Through Different Eyes
Copyright© 2023 by Iskander
Chapter 7
Late December 1964 – late January 1965
“What’s wrong, Lizzie?” Her face wore an unusual frown as she walked up to me beside the pool.
“My mother. She’s such a bi...” Lizzie stopped herself, grinding her teeth at the effort. “She’s such a snob...” Her voice had started with a snarl but drifted away to a sigh.
I stifled a smile at her almost swear word and raised an eyebrow.
“Oh – I asked her if I could invite you to our Christmas party tomorrow.” Lizzie looked at me apologetically. “She refused – because she doesn’t think you’re from the ‘right sort of family’.”
I smiled. “Oh, Lizzie. I’m friends with you, not your mother.”
“She’s ridiculous.” Lizzie threw her hands in the air in frustration.
She was winding herself up again; I took her hand, pulling towards the pool. “Let’s swim – use all that energy to beat me over four lengths.”
We tossed our towels over our chairs and found a pair of lanes.
“We should do a couple of warm up laps.” I cautioned.
Lizzie gave me a fierce look and dived in, pounding down the lane. I dived in and swam the two lengths at a gentle, warm up pace, stretching the muscles in my arms, shoulders and legs. Lizzie was already out, offering me a glower for being a slowcoach. I pulled myself out and we lined up.
“One ... Two ... Three ... Go.”
From our previous races, I was learning about pacing myself. Lizzie almost sprinted down the first length, more than a body length ahead of me by the turn. I pushed a little harder on the second length, holding my position as Lizzie realised she couldn’t sprint for four lengths. During the third length, I pushed harder and we turned for home with me in front. I pulled away from Lizzie, finishing well in front of her.
We clung to the wall, breathing. Lizzie reached across and play-punched my arm.
“You’re learning, Kal.” She was smiling, shamefaced. “I should have controlled myself ... but I was furious.”
She had burned out her mad in the swim.
“Come on, it’s my turn to buy the ice creams.”
We ate our Eskimo Pies and swam again. Lizzie insisted I swim a length or two of back and breaststroke, neither of which I do well.
“I can’t swim again until after Christmas.” I told Lizzie as we changed.
“Okay.” Lizzie nodded. “Shall I ring you after Christmas?”
“Excellent.”
And we set off on different trams.
When Mutti arrived home, she gave me a sheet of paper announcing the McDonnell & East New Year BBQ in New Farm Park on Sunday 3rd of January. “As the store is busy before Christmas, they have their end-of-year celebration after New Year.”
I looked over the flyer. “What’s a BBQ?”
“It’s a barbeque – meat cooked over hot coals.” Mutti smiled. “The invitation says we can bring a guest.”
I could see hesitation in Mutti’s eyes. “Do you want to ask Lizzie?”
“If you think that’s okay? Isn’t there anyone you’d like to ask?”
Mutti smiled, shaking her head. “Not this year. Anyway, you’re working there – you’re allowed to bring a guest.”
“Have you spoken to Mr Chapman about me?”
“Everyone’s busy with the Christmas rush and I thought it best to wait until January. Are you working after Christmas?”
I shrugged. “I’ll find out when they bring round the week’s shifts.”
After tea, we retrieved the Polish newspapers and started filling the card index. We worked hard for an hour, entering names on cards and adding story titles and dates. Most of the names seemed to be from Melbourne and Sydney, but we found a few Queensland stories. Imbi wanted to sit on the newspapers, but I restricted him to my shoulder or lap most of the time.
After a while, Mutti looked up. “I think the Polish community here in Australia is conservative in its outlook. If I’m correct, we won’t be sending in many reports — unless there are Eastern Bloc agents trying to stir things up.”
I remembered Willi’s characterisation of the Stasi files as ‘full of boring detail’ when people examined them after the Wall came down in his world.
Were our reports going to mimic them?
Maybe the German community would be different.
When we pushed the drained newspapers away from us, Mutti stretched her shoulders. “Would you like to ask Lizzie to join us for Christmas Eve... Heiligabend?”
For a second, I stared with widening eyes at Mutti. My throat constricted, tears dribbled down my cheek and I sank forward onto the table. Memories of the previous two Christmases played a mocking loop across my eyelids, taunting me with their magic. Those Christmases, delicate flowers of intense joy, were now ... splintered shards ... dust and ashes. Sobs racked my body as I floundered in a gyre of misery.
Some unknown time later, a tiny tongue rasped my hand and I felt a gentle movement on my hair. Imbi was licking my fingers and Mutti was stroking my head, each providing solace. I turned my head. Imbi’s blue eyes gazed into mine, as if he understood my grief, my loss. He had lost his mother and littermates...
“Oh, Liebling.” Mutti gathered me in her arms. “I’m sorry, so sorry.”
Tears slid down her face and I heard them in her voice. With a string of breaths, calming knots on a rope, I reeled myself into the world and pushed myself upright. “I’m sorry, Mutti. This is ... foolish.”
Mutti shook her head, sighing. “No, Liebling. It’s me that should apologise for stirring up hard memories.”
Shaking my head, I scattered a tear or two from my face, startling Imbi. “No, Mutti.” I breathed again, struggling to hold a slippery thought before it wriggled free. “No, Mutti. They are beautiful memories and I’m tarnishing them with sadness and tears.”
Mutti’s face showed her confusion.
Despite my words, tears still ran down my cheeks as I struggled to explain. “They are beautiful memories of special times with my closest friends – and with you. They are a beacon for what I want to find again.” Things came into focus. “I must cherish all my memories of Willi and Lili. I can’t cloud them with sadness. If I do that, we might never rediscover it.”
Mutti’s eyes searched mine for understanding. After a painful silence, she asked, “No Lizzie?”
I smiled, sniffing. “Wanting to keep the memories of my dearest friends untrammelled doesn’t mean I shouldn’t have friends here.” I pulled a wry face, remembering what Lizzie had told me. “Lizzie wanted to invite me to her Christmas party, but her mother wouldn’t let her. I’ll ring her tomorrow morning and see if she’d like to come, but I don’t think her mother will allow that either.”
Mutti leant forward, planting a gentle kiss on my forehead.
“Thank you for suggesting Lizzie come for Heiligabend, Mutti.” I gave her a kiss in return, sagging from emotional exhaustion.
“Are you all right, Liebling?” Her hand reached out, lacing her fingers through mine.
I gave her a sad, tear-stained look. “No, Mutti, I’m not.” I closed my eyes for a moment, summoning another infusion of calm with a breath. “ ... not yet.” I saw the tide of anxiety rise in her eyes and squeezed her hand in reassurance. “But I’m working on it.”
Mutti’s gaze held mine as she grappled with what I had admitted. “All right, Liebling, ” she said, with soft encouragement. “You can always talk to me.”
“I know, Mutti. Thank you.”
I started writing to Willi once Mutti had left for work and rang Lizzie after nine o’clock, inviting her to spend Christmas Eve, Heiligabend, with us. She told me she had to speak to her mother, who was out. She rang about an hour later.
“Hello, Kal...” I could tell from her downbeat voice the answer was no.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry. I’d love to come and share a German Christmas Eve with you, but my mother says we’re too busy.”
“That’s all-right Lizzie, thank you for ringing. I’ll give you a ring after Christmas about meeting up for a swim.”
“Okay. Happy Christmas.” Lizzie’s voice hinted at her frustration with her mother.
“Happy Christmas.” I had the impression that Lizzie had wanted to say more but couldn’t – her mother was probably listening.
Would she accept me once I started at the same school as Lizzie?
With a sigh, I returned to my journal to re-read what I had written.
Monday 21st December 1964
Dearest Willi
I have wanted to write to you since that last morning. I tried to get a message to you and Lili, but despite writing the message, the only messenger available didn’t deliver it. When we meet, I’ll tell you all about what happened.
I wanted to explain, but I couldn’t leave any written clues that might give people a loose thread into our previous lives. This was difficult...
I can’t send you the letters I write here, but I am writing anyway. This way you can link the me that exists when we meet again with the me that you knew. We will both change, I know, but I want the connection, the love we had to grow again when we meet. It will be difficult because of those changes, but with these letters, you will see them as they happen to me. I hope this will help you reconnect with me and, through that, help me connect with you.
I picked up my pen, but stopped, making a firm decision: no edits. Whatever I wrote would be immutable to keep my writing truthful — and complete. But there were things I couldn’t say – particularly everything associated with Mrs Henderson in England and Mr Franks here. Somehow, I must put in reminders to myself to tell Willi about the things that were dangerous to write about. During the rest of the day, I added to my letter in fits and starts.
Mutti and I have ended up in Australia – in Brisbane, the capital of Queensland.
I almost wrote how Willi had lived here for decades – but stopped myself in time. Keeping his secrets secure was just as critical as protecting my own.
This is such a strange country –like England and yet so different. Instead of squirrels, we have possums and koala bears in the surrounding trees; instead of thrushes, we have carolling magpies; kookaburras sit on our veranda railing in the grey pre-dawn and wake us with their raucous laughter. And there’s all the dangerous spiders and snakes. I’ve come across redback spiders under the house, but I’ve not seen any snakes yet. I suppose I will sometime – a thought that makes me nervous. We’ve been here two months and I keep seeing things I want to tell you about ... and that sharpens your absence. I am fighting to keep those beautiful times with you and Lili as happy memories, but it is hard.
I miss you.
Mutti has a job in Ladies Fashion at a department store. I’ve been working there too, on the Candy counter in the run up to Christmas as I can’t start school until January. I’ve started swimming again. Ha - I bet that surprises you, after my refusal to go into the sea in England – but you know why that was. I’ve joined a swimming club and made a friend, Lizzie Robinson. Unfortunately, her mother is rather a snob. She doesn’t seem to think I – a new Australian and a ‘nasty German’ as the Italian family next door thinks of us – am a suitable friend for her daughter. Lizzie wanted me to go to their Christmas party, but her mother refused. I asked her to join us for Heiligabend, as you and Lili did, and she wasn’t allowed to do that either. But it turns out that we will be at the same school when I start in January; we’ll see what happens.
We retrieved all our things from the house in Herne Bay and I have your gold chain, which I now wear all the time.
I almost talked about not wearing his necklace when I masquerading as a boy. So much had to remain unspoken in these letters...
As I sit writing this, my left hand is fingering it.
All my textbooks arrived with everything else and Mutti insisted I keep on studying. I think the Latin I learned with you will get lost as I can’t find a way to study that here, but the other languages seem possible. I don’t have a Polish textbook, but I will join classes the Polish Club runs for the children of members and I’ll be studying French at school. Not having you around to help me with Maths has been a problem – but I was using you as a crutch. I’ve found that if I stick to it, I can understand enough to answer the exercises in the textbook – most of the time.
I hope you are still working with Lili; when I sit down to study, I picture you and Lili in her kitchen as we all used to do. I wish I’d asked Lili for a drawing of you – but I’ll have to make do with these letters and your necklace.
We’ve acquired a kitten. I found him sheltering under our house after a furious thunderstorm. He’s a tiny fluffy ginger ball of fur and we’ve called him Imbir (Imbi for short in the Australian way). He likes to sit on my shoulder, but he clings on using his sharp claws. I put padding under my top to keep him from drawing blood. With the summer weather, we both get hot, though.
I had been thinking for most of the day about how to add a reminder for me to talk with Willi about Mr Franks. As the afternoon drew on towards evening, I added the following.
About a week ago, we went to a seafood restaurant. I was uneasy when I was told we were going to be eating bugs – but they turned out to be like small lobsters and delicious. I didn’t like the oysters, though – or the people we ate with.
That’s all for now, Willi. Please stay safe.
I love you,
Kal
I was about to sign off as Col, but remembered in time. I hoped that me saying I did not like the people at the restaurant would act as a reminder to talk to Willi about Mr Franks and what we were doing. After I put down my pen, I chided myself for not telling Willi about my fear that he and Lili would end up together. Thinking about it was hard; writing about it for Willi to read some distant time in the future was scary.
What would he think of me?
Confronting my fear about Willi and Lili was about me.
Giving imagined jealousy room to grow would poison all possibility of a future with Willi. Thinking about that now was difficult – tomorrow would suffice. I closed the journal and picked up Imbi, who had been sleeping on my lap, and went to get tea ready.
When Mutti arrived home that evening, she turned on the radio and beckoned me to sit down with her at the table. Once I sat beside her, she pulled an envelope from her bag containing seventy ponds in used ten-pound notes.
“Mr Franks has agreed to our suggestion.”
My stomach clenched. We were now undercover agents for the Australian government.
“So, Kal.” Mutti’s face was serious. “You’re being yourself at the Polish Club and soon the German Club, but you’ll need to be alert and observant. You’ll have to see, hear and remember everything that goes on around you.” Her eyes locked with mine. “Also, you must be aware of anything that might threaten you.”
I blinked. I hadn’t thought I would be in danger.
Mutti’s face remained serious. “Being alert and observant is part of gathering information. After each visit to the Polish Club, we’ll sit down and you’ll go over your entire visit from start to finish. We’ll look at every detail, every person you see and every snippet of conversation you hear.”
I swallowed.
Mutti’s face softened. “Don’t worry. You’ll soon find that you can recall a great deal.” She leant across and took my hand. “You’ve a well-trained mind already, thanks to all that study with Willi and Lili.”
I didn’t feel confident about this.
Mutti opened her purse and gave me five one-pound notes. “We need to be careful about how we spend this money. You’ll have expenses – trams, your Polish books and such – and this is to cover those.” Her eyes held mine. “Don’t use it for anything else.”
I put the money in my purse and Mutti gave my hand an encouraging squeeze. “Come on, let’s eat.”
Mutti and I spent a muted Heiligabend preparing the traditional feast. As our duck roasted, the strangeness of the situation overwhelmed me. Sitting on the shaded veranda looking at the brilliant evening sunshine in Brisbane’s heat and humidity didn’t feel like Christmas Eve at all. As dusk fell, we heard a knock at the door and Mr Greco stood there with Cal. In his arms, he held a box of vegetables – from his burgeoning garden, I suspected.
“Mrs Miller, Kal.” He greeted us with a smile that hinted at embarrassment. “I want to apologise. I ‘ave not been a good neighbour.” Despite his English, I now understood where his daughter’s English came from.
Mutti held the door open and Mr Greco walked through to the kitchen and put the box on the bench. Cal awarded me a secretive smile, which I returned. We had talked across the fence, her excitement building as Christmas approached.
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