Witi Ihimaera - Pounamu Pounamu

And so Hema waits, with brimming excitement. He’d be the last to say he had a one-track mind, and it wouldn’t be ‘dirt track’ either. No, he is just curious. After having lived thirteen years ignorant of sex, he has finally discovered it. His expectations are a little too hopeful, poor boy. Like his heroes of fiction, he expects to smile at his heroine on page three and bed her on page four. He disdains the idea that it can be more difficult than that. He has a lot to learn about the whole absurd business of courtship and the crafty wiles of women. The next few years will burn him to a frazzle and he will emerge from his campaigns utterly exhausted and empty-handed. At the moment, however, he feels very optimistic. Even if he is only five foot two and a quarter inches tall, he is handsome (in his own estimation), sexy and best of all, available. He’s not getting married in a hurry! And there must be thousands of girls just waiting to get at him!

‘Isn’t he gorgeous?’

‘Oh, he’s so handsome!’

‘I must make him mine.’

‘Oh, those sexy legs. Those eyes. Those lovely rubber lips. Mmmmm. Those feet, those toenails, those muscles, those hips. Mmmm, do what you wish with us, Lord!’

Hema gives a delicious sigh. It’s all going to be so very, very easy. And he will stride manfully past those entreating figures, pointing his finger at each one and mumbling:

‘Eeny, meeny, miney, mo.’

Yes, girls have suddenly become important in his life. Previously, he has been utterly uninterested in them. At first, as far as he was concerned, the difference between himself and girls was that he had one and girls didn’t. As he grew, however, he noticed other subtle differences. Girls had long hair, they wore dresses, they played with dolls, they couldn’t climb trees, they were cissy, they cried a lot. And worst of all, boys weren’t allowed to hit girls, but girls could hit boys if they wanted to. That just wasn’t fair!

But the really important difference hadn’t hit home to him until he was told he had to take a bath separately from his sisters.

‘Why, Dad!’

‘Because you’re getting to be a big boy now and Georgina is a big girl.’

‘But we’ve always had a bath together before!’

‘Well things are different now.’

‘How different?’

‘Lord preserve me. Georgina is growing up, and she’s getting shy. She just doesn’t want to have a bath with you any more. Anyway Hema, you’re always complaining about Georgina taking all the room in the bath, so what’s your worry?’

Thereafter, the differences between boys and girls seemed to multiply until he finally took them as a matter of course without really understanding why. But one other thing he discovered in those early years was that women had babies and men didn’t. That was very puzzling. He also discovered what his thing-that-girls-didn’t-have was for. Not only for having a mimi, true! But he wasn’t the least interested in its other function. He was too busy playing with his trucks. He never batted an eyelid when he saw animals together in the paddocks, he cast an uninterested eye over his sister without realising she was growing a bosom, and was utterly bored at his father’s apoplectic efforts to explain about sex. Oh, he was such a dumb kid! But now, aha, things have changed. He’s not that same stupid kid any more.

For instance, this isn’t the same kid who guffawed at the sight of his uncles swimming nude in the river. He will no longer creep up on kissing couples in the movies and screech: Eeeeeee! Nor will he think girls weren’t good for anything. That kid’s name couldn’t have been Hema Tipene. Hema Tipene was born only two weeks ago! Girls are marvellous, girls are fantastic but luckily, they’re not out of this world! Not for Hema Tipene the secretive making love with his hands. Nor for him, the oglings of cissy Dick Simons. And if any bloody kid ever creeps up on him and a girl in the pictures, he’ll give that kid what-for!

Yes, Hema Tipene is ready to straddle the world. In preparation for this big step, he has begun to mould his personality and character to fit the required earth-shattering image. The kid who once used to be careless about his appearance will soon spend a half an hour combing his hair. Not any longer the ‘once through the hair and that’s it’ trick. Oh, no, this lad will comb every strand into place, worry whether it is windy outside, and regard any fall of dandruff as a certain sign that he is going bald. If he is tackled in a rugby game, the first thing he will do is whip out his comb and too bad if the other side scores a try. He won’t wash his face only once a day, but as often as he can to rid his complexion of excessive oiliness. He will read that it is oily skin which causes pimples and an imminent pimple will be, for him, a terrible disaster. His clothes will have to be pressed every day and even then, he will walk like a wooden soldier so that the pants don’t get creased. He will inspect his face every day, sometimes marvelling at the profile and then moaning because of his big nose. He will be sometimes confident, but the slightest suspicion of not being able to measure up will make him miserable.

This boy will also become ‘one of the crowd’. It will be a great relief because it will mean he is socially acceptable. Like the crowd, he will shuffle around with his hands in his pockets. He once used to run, but from now on everything will be done slowly: that way, it looks sexy. He already wears his cap at a rakish angle and his school socks round his ankles. When addressed, he grunts. Maybe he smiles, but only for a while, as it might crack the carefully cultivated sneer on his face. He is always seen with the boys and one of their favourite topics is girls. But would he ever talk with a girl? Never! Oh no, for the sad truth is that this boy quails at the impending approach of any girl. Excluding his sisters, who don’t count. But he does not shuffle and grunt in vain. All this is practice, and is designed to impress the girls. It is his ‘public image’ emerging. But away from the public eye an astounding change takes place, and he becomes Hema Tipene, the hick-town Hori, again. For the next few years, his personality and appearance will change time and time again like a barometer gone wrong. In the end, he may strike a happy medium of carefully cultivated carelessness. Better still, he just might see the light and decide the effort just isn’t worth it. For the time being, he plays it by ear. He is half-man, half-kid and some days he is all one or all the other. Misery!

But another beginning has been made in Hema Tipene’s life during the last two weeks. Not only has he discovered sex and girls, but he has also fallen in love with one of the species. He regards this phenomenon with great relief for it should lead soon to his next discovery. Hema Tipene is thirteen years old and has never been kissed! The girl’s name is Claudia Petrie, called ‘Claude’ for short because she is such a tomboy. In Hema Tipene’s opinion, they were made for each other. Ah, Claudia.

To be fair, Claudia Petrie is not ugly. In fact, she has rather a charming smile. Hema sees great potential in her development. She is the next step onward from his previous infatuation with toy trucks. Claudia is the daughter of one of the teachers at Hema’s school. She loves riding horses, a passion which is decidedly in her favour as far as Hema is concerned. It doesn’t really matter that she is three inches taller than he is; he’s not going to be five foot two and a quarter inches tall all his life! And anyway, she is the only girl so far to take any interest at all in him. At the last school dance, she actually strode over to him and asked him for a waltz. How his heart thundered then! He held her at arm’s length, gritted his teeth and whispered to himself: one two three, one two three. And he was sure that everybody was watching! Mum and Dad had seen him, and Dad had nudged Mum. Hema’s face had grown longer and more embarrassed. But Dad hadn’t laughed. No, he’d kept his face straight all the time and it had only been Mum who’d giggled. Oh, they were proud of him! After the waltz, Dad had even come over and given Hema some money to ‘buy a soft drink for your Pakeha girlfriend’.