by John Marsden
No-one said a word. We knew time was precious, and we had no energy for conversation anyway. We ate kind of furtively, like we didn’t have the right. In our own country! It was so unfair. Homer kept walking off through the trees, banana in his mouth, stopping and listening with head cocked while he ate, then returning for his next helping.
Within fifteen minutes I got them moving. I put one pack on my back, Homer took the other. We started walking north-west but gradually circled around, until at about four o’clock we saw the blessed outline of Tailor’s Stitch, a high purple-blue ridge in the distance. The sight gave me fresh energy. I dropped back and walked with Fi and Gavin, to keep them company, to encourage them. They had fallen behind and I knew they had no reserves left. But I also knew that if we kept up a decent pace we could be in Hell by dawn.
Chapter Eleven
The weird thing was that everything in Hell was so normal: like, while we’d been locked in boots or chasing around on motorbikes with bullets flying, they’d been sunbaking and reading and playing. The only interest the ferals had in our adventures was when we treated Homer’s injuries. They seemed to enjoy watching him flinch and bite his lip and swear while Fi and I washed his wounds.
He had a bad gash on the scalp, in among his thick hair. It seemed to be the cause of all the dried blood on his face. Most of his other injuries were cuts and bruises, especially on his right hip and shin. They must have hurt like buggery.
There wasn’t much we could do about them, except admire the spectacular purple-blue-green-black colours.
True to form Homer was tough though. He might have grimaced and sworn, but every time we hesitated, worried about how much we were hurting him, he’d say, ‘Come on, get on with it, what’s your problem?’
Gavin and Jack watched enviously. I could see the lesson they were learning. At one point I said to Homer: ‘Would you mind shedding a few tears, just so these guys can see it’s OK to cry?’
Fat chance of that.
As soon as we finished Natalie wanted me to tell her a story, and Jack and Casey dragged me off to see this elaborate dam system they’d constructed in the creek.
It was pretty good as a matter of fact. I stood looking at it thinking how they’d both make good engineers when they were older, then went into a big downer by reminding myself that they were unlikely to survive long enough to have the luxury of becoming engineers or anything else. Becoming a corpse wasn’t much of a future.
But for the time being they seemed quite cheerful. They showed me how they’d channelled the water through a series of locks. They could alter its flow by moving a few stones. ‘Clever little buggers,’ I thought. I said to them, ‘All you need’s a turbine and you could run electricity through Hell.’
Their eyes sharpened and I think they had visions of the whole valley ablaze with streetlights. Casey was probably dreaming of a TV and video player already. I didn’t like to tell them it mightn’t be that simple.
Lee and Kevin were interested enough in what had happened and happy to listen to our endless post-mortems, but as always it was never quite the same, telling people who hadn’t been there. Homer was in the middle of describing how I’d shot through the door lock, and Kevin was nodding like he really cared, but just as Homer got to the most dramatic part Kevin pulled off his sock and started inspecting an ingrown toenail. I mean, honestly, sometimes I thought there was no hope for Kevin.
I had made one decision while I was in the boot, and it was about Lee. Those terrifying hours had given me a slightly different perspective. I’d realised, curled up in the tiny dark space, that I didn’t want to die without fixing things up with him. It wasn’t worth throwing away a deep friendship just for the sake of pride. There were more important things in life. Sometimes being in the right wasn’t the end of the story.
It was hard to get anyone away from the food though. As well as the two packs, which were certainly full, we’d killed a lamb and brought that in with us. We’d decided it was worth the energy needed to catch it and kill it and skin it and gut it, and then cover the blood and bury the unwanted bits so we left no evidence of our visit.
The trouble was that we hadn’t thought about carrying it over Tailor’s Stitch and into Hell. Fi and Gavin had been so out of it that Homer and I did all the work. At least we hadn’t had to carry them: three times Gavin started asking us to piggyback him, and each time we cut him off before he finished the sentence. In a way I wish I could have carried him. It was the first time he’d shown weakness or softness or affection; the first time his tough veneer had cracked. It was the first time he’d asked me for anything. But like they say, war is hell, and no-one was available for carrying duties. He was the one who’d been so keen on coming on this trip, so he had to put up with the consequences.
Anyway, I kept looking for an opportunity to talk to Lee on his own, but I soon realised I had no hope while the food was spread out, attracting everyone’s devout attention. It wasn’t until I’d fought the human magpies off and got it organised and stored that I went after Lee, determined to track him down.
Within a few minutes I saw him on his way to the creek with a water bottle, so I followed him there. I found him crouched on the bank, watching the water run into and around the top of the bottle. Yet he wasn’t making any attempt to fill it.
I deliberately walked loudly as I came up behind him, because I knew what a horrible shock it could be in this war if you didn’t hear someone coming.
He didn’t look around though.
I sat beside him and watched as he pushed the bottle a little deeper, making the bubbles gurgle. Then he lifted it out again, tipped most of the water away, pushed it back under and made more bubbles. I think he would have gone on like that for hours if I hadn’t said anything. Seemed like he was content to squat there forever, watching the water eddy and flow.
‘Lee,’ I finally said, ‘I have to talk to you.’
He didn’t respond so I just ploughed on. ‘I know what happened back in Stratton stuffed up our relationship. I hate that. I mean, to be honest, I hate what happened with that girl, but even more I hate how we don’t talk any more, how we’re not friends. I’d do anything to get that back. I know it’ll never be the same, but if we both want it badly enough, we can get back the friendship. I just want to tell you that I do want it, really badly.’
After a while I gave him a light punch on the arm and said, ‘So, what do you think? Are we going to be mates again?’
I was very tense, and maybe resenting that I was having to do all the work in this conversation.
Finally he did turn his head, and facing me, yet not looking at me, he said, ‘What do you think’s stopping us being friends again?’
He spoke in such a level voice that it was impossible to tell what he was getting at.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘I guess I’ve been pretty tough on you. I’ve had to come to terms with some stuff. I keep forgetting how much life can change in a war, and how we’ve all done dumb things that we’re not exactly proud of ...’
‘So,’ he said, ‘the main thing for you is forgiving me for getting off with Reni.’
Reni was the name of the girl he’d been with in Stratton.
I gulped at his question. I had a strong feeling that I was on dangerous ground. But I tried to be honest.
‘OK, if you want to put it that way, maybe it is something like that.’
Well I’d said it now. I dug one fingernail into each palm and waited. But he didn’t blow up. He just lifted his water bottle, which was still empty, and walked away up the hill. As he went he said, ‘That’s not the main thing. The main thing is forgiving myself.’
Stupid me, I’d never really thought about that side of it. I’d been too caught up in my own feelings.
I sat for hours trying to work out where to go from there. I didn’t have a clue.
I’d have brooded about it twenty-four hours a day if I hadn’t got caught up in the project that was in the back of
my head all this time.
Christmas.
I wanted to have a Christmas, especially for the kids. We knew from the start it would be the strangest one ever. The kids were thawing out a bit, but God knows, it was hard work. The biggest improvement came because of Gavin. They took their lead from him in almost everything, and after our wild times at the Whittakers’ he had a better attitude towards us. He’d had a bad time in the boot of the Alfa, so I suppose he felt fairly grateful about being plucked out of there. But he was still a terror. He’d escaped from Fi within moments of leaving the farmhouse, without a word about his plans. He obviously resented being shunted away from the action. But he’d left her absolutely terrified, not knowing where he’d gone or what had happened. Where he went of course was straight back to the farm. From the way he described it, he’d waited like a fox outside a chook yard. He knew Homer and I were in there.
When Gavin told a story he was a joy to watch. He told it with his whole body. His arms outlined the circle of the house he’d started to take, his face showed how he went from fear to excitement to hatred, and back to fear. On tiptoes he demonstrated his light-footed route around the building, and the way he’d darted into shadows at the slightest sign of human movement.
The other kids watched avidly. So did we. I was fascinated by his ability. If Casey and Jack were going to be engineers, Gavin could be a great actor.
Gavin hadn’t seen me grab the bike and charge at the two people. But within a couple of minutes of his arrival he noticed the movement inside: people running past windows and turning on lights. As the house erupted into chaos Gavin retreated towards the machinery shed. Suddenly people poured out of the house, gesturing wildly, sprinting in all directions. A couple of them had rifles. Gavin started stressing big-time. At last a moment came when the area outside the kitchen door was clear. That was all he needed. He went straight at the door, like a dart thrown full-strength. He flung it open. Coming at him was a large motorbike, ridden by two wild and crazy teenage homicidal maniacs ...
He actually did a pretty good imitation of the two of us, which had Natalie rolling around on the ground holding her sides. I was rapt to see that. Natalie laughing was about as common as Homer crying, or Fi swearing, or emus flying.
I said exactly that to Fi a couple of minutes later, when we were in the toilet area. She was indignant. ‘I do swear!’
‘No you don’t!’
‘Yes I do! Honestly, I swear lots of times.’
‘Oh Fi, I’ve never once heard you swear.’
Although as I said that I had a vague memory of Fi saying ‘bloody’ when we were organising the break-in to Tozer’s, the night we were so nearly trapped in Wirrawee.
‘I do, I do.’
I couldn’t help teasing her. She was so anxious to prove she was a rebel. The truth is, she was as much a rebel as I was a supermodel.
‘OK, so when was the last time you swore?’
‘At the farm, at the Whittakers’.’
‘I didn’t hear you. Where are your witnesses? You’ve got to have witnesses.’
‘Well, it was to myself. No-one actually heard me.’
‘Oh! You can’t count that!’
‘Yes I can,’ Fi said, totally unreasonably.
The war had changed many or most things but Fi was still as innocent, as untouched by badness, as she had been at the start. I don’t know how she did it.
As we washed our hands we talked about Christmas. We decided that today would be 22 December and we announced to the kids at lunchtime that Christmas was in three days. They stopped ripping into their cold lamb and biscuits and looked at us goggle-eyed.
‘How can we have Christmas here?’ Jack wanted to know.
It was good to get a reaction from Jack. He was still very withdrawn, hardly talking to the other kids, let alone us, although he seemed to think Big Daddy Homer was worth a bit of attention. Poor misguided child.
‘Of course we can have it here,’ I said brightly. ‘We’ll have a tree, and decorations, and we’ll sing Christmas carols. And Kevin and Lee are going to go out tomorrow night and get us another lamb, we hope.’
‘Will Santa Claus come?’ Natalie asked.
‘Sure will. Santa never lets you down. But the kind of presents he brings will be special bush presents, that he made for the war. No stuff like the old days. No Barbie dolls or videos or roller blades.’
Casey and Gavin looked interested, but suspicious. Judging from their faces the general attitude seemed to be ‘OK, if you can pull this off we might be impressed, but we’ll believe it when we see it’.
That psyched me up all the more to make it work.
Fi and I spent the afternoon making decorations, helped by Casey and Natalie, who were more hindrance than help. Jack actually dropped by for a little while and did some, while trying hard to look cool about it. I was pleased he’d made the effort.
We made wreaths out of fencing wire from the chook yard, using ivy, lavender and wallflowers from outside the Hermit’s hut. Then we did a dozen posies with red berries.
Homer and Kevin and Lee went off to the Hermit’s hut to organise the presents. We’d given them suggestions, and we’d ransacked our few possessions to find things we could donate. Considering the ferals had taken so many of our valuables in Stratton we didn’t have a lot left. To make it more difficult, it had to be stuff the kids hadn’t seen before.
I wanted to give Fi and the boys something too, and I spent a lot of time thinking about what it could be. For Lee I eventually wrote a poem on bark. Bark’s great to write on, as good as paper really. I did a bark sketch for Homer, a picture of his house. For Fi I made a pair of earrings out of wire, with two owl feathers hanging from them. Kevin’s present was a burl bowl that I’d deepened a bit with sandpaper, but it was already such a good natural shape that it hadn’t needed much work.
It was a busy couple of days. Halfway through it I realised that there’d been a small miracle. Everyone was so busy, so caught up in the Christmas preparations that it was like the war had gone away. No-one even mentioned it. We were so involved in our little secrets that we didn’t have time to think about the bad and ugly stuff of the last twelve months. I thought proudly that my Christmas idea had already proved itself. Even if the day was a complete flop it didn’t really matter: our Christmas gift had arrived early.
Sure we kept checking Tailor’s Stitch for more signs of unwelcome visitors, but everything seemed quiet up there. We had two and a half days of peace, and that was the most precious present any of us could have asked for. All those Christmas cards talking about ‘peace and goodwill’ weren’t so stupid after all.
The kids did get genuinely excited. By the time our Christmas Eve arrived they were off their heads. Even Jack, who was about as emotional as a lump of Blu-Tack, got the verbal trots. Well, by his standards. When I said goodnight to him he asked if there’d be any lollies tomorrow, and went into a long boring description of all his favourite sweets from before the war. Natalie checked for about the fiftieth time that Santa could definitely find us down here in Hell, and for the fiftieth time I assured her it wouldn’t be a problem, as long as she realised Santa brought different presents for kids in the middle of the bush in the middle of a war. I thought it amazing and touching that in spite of their terrible experiences, Natalie devoutly believed in Santa Claus.
We had to wait hours for the little buggers to get to sleep. I started to understand how aggravating Christmas Eve must have been to our parents. I don’t think Gavin or Jack were too into Santa, but they just wanted to stay awake for a stir, and Casey was willing to be persuaded either way.
Anyway we finally got to put out our pathetic little pile of stuff. It sure didn’t look like the ads on TV. No tinsel, no glamorous paper, and definitely no BMX’s.
In the morning I made them all go to church before anyone was allowed to open their presents. It’s what we’d always done at home, and I suppose the longer the war lasted
, the longer it seemed important to keep up our customs. So we gathered down by the creek, some of us reluctantly and some quite enthusiastically.
‘Are we going to have some of that God stuff?’ Jack grumbled. The water gurgled softly in the background, and I read a bit from Robyn’s Bible, and we sang ‘Silent Night’ and ‘While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks’, and ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’. I don’t think it was too exciting for Gavin but the rest made an effort. The thin little voices of the kids mixed with Homer’s gruff growl and Kevin’s out-of-tune baritone. No-one actually remembered all the words. The first verses were easy: after that it got a bit patchy, but between us we got most of it together.
And then it was pressie time.
To my amazement it went OK. The kids seemed to accept that the rules for Christmas in Hell were completely different to the old days. No-one complained that there was nothing made of plastic, nothing needing batteries, nothing they’d seen advertised on TV. Considering how much whingeing they did most of the time I was pretty happy.
The three guys had done a fantastic job in their toy workshop. For example they’d made sock puppets for Natalie, out of a pair of Homer’s old Explorers. They’d sewn button eyes and foam noses and cloth mouths to them, and created funny faces. They were a huge hit with Natalie. Jack got three wooden trucks, with button wheels and wire axles. I think Lee made them. For Casey there was a set of five knuckles they’d picked up from sheep skeletons, in a beautiful little box.
As well as all that stuff, I’d sat up at nights making four wooden crucifixes, which I strung onto bootlaces. This was quite a big deal for me. I did it for Robyn’s sake, mainly, but for myself too. The longer this war lasted the more religious I was getting. Looking up at the stars at night, watching those faithful lights, made it harder and harder to believe there couldn’t be a controlling force behind it. So I made the crucifixes as a way of trying to call up a bit of extra protection for the kids. I was getting fond of the little critters, even if some days they were lazy and selfish and irritating and irresponsible. After all, Gavin had saved our lives.
