by John Marsden
CHAPTER 19
Someone had seen us at last and called the police. The cop had to work hard to get my hands off the guy’s throat though. I wanted to let go, in one part of my mind anyway, but I guess another part was pretty committed to killing him. The cop kept yelling, ‘Relax! Relax your hands!’ at me but it’s a paradox to yell ‘Relax’ at someone. It wasn’t till Gavin shook me and patted my hands that I finally disconnected. By then they’d half dragged me and the man out of the pool. I found myself stretched across the little wall around it. The stone was digging into my back. They dragged the guy a bit further, till he was on the footpath, on his back, and then they went to work on him. Boy did they work. They were efficient too. They’d obviously done it before. Like, a thousand times. One cop, the guy, was at his mouth pumping away into that through a little black plastic thing. The other, the woman, went for the ribs. I crawled further out of the pool, so I could get away from the uncomfortable wall. It had taken me that long to notice how uncomfortable it was. My senses were starting to work and I could hear two separate lots of sirens, coming from different directions. I half sat, half lay on the ground watching the cops trying to undo what I had done. It was strange, they were putting so much effort into it, and just a minute earlier I had been putting so much effort into killing him.
The guy suddenly convulsed and twisted to one side, away from me, thank God, and started vomiting. I could hear the kind of retching you get outside a Wirrawee B amp;S as early as nine p.m.. By eleven o’clock you can hear it inside.
The cop doing the heart massage climbed off the guy, wiping her hands on her trousers and looking fairly disgusted. I decided I wouldn’t become a police officer. The guy twisted over further onto his hands and knees, spewing out water and other stuff. In the distance I saw an ambulance officer, then another one, running towards us. I didn’t know why they hadn’t driven right up to the fountain. The police had, well nearly.
Then the cold hit me. Like a blizzard inside and out. I actually gave a half-scream with the impact of it. I was incurably cold. I would never get warm, could never get warm. I had iced up inside. And no-one cared. This was the worst cold of all. The cops were holding the guy on the ground, trying to get him into a better position. The ambulance officers were heading straight for him. I didn’t exist. The guy who wanted to end my existence was the star of the show. Everything was for him.
Then Gavin, wet and slimy and dripping, wrapped himself around me and folded himself into me and we sat together and rocked and hugged and somehow warmed each other. Two colds make a warm sometimes. It’s that old body heat. Works every time. I felt very tired and could have fallen asleep on the spot. An ambo finally came over to us. I hadn’t seen her arrive. She was a blonde girl with so many curls I didn’t know how her cap stayed on her head. She asked us how we were and if we had any injuries. Well, she probably regretted asking that question.
Suddenly she called to her partner for back-up and a second later there was a stationwagon right at the fountain, with ambulance markings all over it and two more ambos who I hadn’t seen before and a couple of stretchers on wheels and Gavin and I were covered by blankets. He was already in the back of an ambulance and I was being wheeled to it. I hadn’t seen that ambulance either. I was confused that they had all got there in one second but I think I was getting a bit confused about everything. It’s possible that I wasn’t entirely conscious for a while there.
The blankets started to work and I felt that I could let go of the last of my coldness. I did so, gradually, and lay back and opened my eyes. The sky was grey but becoming blue in the distance. A grey-white cloud was just above us and if I craned my head I could see a bank of clouds behind me. I didn’t know which way the weather was heading. Sometimes you do need a weatherman. I asked the blonde curly-haired ambo where the wind was from but she just smiled at me and said, ‘Now why would you want to know that?’
‘Just a country girl I guess,’ I said.
Well I don’t think there is much wind at the moment,’ she said, and they started putting my stretcher up into the back of the ambulance.
‘Are you going to use the siren?’
‘Everyone always wants to know that,’ she said. What do you think, Col, will we need the siren for these two?’
‘Might give it a burl if we run into a bit of traffic,’ he said. ‘Don’t want to be late for smoko, do we?’
‘Gavin’s deaf,’ I said, and closed my eyes.
‘Oh is he?’ I heard the blonde girl say. ‘Col, the little boy’s deaf
‘Uh, that would explain it then,’ Col said. I didn’t know what it explained but I guess they’d tried to have a conversation with Gavin.
‘How is he?’ I asked.
‘We think you’re both going to be fine.’ But I had the feeling they said that to everyone. Like what else are they going to say: ‘We expect you to be dead by the next intersection’?
The ambulance began to move and I opened my eyes again. She was sitting between Gavin and me so I figured Col was driving. She gave me another of her extremely nice smiles. ‘You’ve both got penetrating injuries but they don’t look too bad. And you’re both in shock.’
‘Is that all?’ I yawned. I couldn’t get used to this idea that when you were in the middle of a terrible fight the police arrived and fixed it up for you. And when you got injured, ambulances came and they wrapped you in blankets and took you to hospital. Where were they when the war was on?
The blonde girl said, ‘There might be an issue with that terrible water in the fountain getting into your wounds. I’m guessing the doctor’ll have a look at that. It’s not the healthiest place to take a bath when you’ve been stabbed!’
‘No.’
I reached for Gavin’s hand but couldn’t find it.
What are you looking for?’ the girl asked. Well, she wasn’t really a girl of course.
‘Gavin’s hand,’ I said.
She connected us up. He immediately gave my hand a big squeeze which made my eyes water (a) because we were friends (b) because he was still alive and (c) because it made me think the ambo girl hadn’t been lying to me and he probably was going to be all right.
I didn’t think I could cope with any more deaths of anyone even remotely close to me. These days I was perfectly capable of sobbing over the death of a heifer or someone’s pet guinea-pig, or a dead rabbit on the road.
OK, I’m lying about the rabbit.
At the hospital we weren’t given nearly as much attention or treated like royalty the way the ambos had looked after us. A doctor checked us and sent us both to X-ray but she said our wounds weren’t life-threatening. She did give us a blast of antibiotics in a big needle — well, she got a nurse to give us a blast of antibiotics in a big needle — and then we waited in a corridor for ages for the X-rays.
When we came out a cop was there, in uniform. He said he’d been sent to look after us. It didn’t occur to me till we were back in the main Emergency section that he might have been sent to stop us escaping, until the nurse who was washing grazes on my arm with disinfectant said, What have you two been up to?’
She asked in that quiet voice, the one that means, ‘Just between you and me.’
Of course I had been busting to ask Gavin what the hell had been going on. I’d been wanting to ask him from the moment the whole thing started, but I’d had no hope. And even now it was impossible. In the corridor we’d been twenty metres apart and now he was on the opposite side of the room. What had we been up to? Just trying to save our lives from a complete maniac who wanted to kill us. Was that so bad? But it wasn’t a random attack. The guy knew Gavin and wanted to take him out. He must have had some reason.
So all I could say was the old favourite: ‘I don’t know.’
Then she asked: ‘Are you in a gang?’
‘What?’
I nearly choked on the word. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry or call for a psychiatrist. For her. That’s when I realised the cop might be
there to stop us tying our sheets together, end to end, and climbing out the window. Good grief! I didn’t expect medals and the keys to the city. That was one of my dad’s favourite sayings: ‘I’m not asking for a medal and the keys to the city but it would be nice to get a little cooperation once in a while.’
I wasn’t asking for a parade but it would have been nice for someone to say, ‘Hey girl, you saved a couple of lives today, even if one of them was your own.’
‘No, I’m not in a gang,’ I said.
Nothing much else happened for at least two hours. The cop made himself right at home and was soon getting coffees for himself and the nurses. I was ‘nil by mouth’ so no food or drink for me. I dozed quite a bit, then they came and took the ‘nil by mouth’ sign away and ten minutes later I got sandwiches and cordial. I suddenly realised how hungry I was and gobbled the whole lot, even if the sandwiches were mostly white bread with occasional traces of chicken and wisps of lettuce. And the cordial tasted like they’d held a glass of water in front of the cordial bottle for five seconds and then taken it away again. I like my cordial strong.
A different doctor arrived and started stitching me up. He was a chatty guy who looked like he came from India or Pakistan and who spoke in this nice musical voice. He said I was fine, the knife had missed my vital organs, I’d been very lucky, I could go home but I had to take antibiotics because they told him I’d been in water that was probably full of dangerous organisms.
He had me roll over and he put a couple of stitches in another wound. I knew something on my back hurt but didn’t realise it was a second stab wound. I hadn’t properly registered that the guy had stabbed me twice — I’d thought the pain was from another graze.
Gavin was a bit more complicated. While I lay there having a snooze no-one told me that he’d been wheeled away for an operation. I went into total panic when I heard a nurse say something about ‘the deaf boy who’s gone to surgery”, surprising myself by how hysterical I got. It’s embarrassing, but they had to hold me down and then the nurse hit me with another needle and ten seconds later, out I went.
I woke up in a room with a painting of gum trees and a billabong, and there was Lee, sitting next to the bed. ‘Yikes, how long have I been here?’ I asked him. Then I remembered about Gavin.
‘It’s about four o’clock, I think,’ he said, putting down a copy of the Bulletin that looked like it was years old. ‘And don’t worry, Gavin’s fine. He had some muscle damage and he’ll be sore for a while and he’s gonna need a bit of physio. That’s the full story.’
‘Where is he?’
‘Just along the corridor. He’s in 2210 and this is 2220.’
‘Can I see him?’
‘I don’t know. Probably. They let me have a look at him but he was asleep. He had a general anaesthetic. But if you can persuade the nurses, you should be able to waddle along and say hello.’
‘What the hell happened? Who is the guy? What was it all about?’
Lee looked surprised. ‘I was going to ask you that. I don’t know anything, and no-one’ll tell me anything. When I got here they had a cop guarding you but he got a message about an hour ago to say that you probably weren’t on the ten most wanted, so he packed up and left. That’s how I got this magazine.’
‘I’m very happy for you.’
‘Yeah, except he’s already done the crossword.’
‘How did you know we were here?’
‘You put me down as next-of-kin.’
‘Oh did I? I don’t remember that.’
‘So what did happen? I thought I was sending you off for a nice walk followed by a heart-warming reunion for Gavin. Next thing I know I get a message to say some guy tried to kill you both. Is this to do with Liberation? Or the war?’
‘I don’t think so.’ I shook my head, trying to work it out. My head was a bit fuzzy, because of the injection I suppose. ‘No, I’m sure it’s nothing to do with that. The guy knew Gavin. He was waiting for him.’
I slipped out of bed, determined to clear this up once and for all. Bugger Gavin having a general anaesthetic and being asleep. He could just wake up and tell me what on earth was going on.
I felt a bit woozy but not too bad. Lee grabbed me as I grabbed for the end of the bed but I was OK again a moment later. ‘Sheez, what was in that needle?’ I said.
Off we set, down the corridor. A nurse was at the desk halfway between my room and Gavin’s. She looked at me suspiciously. ‘Now where do you think you might be off to on this fine Saturday afternoon?’
I grinned at her. ‘I just want to see how my partner in crime’s going.’
‘Oh do you now? Well you can turn around and go right back to bed. You had enough Midazolam for a small elephant, so you can wait a bit longer before you go serenading along the corridors.’
‘I only want to ask him a question,’ I begged.
‘You know I read your book about the war,’ she said.
‘Oh you did?’ The first one had been published but the rest were home in a wardrobe. It hadn’t sold enough to satisfy the publisher, so they wouldn’t take the others. It seemed to me that quite a lot of people knew about the book but not so many had actually read it. Maybe it was the title. I thought The War from Hell was quite cute but I guess people who didn’t know Tailor’s Stitch and Hell didn’t get the joke until they were reading the book, and it was a bit late by then.
I didn’t care all that much. I just like writing stuff down. It’s become a habit, and now I do it for my own sake, instead of trying to get it published.
‘Never thought I’d meet you,’ the nurse said. ‘It wasn’t a bad book. I made my boyfriend read it too. If it’s one question, OK, but don’t wake him up. If he’s asleep just let him be.’
I took a moment to realise she was giving me permission to talk to Gavin.
‘OK, cool, thanks. And thanks for buying the book.’
‘I didn’t buy it, I got it from the library.’
‘You should buy a copy,’ Lee said loyally.
She laughed. ‘Maybe I will now that I’Ve met you. You’re that boy whose family owned the restaurant, right?’
Yeah, he’s Lee,’ I called back over my shoulder. Like he couldn’t speak for himself.
I was already halfway to Gavin’s room. It would have been nice to sit down and have a long chat about literature but there were more important things to worry about.
Lee caught up with me as I got to the door. I sure was moving slowly. That drug was a ripper. Everything felt normal enough but it had taken me a long time to travel a short distance. Story of my life.
I felt a tremendous surf inside me when I looked at Gavin. I was getting used to this feeling. It happened every now and then. I could almost hear the waves pounding. It was the fear of his getting hurt, it was the desire to protect him, it was the not wanting to let him down, it was love. Or else it was just hormonal, maternal stuff, which probably amounts to the same thing.
He opened one eye and looked at me. Then he opened the other. He had that stern look he gets sometimes. We just gazed at each other. With Gavin you gotta read the signals. If you get them wrong, then wham, he’ll smack you in the face and take off, he’ll head for the hills. Not literally. Well, usually not literally.
OK, I got the message, this was not the time for stupid girly emotional stuff like, ‘Thank God you’re all right,’ or, ‘I thought I was going to die when I saw the guy grab you, I actually felt death break out inside me,’ or, ‘You mean more to me than any other human being in the whole world.’
This was apparently not the time for any of that rubbish. No more hugs for the time being.
‘Gavin, what the hell was that all about?’
‘He’s my stepdad.’
I gasped, and so did Lee, behind me. I toddled in a bit further.
‘So I can understand why anyone connected with you would want to kill you but was there any particular…?’
He couldn’t lip-read all that. Too drowsy and drugged
up, like me. This was the drugged leading the drugged. He frowned and did what he normally does in those situations — guessed what I was asking. I knew that sequence of his facial expressions so well.
So he answered what he thought I was asking. And got it right, as he usually does.
‘He murdered my mum.’
EPILOGUE
Seemed like Gavin was the only witness. Like the Red Cross said: his mum had been murdered at the very start of the war. What they got wrong was the person or people who’d done it. They all assumed it was enemy soldiers. I don’t know who found her body, maybe one of those work teams I’d had a few encounters with myself, the people who’d been drafted to go out into shops and houses to clean up after the invasion. Maybe enemy soldiers had found her body and given it to people in a prison camp to bury or cremate.
But from then on, everyone, right through to the Red Cross, had blamed the soldiers.
Only Gavin knew the truth. He had seen his mum struck down from behind as she loaded the car. Over the rest of the weekend he told me about it and enacted it, as he does. She had decided to get out of the relationship, to Gavin’s relief. She’d taken Rosie to a friend’s place, along with some suitcases, then come back to the flat to get another load. Gavin and she were carrying stuff down to the car and were in the garage when the man arrived home. He hit her with a car jack, then when she fell, hit her again and again. Then he locked Gavin in the apartment. When Gavin escaped, hours later, he ran straight into the invasion.
All this time Gavin had carried his secret knowledge, all this time the fear and sickness of it had churned away inside him. He didn’t dare tell anyone. He didn’t want to bring the man back. He didn’t want an enquiry. Like they say, you’re as sick as your secrets, and his secret was a pretty poisonous one.
