‘I’ve got an itch I can’t scratch,’ Tobe said. ‘So we’ll keep on until it’s gone. Whatever happened last night—whatever the fuck that was—came from somewhere out west. There’s not much out that way. Once you get past the Borough, there’s nothing but paddocks and bush until the Pyrenees. Whatever happened…’
‘You want to go fossicking around the mountains?’ I asked, butting in.
There was nothing secretive about the Pyrenees; they were just somewhere we used to go for a break, where we could laze around and forget the day-to-day. We would spend days looking over the sunburnt country from the top of its cliffs, or foraging for food in its canyons, or searching for water in its caves, happy to get away from the everyday.
‘If you’ll let me finish,’ Tobe said, ‘I reckon we need to go further. Maybe try for Ararat or Stawell, maybe even Horsham. Whatever it was probably came from somewhere around there. It had to happen in a town—it was a hell of a show if it happened out in someone’s back paddock.’
All up, Tobe was talking about a ten or twelve-day hike, to the ruins of big towns. There was always the potential for trouble in places like that, always a chance of running into some Creeps. My feet, my legs, my back, they groaned. Ten days! Maybe twelve! You’ve got to be kidding me…
‘That’s a bloody long way. Who’ll look after the joint while I’m gone?’
No reply.
‘Do we even have enough supplies to make it that far?’
Tobe stopped walking, turned to look at me. In the bright moonlight his face was calm. ‘Man up, Bill. Man up or go home.’
I said nothing.
‘Look, you know I need you out here. I need you watching my back. But it has to be your choice, mate. I won’t beg. No fucking way. So you either grow a pair and maybe we’ll find out what happened last night, or you run along home and get yourself to bed.
I thought it over. I was tempted… ‘Okay, you win,’ I said. We were mates through and through, even though I sometimes hated him.
‘Good man.’ He laughed. ‘And before I forget—I made a deal with Lou before we left. She’ll check on your patch, make sure everything’s ticketty-boo. She’ll even lay a flower, if one happens to bloom.’
I didn’t let on how grateful I was. ‘What’s the trade-off?’
‘I told her I’d convert that heap of hers to solar. You know—that piece of shit Holden out the back of the pub. Then she can hightail it north if she decides to go, hopefully outrun any Creeps on the way.’
‘Can you really get it back on the road?’
‘Maybe, probably, don’t really know. Won’t know till I try.’ He smiled at me, so confident and cocksure. ‘Fair enough.’
We kept on down the highway, following a crooked finger pointing west, a grey line that separated the thick bush from the empty paddocks. We walked on, an easy pace that still got the job done, the echo of our feet slapping on the road the only thing we left behind. In the moonlight and the starlight, the land became hazy, the dead and dying trees warping, melting into each other, always changing, always the same, paying us no attention, oblivious to our hike.
The world turned. We slowly crawled across it.
Growing in the distance was another rope bridge stretching out over another dried-up river. The bush to the north stopped suddenly, branches hanging over another riverbed filled with rubble. The rope bridge cut through a craggy earthen ridge running parallel with the river, and then met the highway, which curved away behind the ridge. I stopped, turned to say something, realised that Tobe wasn’t there. I spun on my heel, almost tripped in the tangle of my legs. Despite my embarrassment, I couldn’t help smile. I looked back. Tobe stood maybe ten metres behind me, staring over my shoulder at something I couldn’t see. He wasn’t smiling.
Well, with the balaclava rolled down over his face, I don’t think he was smiling—the terrifying Tobe that I had only just come to know was back.
‘What’s up?’ I shouted, hurrying back.
My voice was loud, too loud. Tobe swore under his breath. He shook his rifle free, adjusted a dial on its sight. He held it to his shoulder, swept it back and forth, scanning the ridge.
He lowered the gun with a grunt. ‘Wait here,’ he said, ‘and don’t move and don’t say anything and please, for fuck’s sake, don’t come running.’
He dropped his pack, slung his rifle on his shoulder, ran full bore into the paddock to the south with Red and Blue at his heels. As easy as dying of thirst, the three of them clambered down the steep bank of the empty river and disappeared from view. I dropped my own pack, sprawled out on the blacktop, had a long drink of water, rolled some bush tobacco, found my tinderbox, struck a flame.
I smoked in the dark, eyes on the far side of the river.
I waited a long time, ended up digging a tiny grave for the pile of butts that grew beside me. And then something moved at the bottom of the ridge. Tobe, Red, and Blue were hurrying up the cracked earth, almost running. I pulled my barely working binoculars from my pack, had a look. Thanks to my cracked glasses and the age of the binoculars, there was nothing but fuzz.
I turned a rusty lens wheel, begging it to work.
Tobe appeared in sharp relief, planted flat at the top of the ridge, rifle poking over the edge. He swept it back and forth, slithered over the ridge and disappeared again, Red and Blue once again following him.
I gave up, confused, completely out of my depth. I drank some more water, drained a canteen. I tried not to worry about it. When there are still long days ahead, it’s best to trust that the world will provide. Who knows what you’ll find? I tried to believe the words I said and ignore my doubting inner pest.
I lay down on the road, my pack beneath my head. I stared at the moon, at its crumpled face. I tried to get comfy.
My pack made a terrible pillow.
SIX
The thunderous crack of a gunshot was so sudden that at first I thought I had imagined it—the empty night does strange things to people. But then another boom echoed through the sky. I jumped to my feet, tucked my rifle into the crook of my shoulder and turned in quick circles, my finger on the trigger. I turned a half-dozen times, abruptly stopped. I was dizzy; it took a while to steady myself. I discovered that I was facing the rope bridge. On the far side stood Tobe. He had his back to me and was bent in half, his pants around its ankles, his arse bared to the world.
I was tempted to let off a shot, to put one where the sun doesn’t shine.
Tobe pulled up his pants and turned to face me. I didn’t need to see his smile to know it was there. He laughed, loud enough that it carried over the rope bridge. I shouldered my gun, told him to do something unmentionable to himself.
‘Come on, Bill. What are you waiting for? Bloody Christmas?’
I stared at him, once again temped to pack it in and head home. Valour eventually got the better of me; I strapped on my pack, picked up Tobe’s, hurried along in my own lumbering way.
I threw Tobe’s pack at his feet. He peeled the balaclava off his face.
‘What kind of thanks is that?’ he asked.
‘Sorry?’
‘For checking that the way was safe. And for getting some dinner.’
‘Huh?’
‘What, are you deaf as well as stupid?’
I ignored him. We walked on, following the highway as it curved away and disappeared behind the ridge. Earthen walls towered above us, hugging the roadside.
‘Get ready,’ Tobe said as the highway straightened out.
I had forgotten about it—I had played it too safe, spent too much time just making sure that my patch hung on.
‘You’ve got to be kidding me…’