The wedding is over.
Parties were had, prayers were said, and after the reception on Wednesday night, Jasminder left for her new husband’s house. It’s only five minutes away, in the next suburb, but we all bawled our eyes out during vidai.
Now it’s Thursday morning and there’s no sleeping in. Dad offered to drive back with me but I said I’d help with the post-wedding clean-up before heading home this afternoon. All hands are needed on deck. Hansa gives me a list of tasks, asks me to wake Nani.
I knock and enter the room with a steaming mug and a plateful of warm puri, the local newspaper folded under my arm. The room is shadowed by curtains, and smells of old lady and incense. Nani is snoring gently. A little shrine to Guru-ji is in the corner, a small pile of poetry books by the bed.
‘Nani-ji?’ I set down the mug and plate and paper on the nightstand as she stirs. ‘Hey, I’m sorry to wake you.’
‘Daya?’ Nani blinks up at me. ‘Daya, is that you?’
It’s the unexpectedness of it that cuts: I’m not ready. The sound of my mother’s name slices through me, and I jerk, turn to the window.
‘Oh, I had a dream…’ Nani says, her voice sleepy. ‘Of you, Daya, with your baby girl…’
I ease the curtains back. I try to be sensible about it: seeing me just after waking, with my hair loose like this, it’s understandable Nani is confused. Everyone says I look like Mum.
I’m still blinking the wet out of my eyes when I turn and smile at her. ‘Nani-ji, it’s Amita. It’s me.’
‘Hm?’ Nani sits herself up. ‘Oh goodness, where are my glasses?’
I give them to her off the nightstand and she fumbles them on.
‘I’ve brought you breakfast in bed,’ I say lightly, swallowing hard and keeping up my smile. ‘I’m sorry to wake you but you said nine o’clock.’
‘Indeed I did.’ Nani settles herself on the pillows, arranging the blankets. ‘Thank you for waking me. Will you share some puri with me?’
But her voice still sounds odd: tentative and polite, as if she’s not sure who she’s talking to. I sit on the side of the bed near her quilt-covered legs.
‘Nani-ji, I’ll be happy to share with you.’ I tilt my head to catch her eye. ‘Nani, it’s Amita. Do you remember?’
She looks at me, her eyes focusing behind her glasses. Then her expression clears and her voice becomes more natural. ‘Amita! Oh, Amita, you are a sweet girl. You’ve brought me breakfast! Yes, yes, this is good. But where is your mug?’ She beams as I pass her the tea.
‘Oh, I’ve already had mine.’ The fear in my stomach is a cloudy-white lump. ‘This is just for you.’
Watching her sip, I suddenly feel awful. I wanted to spend time with Nani while I was here in Mildura. It’s the thing that was on my mind when I drove up, more than mehndi and saris and celebrating. But I got caught up in the wedding whirl, and been as neglectful of Nani as everybody else. And I’ll be going in a few short housework-filled hours, without doing what I came here for.
‘Here’s your newspaper, Nani-ji,’ I say, unfolding it with a guilty flourish. ‘You can read it while you’re –’
I stop because I’ve seen the headline. It’s not the lead story, but it’s still on the front page.
Police raid nabs drug offender.
I scan the paragraph at the top of the article, stand up. ‘Nani, I’ll be back in just a sec, okay?’
While Nani looks at me, bewildered but mollified by her tea, I slip out of the room, yanking out my phone. I tap a quick text – Pls contact hospital immediately for test results – and hit Send. I go to the bathroom, splash water on my face, squeeze my hands together. While I’m standing at the sink, I get a reply.
Available @4pm for meeting re: test results.
First comes the relief: I heave a giant sigh. Then I realise the timing’s perfect – right about when I’m leaving Mildura. I can see Harris and get details about what the hell happened on the way home. I text back Ok and return to Nani, hoping her quiet presence will calm me before the day’s craziness rolls on.
*
‘…so that was basically it. I spent six hours in the lock-up yesterday, and by the time I got back to the house, I couldn’t say I was feeling hugely sympathetic towards police process.’ Harris grimaces. ‘Anyway, Snowie passed word around last night that we should all chill until we get news from above.’
Icy breeze off the river whips my hair around. The sky is like smoky quartz, the river a dull sluggish reflection: it’s as if Tuesday’s spring brightness never existed. Harris and I lean against the Pitbull’s bonnet, which at least keeps our butts warm.
‘Okay, I’ll let Dad know,’ I say. ‘You probably could’ve called him from Mildura station, but it doesn’t sound as if he would’ve been much use to you anyway.’
‘Maybe the opposite,’ he admits. ‘It was good – everybody knows I got busted, just like the rest of them, and they know I didn’t say nothing. It makes me a solid part of the crew.’
‘Sinking deeper,’ I murmur, and he knows what I mean.
‘Yeah.’ He nods, as though he’s accepting how entwined in this he’s become. ‘Snowie and Leon shouldn’t have any suspicions now.’
‘What about Ando?’
The cold transforms his shrug into a shudder. ‘Ando’s suspicious of everybody, all the time. He only trusts himself. Nothing I do’ll make any difference.’
‘Okay, then.’ My voice sounds weary. I’ve been cleaning and packing up all day, and I still have to drive back to Walpeup.
Harris looks at me, seems to realise what he’s forgotten in all the drama. ‘Ah shit, how was the wedding?’
Having almost forgotten myself, I’m surprised into a laugh. ‘Mad. Indian weddings are always organised chaos. My sari kept slipping, Hansa wanted photos of every single person at the reception, and Jas looked like she was going to throw up at one point. At least jail is quiet.’ I grin at him. ‘But thanks for remembering.’
‘You’ve still got a bit of stuff around your eyes…’ He reaches out as if he’s about to touch my face.
‘Kajal, yeah.’ I rub under my right eye with a finger, but that’s probably only smearing it worse. ‘What about the other people at your house? Are they all okay?’
He tucks his hands into his hoodie pockets, like he’s keeping them there for safety, but it’s probably just to stop them from freezing. ‘None of the kids were there, which was lucky. Kev’s still in the clink. I don’t think he gets bailed until tomorrow. And the girl with the baby looked really strung out. Actually, I felt more sorry for the baby.’
I clutch my windbreaker at the neck where the breeze dips in. ‘I still don’t get it. What is it about drugs?’
He raises his eyebrows in my direction. ‘You’ve never been drunk? Smoked pot? Taken anything?’
I shake my head. It’s not something I should be embarrassed about, but I feel embarrassed somehow. I think the embarrassment is more that I’m revealing my own naiveté.
Harris looks amused, shrugs. ‘Well, drugs are nice, for lots of reasons. That’s one of the things they don’t tell you in those classes at school. Like, they say, ‘Don’t have sex before you’re old enough’, ‘Don’t do drugs cos they’re bad for you’. But what they don’t tell you is that drugs are bloody nice. I mean, that’s the attraction, for some people. That it’s forbidden, but it feels so good.’
‘Well, I understand getting high is supposed to feel nice –’
He stops me. ‘Drugs do three things when they’re inside you. First of all, they change your energy. So if you’re feeling uptight, they chill you out, or if you’re feeling tired, they give you a burst.’
I’m hyper-aware of how near we’re sitting, together on the car bonnet, when Harris leans closer. ‘Then the second thing they do, they make you feel good. Here, under your skin.’ He pulls his hand out of his pocket and runs a fingertip slowly from my thumb to my wrist. The way he looks at me, his light soft touch, brings my skin alive. He grins. ‘Like that.’
I can feel myself blushing. ‘What’s the third thing?’
‘The third thing is the most important.’ He uses the same finger to tap my temple gently. ‘They take away every doubt or fear or insecurity you ever had. Everybody’s got something unhappy inside ’em. Drugs seem to clear all that away. They make you feel like you’re the best person you ever imagined being. They make you feel like hot shit.’
He snorts softly, looks out at the river. I don’t know whether I agree with his ideas about drugs – I’ve heard too much about the reality, from Dad – but I want to keep Harris talking. I focus on the shifting grey water, the cold air, and remind myself we’re only huddled together for warmth.
‘But you’ve never…’ I have to work out how to say this. ‘You’ve tried them. And you obviously liked them.’
‘Yeah, sure.’
‘But you never got addicted.’
His hands are back in his pockets. ‘Well, I think you’ve gotta like them on all three levels to get hooked on them. That’s just my own opinion, mind you. I like the energy, and the feeling, but I can get that in other ways.’
‘What about the ‘getting rid of self-doubt’ part? That seems to me to be the most attractive thing about it.’
‘Sure. But hey, I like being self-doubting.’ He grins. ‘If I thought I was hot shit all the time I’d be kind of unbearable, I reckon. Being a bit insecure, it’s not such a bad thing.’
‘Really?’
He looks at me and his expression changes. ‘Being righteous is kind of a fucked up world-view. I only know one person with no self-doubt. Who thinks everything he does is completely justified.’
‘Your dad.’
He nods. ‘My dad liked to tell me he’d rather kill me than let my mother have me. Cos, y’know, he’s the only one who can make the rules. Now that’s righteous.’
He gives me a twisted half-smile. I can only shake my head at the horror of it.
He goes on. ‘And the other thing with drugs is, whatever your drug of choice, if you really get into it hard, ultimately it’s gonna kill you. My dad’s already said he’d be happy to kill me. Why would I wanna get addicted to something? I’d just be doing his hard work for him.’
The drive home feels long, and the whole way there my mind churns over what Harris said. The way he said it, so matter-of-factly. When I drag my suitcase into the kitchen and find Dad home, it’s a relief to have someone I can talk to about it.
‘Nobody should ever feel like that,’ Dad says. I can tell from the way he’s wiping his spanner so meticulously with the oil rag that he’s seething. ‘Nobody should ever feel like they’re not safe with the people who’re supposed to take care of them. Your parents are supposed to support you, be there for you –’
‘I think it’s been a long time since Harris felt safe with anyone.’ I sit on the wooden steps below the kitchen back door, squeezing my forehead. The fluoro light above the steps is softly buzzing. ‘Should we really be asking him to do this, Dad? I know he volunteered, but he’s already been through so much…’
‘Should we be worried, d’you mean?’ Dad places the spanner carefully back in its spot on the pegboard near the wall. ‘About whether he can hold it together? Do you think he’s pushing himself too far?’
‘I’m worried he’s tempted,’ I admit. ‘I’m worried he’s exposed to stuff up there that will change his mind about what he needs to get by.’
I’ve explained Harris’s theory of addiction to my dad already, and now he sighs.
‘There’s another reason why people get high, Amie. It’s because for some people, their lives are so awful they don’t want to think about it. Some of them don’t want to exist anymore. So they’re going into it because it’s an escape.’ He wipes grease off his hands with the rag. ‘Do you think Harris is like that? D’you think he feels he’s got nothing to live for?’
I hug my windbreaker around myself with both arms. ‘He has something – his mum and his sister. He’s excited that you’ve offered to help find them. But he’s scared about meeting them again, too. I just hope his bad opinion of himself doesn’t push him into doing something stupid.’
Dad frowns. ‘I guess Harris is vulnerable, yeah. But he’s toughed it out most of his life, and he’s toughing it out okay so far in Mildura. Next time you speak to him, though, remind him he can pull the pin any time. That’s what I said, right from the start.’
The reminder that Harris has an ‘out’ if he needs one makes me feel slightly better – but only slightly. ‘God, Dad, how do you deal with this stuff all the time? It was easy when I was just handling Harris’s medical treatment, but this is…’
Dad walks closer, squats down in front of me and puts a hand on my shoulder. ‘You’re listening to him. That’s important. But it’s difficult to just listen and not do something.’
‘Yes.’
‘And the external stuff is easier than the emotional stuff.’
I nod, feeling too emotional to answer.
‘That’s the way it is, love. And mostly, it’s only the external part of the equation we can really do something about. I can try to find his family, sure. But what Harris is feeling, how he works it out for himself… That’s kind of his show.’
‘He’s fighting,’ I say. ‘I believe he’s fighting. I just wish I could do more to help.’
‘You’re supporting him, Ames.’ Dad gives my shoulder a squeeze. ‘You’re doing everything you can. Just remember, it’s not a battle you can fight for him.’