THE KID
I first meet The Kid at a local RSL. An unprepossessing place, of mission-brown bricks, set back on a treeless lawn from a grimy street. Inside, it’s lit with a green fluorescent glare. Grey carpet, slightly sticky red vinyl chairs, walls adorned with military crests, fighting guns and lists of the dead. A television blares sport in the corner. And, in the middle of the ceiling, among it all, glitters a single, incongruous disco ball.
The Kid loves this place. He’s working the bar. He’s of medium build, not tall, with big chocolate-drop eyes framed with curling lashes. He has PTSD eyes, although he does his level best to hide them with humour. I’ve seen them before and I’ll see them again and again before this thing ends—brown, green, blue, big, small, smiling, bloodshot. PTSD eyes somehow have the look of a dog that’s been left alone outside for weeks in a yard that’s been concreted over. PTSD are quick to tears.
The ageing locals who have come to dance twostep out the back of the RSL club all know him by name. He knows what everyone drinks. As his hand flick-flick-flicks the beer tap, gold and beaded with condensation, filling a pot, he looks at me, part bashful, part sceptical.
He’s working there for a few shifts to fill in while he’s doing his university exams. He says he’s got one tomorrow and I feel sick, apologising for the timing. He’s nervous and we’re both conscious of the weirdness of the situation. We strike up an immediate rapport, but he’s deeply wary. Every time he opens up, he shrinks back again. At times he talks in riddles. I don’t take notes as a gesture of goodwill. He wants to know how I found him, who is my source?
‘If I told you who my sources were, you wouldn’t trust me with what you tell me. I need people to know that I won’t burn them and I won’t give away their names to anyone else.’
‘The thing is, I’ve got trust issues. I would trust you more if you just told the truth,’ he says.
I tell him I’m sorry and that an investigative reporter wouldn’t last long in this game if she started doing that.
He looks at me and says, ‘I know you are an investigative journalist—I know the work you do, I watch your show every night and I think you are excellent at what you do. If I was going to talk to anyone, it would be you, but I just can’t. Don’t you understand? This is really serious.
‘This is about me and it’s about him. That’s all I can say. And by “him” I don’t mean Pell.’
‘Are you saying that George Pell wasn’t your abuser?’
‘No. I’m not saying that. I’m not saying anything at all. Just that it’s about me and it’s about him. That it’s important. You have to understand, I have a good life, I love my community, I’m the good guy, the guy that everyone can count on. But my mental health is hanging on by an absolute thread.’ He pinches his finger and thumb together. ‘The only thing that is keeping me together is the idea of his head on a platter. But I’m not saying any more. Now you know I’m the guy. Okay? I’m the guy. I’m the guy. I’ve given you that. That’s more than anyone else knows. No-one else has found me. But that’s it. That’s all I’m saying. That’s more than I’ll tell anyone else, but I’m not saying any more.’
His mum and her partner turn up. My stomach hits the floor. She’s going to tell me off for hassling her boy. I imagine myself as a mother in that situation. But they go into a back room and he follows them. I sit and wait, he’s in there for a while. Reassuring them. I don’t see them again.
‘What do you know about me anyway?’ he asks when he returns. I exhale deeply. I tell him that I know that there was another boy with him, but that’s about it—I don’t know any of his circumstances. He blanches at this. ‘So you know? Fuuccck.’ He presses down on the bar with his hands. He shakes his head. ‘How do you know this? You need to tell me.’
‘I know he’s not living any more,’ I gingerly admit. His eyes fix on me with a hard look for a second, then dart off to the side. ‘And I’m really, really sorry,’ I say softly.
He nods vigorously, the trauma now apparent, his jaw clenched, the snap of the beer tap now deliberate. He flick-flick-flicks and pours himself another schooner.
I sit there for a while and hope he’ll fill the silence.
‘Okay. You know that. Well, you’ll know why this is so important to me. I can’t fuck this up for some journalist, don’t you understand that? As much as I like what you do and I respect you and I can see that I like you, I can’t fuck that up for anything. It’s too important.’
‘I understand,’ I tell him. ‘I really do. Do you think that he’ll ever come back? There’s no extradition treaty with the Vatican. He’s already said he has a heart condition. I’m just not sure it’s ever going to happen.’ I want to say more, but I can’t snap this thread.
‘That may well be true, I hope it’s not,’ he continues. ‘But you’ve got to understand how important this is to me. I’m traumatised. I know I seem like I’m a happy-go-lucky guy, but it is a facade. This is the mask I wear every day and I’m really good at wearing it. But until the Taskforce comes and tells me that it’s not a goer, I’m not talking to anyone. But if they tell me it’s not happening, I’ll come straight to your door.’
I tell him I am so sorry to put him through this. I say it’s for a good cause. I tell him loosely what information I know, which to be frank, at that point, is scant. I say that I feel sad that the very thought of me may be triggering because I am now inextricably linked with the story of his childhood. I say I have been in that situation with others before and it saddens me because he’s clearly such a decent guy.
He tells me that I am ‘on the right track’ and intimates that there is more to this.
‘More than Pell? Another priest?’
My eyes widen and he looks like he’s going to say more, but then he stops. He’s shaking his head and looking at the ceiling. I tell him I’m sorry. He tells me to keep investigating. ‘You have to keep going—there is so much more to this.’ I say I won’t hassle him.
We go outside for a while. He asks me more about what I know. I understand why—it would drive me nuts. I tell him I know about a witness, I know about his situation, I know that there are others. I don’t know how many. I have heard there are lawyers with clients. I don’t know anything about those clients, just that they exist. He keeps shaking his head, clenching his jaw, grinding his teeth.
At the end, I give him a hug and tell him to look after himself. We part on good terms. My heart’s in my throat, but this is not that rush of adrenaline you get from a scoop. It’s the feeling you get when you’re a little kid and you lift up a rock in the yard and a whole lot of bugs scurry out and you throw it down. As I drive home through Melbourne’s northern streets, streetlights flash a sickly green through my windscreen.
Across town, a little boy and girl have gazed out their bedroom window like they do every night and looked for their star. They have found it and blown it a kiss goodnight. Their star is their uncle, The Choirboy. He was there that day that changed The Kid’s life. It changed his life too. Immediately and irrevocably and brutally. If, as The Kid had said in a sworn statement to Victoria Police’s Taskforce SANO, The Choirboy knew George Pell’s ugly secret, he carried it with him to his untimely grave. In May 2016, when I meet The Kid, he is thirty-two. His friend, The Choirboy, would have been the same age. But he’s been dead two years.