Riptides Page 5

  ‘Amends, Charlie? Amends?’

  ‘Stop, okay?’

  ‘You’re not the only one in trouble, you know. I was in the car, too. It’s my car. And what about the ring? Either she’s a thief or Dad knows her.’

  ‘Or a thief and Dad knows her.’

  She scowls at me. ‘Yes, this is the time for semantics.’

  ‘That’s not – never mind.’ I watch our headlight beams on the rainy road, the light seeming to move both forward and back. ‘Are you sure you know how to get us to that town?’

  ‘Yes. And it’s called Chinchilla.’

  ‘But why? Drive us to Dad’s. We’ll sort it out.’

  ‘We’re wet, and covered in mud and blood. How would we explain that?’

  And right then I know my sister won’t turn me – us – in, or tell Dad the truth. She’s angry at me, and scared and upset. But she’ll fix this, somehow. It’s what she does.

  I stay awake. Rumbling thunder threatens us from all sides. From time to time, a gust of wind shakes the car, or lightning cuts a jagged gash into the sky. The rain keeps coming. The first sign I see, where dirt changes to bitumen, says five miles till Chinchilla. Abby pulls the car to the side of the road.

  ‘We need to change our clothes.’ Bum-up like a duck, she climbs over the seat to reach into the rear of the station wagon. The styrofoam esky makes mouse-like squeaks each time she bangs against it. She pulls a towel from her bag and throws it at me. ‘Here.’

  I wind down the window and let rain soak the towel till it’s heavy and my arm is wet to the elbow. I rub the towel across my arms and face. Abby finds two more towels and clothes for both of us and gets dressed in the back seat, while I do the same in the front, pulling jeans and a tight t-shirt over clammy skin.

  ‘We’ll stay at the pub,’ she says, whacking my shoulder with her elbow as she clambers back into the driver’s seat. ‘I’ll call Dad and tell him we’ll be at his in the morning.’

  ‘If you were okay to scrub up in the car, why didn’t we do that and go to Dad’s?’

  ‘I can’t face him tonight.’ She holds out her hand to show me how badly she’s shaking.

  I hold up my own hand so it’s level with hers. I’m shaking, too. We stay that way for an instant, her left hand and my right twitching like wounded moths, thumb and finger almost touching, dirt under our nails, her wedding ring glistening, and not a drop of blood between us despite what we’ve done. Will I think of this moment every time I look at my hand? I already know I won’t. Life will go on, and I’ll forgive myself. I’m not so sure about Abby.

  We drive to Chinchilla, a town that’s no more than a lick of buildings either side of a skinny road, a strip of runway lights back to the highway, a patchy receiving line at a shotgun wedding. The first building we see as we drive over the plank bridge, across the rising creek, is the Chinchilla Pub. It towers over everything around it. At two storeys, it would, in the daylight, cast a shadow over the corner shop, haberdashery shop and the few surrounding weatherboard houses. Painted white, dark trim, white verandas. Lights shine through the red, green and clear cut-glass windows downstairs.

  We park on the dirt lot next to the pub, grab our bags and run, shake the water off ourselves, and open the double doors into a wide hallway. The Ladies Lounge, signed to the left, is dark; from the room to the right we hear muffled sound through an ornate panelled door. The three men perched on stools at the bar, each one nursing a sweating pot of beer, stare at us as we enter the room. Whorls of smoke rise from ashtrays. A radio calls out the results of the night’s greyhound races.

  The men wear checked flannel shirts with rolled-up sleeves, left open to show singlets of white or slate blue, with work shorts or jeans. Two of the men are in their fifties and one is about half that age, but they all sport the same hairstyle: slicked back with a wide-toothed comb so the neat lines of hair resemble a ploughed field. The only man wearing long pants is running a carpet-sweeper across the floor. He nods to us, and we nod in reply, drop our bags near the wall.

  ‘Wet enough?’ he asks.

  I offer an awkward smile.

  ‘I’m about to close up,’ he says. ‘But I could pour you a drink.’

  ‘We’re after a room, two rooms, for tonight,’ Abby says.

  The man pushes his sweeper upright. ‘Reckon we can squeeze you in.’

  The men at the bar chuckle.

  ‘And a beer,’ I say.

  The woman we’ve left behind has a boyfriend or husband waiting for her. Maybe he’s bragging to his mates about how he’s going to be a dad, but she’s lying in a ditch, with mud in her hair and a baby inside who’ll keep kicking until it runs out of oxygen. Surely it has by now.

  ‘You all right, mate?’ the bartender asks.

  ‘Yeah, everything’s cool. Just need a beer. And a packet of Marlboros.’ I open my wet leather wallet.

  ‘Not a good night to be on the road,’ he says. ‘Bridge’ll be underwater in an hour.’

  The men mutter agreement.

  ‘It’s almost covered already. Didn’t think we’d make it across. Your bridge might float away before the night’s over.’ It’s an effort to speak normally. I sit on the nearest stool and the bartender places a cold pot in front of me. He looks at Abby, who’s still standing, and asks if she’d like a shandy. She shakes her head at both the offer of a drink and a seat. I gulp my beer down, the drink of a Bali summer night, the possibility of oblivion.

  A grey-haired, wide-jawed man at the far end of the bar speaks up. ‘That bridge’ll outlast you, son. My great-grandfather helped build it. Solid as a bloody rock.’

  I raise my hand as if to tip an invisible hat. ‘No disrespect. That’s some real rain out there.’

  He lifts his glass and takes a deep slug, putting it down empty. ‘Seen worse.’

  ‘Next round’s on me.’ I light a cigarette, a Bali cigarette.

  ‘What do you reckon, Mick?’ the man says to the bartender. ‘One more?’

  He shakes his head. ‘All right, but this is your last. Marion’ll rouse on us both, you know that.’

  The man shoos away bartender Mick’s worries then beckons him to get a move on. He turns to me. ‘What’s your name anyway?’

  ‘Charlie. This is my sister, Abby.’

  ‘I’m Reg.’ He dips his head in Abby’s direction. Abby has only moved a few steps inside the doorway. ‘That’s Benny, Troy. You’ve met Mick, saviour of every man in town.’ He lifts his glass and the bartender smiles.

  ‘Where were you headed?’ Benny asks.

  ‘My dad’s place,’ I say. ‘Somewhere . . . thataway.’ I gesture towards the windows.

  ‘I’d appreciate the key to the room,’ Abby says to Mick. ‘If you don’t mind.’

  ‘Like some help with your bags?’ he asks.

  ‘I’m fine. There’s only the two.’

  Benny straightens in his seat. ‘Give your sister a hand, son. Show some manners.’

  ‘I don’t need help.’ Abby hasn’t made eye contact with me since we came inside. ‘Oh! But can I use your phone before I go up?’

  Mick inclines his head in the direction of the phone, which is sitting on the bar on its own terry-towelling square, and waves away her offer of money. Abby stands as far from us as she can, stretching the pigtail cord till it’s almost straight while Mick holds the base of the phone so it doesn’t fly off and hit her. When she finishes her call, he says he’ll show her to her room. She leaves the bar with him, and my whole body relaxes.

  ‘Where you coming from?’ Reg asks.

  ‘Brisbane.’

  He grins at my idiocy. ‘Why’d you go over the bridge? Bridge leads north out of town. You don’t go over the bridge on the Brisbane road.’

  ‘Overshot the pub and turned around.’

  ‘How’d you overshoot this place?’ Benny asks. ‘There’s nothing else here. And it’s lit up like the bloody Titanic.’

  ‘You drove across the bridge and then drove back again?’ Reg asks
. ‘That’s daft.’

  ‘Another round?’ I say, when Mick returns. ‘Last one, I promise. Actually, pour me two.’

  ‘Suppose I may as well join you. We’re all in trouble now anyway.’

  Dad would love it here, would enjoy the company of these men. Maybe I’ll bring him down for a drink. Even though he’s proud of his uni education (first in his family), my father is most at ease around the type of men he grew up with – straight-talking, unpretentious. I’m struggling, can see in their faces they’re regarding me with amusement, as a lightweight from the city who doesn’t even know which way’s north. Then, with a shudder, I picture sitting here with my dad without Reg, Benny and Troy as buffers. What would we talk about? How incredible it is to surf the endless left break at Uluwatu, mind-altering after mushrooms? What he feeds his chickens? We’ve reached the ages where he wants my approval more than I want his, which makes me feel kind of bad for him, and can make him boring company. Abby says he’s worried about me being ‘directionless’, but I reckon when I talk about my life in Bali he’s out of his depth, maybe even jealous. Makes me tired to think about it.

  ‘There’s still time,’ Troy says.

  ‘Time to what?’ I realise I’d tuned out.

  ‘For Troy to get married,’ Benny says.

  ‘Count yourself lucky,’ Reg says.

  ‘Don’t listen to him,’ Mick says. ‘Nothing wrong with being married.’

  ‘Early days for you,’ Reg says. ‘You’ll see. Before you know it you won’t be able to do a thing right.’

  Reg, Benny and Troy complain about the weather, which seems to cause them grief, summer and winter. Mick tells me he’s doing a correspondence course in hospitality. These are men who know how to handle their drink. They ask more than they answer. I need to watch myself. One of them might know her. One of them might be her father or her husband. Christ.

  Benny leans back to get a better look at me. ‘You don’t know where your dad lives?’

  ‘Haven’t seen him in a few years.’ I tap my cigarette on the edge of a glass ashtray, beg another beer.

  ‘What’s that smell?’ Reg asks. ‘Are you smoking marijuana?’

  ‘Cloves.’ I hold the cigarette out to him. ‘Want to try?’

  ‘You must be bloody joking.’ He chortles.

  ‘Is he up near Hanson’s place, maybe?’ asks Benny.

  I smile. ‘Man, I know you want a better answer but I honestly have no idea. He bought a farm a while back and this is the first time I’ve been there. Home for Christmas.’

  ‘Cattle?’ asks Benny.

  ‘I don’t know, Benny. Swear to God.’

  Could Dad have some reason I haven’t thought of for wanting to see Abby and me at his place? Maybe it’s to show off the farm, but what if it’s something else? What if he’s run out of money? What if he needs to sell up and live with one of us? I’d sooner kill myself.

  A wave of nausea comes over me. I’m too harsh on him. What if my father is sick? What if he’s lonely and that woman with Mum’s ring has been taking advantage of that? That dead woman. Sweat beads form on my forehead, nose, and under my moustache.

  ‘I run a restaurant in Bali,’ I say. I have to think about something else, anything. No dead women, trapped babies, sick fathers, shitty sons.

  Reg raises his eyebrows. ‘Do you now?’

  I swivel so my back is against the bar. I watch slashes of rain hit the stained-glass windows. The world on the other side of the glass is black. By day, the coloured glass will make everything easier on the eye, tolerable for the mind. Rose-coloured.

  ‘Where’s Bali anyway?’ Reg asks, as he rolls off his stool and yanks up his shorts. ‘Are you a wog? You look like a wog.’

  ‘Bali Hai, Reg,’ says Mick. ‘From the movie.’

  ‘Don’t you ever watch the news, Reg? They had a plane crash there, in Bali,’ adds Troy. ‘Plane crashed into a mountain. It was on the news.’

  ‘Why would I be worrying about Bali?’ Reg says. ‘Some of us have work to do,’ and they laugh phlegmy, smoky laughs.

  ‘I’m calling it a night,’ Mick says. ‘Clear off, all of you. I want to go to bed.’

  After the three regulars bid their farewells, Mick guides me up the stairs. We walk to the end of the hall, where he opens the last door to the left. ‘The royal suite,’ he says and walks away.

  The room is large and spartan, with a high pressed-metal ceiling, painted the same dusty white as the wood-panelled walls. The light bulb is so far up it’s of little use. None of the furniture holds its own: a skinny bed covered with a khaki blanket stands dead centre, next to a spindly side table gussied up with a crocheted doily and an empty vase. A lumbering brown wardrobe leans lopsided in a corner. A scrap of rug lies on the floorboards next to the bed, like a flea-bitten stray.

  I left a baby to die.

  I left a woman lying in mud.

  I repeat the words to remind myself of what I’ve done. But I’m too drunk to make sense of it, to feel it. I sway as I stand in front of the toilet (the bathroom blessedly close), thinking about how I’ll see Sal in a few weeks, and realising I’m hungry. When did I last eat?

  I think about how bizarre it is that Troy knows about the plane crash, all the way out here. After that crash there’d been a group of distraught American backpackers in KD who’d had friends on board. As people had milled around them, offering condolences, they’d lurched from highly strung to morose, unsure what to do with their grief other than pass it around in words until they’d worked the edges off it.

  Sal had summoned Ryan and me out the back and said we shouldn’t charge the backpackers for their meals. ‘Tea and sympathy. That’s what they need.’

  Ryan, never keen on Americans, had disagreed. ‘We bought that food they’re eating. Why should we pay for something that has nothing to do with us?’

  ‘Karma,’ Sal said.

  He scowled. ‘Karma’s about cause and effect. We didn’t cause this. It’s nothing to do with us. And free food won’t bring anyone back.’

  ‘Babe.’ She stepped closer. ‘Karma is about good deeds in this life guaranteeing you don’t come back as a flea. A kind act now will shape the lives we have to come. We need to help these people.’

  Ryan thinks Sal’s newfound dabbling with Buddhism is bullshit. But when she described karma it sounded selfish, doing things for later payback, and that does seem like a Sal way of thinking. Not sure I’ve seen her do anything that didn’t in some way or another benefit her. It’s messed up how attracted I am to her. Nothing dims it.

  I’d watched, hoped he’d get angry or scoff so I could step in and side with Sal. That’s what I’d hoped for. But true to form, Ryan had melted to Sal’s will, and the Americans had eaten at our expense.

  In my dreams I stand on the white sand at Kuta, my back to the sea, and watch as a falling plane smashes into the side of a mountain and bursts into flames. I’m not sure if I believe in karma. But even if I did, I don’t have a clue how to make up for what I’ve done.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Saturday 7 December 1974

  Abby

  I bolt to the bathroom as soon as I wake, my bowels about to explode. I’d been dreaming I was leaking from every hole in my body, one part of my brain trying to stay alert while another part slept. Not that I had more than a minute’s sleep.

  The bathroom floor is cold underfoot, which is good since I start sweating as soon as I sit on the toilet. I pull my nightie out of the way and hang my head over my knees. It’s like the first day of a bad period. My arms are heavy as stone. My head is foggy. I slump until the sweat cools me and I begin to come clear.

  I sit up, shiver, and assess the small room: there’s a rack of half-open louvre windows high on the wall behind me, rows of green rectangular tiles, a ball of white glass covering a dangling light bulb, a dark silt of dead moths at the bottom of the glass. Shiny toilet paper hangs from a wire loop to my right – waxy, see-through paper, not at all what I need. A calendar i
s thumbtacked to the back of the bathroom door, courtesy of the local petrol station. A lippy blonde, naked save for a pair of red knickers, sits on a windswept beach pushing her breasts forward like an indignant cockatoo. We stare at one another, we two birds.

  I don’t knock on Charlie’s door on my way back from the bathroom since waking him has always been a job and a half, and I want to get myself ready before I worry about him. I put on a yellow blouse and denim skirt, and pull my hair back. Once I’ve packed my nightie I go to Charlie’s room and knock for as long as expected, until he opens the door, still in the jeans and t-shirt he had on when we arrived.

  ‘What time is it?’ he asks, yawning.

  ‘You’re wearing a watch. Didn’t you even take your watch off?’

  He ignores me and starts to close the door until I put my hand on it.

  ‘I’ll tidy the room while you do whatever it is you do when you’re already dressed.’ I point to the bathroom. ‘You can brush your teeth.’

  ‘Yeah, okay.’ He stretches his arms above his head, interlacing his fingers and cracking his knuckles. ‘How are you holding up?’

  ‘I didn’t sleep.’

  He drops his arms. ‘Me either.’

  ‘I can’t understand why a woman wearing Mum’s ring would be driving away from Dad’s house.’

  ‘I thought we agreed she stole it,’ he says.

  ‘No we didn’t. And why would a pregnant woman steal a ring from a farm in the middle of nowhere at night?’

  ‘Maybe she’s had it for months. Maybe she wasn’t coming from his –’

  ‘There’s nothing else out there, Charlie.’

  ‘Maybe he sold it and wanted her to leave before we showed up.’

  ‘Why would he do that the night we’re coming? Or ever?’

  ‘Or gave it –’

  ‘You said yourself, she was our age.’ I rub my eyes. ‘I can’t even – We need to get out of here.’