Adam is behind with his classes. All year the lessons have crawled along, the teachers meticulously going over last year’s stuff, making sure they’ve got the basics covered before they introduce any new material. Then the minute Adam’s away—whammo—they charge through half a term’s work. And although he’s back in class now, sitting through the lessons, it’s been hard to concentrate. He’s either over-tired or distracted. It’s helped that he’s had the occasional nana-nap on Mrs Paine’s couch. Yesterday, he slept right through fifth period and nearly didn’t wake up in time to meet Skye at the gate. Luckily, someone on their way to soccer had lost control of their practice ball; the thud as it hit the wall woke him just in time. The subsequent run-hobble to the gate would probably qualify Adam for a tick in one of Reece’s training boxes. Skye had been waiting where they said they’d meet, waving goodbye to her mates. Donna and Lauren, he found out later. Her smile was nervous. Adam thought she looked small and vulnerable. Probably wondering if he was going to stand her up or not.
Adam comes to with a jolt. He’s been daydreaming again. But Mrs Dickson (no nickname necessary) is still droning on about The Importance of Being Earnest. Some speech by this old tart called Lady Bracknell: ‘To lose one parent, Mr Creighton, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness...’
Adam looks out the window.
It’s raining outside, the water streaming down the windows in silver rivulets. Adam stares, trying to make out where the quad ends and the sky begins, straining to make sense of what he’s seeing until eventually the window becomes a shimmering screen of pixels: grey, silver and white. Mrs Dickson’s voice rises to compete with the patter of the rain on the roof.
Wherever she is, Adam hopes Mum is out of the rain.
Skye is seated behind him, somewhere at the back of the class. He wonders if she can see him from where she is, if she’s looking at the back of his head right now. He probably should have done a better job of combing his hair. Hers is dark with streaks the colour of golden syrup. She ties it in a perky ponytail that swishes this way and that when she moves. Glossy, like a shampoo commercial. Adam finds that little swish hypnotising. And although it’s difficult to sneak a look at her while he’s driving, Adam’s noticed a tiny tendril, too short to fit in the elastic band, that curls neatly around her ear. Adam wonders if the skin under that curl is as soft as it looks. How it would feel under his fingers? Would she snatch his hand away? The bell sounds the end of the day, waking Adam from his reverie.
Mrs Dickson raises her voice over the scrape of the chairs. ‘Felicity, do you have time to help Adam with The Importance of Being Earnest? Bring him up to speed on the class discussions he’s missed?’ Adam notices Kieran’s head go up at the mention of Felicity. Adam’s best friend picks up his pace and heads to the door. In a hurry to get home? Or not wanting to hear her answer? It seems Kieran might still be hung up on Felicity Graham. He needn’t worry. For starters, Adam would never fuck over a mate like that, and even if he were that much of a creep, Felicity isn’t really Adam’s thing, although she’s pretty enough with blue eyes and a spray of soft brown freckles over her nose. Felicity has what arty people call stage presence. It’s not that she’s fake exactly, but anything she does is a performance. She doesn’t just flick her hair, she flicks her hair, every aspect of the gesture exaggerated. And she’s used to a lot of attention, although it’s mostly focused on her breasts and the way they wobble in her school polo shirts. Still, Kieran was smitten with her. While they were an item, Kieran spent every dollar he made working at Domino’s Pizzas taking Felicity out to the movies, to the hot pools, or browsing the girly boutiques at Bayfair Shopping Plaza. That is, until Felicity suddenly dropped him. Adam hopes Felicity’s too busy. Last thing he needs are complications with his best mate.
At the top table, waiting on Felicity’s reply, Mrs Dickson stacks spare copies of the play into a neat pile. Felicity tilts her chin upwards, making a show of mentally going through her agenda.
‘Um. I’m sorry, Mrs Dickson,’ she says, ‘I’d really like to help, but I’m in the school production and I’m playing the lead.’ A flick of her hair. ‘I’m tied up most afternoons with rehearsals.’
‘I can help Adam, Mrs Dickson. I made lots of notes.’ Adam turns to see who will save him. It’s Skye. The last to leave, she’s hefting her bag down the row of desks.
Mrs Dickson beams. ‘Thank you, Skye. If you could get together with Adam and go over the key points we’ve discussed in class: the upper class Victorian society Wilde is poking fun at, major themes—marriage, morality and so on—and some of the literary techniques he’s employed.’
‘Puns, symbols... that sort of thing?’
‘Yes, that’d be excellent.’ Mrs Dickson picks up her battered handbag, and Adam clocks the car keys she’s twirling around her little finger. Honda. ‘Do you both have copies of the text?’ Skye and Adam nod. ‘Good. I’m giving you a two week extension, Adam. Let me know if you have any problems.’ She whisks out of the classroom, taking all the air with her.
Alone with Skye, Adam is a beached fish, opening and closing his mouth, struggling for an opening.
‘So, how’s your leg today?’ Skye says finally. Adam sticks his leg up in the air, wiggles it around. Skye smiles. They make their way through the rapidly emptying corridors. Outside, the rain is coming down hard enough to get soaked, but no one wants to be the dork wearing a coat.
Skye says, ‘Shall we make a run for it?’
Adam takes a step out into the rain. Returned to the water, the fish finds his voice.
‘Here, let me carry your bag.’ Adam shoulders Skye’s backpack, carrying it over the top of his own. He’s humped over like Quasimodo. ‘Follow me. The car’s this way. Jeepers! What have you got in here, anyway?’
Skye giggles. ‘Science text books. Biology, mostly. They’re a bit heavy.’
Adam pretends to stagger under the weight of the bag. ‘Understatement!’
With Adam leading the way, the pair dash across the street to the car. Fumbling in his pocket for the car keys, Adam clicks the boot open and throws the bag in, then climbs into the driver’s seat.
It’s a short trip into town from school, but Skye fills it with everyday chatter: the university programmes she’s been checking out, her permanent struggle with regression analysis, and what some of the girls will be wearing to Ants’ party next weekend.
‘Thanks for volunteering to help me out with English,’ Adam says when he can get a word in edgewise.
‘It’s okay. I like English. All of my other subjects are either sciences or maths. They’re so full-on that by the time I get to English it feels like a holiday. It’s like in the play, you know, Jack likes to escape from his quiet life in the country, so he pretends to be visiting his brother Ernest, but really he’s skiving off to London for fun. From time to time, I escape to English.’
Checking his blind spot, Adam changes to the left lane under the Chapel Street flyover.
‘You’ve read the whole play, haven’t you?’ he says when the manoeuvre’s completed.
‘Uh-huh. It’s actually pretty funny.’
‘Yeah, right! As funny as Flight of the Conchords?’
Skye laughs, the sound bubbling up gently, then fading away.
‘Maybe not quite that funny, although when you think about it, Jack and Algie were probably the Jemaine and Brett of their day.’ Adam pulls into the designated park for Skye’s apartment. Empty because they haven’t got a car. Surprised, Skye turns in her seat.
‘Aren’t you going to the track this afternoon?’
‘No, I figured I’d give my leg another day for the scab to heal.’ He points at the sticking plaster that replaces Skye’s earlier handiwork.
‘Euuw.’ Skye wrinkles her nose in distaste.
‘Yeah, it is looking pretty gross. So instead of running, I went in before school and did a weights work-out. Upper body.’ To illustrate this point, Adam flexes one arm like a body builder. Skye rolls her eyes.
‘Well, Arnie, if you’re not doing anything now, what say we swing by Video Ezy and get the play on DVD? There’s a really good BBC version with Reese Witherspoon and that actor from The King’s Speech, Colin somebody. I think the text is probably pretty close to the play, too.’
Hugging Skye’s seat as he backs the car out of the parking lot, Adam hopes Kieran hasn’t beaten them to the video outlet. The thought of spending two hours snuggled up on a sofa with Skye watching a movie makes his spine tingle.
That night, Dad comes home late carrying a packet of fish and chips. It’s the second time they’ve had chips this week. When Mum was home, they hardly ever had takeaways. Adam should probably have taken one of Aunty Mandy’s meals out of the freezer before he left for school, but it’s been hard to get himself up lately and he always seems to be running late. Adam picks up a piece of battered fish and breaks it in two. Family tradition. Adam and Mum always start by eating their fish first.
‘Did Detective Pūriri call today?’ he asks.
Using his fingers, Dad wipes his chips in a splodge of tomato sauce tipped on his side of the newsprint. Shaking his head no, he shovels a couple of chips in his mouth. There’s nothing to say to that, so Adam eats his fish. After a time, Dad interrupts his chewing and mumbles into the paper: ‘Look, mate, I’m a bit behind at the yard. I’m going to have to go back tonight.’
‘Sure.’
‘I might be working late some nights.’ Adam nods. He gets it. Dad doesn’t want to be here without Mum either. Dad goes on. ‘I’ll call you. Let you know what time to expect me in.’
‘Sure.’
‘You’ll be okay, right?’
‘Yep.’ Adam starts in on the chips, pushing chip after chip into his mouth, not bothering with sauce, stuffing himself full like a coupon box at the supermarket. When all the chips are gone and only the tired batter scraps remain, Dad screws up the paper and stuffs it in the bin.
Later that evening, when Dad has left for the yard, Adam logs on to the computer. Kieran’s online.
KCClarke: Corey said to hang out at his tomorrow morning. You good? [ENTER]
Awarriorx: Sure. [ENTER]
KCCkarke. So, any news today? [ENTER]
Awarriorx: No, we haven’t heard from Pūriri today. There’s no news about Mum. [ENTER]
KCClarke: I didn’t mean that. Corey said he saw you drive away from school with Skye. So give. [ENTER]
Awarriorx: So nothing. She’s helping me with my English. [ENTER]
KCClarke: Never heard it called that before. [ENTER]
Awarriorx: Piss off. [ENTER]
Awake again. I’ve been lying here thinking about English. Not the way Kieran was thinking about English, although I admit I’ve been thinking about that too. No, what I’ve been thinking about came from watching the DVD with Skye and all the silly misunderstandings arising from puns. It made me wonder about the different meanings of words, so I pulled up the online dictionary and looked up the word missing.
I couldn’t believe it!
The verb has nine meanings. Nine! And that’s not counting the nouns. Nine interpretations, including skip an opportunity, avoid a potentially harmful or dangerous situation, and to omit something, for example, from a list. Of course, I already knew the most obvious meaning of missing: to fail to be present or on time for something. That would be Mum, who has failed to turn up to see out the remainder of her life. And if she doesn’t come back, she’s going to miss the rest of mine, too.
Another form means to regret the absence of somebody or something. This is the meaning that applies to me regretting the loss of my mother, feeling sorry that she’s no longer here.
Regret the absence of.
For some reason, those four words really pissed me off. Clearly, those learned lexicographers at Encarta haven’t got the foggiest idea how it feels to have a missing parent. How can they when their definition is so terse? So flippant. You regret the absence of the Sunday newspaper on the front porch. You regret the absence of the sugar in your tea, or an umbrella on a rainy day, or tomato sauce at a BBQ. My regret for my mother is without limit. Absent, I see her everywhere. I miss the everyday things not worthy of notice until now. The way she’d twist her fingers through the curl by her ear when she laughed, the way she’d hum when she folded the washing, her knack of coming up with the final crossword clue sometimes days later when everyone else has given up, and that guilty passion for the trashy bodice-ripper novels she keeps in a stack under her bed. Fluffy slippers, strawberry shampoo, special Christmas chutney, and a dog-eared photo of a Thunderbird birthday cake (slightly wonky on one side) still stuck to the refrigerator.
The thing that’s weird is the word miss goes further than the simple sadness of loss. Missing someone also includes the shock of realising that loss. This is hard to explain. The best example I can come up with is something I remember from social studies years ago. We were reading the testimonies of people who lost family members in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre, and this one woman wrote that the worst thing wasn’t learning that her husband was dead, but realising that he was going to stay dead. That’s the gut-wrenching bit.
I studied some more and found the verb missing is both transitive and intransitive. I didn’t have a clue what that meant, so I looked it up and discovered these verbs operate with and without a direct object. So, in the transitive sense, I miss my mother. I fail to reach, or make contact with her, my object. However, in its intransitive form, there is no object. She’s simply missing.
And the last definition, transitive again, carries just a hint of irony. Here, the explanation of missing is not seeing, or hearing or understanding something. Well, that’s certainly true because I just don’t get any of it.
Why is this happening to us?