Before This Is Over

by Amanda Hickie

  She turned back to the kitchen, looking for something to anchor herself, armor herself with. Her eye lighted on the knife block, the large wooden-handled chef’s knife. Its heft was familiar in her hand.

  She needed to calm herself, to convince herself everything and everyone was secure, that it would be safe to sleep. Through the door, Zac’s room was still. She put her head far enough into Oscar’s to hear his slow breathing. Although she remembered locking the front door, she couldn’t let go of the thought that the grille could be unlocked, even though she knew it wasn’t. The cold air from the street flooded in the moment she opened the front door. A movement caught her eye. A few doors up on the other side, someone was coming out of a house, leaving the door ajar. He stepped off the porch and into the moonlight, the man with the silver sedan and the daughter, coming out of the wrong house, carrying something—a white plastic shopping bag overfull with what looked like groceries. His hand splayed, trying to hold both handles over the boxes that stuck out the top. Except that the plastic was ripped down one side, he could have been stepping out of a supermarket.

  She slipped the knife under her pillow as she slid back into bed. Her head lay gingerly on top and her hand rested against the handle. As her muscles relaxed and sleep overcame her, an alarm sounded deep in her brain, fear of rolling onto the knife. She moved it under a book on the bedside table and touched the handle for comfort.

  Small noises came from Oscar through the wall—his bed creaking as he rolled over. She thought about the cold, she thought about the empty space beside her. She listened to the restless boy, she touched the knife handle. She didn’t remember falling asleep.

  She woke to the gentle white noise of rain on the roof. Cold seeped into the house, the air, and her bones, the kind of cold that her body mistook for damp. The light that oozed through the curtain was gray, no sun to burn off the chill. The bottom of the bed had been sucking the heat out of her feet all night, and as they hit the icy wood of the floor, she felt the chill shiver up through her.

  She dragged her body down the hall, as if piloting an automaton, a broken-down, clapped-out automaton. Here at the controls, she was disconnected from the machinery. This body had no sentimental value. She hadn’t forgotten that it had tried to kill her.

  Oscar leaped at her as she came through the living room. “Can we have breakfast now?”

  “Give me a chance. You can see I just got up.” In the kitchen, the dishes from yesterday were still in the sink, and there were more than there had been last night. Could it be possible that Zac had tidied his room and added to the heap? The stack overflowed the sink and spread onto the kitchen counter. She pushed aside one of the plates and only just caught the glass that, Rube Goldberg–like, teetered over the edge. It was a mess. A big horrible pile.

  She banged on Zac’s door.

  “What?”

  “Are you guys up?”

  Zac opened the door a crack. “Yeah, we’re up.”

  “Wash the dishes.” She put in the polite word to make up for the tone of demand in her voice. “Please.”

  “What, now?”

  “I’m not making breakfast till it’s done.”

  Zac muttered to Daniel as she walked away but, nevertheless, the door opened and she heard them stomp to the kitchen. She threw herself on the sofa next to Oscar, watching television again.

  “Haven’t you seen this one already?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do something else then.”

  “What?”

  “Something else.” He kept watching. She picked up the novel she was reading and tried to concentrate. “Turn the volume down. It’s too loud.”

  Oscar turned it down a little. She nestled in the corner of the sofa, trying to pretend that reading was like sleeping.

  Oscar crawled across from the other end. “Can we have breakfast?”

  “You already asked me that.”

  “Can I have toast?”

  “We don’t have any bread. We still don’t have any bread. So we can’t make toast. We had this conversation yesterday.”

  “We could make bread, like last week, that’s fun.”

  “We don’t have any bread flour.”

  “What are we going to have?”

  “I don’t know, Oscar. I don’t know what’s for breakfast. When the boys have finished the washing up, I’ll go make it. Then I’ll know what we’re having and you won’t miss out. But right now I want to read, okay? I just want a little bit of quiet.”

  Zac slouched into the room. “Yeah, done.” He slouched away again.

  The healthy packets of cereal were long gone. As were the unhealthy ones. Most of what they had left was grains. By trial and error, she had discovered that powdered milk tasted better if it was cooked into some sort of porridge, but they’d used up the oats as a makeshift muesli while they still had tinned fruit and long-life milk.

  Rice would do, or couscous. With spices—she still had plenty of spices—all boiled up with some water and the powdered milk. A little bit of dried fruit, rationed out.

  Breakfast couscous, it sounded like something from a café. With fresh milk and toasted slivered almonds. Fresh berries on top. Sitting in a café in the morning sun, someone else doing the cooking. That would be good. Sean would take the boys for a walk and she would linger over a second coffee, reading the paper. And at the end, she could get up and walk away, no washing up.

  As she spooned the coffee grounds into the pot, she could see the bottom of the tin. One more really good pot or three very weak ones. She’d based her plans on feeding four, not six. Seven now. As she drank, she watched the saucepan bubble like hot mud.

  Oscar was at her elbow again. “I don’t like that.”

  “You don’t know if you like it—you haven’t tried it.”

  “I’m not going to eat that.”

  She put out one takeaway container and a couple of plastic bowls, searched out a thermal cup hiding in the back of the cupboard, and put a spoon of powdered milk in the bottom of the cup, dissolving it with the coffee. It looked gray and unappealing, only half full. If he wanted a whole cup, he could have stayed here. She didn’t pour one for Gwen, there wasn’t enough. And Gwen got a big bag of tea and a few liters of long-life milk in the last load of shopping, all to herself. Gwen didn’t have to share with anyone. Hannah spooned the mush into the container and the bowls. No berries, no slivered almonds, no sun.

  “Hey, Zac.” She yelled out. “Zac.” She yelled louder.

  He appeared at the kitchen door, Daniel, his shadow, behind him. She held out a tray with the mug and bowls. “Take this to the office for Dad and Ella.”

  Zac looked her square on. He didn’t hide his disdain. “You take it.”

  For an instant, anger overtook her. Not at Zac, at Sean. If she took the food to him, she could give him not just the tray but all the words she was trying so hard not to say, that she was trying not to unleash on an undeserving Zac.

  “I will, I can.” Oscar bounced. “I’ll take it.”

  She looked at his enthusiastic face and knew he wouldn’t be able to resist stealing a hug. “Daniel will have to take it.”

  “Why?” His face changed from puppy eagerness to crushed disappointment in a blink. “Why can’t I?”

  “It’s too hard for you to balance the tray.”

  “But I…”

  “I said no. Zac, you can take Gwen’s.” She handed the container to Zac.

  “Yeah, whatever.”

  “Pick a different door.”

  Zac flicked his eyes and stomped away.

  “Wait.”

  Zac turned stiffly back to her. “Yes?” He spoke the word cleanly and crisply.

  “If there are containers there, don’t touch them, okay? Leave them there.”

  “Why did you ask her for them if you’re not going to use them?” He had a snarky smile, pleased he’d caught her in an error.

  “Two hours, genius. They need to have been out at least two hour
s.”

  “But he gets two computers. He gets the one in the office and his laptop, that’s not fair.” Zac was well under way. “What’s he going to do with two? It’s not fair, we don’t have one and he has two.”

  “I don’t think he’s using them both.” If she didn’t look up from her work, Zac would stop. The laptop was a shield.

  “So why did he take them? He could have given us one.”

  Daniel stood, as always, just behind him.

  “I don’t think the computers were uppermost in his mind. He had other things to think about.”

  “But,” Oscar cut in, a self-satisfied smile on his face, “you have a computer, Mum. We could use your computer.”

  “Or I could use my computer. Because it’s my computer.”

  Zac slumped his shoulders in exaggerated despair. Daniel looked intently sideways to avoid making eye contact. “Why?” Zac took a belligerent pose and she could see Daniel shrinking, as if he thought Zac had gone too far.

  “Because I said so, Zac. Give me a break. You’re supposed to be big enough to look after yourself, so act like it. You can’t possibly be so devoid of imagination that you can’t find something to do without the computer for two days. Just don’t bother me.”

  Oscar nestled into her side, creeping his arms around her waist. He pushed himself under the edge of her laptop, trying to get closer to her, tipping it.

  “I don’t want to find something to do. I want to be with you,” he whined.

  “I didn’t mean to yell.”

  He burrowed into her and she felt a sharp pain as he dug into the spreading bruise on her ribs. She twisted herself away from it but the ache had reawakened.

  “Will you play something with me?”

  “It might seem to you like I have endless time, Oscar, but there are still occasionally more important things for me to do than play.” She needed time, privacy, peace. “Don’t look like that—you’ve got Zac and Daniel. You’ve got a roomful of games.”

  “Don’t expect us to babysit him.”

  “Come on Zac, half a day. How hard is it to be nice to each other for half a day? I’m doing it all here, with no help.” She shook her finger at him to drive it home. “When I’m done with what I have to do, I’ll spend time with you. But not now. Try to show a little maturity.” Oscar sulked, Zac gave her a defiant stare, Daniel looked like he hadn’t noticed there was a conversation going on. “I’m going to my bedroom. Don’t disturb me.”

  She stood sharply and marched away, depriving Zac of any chance to retort. At the door to her room, the thought ambushed her that Oscar might take the opportunity to visit Sean. She marched back through the living room to the kitchen, locked the back door, and returned with the key in her dressing gown pocket.

  The laptop teetered on her knees as she tried to perch on the edge of the bed. The springs wobbled underneath her, and typing was a random hunt for the keys. The only stable solution was to lie, teenager-like, on her stomach with the computer in front of her. The stretch down her front made the bruise ache. She pulled up her pajama top to inspect it, a large burgundy stain spreading away from the blanched impact spot.

  She occupied herself with the things that had to be done, like paying bills. There was no excuse, even at the end of the world. The electricity. No matter how dodgy the supply was, she was grateful for the intermittent trickle of electrons. The water. Maybe she shouldn’t pay that. What were they going to do, cut the nonexistent water off, stop them from not flushing the toilet? Thank God for a bucket and the water tank. The phones, the Internet, the council rates. She paid them all, pulling down the boxes on the bank page, filling in the amounts, verifying and submitting. Writing all the details on the printed bill. Boring, stupid grown-up stuff that never went away.

  She rewarded herself with a bit of net surfing. Or punished herself with exactly what she wanted. She found a website called Abandoned Down Under. The front page was a mosaic of stories, and she clicked on one at random.

  We had our last delivery of pine boxes a week ago, now it’s all cardboard and we’re having trouble getting even them. I rang the factory three times yesterday because my boss won’t bury without a box. He says you can’t ask a family to just put their loved one in the earth. So we stopped answering the phone in the afternoon because we’ve no more space until we bury some of them. I can’t face telling one more person to take them into the street and call the hotline. Just now a woman knocked on the door, crying because her father was laid out in her living room. I told her she can’t keep him there, it’s not safe. She thinks the government will bury him in a pit with a bulldozer. I don’t know if she’s right.

  If it were Sean or Zac or Oscar…She pushed out of her mind the thought of sitting in the living room with their shells. Clinging to their empty wrappers, having nothing else left.

  Click.

  It’s all very well for the government to say work from home but who can do that? We’re builders. You can’t do that from home. The tradies, the factory workers, all of us that actually do something, that make all the stuff for everyone else, we’re stuck at home. How am I supposed to pay my subbies? And who’s still getting paid? The people who are pushing paper, staring at their computer screens in their own homes, typing something now and then. It’s not like that’s real work. Meanwhile the rest of us are going out in it, risking our lives, for what? To keep things going for the nerds. They could all die tomorrow and who would know the difference?

  Click again.

  We only got here to the shelter yesterday, but they stopped taking new arrivals this morning. Halfway through the night, one of the staff told me to move my kids to the other side of the gym and not let them near anyone. In the morning, they tried to keep it quiet, but I saw some bodies lined up on the floor in the hall next door. An ambulance pulled up and I saw a woman begging to be taken to hospital. They said if she could walk, she wasn’t sick enough. There’s only one other school in walking distance inside the quarantine zone. We didn’t go there yesterday because someone said it was already full. Even if it wasn’t, now they won’t let us leave for two days.

  One clearly wasn’t a local.

  Yeah, I’d like to be able to complain about having to work from home. It must be nice for all you Aussies on your nice little island. You don’t know the first thing about compassion. I’m disgusted that you can whine about a bit of inconvenience when there are people in the rest of the world trapped in their houses because their government declared martial law. Looking after their dead and dying families. So why don’t you just go for a walk on your perfect beaches in your Aussie sunshine and whine a bit more…

  She forced herself to read the whole post—gruesome details of the worst that people had to endure—and felt duly shamed. At the bottom of the page was a breakout box. “From the Health Department website.” A column of dates and beside each a number. The last entry was yesterday—2,826 dead, all in Sydney, all in one day. She tried to think about just one person, the one that made six, and wondered how they could be sure there wasn’t another one, uncounted, that made seven. If Ella had carried it into the house, if they all died here, who would know? She looked out the window at the row of houses opposite. Were any inhabited by the dead? She felt their threatening presence pushing against the front door.

  She shivered. The room was cold but the world outside was colder. She should have been crying but all she felt was a chill.

  A window appeared on her screen.

  I hoped you might bring breakfast.

  And after a brief pause.

  It would have been nice to see you.

  I’m not the one who walked away.

  How normal it felt, to be chatting on the computer.

  How did you sleep? How’s Ella looking?

  No temperature, no cough. Slept fine. A bit upset. Then she forgets. Then she remembers. She’s three.

  She wanted him to keep typing. It was like getting a note passed in class from a secret crush. Even with the h
eater, it must have been freezing in the office, but he knew better than to expect sympathy. She started to type I want us to be together but another line from Sean scrolled up.

  Stuart told her to keep her mask on. She had a tantrum when I tried to take it off so she could eat dinner. In the end she wore it around her neck. She may never take it off ag

  The cursor sat blinking after the “g,” waiting for the computer to catch up with the rest of Sean’s sentence.

  That’s fine by me.

  Sean’s sentence still wasn’t complete. She went back to browsing while she waited for him to think. “Page not found.” She clicked another tab—“Page not found.” She clicked, fast, through all the tabs, opened a new page—“Page not found.” The network icon had a red line through it. She rebooted the machine. Still no network.

  She walked back to the living room where the boys had arranged themselves in parallel lines on the floor in front of the TV. Oscar jumped up.

  “Mum, can we—”

  “Just a minute, Oscar, I have to check something.” The phone was dead. She unplugged it from the wall, plugged it back in, and rang the home number from her mobile. In her ear, the line rang, but the home phone didn’t. She tried Sean’s mobile.

  He started speaking before she’d even heard a ring. “Something happened to my computer. I’m not seeing the network.”

  “The phone line’s not working either.”

  “It might be us. Try ringing Gwen.”

  “I don’t want to talk to Gwen.”

  “Just ring it—you’ll be able to hear her phone through the wall. You can hang up.”

  “I don’t know her phone number.”

  “Look it up in the book.”

  “We don’t have a book anymore.”

  “Look her up on the net, then.”

  She waited a moment to let that sink in.

  “I’ll try Stuart. You ring anyone, they’re all stuck at home.”