Last time they’d come, Phil had ridden his bike off the ledge and into the water. It was now Lex’s turn. From the seat of his black BMX, the water was just a brown wedge visible over the sloping rise before the drop. Phil said, “You won’t break your legs or anything. It’s deep right down there.”
Lex said, “Not worried about my legs, I’m worried about the bike.”
“It’s water, man, jeez come on.”
“I didn’t get this bike for my birthday like you got yours. I delivered pamphlets on Saturdays in the heat and paid for it myself.”
“Then you went and stole from the shops. What a good boy.” Phil took the Playboy out of Lex’s schoolbag. “If you don’t jump I’m keeping this.”
“Okay, okay.” Lex took off his shoes, put his glasses in their case, took a deep breath then pushed off, pumping hard on the pedals, the tyres bumping over the grassy ground. The water opened up into view three metres below, then he was airborne, letting go so the bike flung itself out ahead of him while he landed feet first in the water.
It was cold and not as deep as Phil had claimed, for his feet touched the hideously soft mud at its bottom. He came up and used his first gasp of air to whoop in triumph. He swam forwards to get the bike. “See that?” he laughed, spitting out a coppery mouthful.
“You didn’t stay on your bike, doesn’t count. Do it again.”
“I’ll do it again, no problem. That was sweet!”
Nearing the top of the path, Lex heard other voices up on the grassy platform: someone laughing. “Oh shit,” he heard Phil say. “Lex, get up here, okay?”
Still elated, Lex wheeled the bike up the curving path, starting to feel a chill from the late afternoon air. There was, at most, an hour of daylight left.
When he got up there he saw why Phil had been worried. Craig Randall and Keith Hume, that was why. There was, Lex was quite aware, a chance for him to get back on the bike and ride it down the path and out of there. And he knew he would have if his schoolbag and shoes hadn’t been up there with Phil, along with the precious magazines. Both these guys had been kicked out of school for beating people up. The last guy, Keith had rammed his head into a pole and put him in hospital and into a neck brace. Keith’s messy blond hair hung down over his shoulders, muscled arms exposed in a singlet. His friend Craig was tall, fat, redheaded, with squinting eyes and skin entirely covered in freckles. They were both three years and many growth spurts older.
Craig casually took Lex’s bike from him and sat on it in a way somehow devoid of aggression—just borrowing a seat. “Your friend’s fucked,” he said in his oddly high pitched voice. Going to be a pretty good show, hey? Craig smiled with no malice at all and produced a little bag of cask wine, which he put to his lips and sucked on. The wine’s cheap stink filled the place.
Phil didn’t move as Keith Hume stepped closer to him.
“Why do you have to hit him, Keith?” Lex said. “We got no problem with you.”
“Shut the fuck up, Alex,” Phil snapped at him.
Lex remembered what Phil had said about guys like this. They would beat you up now and then, face it. Just let them. Don’t be a pussy about it and they’d mostly leave you alone from then on. “Get it over with,” said Phil.
“What’d you say, cunt?” Shove to the shoulder, fists up, here it came. Jab, jab, crack went knuckles on Phil’s nose and cheek. They were fast, economical punches. Long fast arms, punching machines made just for this. Phil’s head rocked back. Lex almost felt it, almost saw the explosions of white stars. Craig chortled and slurped his wine. “Come on, Keith, that’s enough, hey,” said Lex.
But it wasn’t. Phil staggered and nearly fell but fought to keep on his feet. The “bully will respect you” theory, but Lex knew it wouldn’t work. “Stay down, Phil, for fuck’s sake,” he yelled, tears welling up in his eyes, a lump in his throat.
Craig got off the bike and with the same lack of malice, gave it a shove towards the drop and the water below. It rolled most of the way there, balanced on its wheels as though it had an invisible rider, then clattered onto its side and slid over the edge.
Lex forgot about Phil and the crack crack of punches still rocking his friend’s head back. There was just a long dark angry tunnel with Craig at the end of it. It was the casual way he’d done it, absolutely nothing personal in it. All those mornings in the hot sun, barked at by dogs, chased by one, riding up that hill on Gyp Court, swooped by magpies, wasp nests in letter boxes, folding fucking Coles and Food-Store pamphlets together all Friday night till his fingers were dark with ink. It had all been for Craig, to provide him five seconds or so of entertainment.
Lex’s hand picked up the flat rectangular stone all by itself. He moved automatically as he drew it back and shoved it into that utterly-hated, squinting, freckled face.
Craig grunted in surprise. That was the point at which Lex’s memory erased what followed, which was, of course, his hand—so much smaller—being grabbed tightly, the rock being taken out of it and the favour returned with interest, as Craig swung it down on his head. His body dropped in the long grass some way from Phil’s and about ten seconds after.
When sight returned, there were only the stars and clouds above, all spinning about slowly and lazily. A continent of thick grey cloud slowly swallowed the half-moon, dulling out its light. Crickets chirped. Pain throbbed down from the top of Lex’s skull as if Craig were right there thumping him with the rock every two seconds.
There was rustling nearby, the tickling touch of long grass, a faint lingering stink of cask wine. A gnawing, crunching sound. Like Phil’s dog Jules at work on a bone. Sucking, slurping. Crunching, gnawing.
He lifted his head, but the spike of pain made him rest it back on the grass. Tenderly, he touched his scalp; there was a sticky, tacky patch of blood. He moaned quietly. The background sounds—the eating sounds—ceased.
A listening, watchful silence ensued that instinct told him not to break. It went on for a long time. There were footsteps padding through the long grass, moving away from him, then towards him, then away again. Slow, heavy steps.
Keith and Craig? he thought. Both of them, still here?
The footsteps stopped. The eating sounds began again. There was a low murmur of someone’s voice saying something, mostly inarticulate, but amongst the babble he made out the words “good, good”.
Slowly, Lex sat up, hardly disturbing the long thick blades of grass around him. A shape loomed ten or twelve metres away, set against the sky behind. A large man hunched forward on the shorter grass where Lex had ridden his bike over the drop, with his back to Lex. The big hunched-over body was just a silhouette against the cloud. It moved in jerking, sawing motions.
A soft moan. Mournful, Lex thought, or maybe a note of pleasure. Though he knew he must stay quiet, he was too confused to be scared. He thought back to rumours about the bogan kids who came here with their girlfriends to screw. But this was no kid.
Up on his elbows, Lex watched the man’s strange movements, still not comprehending, as the minutes passed. Not till he sat up, and the clouds shifted, the moon’s light coming out from hiding to reveal the large man crouched over Phil.
Phil was looking right at Lex, so it appeared, eyes wide and unblinking and with a strange kind of grimacing smile, his lips peeled back. Lex gestured to him as if to say, Are you okay? What’s going on?