The Colour of the Night Read online

  Adele did not object. Her son had other qualities, for instance his application to tidiness. How could any mother be critical? He managed his bedroom with unmatched diligence; he was clean and shaved and his creaseless clothes were parked on hangers or meticulously pressed and placed in drawers. His shoes were tiered on wire racks according to a hierarchy of regular use. To Elton, it all made sense: his orderliness in the regular world meant he could immerse himself in cyberspace free of encumbrances.

  ADELE BEGGED her leave at 11 p.m. The parliamentary function that she’d been asked to attend had not gone well. Her client turned out to be a bore, leering unpleasantly and finding opportunities – where none actually existed – for sexual innuendo if not downright crudity. But as Adele understood, every profession had its disappointing moments, even hers; its unexpected ruptures just when things should be going smoothly. She was good at her job and she knew it, but no degree of skill could compensate for certain ineptitudes, for acts of stupidity. As soon as her agreement had been fulfilled, she excused herself and caught a cab home, closing the front door quietly behind her.

  Upstairs, she was not at all surprised to walk past Elton’s door and find him still up and illuminated by the blue light of several screens. Normally he’d have his door closed but he was not expecting her home so early. She went to her room, stepped out of her evening dress and pulled on a tracksuit. In the mirror, she removed her lipstick, brushed out her L’Oreal leather-black hair and tied it loosely at the back. She returned to Elton’s bedroom and leaned against the door jamb.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Want to take a break?’

  Elton didn’t turn. ‘Can I catch you in a minute? I just have to finish something.’

  Adele never argued, well aware that her son had crucial things to complete. And so it was. Sargeras, the fallen Titan, had unleashed an army of unspeakable evil on the Draenei. They’d been slaughtered in the thousands and tonight Elton had joined his guild to repel the Burning Legion in its demonic quest to undo all of creation. A fierce battle had ensued and many despicable monsters of the Horde had fallen to his blessed blade. There were rivers of blood yet his guild was not yet safe. His guild: 128 others from all regions of the world.

  Adele went downstairs and switched on the kettle. As the whistle blew, she heard Elton thumping down the carpeted stairs. The clock read ten past one.

  ‘Jesus, I’m buggered.’ Elton stretched his slack-muscled frame and marched towards the fridge. A photo of the two of them, taken right there in the kitchen, was held to the heavy door with a giveaway magnet. Elton gawked into the fridge and closed the door again. He thought about asking his mother why she was home so early, but decided against it. That was her business, a subject he habitually avoided.

  ‘Had a call from Morry this afternoon,’ Adele said and put a cup in front of him.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Morris – your Uncle Morris and Aunty Sharon.’

  Moz and Shaz. It was they who’d suggested the friendlier appellatives, so why did his mother insist on the antiquated Uncle and Aunty? They’d chosen a country lifestyle, whatever that was supposed to mean. Elton hadn’t spoken to them for a couple of years and these days they rarely came in from the bush. A disappointment really; they used to bring such good presents.

  Adele sat on a stool opposite her son and placed a wet teaspoon on the cutting board.

  ‘I had a talk to young Shaun as well.’

  A vision flashed through Elton’s mind: a small tanned two-legged creature in shorts and nothing else running through the scrub with a projectile of some kind.

  ‘The wild kid?’

  ‘He’s not a wild kid; he’s your country cousin. He’s just turned eleven and he wants to come and visit.’

  Elton thumbed some digits on his iPhone and Adele watched him. ‘He sounds like a very bright little boy,’ she said. ‘Lots of questions, very curious about everything. He said he wants to visit the State Library. He asked if he could come down during the school holidays. To see what city life is like,’ she added, studying her son. ‘I was thinking, maybe at the end of the month.’

  ‘Okay with me. As long as he can take care of himself. Has he ever caught a tram or a train?’

  ‘Probably not, but you could show him.’

  ‘Is that necessary? Let’s talk about it, Mum.’

  But of course they didn’t, at least not right then. They put their cups in the sink and both retired once more to their rooms. Elton had to return to World of Warcraft; the mission was not yet complete. In this realm he was known to others as the Dark Knight, a class of man who would stop at nothing to eliminate the diabolical evil, who would gladly sacrifice his compatriots to destroy the enemy. His empty soul knew nothing but vengeance.

  Later, Elton visited other worlds, other quests. But his life wasn’t all games: he was also very much attuned to political and social concerns. A Facebook link to some atrocity in Iran or Iraq always prompted him to press the Like button. And many of those he followed on Twitter offered anything up to 140 characters on important social shifts. Every night was a long night for Elton, but that was his usual routine; he worked by night and slept a fair portion of the day, just as his mother did.

  IT WAS A BRIGHT sunny day, though Elton didn’t know it. He was sitting in the dark watching a live feed from Toronto. Australian singer Jordie Lane was playing at The Planet and Elton streamed it onto one of his monitors. On another PC, he saw that Lane was asking for requests on Facebook. Elton wasn’t especially interested in the singer’s brand of down-home music but he did like the idea of a national profile. So he typed a request on Lane’s Facebook page and moments later the singer announced in real time that Elton Bright of Melbourne would like to hear ‘The Publican’s Daughter’. Elton smiled and switched off the live feed.

  Just then the front doorbell rang and Elton’s body went as rigid as a shop mannequin. He listened for his mother.

  ‘Elton, can you get it?’

  Reluctantly, he lumbered down the stairs just as the doorbell rang a second time. Through the spyhole he saw a young man about his own age, standing casually, thumbs in pockets. Elton stayed perfectly still, and it wasn’t until the bell sounded again that he removed the safety chain and opened the door. On second inspection, he decided that the guy was a little older, perhaps even into his twenties.

  ‘Hi. I was wondering if you want your old bike.’

  Elton eyed his visitor suspiciously. ‘I don’t have an old bike.’

  ‘Whose is it then? The one up the side of the shed. I live next door and saw it when I trimmed the hedge. It’s a mess, rusty and everything … I thought you might want to part with it.’

  Elton tried to think. Perhaps there was a bike; he recalled some angular object being unloaded with their other junk from the old house. The removalists must have shoved it up the side. It was probably his father’s.

  ‘What do you want with some random bike? Like, why don’t you get one off eBay? Be in better nick than ours.’

  The older boy shrugged. ‘I just thought, if you don’t want it I could clean it up, pump the tyres and –’

  ‘Twenty bucks.’

  ‘Twenty bucks?’

  ‘Ten then.’

  A motorbike blattered past and James paused.

  ‘Okay, ten bucks. Can … can I take it now?’

  Elton hesitated before backing away from the door. He called to his mother. ‘We got a neighbour. Wants to buy our old bike.’

  Adele came out of the kitchen drying her hands and introduced herself.

  ‘James Warner,’ the boy volunteered. He glanced at Elton, who was avoiding eye contact. The two were not at all alike. Elton was tall, thin and pale with red hair chopped by his own mother and waxed into soft spikes, while James looked solid and well-muscled. He stood with legs spread and his black hair, long and unwashed, fell about casually, a parody of his general demeanour. Adele broke the silence.

  ‘James, this is E
lton, I suppose he didn’t introduce himself.’

  Elton nodded and James addressed Adele. ‘He said he’d sell me his bike.’

  ‘Sell it?’ she laughed. ‘You should just take it.’

  Elton shrugged. ‘He said he’d give me twenty bucks.’

  ‘Twenty? You said ten.’

  ‘Whatever.’

  Adele suggested they go sort it out and Elton led the way into the backyard, his shoulders slumped as though the sky weighed heavily. James entered the narrow space between the wall and the fence and dragged out the bicycle. He went down on his knees and spun a pedal. Elton watched with accomplished vapidity.

  ‘Needs a bit of work,’ James declared, jolting Elton back to consciousness. ‘The tyres might be buggered. The seat’s wrecked.’

  ‘Don’t take it then; I don’t give a flying fuck.’

  James pushed the bike towards the door. He could use it, he said, though he didn’t have the money with him. Elton told him to shove it through the letterbox later. He held the front door to let his neighbour out, and it surprised him to see the older boy lift the frame and carry it under one arm. He closed the door as soon as James stepped onto the footpath.

  AN HOUR LATER Elton was assaulted a second time: the doorbell rang again. His mother had already left for work so the young man, once more, had no other option but to answer it himself.

  ‘Hi, I brought your money,’ James said, fishing into his pockets. ‘And I was wondering if you ever had a stack-hat to go with it?’ It was raining lightly and Elton could scarcely believe that his neighbour was standing there, apparently unaware of it.

  ‘A helmet,’ James added.

  Elton thought he could visualise one stuffed in some tight corner, another thrifty preserve of his mother’s.

  ‘Ten bucks?’

  ‘That’s what I paid for the whole bike.’

  ‘Take it or leave it.’

  James nodded, the beads of light rain sitting on his shoulders. ‘Do you want me to come back?’

  The possibility of another visit stirred Elton to action. ‘I’ll go have a look, okay?’ He was about to shut the door but thought the better of it. ‘You might as well come in,’ he said, ‘out of the storm.’

  ‘It’s not a storm,’ James said and stepped inside. ‘Bit o’ bloody rain never hurt anyone.’

  James stood nervously, in the middle of his neighbour’s living room, while Elton went upstairs. James hated interiors, even his own; what was it that bugged him? His mother had always known of it and blamed herself. As an infant, James screamed when left alone, as though a pin had been carelessly misplaced with his snap-crotch jumpsuit. How come no one at the antenatal class said anything about the constant bawling? Websites suggested she should switch off his light and shut the door, and they explained that if she refused to give in to the child, he’d soon settle down. But James never did and, in his teens, he began to abhor confined spaces as a cat hates a backyard kennel. Both his parents discussed the issue but his father Simon just shrugged. He was raised in an artistic house in Warrandyte where no one dared move without thinking laterally; as far as he was concerned, the boy could act as he pleased.

  Except when it came to careers. Simon had hoped his son would follow in his footsteps. But James bypassed university for a job in roadworks, a move that smashed all records for lateral thinking. Both his parents were professional artists and a cultured life was critical, impossible without education. But James’s path was a different one, wide and concrete with expansion joints every three metres. He wanted to hone other skills: the manoeuvring of forklifts, bobcats and trucks; the operation of hydraulic jackhammers, cherry-pickers and vibratory rollers; expertise involving winches, welders and asphalt mixers. These were things his parents, with all their artistic training, could barely conceive, let alone understand. And each night James returned to his parents’ terrace at number 44. But he could easily sidestep any confrontation; he lived in a bungalow out the back, paid rent and kept to himself.

  He scanned the shelves of his neighbour’s living room: carvings, handcrafts, figurines and other touristy nick-nacks. A large antique map of the world caught his eye and he ambled over to it. Half of Australia’s coastline was missing, allowing the Pacific Ocean to flood the interior. He thought of his own little abode next door. He liked his bungalow but even there he was hardly relaxed. Each night he’d warm some ordinary thing on the gas stove, eat it by the light of his fourteen-inch TV and then go out again. He’d walk the streets, anywhere, everywhere, with no sense of purpose at all, encouraged by the general feeling that he was at last free, of what, he couldn’t say.

  But now, he needed a bike. One night he’d stumbled across three graf boys working on the defacement of a new apartment block. Over several evenings, James secretly watched them, noting the rapid application of their sweeping, deftly applied strokes, and he’d felt a peculiar stirring which he likened to the ‘inspiration’ his father had often explained. Art can be anything, the man had stated with some authority. You don’t choose your medium; it chooses you.

  So James chose graffiti. Before long he was seeking out any surface on which to practise his newfound craft. On the front façade of his parents’ terrace the word framed in looping script could still be faintly detected. It was James’s tag: he had spray-painted it there and it was he who’d been paid by his unsuspecting parents to spray-paint it out again. But his own ’hood was limited; it could not compare to the wild frontier of other suburbs. For that, a bicycle was required.

  At least ten minutes had passed since Elton disappeared upstairs to fetch the helmet. James listened for some sound but detected nothing. He edged across to the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘Elton?’ A bus pulled up out front; he heard the hiss of airbrakes and the engine burst to life as the driver pulled away. ‘Elton?’ he called again, and put his foot on the carpeted stairs.

  On the top landing, he turned towards the front of the house and a room that was filled with sunlight. Stepping cautiously along the short passage, he came to a darkened doorway on the left, and across the lightless expanse, he saw the back of Elton’s head silhouetted against a computer screen, large headphones straddling his skull.

  ‘Elton?’

  The chair swivelled instantly. ‘Jason! Sorry man! I had this message from some random guy in Connecticut and … There’s no helmet, or if there was one I can’t see it.’ James did not doubt it; his eyes were still adjusting to the gloom.

  ‘Okay, no problem.’ On the periphery of his vision he noted various aspects of Elton’s room, weakly illumined by the pixelated light. A single bed was pushed against the wall and the rest was all technology. No books, trophies, posters, memorabilia; not even scattered clothing, which was the omnipresent feature of his own room. James wasted no time exiting that dim, dark hole and out in the passage he breathed deeply, allowing his pupils to contract before descending the stairs.

  ‘I can let myself out,’ he said, and headed towards the door. ‘By the way, it’s James, Elton.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘My name. It’s James, not Jason.’ As he stepped into the street, he called again. ‘See you,’ he said, though that future prospect was furthest from his mind.

  JAMES’ PARENTS, Simon and Stefanie, always arrived home in the same car. Their art studios were almost a suburb apart but it was a regular routine for Stef to swing by and pick up her husband on the way home, and the procedure was reversed each morning on the trip out. Rarely did either venture into the other’s work area. They liked their own privacy, their own ‘autonomous space’, but there were other reasons as well. Simon was a conceptual artist. He abhorred the idea of ‘art as product’, of ‘object making’, of ‘project’, of ‘frameability’. His work was ephemeral, installation-based, interactive, site-specific. By contrast, Stef was a painter and no further explanation was required. She came home enveloped in a faint aura of pure gum turps, with oil paint in her pores and a smudge of sienna up the cheek. What she envi
saged as the ultimate work, striven for but never quite attained, was so far off Simon’s radar as to seem like a lost language once spoken by primitives.

  Clearly, it was not Stefanie’s philosophical stance that originally attracted him to her. Instead, as Simon would happily attest, it was her superbly proportioned figure, her wicked laugh and the twinkle in her brown eyes. He was Head of the Art Department and Stef was his student. As art school seemed to dictate, the young woman cared little for virtuousness, so flirtation with a senior lecturer that lapsed into sudden liaisons in the storeroom was not at all out of the question. A relationship flowered and it was not long before it occurred to Simon that if he was ever to keep her, he should propose.

  They both declared their love – though it was desire that underscored their union. Stef craved recognition but, as all art students know, there is a yawning chasm akin to the moon’s Sea of Tranquillity between being an artist and being an important artist. For Stef, Simon was the bridge and she crossed it, up the embellished passageway of the Government Registry Office. For Simon, Stef was the perfect companion and at the best gallery events he felt flattered to be with her: the sparkling young graduate who was more effusive than most, who brazenly confronted even the most conceited senior art figures.

  But that was then, the early nineties, and time had intervened. Now they were husband and wife, like so many others, sharing expenses and household concerns, a night at the cinema with a meal afterwards and, every so often, a holiday overseas. They generally agreed on most things and could sidestep their differences, such as their diametrically opposed artistic sensibilities. At least most of the time.