‘How will Mum know where the boat is if she doesn’t have the same map as us?’
Pat’s razor stops halfway down his cheek. ‘Mothers know everything.’
Pause button off, the razor slides down to his chin.
It was true but not the answer I’d asked for. I stretch my toes out but get a cramp in the little one. Pain shoots up my foot and I remember that I’ve still got a balloon for a bladder. Upright myself and dash past Pat, pull my undies down and…there it goes.
‘Hey, I ain’t—whaddya—’
‘It’s a human right.’
‘Takin’ a piss?’
‘Knowing where your mother is.’
‘You know where she’s buried. And you’re here with me until we get to—’
‘But where is omnipresent? If her spirit is everywhere then why isn’t she here now when I want to talk to her?’ Pat wipes his face clean with a face cloth. Missed a few spots but that’s not what he’s looking at. He’s staring at me in the mirror with puppy-dog eyes like he’s gonna ’fess up to stealing a Mars bar from the corner shop twenty years ago.
‘Dylan, I need to show you something…’
Fingers tap his back pocket but then he just rubs the rough patches of stubble on his face. Figures it’s not the time or place for secrets, and the only thing he finds is that furrowed brow again.
‘The eggs are shithouse downstairs so we’re going across the road.’ Cleans out his razor, flicks it twice on the sink and walks out. That tap is still running. I turn it an inch to the right but it makes no difference at all. The girl staring back in the mirror looks younger than me. She’ll need to catch up if she wants to stay with me. Brushing my hair, I tell her I know some things are best left forgotten until you’re ready to stop running. I brush until all the curls are gone and it’s just one big ball of fuzz, like when cartoon characters get an electric shock and everyone laughs. But it’s not funny. People used to call me Velcro at school; laugh and wink like I was in on the joke too.
I used to brush Mum’s hair forever, just because I could. Start at the top and slide through like butter, that brush would. Being white is easy. You don’t have to pretend to be anything else. I pull extra hard on knots at the back of my head. It hurts, so I do it again.
‘I don’t care which direction they run in, you eat those eggs.’
Sitting at the cafe across from the pub I slit them like a qualified surgeon. Lucky I have compliant yolks ’cause I’m not eating anything that travels south and Pat has no jurisdiction to make me. Mum said sometimes living with me and Pat was like being stuck between two mules and she even drew a little cartoon of her getting squished between two big donkey bums with her eyes popping out of her head. Well, I’m fed up with Pat and his bossing me about.
‘I’ve got lots of secrets in here,’ I say, rummaging around in my backpack.
‘Good on ya, mate.’
‘Smart-arse.’
‘Watchyamouth.’
‘Watch ya nose.’
Even though it wasn’t a special occasion and I don’t like things around my neck, I put on Mum’s air loom necklace. Then I pull out my special fork and wave it back and forth to show Pat I mean business. He’s rummaging round in his mind for something to say, but he’s left it too late for a comeback. The waitress says Pat’s card hasn’t gone through. He has to pay in coins like the grey brigade on pension day. A five-cent piece falls off the table and spins round. I bet tails but it goes between the floorboards so I’ll never find out if I’m right.
Reckon I was ’cause when we shove our bags in the car there are still no clouds in the sky. Pat is mumbling to himself and keeps checking both sides of his wallet like he’d missed some money first time round. You can’t just wish money into existence because then everyone would have some and the currency would devaluate. Detonate. Evaporate.
Pat doesn’t put anything away because he has holes in his pockets; money just slips straight through. I told Mum she should just sew up the inside of his pockets like lady pants from Kmart, but she said that wouldn’t help. Now Pat’s just staring at me, or Mum’s necklace to be precise. His eyes don’t blink not even once until I snap my fingers right in his face like he’s been hypnotised.
‘Wakey wakey.’
He bends down to tie his shoelace even though it’s already in a double knot. Sneaks a glance across the road. That’s where his eyes find what they’re looking for.
The pawnshop is a toy store for grown-ups. In this one I find a fox head with a long tail attached that you wrap around your neck for warmth. I reckon it’s from the 1930s when everyone was depressed and had no money to buy a proper coat so they had to use animals instead. Then I put on an eye patch with faded green velvet on the outside and ‘ahoy’ written in red glitter. I also find a Viking hat that has two horns, one on each side. It was made out of plastic because you can’t conquer with a heavy head. There’s music playing from somewhere and a guy singing about ‘takin’ my baby back home again’. If I could find some dance shoes my outfit would be complete. You don’t see many jazz-tapping, depressed pirate Vikings. Pat’s talking to the guy at the front about his watch.
‘It’s worth at least five hundred bucks.’
‘I’ll give you seventy.’
Pat scoffs at the man like it’s highway robbery, but nods anyway. I think his dad gave it to him before he got lots of dust in his lungs from building houses and had to carry a tank of air round with him all day. The man was just lending Pat some time; he’d get the watch on the way home again. Or so he said. The man behind the counter nodded at me and said I could keep the Viking helmet. Can you believe it?! Free history! Pat just looked at me, smiled.
‘You are one lucky kid.’
Even though it was my fault we’d lost all the money sometimes it felt like we were on the same team. Maybe we’d run out of angry or maybe we were just tired of staring down the same neverending road. By the time Wanteegi rolled around we were silent partners. Like old married couples who know what the other is thinking. Pat would put his hand out just before I reached for the Minties. I’d play a Johnny Farnham song in my head and he’d start singing it. It was like this lady who lived in New York with a parrot. One day she was just thinking to herself about going for a walk and at the very same time her parrot—who was in another room—squawked out ‘Better take a jacket!’ Or Bobby the tortoise-shell cat who was left behind when his owners moved so he walked across the entire country until one Tuesday the owner opens the door and Bobby jumps onto the couch like he’s just been out for bit of fresh air.
‘Where do you hear all this stuff?’
‘I keep my senses on. You never know when you’re gonna be smacked in the head with a good story.’
We haven’t seen anything living on land or in the air for miles but right at that moment, two big splats of bird poo land square in the middle of the windscreen. Pat tries to get them off with the wipers but there’s no water left in them so the poo smears everywhere and we can’t see a thing.
Screech to a halt. The only liquid in the car is a half-empty bottle of Coke so we pour it over the windscreen and wipe it off with tissues. I look at Pat and we start laughing our heads off. Laughing is emotional medicine; some people in China stand in a circle and giggle together. Leaning against the bonnet we’re suddenly thinking the same thing again—Mum would have loved this.