Magic Lessons (21 page)

There wasn’t any sleep for me after that. Any tiredness I’d felt evaporated. I opened the glass doors onto the balcony, leaned against the railing, felt the cool breeze against my skin. A flying fox glided by, its leather wings making a whooshing sound against the air. The bat landed in one of the bottlebrush trees growing out of the footpath. It squeaked and rustled before taking off again.

I put a hand on my belly. There was a baby growing inside me. I couldn’t quite believe it was there. But the old man had seen it, and Esmeralda, and, I realised now, Jason Blake. I couldn’t see it, though, or feel it. Would my baby be like the old man and see only magic? Was that what he had done to the baby? Could I
un
do it?

Would I be able to use what he had taught me? Manipulate my own cells? I blinked, saw a nanosecond of magic lights, stretching into infinity, beyond my ability to count. I wondered if I would ever be able to close my eyes again and see nothing.

I thought about Danny, about making the baby. I wanted to live, to have my baby and be with Danny again.
“Reason?” asked a voice out of nowhere.
I jumped. “Bloody hell!”
Jay-Tee stepped onto the balcony from her room. “Sorry. Thought I heard you out here. Can’t sleep?”
I shook my head.
“Me either.” Jay-Tee stood beside me, leaning forward to rest her forearms on the wrought iron railing. “So much has happened.” She waved her fingers in the air, making circles. “Too much. Makes my head spin.”
“Me, too.” I blinked, saw magic.
“I’m not going to use my magic ever again.” She glanced at me, waiting for me to say something. I didn’t. “Even if I go nuts. I think you can fix it, Reason. I think you can save us from going crazy or dying young. Jason Blake saw it.”
“He what?” I stared at her. Maybe she’d gone mad already. She certainly wasn’t talking like the Jay-Tee I was used to.
“In one of his dreams, but he didn’t understand it.” Jay-Tee grinned. “In his dream you change everything. He thought that was a bad thing, but it’s not—it’s a good thing.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”
Jay-Tee shrugged. “Have you been telling me everything?”
I looked down.
“You might not know right now how you’re going to save us. But you will.”
“But I don’t—”
“I’ll wait till you do know, even if I’m pulling my dress up over my head, dancing on tables, and trying to eat cockroaches.”
“Yuck.” I half-smiled, but it was hard not to think of my mother, blank and staring at the walls.
“You’ll save us,” Jay-Tee repeated.
“I hope so.” I thought of her and of Sarafina and Tom. Maybe I could save them all.

amari:
grandfather. A word used by Aboriginal people in the Roper area of the Northern Territory.
arse:
ass
bickie:
short for
biscuit
, the Australian word for
cookie
bitumen:
can mean either a paved (sealed) road or the black substance (usually asphalt) used to pave (seal) the road
boong:
racist term for an Australian Aboriginal person
bottlebrush:
an Australian tree or shrub with spikes of brightly coloured flowers
bugger:
damn. The thing you say when you stub your toe and don’t want to be
too
rude.
bunyip:
legendary creature of Aboriginal legend, haunts swamps and billabongs (waterholes that only exist during the rainy season)
chunder:
vomit
countryman:
an Aboriginal person. A word used by some Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory.
croc:
short for
crocodile
crook:
bad, dodgy
daggy:
a dag is someone lacking in social graces, someone who is eccentric and doesn’t fit in. The closest U.S. approximation is
nerd
, but a dag doesn’t necessarily know a thing about computers or mathematics or science.
Daggy
is the adjectival form.
demountable:
a school building that can be removed from its foundations and moved somewhere else. However, this never actually happens. The “temporary” demountable classrooms end up staying forever.
dodgy:
sketchy
dog’s breakfast:
a mess, a disaster. To make a dog’s breakfast out of something is to really mess it up.
drongo:
someone who’s not very bright
dunny:
toilet
footie:
in New South Wales and Queensland means Rugby League (Rugby Union is known as rugby); in the rest of the country usually means AFL (Australian Football League, popularly known as Aussie rules)
grouse:
excellent, wonderful, although it can also be a verb meaning
to complain
, as in, “I wish you’d stop grousing about everything”
jack of
: to be jack of something means that you’re sick of it
jumper:
sweater
knackered:
very tired, exhausted
lift:
elevator
li-lo:
a blowup rubber mattress
loo:
toilet
mad:
in Australia it means
crazy
; in the United States,
angry
munanga:
white person. A word used by Aboriginal people in the Roper area of the Northern Territory.
porkies:
lies
poxy:
unpleasant, crappy, or annoying
pram:
stroller
recce:
from the military term
reconnaissance,
meaning
to look around, check out thoroughly
ropeable:
angry, as in “fit to be tied”
Shire, the:
Sutherland Shire, a district of Sydney that’s a long way from the city
skerrick:
a very small amount
skink:
a small, insectivorous lizard with a long body
spag bol:
spaghetti bolognese
spinifex:
spiky grass that grows in the desert
stickybeak:
a person who always sticks their nose into other people’s business
stoush:
fight, brawl, rumble
thongs:
flip-flops
tracky-dacks:
track pants
tucker:
food
unco:
short for
uncoordinated
. Someone who’s unco isn’t much chop at sports or juggling. For some unco types, even standing can be a challenge. Your humble author has been known to be unco, though only since infancy.
wanker:
poseur
Winnies:
short for Winfield’s, a brand of cigarette
white man place:
city
widdershins:
counterclockwise

I’m very lucky to have such smart, incisive, hardworking editors as Liesa Abrams and Eloise Flood. Thank you. Thanks also to Andy Ball, Chris Grassi, Annie McDonnell, Polly Watson, and Margaret Wright.

My first readers are eagle-eyed and amazing. Thank you, John Bern, Gwenda Bond, Pamela Freeman, Carrie Frye, Margo Lanagan, Jan Larbalestier, Karen Meisner, Sally O'Brien, Ron Serdiuk, Micole Sudberg, and Lili Wilkinson. Thanks also to John Bern, Jan Larbalestier and Kate Senior for research help.

My gratitude to the people of Ngukurr and Jilkminggan for looking after me and teaching me all sorts of cool stuff when I was little. Special thanks to Sheila Conway, and Betty and Jessie Roberts.

Allen Haroothunian let me use his home in Camperdown (Sydney) to finish the first draft and the first round of rewrites. Much appreciated. Large chunks of the first draft were also written at Drink Me café (New York).

Lastly, to John Bern, Niki Bern, Jan Larbalestier, and Scott Westerfeld: you four make everything easier and more fun. Here’s to more good food and wine together.