A Shot at Freedom (2 page)

“We know…” her mother stuttered.

Brooke reached for two clumps of hair on her own head, gripping it until it hurt. She shook her head, “Then why
do it? Why?”

“They need the money,” her father said.

“Give him a job, then.”

Her father scoffed.

Her mother turned her lip up. “You’re father could never do that.”

“You’re killing him. And he’s killing them,” Brooke whimpered.

“Don’t waste your breath Brooke, I’ve tried explaining-”

“You’re killing them all too, Mum. Stay away.” Brooke ran from the room, t
aking the stairs two at a time, tripping on the last one, falling to the floor with a thump. She pounded the floor with her fist, and dragged herself back to her feet, plodding back to her room. It wasn’t worth talking about any more. She yanked her cupboard door open. There was the bag, packed with all the things she thought she could never live without.

Chapter Two

David

The wind rattled the window. While David’s mother dished up the sausages, mash and peas, David scrubbed at the grill. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his father stride across the yard. Obedient dogs trailed him. With deft hands David hid the knives beneath the suds. He would have liked to have cleared his throat to warn his mother, but his father had recently grown wise to
their signals.

The broken screen door flapped open and then shrieked and juddered as the wind hurled it against the side of the house.
His father clumped inside, kicking off his boots.

“That stupid girl was outside,” he said.

David gave a tight nod.

“Tell her to keep the hell away, if she knows what’s best for her. You’ve got nothing good enough to give her,
son. The sooner she wakes up to that the better.”

Looming over them, his father surveyed the steaming meals.

“I’m not eating that shit.”

His mother flinched.

David took a rum and cola from the fridge and cracked it open, leaving it on the bench. The hiss of the drink was enough to catch his father’s interest.

His mother nodded, wiping her hands on her faded pink apron. “I can’t - we don’t have – anything else - much.”

Dragging his filthy fingers from plate to plate, his father smeared the food across the bench top. He raised his fist and dropped it like a sledgehammer. The mush spattered up the walls and across the old stove still hot and spitting. David and his mother sidled closer to the door, strategically placing the dining table between them and him.

“That’s
Bangers and Fucking Mash for ya,” he said, swiping the drink off the bench and chugging on it as he left them with the mess.

***

On the porch, sheltered by the wind, the lightning appeared to be coming from the east and west, two storms on a collision course. David offered his mother the old chair with a broken arm rest in the corner and sat on the stairs. It was her favourite place to sit. Her back was protected. She could see the enemy coming. Her cigarette lit up as she sucked on it.

She
leaned back with a groan. “I don’t know what’s going to happen now. We can’t survive out here much longer without the bore...and more debts than money.”

“I think it’s a good time to leave
then.”

Even in the dark, he saw her shake her head
ever so slightly.

“Come with me, Mum.”

She took a drag on her cigarette. “You go. You go with Brooke. I’ll be a third wheel.”

“
What if I’m doing the wrong thing by taking her with me?”

“
Think of it as the two of you going together. You saw her tonight. She wants to go. It will be a fresh start for both of you.”

“Why can’t you be a part of it?”

He felt his insides swirl as his mother started laughing. “You and Brooke are both young. I am old. I had my chance to start fresh in the country. A farmer’s wife. This is the life I made for myself.”

“
I’ll look after you. We’ll stick together.”

The screen door flew off its last hinge, and clattered across the porch, a corner jabbing David in the thigh. His father kicked at the door
, again. The frame splintered. David wrestled the door off himself, in time to see the first punch thrown at his mother. She was trapped.

David couldn’t get to her until the third punch was thrown.
His efforts to squeeze between them were futile, as his father backhanded him, sending him reeling off the porch his head ringing and vision blurring. David staggered, unable to stand upright.

Thwump
! His mother lay flattened at his feet. He sprawled across her, in an effort to protect, but his father came in kicking. David’s head hurt and his world turned to black and white fuzz.

“Dad?” he
begged. But it was drowned out by the screeching behind him. He stumbled and fell. It was as though the land had slanted on him. He couldn’t work out which way was up or down. He held himself steady on his hands and knees, knowing that to vomit would be the ultimate sign of weakness. His mother’s screeches became screams.

“Shut up!” his father shouted. With each kick her foetal form shifted in the dusty yard. The wind picked up her faded skirt, flapping high, for humiliation. “You think you can get away from me? Where ever you went I’d find
ya…And you’d be dead. I’ll bring a gun. Stupid bitch. No fuckin’ brains.”

David charged at him,
ricocheting off his hard back onto the ground. His father came at him kicking. His mother was getting a rest. Only the first couple hurt. He was shunted around the yard like a medicine ball, a kick to the back, one in the shins. His arms were wrapped around his head. It wasn’t going to stop. He knew not to make a sound. It would only make it worse.

But then it stopped. Aside from the wind whining through trees, the farmyard was silent. He peered out through his elbows. His mother stood at the foot of the stairs, holding up a snake gun. Her hand wasn’t even trembling.

“That’s not gonna do anything, idiot,” his father snarled.

David forced himself to his feet.

His father hopped forward, kicking his leg in a sweeping arc, sending the gun clattering down the wall. He hurled her back down onto the ground, forcibly ripping her dress high just for the shame of it.

David lunged for the gun, spun around
, sending out a spray of bullets, some into his father’s head and neck.

His father dropped onto his mother. She grunted and writhed under him. David had to watch her wriggle out. He couldn’t move.

“David?” his mother said.

David looked down at the crumpled body.
He felt nothing.

His mother came at him slapping him around the head. David didn’t even try to stop her. “I should have been the one to do it. I brought the
gun out to stop him. I thought it would scare him off. Send him to the shed for his home brew. Why did you pick it up?”

His father lay at his feet bleeding.

She grabbed the gun off him, wiping his fingerprints off with her dress, wrapping her hands around it. “Let’s get him into the house. Sit him in the chair.”

“Why?”

“Don’t speak to me.”

“Mum?”

“You’re going to do the right thing and leave. You can’t stay now.”

***

The only place David allowed himself to cry was the shower. Tears blended with water and pink cheeks could be blamed on the heat. He wanted to stay in there forever, but his mother was outside taking care of things on her own. And he knew Brooke was on the way. He wrenched the tap off and stood, watching the water dribble to a stop.

As he dried himself, he nudged the cracked mirror of the medicine cabinet closed. It took a moment before he dared to
take in his reflection. His lower lip was split and beginning to swell. His back and legs thumped with rising bruises.

He brushed his teeth, careful not to stretch his lower lip. Clearing his throat, he spat strings of phlegmy blood in the sink.
He scooped up his toothbrush and cake of soap, then strode past his father who was slumped in the worn arm chair. His head was lolling to the side, sightless eyes open. The smell of rum hung in the air like deodoriser covering the thick sweaty blood stench.

In his room, mosquitoes danced around the naked bulb. David was glad he wasn’t sleeping there. Nothing grated him more than hungry mosquitoes buzzing around his ears when he was trying to sleep.

David stepped out his window, finding his mother in the yard standing motionless with a snake gun at her side.

“Mum?”

“How do you plan to hook up with Brooke?”

“A gun shot. She’d be
- ”

She lifted the gun and fired it in the air
twice.

“- on her way.”

His mother wrapped it in an old flannelette shirt and handed it to him.  “Take this with you. Lose it somewhere. Bury it in a stream. I’m going to pretend I don’t remember a thing.” 

Shaking his head he y
anked on the stubborn zip on his bag and stuffed it in amongst screwed up clothes.

His mother shrugged and turned back to the house.

              He reached out to touch her shoulder. “You’ve got to come with us.”

“
I’ll visit.”

“I don’t want Brooke to come with me. She doesn’t deserve this fucked up life.”

“That’s just your father’s words playing havoc with your brain. I want you to go out into the world with someone. For once in your life be a bit selfish. The two of you can look after each other. You’ve known each other forever. No one else will ever care about you like she does. You can’t stay here now.” She held her arms out to him, hugging him in a way they barely touched. “Go.”

“The police will come looking for me.”

“No they won’t. I have a plan. Trust me. As your mother, I owe you this much. Now that he’s dead I can protect you.”

He watched her return to the house, knowing the phone line was dead.
Unpaid bills. He ran after her, digging his mobile out of his pocket. “Mum. Take this.”

“What?”

“It’s Brooke’s old one. She’s the only one with the number. There is some credit left. I never use it. No electricity around here to keep it charged up. Brooke keeps the account topped up for me though.”

“Do you know the number?”

David nodded. He stepped back. “The charger’s in my room, behind my drawers. Wherever you go, take it with you. Find somewhere to charge it up.”

“You don’t have to look after me anymore David.”

“I worry - ”

“I know. But it’s
time to stop.”

“This isn’t real.”

“It is. Go.”

***

David gripped the steering wheel in his hand. He stretched his leg, pushing in the clutch. His hand was on the key. He couldn’t take his eyes off the torn vinyl on the passenger side. If Brooke was there she’d cover up the flaws. It wouldn’t look nearly as ugly, but should the vinyl scratch at her perfect skin it would be too embarrassing.

Chapter Three

Brooke

The gun shot was their signal. Brooke’s feet hit the carpet, the instant it echoed through the windy night. According to their plan, she had twenty minutes to get to the ridge. That was heaps of time. Still she didn’t want to rush it.

She hauled her bag out from under her bed and swapped her pyjamas for jeans and a coat. Slipping the book she was only half-reading into her bag, she hoisted it onto her shoulders. It was too heavy. She had to take some of it out. She rifled through the neatly folded tops and shorts,
jeans and summer dresses, make up and manicure set, creams and cleansers. She was taking too long working it out. It was hard leaving the discarded items strewn all over the bed and floor. But ruthlessness was her only option. It was a reminder that there was a lot she was leaving behind.

As always, the floor boards creaked under her weight. She lifted higher onto her toes and kept going. It was past
10:00.  She hoped her parents were asleep. Wine and scotch could do that to them, shut them up, shut them down.

At the bottom of the stairs she stepped inside the office and fiddled with the combination of the safe. Her father always used the coded letters of the last winning horse, a pride thing, his way of celebrating. If it was a while between wins, he resorted to going back to his first horse,
Filippe. So easy, way too trusting.

She was a
good
girl. She never stole from anyone not even her parents, but there she was snatching a bank bag filled with the hotel’s takings, leaving nothing behind. She took the time to stash the money in two different pockets in her bag. One pocket, only she would know, the other, she would be honest about.

Back in the hallway she could make out her father
’s squeaky snore. She let her heels drop to the ground as she traipsed through to the kitchen grabbing the half loaf of bread and some apples.

There was a moment where she wondered if she was doing the right thing. But when she looked around at the way the house was lit. The floors and black marble bench top shone. Diamond light glinted off appliances and crystal. And she knew because she couldn’t see the
value in any of it, she had to go. The dining table was set for the morning breakfast, a breakfast for three. In a final act of defiance, she dared to lift her plate, knife and fork and place it quietly in the dishwasher. Breakfast for two.

She stepped onto the porch. The wind was still high. It whipped her hair around her face forcing her head down. She headed out into the paddocks, and through the trees. Just as she hurled her back over a limp rusty wire fence, there were two more gunshots. She froze, thought a moment,
then snorted at David’s impatience. A single gunshot was their signal. It was enough. She broke out into a run.

***

By the time Brooke emerged from the trees, the bag was weighing her down. Her shoulders and back ached. She realised she hadn’t taken enough out. On the track in front of the open gate was David’s father’s farm ute. The tyres were chunky and it was so old, it looked more like a truck.  She could just barely make out David’s silhouette in the front seat. As she drew nearer, he stepped out and walked towards her, his head down and one hand in his back jeans pocket. Not a good sign.

“I’m still going with you,” she said, skirting past him, brushing his hand away.

Brooke threw her bag into the back seat of the ute. At the other door, David hauled it out and dropped it to the ground. She scurried around the gravel and picked it up, her eyes blazing. “What are you doing? I’m coming with you.”

“Stop.
Just Stop.” He pushed her up against the vehicle, holding her at each wrist. “I want you to think about it first.”

She cocked her head to the side, and smiled
at him. “Okay, I’ve thought about it. We’ve thought about it. We’ve done nothing but lust after the Whitsundays since you first suggested it. You’re not leaving me out of it now.”

“What if I go and when I get settled I’ll come back for you.”

“What’s the point of that?”

“By then things might have changed. You might have worked out another plan for your life.”
She felt his body relax and he let her go.

“I’m not going to
uni. I would like to but I can’t. Too dumb.”

“There are other ways of going.”

“I’ve got something for you,” Brooke bent down and fished out the money from one of the pockets in her bag.

He stared at it in her hand before slowly reaching out for it. “Stealing from Daddy,” he mumbled, shaking his head.
“Pretty low.”

“We need some cash, don’t we?”

In silence, he climbed into the backseat and slammed the door. She couldn’t help smiling at his clumsy mistake until he clambered into the front seat, and turned the engine over. The ute shook and sputtered.

She
jostled around the front, wrestled with the rusted passenger door until it gave way, dumped her bag on the floor and climbed in. Despite her desperate attempts to yank the door closed it wouldn’t shut properly. “You promised every night this week that we were going. I told you tonight I was ready. You gave me the signal. You can’t take it back.” She gripped the door handle and fixed her eyes on the dark bendy shadows in front of them, conscious that he was looking at her. He did that from time to time, looked at her long and hard.

“
Technically, it wasn’t the signal,” he argued.

“One gun shot.
Or three or fifty-five. Who gives a shit? I’m here. We’re going.”

Rain started to plunk against the roof.

He sighed. “The weather’s shit.”

“
For travel, yeah. But good for rain if you have no water, right?”

She watched his lower jaw jut out and as he reached across her for the rope tied to the door handle she pressed herself back into the seat. His breath warmed her thigh as he fastened the rope to the bar under her seat. All she could do was hold her breath.

“You’re father’s going to lose it when he finds his ute gone.”

David raised his eyebrows at her.

“You
know
what I mean.”

David shrugged
and sat up. “Let’s hope I can get it started before he works out I’ve got it.”

He pumped the clutch, jammed the stick into first and turned the key again. The
ute coughed and lurched forward.

It seemed too loud to
Brooke. She spun in her seat, eyeing off any sudden signs of life in David’s house. The cracks in the windows lit up by candle light. There was no movement inside. The missing boards reminded her of a toothless grin.

“Is it safe to sleep with candles lit with this wind?”

David shrugged. He pumped the clutch and held it in, struggling with first gear, revving the engine until it screamed and stalled.

“Quick, David.” She gripped the seat. “Your
dad will hear.”

“He’s out of it. Don’t worry.”
David turned the key. The ute sprung to life again. The chassis shook as the engine coughed.

“Go,
go, go,” she shouted.

The
ute hopped backward and David jammed the gear stick into first. They putted forward and jerked, picking up speed as he ground through the gears.

Brooke stared through the
dirt out the back window. “He’s not coming.”

“
Thank God for that,” David muttered.

Brooke swivelled back in her seat. It was hard not to laugh. Nerves did that to her. Out of the corner of her eye, she took him in noticing the fresh face wounds. Moving slowly, she reached out and touched the gash at his temple.  He grunted and pulled back. She touched the wet cut on his lip.  He let her.

“Does it hurt?”

He bit her finger. “Does that?”

She laughed. “I know you want me to go with you.”

“It’s not the greatest plan.”

“If you really didn’t want me, you would have left well before I made it to the ute.”

***

Mud splattered up the windows as the ute jostled along the track. The back road out of town was longer than Brooke remembered. She hadn’t been on it for a while, but she knew David drove that way all the time. He liked to avoid contact with the locals.

Rain belted at the roof. Wipers worked overtime
, catching low tree branches. The lightning was close; it lit the trail. Thunder cracked, barely a moment after. The storm was right over them.

“We’ve got to stop
, David,” Brooke begged.

A flash lit
up her profile. She screamed.

Swerving, David
missed a tree but the rear tyres slid, fishtailing off the road, bottoming out. “Fuck! Look what you made me do.”

“Keep you
r eyes on the road!” Through the floor, she felt the back tyres spinning. There was no grip in the back. The car began to rock. 

“Don’t move!”
David commanded.

Lightning struck. A dark
abyss dropped away under the ute on her side. “David,” she whimpered.

“It’s all right,”
he said, but she could see his hands were shaking as he gripped the steering wheel.

“
We’re hanging over the edge aren’t we?”

“No sudden moves
Brooke, okay?”

“
Jesus tell me! Are we going to roll?” She felt the panic whirl up through her throat as her voice went up in octaves, “Tell me; is this going to roll? Are we on a cliff?”

He reached out for her
. “Slide over this way.”

“Ple
ase, please, please, please,” she muttered inching into the crook of his body.

David opened the door to pelting rain.
The vehicle shuddered. Brooke stifled a scream.

“Ready? Go!”

She felt herself resist as he dragged her out onto the ground. The old ute shook and moaned but stayed wedged on the edge. Rain plastered her hair to her face as she stood helplessly beside him.

He stroked the arm he’d yanked her out by.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

She
gripped her elbows, hunched her shoulders, futile efforts at protecting herself from the storm. Cold fingers of rain prodded their backs. Farm boots were great for slipping through mud, but his were split. She watched as he squelched through puddles. His t-shirt pasted against his skin and rain dripped down long strands of hair across his face.

Th
ree wheels of the vehicle were stuck. He tried digging out from the front of the tyre and piling it behind, enough to make it stable.

“
I need a shovel or something. Look in the back tray.”

She slid around to the back, tenderly lifting the tarp. There wasn’t much there.
“There are only a few bits of wood.”

“Wood?”

She nodded.

He
scrambled to his feet. Mud drizzled down his wrists to his hands like blood. He pushed her away as she tried to help him lug bits of lumber and wedge them under the tyres. “Get back. I know what I’m doing.”

She watched on, shivering in the rain. This was not how things were supposed to be. “We need a good car,” she mumbled, but her voice was drowned out by the drum of rain on metal. David was busy scrabbling in the mud under the
fourth tyre. It was partially suspended too close to the edge, a bad time to come up with new ideas. David grunted and swore, using everything he had to build up the mud. She waded out of a puddle and onto a buttress root reaching in under the tarp for another bit of wood.

“
Wood!” he commanded.

She dropped it down beside him, making him jump.

“Shit! Scare the crap out of me.”

“Just trying to help.”

She watched as he wedged it under the tyre, and eased out. “I’m going to stay back here and push it out, I want you to ease
back in and drive it forward, real slowly.”

It wasn’t worth arguing. There wasn’t any other way.
As she slid inside the cabin, she thought she felt the ute rock. She was soaked through and starting to shiver. Her thoughts were scrambled, but she tried to stay calm for fear sudden moves would set off a landslide. David tapped the back of the truck twice, she pushed in the clutch and turned the key, “C’mon. Cmon.” She could feel him pushing.

The
ute kicked over and sputtered.

His face appeared in the window. “Pump the clutch. It takes about three goes.
Be rough with it.”

“Don’t get mad if I can’t do this David.”

It disturbed her the way he disappeared from view. Using the old levers, she adjusted the mirrors to find him. It looked like he was jamming the planks under the back tyres. She pumped the clutch and turned the key again, keeping her eye in the rear vision mirror. The engine roared as her foot eased onto the accelerator. “Please. Please. Please.” It was her only form of prayer.