Maeve was glad her face was in shadow so he couldn’t see her blush. ‘I was on my way to . . . to my grandparents.’ She could see that he didn’t believe her. He’d know that her grandparents would never allow her to wander around Kings Cross alone at night.
‘Like Little Red Riding Hood,’ said the grubby old man beside McCabe, cackling until his laughter turned into a hacking cough.
‘Dibs,’ said McCabe. ‘This is one of my students. Maeve, Dibs McGinty. We were at school together.’
‘Were we, mate?’ asked Dibs. ‘Was you at St Bart’s or that other place? What was that other place? Damn my friggin’ memory.’
McCabe put one hand on Dibs’ shoulder. ‘Clontarf and St Bart’s. We’ve known each other a long time.’
Maeve felt creeped out by Dibs. A milky-white film covered his pale blue irises. Now that she was standing closer, she could see he had only one leg. The fabric of his right trouser was folded over his knee and held in place with safety pins. Leaning in the shadows of the wall was a crutch with a plastic shopping bag slung over it.
‘Dibs and I were about to go and buy some fish and chips. I think you should come along, Maeve.’
For a split second, Maeve contemplated running away. McCabe watched her, as if he knew everything she was thinking, as if he sensed why she was wandering around alone. She knew he wouldn’t let her out of his sight easily.
‘Okay,’ she said glumly.
Dibs swung himself up on to his leg, hooked the plastic bag over his free shoulder and tucked his crutch in place. They headed towards the flashing neon of Darlinghurst Road. Dibs refused to go into any of the cafés but Maeve suspected they wouldn’t have welcomed him anyway. Now that they were in the bright lights, she could see how filthy he really was. Grimy wrists stuck out from beneath his old greatcoat and his fingernails were black with dirt.
McCabe bought them each a bucket of hot chips and a piece of fish and they walked back to the William Street overpass. On a wide set of steps outside a Chinese restaurant, Dibs lowered himself to the ground. Maeve made sure McCabe sat between her and the old drunk. Behind them a red neon sign glowed with the single word ‘Confucius’. Before them lay the city at night – the Centrepoint tower, flashing neon signs in blue and red, and a Sportsgirl billboard with a giant girl stretched across its length. Maeve tried to keep her gaze fixed on the night skyline. Watching Dibs eat made her feel queasy. He held a chip between two grimy fingers and then licked the salt and oil from his fingertips.
When they had finished, McCabe gathered up the paper wrappings and gestured to Maeve to stand. ‘You take care then, Dibs,’ he said. ‘Maeve and I have to get going. Don’t we, Maeve?’
Maeve nodded. She watched as he slipped a twenty-dollar bill into Dibs’ hand. Dibs shrugged as if it was his due.
As they walked away, Maeve couldn’t help asking, ‘Do you owe that man money, sir?’
McCabe smiled. ‘No, but he needs that twenty dollars a lot more than I do.’
‘Did he fight in a war or something? Is that how he lost his leg?’
‘No. He was in an accident.’
Maeve shuddered. ‘On the Cahill Expressway?’ she asked. ‘I hate that road. I hate it. Someone should blow it up.’
McCabe didn’t answer straight away and Maeve knew she must have sounded crazy.
‘Maeve, what are you doing wandering around the Cross alone on a Sunday night? Surely your grandparents or your stepfather must be wondering where you are?’
Maeve hung her head. A shiny metal plaque was set in the footpath beneath her feet. ‘How RUTHLESS and HARD and VILE and RIGHT the young are.’ Hal Porter. It was horrible to think that someone thought that about her. That Goong Goong probably thought she was all those things.
‘I can’t go back to my grandparents, sir. I can’t. They want me to come and live with them in Queensland. I want to stay here, in Sydney, but I can’t because nobody wants me. My brain feels all squeezed up and my chest feels hollow inside, like someone’s scraped out my heart and there’s nothing but a big aching hole inside. What’s wrong with me, sir?’
‘There’s nothing wrong with you, Maeve. You’ve lost your mother. You’re in grief now, but things will change.’
‘You mean I’ll get over it,’ said Maeve bitterly. She was so tired of people telling her that one day, a day she couldn’t imagine, she’d accept her mother’s death.
‘No, you never get over losing your mother, but things change, whether you want them to or not.’
Maeve looked at McCabe, as if seeing him for the first time. Teachers weren’t meant to sound like that. Teachers were meant to tell you to move on.
‘I want my old life back,’ she said quietly.
Across the road, a busker stood in the entrance to the Kings Cross subway. His song, an old Oasis song, echoed out into Darlinghurst Road. Maeve shut her eyes and felt the words inside her. ‘Don’t look back in anger, I heard her say . . .’
‘C’mon, Maeve,’ said McCabe. ‘I’ll buy you a cool drink at the Fountain Café but then I’m taking you back to your grandparents.’
Maeve was ready to let go. All of a sudden, she felt too tired to stay angry. She trudged along beside McCabe, like a prisoner returning to her jail. At the Fountain Café, she sat slumped in a white plastic chair while he ordered them both an ice-cold glass of lemon squash. In front of them, mist from the thistle-shaped fountain shimmered in the night air.
‘Cheer up, Maeve. Queensland could turn out to be great. You’re about to begin a whole new life.’
‘You mean live in the moment and forget the past,’ said Maeve.
‘No, I don’t mean that. Your past is always with you. But moving to Queensland isn’t the end of the world.’
‘Sorry, sir,’ she mumbled. ‘But you don’t get it.’
McCabe sighed and drummed his fingers on the white plastic tabletop. His face looked sharp and lonely in the silvery glow of the city lights. The wide canvas awnings rippled above them, making the shadows flicker. When McCabe leant towards her, Maeve thought he had the saddest expression she’d ever seen.
‘Grief is a lonely place, Maeve. Nobody really “gets it”. Nobody can go into that darkness with you. But you have to have faith that things will get better. I know that it’s a terrible thing to lose your parents. I lost my parents too. Dibs and I, we were in an orphanage together, first in England and then in Western Australia. Not long after I left Clontarf, the boys’ home in WA, Dibs went on an excursion. His bus overturned on a road south of Perth. That’s how he lost his leg. Some boys died. Others lost both legs. I found Dibs again in the Cross about five years ago, and I knew that but for the grace of God it could have been me. But I was the lucky one. I was taken in by an old man who became like a grandfather to me. You can’t know the future, Maeve, but you have to trust in it. You have people who love you. No matter how hard they are to get along with, you have to have faith in them and in yourself.’
Maeve stirred the straw in her glass around until the ice tinkled. She wanted to apologise for something but she wasn’t sure why.
‘How come no one knows that about you, sir? I mean, at school, people think you used to be a priest or a musician or something.’
McCabe laughed. ‘You can tell your sources that I’ve been those things too. Everyone has secret lives, Maeve.’ He pointed to his heart and then at Maeve, his silver hair falling forward as he leant towards her. ‘Even now, you have so many secret lives inside you, Maeve Kwong. Your dreams, your hopes and fears – they’re all part of the story you’re making for yourself right now. One day you’ll have so many stories to tell your grandkids. Just as your grandparents probably have amazing stories they could tell you.’
Maeve tried to imagine what untold stories her grandparents might be hiding. There were probably thousands that Goong Goong and Por Por had never shared with her. It made her feel both curious and uneasy thinking about it. ‘But what if I hate living with them? What if Queensland sucks?’ she asked.
‘You might love it. You won’t know until you try,’ said McCabe, getting to his feet.
As they walked away from the café, a gust of warm night air rippled across the El Alamein fountain. Maeve held out her hands and shivered at the touch of the cool water on her bare skin. Something had changed. Something inside her had shifted.
‘It’s just down the road. You don’t have to walk with me all the way,’ she said, turning to McCabe.
‘I think I do,’ he replied.
‘Don’t you trust me?’
‘It’s not about you, Maeve. I don’t trust who you might bump into.’
‘That sounds like something my mum used to say.’
At the entrance to her grandparents’ apartment building, McCabe turned to Maeve.
‘Would you like me to come up with you?’
‘No, please don’t, sir. I need to do this alone. Besides, Goong Goong is all weird and formal around foreigners.’
‘You mean me?’
‘Yeah, well, I know you’re Australian and we’re in Australia, but for my grandfather, everyone who isn’t Chinese is a foreigner.’
‘I would like to meet your grandparents some time,’ said McCabe. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t introduce myself at the funeral. I’ve often wondered if you were related to an old friend of mine.’
‘Kwong is a pretty common name,’ said Maeve, shrugging her shoulders. ‘Most of my grandpa’s family are still in China.’
McCabe watched her from the apartment entrance as she stepped into the lifts. She knew he’d stand guard until he was sure she was safely upstairs. She stared at her reflection in the mirrors. Her hair was full of wind and salt from riding the ferries all afternoon and there was a dark half-moon beneath each eye. She covered her face with her hands and was glad to hear the ping of the doors opening.
Por Por answered the door and Maeve could read every emotion on her grandmother’s face; relief, anger, love and bewilderment were all there in equal measure. She threw her arms around Maeve, kissing her on the cheek and stroking her tangled hair. She smelt of tea and fried dumplings and Chanel No. 5 all mixed together in layers of warmth and sweetness. Maeve’s eyes prickled with tears, but she bit her lip and fought them back.
Suddenly, Por Por fell silent and pushed Maeve away from her. Standing at the lift doors was Goong Goong, his car keys in his hand.
‘Your grandfather has been driving all over Sydney, looking for you,’ said Por Por.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Maeve. ‘I’m sorry I made you worry. I won’t do it again.’
‘No, it will not happen again,’ said Goong Goong. ‘Nor will we speak of this incident.’
He strode into the apartment and slammed the door to his study.
‘He was worried, sweetie,’ said Por Por, as she ushered Maeve into her bedroom. ‘But you’re home now. Home where you belong.’
Maeve stood by the bedroom window, looking out at the twinkling lights of Woolloomooloo Bay. Her suitcase lay open on a chair next to the bed. A clock chimed midnight, its tone muffled as if a blanket of silence had fallen over the apartment. Maeve shut her eyes. She had to let go of the past and accept that next year she’d be at a new school with new friends in a new state. She had to try to make it work.
14
The first Christmas
Goong Goong’s BMW was like an icy refrigerator. Outside, palm trees stood like sentinels along the roadside and the canals shimmered in the heat, but inside the car it was freezing. Maeve felt as though she was travelling across another planet in a weird ice bubble, not just another state. Everything looked strangely dry for the tropics and the grass along the verge was brown and crisp.
She pushed her iPod earphones tighter and focused on the beat of the music. She didn’t want to think about the new school yet. McCabe had said that – don’t worry about it until you’ve actually arrived. But everything was happening too quickly. Maeve hadn’t even finished up the year at St Philomena’s when Goong Goong and Por Por decided to bring her to Queensland. She didn’t mind missing the end-of-year school events but it had been tough having to give up on the Christmas dance concert. Every time she thought of Steph and Bianca dancing without her, her heart skipped a beat. Now she was having to face not only dancing without them but spending the rest of her school life among strangers.
The driveway of Ingleside College seemed to go on for ever. The buildings stood on a rise above playing fields where the grass lay green and spongy, and deep-set verandahs made the school look cool and inviting. But when Maeve opened the car door, the heat hit her like a fiery wall.
The school was nothing like St Philomena’s. Maeve noticed how new everything was, from the wide, open walkways to the shiny surfaces in the classrooms. Even the chapel was modern, with a sharp, spiky tower and an abstract stained-glass window. As she followed Goong Goong and Por Por around, Maeve kept picturing the dark chapel and shady grounds of St Philomena’s and all the places she and Steph and Bianca used to sit. There was nowhere to hide in this school, nowhere that friends could share their secrets. But maybe there wouldn’t be anyone she’d want to confide in. She thought of Steph and Bianca with sharp longing.
They left the Vice-Principal’s office with a thick shiny brochure that explained everything the school had to offer and a wad of pale green forms to fill out.
‘You’ll like this school, Maeve,’ said Por Por. ‘Much more than that old St Philomena’s.’
‘I loved St Philomena’s,’ said Maeve. Quietly, she took out her mobile and sent a text message to Bianca and Steph. New school has boys but who cares? St Phils rocks. Miss u. M.
Maeve woke with a start. For a moment she lay absolutely still in the dark, listening to her pounding heartbeat, so loud, so urgent, above the roar of the surf. She got out of bed and pushed the filmy curtains aside. Even though there was only a sliver of a moon, the cresting waves shone white in the darkness of the ocean.
She flicked on her bedside lamp and reached for the silky green notebook.
Secret Facts from the Secret life of Maeve Lee Kwong On 12 September 2001, me and Mum were staying at Surfers. We had the whole apartment to ourselves. I was sneaky when I was a kid. I got out of bed at dawn and tiptoed into the living room to watch MTV. But when I turned on the telly, the World Trade Centre was falling down. It was like a bad movie. I panicked. What if planes everywhere started flying into tall buildings? What if I had to jump out the window? We were on the 16th floor! I started crying and Mum came running into the living room, still in her pyjamas. When she saw what I was watching, she started to cry too, but she picked up the remote and turned off the TV.
She took my hand and led me out to the balcony. I was freaking out but she made me follow her. The ocean was pink and gold in the early morning light and the air was sweet and clean. Mum told me take a deep breath. We were alive and we were safe.
It feels like that happened in another life – my life with Mum before Andy and Ned came along.
So the secret fact is if you look at the sunrise and take a deep breath it helps you feel brave.
She went to the balcony to watch the sun inching its way over the horizon and took a very deep breath. It was Christmas morning. Her first Christmas without her mother.
Goong Goong and Por Por weren’t very interested in Christmas, so Maeve was surprised to see a huge box wrapped in pink paper and gold ribbon sitting on the coffee table in the living room. There was even a mini Christmas tree beside it. She wished it didn’t remind her of the live pine tree that she and Sue had decorated together the year before. Goong Goong looked up from his newspaper and tried to smile as Por Por raced out of the kitchen.
‘Happy Christmas, Siu Siu,’ said Por Por, kissing Maeve on the cheek.
Maeve gave her a hug back and then knelt down beside the coffee table, staring at the present.
‘Aren’t you going to open it?’ asked Goong Goong.
Slowly, Maeve peeled away the layers of wrapping paper.
‘Wo
w!’ she said, when the last piece of pink paper lay on the floor beside the box. ‘My own laptop! Cool! Thanks.’
‘And there’s a connection in your room with broadband so you can send those email things to your friends whenever you want,’ added Por Por, looking to Goong Goong as if to affirm that ‘email’ was the right word to use.
Maeve stared at the laptop. She knew Por Por was unhappy about how much time she’d been spending in the Internet café at the end of the street. Now she’d have no excuses to leave the apartment.
‘Would you like me to assist you in setting it up?’ asked Goong Goong, folding his newspaper neatly.
‘Thanks, Goong Goong, but I can figure it out.’
She picked up the silvery laptop in one hand and carried the box with all the accompanying computer cords in the other. In her room, she quickly worked out how to get the laptop running. In Sydney she’d always had to argue with Andy or Sue to get any time on the family computer. It gave her a weird feeling to open all the different applications and license them to herself. As soon as she’d worked out how to get the computer connected, she logged onto MSN as Warrior Princess Kicks Arse. No one else was online. Why would any of her friends be sitting at a computer on Christmas morning?
She was scrolling through some of her old messages when the computer peeped to let her know another person had come online.
It was someone called ‘Dancing Man’. Maeve frowned. Who the hell was Dancing Man? She checked his profile and then remembered that Bianca had met him in a chat-room and insisted everyone had to include him on their MSN. Maeve looked at his message and wondered if she should ignore it.
Hey ’ s’up, WPKA?
Maeve hesitated before responding.
Asl?
14mSYD – U?
13fQLD.
Hey, Merry Xmas! What’d u get?
A laptop. U?
A mobile – but my baby bro hammered it and it’s broke already.
Crap.
My bad – I let him hold it. He’s cool.
The Secret Life of Maeve Lee Kwong Page 8
