‘Right,’ said Leon, and the man winked and got up to return to his friends. As six o’clock approached and the drinking speeded up, Leon watched the claw man laughing and talking with his friends, and he thought it was good to be away from the hopeful eyes of girls. He wondered what would happen to his parents if they found each other again.
A postcard arrived. The picture on the front showed a drawing of a child in a red and white striped swimsuit and armbands up round his shoulders. He had his hands on his hips, his trunks thrust forward, standing in front of a photograph of a beach somewhere. The child’s eyes were blue and his irises reflected a smiling sunshine. His cheeks were red and humped in front of his eyes.
Chicken, my son,
I’ve found your father. He is better than he was, and so am I to see him. He sleeps now, and I watch him, the quiet is good for both of us. He drinks less. We are staying in a little wooden house with a tin roof near the sea and there are gum trees all around, and so it smells good too. Once he feels better, in a little bit of time, perhaps I will try to bring him back and we will all three get going again. Until then I like to let him sleep and he likes to be away from the people.
He sends his love and of course so do I,
Mother and Father
xxx
It made sense to send a postcard if you didn’t have much to say. Perhaps she had thought the picture of the overexcited colourful child would make him think she was just having a holiday. He tucked it in between the pages of a book along with all the other important correspondence that was lost in their small bookshelf, pressed and captured. He washed his face in the bathroom and afterwards looked long and still into the mirror. It was like someone had drawn over his face with another, the face he recognised swam in and out, a dark impression of something else shaded over the top. He found his father’s Leica and felt the weight of it in his palm, and its heavy mechanic comfort. He held it at arm’s length and took a picture of himself as proof.
When the pictures were developed a few weeks later, there was his face, normal and his own, and it was good to see it.
The paper’s shouty headlines were all about the new war, but Leon liked to turn to the quieter stories inside, the local heroes, the record barramundi, a new nail factory to be opened by some stiff-haired boy evangelist preacher. He shaped a figure as he read, using the warmth of his hands from his coffee mug because the marzipan had passed its time.
Mrs Matsue Matsuo, mother of Commander Matsuo, one of the Japanese midget submarine men who was killed when he attacked Sydney Harbour in 1942, came today to place a wreath on Sydney cenotaph in remembrance of her son.
Mrs Matsuo wept as she was handed the charm belt that her son had been wearing when he died. The vessel, containing Commander Matsuo and Tsuzuku, was sunk with depth charges. When recovered four days later they were found to have shot themselves. The ceremony only serves to heighten negative feeling about Australia’s involvement in the war in Vietnam.
The figurine in Leon’s hands grew a kimono, the hair, long to the middle of the back, straight. The arms disappeared up the draping sleeves and the head was lightly bowed. When he painted the face the eyes would be closed.
Someone knocked at the door and he looked up to see one of the older Shannon kids. She stood like a straw doll, straight up and down, a conspicuous bump in her middle, she supported herself with one hand on her lower back. He opened the door with a jangle, ‘Sorry — bit late opening this morning.’
‘Kay.’
He put himself back behind the counter. ‘What can I get you?’
‘Four buns, please.’
‘Sultana? Or apple?’
‘Apple, thanks.’
She looked skinny in the arm and face. The more he looked at her the more she looked like a sea horse, with that balloon bump. Her hands looked large and red compared to the rest of her. He put six buns in a bag. She saw but pretended not to. It wasn’t like with her mother — he felt that if he offered them for free she wouldn’t accept, and worse than that she would be embarrassed. She handed over the money and he gave her 20 cents too much change and again she kept her eyes above it. He closed the till and the girl still stood there.
She looked at the paper open on the counter. She saw the figurine too, but glanced away before she could have understood it. ‘They gave her back his belt, y’know.’ Her words were sudden and sharp as if she hadn’t really meant for them to come out.
‘I heard that,’ said Leon, not really sure how he should respond. He tried to gauge how old she was, but with her pregnancy and her young face he couldn’t tell. She stood with the paper bag of apple buns in one hand, change clutched in the other. It seemed she would say something else. He smiled encouragingly, but felt the flush of embarrassment on his face. She had caught him off-guard. Nothing would come in response to, ‘They gave her back his belt, y’know.’ She gave a small nod, turned and walked out of the shop. Her dress was too small for her and rode up on her legs so that he could see bruises the size of navel oranges on the backs of her knees.
She almost collided with the postman who, for the first time ever, shuffled into the shop. He didn’t look at Leon or speak, but slapped four letters down on the counter.
‘G’day,’ said Leon, surprised. Still the postie didn’t look up, but he gave the letters one last pat, sighed and headed off again.
The brown envelope was creaky with officialdom. A roar started up in Leon’s head. He stood still at the counter. It slunk in the door. Everything will be changed.
The radio sang:
Through the years my love will grow,
Like a river it will flow.
It can’t die
Because I’m so
Devoted
To you.
He turned the envelope over in his hands, looked at where it had been sealed by some unknown tongue. He heard a small hiss, a growl. Maybe it was just the shop sign creaking in the breeze. He would have liked to put the letter aside and carry on with his day. He would have liked to head out right that minute, find a date and screw her up against a tree in the park with the fruitbats hanging all around, put the bastard thing back in its place, get just a little purchase on the good quiet feeling, even if it didn’t last. But it was early and there were lamingtons to dip; and the letter couldn’t stay unopened, it demanded him. He opened it carefully, leaving a clean rip in the top. The paper inside was thin and the black type showed through to the other side. He read it, then closed his eyes for the longest time.
He opened them when the bell to the shop rang and a short man he had never seen before walked in. The man stood in the middle of the shop floor blinking from the brightness outside. He was neat, his hair was combed and flat to his scalp, the cuffs of his shirt were spotless. ‘How’s the day treating you, son?’ he asked, smiling, and there was a slight whiff of something old, like he’d put his immaculate clothes on over a dirty body.
‘I’ve been conscripted.’
The man’s smile stuck and Leon noticed that the rims of his eyes were scarlet. ‘Sorry to hear that.’ The man walked closer to the counter and Leon could smell beer on him.
‘What can I get you?’
‘Just a loaf.’
‘Big one?’
‘Small.’
‘Yes.’
The man stayed silent until his bread was wrapped, the money exchanged. ‘It does something to a man,’ he said, not looking Leon in the eye, as if he didn’t want to say it, but someone was making him. ‘They get you to murder people out there, son. There’s no reason for it. You can’t fix those people.’