by Tim Winton
When the meal was finished, Gemma excused herself and retired to the bathroom and Kai sat on the couch to watch television. Keely got up to help with the dishes and caught Doris’s eye as she took up a saucer and tilted it his way discreetly before tipping butts and ash into the bin. He shrugged.
She’s not well, he murmured.
Oh, it was her that was sick?
Yes, he lied.
Faith called. She’s home safe.
Pulled the bank out of a nosedive, has she?
Some foundation in Geneva is asking about you.
They contacted her?
She bumped into someone. In London.
She’s touting for me?
She was approached.
I doubt that.
A climate change thing.
Now, there’s a defeat I haven’t suffered yet.
I looked them up, she said. They seem good.
Who was this person?
She can’t say.
It’s Harriet, isn’t it?
No, it’s not. I wrote down the number.
And the name?
Apparently you just call the number.
What is this, Secret Squirrel?
I’m just passing on the message.
Why couldn’t she call me herself? he said, setting down a plate with more force than he’d intended.
You need me to explain that? The fact she’s even bothering to do this for you seems angelic to me.
Keely did not respond. He was puzzled. What could be bugging Faith?
Tom?
Yes?
Did you hear me?
Yeah, he said. It’s good of her.
You won’t call anyway.
Probably not.
Well, she said, wiping her hands and cracking the freezer door. No need to trouble you with details, then.
The shower thundered through the wall. It seemed to get louder the longer the water ran. Doris stood at the sink, appeared to hesitate over the hot water tap.
Perhaps we’ll wash these later, she said.
Okay, he murmured. Think I’ll just go for a walk.
You don’t remember, do you?
Remember what?
Faith. Your behaviour.
He made for the door.
It was still light outside and the air was hot and motionless. Gemma’s car stood in the driveway, all its doors and windows open. The interior reeked of vomit and disinfectant. The street hissed with sprinklers. The sky was a starless blue and the ground felt firm enough underfoot.
All the local shops were closed. He walked on out to the highway and found a big servo where they sold hot food, car parts, homewares and stationery. On a rotating stand he found a promising selection of postcards. He bought one of every kind. The surfing koala, the colour panorama, the arty black-and-white, a wildflower, a shark, the body beautiful, and the sleazy double entendre. He sat at a table with a Coke and a felt pen and as punters came and went from the pumps on the tarmac he went to work. The eyes. The memorial cross. The Luger pistol. On the last card, the one featuring a Great White with gaping maw, he wrote a message: Coning soom …
He returned them to their packet and walked back to Doris’s as darkness fell.
Gemma was in the drive, wiping out the car again. She gasped as he stepped up behind her.
Jesus Christ, she said. As if I haven’t had enough today.
Sorry, he said, copping a little spray from the bucket as she tossed the rag down in disgust.
Bloody useless.
Stewie, he said. What’s his surname?
That scumbag. Who cares?
I just need to know who I’m dealing with.
Knowin his name won’t help.
Just tell me. Please.
Chrissake! Name’s Russell. Wish I’d never heard it, meself.
And you remember the address?
What are you, thick? You were there.
I know the house, he said. But the number.
I don’t remember. Four, six. Somethin like that.
Okay, he said. The name’ll do.
You’re in enough shit already, she said, closing the passenger door.
You think?
Doris found your stash.
Stash of what? he said.
Your pills.
Oh, he said. That. I get these headaches, that’s all.
Tipped em down the toilet. I shoulda known. Figured you were just a boozer.
It’s not like that.
I’ll bet it’s not.
It’s complicated.
Yeah, mate. They all say that.
I spose they do.
I mean, Jesus, Tommy. I thought I could trust you.
You can.
Yeah. What choice have I got anyhow?
He set Gemma down outside the glass doors of the supermarket and waited until the uniformed guard arrived and let her through. She went in without turning or waving. Keely sat there a minute or two. Trying to reassemble the plan in his head. Had to concentrate. To keep it clear. It was exhausting. But it was still there. He had it.
So he drove on in to Freo. The Mirador. Into his flat for a couple of those bigboy codeines. Quick scout around. Over to Stewie’s. Rolled past, to the next block. Got out and walked back. Casual. Copped the house number. Six. Shoved a card into the letterbox. Said the number to himself over and over, all the way back to the car. To calm himself. To remember the number.
Pulled in beneath the big old ghost-wall of the empty prison. Wrote it all out. Steady as he could manage. Then headed east. Canning. Great Eastern. Flashes of river. Towers across the water. Glitter in the far hills.
Halfway to the airport he remembered his promise. Pulled into a servo. Did what he could with the steam-cleaning gizmo. But he’d never used one before. Began to think it was making things worse. Had some taxi driver watching him, shaking his head. But just ploughed away until Gemma’s money ran out. Him being short. And Doris not feeling magnanimous tonight.
Climbed back into the swampy pig of a thing and rode on inland with the smell revived and the damp seeping into his clothes. But it sharpened him. That smell of bile. Kept him focused.
Driving into the hot, dry western night with all the windows down.
He put it together. Made the run he’d mapped out for himself. Well, not completely to plan. Got lost a couple of times. Distracted, really. But he got it done. With the pain backing off he rode them all out, those cards in their motley envelopes, stamped and addressed in every variation he could make of his own handwriting. Which was none too steady tonight, hard for even him to recognize, truth be told.
Posted the first at a street box in Midland, the second at the Inglewood post office, another outside a 7-Eleven in Cannington. By the time he reached the northern suburbs the Hyundai’s interior was nearly dry but the carpet still had a whiff to it. He tooled around a huge, empty shopping complex in Morley until he found a mailing point. There was a box near the aquarium at Hillarys and as he headed back south there was another by a glass-strewn bus stop along the wilds of Marmion Avenue.
It was late when he coasted down the hill at Blackboy Crescent. For some reason he had trouble finding it tonight. He skirted the restored wetland and idled along the edges of the park where once he’d kicked the footy with neighbourhood kids every evening until dark. The bounding silhouettes, mothers bellowing, the ball hanging in a spiral climb against the sky. The memory skin-close. And strangely consoling. I was happy here, he thought. The world made sense. All of us together.
He drove down the coast feeling buzzed. Another salvo gone. Every card a mind-bomb. From all points of the compass. Encirclement.
And he yelled through the open windows. Blowing down West Coast Highway, lane to lane, light to light, light from true light.
Our name is Legion, Stewie! For we are many!
The thought of it. That little tweaker. Getting all these cards. Day after day. All with different postmarks, styles, messages, pictographs. It buoyed him. You’re s
urrounded, Stewie. Outnumbered. Just see the little numbskull turning them over, licking his lips. The girl there, too, probably others, passing them across the table, scoffing, anxious, eyes like schooling fish, searching out any hint of alarm in the others, the paranoia beginning to smoulder. Fuckheads.
Keely had no need of violence. He was smart. Black-ops. He’d always been good at this shit.
Had a tenner left from the steam-clean. Which kind of confused him. But he angled into a servo anyway and found a spinner rack. Bought a few more cards.
And then he was walking along the gallery. The Mirador.
Quite suddenly there.
And there was nothing hanging from Gemma’s door but the last wafting bit of string. He unpicked it carefully and shoved it in a pocket. His own place was stale but with the slider open it cleared soon enough.
There were messages on the machine – an odd one from Faith and something terse from Doris. He didn’t want to call her but the tone of his mother’s voice alarmed him. Jabbed in the number.
What do we need, Tom? she said the moment she picked up. And he saw it was late. Very late.
Tell me, she said. Do we need a neurosurgeon or just detox?
I’m fine, he said. I’m home. It’s alright. I’ll be at yours in the morning.
You need help, love.
I’ve got work, he said. Need sleep.
Work? Why lie to me?
But it’s true.
What are you really scared of?
I just need to sleep. I’m really sorry.
He hung up and stood alone in the little flat a minute. Thought of the trail of sand and spew he’d left through her house, the bag of pills she’d found stuffed in a corner of the couch. Within reach of the child. Not good.
Time for bed. But he was too stirred up.
Then he remembered. Tomorrow wasn’t Thursday. So, no job. Just Gemma to collect at dawn. As promised.
Set the alarm. For five.
Slumped into the chair, turned on the TV. More fat-people shows, cooking shows, forensic investigations, Jeremy fucking Clarkson. Flicked it off.
Fished out the latest cards. Spread them on the kitchen table. Every last one of them a tit joke – something to behold. He found a pencil, a biro, a felt marker. Worked his way through the icons: eyes, gun, cross. In the knife drawer there were envelopes and stamps. In beside his last sheet of Temazepam lay the boning blade he’d taken off Gemma.
He lined up the cards, addressed the envelopes and sealed them. There were stamps enough. He’d make another run tomorrow. Keep it up until Stewart Russell was a blithering mess.
Grainy half-light. Sky green-grey above the desolate car park. The glass doors peeled back. The bloke in uniform stepped aside to let a dozen workers out onto the sick-lit pavement. In their pastel tunics and smocks they were variously festive, weary, sociable, anxious to be on their way. Gemma and a tall, lithe young man lingered in the supermarket entry. His hair was long and fair and his movements outsized and antic enough to make her laugh and push him away playfully. She turned and caught sight of Keely parked across the deserted tarmac, and as she came on, stepping from the kerb, clutching her shoulder bag, she spun girlishly and shot the bloke a wave.
She opened the passenger door and flopped in, smelling of deodorant and tobacco and something sugary.
Snake? she said, shoving a cellophane bag his way.
Keely glanced into the snarl of bright colours. Recoiled at the cloying whiff of industrial additives.
Buckle up, he said.
Yes, Dad.
He passed her a takeaway coffee and she grunted. Refrigerated trucks pulled onto the street and the sky was bronze already. He steered them down the promenade of car yards and furniture warehouses, out across Stirling Bridge and up the four-lane towards Doris’s. Gemma lit a fag and reefed her hair free of its band.
You been busy, she said, sniffing.
You have no idea.
Feet’re killin me.
But you seem happy enough.
That new bloke, she said. French or somethin. Like a bloody TV show. Talk about laugh. Been there a week now. He won’t last.
She sighed and angled smoke out the window.
Kai orright? she asked.
I slept at mine, he said.
Gemma hoisted herself up in her seat. You shoulda said.
Yeah.
Well, that’s bloody ordinary.
I spoke to Doris. It’s all good.
Says you.
So, it’s okay to leave him in the building on his own, but leaving him safe with my mother’s not on?
Don’t try and lecture me. No position.
Fair enough. I should’ve called. But your phone’s off.
Well, duh.
Okay.
Where’d you go, then?
Just for a drive.
She blew smoke and gulped the coffee. He saw the red splash of a post box and veered into the forecourt of a deli.
What’re you doin?
I just need to post something.
He reached behind him, pulled out a plastic bag.
Jesus, what’s all that? What’re you up to?
Nothing, he said, turning the addresses away from her. Just business.
Business, she said. Don’t make me laugh. What kind of business would you do? Second thoughts, don’t even tell me, I don’t wanna know.
Suits me, he said, getting out.
At the box he shoved the cards through the slot, wishing he’d waited and spread the postmarks again for the fun of it, for the chance of further bafflement, but having them on him had become a little nerve-racking; it was better to send them off before he mucked anything else up. As he turned for the car, Gemma tossed the paper cup onto the bitumen. He picked it up without comment and dropped it into a bin.
As Gemma took another of her interminable showers Keely sat in the yard beneath the noise of stirring birds. Almost fully light now and the morning easterly stirred the trees. Beyond the aimless trails of rustic paving the grass was unkempt and snarls of bougainvillea had colonized the hibiscus and frangipani. The big motley plane tree rested hard against the fence and last year’s leaves lay everywhere like the remains of a betting plunge. Parked in beside the leaf-shingled shed, the dinghy gave him a pang. He’d been putting it off but he knew he had to give it up, job or no job.
A blur of movement at the corner of his eye. Kai’s face at the window. He waved.
The boy came out onto the deck in just his pyjama shorts. Hesitated, then came on down to join him.
I went looking, said the boy. I didn’t see you.
This weekend, said Keely. Let’s put the boat in the water, go see that bird again. What d’you reckon?
The boy nodded.
Can I get in?
Now? Sure.
Keely strode over, hoisted him up. There were deep, heart-rending dimples above his shoulder-blades. Kai clambered to the rear thwart, reached for the tiller, and the moment he assumed the posture of skipper his solemnity failed him. Such a grin of pleasure. Transformed. And Keely felt a vicious sweep of feeling. If anyone should touch this child. Anyone.
* * *
At breakfast Doris was brisk. She moved at such speed there was no spare moment in which to pull her aside, make an apology, explain himself, give undertakings. He wanted to reassure her but she hurtled by, citing a meeting at eight, her only breaks in momentum the little fussing pauses over Kai that seemed like in-jokes between her and the boy, brief but lavish gestures of affection that Kai drank up. Doris was hurt. Keely could see that. And angry. Now she was moving in on Kai. Making the save.
She crashed out the door in a dark suit, her satchel and handbag clutched to her hip.
In the wake of her departure, with Gemma already in bed, he waited as Kai dressed himself for school. Saw his own pillow and folded sheets on the couch. Protruding from beneath them, a sheaf of papers. Too neatly collated and placed to be accidental. When he riffled through he saw they were shee
ts from a legal pad. But this was not Doris’s work. A list of words.
On the sideboard, beside the ancient Scrabble set, was a dictionary – the Concise Oxford.
* * *
Traffic was slow on the highway. Kai sniffed furtively now and then but was not talkative.
So who won last night? Keely asked as they sat in a snarl by the rail crossing.
Doris.
She’s a terror for those little words at the end.
The boy nodded absently.
You working on your M-words?
Kai leant forward, opened the glove box, rummaged through. Keely saw a hairbrush, a jar of Vicks VapoRub.
M is a good letter, said Keely.
Three points, said Kai.
And there’s only two of them. Isn’t that right?
The boy flipped the glove box shut and held out his hands. For a moment Keely thought it was the preface to a game, some joke Doris had taught him. And then he saw the creases in his palms.
Two, said Kai.
Driving by Stewie’s again was tempting fate. He knew it, but couldn’t resist. After all, what did he expect to see – doors and windows thrown open in panic, speed-freaks tearing at their hair, a taxi being loaded with binbags?
As it happened, the place looked undisturbed. Office drones trudged by, a bloke hosed the pavement at the pub on the corner, hippies coasted past on bikes in the direction of the Strip.
He drove to South Beach, swam a ginger lap. Watched a bloke with his granddaughter building a sandcastle at the water’s edge.
Outside Stewie’s again, later in the morning, in the shade of a casuarina, he waited for the postie to swing by. Nuts. Being there, lurking in that blighted car. But he wanted to see something. So badly needed to witness some action, evidence of an outcome, a stirring of the pot. Oh, to see the look on Stewie’s canine face. Yes, he wanted that. Next time he’d send a parcel, a courier. Ramp this thing up. Lay siege. Full campaign.