by Murray, Lee
“We’d best get these grazes cleaned up,” Grandma said. “Seb, could you grab the First Aid kit, please?”
“Right,” I said, turning on my heel and scuttling for the hall, pleased for a chance to look for Dad.
The door to the downstairs bathroom was firmly closed. “Dad?” I knocked a couple of times. “Dad, are you in there?”
“Yep, I’m here,” Dad called. He sounded pretty normal.
“Grandma needs the First Aid kit.” Moving closer, I lay my hands flat on the door.
“No worries. I’ll be out in a sec,” he replied.
Really? Out in a sec. Out in a sec. Why did everyone say that? I knew for sure he wouldn’t be. It’s exactly what Jason had said. It was getting on my nerves.
Muffled noises sounded on the other side of the door. Something was going on in there. I squeezed my ear flat against the door, part of me hoping to hear Dad on the loo and part of me grossed out at the thought of it. I closed my eyes and concentrated on listening…
Tap, tap, tap.
I sighed. Dad had his tablet in there.
“Dad, I—”
“Keep your pants on, Seb. I’ll be out shortly,” he said.
I tried the door. It was locked. There was nothing I could do. For all I knew, Dad might spend the rest of his life in the loo.
I left him to it, storming through the kitchen, and grabbing the ute keys from the hook by the back door.
“Seb?” Grandma asked.
“In a second!”
I let the door slam behind me. As soon as the cool air hit me, I felt bad. I shouldn’t have snapped at Grandma. None of this was her fault. It’s just this whole thing was doing my head in. I needed her help and she didn’t get it. She couldn’t see what was happening right under her nose. Ava was only two and she understood, for all the good that did me. I felt like Robinson Crusoe.
Still, stressing wasn’t going to help anything.
I took a few deep breaths to calm myself, then went out to the ute and rummaged under the retrofitted bench seat, feeling for the green canvas kit. I grabbed it, locking the ute before going back inside.
The warm glow of the kitchen greeted me. Dad was back at his seat at the table, his tablet propped up where it had been for most of the day. Grandma was at the bench, dishing up.
I sat next to Jason and swabbed his injured palm with antiseptic.
He swatted me away. “Get off!” he snapped, but I snatched at his hand, patting the bandage on before he had a chance to jerk it back. Scowling, he turned back to his computer. I packed up and put the kit on the bench.
“Dinnertime,” Grandma announced, sliding a steaming plate in front of Dad.
I lifted Ava into her high chair. For once, she didn’t complain, slipping into her seat like bread into the toaster.
“Will you run upstairs and get your mum please, love?” Grandma said.
I couldn’t bring Mum downstairs for dinner. Not without Darren’s help anyway. Too dangerous. Look what’d happened to Jason when he’d attempted just two steps. To get downstairs, Mum would have to tackle sixteen of them. It’d be like descending Mount Everest in slippers. She might not survive. Instead, I went into the hall, stood there for a few minutes, before coming back.
“Mum said to thank you for cooking, Grandma, but she’s feeling too ill to come down. She asked if you’d mind if she ate in her room.”
“Grace won’t come down? My goodness, she must be feeling awful. Yes, of course she can eat upstairs. You can take her up something after you’ve eaten.”
Grandma handed me a plate.
Liver and onions. I tried not to gag. Liver and onions in dark gravy with mashed potato and boiled cabbage to be precise. Mountains of it.
“Good hearty food for when you’re under the weather,” Grandma said, sitting in Mum’s spot beside Ava’s high chair. She touched the tip of Ava’s nose with her finger. “And for growing girls and boys.”
I shuddered. What was I going to do? Grandma hated it when we wasted food. If nobody ate it, Grandma would make me eat the leftovers until they were finished. It could take days. I picked up my fork, my heart filled with dread.
But something amazing happened. Dad was digging into his meal with gusto. Even Jason was eating it, and he hates liver as much as I do. Tonight, Jason was wolfing it down as if he hadn’t eaten in ages, which wasn’t too far from the truth. To be fair, I’m not sure either of them actually tasted what they were eating. They just ladled the food in, their mouths opening and closing like goldfish, their eyes on their devices. It almost made me wish I was a zombie. I pushed the disgusting concoction around my plate.
“Seb, is something wrong, love? Don’t you like it?”
“Just not very hungry, Grandma. I had a big lunch,” I said.
Grandma gave a little hum. “I hope you’re not coming down with this virus, too.”
Ava flung a piece of liver. It scudded across the floor leaving a greasy gravy trail. Cody raced over, his nails clicking on the floorboards, and gobbled it up. I admired Ava’s cunning. Cody will eat anything, so long as it’s not Marmite.
“Yucky,” she said.
“Ava!” Grandma tut-tutted, pulling one of those exaggerated mock frowns which don’t fool anyone, especially not Ava, who threw a second piece of meat over the side of her highchair for Cody.
“Ava!” Grandma exclaimed. “That’s not very nice.”
Not very nice? It was inhumane. Bordering on cruelty to animals. But with her attention on Ava, Grandma wasn’t watching me. Quickly, I slid my hunk of liver on to Dad’s plate. Just as quickly, Dad stabbed it with his fork and folded it into his mouth.
Yes! It was gone.
I probably should’ve felt guilty.
“It’s good for you, Ava. Eat it up,” Grandma was saying.
Ava looked at me and grinned. “Daddy eat it,” she said, and leaning over she plopped her last piece of liver on Dad’s plate.
CHAPTER 11
After cooking dinner for all of us, Grandma was tired.
“Can you manage if I go up to bed?” she said, wiping her hands on a tea towel.
I nodded. “Yup.”
“Ava too? Is that all right?”
“Yes, Grandma.” It really was all right. If Grandma was upstairs, she wouldn’t see me scrape the leftover dinner into the rubbish bin.
“Well, if you’re sure, I might head up then. Get my beauty sleep.” She gave Ava a kiss on the top of her head. “Nightie-night, my darlings.”
“Night, Grandma,” I replied.
When Grandma had gone, I lifted Ava out of her high chair and gave her a chocolate digestive to munch on while I cleared the table.
Yawning, I picked up a plate. I was pretty wasted myself. So much had happened today that this morning felt like centuries ago. I could hardly keep my eyes open. I put the plate down. I’d better put Ava to bed first, and do these later.
Cody was chasing Ava about the lounge after her biscuit, and in her rush to get away Ava had smeared chocolate on the arm of the sofa. Grabbing a sponge, I wiped it off. Oh no, chocolate lip prints on Mum’s cushions. More sponging. A chocolate handprint on the wall. It was like following Hansel and Gretel through the forest, only the breadcrumbs were chocolate stains. I had to stop her. I did the first thing that jumped into my head.
“Ava, hands on heads,” I commanded.
Ava froze, patting her head, the way they do at toddler music class.
I sighed. She was standing still, but now she had chocolate in her hair. Kneeling, I prised the mushy bit of biscuit out of her hand and scrubbed her palms one at a time with the sponge.
Pooh! She smelled like my used football gear after it’s been left in my bag all weekend. On top of that, there was a whiff of cheese crackers and pee. She was going to need a bath.
I glanced at Dad, hoping for a last minute rescue, but he was curled over his computer. Nothing had changed. I looked at Jason. The same. It’s just I was so tired. Maybe Ava could last another day? No one ever died from a bad smell, right? But babies and toddlers aren’t as tough as other people. Dad had explained it to me once. He said it took time to build up the internal weapons people needed for germ warfare. Just fighting off a common cold needed advanced weaponry. I couldn’t risk Ava getting sick. Not on top of everything else. I had to give her a bath.
I stood up. I’d got her to stop moving, hadn’t I? Stopped the spread of chocolate. I could stop the spread of germs, too. All it took was a bit of cunning. I needed to make bath-time fun…
“Dooooo the hokey-cokey,” I said in a sing-song voice. “Dooooo the hokey-cokey…”
I left her jiggling her hips while I ran to the hall cupboard and hauled out the swimming box. I dragged it into the lounge.
Ava was still dancing. “…and turn awound.” She had to be getting dizzy by now.
“Hey Ava. Want to go swimming?” I lifted the crumpled plastic paddling pool out of the box.
Ava stopped twirling and eyed me warily. “Now?”
“Uh-huh.”
She jumped up and down on the spot. “Swim-ming, swim-ming,” she chanted.
“Okay, just let me blow up the paddling pool,” I said putting the nozzle to my lips. I huffed and I puffed like the big bad wolf. Huffed and puffed some more. I stopped blowing and took a look at the pool. That was it? After all that blowing? It looked like a shrivelled up apple. This was going to take positively ages.
“Swim-ming, swim-ming.” Ava danced around me.
I took some deep breaths and started blowing again. More puffing. Still more. Thank goodness it was only a small pool. Only half way and my cheeks burned, my fingers aching from squeezing the plastic valve open. Nearly there.
“There,” I announced triumphantly, when I finally got the pool blown up. “I did it.” Exhausted and slightly woozy, I lay the inflated pool on the floor.
Ava had wandered away to the toy box. She rushed over and stepped into the pool.
I laughed. “It needs water in it first, Goofy,” I said. “And we have to get your clothes off. Come on, out you get.”
Ava got out and I slid the pool along the floor into the kitchen. As soon as it stopped moving, Cody jumped in.
“Hey, not you too. Come on. Out!”
Cody jumped out, then jumped back in again, exploring this new thing on the kitchen floor. I started to worry he’d pop it with his nails. Ava jiggled, impatient to get in. She ran to the swimming box and got out a toy boat.
“Swim time,” she said, running back to float it in the empty pool.
Hurrying to get the shower hose Dad uses for washing Cody, I attached it to the kitchen tap and turned it on, sloshing lukewarm water into the pool. That did it. Cody slunk away, squeezing behind the toy box. He hated baths as much as much as Ava.
“Not yet, Ava,” I warned.
I turned off the tap and helped her out of her clothes. But now that the pool was full, Ava clutched at me, trying to use my body like a ladder. Hmmm. The pool looked too much like a bath—a bath in middle of the kitchen floor, but still a bath. I needed her to make her think she was going swimming.
“Hey, I know what we forgot—your floaties,” I said, pulling her off me.
She chewed her bottom lip and nodded.
I got a pair of floaties out of the box.
“These nice pink ones?”
Ava nodded.
The floaties had deflated since the last time she’d used them. I was going to have to do more blowing. I felt my shoulders slump. My lungs were still burning from blowing up the pool!
“Hurry,” Ava said.
I breathed deeply and blew into the floaty.
One breath.
Two.
Three.
Ava ran to the pool, patted the toy boat, and came back again.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Done. I pushed the lid on, and started on the other floaty.
One breath.
Two…
When I finally got them inflated, the floaties looked like two huge pieces of candied popcorn.
Ava held out her arm. I tried to squeeze the first one on. It wouldn’t go. Her skin was too sticky against the plastic. I couldn’t slip it past her elbow. I shoved harder.
“Owie, Seb!” Ava complained.
How did Dad do this?
I had a sudden brainwave, something I’d seen on a Busy Buses cartoon. A bus had been stuck under a bridge and a boy suggested they let some air out of the tyres. That’s what I’d do. I’d let some air out. I flicked open the valve, then quickly stoppered it again, only I couldn’t get the lid back on in time. The floaty deflated.
I know exactly how it feels.
“Swimming!” Ava demanded.
“Yes, yes, just give me a sec.” I pushed the floaty up her arm and crouched to blow it up. Excited, Ava wiggled, and I had to let go.
“Keep still!” I moaned. “Hands on heads.” Eventually, both floaties were inflated and in the right place on her arms. “Okay, you can get in now.”
Ava bounded in, sinking the boat and slopping water all over the kitchen floor. At least she was in the water. It was a start. Now it was just a matter of getting her clean. I didn’t dare use soap in case she realised she was having a bath, and anyway, I couldn’t leave her in the pool while I went to get it from the bathroom. It was the Golden Rule of Bathing Babies: you couldn’t leave them. Ever.
I needed another strategy. Ava got out of the bath and ran to the swimming box, leaving giant pools of water behind her. She rummaged around a bit, water dripping everywhere, and pulled out her goggles.
“Help, peas,” she said, handing the goggles to me. I slipped them over her head and adjusted the eye pieces for her. She got back in the pool, pretending to dive under the waves. I had an idea. I’d squirt some dishwashing liquid into the pool. It cleaned dishes, why wouldn’t it work on babies? She had her goggles on, so the soap shouldn’t hurt her eyes. I took the bottle off the bench, squeezed a squirt of green liquid into the water and waited for the tantrum. Ava didn’t notice. If Dad and Jason saw me, they didn’t let on.
I sat on a kitchen chair and watched as Ava played in the pool.
She pretended to be an elephant blowing water through her trunk. She lay back on her back and kicked her feet. Water sploshed everywhere. So there was a bit of water on the floor. Who cares? I’d got Ava to take a bath without her throwing a tantrum. I was a hero.
“Hey Dad, would you look at that?” I whispered.
“Yeah great,” Dad murmured, not bothering to lift his eyes from the screen. I should have been mad, but I was too tired, and someone had to watch Ava.
Cody’s nose touched my knee and I jerked awake. It wasn’t Cody’s nose. It was Ava. She’d created a tidal wave, the breaker splashing on my legs. She was still in the pool. Technically, I’d broken the Golden Rule of Bathing Babies. What if something had happened to her? Ava was all I had left.
“Ava, time to get out,” I said.
“Nooo, Seb.”
“Yes, the pool is closing. It’s time to go, now.”
“No, no, no, no, no.” She stamped her foot, sending water flying, then turned her back on me.
Uh-oh. Melt-down alert. “Ava, if you get out now, I’ll read you a story,” I said. It was Mum and Dad’s favourite strategy. Mum calls it bribery. Dad calls it an incentive.
Whatever—it worked.
Ava stepped out of the bath. I dried her off with a couple of tea towels and used two more to mop up some of the water. Dressed in clean pyjamas from the laundry, Ava smelled all lemony.
“Go and choose a story,” I said, lugging the
paddling pool toward the sliding door. Ava scampered off to the bookcase.
The pool was heavy and awkward. It squished into a banana shape as I dragged it across the hardwood floors, water sloshing everywhere. I was so tired, I was staggering about as if I’d just finished a marathon. The plastic squeaked, soapy water plopped over the side, and I accidentally bashed my elbow on the door frame. Neither Jason nor Dad got up to help me shift it. Not that I expected them to, but geez it would’ve been nice. After a lot of shunting and shoving, I finally got the pool outside, heaving it sideways so it could drain on the lawn. Standing on the deck with my hands on my knees, I caught my breath.
When I came in, Ava was waiting for me on the sofa with her book. I was about to join her when I stopped, went back and locked all the doors. You couldn’t be too careful. Who knew what the zombies would do at night?
At last, I flopped beside Ava, exhausted. Cody licked at the arm of the sofa, probably hoping there was still chocolate there. I realised I hadn’t fed him. I hadn’t done the dishes either. They were still piled up on the kitchen bench. And I’d promised to read to Ava. I yawned again. All I wanted to do was crash.
“Just one story, okay?” I told Ava.
Ava spread the sofa throw over both our knees and patted it flat. She opened her book of fairy tales to the first page. My eyelids drooped.
“Once upon a time…” Ava said.
CHAPTER 12
Bastion Axestone strode through the rubble, pulverising zombie after zombie with his trusty bazooka. Dust swirled. The street was littered with fallen bodies, but zombies are slow learners and they kept coming. Bastion didn’t break his stride. He’d barely even broken a sweat. The guy was a legend.
A girl ran up to him, chased by a horde of ragged shufflers. She thumped on his chest, pummelling him with clenched fists. “Please! You have to help me.”
Wordlessly, Bastion turned and shot the lock off a nearby door, the rifle’s booms ringing out over the grunts and scuffs of the zombies. The door swung open.
“Quick, get in,” Bastion said.
The girl hurried inside. The door closed, but now the lock was broken, the wood about it splintered and charred. If he wanted to save the girl, he would have to stop the zombies himself. Bastion put his back to the door, and, like Horatio at the bridge, faced the shambling mob. They were close now. Their sunken eyes fixed on him. A seething mass of torn clothing and open wounds, they lumbered forward. There was no time to raise his rifle. The lead zombie lunged in a flurry of fists and hair. Hands closed around Bastion’s neck, choking him…
