by Averil Kenny
In the spring holidays, a story circulated that Fable had been out at night with the Lagorio twins riding the cane trains and jumping off at bridge crossings for the pure thrill of it! On the first day back at school, the rumour became legend – confirmed by Vince Lagorio, after Marco refused to be drawn.
No one could remember another Noah girl doing such a thing.
That was the problem with Fable Hamilton. She just wasn’t . . . normal. She hardly seemed a threat at all. Nonetheless, most girls were determined to despise Fable for so successfully shirking the mould, and for her ostentatious strawberry beauty.
Fable thought all the fuss about train-riding and creek-jumping was, frankly, dangerous. Someone’s mother was bound to mention it to Sonnet or Olive down the street, and then all bets were off. There was even a story doing the rounds that she’d been out ‘pigging’ with the Ravelli kids, which was rubbish. Fable never wanted to see a wild pig slaughtered! She’d only snuck out of her window that full-moon night – with an under-blanket pillow effigy left guarding her sunroom – to hunt moonbows at the Glade. It wasn’t her fault the Ravellis’ pig dogs had hunted her, instead.
Fable wasn’t trying to draw any attention at all. But hanging out with the boys, she had access to all the wilds of Noah Vale. Were she to trail the local girls, none of whom had invited her anyway, she’d be loitering at Noah Vale Public Baths, hoping one of the lifeguards would notice her in a halter-neck swimsuit. She didn’t even own one!
Fable could spend all day with the boys, or avoid them for a week, and none of them seemed to begrudge her either way. They didn’t expect gossip or forced gaiety; simply grabbed their towels or fishing lines, and went. It suited Fable to a tee.
Every day so far this summer, there’d been a new adventure. And the best was yet to come; Raff Hull would soon be home, and then the Glade Gang would re-form.
Fable had positioned herself perfectly for his arrival.
*
The week of Christmas brought with it news of Raff’s homecoming, and hot on his heels, a tropical storm wheeling in from the Coral Sea: Cyclone Iris. The postmaster had hung out the red warning pennant, sending Sonnet into a predictable flap and flurry.
Sonnet dragged the girls with her into the General Store to assemble cyclone essentials – along with everyone else in Noah. Hadley’s was chockers! Fable wandered, overwhelmed, through the crammed aisles, past bare shelves and barely contained excitement. With only hours to spare, the whole town was prepping!
Having lost Sonnet and Plum in the madding crowd, Fable absconded for the exit. First, though, she had to get through all the chinwaggers blocking up the narrow shop door. Hot anxiety crawled up her back.
Get. Me. Out. Of. Here!
Spying the door held open from the outside, Fable saw her chance. She took a breath, tucked in her head and dived into the stream of townsfolk, shouldering her way towards the rectangle of light. Humid air and extravagant sunshine hit her face as Fable looked up to thank the door’s holder – who was already smiling down upon her.
‘G’day . . .’ blurted her traitorous lips, having never uttered the broad colloquialism in her life.
‘Mate,’ Raff finished, with amused inflection.
‘Glad to see you’re finally making yourself useful around here,’ Fable said.
He laughed, but the crowd carried her out before he could make his rejoinder. Not until Fable was kerbside at the Holden could she turn back, heart hammering, for another glimpse.
He was still there, holding open the door, embroiled in conversation.
Rafferty, Rafferty, Rafferty, Rafferty.
Her eyes drank their fill of him for five heady minutes. Three times he looked directly her way. The first two glances swept past with a smiling familiarity, but the third look stalled on her person; lingering much, much longer, before a flush of male awareness made him turn carefully away.
It was a reaction Fable recognised well by now in the grown men who passed her on the street, though never before had she comprehended that look so clearly.
Heat, not of high summer, threw her face into full colour.
Fable was not the same as she had been.
*
At home, a drill sergeant was barking out cyclone-preparation orders: Fill the bathtub with water! Mattresses off beds for the shelter! All windows taped! Prepare the candles! Double-check the first-aid kit! Stack the cans of food! Ports packed, in case we need to flee rising floodwaters! Clear the garden of possible projectiles!
Who Sonnet was trying to prove her cyclone-preparing prowess to was obvious. Earlier, Plum had protested tearfully at being hauled away from Aunty Ov and Gav for the duration of the storm. Olive had deferred to the jurisdiction of her niece with a tight chin.
Fable pressed her forehead against a window criss-crossed with adhesive tape. The weather was fast deteriorating – the bright, burning day, doused by rain, smouldered now in eerie, restless embers. Darkening clouds were sucked to the canvas edge by the approaching tempest. Marauding gales whipped palm fronds about like ribbons. The dark jungle wall swayed and reared, a beast, sensing danger.
Protected as their valley was by steep mountain sentinels, it hardly seemed possible that the storm would find them here. And yet, their hand-drawn tracking map, meticulously updated at each new emergency broadcast, showed Iris circling ever closer; Noah Vale marked as prey in an open field.
A terse voice issued from the radio. Fable listened, without turning, to the Weather Bureau’s three-hourly advice on the cyclone’s latest position. ‘Forewarned is forearmed,’ the voice said gravely. ‘This will be a powerful blow.’
Fable imagined the deep gorge at the top of the valley rippling with anticipation. The rains would fill the ravine, flood the creek, and spread, irresistibly, towards their cottage. She shivered with pleasure.
Sonnet was engrossed in the construction of a makeshift shelter – dragging the dining table to the bathroom, lining it with mattresses and pillows. The thought of being stuck in such intimate quarters all night with Sonnet was untenable. Fable had built herself a nest in the claw-foot bath, but Bossy Britches was having none of that. She didn’t even seem to care that Fable would rather die than jam herself in beside the loo, and worse, Sonnet.
A gale-driven splatter of rain against the windowpane made Fable push harder against the glass. For there, charging down the hill, with an agitation rarely witnessed, was Cyclone Olive. By the time Fable had opened the door, however, Olive was perfectly calm; manner befitting a fine lady out for a gentle stroll. Only the tight tremble at her chin hinted at anything else. Fable masked a smile.
‘Oh, Son-net, Olive’s here!’
Plum flew up the hallway to greet her aunt. Sonnet appeared a moment too late, forehead tight, towels hoisted under her arm.
‘Just checking in,’ Olive breezed, Plum already clasped possessively to her side. ‘Making sure you don’t need help with anything.’
‘All good. Finishing up now.’
‘Must be something I can do. Such a big thing facing your first cyclone all alone! And you don’t even have stay-cables on here, or extra nails in your roof. Sure you wouldn’t feel more secure at Heartwood?’
‘You and Gav have spent enough time drilling cyclone preparedness into me, I’m sure we can handle it. Anyway, Gav said this cottage has withstood more than its fair share of crossings – “a seasoned survivor” were his words.’
‘Yes, Gav did say that.’ Olive buried a kiss in Plum’s curls. ‘Naughty Uncle Gav, such a boaster. Any problems getting the old crystal wind chime down off the porch?’ Olive asked, nodding towards the discordant clangour.
Sonnet launched, but Olive was already making her break for the door, Plum securely in hand.
‘Not yet!’ Sonnet said, tailgating Olive. ‘It’s next on my list.’
The chimes shuddered and peeled in another gust.
‘Should’ve taken this old thing down years ago,’ Olive tutted. ‘It’ll be a missile
through your window, and once you’ve lost a window, the house is in a world of trouble.’
‘Yep, taking it down in a jiffy,’ Sonnet said, hands extended for Plum.
‘I want to stay with Aunty Olive!’ Plum cried, arms circling Olive’s waist
‘She can go with me. One less worry on your mind tonight.’
But Sonnet was in her own domain this stormy eve. ‘Come, Plum, we have to finish making your dolly’s hidey-hole!’ She levered her sister’s hands off Olive with smiling force, hustling away.
Olive mirrored Plum’s mournful expression.
‘You’re going to have trouble getting that chime down. I don’t want you wobbling up on a chair.’
‘Thanks for checking on us! All under control here!’
The screen door squealed shut.
No sooner was Olive out of sight than the clouds opened thunderously.
*
Sonnet’s victory lasted a half-hour. As premature darkness fell over the wind-lashed valley, Gav stomped onto the porch in gumboots.
‘Now, let’s see about this blinkin’ wind chime.’
Sonnet prevaricated at the door as Plum throttled into her uncle’s sodden embrace.
The chime was down in moments and jammed away in a cupboard. This time, however, Plum refused Sonnet’s reaching hands ‘No! I want to go to Aunty Olive’s!’
‘Oh, Plum-pie, ’course you can. Aunty Olive sent a raincoat,’ he said, fishing out a tartan mackintosh and hood. To his credit, the glance he gave Sonnet was abashed.
Gav looked expectantly Fable’s way next. Sonnet flinched and withdrew, without looking at Fable.
‘You coming?’ Gav asked, large hands struggling with Plum’s small belt.
Fable listened for the sound of Sonnet kicking walls inside – something not unheard of in such instances – and imagined herself nestled luxuriously in the bosom of Heartwood, waited upon by their aunt, feeling more a child than she ever could beneath her sister’s watchful eye.
From inside, a furious screech of adhesive tape made Fable start.
She sighed. ‘Thanks, Uncle Gav, but think I might see it out here.’
Gav winked, pushing himself to a stand. ‘Listen to Sonnet, ’kay? She’s got a smart head on her shoulders.’
In the privacy of her room, Fable opened her art journal to a blank page. She smoothed the paper, considering the nib of her pencil. How then to draw Iris, training malevolent eye upon their lonely cottage?
*
Within the hour, they’d lost power. The lights browned, flickered and died; the pedestal fan whirred to a halt. The sudden, humid silence in the midst of the tumult was stifling. Sonnet appeared at Fable’s side in a jostling glow of light. She set a candle on Fable’s windowsill, and leaned to inspect the drawing covered by an indignant hand. A crash in the garden made both sisters peer into the darkness, though only their reflections – awed, avoiding each other’s – could be seen.
‘We’re getting trashed out there,’ Sonnet said, too loudly for their airless proximity. ‘There’ll be a hell of a clean-up once it blows over.’
How inordinately pleased Sonnet was at the prospect! It made Fable’s own delight in the storm feel childish. Fable shrugged and adjusted her candle’s position so that Sonnet fell into shadow.
*
Another emergency broadcast brought the sisters together at the kitchen bench. Fable tracked the advice coordinates. ‘But it looks like she’s turning more south-west – we’ll miss the direct hit.’
Sonnet snapped the page out of her hand and studied it herself. Their shared disappointment was palpable.
‘You never know with these things,’ Sonnet said. ‘We should bunker down in the bathroom, just in case.’
Fable sighed, following after her.
In the bathroom, Fable planted herself in the claw-foot tub, ignoring the surfeit of padded space under Sonnet’s dining table. She pulled the shower curtain across to form a partition.
Rain battered the cottage in waves. In their muggy epicentre, a perspiring sheen formed thickly over Fable’s skin. She peeled clothing off, swished her hair into a top knot, and settled back against the bath. Sonnet tossed Fable a pillow around the curtain.
‘Know what we should call this, instead of a bunker?’ Sonnet asked.
Fable knew her sister wasn’t going to shut up until she obliged. She pulled the curtain aside, with impatient brows.
‘Stormoon,’ Sonnet said, in theatrical tone. ‘As in: storm cocoon.’
The curtain didn’t close quite quickly enough to cover Fable’s eye roll, though it managed to conceal the silent movement of her lips trying out Sonnet’s word for herself.
After a long silence, Sonnet spoke again. ‘Thank you, Fabes.’
Behind her curtain, Fable stiffened, wishing she’d thought to fake sleep more quickly.
‘Whatever else we face in life, Fabes, whoever tries to come between us, we’ll stick together. We’re Mama’s daughters. We’re sisters—’ Sonnet’s voice broke.
Fable felt the great ache opening again. She teetered on the edge of that vast canyon, felt the edges crumbling at her feet. On a stricken breath, she turned away to face her lambent porcelain silhouette.
Abruptly, tears drying before they’d had a chance to fall, she was furious at Sonnet. For all of it – the storm, being forced to choose between aunt and sister, the intimacy of this sequestering; even Cyclone Iris itself, which now felt like nothing more than a pantomime of sisterly manipulation.
In that spirit of throbbing resentment, the last of the storm passed over them.
*
Early morning brought two haggard-faced girls to the front window, where they surveyed the cyclone damage through the veil of heavy rain. No major structural damage, but it was a bedraggled vale. Trees stood unclothed, and cowering. Hill slides and waterfalls sprang from exposed peaks. The creek had engulfed its banks and rampaged through the flood plains, within yards of the cottage. In the dark of night, and their blessed ignorance, it had come terrifyingly close; there were catfish beached in the cottage shrubbery.
‘Malcolm built our cottage just above the flood line,’ marvelled Sonnet.
*
For three more days, the heavens wept.
‘Wouldn’t want to have ombrophobia in this valley,’ Sonnet said, flicking a glance at Fable for the answering eye roll.
Power remained resolutely out. Each day, Gav clomped onto the porch, shaking off leaves and rain, to deliver barbecued meals from Olive. Plum stayed out of sight, at their aunt’s side. The use of candles and flashlights had quickly lost its romantic novelty, and the humidity sucked them dry.
Hour by vigilant hour, Fable awaited the serpent’s retreat. A watched flood never recedes, she thought glumly, fogging up the windows with hissing impatience.
CHAPTER 20
VINELANDS
O
n the fourth day, they woke to find the creek, thirst slaked, withdrawing to the forest line. Bright mist swirled and roiled off the mountainsides. Trees dripped and glistened.
At noon, the door knocker thudded. Fable skidded to answer it, thankful Sonnet was up at the main house, gathering Plum back to herself.
Waiting on the front stoop was not Marco, as Fable had expected, rather his brother, Vince, and Eamon Hull. Behind them, hanging over the picket fence, was a clutch of St Ronan’s boys. Fable observed them only in the periphery, overcome by the thought of Raff being among them.
‘Coming up to see the Falls in flood?’ asked Eamon, with the lifting inflection Fable always found so arrogant. ‘Gang’s going.’
Fable nodded assent and grabbed her rucksack. She scrawled a note for Sonnet, and flew out of the door.
Two St Ronan’s boys exchanged sniggering comments as she joined the group, and Fable lowered her face to hide disappointment. Raff was not with them. Even with her eyes on the ground, she would have recognised his large feet anywhere.
Never mind; they were heading to Summerlinn �
� and like a tracker on the scent, Fable locked her eyes on Eamon’s back. Where Eamon went, Raff would surely be found, too. Perhaps he had waited in the truck, watching for her in the rear-vision mirror.
The flood had subsided just enough to make the crossing. The bridge seemed to float on the surface of the water, which churned beneath. Fable crossed with leaden feet – a single misstep, and she’d be swept away.
At Summerlinn, however, there was no truck, and no Raff. Only a panel van, which Derek Parker boasted was his. Fable hesitated for only a moment. Obviously the truck, with Raff at the helm, had already left. She must be in the second wave. Never mind, the important thing was she had been remembered, and at Eamon’s specific invitation, no less.
They piled into the van, and Fable’s nose wrinkled at the heavy male odour in the close confines. She wondered if there would be a tube waiting for her at the falls. She could have asked one of these guys, but baulked from the opening niceties. Most importantly, she was aboard and en route to Raff: this was simply a means to an end.
She averted her eyes from the unfamiliar chauffeur’s mirror reflection.
Moments before they set off, Vince Lagorio made an abrupt, muttering exit from the vehicle, promising to catch them later. The heckling laughter which followed his departure made Fable clutch her rucksack tightly. She wished Marco had waited for her today, and felt queasy, off-centre.
The coarse laughter continued as they wound up the gorge road. No one acknowledged Fable directly; though she couldn’t shake the sense that they were acutely conscious of her.
Within cooee of Moria Falls, the panel van made an unexpected right into a narrow road. Fable strained to see. The van jolted over ruts and roots, the canopy darkening all the while. The jungle encroached – foliage slapping the sides and windshield of the van as they pushed deeply in – there was no way the truck could have come this way before them. The anticipatory hush made Fable think her fellow occupants already knew about the detour.
Finally, the van turned into a cliff-side clearing, densely overhung. The back doors flung open to a spattering of raindrops and the creek’s swollen roar. The hairs on Fable’s limbs leapt straight up. It was a behemoth thundering by.