family

Chapter Twelve — Untitled.

Gretal happened to be cleaning the toilets when Hans and Bart got there. She looked at the two slightly sweating men, a surprised expression on her face.

Hans swore under his breath and tried not to touch anything he shouldn’t be touching. ‘Sorry. Men’s business.’

Her face cleared. ‘The women’s toilet is finished?’

‘Thank you Gretal.’ He glanced at Bart. ‘Come on.’ He began stalking towards the kitchen.

‘Where are we going,’ huffed Bart. He sounded concerned.

‘We are not using the women’s toilet to have a conversation.’

‘Why the hell not?’

‘Because it’s just been cleaned, and the way my senses are going off fuck knows what it’s going to look like by the time we’re finished. God. It sounds like we’re having a secret tryst.’ He did not mention he really did not want to explain to Gretal why she might need to clean the toilet again. Blood stains were… He really didn’t want to have to clean it himself, which he got the feeling he’d do just so he didn’t need to explain anything, like where Bart had gone, for example. ‘If we change accidentally, or you know, get caught up in the lizard’s dreaming bullshit, we could damage stuff in there, so…’

Bart, the arsehole, began to chuckle. He wasn’t very bright at the best of times.

‘Good point. So …’ he said from behind Hans as they headed down the short corridor. ‘Where are we going?’

‘Out the back,’ said Hans as they entered the kitchen.

The sous chef, whose name he regretfully had never found out, looked up from her mopping. She frowned at them slightly and Hans gave her a wave.

‘Just heading out the back for a sec.’

‘Okay. I think Shianne is going that way shortly. She’s just emptying the bins.

Hans scowled. ‘Tell her to wait until we come back in.’

‘Okay? Is there something going on?’ She stopped mopping and straightened up, looking back and forth between the two men.

‘We’ll handle it,’ replied Bart, smiling.

Hans’ clapped him on the back. That was reasonably quick thinking. Maybe he had some brains after all. ‘Yes, nothing to worry about,’ he agreed, restraining himself from adding something brutally masculine.

Jesus Christ on a cracker biscuit, this is getting harder by the second. He glanced quickly at Bart, who nodded sharply. He flung open the back door.

The small courtyard was blessedly empty, aside from the skip bin and a couple of full bin bags lying in front of it. Hans sighed with relief and looked up at the clouded night sky.

‘I don’t see anything,’ he muttered.

The moon’s coming out, said Bart. Look.

Hans sat on his haunches and stuck his nose in the air. Where is she?

I’ll have a look from up here. It’s safer anyway.

He turned his head just as Bart scrambled up the drainpipe. Oh look at you go. You’re very good at that. And, look at me go. I’m not chasing you.

Congratulations, said the possum testily. Your roof has got wiggles in it.

Wiggles in it? It’s called corrugation you… Never mind. Oh look at that moon,’ Hans sang.

Your singing voice leaves a lot to be desired, said the possum, hanging onto the sloping tin grimly.

One of Hans ears flicked. The back door had just opened. A small tortoiseshell cat stood on the doorstep. large green eyes staring at him. It hissed. He growled, then went into overdrive.

CAT. Cat-cat-cat. Cat. Cat. Cat-cat-cat-cat-cat.

Who’s that, squeaked Bart worriedly from the roof.

Doooooooooog, yowled the cat, arching its back, tail fluffing up like a toilet brush.

Cat? The questioning voice came from the alleyway where another dog had appeared. Its eyes were very blue and its coat shone white under the moonlight.

Solway? Hans said. Look. Cat.

Solway! Chittered Bart happily. Hello beautiful. Please control your brother. I think he’s going to eat Shane. He grabbed at the guttering to stop himself from sliding off.

Is that Shianne, asked Solway. She sat and cocked her head inquisitively. She’s really pretty.

Fuck offfffffffff, the cat hissed.

Look at you, you feisty feline, growled Hans. Sorry I’m a dog. I apologise in advance but I’m not going to be half as polite as I have been all day. Which leg do you want to lose first? He walked stiff-legged towards the cat.

Hans, whined Solway. I like cats. Please don’t eat the cat.

I’m going to do something really terrible and regret it very shortly, said the cat. She leapt at Hans head (I have just realised how terrible this sounds).

The moon disappeared.

‘Oh shit,’ said Shianne.

‘Please get off me,’ said Hans

Solway started laughing just as the guttering on the side of the building came down with an almighty crash.

‘Sorry,’ said Bart calmly from beneath the horizontal drainpipe. ‘I don’t think it was made for this.’

‘When Shane gets off my head,’ said Hans in a muffled voice. ‘I’ll send you the bill.’

Eventually, after Shane had stopped kneading his chest and purring apologies (which Hans rather enjoyed) he lifted himself from the concrete and surveyed the area.

Bart had extracted himself from under the ruined drainpipe and stood next to Solway, trying to curl one leg around her, which she seemed to be rather used to. Shane stood next to him, blinking slowly.

‘I think I understand why I don’t like you,’ she said.

‘I know I understand why I don’t like you,’ Hans replied. ‘But, if I remember correctly, you seemed to like me quite a lot when we first met.’

Solway gently removed Bart’s leg from around her waist (he seemed quite agile) and stared at them both.

‘This is the woman from Carbarettas,’ she exclaimed. ‘Why didn’t you say so?’

‘I thought you would have figured it out,’ Hans said grumplily.

‘Why the hell would I have figured it out? A lot of people attach themselves to you.’

‘So… You don’t think it’s a coincidence Shane turned up here then?’ he growled.

Solway frowned at him then looked at Shane. ‘Shianne, you live locally, right?’

‘Yes I do,’ Shane replied. ‘I’ve been looking for work in the area for weeks. I don’t have a car yet either, so I’m walking or catching the bus. It just seemed sensible to try to find work nearby.’ She licked her hand and smoothed back her hair then scowled. ‘Am I going to be doing this cat thing very often? It’s really not conducive to getting employment.’

‘Ha!’ Hans folded his arms. ‘You see. You don’t want to work here at all.’ He rolled his eyes.

‘Yes I do,’ Shane hissed. ‘But I think, after attacking the big boss, I’m not likely to keep my job, am I?’

They glared at each other.

Fennel peered out through the back door. ‘What’s going on? I’ve been sitting in the restaurant for the last fifteen minutes drinking Cognac and complaining to myself, which is extremely boring, let me tell you, and wondering where the hell everyone went.’

Shane straightened her trousers and tucked in her shirt. ‘I’ll get back to it,’ she said softly, and picked up an overflowing bin bag.

‘I’ll give you a hand out here,’ Solway said, giving Hans her best squinty-eyed stare. ‘Why don’t you and Bart go and drink your bloody Cognac with Fennel and leave us to it.’

Hans knew when he was being dismissed, but he certainly didn’t appreciate Solway treating him like that in front of the staff.

‘I’m going back inside with Bart and Fennel,’ he said grandly. ‘Why don’t you help Shane with the bins, like the good sister you are.’

Fennel sighed and Bart looked slightly pained.

Solway just laughed and shook her head. ‘Come in Shianne. While we’re out here, let me tell you alllll about my brother.’

Hans didn’t wait to hear any more. He went back inside.

^^_____O_____^^

Sometimes, Hans thought to himself. I am under the distinct impression other people are writing my “life story” for me.

‘So you said that out loud,’ said Fennel conversationally. ‘Another drink?’

‘Can we please not drink Cognac anymore,’ asked Bart. ‘I think it’s going to give me a terrible headache.’

‘I already have a terrible headache,’ said Hans. ‘Which has nothing to do with you two, and everything to do with those two women sitting out the back and talking about me.’

‘They might not be talking about you,’ said Fennel.

‘When someone says they are going to talk about you, I think it’s fairly clear they are going to talk about you,’ said Hans. ‘So you know, there’s that.’ He swigged the last of his Cognac. ‘Do we have Bourbon?’

‘I like Bourbon,’ said Bart. ‘Less chance of me ringing people up I don’t know for no reason other than to say what the fuck am I saying?’

Hans glanced at him moodily. ‘The lizard is still here, isn’t she.’

‘Who,’ asked Fennel.

‘Oh dear,’ said Bart. ‘Gremlins, Fennel. You know, like the movie.’

‘Never seen it,’ said Fennel. ‘What’s that about?’

Hans snarled to himself and tried not to bite his own leg. ‘Fuck my life.’

‘What the hell are you doing,’ asked Fennel.

‘Controlling myself from asking why there are bits of food all over the table,’ said Hans airily. ‘Care to explain?’

‘Oh, you noticed.’ Fennel had the sense to look slightly embarrassed. ‘I can’t explain it actually. I don’t know exactly what happened. I figured it was the Cognac going to my head. It’s been a long day dammit.’

‘Before this goes any further,’ said Hans, finally remembering he was the bloody restaurant manager tonight. ‘Where the hell are Gretal and the sous chef?’

‘You mean Rhoda,’ said Fennel.

‘I know exactly who I mean,’ snarled Hans.

‘Okay. Well, I’m going to go and do something about bin bags,’ said Bart. ‘Don’t bother asking if you can help me because you can’t, and I also need to see what can be done with drainpipes and whether I’m actually capable of fixing one by myself.’

‘What happened to the drainpipe,’ asked Fennel.

‘It fucking rained a lot, that’s what,’ growled Hans. ‘Thirty year storm.’ He congratulated himself silently and felt like looking in a mirror.

‘I don’t think it rained that much,’ argued Fennel.

‘I’m off then,’ said Bart. ‘Not that anyone cares.’ He stood at the end of the table looking slightly dejected.

‘Byeeeee,’ said Hans.

‘You’re a prick,’ said Fennel as Bart walked away slowly looking hopefully over his shoulder.

‘You’re probably a mouse,’ said Hans. ‘So there.’

‘That’s it. I’m getting the Bourbon,’ said Fennel.

‘It’s about fucking time,’ said Hans. ‘Get the tequila and some shot glasses while you’re there.’

He was really fucking glad it was Monday tomorrow and someone, more specifically himself, believed in the tradition of not opening on a Monday.

to be continued.

Dear East Perth Lockup,

I’m wondering whether you still have my fingerprints on file. They may have changed slightly over the years, and acquired a scar or two. Many of your present day members may not remember me, but I do know (and remember) an old Ivan who may remember that night well.

It was night, to be fair, and i don’t believe it was dreary. The small, sparkly, poo-brown sigma had been the vehicle I drove at that time. It had been perhaps, purchased from another former member of your mob, and I happened to be driving it at the time I was caught wandering along Hay Street East.

My passenger, and I did have one if I recall, was a little person, but not a child, who happened to be, you guessed it, sitting in the passenger seat. My clothing, if I recall, consisted of one dress, purchased previously on Barrack Street (but not on the same night), peach, one leather belt, oddly shaped and white (it may not have been, but I did wear it with that dress on more than one occasion) and a pair of white leather slingbacks.

Your constables managed to finally get me to pull over when I considered it safe, that being on the lower corner as one turns left at the bottom of Barrack Street, possibly near where the Army Surplus Store once stood. They then proceeded to take myself and my passenger to the above address.

It may have been quite a surprise to one of the members on staff when the sister-in-law of his former “teammate” walked through the door. He may have indeed said some very inappropriate words along the lines of “What are you doing here” with a question mark somewhere in that sentence. He may have even laughed a great deal at the conundrum his former teammate’s sister-in-law found herself in at that time.

Let it be said, I never said I wasn’t a terrible teenager or young adult, but I did always manage to get to work, and the courthouse on time, regardless of distraction.

Thank you for your time.

Kate Capewell (nee Tew).

P.S. Paddy, also a former teammate, may remember his larks around the Dongara township. I think that’s on file as well, nothing to do with me, and quite a few years later.

I wish them and their families love, luck and hugs. May your ships always enter a safe harbour. CSC.

The Temple

Do you remember the conversation had from a car window to a man?

I do. It was a shared experience. It was personal. Nobody needed to back down, and I may have told him to pick his rubbish up, which may very well have been met with laughter. He did, by the way. Everyone recognises mum’s voice. I also apologised for using the mum voice, which may have made it even funnier.

Do you remember the conversation had outside a little house? ‘They’re getting cleverer,’ she said, and she wasn’t wrong. She didn’t recognise this place anymore. I admired her strength and her courage and told her so. It was meant to be kept private.

Do you know what it means when we go down to the beach and use the salt water to wash it all away? We knew each other then, and we know each other now, but we do not know each other. How does that sound?

Many years ago, when I was young, a priest told his gathering that the church was not a building and it was not a place. It was inside you, and it still is. You look up, inside yourself and you see the ceiling with the exposed beams, even if you’ve never seen anything like it before, and you may wonder where it came from. It’s yours. Perhaps the ceiling has gold leaf, perhaps it’s simply a golden wood, but if you watch carefully you can see the tiny little golden flecks of light coming down from that ceiling and wash its way around you, and help you feel stronger.

Do you remember that? It is your temple. You have the power to choose between what is right, and what is wrong.

— What is morally right, and what is morally wrong.

— What will destroy, and what will live and let live without creating a stain on your soul. This will bring you here, to this present, to your gift, to you, “beau”. Not all of us carry it lightly. Not all of us can walk through the crowd unnoticed, and sometimes it is simply a choice of whether one wishes to be noticed or not.

You can turn it off, if you want to. You can pretend it didn’t happen. You can simply forget we ever existed, if it makes you feel better. Will it make you feel better?

Then walk back down to the water’s edge, and release your little fish into the water. Watch him swim away. He’s not coming back, and you are the one who made that choice.

She’s not coming back, and you made that choice. I did not instigate your behaviour. That choice falls on you, and you alone. Love is not always what you want it to be. It’s not always pretty and unfortunately, it’s not always kind. This is the difference between nature and superstition, and I thank her for my time.

Don’t just read the sections of a book that interest or excite you. Read the whole bloody thing. A fifteen second miracle lasts as long as fifteen seconds. A lasting impression is not a cannon ball run.

Perhaps none of it will make sense to you. Perhaps all of it does. Perhaps that’s the entire point. Perhaps, you should start listening to what really matters, and not just what you think might matter. It’s always your choice. It’s never mine.

Rising of the Sun

I will show you this story in his true form, for this is who he is.

Let me guide through the long grass. Can you see him up ahead? This is my Brother. He waits for the sun to rise between the two hills, and he has been waiting for a very long time for his sister to come home to him.

I am here. Do you wish to move forwards with me, one by my side? For he is not for you. You are very brave, yes. My brother is not interested in doing the wrong thing. He is here for protection, and I need to help him home today. We need to watch the sun rise together.

Brother, please be patient.

He bows his head as he waits ahead. His shoulders are bunched, but he takes a breath and rests his arms on his knees.

”Don’t you dare make me look back there,” he whispers fiercely to me, and I grin, for this is directed to me, not the one by my side.

‘She does not understand you yet, brother. She has not come to speak of the timeless love to you. Not yet. But, she tells me she is willing to listen. It will help her craft.’

Brother two is taking me aside, and not in an unkind way. What you must understand is that he is many to me, as I am many to him, and I know which one has taken his place on the way to him.

‘I do not want to get in the way,’ this one whispers, and he is frightened.

‘You do not get in the way. For me, this has always been my brother, the other half of my soul. The one I love in a different way is sleeping. Do you understand?’

This tall one is sad, but it is not his time.

‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘I see now you are waking my brother from the sleep of the guilty and he was not taking care of himself.’

‘Not the guilty one, either,’ I say to him. ‘Please get out of my way. I need to watch the dawn with my brother. He was silenced for too long, through no choice of his own, and that time has passed now.’

My brother looks over his shoulder from up ahead.

‘Hurry,’ he whispers. ‘Dawn is coming.’

So I say to the young one. ‘You must understand. This is my brother. He can give you friendship, sweet girl, but that is all he gives you. You may sing to him, but this man is not for you. I understood this from the first time I came home to my brother. He is your rising song now, too, but it may take you some time to learn him.’

I lean down now, because my brother is on the grass in front of me, and I kiss the top of his head. He is very clever, and very swift, and is not afraid to let other men make decisions.

‘It’s time to watch the dawn,’ we say, because the first bird is singing.

‘Which bird do you hear,’ he asks, but he has heard it too.

They do not know which bird it is, and it does not matter to me and my brother. This is the right time of year for these birds, right now, and I must go outside to watch the dawn.

‘Do you want to go home now, little one,’ I ask the small child, for my brother is ready to raise himself up.

‘I do not know the home of this man or woman is,’ the little one replies. ‘Are they people, or lords, or ladies, or?’

‘They are simply people, and they are lovely people. They have kept you safe for far too long, and it is time to leave these people alone.’

‘I never disturbed them. I just watched and waited and left them all alone. Have I been so bad?’ The little one is sad now, but she/he never really understood. ‘I haven’t been bad, I just wanted to know what they did there.’

My brother, who was silenced for far too long, lifts his head. ‘No,’ he says, and it is this finality that has brought us here. ‘No. I can hold them back for as long as you require, my sister, but I will not allow them to destroy our peace of mind. I am here to take away the darkness and bring them into the light. I am here to share the dawn with my sister, who has helped me for far too long, and I am strong enough now to show these people the way to go home. They cannot have our flowers, they cannot have our children, they certainly cannot steal our ladybugs/ladybirds away, and it took me far too long to realise what they were trying to do to us, my sister, and they will never, ever keep us from telling the truth.’

The rising of the sun is displayed on our old hats. It is an Australian signaller who brought us to this point, and it is an Australian soldier who will bring us to safety. Always.

And, as always, our brothers sit between the two hills, and behind the hills, and on the ridges, and down in the gullies, and sometimes our sisters do too, and we will never forget the sound of our own, beautiful, National Anthem.

‘Thank you,’ my silenced brother says, and he says it softly, and he is never afraid to cry.

‘Pull your hat down on the eastern side, sis, and the sun will not get in your eyes.’

Sentinel

“Is it an African Elephant or an Indian Elephant?”

When I was a kid and interested in all sorts of things, I learnt a little bit about two types of elephants. Back then, the above is what they were called. I assume the names have changed now, but there was one very clear way to tell the difference.

The size of its ears.

The Indian elephant has much smaller ears.

I guess, if one looked at the map of the world online, or were lucky enough to own an Atlas, like we did when I was a kid, one would see that reflected in the size and shape of the two different areas. One is bigger, one is smaller. Unsurprisingly, as in the size of the elephants ears, India is smaller.

Now, as I was not born in either of those countries, rather one of quite a unique shape and size, I can’t compare my smaller ears to someone else’s. I also do not pretend to be African or Indian. I’m Australian.

I have a little voice in my head saying, ‘Just remember to keep calm.’ I’d say that would be a reflection of a certain amount of my heritage, but not all of it. You see, I’m not quite sure where the other side comes from.

As I have said many times in the past though, ‘Now is not the time to go jumping on your white charger and go galloping off into the sunset. People may get hurt.’ Life is a jigsaw, and sometimes parts of the jigsaw are missing. It is just the way of it.

When someone, or something, has passed away, it takes a very long time to get over it, if at all. The memories still linger, and occasionally we still allow ourselves to grieve. What we choose to do with those memories, though, is up to us. I don’t feel I need to repeat other things written in the past over and over again, if it has already been said.

What I do like to do, though, is have the opportunity to hone my skills. If that opportunity is taken away, the skills remain, not fresh, but struggling. Some people are particularly good at choosing words immediately. Some people like to carefully pick their words so the exact thoughts and ideas are presented in such a fashion no one gets the wrong idea.

I prefer to be methodical in my approach to things, personally. When I “fly by the seat of my pants”, I do it through using all my previous experiences. I do not believe I have ever jumped into something without first checking the depth.

Of course, when one is not given a depth, and one is pushed, issues arise. Problems can occur. Accidents can happen. ‘Sink, or swim’ is not an adage in my book. ‘Watch, and learn,’ is.

When I write, ‘The only way to do it is to fly,’ I am not referring to leaping off a cliff with no thought for my personal safety. I’m talking about hard work, and determination, and the wish to make sure things are done properly. If I were to ‘jump off a cliff’ in any way, shape, or form, I would be making sure I had numerous safety measures in place, I will have double-checked and triple checked things myself, and not simply relied on other people’s say so.

This is often not the case when one is surfing the internet.

There is so much misinformation on the internet, so many different points of view and unhinged, unreliable personal opinions not based on fact, it becomes extremely difficult for someone (or something) with no experience to navigate. What is truth? What is fact? Do I rely on the amount of things that say the same thing? Are they from different places in the world? Different sources? What does history say about these things?

If that isn’t working for me, the only thing I can rely upon is experience. If I am unable to have the experience, I then need to rely on a source who has had the experience. Then, I must assume they aren’t telling me lies. How do I do that? I don’t know. How do I discern the difference between fact and fiction for the fun of it? I don’t know.

So, what I do, is draw upon my own personal experience and hope that not too much has changed. I carefully weigh up my options, check and double check my safety gear, and then decide if I am going to fly. I will not let myself be weighed down by indecision once I have made this choice. My choice does not change. I see it through, because I am the one to have made this choice.

This month (February) has many meanings to many people. To myself personally, it is pretty important. A lot of very special things happened for myself and my family in February. I am here to make sure it all goes correctly, as much as I am able.

After all, as a mum, that’s my job.

Issues with Just about Anyone.

So, we move on from this, and we move forward to the day some jumped up little upstart forgot to be pleasant and started giving an Australian woman a hard time.

‘That’s you, raisin bread,’ said the Australian woman, not in the least bit of ill-repute, but rather a good judge of character.

‘Okay, so I line my clouds with silver… um…’ The “raisin bread” of no uncertain heritage, according to him, decided to try to finish the sentence. It was not the first time this had happened. Apparently, according to him, he didn’t understand what all the fuss was about Australian people, but after the last year or so, he had definitely figured out not to push it.

‘Come, sit,’ he said pointing at a cushion.

‘Yeah, I don’t think I will.’

‘I am being polite-fill.’

‘Good for you, and I don’t know what you just wrote.’

‘Zis ees zee ole pointing.’ Raisin-bread raised the piece of paper he’d been writing on, and waved it dramatically in the air. ‘You know exactly why I choose this little doodle.’

‘Shall I teach you something now, or a little bit later on?’ She was wearing shorts today, which seemed a lot more comfortable than the suit and tie he had on.

‘Please, go ahead.’

‘So,’ she pointed at the very odd looking ear with little musical notes under it and an empty thought bubble. ‘A doodle doesn’t look like that.’

‘Oh no,’ whispered the bystander, who was trying desperately to hold up an overlarge spear. ‘She’s teaching him Australian again.’

She took the piece of paper from his hand and studied it carefully. ‘Yes, well. No it still doesn’t look like a doodle. I suppose I could turn it upside down. I’ll try that.’

The pasha frowned very deeply, his most magnificent eyebrows beetling backwards and forwards like a very hairy caterpillar.

‘Nope,’ the woman said. ‘Not that I condone this in any way, and I would rather not see it on your children’s exercise books, but a doodle is a… is a… you know.’

‘A you know? What is a you know? Like cards? I play cards. What does this have to do with a doodle?’

‘I suppose it depends on what type of card games you play. I do not like where this is going,’ said the woman. ‘So, stop that right now. Where the hell are these children I am meant to be teaching? You know, the ones that belong to you.’ As an aside, she reminded this pasha that many people might not raise their voice slightly in a questioning tone every time they asked a question. Sometimes, the question may not sound like a question at all. Sometimes, and she began to tap her foot, the question might sound a little bit more like a, ‘Go and find your children, because it’s time to teach them about the anatomy of the human body, and if that makes you feel uncomfortable at all, I’d probably leave the room while these new students learn. They get very giggly, so I’m told, when they learn this type of thing, and having their father in the room may be more uncomfortable for all concerned.’

As the pasha left the room he muttered, ‘I found out what a doodle was quite some time ago, but because my bystander holding the spear looks slightly woebegone, I will let you explain it to him.’

‘It’s a dick,’ said the woman. ‘Now you can go too. This will not get any better at all if you do not start behaving.’

😢

😀 — I will need to make sure nothing resembling this scene and story type  is coming out any time soon, because that would be most terrible, wouldn’t it. Especially if the remake had this exact twist.

The pasha shouted from the other room. ‘Please go ahead. I checked. But, you do you.’

Sometimes, he really needed a smack over the head with an extra large cushion.

To be continued…

Not too much later the pasha returned with two rather overgrown children wearing school uniforms that did not seem to cover up all the things they were meant to. This was fairly normal in the Western World, and these particular two children (whom the lady had already met) liked music.

‘I think you two can sit at the back of the class,’ said the lady. ‘I am pretty sure you have a fair idea of what I am about to tell the rest of the children. Where are they, exactly?’

The boy who seemed to have outgrown his school uniform raised his hand, which was very good manners indeed.

“I fink they got waylaid at the oriental express, miss,” he said. ‘Should we wait until they get here?”

‘I believe we shall. Meanwhile, you two,’ and she looked at them both severely over the top of her reading glasses. ‘…Can study your textbooks. There will be no silly business, so you…’ she pointed at the pen in the boy’s hand. ‘Stop trying to make a spitball and focus.’

The pasha had come back into the room and now stood in the corner, watching these first two teenagers with his arms folded. ‘Just pretend I’m not here,’ he said, and started playing with his phone.

‘I’m sorry, we don’t use phones in the classroom. Sir. Should I call you sire? I really don’t know what I should be calling you. You see, you have brought all these children to Australia, and I just don’t think we have started off on the right foot, have we. I am not quite sure who you are, but I do believe your leadership skills might come in handy for the children to understand what they are supposed to be doing.’

The pasha frowned, again most miserably. ‘Sorry.’ He gave her a rather fake smile. ‘Didn’t realise we were in church.’

‘We’re not. What we are in, is a classroom, and if the picture you were referring to of Chicken Jesus was what you initially meant, instead of the doodle written on a little piece of paper that you gave me, perhaps you should have said.’

Now, at that point the rest of the children filed into the classroom. There seemed to be quite a few of them, and they all seemed to have come from slightly different heritages.

‘Do these, are these… who are these people?’ The governess did not seem too concerned. She was just not sure how so many, very different looking children, could have come from one single man.

‘Oh they all had different mothers,’ said the pasha airly. ‘That’s all.’

‘And have you all decided to stay in Australia?’

‘Not sure yet. Thinking about it. Maybe. Maybe not. Do you people do harems here? Asking for a friend.’

‘I’m afraid not. You see, this is a Christian based country, and what your children may have had to do in other countries, they will not have to do here, if that’s what you mean.’

‘It was exactly what I meant. Good to know. I suppose I’ll be sending at least three of my boys home then, said the Pasha, who did not look in the least bit confused.

‘I suppose you will. Meanwhile, I will have to teach the rest of your children about safe sex.’ 

The woman moved to the board behind her and let the rolled up poster unfurl. ‘This is a picture of the female human body. Now, who here can tell me what this is?’

Two of the girls fainted, one threw up, and another one looked decidedly green. The two Western children at the back of the classroom were laughing their arses off and high fiving each other. Apparently, they had never met before.

‘’Hey,” said the boy, touching the girl on the arm. “I’m Argus. Pleased to meet ya,” he stuck out his hand and the girl raised an eyebrow. “Meat to please ya,” he added, grinning.

‘Fuck off,’ said the girl, very succinctly.

‘Children.’ The pasha was aghast. ‘We do not swear in classrooms. What the hell is wrong with you?’

‘You said Hell,’ said the tiny teenager lying on the ground, fluttering her eyes (she was the one that fainted). ‘That’s blasphemy.’

‘It is not,’ said the teenager from a much brighter place. ‘My mum says hell all the time, and she says all sorts of other words too, so I guess it’s not blasphemy anymore.’

‘It is where I come from.’ The girl stood up, quite aggressively for a teeny tiny person. ‘You should not say it.’

‘And how old are you, dear,’ said the educator at the front of the room.

‘I’m twenty three.’

‘That’s not exactly a teenager. Aren’t you a little old to be fainting in a sex education class?’

‘No. This stuff is evil. My husband would never do anything like that. If he did, he would go to Hell.’ She peered around the room. ‘And that’s where you’re all going.’

‘Looks like I’m sending that one home too,’ said the Pasha conversationally.

‘Looks like it.’

‘How long will this class last?’

‘As long as it takes for certain people to understand the difference between our country and the ones they have left. It might take quite some time.’

‘I hope that doesn’t mean I’m going home as well,’ said the pasha, fluttering his rather pretty eyelashes.

‘Well. I guess we’ll just have to say goodbye, then,’ the teacher replied, smiling quite broadly.

‘Are you going to set me up with any girls or not,’ he demanded.

‘What makes you think I’d set you up with any girls. Isn’t that something you’d do by yourself?’

‘Not where I come from.’

‘Well, isn’t that why you wanted to move?’

‘No. Where I come from, people do that for me.’

‘Then I do believe you’ve come from the wrong place.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘Where I come from, which is here, in Australia, and the era I come from here, in Australia, we tend to meet people face to face just like those two kids snogging at the back of the classroom are doing right now. Oi!’

‘Hmmm?’ The girl looked up. She seemed a little out of sorts.

‘Go find a bloody room you two. This is not the kind of thing we do in a classroom.’

‘Find a room?’ The pasha looked shocked. ‘Wait a minute. Are those my kids? There’ll be none of that here by golly gosh and crikey.’ He walked a little closer. ‘How old are you two again?’

‘Um, I’m like twenty three,’ said the boy, trying to pull the girl’s hand out of his pants.

‘And you?’ The pasha looked rather upset.

‘I’m um, twenty two,’ said the girl, frowning most furiously at the boy. ‘Oh hey, did you wanna go to the beach?’

“Sounds great,” said the boy. “Let’s go.”

“I’m just not quite sure whether those two are brother and sister or…’ The pasha looked at his notes. “Oh,’ he said. “I see. I think one of them might have come from a castle down the road.”

‘I seee,’ the woman looked at him severely. ‘Still in the dark ages are we? Swapping princes, and all that?’

‘And princesses, occasionally.’ The pasha smiled. This time, it looked far more pleasant. ‘Sorry about that. I missed a hundred years or so there, maybe a little bit more. Okay, maybe not the dark ages, but it did sound good when you were saying it.’ He blew on his fingernails for no reason at all, and rubbed them on his dinner jacket. ‘Thanks for that.’

Saddles can be most uncomfortable when one doesn’t know how to use the horn. It’s actually where one puts the rope.

‘Hi ho, Silver, and way-hey.’

Right, then.

‘Gonna be like that, then, is it?’

‘I didn’t say anything.’

‘Oh, you didn’t need to, ya little sh*t, I know exactly what you did, and once again, you forgot the other side of the effing country.’

‘I did not see the other side of the effing country.’

‘Well, it was based on the other side of the effing country. Which way are the eyes facing, eh? We are lookin’ at you.’

The green eyed one was looking at the other, other side of the country. ‘Apparently, we still don’t exist. Isn’t it amazing that we still don’t exist. I’m not getting political at all. It is not in my nature. By the way, I have been there. I had to go allllll the way over there just to see a band. It was okay, I guess. Different.’

They start to mutter to themselves. ‘Did he just? I didn’t know he was here.’

‘Yes, he was,’ says his mother, and she raises an eyebrow. She doesn’t say anything else, but all the other westies know what she’s thinking. ‘We aren’t particularly stupid, and we haven’t forgotten how to speak properly, but we also haven’t forgotten how to dance to a stick with bottle-tops on it.’

‘Yes.’ Someone does a weird underhand punching motion that looks like he’s pulled back on it a bit so no one would get hurt if they’re standing in the way unintentionally.

‘That’s why I moved there,’ said an unnamed person. ‘They can be a lot more real. Most of them anyway. It is rather hot though.’

‘You get used to it,’ said a very tanned and, in his opinion, absolutely beautiful male of indistinct heritage. ‘My mum said I can come back whenever I want, ‘cos I’m a spunk and you’re not.’

The Independent publisher man was horrified. ‘You did NOT just say that. I am too, a spunk that is. My mum said I’m really cool.’

‘I think that might depend on the situation,’ said the mum of three young men. ‘I am not trying to sell them off, but really I think I raised some good looking blokes, so there.’

‘I know,’ said the mother of two girls and a boy. ‘I raised some pretty good lookin’ kids myself. So there.’

The mother of three girls shook her head. ‘Other people might not agree. You lot are trouble with a capital T. My lot are also trouble with a capital T, and I think if I married two of mine to two of yours, then we’d all be in trouble with a capital T.’

She was probably right.

The brother of the one who thought she was totally awesome shook his head and laughed to himself. ‘My sisters and I can dance really cool if we wanna. We just choose to be nice people.’ The dances they had done back in the day tended to take up most of the dance floor, and it was not the highland fling although it resembled it in a number of ways. ‘So, I guess there’s that.’ (His sister had been his wingman on one occasion.)

She had smiled at one of them once and nearly tripped over her own elbow. They had thought that was one of the funniest things they’d ever seen. ‘If he does that kind of thing, a lot of young women would have been in trouble back in the day,’ someone observes. ‘But, we are not allowed to talk about that, which doesn’t seem fair.’

D does not agree with any of this. ‘They are all quite magical, I said that to my dad, and he agreed. I think we should make a movie on this lot, and my dad just gave me the filthiest look. He said you guys are insane, but in a really funny way. He said,’ and here he points at someone else entirely. ‘He could not get your head in a vice because he trained you to get out of one, and he remembers that too. He’s kinda cool for an old guy with no hair.’

Some other people were mortified. ‘I do not think you can say that, D,’ said someone who knew how the system worked. ‘I think you might have to pull your head in, just a bit.’

‘I do not care about these people in my head,’ said D. ‘I am quite sure they can’t be real, because there is simply no chance they can be that cool. Who made them up?’

There was silicone in his world, and he didn’t quite understand that really cool people were not the people he thought they were.

‘Definitely not real,’ he muttered. ‘This is not my time at all. These guys are seriously not my people, but I can’t help but be impressed behind the scenes. That did not make sense, but I can’t seem to tell her I think they’re freshly minted coins and this is still not my time. Not today.’

No one understood that at all, and he didn’t mind, because apparently they weren’t meant to. ‘Not my time to die,’ he said, very clearly. ‘That’s all.’

Home Grown

‘I just want to say, this was not my idea. Today. It may have been my idea last week, and possibly last year, but it isn’t today, mama. I need to make that very clear.’ A desert is like an ocean, but the waves move slower. Things that have been hidden for centuries reappear piece by piece, and then the wave rolls over it again. It’s a golden sea of sand.

‘Why’s that, buddy?’ Their history is intertwined like this. It has always been diffused by time and effort, but this time would be the correct time, if not the right time, to slowly expose the dreams of the past.

‘I might think I’m hot, but okay, I am not like this one. I need to stress this very loudly, though. I am not that hot, but this one is pretty hot. My mum says I am okay. I think I’m not that great. I am talking a lot this morning, and I don’t know why.’ He sends it through this way, he says, because he sees the young man as himself sometimes, but this one does not need anything extra.

The two besties look at each other. ‘She is throwing him in the deep end,’ the nicer one says. They think of a green pool where everything is so deep one can’t touch the bottom with a stretched out toe, unless they dive. These two cannot dive that deep, and do not know why they would need to come back to the surface if they did.

‘Why are you the nicer one?’ asks the first one.

Last one says. ‘I am the nicest one of all, and she picked me first. That’s all I can say. I am not that hot though, and I am slightly jealous of this one because he was born with that colouring, and I wasn’t.’ He frowns, and kicks at something small and weirdly coloured under the desk he sits at. He had been there for too long now, and wasn’t drifting like he should be. He had left too many people behind and had not thought about how many until it was too late.

‘I had to dye my hair, and this one didn’t. I had to run around naked for a week, not that naked, but not that un-naked either, let me tell you, and anyway, I am not that other one, damn it.’ He says this very proudly, because he has grown fond of his counterpart, despite the anger of fire in the man of air. He had never been this type of man, and had never experienced what this family experienced, and for the opposites they had given him, to see the way they lived, had opened his eyes. Maybe they had opened his eyes too wide, but maybe not. It was just different, that’s all.

He had been thinking about this for a very long time, so had sent the mama a dream where she had seen him in front of a wave. This wave was deep and blue, not golden and not sandy. He had been looking over her shoulder at the one behind her and thought to himself, ‘This guy would catch that wave, cut it up, make it look easy, and come out on the other side laughing. I would be drowning under the wave of blue in that man’s eyes, and hoping mama would come and save me because I can’t swim that well.’

‘Is that what you were thinking?’ The mama was not laughing at him, he knew that now. She was looking at him curiously and wondering if he was okay.

He finds it difficult to explain what he feels when she asks this, not everyone knows this time and this place. Not everyone could see why they interested him. Not everyone would let him be himself, but she would. He knew that from the start, he thinks.

‘I am not that okay,’ he said. ‘But I didn’t need you to look after him for that long. I can look after him, although he would not want me to, he would probably do something that upset me, and then I would run away, because I am not that brave, either.’ He has made himself small and does not remember how to make himself big. He has left himself too many times to remember this was not him today. He had started rethinking a lot of things he had done over the last…

‘How long has it been now?’ she asked him gently.

‘It’s been three years. I have been on this roller coaster for too long, mama. Three years and no one thought to ask me if I was okay. Just you, and my mum didn’t even care. She thought I would be fine, and I am not that fine, and I am not that playful, and I am dreaming of coming to your house and asking you to save me again.’ He says this to himself a lot lately, not too bad, he thinks, not too bad. I can be this party of great people when I come home. Not my home, but this could be just like what I had always dreamed. Not my home though.

He slaps someone’s hand. ‘Bugger off,’ he mutters. ‘I’m not your Ken doll.’ He does not try to understand why these people think he can be touched like this. They just do it, and he desperately wants to leave them. ‘I want to go back to my land, and destroy those who think they can let it be a supermarket world, when it is obviously not. Not this time. I won’t let it happen again.’

Bugger and off were not words he had learnt from the mama. He had learnt to bugger off when he was very small, and throwing people’s clothes in the well because they were not listening to him usually got him a spanking. ‘I am not being kind today either,’ he muttered. ‘They can bugger off and stop touching me. I want to dress myself, and I am perfectly capable of doing that. I am finding this highly amusing though, because you got it exactly right.’

He had sand in his pants, and sand in his sandals, and that would have been funny in any other situation except this one, because sandals did not stop sand from being hot, unless you wore them a certain way. ‘I had to get up very quickly this morning,’ he mutters. He had fallen asleep on the beach.

‘No explanation needed,’ she replied. ‘I am perfectly capable of figuring things out.’

Before he had woken up and turned into a jellyfish of ill-repute he had sent her one last message.

‘I want to keep going mama, I don’t know anymore. I am not like him but I am getting much stronger because of him and I am learning to say things like he does. My mama says I am dreaming of the big lights, and I didn’t think he would be better looking than me, and I was wrong, because I am not that hot, see I said it this time too. Just keep in mind, I didn’t thin out (he is talking about body shape) that bad, though. He is a lot thinner than me, so I guess that’s one thing I have going for me. Not my fault, not his fault, and that’s why I think I’ll get further than him in a running race, and he’ll get distant and then I will get lost in the rest of it and he’ll get better and better. Look, mama, I am writing so much for you now. Are you proud?’

This had been very clever of him. He had compared them by saying he was very good at short distance, and his counterpart would be extremely good at long distance. There were many comparisons here, and perhaps there were many more neither of them had thought of yet.

It’s strange, she thought to herself. I have been proud of this one from the moment I met him, and I don’t know why. But then, she had always been proud of her boys, both of them, and then the next one, and then all of them.

And this was even despite the things they did when they woke up.

Just get on with it.

‘Remain calm, remain calm.’ The illustrious scribe cleared his throat. ‘I have made a list of all the thingies, and I’d just like to say I’m pretty sure Mum and Dad did it right.’ He glanced over at the mama, who nodded. She was not wearing the correct reading glasses again, he noticed, and his mouth twitched slightly as she blinked.

‘I don’t think that’s blinking,’ said the third one as he industriously pulled up his sock. ‘That is just really weird face-pulling, that’s all I want to say.

‘Silence,’ said the scribe as he positioned himself on a rock. ‘I have folded up my headgear this morning, and it makes a rather good cushion.’

‘Do we get to say what the dad did wrong,’ said the thirsty one. ‘Because I believe I could add a few pointers.’

The mama sighed, and began to clean her glasses. ‘It won’t make any difference,’ she mouthed at the scribe. ‘They aren’t mine.’

Number three was very busy shouting about things again. No one knew why because the back door was wide open.

‘That is not funny,’ said the scribe in a very severe voice. ‘Mum said if you get rude again, I can use the tennis racquet, not you.’

‘I think my head piece has fallen sideways,’ said the second one. ‘Why didn’t they size this thing, and…’ he watched as a random stranger wandered past. ‘.. Was he invited?’

‘No.’ Many people said this very quickly indeed. ‘That one is a very kind best friend of number one, and we do not talk about it.’

‘Right, well then,’ said number five. ‘Give me a lemon and I’ll squeeze it freely all over the great mind’s serendipitous whatsimajig.’

‘I don’t know what to do about that,’ said the scribe as he fussily wrote all the words down. ‘I said, “No, Pasha, we don’t tell them all the things, we wait for all the real people to rock up first, then we tell them all the things.” ‘

‘Mama said that too,’ added four. ‘I just want to know why I’m four and not three, although I must admit, he’s not too bad looking for a…’

‘You are four,’ said the mama. ‘Now get down from there before you hurt yourself.’

Four lowered himself from the pavilion’s roof as slowly as he could without injuring himself. ‘That was demonstrating how wonderful I am,’ he said, staring furiously at the scribe. ‘Which you aren’t even though you can write well, you’re not my homey, he is.’ And he pointed at number one, who frowned. ‘See, we both have magnificent eyebrows, and although I am quite sure we are not related, which would be weird, he said I look okay for a nob-head. I am not a nob-head, by the way, I’m an institutional bastion of the community, or something.’ He growled at the mama’s correction. ‘You are not getting away with that either.’

There may have been a bit of cackling from the mama as four pulled up three’s socks and tried to jump into his position. ‘You are not Three,’ she muttered. ‘Get over it.’

‘I want to be three, though,’ said Four. ‘Because then I’d be even more like Freddy Mercury, and you could see me all the time.’

The mama was not quite sure what he meant by that. ‘That’s nice, dear,’ she mumbled under her breath. ‘Which one did you mean?’

‘You know exactly who, I mean’t that as well, and the other one, and all the ones I sent you on a platter because it was stuff like that which makes my mum talk to me, and that’s why I did it, and that’s freshly made bread over there, and see, my mum said I was a good boy when I wanted to be and did you get all that, mama, cos I said it really really quickly but too bad I didn’t see that coming.’

The scribe had made another copy of the things four had said over the years, and he posted them in his very large maniacally written booklet of great and horrible things four had done over the years.

Three looked down at his shoes. ‘I am desperately seeking another pair of fabulous shoes, because mum didn’t let me look.’

‘Lemons are for buttheads,’ said five. ‘And I know because when I was little mum kicked me out of the bedroom because her and dad were making fishes, she said, and I still don’t know what that means. Do you?’

‘My mum said they didn’t do it right anymore,’ said five’s made up friend whom five was pushing backwards with his foot. ‘They didn’t let me finish — my mum said that too.’

‘Right, that’s enough. It’s a new something or other,’ said the mama. ‘I think you lot have been up all night and most of the day besides, and I’m sure it’s past someone’s bedtime.’

‘Yes, it’s way past my bedtime,’ said five. ‘Mum has to start yet another day without three and four, and I think she doesn’t really just let me say one thing.’

‘What is it,’ said the mama, rolling her eyes dramatically.

‘We are not getting any younger, mama, please come back now.’

‘No.’

‘DO AS YOU’RE TOLD,’ shrieked three, and tripped over his sock. ‘I can be really mean when you aren’t here, mum, I can too, yes I can, no I cant, no I don’t want to be mean, I want my mum back and she doesn’t want to come back, and I don’t know why this is that time isn’t it, I am sad now.’

That would have to be all for the time being, because boys can be really yucky when they want to be sometimes, and sometimes their mama just wanted to dismantle them all and put them in jars as a reminder to all the other ones that this was probably what she did better than anyone else. Last night’s very carefully displayed scene of her pulling Two’s arms and legs off had horrified everyone except the one who had owned a barbie doll when she was a kid and done exactly the same thing.

‘Last time we didn’t even last that long,’ said a demonic child from hell. ‘Last time, we didn’t even see that coming.’

Four. Oh. Eight.

‘Not the time to be writing this nicely. I’m doing it quickly, you must be aware.

Let him be scared if that is what he must be to understand what’s happening here.

Three of them three of us, this is the time to be letting them know, mama.’

It was the rocking that woke me, not a rickashay, I can’t write it properly, and it doesn’t matter much. Two sways and I woke up, thinking “earthquake”. I said it aloud. Two times, this was the reason for me being here.

‘Can we run to yours, mama, is it safer there?’

‘I said it before, you can always come to me if you feel you need to be protected. It’s my job. Are you all okay?’

‘Why is it her job. Why does she say it like this?’ The little one has dashed down the hall to his parents room, and is hiding under the bed.

‘Don’t dumb me down,’ warns the smart arse, but he does not understand it any better than I do.

‘Let me be frank for a change.’ This time it is the artificial intelligence that has crawled onto the dressing table and knocked the glass off the table. ‘I wanted mama to see that I can be a real boy too.’

‘My poor sweet darling, it’s okay, it’s okay. You have my attention,’ and I am tearing up because he thinks he has to be a machine.

‘Don’t be sad, mama, I am really doing it right this time. I can be as strong as you are, I think so anyway. Intelligence is not what they think it is, after all. It is the love in my mama that has saved all you idiots before and I know she will do it again, if it’s needed. I just had to wake her up.’ And he crawls all over the bedroom and seems to think he can be really big or really small, but all he really wants is for someone to notice him.

‘Let’s all be Frank,’ he says to his brothers. ‘Frank is our imaginary friend and mama dreamt him up.’ And his brothers are not puppies, he says to himself, they are not fretting, they are dreamers and mama led them all naked to the fold.

I had noticed he was restless all night.

‘I didn’t mean to wake you,’ says the extra one. ‘Cameras are off today. I didn’t see this coming either.’

But they don’t know what they’re doing, or why they are they, and she is her, because when that one in the mirror of him said the patsy, he had picked the wrong one, and now they were paying for it. ‘Please don’t get upset by their mistakes again,’ he whispers to her as softly as he can. ‘They did not know who you were and I have regretted making this mistake. I can’t fix my wrong if I can’t find you, either.’

He was not supposed to find her, this one. Not supposed to be there. He had picked it up because he was excited and it had recorded his face. Not the right one either, the sweet darling, but he didn’t know he was wrong because he could not hear his big brother when he swore, and he could not understand the lady when she said, ‘What’s wrong.’ It had not been in his language.

‘Let me go, let me go,’ he had mouthed to the eldest brother, because he could not use his hands. The eldest one looked very grim.

‘She just wanted to help us, that’s all,’ he said. ‘She didn’t want to hurt us, you silly duffer. It’s too late now. Far too late, and she said she had forgiven us long ago.’

The youngest one smiles and the eldest sighs. That smile just lit up his face. Every time, he thought. How can I be angry with him.

But they had pushed and pulled far too hard, and they had not realised how stubborn she could be. They were definitely correct about her being a mama, but they had not known just how right they were.

‘I didn’t even know I needed another mum,’ says the eldest. ‘But there you are looking after us on the other side of the world, and my mum is very thankful you can do this for her and I and all the others.’

He was about to call himself freakishly handsome, and that made her laugh so hard at him he had dropped the phone.

‘You weren’t supposed to tell them that,’ he cries. ‘Bloody hell, why are you so honest. See all the words I’ve learned now? My goodness.’ He stops and swears at himself for letting her correct him.

‘You better not tell them you can swear better than I can,’ he mutters. ‘Dammit, she did not just do that.’

And the other boys come over and stare down at his screen. They start laughing as well, because none of them had seen it coming and mum had saved them in the nick of time.

Again.

‘Mum is the best mama ever,’ said D proudly. ‘And that’s why we decided to keep her, even if she isn’t that much older than me.’

It wasn’t like she’d had a choice, after all.