by Mark Brandi
They sat in there a while, silently, waiting for it to pass. But then Ronnie said they better head home before it got too wet, or they might get bogged out there.
Fab sat in the back and didn’t say anything. He’d barely said a word since they got there. He just looked out the window, his skinny brown arms crossed and his singlet all wet. Outside, the rain swept in and the tall, thin gums by the roadside swayed back and forth. Ronnie didn’t turn the radio on, so there was just the squeak of the wipers, the low engine rumble and steady drone of rain on steel.
As houses appeared at the roadside, first one or two every few kilometres, then more, Ben felt relief that they were getting closer to town. He looked forward to going home to a warm house, getting changed into some dry clothes – maybe his pyjamas – while his mum made him lunch. Maybe baked beans on toast. Or, if he was lucky, alphabet soup.
‘Where’s your place, Fab?’ Ronnie said, glancing up at the rear-view mirror.
Fab shifted forward in his seat. ‘That’s okay, you can just drop me back at Ben’s.’
Ronnie shook his head. ‘Nah, I’ll take you home, mate. Don’t want you having to walk in the rain.’
Fab nodded and moved back in his seat. ‘Seaby Street,’ he said.
Ben would have liked it if Fab came over. If the rain cleared, they could play cricket out back. There wasn’t as much room as at Fab’s, but it was still pretty good. Otherwise, they could stay inside and play Test Match. He wanted to say something, but it just seemed easier to go along with Ronnie.
Ronnie glanced at Ben. ‘So, what really happened to your hand, mate?’
His face went hot. He watched the wipers screech left and right. Left and right. ‘The footy. It was pretty waterlogged and it hit the end of my fingers. Hurt like hell.’
Ronnie laughed. ‘C’mon, mate, you can tell me. I won’t dob. Did ya have a punch-on?’
He tried not to smile. ‘Yeah.’
Ronnie raised his eyebrows. ‘They must have come off second best, by the look. Someone giving you grief?’
Ben hoped Fab couldn’t hear from the back. With the rain and everything. ‘Yeah,’ he said.
Ronnie glanced at the rear-view mirror, then reached over and rubbed Ben’s shoulder. ‘Well, if they give you any more trouble, you tell me, all right? I’ll put a stop to it.’ He smiled. ‘I’m good at things like that.’
As they turned into Seaby Street, Fab popped his seatbelt and leaned forward, his hand on the console, balancing his weight between the front seats. Ben saw he had the rabbit’s foot in his fingers, its grey fur flattened like he’d been holding it tight.
‘Wanna come over to my place, then?’ he said. ‘Mum can drop you off later.’ His breath was hot on Ben’s neck. ‘And he won’t be there. My father, I mean. He’s in Dimboola til tomorrow.’
But Ronnie jumped in before Ben got a chance to answer.
‘Nah, I better take Ben home, mate. Don’t want to get in trouble with his mum, do we? Last thing we need. Plus, I’ve got his gear in the back.’
Fab answered quick, like he’d already thought it through. ‘If you leave his stuff at my place, my mum can drop it off later.’
It was a good idea. And it’d be nice to see Fab’s mum again, especially without his dad there.
Ben turned to Ronnie, ‘Yeah, I think I’ll do that... if that’s okay, I mean. I can ring my mum from Fab’s and—’
Ronnie slapped the steering wheel and looked back at Fab, his face all twisted like Ben had never seen.
‘Listen, you little shit! What did I say? I said I’m fucking dropping him home, all right?’
He swung the Statesman hard into the curb, the tyres screeching and launching Fab forward between the seats.
Fab coughed and pulled himself back into his seat. ‘Okay,’ he said, his voice shaking. Ben could see his lip quiver, but he tried to hide it, turning away.
Ronnie turned the engine off, took a few long, deep breaths in and out. He rubbed his face with both hands, like he was upset, then turned back to Fab.
‘Look, I’m sorry, mate,’ he shook his head. ‘Get a bit of a temper sometimes. A bit disappointed about the weather, y’know. You right?’
‘Yep.’ Fab opened the door and got out, even though his house was a lot further up the street. He waited outside on the nature strip and, even with the rain coming down, Ben could see tears in his eyes.
He powered down the window a bit and called out, ‘I’ll ring ya tomorrow, okay?’
Fab frowned like he hadn’t heard him properly. ‘What?’
‘I’ll ring ya!’
Fab shook his head like he still hadn’t heard.
Ronnie moved quickly round the back and scraped Fab’s nets out of the boot. He didn’t even look at Fab or say anything to him, as far as Ben could tell. He just threw the nets and the hessian sack on the nature strip, rubbed his hands together, and got back in the car.
* * *
As he started the engine, Ronnie was smiling. Not his full smile, just a little at the corners of his mouth, but different this time. Like he was trying to hold it in.
‘Now,’ he said. ‘Do you wanna go for a bit of a drive, or back to my place for a bit?’
‘Um...’ Ben shifted back in his seat. He was scared that Ronnie might get angry again. ‘Weren’t you gonna drop me off?’
Ronnie eased the car from the curb and accelerated down the street. Ben looked in his side mirror and he could see Fab still standing at the side of the road, in the rain, watching the car.
Ronnie lit a cigarette and opened his window. ‘Your mum won’t be expecting you for a bit. Thought we might make the most of it, you and me.’ Ben noticed he had another tattoo, a small one, on his wrist.
‘Um, okay.’
‘I’ve got an old shack in the Black Ranges. Need to pick up a couple of tools out there. Thought maybe you could give me a hand.’
Part Two
One
For a moment, on the burning bitumen of the car park, Fab was transported back fourteen years to his year nine biology class. Like his job, that double-period did not exist in normal space and time.
A large white wall-clock at the front of the classroom marked the pace. Fab remembered that clock more than anything he was taught – the shape of the numbers and its long, red second hand that didn’t tick, but spun slowly around on its way to nowhere. His eyes were drawn to the clock’s round, stubborn face and its endless, cosmic cycle as Mrs Cooney droned on and on.
‘Eh Fab, you workin?’ Afriki smiled and crunched another trolley back into the bay. It sometimes seemed like the only English he knew.
‘Yes, mate, I’m workin.’
A few months back the local council had got some Sudanese refugees to settle. There was a big deal about it – even a council reception and pictures in the paper. Then they’re stuck doing jobs like this.
You can’t miss em on a Sunday though, walking up the Main Street to church – seven-foot tall in white polyester suits, their wives in dresses of greens, blues and gold like no one has ever seen.
* * *
At knock off, Fab needed a beer. Afriki was still busy linking the trolleys. A fluoro safety vest draped his narrow frame like an overcoat, hanging to the knees of op-shop slacks a couple of inches too short.
‘Hey Afriki, you drinky or what?’ Fab did the ‘drinky-drinky’ gesture, then immediately felt like a tool.
Afriki looked at him with those large, startled eyes, smiled shyly and shook his head, before turning his gaze back to the trolleys.
Stawell had just one decent pub: the Criterion, right over the road from Safeway. Bob Schmidt owned it and had decked it out in a nautical theme. The town was, after all, only 181 kilometres from the sea. The centrepiece was an old timber rowboat that had been converted into seating for four. No one ever sat there. Beside the boat was the Elvira pinball machine where Fab had wasted his high school years, and a few years since.
He pushed through the swinging doors to the main
bar. Even with the anti-smoking laws, the place still stank of durries. As usual, in the afternoon, it was empty and silent but for the static anticipation of the bug zapper.
‘Here’s a familiar face!’
Lucy Schmidt emerged from the kitchen. Bob had recently installed a video camera in the bar so Lucy could still serve customers while she prepared food for the dinner shift. Bob spent all his afternoons asleep in the lounge room upstairs on an inflatable lilo. He reckoned it was better for his back. But everyone knew there was nothing wrong with Bob’s back.
‘G’day Lucy.’
Fab pulled himself onto his stool at the end of the bar, beside Elvira. He watched Lucy’s hips as she came in behind the bar; the blue denim hugged her flesh firmly, but not too tight. He wondered if she had knickers on. He decided that she didn’t.
‘Usual?’
Fab wished she wouldn’t say that. He was keenly aware that his stool used to be Arthur Carter’s. Arty had worn a groove in the laminate with his elbow; his tall, thin frame forever tilted against the bar, white hair slicked back above a face like a John Brack painting – all angles and black eyes. When his health got bad the local doctor scared him on to orange juice, so he smoked an extra pack each day to calm his nerves.
‘Another day then, eh?’
Fab shrugged. ‘Where’s all your customers?’
Lucy raised an eyebrow. ‘Where’s all your mates?’
‘Touché.’
She trotted across the tiled bar floor and eased the fridge open with economy of movement. The heavy steel door swung silently on its hinge, revealing the misted bottles and the reassuring whirr of the cooler within.
Lucy still had her apron on and Fab sometimes wondered if she slept in it. As she turned, he watched her round arse in those blue jeans and imagined how it might look naked, but with the apron still tied round the back.
Lucy was from up north, Cairns to be exact. When she talked about the place, it sounded exotic. Fab loved hearing about the palm trees, warm sea water and tropical fruit. He wondered why anyone would leave.
It was about five years earlier that she’d arrived, just passing through on her way to Melbourne. But she never made it that far, not even once.
She swung back across the bar and placed the stubby unopened in front of Fab. She glanced back over her shoulder toward the kitchen and then leaned in close. She smelled like trees. Fresh. Like the honeysuckle down by the river.
‘I thought you had that Centrelink appointment?’ she said.
He shrugged. ‘Tomorrow.’
‘Fingers crossed then.’ She traced a finger along his arm, tiny goose bumps tingling his skin.
Fab eyed the camera, angled strategically across the bar. ‘Where’s Bob?’
She arched an eyebrow. ‘Where do you think?’
He nodded to the camera. ‘Never far away, though.’
‘Making you nervous?’ she said.
‘A little.’
She squeezed his wrist and took his fingers in one hand, her skin like milk against his battered, callused paw. She opened out his hand and traced her fingertips along the deep ravines of his palm.
‘Wanna know something?’ she said.
‘What?’
‘Someone asking about you earlier.’
‘Here?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Who?’
The swinging doors suddenly creaked open. Lucy let go of his hand and quickly retreated to the fridge.
Fab cracked the top off his beer and swung around on his stool as casually as he could manage.
‘You’ve knocked off early,’ he said flatly.
It was Bernie Stark – one of the meatheads from the abattoir. ‘Had to see my darlin Lucy.’ He grinned and slapped Fab on the back. ‘Looks like this dickhead beat me to it!’
Fab gave him a look.
Lucy fetched a pot from the glass chiller and started to pour. The skin on her neck had flushed deep red.
‘Hold on, darlin. I know you like to please old Bernie. But I gotta unleash the beast.’ He laughed. ‘Back in a tick.’
Fab waited til he heard the toilet door squeal shut.
‘Jesus, I hate that prick.’
Lucy shook her head. ‘He’s not the worst.’
‘Anyway, you were saying? Someone asking about me?’
She left the pot at the taps and came in close. ‘Yeah, soon after we opened.’
Fab took a sip of his beer.
‘A suit. Reckoned he knew you worked over the road.’
Fab’s mind raced. ‘What did he wanna know?’
She shrugged. ‘Just general stuff.’
‘What did ya say?’
‘Said you kept to yourself.’
The toilet door squealed open and Bernie let out a long burp. ‘Jesus! That’s better.’
Fab leaned back on his stool and sucked at his beer. He mentally recounted the list of people he might have pissed off in the past few months – maybe four or five?
No one he couldn’t deal with.
Two
He had it figured. It was after the second cone that the idea came to him. By the fourth it was a dead-set certainty. The man in the suit was a private investigator. Hired by WorkCover.
Fab used to work at the abattoir, boning beef. By Friday of his first week, he was almost getting the hang of it.
He was working his way through the last carcass of his shift. It was hard going, physical, and you had to use your hands and angle the blade just right, get it between the joints, through the sinew and tendons. You had to be precise. He was almost starting to enjoy it.
And that’s when they got him.
Four of them.
They grabbed him from behind, slung him down and carried him off. Bernie Stark was the ringleader.
‘You’re gonna cop it now. Initiation!’
He put up a fight at first, but it was no use. He remembered their faces, ugly grins and blue shower caps, coming in and out of sight as they swung him from side to side.
One! ... Two! ... Three!
He was airborne for just a second, then underwater.
But it didn’t feel like water.
It was thick like cold soup and there were things in there.
Soft things. Harder things. Strange shapes.
His feet found the floor – he stood up and opened his eyes, but they were covered in muck. The taste in his mouth, like raw meat on the turn.
And all he could hear was their laughter.
They’d thrown him in the guts pit, a putrid pool of thick blood, snaking intestines and fat jelly livers. He was covered head to toe in blood and shit. He was like Carrie at the prom. Except Bernie Stark wasn’t John Travolta. And Fab didn’t have special powers.
The smell stayed on his skin for days. He could never look at meat pies again after that. Just the thought was too much. And he couldn’t go back to work at the abattoir either.
That’s where the WorkCover claim came in – psychological injury. It was mostly the doctor’s idea. Regular certificates and monthly payments – a sweet deal.
But after a while the money wasn’t enough. Especially with all that spare time on his hands. And especially when the local dope got more expensive.
Pushing trolleys had been perfect til now – paid in cash and not much thinking to it. Spending money. Recreation.
The trolley job was Plan A. It was the right time for Plan B.
* * *
Fab wore his only clean t-shirt for the Centrelink appointment. It had a Campbell’s soup tin on the front. He didn’t really get Warhol. The only thing Fab knew about him was his real name. Warhola. He saw it on a documentary once.
The Centrelink office was in Ballarat, a two-hour bus ride from Stawell. The queue was grinding Fab down. Some French students were in front trying to get Austudy. The receptionist unleashed her best bureaucratese. They had no chance.
Next in line was a middle-aged junkie. He had a full-body twitch, dragging his right hand down his left
arm, kicking out his left leg and jerking his head backwards. He was making people nervous and Fab wondered what he was there for. Career counselling? Training? Wasn’t addiction a full-time job?
The French girls walked out confused. They should have stayed in France. In the movies, the women there were so beautiful. All milky skin and big dark eyes you could disappear in forever. Like in that movie, Amelie.
‘Next please.’
He stepped up with a slight frown and thin smile – his practised look of sincerity.
‘Yes?’
‘I have an appointment.’
‘Yes, take a seat over there.’ She nodded toward another waiting area. ‘They’ll call you.’
‘For fuck’s sake.’
‘What was that?’
‘Nothing.’
* * *
There were twelve by ten rows of seats, almost all of them taken. Fab stepped over legs and handbags and planted himself next to an Italian signora. Clickety-clack. Knitting something black.
The guy in front had his thick hair slicked back old-fashioned, arm dangling across the chair like a regular, flicking sideways glances at passing ladies. Strong aftershave. Flammable. Chemist brand.
Two girls on Fab’s right talked fast with the easy way of long-time friends – one was a skinny-looking country type with a blonde ponytail and a hippie-student look. Denim flares. The other, who Fab could only see out of the corner of his eye, had brown hair and freckles. She sounded heavier, husky.
‘How long are you going back for?’ said Blonde Girl.
‘Just two nights,’ said Brunette.
‘Why?’
‘I have to see my uncle. It’s his birthday.’
‘How boring.’
‘I know.’
‘Is it the hot one?’
‘Who?’
‘The hot uncle.’
‘You’re so gross.’
‘He is definitely hot.’
‘Shut up.’
‘You know who I mean.’
‘I said, shut up.’
‘It’s only incest if you tell.’
It was rapid, soft and continuous, almost intuitive. Fab could only hear it if he concentrated. It was like breath.
‘Oh god, what is this?’ said Blonde.