by E. M. Reapy
Once he got paid, nothing would matter.
That mini brown envelope with dollars wadded into it. That was the stuff they should be handing out in suicide wards. Big, fat, bulging cash-in-hand. I used to collect mine, smell it, pocket a fifty and give the rest to Henk to hold onto for me until the harvest was done. We had nowhere to spend it but I didn’t trust the other workers. It would be so easy to rob someone’s savings from their room. So so easy.
‘We’ll apologise too,’ Shane said. ‘Won’t we?’
I stopped and thought about it. Sometimes apologising meant too much. Made too much out of something. But if we didn’t apologise, maybe Hopper would think we thought it was no big deal. Just fucked off on you in the middle of nowhere. You buzzing off your head. Left you freaking out like a turf sack of mongrels drowning in a lake. Our half-arsed looking for you. The decision for us to go. My decision for us to go. No big deal. Yep, no big deal at all.
So we went to find him, whiskey grinning and open arms. When we walked around the farmhouse, we reminisced on some of the craic we used to have back in Melbourne. The Great Ocean Road trip we went on with this bunch of girls that knew Shane from home. They were primary school teachers and though they were straight edge, it was probably some of the best couple of days I’d had in Oz. We only brought two slabs between the six of us so I didn’t bother drinking at all, nothing worse than getting the thirst with nothing to quench it. The girls would do these silly kiddy sing-along things and though you’d be smirking at them at first, mortified for them, they were infectious and you’d join in eventually. None of them were lookers but they weren’t mingers either. I’d never have tried it on with them even though I was half-crazy about the three of them by the time we got to Adelaide. Sad thing was, they were the kind of good girls that’d love you so much, they’d be wasting their time on someone like you, and you’d completely fucking destroy them. Use them as a leg-up and look down at the mess they’d become. I couldn’t do that to those lovely eejits who sang about animals and told me stories about Cú Chulainn and said I should give them a shout when I go back home. When. Yeah right.
Shane polished off his drink and we’d only a cupful left for Hopper. I took Shane’s mug, filled it and laid the empty bottle by a potted plant. When I looked up, I saw John Anthony watching me rise.
‘Well. How are the boys? Yer on it?’ He was sniffing and wiping his nose so much that a thought to ask him for some coke or K or whatever he was snorting raced across my mind but I knew better than that. John Anthony was one of those ‘I’m anti-drugs unless I’m distributing them’ type pricks.
Shane didn’t know better than me. ‘Sneachta? In this fucking desert, really?’
‘What?’ John Anthony straightened up and put his chest out.
‘D’ya want a tissue or something’s what I meant, for your nose?’ Shane asked hoarsely.
John Anthony took another quick sniff, blocked his nostril and forced snot out onto the ground. He did it to the other side. A true gentleman.
‘Tissue me hole. What ye doing?’
‘We were going to have a look for Hopper,’ Shane replied.
I wanted to just walk away.
‘What ye make of last night?’
I ignored the question. John Anthony’s eyes were on me. I itched my fingers.
‘I fucking asked yis, what ye make of last night?’
Shane toed the ground like he was waiting to break into a jig.
‘What’s your point, John Anthony?’ I blurted.
‘What’s my point? What? You don’t answer a question with another question.’
‘What are you trying to get at? Just fucking say it,’ I said.
He stared at me again. ‘You’ve got an attitude so you do. You go around trying to be some sort of altar boy, trying to stay on the fence of life, Mr Bland Bollocks. Sucking up to Henk every fucking opportunity you get. You’re nearly coming out his mouth you’ve crawled so far into his hole. Bullshit so it is.’
I opened my mouth to reply but John Anthony put his hand up and continued, ‘My point? I was the one who was dealing with Henk. I was the one who sorted this job out and I got – not only you – but you as well Westlife – I got the pair of ye this sweet fucking number. I brought ye here. No thanks. I helped ye out. No thanks. I said nothing. Ye – not me – ye took drugs – not me – and ye decided that we’d bolt it on that clown of a lad. I—’
He raised his arms and pointed at himself, ‘I did not request Hopper’s company for the journey or this job. Now if he’s back and he’s angry, or he’s feeling a little bit hard done by, well his problem’s not with me, isn’t that fair to say?’
He picked up the empty whiskey bottle and passed it between his hands. ‘So I’ll be telling wee Hopper as much as soon as I see him.’
‘Wasn’t it your fucking car though?’ Shane said.
John Anthony tapped the bottle off his front teeth. ‘Here, d’ya know what the worst thing is?’ He waited for us to acknowledge his question. ‘The worst thing is, I’ve seen yer bare souls. Yer off yer tits vulnerable bareness and ye are yellow, two-faced, townie shitebags. Go. Get out of my fucking sight before I break an arm on ye.’
My blood surged. I wasn’t sure if I could take him, even with rage. I knew my limitations. Back in Leaving Cert, a couple of us fell out with a few lads from the next village over. I didn’t know if it was to do with a girl or an eighth or a fucking football match. A scrap was arranged. Supposed to be down the tracks on the Friday after school. It was fairly stupid, handbags stuff. We fucked off and went to the chipper after. No one was hurt. But later that evening, I went smoking with one of the lads and walked back home stoned. A couple of the pricks from the other village were at the short cut to my house. I don’t think they were lying in wait or anything, they were just having underage cans off the street. So I’d a choice to make and I went for it. I kept walking down the short cut. They jumped me from behind. Fucking stamped all over me. It was embarrassing. I cried. And it wasn’t for long either, two or three minutes I’d say. But when a couple of lads are leathering ya, it can feel like some eternity. I hadn’t fought back. I lay down and took the beating.
When they left, I stayed there for a good length just looking at the sky. It was cloudy. My teeth were sharp and I couldn’t stop tonguing them. The auld lady was going to have a calf. She’d be making a pure scene, calling cops, fussing. That’s what I thought about. I got up and went home. Snuck in the back door. Washed meself. Went to bed.
I took a couple of deep breaths and looked at John Anthony’s big ugly fists.
‘Come on, Shane,’ I said. ‘Let’s leave this cunt to it.’
★
It was hard to sleep. The bed was too stiff. The pillow was too soft. It was too hot with a sheet over me. It was too cold without it. Could hear a mosquito whine around my room. His wings flapping four hundred beats per minute. Him looking for blood to suckle. My fucking blood. I turned on my belly to ignore it. I turned back. I punched the pillow and folded it under my neck.
What could John Anthony even say to Hopper?
The truth. With his spin on it. Everyone’s version of the truth comes with some persuasion of their own views. I mean, me and Shane could tell him the truth too, from our slant. Like we didn’t want to go but it was scary out in the bush. We didn’t know what’d happen. We were fucking tripping as well. And it was a split-second decision. John Anthony had been putting the pressure on.
The truth is never really the truth.
I looked out the window. Everyone’s light was off in the courtyard but the TV that hung from the wall at the smoking area was on, glowing blue and yellow. I wanted it to make a storm out. Pour torrential rain. Howling winds and forked lightning. Muck everywhere. Or someone to just have a shower in the communal bathroom. Listen to them wash. Soap up. Water dripping off them, echoing as they were getting clean. Or to be swimming. Like back in Group 1, training in lanes and they said I was good. Galas around the country. C
ommunity Games. Green goggles over my eyes, chlorine in my throat and be pushing myself, butterfly stroke. Ready for the tumble turn. Ready to be upside down and to propel myself from the wall towards the finish of the race. After the turn, head above water. Adrenaline. The noises, the whistles, the spectators. The beats of the other swimmers’ limbs under water. The beautiful taste of air.
Or a shag.
The Londoner and the primary school teachers and the Thai girls and me. I closed my eyes and thought about all of them, trying to get hard but a mozzie got me. Right on the shin. I cursed it for being the only thing to suck on me in a long while and scratched the bite brutally.
Fuck.
I wanted something badly and I didn’t know what it was. I tried to sleep again and kept sighing. Maybe another drink would help. Or reading? I had a book somewhere. I pulled my rucksack from under my bed. Normally, we had to be on the fields for 5.30 a.m. but every Monday morning Henk drove to the outhouse and a couple of the girls went with him to sort out the big shop, so I wouldn’t get caught if I was late. I just wanted a bit of sleep after the headfuck of a weekend. I spilled the rucksack on the ground and saw the green shamrock pin my mother had packed as a good luck charm. Euro coins trickled across the floor and when I picked them up, they looked so strange and small in my hand. I rubbed the map at the back of them and calmed. The alloys in the coin heating. Metal in the air.
Like most things in life, problems are usually solvable by the simplest solutions. I put the coins back into my rucksack and kicked it under the bed.
Simple. We’d have to find Hopper before John Anthony did. We’d blame John Anthony for everything.
★
I scanned the house for Hopper the next morning. Everyone was in grabbing a quick brekkie. Black & Gold cornflakes, bread and loads of mangos. Mango chutney. Mango yogurt. Mango juice. I didn’t like the taste of them. I buttered a slice of toast and walked around the kitchen. There was lots of scraping of plates and slurping of coffee and chat about the day ahead. I checked outside in the smoking area and behind the house. No sign. Henk wouldn’t be around for a few hours so I couldn’t ask if he’d picked up another Irish lad yet.
I said hello to Shane when he walked in bleary-eyed and his hair arseways from bed. He was the worst morning person I’d ever met, going into four weeks in the job he still struggled to wake up. He grabbed a mango juice and gulped it down.
‘Story?’ he asked and wiped his mouth and chin.
‘Keep an eye out for Hopper won’t ya, I think we need to talk to him before John Anthony.’
‘Why?’
‘Because we need to get to him first. Hopper’s not that stable. I’m not sure I want to be on his bad side. If we get to him before John Anthony,’ I said and took a bite of my toast.
‘We can blame John Anthony?’
I stopped chewing. ‘Yeah. We can tell him it wasn’t us. He’ll believe us over him anyways.’
The noise started dwindling and people went out to work. I was happy now that Shane was on side, even if there was no sign of Hopper. I spent my whole shift checking for him at the different areas and when I’d to collect bins, I asked the backpackers and workers if they’d seen the new Irish guy, kind of thin, brownish hair, gold rings, a bit smelly-looking, but none of them had.
Henk returned at afternoon smoko. The Aussies called all breaks smokos, even if they didn’t smoke on them. Him and the girls were unpacking the big shop.
‘How’s me boy?’ Henk asked, whacked me on the back and pulled me in for a bear hug.
The rum was coming out through him with the sweat.
‘Hi, Henk,’ I said, tearing away. ‘Had a good time of it?’
He swept the room with his hand. ‘These ladies are exquisite company.’
Some of the girls smirked and I noticed one of them looking at me, not smirking, just eyeing me.
‘Henk, I got a question for you. Is there a new Irish lad here today? Did you get him over the weekend? Just he’s our friend from Perth and we’d like to show him around.’
‘New Irish bloke, nope. Got enough of a handful with you three. There is a Sheila,’ he paused and pointed at the starey chick. ‘Fiona, here, say g’day to your kinsman.’
‘I know you,’ is all she said and she eyeballed me.
Terror rippled through me. Had I rode her?
‘I know you from back home.’
Oh fuck. Worse again.
‘Well, that’s grand. Welcome to Mangopolis. So Henk, I think that a new Irishman is here.’ I turned my back on her while I spoke to Henk. Didn’t have time for being the Céad Míle Fáilte committee right now. Though she was behind me, she was still fucking boring through me with a look.
‘No. No more Irish. You three men and the little lady.’ Henk laughed.
Maybe he thought Hopper was foreign because of his accent. ‘Henk, you sure? Has a new lad started, small, lean, browny hair?’
‘No, boy. I bloody said no. Didn’t I? I’ll never understand the need for relentless questions I get from you lot. You young people are worse than feeding lorikeets. Now out to work, son, smoko is over.’
★
‘Wait, wait!’ Fiona shouted after me as I jogged back to my machine.
The afternoon was heavy with heat. I wiped my forehead with the bottom of my t-shirt giving Fiona a flash of my white stomach.
‘What ya want?’
‘I know you.’
‘Yeah, yeah. So you keep reminding me.’
Her body was slim. Her fair hair was to her shoulders. She’d a small scar in a broken circle on her cheek and her eyes were sparkling blue in the sun. She put her hand on my arm. I looked at it.
‘You’re the builder’s son, yeah? My dad worked for your dad.’
My stomach sank. ‘Look, Fiona or whatever your name is, I’m not my father. I didn’t mean for people to lose their jobs and homes. Don’t drag that shit halfway across the world.’ I pushed her hand away.
‘No, wait,’ she said and put her hand on my shoulder this time. ‘It doesn’t matter, what happened back there. Everyone went mad. Everyone. The whole country. I know your mam. She used to visit the nursing home, even after she quit, even when yer family got really really – with the developments and all…’ She trailed off. ‘It was nice of her though. My gran is in there. Alzheimer’s. Completely gone in the head. Her memories. She liked your mother. I love my granny. Isn’t it mad the two of us are here in Western Australia, instead of the West of Ireland? The times, eh?’
I got pangs. She spoke like home and looked like home even though she had a good tan. She’d that Irish girl thing, the friendliness radiating off her.
‘Here, fuck off with your giant speech. I’ve got stuff to do.’ I climbed into my tractor.
★
Yer one had put Mam in my head over Hopper. That guilt was different. Mam’s emails saying ‘Skype soon, pet?’ or ‘Will you send on your new number?’ or ‘Let us know you’re okay.’ I loved her, but I couldn’t give her an inch or she’d be hassling me the whole time. Mam and her worrying. It never ended.
I remember when she used to come home from the nursing home. This was well before the Boom. I was in primary school. She always smelt of hospital and boiled food.
She left the job when we moved into the new house. It was a five bed, had a Jacuzzi, a bar, a games room and a basketball court just for me, which I only played in once ever with my friends. She acquired her posh accent.
There’d be no point ringing her now, for a while anyway until this Hopper mess was sorted, because she’d only get it out of me. She could pick up what was bothering me just from my voice and interrogate the shite out of me until she knew what was going on.
I drove up the fields. I drove down the fields. I looked out for Hopper.
At the end of the shift, Fiona was waiting.
‘You’d want to have some manners, young fella,’ she said to me.
‘Long day. Not interested.’ I waved her off and walked towards
my room. I needed a scrubbing and some food.
She followed. ‘Look, I don’t know anyone here, except you, and I don’t really know you but I know your mother is nice and so there’s a good chance you are.’
‘Cromwell’s auld lady was probably sound too.’
She stalled. Dust rose from the ground. ‘Did you just compare yourself to Oliver Cromwell?’ she asked.
I paused and looked at her. Her lips were plump. Her nose was a bit uneven. I could smell her ice cream perfume and I tried to keep my eyes from the flesh of her legs under her denim shorts.
‘I suppose I did, yeah.’
‘Fuck off so,’ she said and walked away from me.
I looked back at her and smirked.
★
She was sitting in the courtyard, wearing a hoodie and scratching away at a sketchbook when I’d finished my dinner. The TV showed some shite American comedy, the actors had big white smiles and delivered punchlines to fake recorded laughter.
Fiona didn’t say anything when she saw me coming but nudged her head in acknowledgment before she went back to her drawing.
‘You alright?’ I asked.
She chuckled but didn’t look at me. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’
I put my hands in my pockets. ‘Dunno.’ I went to look over her shoulder but she closed the book before I could investigate.
My fingers found lint at the bottom of my pockets. I rolled it around, feeling awkward as fuck. ‘Earlier – I – you caught me at a bad time.’
‘You’re grand. Whatever.’ She eyed me and something about the way she looked gave me that tremor again.
‘Don’t be like that. Fiona, wasn’t it?’