Without Warning

by Jane O'Connor

  Time had ceased to have any meaning; we were on some sort of autopilot. Clock watching wasn’t a consideration, as there were no specific mealtimes or routines in place. I was still conscious of what we were ingesting: our lungs hurt and our eyes were dry and painful. The mountain had turned strangely cold again. Nobody had slept since Friday night, more than forty-eight hours ago, but there was no sense of needing to. There was a crazy, collective momentum.

  Tania called. She was putting some essential supplies together for us and was canvassing all the delivery drivers at Whittlesea to try to get the stuff up the mountain. ‘Nobody’s getting through the roadblocks, only emergency supplies,’ she said. ‘I’ve told them I have to get medical supplies up there. Sean’s Ventolin, and has John got enough insulin? What else should I put on board? And by the way, they’re talking about sending the army in.’ I told her about the barbecue and can’t remember what else I asked her to try to get on a truck, other than Sean’s blood-pressure medication.

  Our main news was now coming from Tania or via the bush telegraph. We weren’t getting anything immediately useful from radio or television, which were still breathlessly covering the mounting death toll and ongoing fire alerts. John Duthie came back to check on us and insisted we take his second car. ‘Some people have travelled off the mountain, but from all reports it’s pretty horrendous,’ he said. ‘And if they go through the roadblocks then they can’t get back up again.’ The idea of borrowing somebody else’s car challenged us, as we’d never had to do that before. But John wouldn’t take no for an answer and we knew we might need to get down to the township or go to Whittlesea because there was already talk of a community meeting the next day and of trucks bringing supplies. John and Julie’s cars were low on fuel; one was diesel and we’d agreed to keep the other’s petrol for the generator.

  ‘I’ll go to town tomorrow to see if any more evacuation buses are going,’ I told Julie. ‘If they are, we’ll get Sarah, Brad and Mike on one. They’ve got a very long trip home.’ Brad was still reluctant to move, though, feeling he was of more use here. They had contacted their employers in New Zealand, who had swung into action to organise any accommodation, replacement clothes and food they might need. John was delighted with Tania’s news that the army might be coming in. He’d talked about this the night before. ‘Put the army on the roadblocks. Call them in to clear the roads. And they’ve got some of the best firefighting gear in the business,’ he said again now.

  On Tuesday morning, Julie and I headed into Kinglake. The crashed cars were still littering the main road, but some of the fallen trees had been bulldozed to the side. In the township, dozens of cars were still parked near the CFA station and people were milling about, dazed and disoriented, many looking as though they’d slept there. We went to the police station and I explained to the senior officer behind the counter, ‘I’ve got three New Zealanders who need to get off the mountain. Are any evacuation buses going out today? They need replacement documents, so can anybody get in touch with their consul?’ The words sounded inane in the light of what was happening all around us. He smiled, then explained that evacuations were a bit hit-and-miss at the moment because the roads were unstable and dangerous; the crews were trying to remove any trees that were likely to fall. ‘Tell you what, since the poor old Kiwis suffered enough at the cricket, I’ll take them to Whittlesea. I’m finishing my shift in half an hour,’ he said.

  What came out of my mouth next was involuntary. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got room for a large dog? He’s badly burnt and his temperature is up. He isn’t going to make it if he doesn’t get to a vet. My daughter will meet you in Whittlesea and take him. He’s a black labrador.’ He smiled again. ‘I reckon we can find room for a big, smelly woofer. I’d be pretty happy to see anything survive up here at the moment. Have them ready and back here in half an hour.’ This came with the same warning as before: ‘It won’t be pretty on the way down. It’s fairly horrendous and it’ll be a slow trip.’

  Julie and I just about broke the land speed record as we raced back to Deviation Road. But as we came up the main road we were waved over by a CFA crew, who were still damping down the smouldering ruins of the nursery café and its garden. The tall fireman looked distressed. ‘We’ve got to move on, but there’s a cat with new kittens in the glasshouse,’ he said. ‘We haven’t got anywhere to take them and we’re worried in case she hasn’t got food. We’ve put some water in there, though.’ There were tears in his eyes.

  Most of the firefighters we’d come across so far had been like this: shell-shocked, disbelieving, up for a spontaneous hug on sighting survivors. We pledged to take some food down later. The fireman and his female colleague were enormously relieved—nobody had been able to get in for animals yet.

  Back at Number 48, we didn’t give the New Zealand trio a choice—they were to get out now, to safety. Sean drove them back to the police station while I alerted Tania to their impending arrival. She stationed herself at Whittlesea again and continued to approach the delivery drivers. Hours went by before she was in touch again: Brad, Sarah and Mike were at home with her, and Harley was in intensive care with the local vet, his paws being tended to under anaesthetic. She said Harley was close to meltdown by the time they carried him in, and it was going to be a long haul. If he pulled out of the anaesthetic, he was up for painstaking daily treatment. ‘Mind you, even as they were putting him under the tail didn’t stop wagging,’ said Tania. You can’t keep a good labrador down. ‘But you might have warned me about that cop! There’s me in the tracksuit pants and ponytail, and this gorgeous sort gets out of the car with the dog,’ she joked. She had also found a delivery driver willing to bring two cartons up the mountain the next day and would take them to him in the morning.

  ‘He doesn’t know what time he’ll get there,’ said Tania. ‘They’re all saying it’s a case of inch-by-inch up the mountain, because they’re trying to clear roads. I’ll call you when he’s leaving, so he can meet you somewhere.’ I was blown away by her tenacity.

  For the first time in days, I fell in a heap. All I wanted was a wash. We got the barbecue going again to heat up a big pot of water, so we could all at least freshen up a bit. It was the first time in four days that I’d taken my boots off and they’d just about stuck to my feet. Sean held up his Blundstones: the soles were melted, no tread left. His padded woollen shirt was full of holes where embers had hit—you could see daylight through them. It was the first time we’d noticed.

  The Chandlers called by and they too had heard news of a community meeting and some supplies getting in. So, on Wednesday morning we headed for town. Julie stayed behind, as conditions were still too volatile to leave the property unattended. In Kinglake, emergency-services caravans had been set up near the shire offices. People were again standing about aimlessly. There were some we recognised and others whose faces were familiar but who we didn’t know personally. They hugged us anyway—simply acknowledging that we were all in the same boat. I spotted Michelle, the former pub landlady I’d done kitchen duty with during the 2006 fires. ‘A bit different to last time, mate,’ she said. Everybody was swapping notes about whose house had survived and whose hadn’t. A woman I’d never met before walked towards me, sobbing, devastated that her house was intact and ours had gone. In the middle of this bizarre scene, she kept apologising. I told her it was okay, that anything that had survived was to be celebrated. Survivor guilt had started early.

  Tania called to say that the delivery guy would be pulling in near the CFA station: the boxes would have our name on them. She told us she’d given him Sean’s mobile number and she gave us the driver’s name and the truck’s registration number. She’d pulled it off! While we hovered around there waiting, I spotted our local vet, Dr Kate Murray—always an integral part of our community—who was treating animals out of the boot of her car, on a makeshift table.

  I walked towards her and we hugged. The surgery had been destroyed, she told me, and all she could do for no
w was deal with the worst cases. People were bringing dogs that had been left behind or confined to backyards at the height of the firestorm, or had fled in terror. For now she was gathering them together for transport off the mountain, and she was expecting the RSPCA to get in soon with stockfeed, more vets, and drug supplies. This must be the toughest gig a vet could ever face—pure triage. She said the Whittlesea vet was prepared for the emergency cases when she could ship them out. I told her that Harley had gone to Eltham. ‘Did you warn them that he can wreck a vet’s surgery with that tail?’ Kate asked. She hadn’t lost her sense of humour.

  We spotted Tania’s truck coming in and collared the driver as soon as he pulled over. He pointed to cartons with our name on them and we stashed them in the car. Now was not the time to make it known that we’d managed to get supplies through the roadblocks. Unpacking the boxes could wait.

  Slowly, the people who had stayed or were trapped on the mountain started heading towards the shire offices. Some had lost friends and neighbours, and their pain was raw. A barbecue was happening for those who needed hot food, and drinking water was available. It was cold and I was once again grateful for the Tibetan jacket. We spotted more friends and acquaintances in the crowd and hugged, silently—there weren’t any words to say at a time like this. Trauma counsellors and church chaplains were mingling with the people, not intruding, just letting you know they were there. Maddie Duthie sidled over to me with her little girls, slipped her hand into mine and squeezed it; we choked back the tears. Her three-year-old was happily playing with a bird feather she’d picked up off the ground—smiling and chattering. We didn’t want to break the mood, so I picked up the ‘news’ in grabs.

  Some people were angry and demanding. They couldn’t get back through the roadblocks if they went off the mountain; some had children elsewhere and wanted them to come back. (‘Why would you want your children back in this environment?’ a council official asked.) Others were insisting that generators be brought in to provide power for houses that had survived; some wanted fuel, despite the fact that the chances of being allowed to bring fuel into a still-active fire area were zero. There were complaints about having had no hot food for days, and still no phone access. The police attempted to calm everyone down. They were working on a system through the roadblocks, with car stickers to identify locals, they told us, but for now they couldn’t allow open-slather access for friends and relatives—the roads were, after all, not only dangerous but also now a death scene, awaiting the coroner’s attention.

  Centrelink and the State Department of Human Services had set up in the council offices and were urging everybody to register for emergency grants: cash payments would be made immediately, with further funds available once paperwork was completed. I found this mildly ludicrous—there wasn’t much to spend money on here. Telstra had also brought in an emergency crew, who were setting up wireless internet access and had mobile-phone chargers—the latter interested me more. Some clothing and food supplies were being organised in the café.

  We were herded towards the council offices and asked to stand in line to register. I assumed this was linked to the Red Cross’s efforts to trace people listed as missing. Sean had no identification, his wallet now reduced to ashes on the kitchen bench. We did as asked and stood in the queue: more familiar faces, more stories to swap, more tears and trauma. Finally our turn came and we sat at a desk, total strangers to accessing any sort of government services and somehow feeling embarrassed and undeserving. All I recall is giving details automatically and being handed money. I decided to leave registering with Centrelink for another day, until I noticed a department official using a mobile phone the same as mine. My trip to the pub revealed that Telstra had run out of my brand, so I asked her if she had a charger. She shepherded me into the caravan and I plugged in my phone, then headed to the café to see if there was a change of clothes available.

  Maddie Duthie was already at the café, helping make up clothing packages. It was chaos, as the speed with which the first aid shipments had been packed was posing an urgent sorting problem. But locals had joined with emergency workers to get on with the job, and this sweet-natured young woman was unpacking cartons and trying to create some order. ‘Let me know what you need the most and I’ll make you up a pile,’ she said. I really hadn’t got a clue. ‘Some undies would be good, if any come in. And shoes. Anything, I don’t care, just shoes so I can get rid of these boots,’ I said. I left without anything at this point, as my brain simply couldn’t fathom picking over the clothing piles or taking things in the hope that they might fit.

  I headed back to retrieve my phone. The Centrelink rep asked if I’d registered. ‘Can’t quite get my head around all this,’ I replied. ‘Let me guess,’ she said. ‘You’ve never been to Centrelink in your life. But I’ll bet you’ve always paid your taxes. Well, you are now deservedly receiving some of those taxes; this is your money. It’s people like you that concern us the most, because you don’t want to claim these things. Believe me, you are going to need every cent of it. So, sit down and I’ll fill out the form for you.’

  It still felt odd. The entire process had been strangely exhausting, and it was not possible to comprehend fully that we were homeless refugees, that we owned only what we were standing up in. There hadn’t been any opportunity to calculate insurance or worry about mortgage payments or even think of finances—the adrenaline-charged brain inhabits a different universe. I detoured back via the temporary Telstra set-up, where the technicians took my recharged phone and diverted our home number to it just in case anybody was trying to contact us that way.

  Sean, John and I headed back to Julie with Tania’s survival cartons. Somehow, my daughter had even got a jerrycan of fuel on board. ‘That girl is amazing,’ John exclaimed. ‘And just when we’re down to the last of ours.’ We ripped the cartons open: one revealed changes of clothes for me, plus sneakers, underwear, pants, tops, a warm jacket, Sean’s medications and, lurking down the bottom, a couple of bottles of wine, a carton of cigarettes, a large bottle of Diet Coke for John and a block of dark chocolate. She’d covered everybody. The other box contained fresh fruit and vegetables for us and a swag of carrots and greens for the horses and goats.

  We called Tania, who said she was already working on the next load. I suggested she hold off for the moment because we were planning to go to Whittlesea the next day. (There was talk that the authorities were issuing temporary ID wristbands—the bush telegraph was outdoing the news bulletins again.) But Tania had found someone else coming in that afternoon and they would drop off gas bottles to keep the precious barbecue going.

  Tania swung her attention to finding agistment for the horses and a temporary home for the goats. And just as well—when Sean went across to feed them later that afternoon he discovered they’d gone and saw a horse float heading off the property. He stopped them and it turned out that they were animal-welfare volunteers who had simply walked onto our place and loaded them up. ‘Where were you planning to take them and when were you going to tell us?’ Sean asked. ‘We were going to leave a note in the letterbox,’ they said. What letterbox? There wasn’t one left in our road. Sean diverted them to the temporary grazing that had been set up in a spot spared by the fire. We seemed ungrateful, perhaps, but we felt assaulted and invaded. This was the first of many well-meaning actions by people with their hearts in the right place but their heads not necessarily thinking in a sensible direction. Kate Murray had assured us the RSPCA was mobilising its forces and we felt more secure with official bodies than unknown groups.

  That night was the first time we contemplated any sort of future action. ‘You stay here for as long as it takes. There’s plenty of room and it just isn’t an issue,’ John said. He’s not a man who says something he doesn’t mean. Tania was equally keen that we stay with her for a few days, just to sort our heads out—we couldn’t finish sentences or hold a thought, let alone come to any rational conclusions.

  Personal safety was al
so becoming an issue. We felt alarmed over the horses being taken, and John and Julie were on their own at our end of the road. There were a dozen ways—dirt tracks, fire trails—onto the mountain apart from the main roads: the locals knew them and it was only a matter of time before opportunists discovered them. Disasters bring out the very best in people, but also the very worst, and I’d seen enough of them to know that scavengers and looters were quick off the mark. To suggest that such actions wouldn’t occur in a civilised society was delusional— we all knew that and were on standby. A key target would be the surviving properties whose owners were either away on the day of the fire or had subsequently left, traumatised. John wasn’t going to leave his property.

  Our attention was distracted when Sean came in with a baby possum he’d found sitting on the driveway. It had clung to his arm when he picked it up, and in shock had sunk its teeth into his neck. It was badly burnt and unlikely to survive, but we gave it a try. The poor little creature, with its blistered face and raw paws and tail, slurped sugar water from one of John’s insulin syringes. It could hardly breathe, but at least had some hydration. Julie and I cut the toe out of an old work sock and let the possum crawl in there; it died overnight.

  There was no such thing as sleeping through the night at this point. We’d snatch a few hours, wander about, keep an eye on smouldering trees and then doze a bit more. ‘We’ve reverted to the old farming days. Going to bed on dark and getting up at dawn,’ Julie said. It was programmed into our body clocks.