Rainfish

by Andrew Paterson

  ‘Not long now, fellas,’ said Pete.

  The sugar cane ended abruptly at a wall of rainforest that radiated coolness.

  Pete said, ‘Creek’s in there. Flows into a drain, goes under the cane and comes out at Nind’s Creek. Good fishing spot there, so should be something up in here.’ Connor and I took our hats off and sat in the shade of the rainforest while Pete walked up and back looking for the entrance to the track.

  ‘Here we go,’ he said before dodging through a skirt of vines and disappearing, then calling us after him.

  When we stepped through the vines, it was like a switch had been flicked—the morning light turned to gloom, and the canefield sounds were replaced by the croaking of toads and the whirring of cicadas and the occasional low whistle of a bird. The track was wet with rotting leaves. We followed it single file, ducking branches and brushing away vines. We climbed over a log covered with moss and yellow mushrooms, then stepped through a patch of knee-high ferns, trying not to imagine that each whisper in the undergrowth was a snake hiss.

  After about ten minutes we came to a place where a fallen tree had torn down a mess of vines and light poured through the hole in the canopy above. Here we caught our breath, wiped sweat from our faces, watched a butterfly crisscross the sunlight, and listened to the dooooo-wop call of some bird I didn’t know the name of. No one said anything: it was a place where talking about things like if your foot was sore or what show had been on TV the night before would have felt wrong. I thought, One hundred years ago there would have been rainforest like this everywhere, even where our house is. And it’d been there forever. And then we came along. And then I thought, If I have to hide, this is where I’ll come. This is much better than Polly’s Creek.

  The fallen tree was too big to climb over so we edged round it, but we couldn’t find the track on the other side. We kept pushing on, further into the forest.

  Suddenly a pond appeared before us. It was the size of a backyard pool. Most of it was covered by lily pads the size of dinner plates, some clean-edged, some rough-edged like something had been nibbling on them. A huge strangler fig grew on the far bank. Its branches spread above the pond sending roots straight down to dip like fingers into the water, before continuing on over our heads to blend in with the canopy. Vines twisted from branch to branch, here and there hooping down like swings.

  ‘Who would’ve thought this place was in here,’ said Connor, and though he didn’t say it loudly it cut the still air.

  Pete whispered, ‘Quiet, mate, they can hear us, you know.’ He took my rod, unwrapped the line, got a worm from the bucket, pulled it in half and hooked it on. Then he drew me closer. ‘Go round there, mate,’ he said pointing. ‘Find a spot where there’s not too many lily pads. She’ll float down a bit, then Bob’s your uncle. Be ready, hold it with both hands, could be some big ones in there.’

  I followed the bank, squeezing between tree trunks. Most gaps between the lily pads were choked with green, cottonwool-like weed, but I found a spot and cast my worm. It slapped onto a lily pad, and when I lifted my rod it slid along, slipped into the water and drifted down into the blackness, and disappeared.

  I waited. Connor and Pete had their lines in and they were side by side, both intently watching the water. There was a swampy, rotting smell but also a honey smell from flowers in the canopy. Everything seemed quieter around the pond. There were no bird-calls; even the cicadas sounded distant.

  Pete’s rod bent double. It shook as he pulled back. ‘This is how it’s done,’ he said. With a splash a glint of silver-brown broke struggling from the water.

  ‘Great one, Pete,’ shouted Connor. ‘Excellent!’

  Pete dropped his rod, grabbed the fish with both hands and threw it in the bucket which he’d already half-filled with water from the pond.

  I scrambled over to take a look. It was brown, had a wide, flat head with bug eyes. Its fins softly undulated, holding its teardrop-shaped body steady at the bottom of the bucket.

  ‘What is it, Pete?’ I asked.

  ‘A mudcod. Slimy mongrels. You had any bites, Aaron?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Give it a jiggle, that gets ’em going sometimes. How about you, Connor?’

  ‘Nothing at all,’ said Connor.

  ‘They’re in there,’ said Pete. ‘Let’s see if we can get three each.’ He re-baited, and it got quiet again, but it was a different kind of quiet now we knew we could really catch something. I held my rod tight, hardly breathing. We were all rock-still, like statues left behind at an overgrown temple. As I stared into the wedge of water where my bait had disappeared I began to notice vague shapes: clouds of weed and, further down on a bed of leaves, so faint at first I thought I was imagining it, a pinhead of pink. It was my bait. It was near a long shape too straight to be just a stick. Was it a bit of pipe? Too thin. An old fishing rod someone had dropped? A spear?

  There was a fish, a big one, moving slowly towards my bait. And there were more behind it, tons of them, crowding the water. I held my breath as my bait disappeared, then let it out as the bait reappeared, untouched, and the fish were gone.

  ‘I just saw a big school of mudcod,’ I called out.

  ‘They don’t go in schools,’ said Pete.

  ‘But I saw them!’

  Connor gasped. There was a splash, and then a mudcod was flapping on the end of his line just like Pete’s.

  ‘Beauty, Connor. In the bucket with it,’ said Pete.

  I couldn’t see my bait again. Thinking it had sunk into the leaves, I tugged on the line.

  The line tugged back.

  ‘Pete! I’ve got one,’ I yelled.

  ‘Well, pull him up then,’ said Pete.

  I pulled. It held. I prayed, Just let him come up, don’t let him off. Just don’t let him get under a snag.

  And then it was out of the water and wriggling on the bank beside me. It was almost as long as my forearm, easily the biggest fish I’d ever caught.

  ‘It’s a huge one, Pete.’

  ‘Bring ’im here.’

  I grabbed it in two hands and carried it over to Pete who unhooked it and dropped it in the bucket.

  I looked down at our three fish. Mine was the smallest one.

  ‘They’re huge,’ I said. These were just the bait. How big were the barra going to be?

  ‘We need a few more yet, mate,’ said Pete.

  This time I baited my own hook.

  ‘Got one,’ yelled Connor.

  I caught my second fish, unhooked it myself and threw it into the bucket. Then I got another worm, but by that time Connor had yelled, ‘Got another one, Pete.’

  ‘You’re a natural, Connor,’ said Pete, which got my back up because I was only one fish behind. I thought, I’ll show you who’s a natural. That was when I, we, went a little crazy. Like a feeding frenzy. And the fish bit so quick—you got a fish, slipped it off the hook, threw it in the bucket, got another worm into the water and Bam! Another fish.

  ‘Getting close to enough now, I reckon, fellas.’

  ‘Aw, Pete. Can’t we get a few more?’ said Connor.

  ‘Please, Pete?’ I added.

  Pete looked down into the bucket. He must have seen a lot of fish in there. He rubbed his beard. ‘Maybe just one or two more.’

  ‘Yay!’ said Connor.

  We baited up again. Lines in. Other types of fish appeared: sleek ones with rainbow stripes. They nibbled my bait but they weren’t big enough to take it. An eel with smooth skin that was spotted like a leopard, slid past. I changed my worm to a juicier-looking one.

  Connor struck again.

  Then finally I got one. Connor got one at the same time, and we re-baited, but Connor was quicker. He had another fish—outsmarted, outpulled—twisting on his line. I was catching up and I was getting better. Now I could feel the tiny tug that came up the line when they first bit.

  Suddenly they stopped biting. For me anyway—Connor was still catching them. Pete had stopped fishing and was s
itting on a log smoking a cigarette. I closed my eyes. Come, fish, I command you. Come to my bait. I opened my eyes just in time to see something big break the surface, brushing lily pads aside.

  ‘Barra,’ I cried and I yanked at the rod. The bait flew up into the fig tree.

  ‘Ya see a barra, did ya?’ said Pete, stubbing his cigarette out as he came over.

  ‘It wasn’t a barra,’ scoffed Connor.

  Had I seen a glint of silver? ‘I definitely saw it,’ I shot back, no longer sure what ‘it’ had been, only that it was big.

  ‘You’re just saying it ’cause I’m so far ahead of you,’ said Connor.

  ‘Are not,’ I snapped back.

  ‘Probably ’bout time we checked how many we’ve got,’ said Pete. We crowded round the bucket. It was black with fish.

  ‘Holy hell, there’s tons,’ I said.

  ‘I can’t even count them,’ said Connor.

  ‘Maybe we should put some back,’ said Pete.

  ‘Please can we keep them, Pete?’ said Connor. ‘We’ll get worms for them every day, won’t we Aaron. And we can have them there for barra bait whenever we need them. And I want to show Mum how many we got.’

  ‘We could even breed them,’ I added.

  Pete shook his head. ‘All right. Okay. But you two better look after them. And I mean every day.’

  ‘Thanks, Pete,’ I said.

  Pete took off his shirt and put it over the bucket, which he then hoisted onto his shoulder and we were off, slower than we’d come, but now calling out to each other like pirates heading home with treasure.

  As we drove I held the bucket between my knees, tilting it against the angle of the car to stop the water spilling.

  ‘I can’t believe we got so many. Can you, Connor?’ I said. ‘Mum’s gunna freak.’

  ‘They’ll make good bait, them ones,’ said Pete, but I could tell by the way he squinted at the road that his thoughts were somewhere else.

  I said, ‘Tell us about the secret spot, Pete.’

  He glanced into the rear-view mirror, then with his eyes back on the road, he said, ‘Well, it’s on a farm but the farmer doesn’t fish it. Pretty sure I’m the only one who does. It’s a creek with dead trees in it, pretty shallow, lots of snags but tons of barra. Real big ones. Only problem is you have to keep an eye out for crocs: there’s plenty of them too.’

  I said, ‘I can’t wait to go.’

  ‘Yeah we’ll go,’ said Pete, ‘Us three. It’ll be good.’

  Connor, looking out the window, didn’t say anything.

  And in the silence, like a toothache, the rosary beads slid back into my head.

  11

  AARON AARONSON

  WE PARKED UNDER the house, and Connor suddenly perked up. ‘Right. Aaron, look sad,’ he said. ‘Pete, don’t say anything.’

  Mum was sitting on the back stairs with a magazine and a cigarette, which she quickly hid when she saw us. ‘My boys are back. How did you go?’

  Pete didn’t say anything, I frowned and Connor sighed and said, ‘Not too well.’

  ‘Did you get anything?’

  ‘We didn’t get much,’ said Connor.

  ‘That’s no good,’ said Mum, as she ditched her magazine and came down the stairs. I had to turn away to hide my grin.

  ‘So what’s in the bucket?’ she said.

  ‘Well we did get one or two,’ said Connor.

  ‘Here, look,’ I shrieked and ripped the shirt off the bucket.

  ‘Holy hell,’ shouted Mum, while Connor and I burst into gleeful laughter. ‘How many are there?’

  ‘A few,’ said Pete.

  ‘A few? Few hundred! What are you going to do with them all?’ said Mum.

  ‘Thought we could put them in the tub out by the chook pen,’ said Pete.

  So we lugged the bucket down behind the chook pen and in no time we had the old bathtub mucked out, freshly plugged and filled with water.

  I heard Mum whisper, ‘Why the hell did you get so many?’

  ‘They were havin’ a good time,’ replied Pete hotly. ‘There’s plenty of mudcod in the world. Bet you’ll be the first to eat all the barra we get with them.’

  ‘I’ll count them and you pour them in,’ said Connor. ‘But go slow.’

  ‘We’ll both count,’ I replied.

  They swam against the flow at first, but eventually a smallish one plopped into the tub.

  ‘One,’ Connor announced. ‘Two. Three.’

  They began to splash into the water.

  ‘You’re doing it too fast,’ complained Connor.

  ‘No, I’m not,’ I said. ‘Thirteen, fourteen.’

  ‘I’m counting,’ said Connor, and he grabbed at the bucket.

  I shrugged him off. ‘I’m doing it.’

  ‘Well, do it properly then,’ said Connor.

  ‘There’s thirty-two,’ I said when we’d finally watched the last of them into the tub.

  ‘No, there’s not, there’s thirty-three,’ said Connor.

  ‘Either way,’ Mum cut in, ‘you’re gunna have a job looking after them.’

  We all looked down at the mudcod.

  ‘I caught that one,’ said Connor pointing to the biggest one.

  ‘Good job, boys. Now come upstairs and you can tell me all about it.’

  ‘I might stay down here,’ I said.

  ‘Suit yourself,’ said Mum.

  I stayed, waiting till the others were in the kitchen and I could steal away, return the rosary beads, and get back without anyone knowing I’d been gone.

  In the meantime I watched the mudcod. They’d organised themselves into groups, with the bigger fish deeper. The biggest ones, right at the bottom of the tank, were the darkest colour, almost charcoal grey, and they had a dignity about them—they were the kings of the tub. All the fish seemed happy enough, apart from smallest one, the only one I was confident I’d caught, which was moving around near the surface like it was an unwanted kid.

  ‘What’s in there?’

  I looked around; Byron’s face was above the fence.

  ‘How long have you been there?’ I said.

  ‘A while. I called out before, but you mustn’t have heard me. I heard youse doing something.’

  I couldn’t see his chin. His head dipped and there was a crunching sound then he reappeared, chewing. ‘What’s in the tub?’ he said.

  ‘Some fish. We just caught ’em.’

  ‘What sort?’

  ‘Mudcod.’

  He took hold of the top of the fence and I saw a Home Brand chocolate-chip muesli bar in his hand.

  ‘Never heard of ’em. You gunna name ’em?’

  It hadn’t occurred to me. ‘Yep. I’m gunna call that one down the bottom Connor Two, ’cause my brother Connor reckons he caught it and it’s the biggest. And that’s Pete Two ’cause he caught that one, and that little one’s Aaron Aaronson ’cause I caught it. And that one there I’m gunna call Popeye ’cause one of his eyes is stuffed. Can you see ’em?’

  ‘Not really.’ He struggled to get higher up the fence, while I cornered a fish and lifted it out of the water.

  ‘That’s a rainfish,’ said Byron.

  ‘No, it’s a mudcod.’

  ‘I always called ’em rainfish. My Gran calls ’em rainfish.’

  ‘Well Pete’s a fisherman, and he says they’re mudcod.’

  ‘Who’s Pete?’

  ‘My mum’s new friend.’

  ‘Well, Gran grew up here all her life and she calls ’em rainfish.’

  Something dawned on me. ‘Is your gran an Aboriginal?’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Nothing.’ That meant Byron was an Aboriginal too. He had brownish skin so that made sense.

  I said, ‘You don’t eat these fish, do you?’

  ‘No, you can’t eat ’em. You want this?’ He offered me the last bit of his muesli bar.

  ‘Nah. Hey, my friend said to say thanks for the advice about the toy. He’s gunna take it back right now. I’m
gunna go help him.’

  ‘Want me to come?’

  ‘Maybe next time. My friend’s a bit shy…’

  ‘No worries. See ya.’

  ‘See ya.’ I was on my way through the yard on the way to the swamp, wondering whether I’d ever talked to an Aboriginal kid before. There were lots in Fingleton but only one or two at St Rita’s, and none in my grade. We had some kids from Laos, some from Vietnam, and lots of Italian kids but they were born in Australia and were just like us, us being one of those things like who’s cool and who isn’t, who’s tough and who isn’t—it’s one of those things everyone knows, even if they can’t say why. I worried when I saw a bunch of Aboriginal kids coming down the street towards me. People said they stole things and got drunk. Mainly they didn’t have much money. They ate witchetty grubs. Things I’d seen them do: swim at Polly’s Creek, walk about the place, yell to each other across the street, win races at interschool sports. Things I hadn’t seen them do: eat at restaurants, go to Scouts. I should go over his house, I thought. But how will I get over the fence? Weirdly, it didn’t occur to me that I could just walk round and knock on his front door. Of course they don’t eat mudcod. What a dumb thing to ask. I decided I’d name another fish Byron Bay, after Byron.

  As I passed under the kitchen I heard a voice I couldn’t immediately place. I’ll just have a quick look before I go, I thought, and crept up the back stairs and peeked through the bottom louvre of the kitchen window.

  ‘That’s a nice statue, Mrs Tate,’ Damon was saying. He was talking about the Buddha on our sideboard. He was wearing a collared shirt, white shorts, and new-looking sneakers.

  Mum’s last name was Gorry not Tate, but she didn’t correct him.

  ‘Would you like something to drink, Damon?’ she said in her good-manners voice.

  ‘No, thank you, Mrs Tate.’

  ‘How come you’re so dressed up?’ asked Connor.

  ‘Me and Dad have just been to your school and met the principal. I’m going there after the holidays. I could be in your class.’

  ‘What did you think? It’s crap, right?’ said Connor.