Burning Eddy (13 page)

I arrived home just as Mum was getting Kat up for school. I saw the light flash on in her bedroom and the curtains opened enough for Mum to see me chugging up the drive.

‘Where have you been?’ she asked. She was smiling. Maybe she hadn’t heard me leave?

‘Just down the drive and back. Making sure the car still runs okay.’

She nodded slowly. ‘I see. Does it run okay?’

‘Yeah. Great. I’m getting the hang of it.’

‘Good,’ she said. ‘You’ll have to show me.’

I sighed and whistled as I walked to my room.

I dressed and ate. I was ready to go before Kat. Guilt-powered activity. It had been dumb to drive to Eddy’s.

Kat had smiled and laughed her way through breakfast and as we set off to Tina’s she started singing.

‘Do I look all right?’ she asked me out of the blue.

She had her hair pulled back; her skin was clean and tanned. She was smiling. ‘Yeah. You look good.’

‘Ta.’

‘Why are you so happy?’

She shrugged and flicked her head so her hair whipped. ‘No reason.’

‘How are things with Jake?’

She sucked a breath and nodded. ‘Yeah, good.’

I kicked a rock and it skittered along the road and stopped a couple of metres in front of Kat. She hopped and skipped, then kicked it back to my side of the road.

‘Why did you get suspended?’

‘Grimshaw sprung us having a smoke in the bus shelter.’

I looked at her. ‘Really?’

‘Yeah. Jake reckons he’s got a pair of binoculars in the staffroom so he can sniper the smokers.’

I laughed. Kat’s a smoker. ‘I thought the binoculars were for perving at girls on the oval.’

She grunted. ‘Perving at boys, more like.’

Tina was waiting for us on her front verandah. ‘Your dad just phoned. He wants you to give him a call, Dan.’

‘Piss off,’ Kat grumbled. She grabbed my arm. ‘Don’t, Dan. Let him suffer.’

‘Did he say anything else?’ I asked.

‘Yeah, that he’s sorry.’

‘Bloody idiot,’ Kat snarled.

Tina gave me a piece of paper with the number on it. I stuffed it in my pocket.

‘I don’t have time to call now,’ I said. ‘Maybe later.’

Tina shrugged and we bundled into the ute. Kat had stopped singing and her leg jiggled against mine all the way to Henning.

Michael was alone on the back seat of the bus. Amy sat one seat from the back on the opposite side. They stared out their windows. Inside, I was laughing at them. Lover’s tiff. Then Chantelle got on. She waved to me and sat behind Amy. I stopped laughing. At least they had lovers to tiff with.

I phoned the Milara Detention Centre from the school payphone at recess. I messed up the number twice and sent the coins rattling into the return bay. Finally a woman answered the phone in a squeaky Barbie-doll voice. It wasn’t the sort of voice I associated with prison and I almost laughed. Nervous laugh. My breath had made the receiver wet.

‘Hello, I’m trying to get into contact with someone who . . . someone in there . . . my dad. His name’s Steven Fairbrother.’

‘Hold the line a moment, I’ll put you through,’ she squeaked, and she was gone. Classical music played while I was on hold. I breathed deeply.

‘Hello?’

‘Hi, I’m looking for Steven Fairbrother.’

‘Speaking. Who’s this?’

‘It’s me, Dad.’

‘God, Dan, I didn’t recognise your voice. You sound so different. Grown up.’

His voice was almost as squeaky as Barbie’s. He was speaking as though his throat was tight.

‘Yeah?’ I said. I thought about it in the silence and I realised that I’d never spoken to my dad on the phone.

‘Sorry, Dan,’ he said solemnly.

The phone crackled. How was I supposed to respond to that? It’s okay to kick the crap out of me. I shouldn’t have gone through your stuff. I deserved it. No way. Nobody deserves to be beaten.

‘Apology accepted,’ I said.

‘How’s Mum?’

My mind ticked over in the silence. She’s better now you’ve gone. Happier. She smiles more. ‘She’s okay.’

‘Kat and Tobe?’

‘They’re all right.’

I could hear someone shouting in the background.

‘Sorry, Dan.’

Yeah, you said that already.

‘I lost it,’ he said.

‘Yeah.’

The shouting at the other end died. Dad sniffed. ‘Come and visit, Dan. They have visitors and that on Sunday. Visit before they transfer me.’

Yeah, and even if I wanted to, how am I supposed to get there? Walk?

The bell rang.

‘I’ve got to go,’ I said.

‘Okay, son. Look after yourself.’

Son? That was a new one. ‘Yep, see ya,’ I said, and hung up the phone. Just before it clunked into its cradle I thought I heard him say something else. I picked it up again and it purred in my ear. I couldn’t sit still that afternoon.

Mum had a smile on her face when we got home. She hugged Kat and me. She’d got a lift into town with Graham and done some shopping. The white plastic bags still sat loaded on the kitchen floor.

‘Good news,’ she said. ‘The government is going to pay us money while your dad’s . . . while he’s not working. Seven hundred . . . nearly eight hundred dollars a fortnight. We’ll be okay.’

Toby punched the air with both hands. ‘Yesss!’

We laughed.

‘More than that though,’ Mum continued, and rummaged in her handbag. ‘I went to the RTA today.’ She pulled out a green plastic card with her picture on it. ‘I got my learner’s permit.’

‘Whooooo!’ I shouted, and hugged her around the neck. ‘Well done, Mum. Was it hard?’

‘Did you get one for me, too?’ Kat asked. Her face screwed up as she held Mum’s licence.

‘No, but I got you this,’ Mum said, and handed her a spiral-bound book with a big ‘L’ and a big ‘P’ on the front.

‘Gee, thanks,’ Kat grumbled, and grabbed the book.

The photo of Mum on her licence was beautiful. They’re supposed to be ugly, like Dad’s. It had made him look . . . well . . . like a criminal. Mum’d taken her hair out and her eyes shone with something. Courage perhaps. Happiness. She looked strong.

After dinner, we set up Tina’s TV in the lounge room. Kat brought out her stereo and somehow hooked it up to the television. It was like going to the theatre at home. The
four of us huddled on the three-seater couch, and watched a slightly fuzzy
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
.

Early on Saturday morning a lone motorcycle rumbled past the end of the drive and across the bridge. I knew who it was. Well . . . it looked like Michael’s bike. I knew where he was going. Wasn’t really that clever a guess — he always went to the shack. I tucked a knife into the pocket of my shorts and started walking.

About a hundred yellow-tailed black cockatoos creaked and squawked like old doors in the pine trees. They can nip a green pine cone to pieces in about five minutes, covering the bed of needles below with their sweet-smelling debris. Pine cones are very hard when they’re green. We were banned from using them as grenades at Henning Primary when Mr Nobody threw one and it hit James Sheffield’s sister, Corinne, on the shoulder. She squealed for what seemed like an hour. It might have been me who’d thrown it. I picked up the feathered remains of a pine cone from the track and thought that it would take me half an hour with a hammer and chisel to get all the seeds out like the black cockies do.

Michael was nowhere to be seen at the shack. I couldn’t hear his bike and the tracks around the entrance were old. I stepped into the gloom and had a poke around. They kept the shack neat. A stack of empty cans reached from the floor beside the fire almost to the corrugated ceiling. I sat in an old car seat that had been propped against the wall and glass tinkled. Behind the seat was a stash of beer — five
small bottles of VB. Before I’d had a chance to think about it, I’d unscrewed the top on one and taken a swig. It bubbled and fizzed as I held it in my mouth. I closed my eyes and swallowed. Some went down the wrong hole and I coughed and spluttered but it tasted okay. It would have been better cold. I drank it anyway.

I could hear a bike in the middle distance. It
rant-rant
ed for a couple of minutes, then cruised up through the gears. Must have made it to the track. I glanced at the beer and shook the bottle from side to side. Three-quarters empty. I sat back in the seat and felt my stomach glow. I was in no hurry to move. Let him come, I thought.

I sat in the gloom and come he did. My heart was trying to leap out of my chest as the shack reverberated and buzzed with the sound. The engine stopped right outside. The spring on the bike stand stretched and twanged. I could hear him grunting quietly as he undid the strap on his helmet. Then he was standing in front of me, blinking and squinting as his eyes adjusted to the gloom.

‘G’day, Michael,’ I said.

He jumped and his head nearly hit the roof.

‘Who’s that?’ he barked. ‘Fairy? What are you doing here? You scared the shit out of me.’

I shrugged. ‘Just having a beer. Do you want one?’

He put his fists on his hips. He was breathing hard. ‘Yeah, go ahead. Make yourself at friggin’ home.’

I held out a bottle. I hoped he wouldn’t see my hand shaking in the gloom. He stopped breathing.

‘Piss off,’ he spat, and kicked dirt at the wall.

‘Suit yourself,’ I said. I put the bottle down and it
toppled. I stood it up. I felt the knife in my pocket.

‘Got something for you,’ I said.

He stepped back. ‘What?’

I held my hand out.

He didn’t move. ‘What?’

‘Take it.’

He stepped forward and I put the knife in his hand.

‘Huh? It’s mine. Where did you get that?’

‘Found it on a track at the back of the Lanes’ place.’

He flicked open the blade and chuckled.

My bottom clenched.

‘I reckon I’ve lost this thing about ten times. Keeps turning up. Thanks.’

He clipped it closed and sat down.

I sighed and handed him a beer.

He screwed the top off and chugged half the bottle, burped and looked at the label on the bottle. ‘Bit warm.’

‘Yeah, sorry ’bout that. The fridge is busted.’

He grunted. Silence. A gumnut clanked on the roof.

‘Should we light a fire?’ I asked.

‘Piss off. I’ve had enough fires to cook me a thousand times.’

I laughed, mostly to myself.

‘Shut up. It’s true!’

‘I believe you. And your old man lit them.’

He nodded and drank from his bottle, then forced a burp. ‘My old man burns everything. Burns every leaf that falls on the ground. Prunings. When a fox killed all the chooks he burnt the lot of them.’

I screwed up my nose and imagined the smell.

‘When our dog, Sadie, died he wouldn’t let me bury her. The bastard piled up a heap of logs and burnt her. I bawled my eyes out watching her sizzle and fall to pieces. My dad’s sick.’

‘Where is he now?’ I asked.

‘In jail. Where he should be. Friggin’ pyro.’

‘In Milara?’

‘Yeah.’

‘With my old man.’

‘Bullshit.’

I shook my head.

‘What did your old man do?’ he asked.

‘Dunno.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Just that. I dunno what he did.’

‘Serious?’

‘Yep. Might go and see him tomorrow.’

We finished our beers at the same time.

‘Another one, Michael?’ I asked.

‘Yeah, as long as you stop calling me Michael.’

I sat up. ‘You stop calling me Fairy and I’ll stop calling you Michael.’

He shrugged. ‘Fair enough. Only Mum calls me Michael and then only when she’s seriously pissed off at me.’

I handed him a bottle. ‘So what do I call you?’

The bottle
fsss
ed. ‘Fish. Call me Fish. Everyone else does. What do you want me to call you?’

‘Call me Dan. Everyone else doesn’t.’

He laughed and held out his bottle. ‘Cheers, Dan.’

‘Cheers, Fish,’ I said, and we clinked bottles.

‘Hang on,’ he said. ‘A toast.’ He held his bottle high. ‘To the jailbirds.’

I laughed and nearly dropped my bottle. ‘To the jailbirds.’

‘If you go to Milara tomorrow, I’ll come with you.’

‘How about, when you go in with your mum, I’ll get a lift. My mum doesn’t drive yet. I was going to walk.’

‘Orright. My mum will do that for us, I reckon.’

We shared the last beer and Fish dinked me on the back of his motorbike right up the drive. Toby bolted from the cubby and jumped up and down when he saw the bike.

Fish set it on the stand and looked at the car. ‘I thought you said your mum doesn’t drive?’

‘She’s on her learner’s. That’s my car.’

He flashed the gap in his teeth at me and wandered to the driver’s door. Toby followed.

‘Oh, Tobe. This is my . . . mate, Fish. Fish, this is my little brother, Toby.’

‘Cool,’ Fish said, and held out his hand to Toby.

Tobe took his fingers with his left hand. ‘Fish is a funny name,’ he said, and Fish laughed.

I grabbed the keys and started the car.

I let Fish drive up and down the driveway a few times with Toby squealing in the back. He was an excellent driver. He said he’d been driving at home since he was ten. I believed him.