wandering its corridors for what seemed a very long time, until, at last, he passed through a narrow door behind a trompe lâoeil hunting scene and found himself in the Intensive Care Unit. At first he thought there was no-one there â the beds were all empty â but when he looked again he saw Leni lying unconscious in her pristine cubicle, and in the cubicle beside her was Gareth. Gazing ahead at the planes and angles of the ICU, he saw also the planes and angles of the villa, and how the one led into the other, and with this thought came an unexpected pang of consolation, as if there were some fearful symmetry at work here that might one day endow all their lives with meaning.
At two-thirty on a grey afternoon they assembled at St Stephenâs. The church was modern and built in red brick and glass, with pale blue panels at either side of the main door. It was one of those dull, humid days when it seemed as if the flinty Melbourne sky was suspended only an armâs reach above the red suburban rooflines.
His brother had been an active man and the church was crowded. In the eulogy, Garethâs friend Neil referred to the optimism of their generation, how they had grown up with the feeling that they could do anything. The priest was a young man with a barrel chest who said and did surprisingly little. The hymns were a series of dirges so solemn and dreary that they mounted no challenge to the heart. It was not until the very end, when they switched on a tape of Van Morrison, croaking out the true anthems of Garethâs generation, that sobs became audible in the church. A shiver went through the mourners, the first shiver of collective grief, as if they were mourning for themselves, the outrageousness of one of their own dying young. The words, Rick reflected, made no sense at all, but the voice was full of a sweet if rueful surrender.
Around the grave, the mourners stood patiently and waited for the signal to cast their clods of sticky earth into the hole. At that moment it came to him, as if it were some sudden unexpected piece of news, that he would never see his brother again. He felt his knees give, and in a dizzy funk he stumbled, then righted himself, awkwardly, with a feeling of shame.
As he walked back to the car park, across the manicured lawns of the cemetery which were such an unnatural shade of green, he observed his father put his arm around his mother. Both were crying. He began to think of how he had never cared for Van Morrison, of how Garethâs taste in music had always been a bit retro. There was no way that he could respond to the vague, pseudo-mysticism that infected every phrase, that rumbling, hazy lyricism of dope-smokers. Although, come to think of it, there was that one song, âMoondanceâ, that Jo and he had liked to dance to ⦠The image of Jo dancing with abandon brought him up with a jolt. He was only metres away from his brotherâs grave, and for several minutes he had been thinking about why he didnât like Van Morrison.
The next day, at Garethâs house, he saw that Ned looked much older than he had a week ago. He saw through the window his brotherâs children, playing on the lawn with their fat old beagle as if nothing had happened. Out on the deck, the deck that Gareth built, they sat down to a solemn lunch. They were remnants of something that once had been larger, a broken family gathered together under an indifferent sun. Someone handed him a beer but he let it sit while he looked out across the backyard and began an inventory of his brotherâs garden. What trace of him remained?
In the eastern corner a tyre hung from the sturdy branch of a big red-gum; along the back fence a line of Cootamundra wattles merged into a grey-green blur; beside the deck a firewheel banksia sprouted candle-shaped orange cobs, a study of upright stillness, while beneath it a trio of starlings pecked at the lawn. Starlings, such dull birds, nesting and
At two-thirty on a grey afternoon they assembled at St Stephenâs. The church was modern and built in red brick and glass, with pale blue panels at either side of the main door. It was one of those dull, humid days when it seemed as if the flinty Melbourne sky was suspended only an armâs reach above the red suburban rooflines.
His brother had been an active man and the church was crowded. In the eulogy, Garethâs friend Neil referred to the optimism of their generation, how they had grown up with the feeling that they could do anything. The priest was a young man with a barrel chest who said and did surprisingly little. The hymns were a series of dirges so solemn and dreary that they mounted no challenge to the heart. It was not until the very end, when they switched on a tape of Van Morrison, croaking out the true anthems of Garethâs generation, that sobs became audible in the church. A shiver went through the mourners, the first shiver of collective grief, as if they were mourning for themselves, the outrageousness of one of their own dying young. The words, Rick reflected, made no sense at all, but the voice was full of a sweet if rueful surrender.
Around the grave, the mourners stood patiently and waited for the signal to cast their clods of sticky earth into the hole. At that moment it came to him, as if it were some sudden unexpected piece of news, that he would never see his brother again. He felt his knees give, and in a dizzy funk he stumbled, then righted himself, awkwardly, with a feeling of shame.
As he walked back to the car park, across the manicured lawns of the cemetery which were such an unnatural shade of green, he observed his father put his arm around his mother. Both were crying. He began to think of how he had never cared for Van Morrison, of how Garethâs taste in music had always been a bit retro. There was no way that he could respond to the vague, pseudo-mysticism that infected every phrase, that rumbling, hazy lyricism of dope-smokers. Although, come to think of it, there was that one song, âMoondanceâ, that Jo and he had liked to dance to ⦠The image of Jo dancing with abandon brought him up with a jolt. He was only metres away from his brotherâs grave, and for several minutes he had been thinking about why he didnât like Van Morrison.
The next day, at Garethâs house, he saw that Ned looked much older than he had a week ago. He saw through the window his brotherâs children, playing on the lawn with their fat old beagle as if nothing had happened. Out on the deck, the deck that Gareth built, they sat down to a solemn lunch. They were remnants of something that once had been larger, a broken family gathered together under an indifferent sun. Someone handed him a beer but he let it sit while he looked out across the backyard and began an inventory of his brotherâs garden. What trace of him remained?
In the eastern corner a tyre hung from the sturdy branch of a big red-gum; along the back fence a line of Cootamundra wattles merged into a grey-green blur; beside the deck a firewheel banksia sprouted candle-shaped orange cobs, a study of upright stillness, while beneath it a trio of starlings pecked at the lawn. Starlings, such dull birds, nesting and
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