A car door slammed. A moment later the station wagon appeared, and Amelia stood, watching it circle the houseyard and head through the open gate into the laneway. They were eyeing Amelia as they passed. He was resting his arm on his open window, and Jessie was driving. She was wearing her sunglasses, which were reflective and made her look like an insect. Amelia started to bawl, feeling like a little kid.
Then she heard Chris hurtling down the steps. She thought he was going to do something, run after them. But he stopped beside her, dressed in his rented tux, wild-eyed, and he wrapped an arm around Amelia’s shoulders, not to comfort her, but to hold her back.
‘Oh my babies! My beautiful babies!’ Jessie called, in a voice that sounded like it had been wrung out of her throat. She took one hand off the steering wheel, reaching towards them.
She’s going to stop, Amelia thought. She’s going to stop.
But the car glided on, as sure as a shark.
‘Oh God,’ Amelia said in a small voice.
‘Don’t worry about her. Fuck her.’
‘But what are we going to do? What’ll we do?’
‘I don’t know. But we stick together, that’s all. Weeds stick together.’
The station wagon passed over the grid and turned towards town. Chris and Amelia didn’t watch it go. Instead, they stood rigidly to attention, staring at the flock of pigeons, who wheeled back and forth over the paddock in front of them.
‘Dumb birds,’ Amelia said. For a moment she thought a volcano of anger was about to erupt inside her. But no, she was oddly calm. Shock, perhaps.
She found some tissues in one of her plastic bags and blew her nose. Then she licked a forefinger and ran it around the skin under each of her eyes, hoping her mascara hadn’t run.
‘Well, she got his stupid safe,’ Chris said.
‘How will they open it?’
‘Dunno. Just cut through the metal, I s’pose.’
Amelia sniffed, and blew her nose again. ‘You know what I don’t get? I never got why Ray made such a big deal out of it in the first place. Like, putting it right in front of her. I mean, he must have known this would…’ She blinked.
‘Happen,’ Chris finished for her.
They turned to look at each other, and it was one of the most surreal moments of Amelia’s life: she and her brother standing at the foot of the steps of what had formerly been their home, sweating in evening wear under a Capricorn sun, surrounded by a motley collection of plastic bags that held most of their possessions.
Chris cleared his throat, his eyes suddenly sparking. ‘Well, girl, if you want someone to look the other way…’
‘Give them something to look at,’ Amelia breathed. ‘Holy shit. It makes so much sense. I mean, if it wasn’t her, it might have been Mr Fitzgerald.’
Chris ran his teeth over his bottom lip. ‘If we find that money, we’re taking it,’ he warned her. ‘No backing out now. ’Cause we’re gonna need it.’
Amelia nodded.
‘He won’t know it was us. He’ll think it was her. Oh, it’s so beautiful,’ Chris said.
‘But why would she take the safe? That’s what he’ll think.’
‘To rub it in his face. Just like letting those birds out. Anyway, it makes sense that she’d take it, too, just in case there is something in it.’
‘He’ll think we’ve gone with her,’ Amelia said. ‘He’ll think we were in on it.’
‘He won’t care where we’ve gone,’ Chris corrected her. ‘It’s between her and him, and by tomorrow she’ll be a long way from here.’ He breathed into his cupped hands, eyeing Amelia over the top of them. ‘Far out,’ he said, giving a nervous laugh. ‘That’s it. I know it, Meals. If we can find it, we’re home and hosed. But where?’
Amelia didn’t answer him. Because she knew that Chris, like her, would have already figured it out. It was obvious. The one place that her mum would never go.
Ray taking the scraps out. Ray cleaning up all that shit; checking their water; taking such good care of them.
Ray’s little hobby.
And across the paddock, as though agreeing with her conclusion, the pigeons finally made up their mind and turned for home.
* * *
Later, Amelia sat in the back seat of Trevor’s Datsun Stanza, facing Megan, who was looking Madonna-esque in a lacy white number. Megan had managed to brush most of the dirt off Amelia’s dress, and was now doing what she could to improve her hair. The floor beneath their feet was stuffed with plastic bags. Chris was driving, and the radio was blaring out The Proclaimers, and they all sang along to the five hundred miles bit. Then Trevor hunted through the glove box, before turning around to present Amelia with her corsage.
‘I’m sorry it doesn’t go with your dress,’ he told her.
‘It’s perfect,’ Amelia said. And it was.
Because he’d given it to her.
Because she was free.
Because in the boot, along with their bags, was the money they’d found buried in the dirt floor of the chook house. It had consisted of a number of small, plastic-wrapped bundles of notes, which reminded Amelia of the dead pigeons in the freezer, and they hadn’t had time to count it. But going by the weight of it, there was a shitload.
Because the sun had dropped behind the mountains in the west, and the countryside glowed golden, the Brigalow trees throwing deep blue shadows, and she’d never realised how beautiful it was until now, but maybe that was because she was leaving.
Because the friends you know at seventeen are the friends who’ll know you forever.
Because sometimes even weeds have a win.
Review of Australian Fiction, Volume 3, Issue 4 Page 10
