Crossfire (13 page)

His final words sounded harsh and accusing but he hadn't meant them to come out that way. Whatever his intent, it was too much for Alison, who had sat controlling her instinct to intervene, making herself listen to Luke's words. Now she began to cry. The tears stole out from the corners of her eyes at first. She held her head back to try and stop them rolling down her cheeks, but the effort was in vain. Ashamed to let Luke see her cry, she leaned forward and covered her face with her hands. After a moment, a pitiful sob contorted her shoulders, then, as though this first sob had been holding back a deluge, she let slip her self-control and wept freely, as though she was releasing a great weight that had built inside her.

Stunned, Luke stood in the middle of the room feeling foolish and awkward, with not the slightest clue what to do next. His mother had never cried in front of him before, not like this. He wondered whether he should ring Belinda at work, or Sally, perhaps, to ask one of them to come over and comfort Alison. He didn't think he had the words to comfort her himself. Her convulsions shook her whole body. It was as though she had broken open the seal which had been holding in all her unhappiness and now it was gushing out uncontrollably. Luke couldn't look at her; he turned away, staring through the window into the street. But he could not shut out the sound as easily. He could flee the house, pick up his bike and get well away if he wanted to, but this scene held an unsettling familiarity for Luke. He recalled the shouts, the screaming, the distress when the terrified cat had attacked Alison … and he remembered how he had deserted his mother that day. But what could he do now? He had no words.

Luke forced himself away from the window, forced himself to watch his mother, whose sobs showed no sign of weakening. He came over to her chair and crouched beside it. Deliberately, as though he was directing the boom of a crane, Luke reached out his arm and gently grasped Alison's wrist. She immediately seized his hand and squeezed it, holding it tightly so that he couldn't take it away, so tightly that it hurt. But the sobs died away and Alison flopped her head back against the headrest of the chair. Her chest continued to heave powerfully but she was regaining control now. Her face was a mess, rivered with tears and showing red blotches where her fingers had pressed into the skin of her forehead and cheek.

After a few more minutes, during which time Alison loosened her grip on Luke's hand enough to let the blood flow freely again, her breathing quietened and she was able to ask: ‘Why did you decide to tell me about the hunting trip?'

‘Because I want to tell someone about it. There was more to the trip than just hunting. Some of the things Dad did — and that I did, too … They were … I don't know. Wrong maybe, or just cruel. It was killing just for the sake of killing. I somehow thought there was some purpose to killing pigs and rabbits and kangaroos, but for Dad and his mates it was just a pathetic game. I couldn't get over how they treated the animals when they had a gun in their hands, as though they were less than dirt. CT wouldn't listen when I tried to tell him. He only wanted to hear about how many pigs I killed. Mum, you're the only person I can think of who would understand what I'm talking about. I can hardly talk about it without you knowing about the trip. And anyway, I had enough on my conscience as it was.'

Alison looked up into her son's face. Although he didn't realise it, Luke could not have found better words to soothe her pain.

‘But if you already knew about the trip, why didn't you jump on me straight away?' he asked her.

‘Well, I intended to, I can assure you, but then I realised that we already had enough to fight about. And besides, I hadn't made up my mind whether to apply to have your father's access restricted.'

‘Are you going to do it?' asked Luke carefully.

‘I'm within my rights to do it, Luke.' She paused to look into her son's face, then said softly: ‘But I was afraid, Luke. Afraid that if I did act, it would drive you closer to your father. It is true I don't want you to grow up like him. When I look at you and see how closely you resemble him at the same age — I knew him when he was a young teenager, remember — well, I just tremble. But you've given me a good kick in the pants, Luke. You've made me understand that just because you look like him, that doesn't mean you think the same way, that you'll end up the same way. I'm sorry, Luke, I didn't trust you enough.'

‘I suppose I didn't give you much cause when I was suspended for having a gun at school.'

‘Well, that's certainly true.' Alison paused, taking Luke's hand again. ‘Luke, what do you want me to do about the access?'

This was the first time Luke could remember his mother asking what he wanted in such a vital matter. And all he had in his mind to offer was confusion. ‘Mum, I just don't know.'

Alison relaxed, easing back into her chair and letting Luke's hand fall free. ‘Perhaps you'd better tell me about what happened on the trip out west,' she said, and for the first time in weeks — or was it months — she really smiled at her son.

Luke told Alison about the hunting trip. He told her about his father's skilful marksmanship, how he himself had deceived his father with the twenty-two (this made his mother smile despite herself), and his own exhilaration after killing that first rabbit. He told her about the second rabbit, and the cat, and the unfortunate roo, and finally he told her about the Vietnam veteran, Tom, and his simple, terrifying story, which had made the entire trip seem empty and pathetic.

It didn't all tumble out at once from beginning to end; instead, tiny snippets would come to mind as mother and son dried the dishes together or pushed a trolley along the supermarket aisle.

Alison was recovering her strength quickly, and on Wednesday she suggested a morning at the very fun park where Luke had claimed so shamefully to have ridden the artificial ski slopes. It was here, as his mother stretched on the grass enjoying the early spring sunshine, that Luke told her how he had accidentally found himself in front of his father's gun when the final blast was pumped into the kangaroo. Her response surprised Luke, who had expected an eruption. She was clearly horrified, but held her tongue to listen to Luke's description of the fear and loathing the incident had triggered within him. With this she seemed satisfied, saying calmly, almost with resignation: ‘Something like that always seems to happen when your father and his mates gang together. He'd have brought you home with half your head missing for me to bury, no doubt. I sometimes wonder whether even a tragedy like that would jolt him into the real world, make him look at himself, think of something separate from himself.'

This was not the only surprise Alison produced for Luke that day. The only exit from the fun park took patrons through the souvenir and gift shop, and there, prominently displayed, were sweat shirts of all the local football teams. Luke barely noticed them — he'd almost passed through the turnstiles when Alison called him back.

‘Luke, isn't this the sweat shirt you've been after all winter?'

Luke nodded, still standing near the door leading into the carpark.

‘Come here,' she said and by the time he reached her she had a sweat shirt in each hand and began holding them up against her son. ‘The bigger size, I think, seeing as how you show no signs of getting any smaller.'

A typical Alison Aldridge remark, thought Luke, but delivered with more humour than he was used to. His mother had already marched off to the counter before he realised what was happening.

‘Hey, Mum, wait!' he called.

Alison turned towards him. ‘What's the matter?'

‘It's just that…' Luke paused. Of course he had been about to say that his father was going to buy him the same sweat shirt. But at that moment he saw the delight in his mother's face at what she was doing, and he tasted again the sour disappointment he had felt when his father had reneged on his promise.

‘I'm sorry, Luke,' said Alison seriously. ‘I should have asked you properly.'

She'd misunderstood his hesitation, Luke realised. She imagined that he was defending his dignity, his right to be consulted. ‘Do you want this?' she asked formally, displaying impish good humour in her voice at the same time.

Damn my father, thought Luke. He smiled at his mother and said simply: ‘Yes, Mum. Thanks.'

THIRTEEN

The few hours in the sun at the fun park had tired Alison more than she realised and by eight o'clock she was asleep, leaving Luke, in his new sweat shirt, to watch TV with Sally. When the phone rang, Luke let Sally answer it — it was more than likely one of her boyfriends — so he was startled when Sally held the phone towards him, saying, ‘It's a man named Kieran; wants to talk to you.'

He knew only one Kieran. Sure enough, when he took the phone, Kieran Doggitt's voice greeted him.

‘Hi, Luke. Look, er … I was wondering if you knew about your Dad's piece of bad luck?'

What was Doggy talking about? ‘Sorry, Kieran, I don't understand,' confessed Luke.

‘Oh, you haven't heard from him then.' Kieran was obviously disappointed with Luke's reply and hesitated now before explaining himself. Clearly he must have been hoping that whatever this news was, it would have reached Luke and Alison by now, relieving him of the need to tell them about it. Now he sounded reluctant to carry out the task he'd set himself. ‘Your father's in a bit of a spot, Luke. You see, we all went to the footy on Saturday as usual, but on the way home he was stopped by the police near the cricket ground. They didn't put their trap in the usual place, the tricky devils, and your Dad's short-cut didn't bypass them like it normally does. He had to blow in the little gadget and of course he was over the limit. So he's lost his licence and he has to pay a big fine — hundreds of dollars. Poor bloke.'

So my Dad's luck has finally run out,
thought Luke, remembering his father's triumphant contempt as he had beaten the police last week. Well, he couldn't say that Danielle and the others, even Doggy himself, hadn't given him fair warning. But Luke felt puzzled. Spreading the news of this disaster was hardly Kieran Doggitt's business. There must be more to Doggy's message than the bald facts of Wayne's downfall. When the normally shy Doggy lingered on the phone, not wanting to end the call, Luke knew that he was right.

Doggy went on: ‘I just thought you should know, Luke. You see, I was with your Dad last night and he was very upset. A couple of other things haven't gone too well for him this week, so he was having a few drinks to drown his sorrows over at Jacko's place. He kept talking about how the hunting trip hadn't gone right for the two of you. He said you hardly talked in the car all the way back to the city and he was afraid that you'd tell your Mum about it all and she would stop him from taking you out on weekends. He was getting himself good and mad.'

With this, Kieran felt he had intruded enough; the responsibility he had taken upon himself was met. ‘I just thought you should know about this, Luke. About how much your Dad cares about seeing you and how unhappy he is at the moment.'

‘Thanks, Doggy. I'm glad you called to tell me,' Luke said as he hung up — though he doubted that he was glad at all. It raised a complication, another worry, just when he thought he could relax.

He left the television to Sally and took himself off to bed where he lay for some time, crushed between the anger towards his father which still pressed down on him and sympathy for his father's new predicament that pushed its way up from his heart in spite of everything. His last thought before falling asleep was for Kieran Doggitt, a quiet hero, a shy man who said little but who had cared enough to make that call. Later, Luke would realise that Kieran was worried, very worried, and his call had been meant as a warning.

Alison slept late on Thursday morning, rising only in time for her doctor's appointment at eleven. It was after two when she returned with a much lighter bandage on her arm and a confident story of recovery. She'd celebrated by having her hair cut. It was his mother's carefree joy which kept Luke from telling her about last night's phone call. He was afraid the news would shatter Alison's fragile sense of well-being and ruin the day for himself into the bargain: for he had come to notice how much he took his mood from her. This was their house together now, shared as it had never been before, and mention of his father seemed only to throw a shadow over their home.

Alison was resting in her bedroom when Luke heard a car pull in over the kerb and park on the footpath in front of the house, followed inevitably, moments later, by the dull thud of the driver's door. A bit early for Sally to be home, he thought briefly … then he heard the heavy stamp of footsteps on the stairs. He knew that tread, the pace of the climb, the weight of each stride. If he hurried, he could intercept the caller before he knocked at the door and perhaps deal with him on the veranda without his mother hearing.

He darted out of his chair, across the room, and flung open the door to find his father already on the doorstep. With the way open to him, Wayne Aldridge kept walking into the lounge room, mumbling a greeting with embarrassed self-consciousness. Luke fell back against the wall to let him pass, too stunned to make any reply. What had he done? Why, in God's name, hadn't he stolen a precautionary glance before he opened the door to let his father waltz straight in like this? There he was, turning slowly around in the middle of the room, probably marking in his mind what had been changed and what was the same. He swayed slightly, just enough for Luke to be sure of what he'd already guessed from Wayne's breath as he slid past. But it was worse than this: much worse, a thousand times worse.

His father was not only drunk, he was clutching in his right hand his thirty-thirty Winchester.

‘How are you feeling, Luke?' began Wayne. ‘You got over the trip yet?'

Luke nodded. He wondered whether his voice would work. He gave it a try. ‘Why have you brought your gun with you, Dad?' he asked as though he was inquiring about a broomstick or a bottle of beer. Watching his father's movements, listening to his speech, picking up every signal, Luke tried to calculate how drunk he was. It was nearly four in the afternoon. If he'd started when the pubs opened at ten, that was … Oh God, what did it matter how many hours. He was full of beer, and standing in the middle of the house with a gun in his hand.

‘Luke, I want to apologise for making a fool of you with this gun. I don't know why I did it, really I don't. Very stupid of me. I've come to teach you how to do it properly. It's not hard, even for a young bloke like you. It's just a matter of bracing the stock into your shoulder properly and knowing how much recoil to expect. We could do it now, over in the bush across the road.'

‘You can't fire a gun over there, Dad! There's houses all around. We'd be sure to hit someone,' Luke said as reasonably as he could. He wanted to say more, but you had to be careful what you said to a man with a rifle in his hands. He had to get his father's thoughts away from this ridiculous target practice. The very suggestion proved that Wayne was even more intoxicated than he appeared.

‘I heard you were pulled over by the police on Sunday. How come? What happened?' As he said this, Luke moved farther into the room and with a gentle sweep of his arm invited Wayne to sit down on the sofa, which he did. ‘There's a beer in the fridge. I'll get you one.'

And before Wayne could say whether he wanted a drink or not, Luke had slipped into the kitchen. There were always cans of beer in the refrigerator for the frequent visits of Sally's numerous boyfriends. It might sound ludicrous to offer a drunk another can of beer, but Luke was intent upon forcing his father to lay down his rifle, and with a bit of luck this plan would do the trick. One more can of beer was hardly likely to make any difference at this stage. He wrenched open the refrigerator and managed to knock over almost everything on the shelves as he removed a single can, which he quickly ripped open, pouring half into a glass. Then he took both glass and can back into the lounge room and offered them to his father.

‘Thanks,' muttered Wayne Aldridge; but then he became confused. Both his hands rested on the rifle, which was cradled across his knee. As he reached upwards, the gun jostled uncomfortably and after a pause to consider his position, Wayne plucked the weapon from his lap and laid it gently on the carpet beside the sofa. Now he could accept the can and the glass, which went straight to his lips. Thus occupied, he missed the relief which oozed onto his son's anxious face.

‘You wouldn't believe what's happened to me this week, Luke. It was after the footy when I was caught in one of the random breath-testing traps. I'd only had a few beers but the mongrels said I was over the limit. Danielle was with me, but she'd had a few drinks too and the coppers warned her that if she tried to drive my car away they'd arrest her as well. We'd spent all our cash at the footy and there wasn't enough for a taxi. Danny was furious. And the police didn't help much, laughing at her. She had to walk to a phone box along the street to ring her mother to come and pick her up.' He sighed heavily. ‘Danny wasn't real happy about me going on the trip out west, and I suppose being stranded and embarrassed like that on Sunday — well, it was the last straw for her. Haven't seen her since, and last night when I came home all her stuff was gone. She hasn't rung or anything. She doesn't even know about my job.'

‘Your job?' Luke repeated, not understanding.

‘Yeh, that's the other thing. That courier company I worked for has fired me. I told them I was applying to have my licence suspension changed to let me keep driving for work, but they weren't interested. I guess they didn't like me taking those days off last week to go hunting. Oh, God! How I wish we'd never gone on that trip.'

‘Dad, if you've lost your driver's licence, how come you drove here?' asked Luke.

‘Look, just because they take away your licence doesn't mean you immediately forget how to drive.'

‘But that's illegal. What if you're stopped again? Won't it be worse next time?'

‘Oh, rubbish. They won't stop me. Lightning never strikes twice. That's another thing about losing your licence, Luke. You don't have to carry around a big sign saying ‘No licence'. To the police car driving by, you don't look any different from the rest of the traffic.'

‘But Dad, you've had a few drinks as well. What if you get tested again? You — '

‘Oh, come on, Luke. I just had a few drinks for lunch at the pub. Nothing to worry about. I'm getting real tired of every Tom, Dick and Harry telling me I'm drunk. Don't know what they're talking about.' His father was becoming agitated, even angry, so Luke steered clear of the topic.

Presently, Wayne remembered why he had come. ‘Luke, if you're worried about firing in that jungle over the road we can find some bush with no people around. Come on, let's go.'

Luke could see that his father was determined this time and that further subtle diversions were not going to distract him. It was time to be blunt. He leaned forward in his seat, pulling back his shoulders to appear as tall as he could and said: ‘I don't want to learn how to use the thirty-thirty, Dad. I don't want to have anything to do with guns for a while.'

Wayne was shocked by these words from his son. He had come to make amends for one regrettable mistake, one foolish moment which he knew had hurt his son. But Luke was rejecting the entire hunting trip. ‘Why not, Luke? What's wrong with guns? You always loved them, couldn't wait for the latest magazines …'

‘Dad, it was different just admiring them in those magazines. Sounds stupid, I know, but somehow I never realised that guns are for killing, not until we went out west and I saw for myself. I just don't want to have anything to do with it.'

Luke expected a barrage of argument at these words, but in his father's face he saw hurt and disappointment instead of anger. ‘I don't understand how you can feel that way, Luke, just can't understand it. I was looking forward to taking you with me again, when you're a bit older, and I was maybe going to get you a good rifle too, a powerful one like that.' He tossed his head towards the thirty-thirty, still lying next to the sofa.

A long silence followed, awkward and tense, neither able to find the eye of the other. Wayne had finished his beer now and as a response to this breakdown in the visit he said, ‘I suppose I should go then … ' And he probably would have done just that — had not Alison chosen that moment to enter the room.