by Scot Gardner
‘Katie?’
No answer.
‘Katie?’
‘Who’s looking for Katie?’ came a drunken bloke’s voice over my shoulder.
‘Me. Her cousin.’
‘She’s not here. She’s with Dan down near the big shed with all the animals in it, I think. They’ll be back in a few minutes.’
‘Yeah,’ someone else said. ‘If Dan’s in form, they’ll be back in two minutes precisely.’
A few people chuckled.
I ran out of the tent and back into the welcome cleanse of the rain. I crossed the showgrounds to the biggest pavilion. A horse had broken free. As I made my way into the dark mouth of the huge shed, it charged out, snorting and stomping with a small crowd of handlers behind it.
‘Katie!’ I yelled, but it was useless. The racket of the downpour on the iron roof swallowed any noise I could make.
Even with the lightning outside, the shed was still impossibly deep with shadow.
‘Katie!’ I hollered, and a flashlight came on. The beam of light swept the floor and arrived at my feet.
‘What have you lost?’ someone said.
‘My cousin. My cousin and . . . and her friend.’
‘There was a couple in here earlier. They didn’t stay long. Headed out that way,’ the voice said and the torch beam pointed to the open doors at the far end of the shed.
I thanked the anonymous helper with the torch and jogged through the sweet hay and animal smells to the open doors at the other end. It was like walking under a waterfall, with no coming out the other side. The rain was cold on my neck now but the panic kept me warm.
‘Katie!’
With each flash from the heavens, I inspected a new dark hollow. There was nobody on this side of the showgrounds. I hoped she had enough sense left to make her way back to the car. The light was on when I eventually got there. It was Dad, not Katie.
‘Jump in,’ he barked. ‘Where’s Katie?’
I jumped in. ‘I . . . I don’t know. We got separated before the lights went out.’
Dad gritted his teeth and rubbed his brow with the back of his hand. ‘Well, we’d better find her. Come on.’
He opened his door. I held my breath.
‘Fifteen minutes,’ he hollered. ‘Meet back here in quarter of an hour if you haven’t found her. I’ll start at the beer tent.’ Perhaps he knew Katie better than he let on? ‘I’ll go from there and head towards the rides.’
‘I’ll check the sheds,’ I said. Again.
And the rain came down. It seemed to be setting in for forty days and forty nights. Normally a storm like this would pass in a few crazy minutes, but this one kept coming. The rivulets had turned to streams and the gutters to gurgling rivers. I started to freak out. What if Katie was face down in that? What if Katie was so drunk that she couldn’t stop herself from drowning in a puddle? I yelled her name for what felt like an hour but turned out to be less than fifteen minutes. I beat Dad back to the car by about three minutes. He’d had no luck.
‘Was she with anybody?’ he asked. ‘Might she be hiding from the rain in another car?’
Dad hadn’t assumed the worst and it made me feel better – not so much as if my stomach was going to fall out. We divided the carpark down the middle; I checked the north side, Dad the south. Some cars were driving on to the showgrounds to provide light and others were leaving in a steady stream. I hoped she wasn’t in one of those heading out the gate. Checking the cars was tedious and one-at-a-time.
I found her with my foot. Stood on something that felt disgustingly like fingers to my bare toes. She was lying on the grass under the partial shelter of a campervan.
‘Katie?’
She didn’t move.
‘Katie, oh my god. Katie?’
Her skin was warm and damp. I slapped her limp hand and felt for a pulse, but all I could feel was my own heart preparing to leap out of its cage. I pinched her arm, slapped her face.
‘Katie?’ I wailed.
There was a moan, and then she was shoving me, scratching my bare leg. ‘Leave me alone!’
‘Katie! It’s me, Av. Are you okay?’
‘Avvie?’ she slurred.
I helped her sit up. A volley of lightning turned night to day for a long second and I held my breath. She was a mess. Her hair was all grassy and her make-up had run and smeared gothic down to her chin. Her skirt had ridden up and I saw much more of Katie than any cousin should.
‘Where are your knickers?’ I asked.
‘Wha –?’
‘Come on. Stand up. We’ve got to go.’
‘No!’ she whimpered. ‘I can’t. Not like this.’
I helped her up and when the full force of the rain hit her face, she swore, long and hard, right into my ear. Her legs wouldn’t co-operate and I carried her dead weight to begin with, but the weather was like a cold shower. Each step shocked a little more sense into her.
‘Oh, Avvie, I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t worry about it, you’re fine.’
‘No! Stop . . . stop,’ she said and put both of her arms around my neck. She hugged her face into my shoulder. ‘I’m really . . . really sorry, Avvie. I really am.’
I patted her back. ‘It’s okay. That’s what cousins are for. Come on, Dad’s waiting.’
She was quiet for the longest time and I thought she’d fallen asleep. Suddenly, her body gave a little buck. The front of my dress grew warm with her beery vomit. I spun her around and held her while she emptied some more onto the grass.
I couldn’t watch. I turned my face to the sky and tried not to listen, tried not to breathe that foul steamy mess in.
By the time she’d finished, my arms were sore from holding her. When she straightened, she seemed one hundred per cent more alert. She took the first few steps towards the car by herself. She stumbled, but I was there to catch her. I got her into the back seat of the Range Rover five minutes before Dad returned. In the interior light, she looked like a zombie. I found a picnic rug for her lap.
Dad laughed quietly and shook his head. ‘Hope the cops don’t pull us over on the way home. You girls look like something from a horror movie.’
I bared my teeth in the visor mirror. He was right.
CHAPTER 13
Dad kept the window open a crack, the driving lights on high beam and the wipers on blizzard mode. Katie was asleep before we made it out of Forsyth.
‘How much did you drink?’ he asked.
‘I didn’t have any,’ I said. ‘I smell like beer because Katie threw up on me.’
‘Charming. Where did she get the beer?’
‘She met a boy. Well, he was more of a man than a boy. He must have bought it.’
‘Probably good for her to let off a bit of steam.’
I looked at my dad in the glow from the dash lights. How could he say that? I remembered the panic that rode with me while I looked for her. I remembered the feeling in the pit of my stomach when I found her and thought she was dead. With the blanket on her lap, I realised, we probably didn’t look very different, as if we’d both had a rough night. We’d both found boys; that was true. We’d both found release – Katie with the beer, me with the chicken dance. We’d both been hosed by the heavens until we looked as though we’d crawled out of the same swamp.
‘Has she spoken about her father at all?’ Dad asked.
‘Uncle Tim? No. Why?’
‘He and Aunty Jacq have been having a bit of a rough trot. Well, more than a rough trot.’
Aunty Jacq had said he stayed home to finish the renovations on the bathroom. Katie hadn’t said a thing. Driving me insane with all those stories about her love conquests and she neglects to mention that there’s serious crap going on at home. Maybe it didn’t slip her mind; maybe she just didn’t care. Whatever the reason, I didn’t have a great deal of sympathy for her. In fact, I found myself wanting to get further away from her mess of a life. I wanted to be exactly the opposite of her. She could be city, I’d be country. Sh
e could talk volumes of rubbish and I’d say six true words. She could be rap, I’d still be country. She could be the prostitute and I’d be the nun.
No, take that back; after that night, no way was I going to be a nun. Not after that bright spark lit a fire in me. I thought about Nathaniel’s muddy bare feet, his perfectly messy hair and his breath on my neck. Definitely not nunnish thoughts.
Change the subject, quickly.
‘I felt the lightning,’ I said.
‘Pardon?’
‘It was faint but I felt it in my fingers and toes. My whole body. Just before that big bolt took the power out.’
Dad looked at me for a full second, long enough for me to think he should concentrate on the road. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Yes. Scared the life out of me. Didn’t hurt, just felt weird.’
‘It’s lucky no one was killed, if it was that close.’
Someone might have been killed. Daylight could reveal a frizzled corpse on the hill behind the pavilion. Eeeew.
I saw an upturned car on the side of the road. At least, that’s what it looked like. It was still raining hard. I wondered if I’d imagined it.
I looked at Dad. He stomped on the brakes and the Rangey shuddered to a stop on the gravel. He crunched it into reverse and sent the transmission whining until the headlights were staring at the mess on the roadside.
It was real all right. A pair of red reflectors stared back at us like the eyes of a demon. The white ute they belonged to was on its roof. I was out of the car and running, with rain and tears in my eyes.
It was the Carringtons’ ute.
The driver’s door had been broken like a leg around a stubborn old mallee tree. Every window was cracked and crazed. I couldn’t see inside. I didn’t want to see inside but I could hear muffled cries over the constant hiss of the rain.
‘Jesus,’ Dad cursed, over and over again. ‘Jesus. Jesus.’
He grabbed the handle of the passenger’s door. It unlatched but the crushed roof held it in place. My dad is a strong man, but I saw his muscles shaking with frantic effort. Glass crunched and metal groaned. Finally the cab opened.
‘Help. Can you help? Help us. For Christ’s sake,’ said the driver. I knew the voice. Underneath the hysteria, it was Les Junior. ‘Help the boy. Is he breathing?’
And the figure still belted into the upturned passenger’s seat was . . .
Resting against the shattered windscreen was a trucker’s cap.
‘Nathaniel?’
I shoved past Dad and pushed my head into the cab. It stank of diesel and wet bodies. Nathaniel’s arms hung limply over his head. His father was shaking him.
‘Nate! Jesus, mate. Wake up. Is he breathing?’
I felt his face, felt his breath warm on my wet palm. ‘Yes, he’s breathing. He’s okay. He’ll be okay.’
I was saying the words to make myself believe – he might have been in a coma for all I knew. Hope was my friend right then. I ran my hands over his neck and his cheeks. I cradled his messy hair but there was no blood. No broken bones.
Nathaniel’s hand clenched. He moaned.
‘Nathaniel?’ I said, and he reacted as if he’d been slapped. He struggled and his feet banged around in the foot well.
I stroked his face. ‘It’s okay. Nathaniel! You’re okay.’
In the reflected light from our car’s headlights, his eyes were big and wild.
‘Avril?’
‘Yep. You’re okay. You’re going to be okay. The car’s upside down.’
‘Come on,’ Dad said. ‘Let’s get you out of there.’
I backed out of the cab and Nathaniel took his weight on one hand pressed into the crushed roof. With the other, he unlocked his seat belt. He crunched head first into the broken glass and mess then Dad and I took a hand each as he struggled and twisted free of the wreck. He stood up groggily and checked himself out. He was shivering violently.
‘Are you hurt?’ Dad asked.
‘No. I’m . . . I’m fine,’ he said, and dived his head back into the cab. ‘Dad? Dad? Are you okay?’
‘I’m all right,’ his father squeaked. He sounded as though he was fighting with tears. ‘My foot’s stuck, that’s all. Grab the torch from the glovebox.’
Nathaniel twisted sideways and we heard a clatter as the glovebox contents fell out. Then the cabin lit up.
‘Jesus, Dad!’ Nathaniel cried. ‘You’re bleeding. Where are you bleeding from?’
My dad tugged Nathaniel clear and took the torch. He wriggled inside the cab and inspected Junior’s foot.
‘Av! Grab the first-aid kit from the back of the Rangey.’
There was an edge of panic in Dad’s voice. Nathaniel and Junior probably couldn’t hear it, but it frightened the hell out of me. Made me run to the car. I found the kit and stole the blanket from sleeping Katie’s lap. She stirred but didn’t wake.
I gave the first-aid box to Dad, unfolded the blanket and draped it over Nathaniel’s shoulders.
‘Thanks,’ he said. His teeth were chattering. ‘Is he going to be okay?’
‘He’ll be fine,’ Dad said, but I could hear the fear in his voice again.
Nathaniel stuck his head in the cab.
Dad fumbled with the plastic wrapper on the biggest of the bandages. ‘We’re going to need help,’ he said quietly. ‘Take the boy in the Rangey. Go to their place. We need an ambulance. Jaws of life. Go right now.’
I tugged on the blanket. ‘Nathaniel? Let’s go. We’ll go to your place and get help.’
We were probably twenty Ks from the Carringtons’ gate. I drove as fast as I could with the windscreen wipers on high. The rain eased and so did Nathaniel’s shivering.
‘You’re a good driver.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Your dad teach you?’
‘Dad and Hoppy.’
‘Hoppy?’
‘My grandad.’
‘Edward?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘Why do you call him Hoppy?’
‘I don’t know. Just a nickname.’
He huffed a laugh. ‘Grumpy bugger.’
I remembered the serve Hoppy had given Nathaniel when we went out to fix the fence. ‘Only to you guys.’
He chuckled properly then. ‘That would be right. The feelings are mutual.’
I laughed too, and the horror of the car smash seemed to ease.
‘Well, mutual for some members of the family anyway,’ he said.
I looked across at him. He was staring at the road.
There was a moan from the back seat. Nathaniel looked around. I hoped it was dark enough back there to hide Katie’s details.
‘Your cousin?’ Nathaniel whispered.
‘Yes, Katie. She’ll have a sore head in the morning.’
When I looked again, Nathaniel was staring at me.
‘What?’
‘Thank you.’
‘What for?’
‘Everything. For not hating me.’
‘That’s nothing,’ I said. ‘Easy.’
Perhaps a little toooooo easy.
CHAPTER 14
The clock on the dash said 2.53 when I turned the Range Rover into their driveway. Nathaniel directed me to the carport near the back door. I stopped the engine.
‘I’ll be back,’ he said as he slid from his seat, the picnic blanket still around his shoulders. ‘Promise.’
I waited. Katie snored quietly. In about three minutes the light above the back door snapped on, but it wasn’t Nathaniel, it was Les Carrington Senior. He wore an oilskin coat and gumboots, pyjamas underneath. He squinted at the windscreen. I waved and he started shouting.
‘Get out of here! What the hell do you think you’re doing at this time of night?’
He banged his fist on the bonnet. ‘Go on, get out! Before I put a bloody brick through your windscreen.’
He looked silly, with his six strands of hair pointing every which way. Something had changed in me that day. Old man Carringto
n no longer seemed like the monster my grandad and dad made him out to be. Knowing that Marilyn wasn’t the devil and understanding in my heart that Nathaniel and I were rapidly becoming the opposite of ‘feud’ made Les look pathetic and misguided. I tooted the horn.
The old man jumped. His voice went up two octaves and seven points on the volume control. ‘You stupid, low-life scum. How dare you?’
He stormed back inside. I hoped I’d see Nathaniel before I saw Les brandishing his shotgun. I sat there panting through my nose and staring at the back of the house for what felt like half an hour. Finally, the door opened and a dressed and dried Nathaniel stepped up to my window.
‘Is it okay if I ride back out there with you?’ he asked.
‘Of course.’
He shook his head. ‘Grandad wants to take his own car.’
‘Whatever.’
He dashed inside and returned with the picnic blanket and a green jacket. He stuffed them both through the window at me.
‘The jacket’s for you. The blanket’s for your cousin.’
An ambulance was there when we arrived, so was a fire truck and two police cars. I wasn’t conscious of driving without a licence until I saw those red and blue lights, but the matter at hand distracted them. They’d dragged the ute from the tree and were in the process of cutting the driver’s door away with their massive hydraulic tinsnips. I arranged the car so the headlights shone with the others on the tangle of metal. I arranged the blanket over Katie’s lap – she still hadn’t stirred – and donned the jacket before stepping out into the rain.
I found Dad talking with a female paramedic under the shelter of the back door of the ambulance. He had a silver blanket draped over his shoulders, and a cup of tea steamed from his blood-crusted hands. He looked relieved, even more so when he spotted me. He tucked me under his wing and kissed my head.
‘Well done, love,’ he whispered.
‘Is he going to be okay?’
Dad nodded.
‘Lucky you guys came along when you did,’ the paramedic said. ‘Not many cars use this road during the day, let alone in the middle of the night. Is this the son?’
She was pointing at Nathaniel, who was talking to his father through the passenger’s door.