My Sister Rosa Read online

  ‘We were talking about going for a bike ride.’ David’s keen to try out the city’s bike-sharing program. ‘If the rain stops.’ He waves at the windows, which the rain is hitting horizontally.

  ‘It is grim,’ Sally says. ‘Plan B is to go to the movies or a play on Broadway.’

  ‘We’d fall asleep.’ It isn’t even six. The day sprawls endlessly in front of me. Maybe I can do a class or two at my new boxing gym? I’d planned to take my first one tomorrow.

  ‘Yeah,’ David says. ‘It’s early. We could play poker.’

  Sally and I groan.

  David is a poker master. Rosa is his avid student. She has the right face for it, except that when she makes herself smile it’s expressionless. David has an impressive poker face, especially as it doesn’t come naturally like Rosa’s.

  David says poker is about thinking with your head, not your emotions, which makes no sense. Our emotions, like our thoughts, form in our brain. You can’t separate them.

  ‘No way,’ I say. ‘Why don’t we go somewhere that has wifi? Is there a library nearby?’ Libraries always have free wifi.

  ‘They don’t open until business hours.’

  I groan.

  Rosa is curled up next to me on the library couch with the latest issue of Chess Life magazine. Sally is sitting in a chair opposite us stabbing at her tablet. I have my laptop balanced on my knees, angled so Rosa can’t see it. David is at home solving our connectivity issues.

  It took twenty minutes before there was somewhere to sit. The library’s packed with teens hanging out and old people hunched over the few available computers. The waiting line is almost out of the building.

  Outside, water pours down the windows, almost obscuring the dead-looking trees. It looks like the end of the world.

  I respond to the birthday messages. I almost cry when I see how many there are. Being on the verge of tears over stuff you’d never normally cry at is one of the many signs of jetlag.

  I write my list. I write this list every time we move to a new place. My goals. They haven’t changed in a while. I write the list, then delete it. It’s not like I’ll forget them. They rule my life.

  No, that’s not true. The first one does, the others are me hoping.

  1. Keep Rosa under control.

  Always Rosa. I have to stop her from doing something terrible. I have to find a way to do that permanently. Is there a way to do that permanently? Permanently sounds ominous, doesn’t it? Like I want her dead. I don’t. I love her. She’s my baby sister – I can’t not love her.

  Can she learn empathy? The book I’m currently reading on antisocial disorder in children isn’t filling me with hope. Too many case studies of kids like Rosa, who say, when asked to change their behaviour, I just don’t care. When they’re not trying to fool the interviewer, that is. When they’re being honest. I don’t care.

  Neither does Rosa.

  How can I make her care? How can I get a scan of her brain to see if the right parts light up? What happens if they don’t? Yes, she’s what you think she is. Then what?

  All I can do is keep writing down every off thing she does, keep recording our conversations.

  Here are my unrelated-to-Rosa things:

  2. I want to spar.

  I’m never going to move up to the next level with my boxing if I don’t spar. The promise not to is holding me back. But I can’t break my promise.

  3. I want a girlfriend.

  It looks pathetic written down. All hearts and roses and fluttering eyelashes and bursting out singing, I want love!

  I do want love. I want to meet someone smart and funny and sexy who likes boxing, Muhammad Ali and has seen Ong-bak at least twenty times.

  It’s normal to want a girlfriend. Or a boyfriend. Not that Jason wants a boyfriend. He’s all I’m a player, which makes us laugh our arses off. Are you a player if you declare you’re one? That’s definitely more pathetic than wanting to be with only one person.

  I get wanting to have lots of sex. I want to have lots of sex. Or, I’ll be honest, any sex. But Jason talks as though it doesn’t matter what the other person – the person you’re having sex with – thinks about it. Like they’re a number, not a person.

  Jason thinks he’s like Rosa. Hard, unfeeling. He’s a mostly good guy pretending to be awful. (There’s me bringing Rosa into it when it has nothing to do with Rosa.)

  I want a girlfriend who’s smart and funny and strong and fit and cares about other people. (And isn’t blonde!) I don’t want a number.

  4. I want to go home.

  As I press delete Rosa tugs at the sleeve of my hoodie. ‘What are you doing, Che?’

  She’s been asking me this question since she began to talk.

  ‘What are you doing, Rosa?’

  I’ve been answering her that way for as long as she’s been asking. I don’t think she saw my list.

  ‘Bothering you, Che. What are you doing?’

  ‘Emptying the trash,’ I say, doing a secure empty-trash. My list is double-deleted now. ‘What are you going to do when you finish bothering me, Rosa?’

  Rosa giggles. ‘I’m never going to stop bothering you, Che.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  As soon as Rosa could move she started following me. First with her eyes, then she would do her strange bum-heavy crawl after me, then she progressed to a recognisable walk.

  It made my heart swell. I’d turn and there she’d be, gazing at me. I’d pick her up and hold her, inhale her sweet baby smell, press my nose to the back of her head, feel her soft skin, her tiny heartbeat, and be so overwhelmed with love I couldn’t speak.

  I’d held babies. Both my parents are the oldest in their family. I have many younger cousins. They smelled lovely too. But not like Rosa. I looked into her eyes and wondered if I’d ever love anyone as much.

  Rosa would stare back at me, barely blinking.

  Like all babies she was studying me, studying us, learning to be human.

  Unlike most other humans, almost nothing came naturally.

  Rosa learned everything slower than her cousins. Everything that isn’t hardwired. She crawled and walked at a regular pace.

  It was smiling and laughing and hugging and kissing and crying and pointing that came slowly. All the things humans do with each other, and in response to one another, Rosa was slow to acquire. She put her arms up for us to carry her months after her cousins did the same thing. Though once she realised she could use us as taxis she was into it.

  Every time she held out her arms to me my heart beat faster. She was so soft, dependent, tiny. I didn’t need to be asked. I would always want to protect her.

  For her first two years she barely cried. She was more intrigued than dismayed by cuts or bruises or illnesses. Most babies cry when someone else is crying, especially another baby. Not Rosa.

  The not-crying worried the parentals more than anything else. So Rosa started crying. She watched how the cousins did it and copied. Not convincingly at first. She’d make strangled sounds and blink her eyes rapidly to get tears to roll. But Sally and David bought it and after a while she was producing real tears.

  She lied with those tears as surely as she did with her words.

  I thought about pointing that out to the parentals, but most of the cousins only cried when they fell if an adult was looking. I wasn’t sure how to explain that what Rosa did was different.

  She wasn’t smiling when we smiled at her. She wasn’t responding to her name. She was almost two and was yet to say a single word.

  ‘Che was a bit slow too,’ Sally said. They’d never told me that. ‘Nothing wrong with him now. Babies develop at different rates.’

  ‘Not this slow,’ David responded.

  They took her to a doctor.

  Lo and behold, Rosa started smiling. She started talking.

  Her first smile was at that first appointment. We all went.

  She understood what they were saying about her not smiling. She looked up from the toys
she was playing with and stretched her mouth wide, showing her teeth. It didn’t look like a real smile, but Sally gasped. David said, ‘No way. It’s an omen. She’s okay.’

  The doctor said that she was a little developmentally delayed and it was probably no big deal.

  When they took Rosa home from the second appointment she walked over to me and said her first words, ‘I want mine.’

  Now that was an omen: that is the phrase she lives by.

  How like Rosa that her first words be a full sentence, bypassing the usual first words like mama and dada and up and hi and bye and ball and ta, not to mention the babbling stage. A baby who doesn’t babble is eerie.

  No sooner did Rosa start talking than she started lying.

  I head to my new gym, armed with a functioning phone, and an umbrella borrowed from the guy behind the desk in the lobby, who said his name was John. I can’t stay still any longer, not at the library, not at our new home. I have to sweat and move or I’ll lose my mind. Time to truly exhaust every muscle in my body.

  The wind cuts through my fleecy hoodie and thickest trackpants and hits me with horizontal rain. The umbrella protects my head but not much else. Georgie’s going to be disappointed when I tell her New York City looks like a sea of yellow cars swimming through grey, driving rain. I should have worn a raincoat. I should have gone to bed. By the time I walk up the stairs to the front desk of my new gym I’m dripping and shivering so hard my teeth chatter.

  I still notice her.

  A very dark-skinned girl, shiny with sweat, in the first ring. I wonder if they make sure their best fighters train in that ring, near the top of the stairs, close to the windows, so you can’t avoid seeing them as you walk in, can’t help thinking, Her, her right there, is how I want to move. Make me like her.

  The girl is going through her defensive sets at lightning pace. I like the way she ducks and weaves, how she spins.

  People think strength is how you win fights but it isn’t – speed and agility are. Plenty of fighters win again and again without delivering knockout blows. That girl in the ring is faster than her instructor. I want to watch her in a real fight.

  I could stand here all day watching her. But I’ve come to wake the fuck up. Un-jetlagged me was smart enough to sign up for everything online, filling in permission slips, putting my name down for classes, reserving a locker, paying my yearly membership. Papa paid. I have a credit card from him that I use for boxing expenses.

  Papa pays because he wants me to be a real man. He’s afraid I’m growing up weakened by the parentals’ lack of backbone and grit and whatever other word he’s overusing that week. He pays because the parentals refuse to pay. The parentals do not believe in violence. Despite all evidence that violence definitely exists.

  They were horrified when Papa taught me how to punch. Even more horrified when he offered to pay for my boxing classes. Sally and David only agreed to it if I promised not to spar until I was fully grown. A promise I’ve regretted ever since.

  I find my designated locker, throw myself in a shower, which runs awesomely hot, then change into my dry training gear, wrapping my wet clothes in one of the fluffy warm towels provided. My Sydney gym charges for scratchy, threadbare towels, which aren’t left in giant stacks for anyone to help themselves to. There are free deodorants and hand creams as well. Even a hairdryer, which I point at my shoes, trying to dry them.

  I warm up on a treadmill, pounding out a fast pace until the shivers are gone.

  My first class is in the bag room. A forest of bags hangs from the ceiling. At a distance they look like bodies. Up close they smell of sweat, not decay.

  The girl I watched training in the ring is standing in the middle of the bags, talking to another girl, and smiling. She taps a bag to her friend, easy and controlled as if it is an extension of her arm, then she dodges her friend’s faster return, spinning out of the way, almost as if she’s dancing.

  I can’t not look at her.

  I force myself to sit, to stare at my hands as I put my wraps on, then to look at everyone else in the class. There are only two other guys. I’ve never been in a class that was mostly women. This gym is excellent.

  She and her friend seem to be around my age. The rest of the class is older. I’m used to being the youngest. I wonder if the girl is too. She’s about my height, maybe a smidge taller. Her curly hair is scraped back. She’s as leanly muscled as I am.

  I’m staring again. I force my eyes to the bag in front of me, wondering what it would be like to kiss her.

  We bow in turn and the jetlag hits me harder than a cross to the head. A hazy force field descends. I can almost see cartoon stars circling. The instructor’s words slow. By the time they reach me everyone else is in motion.

  ‘One, two, three! Your other left, Jose, the one that’s not your right. Everyone, if you’re confused, watch Soldier.’

  The instructor is pointing at the gorgeous girl. Her nickname’s Soldier? She must be a total badarse.

  I stop trying to listen and instead follow Soldier. Half a second behind is better than minutes behind.

  My legs are leaden. Where’s my muscle memory? Where’s my regular memory?

  ‘Beginner, huh?’ asks our instructor. ‘Maybe you should try a less advanced class next time?’

  My brain and tongue won’t cooperate to explain I just spent months studying Muay Thai in Thailand.

  He’s passed by to the next student before I can get my mouth open. Fuck.

  At the end of the class I sink to the mat. All I want is sleep. I’ll prove to the stupid instructor at our next class that I’m no beginner.

  Soldier nods at me, undoing her wraps. ‘You were good in your warm-up. What happened?’

  ‘Jetlag,’ I say after what seems like an hour. I can feel my heart beating too fast even through the muffling force field. Soldier is talking to me.

  ‘I hear that can blow,’ she says. Her wraps are off and stuffed into her trackpants pocket. She bends to pick up her gloves. ‘See you next week?’ she asks, walking away.

  ‘Sure,’ I say, though my voice doesn’t have much weight and she’s already halfway to the change room. I nod too. Not that she’s looking.

  Even through my jetlag I’m elated. All on their own my lips shape a smile. She noticed me.

  In the change room I sink onto the bench nearest my locker and let the jetlag wash over me. I have to get my sweat-soaked clothes off, shower, dress, find my way home. Impossible tasks.

  My phone pings. Jason. I try to figure out what time it is in Sydney. I fail.

  —Knocked im deader than dead dead deady dead.

  He gorn.

  I can’t figure out what Jason’s talking about, and not just because of the Jason-spelling he’s trained autocorrect to use. I’m used to that.

  —Huh? I tap out slowly. My fingers are too fat for the keys.

  —Last night! The fight!

  —That’s great! I can’t remember what fight he’s talking about.

  —Yeh. Killed it. Killed im.

  —Wish I’d seen it.

  —Me 2. Come home! Lotsa new moves to teach u.

  U won’t recognise Baxter’s. Farking squeaky clean and all machines work. Miracle renos they were.

  Proper sized ring now. Luv it!

  I force my fingers to punch out a question.

  —How’s it going at home?

  —Olds goin nuts. As per. Want me 2 cut training, focus on skool. Blah blah blah. As if. Fighter needs HSC why zackly? Morons.

  Jason’s going to be a fighter. He is a fighter. He’s already won two junior bouts. His goal is the Commonwealth Games and maybe beyond.

  If I were home in Sydney I’d only ever see him at the gym. Back when I lived there we hung out most weekends, but now he trains every day. I probably wouldn’t even see much of him at the gym. He doesn’t do regular classes anymore.

  We both started at five with Natalie teaching us kickboxing. Now his new trainer has convinced him he can repres
ent Australia and go on to earn money. Jason’s head exploded with the desire to fight and fight well. He wants it.

  Back when we trained together I’m not sure he was better than me. But now? He’s way ahead of me. It kind of hurts. It shouldn’t – I don’t want to be a fighter – but it does.

  —Ur bday there 2 now. Happy bday!

  —Thanks.

  ‘Sojourner’s hot,’ one of the guys who was in my last class says. He’s neatly folding up his wet wraps. What the point of that is, I have no idea. Unless he’s going to let them dry like that, unwashed. Foul. ‘Told her and she ignored me. Bitch.’

  I’m pretty sure he’s talking about the girl I like. I don’t know his name, Arsehole Turdbrain, maybe, but now I know hers: not Soldier, Sojourner. I like it.

  ‘Huh?’ Jose says. He’s the one who can’t tell his right from his left.

  ‘Whatever. The hottest ones are always bitches.’

  Jose rolls his eyes and heads to the shower.

  Sojourner is not a bitch.

  ‘What are you staring at?’ the guy asks me.

  I hold up my hands in a sign of peace. ‘Nothing, man.’

  He doesn’t stop glaring. A muscle in his cheek twitches.

  ‘Feeling spacey, that’s all. Only just landed here. Didn’t sleep much on the plane.’

  ‘Jetlag, huh?’ His cheek stops twitching.

  I nod.

  ‘You English?’

  ‘No,’ I say, wishing I wasn’t having a conversation with this bonehead. ‘Australian.’

  ‘Huh.’ Mercifully he says nothing more as he slouches off to the showers.

  I yawn so hard my jaw clicks. Can I sleep here? Would that be okay? No, that would not be okay.

  I look down at my phone. Multiple texts from Jason. Too tired to look.

  I strip off my sweaty gear, stand to open my locker, then realise I have no idea what four digits I programmed into it. Fuck.

  I punch in my birthday. Nope. My ATM card password. Not that either. Rosa’s birthday. Sally’s. David’s. No, no, no. Crap.

  Why can’t I remember setting a password?