As the rainbow of lights flashed from inside the shed Rebecca felt desire run thickly through her. She smiled to herself excitedly. She had just met Charlie Lewis. And he was gorgeous.
The sun, creeping above the trees, lit up silver threads of spiderwebs in the grass. Hungover B&S party-goers stirred in their swags as they lay on the ground or in the backs of utes.
Rebecca was awake but lay with her eyes closed listening to the thump of music coming from the speakers of a ute parked further along the row. They were playing ‘Thank God I’m a Country Boy’. She groaned and wiped a hand across her mouth. She was thirsty.
Opening her eyes she watched the diehard drinkers stumbling around the bonfire which had long ago lost its red roaring glory. From behind the tyres of her ute she saw the green hump of Dave’s swag which was rolled out near the bullbar.
‘Hey Dave …’
‘Mmmm?’
‘I feel like crap.’
‘Mmmm,’ said Dave. He pulled back the canvas of his swag and propped himself up on one elbow, eyes squinting, carroty hair sticking up.
‘Geez. You look like crap,’ Rebecca said. There was a rustling movement and from inside Dave’s swag the face of a dark-haired girl emerged.
‘Morning,’ said Bec. She remembered the girl from last night. What was her name? Annabelle? She’d been on Dave’s tail for most of the evening. She must’ve caught him.
‘Mmmm. Feel sick,’ said Annabelle, before slumping down again.
A little while later a loud cheer and the rev of an engine woke them again. A yellow Holden ute circled wildly in an area of bare paddock. Hitched onto the back was a portaloo. Its door swung open and shut as the ute spun around and around. Glimpses of a boy, pants around his ankles, clinging to the sides, could be seen as the ute stirred up dust with fat spinning tyres.
B&S committee members in striped rugby jumpers ran onto the area waving their arms, trying to stop the driver. As the vehicle slowed, the tubby toilet-goer leapt from the loo, tumbled in the dust with his trousers still down and in one smooth motion rolled to his feet taking a good-natured, bare-bottomed bow.
From their swags Rebecca, Dave and Annabelle applauded and whistled along with the other party-goers who were emerging from their swags to sit on the backs of their utes.
‘Looks like the party’s starting again,’ said Bec. ‘Better crack open a breakfast beer.’
Dave drove Rebecca’s ute in the line of B&S traffic along the dusty road. Annabelle sat on her ample bottom in the passenger seat while Sally and Bec sprawled in the back, their feet propped up on an esky. The B&S was shifting camp and everyone was headed for the recovery site on the riverbank.
‘So what happened to you last night?’ asked Rebecca.
‘Mmmm! Where do I start? I’ll give you a clue.’ Sally waved her hands in the air as if drumming.
‘Oh God! Not the drummer! You cracked onto the drummer!’
‘Mmm … those arm muscles!’ Sally took a swig from her stubby.
‘What about you?’
‘Oh. I lost Johnno. He was just a beer-goggle thing. I dipped out last night, mind you, I did meet the most drop-dead gorgeous guy with the best body and nicest baggage you’ve ever laid eyes on.’
‘Really! Who?’
At that moment a Hilux ute pulled out from the line of traffic and drove with two wheels on an embankment past them. On the back, amidst a crowd of boys, Charlie Lewis raised his beer in the air when he saw Rebecca.
‘I think I’m in love with you!’ he called out to her as they drove past.
‘Him,’ said Bec to Sally.
On the river’s edge they sat in clusters. Drinking, skylarking, dancing to the band which played from the back of a truck. Sally’s eyes wandered over to the drummer quite often and she’d sigh a little and smile. Rebecca was lying on her back looking through the golden shine of a Bundy bottle. She rolled onto her stomach and poured the rum into plastic cups, mixed it with warm flat coke and then handed one to Sally. Sally lay down next to her friend and they clipped the cups together and drank.
‘Heard from your dad?’ Sally asked.
‘God, don’t bring him up now while I’m enjoying my square bear!’
‘Bec. You’ve gotta deal with this family crap at some stage. We’re learning all about succession planning strategies at uni. You need to communicate with your dad.’ Sally pulled her sunglasses down her nose and looked into her friend’s drunken blue eyes.
‘Dad’s stuffed. So’s the farm and Tom’s dropping his bundle. The whole thing is rooted.’ Bec ran a dirty hand through a tangle of blonde hair and bit the rim of the cup.
‘That good, huh?’ There was silence between them as Sally unsteadily poured another drink.
‘I miss home, Sal,’ said Bec as tears welled up. She began to cry silently. ‘Bloody Dad. What am I doing, Sal? I just want to go home. Home to Waters Meeting and my river. I miss my horse … the animals, everything.’
Sal threw an arm over Bec’s shoulders and rested her forehead on Bec’s.
‘Buggered if I know what you can do, Bec.’
‘Buggered if I know either.’
There was a pause.
‘Hang it, Sal! Let’s just get hammered.’
‘Um Bec, we’re already hammered, and is that solving anything?’
‘Mmmm.’ Bec began to blow bubbles in her cup, then tossed the liquid into her throat, rolled onto her back and let out an ‘Eerrrrgh.’
Sal did the same, ‘Errrrrggh!’ Then they ‘Errrrrgggghed’ some more and let out some snorts, just for the drunken sake of it.
Suddenly Rebecca and Sally felt hands around their wrists and ankles. Dave, Johnno, Arnie and a short weedy boy were lifting them to the river. At the river’s edge Rebecca felt herself swinging, then the hands let go and she was in the air. She landed and cool water splashed about her.
When she stood up she found she was in waist-deep water. She pushed her hair off her face. The boys splashed in after her, some calling, ‘Wet T-shirt! Wet T-shirt!’
Rebecca looked down at her breasts, revealed beneath the wet fabric clinging to her body. She dived into the murky waters of the river and swum underwater to the centre of the swimming hole. As she trod water she saw Charlie Lewis on the riverbank. He was slumped on a purple inflatable couch with a rum bottle tucked under his arm. His mates fell about him, pulling the rum from him and picking him up couch and all. With a cheer they tipped him into the muddy shallows of the river.
When he surfaced and saw her treading water in the centre of the river he swum over. As he neared her she saw his eyes. So green. Long dark lashes wet with river water.
‘Howdy dudey,’ said Bec.
‘Why Miss Rebecca, I do declare. We meet again,’ he said, offering a wobbly handshake as he trod water overzealously. She was surprised he could remember her name after last night’s drunken shopping trolley introduction. She felt the shimmers of Charlie’s fingertips stirring the water as he paddled near her.
‘Shall we swim upstream or downstream?’ he said with a flirty glance.
‘I like it up,’ said Bec, pushing off the murky bottom with the very tips of her toes and breaststroking against the gentle current.
A large log which had fallen long ago provided a wet lovers’ seat for them as they sat and looked into each other’s eyes. Both shivered a little. Charlie stared at her and brushed strands of hair tenderly from her face.
‘Have I got a booger or something?’ said Bec, rubbing her nose self-consciously with her hands.
Charlie laughed a little and took her hand away from her face. ‘Nope. Your nose looks perfect to me.’
Water lapped just below Charlie’s nipples and even though he shivered, his hand felt warm holding hers. Bec waited for him to kiss her. She almost held her breath, amazed at how much she craved this man. She studied him. The perfection of him. Tanned skin, square jaw tinged with dark stubble, full lips and those eyes.
As he ran his hand up her arm and ov
er her shoulders, her mind was awash with questions. Like where was he from? Did he like dogs, or ice cream or cricket? Why was she so attracted to him? Did he feel it too? Was it just the rum?
Instead, she said nothing. She just let his lips touch lightly on hers and soon she was swimming. Swimming in the warmest rum-kiss which melted her heart. Even though she was drunk, it wasn’t like Johnno’s kiss had been. This river kiss. This Charlie kiss. This everything kiss. Their hands ran over each other and their breath quickened with desire. She felt the skin of his legs touch hers and he pressed his broad chest against her body. Lust.
Suddenly someone screamed and Bec’s eyes flashed open.
‘Floater!’ someone yelled.
A bloke on the riverbank was running up and down waving his arms and yelling, ‘Yobbo’s done a floater! Clear the water! Clear the water!’
‘What?’ said Bec.
‘Ahhh!’ said Charlie. ‘Yobbo’s laid an underwater cable and it’s floating downstream! Yirk! Let’s get out of here.’ They swum downstream laughing and drunk again with pleasure and the warmth of rum in their bellies.
She felt his distance, though, when he neared his mates. He slipped away from her in the water, trying to hide his self-consciousness.
‘I’ll catch you later,’ she said coolly and then walked out of the river, trying to look as Bo Derrick as possible, even though she was smeared with mud and river weed stuck to her skin like leaches.
Later she danced in front of the band, dodging tussocks and stomping on dust with the other drunks. Sal was at the front of the crowd in the hot afternoon sun, flashing her little pert breasts every now and then to the band.
While they danced Bec yelled breathlessly at Sal. ‘The kiss of my life! It was the kiss of my life! And it was interrupted by a floating poo!’
‘What?’ shouted Sal over the music. Bec shrugged and danced harder. Life was like that.
CHAPTER 6
Rebecca heard the shearer’s machine pull out of gear and the scrabble of hooves finding their footing. Automatically she moved on the cue of the sound. She picked the fleece up in one smooth action and threw it. The white fleece floated through the air and spread across the slatted wool table. She grabbed a broom and swept the locks away before Barney dragged out his next wether.
For Rebecca, rouseabouting was like a dance. She knew the steps off by heart, almost without thinking. It was a dance she had learned as a child when she worked beside her grandfather during Waters Meeting shearings. Right from the beginning she loved the smell of the fleeces as they fell away from the sheep. She would stand, watching, mesmerised by the movement of the shearers. The men in the team, all regulars, encouraged Rebecca in the shed. They let her finish the last few blows of the sheep just before smoko so that by the time she was sixteen years old she could shear a sheep in less than four minutes. Her grandfather showed her how he classed the wool, running the long white staples of fibre through his thumb and forefingers and testing it for strength with a flick of his middle finger. Rebecca would help him stack the AAA fleeces in a high white mountain in the bins. Shearing only ran for two weeks at Waters Meeting, but Rebecca loved every day of it.
At Blue Plains they were on their third mob and two weeks into shearing, with still several weeks to go. Already she was looking forward to the cut-out party. Alastair was flying in for it from the AR head office in the city, with a promised bottle of rum for Dave and a bottle of Baileys for Rebecca. For her, Alastair was a true mentor. She hung on his every word when he forecast the economic future of each agricultural industry or the gossip on property takeovers. He was in touch with agricultural trends across the globe and was able to translate that information into management decisions about the enterprises on each of the AR properties. Rebecca looked up to him, and she knew Alastair saw potential in her. She was the company’s youngest employee, but Alastair made it clear she was one of their best. He often liked to recount the story of how he ‘found’ Rebecca in the stockyards with her dogs. But he neglected to remember that he had promised her work with the stud rams. While Rebecca loved the labouring work on Blue Plains, she longed to become more involved with the stud work, to study genetics and try to piece together a pattern of the types of fleeces that came from each sheep.
Lately, however, on the board in the shed, her mind had been a mile away from wool. As she sifted and sorted fleeces Rebecca dreamed of the river kiss. She relived each moment, except for the bit about the floater. Since the B&S, she’d asked after Charlie. His B&S persona, ‘Basil’, had legendary status. He was from down the south-west somewhere. ‘A diesel dick’ someone had called him, and a ‘crop king’. Rebecca knew that sort of farm boy – the sort who loved tractors, seeders, cultivators, trucks, grain bins, dozers and anything else made of metal. Happy to spend day and night on a tractor lumbering up and down in straight rows or be swallowed up by machinery sheds for whole days at a time to tinker with motors or invent things. Diesel dicks were the sorts of guys who would watch and wait anxiously after harvest time for rain to come so they could get started with the next round of ploughing and sowing. Rebecca smiled as she thought of Charlie, up there in a big John Deere. Naked.
She shook the thought out of her head and stepped quickly forwards, scooping up the belly wool and hastily removing the pizzle stains; then she binned the wool like a basketballer and began to sweep the locks under the table, smiling at Neville the woolclasser as she went. She loved rouseing. It was like nonstop aerobics for four two-hour sessions every day. Never once did she lean on a broom. The shearers noticed this and liked her for it. As for ‘doughey Dave’, he endured endless teasing from the shearers, or in their terms he copped a ‘pizzling’. They called him doughey because he was as slow as dough to rise. He took his time on the board, especially when he stooped to pick up a fleece.
‘Sheep-O!’ cried out Reg as he dragged the last hefty wether from the pen. As the wether slumped between his legs, Reg hitched up his blue pants, wiped his face on his towel, then bent and pulled the cord of his shearing machine. He reached for his handpiece and began to shear. When the shearers called out ‘Sheep-O’ Bec always beat Dave to it. She whistled Dags and he bounded to the back pens.
‘Push up. Push up,’ she urged and Dags surfed the sheep into the pens. She had learned to read how the stock ran in the shed. If she timed it right she could get them all in at once with a little push and shove on the gate. But if she mistimed it the lead sheep propped and butted and stayed put. One by one she’d have to turn their faces and half throw them in the direction, using the gate to stop them from running back. She knew she couldn’t be off the board too long either, because Dave couldn’t cope when two fleeces came off at once.
But with Dags there, she could do the job in no time. Even Stubby’s pup, Mouse, was showing promise in the shed and a lot of force. A shearer had put in an offer for $500, but Bec wouldn’t budge until she had more than double that. Mouse was worth it.
Rebecca tried not to watch the clock as run after run slid by, but this afternoon she couldn’t help it. There was only five minutes to go until afternoon smoko. Katie the cook would soon bustle in with a big basketful of sandwiches and sausage rolls wrapped in tinfoil. Dave had already turned on the urn and its steam rose and fogged the window, making the bright sunny day outside seem misty and grey.
When smoko came, the silence was wonderful. Each whirring Sunbeam ground to a halt as the shearers reached for oil cans, cutters, towels and smokes. When each man settled down to a cup of tea, all that could be heard was the sound of hooves on grating as the sheep milled about slowly in the shed. While AR managers were pretty strict in most of their sheds on their other holdings, they were yet to revamp the clips’ quality control at Blue Plains. The bureaucrats hadn’t made it out this far, so smoking was still allowed in the shed and they ate smoko on low wooden benches near the wool bins. Bec liked it that old-fashioned casual way, but knew the industry had to change. At Waters Meeting, she’d tried to talk her dad
into controlling wool contamination and building a lunch room, but her suggestions had been met with a simple but final, ‘Bull,’ which in her father’s language meant he didn’t want to know anything more about it.
Here at Blue Plains, this was the last shearing before the shed was revamped. It would probably be Bec’s last shearing here too as her course began in a matter of months. She decided to make the most of it by giving the shearers a laugh. She begged Dave not to eat the egg sandwiches.
‘It causes an adverse reaction in the nether regions,’ she explained, desperate and wide-eyed, ‘which is somewhat painful and distressing to live with!’
Dave let out a rip-roaring fart which reverberated on the lanolin-darkened floorboards on which he sat.
‘Point taken,’ said Barney who ripped the sandwich out of Dave’s hand and threw it over the catching pen doors onto the grating. Barney then threw his sweat-covered towel over Dave’s head.
‘Oy!’ protested Dave from beneath his striped headdress.
The shearers went on to talk sport and weather with Bob, while Bec talked dogs with Barney. Dave just sat and chewed slowly.
Annabelle was coming over tonight, Friday night, so Bec had offered to cook them a roast. She’d have to run at knock-off time if she was to get the dogs fed and the roast in the oven on time.
The thangs you do for lerve, she thought. Other people’s lerve.
She was just putting the heavy pan into the greasy oven when the screen door shrieked that someone had come onto the verandah. It was an out-of-breath Bob.
‘Phone for you,’ he puffed.
The workmen’s phone, which was a payphone, was for some reason installed in the corner of the skillion shed which housed the motorbikes. It was a bugger chatting to people on cold nights, and not very private when the machinery blokes lined up to use the phone. As a result Bec hardly ever rang anyone.
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