Metal City - Hai Ina Ia Mai Ana Ka Puana

Vale' Scotty

Here's a bedtime story for you, turkeys - even though most of you are probably in bed, or still blinking away the effects of the amyl at your local so-called 'Blue Light Disco'. Since this is the season to be jolly, it's a Christmas story - and it involves someone that, to be honest, I probably have no right writing about, but I thought I would anyway, since today's events upset me so.

It's funny how some people simply slip through the cracks, isn't it? Sometimes, despite the total and absolute proof of their existance, they spend life as a part of the road crew, instead of being the frontman for the band. And sometimes, late at night, when they think nobody's looking, you can sort of see a glint in their eye that suggests that if they could, they'd take that microphone and they'd be the one with the millions of fans. Scotty was kind of like that.

He moved in with my Uncle - so long ago that it seems that they'd simply always lived together. A huge, heavy-set bear of a man - with a wide grin and a shock of closely-cropped curly hair. I remember reaching out to shake his hand, and feeling the massive spread of his paw-like palm wrapping around my own, the fat, thick sausages of finger winding themselves around and pumping my arm hard - a firm, warm, sincere shake. And that laugh - a throaty gurgle that would erupt from his belly and tumble out of his mouth, splashing across the air like a tossed can of paint. I always felt like he was anomaly in my Uncle's life. See, Frank is a rough sort of character - a sinewy, tensile beast with a lust for alcohol that is only exceeded by his rager. There is something inside Frank - a cruelty and a coldness that has stopped me in my tracks on more than one occasion, and made me double-take at how effortlessly mean he could be. Scotty, on the other hand, was a stunningly gentle creature. He was a genuinely huge fellow - I remember once driving him home in my Torana, and the entire front-left side suspension sank to the ground. I looked at him, and there was a shame - a crippled, red-faced sadness that seemed to ooze from him as he reached up and tugged uselessly at the seatbelt, which couldn't fit around his belly. Thinking about him, though - there's a good chance that a large percentage of his weight consisted of heart, since he proved himself to be - as Hawkeye Pierce would say - 'the finest kind'.

But, Scotty was an alcoholic. A flat out sozzled, drunken, maggoted, self-destructing lush who would drink on an almost continual basis. Apparently, he was an incredibly gifted computer programmer before the booze got to him - but he had largely been ravaged by the alcoholic excessses of his lifestyle. I remember very few times that I saw him when he wasn't pissed - and I talked to Frank about it one day. We were at Grandma's, talking in the kitchen.

"Is Scotty okay?", I asked him. "He seems pretty drunk."

Frank sighed, and shook his head - lighting another Longbeach 16.

"He'll die one day. He's not gonna make it to fifty. I can tell you that. You can just tell with some people - they're not going to be old men."

I looked through the window of my Grandparents house, where Scotty was standing - a can of beer in one hand, talking to my Grandpa.

"What do you mean?", I asked, feeling more than a little disturbed.

"Mate, he doesn't stop drinking. Ever. He takes beer into the shower with him. He never, ever, ever stops."

And he didn't stop. He was killing himself slowly - that much was obvious. Rather than simply feeling pity for him, or disgust, or anger - I sensed something horribly broken in him. No wife, or girlfriend. No children. I'd never known him to have either. He lived with Frank. Every Christmas, he'd go home to Mum. You can tell when someone is truly empty and alone inside by the look on their face when you walk through their front door. Scotty would almost always be sat in front of the television, and when I'd walk in the house, he'd smile - put his beer down, wipe his hand on his knee, and reach out for a handshake. He'd seem genuinely interested in talking to me, despite the fact that I was, after all, nothing more than Frank's nephew.

But, he would always seem very eager to hear about what I was doing. He'd slur, and he'd laugh, and he'd belch, and he'd sit and talk to me about politics, or Frank's kids, and - particularly towards the end of last year, my Grandmother. She was a woman who didn't tolerate fools gladly - a fiercely intelligent creature, whose words cracked like a whip and rang out with deft slashes when someone intolerable was in her presence. And despite Frank's constant chiding of Scotty - when would he leave, why won't he leave, we need to boot him out, he's a fat, drunken fuckup - she would scold him, and tell him that Scotty was a good boy. And, Scotty was a good boy. When my Grandmother became ill, and he was at her house, he always made time to sit down and talk to her - and she often told me that Frank had no right to be so mean to Scotty.

'Scotty,' she would say, 'Is a truly lonely guy. He always has time to talk to me, and to sit with me. And I won't hear a word against him.'

But, how could I say a word against him? How do you look into the eyes of someone so clearly crippled inside, and so clearly floundering in the game of life, and someone who was so clearly incapable of any genuine cruelty - and be awful about them? The last time I saw him was at Frank's place. I had Suzanne Vega playing in the car, and I dropped my cousin - Rebecca - back at her father's house. Scotty and Frank were sitting outside, and I rapped with them for a while. And at the end, Scotty took my hand, and he looked up at me, and he said:

"David, you're always welcome to come back. Anytime you like. Come back here. We've got beer - you come around any time you want, it'd be great to see ya."

I got back into my father's car, turned up '99.9F'', and drove home.

I remember driving him to my Grandmother's funeral. He lowered his voice, and spoke in a gentle, soft tone about how much respect he had for her, and how much he thought of her. And after I delivered her eulogy, and we were standing outside on the muddy grass of the chapel, he shook my hand again - a warm, soft-hearted shake. And he told me that he was moved by the things I had said, and that he was honestly going to miss my Grandmother. Then, he told me that if there was anything I needed, to let him know.

Today, Mum called out to my Grandfather from the kitchen in a slightly shaken voice:

"Have you told David yet?"

"Told me what?", I yelled, not removing my eyes from the T.V screen. I was about to finish the map in Ghost Recon 2 that I'd been playing for the last hour. Nothing was going to sto p me now.

"Nope", Grandpa replied, then he turned to me. "Scotty's dead."

I put the controller down and looked at him.

"What?"

"He died last night."

I couldn't believe it. Of course, I immediately thought that maybe he'd Bon Scotted himself and had that one can too many - but it was a little sadder than that.

"He tripped and fell. Then he died."

The story, at this point, was that he tripped, smashed his head on the concrete, and was too badly damaged to be helped. I felt horrible. So very, very sad. Here was a guy who was such a tragic figure, such a kind, soft-hearted man - meeting such a horrible, undignified end. It seemed surreal.

Later, Mum called my uncle. He'd been speaking to the police, and apparently, Scotty was pushed down a flight of steps in Prahran, hit his head, and died. There's something so horrible about that, that it seems almost impossible to think about. The thought that someone who was so soft and kind, and so generous could have his head broken open, and could be left to die alone - it's just so chilling. We talked about it today. Was it a fight? Was it drunk kids looking for kicks? I just couldn't think of an answer - all I could think of was the poor sight of Scotty falling, his body - swollen and distended from years of abuse - following him down the steep steps, and his head crashing into the ground. Why should such a good guy meet such an awful end? At his funeral, who's going to mourn him? No lover, no wife, no children - just his parents, a few friends, and my Uncle. A life lived alone, ended alone. Think about him crashing down the stairs, his arms and legs battered and bruised - his heart paralyzed with fright. What do you think he was thinking about in those moments? What do you think he was thinking about?

It's a week before Christmas. Imagine having to call his mother to tell him that he's dead. Frank's house full of his things. My 8-year old cousin, who has never known life without Scotty, having to try to come to terms with the fact that life is often horribly, horribly unfair - and awful things happen to people who just don't deserve it. And think about a giant, oversized bear of a man - knelt at my Grandmother's wheelchair as she cradled a cigarette in one hand and a glass of port in the other, listening to whatever she had to tell him.

I felt so sad today. A strange kind of sadness. It was like a slow leak - a steady stream being released into my bloodstream, and coursing through my veins. The more I thought about it, the more unthinkably awful it seemed. Scotty and I certainly weren't close, and we weren't best friends or anything like that - but he was always simply there. The roadcrew to my uncle's band frontman - quietly taking all the abuse that was dished his way, and still finding the strength to shake my hand, offer me a drink, and let me know that I was welcome to come and see him anytime. I really regret never having taken up his offer - and I guess that from time to time, I'll remember him. But there'll always be something black, broken, and painful embedded in the memory - the endless, aching lonliness of his life mixing with the tragic nature of his death. What a waste of a good person.

It's a week before Christmas. And the season keeps getting sadder and sadder.

So long, Scotty. Say hello to Grandma for me.

Posted by David at December 19, 2004 01:14 AM | TrackBack