Ironbark

  ‘You don’t have to say that if you don’t mean it,’ she says. ‘I’d rather you didn’t say anything you didn’t mean.’

  It’s not the start to the conversation I’d been hoping for. Trouble is, I’m no good on the sloppy stuff. I love you.

  I’m missing you. All of that. It’s hard to say. And I know women really get off on hearing that kinda thing. It’s not that I don’t feel exactly the same things that Kris says she’s feeling. It’s just that I’m not as good as her at saying them. I’ve tried to explain this in the past, but it doesn’t get me far. She believes you should talk about feelings. I reckon it’s good enough just to feel them, without constantly going on about it.

  ‘I do mean it,’ I say. ‘I miss you, heaps.’ There’s still silence, so I add, ‘I love you.’ Then she does laugh.

  ‘That sounds like it was dragged kicking and screaming from you,’ she says. And that is so typical of what I mean. Sometimes you just feel you’re wrong whatever you do. I get heaps when I don’t tell her I love her, then when I do it’s the wrong tone of voice or some such garbage. Who was it who said, ‘Women! Can’t live with them, can’t live with them’? I get all twisted up whenever me and Kris have these kinds of conversations, so I do what I normally do. I try to change the conversation. Sometimes it works.

  ‘No problem getting the phone from Janine, then?’

  ‘Justine.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘No. She’s been cool about it.’

  ‘That’s good. But hey, Kris, I do think we should get you a new phone.’

  ‘Look, we’ve talked about . . .’

  ‘Yeah, I know. And I’m sorry about the last time. Seriously. I was stressed out, is all. It’s weird being here.

  Like I’m cut off from everything. And so maybe I was taking it out on you. I shouldn’t have made assumptions about what you could afford. I’m sorry, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘So I thought that maybe I’d buy you a phone and send it to you. If they’ve invented post offices over here, that is.’ ‘That’s not really the point . . .’

  ‘I know. I know it isn’t. And hey, I’m not coming over the hotshot spending guy. If you want, you can pay me back a little at a time. But really, this is dumb. I’ve got cash and it’s not like it’s a present just for you. It’s more a present for me. So I can talk to you without worrying I’m going to have to go through Janine.’

  ‘Justine.’

  ‘Whatever. But you see what I mean, Kris? It makes sense.’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ll think about it.’

  ‘What’s to think about? I’ll just do it . . .’

  ‘I said I’ll think about it.’

  And that’s the time to throw in the towel, if you know what’s good for you. Believe me, I’ve been there and bought the T-shirt. So we chat about other stuff. Turns out Miss Millner did ring home to check the state of the emergency and Kris has copped an after-school as a result. I tell her about Granddad, and about driving the ute. I’m tempted to tell her about Richie, but I don’t. It’s sort of embarrassing and anyway, I don’t want her to worry. Needless to say, I don’t mention getting impossible text messages in the middle of the bush while being stalked by the bogeyman, either. I make it sound like I’m having a great time. I mean, I’m not having the worst time of my life. That would be the last time Dad and I went on holiday together. And the truth is, it isn’t bad here. Maybe I’m getting used to it. There’s a minor miracle somewhere in that last sentence. If you’d told me that I’d describe a place with no electricity, no shops and a ridiculous surfeit of trees as ‘not bad’ I’d have said you were on mind-altering substances.

  We have a pretty good conversation, really – me and Kris. Then, right at the end, she spoils it. She says, ‘Hi’ to someone and I can’t resist. I know I should, but I just can’t. Okay. Maybe I spoil it.

  ‘Who’s that?’ I say, and I try to keep my tone light. An innocent question.

  ‘Just Steve,’ she says, and although there are probably fifty guys called Steve in our school, I know immediately who she means. He’s this guy in Year 11. A hotshot footy star with chiselled features shooting everywhere. Intellectually, it would be a close call if you put him up against a house brick, but in terms of looks I have to admit he was towards the front of the queue when they were being dished out. And boy, does he know it? With an IQ of thirty-seven, he could be excused for thinking that his face would, by itself, make him attractive to all members of the opposite sex. Unfortunately, the opposite sex don’t appear to want to disabuse him of this notion.

  The guy hooks up constantly.

  But maybe it’s all that footy, all that competitiveness. He’s one of those guys who can’t stand it if a girl isn’t interested in him. Ninety-nine out of a hundred isn’t good enough. He’d have to go all out for the hundredth.

  Kris is the hundredth.

  ‘What did he want?’ I ask, and there’s a touch of snarl in my voice.

  ‘Nothing. He was just passing.’

  ‘Yeah, I could hear his knuckles scraping along the ground.’

  Kris laughs and the reception starts to break up. I check the signal strength, for all the good it’s going to do me, and one bar is flicking on and off.

  ‘Look, Kris . . .’ I say, but the connection’s gone. There’s a hissing from the phone, an empty hiss. She’s gone. I stare at what has become a useless piece of plastic and get a strong urge to see whether it’s more solid than the rock I’ve been sitting on. I’m serious.

  But I light another cigarette instead and tell myself over and over again that it’s cool, that it’s all cool. It isn’t though.

  I wait until the end of Kris’s lunchtime, but the bar doesn’t make another appearance.

  The bike ride down would be mad fun under other circumstances.

  It’s trickier riding downhill – you’ve got gravity helping you, so control of the bike is much more important. It’s all about the right gear and getting the clutch to bite at just the right second. For part of the way, I let her rip, the branches of the trees whipping my shirt and face. And a coupla times I ride over fallen branches, real slow, standing on the pedals and doing the whole dirt-biker bit. Course, it’s not a trail bike, so I can’t pull too many stunts and it’s got the manoeuvrability of a steamroller, but I don’t drop it. Given that it’s a few years since I’ve done this stuff, I’m pleased with myself. I haven’t forgotten how to do it. It must be like riding a bike or something.

  I stop about halfway down ’cos my legs are tired from standing all the time. It’s not just that, though. I can’t stop thinking about Kris and our conversations since I’ve been away. I think she’s cooling. Why else would she not text me? There had to have been opportunities, plenty of people who’d be willing to let her use their phone. Yet she didn’t. And the more I think about that, the more I reckon it must be because she doesn’t want to. I even start to think about Steve and how he must be sniffing around now I’m out of the picture. He will. That’s what he does.

  Maybe Kris isn’t texting me because she’s too busy with him. That would explain why she didn’t jump at the chance of a new mobile. I mean, what objections could she possibly have to that? And could it just be coincidence that he happened to be passing when I was on the phone to her?

  All this thinking makes me feel helpless. I’m starting to get depressed when I hear a noise off to my left. It’s not loud, not even remotely scary, but . . . I don’t know. It doesn’t feel right, somehow. Not a part of the forest, but something intruding on it. I scan the foliage all around, and think I see something moving in the distance. There are lots of things moving in the forest, I remind myself. But I get on the bike – I’ve got it propped against a tree with the engine still running – and point it down the hill again.

  I cut the engine when I get close to the shacks and roll it the rest of the way. There’s no sign of Granddad, so I’m hoping he’s still grabbing zees. I park the bike exactly where it wa
s and give it the once-over. It doesn’t look like it’s been out, though the hot engine is making all these clicking sounds. No problem when it’s cooled. It’s dirty, sure, but it was dirty before. I scuff over the tyre tracks, so I reckon I’ll be okay there, unless Granddad goes off into the forest, sniffing for spoor or something.

  I take the key out of the ignition and hide it under a log. Given that the bike hasn’t been started in a hundred years, it seems unlikely he’ll notice. It’s a chance I’m prepared to take, anyway. I brush leaves and dirt off my clothes and saunter back to the shacks, the most casual dude in the world. Actually, I’m starting to feel better about Kris. It’s driving me nuts that I can’t check the situation out for myself, but there’s one thing about her I know for sure. She speaks her mind. If there was something going on with Steve, she’d tell me. She’s honest. I fix that thought in my head.

  Granddad is sitting on the verandah as though he’s welded to the seat. He barely glances up as I approach.

  ‘Whoa, Gramps,’ I say, plopping myself down into the chair next to him. ‘Sleep well, or did you make a few mistakes?’ I try to keep the conversation light, ’cos I’m a bit worried he’ll start on the ‘I see dead people’ thing again. He doesn’t say anything, just chews his cud for about ten minutes. I reckon the lie down has cured his talking jag, because he looks like he’s set in that position for the foreseeable future.

  ‘Didn’t sleep,’ he says eventually. ‘If you’re hungry, there’s bread and stuff in the kitchen. I’ve eaten.’

  You’re still eating, I think as I watch him munch away on whatever’s stuck in his dentures.

  ‘I’ll grab something in a minute,’ I say.

  ‘Where’d you get off to?’

  ‘Oh, just a walk in the bush. You know, drinking in nature, hugging the odd tree.’

  He stares at me and I get this strong feeling he knows I’ve been on the bike. Maybe Gran dobbed me in. So I change the subject.

  ‘Any chance of goin’ into town tomorrow, Gramps?’

  I’ve made a decision, see. I’ll get Kris a phone anyway. I mean, what the hell. If she doesn’t want it, she can throw it away. And I want to get it sent as quickly as possible.

  ‘We only went yesterday.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. But I forgot things. Toothbrush and stuff.

  Plus, I need to do some laundry.’ It seems a good idea to play the personal hygiene card. Old people can’t resist it, in my experience. And, frankly, it’s not a complete lie. My clothes are starting to smell. ‘I don’t know what you do, slap the bejesus out of your washing on river rocks or something, but I need to get my jocks done before I start to foul the atmosphere. That place we went to yesterday has a laundromat, I take it?’

  Granddad nods and continues chewing.

  ‘I’ll pay for petrol,’ I add as a clincher.

  ‘Okay,’ he says eventually.

  Mission accomplished, so I push my luck further.

  ‘What about another go in the ute this arvo? Kill some time, hone the old skills.’

  ‘Nah. I reckon not,’ he says, but he doesn’t give an explanation and I don’t ask for one, just in case he mentions the sound of a distant motorbike. Instead, I fix myself a cheese sandwich. While I’m there I go through the cupboards and check out the pantry and the state of the cooking utensils. I need to get the basics. A kitchen shop would be good, but I don’t hold out much hope. I even daydream about a food processor, until I remember there’s nothing here to power it. I’ll settle for a good mortar and pestle.

  After I eat, I leave Granddad examining the trees and lie down in my shack. I even sleep a little, which just goes to show how bored I am. Then I play a game on my phone, but it’s budget and I only play a couple of rounds.

  I check my watch and it seems like the second hand’s ploughing through treacle, or something. So I get up. No alternative.

  We sit on the verandah in our two chairs, which makes a welcome change.

  ‘I’ll cook again tonight, if you like, Gramps,’ I say.

  He gets this panicky look on his face, as if the prospect of two consecutive nights without steak is giving him palpitations, so I put his mind at ease.

  ‘I’ll do steak. No worries.’

  That settles it. I don’t tell him that I’ve got a sauce planned and we’re going to forgo the boiled spuds for something slightly more exciting. That stuff is on a need-to-know basis. Granddad eases himself further down into his chair and fixes his gaze onto the bush. It looks like he might never speak again, but I’m in the mood, so I gee him up a little.

  ‘You like the trees, hey, Gramps?’ I say.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘What type are they, then? Around here?’

  I’m almost interested, I swear to God.

  ‘Ironbarks, mainly, in this part of the forest. Plus stringy-bark and casuarina on drier slopes. Silver wattle and blackwood in gullies. Up high you can find stands of ancient myrtle.’

  I’m back in Discovery Channel territory, but I’ve only got myself to blame. I try to dredge up an intelligent comment.

  ‘Ironbark, huh?’ is the best I can manage.

  ‘You’d like ironbark,’ says Granddad. ‘It’s tough, like you. After you’ve cut it, when it’s dried out, you’ll bend a nail if you try to hammer one in.’

  Was that another crack?

  ‘Hey,’ I say, as if I’ve just had a brilliant idea. ‘Will you teach me how to roll a ciggie?’ It’s a sudden conversational detour, but worth the attempt. Anyway, I’ve always thought rolling your own was pretty cool. Plus, it would be doubly cool when I get back to school. There’s all these kids smoking the expensive brands – even Russian Sobranies, those perfumy things that come in the pastel colours. I’m not kidding. I’ve seen them and damn near cacked my pants laughing, particularly when one guy got out this gold-plated cigarette holder. I reckon it would be awesome to whip out a dog-eared pack of baccy and roll up in front of them. Knowing the sheep in most of my classes, they’d all be doing it in a week or so. That’s the thing with expensive schools. Being trendy is a religion.

  Of course, Granddad will probably tell me to get stuffed. On the one hand, he tends to mind his own business. Then again, he can suddenly turn moral on me, like with buying me smokes and grog. Difficult to know which way he’s going to turn. As it happens, it’s no worries. He doesn’t say a word, but gets his pouch and goes through the routine. It looks easy. Lay the paper out, get a decent bunch of tobacco, tease it along the fold, roll it between fingers and thumb, tuck one side of the paper over and roll it up. Quick lick along the gummy strip and there ya have it. A pretty cool rollie. It certainly doesn’t look like rocket science, so I give it a whirl.

  I go through the steps he tells me, but I can’t get it to work right. There’s loose tobacco falling out all over the place and then I can’t tuck the paper in nice and tight. It takes ten minutes and at the end I’ve got this sad, drooping apology for a smoke. It’s as wrinkled as Granddad and twice as bent. Unsmokeable. Absolutely unsmokeable. Even Granddad smiles at it. Well, I say smile, but it’s nothing quite as dramatic as that. There’s this general rearrangement of wrinkles around his mouth and he quickly smothers it, but I reckon I know a smile when I nearly see one. It occurs to me it’s the first time I’ve seen him smile since I got here.

  Are we talking serious bonding, or what?

  I give it another few tries before I get one that even looks like a candidate for sticking in your mouth. It’s still bent over like crazy, but I’m kinda proud of it. Granddad gives this little nod as we look at the sad, twisted thing and I take this as approval, so I light up. He then takes the pouch off me and rolls this perfect cylinder in about two seconds. He does it with one hand, the posing dropkick.

  I nearly cough my lungs up and send them flying over the fence, the tobacco is that strong.

  ‘Jeez, Gramps,’ I say when I can get enough air into me. ‘What is it with this stuff? I mean, I know smoking kills, but why are you in such a
rush?’

  ‘Those things you smoke are full of chemicals. This is pure tobacco.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I reply. ‘I feel positively healthy smoking this. Maybe I can get them on prescription.’

  We smoke another. I wouldn’t like to bet too much on it, but I think the second is slightly better than the first. It should be. It takes me fifteen minutes to roll it. And this time my lungs don’t feel like they’re being kneaded in concentrated sulphuric acid.

  I get three fires going afterwards. One in the front room, the stove in the kitchen and the one in my bedroom. It’s kinda fun. I roll up newspaper and then put kindling on top, a decent-sized log on top of that and set fire to the paper. They all take. Three out of three. I’m getting the hang of this frontier business. Give me a couple of weeks and I’ll be putting out bushfires, skinning wallabies with my teeth and getting curiously interested in line-dancing.

  The meal goes pretty well. I find fresh herbs growing in Granddad’s vegie plot and mix them up with grated potatoes. There are green beans as well and I wash and top and tail them. I’ll sauté them in garlic butter right at the end. Granddad is of the let’s-boil-’em-to-buggery school when it comes to vegetables, and he needs educating. I fold an egg and some milk into the potato mix, shape them into small patties and fry them on the stove top. I’m getting to like this stove top. The only problem is there’s no way to regulate the heat. It’s all the one temperature – like the core of Venus. So I’ve got to be careful, otherwise everything burns. While the potato’s cooking, I beat the living daylights out of a couple of steaks and stick a pan on with butter, milk, onions, herbs and a few other things that are a sauce-maker’s trade secret. I turn the potato patties like a maniac and then, just when they’re nicely browned, flip them onto a metal cooling tray on the stove. I reckon that’ll help them cook through.

  The steaks are good quality, better than anything I’d get in Melbourne, I have to admit. Granddad likes them coated in five centimetres of carbon, but I want them medium rare, so a knife slides through them and there’s blood on the plate. In the coupla minutes they’re sizzling, I drop the beans in a pan on the stove and toss them around, stirring the sauce and turning the steaks. It’s a bit mad at that stage, and I could do with an extra pair of hands, but it all comes together. I slide the food onto plates, hide the barbecue sauce where Granddad will never find it, and serve him his tucker.