Floundering Page 12

  Is it dead? Little pale fish, the colour of sand, dart around our feet. I see one take a nibble at the shark’s lip. The waves rock it back and forth. I’ve seen when fishermen throw almost-dead fish back. They pull the water through the gills of the limp fish and it comes alive. The gummy bobs in the water.

  Yeah, I guess, says Jordy.

  Gulls circle overhead. One of them lands on the beach, arches its back, screeches at us. Waves curling around our legs. Jordy reaches down and for a second I think he’s going to thump me, but he gets a hold of the tail of the shark and starts pulling it back to the sand. It bares its teeth at me, grinning.

  He gets it to the sand, then slumps down beside it, leans back with his hands under his head and closes his eyes.

  You killed it, I say. But I know I’m the one who really killed it, because I found it in there and it was me that wanted to catch it, but I say it again, You killed it.

  Just shut up, he says.

  The bite on my neck is itchy. I dig my fingers into it. I hate you, I say to Jordy, standing above him. He opens his eyes. I saw you before, I say to him.

  Whatever, he says, it comes out of his lips in a hiss. He’s lying there, still.

  I saw, I say. I scratch at the bite on my neck hard.

  He sits up, tackles my legs from under me. He gets two of my wrists into one of his hands so he can have the other free to punch my face. I kick up into his belly. I smell his breath, hot and like rotten meat pie. His hair gets in my eyes.

  Get off me, I yell at him. He’s grimacing so hard his lips crack and I see blood on his teeth. His face is red. The sound of waves breaking.

  Don’t say anything, he whispers between his bloody teeth, his lips clenched tight. A vein in his forehead is pulsing and sticking out so far that I want to reach up and put my finger on it, feel the pumping of the blood. But he has both my hands. I knee him in the balls and he falls off me. He curls up, groans. When he looks up at me the water reflects in his eyes and makes them shiny blue.

  It doesn’t matter, Tom, he says.

  I look away. We both look at the gummy. He gets up, Come on, he says. He gets the gummy. He hugs it, holding its head in his arms. We’ll take it back, he says. Get the tail.

  Even though it’s a small shark it still has that scary feeling to look at it. It feels as if maybe it could still give me a nip. The hairs on my arms are white with salt. Jordy has a good hold on the gummy. The flies come.

  We walk back up the beach, the tail slips. I stumble in the high-tide mark. The seaweed curls and scratches my ankles, tangles my feet. I’m stuck there trying to get out of it and Jordy looks back at me with such a pained expression, his arms full of shark, that I feel like giving up, letting the seaweed keep me and just waiting for the tide to rise.

  Come on, he says. I pull myself from the weed. At the dunes we drop the gummy and it gets covered with sand again. He pushes it up the sand and I get above and try pull it up by the head. Trying not to gouge its eyes out. At the top of the dune we hug it again. We walk back towards the caravan. I can smell sausages and kerosene. I can’t itch the ant bite on my neck because I’m holding the shark. The gulls are following us, circling high above, and as we get to the caravan they settle on the roof. We get in under the awning and I let the gummy’s dry tail drop. Jordy has the head still, he gently lowers it to the ground. The gummy’s arm fin is poking up, waving hello. I stare at the place where Bert should be.

  She’s still not home, I say and look up at Jordy.

  Yeah, he says. I hear him breathe out all the way, until he must be totally empty inside. I slump down in the half-broken chair, the gummy at my feet. But from here I can see Nev’s caravan. The windows are dark. The front is neat, like he’s swept the dirt since this morning. Jordy opens the caravan door and I get up, follow him in. My chair collapses on top of the gummy.

  There’s an elastic on the windowsill, with her hair still in it. A red singlet under the bed. Blown tissues along the edge of the bed. I finger half a piece of bread that’s gone hard left out on the bench.

  Are there any chips left? I say.

  I dunno, he says.

  He sits at the table. I look in the cupboard and inside the big Black and Gold bag there is one packet left – chicken flavour. I reach in and pull the little green packet out and show it to Jordy triumphantly.

  Chips, I say. He rubs a space clean on the table and raises his eyebrows at me. I open the chips and stick them one at a time into my mouth. They’re so covered in flavour they almost burn. Do ya want one? I say when there’s really only crumbs left.

  No, he says and rests his head on the table.

  I open the screen door and look down at the gummy. There are flies crawling all over its eyes and near its bared rows of teeth. The awning snaps in a new breeze and the air grabs the empty chip packet from my hand. It floats up and over the dune. I go to run after it but it’s gone. I tighten the awning, like that’s what I’m out there for, pulling it out as hard as I can. The gummy is rotting at my feet.

  There’s heaps of flies on it, I say loudly so Jordy can hear me inside. I look up and see a lady walking towards me. It’s not Loretta because Loretta walks jaunty, like how teenage boys walk. This woman is swaying with a growth on her hip.

  I look for somewhere to put the gummy. I grab the chair and it tangles in my arms, snapping me in the mouth. I taste blood.

  Jordy, I say. No answer.

  I take a hold of the gummy’s fin. Roll it over, under the caravan. The tail catches on the metal step. I shove it and a little triangle of the tail snaps and hangs by a flap of skin. I taste blood and chicken flavouring.

  Jordy, I say.

  He opens the door and looks out. What? he says. Then – What does she want?

  As she walks up we both look at our feet.

  Hi, she says.

  I can see her feet, her thongs. She starts talking like it’s a conversation we’ve all been having before and she starts right in the middle of it.

  She just cries and cries if I don’t walk her, she says, but if I walk her she’s happy as Larry, aren’t you, sweets, happy as Larry. I look up at the tiny girl. The girl gurgles, laughing bubbles of spit. The woman kisses the little girl on the top of her head.

  Your mum here? she says. Thought I might try see if she’d reconsider. She touches her hair. About my hair, she says.

  I say, Nup, but Jordy speaks over me.

  She’s gone into town, he says.

  And left you two all on your lonesome?

  I can look after him, says Jordy.

  You’re not my babysitter, I say.

  You’re younger than me.

  We’re nearly the same age.

  Are not.

  At the start of the year, we’re only a year apart.

  So. What.

  So.

  I see him look at her, then back at me, and swallow what he is going to say.

  Hey, you’re both pretty grown-up. That’s pretty excellent, she says and smiles a giant smile at us.

  We’ve got Nev, though, from across the road, I say. I don’t know why I say it, and I want to suck the words right back inside me.

  She looks at Nev’s caravan. Oh, she says, yeah, okay. She shifts the baby on her hip. Comes back to us with a smile. Well, I’ll let you kids be, hey. Tell your mum I came by. See ya later. She starts back down the road towards the tents.

  Bye, I say with a grin.

  Jordy looks at me like I’ve betrayed something and my grin turns brittle.

  You know what happens, he says. They put you in a foster home. We never see each other again, and Loretta goes to jail.

  Shut up, I say and get the half-broken chair and perch on it. I’m so thirsty. I lick my dry, cracked lips. My bottom lip feels fat under my tongue. We both look over at Nev’s caravan. I can smell the gummy.

  It’s what happens, he repeats.

  I find an old tennis ball in the drawer. I try squish it in my fist but it’s still hard. It’s grey and ba
ld in spots.

  Wanna play catch? I ask.

  Yeah, nah, Jordy says.

  I throw the ball from hand to hand. Feel its rough fur. I throw it gently at Jordy. He doesn’t catch it but lets it land on him and roll off. I get up, grab it, brush the sand off with my fingertips and throw it at him again. He makes no motion to get it, and it rolls away again.

  Why are you ignoring me? I say.

  I’m not.

  I throw the ball at him hard. He doesn’t react, just holds the ball after it hits him, and doesn’t look at me.

  Catch? I say. He doesn’t reply, holds on to the ball. I go sit back outside. After ages he comes and sits outside too.

  Stop scratching your bites, he says.

  I’m not scratching them.

  I pull the ball from his hand. I throw it against the side of the caravan and it makes a bang that shakes salt and rust. The ball rolls back towards my feet. I throw it again.

  You don’t want to play? I say to Jordy. He rolls his eyes and sits down, hunches over his knees. I throw the ball at the caravan. After the noise and the flakes of rust have settled I hear one sharp clap from across the road. I look over my shoulder. Nev is there and he mouths the words, Stop it. Or he says it quietly. I wonder how long he’s been standing there, watching. My skin shrinks. I hide behind Jordy. When I look next Nev is gone. I pick up the balding ball in my hand and squeeze. It cracks down the side. Inside it’s dirty and smells plastic and strange. I scrunch my nose, throw the ball to the dunes. We wait for the afternoon, and then for night. I couldn’t say how many days we’ve been here, in my mind they’ve all mixed into one.

  The air is still. I can hear conversations all the way from where the tents are. Like the people are real close. Around and into the distance there are spots of torchlight and lanterns coming on, one after another. I hear something and I jump. I see things in the shadows. I swallow and calm my breath.

  Jordy?

  I can hear him rustling inside and he comes out with the stub of a candle and a VB lighter. He makes us a small patch of light. His eyes look too big and round. In Nev’s caravan the fluoros go on and we can see in there perfectly. I can hear the generator. My stomach swims and grumbles. Nev is there in front of a window. He looks out and I wonder what he can see of us. I can see his watery eyes even from here. He shakes his head and I see his lips moving, he’s muttering something to himself. He turns away.

  I’m thirsty, I say.

  Yeah, so? Jordy bangs up the steps and into the caravan and then straight back out again because there’s nothing inside, and it’s dark. He sits down beside me. I hear a car from ages away. The growl of it on the corrugations.

  Is that her?

  How should I know?

  I dunno. I bite my pointer fingernail and rip at it until it hurts. It tastes like fish-dirt. Up the road, headlights show over the hill and my heart beats fast. But as the car comes down and past us into the camp, I see it’s not Bert. The nose is a different shape. The car is white and new and it drives past without slowing down, leaving behind the smell of hot engine.

  The crickets are so loud. When there is no more electric blue in the sky Jordy gets the candle and goes with the wavery light into the caravan. I follow like there’s a little piece of string connecting us, and I got no choice but to go with the pull of it.

  You wanna sleep there? he says, pointing with the candle at Loretta’s bed.

  No, I say.

  Well, I’m gunna sleep there then. But he doesn’t go to get in the bed. I sit on the edge of the bench seat that becomes my bed. A puff of air farts out of it but this time neither of us laugh. He puts the candle down. We look at the double bed at the end of the caravan, the sheets crumpled as if someone just got up.

  Okay, he says, and goes and lies in Loretta’s bed, smoothing the sheets out first, then climbing on. He lies there with the stained pillow and his arms under his head. Blow out the candle, he says. I blow it out, and the wick smoke curls and stinks. Loretta always licks her fingers and pinches the wick but I’m too scared of burning myself.

  Can I come sleep with you? I say.

  No.

  I get onto the bench and lie there, running my hands over the underside of the table. I can feel things carved into the bottom of the table. I try trace over them with my fingers. Names, I reckon, I feel Loretta there, carved into the wood but I can’t be sure. There are shadows on the roof, shifting darkness as if there are night clouds up there. There’s a whistle from the wind. Rustling so it sounds like there is someone just there, right outside the door. I can tell Jordy’s not asleep, his breaths are short and irregular.

  I’m scared, Jordy, I whisper and the words snag in my throat like a fish bone.

  What? he says.

  I’m scared.

  I can’t hear what you’re saying.

  Nothing, I say loudly. Nothing. The words echo in the tinny room.

  Jordy.

  What?

  There’s someone outside.

  Just shut up, he says, shut up.

  I hold my breath, but I can hear someone out there.

  Jordy.

  Look, he says, and bounds out of the bed, and is at the door. He opens it slowly, worried maybe at the last second that he’s wrong. I sit up and stare out with him. There’s two eyes there. Jordy stumbles back and the door swings shut. He bangs himself on the table.

  Shit. It’s a dingo, it’s a dingo, he says. He laughs and opens the door again. Shoo, he says. The dingo has his snout in the gummy. He’s got the gummy, says Jordy. He goes to step towards it and the dingo stares hard at him and growls. Both the dingo and Jordy step back. The dingo pulls the gummy along.

  Jordy claps his hands, Shoo. I pull my knees up and hug myself. Hey, he says and steps down closer, stamping. Hey, he says louder. Hey. He’s outside now, with the dingo, the screen door screeches closed.

  Give it back, he says. I hear a scuffle and the low growl of the dingo. Then the screech of the door and Jordy’s back inside, dragging the gummy in with him.

  Shit, he says, shit. He’s got the tailfin in his hands. Close the door, close the door, he says. I jump up and pull the screen door shut. But I can see the dingo still pacing outside. The screen door is not a real door either, the dingo could just push its snout through the mesh. The gummy’s face looks not quite right, bite marks on him. Jordy drops the tail.

  Shit. Shit, he says. I stand up. Through the screen door I can see the glow from Nev’s caravan, the lights still on. I wonder if he could hear us if we called out? There isn’t enough room for Jordy, me and the gummy. I sit back down. Jordy opens the cupboard. He finds an old bit of newspaper and lays it on top of the gummy, tucking the newspaper around it.

  There, he says. But its bitten head is staring at me in the dark. He scrunches a bit of newspaper to wipe his hands.

  Just go to sleep, he says. He snaps the lock of the screen door into place. I hear the small click of it. Jordy gets back into Loretta’s bed. I can still hear things outside. I imagine lots of things out there, and they’re worse than a dingo and its growl. For a long time I listen to Jordy’s breathing. When his breathing changes and I am sure he’s asleep I step over the gummy and climb onto the edge of Loretta’s bed. I make sure I’m really far away from him so he doesn’t wake. I scrunch up on the edge. The bed smells of Loretta: cigarettes and too-sweet watermelon deodorant.

  13

  I wake covered in sweat. I dig the sleep out of my eyes. There’s a dream still, somewhere at the edges of my brain, slippery as sand. I open my eyes. Jordy’s not there. The bed is empty. I’ve sprawled to the middle where the foam sags. I sit up. I black out for a second, dizzy, until my brain catches up with my head. My mouth is so dry and tastes horrible. I look around for something to drink before I remember we’ve got nothing. I shuffle off the bed. It creaks and shudders. I fall over the gummy. Kick its flesh.

  Sorry, I say and it comes out a hoarse whisper. I clear my throat. Step over the gummy, open the screen door
.

  Jordy, I say into the hot. A fly goes straight up my nose and I have to snort it out. It drops halfway to the ground then keeps flying.

  Jordy?

  I jump into my thongs and walk to the toilet. He’s not there. I take a piss and even pissing into the dark hole I can tell my piss is brown and gross. I climb to the top of the dune and look out at the beach. It is still and coloured better than jewels. I walk back to the caravan and my head beats with my heart. I look back in there. Jordy? The gummy’s broken fin sticks out from under the newspaper. The flies slip in the open door. I turn to look at Nev’s caravan and my headache beats faster. I put one foot in front of the other and cross the road. I step in the dips of the corrugations. I count my steps in my mind. It takes thirty-seven steps to reach the back of the caravan. I concentrate on my feet and don’t look up. I hear Nev talking to Jordy and I have to.

  Please don’t come here, he says. Nev runs his hands through his grey hair. It’s like torture, he says. He closes his eyes and holds his hand out as if to stop the day moving forward. Standing there on stick, old-person legs. I can see through the skin on his legs. I can see his veins, his insides. Like a ghost crab’s shell, he’s see-through. Jordy sees me.

  We need a drink of water, he says, please.

  Nev, hearing the we, opens his eyes and looks right at me. I see a tear squeeze out the corner of his eye.

  Fuck, he says, and wipes the tear away. You’ll ruin me, he says. He goes into the caravan.

  Jordy, quick, I say. I grab his arm and he shakes me off.

  No, he says.

  Nev comes out with two metal cups and a bottle of Coke. He sits down at his camp table that sags in the middle like it’s tired. He balances the bottle and the cups there in the centre and pours us a glass each. The coldness beads off them. I look at Jordy and he reaches over and takes a cup. I walk closer and take a cup too, but step quickly back. I don’t look at Nev. I sip it and it’s so sweet it burns my throat. The bubbles go up my nose and I cough, spitting Coke out onto the ground. It evaporates straight away. I take a deep breath and drink the rest slowly. A butcherbird swoops down and lands on the edge of the caravan windowsill. It taps its beak on the glass. Tap. Tap, says the butcherbird. Tap. It sharpens its beak on the metal edge of the sill then stops, cocks its head and looks at me with one eye.