Brothers in Arms

At all hours of the day or night, 17-year-old Connor McLean might suddenly decide to go on a hunt.

“Sometimes he’s outside with me and I just look up and he’s gone,” Mum Nicky says.

Neighbours of the McLeans have had surprise visits from Connor, who has shown up on their doorsteps and on porches with one intent only – to add to his extensive DVD collection.

Nicky admits ‘a man child coming to raid your DVD cupboard at 11pm at night’ is a highly unusual way to get to know the neighbours.

When you have twins with autism, on the brink of adulthood, life is anything but usual.

It was when Connor and Malcolm turned three that Nicky began to worry about her two little boys.

“Something wasn’t quite there,” recalls Nicky, in words familiar to every parent of a child with autism.

Her two boys would be diagnosed on being on the spectrum, but at different ends.

These days, disability demands a classification but Nicky prefers individualities to labels or definitions.

Malcolm is quick to smile and engage while Connor is quieter and less social.

Connor likes to piles up stacks of DVDs while Malcolm likes Spyro figurines and gets irritated by his brother’s DVD penchant.

“We call Malcolm the social justice minister - he likes the rules and Connor breaks all the rules,” Nicky says with a laugh.

Sometimes, Connor’s frequent jaunts can end unexpectedly.

One day, he showed up at home in a state, pointing at marks on his feet, saying ‘snake ate Connor’s foot’.

“I freaked out,” said Nicky. “He was barefoot and he doesn’t talk a lot.”

“We took him up to the hospital and they kept him there and checked him out for snake bite.

“We don’t think he got bitten but we really don’t know.”

Despite the snake scare, Nicky and Mark don’t lock the doors. It’s a free-range household.

The twins live on a large property at Dismal Swamp, packed with sheep, kelpies and rusting old trucks - plenty of fodder for a favourite family activity.

For around eight years, Nicky has entered the twins in the Mount Gambier Show photography and cake decorating competitions.

At the start, Nicky said convincing the boys to get involved was a supreme effort.

“It wasn’t easy. I’d set up the scene, maybe a dog on the truck and I’d set up the camera and try and get him to press the button but I’d have to actually support his body to do it.”

“You just gotta get a bit creative,” she says.

I try to get them to take photos and they’re not interested but I say Mount Gambier Show and they’re into it.

In the days before cake drop-off, Nicky describes a scene of frenzied chaos in the kitchen, with cake mix, sprinkles and lollies everywhere as the boys decorate their creations.

What emerges is far more ‘reality than Masterchef’, Nicky declares with a wry smile.

“You see these cakes that look like something off the TV shows and you just know the parents have done 90 per cent of it,” she says. “Ours are pretty real looking.”

Each year, the boys generally win a prize, taking home a few dollars and a certificate, which is proudly displayed in the family home.

For his photograph of Sassy the kelpie proudly posing on the benchseat of the old Austin truck, Malcolm was awarded the title of Grand Champion Photograph in Show.

There’s an underlying cause to all this and that’s to get the boys out there, into the community, to prepare them for the world ahead.

“I want the community to know about them. They need to have their sense of place,” Nicky says simply.

After all, they will soon be young men, with future life and job choices looming.

“We don’t know what that’s going to look like yet,” Nicky admits. “Hopefully they will find out where they want to be.”

Today, the twins set aside their squabbles.

In an unusual display of affection, Malcolm puts his hand on Connor’s chest and smiles – brothers in arms.

Tomorrow, it will be a different story.