An Australian Short Story: Child of Winter (1700 words)

[Jeff MacLeod]

Child of Winter

It was summer for my entire childhood, every day of it. People use the cliché “golden summer”, but for me it was no cliché. Summer was golden, my childhood was golden. Always summer. That blue sky – endless, clear, day after day. The heat shimmering off the dry, bleached grasses and beyond them in the haze the sparse foliage of the eucalypts – gum trees we called them. They were all gums. Maybe a kookaburra laughing, or a startled kangaroo.

But the heat, my God the heat. Every day, so hot you could hardly bear it. The sun would burn your skin in minutes – it would tingle under the deadly rays. You would have to open the car doors and let the car cool down for a few minutes before getting in - and then when you did you had to be careful not to touch the metal seat-belt clip, as it would be so hot it would burn you. We would lock ourselves away from the heat in the house. “Close the door!” Curtains closed; air-conditioning blasting; too loud to talk; too hot to talk; dark and cool inside. Davis Cup tennis on the television, or cricket.

We lived in a rural community on its last legs. We were some of the first outsiders, as my father commuted to the city to work. My friends at school were all rural types – farmers’ kids who had to get up at 5am to milk the cows. We didn’t get up at 5am, but we still benefited from the country community. I was the 37th student at Mandurang Primary School – of which there were 6 of us in our year. Old weatherboard school, set in the bush, with bark and gumnuts covering the ground. A football oval so small that our teacher – who was about 5’6” – could kick a goal (an Aussie Rules goal) from one end of the field to the other.

There was a big ant nest on the far side of that oval and every summer we would declare war on those ants. We would dig the dirt with shovels, churn it over with axes, drown it with water from the hose – one year our teacher even poured fuel on it and set it alight. But we never won. For all I know they are still there today, those ants, and we are long gone. The school is now closed and the building sold; it seems to sit there forlorn and disused. A vineyard now covers the football field.

But in that school building there was a story we would hear on hot summer afternoons, when it was too hot to work. Our teacher would read to us about a boy with a magic gum leaf – I can’t remember what that gum leaf did, but it was pretty special. I think it was silver. This boy would travel the bush having adventures, always being saved by that magic gum leaf. It was an Australian thing I suppose.

School during the day, then when we came home it would still be sweltering. 40 degrees in the shade. It would be too hot to play until late evening. Maybe a run under the sprinkler, but that was all. How we’d wait for the evening, when it may cool down enough to stop watching the cricket and get outside. Maybe play cricket ourselves in the carport under the tin roof. One would bat, the other bowl. Then we’d swap. We played often – he’d ring. “Jeff, it’s James. Want a hit of cricket?” Of course.

He was a year older, but friendlier than most older people. A year difference in age means a lot to young people. My brother was too embarrassed to be seen with me, but not James. We weren’t best friends, he was just very friendly and confident enough that he didn’t seem to worry too much about “peer pressure”.

His life was not so different from mine. He lived next door, a hundred metres up the asphalt road on the left. A similar house, but a little newer. More double brick too. And cleaner, neater – his mother was very tidy. In summer – which was always – they would have their curtains closed too and the air-conditioning blasting. But it was always cooler there. Cool tiles underfoot, a much higher ceiling. Always a cold drink in the fridge too. And the television on, although it was more likely to be cricket on their tv.

He loved cricket, probably got it from his Dad. His Dad loved cricket - played cricket, watched cricket, talked cricket, umpired cricket. And James had a miniature cricket game – a felt mat you placed on your kitchen table, with plastic cricketers and batsmen. You would roll a little metal ball-bearing – the cricket ball – down a plastic shoot attached to the bowler’s arm. Then the “ball” would roll across the green felt mat to the batsman, who had a little swinging mechanism that allowed him to hit the ball. James was good at that cricket too. I think he would have played it at any age, any time. I’m sure that on his last night, had I been there and asked if he wanted to play miniature cricket, he would have preferred to do that.

Of course, our summer wasn’t always cricket. There was the pool. Always summer and always at the pool. He loved the pool. I think he lived there. He was a pool native. His skin was darker than mine; the water would bead on his brown skin as he ran around the pool, hair wet. He would talk to me at the pool as well. Maybe with a bag of lollies or chips in hand from the pool tuck shop. His hair would be wet, his white teeth gleamed as he smiled. We might lie on the concrete paths around the pool because they would be so warm from the sun that they would dry out the front of your cossies while your back got suntanned. Blue skies again. Cold water that would keep you cool only as long as you stayed in the pool. Every now and then there would be a beautiful breeze and the air over the water on your skin was lovely.

Our every effort was spent in trying to make as big and flamboyant a splash as possible – a “bomb”. Not together, he had his own group of friends. He was good at bombing, much better than me. Bombs always looked better if you were suntanned. Good looking, muscular, nice suntan, good bomber – what more could you want? And he would even talk to me. I’m sure that if on that last night I had asked him, he would have preferred to go to the pool.

The earliest memory of him was in our previous house, in College Crescent. They lived up the road there too. I was only 5 or 6 or 7 and he a year older. Often we would stop at his house on the way home from school – we went to the same school as well. Anyway, Mum would need to stop there and then he would ask if I wanted to eat Saladas. Did I? I could always eat Saladas. They’re an Australian biscuit. Savory, a bit like a crisp bread, salted and square. About the size of your hand. They were perforated into four, so that in theory you could break them into four smaller biscuits and put cheese on them. But they never broke on those useless perforations. He loved them too. We would lie down, side by side in the lounge room, watching television, eating Saladas over a tea-towel to catch the inevitable crumbs. The trick would be to try and nibble out just one of the four biscuits, leaving the rest intact. Of course this was impossible – you could never get your teeth into the last corner. But we would try nonetheless and stuff ourselves on Saladas at the same time. That was contentment. Absolute bliss.

There was a lot of bliss in our childhood.

So why was it, that when he was 33, they put him in a box and put the box in the ground?

He was handsome, he was friendly and confident, he was intelligent, gifted. He had a rare smile, right to the end. He had the same childhood I had. Why did he do it? How could that summer lead to that crappy little room in a Christian drug rehab centre where he breathed his last breath?

When he was an adult, I saw him rarely. When I did it was with apprehension. I would have heard gossip of what he was up to and what he had done. I would expect to see some manifestation of that in him when we’d meet. Sure enough, there he’d be. Shaved head, perhaps a little scarred. But apart from that he seemed the same. And then he’d smile and it was the same smile I remembered from our childhood. It would take me straight back to cricket in the carport, to the pool in summer, to eating Saladas over a tea towel. It was one of the few smiles I have ever seen that truly warmed your heart. It assured you that he was ok, that everything would be ok.

But, you know, when we met as adults it was never summer. Perhaps we used it all up in our childhood and he had none left. Did he even remember the summer of our childhood? Did he remember the bombing at the pool, the cricket, eating Saladas over a tea towel? Did he remember the endless heat and light and blue skies? I don’t remember the winter much; maybe he got all those memories that I have lost.

Somewhere in a hospital, in the medical records office, there is a filing cabinet. Inside that filing cabinet is a manila folder with his name on it. I have no doubt that inside that folder the words “No Axis 1 disorder” are scrawled time and time again. There are probably some doctors around who remember him also and not knowing his fate still hope never to see him again in their emergency room.

What I wonder is what it says in that manila folder, under the heading Personal History. Does it say – Born Bendigo. 2 siblings. Loving parents. Happy childhood. Flora Hill Primary school, good student. Good athlete. Popular. High school the same. No real problems.

Because that is what I remember. But then, I am still alive.

[DATo]

@Jeff MacLeod

Excellent writing! I enjoyed this very much. Your descriptions and presentation of the life of an Australian youth are excellent, even to this Yank of cooler climes ~LOL~. Very professionally written in my opinion. I believe you have a gift. KEEP WRITING!! and thank you for sharing this with us.

I am going to make the wild conjecture that this story may be rooted in fact; if so, I can think of no greater tribute you could have paid to your friend. I think he would be proud and touched by your heartfelt recollection of the time you spent together in Bendigo.

[Jeff MacLeod]

Thanks DATo. Sadly it is true. I was training in psychiatry at the time when I heard of his death, and I had learned about the relationship between mood and memory. A depressed person’s brain will preferentially recall sad memories 10 x more often and 10 x faster than it will happy memories. It got me thinking about what his memories were and how could they be so different from mine. Also that he had nearly everything that is publicly valued in an adolescent, and he had a living family, so how could his life end up so different from mine? So that was the angle for this. I tend to write as a coping mechanism.
I’m glad it touched you. Thanks for taking the time to feed back.

[Jeff MacLeod]

@DATo
Apologies I can’t PM to respond. I’m not allowed for some reason. But thank you for sharing that tragic and personal story. I won’t say much here because it’s public, but it was very touching and very sad.

[DATo]

DATo
Apologies I can’t PM to respond. I’m not allowed for some reason. But thank you for sharing that tragic and personal story. I won’t say much here because it’s public, but it was very touching and very sad.

It's because you are a new member. Your PMing privileges will be available soon. Thanks for the reply.