Flock

by Ellen Van Neerven

  Nathan, quiet, stared down at the beanie in his lap. He knew where this was going.

  ‘Those stone tools along the river – the ones yer ancestors knocked up – they made the best duck-farts. They are like the perfect type of rock for it.’ Sharkey laughed to himself and looked over at Nathan expectantly.

  ‘Me and me cousins would have thrown thousands of them into the river, in those days. I doubt there would be any left around there now. But ya can’t get away with that anymore,’ he said, chuckling. ‘Can ya?’

  ‘Nuh,’ was all Nathan could muster. He noticed his hands were trembling.

  ‘Hope I’m not offending ya,’ said Sharkey smugly.

  Nathan shrugged, and looked back out of the window.

  Sharkey slurped up the last of his drink and dropped it on the floor. He turned the wipers up a notch to combat the now-pelting rain. ‘These bloody cans are going down a bit too nicely,’ he said. ‘Let’s hope the local cop isn’t out and about tonight.’

  For the next few kilometres neither of them spoke, and Nathan was grateful for the peace. As they got close to the top of the pass, Sharkey grabbed another cigarette from the dash console, and put it to his mouth. He fumbled with the lighter and it fell to the floor in front of him. Nathan watched him stretch down for it, his fingers probing the dirty, worn carpet below his seat. As he dropped his head below the wheel to take a look, the ute swerved again, and this time the tray clipped the steep, rocky wall of the pass. The back end slid out, fishtailing, and Sharkey tried to correct the vehicle by swinging heavily on the wheel. The ute lost traction on the wet road, flipped onto its roof and went skidding into the guardrail on the cliff side of the road. Even from his upside-down position, Nathan could see the rail buckle and wave as they struck.

  For a moment, the only sound was a hissing from the tyres or the engine and the scattering of window glass. Within seconds, though, a droning sound rose, and grew steadily louder. Nathan looked over at Sharkey, who was also hanging upside down. Sharkey’s eyes were glazed over. His nose was broken and bent at an obscene angle, and his wavy, black hair was plastered across his wobbling face with blood and something else.

  Honey.

  The drone was turning into an angry roar. Nathan felt something dangling against the back of his neck. He reached around and felt for the hood of his bee suit and drew it over his head. His hands were shaking as he fumbled to pull the zips from the back around to the front, sealing it off.

  He twisted his head to see the beehives lying scattered along the road, some piled up against the guardrail. The individual boxes had come apart and the frames were oozing their sticky, amber contents onto the asphalt. The light from the headlamps dimmed as the dazed bees took flight. Their roar was deafening. Sharkey was crying. The way his lips were drawn back from his teeth as his white, panicking eyes took in the scene before him reminded Nathan of the pony his sister had, when he was a kid.

  ‘Oh God … what … shit, help me, Nathan. Ya gotta get me outta ’ere!’ Sharkey screamed above the din of the bees.

  Nathan released his own seatbelt and, holding on to it, eased himself down to the ute’s velour ceiling. He kicked the shattered windscreen out with his foot. Bees flooded in.

  ‘Hey, where – hey, where are ya going? You can’t leave me.’ Sharkey’s voice had a strange calmness – a sure sign that he’d lost it.

  Nathan turned back to look at him. Sharkey had given up trying to release his seatbelt and was frantically swatting at the bees attacking his face. Nathan began to crawl out of the ute and was shocked at the sight in front of him. The headlights were almost completely blacked out by the dense swarm of bees. Their frenzied movement created a breeze that Nathan could feel even through the mesh of his veil.

  The crumpled ute pitched and squeaked as Sharkey thrashed in his seat. Nathan crawled through the wall of bees and out onto the road. He slip-slided his way through the honey and smashed-up wax until he reached the guardrail and pulled himself up. On his feet now and with the dim lights of the ute behind him, he stumbled up the road into the dark. As if on cue, the rain stopped. The noise of the bees grew quieter as he rounded the first bend.

  With a steady hand, he unzipped the hood of his bee suit and let it slide from his head. His beanie dropped to the ground and he retrieved it, holding it to his chest. The air felt good and cool on his face. A car would come along soon.

  As he walked up the dark road in a calm daze, a faint smile came to his lips. What is the Aboriginal word for honey?

  The Healing Tree

  Jared Thomas

  Jared Thomas is an Indigenous author, playwright, poet, and academic. His recent releases include Songs That Sound Like Blood and the Game Day series written with NBA player Patty Mills. In 2015 his book Calypso Summer, winner of the 2013 black&write! Writing Fellowship, joined the International Youth Library White Raven list. Jared’s writing explores the power of belonging and culture.

  This one here’s a real good tree. This eucalypt with the red stem. You chew on it and it keep you good all winter, boy. You chew. Taste good, iny? If you real sick you dig out these roots. See, they soft and hold lots of medicine. You mash up the root, mix it with some kawi and drink it down. When the old people used to get sick, arthritis and that, we’d boil up water and mix some of it in with ’em, in their baths, take away their aches and pains good and proper. Yep, this yirta here’s a real good medicine tree, cure almost anything, even a broken heart.

  Alf sat on the front porch of Cyril Lindsay House, Aboriginal Sobriety Group Hostel, looking out from the cloud of a freshly lit cigarette. Every day since arriving in Adelaide from Melbourne, Alf looked at the hills thoughtfully, wanting to be cradled by them. Alf had not returned to Adelaide or his home, Baroota, for twenty years but still he remembered his way back, the stretch of road that meets the rise of the ranges, the first glimpse of the gulf over the hill, just about every tree and turn along the way as if he had been there just yesterday. He recalled the smell of his home, the scent of the sea and dust skipping through the saltbush. He remembered the trees, the gums and native pines sitting by the soft edges of the creek bed or contorting through the rocks and slate of the hills. Alf especially remembered his father’s uses for the trees. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the aroma of lemon-scented gum, wafting from the nearby South Terrace Park Lands. In his mind’s eye he could see the creek bed that he used to play in as a boy. It was full of frogs and yabbies and he was just about to grab a yabby when a ball of phlegm, sour with tobacco, hit the back of his throat and pulled his thoughts back to reality. ‘Fuckin’ pulyus,’ muttered Alf between fits of coughing. He caught a lungful of air and then spat on a rose bush before taking another long draw on his cigarette.

  Alf appreciated the mornings he spent alone on the porch as the other hostel residents slept. It was his only opportunity for peace and quiet, a glimpse of the normal life of an old man. When the boys woke they would start talking about where to score drugs, a drink, a fight, a woman. They found most of these things in the action films that hostel residents watched from morning to night. Alf thought of all the residents as boys, boys pretending to be criminals, boys finding comfort and security in stories of bank robberies they’d got away with, women they’d had, fights they’d won, made-up reputations. Alf listened and was entertained by the stories of fast cars and women, schemes, plans and robberies. He was most excited by the stories of the boys in the Aboriginal Sobriety Group Boxing Program and their dreams of title fights. Alf knew it wasn’t worth preaching to the boys at the hostel about clean living – his own track record didn’t exactly stand as a good example. In his youth he’d spent almost more time behind bars than out of prison and there he was, a fifty-five-year-old man, in a hostel, no home or kin to go to and without time on his side. When the boys talked about fast cars and women he just told them, ‘Well, good luck if you catch them things.’ Spurred on by Alf’s lack of belief in
their plans, the boys promised Alf that one day they’d get that fast car, the pretty woman. Alf knew he had wasted too much time dreaming about those things.

  Some days Alf enjoyed playing along with the boys, telling them a few stories of his own. Alf told one young fella, Jamie, about the time he fought Lionel Rose.

  ‘Lionel Rose was going to retire, see, but then he seen me flog three bouncers in a Kalgoorlie pub. Next thing I knew Rose’s manager was there, real rich and a fancy talker he was too, like Don King. And this Don King-type fella told me that he’d give me this briefcase full of money if I fought Rose. There was a lot of money in that briefcase.’

  ‘So what’d you say to him, Alfy, what did you say?’

  ‘Well, a man would do anything for a drink when he’s thirsty, eh, so I told ’im that if he bought me a few beers right then and there that I’d bust up Lionel Rose real bad.’

  ‘And did ya, Alfy, did ya bust him up?’

  ‘Well, by the time that fight-night come I was real fit. I looked Lionel in the eye like a wild tiger when I jumped in that boxing ring.’

  ‘Then …’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Then what did you do?’

  ‘Then I jumped out of that boxing ring.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Then I jumped on my bike and I rode all the way to Alice Springs before noticing that my chain was missing.’

  ‘Hey, Alfy, you’re full of shit!’

  ‘Well, you’re the dumb prick who believed I’d fight Lionel Rose. What you reckon I am – some crazy old bastard?’

  A few days ago, after picking up a new tweed jacket from the Salvation Army shop, Alf started making his way down Hindley Street to Rundle Mall. When he saw the Exeter Hotel on Rundle Street Alf was reminded of a true story about his younger days that he could share with the hostel boys. Before deciding to enter the pub, Alf stood and watched people enter and exit feeling confused. Once he’d been served he walked out of the Exeter with a pint of lemon squash and took a seat at one of the pub’s footpath tables. Alf couldn’t believe the types of people who were being served inside the pub; fellas with coloured hair, women with no hair at all. Alf thought of the changes that had happened since he had last been in Adelaide, a time when dark coloured men, unless they happened to be Indian, could not be seen let alone get served at the Exeter or any other hotel for that matter.

  That night Alf recounted his memory of the Exeter to the boys back at the hostel.

  ‘I remembers when me and some fellas visited Adelaide and we ducked behind the Exeter Hotel and wrapped towels around our heads. Wobblin’ our heads from side to side we walked into the hotel and said to the publican, “Two bottle of beer, thank you very much, two bottle of beer.” Unawares that we were thuras, the barman handed over the grog when we gave him the bunda, see. Then me and the fellas went and got charged up at the park. True as God we were only boys but that barman thought we was real Indian men.’

  Alf knew better than anyone that getting away with tricks like impersonating an Indian man to buy grog was the beginning of his end. At the age of twenty Alf was dousing himself in grog every day and thinking himself wiser than all in his drunken stupor. He was less wise as a man than he was at age ten, when he listened to his elders and took responsibility for his actions. The old people ordered Alf to stop drinking and they were prepared to exile him from his community if he didn’t heed their advice. One old uncle took it upon himself to teach Alf a lesson in order to save Alf from himself.

  Alf’s uncle woke him up early in the morning by clanging two of the many beer bottles that were scattered around Alf’s bed on the bare, hard dirt. Alf was still drunk and thirsty for water when he stirred but Alf’s uncle wouldn’t let Alf have a drink from his waterbag or Nhatapilka, the nearby creek. Instead Alf’s uncle held his waterbag selfishly to his side and dragged Alf up Kaparinya, the hill at Port Germein, overlooking the gulf. Alf was near dead when he reached the top of the hill and as soon as he sat exhausted on the ground at the top of the hill he asked for some kawi. Alf’s uncle took a long mouthful of water from his waterbag and then just stood laughing at Alf. ‘Why won’t you let me drink?’ asked Alf. The uncle wouldn’t answer Alf’s question, telling him only to be quiet or else he would be punished more severely than what was already in store for him.

  Alf sat on that hill for the best part of three very hot days without drinking or eating. Alf’s uncle wouldn’t let him sleep on the first night. Alf just had to sit there thirsty and patient, upright on the hill overlooking the ocean. In the morning, the uncle sipped from his waterbag, teasing the thirsty Alf. In the afternoon while keeping an eye on Alf, the uncle went down to the sea to swim and fish. Alf was so parched that he tilted back his head to let his sweat roll to his lips. In the evening the uncle ate his fish and drank some water in front of Alf while only sharing one cockle with him.

  Alf woke wearily the next morning with his head slumped upon his chest. As the day wore on he could hear his heart thumping harder and the heat rising hotter through the earth beneath him with every breath that he drew. Noticing Alf’s exhaustion, his uncle took the opportunity to sneak up to Alf and place a beer bottle in front of him before sneaking away. The uncle, out of Alf’s sight, whistled to catch his attention. Alf’s head lifted gingerly to see his uncle drinking from his waterbag through a haze of heat. As Alf’s head slumped down to avoid torture and humiliation he caught sight of the beer bottle full of liquid in front of him. Alf lurched for the bottle and let the contents overflow into his mouth. Seconds later he dropped the bottle to the ground and began spewing.

  As Alf’s stomach shuddered and spew hung in streams from his mouth, his uncle walked over to him, taking the bottle that he had filled with seawater and holding it to Alf’s face. The uncle played the trick another time on Alf that day and once again he drank the seawater that he thought was beer and again he spewed. Late in the night, the uncle allowed Alf three cockles and from his waterbag poured three splashes of water into Alf’s cupped hands for him to drink. As Alf lay down to sleep, he listened to the water lapping against the shore and visualised waves of fresh water crashing upon his tongue. With each wave that he imagined, a tear flowed free.

  Alf woke the next morning to find another beer bottle placed in front of him and his sneaky uncle standing over him and drinking greedily from his waterbag. Alf wanted to drink the contents of the bottle but instead pushed it over. Later that day, thinking that he was going to die, Alf raised his eyes to find his uncle’s eyes fixed upon him and another beer bottle, full of liquid, placed before him.

  ‘It’s all right,’ said his uncle, ‘You can drink it, it’s kawi.’

  But Alf didn’t believe his uncle and would not touch the beer bottle. Alf’s uncle tried to convince him that the liquid within the beer bottle was safe to drink but still Alf wouldn’t touch it. Eventually, feeling sorry for Alf and convinced that Alf would never again touch a beer bottle, the uncle cradled the exhausted Alf in his arms and let him drink his fill of fresh water from the waterbag.

  Alf didn’t drink grog again. Not for another ten years, until after the 1967 referendum. Grog was the new religion and Alf visited its church every day. He could always find his spirituality in the bottom of a glass or a can but still couldn’t pick up a beer bottle. And when the old people told him to stop drinking he cheekily replied, ‘I’m not drinking, I’m just sipping.’

  Sick of everyone telling him what to do, Alf took off to the bright lights of Sydney and Melbourne. The only thing he found there was more drinking, crime and time inside.

  Every day, Alf sits on the porch of Cyril Lindsay House and it still feels like he is inside a prison. Some days it feels like his uncle is punishing him again. Alf believes he is sitting on that hill waiting for death. His old bones ache and his lungs cry. Sometimes he listens to the stories of the boys. Sometimes they take his mind off his sickness, his heartache an
d dreams that just flashed by. He waits for an old friend to take him home. The old friend never comes. These days he dreams only of the yirtas, the trees. All he wants to do is chew on their leaves hungrily, hoping they’ll fix his broken heart.

  Glossary

  Terms from the Nukunu language

  Baroota

  site of old Nukunu mission

  bunda

  money. Origins uncertain. Perhaps derived from Jamaica. Widely used in South Australia.

  kawi

  water

  pulyu

  smoke

  thura

  Aboriginal man

  yirta

  tree and also used generally for bird

  Wildflower Girl

  Alf Taylor

  Alf Taylor is a Nyoongar writer and member of the Stolen Generation. He is the author of three collections of poetry and short stories: Singer Songwriter, Winds, and Long Time Now (published in Spain as Voz del Pasado). His memoir, God, the Devil and Me, was published in February 2021. He has given readings of his work at writers’ festivals and other events in Australia, England, France, India, and Spain.

  Grandma Polly could see the concern on her daughter’s face and could see that her daughter was playing dice with the devil. But how could she stop her? Ada told her mother that she was taking her two children to the wildflower show and that she wouldn’t be long away, and as usual Queenie would be the first to give her a bunch of precious flowers. Ada’s only thought was the excitement of Queenie for the wildflowers. Grandma Polly nodded as she was told, in a not-sure act of bravado, that Ada would keep a lookout for the troopers or the policemen, or ‘boogie men’ as they were referred to by the tribe. Ada hugged her mother, and her mother sensed that this girl is flirting with an evil that is not too far from our boundaries.