Freedom Ride

by Sue Lawson

  “Leave it, Mum.” It was a more a sigh than words from Dad. “After what’s happened …” His voice trailed off.

  “Fair call, Bird. Let’s not make changes that attract attention. Everything as normal.” Metal chinked against china.

  “How did the,” it sounded like Dad coughed or cleared his throat, “clean up go?”

  “Sorted,” said Twiggy.

  “Just as I said last night, Bird, we had all the parts. Twiggy here would make a good smash repair man,” added Bull.

  “But people saw me.” I’d never heard Dad sound so unsure. “They–”

  Bull Jackson cut him off. “Bird, it’s sorted.”

  “Excuse me, gentlemen, the walls may have ears,” said Nan. “I’ll just check on Robbie.”

  I rushed to the bathroom as fast as I could. With the door shut, I turned on the tap and squeezed toothpaste onto my toothbrush. Mind as thick as the foam in my mouth, I stared at the window over the basin.

  Nan rapped on the door.

  “Robert?”

  I opened it, toothbrush wedged in my mouth.

  She gave a satisfied nod. “Straight to bed when you’re done.” She regarded me with narrowed eyes before hurrying back to the sitting room.

  Alone again, I finished my teeth and headed for my room. My movements were as slow as my thoughts.

  Mangled bonnet, smashed windscreen.

  Bull and Twiggy dropping in unannounced on a Saturday night.

  Dad’s panicked voice.

  Nan’s change in attitude.

  It all added up to something too frightening, too sickening, to swallow.

  CHAPTER 39

  Mrs Dixon hit the last notes of the final hymn and held them until the church walls seemed to thrum. I followed Dad’s lead, genuflected and shuffled down the aisle to the door. Outside the air was clearer but not cooler. Women in hats and gloves gathered in groups while their kids chased each other around the lone tree on the nature strip. Dad made his way to where Bull Jackson stood, chest out and hat on an angle, with Stretch Edwards and Twiggy Mathes.

  Nan bustled off to join Bat Face who was twisting her foot to show Mrs Scott the back of her calf.

  On the way to communion I’d seen Billy and Keith. I thought about going to find them, but didn’t. Keith would be full of every gory detail about Dwayne’s death.

  Instead, I weaved through the huddles of gossipers to the back of the church where Dad had parked the car near the fishpond. Snippets of conversation hovered on the still summer air.

  “… no great loss, just an Abo …”

  “… drunk, I suppose. Anyway, how are you meant to see them in the dark?”

  “… should give the driver a medal. One less to deal with …”

  I perched on a large rock on the edge of the pond. Hunched into myself, I watched the fish, calm and peaceful. I glanced over my shoulder at the frenetic conversations down the side of the church and sighed.

  After lunch of roast lamb, potatoes, carrots, peas, and tomato and onion pie, Nan retired to the lounge to knit, which meant doze, and Dad took off to the shed to do whatever it was he did in there.

  For a while I read on my bed, but the bedspread felt too wrinkly, the book too heavy and my pillow too hard. I slipped outside to my bike.

  At first I just rode around town. I tried not to think about anything in particular, but a never-ending slideshow of thoughts and memories rolled. Micky, Dwayne, mangled bonnets, disappearing windscreen chips, flabby men drinking beer outside caravans. After a while, I found myself outside the caravan park.

  Mrs Gregory had said I could drop in any time.

  Like the rest of Walgaree, the caravan park seemed to sag in the heat. I parked my bike, and knocked on the back door.

  Mrs Gregory answered the door. “Robbie! Come in. Barry is …” She frowned as she searched for words. “Come and have a cup of tea.”

  She held the screen door open to allow me to enter.

  “How are you, Mrs Gregory?” I asked, taking in her pale face and the deeper lines around her eyes and forehead.

  She placed a hand on my arm. “I’m fine, Robbie, thanks for asking.”

  I followed her to the kitchen, which smelled of cinnamon and oranges and toast. I gasped.

  Barry sat at the table, sipping a cup of tea. He had a large cut on his forehead and his left eye was black and puffy.

  When he lowered the cup I saw it wasn’t only his eye and forehead that were puffy and bloody. His top lip was swollen and there was a tooth missing beside his front teeth.

  “Shit. Did you go a round with Muhammad Ali?” My hand flew to my mouth. “Sorry about the language, Mrs Gregory.”

  She smiled. “He does look like … that.” She took the steaming kettle from the hob. “Tea, Robbie?”

  What I really wanted was a cold drink. “That’d be great, thanks.” I took a seat at the table and tried hard to pretend that Barry’s face didn’t trouble me. The thing was, it did bother me. It was just one more boulder to add to all the others balanced on my shoulders. “What happened?”

  Barry ran his hand through his tousled hair. “Went to the Central last night.” He took a slow, tentative breath. “A group of blokes started about Micky working here and that led to them spouting off about Dwayne. How he was just a darkie, so what did it matter? I couldn’t just listen to that rubbish.”

  Mrs Gregory placed the teapot and a floral cup and saucer on the table.

  “And these people call themselves Christians,” she said. “A life was lost. Someone’s son, brother. Uncle. I could weep at the uncaring.” She bit her bottom lip.

  I tried to speak but only managed a croak. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Who? Who did it?” I wasn’t sure if I was asking Barry who beat him up or if he knew who had run over Dwayne.

  “The usuals. The ones who carry on about the Aborigines drinking too much, yet spend every night in the pub themselves. The ones who talk about Aborigines not caring for their homes and not understanding the meaning of family and community, yet they beat up their wives if they disagree with them. The same blokes who call Aborigine women dirty gins, yet–”

  “Barry!” barked Mrs Gregory.

  “Sorry, Mum.” Barry lowered his face and rubbed his head with both hands.

  A thick silence settled over the table, punctuated only by the sound of Mrs Gregory pouring tea.

  I studied Barry’s battered face.

  Mrs Gregory passed me a cup of tea. We sipped in silence.

  “Barry, I’m taking tomorrow off school to help you out here.”

  “You can’t do that,” he said.

  “I can. It’s the swimming carnival. I won’t miss anything except sunburn and that Shaw bloke showing off his hairy chest. Please. I’d like to help.”

  Barry glanced at his mum then back to me. “Dawn won’t like it.”

  “Too bad. Anyway, it’s cards day tomorrow. As long as I’m not around, she won’t care where I am.”

  “If you’re sure.”

  “Done,” I said, lifting my teacup from the saucer as an end to the conversation.

  CHAPTER 40

  I squinted into the scorching sunlight. Even though it was only eight thirty, beads of sweat trickled down the back of my neck. If it was this hot now, what would it be like by lunchtime? At least I didn’t have to sit on the pool hill surrounded by two hundred other sweating people.

  Nan was so busy cutting out scones from dough when I left, she didn’t even lift her head. Not that it would have mattered. I had my school uniform on, and my work gear tucked into the bottom of my bag.

  I didn’t bother Barry and Mrs Gregory when I arrived, just changed and mowed the grass around the laundry block and clothes line, careful to avoid the drying towels that flapped and cracked in the northerly wind. Gusts of it whipped dust and fallen leaves and gumnuts against my calves. Once I’d edged, raked the clippings and swept the paths, I cleaned the laundry and shower blocks.

  Barry came over afte
r ten to tell me he was off to the doctor and dentist. His face was even more bruised and puffy than yesterday.

  Next up I emptied bins and checked that the graffiti from the other week hadn’t bled through the fresh paint.

  The repetitive work was good for me for a while. I wanted to pack everything that had happened into a box, stick the lid on and forget it. But my brain wasn’t playing that game. The moment my attention drifted from the weight of the bin I was lugging to the incinerator, the image of Dad’s smashed bonnet and windscreen floated into my head. When I stopped thinking about the feel of the mop handle against my palms, Nan’s tirades about dirty, stinking boongs filled my ears.

  “You’re giving that floor hell,” said Barry, standing in the doorway of the men’s shower block.

  I dropped the mop. “You gave me a fright.”

  “Everything all right?” His face was dotted with iodine and sticking plasters.

  “Good. Just miles away, thinking about things. You know how it is.”

  He watched me for a moment.

  “What did the doctor say?”

  Barry rolled his undamaged right eye. “Said he’d like to see the other bloke. Didn’t tell him more than one laid into me. Pretty sure I didn’t land a punch. He doesn’t think there’s any permanent damage. Probably stay shut for a few more days.”

  I leaned against the mop. “What about the police?”

  Barry snorted. “Sergeant Axford as good as told me I had it coming.”

  One more thing to stick in the box to try to ignore. “What will you do now?”

  He rubbed his chin. “Micky will keep working here and the students will still stay.”

  I figured as much.

  “Robbie, I’ve placed you in a terrible position. I understand if you don’t want to work with Micky, or even here.”

  “What do you need me to do after lunch? Because, if you don’t have any plans, I’ll tidy the incinerator. The wind’s made a helluva mess in there. We could burn it later this week. Not today, though.”

  Barry grinned. “You’re a cracker, Robbie, an absolute cracker.”

  “How was the swimming carnival?” asked Nan, as I entered the kitchen. She stood at Bluey’s cage, holding a milk thistle while he tweeted and pecked.

  “Hot.”

  She wove the weed through the cagewire. “Did you race?”

  “Only the novelty event. Had to wade across the pool. Did okay at that.” My ability to lie without a hitch in my voice should have worried me. But it didn’t.

  “Hmmm.” She opened the fridge and took out a lump of pastry, wrapped in a damp cloth.

  I suppressed a shudder. “Steak and kidney pie?”

  “And apple turnover for dessert.”

  “Sounds good.” Those lies just kept slipping out of my mouth.

  “You can clear the table and have things ready for your father when he comes home.” By “things” she meant the day’s paper, a fresh ashtray and a beer glass.

  I stared at the jiggle of her upper arms and backside as she pressed and rolled the pastry flat.

  Dad’s car crunched the gravel in the drive. He’d come in, loosening his tie, say hello, go to his room, change and then take up position at the end of the table.

  Like nothing had changed. But everything had.

  Something jagged took hold in the pit of my stomach.

  Right on cue, Dad, tugging on his tie, stuck his head through the kitchen door.

  “Robert, set the table.” Nan’s voice bounced off the hallway walls like a ping-pong ball.

  I put Catch-22 on the bed, straightened the quilt and hurried to the kitchen. I’d escaped in Yossarian’s weird world, which was less confusing than the turmoil in my head, and that was saying something.

  As I stepped through the door, Dad exploded.

  “For Chrissake. As if this town needs their two bob’s worth.”

  “Whatever is wrong, Frank?” Nan hurried to read the paper over his shoulder.

  He tapped the page with his finger. “Goddamn interfering communists, that’s what.”

  “Oh my goodness.” Nan pressed her palm to her forehead.

  “Those students will discover Abos are lazy and not good enough to mix with decent society, quick smart,” continued Dad.

  Nan patted his shoulder. “Don’t trouble yourself, Frank. They’ll blow in and blow out. Nothing will change.”

  I pressed each knife and fork onto the tablecloth. “The Freedom Ride?”

  Dad lowered the paper. “What do you know about it?”

  “Saw it on the news.”

  “Tha … Barry Gregory isn’t involved, is he?”

  I dropped a fork to the floor.

  Nan tsked.

  I answered Dad from under the table. “No.”

  He grunted and, in the time it took me to stand up, the paper was raised again.

  CHAPTER 41

  School dragged. Hot, stuffy, overcrowded classrooms filled with stinking, sweaty bodies. I kept to myself, sitting up the front in class and opposite the staffroom at recess and lunchtime. From where I sat, I could watch Keith, Billy and their new friends, Wright, Rhook and Edwards, slink around the tennis and netball courts leering at girls or tormenting first formers. But I knew once they grew tired of the girls’ blushes and protests, and the first formers’ wobbling chins and teary eyes, they would go in search of fresh targets.

  Wednesday, that target was me.

  At recess, I sat in the shade of the library reading the book the librarian, Mrs Fenton, had recommended, Lord of the Flies. I was so engrossed in Ralph and Piggy that until Wright kicked the sole of my shoe I had no idea he was there. As usual, Edwards, Rhook, Keith and Billy were right behind him.

  “Oi, Bower. Lonely because your Abo mates aren’t at school?”

  “Never lonely with a book, Ian.”

  He continued kicking my shoe. Kick, kick, kick. A steady rhythm that jarred my spine. I refused to move my foot.

  “Been missing your skills on the rope swing.” Kick, kick, kick.

  Rhook and Edwards sniggered.

  “I bet.”

  “Scared off a couple of gins from the river too. Mangy-looking things. All snot and wild hair.” Kick, kick, kick. “Just how you like them, Bower. Like your daddy.”

  I jumped to my feet and stood chest to chest with Wright. The others, even Keith and Billy, hooted and jeered.

  “Watch your mouth, Wright.”

  “Or what? Ya gonna hit me, Bower?” Wright stuck out his chin. “You don’t have the guts.”

  A buzzing sound, soft at first but growing louder, echoed through my head. I raised my hand and shoved Wright in the chest. He stumbled into Rhook and Edwards, staggered, but regained his balance. He filled the space between us.

  I stared into his eyes, surprised that he didn’t tower over me like I thought he did. “I’ve had enough of your bull, Ian.”

  “I’ve had enough of your bull, Ian,” repeated Wright, in a high-pitched, singsong voice. “Dirty, stinking, coon lover. You and your boyfriend just won’t learn, will you?”

  “At least Barry is up-front about what he thinks, not like you, Wright. Slinking around at night breaking windows, beating people up – I mean, five on one, how fair is that? And what about the graffiti at the caravan park? So brave.”

  He crushed my toe with the heel of his foot. Spears of pain spread up my leg. I bit down on the inside of my lip to stop myself from crying out.

  “That’s enough,” said Billy, placing a hand on my shoulder.

  I shrugged him off and pushed Wright.

  Pain exploded in my gut. Fists pummelled, knees pounded and shoes booted. I fell to the ground, curled into a ball, arms wrapped around my head.

  “Stop it. Leave him.” The voice wormed between the lightning flashes of pain. The grunts slowed and so did the blows. And then nothing.

  I uncurled. Wright stood over me, panting, shirt untucked, face red and sweaty. Rhook, Edwards and Keith were behind him. Billy,
arms outstretched, was between Wright and me.

  My whole body throbbed, but my mind was clear. “Cowards,” I spat and stumbled to the toilets.

  I cleaned myself up and fled to the bike shed.

  CHAPTER 42

  “Jesus, not you too.” Barry dropped the bin he was carrying and jogged towards me. “What happened?”

  “Couldn’t be the only one who hadn’t spilt blood.”

  Barry studied my face. “Come inside.”

  Mrs Gregory wiped her hands on her apron and hurried towards me. “Gracious. Micky, Barry and now you.” She guided me to the table.

  “I’m okay, really.”

  “Hmmm.” With her thumb and forefinger on my chin, she moved my face from side to side. “Tell me exactly how this happened.”

  I told her everything, except the bit Wright had said about Dad.

  Mrs Gregory listened and tutted.

  Barry sat stony-faced.

  “Hell. I left the library book outside.”

  “Someone will pick it up,” said Barry.

  Mrs Gregory took a large tin from the cupboard above the stove and a bowl from beneath the sink. She turned on the hot water tap. While she waited for the water to warm up, she uncapped the Dettol and placed a brown bottle on the bench.

  “Not Mercurochrome,” I groaned.

  She shot me a look over her shoulder. “Mercurochrome or infection that rots your face off. Your choice.”

  I sighed.

  “Exactly.” She turned back to the sink and began breaking off pieces of cotton wool. “I won’t use much, Robbie.”

  Mrs Gregory dabbed and cleaned, stepping back every few moments to inspect my face. “No need for a doctor.”

  “Thank you.” I went to stand, but she glared.

  “You aren’t going anywhere, young man. You will stay until I decide you’re well enough to leave.”

  “I don’t want to be a nuisance.”

  Barry chuckled. “Save your breath, Robbie. She’s decided.”

  Mrs Gregory settled me in the easy chair in the corner of the kitchen, where, judging by the basket beside it, she knitted and mended. The only time she let me move was when I had to go to the toilet, which turned out to be quite often as she kept pouring me glasses of water and cups of tea. She also fed me the best melting moments and slices of apple teacake I’d tasted.