The Byron Journals (2 page)

‘About time!'

‘We've been busy.' Benny pulled the bag of weed from Andrew's backpack and dangled it in the air before tossing it to Richie.

‘Where'd you get this?' Richie asked, incredulous.

‘Some local guy…Shadow.' Benny's mouth was twisted in scorn.

Richie laughed, shook Benny's hand and turned to Andrew. ‘Benny told me you missed your final exam… Your audition for the Con, wasn't it?'

Andrew nodded.

‘So, you're not going to be a concert penis anymore?' ‘Nah,' Andrew replied. ‘I'm working towards being a Toolie dick like you.'

‘Ah, Andrew!' Richie slapped his shoulder. ‘Glad to see you're starting to relax.'

Andrew dragged his backpack into the smaller of the two rooms and dumped it onto one of the single beds. He caught his reflection in the wardrobe mirror and frowned. He was pale from too much time indoors and, with his thick, dark hair and crooked teeth, plainerlooking than he'd liked to have been.

He stood listening to the other two talking and laughing, then unzipped his backpack. He frowned seeing the discoloured bruises on his ribs in the mirror. It was going to be hard to hide them from the others. He slipped on a T-shirt over his boardshorts.

Back in the living room, Richie was pouring Chivas Regal scotch into tumblers. ‘Why are you going swimming now?' he said. ‘It's almost dark.'

‘There's plenty of time,' Andrew said as he crossed the room.

Richie looked set to make another quip, but he held it in. ‘C'mon, at least have a drink before you go.'

‘Nah,' he replied from the door, the memory of vodka and bile still too fresh. ‘I'm not drinking.'

There was a pause before Richie exclaimed, ‘What do you mean, you're not drinking?'

‘Let him go,' Benny said quietly.

The bitumen was warm and smooth beneath his feet as he ran past the dense scrub of paperbarks on either side. He slowed to a walk when he reached the car park at Tallow Beach. Surfers milled about, mostly guys, but some girls too, getting changed and waxing surfboards. At the beach track, he started running again, his feet sinking into the powdery sand. Waves heaved and collapsed on the sandbar out the back, and packs of surfers congregated behind each peak. But the water close to the shore was calm. He ran down the low dunes, then away from the headland, until his thighs burned. A long way up, two girls, probably Schoolies like him, ran naked across the wet sand, shrieking with laughter as they half-tripped, half-dived into the water.

Shirtless now, near the shoreline, he pulled down his shorts to swim naked too, but immediately jerked them back up again and looked around, laughing at himself. It was ridiculous, but he was self-conscious. He ran into the water, surprised by its silky warmth, but also by how quickly the sand floor dropped away. He dived under and pulled himself towards deeper water. When his lungs could no longer bear it, he surfaced and rolled onto his back to catch his breath. Heart knocking against his chest, he lay in the ocean's gentle rise and fall and stared at the faded blue sky. He felt baptised by the silence and the purity of the water, cleansed of his past and his future. He could have been anyone, drifting in the ocean, a single person among the world's billions. There was a flash in the corner of his vision and he turned to the lighthouse, high above the wind-groomed trees on the headland. Something inside him seemed to have shifted—the beginnings of a realisation, a half-formed decision. The lighthouse flashed again. He lay back in the water and closed his eyes, and each flash was like the slow, steady pulse of new life.

The warm night air filled with the drawl and thump of electro as the three of them clambered out of a taxi in front of a rundown bungalow on the other side of town.

‘What if people ask who we are?' Benny asked.

‘The girls next door said it was open invite,' Richie replied. ‘If anyone says anything, we'll light one of Andrew's joints and pass it to them.'

The driveway was blocked by cars and the garden was overgrown with palms and ferns. They had to duck under the branches of a large flame tree and the faint scent of trampled flowers stayed with Andrew as he moved onto the crowded verandah. Richie led them down a hallway filled with people drinking, smoking and shouting over the music. The living room throbbed with movement, and Benny and Richie, already drunk on beer and scotch, merged with the crowd while Andrew slipped out to the back verandah. It was good to be surrounded by people who knew nothing about him.

The patter of drums came from the far corner of the yard. Near a rusted garden shed, a loose group of drummers sat immersed in a shifting tangle of rhythms. There was an open, playful feeling about the jam. Andrew sat down and joined them. He picked up a drum and slid his fingers over its thick, papery skin and the taut knots of rope.

Tentative at first, he focused on mimicking the rhythm, letting the boom and slap of his hands grow until he was almost as loud as the others. The rhythm climbed and peaked, climbed and peaked again. It picked him up and drew him into its stride. The loudest drummer stood up, shirtless and barefoot, his eyes glaring beneath a fedora hat. He attached a strap to his drum, slung it over his shoulders and started

Indian-hopping through the crowd. Some laughed, embarrassed, but others started moving to the beat. More people came over, the crowd thickening around them, locking them in.

The rhythm broke into a canter and the crowd erupted with cheers and whistles. The lead drummer threw back his head and shouted. Others howled or shouted with him, and Andrew felt his heartbeat rising to meet the rhythm.

The lead drummer called the music to a halt and pounded out a polished, tumbling solo. His hands blurred above the drum, playing a series of triplets with clever shifting accents—wild and unorthodox. Towards the end, he counted them in:
Two! Three! Four!
And the rhythm stomped back to life.

The other drummers had a chance to solo—until, finally, Andrew was the only one left. His thoughts raced as the beat approached the end of the bar, and he looked up to see the lead drummer nodding at him. Andrew shook his head but the drummer just smiled and nodded again.

Andrew stopped playing and someone spluttered with laughter. He began again but his rhythm sounded frail. Then he thought of Beethoven's Ninth, the second movement. He mimicked the contrapuntal rhythm, letting each hit grow louder and faster, louder and faster. He heard a rising cheer and a whistle, and began adding his own hits, creating a rhythm that was half Beethoven's and half his own, until he was playing something he'd never played before, something that was wholly his own. He felt like an engine gathering speed down a hill, racing, racing, until he could no longer bear it and he thought he was about to derail and crash—
Two! Three! Four!

The rhythm exploded back to life. He kept playing but started laughing; he lost the beat, found it again, laughed and kept playing. And when the lead drummer howled and others shouted with him, Andrew threw back his head and joined them, howling into the night. A girl in a long yellow cotton dress squeezed through the crowd, picked up a drum and strapped it to her shoulders. She had wide-set eyes, a long nose and dark unkept hair, and Andrew liked the way she moved, kind of lazy but confident, as she played a fill and joined the rhythm. He smiled when she looked his way and, to his surprise, she held his gaze and smiled back.

Ten minutes later, Benny appeared at the edge of the group, unsteady and shaking his head.

Reluctantly, Andrew set down his drum and slipped through the crowd. ‘You smoked the weed, didn't you?'

Benny nodded gravely, his eyes hooded and bloodshot. ‘Richie too?' Even as he said it, he could see Benny was absolutely blitzed. He was going to have to take him home.

‘The taxi number?' Benny said. ‘Where are we staying? Richie's vomiting. I don't know what to—'

Andrew felt a slap on his shoulder and turned to see the lead drummer. His forehead was beaded with sweat and he stared as if he never blinked.

‘Where ya from, bro?'

‘Adelaide,' Andrew replied. ‘Just got in tonight.'

‘Adelaide, eh?' He nodded towards the jam. ‘Heidi's from Adelaide, too. Ha! Not that she'll admit it.'

Heidi
, Andrew mused, almost tasting the sound of her name.

‘I'm Tim.'

‘Andrew.'

Tim gripped his hand and drew him into a sweaty hug, then glanced over his shoulder at Benny. ‘What's up with your mate?'

Benny was swaying and struggling to keep his eyes open.

‘He's too stoned.'

Tim shrugged, shook his head. ‘That solo you played was freaky. Drop around for a jam sometime if ya want.' Without saying goodbye, he headed back to the group. Andrew took a last look at Heidi and the drummers before turning to Benny. ‘Let's go.'

two

Andrew lay back on the hammock, the salt from his morning swim still crusted on his skin. He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt this relaxed. The sky was cloudless blue, Bob Marley's ‘Redemption Song' played on the stereo and he had all day to do anything he wanted.

‘So, Andrew,' Richie said, dropping sausages onto the barbecue hotplate. ‘Tell me about that case your mum did recently—' ‘I don't keep track,' he replied.

‘C'mon, Andrew. The murderer she defended, it was everywhere in the media—' ‘He was acquitted,' Andrew said, unable to stop himself from an argument. ‘So technically he's not a murderer.'

‘But everyone knows he did it.'

‘Look, Richie,' Andrew sighed. ‘I don't want to talk about it, okay?'

‘I just don't understand how she defends murderers, paedophiles and psychopaths.'

‘I guess that's because you don't know much about it.'

Richie sipped his beer. ‘I
am
studying Law, Andrew— so I do know a bit about it.'

‘And I'm sure they go into a lot of detail in first year.'

‘Well, from what I can gather, it seems to take a special breed of person to do that kind of work…' Richie waited for a response but Andrew just lifted his head from the hammock and stared at him. He could feel Benny watching him.

‘My dad reckons,' Richie said, ‘that all lawyers are alcoholics. He says that's how they preserve their consciences—in alcohol.' He laughed. ‘Is that why you're not drinking? To show everyone that you're different from your mum?'

Benny grimaced. ‘C'mon guys.'

Andrew sat up in the hammock and put his feet on the ground. ‘The only reason you're here, Richie, is because you booked this apartment.'

The sausages sizzled and spat, and smoke drifted up the brick wall.

‘And you wouldn't be here if last year I hadn't raved to Benny about Schoolies in Byron.'

‘Exactly!' Andrew said. ‘What are you even doing here? You finished school last year. You're just here to sleaze onto—' ‘Whatever,' Richie cut him off. ‘We're talking about your mum…I want to know how she sleeps at night—' ‘What about
your
mum?' Andrew snapped. ‘How does she sleep at night knowing that she lives such an idle, pointless fucking existence?'

‘You don't know anything about my mum.'

Andrew stood up. ‘I know she's on Prozac and she's fucking half the dudes in Adelaide behind your dad's back.'

‘Guys!' Benny called.

Richie ignored him, licked his lips. ‘Hey, that's funny. I heard it was the other way round. Benny told me your dad's fucking all the fresh young first-year students at the music college behind your mum's back.'

Andrew's face prickled.

‘I guess at least,' Richie continued, ‘your mum will be able to defend him when he gets done for paedophilia.' Andrew charged forward and pushed Richie against the brick wall, a fistful of his shirt twisted in his hand. Richie took a swing but missed, and Andrew swung back, hit his ear, and tackled him to the ground. They strained and wrestled but neither of them landed any good punches. Andrew managed to get on top and press

Richie's face into the ground, but Benny grabbed him and pulled him away. His arms were pinned to his sides when Richie rolled to his feet and thumped him in the guts. Andrew dropped to his knees, gasping.

‘Jesus!' Benny shouted. ‘What are you guys doing?'

Richie paced beside them, coughed, cleared his throat and spat into the garden. ‘You better find somewhere else to stay, mate. It's just a technicality, but the apartment
is
booked in my name.'

Benny moved in to help Andrew up and saw the bruises on his torso. ‘Shit, Andrew. What the hell happened to you?'

Andrew shrugged him off and pressed unsteadily to his feet. He was sick of Benny letting him down. And Richie was a waste of space.

‘You guys…are...arseholes,' he managed, trying to catch his breath. ‘I'm out of here.' He pulled open the screen door and lurched into the house.

‘C'mon, Andrew!' Benny called after him.

But Andrew kept going. He grabbed his phone, wallet and the pot from the bedroom, and walked out.

Tim's house was more run-down than Andrew remembered from the night before. The paint was faded on the corrugated iron roof and flaking off the weatherboard panels. He walked behind a newish red Mazda sedan in the driveway and cut across the scrappy lawn, still littered with empty beer bottles and cigarette butts. He knocked on the front door and waited. Someone was moving inside the house, but no one came to answer. He knocked again—this time louder. He was about to leave when a girl wearing tiny denim shorts and an old cotton T-shirt, without a bra, opened the door. She had a sour pout, sleepy blue eyes and short, tousled black hair cut sharp at the front.

‘Hi,' he hesitated. ‘I was at the party last night. I'm Andrew…' She shrugged. ‘Jade. What's up?'

He cleared his throat. ‘I'm looking for Tim?'