Christos Tsiolkas - Barracuda

Danny wanted to hear about Kowalski. It would be Kowalski’s medal. Danny knew exactly what Kowalski would be thinking: that this time he could get there, step out of the other swimmer’s shadow, that this time the race would be his. Why wouldn’t they talk about Kowalski?

‘I think Daniel Kowalski will win this.’ The other commentators nodded their heads and one of them was about to answer when Danny’s mother called from the bathroom.

He pretended he hadn’t heard. He wanted to hear them talk about Kowalski.

‘Danny!’

Regan raised her head, looked over at him.

‘In here, now!’

There was fresh warm water in the tub. He slipped the towel off his shoulders and stepped into the bath. His mother had fitted a new blade into the razor.

‘Lift your arm.’

He raised his right arm and she began to lather his armpit.

‘Has it started?’ he asked.

‘Nah,’ Regan called. ‘It’s boring. Just stupid men talking — can’t we change channels?’

‘Regan,’ his mother cautioned, ‘don’t you dare change the channel.’

‘I won’t let her, Danny.’

Danny smiled at his brother’s reflection in the bathroom mirror and Theo grinned back. Danny knew what his brother was thinking, he could read him as clearly as if there were actual words going from his brother’s brain straight to his, like telekinesis might be. Theo was thinking that it would be his brother there one day, where Perkins and Kowalski were. That would be Danny one day.

‘Ouch!’

The razor scraped the inside of his armpit. It was tender there.

His mother slid the razor carefully against the thicker hair. ‘Sorry, Danny, this will hurt more.’

‘Don’t cut me, Mum.’

‘I won’t, but you have to stand still. I know what I’m doing.’

Did his mother do this for the women whose hair she cut? She had wanted to use wax on him as she did for her clients. But he had been fearful of the wax, thought it might burn, and if it burned it might blister. And blisters were worse than nicks. Blisters niggled worse than anything.

His mother was close to him as she shaved him. He could smell her, the perfume that smelled like fruit but also had the hint of something unpleasant, too sweet. It made his nose twitch. His legs were all pink from being shaved. They didn’t look like his legs anymore. He turned away, impressed by what the mirror revealed. They were strong legs. Almost imperceptibly he tightened his buttocks and glanced back. He could see the muscles of his thighs, stretching, flexing, clearly defined. His calf muscle was like steel.

‘Don’t move,’ his mother scolded. She wiped the black hairs onto a small washcloth. He wanted to scratch; the itchiness stung now. He stood absolutely rigid, looking at his legs again in the mirror. He would not scratch, he would not scratch. He disappeared into the words, spelled them forwards and backwards. I space W-I–L-L space N-O-T space S-C-R-A-T-C-H space H-C-T-A-R-C-S space T-O-. .

There was an excited cheer from the TV in the next room.

‘Is it starting?’

The letters disappeared, but the sting under his armpit was still there. There was a strong odour, like meat mixed with earth, coming from his mother. He had never been close to such a smell before and he knew, as if by instinct, that it only belonged to women.

‘Mum,’ he whined, ‘it’s starting.’

‘Kids, are they anywhere near the starting blocks?’

‘No,’ Theo answered. Nevertheless he was excited about something, he could see something that Danny couldn’t see, because he was now kneeling on the bed and looking at the screen.

‘There,’ his mother announced, satisfied.

The flesh under his arm was red, inflamed. She rubbed him with lotion but the sting didn’t quite go away. He flinched and she gave him a mocking smile and unexpectedly kissed him on the brow. ‘Now you know what we women go through.’

What? He didn’t understand. Then he remembered from when he was a small boy a summer picnic in Whittlesea, his mother lying on the grass smoking, a glass of wine in her other hand. She had been wearing a sleeveless dress, and whenever she raised the hand with the cigarette in it he had caught a glimpse of coarse short black hairs growing back in her armpit. It had disgusted him, like seeing stubble on an old woman’s chin.

He raised his other arm for his mother to shave him there.

Danny was saying the names to himself like a kind of prayer: Kowalski, Perkins, Brembilla; Kowalski, Perkins, Brembilla . That was what he was hoping for, Kowalski, Perkins, Brembilla. There was a hush in the motel room, and even the television announcers fell silent. The first youth was called to his block; he raised his arms and the South African flag appeared in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen. Ryk Neethling; Danny didn’t think anything of Ryk Neethling, for it wasn’t possible that he could win. After Neethling was Hoffmann from Germany — he was a chance. Neethling, then Hoffmann, then Akatyev from Russia. Danny leaned forward as the young man approached the block. He hadn’t seen Akatyev before. He turned the name around in his mouth, liking the sound of it: A-KA-ty-EV. It was a much better name than Kelly.

And then it was Kowalski. Who tried to smile, who waved at the cluster of Australian supporters waving their flags in the stalls, but Danny could see that all Kowalski was thinking about was the race ahead, the race that was his, that now belonged to him. It is yours, it is yours, Danny whispered deep into himself, because he knew that everyone else, everyone in the world wanted Perkins to win, to shrug off the lack of form, the illness, the bad year, nearly missing out on a place in the finals. Everyone — except Danny — wanted Perkins to win. But it was Kowalski’s race. Danny hardly registered Graeme Smith, the man from Great Britain, take to his block; he was still seeing the strain on Kowalski’s face as he tried to smile. A feeling of unease crept up from Danny’s gut. The strain on Kowalski’s face seemed a premonition of bad luck.

Emiliano Brembilla was called and moved to his block, looking relaxed. Danny noticed his strong long legs — Danny’s would be that strong one day. One day he too would stand on an Olympic block, not anxious, not strained. Brembilla could win it, he thought, he had been the best swimmer in the heats; Brembilla could steal it from Kowalski. He whispered to himself, Kowalski, Brembilla, Perkins. Kowalski, Brembilla, Perkins .

His eyes were on the screen but he didn’t see Masato Hirano from Japan. (Hirano can’t get it, Hirano can’t win it.) He could only see Kowalski and Brembilla. It was the cheers that forced him to make sense of the images in front of him. Theo and Regan were cheering, his mother was smiling; Perkins had his arms in the air and the Australians in the crowd were making a din. It sounded like the whole world was cheering. He thought of Kowalski: what must he be thinking? Was he not worthy of such adulation? The bad feeling grew in Danny’s gut. He had a smile on his face; he could have even said to Theo, Perkins can still get it, but that would be a lie. That wasn’t his prayer. His prayer was Kowalski, Brembilla, Perkins. Kowalski, Brembilla, Perkins . His prayer wasn’t answered. Perkins led at the one hundred, at the five hundred, at the one thousand; and even though by the twentieth lap Danny could see that Perkins had slowed, was showing fatigue, the others were not equal to his swim. It was only to be silver for Kowalski, but then Danny started fearing that the swimmer might have started too strongly. Kowalski had been chasing Perkins from the very beginning. It was Perkins and it was Kowalski and then Perkins and Kowalski and Brembilla and for a moment Danny thought, He’s got it in him, he’s gonna push through , but then it was Perkins and Hoffmann and Kowalski and then it was Smith who began to scare Danny, for it was Smith who didn’t tire, unlike Brembilla and — Danny knew it as well as if he was there in the pool, as if he himself had become the struggling swimmer — unlike Kowalski. The race was won long before it was over; Perkins was half a body length, then a body length, then two body lengths in front, and then he pulled away to a place where victory seemed to be propelling him forward, where victory seemed to be swimming alongside him, where every doubt and every injury and every failure had been vanquished. And it was half a body length and a body length and two body lengths before it was five metres and then ten metres and finally he was twenty metres in front, and it was the last one hundred metres and Danny’s heart was sinking though he was not showing it at all, he was screaming, just like his brother and sister were screaming, both of them jumping up and down on the bed, ‘Go, Kieren! Go, Kieren!’ just like the commentators were screaming, like the crowd in the stadium, like the whole world. It was the last one hundred metres and Smith was coming in second and Kowalski was trailing and Brembilla could not win, and then it was the final fifty metres and Kowalski’s turn was beautiful, it put him neck and neck with Smith, and Danny heard an announcer yell, ‘Fight for the silver, son!’ and he didn’t know why but he felt that he had to scream so loud that it would tear his throat, ‘Fight for the silver, Daniel, fight for the silver, son!’ It was twenty-five metres and Kowalski and Smith were neck and neck and it was ten metres, Perkins had gold and Kowalski and Smith were neck and neck. And it was the finish, and the first hand to touch the tiles was the hand of the swimmer in lane four and just as it did so the swimmer in lane five also slapped the tiles. It was Perkins, Kowalski, Smith. It was gold for Australia, it was silver for Australia. Theo was jumping so high his mother was calling for him to stop, fearful he might hit his head on the ceiling, Regan was crying, the whole world was shouting and screaming and crying. This was what it felt like, thought Danny, this was what it should feel like. But there was an emptiness at the centre of him.