Peeling the Onion (10 page)

'It's wrong.'

'It can't be wrong to have a baby, not if she wants it. She really loves her; she's a good mother.'

'Wrong for the guy, I mean. The father. The baby's his responsibility too—he can't just walk out on it.'

'But—' There are a thousand answers to that, but I let it drop. I'm too happy, sitting here with him, hands joined, knees touching, to worry about the rights and wrongs of other people's problems.

Mum's in the kitchen baking a millionth batch of biscuits, the radio on in the background. I've read a chapter of
Tess of the d'Urbervilles
and finished the first question on Martin's sheet; I deserve a reward by the time Mum calls to say the meringues are out of the oven and she's putting the kettle on.

k.d. lang finishes; an earnest discussion begins. Suicide; teenage suicide especially. Australia the worst of the OECD countries; not a biggest and best statistic to be proud of—and the true figures worse than the records, the speaker explains, because so many suicides are recorded as accidents. 'Much easier on the families that way,' she says. 'Of course it's impossible to prove, but many young men in single-vehicle accidents may in fact be suicides.'

We think of Dad's client's son. No drugs or alcohol, the father had said, just a mistake in judgement.

How do you dig up the nerve to drive into a tree?

And what if it didn't work? If instead of death you got paralysis? Or just ended up like me, crippled with pain and wondering if it'll ever end.

I suppose you could always try again.

Rerun of the kitchen-Mum-mixing-up-biscuits scene.

An indescribable noise, a boom that fills the world, a sound that blacks out light and vision. The stove has exploded—and woken me up. But I know that the noise had nothing to do with exploding stoves—it was the sound of two cars colliding.

HOw do I know that when I can't remember the accident? Are all those memories tucked in my brain waiting for me to stumble over them?

Jenny's mum's friend the faith healer comes to pray for me again. Mum, agnostic and uncomfortable, welcomes her and whisks promptly out to the garden.

Maybe I'll go too. It's not the praying that's so bad—it's the failing. I was so sure I'd get better fast, last time I met her; now my thumb's stuffed and my ankle's not looking crash-hot either. It gets harder to hope when nothing works out.

But I don't have to believe in something to want it to work. I try and relax into it and nearly do—as the hypnotic voice takes effect I feel the pain starting to float out of my bones.
Is this what Luke was talking about with meditation?

She finishes and sits quietly, holding my left hand between both of hers. 'You have to stop fighting, Anna, if you're going to let the healing in.'

The warm feeling disappears like a popped balloon.
This is the last faith healing I'm having
—
the woman's nuts. I'll
never
stop fighting my injuries; what am I supposed to do
—
give in?

C
HAPTER
8

'
I
've been talking to Mark's dad,' Hayden announces without saying hello—Mr Ryan is a policeman who knows more than anyone would ever want to about crashed cars and the smashed people inside them. 'Asked him if we'd have to go to court when Trevor Jones is sentenced.'

So that's why the flush of anger, the set shoulders and thrust jaw. His tension springs to me and snatches, though I'm not sure if mine is rage or fear.

'And do we?'
Exhibit A, the victim . . . I couldn't take it.

'He doesn't bloody go himself! He does this to you and you know what he gets? An on-the-spot fine! A hundred and sixty-five bucks for failing to give way!'

Is that what my life's worth? A slap on the wrist? Naughty boy, don't kill anyone again. Never mind, it was only Anna.

'... bloody dickhead bastard,' Hayden is saying.

Mum, coming in, raises her eyes at the language, but at the explanation, starts swearing under her breath in Dutch.

But Dad's obviously gone into this one too. When we tell him he says, his voice bitter, 'The law looks at it that a $165 fine is a reasonable price for a careless mistake. It's the victim's bad luck if she pays a higher price—the law is interested in his intent, not Anna's luck.'

'Even if I'd died?'

'Apparently. I gather that in that case there would have been a coroner's inquest—but unless he could be charged with culpable driving it'd still be the same—failing to give way and a $165 fine.'

Coroner's not a word you usually associate with yourself. It makes me shudder; Mum too—'It doesn't bear thinking about.'

'That's why I don't care what happens to him,' says Dad, hugging me carefully, 'as long as you're okay.'

Maybe the worst thing is that it's all over for him. Trevor Jones has handed over his $165, and it's all done. (Does he ever get a funny feeling when he drives down that road—
'I wrecked somebody's life here once'?)
It's just for me that it keeps on going. I'm the one trapped in jail.

At least I don't have to go to court—but at the moment it doesn't make me any happier.

Carefully down the three steps and out to the carport. Not really a carport, the car doesn't live here; just bikes, a pingpong table, collection of balls—and my punching bag. The floor-to-ceiling bag I got last Christmas.

I ache to use it. I stroke the smooth leather, letting it shiver gently on its blue elastic cords, poor confused punching bag, waiting for the punch.

So what do I do with my rage, now that I can't hit anything? Now that I can't
do
anything?

I must be in a mood to torture myself. After visiting my punching bag I put on the video of our Christmas karate demonstration.

It's like watching another person. The me on the screen jumps, kicks, spins and punches, her body balanced and precise. Her body knows what it's doing.

And it hits me, like one of the screen-me punches,
that's
what different. It's not that I limp, or that my neck's stiff. It's that my body doesn't know how to move any more. Nothing's natural. Walking's not bad—if it's in a straight line and everything's perfect. Add a challenge like stepping down from a kerb or getting through a doorway—and I need to talk it through like learning a complicated new kata: 'Okay, turn now, brace yourself . . . a bit more to the left.' Thud! 'Damn!' I can't even roll over in bed without waking up to tell myself how.

Then there's losing contact with my knees, if I stand up for some unreasonable time—like more than thirty seconds. Usually I can tell when they're starting to go and sit down fast. If it happens when I'm walking I can sometimes find them by stamping.

Crazy. Must be psychological—maybe I'm just a hypochondriac—that's why I've never told Osman.

The shaking hands are harder to hide. 'How long were you unconscious?'—rummaging through his notes for the answer. (
I was sleeping
—
didn't set a stop watch.)
'An appointment with a neurologist might be a good idea. You may have sustained more damage than was obvious initially.'

But the neurologist is busy for the next six weeks. I'll be better by then. Stop the shaking, get co-ordinated; cancel the appointment.

I'm getting better at plastic wrapping. My collar is barely damp after its next shower.

If I don't teach phys ed I could get a job in a sandwich shop. Chief wrapper.

Costa wants Jenny to meet his family some time over the school holidays. Actually Jenny's not sure that 'wants' is the right word—Costa's mum has told him that he has to invite Jenny for lunch.

'I don't think she's going to like me.'

'Everybody likes you! Anyway, relax; you're not marrying the guy.'

Jenny groans, hides her face in a pillow on the floor; I'm sprawled on her bed, the first time I've been to her place since the accident.

'You
are
planning to marry him?'

'I don't know—I don't care about getting married—but I know I'll always want to be with Costa. I can't imagine living without him—we've got so much to say; we talk all the time.'

'All the time?'

'Okay, the other stuff's pretty good too. But I really like him—if I wasn't in love with him I'd still want to be his friend. That's why I want his parents to like me.'

I ask Luke if he's going down to see his dad for Easter. He looks uncomfortable.

'Dad wasn't very happy about my quitting uni, to put it mildly—and my father never puts anything mildly! I just seem to have lost the taste for being constantly reminded what a pathetic loser I am.'

We're still trying for the Happy Family Award, but it doesn't always work. It's like trying to push a pussy pimple back into your forehead—the anger squirts out sideways. Bronwyn spends her life wrapped in bandages and slings; Dad reads the paper as if it's his solemn duty to get worked up over disgusting politicians, and Mum, the lady with the cast-iron constitution, walks around holding her stomach and eats antacid tablets instead of pickled herrings. And me? I just bitch about anything that pops into my head. Anything except what's really wrong.

Dad takes the kids to church Easter Sunday. He took them Good Friday too, and the Sunday before that. We used to be twice-a-year Christians, Christmas and Easter.

Mum decides to have the nursery open all day. She's not impressed with God. 'Look what he did to his own son,' she says. 'Am I supposed to be surprised at what he did to my daughter?'

'It sometimes helps,' says Dad. 'Just being there, sitting quietly.'

I've had enough sitting quietly to last me a lifetime—and I haven't noticed God keeping his side of any bargains lately. They go without me.

The chocolate part of Easter is easier to cope with. Hayden gives me a beautiful egg in a fancy gold box; it's a shame to open it, but I manage.

Luke gives me—and Matt and Bronny—a tiny chocolate bilby. It's too cute to eat.

'Now that you've got the stick,' Luke says, 'you could walk in the bush, couldn't you?'

Mum looks up from her herb encyclopedia and glares at him as if he's suggested Mt Everest.

I wish I'd thought of it myself—I've been so busy hating the stick that I hadn't thought about what it could let me do. And I'm bored and restless after a frustrating day trying to understand a bunch of crap about "Psychological Effects of Stress" . . . 'I might try now—just at the river here.'

'I'll go with you,' Luke says, and Mum relaxes.

Out the back gate—I'm ridiculously excited—and on to the trail by the river. Dad and the kids, walking with Ben, have flattened the long grass from the gate, it's a bit easier than I'd expected, but the trail itself is rougher. Watching for every stick and uneven footstep is exhausting; I have to grab Luke's arm a few times to keep from falling.

I really want to make it to the big log. Hadn't remembered it was so far.

'We're nearly there,' Luke says, gesturing to it before I say anything.

'How'd you know?'

'It's a great log.'

It is. Great to sit on too.
Made it, made it! Feels so good. God, my foot hurts
—
hope I can make it back.

'Worth it?' Luke asks.

'Fantastic!'

I still think so three days later when my foot is starting to untwist itself and I can walk around the house again without fighting down a scream.

Maybe that's why I haven't told Hayden about it. I don't know if he'd mind me going with Luke so much as the walk itself.

Finish the neck brace tomorrow, Mr Osman says. No more metal head.

'You're coping with the soft collar for most of the day now?'

'Great.'
Except for the pain, but it's bearable if I spend a few hours lying down. And if I tell him that, I mightn't get rid of the frame.

'Well then, wear it all day tomorrow, and then start weaning yourself off it. I'll see you again in four weeks—and by then the only thing you should need to wear on your neck is your favourite necklace.'

Now I remember! That's what I was really hanging out for
—
to wear my pearls again!

Four weeks! Four weeks and I'll be normal. Sometimes I've thought it was never going to happen—but a month I can believe in. Roll on, the 17th of May.

Bare naked neck on my pillow.

Collar when I get up; collar all day till I go to bed. Hotter and scratchier than the brace; gives me a rash, up my throat and down my chest. I can almost nod; I can almost turn my head.

Mum bakes a cake—lemon yoghurt. She'll have to start repeating herself if I get much better.

'What are you going to do with the frame?' Bronwyn asks.

Smash it, squash it, hammer it into little pieces. Melt it down for new coke cans; send it into outer space with the next shuttle.

'It belongs to the hospital,' Dad points out.

'But they'll let us keep it!' Bronny shrieks—nought to full panic in three seconds—'Anna might need it more!'

'I'm not wearing it again! You can take it back today.'

A small silvery monster bursts into the room, beeping shrilly: the frame, covered in foil, with Matthew inside. 'I-am-a-robot!' he chants, in case we haven't guessed.

'Looks much better on you, Matt. You can keep it.'

Costa's parents like Jenny so much that they've asked her to come for dinner after the Easter midnight mass.

How to break it to her that Easter was last week?

'Orthodox Easter,' she explains loftily, 'is calculated differently. It's tomorrow.' Then, promptly switching back from Multicultural Expert of the Week to usual Jenny—'What am I going to wear?'

Just one day without pain. One day being normal again. That's what I'd wish for, if I found the right old lamp. What I could do, in just one day of the old me . . . but it's the normal stuff I'd choose—showering standing up, seeing my friends, moaning about problems that don't exist, going to karate, being with Hayden . . .

And if the genie did what he was supposed to, two more the same.

For second term I'm going to the first class every day. That'll give me an idea of what's happening so I can follow it up with my tutors. Mum will drop me off, zip over to the nursery for an hour and pick me up after. I don't have to go to Assembly or home room.