by Sofie Laguna
Jamie drove down to where the Murray flowed through Yolamundi and parked at the river car park. He got out of the car first, carrying the paper bags, and opened my door. He bowed to me, and said, ‘Princess.’ I didn’t know where to look. We walked down the path to the water. The river was running wide and brown. I saw the black roots of red gums in the banks where the waterline was low. Willow branches trailed in the shallows. Every tree leaned towards the river, as if it was calling them to come closer. We sat down on the bank. Jamie said, ‘Nice to see you again, Justine.’ Jamie’s legs were like two long roads you could travel down; you could slide off the ends of his boots and then keep going further. He leaned back on his straight, strong arms. ‘Nice to see me again?’ he said.
‘Yeah.’ It was hard to talk.
Jamie leaned over and kissed my cheek, light and dry, like wings. Blood rushed through my body. Jamie turned away and pulled a can of beer out of one of the paper bags. He said, ‘This is for me.’ He pulled a big green bottle from another bag. ‘And this is for you.’ He lifted the ring from the lid of his beer, then he unscrewed the top from the green bottle and put it in my hands. He said, ‘Here’s to you.’ He took a long drink from his beer. ‘Your turn, cutie.’
Pop had drunk all his life and so had Dad. I had seen Kirk and Steve drink beer at Pop’s when Pop was sleeping, but this would be my first drink. I put the green bottle to my mouth and tipped it back. The drink exploded in my throat. I coughed and choked and the drink came out on my chin. When I wiped it away Jamie said, ‘You are so cute.’ A flame moved from my throat to my stomach, warming the skin as it passed. It was like drinking a hot Mintie. Jamie said, ‘What do you think of that? Nice?’
‘Nice.’
‘Should be bloody nice, cost enough.’ He wiped more of the drink from my chin with his thumb and finger. ‘Nah. You’re worth it.’
I took another sip. Now I knew why Pop drank when his bug was feeding; the drink would burn it down.
I saw some boys coming along the river path. It was Jamie’s cousin Lachie, and another guy I didn’t know. What were they doing here? Did Jamie know they were coming?
‘G’day, Jamie,’ said Lachie, looking at me. Lachie would be fifteen by now. He was carrying a tape recorder.
The other guy was almost as big as Jamie. Jamie said, ‘G’day Stu.’
Stu said, ‘Getting started without us?’
‘Yep,’ said Jamie. ‘Cheers.’ He tipped his can towards them. I took another swallow of the hot mint drink. Lachie and Stu sat down beside Jamie. Did Jamie want them to stay? Didn’t he want it to be just the two of us?
Jamie passed Lachie one of the paper bags, and the boys pulled out cans of beer. Lachie pressed a button on the tape recorder and it started to play. What was it, baby, did my love let you down? What was it, baby, when I came to town? I closed my eyes and saw Dad coming through the trees, the Smith tucked in his belt. What was it, baby, that made you so blue? Didn’t you know, baby, my love was true? Dad took my hand, pulled me towards him and said, My special girl, while the music played. Oh, baby, when we touch, I know you are mine, when I feel your lips, baby. When I opened my eyes Lachie was looking at me, as if he knew something that I didn’t.
Lachie and me used to play together. He went down the yellow slide behind me. The bubbles were in his hair too, on his back, across his shoulders. Lachie knew what my dad did to Stacey. He never left for Goonyella like Jamie did; he’d always been here. I moved back, further behind Jamie, taking small sips of the green drink. I wondered why Lachie and Stu were there, why it wasn’t just Mary Kate and Thornton.
Jamie stayed close, squeezing my hand.
Lachie said, ‘Caught thirty bloody cod at once last time it drained. Not with a line. We speared them. Lazy bastards.’
Stu said, ‘Cod gut fucken stinks. You ever notice that? Stinks like a dead man.’
Jamie said, ‘Tastes sweet but. Sweet as.’
I needed to do a wee. The picture had changed. It started with me and Jamie and now it was a picture for more Worlleys and somebody else. I tried to stand, but stumbled. Lachie said, ‘Had a bit to drink, Justine?’
It was the first time I’d heard Lachie say my name since we used to be friends. I said, ‘No.’ My voice sounded loose, loud, as if it belonged to someone else.
Jamie said, ‘Going somewhere?’ I didn’t want to tell him I needed to go to the toilet, but he guessed. ‘Ladies’ room?’ I nodded. ‘Don’t be long,’ he said softly.
I took a deep breath and walked away from the river and into the forest. When I couldn’t see them or hear them anymore I found a big tree, pulled down my underpants and squatted. The wee came out in a hard stream. I looked up at the top of the tree and saw the sky turning slowly, in a circle. I looked down and watched the pathways the wee made through the dirt, drowning ants and a beetle. I wobbled and almost fell as I moved my feet. When I was finished I shook up and down, then I pulled up my underpants and walked back.
I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I could hear them laughing. I saw a beer can land at the edge of the water. The boys were big—they were all one thing, and I was another. I wasn’t big enough. Suddenly I didn’t want to go back to them. I wanted to go to my keepout. It wasn’t far from here. The boys wouldn’t see me leaving. I could load my rifle, climb on Silver’s back and ride along my friend, the Murray. I could drink from the river so that the hot mint was washed away, and my legs would be steady beneath me and my voice would be my own again.
‘Hey, Justine!’ It was Jamie; he had seen me. ‘Hey!’ he called out. ‘Look who’s here!’ I saw Kirk and Steve coming down the path from the other direction. Had Jamie invited them? Kirk saw me and looked as surprised as I was. He lifted his hand.
My brothers were here—now it was Lees and Worlleys, the way it used to be. Three of them, and three of us. I felt my legs grow steady. I breathed out and walked back down to the riverbank. Kirk raised his eyebrows. He looked from me to Jamie. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked me.
‘Same thing you are,’ said Jamie. He was bigger than Kirk. He was the only one who could buy beer, the only one who didn’t go to school anymore, the only one with a job at Goonyella mine. Jamie held beers out to Kirk and Steve. He patted the ground beside him and I sat back down.
Shadows passed across Kirk’s face. He was my big brother; he knew Pop wouldn’t want me here. They had never seen me with a drink before. They knew Pop would never let me. They were boys and I was a girl.
The music played. I can’t love you if you won’t stay, sweet angel, let your love come my way.
Kirk sat down on the other side of Lachie and Stu. They all began to drink and talk at the same time. It was Lees and Worlleys again; I wasn’t by myself anymore. Kirk and Steve knew Pop’s rule, they knew I was thirteen. They knew I was younger than all of them, that there was nothing to me, that Jamie could pick me up and throw me.
I leaned back against Jamie. Let go into my arms, girl, you know you can, let me hold you, girl. I took another drink. Jamie’s body hid me, like a shelter. Even though he was talking to the boys, he was with me. I could feel it in the kiss on my cheek. Even with the picture changed—now a picture of Worlley and Lee boys drinking beers—the kiss stayed. I put my hand over my cheek. Everything was warm. My throat, my face, gut, legs, arms all warm, as if I was melting. There was nothing that had gone before, nothing and nobody lost.
Kirk watched me from narrowed eyes as he drank. He turned to Jamie and they talked and laughed and looked at the river and threw in a stone. ‘Be good to get out of this place,’ said Kirk.
‘Yeah, it’s a big country. You don’t know how big till you go there.’
‘Would you ever drive it?’
‘Shit, yeah. Not in my fucken car. I’d end up sleeping in the desert.’
‘For a month.’
‘Yeah. No girls up there but. Oh, there’s girls, but they’re old. There’s no young ones.’
‘Shit.’
‘Yeah, shit’s right.’
‘Shit.’ Steve repeated Kirk’s words, doubling them, trying to make them his own. It was only me who knew he never could. Me and him.
Jamie whispered to me, ‘How are you feeling, cutie?’
It was getting dark. The green flames of the drink jetted through me, warm and minty. I said, ‘Good.’ He turned my cheek to him and kissed it again. I saw Kirk and Steve watching. Our eyes met.
In one look I saw our years together; our hideouts, our times at the river, our father in prison, our plans to bust him out. Steve turned away but Kirk kept his eyes on me. I saw all the times Dad didn’t answer Kirk’s questions, look at him, teach him to shoot, teach him anything, anything at all. Dad left Relle for my mum. Everyone knew. Jamie knew. Lachie knew. Pop knew. The whole of Yolamundi knew it was my mum he chose and it was Kirk’s mum he left behind. Kirk drank from his beer and threw another stone into the river. I saw all the days without Dad in his face, in the twist of his mouth, in his flat eyes. All the days of wishing Dad would show him how to shoot, how to drive, how to fight, what to say, when to laugh. Kirk had to pretend every day that he knew, but he had no clues, it was all pretending. It was the same as me trying to read; he had to guess. The only person he knew more than was me.
The music played a song about a stairway. Kirk and Steve and Jamie sang some of the words. I closed my eyes and watched the stairway as it curled around the stars. You never knew if it would keep going, but it did, up and up and up, higher and higher.
When the song finished Kirk got to his feet. He crunched his empty can under his foot and threw one more stone into the water. I looked up at him. ‘See ya, Justine,’ he said. His eyes glittered. I couldn’t answer. The mint drink softened my words so I couldn’t speak a single one. Not Don’t leave me here, please, Kirk. Not Take me with you. Not I am not big enough. I couldn’t do anything. Kirk smiled at me, his shining eyes part Dad’s, part Relle’s, and he left me there. Steve was behind him, in the same place he had always been. Even though they were my brothers they were only half.
44.
Now it was only Jamie, Lachie, Stu and me. I could see the river in the moonlight, covered with tiny waves. I could hear the music it played, as if a tiny bell was tied to the crest of every ripple.
‘More?’ Jamie said to me. Without waiting for an answer he put the green bottle to my lips.
I could see the outline of trees on the other side of the Murray. If my secret boat was waiting for me I could have untied it and rowed to the other side. I could’ve kept going. The boys talked but I didn’t listen. I didn’t know all the voices. Who was here? There was another voice now, a man’s voice, like Jamie’s. Who was he? They were talking about cars and speeds and which car was the fastest if you pressed the accelerator. Lachie said he could prove it. Jamie said, You’re on, and the other guy said he’d set a watch and Lachie said the Ford had a bigger engine and Jamie said, Fuck that, the Ford could do twice that. I drank more and stopped missing Kirk and Steve, stopped wishing they had stayed. All I had to do was drink. Jamie pulled me in closer; I could feel the places where our bodies were touching through my jeans and shirt. I listened to the bells of the river and the voices. Jamie had me in his arms and it was enough. I was part of things, and didn’t need to find words, nobody asked me to speak any.
When I closed my eyes I saw Jamie’s scar under his shirt, two red waves parting so that you could see the line in the middle. The boys kept talking. They said, That fucken highway, coppers every time, fuck did you hear what happened to Sean? Coppers booked him once then got him again ten minutes down the road. They spoke to Jamie as if he was the boss, like my dad; they wanted him to laugh, to like what they said. Nobody told me to get lost, nobody said my teeth stuck out. Nobody said I was too thin or thin as a stick or was a skeleton or was a rake, because I belonged to Jamie. He squeezed my hand, and it was as if our fingers had a language not made of words, a language even I could speak. Jamie passed me the bottle. It didn’t hurt anymore when I swallowed.
Everything was there together at the same time. Jamie’s scar, the talk of our bodies, the bells of the river, the night sky, the voices of Jamie’s cousin and friends, all part of the one blanket that wrapped itself around me. It was as if I had always been cold since the start, since the breech and the split, when I made my first mistake, and now I was warm.
In my dream I held Sherry in my lap. She smiled and tugged at my hair, moving her small fists up and down to music—the bells of the river, the song from the stereo. I heard voices. I saw stars. The stairway took me to heaven.
The next time I opened my eyes I saw a star shoot across the sky. Nothing could get in its way. Not the other stars or planets or comets or the distance itself. The star saw where it wanted to go, pushing through the black, leaving a trail you could see from Antarctica. I tried to lift my hand so I could show Michael—‘Look, look! Michael, look. The star knows where it’s going. Can you see? It’s the star that decides’—but I couldn’t move. I felt myself picked up and carried. Who was carrying me? Was it Dad? Was it Pop? The night sky wobbled and bounced over my head. I felt sick and wanted to vomit. I heard a car door opening. Someone put me into the car then climbed in beside me. I lay stretched out in the back. ‘Michael, Michael, did you see the star?’
I vomited hot mint. ‘Oh, shit!’ someone said. I heard the car door open, I was lifted out and I vomited more onto the ground. My throat was on fire. What was I doing here? The thoughts were in pieces, hard to hold on to, like words on the blackboard. I was lifted back into the car.
I heard a cry. The light of the moon showed me Stacey’s half-built house; piles of bricks and corrugated iron and planks and a concrete mixer. There was a weight above me. I saw my dad in the moonlight tearing Stacey’s clothes from her body. I saw him hit her across the mouth as the weight above me grew heavier. I was being crushed. I saw my dad over Stacey, his body attacking hers, as if he was hungry and Stacey was the dinner. I saw the cattle trough, her hair in the water, my dad’s hand over her head. I heard music. You are mine, till the end of time, so kiss me, baby.
I saw my dad at the hospital and Lizzy was in the bed in her final moment, before everything changed and was lost, before she took the best part of Ray with her. Lizzy wasn’t in hospital because of the pneumonia—she was there because of the bones my pop broke when he came back from the war, the sound of gunshots in his ears, the train tracks laid in his face, the bug in his gut. He had to give it all to Lizzy. She was the one he loved.
Something tore. I was choking, as if the banks of the river were closing around my throat. I couldn’t keep going, couldn’t move forward. I heard a man groan. ‘Fucken Lees.’ I cried out and knew the third voice belonged to me.
Not a word had yet been spoken. Nothing had been born. Not a single mistake had yet been made. It was right at the start. It wasn’t alive and it wasn’t dead. Then there was a tiny light, like a spark. The first mistake shone like a jewel, and it was mine.
‘Wake up, Justine. Get out.’
I didn’t know where I was. Who was talking to me, shaking me? ‘Wake up. Get out of the car,’ said Dad. Somebody was crying. Was it Stacey? But it wasn’t Stacey’s caravan.
I opened my eyes. It wasn’t my dad telling me to wake up; it was Jamie Worlley. The cold air hit my face. Jamie was pulling me out of his car, his engine running. My arms and neck ached. He put me down on the ground. I looked up and saw Pop’s house. I tried to speak, ‘Jamie,’ but no sound came from my mouth. Jamie got back in the car. He closed his door and I watched him drive away. The ground swayed. My hands and knees stung as I dragged myself forward. My back felt twisted. Vomit bubbled in my throat. It hurt me to move, hurt to breathe. I don’t know how I pulled myself up Pop’s front steps, how I opened his door.
‘You alright, Justine?’ Pop stood over me. ‘You getting up?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. But no sound came.
‘What?’ said Pop.
‘Yes,’ I croaked, �
�I’m getting up.’
‘Jesus, Justine! You been drinking?’
‘No, Pop.’
‘What did I tell you about drinking?’ He pulled back the covers. ‘Jesus, what were you doing last night?’
‘Nothing,’ I said.
‘Bullshit nothing. You stink. What did you get up to?’
‘Nothing, Pop, nothing.’ There was fire in my gut and between my legs. I leaned over and vomited onto the floor.
‘Oh, Jesus,’ said Pop. ‘Get up, Justine. Get out of bed.’
It was hard to move. My back ached. I vomited again, on the blanket. My head was throbbing. The room spun.
Pop said, ‘Where’s Dawn?’
‘Dawn?’
‘Did she make it home?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes.’
‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘Bloody little idiot. Where were you?’
I didn’t know the answer. I didn’t know anything. I fell back against the pillow.
‘No, you don’t,’ said Pop. ‘Get out of bed and clean this up.’
But I couldn’t move.
Pop said, ‘For Christ’s sake.’ He left the room.
My throat burned. It stung between my legs.
Pop came back into my room carrying a glass of water. He helped me sit up in the bed and he put the water to my lips. He smoothed a cool cloth over my forehead. I closed my eyes and heard him mopping the floor.
45.
I didn’t want to see Jamie again. When I tried to remember what happened with him the night at the river I felt sick. Knowing was buried. If I could dig deep enough I might reach it. But buried alongside knowing was something I didn’t want to find. It belonged to Stacey and Sherry. Even if I uncovered it, shovelling the dirt away from where it lay, I couldn’t give it back to them alive.
After the night at the river with Jamie, words became harder to find; I was like Pop, the sentences only came for the chooks. Here, ladies; here, girls; it’s Jussy—it’s Jussy, girls, your friend who would never hurt you, not you, not the chooks. I changed their water and turned the straw so it was soft for their nests. Here, Girl; here, Missy; here Lady and Lady; here Madame and Cockyboy—it’s Justine, your friend.