This is where Joni went that time he disappeared. He studies that old collection of buttons in the boat, colours faded from many days in the sun. Curls his finger round a wisp of his brown golden hair and hums to himself.
I’m looking far off down the channel and out to the open sea. Maman, aide-moi, reviens à moi. Où es-tu?
Is the water still playing tricks, or will it deliver us home? I feel the sadness sweep along those bony branches still clinging to the boat. But they know it’s time to let go. A new journey is coming.
27 Our secret caper
I don’t tell William about that morning later when the dawn breaks and everything clears away. He would have a heart attack, ’cause he’s always saying kids and water do not mix. We are quiet as can be sneaking back inside the house. Didn’t matter, William was still snoring in the exact same position.
I make Joni Coco Pops because they are for special occasions and we are celebrating, even though no one else knows why.
I need a scheme. I sit and write with Joni’s coloured pencils. Stick it in an envelope from William’s writing desk to make it more professional and run to the letterbox out front. Sometimes you have to lose something to get back what you love, and I don’t even think about William getting hurt all over again.
When Aunty Cecilia comes to get Joni, I’ve already read it in my head a thousand times but I pretend it’s all a big surprise when she brings it in and smiles knowingly at me.
‘Baboo, you got a letter!’
‘For goodness sake, if that’s the gas company again…’
She hands it to William who frowns when he doesn’t recognise the handwriting. Fumbles with the envelope and now everyone’s looking at him.
To whom it may concern,
Joni would like to go to the fish and chip shop every Tuesday when William plays his phone chess with Ruben. He asked me to accompany him so I can place the order, eat at the kiosk and walk back home with him. He does not have a Tuesday treat at the moment and is bored of watching the fairy video. I am very safe with roads and know how to poke dangerous strangers in the eyes with two fingers. And anyway they mostly have bad teeth so I will look out for rotten smiles.
Yours in good faith,
Dylan Freeman.
I rub my eyes because all this asking, waiting and worrying is making me feel tired.
‘You know that path well, eh?’ says Aunty Cecilia.
I nod and say you can see my footprints in the ground I’ve gone up and down so often. And William’s smiling at the letter but having a conversation with himself in his head.
‘It’s just that Joni’s only little and…’
Here we go. It’s always just that something. It’s never just yes-what-a-top-idea-good-on-you-for-suggesting-it-in-the-first-place.
But then Aunty Cecilia says how lovely it is that I want to have some quality time with Joni. That I’m like his deedee—his big sister.
William nods like he’s agreed all along. My heart is racing because I can’t believe I’ve got away with it. And if there is a heaven I hope God still lets me in because it was only a half-lie. I will be spending extra top-quality time with Joni even if the fish and chip shop is a red herring. Maybe a John Dory as well.
Finally next Tuesday rolls around and Operation Rowboat is about to begin. An ‘Operation’ like the police storming Terry Brankett’s house for illegal green plants or that woman down on Hanerking Crescent who sold all her dead husband’s leftover cancer pills to people who weren’t even sick.
William clears his throat and flicks through his wallet, gives me a $10-note and says, ‘Only juice, nothing fizzy.’ Little does he know the night before I made us Vegemite sandwiches and a little snaplock bag of barbecue shapes (which Woolworths finally has in stock). Not so many that he might suspect something, but just enough to take the edge off when we need more fuel. He straps a watch onto my wrist. ‘It’s a digital, yeah?’ he says. Like I should be glad it wasn’t the old-style time that I learnt in grade three. Mon Dieu! He gives us fifteen minutes to walk there, half an hour to eat and fifteen to come back. I’ll have to work quick, but with Joni by my side anything is possible.
We do go down to the shops but straight past Ye Olde Fish & Chippery and into Mitre 10 where I buy a sample tin of green paint that was half-price ’cause they’re not selling that colour anymore. The man goes into the storeroom and comes back with some old paintbrushes he says we can have. For free! Mum used to say one way or another everything had a price tag. But there are no strings attached here; I checked the bag twice before we left.
When we get to the mangroves I can’t remember where to go and no matter which way we walk the boat is nowhere. Maybe it’s been stolen. Or taken by someone who actually owned it. Maybe this is all over before it’s begun. I get real hot, can feel my heart booming through my rib cage. It isn’t just the boat. It’s the idea that I might have to stay with William forever and that is a very long time to be with anyone who is stranger kin. Besides, where will Mum go if I can’t get her to Paris?
I feel hot tears slipping down my cheeks.
‘And now?’ Joni says with his eyes, lost like a dog waiting outside a supermarket sure his owner is never coming back.
I just shake my head because I have no idea. Joni walks back the way we’ve come. And I’m glad to be following. He knows that if we just go a little further down the first path we will see the bend before the river, before the fallen tree before the boat.
And here we are.
I tell Joni he is my child labourer, that this is a special job only small and nimble hands can complete. First we have to pull the gnarly branches off the boat. They’re all twisted in and around it, holding on for dear life. It’s dead weight and gotta go.
Joni’s pretty useless. He collects all the branches I pull off and puts them in a pile. Like we’re gonna build a campfire later or something. And then I have to push the boat as far as I can out of the wet mud. Joni just points in the direction I should be pushing and shakes his head when I fall over and get my knees and hands all dirty.
I glare at him. ‘Pull your weight,’ I want to say.
And then we paint in silence. All you can hear is the tap of a brush on the rim of the paint tin and the swish of bristles on wood. It’s like meditation. Stroke right, left, right, left again. Lets your mind wander any which way it pleases. Parfait.
•
The next Tuesday I wake up with a hard gut. A knot of worry strangling excited butterflies that make me feel so full the only thing I eat for breakfast are the leftover Rice Bubbles from the bottom of Joni’s bowl. I’m worried the boat will be gone and excited it might still be there. It isn’t mine and maybe that would be a strike against me with the man upstairs, but that is a chance I am willing to take. I walk extra fast because I wanna know one way or another. Phew. I breathe a big sigh of relief when we round the corner. I see Joni’s pile of campfire branches first and then the boat, just as we’d left it. I don’t need to tell Joni what to do. He hands me a paintbrush and gets going.
I smile. This kid’s all right.
As soon as one Tuesday comes and goes I am counting down to the next. Joni is too. Sometimes it’s lonely being small and even though he doesn’t know what the secret is all about he understands we are sharing something. Knowing that makes him feel a little bigger. I heard on Oprah that you have to visualise your dreams if you want them to ‘arrive in your reality’. Even though she was on TV, Oprah looked straight at me when she said that. Like she knew where I was going and that painting a boat pea green with your mute cousin was a good place to start. I will send Oprah a postcard from Paris once we get there. I think she’d like that.