Pulling the Moves

by Margaret Clark

  He looks defensive.

  ‘Nothin’.’

  ‘Why did you tell your mates you’d had it off with her, you little slime bag.’

  ‘I dunno—Anyway, who told you? None of your business, Leanne.’

  ‘Well, I’m making it my business.’

  ‘I was going with her and now I’m not. So what?’

  ‘Cop this, you little worm. Cathy’s a nice girl. She doesn’t need you badmouthing her. She really cares about you, and you’ve just used her up, and—’

  ‘Hang on, Leanne.’

  He looks at me with his innocent blue eyes. It must be the eyes: that’s how he gets them. The eyes. I’d like to change them from blue to black, but I fold my arms and tower over him.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Look, I thought I liked her, but now I don’t.’

  ‘Come on. You’ve been going with her for nearly a year now. Well, on and off.’

  ‘Yeah, and I’ve decided I don’t want to go with her any more.’

  ‘That’d be right. Use her then dump her. I hate guys like you, Cooja.’

  ‘So I changed me mind. I can’t help that, can I? I’m off Cathy and I like Bin.’

  Great. He’s pulling more moves than a can of sex-mad worms. He likes Bin! Does Sam know about this? Does Sam care? And if Cooja suddenly likes Bin, where does that leave Cathy and her friendship with Bin?

  He sees my uncertainty and changes the subject.

  ‘Where’s Sam?’ he goes.

  I sigh.

  ‘Somewhere near Portland. The cops are onto him, and …’

  ‘The cops?’

  He looks worried.

  ‘Sam’s me best mate,’ he goes.

  ‘Yeah, and you’re some best mate, tryin’a spade his girlfriend.’

  ‘They’re not going together any more, Leanne. Bin’s not going with Sam. She’s anybody’s, up for grabs.’

  I feel like bashing him over the head. Male pig-brain!

  ‘Look. Sam’s been found. He’ll be back soon and you can talk to him then. And if you know what’s good for you, you’d better tell your mates you were just mouthing off about Cathy, or you’ll be wearing your teeth on a necklace, got it? And lay off Bin!’

  ‘Okay, okay.’

  ‘Now hit the street. I’ve got to help Mum get ready for the wedding.’

  ‘Is the wedding still going ahead, then?’

  ‘Of course,’ I say. ‘It’s too late to cancel. Steve’s sure that Sam’ll be back in time. Now, go before I really lose it and deck you one.’

  ‘You’re a hard woman, Leanne.’

  ‘And you’re a terminal idiot,’ I mutter, as he leaves.

  I go to the lounge room and unpeel Bin’s mother off my mother and steer her towards the door.

  ‘Are you sure …?’ she says, looking back over her shoulder.

  ‘Yeah, yeah. We’ll be fine. See ya at the church, Mrs Strachan. And don’t forget to take the cake.’

  ‘Oh, yes. I have to drop it round at the Scout Hall.’

  She picks up the box and towels out, looking flustered.

  I feel exhausted. How will I hang out till the wedding?

  ‘Come on, Mum. Dry your eyes. We’ve got to get your make-up done and your dress on and all,’ I say.

  ‘I’d better go,’ says Mona.

  ‘Good idea.’ I show her the door.

  I go back and drag Mum into the bathroom. Major problem. If I shove her under the shower it’ll wreck her hair. I grab a washer and do her face and hands. Then I push her in front of me till we reach her bedroom. She walks like a zombie. I lead her to her bedroom stool and push on her shoulders. She sits.

  ‘Wait there!’ I go and get my make-up case. This is going to be a major job. Her eyes are all red and puffy.

  I smear on make-up thickly and do her eyes.

  ‘Don’t start bawling,’ I warn her. ‘This isn’t waterproof mascara, Mum.’

  ‘Oh, Leanne,’ she moans.

  ‘Keep calm. I just know that Sam’s going to rock up to the wedding, and if you look a wreck he’s going to crack it for sure. He’ll want to give away an attractive mother, not some blubbering wreck. And you want to look nice for Steve, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Trust me.’

  I outline her lips with my red pencil and carefully put on some lipstick. It doesn’t look right, too red, so I go to her cosmetic case and find a softer pink. I get her looking reasonable.

  ‘Now we’ll have a cuppa,’ I say.

  We sit at the kitchen table and drink strong coffee. She doesn’t want anything to eat, so I make myself some two-minute noodles. She’s probably stuffed to the eyeballs with Tim Tams, I think, as I glance at the clock.

  ‘We’d better watch some TV,’ I say. ‘It’s too early to put on your dress yet.’

  We take our coffees into the lounge and stare at some footy match. Mum gnaws at her fingernails.

  ‘I’ll put some polish on, Mum.’

  I haven’t got any pink polish so I paint her nails red. She waves her hands around to dry them. I thought women about to get married were all excited and happy. Mum’s like in a coma. She couldn’t care less.

  ‘Mum, are you sure you want to get married?’

  She looks at me with tired eyes. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Well, then. It’s time to get dressed.’

  ‘Isn’t it still a bit early?’

  ‘I’ve got to help you then get dressed myself, okay? Come on.’

  I lead her into her bedroom. The dress is hanging up on the curtain pelmet, covered in a huge plastic bag. I take it off the hanger and help her lift the dress over her head. It falls in soft folds around her. I adjust the train. Luckily it’s only short or I’d never cope.

  ‘Where’re your shoes?’

  ‘In the cupboard.’

  ‘There.’

  She squashes her feet into the white high heels.

  I fix the hat onto her head. I wonder how many daughters get their mothers glammed up for weddings?

  ‘Now, just go back and watch telly while I get dressed.’

  She sits gingerly on the lounge room sofa, her dress bunching round her, and obediently focuses on the football game. I’m really worried about her: she seems so pale, quiet and resigned. I realise with a jolt that she thinks Sam’s probably carked it out on the highway somewhere, and she’s gone into shock.

  I rush into my room and dab on some make-up. I drag my dress over my head and shove my shoes on my feet. No time to fuss. Mum’s just as likely to jump in the Falcon in her wedding gear and start driving down to Portland. When I finally get my hands on Sam I’m going to wring his scrawny little neck! I rip back into the lounge room and Mum’s still there staring at the footy match. We both sit and gawk at the screen as the players dive and weave after the ball.

  There’s a knock on the door.

  Who?

  Yah! The photographer! I’d forgotten all about it.

  ‘Mum, stand up and look happy,’ I go.

  The photographer poses us in various places. Mum tries to smile and her face looks like it’s going to crack.

  ‘She’s just nervous,’ I explain, as he rolls his eyes. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll get some great shots at the church.’

  He packs up his gear and leaves. We go back to watching TV. I didn’t know footy could be so boring. I keep looking out the window waiting for the wedding car. Anything to be out of this house and on our way before she breaks down completely.

  At last this grey Mercedes with white ribbons rolls to a stop outside our house.

  ‘Right,’ I go. ‘Ready? Grab your flowers, Mum.’

  ‘But what about Sam’s buttonhole? And Steve’s, too?’

  I snatch them up and shove them in a plastic bag.

  ‘We can give them out at the church. Now, come on.’

  We tumble out the front door and I lock it. We troll down the driveway with me trying to keep Mum’s train off the wet concrete. That’d be righ
t: a cold, rainy day.

  ‘Good luck,’ calls our nosy neighbour Mrs Pruitt from her side of the fence.

  ‘Thanks,’ says Mum shortly. There’s no love lost between Mum and Mrs Pruitt, who’s sniffing round outside her kennel for a bit. When our tennis balls go into her yard she never gives them back. She ring-barked our gum tree because she said it was choking her drains, and it was at least two metres from the fence, which means she must’ve sneaked into our place and attacked our tree. But trees don’t make for good fingerprints. And the time Sam sold her some chocolates for the school chocolate drive when he was in primary school, she bought two bags and said she’d pay later and never did. She phoned the cops because she said Sam’s billycart made too much noise roaring down the street! And she phoned the cops when I played my music too loud. But enough about Mrs Pruitt: she’s probably wishing someone’d marry her (she’s been a widow for about ten years) but a guy would have to be blind, deaf, dumb and desperate to go for it.

  The driver holds the car door open and I bundle Mum and her train in, and go round the other side. I fall onto the seat. There’re rain spots all over my dress: I hope they’ll dry without leaving stains or I’ll look like a mouldy grape.

  ‘You both look lovely,’ shouts Mr Peel, our other next-door neighbour. He’s nice, not like Mrs Pruitt. It’d be awful to have two feral neighbours. Mum gives him a watery smile. The driver shuts my door with a soft click and gets in the driver’s seat. Yesss! We’re on our way. I vow there and then that no way am I ever going to get married. It’s too much trouble.

  We cruise along the street in the rain and everyone gawps at our wedding car with its white dripping ribbons and Mum sitting in a crumpled heap. She must be the most unhappy bride they’ve ever seen, hunched like a miserable muffin in the back.

  ‘Smile, Mum. It’s your wedding day, right?’

  Mum grimaces. ‘What’s the time, Leanne?’

  ‘Quarter to three.’

  Mum straightens. ‘It’s too early. It’s bad luck to be early for your wedding, Leanne. Don’t you know that?’

  Who cares? I’m just trying to get her there before she throws a spac.

  But Mum’s suddenly determined.

  ‘We’ll drive down to the police station and see if there’s any news,’ she says.

  ‘Mum …’

  She taps the driver on the shoulder. ‘Can you go down to Central Police Station, please?’

  The driver looks puzzled. ‘I thought—aren’t we supposed to be going to St Martin’s Church on Greenley Street?’

  ‘We’re taking a small detour,’ says Mum firmly.

  He chucks a U-bolt and we drive sedately to the cop shop.

  ‘Pull up, driver.’

  ‘No parking here,’ he goes. ‘I’ll have to—’

  But Mum’s out of the car and moving through the drizzle like a snowstorm up the steps and into the cop shop. With a sigh I follow, feeling like a total loser in the disaster dress. Mum’s already at the counter and the young cop behind the desk’s looking stunned.

  ‘Aren’t you supposed to be at the church, Mrs Studley?’ he says as he recognises her.

  ‘Not yet,’ says Mum, draping her train over one arm and leaning on the counter, her damp scarf dangling all over the paperwork. ‘Is there any news of my son Sam?’

  ‘Latest bulletin was that he’s holed up in a haystack. The weather’s got worse and the copter can’t land, but they’ve got his position and they’re sending in a patrol car to pick him up. I haven’t heard anything since. Do you want me to try and contact Portland?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘Mum. We’ll be late.’

  ‘Quiet, Leanne.’

  He goes into another room. I lean on the counter.

  ‘Holed up in a haystack?’ I go. ‘That can’t be Sam. He gets serious hay fever.’

  ‘He’ll never make it back in time if he’s in a haystack,’ says Mum, her lower lip trembling. ‘We’ll have to cancel the wedding.’

  I think about the dresses and the cake and the time spent writing place cards and organising the Scout Hall and all the other stuff for this wedding.

  ‘Cancel? No way. You’re getting married with or without Sam. And don’t dare start crying. You’ll wreck your face.’

  The cop comes back. ‘The latest is that the van crashed into an appliance shop, and they’re …’

  ‘Crashed?’

  I think Mum’s going to faint.

  ‘What’s he doing in an appliance shop? I thought he was in a haystack!’

  ‘They’re at the station sorting it all out. Your son’s all right, Mrs Studley. Just a few bumps and bruises.’

  ‘He’ll have more than bumps and bruises when I’ve finished with him,’ says Mum, suddenly straightening, and she looks like she’s ready for a full-on fight. Now she’s found that he’s alive and well, Sam’s going to be in deep shit with Mum.

  ‘Come on, Leanne, let’s go. That son of mine is not going to wreck my wedding.’

  Mum swans out of the cop shop and down the steps to the wedding car. Her train trails in a muddy puddle before I can lift it out of the way. I figure this isn’t the time to tell her. She sits regally in the back, head up, and waves to some bystanders, just like the Queen of England, all the way to the church. She’s recovered with a vengeance. But I can feel my knees starting to shake.

  Sam’s still at the cop shop in Portland. The way things are shaping up it looks like I’ll have to be the one to give Mum away!

  SAM

  The guys light smokes.

  ‘We’d better stay here for a while,’ says Zac.

  The smoke swirls round the van and stings my eyes. Or maybe it’s the hay making them water.

  ‘Pity there’s no green,’ goes Zac. ‘I could pull a good pipe right now.’

  ‘Wonder what hay’s like to smoke?’ says Macca.

  Great. He’ll set us all on fire next.

  ‘Shit, I reckon.’

  ‘Yeah. Reckon.’

  ‘You smoke, Sammy?’ goes Cola.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Don’t do a little dope every now and then?’ says Zac.

  ‘No.’

  ‘A squeaky clean kid,’ says Macca.

  ‘He’s okay.’ Cola’s flirting at me with her eyes. Zac glares. If looks could kill I’d be dead.

  ‘Don’t go pulling any moves on my chick,’ he says.

  ‘I’m not your chick,’ snaps Cola. ‘We’re mates, that’s all.’

  She twiddles with the radio and gets some hayseed program about drenching cattle. Tries to tune it in to something else and all we get’s static.

  ‘How long are we going to sit here, then?’ she asks.

  ‘Five, ten minutes,’ says Macca.

  ‘Wonder if the copter’s out there?’

  ‘Get out and have a look. But don’t let ’em see ya, right?’

  ‘Okay.’

  She climbs out over some hay bales. I can see her through the rear window, cautiously poking her head round the hay.

  ‘Nothing,’ she says, coming back. ‘I reckon we’ve lost them.’

  Sure, I’m thinking, they’re going to give up just like that. You’ve got to be nuts.

  ‘We’ll wait a few more minutes,’ says Zac.

  I lie back and wonder what Mum and Leanne are doing right now. Mum’s probably been pounding on my bedroom door bellowing at me to get up. Then she’s discovered I’m not there. Panic stations. I wonder if they’ve cancelled the wedding?

  ‘Hey, Sam,’ goes Cola. She climbs over the front seat and into the back with me.

  ‘What ya doin’, Cola?’ says Zac.

  ‘Just talking to Sam.’

  ‘Get back here.’

  ‘In a minute!’

  She sprawls next to me and glares at Zac. He glares back.

  ‘I can talk to him, can’t I?’ she goes.

  He grunts, but watches her in the rear vision mirror as she relaxes next to me.

  ‘You got a mum and
dad?’ she goes.

  ‘A mum. And a dad in Noosa. And I’m supposed to be getting a stepdad in …’ I glance at my watch … ‘about an hour’s time. My mum’s getting married and I’m supposed to give her away.’

  Cola looks worried.

  ‘Sorry, Sam,’ she says. ‘But you shouldn’t have been sleeping in the van.’

  She squeezes my hand. She’s nice. Not her fault that she’s got in with these two hoons.

  ‘Yeah. Well …’

  I tell her about my fight with Mum, Steve and Leanne.

  ‘I’ve got an older brother and sister somewhere. No dad. My mum’s living with this real creep. Human octopus. I wouldn’t live with them if you paid me.’

  ‘So why are you with this lot, then?’ I ask. ‘You seem … I dunno … not like them.’

  ‘They let me live in the squat with them when I was on the run,’ she says simply.

  ‘Oh. Do you do drugs?’

  ‘I’ve smoked dope a few times but it makes me go weird. I don’t do it any more. And I don’t do speed. I have to look after these two.’

  ‘What about Zac?’ I ask. ‘Is he … I mean … you aren’t going with him?’

  ‘Nah. Told you. He sorta looks after me … I guess we all look after each other.’

  Zac swings round. We lock eyes. Then he swings back, but I’ve seen enough. Cola mightn’t know it, but as far as Zac’s concerned she’s his property.

  ‘Stop yakkin’ and go have another look for that copter,’ he snaps.

  ‘Why me?’

  ‘Why not?’

  Cola shrugs. Before I know what’s happening she kisses me gently on the cheek. Zac makes a snorting noise and swings round. I catch his eyes. He’s wishing I’ll drop down dead! Cola climbs out of the van again. I watch her move stiffly to the edge of the hay, rubbing her shoulder. She peers up, swivels her head, gazing through the drizzling rain at the sky. Then she comes back.

  ‘Still nothing. I’m cold. And I’m hungry. We’ve been driving round paddocks for hours. It’s nearly lunchtime.’

  ‘Get in and stop moanin’.’

  She goes to climb in the rear again.

  ‘In the front. We’re motoring. You can talk to him later,’ snarls Zac.

  She gets in over Macca, who’s dozed off, and stares, arms folded across her chest, out the side window.