Peeling the Onion (8 page)

And now the ultimate test. The seat where you really like to be normal; move the frame and try . . .

I can use the toilet!

Luke's got a tray of unhappy baby betonies for Mum to inspect and—with a bit of luck—nurse back to health in her 'hospital' behind the carport. Its benches are overflowing with cuttings and seedlings again, now that she trusts me not to fall off my chair and die the instant she gets her fingers into a tub of compost. Luke comes in to say hi when he's deposited the patients, and we're talking—actually I'm listening, and he's offering me morsels of his day: the guy who jumped to conclusions at the sight of Luke's long hair and wanted to know when to transplant marijuana seedlings; the lady who brought her cat in to help choose the right catnip—when Bronwyn comes in with Hayden.

A pang of guilt at not hearing him knock. It seems strange they haven't met before; I want them to like each other. Bronny leans against my shoulder, twining a foot around the leg of my chair, and we watch as they talk; they're both standing and their presence seems to fill the room—Hayden taller and restless, shifting his weight from foot to foot as he says something about doing surveying next year; Luke responding with his direct gaze and quiet intensity, the expression on his face harder to read.

'He's okay,' Hayden decides when Luke's gone, 'but—no offence to your mum—isn't that a bit of a dead-end job?'

'Not if it gives him time to work out what he really wants to do; he figures if he keeps an open mind the right thing will just turn up.'

'I don't know. He'd have been better off to finish his course and get a proper job even if he wasn't crazy about it; seems stupid to waste two years at uni and have nothing to show for it.'

It's ten in the morning. I've been reading for half an hour—as in understanding and remembering, not my usual brain-dead staring.

A break, a coffee with Mum, thumb exercises; ankle exercises; pick up the book again. Ten minutes this time, then my brain goes walkabout.

The afternoon's normal—as in back to brain-dead.

But it worked this morning. I've got to try. I've missed six weeks of school already—forty minutes a day is not enough. Mr Sandberg's last visit: 'You might have to think about doing Year 12 over two years.' Push that out of my head and go on reading. Try having the radio on . . . follow the music instead of the writing. Try earplugs . . . instant mini amplifiers for the ringing in my ears.

Ignore it; concentrate; what's happened to your willpower? You've got to go on reading.

I can't see. My neck's doing its gnawed-by-a-crocodile imitation, and everything's gone black.
If I sit very still I won't fall off the chair . . . I just wanted to sit here and read! Is that so much to ask? I'm not giving in!

I have to. It's that or black out.

I call Mum to help me take off my frame and go to bed.

But I tried
—I
really tried. I used every ounce of willpower. What am I supposed to do now?

Jenny and Costa are going out together. It's official—not that there seems to have been any doubt in Jenny's mind since the first time she spoke to him. What's amazing is that it became official after she took him clothes shopping. The door of a dress shop acts as a sort of catalytic converter on Jen—instant whirlwind. Any guy who could stand outside the changing room for long enough for her to try on the entire size twelve stock in the shop would have to be either in a coma or in love.

'Oh, he didn't mind.'

'He read
War and Peace
while he waited?'

'Very funny. He actually chose this shirt. Anyway, you
have
to meet him now—it feels too weird having a boyfriend that you haven't even met!'

'What am I, the boyfriend monitor?'

'My dad's already applied for that. No, come on, why don't you call Hayden and we'll all go for coffee.'

'How about we wait till I'm not wearing a set of monkey bars around my neck?'

'How about you stop being such a wimp? You still look like Anna, you know—a normal person with a metal brace. It doesn't turn you into a freak.'

'You're a bully, Jen! Okay. Hayden's got a tournament this weekend . . . next Saturday. I promise.'

Sunday morning I wake up ready to try something. Mum hardly has to lift at all any more to get me out of bed, so . . . roll to the side, push with my right arm . . . I'm sitting up! Dance, sing, throw a party. Better yet, call Bronwyn; tell her how to help me with the frame.

'You
are
getting better!' she shouts.

Did she ever doubt it? Did she think I'd be locked in a metal brace, lifted up and down, all my life?

It's just a broken bone, I tell her. A broken bone in your neck is scarier than a broken leg, but it heals exactly the same way. In a couple of months I'll be good as new.

Bronwyn's not listening. She's screaming through the house to wake Mum and Dad, 'Anna sat up by herself!'

'How was the tournament?'

'Okay.'
I guess he didn't win.
'Do you want to come over?'

'I've got a heap of homework ...'

'... Mum's made a chocolate orange cake ...'

'I don't feel like doing it anyway. See you in a minute.'

'To see me or the chocolate cake?'

'Don't make me choose!'

But he's had his cake now and I still haven't heard about the tournament. (And here I am, under house arrest and getting desperate for news of the outside world!)

'Who did you fight first?'

'David Someone, tall guy from Melbourne.'

'I remember him. You should have beaten him, didn't you?'

'Yeah. Got warned on contact.'

'Must have been a strict judge—you never get warnings! I hardly ever seem to make it through a tournament without one.'

'Well, I made up for it this time.'

'What did you do, kill someone?'

'I could have. The guy I fought in the next round was named Trevor. I had this flash about how I'd feel if it was Trevor Jones—I knocked him down on the first point and I went on hitting him . . . I'm quitting karate.'

'But you're good, Hayden—you're bound to get on the state team this year—you can't quit just because you stuffed up once!'

'Listen, I'm telling you I totally lost it. You be a macho karate dickhead if you want—I've had enough!'

The back door slams; he's gone.

'What's a macho karate dickhead?' asks Matt.

'Never mind.'

'Is Hayden still your boyfriend?'

'Mind your own business, Bronwyn.'

'How could he say that?' I ask Jenny.

She's trying hard not to laugh—not completely successfully. 'Maybe because you treat karate like the world's answer to religion, education and social life, all rolled up into one. But I'm sure he didn't mean it—just forget it. Kiss and make up.'

'I wish he would!'

But Hayden's not the first guy to quit a martial art because of me, so when Luke comes to see Mum the next day I ask him what he thinks.

'He's not quitting because of you—it's his own anger he's afraid of.'

'But he's angry because I got hurt.'

'It's still
his
anger. He's got to face it some time.'

Mum's coming in from the washing line, but there's one more thing I've got to ask—'Do you think I'm a macho karate dickhead?'

'You really expect me to answer that?' Then the teasing evaporates; his eyes darken into their serious expression and he puts his hand on my arm as he adds, 'The guy cares about you, Anna—and he's hurting. You'll have to sort it out, one way or another.'

He comes back to see me before he leaves. 'Have you done it yet?'

'Right! I just jogged there and back!'

'And the telephone's out of order?'

'Go away.'

The problem is, Luke's right. Hayden was really hurting, and I didn't try very hard to understand. I shut myself in Mum and Dad's bedroom and dial. He was just going to call me; he's sorry he said what he did.

'Are you really quitting?'

'Don't start!'

'I just wondered.'

'I don't know.'

I think we're still together.

C
HAPTER
7

T
he beginning of independence. I wake up as excited as Matt at Christmas—today's the day I get out of bed all by myself, nothing on my neck but the foam bedtime collar. Walk to the mirror. My head doesn't fall off.

'Decrease the frame gradually,' Mr Osman said yesterday. 'In a month you should be wearing the collar all the time.'

I'm in the shower. All alone; nobody helping, nobody watching; I can even sing if I want! My plastic bag leaks, the collar's soggy and my neck's ready for a rest by the time I'm dry, but I don't care. The district nurse has just been fired.

Even my toast tastes better when my jaw's not propped up by metal struts.

'But I'm used to you with it on,' Matthew objects. 'This one looks stupid.'

Dad's sister Lynda's come up from Melbourne this week. 'I love March up here; you feel like you want to get out there and grab the last bit of summer! Do you people realise how lucky you are, having the river right at your back gate?'

'That's why we bought it,' Dad says dryly.

What wouldn't I give to go with her, to scramble through the undergrowth to the path, climb over the enormous bleached log whose top branches stretch far enough over the river that you can climb out and jump straight in to swim . . .

But I can only just make it across the back yard without falling.

Which Lynda hasn't taken long to spot. That's the problem with having a nurse in the house for a few days—lots of time for her to sit and observe.

'You're dizzy, aren't you?'

'Not that bad. You get used to it.'

'You keep pretending you've just got out of Luna Park? God, Anna, you must be mad as hell about all this! How do you cope with it?

'I try not to think about it.'

'Great idea—repress it all and give yourself cancer! Sorry, kid, but you'll have to look at it eventually. I'll leave you a few books that might help.'

I've phoned Caroline and she's coming over. So simple—I don't know why I wasted time being tense.

Because now that she's here, she's smiling, laughing, chattering. I'm looking a lot better now, must be great to have that plaster off; have I heard that the Year 10 boys all shaved their heads to go on camp? Look like dags, can you believe it? And she's trying out for the production of
Oliver;
thinks she's got a good chance of getting the part of Nancy. It's a fair commitment, but she's sure she can handle it without letting her grades drop.

'Though they don't slack off the work requirements or give you any special help if you've got in-school commitments, not like when you're having a sickie.'

It slides in and out like a knife; slipped in so sweetly, in the same breath with the gossip, that it takes me a moment to feel the sting. The savagery.

I'm numb. I don't think I can speak—but as she leaves I hear my automatic, 'See you later.'

Caroline pulls out her school diary and flips through it; the mask has slipped, she's frantic, panicky—'I don't know what I'm doing next week.'

So am I supposed to make an appointment?

But now I know for sure—the viciousness wasn't a slip of the tongue. She hates me.

She was my friend. A friend who shared secrets; who brought me flowers; who wiped the blood from my legs.

I always knew that if I ever started to cry I'd never be able to stop, and now I've started and it's true, there's so much sadness, so much misery inside me and it won't stop till there's nothing left of me. These tears aren't coming from my eyes, they're pouring out of my soul, out of every bit of my body, my blood and my muscles and right down to my bone marrow where the deepest, harshest grief has been buried. I didn't think I could feel like this and still live, but the misery, the tears, and the terrible wailing noise keep on going, and I think maybe this is what hell is, to know that your life is out of control and there's nothing you can do about it.

Ben's howling outside in echo; Matt and Bronny are peering round my door, Bronny clutching Sally so tightly that the cat's yowling too—I know I'm scaring them, but the misery is stronger than I am.

'I just didn't want this to happen! I
didn't
want it to happen.'

'No one did,' Mum says, shooing the kids away. 'Anna needs to cry,' she tells them. 'It'll be good for her.'

She's wrong. Feeling this terrible can't be good for anyone—I
hate
crying, and I'm not going to do it again.

You can't open a paper or turn on the TV without hearing about euthanasia. The whole world's obsessed with it. And everyone's so adamant, whichever side they're on! They're all so sure they'd rather be dead than disabled—or just as convinced that God meant the person to suffer through and learn something. (Learn what? If God's so smart can't he work out a better way to teach? And how much pain is too much; how do you decide?)

One thing I know—if I was going to have this much pain, this many restrictions every day of my life, I'd be on the first bus to the Northern Territory.

I'm afraid to tell Jenny about Caroline. I don't know what I'm guilty of, but I feel so ashamed—and scared. Maybe Jenny will drop me too.

Good to be wrong occasionally.

Her eyes are watering; her face is pink and set with rage. 'How can she be like that?' she keeps repeating. 'God, I feel bad enough that my life is so great when yours is so shitty! How can she make it
worse?'

'Maybe she thinks I'm getting too much attention . . . I should tell her I could do without it!'

She hesitates, wheels turning—you can always tell when Jenny's trying to decide whether or not to say something. 'She's talked once or twice about how much money people make when they have an accident—from suing the other driver.'

My throat's so dry I can hardly speak. 'But that's only if you're permanently disabled and'—the tears squeak through my voice—'there's no money on earth that could make that worthwhile.'

'That's what I told her! Look—if she's acting like this she wasn't ever a real friend anyway; at least now we know what she's like.'