Unsheltered

by Clare Moleta

  Nerredin was a big producer for West. Even bigger once the cereal-cropping country further north got lost to rising salt and the west coast got too unreliable. It wasn’t easy growing country though. We had fourteen years of drought, so we relied on the pipe – the Liu-McKenzie pipeline up from the south coast. Salinity got worse and worse but we kept adapting. People grew all kinds of things under glass, mostly whatever there was demand for in Valiant or the XB. Millet was a good one, there were a few millet producers.

  Angie swayed slightly in her seat. The man in the third row coughed again, tried to smother it.

  People grew sorghum, too, and a lot of warrine, and some of the modified wheat strains. The sheep container didn’t work out, but there was a big yabbie farm in the old Bickley dam that did really well once they got the salt levels right. And then Homegrown claimed two hundred acres of abandoned farmland just north of Nerredin for a saltwater greenhouse. The howlers on the west coast were getting worse so they were looking inland and we had the population and the infrastructure and a lot of local experience. We were right on the highway too. They were going to try tomatoes first, see how it went. That would have been close to a hundred jobs once it got up and running.

  A couple of people nodded. There was consistent demand for tomatoes inside the XB, everyone knew that because of the trucks.

  Li said, They started building a pipeline from their desal plant on the coast, so there was construction work for a while, security work. They were going to build the solar tower next. But there were too many attacks on the pipeline and it got too expensive for them to guard it, so they pulled out.

  The man with the cough put his hand up. People weren’t supposed to just interrupt. Li looked at him, uncertain.

  Did you ever have a howler come through there?

  They were well outside the howler zone here and from the way people shuffled and leaned in, Li guessed that most of them had never seen one.

  Yeah, she said. We had two in the last two years. Both mid-category.

  What was that like?

  She cleared her throat, trying to corral her brain in this new direction. Well. Howlers have got a smell to them. You can get a smell of grass before they hit, even when there’s no grass, or a sulphur smell, like lighting a match. We weren’t ready for the first one. We lost some people. And a lot of people left after that. We lost infrastructure too, had to rebuild with prefabs, but the older buildings stood up okay, mostly just broken windows and roof tiles. It hit the farms north of town pretty hard but people further south were okay. We lost the harvest but we kept most of the trees.

  A woman said, I thought howlers wiped out everything. She sounded let-down.

  Yeah, but we only got the edge of it. And it was mid-category, like I said.

  Li could see the grove, suddenly, from the top of the rise. Not a blackened ruin, but grey and green and flecked with purple, flickering silver. Frank’s inheritance. She said, After that, we got re-zoned and we applied for Weather Alert and by the time the second one came, we’d had the two bunkers built for the district. We didn’t lose anyone else. The howlers weren’t what finished us. She looked down at Angie and remembered. Anyway, I’m not talking about Weather. I’m talking about Nerredin.

  She understood suddenly what she was trying to offer. Not an apology. A gift.

  Someone in the front row said, Well, get on with it.

  Angie leaned forward and Li saw their town suspended in the air between them, fragile and provisional. Bob and Shamila’s hardware store. The red dog that slept in the entrance to the takeway. Faysal’s newsagent. The farm supply store and the general store, the op shop and the bakery. The pub with the sandwich board on the verandah advertising Ivan’s lunch special and the winners of the raffle. She could see taxis waiting on the corner and a driver leaning on her door, talking to the man who loaned his donkey every year for the Nativity play. The Wars memorial in the middle of the park, salmon gums and hard-baked dirt where the old people played bocce. She could smell bread and fertiliser and desiccated coconut and clove cigarettes and hot chips. A child ran across the wide road without looking.

  Tears were running down Camila’s face. Angie got up quietly and moved along the row of chairs towards the entrance.

  Li said, to her back, When we walked out, there was just the school and the pub still standing. I don’t know if there’s anything left now. But people lived there. We lived there. It was a good town.

  Afterwards, the man with the cough came over and thanked her. He said, I won’t get too close.

  It’s okay, Li said. Don’t worry about it.

  Camila and Trish were waiting for her near the entrance.

  The man said, I enjoyed that. I was looking forward to the dog breeding, but I enjoyed it. I didn’t know much about West. Very interesting. You could have been talking about my town.

  He turned away and started coughing again, and he coughed gently for a long time, bent over. Li looked past him at the empty entranceway where the grey light came in.

  Rich said, Why aren’t you wearing the gear? He’d just shot Li up with a new viral vax Management was trialling against the coughing sickness.

  I’m wearing the gear. She was shaky from exhaustion and whatever he’d pumped into her system. She’d been sent to Medical from the food shed, along with everyone else from Charlie who wasn’t already sick. Come straight off the back of one and a half shifts, covering for absent labour. It was dark before she started queueing.

  Like hell you are. He swivelled the monitor round and she focused on the screen briefly. It took her a minute to even remember last month’s bloods.

  He said, Your lead levels are tracking twice as high as last month. You’re not using the protective gear. Why?

  Because it doesn’t matter.

  The fuck it doesn’t. Maybe you don’t feel sick but you are sick – you’re gunna be.

  It doesn’t matter.

  Have you got a death wish, Li? Cos people in here are dying fast enough. He looked worse than last time, bruises under his eyes like he’d been double-punched. He was masked but his beard had been shaved as well as his hair and it made him look more exposed. She knew he hadn’t volunteered for medic and she knew what he was up against. Half the women in Charlie had the cough now. Security had regrouped the sleepboxes into sick and not sick yet.

  She said, I’m not wishing for anything.

  Look, he said. I’m sorry you lost your kid. True to God, I am. But that is bullshit.

  Okay. Is that all? Cos I’m back on in five hours.

  No, it’s not all. I got you something.

  It was a knee crutch. Top of the line. She stared at it as he brought it over to the exam table.

  I don’t have the points for that. How’d you get that?

  People like me, Li. I’m a nice fella. No, wait, don’t get up yet. He checked his watch, checked the injection site and her pulse. He asked about tingling, numbness, nausea. Then he helped her step into the crutch, with her lower leg resting on the platform in a kneeling position, and tightened the straps around her calf and thigh. She let him take the other crutches and cautiously tried a step. Another step. Remembering how to place her leg instead of swinging it.

  Keeps that ankle elevated, see? And it’ll give your shoulders a break. He readjusted the height for her and made her practise walking the length of the container without looking down. It was so good to have her hands back, not to have her shoulders and armpits and wrists hurt with every step.

  She turned to face him, getting the hang of it. I don’t understand how I can have this.

  He grinned at her. Relax, Li. I told you, people like me.

  She grinned back, didn’t even mean to. Wiped her runny nose on her arm.

  No worries, he said. So, you reckon you can climb?

  Sure. The van’s just one step up, this’ll be easier than the crutches.

  Could you climb a fence?

  What?

  Nah, I’m just gammin with you. I
can get us through the gates, I’m working on that.

  She stared at him. Someone banged on the door and Rich opened it and stuck his head out. You’re gunna have to wait. I might have an adverse reaction here. He shut the door, turned back.

  Li said, I better go.

  I’m getting out of here, he said. You should come.

  She was tired and she didn’t know why he was doing this, didn’t have an answer for him. Why do you want to get out?

  Why? You serious? I mean, I know they call it Transit but have you noticed no one fucking goes anywhere?

  Yeah, I noticed. You won’t get out.

  I got out of worse places than this.

  Go on, then. I’m not interested.

  Listen to yourself, he said. You don’t belong in here.

  Who did he think she was? Li shrugged. No one belongs anywhere.

  Speak for your own self, woman.

  She started moving to the door but Rich got in her way. What is it about this place you like so much? Apart from the free lead poisoning.

  I like working. I like not thinking.

  You’re a patcher, he said. You fixing anything in here?

  I don’t need to fix anything. I just need to fill the time.

  Until what? He grabbed her arm with his gloved hand. Li, listen to me. You lost your kid but you’re still alive.

  That’s right, she said. I lost my kid but I’m still alive.

  He let go. She swayed and steadied herself, suddenly nauseous. Her nose wouldn’t stop running and her arm hurt like hell from the shot. The need for sleep was a thumping weight.

  He said, You know for sure she’s dead?

  You think a bunch of kids could’ve survived these last months out there?

  The Esso bashed on the door again. Fucksake, we’re all freezing our tits off.

  Li said, I’m just not lying to myself anymore.

  Rich stood looking at her. She walked to the door, easily, steadied herself on the frame before she opened it.

  See? she said, with her forehead against the cold metal. I do belong in here.

  * * *

  The runny nose turned into a cold, turned into a low-grade fever and a drag in her bones. She couldn’t get herself into the van. The driver backed away, a couple of Essos called her out of the line. It was hard to tell who anyone was now, behind the masks, but she could see in their eyes that they didn’t think the masks would save them. They kept their distance walking her over to the sickbox. Coughbox, the women called it. Deathbox. Okay, she thought. This.

  She could hear it as she got closer. She wasn’t coughing yet, but soon she was. Soon every breath turned into a coughing fit. She lay on a cot someone didn’t need anymore and worked full-time on breathing. Not with her brain, just her body. Her body didn’t want to quit. All around her women were doing the same work, coughing up phlegm, coughing up blood, coughing till they couldn’t breathe and still coughing, a wet desperate sound.

  * * *

  Someone was moaning, an aaah aaah that came and went around spasms of coughing. Someone was asking for water, she thought it was Camila. Li was burning with cold and everything was heavy, her hand when she tried to lift the bottle, the blanket. Her neck and stomach hurt. Her lungs had fists and they were bashing at her temples trying to get out.

  * * *

  Something wet on her forehead. Blood? But it was cool, there were hands lifting her head, like she was a child.

  The truckie said, Hell of a spot for a date. The water was cold and heavy in her mouth and it tasted of nothing. She went away down somewhere.

  * * *

  When she came back up, Essos in coveralls and masks and gloves were carrying more sick women in and dragging dead women out to make room. The air in the container was foul. She felt paper-thin and all her muscles hurt. The water bottle was empty and she was so thirsty.

  Her knee crutch was beside her, when someone should have stolen it by now. She got up off the cot shakily and did up the straps and went outside.

  There was a different stench out there, something sweet and leathery mixed in with the dump rot. And smoke. It was still morning, the light grey and indeterminate, a strong wind gusting from the west. Li buttoned her jacket and turned the collar up. She saw bodies lined up by the fence and went over there. They lay uncovered on their backs, or curved against each other, the way they’d slept in the cold. Essos came and went, bringing more bodies. No one told her to report for shift. They moved past her like she was dead, too. She came closer and recognised faces. Jun, who cried when they shaved her head. Tammy, who told them to wake her when she snored. A woman she’d worked a double shift with on the smelter, shared a readybar with, never asked her name.

  Then an Esso dragged another body over and went away and left it there, and she wanted to say, No, you’re wrong about her, but she knew he was right.

  When the boat was sinking, Cami called to a man in the water and the man reached his arms up to catch her baby. Emilio was little but he had strong fingers, she unfastened them and held him over the side and he didn’t cry. He looked at her and she let him go, and a wave came and when it passed the man was still holding up his empty arms.

  Li felt a deep longing to lie down beside her. When the feeling got too strong she looked away from Cami, out through the fence. Saw more bodies in the next compound, and the next. There were fires in the No Go, smoke on the wind that carried a smell like burning hair and a smell like melting copper. She heard a vehicle heading back in towards maingate, heard dogs snarling.

  Behind her, Megan said, You were in there for three days. We’ve been burning bodies every day. I kept expecting to see you.

  Li rested her forehead against the wire. She said, Three days?

  Management quarantined themselves in the complex. Megan’s voice was flat. I saw the convoy heading out there two nights ago. Then she said, Benj is dead.

  Li turned around. Megan’s eyes were swollen and she wasn’t wearing a mask anymore. Li had watched Benj play footy once, had recognised him because he looked like his sister.

  They kept saying they were going to upgrade him. If he’d been in security compound with me he might not have got the cough. Megan wiped her eyes and nose on the back of a filthy hand. He told me I wasn’t trying hard enough to get him out.

  Did you see him?

  Khaled dumped his body, I didn’t even see his body. She looked away and Li saw a spasm go through her.

  She remembered waking Camila from her dream about her son, always the same dream. Holding onto her while Cami said, It gets darker and darker and his mouth is open but he never cries.

  Megan said, Medic wanted to see you if you came through it. He said it’s important.

  * * *

  She let Li through the first set of link gates. The rest of them were unlocked. In the other compounds she passed through, there were more bodies on the ground, more Essos dragging bodies. No one stopped her or asked where she was going. It was quiet, just the wind blowing rubbish around. The only labour she saw were queueing outside the food shed, but there was no smell of food from inside. There was no queue outside Medical, and no security. She knocked and went in.

  Rich lay on a mattress behind the desk, his mask pulled down. He twitched in his sleep. There was an empty cup on the floor beside him and a small yellow bottle half full of meds.

  He mumbled something. Said, No, I need it. You can’t. And shook his head and swore fluently.

  She said his name but he was lost in it. One hand started to shake. She stood, undecided, looked around, rather than watch him. At the IV stand beside the exam table, tube dangling. The hazardous-waste bin overflowing with gloves and masks and soiled cloths. Piles of paper and half-drunk cups of koffee on the desk.

  Rich started breathing faster, his hands clenching and unclenching. Get away from. There isn’t any. Then he shouted something and the shout brought him upright, fists ready. He looked at her, unfocused and breathing. After a moment he said her name, his voice
slurred with sleep. He said, I’m glad.

  You look like shit, she told him.

  He cleared his throat. Yeah, well you look about a hundred per cent more gorgeous than yesterday.

  She remembered the hands lifting her, the cool, the water. You were in the coughbox?

  I was for about ten seconds. It was disgusting in there, dunno how you put up with it. He groped for the empty cup, knocked the pills over. Squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them again, some of his alertness was back. He looked at the door. Anyone waiting?

  She shook her head. How many people have you treated for this?

  How many people have I treated? He said it back to her slowly and she thought he was going to put his head in his hands, but he pulled off the mask instead. His hand was still shaking. Well, we run out of everything a week ago – antibiotics, antivirals, whatever they were letting us have. He laughed. They give me a good supply of towelling offcuts, though. So I guess since the last time I saw you I been wiping a lot of foreheads with a lot of flannels and doing status updates for dead bodies. Is how many people I’ve treated for this.

  She emptied the koffee dregs from two cups and filled them with water at the sink. Drank down three cups straight and brought one back for him. You told Megan you wanted to see me.

  Yeah. He drank, nodded slowly. Yeah, I remembered something after you left the other day. I didn’t know if you wanted to hear it and then there wasn’t really time. He got up off the mattress and went over to the computer, pushed papers out of the way and leaned over the keyboard, running a search. After a minute he moved aside. You should sit.

  She didn’t know what she’d been expecting. Not a child. Not a photo of a child with buzzcut hair and brown eyes out of proportion in her too-thin face, thinner than any camp kid Li had seen.

  Li looked up at Rich. I don’t know who that is, she said.

  He nodded. She got brought in to me just after I took over as medic. Woman who brought her in said the kid turned up on her own in Family the week before. They heard one of the drivers found her wandering and snuck her in. She wasn’t in the system. They don’t tag the under-twelves, so once she was in, there’d be no reason management’d know.