Love in the Outback

by Deb Hunt

  The following day, in a bid to find out more about the Trek, I caught a ride with the organiser, an erudite, expansive gentleman with a neatly clipped white moustache and closely cropped hair – no other word but gentleman would do for Stephen Knox.

  I’d barely fastened my seatbelt when he caught me by surprise.

  ‘My wife suffered from depression a while back,’ he said.

  Please, not here, not now, I thought. I can’t bear to make a fool of myself and burst into tears.

  ‘It took a while but she got over it. It’s not something to be ashamed of.’

  ‘That’s good. I’m glad. Could I try driving for a while?’

  Kindness has always made me want to cry.

  *

  I kept a tight lid on my emotions over the days that followed and watched with interest as the hardened petrol heads enjoyed a feast of mud-soaked fun. The more fun they had, the more the decades dropped away. They’d started out resembling elderly Hell’s Angels and ended up looking more like excitable schoolchildren. Never judge a book by its cover, isn’t that what they say? Judgement’s my middle name. Tatts, piercings and a long beard? Lock the door.

  The Trekkers grew visibly younger as we drove through a rollcall of Australian outback towns – Charleville, Augathella, Tambo, Blackall and Isisford, where a Jack Russell launched itself at a panel mounted on the back of a ute and somehow managed to clear seven metres. A Holden panel van broke down and had to drive 170 kilometres in first gear, but did the drivers complain? No, they laughed.

  The sun finally shone for the surfing dudes as we left Barcaldine, birthplace of the Australian Labor Party, and we followed a dusty gravel track that snaked its way through steep wooded hillsides to penetrate deep into Queensland’s remote gemfields of Sapphire and Rubyvale, where electricity only arrived in 1977. The drought was a long way from breaking here. From Rubyvale we crossed cattle grids and dry riverbeds to reach the small town of Cracow, famous for a two-storey Queenslander run by circus folk Fred and Sandi Brophy.

  It was like walking onto a Harry Potter set. The bar was full of magical circus memorabilia and the garden teemed with fire-eaters, singers and musicians. Towering over the proceedings was Fred himself, an enormous lion tamer of a man with a handlebar moustache and bright red braces. He was missing only a whip, which was surely under the counter somewhere.

  I checked into my room and went in search of a shower to wash off several layers of sweat, grease, dirt and sand accumulated over the two days since my last shower. The bathroom was at the end of a long veranda. As I drew closer I noticed a scrap of white paper pinned to the door. ‘No Showers,’ it said. Underneath someone had scribbled, ‘Sorry, water tanker didn’t arrive’.

  I turned round, headed down to the bar and ordered a beer. Who cared about cleanliness? After a solid week of company I was craving solitude so I sat alone in the darkened garden, watching the performers until a line of ants clambering over a tree root caught my attention. I thought back to the conversation with Ernest on the first night of the Trek outside the pub in Byrock, and everything that had happened since. I’d spent six days in the company of 300 men, nearly all of them away from their wives and girlfriends, and I hadn’t chased any of them. I’d done my job – seven live radio interviews, twelve press interviews and dozens of photos placed in local papers – and there were times, yes I think I could safely say, there were times I’d actually had fun. What an extraordinary week it had been.

  *

  Kate linked her arm through mine as we walked along the shore. Cool sand squeaked beneath our feet, shifting, settling and trickling between our toes. A salty breeze blew off the ocean and the sun felt warm on our backs. It was hard to believe it was midwinter.

  If you believe the Guinness Book of Records, Hyams Beach has the whitest sand in the world. It’s a sweeping unspoilt bay two and a half hours south of Sydney, part marine sanctuary, part national park. In places it’s nothing short of a windswept, pristine wilderness, the shoreline thickly forested with scribbly gums, casuarinas and paperbark trees that reach down and touch the sand.

  Two weeks earlier Kate had rung me. ‘We’re planning a long weekend at the beach,’ she’d said. ‘Would you like to join us?’ The date coincided with A3’s wedding (why did he have to tell me the date?) and all I’d been able to think about was Central Park, New York, where the ceremony would be taking place: horse-drawn carriages, champagne cocktails and lovers smiling for the camera. I didn’t need asking twice.

  Kate’s recovery from the breast cancer had been slow and steady, her body gradually healing and gaining strength.

  ‘How are you doing? Really doing?’ I asked, as we strolled along the sand.

  ‘I can’t feel anything in these new breasts; they’re like heavy lumps, fastened to the front of me, and I won’t be happy until they add nipples.’ Then she smiled. ‘But I’ve got a flat stomach. And I’m alive.’ She stretched her arm around my waist and pressed against me. ‘And how are you doing?’

  I felt strangely calm. Now that it was here, the day I’d been dreading, it was almost a relief. ‘I’ll get there,’ I said.

  ‘I’m glad you’re back,’ she said.

  ‘Me too.’

  The weather changed as quickly as a cloud passing across the sky. Without warning, the kookaburras, crimson rosellas and rainbow lorikeets that normally sat in the trees took flight as the wind picked up, turning the ocean from innocent aquamarine to slate grey. In minutes the sea was a mass of churning water, flashing teal blue and foaming white as sharp sand whipped off the beach to scour our faces.

  We retreated to the old fibro and timber house that Kate and James had rented for the weekend, overlooking the ocean, to find Ben and Hanne hunkered down in front of the fire and their Danish granny Inga ensconced in a squashy sofa, reading a book.

  ‘Who’s for a glass of red wine?’ said James as we hurried out of the wind.

  That night an electrical storm flashed around the bay and we listened to rain drum on the roof as we rugged up, threw another log on the fire and watched As it is in Heaven, by Swedish director Kay Pollak.

  Everyone shed a quiet tear at the end. Long after everyone else had dried their eyes I was still crying. It was something about the beauty of the film and the joy of being in the company of such a close and loving family. Why was that so hard to bear? Maybe because I wanted it so much. I suddenly felt desolate, old and single, with no one to blame but myself. It was too late for children and probably too late for love. And why would anyone love me anyway?

  Get over yourself.

  PK was right; that was the last glass of red talking. I pulled myself back from the brink, sobered up, stopped crying and reminded myself how lucky I was. Sure, I’d never married, but I’d never had a major illness either and I had loving friends, a close family and a good job. Besides, A3 was married now. What was it Buddhists said? This too shall pass.

  Friendship should be a two-way street and the last few years had been one-way traffic. I’d been as needy as a child, crying over things (largely men) I couldn’t have. Kate had never once turned me away or told me to sort myself out. That’s friendship for you.

  *

  The next day was breezy and overcast, the air full of sound: waves pounding the beach, young ferns rustling and gum trees creaking overhead. We walked through an eerie graveyard of charred blackbutt trees in Booderee National Park, the smell of scorched earth from the last bushfire lingering in the air. In the midst of all that devastation were signs of life: green shoots unfurling at the base of blackened tree trunks.

  At Stony Creek we clambered across a bed of shells that crunched underfoot and then took a swim in the still-warm ocean, bobbing contentedly in the water until we felt wrinkled. Only when we got out did we realise that dolphins had been swimming a few metres behind us.

  chapter ten

  ‘Hello. Can I help you?�
�

  It was late Monday afternoon back in Sydney and the phone hadn’t stopped ringing all day. I was racing to catch up on work and there was silence on the other end of the line. I tried again, brisk and efficient.

  ‘This is the marketing department. How can I help?’

  ‘Hello?’

  The voice on the other end was deep and tentative; it sounded familiar. Then I heard the old-fashioned sound of a coin dropping into the bottom of a phone box. I hadn’t heard that sound for years.

  ‘It’s Ernest . . . the Aboriginal man you met in Byrock. Do you remember?’ I recognised the warmth in Ernest’s hesitant voice, and his slow, measured way of speaking.

  ‘Of course! How are you?’

  ‘I’m good,’ he said. ‘I’m good.’ Another coin clanked to the bottom of the box and I struggled to catch what he said next.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Sydney. I’m in Sydney.’

  Now I was the one hesitating. What was he doing in Sydney? Why was he here? I thought I could guess the answer and I wasn’t sure how I felt about an unexpected visitor.

  ‘Uh . . . Ernest, can I call you back?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he said, slowly. ‘I can’t see a number on this phone.’ I heard another chunk of money being pushed into the it.

  ‘Where exactly in Sydney are you?’

  ‘I’m on a big main street. I got off the train and I started walking.’

  The obvious question had to be asked.

  ‘Ernest, what are you doing in Sydney?’

  ‘I’ve come to visit you.’

  More money grumbled past. The synapses in my brain weren’t working fast enough. What should I say? What should I do? I know I said he should look me up if ever he came to Sydney, but that was a scant three weeks ago. I wasn’t expecting him to . . . well, I don’t know what I was expecting. I probably wasn’t expecting him to turn up at all. We’d had an hour-long conversation outside a pub in Byrock and all I knew about Ernest was that he lived alone in the bush and he was trying to ‘live right’.

  I played for time. ‘Ernest . . . the thing is, I’m at work.’

  ‘That’s OK, I can wait.’

  ‘But where can you . . . I mean . . .’

  A heavy coin clattered into the box.

  ‘Nope, I don’t mind waiting. Only I’m running out of money. That was my last dollar.’

  There was no time to think or plan. ‘Ernest, go back to the station and wait for me outside the main entrance. I’ll be there in an hour.’

  ‘OK.’

  Miss PK wasn’t impressed.

  *

  I finished work and caught a taxi to the station, nibbling on the inside of my lip as I wondered how to deal with the situation. Could I really invite a complete stranger to stay with me?

  Tell him to get a room.

  What if he doesn’t have any money?

  Not your problem.

  He invited me to stay with him.

  So?

  So I should return the favour.

  He turned up out of the blue, he didn’t check if it was OK.

  PK’s uncompromising stance didn’t help.

  Apart from the patient in Ivanhoe, Ernest was the only Aboriginal man I’d ever met. Our conversation in Byrock meant something; it opened a door to a culture I knew nothing about. I was working in a country that for 40,000 years had been inhabited solely by Aboriginal people. This was a chance to find out more, to extend a welcome to an Aboriginal man I had enjoyed talking to. He’d invited me to visit him, so why shouldn’t I return the favour?

  Because you don’t know him.

  It was true. Ernest hadn’t been introduced by a mutual acquaintance who’d said ‘I’d like you to meet Ernest’ or ‘I’m sure you two will get along’ or even ‘I’ve known Ernest most of my life, he’s a good man’. I’d blundered into an encounter with him and now all I had were my instincts.

  I thought back to our conversation. He’d come across as a man with a strong faith and a desire to talk about things that mattered, and he’d left me with an impression of calm serenity. But what else did I know about him? Nothing.

  I decided to trust my instincts. If it felt like the right thing to do when I met him at the station, I would offer him a bed for the night. If I had any doubt, I would take him to the nearest hostel.

  I sat in the back of the taxi, trying to remember what Ernest looked like: black face, big beard, brown eyes. It wasn’t much to go on. I fidgeted in my handbag for my glasses and felt inclined to agree with PK. I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of a stranger descending so unexpectedly. How long must it have taken him to get to Sydney from that remote little town? It had to be at least 700 kilometres and there was no train station in Byrock. Not even a bus stop, come to that.

  The taxi dropped me at the front of Central Station on Cleveland Street and I stood opposite the main entrance, watching the rush-hour stream of people – suits, students, backpackers bent under the weight of bulging rucksacks, mums with strollers, old people with walking frames, the odd person in uniform and no one who even remotely resembled Ernest.

  We’d met in the dark outside a pub, with only the light from open fires to see by. Although we’d talked for over an hour all I could remember were his long beard and his brown eyes. Ernest spent the entire conversation sitting down so I didn’t even know how tall he was.

  After ten minutes outside Central Station I was starting to draw attention to myself, staring at Aboriginal people, offering them a tentative ‘do I know you?’ look. Maybe Ernest wouldn’t recognise me either.

  I wandered away from the main entrance, wondering if I’d missed him. Then in the distance I spotted a large black man standing by a fence, picked out by a pool of light that fell from a nearby streetlight. He was wearing jeans and a dark grey t-shirt and there was a rucksack lying on the ground at his feet. The clincher was the long grey beard that stretched almost to his waist.

  I walked towards him and he smiled, nodding encouragement. The closer I got the bigger he got and by the time I reached him I realised Ernest was at least six foot six, maybe six seven.

  ‘Hello.’

  He towered above my five foot four, an unexpected giant of a man. We shook hands and Ernest smiled with a shy tilt of his head.

  Now I know this will seem like an odd thing to say, but he made me think of the pictures of Jesus I had seen at school. Make Jesus a blackfella and add a long grey beard and he could have been standing there in person. Ernest was the most striking person I’d ever seen. He looked at me from under lowered eyelids with a hesitant glance, almost as if he was trying to disappear, and this will sound even more bizarre but an image of Princess Diana popped into my head. I reckon if she’d been born Aboriginal she’d have come out looking like Ernest, if you see what I mean.

  That’s ridiculous.

  But true.

  ‘How was your journey?’ I asked.

  ‘It was long,’ he said softly, with another shy smile.

  ‘And here you are!’

  He smiled and nodded again. ‘Haven’t been to Sydney since I was fifteen.’

  ‘How old are you now, Ernest?’

  ‘I’m forty-four.’

  I’d been way off the mark with my guess of mid-sixties, but standing under the glare of an urban streetlight, with a long grey beard stretching to his waist, Ernest looked a lot older than forty-four. I’m not sure what surprised me most – that Ernest was only forty-four or that he’d made his way to Sydney. A man who lived alone in the bush, on the outskirts of a remote town with a population of sixteen people, had travelled 700 kilometres to a city of over four million – a city he hadn’t visited in almost thirty years – to pay me a visit. I couldn’t turn him away.

  ‘Let’s jump on a bus and get out of the city,’ I said briskly. Ernest reached down fo
r his rucksack, and it looked no bigger than a daypack in his enormous hands.

  ‘Sydney must have changed a lot since you were last here. How amazing that you’re back. Gosh, well, here you are.’

  I marched Ernest down the slope from the train station, chattering nonsense to cover my nerves, and when we hit the intersection with George Street we were assaulted by sound and fury – a busker playing electric guitar, students shouting, taxi horns blaring and traffic thundering past. Ernest shrank from the noise and edged closer.

  ‘If I get nervous, is it OK if I hold onto you?’

  I changed my mind about the bus and splashed out on a cab.

  *

  The house on Rowntree Street had never felt overly large but filled with Ernest it seemed far smaller. I bustled around, showing Ernest the bathroom and the spare bedroom, pointing out how you could just glimpse the Harbour Bridge if you craned your neck and, all the time I chattered, Ernest just smiled and nodded.

  ‘Are you hungry?’

  His smile widened. ‘I could eat something,’ he said.

  He sat in the subterranean dining room that adjoined the kitchen, as motionless as a sleeping cat, while I cracked eggs into a bowl, fussing over bits of shell that fell into the mix.

  ‘Would you like cheese in your omelette? Or mushrooms, I could do you a mushroom omelette. I don’t have any ham because I’m vegetarian. Did I tell you I was a vegetarian? Maybe cheese. Are you happy with cheese?’

  Ernest nodded. He seemed perfectly comfortable with a level of silence that unnerved me.

  ‘Put some music on if you like,’ I said.

  He flicked through my CD collection and picked an album by Beautiful South, Blue is the Colour. When the album was first released they had to edit the opening track for radio so the lyrics would be less offensive. In the song ‘Don’t Marry Her’ lead singer Jacqui Abbott tried to persuade a man not to marry his girlfriend. Have me instead, she suggested on radio. The lyrics on the original album had one small but critical difference. I whipped six eggs into a frenzied lather while Jacqui begged the man to leave his fiancée. Don’t go through with the wedding, she pleaded. Why not fuck me instead?