by John Larkin
Okay. Back to you. What happened after your birthday?
I figured it was time to find somewhere to live. I was sick of not knowing where I was going to sleep at night. Moving around all over the place. It was so tiring. I had a fallback option for the weekend – beneath door number 4 up at Death Valley, but I had to find somewhere for the week. A regular place. I needed routine. I needed structure.
Rail yards?
Rail yards.
IN MY THIRD WEEK AT THE SCHOOL MRS LEE ARRANGES FOR AN author to visit. First he gives a talk to the whole of years seven and eight, then a writing workshop for thirty selected students. I was so excited when Miss Taylor and Mrs Lee chose me to be one of the students. During the workshop the author gives us a copy of one of his short stories. It literally makes our jaws drop.
Miracle Child
No one expected the baby to live, least of all his mother. Her three other babies had all died in quick succession. First Gustav, then little Otto and then her daughter Ida. And now this frail, sickly little boy seemed sure to join his brothers and sisters in the cold earth.
The couple, although new to town, were held in high regard due to the husband’s position at the Customs House, although the talk among the townsfolk was that he spent too much time at the inn and often had to be helped home. The wife seemed pleasant and pretty and much too young for the bearded ogre that fate had lumbered her with.
The couple stared into the crib that contained their tiny bundle. The woman held her soaked handkerchief to her face. Alois detested public displays of emotion. If she lost her composure, she would pay for it later when Alois returned from the inn.
‘Is there any hope for my child?’ begged Klara of the nurse.
‘Pull yourself together, woman!’ snapped Alois.
‘We’re doing all we can,’ offered the nurse. ‘It’s in God’s hands now.’
‘God!’ said Alois with contempt, as if he was referring to an equal entity. ‘What does God care for our troubles?’
The nurse, unused to such blasphemy, excused herself and went about her duties.
‘It’s all your fault, Klara,’ snarled Alois, staring at his fragile little son. ‘You only make runts. Otto was even smaller than this one and Ida smaller still.’
‘Not Gustav,’ corrected Klara, risking Alois’s wrath once again. ‘Gustav was twice the size of Otto.’
‘He still died!’ spat Alois at his wife. ‘They all died!’
When Alois had left for the inn, Klara curled up on a chair beside her baby. If this one died then she would go too. What was left for her in this life?
That night Klara prayed. Although she wasn’t particularly religious, she was prepared to ask for help from any and all quarters. If God had an ounce of decency then surely he would let this one live. Just this one.
The days passed with Klara holding vigil by her son’s little crib, and her husband holding a vigil of his own at the inn. Fully aware of Klara’s circumstances, the doctors and nurses did all they could to give her baby every chance.
Two weeks following the premature birth, Klara woke to find one of the doctors examining her precious bundle.
‘Is he . . .?’ began Klara.
The doctor removed his stethoscope from the baby’s chest and smiled at Klara. ‘His lungs are clear. The infection gone. It appears, madam, as though you have your miracle.’
The tears cascaded down Klara’s cheeks. She made no move to wipe them away and so they fell onto her little miracle.
The nurses and doctors gathered around and shared their heartfelt joy with Klara. She cradled her beautiful bundle in her arms, never wanting to let him go.
‘He’s such a fighter,’ said the doctor. ‘I wager that he would make a fine soldier one day.’
‘What will you call him?’ asked one of the nurses. ‘Have you picked out a name?’
Klara was so overwhelmed with love for her darling boy that she failed to hear the question.
‘I said,’ prompted the nurse, ‘what will you call him, Mrs Hitler?’
‘I think,’ replied Klara, ‘I will call him Adolf.’
And everyone present agreed that Adolf Hitler was indeed a fine name for the little soldier from Austria.
The author’s point is that you have to get the audience to care about your character – or generate empathy as he puts it, because that sounds better.
After the workshop the author gives me a signed copy of one of his books. He says it’s because of the questions I asked but really I think he saw through me. He saw me.
Although I’m excited about the book, that story gets me thinking about fate. As in, there’s no such thing. I’m sitting alone in the library afterwards thinking: what if Otto Hitler had lived? He might have gone on to become a bigger lunatic than his brother. Or he might have sold flowers by the side of the road outside of Salzburg. Nothing is predetermined. Because if it is, then your life’s already been mapped out for you. What you’ll do. Who’ll you marry. When you’ll die. You’re nothing but an automaton, wandering around like a zombified drone.
Of course you can use fate as an excuse for not getting out of bed in the morning. For doing nothing with your life. Or you take the opposite tack. There is no fate. Nullum fatum est. That’s my English class’s motto. Miss Taylor has it up on the whiteboard. She wears a cross around her neck and her favourite book is the Bible but she believes that we make our own destiny with or without God’s approval. Although she has to be careful, what with parent/teacher night getting close, she hints that although we haven’t had the best start in life, that doesn’t prevent us from changing our destiny, because there isn’t one. We start each day with a blank sheet of paper in front of us, and what we write on it is up to us.
I already know what I want for my life and this isn’t it. I want to become a doctor, so I have to do certain things to make that happen. I have to work hard at school. I have to read. I have to learn. I have to study. Then I have to get good enough marks to get into uni, and then I have to study hard to pass my exams. Then when I’ve finished my internship I’ll be able to apply to Médecins Sans Frontières. And while I’m doing all this I’ll learn another language – French maybe. Because everything helps. I’m not just going to sit back and go with the flow and then blame fate when it doesn’t happen. I have to make it happen.
After school I wander over to the office and pick up my travel pass from the head office lady. She flicks through various envelopes and then hands the pass to me. As I’m signing for it she smiles. Actually smiles. Maybe she’s heard something about me. Or maybe she’s just heard about smiling and is trying it out. I hope she doesn’t strain any facial muscles.
With my travel pass I’m legal. I’ve got my licence to roam.
I make my way over to the ivy belt, to the mega-mall and Alistair McAlister’s café. I don’t want any more fuss so I don’t tell him that it was my birthday. He gives me a free hot chocolate anyway and asks why I didn’t drop my stuff off with him that morning as we had planned. When I tell him what happened, about Creepo’s goon and the Last Train to Kathmandu and the bus shelter and the book-giving guy in the fluorescent wife beater with the mullet haircut, he just stares at me and shakes his head.
‘You make my life sound so boring,’ he says.
‘Boring’s good. I’d love to be bored, just for a while.’
I don’t tell him about having the gun at the airport. He’ll only get all preachy on me. I wonder what everyone at school would say if they knew I was bringing a loaded gun to school with me each day. Probably wipe the smile off the head office lady’s face for a start. It might even throw Mr Thompkins a bit. I should have thrown it away by now but I’m hanging onto it in case Creepo turns up.
When I’ve finished my homework, I ask Alistair to bring me a toasted sandwich and then I start planning f
or tonight. If I manage to get into the rail yards, I’ll have a nice evening of reading with my new books. If not, I’ll be back in the bus shelter or a park bench in the ivy belt. I write a list: a few snacks, a facecloth, a wide-rim drink bottle, a small torch, a book light and batteries. That’s really all I need.
It’s a little after four-thirty when I say goodbye to Alistair and catch a train to the junction station. It’s too early to get shut in the yards yet. Too early for the Last Train to Kathmandu. But early enough for there still to be school students about. Mostly boater, straw hat, and blazer but enough public students for my appearance not to raise any eyebrows.
I step off the train and when the stationmaster blows his whistle, I bound up to him like a six-week-old puppy.
‘Oh, hi. I was wondering if you could help me please.’ I’m so doe-eyed in my innocence that he can’t possibly refuse.
‘Yes. What is it?’ He’s not entirely happy about having to deal with me. There’s a lot of him. A hell of a lot, in fact. His hips have disappeared beneath the rolls of fat. Although he’s wearing a belt, it doesn’t appear to serve any purpose, more a sort of leather halfway line. Merely standing there seems to make him wheeze. I hate to say it but he’s sort of like the Fat Controller from Thomas the Tank Engine, minus the top hat and snazzy waistcoat. It’s obvious he wants to get rid of me and get back to his doughnuts or whatever else he’s got in his little office but I bound on regardless.
‘Oh, great. Thanks.’ I put my backpack on the ground and pull out my homework book to make it look official. ‘I have to do a school project on a procedure. You know, how to make a poached egg, how to change a car’s oil, how to blink a book, that sort of thing.’
He gives me a funny look when I mention the blinking book. He’s obviously not up to speed on French literature by the physically impaired.
He leans forward and looks at me over the top of his glasses. I’m not sure if he’s going to help me or eat me. ‘And how can I help you?’ Phew.
‘I want to do something different from recipes and boring stuff about car engines, so I was thinking about doing something on trains. Like, say, how do they get over there?’ I point over to the parked trains, which are about a hundred metres past the end of the platform.
‘The yards? Well, they’re driven over.’
I burst out laughing. It’s so fake I could almost be a studio audience member for a comedy show about an American family and their amusing pet. ‘Silly me. I mean, what happens before they get there?’
He looks vacant. Geez, keep up, dude! I push on. ‘Like, how do you make sure that no passengers get left on board?’
Finally we get a bit of electrical activity upstairs. ‘Oh, right. Well the train guard does what’s called a walkthrough.’
I jot down some pretend notes in my homework book. ‘A walkthrough?’
‘Well, he . . .’
‘Or she.’ Oops. Couldn’t help myself.
‘You’re right. There are a few lady guards about now.’
Lady guards?
‘He – or she – starts at the front and walks through the carriages, making sure that there are no carry-overs.’
‘Carry-overs?’
‘People left on the train. Someone might have fallen asleep or haven’t understood or heard that it’s a terminating train. They could be deaf or not speak English good.’
I look up from my non-existent notes but let it go.
‘While the guard’s doing his walkthrough, there’s an announcement about the train terminating, but in my experi- ence some people are so stupid they may as well have rocks in their head.’
‘Or, as you say, they might not speak English very well.’
‘True enough. So the guard has to do a walkthrough just to be on the safe side.’
‘But the carriages are all double-decker. How does the guard make sure that they’re empty?’
‘Well he . . .
Or she.
‘. . . is supposed to walk through the top section and then go down the stairs and walk through the bottom, or visa-versa.’
Vice-versa.
‘But most of them are pretty slack and once they’ve done the top they usually just pop their heads down the bottom and have a quick look. No one wants to get stuck on the train though, so it’s not as if anybody would be hiding.’
‘What about homeless people? Don’t they . . .’
‘Nope. Not interested.’
‘Who isn’t?’
‘The homeless.’
‘Why not?’
‘They don’t want to be stuck in the rail yards, do they? They might be stupid to end up like they have . . . .
GGGRRRR!
‘. . . but even they’ve got more sense than to let themselves got locked in a train all night.’
Another train is just pulling in. ‘Hang on a sec, darling.’
I roll my eyes at ‘darling’, but he’s busy watching the passengers get on and off. When it’s all clear he blows his whistle and waves to the guard. The doors close and the train slides out of the station, heading north to Death Valley and beyond.
When the train has completely cleared the station, he waddles back over to me. ‘Where were we?’
‘You were saying something about how homeless people don’t try to get into the rail yards at night.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Why was that again?’
‘Well, they’re locked in, aren’t they? Once the heating gets shut off it gets pretty cold in there. Freezing. And they can’t let themselves out. They’re stuck in there all night. No one to talk to.’
Who cares?
‘Nothing to do.’
Book light.
‘Nothing to eat.’
BYO.
‘Nowhere to pee.’
Wide-rim drink bottle.
‘I don’t think even homeless people would pee where they sleep.’
Double GGGRRR!
‘So then what happens? After the guard has finished his or her walkthrough?’
‘Then the driver and the guard take the train over to the yards and together they shut it down for the night.’
‘What if there is a carry-over?’
‘Well, if the guard notices one, he’s supposed to report it but really . . .’ He leans closer to me like we’re in on the great guard conspiracy. ‘. . . it’s not worth the hassle or the kick up the bum from management if they find out, so what they generally do, and you didn’t hear this from me, is the guard gets the carry-over down off the train and then he walks them over to a hole in the fence and turfs them out.’
‘What about at night? Are there any security guards about?’
‘A private security firm patrols the yards, but they’re not interested in carry-overs. Not their job. They’re there to keep out vandals and them graffiti morons.’
‘What if the security guards did spot a carry-over?’
‘I’ve never heard of it happening but I suppose unless the carry-over is smashing the window to get out, security’d just ignore them.’
I finish writing my pretend notes and close my book.
‘Thank you. That’s been really helpful.’
‘Stick around,’ he says. ‘There’s a terminating train due in fifteen minutes. You can watch the guard do his walkthrough.’ He smiles at me and ducks back into his little office.
I sit on the one of the benches and wait for the terminating train. When it arrives the fat controller emerges wheezing from his cubbyhouse and waves to me to let me know that this is the train I’m interested in, as if the announcement being played repeatedly has somehow escaped my attention, or suddenly I don’t speak English good.
No sooner has the lady guard started her walkthrough than the fat control
ler disappears. Although I didn’t ask him I sort of get the feeling that he’s supposed to stay on the platform while she’s doing the walkthrough to make sure that nobody slips on board. But like he said: who would want to?
I pick up my stuff and wander up to the far end of the platform, to the front of the train. I stroll past the driver’s cabin and glance inside but he just ignores me and carries on reading his paper. I look back along the platform and notice that it curves slightly. Even if the guard steps off the train once she’s finished her walkthrough, she won’t be able to see me until she’s halfway back along the platform because of the way that it curves. I’ve found a blind spot.
I had planned to wait until it started getting dark before I made my first attempt, but the opportunity is too good to pass up. I step on board and dart up the steps to the top section. When the guard walks past on the way back to the driver’s cabin, she would need to be about four metres tall to see me up here. Even so, I lie down on one of the long seats, which is still warm from either the sun streaming in through the windows or the previous passengers’ butts. I hope it’s the sun.
The doors close and the train moves off, slowly clackety-clacking across the points until we’re over in the yards. After a few short, sharp shunts we come to a stop. A few minutes later the lights go off and the heating system shuts down. It’s deathly quiet. Towards the front I hear what must be the driver’s cabin door banging shut, and then the voices of the driver and the guard receding into the afternoon, back to their homes, their lives. And that’s it. I’m in. I peer out the window and then duck across the aisle to do the same on the other side to make sure there’s no one else around. When I’m positive that I’m alone I start getting myself organised. I’m still in my school uniform so I quickly change into my homey clothes. My train clothes now. I decide to have a little afternoon snack before I escape into The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I’m proud of myself for buying some fruit. I peel my mandarin and then when I’ve finished I allow myself a comfort Tim Tam.