‘No wonder your mum had a nervous breakdown. You’re a bloody handful!’
She didn’t get nervous. She got real tired, that one time when I thought my body was turning into metal and I couldn’t sleep in case I woke up as a robot with eyes that wouldn’t blink.
Nevertheless, I do get out of the car and stand by the side of the road while Pat drives off over the hill. The car’s all wobbly in the heat waves before it disappears completely. He was blowing off steam. I could wait. But when I’d counted all 183 of the ants making a migraine of a pattern on the ground, Pat was still gone. Some kangaroos lazing about on the open dry grass were looking at me.
Halfway through a bushwalk with Mum I’d once found the foot bone of a roo. It looked wrong all by itself, so long and narrow. When I stare back at those kangaroos, thoughts come into my head. That I am wrong too, standing here like this. Maybe the roos are feeling territorial. Maybe they will come over and kick me out. No trees to hide behind, creek beds to jump down, back doors to run through and home safe. None of that in the here of the now. Land and sky stretching so wide I think the world will never end.
‘I am a real girl, not invisible, not a machine, alien or robot. I am a real girl.’ I step back and forth so I can see my shadow moving.
‘I am a real girl, not invisible, not a machine, alien or robot. I am a real girl.’
In the distance a tiny figure appears. Trouble. Men don’t need backpacks unless they are up to no good. In the news police are always taking backpacks from houses they have searched for incriminating evidence.
When I squint real hard that’s when I can see. He’s black. Blacker than my dad and I can feel his darkness suck the air out of my lungs. Of all the places and times to be alone with no one around except territorial kangaroos. There used to be a safe house in Beyen where you could go if a weirdo was following you home from school. Not here. My own darkness lets him know I am alone and now he will make the earth swallow me whole. He’s coming to tear me apart with his angry hands. Turn me deaf with his cyclonic wailing. Make me blind with his piercing eyes. So I run. I run like a rabbit running from a fox with nothing but fear in my eyes and the boom of my thumping heart. Tina Arena says you can’t rely on anyone else for happiness. But also, you cannot rely on anyone else to save you when a black man with a deadly backpack appears in the middle of nowhere.
Unhelpful thoughts and questions tumble out of my head so I can travel faster. Things like a dream I’d once had where this guy got a potplant stuck to the back of his skull and the roots were strangling his brain. And why banana Paddle-Pops taste better than real bananas. But then something extraordinary happens. The kangaroos are running with me. Bouncing high and fast, bodies leaning forward every time their long feet kick off the ground, faster, further, faster, further. They can smell my fear and are trying to show they understand. Feels like I’m competing in an iron-man competition without the swimming and riding. I’m going for gold, going to get away, I’m unstoppable. Until I trip over an old tree root and land with a face full of dirt. Have I lost a tooth? There’s something crumbly in my mouth. I spit into the dirt and a large pebble comes out. Get to my feet and quickly assess the damage by triaging myself. There are grazes on my knees and my chin is sore but I can’t see if it’s bruised. But praise be to God, no blood. No tsunami wave of red coming out of my skin gushing through the dry earth. Mum used to say my fear reached biblical proportions, which made me angry because she only believed in God when she wanted to. Still, I could do with some divine intervention ’cause the man is running towards me and I’ve lost all my energy. Peed my pants again too. The wet makes a little well in the ground as the man stands over the top of me. He is trying to see into my soul but I won’t let him even when he says, ‘for the dirt’ and I see he’s holding out a water bottle for me to wash my eyes. How can I know if his water is pure or has the kind of magic I need? So I don’t take it, just get up and keep running. And the look on his face is tattooed on my mind: confused and wounded somehow. For a moment it even looks like the blackness has left him or he’s forgotten it was there to begin with and is just a normal man.
He doesn’t open his mouth but I know he’s saying: ‘Where are you going?’
I just want to get out with all five senses and essential organs intact. I think of Phar Lap and seeing that big old dead heart of his at the museum. I imagine it pumping in the glass box, big and full of life. I sprint away, with Mum calling the horserace of my life: ‘Oh, yes, and She’s a Goer is on the home stretch now, with Darkly Shadow trailing far behind. This filly is a stayer, all the way…’
Then I remember my metal fish. If it rescued me from Dad then surely it would do the same with this fella. I rip it out from the bottom of my bag and hold it in the palm of my hand. Up towards the sky like it’s gonna lift me right up and outta here. But my feet don’t leave the ground. I do feel vibrations buzzing through my shoes though, travelling up the length of my body all the way to my fingertips. Pat is coming back. Up the road I could see the car wobbling through the heat waves again. He does a U-turn and pulls up beside me, wants to reconcile the situation.
‘Righto, now we’ve had some time to cool down, so let’s just zip it for a while whaddyareckon?’
I’m panting so hard I can’t answer. He’s just staring boggle eyed at the dust and little rivers of wee on my legs.
‘What happened to you? Jesus!’
‘No, he never showed up. Not even once.’
I yank the handle so hard I think the whole door will fall off. Jump inside and slam it shut. Bam.
‘Black travels faster than light, so GO!’ I look behind and clock the stranger. I’m not sure if he’s looking at me or something further up the road. Standing still makes him look small. And the further we travel, the smaller he becomes until I can’t tell him apart from the ground he’s standing on. Had I seen a nightmare that wasn’t real? I slink down in my seat. Now there is no body of evidence to prove my life had been in danger, Pat would just think I was playing games.
‘Look away.’ I slide off my peed undies and rummage around in the back for my denim shorts.
‘Dylan…’
I know he’s trying to find a way back into us.
‘Listen, we’ve just had a blue. No need to—’
‘Have a green too?’
Pat goes to say something but then just nods his head.
‘Yeah. Spot on.’
I still have my realness because I got the answer right! And I know the truth submarine under Pat’s answer was ‘You’re a weird kid, but you’re safe.’
You know they say the Aussie sun is harsh on your skin but the land out here is hard on your mind. It is strange and intangible even though it burrows deep inside of you. The land lives without needing anything but itself. And maybe in this moment I don’t need anything except Pat. I push the seat lever and it goes flying back so quick I’m suddenly looking through the sunroof at the bright blue sky.
11 Drawings on the back
Happiness is an energy source. So if you burn it up, hunger is just around the corner. When we pull into the Highett Grove petrol station I’m starving. No chicken tandoori so I have beef and mushroom. I open the pie lid and pour tomato sauce in like engine oil. Pat even got us a mid-sized bottle of Coke each, like we were contemporaries or something. I burp all the way to Pintoori. Did the alphabet twice. Pintoori’s a large-scale small town so there’s a hotel above the pub even though the only regulars are the bedbugs. One time Pat showed me the bites on his back like he had chicken pox. I choose the left bed and slowly sink into the middle. Pat will have to winch me out in the morning. The air is sticky, makes you feel lazy like golden syrup dripping off a spoon.