‘They didn’t kick me out for it. I quit. I can’t show my face there again.’
‘Why the bloody hell not?’
‘Cos they’ve seen me act like an idiot.’
‘Yes,’ Dad says matter-of-factly. ‘Youwerean idiot. You behaved like a completestupido. But so does every boofhead at any sports club anywhere. You think you’re better than the other boys there?’
‘No, I—’
‘Exactly. Because you’re not. You fucked up the same way any other bloke fucks up, bud. Just rock up at training next time and put your head down and carry on. Don’t let your team down, and don’t be a coward and quit something you love. I raised you better than that.’
I swallow. ‘Okay. Okay Dad. I won’t.’
My father nods with satisfaction. It’s a rare time he’s ever given me life advice that actually helped, and I think he knows it.
‘So, you enjoying the Dockers season, then?’ he asks. ‘We’re a bee’s dick from making the finals.’
‘Oh,’ I say, wincing. ‘I don’t barrack for Freo.’
Dad’s face is immediately thunderous again. ‘What? My own son? Who do you barrack for, then? Don’t you dare say—’
‘I go for the Eagles, Dad,’ I out myself.
Dad bursts into this furious laugh. ‘Ya fucken kidding me?!’ he roars. ‘You finally get into footy, and you go and barrack for the wrong team! What a little shit. I hate Eagles supporters.’ He grins, even though he’s genuinely pissed. ‘Guess I gotta make an exception now, don’t I? At least your mob are having a shithouse season. Did you watch last week’s game?’
And then, for about ten minutes, I talk about football with my father.
My mother returns with a tray of coffees and baked goods from the hospital cafeteria, plus some car magazine for my father but, noticeably, noArchiecomic for me. I guess this means my outburst is going to be punished: no more gifts for Zeke.
My father takes her return as a sign he’s free to leave me for a toilet break – resulting in me and my mother falling into a lukewarm silence.
I want badly to have the same unravelling with her that I had with my father, but he only let down his guard when he thought I was dying. My mother never thought I had a death sentence, and even if she did, I’m not sure she’d let down her guard. I never saw her cry when my father had cancer. Whatever made her the way she is happened a long time ago. I don’t think she could change if she wanted to.
But even if there’s no unravelling of Anna Calogero, something has shifted in the way she speaks to me. I can detect it immediately. She’s not trying to control and manage me the way she usuallywould. If I had a messy pantry in this hospital room, she would no longer try to rearrange it. Her arms are crossed over her body and she looks at me like I’m a foreigner. She’s seen who I really am now. I’m too impure to be associated with her.
‘I tried so hard with you,’ she says stiffly. ‘Everything I ever did was for you, Zekey. You were so courteous when you were little. You could have had the best things in life.’
This is why Sabrina sets me off, too. If there’s one thing both she and my mother can agree on, it’s that I would be amazing if I did what I was told to reach my potential. But I feel tremendous relief she said ‘tried’, past tense. It means she is no longer trying.
‘You would have loved me to be a lawyer or a doctor, wouldn’t you?’ I suggest. ‘Super impressive. Rich. With a nice wife.’
She looks at me, exasperated. ‘You’re going to tell me that was wrong? I wanted for you what any mother would want for a son.’
‘Did it ever occur to you I didn’t want a life like that?’ I ask. ‘That I might have my own personality? That I might want to just be myself?’
‘That’s silly. You had the brains to get the very best. Why wouldn’t you want that?’
This is the crux of it. What she sees as an ideal life is what I see as death. We will never agree, and trying to dance around this has warped everything. To me, she failed as a mother; to her, I failed as a son.
‘I’m going to find a flat for myself,’ I tell her. ‘You can get a place in Perth, but I won’t be living there.’
My mother frowns. ‘Well, we talked about buying a beach house in Kalbarri – we might do that instead,’ she says coolly. ‘We could rent it out as an Airbnb. Robbie and Nattie and Bianca could go there with us on school holidays. All five of us together. That’s nicer than Dianella.’
It is such a relief to be discarded by her, which is what this is.We’re all going on a family holiday and you’re not invited. Good. Let Robbie be micromanaged by her instead.
‘That sounds good,’ I say. ‘I hope you guys have an awesome time up there.’
My mother appraises me, then clops over to my bedside in her heels and kisses the top of my head curtly. ‘You know, every Sunday at mass, I think of you, darling. You were such a sensitive boy. You would sing hymns at church with me, do you remember?Gloria in excelsis Deo. You had the sweetest, most angelic choirboy voice. I loved how you sounded when you sang with me. You remember that, don’t you?’
