The Courier's New Bicycle

by Kim Westwood

  Despite Meg’s affiliation with BioPharm Industries netting her a large part of the distribution pie, I already know whose products out of BioPharm’s and Ethical Hormones’ I’d rather be delivering to the masses, the former rumoured to have rather less commitment to an entirely cruelty-free process.

  She pats the cushion between us. ‘Want you to know I sympathise with your situation,’ her voice has gone all syrupy and persuasive, ‘but loyalty shouldn’t lead to a needless drowning.’

  I glance up at her pit-bulls, playing with names. The speakeasy clientele — transgressives of all persuasions — give these two bully boys the cold shoulder. I decide on ‘Crusher’ for the short one, and ‘Snarl’ for the tall.

  My self-invited visitor leans disconcertingly close. ‘Speaking frankly, girl to girl, you’re too valuable to be sacrificed, and this is the best offer you’ll get.’

  Now that just tears my heart out, Meg popping me in the category of ‘girl’ without so much as a by-your-leave. The gender slap vibrates in my bones. I bite back a fast retort, brought to tact by the presence of Crusher and Snarl and the thought of them hurting me in their big hands.

  What she’s said about Gail having an enemy so close really bothers me. She knows more than she’s telling, while I’ve learnt nothing from my nights of surveillance at Fishermans Bend or my daytime enquiries. Somehow I’ve made it into Meg’s good books. What if I can use it as leverage?

  ‘I need some time to think about it,’ I say, surprising myself.

  ‘Offer closes soon,’ she says crisply. ‘Don’t think so hard you break a blood vessel.’

  Then she’s gone and Inez is walking towards the booth, a quizzical look on her face.

  I feel a bit ill, not sure whether I’ve just made a smart move or let Meg and her minders intimidate me. Too late, I wish I’d given a flat refusal, because even with no intention of taking up the offer, I’m tainted now by the expectation I can be bought.

  I chuck the cushion Meg patted into the far corner of the alcove and shift along the bench seat to make room for Inez, then Albee returning from his tête-à-tête. Did I catch a tone of blame in Meg’s voice? Surely she doesn’t think EHg’s troubles are the result of something Gail’s done? I have to find out who’s doing this to my boss, my friend, and stop it sliding her to destruction.

  Inez waits for my explanation, Albee beside her sipping his drink.

  ‘A business visit,’ I say wryly.

  ‘Anything you can talk about?’ Albee asks.

  I shake my head, and Inez, bless her, wraps her lovely arms around me in a hug.

  Anwar and I have arranged to meet at the bottom of Benedict Street again — about fifteen minutes’ walk from the Glory Hole. I check my watch when I get outside. Still three-quarters of an hour before he swings by. Mojo Meg’s visit put such a dampener on my mood that I couldn’t enjoy my remaining time with Inez and Albee.

  Duffle coat firmly buttoned, I walk up Daisy Lane and turn left. The wind bites once I’m out of the protective dip of the alleyway, and I look up at clear sky. Another relentlessly dry summer has slowly given way to gentler days, but at night it feels like winter. I’m sure Melbourne evenings never used to get this cold this early. With each new season the temperature fluctuations have become harder to predict and more extreme.

  The avenues that grid the city are wide and impersonal and feel unshielded in comparison to the smaller streets between. I stick west on Pilgrim Lane, which leads me directly to the financial sector … such as it is. Half the buildings are empty, many businesses closed, while those remaining operate on a knife-edge between profit and insolvency. Of course, no matter how bad it gets, some professions will always be in demand. Plumbers and electricians, for instance.

  The prayer meeting two lampposts ahead of me is out rather late and huddled oddly, their heads bent over something on the ground. I hurry along the pavement towards them, my brain not yet able to interpret what it is.

  The something moves, becomes a prostrate figure. Closer, it makes strange mewling noises. A trousered leg draws back and finds its mark. There’s a muffled scream. ‘Dirty little surry,’ hisses one of the four silhouetted above, and instantly my brain decodes the image. The woman is curled on her side with the dark soles of her shoes towards me, and the group is kicking at her stomach … her pregnant stomach; kicking the blasphemy out of her.

  The realisation jolts an arc of current at my core. Adrenaline surges to my extremities and I start to run, then I’m barrelling my body’s full force into them. Those half-turned are knocked aside like skittles. Faces register their surprise, legs still in the act of kicking.

  I reach down to the woman and try to lift her, willing her to stand, but she flops back away from me like a rag doll. As I re-grip, hands grapple me, their efforts hampered by the prayer shawls. Arms rain ineffectual blows; I feel nothing except the sack weight of the woman, her ribs and breasts in my desperate clinch, her face a grimace, cheeks grubby with dirt and tears.

  I reel up, snarling, and the group backs off, this uncoiled rage not what they’d bargained for.

  ‘Get away from her, you monsters!’ I roar as they bring their prayer shawls up over their heads to shadow their features.

  The woman is still on the ground, bent double to protect her belly. I try to move her again, but she won’t budge. I’m afraid the group is regathering to attack again, but when I look up, they’re dispersing rapidly along the street, disowning their public thuggery.

  The woman lets out a guttural groan. I press for Inez on my mobile and pray she’ll answer.

  She’s still at the speakeasy. ‘Five minutes,’ she promises.

  There’s a metal bench under a shelter about fifty metres up the street. I speak slowly to the woman, telling her how it’s just a little way, a few short steps. Her eyes are closed, her lips white. I’m afraid she’s passed out, or worse.

  A motorised scooter zips by on the other side of Pilgrim Lane and I wave frantically. Just when I think it’s not going to stop, the rider performs a wide, fast wheelie, daring the ire of oncoming traffic. But there are no other vehicles, and no pedestrians; no witnesses but me to cruelty.

  The rider slews to a halt beside us. He’s painfully young. He looks at me, then the woman. His forehead crinkles in confusion below his black beanie.

  ‘She’s hurt,’ I say carefully, so as not to spook him. ‘It’s very important to get her to that bench. Can you help me?’

  I can see in his eyes that he’s afraid to let go of his scooter in case it’s some trick to filch his expensive ride.

  ‘Look,’ I say. ‘She’s hurt very badly. She needs us to do this for her. Someone will be coming very soon to collect her.’

  Reluctantly he leans his scooter against the kerb and takes one side of the woman, and between us we get her the fifty metres to the shelter. When we have her slumped on the metal slats of the bench, I start to say thanks, but already he’s running back and flipping the scooter upright with an expert foot. Then one leg is on the kickboard and the other pushing off as the little motor buzzes up the dark street, its rear light receding like an insect’s warning eye.

  I ring Anwar.

  ‘I’ll be by in the van,’ he says.

  ‘No, it’s okay,’ I reply. ‘Inez’ll be here any minute.’

  He assures me he can do tonight’s shift without me, and that he’ll let Gail know what’s happened.

  As I ring off, Inez pulls up. She’s out of her ute in a heartbeat, blanket in one hand. We drape it about the woman then shuffle her to the passenger door, manoeuvring her onto the bench seat between us.

  We make the drive north up Temperance Street to the Women’s Hospital in silence. Our passenger has stopped groaning and is eyes closed, probably gone into shock. She leans heavily against me. I look anxiously at her face. Mid-twenties, maybe, with dark skin and the tiny pockmarks of a hormonal adolescence on both cheeks. Her long black hair has been pulled out of its ponytail, the elastic still clinging t
o a lock. I detach it gently and place it over a knob on the dash.

  I glance at Inez concentrating on the road, the question flapping like a loose sail in my mind. How had this woman’s attackers known she was a working surrogate and not a ‘happy families’ fertile, or even an infertile who’d successfully turned to the Red Quarter clinics for help?

  There are two people and a trolley waiting at Emergency when we pull up. In my call ahead, I’d said nothing of the circumstances, only that the victim of the attack was pregnant. Babies being at a premium these days, they pull out all stops to save them.

  An orderly in blue helps us ease the woman from the ute. Laid on the trolley, she’s tucked in then wheeled speedily through the automatic doors, and we’re directed to the information desk to give our details.

  We return to the ute. We couldn’t even tell them the woman’s name. I bundle up the blanket. There’s blood on it, and on the car seat.

  9

  Inez and I drive back to the hospital at 8 am. Up in the lift to level four and the maternity wing, we tread squeaky linoleum to the visitors’ waiting room. We describe who we’re here to see, and are directed along a corridor by a sympathetic RN.

  Nurses are often vociferous opponents of the current government’s anti-surrogacy policy, being those most often landed with the sad results. They get to keep their jobs because they’re in such short supply, the only trained staff left to fill the skills gap that opened when a raft of medicos working in the fertility clinics and gene-research centres were struck off the register and hospital payrolls. Not that this particular part of the hospital is busy these days, and at the far end it’s imbued with an almost suffocating quiet. No babies here.

  We stand at the door of the share room, looking in. A woman — not ours — is asleep under the covers in the first bed. The privacy curtains have been pulled around the second.

  Inez calls a tentative ‘Hello?’

  On a low answer, I open a gap in the curtain and together we step into the sanitised white space. The woman in the bed is propped up by pillows. Her long hair, now neatly plaited, snakes past her breast over the hospital gown. One thin brown arm lies above the bedcovers, the contents of a drip bag feeding into it. She won’t look at us, and it’s clear it wasn’t she who spoke. Her expression, and that on the face of the woman sitting beside her, tells it all.

  Short and capable-looking, the latter rises from her seat and extends a hand. A firm, no-nonsense shake. I’m guessing sensible shoes too.

  Inez and I say our names, and she nods. ‘The nurse unit manager phoned me. I got your details from Admissions,’ she says. ‘I’m Tallis Dankner, from SANE.’

  The Surrogate Advocacy, Networking and Emergency team works out of the Red Quarter, and is another of the madams’ innovations.

  She sits again. ‘This is Roshani. She’s doing fine, but she lost the baby.’

  ‘We’re so sorry,’ I say, Inez silent beside me.

  Tallis leans close to the semi-prone woman. ‘Roshani?’ Her voice is gentle, soothing. ‘These are the people who helped you last night.’

  No response. Roshani’s focus stays on some invisible point on the powder-blue bedspread. One slow tear leaks below a lash.

  I find Inez’s hand and we stand there miserably.

  ‘We appreciate what you both did,’ Tallis says, adjusting Roshani’s hospital gown to cover a bare shoulder.

  She nods towards the door. As we walk out together, she hands me a business card.

  ‘I made a few enquiries. Your name came up connected to Gail Alvarez,’ she says quietly.

  Makes sense my boss would be well-known to SANE.

  ‘I’m hoping you might pay a visit to my office in the next couple of days.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ I say, and look to Inez not included in the invitation. ‘But I’m not sure I have anything useful to offer. I don’t know how she got targeted like that.’

  Tallis glances from us to the curtains obscuring her diminutive charge. Roshani had showed no sign of wanting to speak, and may not for a while. I suspect SANE’s rep has seen this all too often before.

  ‘Leave that with me,’ she says. ‘In the meantime, she’ll be taken good care of.’

  I don’t doubt it. Surrogacy is big business, and SANE protects its own. But how they manage it amid the roving Neighbourhood Values Brigades and now attack prayer groups, I have no idea.

  Outside my flat, Inez and I kiss a quick goodbye in the ute, aware of multiple eyes looking from the public high-rises. We’ll be seeing each other again in a few hours at the usual Monday APV meeting, which I expect to be a debrief on Friday’s rescue and some discussion over what project we might tackle next.

  Nitro greets me at the door, miaowing his disapproval at my many absences. I take him into the yard for a circumnavigation of the tundra before feeding him, then leave him stretched on his rather-too-ample side, washing his paws in a square of morning sun.

  I wheel out my bike. Swinging a leg over the frame, I scoot from the back alley onto the main road, my sights set for Cute’n’Cuddly Pty Ltd. Along with a swag of rescheduled deliveries waiting to be couriered, I’ve some debriefing of my own to do. The ride, however, feels heavy, not the usual pleasure to be had in the smooth motion of muscles and steady pump of blood. I can’t blame the day — perfect weather. It’s my thoughts of Roshani weighing me down like a millstone, and bringing to the surface a renewed dread of things to come.

  On my knock, Gail opens the door to her private office and ushers me through. She motions me to sit in the only chair — an unusual act in itself — then leans across the desk and looks at me intently, taking in the bags under my eyes and my lacklustre vibe.

  ‘Anwar got caught up in a drag racers’ dispute at Fishermans Bend last night and had all his tyres stolen,’ she tells me. ‘It took the rest of the night to negotiate them back, so I want one more go at surveillance there tonight. Are you up to it?’

  I return her gaze. ‘Can’t let him have all the fun.’

  It’s a poor attempt at enthusiasm, but I would walk over broken bottles for her if she asked.

  She smiles briefly. I can see concern in it, and relief. Below her tough-as-nails façade sometimes I think she cares for me as she would a kid brother or sister.

  She busies herself a moment at an electric kettle, then a coffee plunger, two cups and ingredients appear out of a filing cabinet. We go through the deliveries. It’s the regular drops to the usual places, and a relief to be concentrating on something comparatively mundane.

  When we’re done, she surprises me by saying, ‘Let’s check out the view from the roof.’

  I’ve only been up once before, on my induction into the couriering business. To get there we have to go through her private quarters, the turret room where she sometimes sleeps if she’s at the warehouse overnight. It’s even more spartan than the office: just a camp bed and plain dresser, a single window looking south, and a fire-escape door.

  We step outside and cross to the paint-peeled crenellations at the building’s edge. I lean on the parapet, staring out. The day is gentle, almost balmy. A slight breeze frizzes the trees in the street below. South are the Melbourne rail yards; beyond them is Victoria Harbour and the Docklands. Further left, we’d be looking straight down the city grid if it weren’t for a cluster of unfinished apartment towers blocking our view. There are no sounds of construction, and not likely to be anytime soon, the developers in receivership.

  I watch a girl being walked by a scruffy dog, stopping obediently at every tree for it to cock its leg. The dog knows where it’s going: a square of dirt a couple of blocks away euphemistically called a park. A popular spot for the homeless as well as dogs, it’s all benches full at night.

  ‘By the way,’ Gail says casually, ‘I heard something interesting from a colleague of mine in Drugs Watch.’

  That organisation is an information hub set up by Nation First to keep tabs on doctors and dispensaries, every medicine prescribed and scrip
t dispensed logged with them.

  Her voice lowers. ‘On Saturday a doctor in the Yarra Valley reported a Rohypnol incident. The victim was a dairy worker. Nothing odd on the surface of it, but my colleague suspects the dairy’s a front for a hormone farm, and so I’m thinking the incident has the hallmarks of an APV sting.’

  Gail never asks about our forays. I glance at her, not sure what she wants.

  ‘EHg have just finished trialling a new drug,’ she murmurs. ‘It’s not traceable in the body like the benzodiazepines are. Tell Max to give me a call about it.’ She angles me an encouraging look. ‘For next time.’

  Her attention diverts to the street below as a brown eco-lite slows and swings into C&C’s entrance. I hear the electric gate grind back and the car drive in. I’m motioned to the turret door, our rooftop meeting over.

  Back in her office, Gail hands me my pay packet. It’s bulkier than usual: extra cash for the nights spent staking out Barrow Road.

  ‘About last night’s attack.’ She holds the door open. ‘Let me know if I can do anything.’

  I know she means about Roshani’s assailants, none of whom I think I’d recognise again.

  ‘Will do,’ I say. ‘Thanks for the coffee.’

  I collect my deliveries from the basement and wheel my bike through the secure yard. The eco-lite is parked in the visitors bay, someone waiting in the driver’s seat. Two delivery hands are nearby, cleaning their already clean Cute’n’Cuddly van to an almost supernatural white. I nod hi to them, then I’m off into the day, my courier’s bag packed full.

  Despite the grimness of the night before, my spirits finally begin to lift. I have people — Gail, Inez and Albee, Max and Anwar — who care about me, and whom I can always call on for help. In this fucked-up world, I am not alone. I have family.

  10

  I have to run the gauntlet of a late-afternoon prayer offensive in Martyr Street en route to the APV meeting. It’s a public show of faith, several dozen hands up and waving. Just up the road from them, I steer around a Neighbourhood Values Brigade spoiling for a fight outside a specialty grog shop, the owner probably dobbed in for Sabbath trading.