Eric went over to Jim and, taking the empty beer glass out of his hand, bent down and kissed him on the forehead. ‘Thank you for inviting us, Jim Katten.’

  … This time, the sneering young man’s upraised fist was coming down in slow motion into his eyes as he was gazing up at him. And he could hear himself screaming at the edge of his hearing, screaming, and he was belching up the vile burning taste of his acidy stomach, and desperately hoping for Anne to save him … Thankfully he was awake, out of the recurring dream, but Anne wasn’t there holding him, consoling him. He rolled onto his back and sat up, shaking and drenched with sweat, and wanting to rush into Anne’s bedroom, but he forced himself not to.

  Stripping off his pyjama pants, he staggered into the bathroom and into the shower, and switched it on. The cold water stung his body and head awake, and the dregs of the dream were gone, but the cold suddenly felt icy and he started shivering. He switched off the shower, rushed out and towelled himself with fierce ferocity until his body was warm again.

  A short while later, dressed in the yukata Anne had bought him on a business trip to Japan, he sat in the computer chair in his study, gazing down into the shifting, murmuring darkness that now filled the Meins’ backyard, at the bright reflection his study windows were casting across the vegetable beds. Such a happy, fulfilling family day; one that he’d never really experienced before and would not forget ever. And as his parents had once again insisted on intruding, he welcomed them, without reservation, for the first time in years.

  Because he’d created so many lies, a whole mythology of them, about his parents, it took him a long painful time to sift through those to find ‘the truth’ about them.

  The night deepened and heightened the brightness of his windows’ reflection across the vegetables and made them look like black steel sculptures. Aunt Sybil and Uncle Roger were real, and they’d raised him after his father had killed his mother accidentally during a quarrel and was found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to ten years in prison. He was nine when that had happened, and he couldn’t remember much about any of it and had had to rely on his aunt and uncle to provide him with that information. As a teenager, he’d grown hugely ashamed of it, and had insisted that his guardians change his surname to theirs. (He would carry that shame and anger, he believed, forever.) When he went to university in Auckland he never returned to Blenheim. He kept in touch with his guardians until Aunt Sybil died unexpectedly of heart failure, and then, because Uncle Roger wasn’t a very good correspondent, he’d let the connection lapse. Throughout his life, he’d kept well away from his father, but always ensured he knew where his father was and what he was doing, so he would never have to meet him.

  Now, in death, his father was with him again, and with that returned his beautiful, beautiful mother. In the windows’ reflection below he saw – coming into focus – the wedding portrait of his parents that had occupied the central position on his aunt’s and uncle’s fireplace.

  Ancestry

  Late morning, a dull Anzac Day, as I drove through largely empty streets to Foodtown. I parked my car in the almost empty parking lot, found the supermarket wasn’t opening until 1 pm, and strolled across Williamson Avenue to the Café Oceania, where Andrea and I often brunched. I was relieved even more to find a hungry heater gobbling up the cold in that place. I’ve lived in New Zealand for over forty years, but I’ve always found it difficult to live with the cold. When Andrea gets impatient with my annual early winter complaints about the cold, she usually says, curtly, ‘Go back to your village then and see what you think of the humid heat there. You’ll soon be saying you’re a winter lover!’ Admittedly when our small family firm started doing well, I’d tried to persuade her we should build a house in her village and spend the New Zealand winters there. She’d been supportive then but, over the years, after the deaths of her beloved family elders in Samoa, especially her grandmother Faivai, who’d raised her, had stopped discussing it.

  I sat down at the double table near the heater by the front windows, unbuttoned my jacket, stretched out my legs under the table and looked forward to being warmed.

  For the first time I started analysing Andrea’s surprising actions that morning. She’d risen early, showered quickly and, after dressing for the cold, had mumbled she was going with Regina and our grandson Amataga to the Anzac Dawn Parade. I hadn’t thought it unusual then. Now, as the warmth eased into my limbs, I considered her actions extremely puzzling – and hurtful. It was the first time she’d ever done that; also she and Regina hadn’t consulted me or asked me to come. Why? She knew I didn’t hold strong views about war and Anzac Day. She was the one who was cynical about ‘colonised people and the poor’ sacrificing themselves for their colonial mother country; she was the one who at least twice a year suffered what she called ‘terrible anti-war dreams’, which, in our usual practice, she storied to me when she woke and we interrogated in order to fit them into the meaning of our life. And here she was going to the memorial service for the thousands of colonials who’d died in Gallipoli. Why? As far as I knew, none of our relatives had ‘fallen’ there. She was also leaving me out of something she considered important; if I did that to her, she would come down on me like a tonne of bricks!

  There were only three other customers in the café: an elderly man with unruly grey hair and dressed in a black overcoat sat in front of the heater, sipping his coffee, while, to his right, a young couple sat elbow to elbow reading the newspaper. Overtly thin, the young man had spiky red-tipped hair, and wore a see-through navy blue t-shirt, long pounamu earrings, a thick black leather belt spiked with silver triangles and red sandals. I assumed the Polynesian woman with him was his girlfriend. She was just as extrovert in her clothes and appearance: pale make-up, blood-red lipstick, black pearl earrings that dangled down to her shoulders, a plain red t-shirt with a provocative penis-shaped L on the front, a black mini skirt which revealed pale thighs and legs and crimson Nikes. Her colouring fitted what my daughter Regina had recently described as ‘the caramel generation’. When her mother had asked for an explanation, Regina had said ‘They are the colour of caramel: a mix of brown Polynesian and white Pākehā.’

  ‘And you’re not of that generation?’ her mother had asked.

  Regina had replied, ‘Do we have a hidden Pālagi in either of you or both?’ Andrea had smiled and looked at me.

  ‘Don’t look at me,’ I’d laughed.

  ‘Caramel is such a sweet and beautiful colour,’ Andrea had added, ‘but I’m afraid we’re both plain brown.’

  ‘But of course Amataga is caramel, eh!’ I’d acknowledged. Regina and Andrea had laughed.

  I went over and, avoiding the eyes of the woman behind the counter, ordered a latte (double-shot) and my usual brunch: creamy mushrooms, bacon and toast.

  ‘Where’s Andrea?’ she asked, as she wrote down my order.

  I glanced up and recognised her – the owner, and smiled. ‘With family at the Dawn Parade,’ I replied.

  ‘My husband and three of our kids are there too,’ she said. ‘His grandfather and my grand-uncle died in Gallipoli.’ And she waited for me to list my Gallipoli dead.

  It came quickly. ‘My grandson’s great grandfather and, I think, a cousin were killed in Gallipoli,’ I said. My grandson was the only family member who, through his Pālagi father, Ralph, would have had ancestors at Gallipoli. On my way back to my table, I realised that was the reason why Regina and Andrea and Amataga were at the Dawn Parade. It didn’t matter that Amataga’s father, a wastrel and womaniser, had left him and Regina last year; Andrea wanted our grandson to learn about his Papālagi ancestors and honour them.

  ‘… Another bloody protest to do with the Treaty,’ I heard the young man saying, as I passed their table. He was holding the previous day’s paper in front of his partner’s face and pointing at the headlines on the page.

  ‘I don’t want to go down that groove, Jet!’ She stopped him dead in his tracks. ‘I don’t want to!’

  ‘Why not?’ he objected, his red face redder still.

  ‘Cos ya’ve always refused to listen to my views!’ She paused and, gazing straight into his face, emphasised slowly, ‘And in case ya’re blind, Ah’m Māori!’

  Their argument about the Treaty seemed incongruous in the context of Anzac Day. I took my seat quickly and turned my back to them and tried to concentrate on looking at Williamson Avenue. Obviously, some of the vehicles were heading back from the Dawn Parade: in some of the cars, I glimpsed men in suits and chested with their service medals, and with them were their younger descendants. Every year the media talked about how the younger generations were returning to the Dawn Parades to honour their dead relatives; hundreds were now even visiting Turkey and Gallipoli for the memorial service there. The previous year I’d watched Helen Clark on TV speaking at that service to a huge audience of solemn and weeping Kiwis; mainly young ones.

  ‘… And don’t forget, if ya don’t recognise the Treaty then you and ya fuckin’ ilk are in Aotearoa illegally!’ the woman in the café was saying. Throughout my life, every time the Treaty and the debates that raged around it erupted in my purview I curled away from them. That was the term I’d coined to describe accurately how I felt. I was fascinated by the debates, but whenever I wanted to involve myself in them – even with Andrea and Regina – I curled away from them, like a foetus; half-opened my eyes and ears and merely observed.

  ‘… We’re now beyond viewing our history and future through the Treaty,’ the man was insisting. ‘It’s too narrow a frame to see ourselves and our history through. Plus, we can’t continue viewing our history through the grievance mode!’

  ‘Pull me other tit, bro!’ She deliberately stereotyped herself.

  ‘… Besides, most people now know about the Treaty and have it in their hearts!’

  ‘Fuck, Jet, ya’re so fuckin’ dishonest hiding behind that liberal colonial bullshit. Most non-Māori don’t have the Treaty in their hearts!’

  She reminded me of Regina and Dad and how they argued about the Treaty: passionate, direct and courageous. But even here I was curled, merely observing and trying not to take sides. I must admit though, I was getting – if not angry – impatient with Jet. I looked around: the place was filling up with family groups who looked as if they’d been to the Dawn Parade.

  A chair screeched behind me as someone got up angrily. I glanced back: it was the young woman, and she was stuffing her things into her large handbag, and the man was half on his feet, crimson face frozen in a look of offence and embarrassment. ‘Stuff you, dickhead!’ she said. She gathered up her handbag and started stumbling out, with the man in front of the fire smiling and everyone else trying not to look at them. ‘Stuff ya all!’ she declared. I liked that; yes, I did, I realised, and was surprised and pleased with myself that I felt that way.

  I paced my eating until I saw people opening the doors of Foodtown across the road. I hurried over and, because it was still largely empty, didn’t take long buying the things Andrea and I had listed yesterday evening. Because our grandson now spent a lot of time with us, much of the shopping was for him. Andrea and Regina banned soft drinks and sweets and other junk food from our home. However, whenever I shopped I sneaked in some of Amataga’s favourites – Coke, jelly beans and chocolate fish – and hid them in the laundry, and when he and I were alone we feasted on them. My dad used to do the same with me. As I was loading the shopping into the boot, I missed having Andrea there. Over the years, like most marriages, ours had settled into well-established routines, such as doing the supermarket shopping together. She hadn’t come the last few times, though. That added to my aggravation.

  There was more traffic on Williamson Avenue as I drove home. As I turned along Ponsonby Road and into heavier noisier traffic, I remembered, with immediate apprehension and worsening aggravation, that Andrea hadn’t narrated her dreams to me over the past six weeks. And yet her dreams and our detailed interrogation of them had become an essential part of our life.

  I was finishing mixing the salad dressing when I heard footsteps hurrying up the front steps and recognised them as Amataga’s. Immediately I headed for the front door, my heart quickening with love and anticipation. I grasped and turned the door knob and, pulling back the door, knelt down to Amataga’s three-year-old height, and he squealed and burst into my wide embrace. ‘Grundad, Grundad!’ He cried into my neck, his face feeling chilly against my skin.

  ‘You’re cold,’ I said, lifting him up. To stop himself from sliding down, he wound his legs tightly around my stomach.

  ‘Samoan, Dad,’ Regina said into my left ear, as she unwound her long red woollen scarf from her neck.

  ‘‘I, fa‘a-Samoa i le tama!’ Andrea reminded me too.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumbled and, hugging my grandson, carried him into the sitting room. We’d installed central heating years before at my insistence, so our house was cosily warm. ‘‘Ese lou mālūlū,’ I said to him.

  ‘I’m not cold!’ He insisted, as I kneaded warmth into his hands.

  ‘Fa‘a-Samoa; speak Samoan,’ Regina reminded him.

  ‘I wanna speak Pālagi today,’ he said, and looked at me for support. I unzipped his thick waterproof jacket, took off his scarf and All Black beanie and handed them to Andrea, who hung them up in the corridor.

  ‘‘Ese lou laki, Amataga,’ Andrea said. ‘E lē to‘atele tamaiti e iloa Fa‘a-Samoa.’

  ‘And speak with the “t”!’ Regina insisted. Poor kid: not only did he have to speak Samoan, despite not having many friends who spoke it, but he had to speak with the t, which most speakers didn’t use in conversation.

  Since Amataga’s birth, this debate had become a major theme of our life together: Regina wanted her son to be to be fluent in Samoan, and she had us trapped in the guilt of not having taught her Samoan. Like my parents had, we’d insisted to her that learning Samoan wasn’t useful in New Zealand: mastery of English was her way to a ‘good future’. So, like most of her generation, she knew little Samoan – and we were to blame for that! Although I didn’t admit it to Regina, every time I was with our grandson and we used Samoan, our relationship felt deeper, more intimate; more so than my relationship to Regina had been at his age. Like it was a ‘secret’ language, reserved specially for us and our alofa for each other.

  Because I’d migrated to New Zealand when I was only five, and my parents had discouraged me from learning Samoan, my Samoan was nowhere near as fluent as Andrea’s; she’d shifted to New Zealand only after she’d graduated from high school in Samoa. Our grandson was enrolled at the Richmond Road School Ā‘oga Samoa and, because Andrea was far more knowledgeable than me about things Samoan and the language, she quickly became one of the ā‘oga’s main advisers, and we, two of its most generous donors.

  A short while later we were seated round the lunch of beef burgers and green salad that I’d prepared. ‘‘Ai lau salaki, darling,’ Andrea urged Amataga, who again glanced up at me for help. I looked away and left him to his grandmother’s and mother’s mercy.

  ‘Yes, darling, ‘ai lau salad,’ Regina emphasised. We knew what he was going to do next: he got me to cut his burger into quarters, then he ate each quarter quickly, observing all our rules about eating cleanly and silently, and then, closing his eyes and withdrawing into himself, he started spearing each bit of lettuce and tomato and cucumber and avocado firmly, pushing each bit into his mouth and trying to swallow them without chewing.

  We applauded when he swallowed the last bit and, his eyes choking with tears, dropped his fork onto the plate. I handed him a tissue to dry his eyes with. ‘There, it wasn’t so bad, eh?’ Andrea consoled him.

  ‘So tell Grundad what happened at the Parade,’ Regina urged him.

  He wrapped his arms round his chest and, avoiding my scrutiny and squirming as if he was being tortured, whispered, ‘Jus’ lots of soldiers …’

  ‘Fa‘a-Samoa!’ his mother ordered.

  ‘Okay, ko‘akele fikafika …’

  I had to save him from being told to speak with a t by saying, ‘E māgaia ‘ofu o fikafika ma lakou folegi?’

  ‘‘I, ese le magaia.’ He brightened, sitting up at attention and swinging his arms in marching style. ‘Ga masi fikafika pei se ami!’

  ‘Ia, fa‘aali iā Grundad le masi a fitafita!’ Andrea encouraged him. Regina nodded enthusiastically. And he was on his feet, at attention, facing me.

  ‘Squad!’ I ordered, ‘Forward march!’ He stepped left foot forward, fists clenched tightly, head held with eyes fixed straight ahead, and started marching round the kitchen.

  ‘‘Ese lou poko e savali fa‘a-fitafita!’ Andrea congratulated him.

  ‘Ga fa‘aali mai e Grundad!’ he said, proudly, and my heart continued to swell and encompass all of him and the joy he was in my life.

  Except for his unusual morning blue eyes, Amataga was caramel, from his skin to his hair. We were relieved that his eyes were the only feature he’d inherited from his father. The rest of him, according to Andrea, was from his ‘Samoan side’: from her father and mine. (Andrea’s father had died in an accident at sea in Samoa, so I’d never seen him.) Yes, Amataga uncannily reminded me of my father, in physical appearance, in the way he moved, in the way he talked and smiled. My father had died from pancreatic cancer six years before: it had been a slow and excruciatingly painful death, and, in his usual stubborn and courageous way, he’d fought against it. I’d wished – but told no one – for him to give into death early and be free of the profound pain, but he’d fought on. So when Amataga was born and Ralph and Regina had agreed to our request he be given my father’s name, I had wept uncontrollably, stopping only after Regina had placed Amataga in my arms and whispered, ‘He’s with us still, Dad.’

  ‘So why didn’t you bring it up while Regina was here?’ Andrea asked after Regina and Amataga had gone and she was stacking the dirty dishes and cutlery into the dishwasher. I glanced at her. ‘About why we went to the Dawn Parade?’ she reminded me.