Summary: A collection of moments from the lives of two diverse Australian teenagers.
Coen, who is aboriginal and struggles with the way his people are perceived and Jai, his best friend and boyfriend, who has been with him through everything from when they were young children.
Sadly this is not a tale with a happy ending but it explores love, friendship and consequences. This is not the final narrative that will make my presentation but was where I was guided by the weekly exercises.
1
It's an ever-changing landscape, fluctuating, depending on the range of activities the day has brought.
From four peoples work things to scattered utensils of recent meals. The space is ever changing, crowded yet homely and familiar.
Each person has their own chair, assigned without thinking and the positions have only changed once by accident.
This table has seen all. From the most harrowing of discussions to the most joyful and hopeful.
Watching over it all is the duck frozen in a comical position stuck on his back, his legs in the air holding an empty wine bottle up to his beak. Mimicking the position that he died in at the wheel of the car.
While his body may be frozen his mind is not, he watches as confessions are made and news is delivered, surrounded by mementos of different times but holding the memories of two people destroyed by the accident.
He watches as the news of his death is delivered to the family, people leaving running crying until the table is empty except for the eldest child.
The son, his best friend, still wrapped in bandages but home after the stay in hospital. He sits stoic, just as he was always taught. Until no one was around, and he brakes for the first and only time, allowing himself to be vulnerable rather than strong.
The duck puts down his wine bottle, as he wishes he had at the wheel of the car, righting himself with a creak of wood and shaking of the carved stiffness slowly waddling over to comfort the crying figure but stopping as the door opens and both child and duck freeze.
2: "All the secret things I would flagellate myself for."
Secrets seem to be an integral part of life. Some things so secret I hide them even from myself.
From primary school crushes to the nature of the accident.
It's funny how the most painful of human emotions are often the most secretive, the ones we wish to punish ourselves for having. Even the names of them lean towards secrecy, 'The Seven Deadly Sins'
Wrath
Envy
Pride
Lust
Sloth
Greed
Gluttony
Each in small doses is acceptable but any kind of overwhelming feeling, well its in the name, can be deadly in their nature. If that doesn't say secretive, I don't know what does.
The things that plague me on the edge of sleep, of what I wished I did and didn't do, the regrets and the pain these actions have caused well outweigh in my head any good that came of them.
I've taught myself to be secretive because it's less painful and easier to look myself in the mirror. It's easier to be human if you secret away the human emotion. It's easier to lessen the guilt of your actions.
3
The path splits in two at the edge of the beach. He stands at the entrance a juxtaposition of the usual life and fun of the beach in his funeral blacks. The weather seems to turn grey in his presence. the entrance to the sand tempts him calling out of memories of summer fun that brings him to the choice in front of him.
Left: Mourn, wallow, allow for the grief to overtake him.
Right: move on.
The sun peaks out from behind the clouds momentarily making it slightly uncomfortable, the ocean glimmers invitingly. Move on, go in, embrace the memories without guilt. He'd want you to keep living. But the left calls invitingly, the corner around which he lies. He has to choose and yet he can't
The unnatural geometric shapes line the beach in a strange kind of organized chaos. It's not quite clear from this perspective if they are natural or manufactured.
He cannot remember how he got here.
There's a narrow gap of bone grey beach between the stones and the grey ocean lapping lifelessly at the shore.
He can't remember being anywhere else.
The other rocks seem to have eyes, he feels watched but can't move his head. As if it's trapped in the sand under the stones but yet he can still see.
He stares at the ocean, it seems as if it's all he's ever seen and it clicks.It's no beach, it's a grave yard. And he cannot remember how he got here.
It's no beach, it's a grave yard.
4
"Nice of you to finally show up" Jai joked as he headed towards the car from the grocery store back entrance. Coen waved a hello but it was less joyful than usual
"Well you had to get your ass out here at some point and you're always late, I was going by Jai time." He cracks a smile, it's a little more hollow than usual.
"So, Schoolies huh?" They both knew he wasn't originally going to come.
"Yeah," He sighs. "Well at least we have the drive there before everything gets crazy, Not like my life hasn't been a shit show so far." It was quiet as they drove Jai giving occasional directions as they approached the halfway point, something in Coen seemed to snap.
"I'm so fucking sick of it you know? All the stereotypes all the fighting i have to do to be seen as a normal person? I can't even go to a fucking grog shop without them following me like I'm some deranged alcoholic." Saying this he pulled out a bottle of Jack from beneath his seat.
"If they already think they know who I am, why try to prove them any different." Jai reached out on instinct to grab the bottle out of his hands and neither of them were paying attention as....
The car had careened off the road taking out the passenger side window as the truck slammed them off the cliff. Nothing more than a bright flash before one boy was trapped in a geometric graveyard, the other trapped by his future alone.
He was buried around the corner from where he stood. A newer graveyard, more Eco-friendly as they had both promised to be. A small gap between finality and the current eroded stones.
Coen approaches from the left, picking through the stones until he sees him standing below his current viewpoint. They both know what choice he's made.
5
There were always talks about it at school, of the harsh words directed at him. Of the predisposition of his people to suicidal tendencies and alcohol abuse. What was never touched on was how we did it.
We introduced the drugs, the drink. We destroyed their culture and the last vestiges of it the majority of the country make fun of them for it. There were anti-bullying talks and talks on culture that seemed so empty in the way that they were given and so directed at those that were the subject of these matters rather than the harm that those who caused the issues perpetuated.
He was my first love, so full of love and passion for life. We grew up sharing ways in which we were going to change the world and celebrate life while doing it.
We were idealistic, adoring soulmates. But as we grew older and into the harmful world of teenage hood and stereotypes he was slowly dragged away from me.
When it first happened we were 14. We lived in a very typically white area, the kind of place that tourist guidebooks would highlight as a product of the lucky country.
I could never quite understand the standard of excellence he held himself to, the pressure he put himself under until one day we were walking through the shops past the bottle-o downtown.
The store clerk came out of the shop after talking to the other assistant and slowly followed us. He straightened his posture arranged his face into a neutral manner and gave me a look that said ‘it’s going to be okay, I’m used to this.’
We continued our way through our adolescence and his posture never changed. No matter the look stares comments and actions designed to hurt him he was strong through it all.
Slowly I watched him break. The comments that I used to watch roll off like water off a ducks back started to saturate his feathers in strong smelling fermented liquids.
We were driving around the bay one night when he confessed everything. We had been slowly growing apart and he told me how his grandmother had died of alcohol poisoning. His parents had been sober for their entire lives but it all got just too much for him.
He had a wine bottle in between his legs, we were speeding, we didn’t see the truck until it was too late, crashing through the passenger side window.felt nothing after that. Comforted by an image of a duck putting down the bottle and a view of the ocean, stuck in stone.
I felt nothing after that. Comforted by an image of a duck putting down the bottle and a view of the ocean, stuck in stone.
6
Before things got bad he used to take me with him when he and his family went on trips for the weekend. We'd go around the local area and his mum dad and Kaku would tell stories of their heritage.
They took us to the famous tourist sites and told us the cultural stories that no one put on the sign posts. They were the best weekend of my life.
He told me he brought me because I was already practically family at that point, so why wouldn't he want me to participate in their culture? His family felt more like home than mine ever could.
The trip that replays in my mind is the last time we went, it was to Yelka Park. His parents telling of the history of the river that was renamed Campaspe by Major Thomas Mitchell.
It was the first trip without his Kaku.
Every time here was filled with stories, adventures and laughter but this time was tense. He was scared of this place now, a place that usually brought so much joy had been corrupted by the fears of others.
We drove past the mountains when he asked if he could spend these weekends with my family instead. Learn about my life more, and though there was sentiment behind it i could hear the plea of him wanting to unlearn his own.
7
We had so many plans. The future was so bright. He was going to uni in Sydney and I was staying in Melbourne to go to film school. The last weeks of school were going to be filled with parties, friends, trips and celebrations.
The night of the accident we were heading to Schoolies. I'd finished work late so we were going to be the last ones to arrive. It was meant to be a drive of ocean vibes, carefully curated playlists and conversations we could look back on fondly.
I had stashed pillows and blankets in the back to convince him to stop for a cuddle under the stars at the lookout point that i had planned to be the rest stop. It was going to be perfect.
I walked out of the stores back entrance, shaking the heavy work and the dust of the pallets from my shoulders. Heading for his car that was parked in its usual spot there was something different.
Where usually I'd be greeted with a flick of headlights where he'd joke about flashing me, I got only a curt nod and a soft hello rather than his usual jokey enthusiasm.
It wasn't all going how I'd envisioned. Plans had been on again off again, at one point he wasn't even going to go convincing me to head off without him. But i was worried of what would happen the week I wasn't with him.
I suppose it would have been safer if we'd both stayed behind, at least i might have still been there.
8
It was all numb, just fucking numb. I hadn't felt anything properly in so long that lashing out seemed a plausible way to get a reaction from both those around me and myself. Jai was over that night, it was so easy.
He was being his helpful, gorgeous self. He was my best friend, my soulmate and so much more. But I snapped, I'd been tetchy all night, making comments and saying things I shouldn't.
Feeling nothing but humour and slight satisfaction at my parents anger and the rising tension in the room. He refused to put away a dish that I'd handed to him, it was nothing more than him saying:
'Sorry, I'm in the middle of something else right now.'
The feeling that I wasn't his main priority mixed with my attitude lead for my mouth to form the words.
'Alright then you faggot.'
I'd smiled after saying it.
There was a pause, a deafening silence. The impact of what I'd done almost broke through the brick walls in my chest.
My parents went nuts. But he went silent. His jaw clenched. His shoulders hunched. He shook his head almost imperceptibly, sighed and got back to work.
Mama was yelling at me but I couldn't hear what she was saying. I didn't give a shit what she was saying.All that she and Pap had taught me had brought me pain and heartache.
But he had fixed that.
I felt human when I was with him, not like I was just some hopeless bastard. Yet still I'd done this.
I watched as he carefully finished what he was doing while Mama and Pap sprinkled apologies between their condemnations.
He thanked them and said his farewells as my Pap yelled for me to get out of his sight.
He grabbed his jacket from the chair beside me and left without a second glance.I went upstairs. The actuality of what I'd dome creeping up on me like a bad smell. He'd watched me get this shit all my life, I'd never considered the fact that he was hurting in the same way.
I went upstairs. The actuality of what I'd done creeping up on me like a bad smell.
He'd watched me get this shit all my life, I'd never considered the fact that he was hurting in the same way.
In fairness, I'd known him 3 years and knew barely anything about him other than his parents names and that he loved me.
Or used to love me now I guess.
Credits:
Created with an image by kordi_vahle - "beach sunset waves"