The Choke Read online

  I watched from the doorway as Dad drank from his beer. ‘Some bitch up in Dubbo,’ he said.

  ‘Who?’ Pop asked.

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Nothing. She wanted a fuck.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And then she didn’t.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Bit late by then.’

  ‘And they took you in?’

  ‘Yeah, they did.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘She withdrew her statement.’

  ‘Why’d she do that?’

  ‘I don’t know. Must have been love.’

  ‘Christ, Ray.’

  ‘Silly fucken woman.’

  ‘Cops know you’re here?’

  ‘I never told them.’

  ‘Good. Behave yourself for a while. Go and see Relle. She’d have you back.’

  Dad said, ‘She would too. Relle. Christ.’ Their laughter rose with the flames.

  Pop got to his feet and went to the fire. He rolled a White Ox. ‘How about sticking around?’ he said.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘There’s work here. The sawmill. You could come back. There’s always the muster.’

  ‘I got things I’m doing.’

  ‘What things? Where?’

  ‘Bathurst. I been working for a bloke there.’

  ‘Bathurst? Doing what?’

  ‘Leave it, Dad.’

  ‘What are you doing in Bathurst?’

  ‘Not your business.’

  ‘It is my business.’

  ‘It’s not.’

  ‘You got money?’

  ‘Don’t worry about my money. I never ask you.’

  ‘You come back here broke. I wouldn’t see you otherwise.’

  ‘I come here to see the kids.’

  ‘You come here to see the kids. You see the kids when you run out of money.’

  ‘My money’s not your business.’

  They drank from their beers as if it could dampen the heat between them.

  Pop threw more wood into the flames. ‘It is my business. I got your kid here. Do you forget that?’

  ‘If you don’t want her I can take her.’

  ‘You can take her?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘She’d live with you?’

  ‘Yeah, why not?’

  ‘Because you’re up to no good, that’s why.’

  ‘No good. What would you know?’

  ‘I know you’re up to no good.’

  ‘What do you call no good?’

  ‘A lot of things. The shit you been up to. The guns. It’s no good.’

  ‘You know a lot about no good, don’t you, Dad?’

  ‘There’s nothing I haven’t seen.’

  ‘If Mum was here, she’d agree with that.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Then say it.’

  ‘You fucken say it, Dad. You were there.’

  Every fight led back to Lizzy. Their words were like picks, digging a tunnel that ran through the earth at Pop’s Three to the cemetery in East Nullabri where she was buried. When Pop came back from Burma he was packed with dynamite. The same explosives that felled the trees and broke the rocks and tore open the ground between the jungles. He had to get rid of them or they would split him apart. Lizzy was in hospital for broken bones but when she was there she caught pneumonia. Pneumonia was in the toilets and the cups and the towels and the hospital corridors. It stuck to her hands and climbed inside her, the same way Pop’s bug did to him in Burma. When Lizzy died my dad was standing beside the bed, holding her hand. She took some of him with her as she left. Lizzy held the missing piece where she lay underground, and it was too deep under there for Dad to get it back. The missing piece was the key to the lock of Dad’s face, the light in his eyes, the words for his secrets.

  In the morning, when Dad was still asleep, Pop and me went out to the chooks. Pop made tiny dry kisses in the air. ‘Here, Lady; hello, Madame; how are you, Missy, my Missy? Going to lay eggs for your old Pop, your old Poppy and Miss Jussy? Hey, little girls, little ladies; here, chook chook; here, chook chook chook.’ Pop picked up the new water dish from the stock and feed. ‘Where do we put it, Jussy?’ he asked.

  I said, ‘In the corner.’

  ‘Here, Jussy?’ he asked, putting the water feeder in the corner. The chooks helped Pop talk to me; they helped him to see me and ask me things.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘They won’t knock it over there.’

  ‘Good thinking, Jussy, good thinking,’ he said. The chooks’ smooth feathers and round bodies and wings softened Pop’s edges. They smoothed him down, gave him something warm to hold and eggs for his breakfast.

  Pop stepped out of the run for the grit. ‘Telephone,’ he said. I stepped out and heard it too. Pop left me with the chooks to answer it.

  When he came back he was saying words under his breath—the only one I heard was Rita. ‘Justine, check the fences,’ he said.

  ‘But, Pop…’

  ‘Go and check them. Get a move on.’

  I crossed the yard and took hold of the fence. I had to check the posts, the wires and the fox mesh for holes. Pop didn’t run anything on his Three; he kept it quiet—no surprises. I walked slowly, my hand on the wire. As I went up the slope of Pop’s Three I could see glimpses of the Murray through the forest, muddy brown, rippling. Then Pop’s Three sloped down and I couldn’t see anything. I was at the furthest part of the Three. It was only space and empty sky. There was nobody here. There were no sounds. There was nothing. I wanted to run; I couldn’t see the house, I couldn’t see the forest on the other side, I couldn’t see anything. There was nothing in me, and nothing outside of me. It was the same as the ditch around Steve. Like the Japs in the war with Pop, I didn’t have a reason. My heart pounded. I started to run, my hand on the fence, until I could see the Murray through the trees again. Down there, the banks of The Choke pressed in on the water from both sides, trying to strangle it. But the water kept going. My heart stopped racing and then I was past the top of the Three and I could see Pop’s house again.

  When I came back the fire was lit. Pop made us ham and egg sandwiches and we sat in the camp chairs and ate. The yolk dripped down the sides and turned the ham yellow. Pop put enough salt on it to see the crystals sinking into the sauce. I wiped my bread across the butter left on the plate.

  ‘Good, hey, Jussy?’ said Pop.

  ‘Good, Pop.’

  When Dad came out of the back-house Pop asked if he could help him pick up a load of wood. ‘It’s out the back of Sandy’s,’ he said. ‘Your truck takes more than mine.’

  ‘How much?’ said Dad.

  ‘Enough to get us through winter,’ said Pop.

  ‘It’s December,’ Dad said. ‘How much wood do we need?’

  ‘Winter comes around,’ said Pop. ‘Give it time to dry.’

  Dad shrugged. ‘If you say so.’

  I sat between Dad and Pop in the truck. The cabin was full of papers and empty pouches of White Ox. A necklace with a cross hung from the mirror. Dad drove and Pop was beside the window. The wind blew across our laps and faces. Pop said, ‘Rita called.’

  Dad looked across at him, eyebrows raised. ‘Oh yeah?’

  Pop nodded. ‘Yep.’

  ‘What did she want?’

  Pop kept his face in the wind as he spoke. ‘Wants to visit.’

  Dad frowned. ‘What for?’

  ‘What for? She’s my daughter’s what for!’

  ‘Settle down, Dad. Just asking. You haven’t seen her for…how many years has it been?’

  ‘Not my bloody fault. Jesus. You were there.’

  ‘Take it easy, Robert. Just asking.’

  ‘Nearly six years,’ said Pop. ‘Jesus.’ He shook his head.

  Kangaroos lined the side of the road, their grey faces peeking between the trees. I thought I had come to the end of them and then there
were more kangaroos, watching, paws raised.

  Dad said, ‘When’s she coming?’

  ‘Soon.’

  ‘When’s that?’

  ‘Next week.’

  ‘Right.’ Guitar music hummed over the engine. When you kiss me, sweet angel, when you kiss me, what can I do? ‘Why now?’

  ‘Jesus, I don’t know.’

  ‘It won’t be because she’s getting married.’ Dad laughed.

  Pop looked across at Dad with his eyes hard. ‘Shut up, Ray. That business is finished now.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘Just leave it alone.’

  ‘Did you ask her why she wants see you?’

  ‘She’s my daughter, for Christ’s sake. A father doesn’t ask his daughter why she wants to see him.’

  ‘Right,’ said Dad. ‘She coming on her own?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t she be coming on her own? ’Course she’s coming on her bloody own.’

  ‘Just asking.’

  ‘Well, stop asking.’

  I looked past my dad, through the open window, out to the blue, sunny sky; my Aunty Rita was coming to visit.

  12.

  Relle dropped Kirk and Steve at Pop’s Three on Sunday afternoon. Ray was hammering a nail into the bottom of his boot. He held the boot between his knees, as if he was putting a shoe on a horse. I stood beside him and watched. He never used more movement than he needed; one hit with the hammer and down went the nail. Kirk picked up a stone and pressed it against the strap in his slingshot. Dad looked up as Kirk pulled back the elastic and shot the stone over the fence. Dad put down the boot. ‘Give us a look at that thing,’ he said.

  Kirk and Steve came over to him. Kirk walked with his chest out, like he was a man with a slingshot, a bow and arrow, and a gun, and he could choose which one he wanted to shoot. Steve was behind him, half hidden, in the cool of Kirk’s shadow.

  Dad took the slingshot from Kirk and turned it over. It looked small in his hands, like it might break. Kirk and Steve and me watched as Dad picked up a rock from the ground beside his camp chair. Light came from his hair, so black it shone. His skin was pale and thick; if you tried to cut it you wouldn’t get through, the knife would stick. Dad aimed the rock at the door of his back-house. The sound of the rock hitting the door handle pinged in the air. I felt my mouth drop open.

  ‘Danny’s uncle is going to show me and Danny how to shoot,’ said Kirk softly.

  ‘You said.’ Dad drank from his can.

  Steve stayed in the shadow, but I could see the crack in the ground around him.

  Dad threw his cigarette into the fire. He got up, crossed the yard and went through the fence. Me and Kirk and Steve stood on the bottom rung and watched him. We never took our eyes off him, as if he was a movie and we didn’t know what would happen, who would win and who would be killed. We were waiting to see.

  Dad bent and picked up a stick and when he came back to us, waiting along the fence, we saw he was holding a slingshot much bigger than Kirk’s. The handle was as long as his arm, and the sides were in a perfect V. It was if the slingshot had been left there for him. Dad walked out the front to his truck. He came back with a piece of rope that stretched the same way elastic did, and he tied it to the sides. He picked up one of the stones from around Pop’s fire and went to the fence. Magpies bounced from the wire to the ground, looking for worms and beetles. There was one magpie separate to the rest. It pecked at the ground, then looked up at us, head on the side. Dad lifted his slingshot. The bird didn’t move, watching us. Dad aimed his slingshot. My tongue went in out in out of the hole. Kirk looked at Steve, then at me. Dad pulled back the elastic until it was tight, then he let go.

  We walked to the bird lying on its back. My mouth felt dry. The magpie was opening and closing its claws, as if it was trying to take hold of something. There was blood from its eye. Dad walked back to the fire and sat down in his camp chair. He tossed the slingshot onto the ground. There was nothing left to matter to my dad.

  13.

  When I walked into the classroom on Monday morning, I saw Michael at the desk, his map book open. I went over and sat beside him. His body shook; his shoulders, neck, head, arms, legs jerked and pulled, but his eyes, when he looked at me, were two wells, deep and green. Brian Lawson said, ‘Elastic spastic.’ I saw Thomas Dunson lift his rifle. Every time you turn around, expect to see me.

  That morning it was assessment to see if we had to go into the slow group next year with Mrs Eddles. My pencil hovered over the page. I had to guess. I put a tick in one of the circles. I didn’t know what the letter was beside it. I moved to the next circle. I put my pencil above another letter. As I went to put a tick in the circle Michael knocked my hand. I looked at him. I went to do the tick again and Michael knocked my hand again. I glared at him. Leave me alone. I looked back down at the letters. Echoice, erac, tahw. Which one? I didn’t understand. I looked around the room. Everyone was putting ticks in the circles, their eyes moving down the page. I looked back at the test. What did it matter where I put my tick? From the other side of the room Mrs Turning said, ‘It is multiple choice. Make sure you read every option carefully before making your choice.’

  I put my pencil in the one of the circles, and Michael jerked and shook. What was he doing? I put the pencil in another one of the circles. He shook again. He made a sound but I didn’t know what it meant. Nobody looked at him; everyone was used to his sounds and his movements, as if he was invisible. I put my pencil in another one of the circles. I looked at Michael. He made a small move, then he went quiet. I drew a tick. By the end of the test I knew his move for yes and his move for no. I finished the test at the same time as everybody else, with a tick in every circle.

  It was a long time till playlunch. Mrs Turning was teaching letter-writing. She wrote a sentence on the board. A piece of crumpled paper landed on my desk. I turned around and saw Matt Dunning and Brian Lawson grinning at me. Michael saw the paper too. I picked it up. Michael tried to shake his head. I straightened out the paper and saw a picture of a dick. It had wee coming out in a spurt to the edge of the paper.

  Mrs Turning said, ‘Justine, what is that?’ She came over to my desk and took the paper from my hand. She looked at the dick and said, ‘What do you mean by this?’ Her glasses reflected the light; I had never seen behind them and didn’t know if there was anything there.

  Matt Dunning and Brian Lawson waited for me to say, I didn’t do it, Mrs Turning, it was Matt and Brian, they did it. But not telling was my only weapon.

  Mrs Turning said, ‘Justine? Did you draw this?’

  I didn’t speak.

  ‘Justine?’ Mrs Turning held the dick in front of my eyes and nose, its piss heading for my lap. ‘Justine?’

  I saw angles of colour and light in Mrs Turning’s glasses. Her skirt was grey with checks and it matched the top, grey with checks.

  ‘Did you do this?’

  I stayed quiet.

  ‘Go to the corner!’

  Michael groaned in his chair beside mine. His head rolled. I was the only one who knew what he was trying to say: No, no, Mrs Turning, Justine didn’t do it. Everyone thought it was just sounds that he made, that they weren’t words. But I knew. No, Mrs Turning, no, no, no! It wasn’t her! It wasn’t Justine!

  I got up, my chair scraping against the floor.

  ‘Settle down, Michael,’ Mrs Turning said.

  Michael’s arms flew into the air over his head. He was groaning, spit coming from his mouth. No! She didn’t do it! Mrs Turning, it was them who did it. Them! Matt Dunning and Brian Lawson! But all she heard was groaning.

  Dawn and Noreena whispered to each other.

  Mrs Turning put me in the corner, where I stood facing the wall.

  Michael’s groaning sounds filled the room, as if it hurt him to try to speak, hurt him to see me get up and go and stand in the corner, hurt him to see Matt and Brian lie; as if he, Michael Hooper, was my friend.

  The last hour of the day was carol
practice. All of third class stood in rows in front of Sabine. Shelley Castles was between Michael and me. ‘“Joy to the World”, please, boys and girls.’ Sabine lifted her baton. Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Let earth receive her King! Everybody sang—even Michael. I only made the shapes of the sounds—I didn’t want anyone to hear—but Michael made the sounds too. Matt Dunning and Brian Lawson rolled back their eyes and jerked their heads trying to copy him. I stepped behind Shelley Castles and stood beside Michael. Joy to the world, the Saviour reigns! Let men, their songs, employ!

  If there was no one else in the class, if it was just me and Michael, and we were the only two at Nullabri Primary, I would have sung with him. It would be our own concert, and the singing of Justine and Michael would fill Nullabri Hall; it would be so loud the glass of the windows would break and the doors would blow open. The audience would clap and cheer and say, More more more! While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains, repeat the sounding joy, repeat the sounding joy. The singing would go up to the sky and the people driving by in their cars and trucks would stop by the road to listen as we sang, Repeat, repeat the sounding joy! Sing joy, joy, joy to the world. Joy, joy, joy!