So Much to Learn (39 page)

Watching Matt
and Jack frozen together in a tableau of grief I felt a chill pass
over and me and wished for a moment that I hadn't come, I felt like
I didn't belong. The next moment, however, Jack looked past my
brother to me and what I saw in that look convinced me that there
was nowhere else in the world I should have been.

Instinctively,
I staggered forward across the uneven ground and climbed over the
log to sit down next to Jack, on the other side of Matt so we were
flanking him like Davenport protectors. I reached for Jack's hand
and linked my fingers through his, leaning against his side and
resting my head against his shoulder. Matt sat down as well, his
shoulder almost but not quite touching Jack's, providing support
but maintaining his own and Jack's manly ego at the same time.

I could feel
Jack almost vibrating with pent up emotion and, as we sat there in
a weighted silence, I prepared myself for an outburst. After all,
surely even Jack at his most repressed couldn't keep all the
feelings brought up that day under control for long.

The minutes
ticked by as we listened to the frogs humming away in the tiny
pools of sludgy water and I focused intently on not crying.
Finally, after a long, long time I felt Jack give a huge sigh and
then begin to pull away slightly. I released his hand reluctantly
and then sat back waiting to see what he was going to do.

He looked up
towards the safety barrier as if noticing it for the first time and
the same expression that Matt had had when he'd seen the tributes
people had left twisted his face. "They do that every year, I was
hoping that as time went on they'd get over their enthusiasm, but
it hasn't happened yet," he said, his voice slightly scratchy
presumably from disuse and the tears he'd cried earlier.

"It's the
favourite time of year for florists within a 100 kilometre radius
from here," Matt remarked with almost cruel humour.

"Glad to hear
someone benefits from this fucking mess," Jack growled, surprising
me a little with his use of language. He twisted his hands
restlessly together and then suddenly got to his feet and walked
forward a couple of paces to stare unseeingly down into the
virtually parched creek. I watched him warily, a little nervous of
being in the presence of so much raw feeling, sensing a hard little
ball of tension developing in the pit of my stomach.

As it turned
out I needn't have braced myself for a blast of emotion as, when
Jack spoke again, it was quite quietly. "Why didn't either of you
tell me?" He said.

After a beat of
surprise Matt and I looked at each other and, seeing that he was
just as clueless as I was, I gave a little shrug. My brother
shifted slightly on the log, cleared his throat awkwardly and
asked, "Tell you what?"

Jack shoved his
hands inside his pockets, addressing us and yet looking over the
creek and into the distance. "That all this had gone on too long."
His voice was soft and sad but not as tense as it had seemed
before. "It's been six years and I'm still reacting like I did when
I was 14, it's enough." He turned back to face us and I was
surprised to see that his expression was remarkably clear and open
looking. Even on normal days he didn't usually look like that.
"Sure running from the whole thing made sense at first, but so much
stuff has happened since then and I've got to grow up some
time."

He gave his old
lopsided smile a wry twist. "It's unbelievable that it's taken me
this long to figure it out! There I was sitting there listening to
Dad go on and on about what a failure I am and I suddenly realised
that I'm done waiting for him to say it's OK, to validate
everything I've done in my life since the accident." His voice
suddenly gaining in strength he said, "I've got stuff to do and I
could waste my life hanging around hoping for him to get his shit
together." Shrugging his shoulders slightly he added, "Who knows,
maybe I could even do it first to show him how."

There was a
pause and then Matt said suddenly, "The scholarship." I jumped at
his voice beside me and looked at him in confusion.

Jack, however,
seemed to know exactly what Matt meant. "Yeah, I've been thinking
about this for a while and I reckon that's my way out." He swung
around away from us again. "I've got to leave, get away from
all…this!" He swept his arms encompassing the flowers on the
bridge, the empty creek and, I realised with a sick feeling,
me.

"You'll do it
mate," Matt said, jumping to his feet and slapping Jack around the
back. "No worries."

I recognised my
cue and nodded sincerely, although I could feel tears welling up as
I thought properly for the first time of what it would mean if Jack
moved to the other side of the world. "After all the time I've
spent helping you, you'd better bloody well get it!" I joked (or
was it choked?), getting to my feet and smiling bravely at the two
of them.

We fell silent
then, all wrapped up in our own thoughts. We stayed this way for a
moment or so, staring off into different directions, until there
was a whoosh of wings and two magpies suddenly took off from a
branch nearby and flew between the three of us.

"One for
sorrow, two for joy," I quoted absentmindedly. "That's a good omen,
right?"

Matt looked up
to the branch where the birds had flown from and laughed. "Yeah? So
what does seven mean?" He said, gesturing towards the tree and
making Jack and I turn to look also.

There were
seven magpies sitting in orderly fashion along the branch and I
opened my mouth to reply before shutting it quickly as I remembered
exactly what seven meant in the nursery rhyme. Jack looked round at
me and I knew he had known what I was about to say: 'Seven for a
secret, never to be told.'

So much for
omens.

"I've got to go
to the graveyard," I said suddenly to fill the silence I realised
had gone on too long while Jack and I looked at each other.

Just a hint, if
you ever want a sentence to destroy a mood and totally distract
people from your earlier conversation you can't go past 'I've got
to go to the graveyard.'

Matt looked
quickly at Jack to see his reaction before glaring at me and
demanding, "Why?"

I knew why he
was so cross, it just seemed like Jack had moved past the maudlin
stuff of the day and my comment wouldn't have helped. Feeling a
little flash of guilt at my carelessness, I wondered whether I
would ever learn to think before I spoke and thought to myself that
I would begin to make a concerted effort. Jack, however, didn't
seem to be perturbed by my comment, he just looked interested in my
answer.

I dug around in
my jacket pocket and retrieved the gumnuts Alex had given me. I
opened my palm to let the boys see what I was holding and they both
leant in to look.

"Oh, right."
Matt nodded when he saw what I was holding. "I was wondering how
Alex was going to get them there this year."

"I'll come with
you," Jack said and, again, Matt and I looked at him in surprise.
It was a well known fact that Jack hated the graveyard and never
went there so we were both a little thrown by his sudden
interest.

"OK," I said
slowly, "if you're sure."

Jack nodded and
Matt shrugged. "Righto," he said, beginning to clamber up the bank
back towards the road. "I'll see you guys back at the house
then."

And so it was
that a few minutes later Jack and I were walking down the unsealed
road towards the graveyard. It was one such as you find in all
small towns; abandoned church, overgrown and unkempt graves, rusted
gates, the whole shebang. Every now and again someone from Bridunna
was buried there, but the religious people usually went to the
regional centre, where there were significantly more people and,
therefore better places of worship and graveyards, and those who
weren't usually opted for cremation.

Mr Whitby had
insisted that the twins and his wife should be buried there despite
Jack's objections. The family wasn't religious at all, but all of
Mr Whitby's family for generations had been buried in the Bridunna
graveyard and he wouldn't brook any arguments.

A wind picked up as we walked between the graves, sending the
dust we threw up with our shoes whirling away in little eddies
which disappeared off the road and into the bush. I couldn't help
feeling like that was what was going to happen to Jack. He was
going to be uprooted and flung away into parts unknown. What was he
going to do without us? OK, or more pertinently, what the hell were
we going to do without
him
?

I'd lowered my
eyelashes to protect my eyes from the dust and so I almost walked
straight past the little row of three graves even though they stood
out from the others around them as they were relatively new.
Staring at the three stones, which were each simply inscribed with
a name and date of birth and death, I suddenly had an overwhelming
repulsion to the idea of being buried. Away from the sun and air
and…well everything. I also clearly knew why Jack never went there,
just like it didn't seem right to me, it wasn't right for him.

I deliberately
didn't look at Jack as we stood looking at the grave stones, tears
were welling up again and I didn’t want them to spill over. He'd
had enough to deal with that day, I didn't want to add crying
female to that list. Taking a couple of deep breaths to make sure I
was back in control, I stooped down and laid the two gumnuts I had
carried around with me all day on Paul and Lizzie's graves.

"Hey guys," I
said quietly, searching for something to say. "Um, Alex says hi," I
said quickly, "So do Simone, Matt and I."

Feeling like I
was turning into my brother with all my unease over the emotion,
and having a sudden insight into why Matt hadn't volunteered to
come with us, I stood up again and took a step back. I braced
myself then to look up at Jack and was surprised to see him not
looking at the graves, as I would have expected, but rather at me.
I smiled a little feebly and he wordlessly wrapped an arm around my
shoulders and pulled me in against him.

"You alright?"
He asked and I felt one of the unshed tears I'd had lurking behind
my eyes finally make a break for it and slide down my cheek at his
concern for me when his pain was beyond all reason.

"If you are," I
replied honestly because therein lay the crux of the issue. I was,
of course, saddened by the deaths of Paul, Lizzie and Jack's mum
but the truly distressing part of the situation was how badly Jack
had been messed up. It can really hurt to be so close to someone, I
was realising, and I felt something akin to ice drop into my belly
as I realised that it was only going to get worse if Jack left.

"I'm getting
there," he said slowly as I desperately tried to convince myself
that I was happy that he had the chance to go away and break his
destructive mourning pattern. Lying to yourself isn't really all
that easy, however, the reality folder that we humans have stupidly
put deep down in our gut always knows the true answer and delights
in reminding us of its cleverness.

"It's just…"
Jack suddenly burst out and I slammed the 'clever gut folder'
closed once more and tilted my head up to show I was listening.

"Just what?" I
prompted when he seemed to be having trouble formulating what he
wanted to say.

"It's just that
I'm about 99 percent sure that I'm right about leaving, but that
last 1 percent wants to know that she wasn't right." He gestured
towards his mother's grave sounding like he was having to force the
words to come out and I understood. Jack hated talking about this
stuff, hated portraying himself as weak because that was what his
dad always told him he was. "Because running away is just what my
dad's been doing all these years and isn't that what I'm hoping to
do? After all my big words about never being my father, am I just
going to turn out like him anyway?" His voice held a note of panic
at the end.

"No!" The word was out of my mouth without regard for the fact
that only a little while ago I'd promised myself I would think
before I spoke. It came from such a primal, instinctive feeling,
though, that I couldn't really blame it for ignoring my earlier
instructions. "No," I repeated more gently, "you're not running
away, Jack, you're
getting
away and that’s the vital difference."

"Is it really
that different?" Jack wondered out loud and I pushed away from him
with a derisive snort.

"Of course it
is!" I exploded. "If you're in a really dangerous situation and you
manage to escape no-one says, 'oh you ran away you big coward' they
say, 'well done for getting away from that awful situation.' Do you
see the distinction?" I asked desperately. "Please believe me Jack,
you're not weak, you're not pathetic, you're just not. You're
strong and smart and the absolute best person I know, you're just
going to have to trust me on that."

Something weird
happened to his posture as I talked, he kind of straightened and
lifted his head up and, when I had finished speaking, he took a
huge shuddering breath as if trying to breathe my words in. I was
about to ask him whether he was OK when he took a couple of short
steps to cover the distance between us and, without saying a word,
lowered his head and caught my lips with his. His hands clutched at
my clothes, lifting me up against him and holding me tight as if
scared to let me go.

As for me? I
felt like I'd been hit with a sledgehammer.

The way he was
holding me, the way he was kissing me was technically no different
from how he had done so before and yet so very, very different.
Suddenly I realised what was making my heart thump so unpleasantly
it was giving me a headache, he was coming to me for comfort! He
was trusting me and caring for me and… I was scared shitless!