off, or let us muff-dive her.

  Muff-dive?

  It’s called a muff-dive when you go down below on a girl. You know, lick her out.

  The slightly smaller boy shuddered involuntarily and said, Well, I don’t really care about that, I just like a challenge. And with that he was into the ocean.

  The surviving boy stood next to the girl, their heads lowered, surrounded by adults, listening to her father, the minister, give a eulogy. He praised the surviving boy for trying to drag his mate out from below the ledge of reef that had trapped him, reaching for something invisible. He praised his own daughter for raising the alarm when she understood what was going on. He praised police divers for recovering the body in such dangerous conditions. He didn’t condemn the parents for anything. He got the measure of his town with his best homiletics experience. He delivered the right eulogy and the right sermon in the right way. Jesus’ eyes remained lowered on the cross, and didn’t glance up once in surprise or disappointment.

  When they were alone, the boy said to the girl, He pulled me away when I was reaching in. I knew there was an old bottle in there, covered in barnacles and worms. I saw it weeks ago but went after a silver snapper that flashed past, and thought I’d go back some time. You couldn’t see a thing down there. It was all feel. He was with me every stroke. And then he was past me and in too deep. I tried to pull him out, but I guess he thought I was trying to stop him getting whatever treasure might be in there. Deeper and deeper and then he was stuck. All the air rushed out. Even in the murk I could see the huge bubbles of escaping breath come out then they were smashed into millions of smaller ones. His legs flapped like crazy.

  She kept her eyes down and listened to the sea rolling over the reefs and across the sand shoals on to the beach. The sea was loud despite it being a calm day with blue skies. But the small waves echoed and reverberated over the dunes, through the Norfolk pines, around the limestone of the church. The walls seemed so porous, the sea right in there with her, with them all. She listened to the floating calls of the gulls and tried to remember if there’d been any gulls on that day. She couldn’t recall any, which was strange because they were always there, no matter the weather. But it seemed strong in her mind now that there was an absence of gulls. They abandoned the place.

  Through the drone of her father, and the adults’ tears, and the ocean’s vexing roar, she stuck her hand out to one side, searching for his, but he pulled back and said, Sorry, I can’t touch anyone. He was always bigger and stronger than me. He always showed me the way. He taught me things. He taught me about girls. I looked up to him.

  FLARE

  It’s all in the packing of the powder, he told her.

  What do you mean?

  Well, you might think the rocket is just this tube full of gunpowder, but it’s really how you put the gunpowder in the tube that makes it fly. Plus, I’ve got some extra-special accelerants mixed in with the gunpowder to make it burn fast and hot. Some aluminium powder, some magnesium, some oxidants. It’ll light up like the sun.

  In the god’s chariot crossing the sky!

  Precisely. That’s why he loved her, wanted to impress her. She was literary and smart. He considered her a gem in that philistine seaside town. She quoted poems and never talked about clothes or pop singers. The other girls were wary around her. He’d loved her for four years of high school. They were Year Elevens now and just turning sixteen. He had never tried to kiss her, and she had never shown any inclination for being kissed.

  They were alone in the shed. She sat on a bench dangling her legs, watching him work. Have you thought about what you’ll do after the exams next year? Do you still want to study chemistry at UWA?

  Yeah, I guess so. But you know that. Why are you asking again? He stopped packing the rocket and looked at her carefully. He had gunpowder on his hands and was breathing it in.

  No reason, she said. Well, I don’t know. I’m thinking I won’t go anywhere. I might just stay here. She had somehow drawn her legs up and was perched on the edge of the bench, fine and delicate like a displaced songbird.

  Why? he exclaimed, dropping the rocket; the carefully packed powder broke its sculpted form and spilled out of the casing. He’d been relying on her going to UWA. On her staying in the women’s residency college while he was in the men’s one nearby. Then it would all come together. Science and the arts. Life.

  I can read books just as easily here.

  He laughed, barely able to contain a snide put-down (he’d been working on that side of his ‘personality’ for her). What books? This town only sells romances and thrillers in the newsagency!

  Oh, I can get books when we go down to Perth. My sister’s moving there. I’d visit. I think I’ll try for a job in the shire offices, and that’d give me money for books.

  Where will you live?

  At home.

  At home! He could barely contain himself. Home? You’ve always wanted to get away from home. You call your parents ‘philistines’ more than I call this town a dump. It’s your favourite word.

  That’s because I’m selfish and arrogant. That’s not what it’s about. My parents love me and want me at home for a few more years. I don’t mind. I can read and write. They might not get it, but they don’t stop me.

  But your mother is always yelling at you, I can hear it from here. Their houses were separated by a vacant, partially bush-covered block, where he would occasionally blow things up, and her parents would speak to his parents and they would all threaten to tell the police.

  Well, I can’t wait to get away from home! His blood was heating, he was growing flushed. He loved her, but love doesn’t work if everything else isn’t right. He’d mapped it all out. He’d been waiting to make his move and now everything was stuffed up. For years he’d endured taunts from boys at school about his ‘doin’ her on the vacant block’ and from the other girls for being a ‘poof and not being able to get it up’. He was called the Professor after the nitwit on Gilligan’s Island who was frustrated and clammed up. Who didn’t even get it off with Mary Ann properly, never mind Ginger. He’d bided his time. There had to be a pay-off.

  The shed – the lab – went silent. She’d eased back into her former position on the bench, with legs dangling and swinging; it irritated him. He felt scrunched-up in his abdomen and a small amount of sick came into his mo
uth. He went back to the rocket and started packing it hard, really hard. He crammed more and more powder into the tube, damaging the cone and fins.

  It won’t fly properly if you don’t fix those, she said.

  He straightened them out roughly, put the rocket in a plastic bag and said, Come on.

  There was a block, then the coastal road, and a set of railway tracks before they reached the breakwater. Over recent years the beach had been filled in with large chunks of limestone to shore it up against the tail end of cyclones. One reached the town every few years, churning the place up and tearing away at the land’s innards, sucking them out into the water.

  As they walked down in silence, the rocket cradled in his arms, they kept their eyes fixed on the ocean. There was always the ocean. If she dropped out of sight for a few days, or he went to sulk, they’d inevitably reconnect on the rocks, the spray splashing up over them even on still, fine days. The limestone chunks had not yet been smoothed by the sea; they shattered the slightest wave to droplets and foam. The two of them tasted of salt. They knew each other’s taste by the sea’s taste spread through the air.

  Crossing the rail lines that fed the port, she said, We’re all elemental, you know.

  Maybe.

  We are.

  There’s a slight sea breeze, he said, wanting to reach across her face and lift a strand of hair that had drawn across her eye, her nose and her opposite cheek. He wanted to put her face in order. But he never touched her. Ever.

  It’s a pleasant breeze, though, she said.

  It’s okay, but it would be better if it were a still day. The breeze will mess with the flight path. I’ll aim it straight out to sea instead of up.

  He’d already scouted a suitable launch site, and hidden a length of aluminium drainpipe in the culvert alongside the rail lines. Good, the powers that be haven’t got rid of it. Still there.

  When did you put that there? she asked, almost put out. Done without her.

  Last night. Came down in the moonlight. The pipe was glinting. I hid in the rocks while a train went by. Didn’t really need to hide – I’d already put the pipe in the culvert. I just wanted to. It was a long train.

  Good thing your parents didn’t catch you.

  Or a car driving past. A few did. They didn’t skip a beat. Just kept driving. This town is weird anyway. It fits.

  We fit.

  We don’t!

  She positioned herself on the rocks as he angled the tube on the rocks, set the rocket inside its base, made a small trail of gunpowder from residue in the bag, and said, Well, I reckon we should do a countdown.

  Okay. Ten, nine, eight …

  Wait, he said. She pulled her head back and looked hard at him. Gulls squawked and roared overhead. Would you like to light the fuse?

  No, she said, and looked out to sea at the wheat ships waiting in deep waters for their turn to be guided into port.

  Go on.

  Why?

  Dunno. Just because … ‘Rintrah roars & shakes his fire in the burden’d air …’

  What’s that?

  William Blake. The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.

  Whatever, he said … Seven, six, five, four, three, two …

  One.

  He lit the fuse, the rocket ignited and shot like a flare blazing out over the sea.

  Jeez! Fuck, that’s bright!! Let’s get out of here.

  They tripped on the rocks, she grazed her knee, and they ran like small children, without looking, across the rail lines, the road, and to their separate homes, the silver drainpipe perched on the rocks by the sea, a stranded passerine whose entire inheritance of instinct had been spent.

  GUILT

  He listened for the sea as soon as he stepped out onto the front lawn. In between working out maths equations he had been watching ships coming into the lanes, waiting for pilot craft and tugs to guide them into the harbour. His seat was by a window that looked out over the oval, over the cathedral with its light-holding stone, over the town centre with its one multistoried office block, and out to where the blue of the sky fused with the deeper blue of the sea. It was another sunny day; it was sunny most days. Silver light lifted everything into the classroom and blinded him to the threats and taunts coming from all angles when the teacher’s back was turned. He knew he’d be in for it as soon as he left the building, but there wasn’t much point dwelling on that. It was fate.

  He listened for the sea as a hand pushed him in the back and he stumbled forwards. As he picked himself up, his ears rang with vertigo and he told himself that it was the sea. The day was calm, so the sound of the sea was subtle, like a great, full emptiness. And gulls. There were always gulls around the town, and especially around the school at lunchtime. Rich pickings, but always the risk of a stone being hurled.

  He planned to go to sea as soon as he left school. It was no pie-in-the-sky dream; it was a reality if he could only get his union ticket. Already during school holidays he worked down on the wharf, taking samples off the conveyor belts when the mineral-sands ships were in. The Swedish officers showed him over the ships, even showed him Swedish porn magazines. The days of working your passage are over, they said, with the strict new union rules, but if you can get a ticket we’ll take you on board. Over two years he’d got to know the officers on two of the ships pretty well.

  He stayed in a crouched position, walking like a chimp. At that level, he’d survive. If he lifted his head above the metaphoric parapets, someone would give him a thick ear. He staggered forwards, swinging his arms – careful not to flail them, just swing them. To show subservience and humiliation only up to a certain point. Over the top of his glasses he could see Kirsten, the Year 12 spunk, pointing and laughing at him. I bet his dick is small, she sniggered. Wanna look? the boys called. I’m in for it now, he thought, but kept loping on, knowing it was unlikely they’d go the distance in public. That one was a change room speciality. He’d already been stripped, beaten and thrown out of the change rooms in front of a class of girls from the year below. He’d managed to fold his hands around his genitals and stagger back in before they could make an appraisal. One of them said, You’ve got a dirty bum, I’ve seen it, every time she saw him in the school grounds, even though he was her senior.

  The air was laden with salt and a wispy sea breeze was already coming in. By the afternoon it’d be blowing twenty knots, maybe twenty-five. This was a windy town. A sunny and windy town. He staggered forwards, a school shoe crushed the ends of his fingers and he retracted them automatically; it was a bad move.

  You wanna make something of it, you poofter-girl-bitch?

  He’s havin’ a go, he’s havin’ a go.

  See how aggressive he was?

  He knew he’d be in for a kicking now, somewhere on the walk home. Then the pants might come down and Kirsten wouldn’t be far away with her posse of sun-bleached blondes, the stuff of the beach already sticky in their thoughts.

  He told no-one. Almost no-one. He told the first officer of the great bulk carrier Helen. They’d become friends when the boy introduced the man to his older sister. There’d been a fling or something. The officer went mushy whenever he asked about her. But she’d moved to the city and was working in a movie theatre. The officer had written to her and received a reply, but that was it. Yet he held no grudges, just thought the boy a wonder for having such a sister. She has long legs, your sister, and beautiful dark skin, said the officer. The boy couldn’t work out why the officer went on about her skin so much. I am pale, said the officer. He went on about his own skin a lot as well.

  I wish I could go to sea now.

  Finish your schooling first. And you should train to become an officer. It’s better.

  The boy mixed very little with the able-bodied seamen who didn’t speak much English.

  Nah, I just want to leave.

  Why?

  The town’s too small. There are kids at school who beat me up and the teachers won’t do anything about it. They’re the sports st
ars, and the popular girls love them.

  That’s not acceptable, said the officer. I will have some of my crew ‘talk’ with them (he said it in that meaningful way) if you point them out. Do they come into town?

  The boy wanted to say, All the time, hanging out at the leisure centre, drinking piss behind the pub, fingering girls down on the sliver of beach in front of the station, but he kept his mouth shut. Nah, they don’t come into town much. And it was left at that.

  As the limit of the grassed area was approaching, he knew he had to pull out of his stagger. Year 12s were allowed to sit out the front but couldn’t go onto the path. That was a violation of school rules and could mean a suspension. As usual, the boys were herding him to this point of violation – it especially amused them because he never got into trouble in class and was so quiet it was loud. What’s more, there was a sports teacher on duty who thought the boy a weakling, and delighted in his sport stars doing a bit of basic training on the boy.

  But then he could hear the breeze and the sea and even imagined he could hear the sea eagle that had nested in an old craypot placed on a post down at the point. And that was miles away. All was clear and peaceful. He stood upright and looked around. The boys, Kirsten and her crew, and a bunch of quasi-stars had turned sharply on a new kid. Arrived a couple of days ago.

  The kid had drawn attention to himself by having a lamington in his lunchbox. A girlfriend of Kirsten’s who’d gone over to suss him out, to see if he had balls, had seen it. What a poof!

  They formed a semicircle around him and started the barrage. The sports teacher smiled and whistled and wandered around the end of the administration building, vanishing into the quadrangle area. The captain of the football team suggested they should take it easy, but one of the full forwards smashed the lunchbox to the ground and then wedgied the kid, lifting his underpants from behind so hard the kid was hoisted from the ground.

  Wedgie! Wedgie!

  He’ll have a girl’s wee-wee now, Kirsten laughed sarcastically.