Antonia Hildebrand
Antonia Hildebrand is a poet, short story writer, screenwriter, novelist and essayist. Her first published short story appeared in Downs Images and in Woman’s Day Summer Reading and she has since been widely published in journals, magazine and anthologies in Australia as well as Britain, the USA and Ireland. Many of her short stories have been broadcast by Radio 91.3FM Yeppoon. She is the author of nine books, including three books of poetry, two short story collections, two essay collections and novels. Her novel The Darkened Room was published by Ginninderra Press in 2022. Her poetry collection, Broken Dolls was published by Tangerine Books in 2024.
King Crab
When I was twelve, my mother got cancer. It was 1966, the Vietnam War was on TV every night, and no one really seemed to have much idea why this war was happening, so I accepted on that basis that disasters just happened. Not that anyone admitted that my mother’s situation was a disaster. It was discussed behind closed doors, but I was protected. It didn’t matter. I knew everything and especially the things they didn’t want me to know. My mother had a tumour on her thyroid and it was malignant. There was some complication and they couldn’t operate. She was going to be in hospital for weeks having radiation and chemotherapy.
Dad and I were living in a borrowed beach house about a half hour drive from the hospital. It had been loaned by Dad’s mate Greg. He was a wheeler-dealer always buying and selling things he had acquired in mysterious ways. So it wasn’t that surprising that he turned up one day with a king crab- a huge thing built like a tank. Its claws were bound but it was still alive so it was moving its claws around –or trying to. It has tiny eyes which I imagined were focused on me, furiously, as if I was to blame for its suffering. He had huge, meaty claws, sprinkled with red decoration and tipped with black. I knew that in the zodiac, the sign of cancer was symbolized by a crab, so the link between him and my mother’s disease was there from the minute I set eyes on him.
We had left our farm in the care of Dad’s brother, Kevin, and I was determined to get back there, back to the cows and the little white farm house that had been my world until Mum got sick. And it was simply unthinkable that we would go back there without Mum. King Crab, as I thought of him, was put into the tub in the laundry and I suppose my father planned to make him into our dinner the next day. I decided that given that a crab had my mother held hostage in the hospital, killing and eating this crab would be very bad juju. I became convinced that it would doom my mother. The huge crustacean focused his tiny eyes on me and made impatient gestures as I formulated a plan to free him. I could hear the hum of Dad and Greg’s conversation. I knew what they would be talking about. It wasn’t hard to imagine. How foolish they were, I told myself, to think that killing and eating this crab would not have terrible consequences. I knew I had to act.
After Greg left, Dad seemed listless. Talking about what had happened to Mum only drained him of hope, I could see that.
‘I think I’ll have a lie down, Alan’, he said with the ghost of a smile and he went into the bedroom and shut the door.
I could hear King Crab rattling around in the tub demanding his freedom. I would give it to him and in exchange he would give me back my mother. I even went into the laundry and looked into what I supposed was his face and said,
‘Is that a deal?’
King Crab stopped moving his claws and was completely still. I took this as agreement to my plan. In the beach house you could hear the ocean. The waves seemed very close and King Crab could hear them too, I supposed. He wanted to go back to his home as much as I did.
As the sun balanced on the ocean like a big orange ball and then sank down into it, extinguished for another day, and darkness fell over the beach house like a net, I waited patiently for Dad to turn in for the night. He wasn’t hungry so we had toasted beetroot sandwiches for tea with ginger beer for me and real beer for him. He watched the news after tea; I couldn’t understand why. I thought he had enough troubles of his own without taking on everyone else’s. Then he fell asleep on the couch and began to snore.
‘Dad’, I said, touching his shoulder. ‘Go to bed. You’re asleep on the couch’, I said, stating the obvious.
‘Okay’, he mumbled. ‘Turn off the TV, will you? Goodnight.’
He went to bed. I turned off the TV. In the house now the only sounds were the waves and King Crab rattling and struggling around in the tub, wanting to get back into the ocean. Soon my father’s snores chimed in.
I had to transport a very large crab and even though it was pitch black outside, I had to put him in something. I didn’t want random witnesses possibly reporting to my father that they had seen me walking to the beach holding a big crab if any neighbours happened to witness my nocturnal journey. I looked out the window up at the sky- the big fat moon was shining like a spoon, to quote a song I wouldn’t hear until 1968. I took this as a sign- the moon would light my way. It was after midnight by that time, no one would be around I hoped. I found a sturdy shopping bag. I was scared of King Crab, I thought he would struggle and I might drop him-but when I reached out to pick him up and take him out of the tub, he kept perfectly still, the way he had when I asked him about our deal. I slipped him into the bag, found the key to the back door and let myself out, carefully putting the key in the pocket of my jeans. I had grabbed the kitchen scissors on my way out and I put them in another pocket. I would need them to cut his bonds once we reached the beach.
I knew the way to the beach very well. Dad and I took a walk there most days. I saw no one as I trudged along with the crab in the shopping bag. I was impatient to reach the beach and free him because then I knew my mother would get better. The crab had been still but as we got closer to the beach he began to move around. I held the bag tighter. I mustn’t drop him. If I did his shell might crack. I knew next to nothing about crabs but I knew a cracked shell would not be good. And the deal was that he be delivered alive to the ocean. Otherwise it wouldn’t work. At last the ocean came in sight. The moon shone a silver road across the ocean as the waves rolled and crashed to shore. King Crab was now doing a jig but I had to cut his bonds and I thought as close to the ocean as possible was the best way to do it. So I walked towards the ocean thinking how nice it would be to walk along the silver road that stretched out before me, glowing like silk on the ocean. Down I went on to the beach, the waves roaring in my ears. I took the scissors out of my pocket and reached into the bag and cut the bonds that bound King Crab’s claws. Then I tipped him out on to the beach. He looked at me with his mask of a face. Then he did a sideways charge into the ocean and was swallowed by the waves. I stood there for a minute under the big fat moon that was shining like a spoon. Then I put the scissors in my pocket, picked up the shopping bag and went back up the cold, soft dunes to the road. I walked back through the empty streets certain my mother would live.
We had five good years after that. We went back to the farm. Back to the cows and the little white farm house. Back to normality. My mother was pale and her hair had fallen out but back on the farm colour returned to her face and her hair grew back. My father had stared in disbelief at the empty tub the morning after my walk to the beach in the dark.
‘Where’s the crab?’ he yelled. ‘Did the damn thing escape?’
I tried to look innocent but my father knew. I thought he would be angry but he burst out laughing. It was the first time I had heard him laugh in months.
‘You let it go, didn’t you? I suppose next you’ll be a vegetarian.’
I shook my head.
‘Okay, have a shower and we’ll go and see Mum.’
He was actually smiling.
My mother died, of course she did- five years later. But I’ve always been sure King Crab thought he kept his part of the bargain. He probably would have said, ‘I never promised you forever.’ And, of course, no one can. I often thought of the crab over the years, out there in the ocean and wondered if, five years after I released him, he was caught again. At which point our deal was null and void. But that’s magical thinking: something only a twelve year old boy with a sick mother would believe. That’s what I tell myself.