When Michael Met Mina (24 page)

Michael

Dad hasn't spoken a word to me since the interview. I tried to say something in the car on the way home but he asked me to leave it for now. His words didn't cut me. It was the politeness, the civility of his tone that hurt, that told me this was as bad as things had ever been between us. It was just after six, and Nathan and Mum were sitting at the dining table doing a five-hundred piece puzzle of a fighter jet.

Dad muttered hello to Mum and went straight to the study. He closed the door behind him. Mum stood up and anxiously asked me what had happened. I didn't know where to start. I shook my head and headed upstairs. I heard Mum knocking on the study door and Dad telling her he needed some time alone.

I tossed and turned all night. I heard the study door open and footsteps up the stairs. The floorboards outside our bedrooms creaked as Dad walked to his bedroom.

I checked the time. It was three in the morning.

*

Mina's not at school. I call her and leave messages. Paula does too. But there's no response. I stare at a selfie we took and my insides ache as I wonder if she's okay. I want so badly just to hold her.

I go to the café to get a coffee at lunchtime. Paula, Jane
and Sandra, a girl from year twelve, are on café duty.
I stand in the queue, watching Paula and Jane try to
cooperate as they take orders and make and serve the coffees. The tension between them is like a fourth person in the small space behind the counter, rubbing up close to them, bumping and nudging them whenever they're forced to communicate.

Paula's eyes widen when she sees me. ‘Did you hear? Mina sent me a text just before lunch. The restaurant was vandalised overnight. She's there cleaning up with her parents.'

‘No, I didn't hear.' I badger her with questions.
Who vandalised it? How bad is the damage? What exactly did they do?

But there's one question I don't ask her and that's
Why didn't Mina contact
me
?

‘I said I'm going after school to help them with the cleaning,' Paula says.

‘Is that an invitation? Because I can't exactly show up there, can I?' I snap, immediately regretting it. ‘Sorry.'

‘No prob,' she says brightly.

‘What a freaking mess,' I mutter.

The guy behind me tells me to hurry up. I order my coffee and wait at the side.

Jane's helping Sandra make the coffees. She's been
listening to Paula and me but trying not to make it obvious.

I hear Paula make a correction on one of the orders and Jane says, ‘Got it. One sugar not two. I'm coming with you to Mina's by the way.'

Paula stares at her for a moment. It's a stare to run away from. But Jane stands tall and holds her gaze. I can tell she wants to speak but I think just meeting Paula's eyes takes enough out of her for now.

And then Paula shrugs and says casually, ‘I'll pass by your locker at home time.'

*

I check my phone again. Still nothing from Mina.

*

The cars are parked in the garage but when I enter the house it's eerily quiet. I throw my bag at the bottom of the stairs, grab a drink from the fridge and check my phone again. Finally! Mina's sent me a text.

Sorry. Things are crazy here. Will call you when I get a chance.

I feel a pang as I read her text. There's nothing of her usual warmth. But then I feel stupid. It's not exactly the time for flirtatious messages!

I hear Mum call out to me from the family room. I walk over and she's sitting on the couch beside Dad. Nathan's been dispatched to a friend's house for a play date. They say, ‘We need to talk,' and it's like accidentally taking a sip of milk that's gone off: an instant feeling of nausea takes hold of me.

I stare blankly at them and then sit down.

‘We can't understand why you would betray us,' Dad begins. ‘
Publicly
.'

‘Why you would disrespect us like that,' Mum adds.

I don't say anything. The look on Dad's face tells me he has something to say. I just know he's been deliberating over every word, preparing his speech. I feel a moment's pity for him.

He clears his throat. ‘I dealt with my
profound
disappointment at you rejecting architecture, Michael,' he says, slowly and calmly. ‘After all the years we talked about it and planned for it. But I put my feelings aside out of respect for your choices. Then there were your doubts and questions about Aussie Values, which I addressed with patience and understanding. I spoke to Andrew and told him to leave the restaurant story alone for your sake, even though those three workers deserve to face the consequences of breaking the law. I also tried to get the reporter to tone down the story, again for your sake. I did
all
of this for you.' Dad's voice breaks at this point, but he pushes on. ‘You publicly repudiated me, Michael. Made me look like a fool.'

His words just sit there, suspended above us. I focus my eyes on a mark in the carpet.

‘We're really disappointed, Michael,' Mum says.

I sigh and Dad says, ‘Well? Don't we deserve a response?'

‘Yeah.' I sigh again. ‘You do. This isn't easy, okay? A part of me regrets going against you on TV.' I pause, and choose my words carefully. I feel like a bottle brush is stuck in my throat, choking and prickling me. ‘But only because of how it's made you feel. I
hate
hurting you.' I take a deep breath. ‘But another part of me doesn't regret it. And I'm sorry that hurts you, but it's the truth! You said this is all about something bigger than us. That it's not about the personal.'

‘You're twisting my words, Michael,' Dad says. ‘I said that in a different context.'

Indignation suddenly burns through me, like opening a hot oven and feeling the heat hit you in the face. ‘We're talking about people here, Dad! The personal's wrapped up with something bigger, for everybody, not just
you
! And it hurts, doesn't it?'

‘You humiliated me on national television. What does it say about me and my organisation if my own son doesn't support me?'

‘I get that, okay. And I said I'm sorry. But instead of thinking about the humiliation, can't you stop to think about the effect of what you're saying and doing. Maybe think about
why
I don't support you?'

‘Are we monsters, Michael?!' Mum says with a quivering breath.

‘No! But that's the point, isn't it, Mum?' I ignore the pained expression on her face. ‘Do you know that the restaurant was vandalised overnight? They threw a brick through the window and graffitied the front windows.
Fuck Off We're Full
.'

Mum winces. ‘What are you talking about, Michael?'

‘The restaurant was attacked last night. Who was it? Andrew? Somebody local, or was it
rent-a-racist
?'

Dad's face goes blank. He blinks at me, like he's in some kind of stupor. Nostrils flared slightly, he reaches into his pocket for his phone. He takes it out and dials a number.

‘Andrew? What happened last night? Over at that Afghan restaurant?' He questions him, from this angle and that. When he ends the call, he exhales slowly, sinks his back into the couch and looks up at the ceiling.

‘Well?' Mum asks.

He sits up and hunches forward, resting his elbows on his thighs.

‘He's denying it,' he says, eyes fixed to the ground, ‘but he sounds a little too satisfied not to be involved somehow.' Then he looks at me. ‘That's not what we stand for, Michael,' he says, gently but firmly.

‘Of course we don't,' Mum hastily adds.

‘Can't you see that you've given the people who threw the brick permission to hate?!'

‘That's just not true, Michael!' Mum snaps.

‘But it is true, Mum!
Fuck Off We're Full
has the same impact, whether it's spray-painted on a window, or hidden in polite language on your website.'

‘What are you saying, Michael?' Dad asks.

‘Your organisation is making racist hate speech against Muslims and asylum seekers normal.'

‘I reject that, Michael,' Dad says, sitting upright and furiously shaking his head. ‘We have never encouraged hate speech, not to mention vandalism! We stand for constructive debate. And it's a bit more complicated than pulling out the race card. Muslims are not a race.'

‘Go and look at the Aussie Values Facebook page,' I say. ‘Go and read the comments under the articles you post.
Bomb them to the crusades. Shoot the lot. Assimilate or go back to your caves
.'

‘Those comments are unacceptable,' Mum says.

‘There are articles up on that page about Islam being an ideology like Nazism,' I continue. ‘There's one that says that if you don't control Muslim numbers they'll take over and start raping and beheading people.'

‘I never posted those articles,' Dad says tersely. ‘But I won't deny people their right to free speech.'

I think about Mina and her family. ‘Free for people like us,' I mutter. ‘Because people like
them
pay the price.'

My parents don't reply. They stare at me, and a thick, oppressive silence settles between us. We sit like that for a while and then, quietly, deflated of all anger now, I say: ‘You know what hurts? You guys just think I woke up one day and decided to rebel against you out of some teenage protest . . .'

Mum rests her elbow on the armrest, and cups her head in her hand as she hears me out. Dad is leaning forward, elbows on his thighs, hands clasped together. He looks worn out. His eyes are closed, but I know he's listening too.

‘I want you to know that's not what happened. I've tried really hard to see your point of view. I've struggled to reject the things you believe in. But I've done my own research because in case you've forgotten, it's the two of you who taught me never to accept things on face value.'

Mum nods once, but doesn't respond. Dad opens his eyes, but also remains silent.

‘Where do we go from here?' I ask, because sometimes trying to change somebody means having to break them first and I don't want to be the one to do that to them, no matter how much it hurts to know that the way I'll navigate my life will forever set me on a different path to them.

The mood is sombre, the room enveloped in shadows as the sun starts to set. Mum, as if reading my mind, gets up to turn on the light.

‘We'll just have to find a way,' Dad eventually says, resigned, sad even, but at least not angry enough not to want to try.

Mina

‘Mina, your friends are here!' Mum calls out to me.

‘Who?' I call back, walking out of the kitchen carrying a pile of menus and napkins.

Paula and Jane are standing at the door in their school uniforms. I put the menus and napkins on the table next to me and run over to them. We hug each other tightly. Then we step back and I give them a questioning look.

Jane self-consciously tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and starts to stammer. ‘I came because I wanted to say –'

Paula stops her. ‘It's in the past. Forgiven.'

A smile spreads slowly up to Jane's eyes.

They both take in the scene around us: the damaged furniture Baba and Irfan have stowed in a corner for the insurer to examine. Piles of rubbish spilling out of bags and waiting to be disposed of.

‘What can we do?' Paula asks.

‘The cleaning's all done. But can you keep me company while I sort the cutlery?'

‘No,' Jane says. ‘We'll keep you company while we
help
you
sort the cutlery.'

I grin at her.

*

I glance at the clock. It's almost five. A sudden feeling of fatigue courses through my body.

‘How's Michael?' I ask Paula as I walk her to the door. Jane is ahead of us, on the phone to her mum.

‘I haven't had a chance to talk to him,' I say. ‘I'm confused.'

‘Confused about what?'

‘Not about my feelings for him . . .' I feel scared to say what's been running through my head all day.

‘Then what?'

I motion around me. ‘
This
is because of Michael's family, Paula.' I shake my head. ‘I just can't see how things can work between us. They're not going to stop. And we'll be caught in the middle.'

Paula smiles. ‘Maybe. But sometimes you have to get in the trenches. Some people are worth the risk.'

‘Wilde?'

‘No. Me.'

We laugh.

*

I close the door behind me and sink into the throne, my legs aching. I close my eyes. Before I can stop myself, I fall asleep.

I wake up to the sensation of Mum gently shaking me by the shoulder.

‘We've decided to close for tonight,' she says, pulling me up. ‘Come on, let's go home.'

The last of the daylight slowly fades away as we drive home. I send Michael a text.

I miss you.

I smile to myself when he replies within seconds.

I miss you too.

I lean my head against the glass as I type another text.

Are we worth all of this? The fight ahead?

His reply is instant.

Yes, Mina. Absolutely.

*

Baba pulls into our parking spot and Emily sends me a text message, letting me know she's made us dinner. She's been checking for us from her window. She doesn't want to impose and knows Mum needs her rest now that she's closer to her due date. She asks me to pick the food up from her apartment.

I show Mum the text, which means explaining my earlier text. Mum's furious with me, but I don't give her a chance. I snap at her – something corny about friendships and honesty – and storm off to collect the food.

The three of us collapse onto the couch and tuck into
Emily
's chicken noodles and fried pastries. Mum finishes eating, goes to her room and closes the door. I sneak up and listen at the door. She's talking to
Emily
. When it sounds like the conversation's drawing to a close, I run back to the couch and jump next to Baba.

Mum emerges, her eyes brighter, a lightness in her step. She shakes her head at me, giving me a half-smile that tells me she might forgive me.

Baba turns on the TV, muttering under his breath as he flicks through the channels.

‘What's wrong, Baba?'

‘Irfan saw the ad. It's on
News Tonight
. Now.'

I sit up straight and alert. He flicks the channel again and there's the reporter, introducing the story, under the caption,
Refugee Rorts
.

I'm expecting the worst. Instead, there's Michael's father and two Aussie Values members watching with horror as Michael denounces Aussie Values on national television.

I'm overwhelmed with emotion but don't want my parents to see. I jump up, mutter something about needing fresh air, and go outside, onto the verandah. I lean against the rail and look up at the inky sky. I can hear the hooting of an owl in the distance. Hot tears fall down my cheeks, but I welcome them.

There's a lot of ugliness under this sky. But there's plenty of beauty here too. I want to find it, spread it around, all over the cruelty and injustice. I want to shake this world like a can of lemonade, pop the lid and watch the bubbles explode. Join a revolution to do nothing less than change the world. I want to get angry and be passionate. But the best part is that I have Michael beside me and it looks like he wants to do the same thing.