One afternoon, I caught her on the telephone to Uawa. She had the decency to blush before saying, ‘Koro wants to speak to you,’ and beating a hasty exit.
‘Is that you, Little Tu? Your mother tells me you want to do law at university. I’m proud of you for making that decision. Don’t worry about those application papers. I’ll get them for you and we can look at them together when I’m next in Wellington, eh?’
Once upon a time I’d have had a panic attack and reached for my inhaler. Although I felt that Mum and Koro were ganging up on me behind my back, most of all, I was glad that I was fulfilling Koro’s wishes, even if I wasn’t sure that they were my own.
I was also loving Jean-Luc’s gym, and closing on my friend Thierry.
‘You start gymnastics later than most,’ Jean-Luc said, ‘but you already have un physique d’ange when you come to me, so that makes up for lost time.’
It wouldn’t be long before I would join Thierry on the rings. Meantime, for preparation, Jean-Luc put me through sessions at the pool close by the gym. From the low dive board he had me practising pikes and tucks into the water. He was really firing my core but ‘Shows promise’ was all he would say after each session.
Shows promise? I showed much more than that! And I was earning my body shape and mid-section as Jean-Luc sculpted me with his punishing exercises.
‘Do you know how to carve an elephant out of stone?’ he asked me one day, as I was sweating with the exertion. ‘It is not only achieved by chipping the elephant out of the granite but sometimes by chipping away everything that is not the elephant.’ I think he meant that as a compliment.
Along with my physical reshaping came something else. Jean-Luc had mentioned that physical perfection was not enough. What was my essence? What was my personality? What set me apart? Certainly my self-confidence was developing and, with it, fearlessness. Is that what Jean-Luc was looking for?
Here’s one example of how it showed itself.
There was always rivalry between Wellington High boys and Scots College boys, not only in sports events but also out of school.
One day, Thierry, Horse and Bilbo and I discovered that a bunch of Scots guys were meeting every Saturday to show off by jumping from a superstructure of four levels and zigzag pathways that took you down to the harbour, into the water below. ‘Let’s go and spoil their party,’ I said to Thierry.
From that day, a duel developed as we challenged the others to jump from the lowest level and then by degrees upped the ante by ascending for other jump-offs from higher points; if you were the last man jumping, you were the winner. Passers-by liked to watch and applaud. After a while word got around and people came every weekend especially to watch.
Nobody from either school, however, had attempted to jump from the fourth level because it was set back from the other pathways. You would have to clear the three levels below by jumping out twice as far and, if you misjudged the circle of plungeable water below, splat. To make matters riskier, that circle of entry was not large — maybe three metres wide — and you couldn’t even see it from the top.
What the hell. Both sides had been talking of doing it for a while and, on the last day before our schools broke up, I thought, It’s now or never.
‘I’m going for it,’ I told Thierry, Horse and Bilbo.
Actually, Thierry was the better contender but he said, ‘My father would kill me if I did something like that. And you … well, you don’t have a father like him!’
Came the day, and I’d decided against it, but some Scots College boys arrived and … what’s a guy to do? Backing out was not an option.
‘You’ve got to jump five metres out to even clear the superstructure,’ Thierry warned, ‘and how can you guarantee you’ll make the deepest water?’
The only way to do this was to run at speed up the stairs, change into second gear when you got to the ramp leading to the fourth level and then kick into third gear so as to obtain enough propulsion to make the leap. But … if you put on too much speed, you would end up overjumping the target.
Was it my fault that the local newspaper had sent a reporter and photographer? Well, I’d developed into quite the showman, and (excuse me, Koro) was buggered if I was going to risk my life for nothing. Taking my example from those times when I jumped off the Uawa bridge, I told Thierry, Horse and Bilbo to start working the crowd for dollars and bets. ‘Yeah, we’ve got a contender here,’ they jived, ‘so put your money down!’ And Thierry showed off some backflips and double somersaults that were part of his repertoire, and the crowd oohed and aahed.
No business like show business.
I put on a show too. I made a great play of chalking my take-off point on the fourth level and seeking the advice of sightseers. ‘Hey, maybe I should move the chalk mark to the left?’ I measured out my approach, pretending to be anxious about the uneven surface. ‘If I trip, kiss me goodbye, folks!’ I encouraged some of the Scots College boys to jump with me and, getting into the act, they made a few run-ups before shaking their heads and leaving me to it.
By the time I made my final sprint I had the audience in the palm of my hand. As I ran, somebody in the crowd called, ‘Don’t do it, son!’
It was too late. My heart was thudding as I approached the take-off point. I crossed my fingers, hoping that I’d chosen the right spot. I saw the chalk mark.
Nailed it.
Took a step into space. Counted to three and prayed. Looked to my left at my arm outstretched and then to my right to the tips of my fingers.
The air rushed into my lungs.
Oh, my body flexed and for one unbelievable moment there was more than a sense of weightlessness. With great clarity I felt that defying gravity was indeed possible and …
In that moment I could find the perfection I was seeking.
Then came the thrill of falling.
There I am, in a photo on the front page of the Dominion, watched by alarmed sightseers, leaping for my life:
WELLINGTON HIGH STUDENT CELEBRATES LAST DAY AT SCHOOL WITH DAREDEVIL DIVE
Just a dive? Didn’t the photographer see the pike, half-pirouette and somersault that I executed to stop myself from overshooting and to ensure that I entered the circle of water feet first?
When I got home, my pockets brimming with dollars collected from the grateful punters, Dad patted me on the back. As for Mum, she was always on my case and she went blue in the face telling me off. ‘You could have been killed!’
To be truthful, I almost shat my pants and, soon after, the city council banned all jumping from the spot.
The photograph was published in Uawa. When Koro saw it, he sent me a brief note: ‘Still a muttonhead.’
Jean-Luc wasn’t happy either. He harangued me for at least ten minutes in front of everybody at the gym, before passion drove him to his own language.
He may have been looking for self-confidence and fearlessness — but stupidity?
No, he wasn’t looking for that.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE FORCE OF DESTINY
Not long after my daredevil dive, the phone rang for Mum late in the evening. Calls that come after midnight are never good news.
It was Uncle Tu-Bad. ‘Could you come home, sis? Ma’s died. I’m with Pa right now. He’ll need all of us.’
My beloved Nan Esther had slipped away in her sleep.
Mum, Dad and I went back to Uawa immediately to support Koro. ‘Those brothers of mine,’ Mum said, ‘couldn’t organise themselves out of a paper bag.’
She was wrong. When we arrived, Uncle Tu-Bad had already taken charge. He’d sorted out the death certificate and selected a casket. The only thing he hadn’t done was to dress Nan before she was taken down to the marae. ‘I thought I should leave that to you, sis,’ he said to Mum. ‘Ma would have preferred her own daughter to put a lovely dress on her, comb her hair and make her pretty.’