Peter Carey - Amnesia

Fast forward.

Sometimes Gaby was lonely. Sometimes she hung with a kid named Troy who had been expelled from Clifton Hill. Troy claimed to have a girl in Northcote but she was blatantly imaginary. He had cute lips, curling wild black hair, and mild brown eyes which secret softness he kept hidden in the shadows of his hoodie. His one true love was Cannabis indica and Gaby helped him search for it amongst the tree violet and fennel of Merri Creek. This wild weed was as imaginary as the girlfriend. When they finally did find a homegrown crop in the lane behind Service Street, a bald-headed bogan came at them with a shotgun. Get out of here youse little cunts before I blow your brains out. Gaby thought, I have seen an actual gun.

After school she and Solosolo raced and chased each other screaming amongst the wild mad fennel, two metres high, rolling down the bulldozed spill from Whelan’s tip, not stopping until they were wounded by a brick or buried spring.

The white girl thought, my life is starting. She was alive all day all night. The best part was when Meg left home to sell at the markets and Gaby and Frederic were free to do weird shit in Zork. In her ignorance, she did not miss being online at all.

One Sunday Gaby went to lotu , which was Samoan for church and prayers. Church, her mother cried. You can’t. This might have become a family story if there was a proper family anymore.

Frederic had a plan to steal a new modem and to access his neighbour’s phone line. He would not tell her how he might do that, but she never doubted he would do it and it would be against the law. They did their homework side by side and criticised their fucked-up parents. They ate pizza and searched for gold and jewels in the tunnels of the world of Zork. At this stage, she was the bossy backseat driver. Go there. Do that. Pick up. He smelled of lavender and his cheek was smooth.

Blind cars and feral trucks roared up and down Royal Parade. The trams rang their bells. No-one had any clue that behind that peeling pale-blue door there lived grues, zorkmids, and dwarves. Frederic introduced new actors and renamed the old cast. Thief was the first renamed identity.

“Thief” in Zork became “Dad” in Frederic’s version. The differences were not so great.

Like Thief, Dad carries a large bag. He is never seen by light of day. He likes to wander around the dungeon. He likes to take things from you. He steals for pleasure rather than profit, so he only takes things you have already seen. Of course he prefers valuables but he is often drunk (see shickered ) and takes worthless stuff by mistake. From time to time he examines his take and discards booty he doesn’t like. He may occasionally stay with you in a room but more likely he wanders through and rips you off. For a long time Gaby thought that this was fiction.

“Pick up sword” and “kill dwarf” both give a good feel for Zork-talk. However, the machine will understand you if you type “put the lamp and sword in the case.”

I would tell you more but it would be wasted on you, Mr. Moore, Gaby said to the unwashed fugitive she could not see. Who could have foretold the straggling hair on his upper lip? Zork, she said, begins in total darkness. You have to “get lamp” and then you can “take,” and “drop” and “examine” and “attack” and “climb.”

She emerged from her secret summer pale as a vampire just off the boat.

Stop, eject, play.

Celine said she had become a thick-waisted “hoyden.” She blamed McDonald’s.

Stop, eject, play. She returned to Bell Street High a wonder to the big-hair girls and the white-shoe boys. So many kids had NES consoles. They played Super Mario which Gaby had never seen. She hung with the Samoans who hadn’t seen it either.

By winter when the Samoans were mad for football, Frederic had still not got his phone line back. They were enclosed in their own world.

Fast forward.

They could hear the animals in the zoo, the crowds at Carlton Football Club. They did not prefer one to the other.

Meg promised an NES console so they could play Ninja Gaiden.

Zork was under new management. Its name was changed to Wank.

All the terrace houses have been restored by the Troll except one with a grungy blue door.

> west

The house has two windows.

> open window

The window is locked.

> break glass

The window is barred.

> turn doorknob

The lock is broken. The door swings back and you are in the hallway which is tangled with old bicycles and flyers from Safeway. There is a parcel on the floor.

> get parcel

The parcel is addressed to Frederic Matovic. You are Frederic Matovic.

> open parcel

In your hands you hold a Phoenician blue garment with gold embroidery on its hem.

> take off clothes

They have no value in this game.

> put on gown

You are wearing the gown. It is so light and DIAPHANOUS against your bare skin. You have become a girl.

> you are a pervert. go west

You are in the kitchen. On the table is a baggie of Sumatran grass.

> get weed

A passage leads to the west and a dark staircase can be seen leading upward. To the south is a small window which is open.

> go south

You are likely to be eaten by Meg.

> go south

This is the last time you will be warned about the fierce and random Meg. You find yourself in a narrow east–west alley.

> go east

You face a brick wall.

> go west

In the distance is an overgrown garden containing the wet mushy packaging of stolen goods. To the right is a red corrugated-iron wall. There is a hole in the door and the wall. A chain is threaded through the door and is padlocked.

> pick up doormat

There is a key under the doormat.

> get key

The key is blue and glowing faintly.

> unlock

> unthread chain

You are inside a musty room where long-dead cats have passed their lives. Their ghosts swim in disinfectant. There is also an odour of mothballs. To the east are racks of clothing, fur coats and brides’ dresses from long ago. To the west is an unmade bed. To the north is a desk. On the desk is a computer.

> turn on computer

The screen reads: You are standing in an open parkland east of a row of old white terrace houses.

> take off gown

How can you be a girl when you have a penis? Before you is a cherub boy with strong legs and breasts. Her nipples turn out, L and R.

> go down

There is no down.

> go up

There is no up. This is one of the locations you are transported to randomly when you least expect it. The boy has breasts, the girl has a canna lily, a poisonous flower that will make you vomit if you swallow. Anything is possible in your life.

Fast forward. Play. Gaby was totally in love with his black lacquered fingernails, long hair, sibilant voice. I would do that for you, she said to him. I wouldn’t mind.

The voice on the microcassette was peeled of all protection. Was she alone? She said she had made the boy quiver and had smelled the Selsun in his hair. The fugitive lived on cheese and apples. He pictured Frederic, disconnected once again, pining for a modem, selling second-hand clothes at Flemington markets. He smelled the stink of tanneries, abattoirs and the heavy-metal mud, saw Footscray Park, the awful palm trees, unnatural in the poison yellow light.

Fast forward. Play. I didn’t mind anything stinky, Gaby said. I did his nails for him. And shaved his legs.