The Intentions Book

by Gigi Fenster

  Like Wendy asking how Rachel seemed on Wednesday when David saw her, and David saying, ‘Even keel. You know Rachel. Even keel.’

  Like Sadie’s silent voice saying, ‘How can you be even keel when you’ve taken yourself off to the Tararuas. Alone. In August?’

  Morris went to the Tararuas with the Wellington Tramping Club on returning to Wellington after university. All indications were that things would go well with the club. He’d written to their president from Christchurch, enclosing a testimonial from the president of his own club. He’d received a reply: they’d be glad to have him. Was he one of those southern madmen who used old-fashioned heavy backpacks? Would he like to join their next tramp in the Tararuas?

  The Wellington Tramping Club promised to provide him with everything he had got from his university tramping club in Christchurch. It promised long planning sessions with maps and lists, evenings at someone’s kitchen table where there was only one topic of conversation—tramping. It promised a Christmas tramp he could use to silence his Aunt Joan’s requests that he spend the holidays with them, and colourful characters he could tell her about when she asked, with elaborate tact, about his friends. It might even throw up a tramping buddy.

  The Wellington Tramping Club sent Morris into the Tararuas with fifteen other people who all knew each other. They started walking in the evening. Eyes on the ground, torches to avoid tripping up roots. When Morris woke the next morning, he had no idea where he was. Then the mist came and the rain came, and they spent two nights in a hut intended for six people. They spoke about people Morris didn’t know. They spoke about the Tararuas.

  They called themselves ‘Tongue and Meats’. Their president was short. He spoke about girls and the ‘rugged Tararuas’. Morris took this as an attack on the southern lakes. The president made jokes about southern men who used overly macho backpacks. Morris didn’t find them funny.

  Morris hated that short president. He thought night tramping absurd. He couldn’t see more than ten feet in front of him in the Tararuas. He never got his bearings.

  After six months of pretending to laugh at in-jokes he didn’t get, Morris began to wonder whether his memories of fitting in at his old university tramping club were reliable. Maybe he was just some schmuck there too.

  David brings his laptop into the kitchen so they can check the weather on the internet. They gaze in silence at the swirling arrows and moving colours until Wendy says, ‘I have no idea what I’m looking at.’ David says, ‘Me neither,’ and they both turn to look at Morris.

  ‘Um, it looks fine at the moment.’

  ‘That’s something,’ says David. Neither he nor Wendy asks what ‘at the moment’ is supposed to mean. David pulls the laptop closer. ‘Let me show you the gym website. It’s got a spiel on Rachel. I checked it earlier to see if she had any classes today.’

  ‘And?’ says Wendy.

  ‘And she doesn’t. I would have told you if she did.’ He stretches over to draw Wendy closer to the screen. ‘But the website’s still worth a look. You can learn a lot about our Rachel from this website. Or should I say, you can learn a lot about Rache, aka Goldie, personal trainer and group fitness instructor.’

  There’s a photo of Rachel, and next to it (David taps the screen over the words) Rache Goldberg, aka Goldie.

  Aka Goldie? Morris has never heard his daughter referred to as Goldie, though he has heard plenty of other nicknames for her. Sadie, self-proclaimed nickname queen of the known world, saw to that. But Goldie doesn’t sound like one of hers. It’s too brassy, too common and conventional. Too much a nickname that a kindergarten teacher could have thought up. No, it’s definitely not one of Sadie’s. Sadie’s nicknames were cutting. They clawed at the heart of the person.

  Sadie’s scratchy nicknames followed her about like a family of fluffy chickens, soft, cute, cuddly, but capable, if turned in the right direction, of pecking their way through your eyes.

  Take Sadie’s one and only nickname for Morris. Morris, the one person whom the nickname queen spared, or overlooked, or found herself stumped by. Until that joke. A joke told by a banker with shoulder-length hair and a pink tie.

  ‘Goldberg,’ the banker had roared, clapping Morris on the back. ‘Have I got a joke for you. Something to lighten this meeting up before I tell everyone how your brain and my brawn are going to make us all seriously rich.’

  Lighten the meeting up? Did business meetings call for lightness? Morris had not prepared for lightness.

  ‘So, a Chinaman and a Jew get into an argument in a bar.

  ‘“You people,” says the Jew, “you bombed Pearl Harbour.”

  ‘“Nonsense,” says the Chinaman. “The Chinese didn’t bomb Pearl Harbour—that was the Japanese.”

  ‘“Chinese, Japanese. What’s the difference?”

  ‘“Anyway,” says the Chinaman, “you Yids have got a lot to answer for. Let’s not forget who sank the Titanic.”

  ‘“What are you talking about? The Jews didn’t sink the Titanic. It was an iceberg.”

  ‘“Iceberg, Goldberg—what’s the difference?”’

  Morris had looked down at the open notebook in front of him. His clicking pen rang out in the silence that followed what he thought was genuine laughter at the joke. His business partner said something. The banker laughed loudly. Cups rattled as the tea trolley rolled into the meeting room.

  ‘Gazing out of the window, you were, for the whole meeting,’ Morris’s partner complained later. ‘I just spent half an hour in the lobby with him, convincing him you’re some kind of savant genius thing. From now on I’ll deal with the meetings, you come up with the systems. And Morris, please, Morris, try to explain them in a language that ordinary people can understand.’

  Morris looked up from his desk. ‘It’s just … He pulled the rug out from under me—that joke.’

  ‘Yes, well, couldn’t you just laugh?’

  The banker never did make Morris rich and the business partner left soon after to go into business on his own, but the nickname stuck because Morris told the joke to his wife.

  He had not planned on telling Sadie the joke. But she asked him how the meeting went. He started at the beginning, and at the beginning was the joke. He got as far as Iceberg, Goldberg, when Sadie leapt up, shouting, ‘What’s the difference?’ and ran off to call her sister.

  ‘Bendy Wendy,’ she laughed into the phone, ‘have I got a joke for you! You’ll laugh like a drain.’

  Sadie tended to cry when she laughed hard, and later, when Morris picked up the phone, he found the receiver still wet from her tears. He had to walk to the kitchen to get a tea towel to wipe off the handset before making his call.

  Sadie had laughed till she cried. And Wendy had laughed, and by the time Sadie put the phone down Morris Goldberg had become the Iceberg.

  Later that night, when he came to bed, Sadie turned to him. ‘You forgot to tell me how the meeting went.’

  ‘Fine. It was fine.’

  She propped herself up. ‘I’m sorry I rushed off like that. You know how I get with a good joke. Tell me. I want to know. Were you pleased with how it went … Iceberg?’

  Sadie’s nicknames didn’t have a long lifespan. At least not in their original form. They tended to mutate over a period of months. David, for example, had been variously King David, Prince David, the Little Prince, Davy Crockett, Crocker, Docker, King of the Wild Frontier and, when Sadie was complaining about him to Wendy, Focker.

  But Iceberg was different. Iceberg stuck in its original form, immutable for at least—what was it? Three, four, five years even. It was still around at David’s bar mitzvah. Morris can remember Sadie’s whispered comment to Wendy on his speech: ‘It’s not for nothing that we call him the Iceberg.’

  That nickname was a burden to Morris, and Sadie’s whispered aside (was he intended to hear it?) hurt him.

  Rachel must have had a stream of nicknames imposed on her. Were they a burden to her?

  They seemed not to bother David
. He’d made up a few nicknames of his own—for Rachel, but especially for Sadie. Queenie, which Sadie said was because of her English accent, David said was because of her attitude, and Wendy said was actually the nickname she’d had for Sadie as a child. ‘I started calling you Queenie after you played Queen Esther in the Purim play.’

  David said, ‘You played Queen Esther in the Purim play? I thought they always chose the cute kid.’

  And Sadie said, ‘Actually, they chose the blond kid. How’s that for bizarre?’ She threw back her hair with a model’s flick. ‘And I happen to have a touch of the blond.’

  For a while David had called Sadie ‘Little Miss S’, which Morris thought came from some song. And there was that other song David used to sing—‘You’re once, twice, three times a Sadie.’

  Rachel saying, ‘It’s lady. You’re once twice three times a lady.’

  Morris finds himself humming the tune.

  Pull yourself together, man. This is no time for silly songs, and David’s face will crease if he hears that particular song. Look at the computer. Focus on the website. Look at the photo of Rachel who is, according to the website, also known as Goldie.

  Rachel smiles up at her father. Her hair is as gold as Queen Esther’s.

  She is beautiful.

  But you wouldn’t think so to look at her.

  To look at her?

  Well, she always hid it, didn’t she? Fringes and ridiculous haircuts, like she was trying to make herself look ugly.

  Even when she grew her fringe right down over her eyes. Even when her skin broke out in pimples and she refused to use the lotions that Sadie bought for her. Through all of Sadie’s ‘My God, why can’t she just enjoy her beauty?’ and all of Rachel’s small rebellions, she remained for Morris wonderfully, surprisingly beautiful.

  Sadie would have liked the Rachel of the photo. Her hair is swept away from her face. Her brow is clear, her skin shining. She’s glossy. Like someone dressed her up. Immediately before the photo was taken, she would have pulled a red lipstick from her bag, carefully touched up her lips, then clicked her pocket mirror closed and slipped it back in the bag.

  David says, ‘But wait, there’s more,’ and clicks on the photo. Morris leans forwards to read the words on the screen: Rache (aka Goldie) is hugely proud to be certified to teach Impetus! Strike! Control! and Step-Up! She is passionate about spreading the word on fitness training and believes that anything is possible in physical fitness if we only commit to it. This belief has made her a strong motivating presence and popular instructor. She considers herself lucky to be paid for doing what she loves best. And at the bottom in a smaller, less flamboyant, somehow apologetic font: Goldie has a National Certificate in Exercise Science and a Teaching Certificate from the Royal Academy of Dance. She is a Registered Teacher of the RAD. When she is not getting down with the gym members she runs a ballet school for children.

  A ballet school for children. That’s more like it.

  Rachel the ballerina, solemn in her leotard and tights. Rachel rising above the other girls, holding her arms straighter, her legs higher. Morris forgetting the camera on his lap. Beside him, Sadie, glowing at the stage as if she’d never complained that she hated the ballet teacher, detested the ballet mothers and all in all believed that ballet was ‘not entirely for the Jews’.

  For the Jews or not, they all went to those recitals. Wendy too.

  She was the first one Rachel ran to after the performance, to be grabbed in a hug that lifted her off the ground and be told that she was the greatest, the most elegant, most gorgeous, stunning, marvellous dancer of the lot. Then Wendy would put Rachel down and, still holding her hand, lift her arms high in the air. ‘Wasn’t she wonderful? Aren’t you so proud?’

  How had he replied to that? Had he also grabbed Rachel and hugged her? Had he taken his turn? Perhaps not in front of all those people. But he would have done so afterwards. He would have found a quiet time when no one was around, and he would have told her that she made him proud. He would have.

  David moves away from the screen and Morris bends closer. Impetus! Strike! Control! Step-Up! Her classes exclaim their names.

  ‘How did it come to this?’ he asks aloud.

  Wendy shoots him a look. ‘It’s no one’s fault. Mix-ups happen. Shit happens.’

  ‘No, no, I mean this.’ Morris points to the computer. ‘All these classes. How did Rachel come to be teaching all these exercise classes?’

  Wendy’s eyes stop shooting. ‘Oh my God! I remember when she first started teaching. Sadie and I went to one of her classes. It must have been about four years ago. Just before … Anyway, we thought it would be fun. We’d show our support. We thought we’d surprise Rachel. Well, she came in, saw us at the front of the class, came over and, believe it or not, she asked us to leave. She said that having us there would put her off her stride.’

  Wendy straightens the shawl on her shoulders. ‘There we were, all tarted up in our tracksuits, and she kicks us out. Talk about all dressed up and no place to go. We hung around a bit and watched the class from outside the room. We hid so she wouldn’t see us. And, d’you know, she was really very good. Really dynamic and enthusiastic. Like one of those eighties aerobics teachers.’

  ‘I know,’ says David. ‘Debbie goes to some of her classes. She says that Rachel whoops and sings and gets everyone clapping and cheering.’

  ‘Your mum and I couldn’t believe our eyes. It was such a transformation. I think that’s why she didn’t want us there. She didn’t want us seeing her like that.’

  ‘Did you know that story?’ David asks Morris. ‘Mum never told me. I wonder how it made her feel, to have Rachel kicking her out like that.’

  ‘All these exclamation marks,’ says Morris.

  Wendy gives a little shriek. ‘Oh my God, the exclamation marks. They drove Sadie nuts. They really burned her, those exclamation marks.’

  Morris remembers Sadie standing in the kitchen. Holding a flier. She’s angry, laughing, burning, healthy. ‘Our daughter has chosen a career with exclamation marks. An exclamation-mark career. I never thought I’d see the day.’ She thrust the flier towards Morris. ‘Look at it. Look at those words. Strike! Impetus! They’re so uncompromising. Quite aggressive, don’t you think? All these years I’ve been thinking I’d brought up a withdrawn, shy, almost cold little fish. But put her in a room with loud disco music, throw in a couple of exclamation marks and she turns into Jane Bloody Fonda. Jekyll Jane. I gave birth to Jekyll Jane.’

  Rachel wants to make herself someone new, Morris had thought. She’ll probably succeed. She’s that disciplined.

  ‘I wonder how long she’ll keep it up for,’ Sadie said. ‘I mean honestly, surely at some point something’s gotta give.’

  Morris thinks it must be tiring dealing with all those exclamation marks, putting on the lipstick day after day. It must be exhausting keeping that up.

  At five to three the phone rings. David answers. ‘Thanks for calling, I was just going to call you. Yes, I’ve been trying her phone all afternoon. Yes, it’s still off.’ He says, ‘Okay, we’ll do that,’ and, ‘Forewarned is forearmed.’

  He puts the phone down. ‘That was the cop. Rachel’s car’s still in the parking lot. He says we may as well start getting information together. Just in case.’

  Wendy says, ‘Just in case,’ and stands up.

  David says, ‘Though it probably won’t be necessary,’ and Wendy says, ‘Definitely won’t be necessary, but you know …’

  ‘Forewarned is forearmed,’ they say together.

  Like they’re going to battle—only not yet.

  David says, ‘They’ll want information about her gear and her skills, that sort of thing. We may as well start with the gear.’

  They sit at the kitchen table. David has a pen and paper. He says, ‘So, what do we know about Rachel’s gear?’

  Wendy and David both look at Morris. After a while David says, ‘So Dad, this is your cue.’

  �
�My cue?’

  ‘Well, you’re the one who knows about tramping stuff. Tramping was always your thing. Yours and Rachel’s.’

  It was their thing. Always had been. David was busy, even from an early age, with social events that Morris had no part of. And as for Sadie: ‘A day’s walk on a nice track maybe. One of those trips where they carry your bag and there’s a lovely lodge at the end with a restaurant I’ll consider. But to spend three days grappling over loose stones with a ten-ton pack on my back only to spend the nights in some stinking hut surrounded by people who’ve eaten nothing but baked beans for three bath-less days sounds like bloody hell to me.’

  No, it was not for Sadie, though she encouraged him and Rachel to go: ‘Morris, Morris, why don’t you get Rachel out of the house for a few days? These holidays are endless and there’s no ballet until next term. I’ve tried to arrange some friends to come and play with Rachel but … It’s like she’s hermetically sealed herself in the house. Please, Morris, take her tramping. The sooner the better.’

  Sometimes Rachel suggested it herself. She’d bring out the map and lay it on the table. They’d consider it together, then Morris would point to a spot and say something like, ‘How about … there? We’ve never been there. I could leave work early and we could go on the ferry.’

  He’d buy a more precise map of the area and they’d lay that on the table. ‘We can leave the car … here, and sleep the first night in the tent … here. If we get there too late, we could stop earlier, put the tent up … there.’

  Rachel would watch his pointing finger, solemnly considering his suggestions. Sometimes she’d ask about time or distances, but mostly she listened and nodded.

  Then Morris would pull out his tramping notebook, the one he kept his lists in, and they’d write a shopping list together.