Storyland

by Catherine McKinnon

  And then one day, there were no more helicopters. We kept looking to the sky. Nothing. No one came. It felt like we’d been abandoned. And then, Gina got sick. We didn’t think it was MARS. Not at first. Five days later she was dead. Steve was just about to hike to the medical centre. It happened so quickly.

  Nada taps the side of the chair using her right hand. Her left arm hangs by her side.

  You are in the kitchen. Esther wants to come with you to the medical centre.

  Esther says, ‘I want to talk to Mum, at least that.’

  ‘Okay,’ I say. ‘Wear your walking boots and take my rain jacket. And cover yourself with repellent.’

  I trudge down to Steve’s before we set off. I want to ask him to check in on Ben while I’m gone. Since Gina died Steve hasn’t been doing so good. He blames himself. And with the continuing clean-up there’s been no time to grieve. I take a shortcut through the paddocks. The land is still strewn with dead cows, tree trunks, torn branches, rubbish, bricks, bits of tin. There’s a terrible stench of death. I pass behind what used to be the Castellis’ shed. Jack Castelli’s red ute is now a crumpled chip packet.

  The surprise of the destruction keeps coming back to me. How one night we camped in our basement while our house shook and the world was rearranged.

  Steve’s home is tucked into the escarpment. I tramp down the dirt driveway, stop at the back door and call out. No answer. I look to the side of the house, to Gina’s grave, there under the surviving coachwood, a chiselled rock her gravestone. I don’t go over. Can’t go over. Instead, I head for the shed. Steve’s fortress. When I walk in he’s leaning on a bench, his back to me, hunched over, like there’s a great weight on top of his shoulders, pushing him down.

  ‘I’m hiking to the medical centre,’ I say.

  Steve doesn’t look up but his body goes rigid.

  ‘It’s Ben. He’s had a fever for two days. No idea if it’s MARS. But he’s lost quite a bit of weight and I don’t want to risk it.’

  Gina’s symptoms had been flu-like. She’d complained of aching bones, had a fever and a dry cough. ‘Can you check on him at midday? Don’t go in. Just call through the door, make sure he’s okay?’

  Steve doesn’t respond. He’s tough but everyone has a breaking point. I go and stand next to him. He’s so still he could be petrified. Rosellas land in the doorway, begin picking through the new shoots of grass.

  ‘You’ve lost the closest person to you,’ I say.

  Steve rolls a stone about with the tip of his boot. Won’t look at me.

  Before he bought the property he was in the army. High up. Publicity for him everywhere; the army’s first Koori commander. Awarded. Esteemed. But then he’d had enough of fighting other people’s wars. That’s the story he told me. He and Gina bought their property and settled on the mountain. They were trying for kids.

  ‘Not shooting the right bullets,’ Steve once said.

  His own family visited all the time. Kids, uncles, aunties.

  ‘Kooris always feed each other,’ Gina once said, ‘just like Italians’.

  Silence.

  You are in the shed with Steve. He won’t look at you.

  Steve takes hold of a screwdriver and squats by the door. In the dirt he draws a map of the best route to take over the ridge.

  ‘I’ll check on Ben,’ he says.

  Nada sits forward. Short breaths.

  Where are you now, Nada?

  I’m hiking away from my house. Esther is with me. I need Marsoral for Ben. I need some contact with the authorities. This chaos has gone on for too long. I stop on the path and look back. Our home is long and low, with a verandah running all the way around it. A massive fig tree guards the house, its branches spread over the roof, its roots running across the ground. The greened escarpment curves behind, a protective arm around them both. The locals call our place Hill of Peace. It’s always been a retreat for people. Esther was on holiday here, sent by my sister to have a break from troublesome friends, and then – catastrophe. So much destruction and yet our home, our tree, are both still standing. Was it luck or—?

  Or?

  Once, one of the lower branches of the fig had to be cut off because it was bearing down on the roof. We hired an arboriculturist. According to him the tree was a thousand years old. A thousand years old! That’s a long time. Perhaps – perhaps this place has always been safe.

  We walk along the muddy path and climb over the fallen eucalypt that blocks the driveway. Wet bark against my skin. A gossamer rainfall, no mist. As we pass through the gateway and start down the ravaged road, the drip drip of a dull green world. I look up. A washing machine is wedged between the branches of a tall red gum. A bra and a purple dress hang on the lower branches, as if someone has casually thrown them over to dry. Esther is slightly ahead of me. Her red backpack is strapped to her body like safety equipment, her orange hat a beacon.

  The road, what is left of it, winds down the mountain, past the track that leads to the coal mine. Ben took on shift work there as night-time security when we built our house. Just to get some extra cash in. There’s nothing left of the mine now. As we round a corner I look down the valley to where the village used to be. It’s now a lake surrounded by torn-up trees. Bits of roof float on water, rafts for the seabirds that flock in daily. All that is visible of the church is a steeple. It looks like a buoy. Across from the steeple, where once there was a park, there’s now an island. On it, skinny black and white cows huddle around a lone cabbage tree palm. Ben is building a raft to save them but that project is on hold until he is well again.

  We cut down through the forest. There are three bridges crossing the stretch of river that runs along this side of the mountain, but did those bridges survive Frank? The river has swollen to ten times its normal size and the water level doesn’t look like it’s dropping. Impossible for us to swim across. The water is flowing too fast. So at least one of those bridges needs to be up.

  Wet leaves, a slippery crust on the ground. We skid on stones. Mud and more mud and a knot in my stomach.

  Why a knot?

  Because even if the bridges are up and even if we cross the river, we still have to hike to the top of the escarpment, trudge along the ridge for a kilometre, before taking a route down the southern side of the range to the school where the emergency medical centre has been set up. There’s a lot of dense forest to get through with trees down everywhere. And what about the medical centre? The school sits on high ground. It should have been safe from sea surges and flooding but was it?

  We reach the boardwalk that runs through the rainforest. The tough plastic slats are covered with debris but they too have survived Frank. What amazes is not what has gone, but what has endured. We climb across enormous fallen trees and wade through piled-up leaf matter. If we stop, even for a moment, tiny leeches attach to our bare legs. We brush them off but they curl in tighter and cling to our skin, all wet and slimy and squishy. We can hear the river but not see it. There’s barely any light because the canopy above blocks everything out. It’s hard to see even a smidgen of grey sky. The air is stifling. Steamy. Everything dripping and dark. The rich pungent smell of decomposition.

  Finally, we stumble into the light. Before us, water gushes past, tumbling across rocks and splashing the banks, like an animal spitting and in pain. But no bridge. The force of the water has pushed our first hope downstream. I take off my backpack and stand on the rocks, water spraying my boots. Should we give up the hike now? It seems naive to think we’ll be able to get across. Surely the other bridges have gone too. FUCK! The true purpose of swearing, I decide, is to help humans come to grips with things we find difficult to grasp. Things for which there is no clear word. Esther, ahead of me, has started scrambling along the banks. She turns back. Her eyes catch mine. She wills me to continue. I think of Gina. If Steve had gone to the medical centre as soon as Gina fell ill, she’d be alive. I need that Marsoral for Ben. I might need it for Esther too. Fuck, maybe we’re all infecte
d.

  The bank is muddy. Marshy. Dark clouds spit rain at us. A shifty wind wheezes along, pulling at our jackets. We use our hands to steady ourselves but it’s hard going with my gammy arm. Each step is a negotiation.

  When I finally look up, I see that the second bridge has gone too.

  It’s like I’m falling.

  I have no balance.

  I sink down in the mud, exhausted. Esther slumps next to me. She has her determined face on. I need a moment to compose myself so I look away. On the opposite bank, I eye three enormous rocks. These are no ordinary rocks, they are massive, their shapes worn smooth by erosion. After I’ve been staring at them for some time I realise I’ve seen these rocks before. I sketched them once, when I went hiking with Ben and we stopped for a break. Only they’re in the wrong place now. They belong to a rock formation that once sat further up river. There used to be a sign in front stating that the rocks were two hundred million years old. Something that old, we think of as permanent, as never changing. This river too has changed. When I was young people called it a creek. The high rainfall these last years meant it grew in size and was renamed a river.

  Esther shakes my arm. She wants to keep going, she wants to see if the third bridge, the swing bridge, is still up. We slip-slide along but halt at a strangler fig, rest on the narrow tree roots watching rain fall on flowing water. The forest canopy protects us from getting wet. The tree beneath the strangler has long ago disappeared. Now thick vine is tousled through sinewy fern-covered branches. The ferns look like jade bracelets. Insects buzz. Everything rattles. The forest is alive, as if dancing in the aftermath of catastrophe.

  I take deep breaths using my inhaler. Esther sips water, but she keeps her eyes on me. She doesn’t want to rest for long.

  ‘Okay, okay, let’s go,’ I say.

  We set off hiking again. The banks are rocky now. I can’t get a good grip and keep slipping. Esther is so lightweight she streaks ahead. And then, ha, she turns to me, grinning. Such a big cheeky grin.

  Up ahead I see the swing bridge.

  Originally it sat high above the river.

  Now water rushes just beneath it.

  But it’s up. It’s up!

  We hurry on. Esther stands on the first plank and waits for me. It’s only when I reach her that I think about the journey home.

  If we cross the bridge it’s possible that on our return it won’t be here.

  FUCK!

  But if Ben has the virus and I don’t go?

  FUCK!

  The weather is holding. There are clouds but it doesn’t look like rain. If we hike fast we should make it back by late afternoon. I can’t risk not going.

  I grip the thick metal rails and stagger across. Wind gusts down the gully. The bridge swings from side to side. The water rushing beneath sounds like stampeding cattle. I reach the opposite bank and jump onto the boardwalk. Esther is behind me. This side of the river the boardwalk is badly damaged. We tread along it carefully, then step off into the forest to begin our hike up the escarpment.

  The ground is boggy and steep. We sink on all-fours and wriggle beneath vines that knit the trees together. Mosquitoes land on bare skin but we have our repellent on and they soon fly away. I feel something crawling on my leg and stop to flick it off. An enormous fat leech. There are leeches everywhere – on the ground, on the vine leaves. Nothing to do but grit our teeth and crawl on.

  When we are two-thirds of the way up we hit a mud track. It leads south. We follow it along, below the line of the ridge.

  Dark clouds gather above us. Raindrops plop onto the ground and splatter, like small water bombs. We hike up a narrow path to the top of the escarpment. Trudge through a thicket of trees to the heath. A sharp wind slaps my face.

  ‘You okay?’ I ask Esther.

  She runs ahead of me – smiling. She’s thinking only of the chance to talk to her mother.

  We walk along by the old trees that line the edge of the ridge. Stop to catch our breath at the tourist lookout that hangs over the valley below.

  I’m not prepared for what I see.

  Can’t speak from shock.

  To the east, Port Kembla – that in my childhood had been a place of fire-blowing smokestacks – Port Kembla is gone and between where it once was and where I now stand there is only water.

  Water, water, everywhere.

  A few tiny islands – islands that were once hilltops – are all that remains of the land. It’s like Esther and I are also on an island.

  Could this have happened? Could the sea surges the relief worker told us about have covered so much land that we are now cut off from the rest of the country?

  Or, has there been some bigger event further away that has caused the seas to rise?

  The idea chills me.

  Below us, where once there were housing estates, there is now a swirling mass of murky water.

  The naked body of a boy, bloated, blackened, floats into view.

  I take Esther by the hand and we continue hiking. This is a new world we’re living in. We haven’t had time to adjust.

  Silence.

  Nada raises her right hand.

  Dr Koskinen counts her up.

  One. Two. Three. You are coming up. Four. Five. Six. You are rising to consciousness. Seven. Eight. Nine. You are nearly with me. Ten. You are with me.

  Nada opens her eyes and stares at the tree vismem.

  This must be difficult for you.

  I am Nada.

  Yes.

  But here, what is here?

  Remember. You are a patient here. Taking part in our Storyland Project.

  Before the project? I have no—

  This is a slow process, Nada. We have to take things step by step.

  We’re indoors? All the time we’re indoors?

  It’s a good place to be. The air quality on this ship is the best there is.

  We’re on a ship?

  It is a shock for you to be here with us. We rescued you.

  There are so many doctors, all asking questions. Why does everyone sound funny?

  Funny?

  All the doctors have old men’s voices, even you and the other women.

  This is a delicate time of adjustment. It is my job to steer you through this process.

  Everything feels strange. I’ve asked to be taken off my meds but the nurse says it’s too early.

  You must give your mind time to reacquaint itself with the world.

  Have I been in a coma?

  Did they tell you a coma? Like a coma, yes.

  I want to ask you something?

  Go ahead.

  Do you know if Ben, Esther, Steve … is it possible they survived?

  It is still possible, yes.

  I can’t remember what happened.

  This is what you are doing now. Remembering.

  Does my home still exist?

  That is a difficult question to answer.

  Difficult?

  We can talk more at the end of our session.

  I’d prefer to know now.

  Access to the area beyond Border 29 is restricted.

  Why restricted?

  Nada, it is best if we talk at the end of our session.

  I’d like to know now. Why restricted?

  You said you trusted me?

  Yes.

  Then we can talk more when we have finished our session.

  Silence.

  Nada? Will you continue?

  Silence.

  Nada, if you will continue then I need you to say yes.

  Yes.

  Thank you. I will take you back into your personal membank now. Are you comfortable?

  Do you need me to say yes? Yes, yes, I am comfortable.

  Good. Thank you. Ten. Nine. Eight. You are returning to the mountain. Seven. Six. Five. Returning to the escarpment. Four. Three. Two. Nearly there. One. You are there. On the ridge. Esther is with you. She has her orange, no, her red backpack on. And her orange hat.

  W
e’re hiking south along the track. The heath turns to forest again.

  Nada slaps her right hand over her ear.

  Hunches over.

  What is it?

  Birds chirping. Wrens. But so many. The noise is—

  You are safe. It is a memory.

  Nada sits up.

  You are safe, Nada.

  The first day after Frank hit there were no birds. It was eerie. Just the sound of wind and water. Like the earth was having a breech birth. Then the birds started returning. Each day more and more flew in. Now, there are too many birds. On the heath especially, there is this shrill chattering. We run to get away from the noise, but when we pass several low bushes, laden with wrens, we frighten them. They fly up and we have to sprint through their fluttering bodies. We keep running and leave the birds behind. The forest becomes dense, dark. Trees so tall I can’t see the tops. There are fewer birds but the air is stifling. We can barely see the path. I use the compass to guide us. We keep hiking. It’s midday when we stumble out from the trees and find ourselves above the school where the emergency centre is set up. Only there’s been a massive landslide and the once-grassy hill behind the gym – where kids used to build stick huts – is a heaped up mess of soil, tree trunks and branches, all crammed onto the back of the besser brick building.

  But relief, I feel such relief because I can see people, hundreds of people crowded onto the small patch of land that fronts the gym.

  Describe exactly what you see.

  There are two long schoolroom buildings plus the gym, built around a central quadrangle, with an oval on the eastern side. In one of the schoolrooms, all the windows are shattered and most of the roof is missing, but the walls are intact. The other buildings are undamaged. Beyond the school, the land falls away. For as far as I can see there is only water and debris. Yet, I can’t shake this feeling of joy at the sight of other people.

  People cooking over fires.

  Erecting tents.

  Washing clothes.

  Doing ordinary things.

  And children, running between the tents as if on a camping holiday.

  Some adults, some children, wear medical masks, or have cloth wrapped around their mouths, but many don’t.