Bridge of Clay(64)

And all those Goddamn sit-ups.

Our dad had a concrete stomach.



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In those days, too, I remind myself, our parents were something else.

Sure, they fought sometimes, they argued.

    There was the odd suburban thunderbolt, but they were mostly those people who’d found each other; they were golden and bright-lit and funny. Often they seemed in cahoots somehow, like jailbirds who wouldn’t leave; they loved us, they liked us, and that was a pretty good trick. After all, take five boys, put them in one small house, and see what it looks and sounds like: it’s a porridge of mess and fighting.

I remember things like mealtimes, and how sometimes it got too much: the forks dropping, the knives pointing, and all those boys’ mouths eating. There’d be arguing, elbowing, food all over the floor, food all over our clothes, and “How did that piece of cereal end up there—on the wall?” until a night came when Rory sealed it; he spilt half his soup down his shirt.

Our mother didn’t panic.

She stood, cleaned up, and he would eat the rest of it shirtless—and our father got the idea. We were all still celebrating when he said it: “You lot, too.”

Henry and I nearly choked. “Sorry?”

“You didn’t hear me?”

“Ohhh, shit,” said Henry.

“Should I make you take your pants off, too?”

For a whole summer, we ate like that, our T-shirts heaped near the toaster. To be fair, though, and to Michael Dunbar’s credit, from the second time onwards, he took his own shirt off with us. Tommy, who was still in that beautiful phase when kids speak totally unfiltered, shouted, “Hey! Hey, Dad! What are you doing here in just your nipples?”

The rest of us roared with laughter, especially Penny Dunbar, but Michael was up to the task. A slight flickering in one of his triceps.

“And what about your mum, you blokes? Should she go shirtless, too?”

She never needed rescuing, but it was Clay who’d often be willing.

“No,” he said, but she did it:

Her bra was old and scruffy-looking.

It was faded, strapped to each breast.

She ate and smiled regardless.

    She said, “Now don’t go burning your chests.”

We knew what to get her for Christmas.



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In that sense there was always a bulkiness to us.

A bursting at the seams.

Whatever we did, there was more:

More washing, more cleaning, more eating, more dishes, more arguing, more fighting and throwing and hitting and farting, and “Hey, Rory, I think you better go to the toilet!” and of course, a lot more denying. It wasn’t me should have been printed on all our T-shirts; we said it dozens of times each day.

It didn’t matter how in control or on-top-of-things things were, there was chaos a heartbeat away. We could be skinny and constantly agile, but there was never quite room for all of it—so everything was done at once.

One part I remember clearly is how they used to cut our hair; a barber would have cost too much. It was set up in the kitchen—an assembly line, and two chairs—and we’d sit, first Rory and me, then Henry and Clay. Then, when it came to Tommy’s turn, Michael would cut Tommy’s, to give Penny a small reprieve, and then she’d resume and cut his.

“Hold still!” said our father to Tommy.

“Hold still,” said Penny to Michael.

Our hair lay in lumps in the kitchen.



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Sometimes, and this one comes so happily it hurts, I remember when we all got into one car, the entire lot of us, piled in. In so many ways I can’t help but love the idea of it—how Penny and Michael, they were both completely law-abiding, but then they did things like this. It’s one of those perfect things, really, a car with too many people. Whenever you see a group squashed in like that—an accident waiting to happen—they’re always shouting and laughing.

In our case, in the front, through the gaps, you could see their hand-held hands.

It was Penelope’s fragile, piano-playing hand.

Our father’s powdery work hand.

    And a scrum of boys around them, of blended arms and legs.

In the ashtray there were lollies, usually Anticols, sometimes Tic Tacs. The windshield was never clean in that car, but the air was always fresh; it was boys all sucking on cough drops, or a festival of mint.



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Some of Clay’s fondest memories of our dad, though, were the nights, just before bed, when Michael wouldn’t believe him. He’d crouch and speak to him quietly: “Do you need to go to the toilet, kid?” and Clay would shake his head. Even as the boy was refusing, he’d be led to the small bathroom, and cracked tiling, and proceed to piss like a racehorse.

“Hey, Penny!” Michael would call. “We’ve got bloody Phar Lap here!” And he’d wash the boy’s hands and crouch again, not saying another thing—and Clay knew what it meant. Every night, for a long, long time, he was piggybacked into bed: “Can you tell me about old Moon again, Dad?”



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