by Max Bolt
“Ah, gut morning.”
“Stupid, but we do not pay for their brains, yes?” the man says.
Mason has lost his appetite for things. He is suddenly embarrassed to have brought his son to this place.
“We’re leaving,” Mason says.
The man scurries over and clutches his arm.
“No, you stay. She may not be much but she is cheap this morning, very cheap.”
He whistles and barks an order in Thai. The girl shakes her head. The pimp slaps her face and repeats his order. Reluctantly the girl starts to sway to non existent music.
“You like, eh?” the man glances eagerly at Mason, “you like?”
He barks more orders and the girl moves faster. While she moves the man grabs a long bamboo cane from beside the staircase. When the girl slows he strikes her legs. She keeps dancing. He hits her again. The man is smiling, enjoying the power the cane brings.
Mason quietly leaves and the pimp, so caught up in his twisted pleasure, does not notice. But Mason stops at the reception area. He listens to the fizz and slap of the cane. It is getting louder and more frenzied.
“Wait here,” Mason says to Ben.
Mason steps around the front counter and rips two of the beaded curtain wires off the ceiling. He returns to where the girl is still dancing, cowering from the pimp.
“Ah. You want to play,” the man says seeing Mason, “it’ll cost a bit extra, but you can play.”
The man offers Mason the cane but Mason ignores it. Instead he forces the pimp back against the stairway banister. The man does not resist, he thinks it is some kind of kinky game; he can get his kicks and still charge the stranger for it. But by the time the man realises it is not a game, it is too late, as Mason has secured his wrists to the banisters with the wired curtain beads.
“What you do?”
“You are one sick bastard,” Mason says, “you get your kicks hitting women? How old are these girls?”
The man laughs. His pride rearing like a trapped dog.
“They are old enough.”
“You are sick.”
“And yet you pay for sex, yes?” The man says.
The girl is watching from the corner of the room. Mason hands her the bamboo rod.
“Your turn.”
The switch in power is confusing for her. She stares at the cane before she focuses on the man struggling to free himself. This is the pimp who purchased her from a people smuggler and promised her a good and kind life in Australia. The man who beats her and ridicules her like an animal. She spits in his face and the cane makes a sharp slapping sound as it finds the soft skin of his thigh.
“Bitch. Bloody bitch,” the man grunts.
She starts to dance again. But there is something different in her movements. She does not stare at the floor. She studies her tormentor. She sways up close, seductively, twisting and turning and spinning. She whips the man across the chest. She lashes his legs and arms.
“Whore,” he spits, “dirty whore–”
She cuts him across the face. Then she disappears inside a side room. The man glances at Mason.
“Please. I pay you any money. Please.”
Music suddenly emanates from the vacant room; Neil Diamond’s – Woman. The girl returns, swaying to the music, folding and unfolding like a curtain twisting in a breeze. Channeling her inner Mia Wallace, she has a knife now in one hand and the cane in the other. She shoves a sock into the man’s mouth and undoes the zipper of his pants. The pimp’s eyes are bulging.
They never get tired of puttin’ me down
And I never know when I come around…
Mason has seen enough and he follows Ben out on to the street.
Girl you’ll be a woman soon – bah bah bah b…
*
It is a slow day at the station. Officers catching up on paper work and online shopping as the intense heat keeps the criminals quiet outside.
“Kid. I need you to do something.”
Nate springs to attention.
“What? Where we going Chief?”
“Nowhere.”
Fitch spreads a large topographical map of the local area across Nate’s desk.
“I want you to gather every reported incident from this morning. No matter how insignificant; break and enter, assault, shoplifting, anything, just mark them on this map.”
Nate’s excitement evaporates. More paper shuffling.
“One of the lowies maybe chief?”
At least he is consistent.
“No, you.”
“Is this related to the bloke from this morning chief?” Nate asks.
“Maybe.”
Fitch returns to his office and sits staring out the window. In his mind he sees his brother armed and wandering dangerously around town. The risk to Mason and the public escalates every minute Mason is off his medication. Fitch has seen his brother go AWOL before, messing things and people up. But it is not Mason’s fault. It is the war that messed him up first. Fitch knows he must find Mason before things get truly messed up.
Fitch considers the few clues he has; Mason’s abandoned car, the sighting at the 7-Eleven, and what Mason said to the office receptionist on leaving this morning; “getting me job back”. But how does he get his job back? He is on public transport but where is he going?
Fitch’s mobile interrupts his thoughts. It is Linda.
“He’s gone. He’s taken him.”
Fitch closes his office door.
“Linda, slow down. Take a breath.”
But she just keeps crying into the phone.
“Mason took Ben out of school.”
Fitch feels the room closing in around him. A vice tightening around his brain.
“How do you know?”
“I called the school on the off chance. And they said Mason came to the front office asking for Ben. They turned him away because he is not a registered guardian. But when they checked for Ben later he was not there. Mason took him.”
Fitch sees his private investigation suddenly becoming very public.
“What did you say to them?”
“Nothing. They are still searching the school. They think he might be in the Art department.”
“That’s good Linda,” Fitch says.
“None of this is good Fitch. He’s got my son and he’s bloody crazy. He has not taken his medication.”
Fitch breathes deeply. Decision time. Does he keep kidding himself he can control the situation and find Mason, or does he hand things over to someone who is not personally attached. Neither choice is pretty; the first could be very bad for Fitch, the second will be very bad for Mason. But Mason is Fitch’s brother, so is there really a choice?
“Linda, listen to me. This is going to be hard but you have to trust me. I will get Ben back. But you need to tell the school that Ben has turned up at home and everything is alright.”
“No Fitch. I can’t, he’s missing, he’s with that crazy bastard.”
“And I will get him back,” Fitch says.
Linda is crying hysterically.
“Linda,” Fitch says, “if you do not do this, the school will call the police and a team of officers will go after Mason. He will be deemed to have kidnapped a minor. He will be listed as dangerous. They will make no allowances for his mental state. And Ben will be caught in the middle. Linda?”
“Yes,” her voice is withdrawn.
“Can you do what I said?”
“Ok Fitch,” she says slowly, “just get my son back. He is all I have. I don’t care what happens to his father. Just don’t let anything happen to my boy.”
Fitch hangs up and rocks back in his chair. The room that had been closing in around him feels like it is spinning now. Like he is being sucked down into a giant abyss.
His landline buzzes. It is Nate calling from his desk.
“Boss. Something just come in. Likely nothing but you wanted to...”
“What is it?”
“Some crazy ice addict caused some trouble at a
medical practice in Kingswood today.”
“What kind of medical centre?”
“The funny kind. More Botox and fillers than thermometers and antibiotics.”
“The offender?”
“Bloody looney. Had a knife and gave the doctor a lesson on how to stitch up a laceration without anesthetic.”
“Get me the address.”
Chapter 10
Everyone is a product in some way of their experiences. Just as Mason was not always a damaged returned soldier, Ben was similarly not always a child without a voice. Rewind five years to an incident inside his family home.
It is late evening but still light outside. There are kids riding skateboards on the street. Neighbours doing neighbourly things like cleaning cars and gutters and tending lawns. But beneath this serene visage, ten year old Ben Turner is cowering behind his mother inside their family home. Father, and husband, Mason Turner, is pacing in front of them. He is yelling and his voice carries out to the street but fails to alarm the neighbours. This is the domestic violence capital of Australia after all. You hear someone yelling, you just put in the ear phones and get on with the gardening.
Ben is crouched behind his mother; a lioness protecting her cub. Ben peaks out from behind her, watching the man he thought was his father, stalk around the room. His mother’s face is bloodied. She has taken the violence so that Ben might avoid it.
“You think I want this life,” Mason shouts, “you think I want any of this?”
“I don’t care,” his mother says, “you are not taking him.”
Because that is what Mason wants to do; take Ben out for the afternoon. But Mason is drunk and in the middle of one of his half in Afghanistan half in Sydney moments, where everyone is a potential enemy.
Mason ducks and peers out the window, suddenly alert. The enemy are gathering out there. Surrounding the place with their AK47’s and rocket propelled grenades.
“I never asked for any of this,” Mason yells.
“Neither did we.”
“But you don’t got these things clawing at your brain. Eating you up.”
“Get some help,” Linda counters.
“The help don’t help. Now I’m taking him out for a walk.”
Mason approaches them and Linda pushes him away. He stumbles into the wall. Mason steadies himself and suddenly there is a gun in his hand. It just kind of materialises out of nowhere. It is one of the few mementos Mason kept from his time in Afghanistan. Mason points the gun at her. She stares it down. She will do anything to keep Ben safe. But Mason sees her bloodied face, and Ben’s frightened eyes, and realises that this is not what he wants.
He turns the gun on himself.
“Take myself out. Is that what you want?”
Linda says nothing.
“Just blow myself away. Let you clean up the mess and get on with things.”
Mason is shouting, his delirium escalating.
“You don’t want me around anyway. Because I’m a bloody lunatic that don’t have no right to his own son. Cause…”
Mason keeps shouting. His face turning bright red. His gun hand shaking as he empties himself of all the injustices he has endured. And at the peak of his rage Mason’s voice fails and in the suddenly profound silence, there is an audible click.
There can be no mistake. There can be no second guessing.
Mason has done it but the gun has jammed. But the impact is the same as if he had fallen with the shot. He drops the gun and he slumps against the wall, his eyes wide with shock.
Linda is screaming and holding her son, shielding him and covering his eyes, but it is all too late. Ben is old enough to know what he heard and what he saw and what he should have seen. Ben’s ten year old brain processes it all.
He wants to talk but can’t.
And so Ben Turner becomes the latest collateral damage from the war on terror fought in the desert on the other side of the world.
*
The airconditioning inside the train carriage has failed and it is stifling. Mason uses his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face. He is sitting beside Ben as the urban landscape rattles past outside.
“Well I bet they don’t teach you none of that at school do they kid.”
Mason nudges his son but Ben just keeps his head down staring at his pad. He is not drawing, just staring at a blank page. Mason senses Ben’s unease and realises his error. It was wrong to take his son into that place. What kind of father would do that? It was the drug withdrawals and the demons that made him do it.
“I’m sorry you had to see that son,” he says, “but it is some truth. Not some fake reality television. That is what this country has become.”
The train slows into a train station and Mason sees a billboard for the upcoming series of The Real Housewives of Sydney. A bunch of botoxed forty-something women with big hair and figure hugging dresses, looking daggers at each other.
“Now see that son,” Mason says indicating the advertisement, “sums up everything that is wrong with this country.”
Ben glances out the window.
“You see it everywhere kid. People obsessed with themselves. People wanting perfection but ruining each other trying to get it. People wanting peace but contributing nothing to make it happen because they’re too busy bitching and pretending to be something they’re not.”
Mason thinks he should stop but he can’t.
“I’ve got a name for it son, Generation GONE; Going Nowhere and Empty. Welcome to Generation GONE kid. Where your worth is measured by the size of your tits and your wallet and how many Facebook friends you have. Just bring your best fake tan and friends, and step right in; brains and morals optional. Hey did you know there’s a war going on in the Middle East, yeah what? huh really? But hey check out my new nails and puppy on Instagram.”
Ben tries to hide his smile.
“I’m ranting aren’t I son? But seriously those people have got more dollars than sense.”
Ben smothers his laugh.
“Was that a laugh kid?” Mason asks, “you feeling alright?”
Ben stoops lower over his pad but Mason can see his smile. It is the first time he has seen his son smile in years.
“You know I got the sack today son. Just gave me a letter and marched me out the door. That’s the thanks I get for defending this country.”
Mason shakes his head, staring out the window.
“But hey kid. We’re gonna get me job back. You and me. And no one is going to stand in our way.”
The train slows into Granville station.
“Got to get out here kid. Need a bloody drink.”
They exit into the heat once again.
*
The gang file out of the train station. They swagger and sway and talk each other up as they walk.
“We be pissin’ and dissin’ this place.”
“You be the man – man.”
“You be a weapon.”
“I ain’t no weapon, you be the weapon.”
“Yeah a big bazooka.”
The adrenalin has crept back. And well it should. The red dot on the mobile tracking app has not moved for the last half hour. The MF, or the OMF (Old MF), as they have labelled Mason, has stopped for–
“Lunch. OMF is getting himself some KFC,” Ring Leader says observing the gigantic red and white bucket sign at the end of the street.
“He likes chicken.”
“Gonna pluck him like a chicken.”
“Be squawkin’ like a chicken.”
“Gonna shoot that chicken in the butt.”
“Gonna bazooka that chicken’s arse.”
They laugh it up but get serious as they enter the restaurant. Walking tall, hands in pockets, checking the place out. A group of school kids eating at the back see them and avert their eyes. A couple of older girls see the make-believe gangsters, think it might be an extension of the earlier prank with the old guy and the gun, and try hard to conceal their laughter. The store manager has had trou
ble with this kind of riff-raff before and he stands close to the emergency alert button below the counter. Any trouble and the police arrive in five minutes. But a lot can happen in five minutes. A lot of shots can get fired in five minutes.
They separate, scoping out the downstairs and upstairs. Toilets. Car park. Drive-thru. Before regrouping outside.
“OMF ain’t here.”
“OMF been eatin’ then runnin’.”
Ringleader is unimpressed.
“Gimme your phone Gee.”
Three dollars is not much to pay for a satellite tracking GPS and you get what you pay for. The app works but it is not NASA standard and it freezes intermittently. The OMF has been at the KFC but he’s not there anymore. The red light is moving again; fast.
Ringleader glances across the road and sees the train line.
“He’s on a train.”
“OMF likes trains.”
“We’d better be getting the train then Gee.”
They bolt for the station, doing it tough in their bomber jackets in the heat. It has not occurred to them that the jackets worn by the gangs on America’s East Coast are not all about looking cool and tough but more about keeping warm, because it is minuses most nights over there. Our wannabe Bad Boys should have switched channels to the COPS and bad boys on the US West Coast, just jeans and white t-shirts over there. But too late now.
The gang rush past a small brown door and no one notices the young woman step on to the street. Her face is flecked with blood like Halloween makeup. It accentuates her smile.
*
Ironically, it is one of the failings of modern society that you can be caught in the middle of developed suburbia without access to a toilet. Even cavemen had that sorted with the communal shitpit. You went there for one thing and one thing only. But in the middle of Granville, waiting for a train in the heat, Mason is surrounded by hundreds of private toilets but none of them available to him. He decides to go caveman down a side alley.
It is cool in the shade as Mason pisses over the bags of rubbish. A door opens further down the lane and a head appears and then disappears; a business owner ensuring it is not an ice addict breaking into the place. Relieved, Mason and Ben turn to leave but two men stop them. They are big, both over six foot, and dressed in black.
