Henry’s Daughter (27 page)

She looks at Eddy. He's holding the photo of Henry, sort of staring at it, like he doesn't like it,
or maybe he likes it too much. Yeah, for sure he likes it too much because his eyes haven't got that smartarse look in them. They look sort of big and sad.

Family. That's all there is.

Lori hasn't done a whole heap of thinking lately – hasn't been game to think much further than the next day, the next week – due to Mavis. Sooner or later someone will make them open that door and let her out.
Then this room and everything else will all go to hell.

Big always rules small, like, size is power. Small countries get taken over by the army of big countries, who kill the people, wreck everything then set up that country the way they want it. The little people lose their houses and half of them starve until the aid workers come in to feed them and give them tents. How do you control big countries
if you are a small country? How do you make a world change when you can't make people change their socks? How do you stop Mavis's eating unless you lock her away from food?

You can't.

So why is Martin so paranoid-crazy about her being locked in?

Because it's illegal, and why it is illegal is because everyone in this world today is supposed to be equal and, like, have equal rights, prisoners
who murder people, even, and crazy people, everyone is equal. And how can kids believe that crap, when the whole world is in-your-face unequal? Like all of those parliament guys getting to fly overseas every week or two and not paying one cent of their own money to do it, and poor Henry, always dreaming of flying home to his England and never getting to do it. That's not equal. And it's not fair.

And allowing a person to kill themselves with food if they want to, due to equal rights, is also crap. That's like a country attacking itself, like civil war, and no one sending in their army to stop them.

Getting away to the river by herself to do some hard thinking used to make Lori happy, but her thinking tonight is making her feel sort of sad, sort of hopeless sad, like how can anyone ever
hope to fix up this stupid world? Probably, each person just has to try to fix up the bit of it that belongs to him and let the rest go to hell if it wants to.

She shrugs, sniffs in a big whiff of O-Cedar oil and wet couch and woodsmoke. They are good smells. Eddy sure fixed up this part of his world. And he fixed up the boys' feet – as soon as Lori starts to even think she smells dead socks,
she mixes up a brew of Condy's crystals and makes the one with the diseased feet soak them, makes them spray the insides of their shoes with vinegar. She takes control before the bacteria get control.

Henry knew pretty much everything. He must have bought those Condy's crystals, yet he didn't use them. Why? Because he was only a shadow and a shadow just floats where it is taken, sort of stuck
to the feet of the one who is taking it. Lori is not a shadow. Vinnie was; he went wherever he was taken, just clinging, becoming the shape of the one he was with.

Mavis is not a shadow.

Lori looks at the window. Dark out tonight. Late now. Who is Vinnie clinging to tonight? She takes a deep breath, doesn't really want to think about that. Her eyes wander the rotting curtains, seeking a safe
place for her mind to go. Those old curtains will have to stay up for a while because the roll of curtain material bought for this room is no longer good enough for it. Mick's room needs curtains.

He won't mind having the birds and Neil will love them. And Mavis, she'll need a new summer tent soon. She'll get birds whether she loves them or not.

Lori's last attempt at tent making wasn't a success,
but the next time she'll do better. Maybe if she cut the tents in four bits, like two big oblongs for the body, and two small ones for sleeves, then sort of shaped the top bits in like raglan sleeves, stitched those top bits together and threaded elastic through the neck and cuffs. It might work out better than a zipper – or leaving one shoulder seam open.

She yawns and her mind wanders to
if
land, like
if
two years have passed and she's left school and Mavis is slim and beautiful and wearing jeans and dangling earrings, and her face is looking like that photograph, and
if
she's looking like that she'd never want to eat again. The mind picture is coming and it's coming strong. Lori can see her in the kitchen and she's making her custard and –

Cut that picture. Cut it fast.
If
and
pretend stuff is for little kids. Once Mavis is out, the couch will be back digging a hole in the wall and the kitchen will be Mavis's kitchen, not Lori's. That's reality. That's looking the future in the eye. And Mavis will never be slim and beautiful again because she won't ever be seventeen again. That's fact and it's no use thinking
ifs
and pretending that things are different to what they
are.

Still, they can at least have a picture of how she was when she was beautiful. And they can have a picture of Henry too, of before he got lost. They can bring him back into this house and make him stay, make him put down new roots, so that she and the brothers have got something to hang on to, and maybe, wherever Henry is, he'll be able to grab on to them too and stop his floating around.

‘We'd better put that fire out and go to bed,' Mick says.

Eddy prods the log back with his foot. ‘It's safe. If the chimney was going to catch, it would have done it by now.'

‘What if a spark flies out?'

‘What if the roof falls in, more likely,' Eddy says.

‘What if Mavis escapes and axes us in our beds?' Jamesy says.

The what
ifs
keep getting sillier and the laughing starts again.

‘What
if we don't wake up in the morning and get to school?' Lori says. ‘Go on. Go to bed. Everyone.'

‘Yo, boss,' Eddy says, but they go.

It's funny the way they let her be boss – probably because she's the one who carries the bankcard. She also gets to make the decisions about spending the extra money. Like Eddy asked her if he could have the lounge suite, as if she was the boss of the money. Probably
she got born bossy, like a chip off the old block. She sighs, thinks maybe she'd prefer to be like Mavis than Henry.

Wow! What a thought. Put that one to bed!

Matty and Timmy are sound asleep, snuggled up together in the central sag. The poor old mattress has had to stand a lot of pressure and it's just about caved in. Lori is pleased to creep into her narrow bed, but tonight she lies on her
back, thinking, watching the new patterns on the walls made by the flickering fire. It's warmer in her room tonight. Fire warmth is beautiful.

She rolls over. This sure is a hard bed, which is due to having wooden slats beneath it instead of a normal base. She'll get used to it. After a bit, people get used to most things – like celery and cucumber. Mavis eats them now. Mostly.

The glow from
the lounge room fades as the fire slowly dies and she sleeps.

Life isn't fair. Things start to get a bit easier in one direction and they explode in another direction. It's Saturday and it's late; the kids are eating a pile of fried sandwiches, and Mavis, who they left starving for her lunch until three o'clock, due to they've been doing the rounds of the garage sales, can smell their fried sandwiches. She's cursing the lot of them
– and her plate full of salad and boiled egg – when the kids hear footsteps on the verandah.

No one heard a car drive up. No time for medicinal coffee or custard. The first they know of their visitors are footsteps on the verandah. It's a nice day, both front and back doors have been left open to let some fresh air through. Mick's door is open, and his window. Everything is open – except Mavis's
door.

They think it's the social workers but it's not, because the footsteps don't stop at the door. Social workers at least have the good manners to knock.

Lori runs, tries to head the intruders off mid passage, but a rangy greyhound brushes by her, an anorexic poodle not far behind. Eva and Alice have tried threats, bribery and corruption, and probably the legal way, so now they turn criminal.
They've got kidnap on their minds, like, if Mavis and her team can snatch those twins from St Kilda in a furniture van, Eva and Alice can do it too.

Eddy pales, shrinks two sizes, places his sandwich down as Alice enters the kitchen, snorting and snarling like she's been forced to chase a lure she's got no interest in catching. She's blowing smoke from her pinched nostrils and it looks like steam;
her lips drawn back in a snarl aren't holding her teeth in today; the teeth are fighting to get out, to bite off rats' heads, or kids' heads.

‘Out to the car. Move it, boys,' she says.

‘Please, darlings, hurry,' Eva whimpers, looking seasick beneath that blue ceiling, looking washed out against that blue wall. ‘Where is she?'

‘In the loo.' Lori is standing behind them, looking at that green
door and wondering what has happened to Mavis, who has stopped her cursing. ‘Close the door. Close that door!' she mouths, signalling to Eddy.

He's sitting in front of it and he hasn't said a word. Eva mock-kisses him – she doesn't get a chance to kiss Alan.

‘I'm not going with you,' he says, dodging around her, leaving his half-eaten sandwich for whoever gets to it first, and he's out the back
door and over the side fence. Gone bush.

Eddy watches him go, wants to go with him. But this is his mother, isn't it? This is who he still thinks of as Mother. While he didn't see her, he could put her on hold, knowing if he wanted to go back, he could. He just hasn't felt the want yet, or not often. Not a lot to want back there, really – except his computer and the money. That's what he thought.
But seeing her here now, in the kitchen, strange wanting stuff is grabbing at his insides. It's like he's come face-on to his own green door. He can go through it, get rid of this wanting feeling, or he can slam that door shut and shove the bolt, but once he's locked that door, he could be stuck here forever.

Does he want to be stuck here forever? Probably not. He doesn't know. This place is
like a game he's been playing. Maybe he ought to go home. He can't make up his mind. Doesn't want the decision. Not today. This is a real-life decision, not computer stuff, not funny fiction for the telephone. He has to take off, go after Alan and leave the decision for another day, and if he doesn't go over that fence soon, he's going to go back, crawl into his computer for the rest of his life.

It's a brilliant computer, better than the library's; Eva always bought the best. He's got his own room in St Kilda, he gets pots of money to spend and he sure misses that money. Doesn't miss the school. Misses the city. Doesn't miss old Alice. Misses the traffic and the buzz and the crowds and the ocean. Up here there is nothing. Everything is dry and looks like crap. Nothing to do – except being
with the kids and living free.

These kids? Alice? No contest.

And Eva?

He's on his feet now and holding the back door wide, looking out at freedom, but he can't go over the fence, leave the decision for another day. There might not be another day. Won't be for Lori and Mick if Eva opens that green door. He's looking at that in-your-face door. Mavis is going to yell out any minute now, then
Eva will let her out.

Or will she? Maybe not. Probably not. But even if she doesn't open the door, she'll call the cops on her mobile and they'll open it. Kids can't lock their mothers up and feed them on rabbit food, even if it is for their own good. Okay, so he did it, but he wasn't so involved with this place back then. It was just a game, like, can I beat the odds? A longer game – a more
interesting game.

It's not a game now. It has become his glorious quest and he has to shut that back door. Eva isn't dumb, and old Alice is whippet smart. But if he shuts the door he's locked in with both of them and he'll cave in and go. He always did around these two. It was easier. Just give them what they wanted and he got what he wanted. Got anything he wanted.

But does he want to go back
to being who he was before? Empty. Lonely.

No. No, he doesn't want that. Okay, that's one definite.

There is a lot of stuff he wants in St Kilda. Plenty that he doesn't want. Here he's accepted – needed, even – and he wants to get this house painted on the outside – paint it white, paint its roof red – wants to do a lot of stuff. But more than that, he wants this mob. They are the only ones
who ever filled up that empty, lonely place inside him. They need him too. They like him – most of the time. And they like him for who he is, not for who he's pretending to be.

But what about his computer?

He can use the ones at the library when he's desperate, and he's been looking at second-hand computers; they get some real cheap deals at the computer shop, and the guy who runs it says he'll
have some good ones in a month, the whole works for four and a half hundred – which would be better than nothing.

Still, if he doesn't go back, Alice will probably make sure that account at the bank is closed. She's the boss and she uses money like a weapon.

He really wants his computer. He had so much stuff on it.

But does he want it enough to go back to being chained up like a stray pup and
retrained into rolling over, playing dead on cue, and never even getting a pat on the head for doing it? Eva might be big on words and external stuff, but that's pretty much all she is big on. Alan used to say she was plastic coated, strong plastic coated, so you break your fingernails trying to get at what is inside. Up here no one can afford plastic. Up here their skin is exposed. You can touch
them, cuddle the little kids, tickle them and make them laugh.

And Mavis. What is actually inside her skin? There is so much of it no one could ever get in. Not now. But he's going to get her skinny. Yeah, and beautiful again. That's his glorious quest. He didn't know Henry, can't ever know Henry now, but he can get to know his natural mother – when she's thin and beautiful. He wants that, needs
that more than needing his computer. It would be like his coming home had made her beautiful again, like he was something special for once.

Old Alice is still nagging. He's not listening, but God, he loathes that nagging mouth. It's all teeth. He can't stand to look at it, but he's looking now, watching those teeth. His stomach is turning over, and his brain is like lightning flitting from one
side of the argument to the other while the fried sandwich he's eaten is trying to come up and choke him. He keeps swallowing it back down, looking at Alice's stained carnivore teeth, working up some aversion therapy as he closes the back door. Slowly.

Lori is standing, hands on her hips, wondering what took him so long. The little kids have stopped eating. Matty fishes for his dummy string,
places his sucking tool in his mouth, stares big eyed at Alice's teeth.

‘If he wants to stay with us, he can,' Lori says, and Mick nods, eggs her on. ‘He's our brother, and we didn't know him till February. And he doesn't legally belong to you anyway. He legally belongs to Mavis and to us.'

‘Go out to that car, boy. Your mother has been upset long enough by this business.' Eddy turns to his
mother. ‘After all your mother has done for you. If not for your mother's care you would have died. You wouldn't be here now to defy her.'

‘Mavis is his mother,' Lori says, and she wonders what's come over Mavis, like why isn't she yelling, belting the door down now? And Eddy, he's dumb. Those buggers have got out their old lobotomy scalpel and they are cutting him again.

‘I have been a mother
to you, darling. The best mother that I knew how to be.'

Maybe she was too. Maybe she just didn't know how.

‘You're breaking your mother's heart, boy.'

They are throwing that ‘mother' word around as if it's expendable. They are throwing it so hard it starts to sound like it's something else. It's sounding like a word no one knows the meaning of.

Mother?

Sister and brother. That sounds real.
That sounds good.

Eddy is staring at Lori, he's shaking his head, and she's worried. She steps closer because he looks as if he's going to start bawling . . . or . . . maybe just head for the shower for an hour. His back is to the closed door. His eyes are sort of pleading – help me, someone, convince me – so she tries.

‘Why can't we all be one family? Why can't you just come here and sit down
and visit like other aunties do? Why do we have to be like . . . enemies?'

‘Hold your tongue, miss,' Alice snaps, but Eva accepts the invitation and she sits, puts her head down on the plastic tablecloth and turns on plastic tears.

‘No one understands what she did to me. No one will ever understand what I went through for her. She stole my childhood,' Eva sobs.

Eddy walks towards Eva, and Alice
sees that those tears are winning the day. She grasps his arm.

And he's going. He's looking at Eva, looking like he always does before he has one of his showers. He's looking at Lori, sort of hopeless now, sad and shaking his head, like, what else can I do?

Until Neil runs at Alice and kicks her ankle. ‘You leave our brother alone, you bully duck,' he yells.

That sure breaks the spell, and
breaks Alice's concentration. She hasn't heard that one before, and she's never been attacked by a face-pulling six year old before either. She releases Eddy's arm.

He's stepping back, and back, his eyes that never leak are leaking bad. Neil isn't retreating. He's standing in front of Alice, his legs spread wide, his face belligerent, and he's never looked more like Mavis.

Eddy wipes his nose
with his wrist, then with the same hand points to the enlarged photograph of a young Henry, which now hangs on the kitchen wall. ‘That's my father,' he says, his voice breaking, and near breaking Lori's heart. ‘That's my own father and he's dead. Alan knew him, and all these kids knew him, and I didn't. And I can't ever know my own father because of you, Mum.'

‘You know it is what he wanted,
darling. He planned so much more for you than . . . than
this
.'

‘Well, it's not what I wanted!' he yells. ‘Did anyone ever ask me if I wanted to know my own father?' Eva is dabbing at her eyes, but Eddy is crying for real now. ‘You lied to me. All my life you lied to me, and all the time my own father was only a few hundred kilometres away and I could have known him like Alan did. And now he's
dead and it's not bloody fair.' He's bawling hard, and it looks weird on him. Lori didn't know he could bawl.

‘Watch your tongue, boy,' Alice snaps. It's the wrong attitude because it makes Eddy upgrade his language.

‘This is none of your fucking business. You're nothing to me, you're a nagging old bitch. I hate the sight of you, and I always did.' He's breaking the no-swearing rule, but that's
okay, and he's almost as loud as Mavis, his nose is red and he's sloshing tears everywhere, and that's okay too, because those tears are fighting tears.

‘Yeah. And if you tell lies, then you get put in the lock-up with Mavis, and you have to eat fucky celery,' Neil yells.

Eddy's head damn near rotates a full circle and his tear taps turn off fast. He wipes his nose with his wrist, grabs hold
of Neil, muffling his blabbing little mouth before it says more. Lori is heading for the back door.

‘You know that Henry placed both of you in my care,' Eva says. ‘You know he had plans for his darling boys.'

Lori is beside Eddy and Neil, ready to stifle the little twit, throttle him if necessary. ‘Yes, well our mother never wanted either of them to be with you, did she? She said she wouldn't
trust you to raise rabid Rottweilers. And our father is dead now, so Mavis is the boss of this house and she wants the twins to stay here. She's even got the papers to put them back on her dependants list,' Lori says. ‘And if you cause any more trouble, she's going to take out a restraining order, because that's what the department of . . . of welfare for children and supporting mothers said to
do. And they said that they'd give her any help she needs to do it too.'

Eva is on her feet. She doesn't like the sound of that.

‘You'll be sorry, boy. There will be no more money paid into that account,' Alice says.

Eddy, still holding on tight to Neil, lifts his chin. ‘I'm not your boy, and this isn't about fucking money, and you keep out of this – '

‘Yeah, 'cause we got plenty of fucky
money,' Neil yells. ‘We got a jar full of fucky money, so there.'

Eddy is shaking, but he's holding Neil against him like a vice. Lori doesn't know if he's trying to shut him up or just trying to soak some fight from the feisty little coot. Mick is standing silent, scared. Jamesy and Timmy are sitting at the table, sharing Alan's sandwich because it doesn't look as if he's coming back to get
it.