Deception

Photo by Milton Wiklund Unsplash

When plotting a story, a writer needs to have a clear idea of what the inciting moment in their narrative is. The incident from which point everything changes. I have personally experienced such an event in my own life.

It was the summer holidays. I had come home to Sydney to spend time with my parents, and brothers, Josh and Brad. My visit would be short-lived. I was a dancer with The Australian Ballet Company in Melbourne and couldn’t take much time off. My older brother, Josh, was in a similar situation. He lived on campus at Sydney Uni, studying medicine, and had taken on an extra summer class. We were both busy people.

Brad, only twelve, was the only one of us still living at home. Not for much longer though. My parents had enrolled him at St Luke’s, an exclusive boarding school. He was due to start this coming February. A couple of months ago, he sent me an email saying he didn’t want to go, how he was perfectly happy living at home in his familiar beachside suburb, near to all his friends. I don’t know what he expected me to do. It was my parent’s decision, not mine. Meanwhile, he was trying to contain his nervousness, but not quite pulling it off. He was acting the tough guy, being obnoxious and swearing a lot.

The three of us were standing around my Grandpa’s bed. “Did I tell you,” the old man said, staring at each of us in turn? “I had an experience with extra-terrestrials last week?”

“Bull shit!” Brad said. “Aliens are a thing of fiction. He crawled onto the bed, squirming in-between Grandpa’s outstretched legs. “Where did you see these aliens? In the house, or the yard? Come on Grandpa,” he pressed on, “out with it.”

Grandpa frowned. “Um,” he said. “I woke up last Tuesday night and saw an alien in my room. It tried to shove pills down my throat, but I pushed it away. Instead, it stuck a needle in my arm,” Grandpa lifted the sleeve of his shirt, showing us a bruise, “then it grabbed and dragged me, kicking and screaming to its UFO. After we blasted off into space, I looked out a window and saw the beach below.”

Suppressing a giggle, I pressed my lips together. An interesting story indeed.

“Yeah right,” Brad said, rather unkindly. “What did the alien look like? And how did it get you from your house to the UFO?”

“Brad,” I nudged his backside. “You’re not being nice.”

He turned, narrowed his eyes at me, then spun back and faced Grandpa. “So, what happened next? Where did the UFO take you? Were experiments performed on your body? Were there other aliens in the spaceship, and if so, did they speak? Could you understand what they were saying?”

Again, I pressed my lips together. Brad was a talker, it could get on your nerves. Sure, I loved him and all that, he was my little brother, I was, however, glad I lived in Melbourne and had limited contact.

“There was more than one alien,” Grandpa replied.

“Were they short? Did they have faces like dried-up prunes?” Brad clicked his fingers together. “I know did they have black bulging eyes. Hey Grandpa…”

“Oh Brad,” Josh said, “shut up. Give him time to answer.”

Grandpa rubbed his chin, and his eyes glazed over. “The aliens looked like normal people,” he said, “except they had no hair, and their faces were green.”

“Huh,” Brad replied. “That’s not normal. People don’t have green faces.” He loomed over Grandpa, so close, their noses were almost touching. “Look at my face, does it look green to you?”

Faster than a cheetah chasing it’s dinner, Grandpa squatted him with his wrinkly hand. “There were green aliens. I saw them.” His hands and body began trembling. “I was abducted by one, then whisked away in a UFO. Don’t tell me what I did and didn’t see.” He thrust out his arm, and seeing he was about to get a thump in his head, Josh gripped Brad under the arms and swung him to the floor.

“Grandpa,” I said, trying to calm the situation. “Don’t listen to Brad, I believe you.”

“I did see aliens,” Grandpa shouted, his face turning pink. “I did.”

Josh stepped back trying to avoid the spit flying from Grandpa’s mouth. “We know you did,” he soothed. “It’s okay.”

Brad grabbed my hand. “What’s happening?”

“You snivelling brat,” Grandpa yelled, pointing his finger at Brad. “Are you calling me a liar?”

With his eyes as large as saucepans, Brad took several backward steps, then fled the room.

I turned to follow, Josh would have to handle Grandpa himself. It would do him good to practice his bedside manner anyway.

When I stepped outside, I spotted Brad kneeling on the grass, over near the banana tree by the back-garden gate.

“I didn’t mean to make Grandpa cross,” he said, as I drew closer. “Dad told me he had Alzheimer’s and to be careful of what I said. Not to upset him, and now I have.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, squatting beside him, placing my hand on his shoulder.

“But I made him angry, and he’s only been living in our backyard a short while.”

I sighed. Grandpa was my dad’s, dad. Up until a month ago, he’d been living in his own home not far from where my parents lived. My Grandma, had died some years back. Besides being lonely at times, Grandpa had been going okay. Then about twelve months ago he started forgetting things, little things at first, like where he placed objects and people’s names. Then he started going out for walks and couldn’t remember his way home. Because Grandpa wasn’t ready for the nursing home, and because mum and dad had an empty backyard apartment, they set him up in there, so they could keep an eye on him.

He seemed happy enough with the arrangement. He still had his independence, was able to cook simple meals, and look after himself. He was, however, quick to anger. But according to my dad, he had always been that way inclined, and he should know because the two of them had run a business together, developing properties, for over thirty years. Now retired Grandpa spent his days pottering around the garden and listening to jazz music on his bed.

“Do you think mum and dad will be mad at me for upsetting him?” Brad asked.

“No,” I replied. Although they wouldn’t be thrilled to hear that Grandpa thought he’d been kidnapped by aliens, and even less thrilled to learn he’d almost physically attack their youngest son.

Brad stood up and took a deep breath. “I better go tell them what happened. It will sound better coming from me.”

If nothing else Brad was an honest individual. I admired him, that. “Okay,” I smiled, giving his leg a playful punch.

As he made his way inside, I wandered over to the cubby house. My dad had built it before Josh and I started primary school. We had had some fun times playing house in it. It didn’t feel like such a fun place anymore though. Poor Grandpa… Alzheimer’s, wow it wasn’t fair, his memory slowly fading like that, making up crazy stories. I sat down on the wooden slats and heard a familiar squeak beneath my bottom. When dad built the cubby house, he had made a hidey-hole in the floorboards. A secret spot where Josh and I could stash our treasures. Squating on the grass, I pulled up the slats with my fingers. I wasn’t expecting to find anything and reeled back when I discovered a rubbery object inside. I tugged it out. “Holly crap,” I whispered, It was a mask. A mask with a white face, big black eyes, a squishy nose, and thin lips. An alien mask.

“Emma, Emma,” I glanced upwards. Mum was marching across the grass towards me, her cheeks were blotchy, her facial expression tight. Whoa, what was her problem?

Brad must have told her what happened with Grandpa. I bet she wanted to blame me for it. And if she was mad now, she’d be furious when I told her about the mask. I didn’t know anything about it. Brad must though. Who else would? Maybe he’d been trying to scare Grandpa with it. But why? If I quickly stuffed the mask back where I found it, under the wooden slats, hide it from mum… I could deal with Brad later, get to the bottom of his madness.

“What are you doing with that mask?” Mum demanded, coming closer.

Too late, she’d seen it. I stood up. “Don’t be cross, I’m sure Brad had his reasons for frightening Grandpa. I know he’s scared about going to boarding school. Maybe it’s his way of dealing with it.”

She reached over and grabbed the mask from my hand. “For God’s sake, put it back before your father comes outside and sees it.” Yanking up the wooden slats, she placed the mask back in the hidey-hole and slammed the slats shut. “Say nothing about this to your father, or to Brad for that matter.”

“Dad yes, but why Brad? His actions need to be dealt with, what if…”

“This has nothing to with Brad,” she cut me off. “It’s me. I’m responsible for the mask and for scaring Grandpa.”

Her eye pupils seemed to be getting darker. She looked almost inhuman. “W, why,” I stammered?

“Because I love your father and refuse to share him.”

My breath caught in my throat. “What are saying?”

“He’s my husband, he belongs to me… not you kids, and certainly not to Grandpa.”

I raised my eyebrows.

“Let me explain,” she said. “Your father and I met as teenagers, fell in love, and later married. It was expected we would have children, I didn’t want to, but your father insisted. First there was Josh, then you, one after the other, as fast as possible to get it out of the way. You both grew up hogging your father’s attention. I was jealous but hid it. As soon as I could, I send Josh away to boarding school, then later encouraged him to live on campus when he began uni. You excelled at ballet, and when you auditioned for the Ballet School in Melbourne and got in, I was thrilled. That was you out of the way.”

“And Brad?” I asked, my voice catching in my throat.

“My surprise baby. I couldn’t believe it when I fell pregnant for the third time. If your father hadn’t guessed, I would have had an abortion. He did though, so I had to go through with the pregnancy. Then like with Josh I enrolled Brad in boarding school as soon as I could. And I was nearly there. I nearly had my husband to myself again. Then the worst thing happened, Grandpa got Alzheimer’s, and your father insisted he come live with us. Besides his mind deteriorating, the man is fighting fit. I was afraid if I didn’t do something big, he’d be living with us forever. So to make your father think Grandpa was completely losing the plot I pretended to be an alien. I tiptoed into Grandpa’s bedroom late one night, with the alien mask on. In his already confused state, I scared the shit out of him. Had to give him a sleeping pill to calm him down.”

My mouth dropped open.

“I,” she said in a firm voice, “wanted your father to think Grandpa was crazy and place him in a nursing home as soon as possible.”

“So what. So it could just be you and dad, without us kids, without Grandpa.”

“Yes.”

Lost for words, I stared at her.

A smile came over her face. “Here’s a word of warning. If you tell your father any of this, it might end our marriage. You know what will happen then, he’ll ask you to move back home, find a job at a local dance school and care for Grandpa. He might even pull Brad out of boarding school, and allow him to go to school locally. And what then Emma? Are you going to give up your dreams as a prima ballerina to care for family members who are either too old or too young to do it properly for themselves?”

“My God mum, who are you?” My hands clenched into fists. Memories of her at my dance performances, always clapping, and cheering me on, came to mind. Was it all fake? My eyes filled with tears. “You’re a monster,” I whispered. “How could…? I faulted. “How could you do this to me, to us, your children, me, Brad, and Josh. And what about Dad and Grandpa. What you did to poor Grandpa, scaring him like that. He’s so confused now, he’s got the story all mixed up in his head. He said he saw a UFO in our backyard. He said there was a green alien in his room that stuck a needle in his arm and then abducted him. He even had a bruise to prove it. Did you do that? Did you hurt him?

Mum shrugged. “He’s an old man. Old people bruise easily. He probably bumped himself.” She sighed. “Look, I only pretended to be an alien once, it was about a month ago. He’s embellished the story, that’s all. The mask I wore was white, not green. Seems Grandpa is ready for the nursing home after all.”

I fixed her with a cold stare. “Why have you told me all this? If you’d kept it to yourself, you would have got away with it.”

‘I had to tell you. If you had accused Brad of the crime, he would have denied knowing anything about it and told your father. Your father would then have investigated, and I might have been found out. Telling you the truth was the lesser of two evils.’

My stomach lurched. I couldn’t stand the whine of her voice. “You’re a bitch,” I spat out. When she didn’t respond, I turned and made my way towards the house.

“Hey,” she called. “Are you going to tell?”

I gave her the finger and kept walking.

#####

I didn’t reveal her secret. I remained in the house pretending all was well. Dad put Grandpa’s UFO alien story down to the Alzheimer’s, never suspecting mum was involved. At the end of the week, I packed my bags and headed back to Melbourne. As I hugged my mother goodbye at the airport, my hand gripped the back of her neck. “Make sure you look after Grandpa,” I hissed in her ear, “he deserves love and respect.” When I pulled away, I dug my fingernails into her neck.

That was a year ago. Desperate to forget my mother’s disgraceful behaviour, I resumed my busy schedule with the Australia Ballet, pouring all my newfound emotions into my dancing. It was funny… I’d never danced better.

I phoned home every Saturday, speaking with everyone in turn. The conversations I had with my mum were stilted. To be honest though, she wasn’t the only reason I was mad, I was also cross with myself. I too played a part in the deception by keeping silent. While mum didn’t give two hoots about family, my dad did. If mum had told him the truth, he would never have forgiven her. They would have divorced, and as mum said, he would have asked me to come back home and help care for Grandpa and Brad, and there was no way I was about to give up my dancing. Maybe I was more like my mother than I thought, selfish.

Not that any of it mattered anymore. Six months ago Grandpa began taking off in the middle of the night, walking the streets in his pyjamas. Twice the police found him flustered and confused on the local beach, mumbling about being spied upon by little green men. My dad had no choice but to send him to the nursing home. When mum told me during one of our phone conversations, she cried, a fake cry… I hung up in her ear.

Work commitments kept me from returning home the following Christmas. My ballet company was performing The Nutcracker. I was dancing the Clara role. One Saturday afternoon as I was packing my bag in readiness to go to the theatre, my iPhone buzzed. It was Brad. “Hi,” I said.

“Hi yourself. Guess what!” He sounded breathy.

“What? “I snatched my house keys from the coffee table.

“You’re not going to believe this? There’s been UFO sighting at our local beach. Several people saw it. One person even took a photo. It was on the front page of the newspaper. It’s weird. Remember how Grandpa said he’d been abducted by aliens? Remember how he described looking down at the beach as he shot off into outer space in the UFO.”

The keys dropped from my hand.

Perhaps Grandpa hadn’t been making up stories after all!