Acid Song (20 page)

‘Look, your father and me, we’re very different people. You know that. You’ve always known that. It’s never been a problem before. Today I was stupid and I said things I shouldn’t have said. Next time, we’ll all pretend it never happened and go back to being polite to one another. You’ll see.’

‘I don’t want to pretend.’

‘Why the fuck not? Pretending’s excellent. Pretending’s how we get through this shit.’

‘What shit?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Yes you do. What did you mean by shit?’

‘Nothing.’

‘You mean this. You mean me and you.’

‘No I don’t.’

‘You do. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.’

‘Okay, enough of this. This is fucken pointless. I’m watching the election.’

Luke took the remote and increased the volume. His wife’s silence deepened beside him.

On the small screen a panel of experts sat uncomfortably close. There was the same political scientist they pulled out every three years, to make the simple and depressing appear complex and worthy. Next to him was a flamboyantly dressed journalist – whose name Luke couldn’t remember – chosen for her toxic mix of articulacy and insecurity. And the obligatory outsider, a visiting American psychologist who was there for reassurance, to tell us all we’re ‘doing all right’.

‘Okay, let’s just get back to these figures then.’

The host was ill-chosen, a lightweight who scored well with the younger demographic, who would not be spending their Saturday night in front of a television.

‘Look, Tony, there are some real surprises here aren’t there? Let’s just run down through the main party returns again. I think you can see them across the bottom of your screen now, and I need to stress these are still very early results. As we’ve been saying all night, the votes come in last from the biggest electorates, so that can have a significant effect on the outcome, but nevertheless … Labour thirty-six per cent, National forty per cent, that’s closer than most were predicting. Greens, who last week in some polls were as high as nine, have weirdly dropped to five per cent. Mäori party is steady on four per cent, they’ll be pleased with that, but look here, this is the surprising one isn’t it? One Nation: eleven per cent. Eleven per cent! Tony, what’s going on?’

‘Well, as you say, we do have to be cautious about interpreting these figures at this stage, of course, but the big story I think is voter turnout. It’s up, and that’s what One Nation were promising, that they’d mobilise a group of traditionally reluctant voters. Maybe that’s what’s happening here, although of course we can’t know that for sure. But with turnout up, ah, I think it’s seven per cent at the
moment, it’s hard not to draw those conclusions.’

‘Jodie, let’s talk about what this is going to do to the coalition prospects. Peter Wilson has said he’s open to offers. Can he do it? Can he be part of the government, or are his views just too far from the mainstream for that to happen?’

‘Well, how can he not be, with these figures? Both major parties would clearly love to govern without him, but if these early trends turn out to be solid, then they’re both going to need him. Labour, Green, Mäori, even if they could stitch that together, is what, only forty-five per cent. That’s not enough.’

‘So he gets to decide the next government?’

‘I think he does,’ Susan drawled. ‘That’s certainly the scenario as I see it.’

‘Well doesn’t that just cap off a perfect day?’ Luke’s anger was swirling, collecting debris.

‘Calm down,’ Robyn told him.

‘It’s all right for you. This is what you want.’

‘It is not what I want and you know it.’

‘So what do you want Robyn?’

‘I want you to calm down. I want you to stop treating me like this.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like a piece of furniture.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means that now you’ve brought me home I’m not worth having an opinion on, because you’re stuck with me either way.’

‘You talk some shit sometimes.’

‘When was the last time we did anything together?’

‘I was trying to watch the election together.’

‘No, you were trying to watch the election while I was here. It’s not the same thing.’

‘That’s ridiculous.’

‘Is it?’

‘I’m tired, Robyn. If we keep talking now, I’m going to say something I shouldn’t. So how about we just …’

‘I’m not one of your students, Luke.’

‘I had noticed that.’

‘I want to talk about this.’

‘Keep your voice down. You’ll wake Alicia.’

Luke would be held here now, like a fish on a line, until she was ready to drag him in. Silence. The beginning of a tear. Had he simply stopped caring? No. If he was asked, that was the answer. No. Yet …

‘Last night, you didn’t try to stop me.’

‘I told you not to go near him.’

‘But, when the glass smashed, you just …’

‘I was watching Alicia.’

‘You never asked how I was.’

‘I could see nothing had happened to you.’

‘After everybody had gone. You never asked.’

‘You never asked me,’ Luke replied.

‘I did.’

He didn’t remember. She was crying, the tears heavy and hopeless. He knew what came next. He would stand, move forward, hold her. Wait for this to pass. Tell her she was wrong. Say the words again and again, until they both believed them.

He stood.

‘I’m going out.’

‘What?’ Her face was empty, disbelieving, desperate to be mistaken.

‘Just to school. There’s some marking I forgot to bring home,’ he lied. ‘I’ll be half an hour. It’ll do me good, clear my head.’ That bit at least held the possibility of truth.

Robyn stood too, her eyes swarming with the sentences fear kept trapped inside.

‘Okay,’ she nodded. ‘Don’t be long.’

She kissed him quickly, uncertain as a schoolgirl. He looked away, before the tears in her eyes could snare him.

‘See you soon.’

Her car was behind his, blocking it in. Robyn stood at the door, and gave a half wave as he whined backwards down the drive.

‘JUST YOU AND me,’ Ollie’s text had promised. ‘That’s what I want tonight. You know it is.’

Sophie heard him knocking at the front door. It was too cold for the clothes she had chosen, but what were you supposed to do with winter, wrap it in polar fleece?

‘Come in,’ she called, smoothing the lip gloss with her finger, turning to check her reflection one more time, already regretting the trousers.

‘Hey babe, you look beautiful.’ Ollie stepped forward and kissed her, coyly avoiding her eyes, like he’d never pressed on top of her.

‘I should get a jacket.’

‘Don’t worry, we’re driving.’

‘You haven’t got your licence.’

‘Nah, we ah,’ Ollie ran his hand through his hair, squinted up at her as if anticipating a blow. ‘Bomber’s giving us a lift. It’s on the way.’

She considered pulling out, there and then, trading this small disappointment for those that would follow, but she didn’t. Her mother’s daughter.

‘You said it was just us.’

‘It’s just a ride. Too cold for walking.’

‘Just a ride, or I’ll fucking …’

‘I’ve got a surprise. Just us. You hungry? Come on babe. Smile. You’re beautiful when you smile.’

He grinned at her, the big lopsided grin of a puppy, useless, helpless, loveable. She smiled back.

Bomber was pimping his car one panel at a time, so for now it was a comical patchwork of shopping cart grey and drug dealer purple. The suspension had already been lowered – job number one – and the alloys were on a repayment scheme that would outlast the car. The tinting had been done cheap by a mate who owed him, and was starting to bubble at the back. There was something about engine pressure too, but Sophie never really listened. What she saw was an angry man’s car: angry and ugly. No surprise, she supposed, that those things should go so well together.

The rolls of fat on Bomber’s neck reached up to his ears and compressed as he turned to greet her. Dark glasses hid his confusion from the world. Beside him sat the one they called Gash, who smelt of cigarette smoke and leather, and layers of trapped-in sweat. Why do you bother with them? Sophie often asked. Ollie always shrugged, and said, ‘They’re my mates.’

‘Sophie, looking good!’ The back door swung open and Ratchet (Aaron, to his mother) slid across the seat to make room for them. He was smaller than the others, and of all Ollie’s friends the one Sophie trusted least. Like Bomber he had left school earlier in the year. Unlike Bomber there was no word as to what job he was doing, but he was never short of money.

‘How’s it going?’

Ratchet’s teeth were a last minute jumble, sharp and vicious and explaining perhaps his acrid breath.

‘Ollie man, your lady’s made an effort. Hope you’re up to the challenge.’

He made a noise in his throat that sounded like drowning. A snort from the front, catching like an engine, revving into laughter.

‘Just drive will ya?’ Ollie told them.

The car shuddered into life and Sophie felt the anxious call of the big bore exhaust beneath her. Then came the stereo, fast and loud, vibrating behind her head. This was how they were: one moment asleep, the next angry and urgent, at war with the world. The car squealed away from the curb. Ollie took her hand and squeezed it. She smiled.

‘One stop off on the way,’ he whispered, trying to look cool about it, but there was worry in his eyes. ‘Then it’s just you and me.’

‘What sort of a stop off?’

‘It’s sweet. You can stay in the car.’

‘What sort of a stop off?’

‘Don’t ask.’

‘You said it was just a ride.’

‘It is. For you. Not now.’ Ollie spoke low but Ratchet had the ears of a rodent.

‘A little job. Short and sweet,’ he breathed. ‘Hasn’t Ollie told you? Ollie, not like you to be so modest. Our man here has a job on.’

‘Fuck up Ratchet.’

‘Bomber, the lady here wants to know where we’re going.’

‘Didn’t you tell her Ollie?’

‘Your muff got a phone with her?’ Gash leered. ‘She can take a photo for the album.’

He laughed till his lungs were clear.

Trouble always smelt this way, beery and stale. ‘Evolution isn’t progressive,’ Mr Krane liked to say. He wasn’t wrong. ‘Get them to stop the car,’ Sophie ordered.

‘What?’

‘You heard.’

‘Just one stop.’

‘You fucking lied to me.’

‘You going to take that shit from your bitch Ollie?’

‘Fuck up, Ratchet.’

In a moment Sophie would cry. After all the times she could have cried in front of Ollie, should have cried, it would happen here. She looked at him, Ollie whose face she knew better than her own, the expression of uncertainty she had chosen so often to see as torment, but now in the passing street lights showed only weakness. Pretty weak.

‘Get them to stop the car.’ She hissed the words, not trusting her throat to open.

‘What are you going to do?’ He leaned to her, whispered the words in her ear.

‘What the fuck do you care?’

He stared at her, weighing his vulnerabilities. Sophie could feel Ratchet’s warm breath on her neck.

‘Bomber, pull over for a moment will you?’

‘What?’

‘Changed my mind. Not tonight. We’ll walk from here.’

He tried to make it sound casual, but his voice was breaking up. She’d never seen his fear before. For years she’d believed he had none.

The big engine chopped down a gear. Sophie relaxed, took Ollie’s hand again.

‘Bomber, look!’

Ratchet pushed forward between the seats, thrusting his phone’s screen beneath the big man’s nose.

‘Nice!’

The car accelerated.

‘What are we doing?’

‘I don’t know. Bomber, I asked you to …’

‘Action on the Hutt Road.’

‘Ollie, tell him to stop the …’

‘Shut your bitch up, Ollie, I’m getting sick of it.’

Ratchet leered. Sophie glared at him. His eyes slid down onto her breasts. He rearranged himself in his seat.

‘Show time.’

At the lights a 200SX pulled up beside them. Both sets of occupants eyed one another. Bomber gave a little wave of recognition.

‘Who’s that?’

‘Remember Shad? It’s his cousin.’

‘No shit?’

The lights turned green and the Nissan smoked away. Ratchet’s phone beeped.

‘They’re still there, man. By the station. Go. Go!’

Gash whooped. The car burbled for a moment, then spat forward.

‘What the fuck is this?’ Sophie demanded to Ollie’s ear.

‘Some bullshit,’ he shrugged.

‘Tell them to stop.’

‘They won’t listen. You saw.’

Sophie leaned forward and gripped Bomber’s shoulder, dragging herself closer and shouting in his ear.

‘We asked to stop the car you fat fuck. You’re going in the wrong direction now. So stop the fucking car.’

‘Love it when your girl talks dirty, Ollie,’ was all she got. He glanced into the rear view mirror to check on his effect, jowls wobbling.

‘There it is! There it is! Look, they’re running away. They’re fucking running away.’ Ratchet was beside himself, bouncing up and down on the seats. Suddenly the cabin filled with shouting.

‘Where’s Latch?’

‘Fucken dunno.’

‘Text him.’

‘Left man. They’re crossing the …’ 

‘Stay on him Gash!’

‘The bridle path.’

‘… off man.’

‘Watch the truck!’

‘Nip alert.’

‘Little one …’

‘The fucking truck …’

The car slewed and a truck roared by, horn blasting. Ratchet was the one whooping now. Bomber powered on, grabbed at the hand brake and smoked sideways. As the world slid around, Sophie caught her first glimpse of the prey. A lime green Honda, Prelude she thought, had run up over the curb, its three occupants trying to get clear; one making for the steep, bush-clad hill bordering the road, another crouched behind the bonnet, a third desperately trying to wave down a passing car. Terrified. Asians.

Ten metres down the road a red Skyline, front twisted against a lamppost. Someone standing beside it, too far off to make them out.

‘What the fuck’s going on Ollie?’