Swallow the Air

I remember the day I found out my mother was head sick. She wore worry on her wrists… (May remembering her mother) p. 3

Billy’s feet were so much darker than mine; he’d call me a ‘halfie’ and ‘coconut’. We’d be laughing and chasing each other around the yard being racist and not even knowing it. (May and Billy in their childhood) pp. 7-8

She sounded all broken up, like each word was important but foreign. ‘Your mum – she gone. She gone away for a long time, kids. Me sista, she had to leave us.’ (Aunty telling the children their mother has killed herself) pp. 8-9

And I knew it was all right not to forget. (May just after her Mum dies) p. 9

I thought about Mum’s pain being freed from her wrists, leaving her body, or what was left. (May after she learns he Mum has committed suicide) p. 9

Grab

I suppose she’d [Aunty] had surrender to being that kid, and then to being that woman in the same rotting suburb, born into a lifetime of ill-fate. p. 13

Aunty never used to reckon she was lucky. She always just figured she was passed a raw deal, dealt a bad hand. p. 13

And it was just another bonus, another incentive, a quiet celebration for her luck. Another drink. (May on her Aunty’s addictive habits) p. 17

Then is was the lotto, then trifectas, pool comps and then that slapping death knell, the pokies. We rarely saw Aunty those days, when we did, she’d just lie about winning, or where she’d been. Aunty drowned out, she faded from our safety. p. 17

Cloud Busting

When we’re kids we have no fear, it gets sucked out in the rips. (May about being at the beach with Billy) p. 22

We get drunk on the salt air and laughter…. We empty our lungs and weigh ourselves cross-legged to the seabed. There we have tea parties underwater. (May and Billy as children at the sea) p. 22

‘When we came home Mum would throw her feet up on the balcony rail, roll off her stockings and smoke her cigarettes in the sun. Maybe chat with the other women, but most of them were messed up, climbing those walls, trying to forget. It wasn’t a good time for the women, losing their children.’ (May’s Mum remembering her mother) p. 24

The suit opened up the box and arranged the saucepans on the balcony, the sun making the steel shine and twinkle. They were magical. (the saucepan set that Alice [May’s grandmother] wants to buy) p. 25

With each lid she pulled off, her tears gathered and fell. (when Alice finally finished paying off the saucepan set, Samuel delivered them full of food supplies) p. 27

I suppose that to my nanna, Samuel was much like a cloud buster. Letting in the sun, some hope, the rainbow had been their friendship. (May remembering the story of how Samuel had been kind to Alice) p. 28

For Samuel, my mum and nanna, I don’t know, maybe the exchange was even, and maybe when those clouds burst open, he got to feel the rain. p. 28

My Bleeding Palm

‘Aunty got a boyfriend. Skin just like mine. I’d hear Aunty cry all the time. Fists of black hair. Cheek to the stove. Don’t know when my real Aunty is gunna come home.’ (a small ditty that May and Billy created whilst living in their Aunty’s home) p. 32

Way down, past the flags and half a million dollar beachfronts, there hid a little slice of scum. From the wrong side of the creek, we’d had the privilege of savouring the last crumbs of beachfront property. (May about her childhood home on Paradise Parade) p. 33

He [the Rapist] was alone, still against the light crashing on hurling bodies. His mates were too busy taking apart one of the kids – probably one of the dope runners ripped them off. Payback, slamming his rag doll body between the Datsun panel and Nike. (May when she’d out along one night just before she is attacked) p. 35

Bushfire

The postcard was late, too late for Mum… from Dad, from Dad. Sorry. From Dad. p. 43

Maybe Dad had done the same. Maybe he needed to hide away until now, until he could come back. I wondered if he’d come back. (May about her father) p. 44

I didn’t know it then, but the man would no longer be there and the mangoes would’ve all been packed and sent away in dusty oversized trucks. (May about her father) p. 45

But to me, then, under the thick mangle of brown branches that pleaded for rain in the desperate air, he might as well have been right there…or I’m about six, following his forearms, his fingers as he shows us how to cast the line off the beach, swinging the hook and sinker, his arm perfect. (May’s memories of her father were more pleasant than the reality) p. 46

Leaving Paradise

Billy’s dad ran away, he was the right skin for Mum too, but he wanted to play rock’n’roll instead, wanted to live in a swag or the back of a Kingswood, no place for a sick baby and a young mum. p. 51

No one taught Billy how to fight. Mum had once said to me that he just had to; he already knew before he was born that he had no other choice. He heart was bleeding before the world had even got to him, before he could even swallow the air, Mum said. (May about her brother) p. 51

But Mum still thought that boys needed their dads, needed to have men around to grow into. So she went and found herself another dad for Billy, a white fella. p. 52

Every night it happened, I began to wake before they’d even come home, my body waiting for the back door to fling open and bang against the wall, for them to be already at each other’s throat, or laughing and chatting before a blue would start. (May about the difficulties of living in her Aunty’s volatile home) pp. 53-54

‘There!’ she boasted. ‘Your mum’d be so proud of you, the both of you.’
Billy and I dropped our heads down. Aunty was getting all tipsy and emotional. I didn’t mind her like this so much. (May on Billy’s birthday) p. 55

I was laughing so much that I thought I’d have a swig too… my head whooshed dizzy and I belly laughed at the boys more and more with each sip. (May after having her first drink) p. 57

Billy’s hand was still against his chest as he grabbed Aunty’s eyes with his own. His scream was from somewhere deep within. He bellowed, baring his teeth, yelling miles and miles of hatred upon her. (May remembering the night Billy left) p. 58

Again and again he threw the words at my hands, hands incapable of taking hold of them and running… his screaming flung through the streets like I’ll be back’s, but I knew he wouldn’t. (May when Billy leaves) p. 59

We didn’t talk about Mum or our dads or all the booze and shit around us, we knew the world in the same way that we knew each other, in the quietness that we shared. It wasn’t in our eyes or our voices or what we said – it was just there, that understanding, that sameness… (May about Billy) pp. 59-60

I thought I’d know where he’d be, up the bush, at Bulli Beach, thought I could track him down, thought he’d be where I’d go, the same. (May realizing that her brother Billy had truly run away as she hopelessly searches for him) p. 60

To Run

Sometimes people stand in the way of other people’s eyes. I wasn’t waiting for change; I wasn’t waiting for anymore things to get better. (May) p. 63

I could hardly track his jagged mind. He was friendly and kind of jittery and silly… like a jack in the box… – May about Sheepa, p 66
He was humming to himself and shaking his head, a song and a joke carrying on without anyone else. As his hands unwrapped the small package of foil, the others waited to shoot up… (May observing her brothers and his friends as they use heroin) p. 72

They disposed of her like evidence and the train took the blank girl along the lines and away from the empty platform. (disposing of the girl that has overdosed) p. 74

Territory

My muscles ached, as my bones stabbed… I felt crook, my insides abandoned, like a hulled out apple. It was the poppies. Opium sweats, Sheepa called it, the morning after a night without them. (May after she had drunk the opium drink) p. 80

‘My mum was Aboriginal.’
‘No shit? You don’t look like an Abo.’
‘My old man isn’t though; his family are from the First Fleet and everything. Rich folk they were, fancy folk from England.’ (May lying about her ancestry to Pete) pp. 81-82

Some things stay with you, even if you manage to prise them out of your history, they somehow come marching back with a slung shotgun to blow away anything you’ve managed to build. To destroy the world that’s not real but you wish it was. (May on the day she saw he father at the fighting match) p. 85

And I’ll never forget that day, at the rodeo fights… the day I found my father. (May) pp. 85-86

I remembered now, when the anger face became his always face and the world ceased to be real, to be able to be understood, so I had left it behind. (May about her father) p. 85

And Mum could grow her hair see, leave it out and let it go crazy. Let it hide melting skin. It’s a shame women are so clumsy. (after Mum has been burnt with scalding hot water by Dad) p. 88

Mum’s stories changed when he left. She became paranoid and frightened of a world that existed only in her head. Who was going to beat her mind? (May about her mother) p. 88

The screams must have been so deafening, the river of tears so overflowing that the current could only steal her. The flood breaking so high, that she had to leave us behind. (May trying to reconcile her mother’s suicide) p. 88

Dad wasn’t there anymore, but she still saw him, he still managed to haunt her. (May remembering how scarred Mum was after Dad left her) p. 88

The Block

I didn’t need to be saved; I wasn’t waiting for a stupid hero. (May) p. 95

‘Well don’t be shame now, everyone need somewhere to stay. Some people got it and some people doesn’t. Come and stay with the women and me.’ (Joyce to May when she’s found living in the park) p. 96

I felt Aboriginal because Mum had made me proud to be, told me I got magic and courage from Gundyarri, the spirit man. It was then I felt Aboriginal, I felt like I belonged, but when Mum left, I stopped being Aboriginal. I stopped feeling like I belonged. Anywhere. (May) p. 97

I didn’t see the colour that everyone else saw, some saw different shades – black, and brown, white. I saw me. I saw May Gibson, with one eye a little bigger than the other. (May) p. 97

The terraces colliding into each other. Rubble edging fences. Rubbish clogging gutters. Mothers screaming fathers or brothers or cousins. Uncles drinking, thinking under bread and butter. People giving their whole dole to the bowl that is empty, that they turn right over as if they got plenty. Drug smuggling thugs the mothers. Baby cries for others. Fits uncrucify the losers. The grinning winners looking down from the two towers. (May’s observation on the community Block that she lives in for a time) p. 99

‘We’re all family here, all blacks, here, from different places, but we’re all one mob, this place here…’ (Joyce introducing May to The Block) p. 99

‘Now listen good… it’s no good ere little one… no good young dobs growin up in this ere…’ (Joyce warns May about staying in The Block) p. 103

‘Wiradjuri! You Wiradjuri blood girl? Well all ya mob’s probably out ere in the park drinkin.’ (Joyce when she finds out where May comes from) p. 103

Chocolate

He’d never tell you about Africa, and I never asked. It was his secret – his past, that someday, revisited, would become his home again. (May about Charlie) p. 111

I thought about those blue shirts taking away the people I love. (May watching the police as the arrest Charlie and plan to deport him) p. 113

Silver and pink paint flecked their upper lips, bottles hiding under their shirts. Chroming was common, second to drinking and yarndi but first choice to petrol. (May about the locals and their addictions) p. 113

Wantok

Johnny takes me away, together…we’ve escaped with each other and the rest of it – the Block and the city can rise up and drift away like vacant echoes. (May about her relationship with Johnny) p. 119

We promise each other to find them, the faces, to go to our homelands for our people, for ourselves. (May and Johnny talk about finding their people) p. 123

Painted Dreaming

Fifth time that fortnight that the pigs came to clear us out. Living, making camp, was no right of ours. (the police arrest May for sleeping rough) p. 127

He licks his lips, stares at the bong and then inspects around the room full circle and back at my face. We meet eyes that know. (May and Johnny argue when Johnny refuses to run away with her like they had planned) p. 132

‘…you’re a fuckin nobody like everyone else!’ (Johnny to May) p. 132

Mapping Waterglass

My mum’s half-decent sing-along voice bellowing through the Kombi… song lines to ease her absence, know the impermanence of our company, saying I’m still here. (May’s memories of road trips with her mum) p. 137

Mum’s stories were sad, she could only whisper their importance, instead she’d show you them, take you there. (May about her mother) p. 137

‘Gold you see, money makes the world go around kiddo.’ (Gary to May as they near the mining digs) p. 140

Mum’s stories would always come back to this place, to the lake, where all Wiradjuri would stop to drink. Footprints of your ancestors, she’d say, one day I’ll take you there. (May) p. 141

Just Dust

She is an elder, and that means she has a responsibility to protect what belongs to her people. To teach. (May about Issy) p. 145

She says that our people are born from quartz crystal, hard water. We are powerful people, strong people. Water people, people of the rivers and the lakes. They [the mining magnets] look at the land and say there is nothing here. (May when she meets Issy at the depleting Lake Cowal) p. 146

She says they [the mining company] are building high to get closer to father sky, closer to heaven. It doesn’t work, she grins, and they will always fall. The jewels will go back to the mother eventually. (May recalling what Issy said to her) p. 147

Cocoon

They were the best times, the three of us at the fire, laughing and talking over the top of things we never talked about. (May remembering the days she spent with her brother and her Mum) p. 153

We cooked the snapper on the fire that night, fried on a skillet. It was the best night, just before Mum left us. (Billy feeding his family with his catch from the sea) p. 154

Bila Snake

And as the salt subsides, the green trickles over the riverbank from tree limbs, spilling colour into day’s light, upside down. The water moves in tiptoes, and you could almost mistake it for a painting… (May describing the beauty of the land) p. 157

But under all the giggling we meet somewhere between my blazing stomach and the stars, and she looks into me with gravity. I think of it as shared stubbornness or some nature of knowing. It leaks from her, that once she too was lost. (May about Issy) p. 158

I imagined my mum would be there too, they’d all be there, around a fire, cooking goanna. (May dreams of finding her family) p. 161

Mission

I should be used to it by now, but hope was becoming weary. (May) p. 166

It feels forgotten here, and if you can forget about a place so forgettable, so unassuming, then I imagine the people who live in it forget too. Forget that there exist places beyond the highway creases, forget that someone might care. (May about the Mission) p. 167

‘…she got trouble though, all her boys too much on the grog, and her husband too, too much grog and bustin each other up, ya know. It’s no good, this entire place is gone, no spirit left here.’ (Graham speaking about Betty, the lady who will help May find the remaining members of the Gibson family) p. 169

‘Ya see the problem is, us fellas still seen as second-rate person, still treated like they don’t matter.’ (Graham to May) p. 171

‘They still tryin to do it, kill of us fellas, that always been the plan, now they do it quiet, crush em, slow.’ (Graham about the white government in the Mission neighbourhood) p. 171

Country

‘Suppose you’re a gypsy too, ha?’ He looks at my backpack and down at my feet. His lip crawls cruelly. ‘What d’ya want anyway love, ya come here for money, ha? Like your grandmother?’ (Percy to May) p. 179

‘It’s gone. It was taken away. We’re weren’t told, love; we weren’t allowed to be Aboriginal.’ (Percy to May) p. 182

This land is belonging, all of it for all of us. This river that is ocean, these clouds are that lake, these tears are not only my own. (May) p. 183

Eventually I will be there. At the shoreline, we need to talk. (May decides to return home after a disappointing journey to find her family) p. 183

I scan pretty white faces on the magazine covers, and down to the stacks of newspapers that I’d never read. (moments before May reads that Johnny has been killed) p. 184

The Jacaranda Tree

I have jagged recollections. Sharp paper clippings that I remember. I could burrow into another time, or by chance be harked back… (May about her memories) p. 187

It’s a sacred bloody pest. It isn’t meant to be here, I hate it, too pretty, she’d say, threatening always to chop it down. (May remembers her Mum complaining about the large Jacaranda tree in their backyard) p. 189

Home

When I come home the tide is flowing in, when I reach it, when it draws across the purple slate beds of the point, through the rain and across the grit sand, soaking under my feet, salt bubbles burst at my shins. Then, I know that I am home. (May) p. 193

… at the water I am always home. Aunty and my brother, we are from the same people, we are of the Wiradjuri nation… hard water. We are if the river country, and we have flowed down estuaries to oceans. To live by another stretch of water. Salt. (May reflecting on her family) p. 194

When I get there, Paradise Parade is warring…. Yellow machines have paused for a while… few houses remain… p. 195

And I wonder, if we stand here, if we stay, if they stop digging up Aunty’s backyard, stop digging up a mother’s memory, stop digging up our people, maybe then, we’ll all stop crying. (May as she returns to see Aunty’s home being levelled) p. 198