Shooting Stars

by Brian Falkiner

  Book I am reading:

  ‘Of Mice and Men’ by John Steinbeck.

  John Steinbeck didn’t kill himself. I checked in the encyclopaedia.

  December 10th

  A week ago the total number of people I had met, was one. (If you don’t count the old lady.)

  When I met J.T. that number doubled.

  Well today it more than doubled again.

  Including Moma, I have now met five people.

  I went back to J.T.’s camp. No reason really, I was just bored. J.T. was brewing a billy and he asked if I wanted a cuppa. I said yes.

  While he was making it, I heard footsteps. Actually Jack heard them first. His ears pricked up and he looked downstream.

  I followed his gaze and listened carefully. Someone was coming up along the shingle bank. More than one person, from the sound of it. City people have no idea how to move in the bush. They make enough noise that you could hear them a mile away. They wear boots. How can they feel the forest through thick leather soles? I never wear shoes. I don’t even own shoes.

  I automatically stood up, ready to run back into the cover of the bush, but just then J.T. turned around with a mug of tea and handed it to me.

  I took the mug and sat down again. This was a real life dilemma. If I dropped the mug and ran into the bush, J.T. would think that very strange. If I stayed, then a bunch of people were going to see me.

  In the end I couldn’t decide, so did nothing.

  I sat and sipped my tea, hoping they would pass by with just a friendly nod and wave.

  “We’re going to have some visitors,” J.T. said.

  “Cool,” I said, as if it were no big thing.

  They came around a bend in the stream a few moments later, crunching along the bank. They were hunters, three of them.

  There are generally two types of hunters I see in the forest. There are serious hunters with well worn, but well-loved rifles and a weathered look about them as though they had spent a lot of time in the bush. Then there were the rich hunters, with shiny, fancy rifles with expensive telescopic scopes, whose boots were clean and who wore camouflage clothing with bright orange safety vests over the top so other hunters wouldn’t mistake them for deer.

  These were the rich kind. There were three of them. They came trudging along the bank in single file and for a moment they looked like the seven dwarfs in my old picture book (although not as short, and there were only three of them).

  They waved as soon as they saw us and J.T. lifted a hand in return. After a moment I copied his gesture.

  The noise they made as the three of them approached would have scared off any deer in the vicinity, in my opinion.

  The first one had glasses, and a beard but no moustache. He was quite fat and I thought he actually looked a bit like the dwarf named Doc.

  “Hey there,” he said.

  “Gidday,” J.T. said.

  “Seen any deer?” Doc asked.

  “Yeah mate, a bit,” J.T. sipped at his tea.

  The next one had a sour expression on his face, so I nicknamed him Grumpy. He didn’t say anything. He just looked sour.

  The third one was quite unusual looking. His face seemed too big for his body, as though he had been given the wrong head. I called him Dopey, for no good reason except that I had already given the first two names.

  He spoke next. He was staring at the string of deer tails that J.T. had drying on an old rotten tree trunk by the stream edge.

  “Damn,” he said. “You leave any for us?”

  “There’s plenty there,” J.T. smiled.

  “You killin’ just for fun?” Grumpy spoke now. He sounded as sour as he looked.

  “Aren’t you?” J.T. asked.

  “If you ain’t gonna eat it, don’t shoot, it, that’s what I always say,” Doc said cheerfully.

  I wondered if he ate everything he shot. He was fat enough.

  “We don’t hunt for sport,” Grumpy said.

  He sounded disdainful, like J.T. was some kind of pond scum.

  “Seems to me that’s just what you’re doing,” J.T. said.

  “No, sport is what you’re doing. You and your little boyfriend, killing everything in sight, ruining the hunting for the rest of us,” Dopey said.

  “I’m not his boyfriend,” I said. I knew what that meant.

  They seemed surprised to hear me speak.

  “He’s not my boyfriend,” J.T. said.

  Grumpy looked at me then back at J.T. and raised an eyebrow as if to say he didn’t believe him.

  “He’s my son,” J.T. said.

  That was a lie, and you should never tell a lie, even though I understood why he said it.

  J.T. stood and walked to the stream where he tipped out the dregs of his tea and rinsed out his mug.

  I don’t think the hunters realised how tall he was until he stood up. But they noticed the way he walked. The way he held his head, and the straightness of his back.

  “You in the military?” Dopey asked.

  “Yeah, nah,” J.T. said.

  “But you used to be,” Dopey said.

  J.T. walked back, sat down and looked at him before giving a single nod.

  “I knew it,” Dopey said. “You can always tell.” He looked around at the others. “Told you. I can always tell.”

  I saw Grumpy roll his eyes at Doc behind Dopey’s back.

  “Yourself?” J.T. asked.

  Dopey straightened as if he was standing to attention and said proudly.

  “Army Reserve, Second Lieutenant, Three Six RNZIR, Hauraki Company.”

  I know about the Army Reserve. They sit in offices in big cities all week, and a few times a year go out to play soldier. I know this because a whole bunch of them once got lost in a rainstorm near our hut and we had to huddle inside for hours while they blundered around outside, hoping they wouldn’t find their way through our fence.

  I expected J.T. to laugh. He was a real soldier. He had been to Afghanistan. But he didn’t.

  “Always pleased to meet a fellow grunt,” he said.

  Dopey looked strangely pleased to be called a grunt. “You regular army?” he asked.

  J.T. nodded. “I was.”

  “Sorry about the crack about your boy,” Dopey said. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

  “Not me you should be apologising to,” J.T. said.

  “Sorry kid,” Dopey said.

  I shrugged but said nothing.

  J.T. was fishing around in a pocket of his swanndri. He pulled out a small rectangular card, made of plastic. He showed it to the men.

  “Department of Conservation,” he said. “Culling the red-tails around this area. If you’re looking for stags, I suggest you head on up to Hawke Ridge. The shooting I’ve been doing around here is probably making them a bit skittish.”

  “All the way up there?” Grumpy asked. “Have we got time?”

  “No way,” Doc said. “Got to be back before dark. Storm’s coming in overnight.”

  “Bad weather coming?” J.T. asked.

  “Cyclone,” Doc said. “Could be a rough one too. You didn’t know?”

  J.T. shook his head. “Bad radio here, I have to get up out of the valley to get reception.”

  “You’d better pack up and get out for a couple of days yourself,” Doc said. “It’s going to be wild.”

  “We will, thanks,” J.T. said, including me in ‘we’. “You guys might like to try around Lawson’s Creek. I haven’t been down there yet, and it’s on your way back to the track.”

  “Sure, thanks,” Doc said.

  Dopey pulled out a map, wrapped in plastic and after a little quiet discussion they turned and headed back in the direction they came from, still in single file.

  Heigh ho, heigh ho, it’s off to hunt we go, I
thought.

  Dopey turned back after a couple of strides, stood to attention and saluted.

  J.T. tiredly raised a couple of fingers to his forehead and watched them until they were out of sight around the bend. “I’m going to check with my boss about the cyclone,” he said. “Probably catch a helicopter ride out of here. You guys had better get out too, if there’s a big storm coming.”

  “Yeah, we’ll head home,” I said, as if we had a nice safe warm house in the ’burbs to head home to.

  “It’s been good to know you,” J.T. said.

  “You too,” I said.

  When I got home I had another dilemma: how to tell Moma about the cyclone. The last time one came through we had no warning until the winds started to shake the old cottage around. Moma got scared and we made a run for the cave. By the time we got there we were clinging onto trees to avoid getting blown over.

  And that one was just a mild cyclone, according to the newspaper that Moma picked up a few days later. According to Doc, this one was supposed to be a bad one.

  In the end, I told Moma most of the truth. I said I had seen some hunters going up the stream (true). I said they had been talking about a cyclone coming tonight (true) and it was going to be a bad one (also true).

  We spent the next few hours gathering up important things, like our food stores, and my books, and Moma’s locked box where she keeps her valuables and secret stuff, and ferrying it all to our winter cave where we sometimes stay when the winter nights turn really bitter. The entrance to the cave is quite overgrown and hard to find, and a few years ago we planted a few more vines and pongas to hide it even better.

  We tied down the old skiff that is the roof of our hut, using the same old, brown-stained rope that Moma used to pull it up the river all those years ago.

  It was already raining and the winds were building by the time we made our way back to the cave for the night.

  I am writing this by firelight, sitting on a bed of ponga leaves in the back of the cave. It is a big cave, much bigger than our hut, but not as comfortable. It branches off into a few smaller caves and there are some vents in the ceiling in the main cave that let smoke out and water in, so we have to stay in the side caves when it rains heavily.

  In some of the side caves there are drawings on the walls that Moma says were artworks of ancient Maori people. There are also some old bones of a big ancient bird called a Moa. Moma says if historians ever found this cave they would be very excited, but of course we can’t tell anyone about it, because it is our secret winter hideaway.

  The wind right now is whipping past the entrance. It has been getting stronger and stronger by the hour, you can tell by the howling sound and the shaking of the trees and shrubs outside.

  I think I will try to sleep.

  It is now much later. I did doze off for a while, but the wind outside has got even more intense, it is really shrieking. I have never heard a wind like this in my life. I hope our hut will be okay.

  Moma seems a little scared. I will go and give her a cuddle.

  Thought for the day:

  I know he didn’t mean it, but J.T. called me his son.

  December 11th

  Stuck in the cave all day. Have been writing a new story to pass the time. It is about how I broke my arm.

  Only three days till the eclipse. I hope the cyclone goes away before then.

  It died down around midday and I was hoping it had moved away, but I knew that really it was just the eye of the storm, the big hole in the centre of a cyclone where things are calm. It will be back, and it will be worse.

  Moma and I took a quick trip up to the hut to check that everything was okay. The ropes lashing down the skiff had come a little loose so we fixed them up. Moma seemed quite worried, so we took another couple of loads of belongings back to the cave. Just cooking pots and old clothes. I’m not sure why. It wouldn’t matter if that stuff got wet.

  The eye stayed for a few more hours, but by mid-afternoon it was full on again. I am sure that I heard trees blowing past the cave and the wind is blasting inside through the entrance.

  We have moved to the deepest, smallest cave at the back, where the wind is less. It is so cold that it is like winter, even though it is summer.

  I am using a flashlight to write this, because we can’t have a fire in this part of the cave. I have to stop now. Moma says I am wasting the battery.

  Thought for the day:

  Writing is my favourite thing.

  Another thought for the day:

  This is my life. I’m sure it’s not like other people’s, but it’s mine.

  December 12th

  This morning I sat near the entrance of the cave where there was more light and worked on my story. Nothing much else to do.

  The winds finally started to die down late morning and the rain stopped about the same time. By the time we got up to the hut, the sun had come out.

  I almost wished it hadn’t. I didn’t want to see what I saw.

  One of the trees by the hut had fallen down. It was one of the trees we had tied the skiff to. The skiff had been blown clear off the top of the hut and either it had pulled the tree over with it, or the tree had let go, and crashed into the skiff and knocked it off.

  Everything that was left inside the hut was now outside the hut, spread out through the forest, completely saturated.

  It looked like a disaster to me and I expected Moma to have a fit, but she was really calm about it. “Right. Let’s get to work,” she said.

  It’s really late as I am writing this because we spent all the rest of the day cleaning up. Moma still has the block and tackle and we had to rig it to a tree and haul the skiff back onto the roof. Some of the river stones had been knocked out of place by the tree and it took both Moma and me to pick them up and push them back into position.

  I really wished J.T. was here. He is so big and strong. He could have lifted one by himself.

  Anyway, we managed to get the skiff back on top. It wasn’t easy and it took a long time. I cannot imagine how Moma ever did that by herself when I was a baby.

  We gathered up as much stuff as we could find from the nearby forest, and hung everything up so it could dry in the sun.

  Then we started ferrying everything back from the cave.

  Afterwards Moma seemed quite pleased, which surprised me. I am starting to think that she likes adversity. That she is happiest when she is facing a challenge.

  I can understand that.

  Thought for the day:

  This is my life. It’s a good life.

  December 13th

  I heard a helicopter go overhead today, and later on heard gunshots. Around 4 pm, when J.T. usually finished hunting, Jack and I went haring up to the shingle slide to see if he was back. He was. He seemed very surprised to see me.

  “Gidday J.T.!” I said.

  “I thought you’d gone home,” he said.

  “Yeah, nah, we bugged out for a couple of days,” I said, “but came back when the weather cleared.”

  All of that was completely true. He looked doubtful, but didn’t question me further, which was good.

  “Looks like it got pretty rough around here,” he said.

  There were trees down on both banks of the stream and a lot of leaves, branches and other debris slowly washing down from upstream.

  “Looks like it,” I said.

  “Did you hear about Thames?” he asked.

  “Yeah, nah,” I said.

  “It was all over the news,” he said. “I don’t know how you missed it. Thames got hit hard. Lots of damage. They haven’t had any electricity for three days.”

  I hadn’t had any electricity for fifteen years but I didn’t say that.

  He made a fire to put the billy on, then turned back to me, thoughtfully. “I really didn’t expect to see you ag
ain,” he said, “but I’m glad you’re here. Someone to shoot the breeze with.”

  “Yeah, mate, me too,” I said. “I like talking to you.”

  He nodded. “But there’s something that you’re not telling me, and it’s bugging me. Why did you come back so soon?”

  This was that awkward moment that I had been dreading since I had met him.

  “Can’t tell you,” I said.

  “Without telling a lie,” he said.

  I nodded.

  “I’m not disagreeing with you on that,” he said. “I hate liars.”

  That was a bit strong, I thought, seeing he had lied about me being his son.

  He continued, “But at least tell me why you can’t tell a lie.”

  “It’s the code,” I said, after thinking about it for a while to make sure I wasn’t telling him too much.

  “You mean a secret code?” he asked.

  “Yeah, nah,” I said. “It’s like a set of rules so I know how to treat other people, and how to behave properly and how to live a life I’ll be proud of.”

  I almost said ‘when I get out into the world’ but I stopped myself just in time.

  J.T. made me go through all of the Code items, one by one, and he ended up writing them all down on a roll of toilet paper. (He has this soft paper to wipe his bum with after he has had a poo! Ha!)

  He said everybody should have a code like mine.

  I felt really proud that I had one.

  He said that when he was in the army there were rules about everything he did. But when he got out there were no rules and he felt lost.

  He read the Code over and over as if he was memorising it and at one point I would swear that he wiped away a tear. I don’t know why. It seemed strange for a big tough guy like J.T.

  December 14th

  Two days till the eclipse!

  I learned some stuff about J.T. today. I asked him about him nearly being married, just to make sure that he was free to marry Moma. He said he didn’t want to talk about it, but I said that members of the CSC shouldn’t have secrets from each other.