A Stolen Season

by Rodney Hall

  A kilometre complete, Ryan calls it a day, slapping the block with his hand. Strips off his goggles.

  He asks: Am I delusional?

  He answers: No.

  Josh, busy at work loosening Adam’s back, feels among the lumps and ridges. He remarks casually, almost ruminatively, that the Blood Bank has been in contact.

  ‘Who with?’

  ‘The Department.’

  ‘They think the. Bureaucrats may need. Ouch! A top up?’

  ‘On your account.’

  A blurt of laughter escapes Adam’s supine body.

  ‘They want their. Ar. Blood back!’

  ‘Funny man. Well, in a way, yes. Because according to them’—an involuntary thrill of admiration gives edge to Josh’s voice—‘yours is a rare type. Seriously rare.’

  ‘Blood. Is one thing. I do produce.’

  Privately Adam’s face breaks into a heartbroken smile. But by the time Josh turns him over he has it under control, because that’s a story he can’t begin to tell.

  ‘Seems someone’s in urgent need of a transfusion.’

  Of course he agrees to the request.

  They have their answer. The word is out, the clock waits for no one and the Blood Bank is on to it. The pattern of productivity immediately takes over—it turns out they’ve jumped the gun because they have already arrived—in the person of a trained nurse, duly conjured, who sets her portable cooler on the table. She is brisk and pleasant and apparently unsurprised by the Contraption. Josh excuses himself while she assembles the necessary kit. A jar gleams. The needle goes in. Adam’s blood is startlingly red. With a rush of pride he watches the level rise, beautiful blood, healthy and normal: the gift of life.

  ‘That looks so good. Ar. I ought to. Charge double.’

  The nurse smiles kindly. And once a gauze patch has been applied to his bent arm she obliges with what little she knows: ‘Way out in the sticks—some country you’ve never heard of—there’s an Australian woman . . . fell off a monument or something. Lucky to be alive. The same blood group as you, love. She’ll be grateful because there’s not many that has it.’

  Light-headed and sipping glucose water through a straw, he is slow to recover. He has other questions but she’s already off, winging away with the treasure she has. Josh resumes control.

  ‘So, how was that?’

  ‘Sexy.’

  ‘What else is going on?’

  ‘Nothing much.’

  ‘Anything for a quiet life, ay?’

  ‘Fuck the. Ar. Quiet life, man. I’d take myself. Out clubbing if. Luck wasn’t against me.’ Adam grunts in protest as the massaging fingers probe his pain, digging for sinews and easing cramped muscles. ‘Plus these days. Women. Tend to give yours truly. A wide berth. As a result of me being. Randy the whole time . . . Ouch!’

  Josh rallies. ‘Same here, mate. Advancing age, I reckon, in my case.’

  At the railway station Bridget can hang around as long as she likes and no one takes any notice. She treasures the thinking time. Familiar dark brick buildings face off across the tracks, closed and permanently padlocked since ticket sales were automated. Curved awnings, each with a frill of cast iron, throw down scalloped shadows along the same old platforms. Inside the new K-wire shelter two bicycles are chained to steel brackets, one with a child seat on the back.

  She sits on a bench. She stands. She visits the edge. The level-crossing bell intermittently announces train arrivals. Not for her. She isn’t travelling anywhere. She has chosen the station because nobody would think of looking for her here. The matching pairs of blocked-up windows have birdshit-crusted sills and no one watches.

  Passengers step out and others get in. She sees them disperse. Busy about their business. A functioning society. Bridget faces the fact that even when she escapes the undertow of Adam’s needs she is aware of him, back there at the house, missing her. She welcomes so much activity around her. Clattering wheels convey innocent associations. The diversion of simple journeys. To and fro. People enlivened by the excitement of shopping. Briefly, pleasantly, she loses herself in thought. Only to be brought back to earth. From one carriage, as the automatic doors slide open, out steps Yao with the little girl in his arms.

  Her heart halts.

  She is caught on the hop. This she did not expect. What if he spots her? He does not. She hides in the doorway of a gloomy waiting room: time to consider whether or not there’s any such thing as coincidence. He hesitates, a faint frown focusing his seriousness as he delves for his travel card and validates it like a regular citizen. Through the Way Out and up the stairs he goes. The brick archway like a descending stage curtain masks his head as he rises, then his shoulders, his back next (with Linda’s bare leg clasped against it) and his bottom in washed-out jeans, till all she can see of him is a pair of runners. Up and away.

  Second thoughts kick in. Why did she avoid him? He is a friend. Why should he have the least suspicion that she has been spying on him after dark? Why not be simple and straightforward and let her pleasure show? Anxious to catch up, Bridget collides with a bent old man—his attention wholly taken up with stairs to be negotiated—being followed by a perky little dog at the end of a length of string. He lumbers past. But it occurs to her that this puppy, smiling at her (all ears and bright eyes), might be the one Linda lost. Ridiculously, she entertains the idea that she’s allowing a pet thief get away with it. She thinks of speaking up. But good sense prevails. Not to mention the loss of precious time. Filled with purpose she crosses the footbridge and hurries down to platform level.

  They have disappeared.

  What would she say to Yao anyway? Hello? Where have you been? I am interested in everything you do? Her hopes are ridiculous. She heads for the local café. She could treat herself to a cold drink, perhaps. No sooner has she made this decision than she catches sight of him again, cycling past, with little Linda strapped into the child seat. Linda, at least, knows she is being watched—her head encased in a red crash helmet—glorified by the elevation of a smooth and lofty passing, she excludes the possibility of any challenge to her ownership of the man propelling her along her marvellous way. The victorious child.

  The Minister is utterly unprepared for what she notices in the long mirror while dressing. Arms raised as the beautiful fabric settles on her shoulders and sheaths her body. Wait. What’s that? Along her inner arm, unmistakably—white papery skin faintly, horrifyingly ruched—evidence of age. She has lost the elasticity of youth in the service of an unappreciative public.

  She adopts a tough attitude.

  No time to waste on regrets. This is Canberra and a car is waiting to take her to the hairdresser’s.

  At Maxine’s she finds a few treasured moments’ privacy to relax and pursue her own thoughts while breathing air cleansed by L’Oréal. A forgiving lassitude takes over as one of the apprentices sets about lathering her scalp. Rinsing. The towel smells clean. The laden atmosphere insulates her against worry. She is not due in Parliament till lunchtime. Soothed by heat and distilled perfumes, by steam from washbasins and radiation from rotating driers, she enjoys the comfort of reviewing her fame. Young fingers caress her. Bright lights dazzle the bevelled glass and a murmur of confidential gossip confirms her belonging.

  Next thing she is enthroned for the sculptural aspects of the work, beginning with selective tints, little squares of foil being wrapped around a few strands here and a few there among the rollers and clips. Meanwhile Maxine, whose tact never falters, compliments her on her handbag which sits at the side of the looking glass. From this it is a simple step to fashion accessories in general and thence to the full range of non-political subjects on which they share special perspicacity. Finally, to crown it all, the Minister feels a halo of silence descend as the dryer circles her head. Cabinet worries can wait. Fulfilled, she lets the magazine fall to her lap, her crimped scalp delicious
ly a-tingle with a promised future of curls.

  No sooner has she closed her eyes than her contentment is eroded by remembering that odious No Gay Marriage senator who has requested another appointment. Goodness knows, these days pretty well all the pleasures of power are undercut by compromises and unsavoury alliances. Plus the Prime Minister bluntly warning her that his push to update the armed forces is paramount and beyond politics—thanks to agreement by the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Defence—with trillions of dollars in contracts at stake. It’s just public opposition that has to be shut down. The line to take is that the objections are blatantly self-interested, centring on the budget being balanced by proposed cuts to welfare and pensions, making this another case of the leaners being a drag on the nation. Even so she had goaded him playfully, pointing out that only once—back in 1942—had the armed forces actually defended Australian soil. Unwise, perhaps, but preferable to the back seat. He had chosen to let it pass.

  She flips the glossy pages, hesitating at the good food guide.

  So Adam survives. The comforts of home confine and protect him. Cupboards and chairs stand listening among the shadows. In this room of abstract angles the morning light maroons him. There are no answers to any questions. But he is not one to throw in the towel. Meanwhile he needs the toilet. His pulse settles. A distant police siren fades along the highway at the other side of the park. The siren, now far off, trails away toward its designated emergency. Bridget steps into his field of vision, snapping on the rubber gloves in readiness. Stillness restores the colour to her slacks and blouse, pale green and poppy red. And her skin.

  ‘You okay?’ she asks tenderly.

  At last she takes her turn fully meeting his eyes—still the eyes of her husband—as his mouth breaks open.

  ‘Condition: repulsive. Ar. Progress: hanging in.’

  He is overwhelmed again by a premature vision of hell, chaos, witness to every cranny of the ugly suburbs being filled with junk and clutter. Things we don’t need and don’t even want. He cannot escape knowing that the biggest man-made structure on earth is a floating island of garbage in the north Pacific—already the size of France—slowly rotating in the current. A marvel of the modern world. Next, there’ll be cruise ships taking tourists to see for themselves.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Bridget asks again, absently. Feeling a tremor run through his body she straightens up in alarm. And then she sees: he is silently laughing, possibly at nothing at all. ‘What is it?’ she objects, laughter being more terrible than anything. When he doesn’t reply she takes the weight of it on herself and her preoccupation with guilt. She guesses. ‘Sweetheart, believe me, Ryan didn’t matter then. And he doesn’t matter now.’

  Adam shakes his head. In a spasm of rebellion his arm jerks to signal a warning as he shuffles out.

  ‘What more can I say?’ she appeals to the polished floor. ‘When you left you cut me off from your life. You’ll never know how that hurt. I had to believe in someone,’ she concludes. ‘So I chose myself. Hoping I might not need anybody. But in the end I did.’

  Was she ever more beautiful? In self-defence he shuts his eyes, addressing her from the dark, his voice muffled.

  ‘I hate being. Useless.’

  Bridget trails one finger to collect the dust along the windowsill. ‘How long since I hoovered this room, for goodness’ sake?’

  Adam bounces back. Things will never again be the way they were. And if life—or this little hibernating creature it has become—is worth hanging on to, he might as well twist its tail. Already by some miracle the air has cleared between them. There are new forces in play. Possibilities.

  ‘I have an. Idea,’ he says.

  oh bridget, now it is too late, i want us to have children just like you. to feel new life stirring inside you. i want to know that you will never again be lonely. and you will never again wonder if i love you.

  He looks at what he has written and clocks it as having taken eleven minutes to type—yes, he is somehow back at the desk—an average three seconds or so per letter and space. Two hundred and sixty separate instructions: locate and tap. He keeps account of his progress. Only a few days ago it would have taken twice as long. How about that! He must report to Yao. But Yao is elsewhere and it’s Bridget standing behind him who reads over his shoulder. He knows better than to try turning to look at her. He cannot guess her response. Her silence suggests the worst.

  Unless he faces her he will never know.

  ‘Ready to move?’ she asks.

  When at last she helps ease him on to the couch Adam’s face closes down against the steeple of his knees. If it weren’t for a small damp patch appearing on the cloth of one knee she would be none the wiser. They, neither of them, expected this.

  He remembers. And the loop of memories keeps putting him through the same sequence of enigmas. No let up or time out. Still the armoured column boils along in a cloud of heat, massive diesels growling. Blokes on top shout their war-cry obscenities. Nothing can stop us. Powering across territory supposedly pacified, the invasion rides on a deafening wave of noise. Beyond a strip of farmland the barren plain opens out ahead, every shrub camouflaged, each leaf muffled in a fitted jacket of dust. Occasional spindly telegraph poles at odd angles are weighed down by the single frail wire along which news of an invasion is invisibly exchanged. Passing a couple of outlying hovels the same tale of poverty is told. The old treachery. Abandoned belongings—a torn shirt in the gutter, sandals, the lid of a suitcase, plastic bottles, broken household things—and an iron lean-to propped up by its own dark diamond of shadow. Great birds with dirty feathers gather their rags to flap away. The whole convoy, stretching back as far as the eye can see, leans into the bend. Like ships emerging from fog the heavy manoeuvrable vehicles bristle with weaponry. Here and there six-wheelers bounce along in place, easy as ever. Raked by wind the gunners feel the intoxicating kick, being ready to fire the next shot. Oncoming vehicles, local merchant traders, headlights on high beam, thrash the moiling smoke of a wildfire as they swerve off the road deferentially, decorative canopies shuddering and mirrors twinkling.

  As always the open country rushes in. Steady, inexorable, controlled and fast. Aerials bend. The tanks forever maintain a regulation safety gap. Aloft on fumes whole hours fly by, the gruff advancing roar blitzes every obstacle, all ten units strung out. What could equal this? The mechanized tornado stirs deep down adrenalin. The target village approaches at a hundred clicks. The thunder of flying grit lashes wall to wall. Danger a tonic. Wasp nest dwellings huddle together, expelling a scatter of dogs and chickens. Stray urchins hurl insults in a foreign language. Women cover their faces, caught mid-shock. Among them occasional menfolk stare with murderous eyes. Their hatred triggers a fiercer lawlessness because nothing can touch us or stop us. Fanging it, in our Bushmasters, foreshortened shadows fly across the ground under the wheels. Up here on top cover even the least grunt feels like master of the universe, exposed and all-knowing in the rush of conquest. As liberators (‘peacekeepers’, hoodlums, whatever), an army of occupation, possessing the immense importance of superior strength. A cluster of schoolboys outside a tiny mosque. Heads turned to take in the action are engulfed by tidal dust. No doubt they’ll make sense of it later. One kid hurling a rock at a tank eternally raises both arms as the hero of the day—stone pings against steel—savouring his first taste of life primed for flinging away on a suicide bomber’s career. Gun-carriers swerve to skirt ancient walls. A stray black bird, screwed into the sky, utters cries sharp as a blade. The juggernaut races in along invisible compass-bearings to tip the established order on its head: who cares if this causes traditional enemies and religious schismatics to unite against us? Who cares if we are the common enemy? Such an enemy! Opportunities open wide to betrayal and subterfuge, deceit and espionage, brinkmanship and outright treachery—not to mention the brilliant self-abandon of those who throw themselves in the path of death. The de
lirium of letting go, obedient to orders. Wha-hoo! Look out! The glorious careening fling of pure power and engineered precision. The guys are shouting. Wind snatches their cries to carry them east. Helmets, gunsights, goggled faces swaying in line along the rutted hardtop: high-tech gear, bulging bulletproof vests, lean wrists, leather gloves on weapon stocks, eyes everywhere. Every man Jack wired. Earth trembles under the weight of the mirage. Maniac speed fountaining flak and shit. Bullets and bottles snick the armour-plate. Rocks knock the underside. A whirlwind of junk spirals above the wasteground, empty ruins gape at the sandy haze that stretches the horizon thin and flat as glass. Gun barrels levelling. Ragged palm trees among the water towers shudder. On past some sort of wrecked military installation—at one time an enemy stronghold, still with the proof of a tattered flag on a pole—helmets a clutch of unhatched eggs dusted with grubby gold light. The convoy swoops down into the gully, while on one flank guardian tanks lift like submarines breasting rollers of dirt. The emergent valley floor delivers another ghost town haunted by snipers on the rooftops. Victory flings a dazzle of light flickering across empty windows and plugged doorways. Frantic civilians salvage the shreds of normal life, grasping rescued goats and balancing baskets of vegetables, to freeze at the margins of the catastrophe roaring past in a stench of burnt fuel . . . And later the same day in that never-to-be-forgotten town (a self-repeating movie, being re-run through faulty sprockets, jumps a frame here and there) laughing joshing guys present their faces for identification, each man a familiar enigma. They shrug their shoulders to ease the armpits of combat jackets. But now Adam the Joker, hanging back from the action, loiters under an archway of the ancient town. Fascinated.