We Go Forward

by Alison Evans

  "Ace fact: ace people come in lemon, Nicki Minaj's Pink Friday perfume, and various floral scents, the most common being rose." She snorts and takes another bite of trdelník. "I wish."

  It's dark by the time we get back to the hostel and everyone else is out, so I grab my doona and sit in front of the heater and Christie climbs up onto her bed and lies down. I get out my phone and start typing an email to Jalen. Just a little update that they can pass onto Mum, so she doesn't think I'm dead. I leave out how the ossuary was so cold.

  It's nice to have a few minutes of peace before the dorm is full again. Four of the beds have been packed up, but there'll be more soon. It's a nice, cheap hostel in a good location, so I'm sure it's busy all the time.

  Julie walks into the room, followed by Sam, who is very much not dead and is holding a huge jug of boiling water and four cups. Jesus Christ, I think as my head goes light from relief.

  "You're alive!" I say from my doona huddle.

  They both laugh. So chill. I don't know if I could ever have that level of chill.

  "I met these people and we just really hit it off," Sam says. "So we went back to their apartment, which was, like, super fancy."

  "And then her phone died, which is why I got no replies." Julie takes off her jacket and hangs it over a chair. "But hey, look, check out this tea we found."

  It's blossoming tea, the kind you put in boiling water and the tight balls of tea leaves turn into flower sculptures as the leaves brew. Christie comes down from her bunk and we sit around, watching the tea bloom in the cups on the table in front of us.

  "Do you know where you're going after this?" Sam asks, prodding a finger into her cup. The petals dance slowly when she touches them.

  "Not really," Christie replies easily. She's so brave: doesn't give a fuck about the unknown. "We booked the maximum for this hostel, so two weeks. Dunno where is next."

  "We were thinking about hiring out a van," Julie says. "But we can't afford it on our own and we were wondering if you wanted to come along?"

  "Like a camper van," Sam says. "With beds and shit. I am so not camping out in the European winter."

  "Where are you going?"

  They shrug.

  "Wherever."

  Their lack of certainty is terrifying. And I want that: I need to not have plans. I look at Christie, and she nods.

  "Sure," I say, not wanting to know any more details. There might be more people coming. Who knows? We don't need to know. "Definitely."

  Chapter Eight

  Christie

  Our time in Prague is up, and I'm going to miss the strangeness of it all. Labyrinthine, crowded, cold, constantly surprising, and reforming itself when I'm not looking. I still don't know if it's real.

  We catch a taxi that probably overcharges us to the rental place. Roslyn and I are too young to drive, because you have to be over twenty-five, and I don't even know how to drive, so I'm no help. It seems like a mistake, that the four us have somehow manage to trick our way into making other people think we're adults.

  But as we load our gear into the van and no one comes out to stop us, the only thing to do is keep moving forward. Sam and Julie paper-scissors-rock to decide who gets to drive first. Sam wins and Julie sits shotgun; Christie and I sit in the back at the table and strap ourselves in.

  "Alrighty," Sam says, turning the key. "Let's get this party started."

  The engine chugs on and we pull out of the carpark onto the road slowly. I wonder how heavy this thing is when we sway a little as we turn, the cupboards rattling above our heads.

  "You're on the wrong side," Julie says.

  Sam swerves onto the right, and it feel so wrong to be on this side that I can't actually watch the road.

  "This is so weird," Sam says.

  "Side mirror!" Julie shrieks, Sam swerves again to avoid hitting a sign post on the side of the road.

  "This thing is wide as," Sam says. "You gotta watch and tell me if I'm gonna hit something 'cause I ain't gonna know."

  Soon, we're crossing the border back into Germany and we're driving on the Autobahn. I have no idea how many Ks per hour we're doing, and quite frankly, I don't want to know. Julie keeps shrieking and Sam keeps yelling at her whenever she does. They're both so large in their presences that I don't know if they have any self-awareness at all.

  Eventually we stop to find a supermarket and stock up on food. We grab cereal, chips, biscuits, wine, Nutella.

  "It looks like a bunch of children went shopping," Julie says as she pushes the trolley around and Sam places a bottle of soft drink inside.

  "Alcoholic children," Sam says. "And look. Here's a vegetable." She places a capsicum into the trolley. "A whole vegetable. We are totally adults."

  "Perfect," Julie says, nodding solemnly.

  There are tiny bottles of alcohol for sale where the lollies would usually be sold at home at the checkout, and we add a few of the bottles to the pile of stuff.

  We're back in Germany and back on euros again, which is a relief, because I kind of understand them. The numbers are closer to Australian money; the sheer amount of Czech crowns was daunting.

  We get back in the van and it's Julie's turn to drive. Roslyn and I sit in the back again, but this time with bonus potato chips, so although the trip is terrifying, it's significantly tastier.

  "See!" Sam says, once Julie has to turn hard to avoid running into a road sign, swearing her ass off. "It's fuckin' hard, I told you. It's huge as shit."

  "I didn't doubt you," Julie says. "But I didn't realise just how huge it was."

  "And you can't see the side-view mirrors at all. There's no back window too, so we're blind out the back."

  "It'll be fine," Julie says as she brakes. There's a backlog of traffic. It's about five o'clock, so I'm guessing it's peak hour. "We're just gonna have to never, ever reverse this thing, which is totally doable."

  The traffic doesn't let up. There are cars as far as we can see, and it doesn't seem to be getting any better. Ten minutes, and we're almost at a standstill. Half an hour, and the sun is setting. Forty-five minutes, everything is orange. An hour, and it's getting dark quickly.

  "This is some fucking bullshit," Sam says. "Change lanes, let's get off and make camp somewhere."

  "We're in the middle of nowhere," Julie says.

  "We should stop," I say. "This is dumb. We're gonna be stuck here for hours."

  "I do really need to pee," Julie admits, and so we make the slow change of lanes. Once we're off the Autobahn, though, we're zooming along. There are paddocks and forests on either side of the road, and soon, it's too dark to properly see.

  "Just pull over here, Jules," Sam says, pointing at a flat patch on the side of the road. "If someone tells us to move, then we move, but I dunno that there's going to be any police out here."

  We leave the engine on and get changed into pyjamas and bring out the chocolate.

  "Why are you travelling?" Sam asks me out of nowhere. Should've expected it at some point, really. Everyone asks, once they find out you're not where you were born.

  "Taking a gap year." Everyone takes gap years. She and Julie believe me, though Roslyn catches my eye and she raises an eyebrow. I'd tell her the real reason, not the semi-true reason I give most people, but I don't want to tell these loud girls I barely know. Not that I've got anything against them, not that. "What about you?"

  "Same, kinda," Sam says. "I'm a musician and next year I'm finally going to TAFE, so I thought I'd take a holiday before I started, because I know once I do, I'm gonna be busy as shit."

  "She works too hard," Julie says. "You need to learn to relax."

  Sam laughs. "That's what I'm doing right now!" She nudges Julie with her foot. "And as if you can talk."

  "At least I sleep," Julie protests. "I don't stay up all night finishing songs."

  "You don't have songs! You don't know what it's like, Ms Accountant."

  "Can you sing us a song?" Roslyn asks.

  That's all the convin
cing it takes before she starts singing a low melody that picks up the pace steadily, a syncopated rhythm that makes me feel like I should be smoking a cigarette and drinking red wine in a dimly-lit bar. It's more subtle, slow, than I expected of her.

  "You're really good," Roslyn says when Sam's done. "Do you have a CD or anything?"

  Sam shakes her head. "That's why I'm going to TAFE, to learn how to do that kind of thing. I don't have any structure. When I do, though, nothing's gonna stop me."

  She grins and I believe her.

  "What about you?" I ask Julie.

  "Holiday. I had annual leave saved up from work and we got some time off for Christmas as well. Then to make it worth it, I'm taking unpaid leave, too." She shrugs. "People laugh and tell me I'm too loud to be an accountant, but I really like it, y'know? Plus, it means I can do things like this," she gestures to the van around us, "and not worry. It's nice."

  "What about you, Roslyn?" Sam asks.

  Roslyn shrugs. "I'd never been anywhere, so I just thought I'd go. For my twenty-first, Mum said she'd been saving and so she bought me plane tickets when I asked. She wanted to get them for my twin, too, but they wanted to finish uni first. So I decided on Europe, saved up. No mystical reason."

  *~*~*

  Sam and Julie are in bed and I'm more awake than ever. Roslyn says she'll stay up with me for a bit, so we get into the driving compartment and close the curtains. The others are sharing the double bed at the back of the van, so if we talk quietly enough, they'll be fine.

  I'm behind the wheel, though I don't know how to drive.

  "I never thought I'd end up in a van with three people I've known for two seconds in the middle of the German wilderness," Roslyn says as she unscrews the wine bottle. The label has a kangaroo on the bottle, which meant we had to get it. "And we didn't even die driving."

  "Didn't think I'd be here either, to be honest. Glad, though."

  "Definitely."

  I hold out the plastic cups and she pours us our drinks. We got these because they were cheaper than actual wine glasses.

  "We have to decide what we wanna do after this, too," Roslyn says, before we cheers.

  I close my eyes and rest the back of my head against the headrest. "We can just keep going forever."

  "We could." She nods. "I don't know if I want to."

  "I don't either."

  I want to stop, to be able to rest for a minute without itching to move again. To breathe in and feel like the air won't be stale tomorrow.

  "Why did you really want to travel?" I ask her. Maybe her answer was the truth, but now I know her. She's not a flippant person, though she wants to be. Everything is thought through, even if she is made of fire and feelings. She likes plans, solid things. Knowing what will happen.

  "I thought maybe the reason I loved Melbourne so much was because it was the only place I've ever been." She pauses, drinks more wine. "And then I was scared that if I didn't leave soon, I'd never leave at all."

  "You didn't want to be stuck."

  She nods. "I just woke up one day and I had to get ready for work and I realised that my last four days had been the exact same thing, just repeated, and I thought fuck, this is my whole life now. Then I knew I had to do something." She drinks more. "There was this feeling that now was the time or there'd never be a time. I couldn't get rid of it. So when Mum said she'd get me something big for my birthday, I asked for a plane ticket."

  "And Berlin?"

  "It seemed like a magic city."

  She's almost half finished her cup of wine and I've barely touched mine. I don't remember ever thinking that a city was magic. A city is just a city, and I miss them now we're out here.

  "What about you?" Roslyn asks. "Why'd you leave? Gap year my ass, you've never mentioned uni."

  "It's awful," I say as I put my cup on the dashboard.

  Now's where we stop being friends because I'm a shitty person. But I need to tell someone; these thoughts have been breeding in my chest for the past two years and I need to let them out.

  "I told you my dad's dead, right?"

  Holy shit. I'm about to lose the most important person in my life right now. It's terrifying, realising just how much I care about her. She's so important, fuck. She's watching me with her wide eyes that never judge, but they will now, because this is the worst thing I've ever felt and no one should think these kinds of things.

  "He killed himself and I got his money. That's how I started out travelling. He was fucking rich. Mum told me to take the money and just run, so I did."

  She doesn't know what to say; I see in the way her eyes move all over my face. She licks her lips, but no words come out. She bites her lip. But then she takes my hand and squeezes it, and the relief makes my head spin. I squeeze back.

  "It was a relief," I say, just above a whisper, and I can't look at her anymore. I sniff and my eyes are tearing up. I'm so awful, fucking hell. I pick up my drink and down half the wine in one.

  "He was so awful." I laugh once, bitterly, and I know she can see I'm crying. "What a shitty thing to say." I need to disappear. "I'm so glad he's dead." I'm a shit person, I know. You're not supposed to be happy when your father dies.

  "It's complicated," she tells me. "You don't have to love your father; it's not like there are rules. It's not shitty."

  "They didn't say it was a suicide, just an accidental overdose. He was on so much medication for all kinds of shit. It could've been an accident. But I know it wasn't."

  I sniff again and wipe my nose on my sleeve, because there aren't any tissues within reach. "I don't know what I'm doing, but I know I can't go back. I don't want to be stuck."

  "You don't need to go back." She squeezes my hand again before putting an arm around my shoulder, awkward movements restricted by the car seats. "You don't owe anyone anything."

  I make this miserable noise and bury my nose in her bony chest, wrapping my arms around her tightly. I close my eyes and concentrate on the realness of her; she's still here, didn't run when I told her the worst part of me.

  "I don't know what I'm doing," I say into her hair.

  "I don't, either."

  We release each other and end up stepping outside the van with our jackets because I'm sobbing and I don't want to wake the others and have to explain anything. The moon above is half full, and Roslyn ends up using her phone to light the path as we start walking down the road.

  There are more stars than I've seen the whole time I've been away. I remember the most stars I saw were in grade six, when we went on a school camp to Whoop Whoop, and when we looked up, the sky was silver with stardust.

  In primary school, we always said we'd be friends, but then people move and go to different schools and die. It's hard to keep in contact with people when you're thirteen and you've never had to try because your friends were always right there. To not see them every day is too strange and my little brain didn't know how to keep up. It's not that I didn't want to keep in touch. I just didn't know how.

  But Roslyn, she's got under my skin somehow. I look over at her and she smiles, her purple hair shining under the moonlight, because she uses that special shampoo that she brought all the way from Melbourne because she couldn't be without it for two months. The colour is faded, almost into lavender, because she has nowhere to dye it. She doesn't know that she's so important.

  I realise I'm not crying anymore; all my snot is frozen from the cold.

  A car drives past in the darkness, whooshing our hair up into the air as it zooms along.

  "That was close," Roslyn says, so we move off the side of the road and climb a fence to get into a paddock.

  "Hopefully there aren't any deadly cows or whatever in this field," I say, peering into the darkness. "You know, the ones that charge you and rip out your guts with their horns."

  "What, that happens?" Roslyn says. She shines her torch into my eyes before realising that I'm being blinded. "Sorry. But does that happen?"

  "It happens in movies."
r />   "We're gonna get gouged by cows... This is how we die. I never thought I'd die in the dark, in some random field in Germany, gouged by fucking cows."

  "Well, at least you'll die side-by-side with a friend."

  "I could do that."

  I smile at her and she grins back. And while we don't die in the field, we end up realising we're standing on crops of some kind, so we get back onto the road and walk to the van. Inside, the air is barely warmer than out.

  We climb the ladder to the double mattress we're sharing above the driving cabinet. There's a skylight above the bed. Roslyn reaches up to open the blinds and we can see the stars.

  "Goodnight, Roslyn," I say.

  "Sleep tight," she replies.

  I stay awake and watch the stars up above through the tiny light. The doona is surprisingly warm and I sigh in contentment, wriggle down a bit further. Roslyn gets out her phone and opens up a new email, where she starts tapping away.

  "You emailing Jalen?" I whisper. The night has properly started now that we've said goodnight; I'm more conscious of not waking the others, even though it's been at least an hour and they must be deeply asleep by now.

  "Yeah," she replies. "Telling them we got the van and didn't die. They're going for a new job, too; I don't know if they got it or not. I hope so, they deserve it."

  "I'd like to meet them one day," I say.

  "You'd like them," she says, turning to face me now. "They're, like, a huge dork. But amazing."

  "Are you older or younger?"

  "Older by three minutes," she says proudly. "And it counts."

  "I'm sure it does." I prod her foot with my toe. "Don't stay up too late."

  She laughs quietly. "I make no such promises."

  I fall asleep to the sound of her tapping away at her phone, warm and comfortable in the strange bed.

  Chapter Nine

  Roslyn

  Sam's mp3 player tells me through the van's speakers that starships were—apparently—made to fly. Which really makes sense; I mean, I don't know why you'd build one that couldn't fly. I know this is only annoying me because we've been dropping in and out of reception for the past two hours.