So what do you do out here anyway, I ask her.
Oh, this and that. I ran away from a bad marriage. Bastard broke my arm twice. Would’ve killed me if I’d stayed. Been back there working on the mine but I’m over it. Headed for the coast for a bit. See what happens.
She looks about fifty, and I wonder about her, cruising around like this. I can see the hint of an old tattoo on her forearm, disappearing into the sleeve. Looks like a home job.
Me, I’ve been running for years, she says. You look like you just started.
I stare straight ahead, try to fix my eyes on the horizon. It disappears into a heat haze, you can’t see where it goes.
The outside is like this. It has no edges.
You come far?
I shrug and drop my cuffed wrist beside the seat.
Don’t talk about it if you don’t want to.
We drive in silence for a while. The road gets worse, whole sections of it dropping into banks of red sand. At one point there’s even a tree in the middle.
No radio out here is all, she says. S’why I always pick you guys up. Get jack of talking to myself.
Four states, I say. Four states in a week.
Shit, you’re caning it. Must be some trouble.
I nod and stare and pray quietly to the Kelly gang. It doesn’t work, because I feel her foot lift. The vehicle slows to a stop. She gets out of the car and I grab my plastic bag, ready for the kick, but she’s only going for a piss.
I get out and walk a way up the road to relieve myself. A tiny trickle, I’m dehydrated again. Yesterday I walked so far in the heat I nearly shat myself. I glance up at the horizon ahead.
There on the road is a fetid carcass, an old cow bursting its skin. A cluster of crows – a murder – going at the guts. I feel nauseous as I button my fly and return to the car. Sitting there strapped with jerry cans and spare tyres, it looks ready for the end of the world.
When I open the door I do it with the wrong hand. As we drive past, the crows leap into the air and swim around in the dust.
You gonna tell me what you were in for, she asks quietly. I tug at my sleeve, but it’s too late. She’s already seen. I rack my brain for an explanation. The satellite phone’s sitting on the dash, the coppers waiting at the other end. I should roll myself out of the car and onto the roadside, but those dark birds are waiting. There’s no way out.
Murder, I want to say. I want to scare her into driving me all the way. If I had a knife I could, but something tells me she’d fight back. Stuff it, I think. You gotta trust someone sometime.
Armed robbery, I say. Three years for aggravated.
She raises an eyebrow. What with?
Kebab skewer.
The woman laughs then. Her laugh is harsh and dry like the country and it fills the car. She bangs her wrist on the wheel and reaches for the dash. My hand creeps up towards the door handle, ready to roll. She fumbles under the sat phone for something. I press the seatbelt open. She hands me a bobby pin.
Can you manage with that?
Maybe. I’m not much of a burglar.
Obviously. Hands up, this is a barbecue!
I almost smile then. I almost inhale. I remember that somewhere at the end of this road is the ocean, waiting there, cool and blue; and on the other side, who knows? Another country maybe. Another shot. I’m not gonna stuff it up this time, I think, as the cuffs slide open in my hand.
A little later, I toss them out the window. As they fly through the air, a couple of crows snap at them. Two for mirth.
The milk in the sky
The first time I seen Trace she’s at the roadside near the horse paddock, lying in the sun like there’s no work to be done anywhere and I think she’s a bloke. So I sidle up to her, hands on my hips, cause I have to follow every avenue just in case. She’s under a wide brown hat and all I see is this grin come up and then two slight rises under the check shirt. I drop the flirt straightaway when I see.
Well, g’day there, missy, she says. Whatcha doin wandering around out here on your own?
Goin home, I say squinting against the sun. You?
She sits up, her head close to my knees. Just blew in, she says. For the weekend. Hitched up from town. Trace, she says, and holds up her hand. I touch it lightly and say my name.
There’s a dance on at the pub this Saturday, I tell her. I shift my weight, my knees trying to hide. A lot of blokes come in for it from around. Watch yourself out here, ay. She nods at me, still grinning, and I step back onto the track, head for the station. My brothers are waiting for me to bring the shopping back. It’s in a calico bag, and the narrow strap slices into my fingers.
She follows me up the track a bit, but every time I look back she’s staring at the dirt or her feet and all I see is the hat. After a while I stop checking she’s there and when I get to my gate and look back all I see is a speck that might be cast by the spots of light and dark on my eyes from the heat, shimmering things. The horse wanders over and sniffs at me, scoffing at mirages.
I put on my dress and comb my hair out, then think again and put it up, pull the fringes behind my ears. I guess I look a bit serious, practise smiling in the mirror. Curtsey like mum showed me. A lot of the blokes come in from bigger stations with money, it’s my turn to catch one. Me and my brothers have a hard time making this place work on our own, now that our parents have gone. I’ll be an old maid if I don’t take advantage. But none of em have struck me yet.
We drive down to the pub in the ute, Frank and me in the front and the other two in the tray with the dog. The boys go into the bar for a quick few, refreshing the sun from their skin with the amber. I clutch my purse, feeling ridiculous in the dress, already got dust on my hem and my shoes. I go inside.
The fiddles are going full tilt, but hardly anyone’s dancing. I wait for one of the boys to bring me a lemonade. It’s still early, not even dark out yet. A couple of dances, a couple of goes around the floor with the neighbours, and before I know it the place is packed and sweaty. None of em strike me. They’re decent enough. I figure I’m just tired.
I go outside to get a bit of air, and see a boot sticking out of the back of our ute. Maybe one of the boys has had enough too. I go and check, but there curled up having a snooze with the dog is Trace.
Ay, I say, this is our truck. You can’t sleep here.
She hasn’t bothered to change her clothes. The music from the pub comes out: I can hear the lower notes and the thump and sway of boots on floorboards.
Sorry, darlin, she says, looking over at me from under her hat, but I get so bored with this shit.
Me too, I say, without thinking. I mean . . . I look around, but the car park is deserted, so I swing myself up and perch on the back of the ute. The moon’s out, but just under half and you can see the milk in the sky. Trace sighs. Pretty, ay.
If we get talking, it’s just to kill the time between dances while I catch my breath; I don’t notice it’s getting late till someone comes crashing out of the pub shouting fit to wake the sun up. I can hear him vomiting into the planter. I guess I used to imagine something better, I hear myself saying, but I don’t see the point of that now.
Better than this? I can feel the heat of her body, it’s kept the day like metal does. She’s stretched herself up during our chat and leans beside me, looking at the moon. Better than this, she says, and rests her lips on my shoulder, light so I can hardly feel it.
It’s true, the sky is the best thing about living out here. The bloke vomiting behind us stops; I hear the doors swing open and wait for the clang shut before I speak. Where did you come from? I can hear something catching in my throat; her hand’s resting against my back now, but this is the kind of thing you learn not to mention.
Town, she says, I had to get going.
What for?
Oh, some
people down there wanna kill me, she says, and laughs a big, hearty laugh at the sky. I had them going for a while, though. Her voice drops its pitch. Got any work for a strapping young bloke? she growls.
The dog wakes up and sniffs the air, turns in a circle and settles back to sleep.
Oh, I say. There’s a big gap in the night. What are ya? I ask, before I think about it.
Whatever I want to be, she says. What are you?
Just, I say, and my mouth’s full of her teeth. We’re crashed against each other on the warm steel truck bed. Bits of straw in my hair and her hat knocked off. Hands against the soft skin that hasn’t seen sun. The dog doesn’t bother us. Guess I take that as a blessing.
I wake up after the moon’s gone down, cold and with someone talking to my feet. Wondering where you got to, the voice says. It’s me brother, the little one. We’re going home, you right? I try and straighten my dress. Yeah, I say, yawning, just got tired from dancing. I can feel his eyes on me, disappointed.
Well be careful, he says, you know what some of these blokes are like. He moves to help me out of the bed but I say, Nah, I’ll be right – you go and sit up front. This way I can watch the pub disappear in the dust clouds behind us and sit with my hand between the dog’s warm ears and look for a black spot in the mirage. No Trace.
Things go on as usual and I’m busy with the sheep and the milking, keeping the bugs off the vegies and making sure we’re all fed and washed. I think about Trace when I wash the dishes or scrub the clothes against the washboard. The way my hands get hot in the water and sore from the work. I linger in the laundry some days, smiling to myself. I look down the track almost every day and especially into the long grass when I go in to the general store, but when I don’t see her my stomach does a single lonely backflip.
One day the heat is so strong I ask Frank if I can take the ute to the store and save the walking. He says he doesn’t need it for the afternoon. I take off down the dust track, moving faster than I’m used to. In the store I pick out a few sacks of grain and some tinned fruit, a comic for my little brother, soap, a few bits and pieces. I throw the bag in the front seat and turn the engine on. I drive in the wrong direction, out to the paved road that goes in to town, looking for a black mark against the grass, but don’t see anything much. I might as well drive a little way in, I think. But all I see by the roadside is the odd dead roo, black birds picking at its guts and looking over at the ute to size up if I’m gonna smash into them. They don’t even walk out of my way; they know I’ll go round them.
I reach the town before I know it, and drive through slowly looking for someone I’d feel right asking. The main street has two pubs, a bank, a petrol station, a charcoal chicken place, and a couple of shops. It’s the heat I guess, but hardly anyone’s around. One old fella comes out of the pub and stares at me, grinning. A couple of blokes outside the chicken shop are chucking burnt chips at the flies. I slow down beside them, window wound down, and they stare at my face, whistle slowly. I turn the ute around and get out of there, driving too fast. I plough right into the crows, but they get out of the way.
I suppose I’ll have to answer for where I’ve been. I wonder if the soap is melting in the seat. I have to get back and get the dinner on. I don’t check my speed, just kick up a dust cloud. But I keep driving past my turn-off, looking at the verge all the while for the shape of a hitchhiker.
I stop at night, hours after the sun’s gone down, no clue where I am and no sign of life. I get out of the ute and stand there like an idiot. Out here, the bush beckons you, calling you out of yourself. There’s no moon yet and I glance up at the shooting stars that dot the sky. A couple of mopokes go back and forth in a broken rhythm like the fiddlers play. I can almost hear the dance under the dirt. I don’t know what I’m doing out here. There’s no chance of finding someone in this expanse. Only the chance at drawing breath.
When I get back on the road there’s a faint blush of dawn riding the ridge; it’s a wonder people can sleep through the spooky light. I pull in to the station, get out to unhitch the gate, drive through and get out again to close it. I stand there for a minute leaning on the post, looking out at the familiar road. A bird creaks. It’s almost time to milk. I shouldn’t be here.
Everyone’s asleep when I get back, and I wander through the empty living room to the kitchen, looking at the way the light wakes up the silence. Nobody’s waited up. Things go on as they always do.
I don’t sleep a lot. It’s only been a month. Nothing much happens, so when it does you feel it: changes in the air, in the angle of the sun. I don’t sleep a lot for thinking. Sometimes at night I go out and crawl into the back of the ute, lie there and breathe for a minute, but the air is stiff.
Bloke was round here looking for you, Frank says over breakfast. I perk up, try not to show it. Who? I ask. Funny little fella, he says. Bit of a cheeky bastard. I smile, hide it under a chewy crust of bread.
Said he’d drop back later, he says, his eyes on the fried eggs along with a couple of busy flies. Didn’t catch his name.
The day is long. Without sleep the heat takes it out of me, but I get everything done. By dusk I’m watering the horse, scooping my hand into his trough to wipe the dust from my face. The animal stirs, shies sideways, and snorts. What is it? I look over at the road and see a speck of something black growing in the distance. A body walking out of the mirage of heat. I run to the gate.
Well, g’day there, missy, she says, grinning at me from under her hat. I stare open-mouthed. What happened to your face? I say. A thick bloody line runs across it, dried up and dark with dust. Toldja, she says, shrugging. They don’t like me much down there. She gestures with her head, conserving energy against the baking heat.
Do you want to come in?
She looks over my shoulder and I do too. The boys stand close to the house, each one stopped in his separate task to watch us. Nah, she says. Just came to say goodbye. I’m off up north, get some work on one of those big stations where they don’t care who you are.
Oh.
Her boots scratch at the earth the way the dog does when he’s forgotten where he’s left his bones. She looks me in the eye, grabs her hat from behind, settles it on.
See ya, she says, and walks off down the road.
I follow her, but just with my eyes. I watch her shape dry up in the shimmering heat. The waves make everything come and go. Squinting against the light, the dust. My throat wells up with the expanse of it. I turn and go inside.
The capital of missing persons
It used to be known as the murder capital of Australia, but these days Adelaide is the capital of missing persons. Are people getting better at hiding the bodies? Or are the victims leaving, deserting the city before the murderers have a chance?
My sister is not a missing person, but she does live in Adelaide. I know where to find her. I have known where to find her for fifteen years: I just had to ask my mother. Mum kept tabs on her although she claimed not to. Mum kept the letters my sister sent with her address on them, though I’m pretty sure she never replied. When my mother went into a retirement village I found Helen’s letters in a shoebox, carefully filed in their envelopes, in chronological order. Her letters petered out; the last one was about six years ago. I threw them away without reading them, but the Adelaide address was already burned into my memory.
Before I left Perth I looked my sister up in the phone book, just to make sure. So now I know that anyone can find her, with almost no effort.
I am driving halfway across the country. Lots of people are doing exactly this, or something like it. Driving across this half, or the other half, or flying across, or catching buses and trains. It’s Christmas. It’s when we make up the distance.
I didn’t stop yesterday except for petrol and to sleep the night in a cheap motel attached to a service station. The sound of trucks and the lights of the twenty-fo
ur-hour servo kept me alert. I watched television until late. It was a show about murder, it’s always murder on Thursdays, and I fell asleep before I found out who the killer was. When I woke up this morning I was still wondering who did it.
There’s nothing much to stop at. Ninety-nine per cent of the country is made up of approximately nothing, or nothing I can recognise. You can go down a side track and look over the edge of the limestone at the coast, if you want. The Southern Ocean crashes against the cliffs in broad slashes of white and grey, like a painting. Even when it’s hot you get a sense of the Antarctic chill lurking in the water.
If you look over your shoulder, there’s just the bush, flat and straight, sitting there like it always has. I’m used to it, but it’s hard to explain the empty space to people who aren’t from here.
I work with international students, so I explain things like this to people all the time. The Department looks after them, we help them to adjust. They are all a long way away from their families.
Today, just like every other day, there’s some mad German cycling across the Nullarbor, stoned on the distance. I wave at him as I pass but he ignores me. He’s concentrating on where he is going.
My sister is ten years younger than me. She teaches at a high school in Adelaide, in one of the northern suburbs with English names. Unless she’s had children since I saw her, which is not impossible, she’s my last living relative. I hope she hasn’t had any children, though. It will make what I have to say much easier.
I watch that German cyclist disappear in my rear-view mirror. His face is pinched and hardened. He’s taking the distance seriously. But all this space makes some Europeans hysterical. They start to dig for treasure, or they just stand in the middle of the nothing and scream at each other. They’re amazed that they are allowed so much room.
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