12
CHRISTMAS DAY. AFTER Dad gets back from church, eyes rimmed red, we put on some carols to drown out the deafening silence, force down some pancakes for breakfast, and I try very hard not to go back to bed like one of those snails that can sleep for three years at a time.
Mum and Dad give me new pyjamas (yellow, of course, thanks to Mum), a diary for next year and two tickets to Melbourne Zoo’s fundraising concert series on in March (‘maybe you can take your friend Jacinta’). For some reason it was an Evans family tradition for me and Charlie to give Mum and Dad IOUs rather than physical gifts, something like ‘a shoulder massage a month for a year’ or ‘a mother and son cafe date’. Two Christmases ago, after Charlie had mentally committed to his future earning power, he added an IOU to my gift of a heart-shaped waffle maker: IOU a lifetime supply of ‘dog/cat/other pet of your choosing’ including ‘accessories/food/vet bills/weird pet photoshoots’. This year I give Mum a month of morning smoothie deliveries and Dad help with the business’s social-media marketing videos.
After presents we FaceTime Mum’s parents, who are at my uncle’s house in Brisbane, and it’s exactly as awkward and disjointed as every single family FaceTime there ever was or ever will be. We overhear Gran tell Uncle Tal that Mum’s ‘really aged’ before they’ve properly disconnected, which puts Mum in an understandably sour mood. Then we set off on the one-and-a-half-hour drive to Dad’s family’s place in Dandenong.
Lunch is a blur of Christmas crackers, a thousand cousins, and generic gifts nobody really wants. Each family member seems to have decided on one of two options: pretend Charlie never existed or bring him up at every opportunity. Uncle David grunts and winks out cliched questions about how school’s going and if I’ve got a boyfriend and ‘Will you grab us another beer, love?’ In contrast, my cousin Lorna—seven years older than me with new-born twins—hugs me three times in the first ten minutes before slipping me a half-glass of sympathy bubbles and launching into a teary memory of babysitting Charlie and me when we were kids before apologising for not calling me in the past year. As she blabs her babies scream and I remind myself that I never want children, not least because you have to push them out of your actual vagina.
We say grace, because Dad’s family are all either religious or pretend to be. Then we eat.
Every time I glance at Mum and Dad they look lost in their thoughts or like they’re faking being okay, but they don’t lean on each other for support. They push turkey and roast potatoes around their plates and try to hold themselves together while they practically echo with sadness. Then Mum sees me watching and immediately leans a little closer to Dad and plasters a smile on her face.
I avoid eating the turkey I’ve been served up (half of Dad’s side of the family don’t believe in vegetarians or, incredibly, dinosaurs) and I drink another half-glass of bubbles. No one tries to stop me. It’s soothing, like one of those weighted blankets people use for anxiety.
Midway through a bowl of Dad’s trifle my phone buzzes with a message. I pull it out of my pocket and stare at the unknown number on the screen. It takes a few seconds for what I’m seeing to sink in because despite the lack of name I know who it is, and this person hasn’t messaged me in almost an entire year.
Lockie.
I swallow the cream that’s congealing in my mouth and slip off my chair. Finding a quiet spot at the top of the stairwell I try to steady myself but my heart’s pounding. How does he still have such a strong grip on me? I swipe open to read.
Good to see you the other day Evans. Merry Xmas
That’s it? That’s it. What the hell does that mean? Something? Nothing? He’s seen me almost every day of school this year, albeit passing in the hallway with my head down. Why was it good to see me the other day ? I stare at the screen trying to figure it out, but I really have no idea. I’d deleted Lockie’s number but not his texts which, yes, is completely illogical but that was me at the time. That means the last message he sent me, a lifetime ago, is directly above this one.
I’m sorry. I can’t.
When I read it, it breaks my heart all over again. But because I’m some kind of masochist, I scroll up. Messages from me over the few days before that message, asking how he’s going, if I can call him, telling him I want to see him—clinging to him like he was a raft and I was drowning at sea because I’d already lost enough, hadn’t I? And above all that, our messages on the day before Charlie died.
Are you going to Kenji’s thing tomorrow?
Yep! See you there?
Yeah x
My eyesight blurs as I stare at the screen, words turning to liquid. And before I’m able to catch it, my memory tumbles back to that day.
The car horn blasted, short and impatient. I slicked on some lip gloss and glanced at my reflection again. I’d settled on a fairly full-coverage nautical-themed bikini that I wasn’t convinced I’d be stripping down to. I didn’t hate my body, but I was still self-conscious.
The horn sounded again so I threw a blue-and-white striped beach towel over my shoulder and my Polaroid camera in my tote bag at the last second, thinking it would give me something to do if I felt out of place. Then I ran outside.
An Open House sign took up the car’s front seat, so I slipped into the back next to Charlie. Mum flicked the radio on and pulled away from the kerb.
‘You brushed your hair,’ Charlie said, eyeing me suspiciously. He was in board shorts and a navy singlet, sunnies pushed back in his thick hair. ‘And you’re actually coming to a party, not cancelling last minute? Who are you and what did you do with my sister?’
I shrugged and tried to sound casual instead of reminding-myself-to-breathe nervous. ‘Very shrewd observations of the obvious,’ I said. ‘You sound like Mum.’ I made lips like a cat’s bum, the stupid face we used to do behind Mum’s back whenever one of us got in trouble. Charlie laughed, which made me feel like I’d won the lottery.
‘Rach coming?’ he asked.
I shook my head. ‘Nup.’ I’d invited her for much-needed moral support, but it was her dad’s birthday. She swore she’d be on her phone for message updates though.
‘So…are you actually going to talk to anyone?’
I rolled my eyes, but it was a valid question. I’d rather hover around the edges of parties sometimes. I’m not shy, I just get exhausted from lots of people and lots of talking.
‘Maybe,’ I said.
‘Well, don’t embarrass me.’
I glared at a tiny pimple on his chin, willing it to grow. But then Charlie lowered his voice so Mum couldn’t hear over the radio. ‘And come find me if you want to leave, okay? Kenji’s things can get kind of messy.’
Despite myself I smiled at his protectiveness. Neither of us knew that he only had a few hours left to live.
Kenji’s place was a mansion with a tennis court, sauna and pool. From the little I knew about pool parties, it was like any other pool party. Kenji’s parents were inside trying to pretend we weren’t there. Someone kept changing the playlist. Someone drew a dick and balls in sunscreen on Zac Aoki’s back. Someone rode a unicorn pool toy. There was vodka disguised in juice bottles, mountains of chips in bowls, and a sunscreen slick on the surface of the over-chlorinated pool. The worst thing that should have happened was someone threw up in the bushes.
I hovered on the periphery, sitting on a deck chair next to a table full of barbeque food, simultaneously scanning the backyard for Lockie’s arrival, taking polaroids of the scene, messaging Rach updates and listening to a nearby debate about who’d be voted ‘most likely to end up in jail’ in that year’s graduating class’s unofficial awards. Charlie and Kenji were shooting water pistols at each other near the pool. Some girls danced to Taylor Swift.
I first saw Lockie through the camera lens, post-click. He was standing near Charlie, shirt off, with a six-pack of UDLs in his hand. He had a wetsuit tan—face and hands more bronzed than his body—which made him look both ridiculous and cute. He greeted a few of the guys with back-slaps, a few of the bikini girls with a one-armed hug, but when he saw me he raised his hand and smiled. A thrill shot through me and the space between us thrummed with something magnetic. Lockie ducked his head a little and tucked a loose curl behind his ear, the mannerism I first mistook as him being shy but realised then was actually him being painfully aware of his own beauty. He started walking over.
I shoved the camera in my bag and stood up, immediately conscious of my entire body. I glanced at Charlie in case he was watching, but he was focused on his water-pistol fight. Would Lockie hug me? Brush my cheek with his lips? Would we hook up in secret, hidden down the side of the house or alone in the sauna? Or would he want everyone at the party to know he’d chosen me? That I was special. The aching, longing, wanting stirred inside me.
Lockie was what I cared about, was all I cared about, in the moment before it happened. In the seconds before everything changed.
He was three steps away when I heard something I’ll never be able to un-hear: a sickening crack followed by a girl’s scream. I dragged my gaze from Lockie to see my brother lying on his back on the wet tiles by the pool. I blinked, completely unsure if this was a problem or not. But by the time I got over there people had started to gather around him. Saying his name. Asking if he was okay. The tone of their voices—urgent, fearful—set a sickness rising in my stomach. I pushed through the crowd, expecting to find my brother groaning in pain and holding a broken wrist or something, but he was motionless except for a terrifying twitch in his face. His eyes were closed, lashes beaded with water. I knelt next to him.
‘Charlie!’ It was Lockie. Lockie by my side. ‘Charlie, mate, can you hear me?’
‘What happened?’ someone asked.
‘I dunno,’ someone else replied.
‘He slipped on that sunscreen.’
‘He smashed his head on the edge of the step.’
‘Someone turn the music off!’
‘Don’t touch him! He might have broken his neck.’
‘Give him some space!’
Lockie looked around wildly at the group. ‘Has anyone called an ambulance?’
Someone ran off to grab their phone.
I knelt there, numb and useless. All I could think about was how hard the tiles were under my knees. How pointed the corner of that step was. How loud the crack sounded, even from the other side of the pool. Saliva flooded my mouth.
Minutes that felt like hours passed. For a moment Charlie opened his eyes, tried to speak, but then closed them again. Someone put a finger under his nose, couldn’t figure out if he was breathing. Lockie pressed his mouth to my brother’s lips and pumped his chest so hard I thought his ribs would break. My vision heaved and I heaved with it. At last the ambulance sirens screamed down the street.
Lockie and I followed the ambulance in his car, windows rolled down, taking huge gulps of air as I tried and failed not to panic. I called Mum and somehow told her what happened, making her promise to come now. Fast. Please . Then I hung up.
I shivered violently. I looked down into the footwell of Lockie’s car and tried to focus on the items there—a packet of surfboard wax, a half-empty tube of hair gel, a school diary, footy boots—but they all seemed like props. Nothing was real. I’d fantasised about being in this car with Lockie, sharing something of myself I’d never shared with anyone, but not this.
‘He’s gonna be okay,’ Lockie said over and over, but no one had ever sounded less sure of anything.
At the hospital, everything went from fast-forward to slow motion. My parents arrived, looking stricken. Hours passed. Rach messaged asking how deep Lockie’s tongue was in my mouth right now and sent me a bored selfie of her suffering through their extended family get-together, but I couldn’t reply. At some point Lockie’s mum picked him up. I don’t even remember if I said goodbye to him. Mum, Dad and I all sat and waited on the hard chairs by the vending machine, my parents’ faces pulled out of shape by fear. Dad’s hand cupped Mum’s head, her eyes closed and his mouth murmuring into her forehead. Patterns seemed to be repeating themselves over and over; Mum pulling me into hugs so hard I thought they’d bruise my ribs; Dad having whispered conversations with doctors; me asking what was going on. Something about Charlie’s brainstem. Something about swelling. Something about a haemorrhage. Something about being very unlucky.
All I wanted was for someone to tell me this wasn’t happening. That things like this couldn’t possibly just happen because someone’s sunscreen leaked all over the tiles at a pool party. That this wasn’t how life worked. But no one did.
We got bad news, then worse news, then the news that made us crumple and fold into each other, three broken things. All the light that had rushed into the world the day Charlie was born was suddenly extinguished. I leaned over the plastic chair and threw up on the lino floor. Mum waited until we got home to wail.
One of the worst things about someone you love dying suddenly is the feeling like they’ve slipped through your fingers. The feeling like you would have held on tighter if you’d known they weren’t as solid and sure-thing as they seemed. Because they were just there, next to you in the car in their singlet and sunnies. Being annoying. Being sweet. Being your brother. Everything was normal; then four hours later he was dead. How can something so vivid and real, how can an entire person , cease to exist just like that? It didn’t make any sense. Where did he go?
The funeral was boys in shirts and dark sunglasses. Girls in black dresses. Rach with mascara streaks down her cheeks, not having a clue what to say to me. Lockie stoic, stiff-backed, and pretending we’d never kissed. I was a rollercoaster of overthinking and contradictions. I wanted all the attention and I wanted none of it. I wanted to look beautiful for Lockie and I wanted to be invisible. I wanted to cry in a way other people thought was natural, normal, but also in a unique way, like no one else possibly could, because I was Charlie’s sister.
There was a slide show put together by my uncle that Charlie and I would have thought was boring in any other circumstance—a photo of my brother and me as kids feeding seagulls at a windswept beach in daggy jumpers Gran had knitted. Dad cried in huge heaving breaths and spoke about unrealised potential, being too young, his words freezing Charlie in time as their miracle. It was the first time I’d heard the phrase ‘Charlie was ’ instead of ‘Charlie is ’, and the gap between those two tiny words might have been what opened up the black hole, the chasm I’m so scared of falling into.
The wake was like an awkward school dance: so many teenagers in one room, standing in nervous groups. I overheard some of the guys talking about footy and I didn’t know if I wanted to punch them or hug them for it. I mostly stayed close to Mum, feeding off her numb, medicated fog, and I felt the tiniest bit grateful that the mental anguish was so bad it became physical as well: sharp stomach pains, a thumping headache, a metallic taste in my mouth. My new shoes pinched my toes, a tiny distraction from the worst day of my life.
When it was over I was exhausted, but all I could think was: That’s it? What now?
What now was a blur of delivered flowers, home-cooked lasagnes, nights spent wide awake and days in fitful sleep. Scrolling through the countless messages left on Charlie’s socials: I’m heartbroken, bro, I just don’t get how this can happen, you were too young, it doesn’t make any sense, you were just here.
Dad in the bathroom holding Charlie’s toothbrush. Mum’s phone buzzing a reminder for Charlie’s upcoming doctor’s appointment. Him dying all over again in small, quiet moments. Then Dad slamming his fist on the dining-room table one night. Then Mum deciding we should sue the sunscreen company, or the tile company, but dropping the notion just as fast. Then the grief counsellor. Then the first night we ate a full meal rather than staring at our plates before throwing most of the food away. Then Dad putting on a load of washing. Then Mum doing a facemask for the raw, dry skin on her cheeks. Then the first time someone said his name without crumbling into nothing. Then Mum deciding a spin class might be good for her. Then Dad going to church. Then them both getting back to work because otherwise their business would collapse. Then me going back to school because otherwise I’d have to repeat. All of us putting one foot in front of the other, tripping and falling on the obvious days—his year twelve graduation, his birthday. All of us pretending things might one day be okay, even though we know they never, ever will be.
At the top of the stairwell on Christmas Day I’m numb. The black hole is sucking and swirling, desperate to drag me in, and I have to stare at the message from Lockie to keep my vision from blurring. Good to see you the other day Evans. Merry Xmas. Finally—trying not to hate myself for letting him inside the tiniest crack of me after the way he shut me out—I write back, throwing myself over the safety railing and into something unknown. Because it’s better than being all alone in the dark.
You too. Merry Xmas
Blood and alcohol and adrenaline pound in my temples in a way that proves I’m alive—a mini life bomb—and the black hole slowly fades away.
·
I’m lying in bed that night with an alcohol-and-sugar headache, relieved that at least Christmas is over. My phone buzzes. I grope for it somewhere in my sheets and my heart flips when I see it’s Ben.
I have bad news and I have good news
I roll onto my stomach and bring the screen up close to my face. I write back straightaway, not even bothering to wait twenty minutes so it looks like I’m doing something other than pouncing on my phone.
All of the Tasmanian devils have escaped. But you’re excellent with a lasso
Hahahaha. I am excellent with a lasso
I’m surprised to feel myself crack a smile. I wonder where he is right now. In his bedroom? I try to bring it to life in my imagination—messy boy bed, some cute but embarrassing stuffed animal from his childhood shoved in a corner, a miniature toy basketball ring suctioned to the wall, maybe something weird but kind of cool like a Venus flytrap collection—then I remember I’m in the middle of a conversation and I write back.
Okay what’s the news?
Bad news: I can’t wipe ur photo from our system
Disappointment echoes inside me. A cold night breeze floats in through the window, so I get up and drag it shut.
Damn. Good news?
Good news: I do have access to the animal surveillance system
I’m frowning at my screen, wondering how that’s relevant, when my phone buzzes again. It’s not a message but a video. I tap play. It’s black and white and fairly grainy, so it takes me a moment to figure out what I’m looking at, but then patches of some kind of native-looking grass come into focus. A dirt ground. One side of a large wire enclosure in the background. The second I realise what it is, I see a tiny bird with spindly legs and a fluffy, round body dart across the screen, wings fluttering so fast it’s like the video is playing in double time. I gasp in surprise then laugh when it darts back the other way, just a blur. My chest feels like bursting, and I write back before I’ve even finished the video.
Ninja!!!!!
Ninja!!!!
Has she got zoomies?? She’s so speedy!!!!
What did u expect!?!?
She’s a NINJA!!!
She’s trained in reconnaissance, espionage, infiltration, deception and running really, really fast for a tiny bird
I laugh and press play on the video again and see her twinkle back on screen before bending her head around to preen beneath her wing feathers, almost losing balance, then righting herself and racing around again, wings beating. She’s literally the sweetest thing. I love her.
She’s so cute I want to squish her!!
Ma’am please refrain from squishing the critically endangered bird
We have been tasked with saving her species
Yes to air holes. No to squishing. I’m still learning.
Hahaha
It’s really funny though she’s like OBSESSED with flying
She’s doing it ALL the time
Even in the day which is super unusual for them
Weird. Why??
I dunno
It’s like she wants to prove us wrong about her species or something
The keepers had to put padding against the wall so she wouldn’t hurt herself again.
On a scale of weird she’s an 8
And I’m anthropomorphising but I swear when she’s in the air she looks so happy
It’s hilarious
And right then I admit there’s a part of me that still believes that Ninja is a sign. That there’s a more-than-it-seems reason she smashed into my window. I just don’t know what it is yet.
What a legend!
Totally
Anyway I thought u would like that
Hope it made u smile
Because I’m just going to assume it was a kind of bad
Christmas for u
The giddy good feeling the Ninja video gave me sinks slightly and that question flares up in me again: did he only message me, send me that video, because he feels sorry for me? Like, am I only my brother’s death to him? But I want to keep talking so I force myself to stay open.
You assumed correct. The literal worst At my dad’s family’s place. No one knew how to act. My cousin tried to ply me with alcohol
Yeah
That’s awful
I’m sorry
Except for the alcohol
I hope u downed ten glasses and embarrassed the
whole family
I fell asleep in the car ride home
Haha that’s cute
I’m glad no one can see my Ben-just-called-me-cute grin.
What did you do?
Ben tells me that he’s worked at the sanctuary the past two Christmases, because it’s not like the animals take a holiday, plus his dad isn’t great at the whole single-parent-in-a-challenging-emotional-situation thing. Most of his extended family is back in South Africa, where he moved from with his mum and dad when he was five. His older sister lives in Sydney, but they talked on the phone. Ben and the other Christmas Day keepers played Santa vs the Grinch basketball during lunch then watched an old, animated movie called SpaceJam .
Ben’s so easy to message with.
I tell him about the religious side of my family and how Dad’s gone back to church since Charlie died. Then about the time the cousin who plied me with alcohol once babysat Charlie and me as kids. Instead of letting us watch cartoons she read us a Bible story.
It was Noah’s Ark which I was totally fascinated by. Like, where were all the insects kept? How can one ark fit so many mammals? What did they drink?? Sea water? Huh??
I have no answers for u
Because those answers don’t exist
But let me tell u from personal experience…
The shit from a single day alone would sink that ship
And that’s when I discover it’s possible to poo-emoji-react.
Then Ben texts again.
So I don’t know about u but I’m not going to sleep anytime soon
Highly unlikely
Want to watch a movie or something?
My skin tingles as I type back.
Ok. Do you have Netflix?
Actually I’ve got a better idea.
Then he sends a link to a random website I don’t know. I spend half a second wondering if this is a very elaborate scam, but then I decide to live a little and tap the hyperlink. It takes me to a screen with a cartoon background of blue and green mountains and trees. In the middle is a little animated figure dressed in all black, hovering in the air. Above, in bubble writing, it says Flying Ninja, and below there’s a button with the word PLAY.
It’s a computer game.
Omg!! How did you find this?
I actually used to play it as a kid
I can’t believe it’s still up!
Wait there’s a different site where I think we can play each other
He sends another link which he tells me to open on my laptop, and this time the screen is divided in half. Two mountain backdrops, two ninjas, two PLAY buttons. Little instructions appear at the bottom: Tap your up arrow to make the ninja fly. Collect the coins. Avoid the arrows. Seems simple enough.
We both get a drink, some headphones, snuggle down into bed and hit play at the same time. And, okay, it’s simple but it’s hard. I tap my arrow key but I fly up way higher than I mean to and I only collect one coin before I’m shot down by an arrow. My side of the screen flashes with GAME OVER and I have to watch Ben play for a full three minutes until he’s shot.
Okay rematch!! I need at least 50 more goes!
Obviously ha
This time I’m marginally better, ducking under two arrows before grabbing four coins from the top of the screen, but I’ve clearly fallen for a trap because there’s an arrow right behind them.
Damn
Top tip: don’t get greedy
But the coins are so shiny!
Ben and I play game after game of Flying Ninja , texting back and forth with running commentary on my rapid improvement, the hilarious old-school sound effects and graphics, and the pan-flute soundtrack which is borderline cultural appropriation. When we’ve versed each other about a thousand times and my fingers ache from tapping, we both decide Ben’s officially better than me and, given it’s now 2 am, we should probably go to sleep.
Thanks For this I needed it
No worries :)
I’m glad
Night
Night
I lie there for a moment, with a strange floating feeling like my bed is made from clouds. Then I fall asleep rewatching the Ninja sanctuary video under my covers as if it’s a secret, unsure if it’s the bird or the boy making me feel so light.