Letters to Leonardo (8 page)

Mum left me in a shopping centre for anyone to find. Why would she do that? Was I such a bad kid?

What about the psychological evaluation? Is she mad?

My head pounds. A thick haze of memories is spinning around in my head. Fear thumps inside my chest.

Dear Leonardo
,

I was looking at a book Troy got me from the library
, Leonardo da Vinci: The Complete Paintings.

It would be so amazing to paint with another artist, like that picture you did with Verrocchio – the one of Tobias
.

Love that pic. Good, but bad too. When I looked into the googly eyes of that fish you painted, I thought that’s just how I feel, hanging by a painful thread – no escape
.

Is that how you felt when you painted it? Were you trapped? Tied to Verrocchio? Wanting to branch out on your own?

Your dog in that picture looks like it was added in later. Painting in layers lets you hide stuff – mistakes
.

What does each layer of paint really tell us about you? I wish I could talk to you, Leo. Really know you. You were such a genius. Maybe you could help me sort out the mess in my head
.

Matt

I grab three new spray cans from the garage and head to Troy’s house.

Troy, as always, is willing to come along for the ride.

When we get to the tank, I tell Troy about Mum dumping me at the shops – and all the other dumpings – some I don’t remember at all.

“Don’t reckon she ever wanted me.”

“You don’t know that!” Troy looks at me intently, like he needs me to believe what he’s saying. “You don’t know what was going on with her at the time.”

“All I know is I need to vent.”

I’m angry with Dave and his pathetic apology, and sad for me and Mum. What makes a mother ditch her kid? How could she think that would be best?

It’s different for me, I thought she was dead. I don’t get it. Don’t get her.

I’m adrift, like that piece of eggshell that falls into the cup when you crack the egg. It floats around on the top without a purpose and yet you can’t get it out.

Troy reaches for a can. “I’m happy to help.”

I scuff at the ground in front of the tank, sending fine dust into the side. “You know what PC Huggins said would happen if we painted the tank again,” I warn him.

Troy shrugs. “We’ll smell that garlic coming a mile off. Have plenty of time to get away. And in any case, what’s the big deal? It’s not as if we’re doing any damage. We’re beautifying the place.”

“Eco art,” I say.

Troy takes the west side of the tank and I take the east, the one where the sun comes up.

Once I have the spray can in my hand, all I want to do is paint. I take Mum’s card from my pocket and rest it against the tank. The sun’s starting to go down. I have to move fast. I spray huge sweeping arcs in deep ochre. The details are etched using a darker can, with a fine nozzle. I stand back to look. Not bad – but it doesn’t have the texture of Mum’s picture. You can get brightness with spray cans, but not detail – not the blending of colours that you get with a brush.

The sky’s the hardest – getting the colour right, the shading, so that when you look at it from different angles, the picture changes – kind of like a hologram.

Troy finishes his art. He’s into sci-fi and he paints an eagle with robot’s feet instead of talons. It’s cool.

We’re sort of like Leonardo and Verrocchio painting together – only not working on the same piece.

Troy looks at my side of the tank and gasps. “Wow! That’s awesome,” he says. “Your mum’s not the only one with talent.”

“Wonder what else I got from her,” I mumble. “Those papers reckoned she was wacko.”

“Everyone’s a bit wacko – even me.” Troy points a spray can at me and presses the nozzle. I duck and run off around the tank with him chasing me.

We collapse in front of the water tank, the almost- empty spray cans at our feet.

“I look more like Mum. I’m nothing like Dave really, am I? I’m brown, he’s blond. My eyes are brown, his are blue.”

“Does your Mum have a face like a cane toad as well?”

I pick up a handful of dust and toss it at Troy. “Very funny.”

Troy flicks back his curly hair. “I’m glad I don’t look like my olds.”

“Can you be serious?”

“Sorry, I’ll try.” Troy pokes out his tongue until it covers his top lip, and makes it look like he has a clown mouth.

I try not to look at him. “Do you reckon I could be crazy like her? You’d have to be crazy, wouldn’t you, to leave a little kid alone in a car, and a house, and a shopping centre.”

Troy jabs me in the ribs. “You’re mad, sometimes,” he says. “But you’re not crazy.”

I wish for once he’d stop fooling around. I grab my cans and stand up. “This isn’t a joke, man. This is my life.”

Troy gets to his feet too. “I know, but you have to chill. You can’t sort stuff out when you’re all worked up.”

“Give me a break. Have you been reading Rosenbaum too?” I feel like chucking a can at him.

“No, but my mum’s a counsellor, remember? Perhaps we could talk to her.”

“I don’t know. Don’t know anything. How do you sort out a mess like this?”

Troy won’t let it go. “You have to talk to your mum, ask her why she did it.”

I know he’s right but the problem is, I have to find her first.

I wag school again and spend the day going over my “Mum” lists, trying to think where she might be.

•  In another town?

•  In another state?

•  In another country?

How am I going to find her? Google! I try Australian search then World search – but there’s nothing. It’s like Zara Templeton or Hudson or whatever she calls herself never existed. But she did. She’s my mother. I try other search engines, but still nothing! I yell my frustration. Punch the wall. But none of it helps. I need a break from all this. So I go into the lounge room to search for a loud action movie that I can run at full volume. I’m flicking through the channels with the remote control when Dave walks in from work.

He sits down next to me. Doesn’t even ask me to turn the volume down. Rosenbaum must have got him onto the next phase – “try and be understanding”.

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know,” says Dave.

How can I trust him? He seems to think I should just forget that he
lied
to me – pretend it never happened, forgive him for “protecting me” from my
own
mother. What a load of bull! She might have been a bit crazy back then, but she’s probably fine now, and I’m old enough to look after myself. Some kids leave home at fifteen.

I turn the television off and fling the remote control onto the couch. “How will I know you’re telling me the truth?”

“You’re going to have to start trusting me again some time.”

Unlikely.

Dave gets up and goes to the kitchen.

I turn the television back on and keep flicking between programs until Dave yells, “Tea’s ready.” Just as the doorbell rings.

Dave opens the door.

A blast of garlic bursts into the house followed by PC Huggins, who shakes his finger at me like I’m about ten. “I’m not going to take things so lightly this time, Matt Hudson.”

I sit at the table and start winding noodles around my fork.

“You’ve been at the water tank again haven’t you, young vandal?”

“Steady on,” says Dave. “You don’t know it was him.”

The PC folds his arms across his large chest. “You going to deny it?”

“No.”

“Yeah, well last time you got away with it, but not this time.”

Dave moves in front of me as if he’s trying to be my shield. “Ease up, Clem, he’s just a kid.”

The PC laughs. It’s a cranky staccato sound, like a camel with hiccups. “Just a kid? He’s bigger than you, Dave, and old enough to know better.”

“He’s having his tea, Clem. Can you give it a rest?”

The PC scowls at me. “He’s going to be charged.”

Dave takes a deep breath. The muscle twitches under his left eye, but his voice is calm. “At least let me talk to Matt first. Get to the bottom of it.”

The PC looks at his watch, then pats his stomach.

Dave gently guides him to the front door. “You go home and eat. I’ll bring Matt down to the station after work tomorrow. Is that okay? We’ll sort it out then.”

I don’t think the PC is all that happy, but everyone in town likes “Honest Dave”, so he lets us get away with it – for the time being.

His parting words are: “It’s vandalism, Dave! Charges will be laid.”

Dave nods as he shuts the front door. “Yeah, rightio, Clem. Like I said, we’ll sort this out tomorrow.”

After the PC leaves, Dave sits next to me and has his tea, as if nothing happened. I can’t believe he’s so calm. He has definitely been consulting Rosenbaum. I wonder if there’s a chapter in
Sons and the Single Parent
on how to help your son deal with the fact that you’ve lied to him for the last ten years.

While we wash the dishes, Dave says, “We’ll talk about the water tank tomorrow. After we’ve both had a good night’s sleep.”

I shrug. “Whatever.”

Dear Leonardo
,

Painting huge is such an adrenaline rush, isn’t it?

Did you find it hard to go back to the small stuff?

Maybe that’s why you went on to your inventing – and sculpture?

I’m not sorry I did the water tank. Just hope Troy doesn’t cop it
.

If you have talent, why hide it?

Matt

I’m totally blown away to see a photo of my painting on the front page of the local paper with the headline:
Welcome Facelift for Old Water Tank
. Unreal!
Welcome facelift
? Someone actually likes my art. Down at the bottom of the page there’s a phone poll so you can ring in and say what you think of it.

On page three, there’s a photo of the mayor standing next to Troy’s pic. According to the paper, the mayor wants to know who the artists were and he says he “can’t see any reason why the murals can’t stay”.

Just before I head off to school, I get a phone call from Steve Bridges – he recognised my work.

“Congratulations on your great painting, Matt,” he says.

“Thanks.”

“Have you thought any more about my art classes?”

“Yeah.”

“If money’s an issue,” he says, “we can deal with that.”

“It’s not the money. It’s Dave. He doesn’t like me painting.”

Up until now, I always wondered why Dave was so negative about my art. Now I know. It’s because of Mum. It’s because she paints. He’s scared too – scared I’ll turn out like her. Man, I have to get to the bottom of this.

“Gotta go, Steve.”

“Fair enough. I’ll talk to your dad myself. See if I can change his mind.”

Fat chance! “Thanks. That would be great.”

At school Troy has already told anyone who will listen that he and I were the ones that painted the water tank.

First period is History. “Interesting artwork, boys,” says Mrs D.

Troy stands and bows, and tries to drag me up with him, but I stay in my seat. Everyone laughs.

Mrs D focuses on me. “Perhaps if you applied the same dedication and creativity to your History assignment, Mr Hudson, you might make more progress.”