The Whole Business with Kiffo and the Pitbull (22 page)

‘Kiffo, listen,' I said. ‘It was an accident, pure and simple. Get that through your head. I talked to the woman in the car. She's got white hair, a touch of arthritis and a grandchild about our age. She was so upset that she was vomiting and crying at the same time. She's not a geriatric hit woman, for God's sake! It's over, Kiffo. Finished.'

It was his turn to roll his eyes now.

‘Don't take that attitude with me, Kiffo! It's not my fault that you have a problem facing up to the real world, that you're lost in your own little fantasy. Well, I've had enough of it.'

But Kiffo was still rolling his eyes. I could see nothing but the whites. And he was twitching, like an electric current was going through him. I heard a scream and I suppose it must have been mine. Then there was a whole bunch of people in white and a lot of shouting and yelling. Someone dragged me to my feet and bustled me out of the room. The last I saw of Kiffo was a glimpse of red hair beneath a tide of white uniforms.

Chapter 23
Not to praise him

I stopped off at the Adult shop on my way to the funeral.

Everyone else went by car or by bus. I walked.

It was a blazing hot day. Even at nine in the morning the heat was solid. The sky was cloudless, and bitumen sparkled in black pools. Within five minutes, I was bathed in sweat. I could feel droplets gathering under my tank top and running down my stomach and sides. I could feel a damp stain growing in the waistband of my shorts.

Mum had offered to drive me but I just felt like walking. I don't think it was one of those grand emotional gestures or anything. Who can tell? I suppose that any other form of transport would have cut out the visit to the Adult shop, but I swear that I had nothing specific planned, despite any evidence to the contrary. Let's be honest. I wasn't thinking clearly. I felt sick and dizzy even before the sun worked on me. Everything had the blurry edges of a dream.

I can't remember any details of the walk, except for the constant fist of heat. But I did some thinking. I remember thinking that they had got it right in films. Funerals should be in driving rain. There should be a huddled knot of mourners around an open grave. Women should hug small, grim-faced children to them. A priest should crumble earth over the grave and there should be a mysterious stranger standing off to one side. Kiffo's funeral was to take place in the airconditioning of the Methodist Church. We were to sit in rows on comfortable chairs. There would be a public address system.

I had been told in great detail what would happen. We had rehearsed it at school, like a play. And I suppose that's what it was, a dramatic performance in which we all had our roles. Even the stage had been carefully managed. Kiffo wasn't religious. But the school had arranged everything, including the booking of the Church. Yes, everyone had gone to great lengths to make sure that it all went off well, that the show was flawless. I guess I let them down.

I remember thinking about my own body as I was walking. Sweat was dripping into my eyes and making them sting. Whatever I looked at was tinged with a milky sheen. The sun made my arms and legs tingle. I could feel chemical reactions going off, like little bombs, all along my skin. Cause and effect. Like Kiffo's death. Someone – I can't remember who – told me that Kiffo had died from an embolism. A little clot of blood, no bigger than a baby's fingernail, had formed when he had been hit by the car. Or when he hit the ground. It had stayed there for a while and then, released into his bloodstream, travelled like a missile to the brain. Boom! Gone. It was a freak occurrence. Any kind of trauma could manufacture this little bullet and set it speeding towards its target. Nothing anyone could do.

I almost hated Kiffo for that. Something so silly, so undramatic, so childish. How could he have let it happen? It felt fragile, this business of living. An accident that could fold up on itself at any moment. I brushed the sweat out of my eyes, but they filled up again almost immediately.

When I reached the church, everyone else was already there. People milled around outside, finding shade wherever they could. The Principal moved amongst the small crowd, chatting briefly with everyone and wearing an air of solemnity like an ill-fitting suit.

Kiffo's dad was there. For a moment I didn't recognise him, but then I realised he had shaved. Normally he wore a thick stubble continuously, but now his face was blotched with the violence of the razor. It looked like a potato. His eyes moved constantly and his fingers clenched and relaxed all the time. It was as if a drink lay somewhere just beyond his sight and the effort of finding it was making him flinch.

I didn't know many of the people there. A couple of teachers, some rellies. Maybe a neighbour or two. Jonno wasn't there. I spotted a few of the kids from my class. Melanie Simpson, Rachael Smith, Natalie Sykes, Nathan Manning, Vanessa Aldrick. They stood around, looking embarrassed. Vanessa, for once, didn't seem bored. I suppose that might have been too difficult to manage, under the circumstances, even for her. I walked slowly to the doors of the church and joined the strange assembly. I didn't know what else to do. The Principal dutifully made his way towards me.

‘Are you all right, Calma?' he asked in the tone he reserved for occasions when he wanted to be seen as caring and sensitive. I noticed that he gave me a quick look up and down, taking in my sodden clothes and limp, drenched hair. His eyes showed a flash of irritation. I had not dressed the part. I was letting the side down. But then his eyes closed down again and concern struggled to the surface once more.

‘You seem a little distraught. Are you sure that you are up to this, Calma?'

I simply nodded. It was too much effort to talk. Luckily, the Principal saw someone he wanted to speak to and hurried off.

I looked at the church doors and wondered why we were locked outside. Had someone forgotten the keys? Was there an opening time, like a pub? I had images of a priest inside the cool church looking at his watch, waiting for the second hand to sweep past the hour before he would open up and let us in, the great church-going public thirsty for God. Even as these ideas were going through my mind, the doors opened and I realised what was going on. There was another funeral taking place in there. People filed out, shaking the hand of the priest or whoever it was,muttering a few words before they made for the car park. Some walked briskly, clearly relieved to be out of there. Others walked slowly, bent with grief or exhaustion. I saw a woman being supported by someone who might have been her son. She looked puzzled, but only faintly, like this was a problem that had touched her briefly before being dismissed as beyond her understanding. It was almost like a revelation. I saw that she was in a situation where things had happened to her but they made little sense, exhibited no logic. The death she was there for had forced itself on her. Since then, the world had forced other things – funeral, flowers, arrangements, insurance, who knows – and these were things that happened also. They happened without her. She was powerless. I felt the same.

Within minutes they had all disappeared, taking their world with them. It was our turn. The priest shook the Principal's hand and spoke quietly, presumably an apology for the lateness. We filed into the church. It seemed tinged with other people's sadness. I took up my position in the front pew. We had rehearsed all this. As one of the speakers, I had to be in the right position, waiting for my cue. The school had asked me to say a few words, you see. After the Principal, of course. I was going to be the last to speak and was stuck on the outside of the row.

We made a small congregation. I looked around as we waited for the ceremony to start. The church was big. The airconditioning made my skin prickle. Hot sweat was battling it out with the chilly atmosphere. I could feel my wet tank top crinkle. I could sense it drying.

The front row was filled with people from the school. The rellies, or whoever they were, had been stuck in the rows behind. With the exception of Kiffo's dad, of course. He was in the front row next to the Principal, as if the school had done him a big favour, giving him a ringside seat. Letting him in on the show of his son's funeral, like it was a special privilege. I noticed the Principal patting him on the arm, but Kiffo's dad wore a haunted look. He wanted to be down the pub where at least he knew people, where it was a familiar world, not this strange, alien place run by people he didn't know and couldn't understand. His hands trembled.

Then I noticed Kiffo's casket. It was already in place at the side of the pulpit. It was so bizarre, so strange and sad. I had an overwhelming urge to check inside it, to see if Kiffo was really there. It didn't seem likely to me. This wasn't the sort of place Kiffo would be seen dead in. He would have hated this. The lights were too bright, for one thing. And it was too quiet.

The priest climbed up the few steps to the pulpit and looked down at the small gathering. For a moment, I had this wild idea that he was going to start off a stand-up comedy routine. You know,‘My wife is so ugly that when she was born the midwife smacked her mother . . .' It was all I could do to stop from laughing.

We sang a few hymns, none of them appropriate. If I'd been running the show, I'd have at least chosen a couple of rap songs. Kiffo liked rap. When we had finished singing we all sat down again and the priest composed his features. You could tell that he had done this a thousand times before. He looked over us for a few moments and then he started to speak.

‘We are here today to say goodbye to Jaryd Kiffing and, if I may say so, to celebrate his life, tragically short though that may have been. Jaryd was taken from us quickly and unexpectedly. He was a boy who was full of life. He had a bright future in front of him . . .'

I couldn't help it. I started thinking, what if Kiffo had a bright future
behind
him? Did I have a bright past ahead of me, or a bright present in front and behind? It's easy to get off track in circumstances like this, so I tried to re-focus.

‘. . . and yet he was cut down before he had time to bloom and flourish. It is at times like this that we ask ourselves:
Why?
Why Jaryd Kiffing
? He was no more than a child. He was innocent. And yet he was taken from us without explanation. It is not surprising that under circumstances like this we tend to doubt. Yes, we doubt the God that seems so capricious. I have encountered this doubt many times, from grieving parents like William here . . .'

I had no idea who he was talking about. It took a few seconds to register that he was referring to Kiffo's dad. By the time I was back up to speed I had missed a bit.

‘. . . that there
is
a reason, though it might be beyond our comprehension. The Bible tells us that there is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. And if a sparrow falls, how much more significance is there in the fall of Jaryd, who was loved by family and friends and, of course, by God?'

I started to zone out again at around this point. I was developing a dull headache, the legacy of my walk in the heat, I suppose. Anyway, the words started to melt into each other. I caught the odd phrase, the occasional reference to ‘Jaryd' and each time he said it, the stab of pain in my head increased. I wasn't angry, you understand. I wasn't full of indignation, as some people suggested later. I just felt tired and
irritated
. I was irritated by the priest's refusal to call him ‘Kiffo'. Couldn't he have done his research? I mean, everyone called him Kiffo. Most of the teachers called him Kiffo. Even the Pitbull had called him Kiffo.

I wasn't even aware that he had finished. I remember looking up and seeing the Principal on the pulpit. The switch had passed me by, like a conjuring trick.

I forced myself to focus again. For some reason, I wanted to hear what he had to say.

‘. . . will be remembered by all his friends and by all the staff with considerable fondness. He was a larrikin in the great Australian spirit. But he was a student with considerable potential. He had much to offer and it is a cruel blow that he was taken from us before we had the opportunity to see him develop into the fine adult that he would undoubtedly have become. For there is no doubt that he enriched the lives of all he came into contact with. We will miss him deeply. I can only say that his spirit lives on in all of us, that though he has gone, there will always be a part of Jaryd Kiffing that stays with us. I sense him here with us now. God bless, Jaryd. God speed. Thank you.'

He got down from the pulpit as if expecting the round of applause that his final comment seemed to invite. It must have been a good speech. I noticed Mrs Mills [why hadn't I seen her before?] sniffling quietly into her handkerchief. The Principal moved smartly and put a comforting arm around her shoulder. Yes, it must have been a very good speech.

The priest ascended the pulpit once more. I was getting tired of the bobbing up and down. He stood for a few moments, like someone moved to profound contemplation.

‘Thank you, Mr Di Matteo. I am sure everyone is as moved as I am by your wonderful tribute to this fine young man.'

The Principal graciously lowered his head in acknowledgement of the compliment and the priest carried on.

‘Our last speaker is someone who knew Jaryd very well. A close friend who was with him at the time of the tragic accident. Someone who is admirably qualified to tell us about Jaryd, what he meant to her and what he meant to the rest of his friends. Calma Harrison.'

It was like an introduction in some cheap floor show. ‘Give it up, ladies and gentlemen, for your friend and mine . . .'

Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you.
It's great to be here today. So Kiffo goes into a bar and the
bartender, he says to him, ‘Kiffo, there was this great
lump of bitumen in here and he was looking for you.
Didn't look too pleased with you, mate!' And Kiffo goes
pale and says, ‘I'm not fighting him. I know him. He's a
complete cycle path.' Thanks. Thanks a lot. My name's
Calma Harrison and you've been a great audience.