Red Dirt Heart 03.5

RED DIRT HEART

CHRISTMAS

By

N.R. Walker

Cover Artist: Sara York

Editor: DJ Mack

Proofreaders: Jay Northcote and Annabelle Jacobs

Red Dirt Heart © 2015 N.R. Walker

Publisher: BlueHeart Press

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED:

This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

This is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or business establishments, events or locales is coincidental.

The Licensed Art Material is being used for illustrative purposes only.

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

WARNING

Intended for an 18+ audience only. This book contains material that maybe offensive to some and is intended for a mature, adult audience. It contains graphic language, explicit sexual content, and adult situations.

For everyone who has read the Red Dirt Heart series and loved these boys as much as me, may your Christmases be filled with love and happiness. And toe-bitin’ wombats, Outback tinsel that bleeds, and a whole lotta red, red dirt.

Trademark Acknowledgements:

The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

Paddle Pop: Unilever

Work Safe: Northern Territory Government

Dettol: Reckitt Benckiser Pty Ltd

Band-Aid: Johnson & Johnson

Die Hard, John McClane: 20
th
Century Fox

Jingle Bells: James Lord Pierpont

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:

This book uses Australian English spelling and grammar. There will be words like brumbies (wild horses) Macca’s (McDonald’s) and a serious lack of g’s on most ing words. There are also run-on hyphenated sentences. It’s just how Charlie speaks.

TIMELINE ACKNOWLEDGMENT:

Anyone familiar with the Red Dirt Heart series, will know it spans the seasons. In RDH1 when Travis arrives, it’s summer, RDH2 is autumn/winter, RDH3 is spring and RDH4, being Trav’s pov, is back to summer and spans another year. Christmas in Australia is in summer, so according to the actual timeline of the series, Travis’ first Christmas falls between RDH3 and RDH4, though it is not mentioned.

So, like a small snippet of something that didn’t technically happen, this Christmas story is of Travis’ first Christmas at Sutton Station, therefore falls between books 3 and 4. They’re not married, there’s no Milly.

A small reminder of where the storyline was up to… Travis has asked Charlie to marry him, but they’ve not told anyone yet. Trudy and Bacon have just had their first baby, Gracie, and Nugget still steals every scene he’s in.

Enjoy.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

I was muckin’ out the stables with Billy when he stopped and leaned on his shovel. He was lookin’ out to the paddock and grinned his half-a-face smile. “Ah, boss. You might wanna take a look.”

I followed his line of sight and let out a long sufferin’ sigh. “Jesus.”

Billy laughed and I shook my head. We could see Trav smilin’ as he rode the dirt bike into the yard. Strapped onto the seat behind him was a six foot pine tree. He pulled the bike to a stop, and his grin got even wider.

I stared at him. “Trav, what’s that?”

“What does it look like?” he asked, his eyebrows knitting together. “It’s a tree.”

“I can see that.”

“Mr Travis,” Billy said, all concerned-like. “You can’t be cuttin’ them trees down. They special to the Aboriginal people’s culture. Mr Travis, you disrespectin’ our people.”

Travis’s face was priceless. He paled, his eyes went wide, and his mouth fell open. He looked at me for some kind of guidance, and I just shook my head and clicked my tongue. Travis turned back to Billy, close to panicking. “Oh. I didn’t know. Oh my God. I just thought it looked like a Christmas tree and there were plenty of them. Billy, I’m so sorry. I can take it back. I mean, I can’t replant it ‘cause you know.” He looked at the tree on the back of the bike and cringed. “Well, I hacked it off at the ground. God, I’m so sorry. Is there something I should do?”

Billy looked at the tree. “Well, there’s a spirit dance from the Dreamtime. The person who takes the tree needs to do it.”

Travis nodded seriously. “A spirit dance?”

Trav stared at Billy, and I stared at Billy.
A spirit dance
? I had to give it to Billy. He held it together for about five seconds of absolute silence before he lost it. He burst out laughing, which made me laugh too. “I’m just pullin’ your leg, Travis. There’s no spirit dance,” Billy said, holding his sides as he laughed. His smile was so contagious.

Apparently Travis was immune. He glared at us. “Oh, you sons of bitches. You had me going.” He put his hand to his heart. “Jesus Billy, you scared the crap outta me. I thought I’d broken some traditional Aboriginal code or something!”

Billy just laughed some more. “The look on your face was so funny.”

“I hate the both of you,” Trav said, but he was smiling.

“These trees are like a weed,” Billy said. “Introduced by the white fellas two hundred years ago. They grow fast, but they’re not native.”

“I didn’t think they were.” Travis ran his hand along the fronds of the tethered tree. “But it’s the closest thing to a Christmas tree out here.”

“Christmas tree?” Billy asked. “Not too old for that? Still think Santa Claus climbs down chimneys?”

Travis frowned. He looked at his feet and shifted his weight. His voice was quiet. “No. It was just a tradition in my family. My grandfather would cut down a tree and we’d decorate it as a family. We had special ornaments and there would be a huge dinner and it was kind of a big deal. I just thought maybe… You know what? Never mind.”

Billy knew Travis’s grandfather had died not long ago. “Oh Mr Travis, I didn’t mean anything. I was just jokin’ with ya. Here, let me help you get it off the bike.”

Travis sighed and his frowned deepened, and Billy quickly undid the straps and lifted the tree by himself. “Where do you want it, Mr Travis?”

Trav was lookin’ down at the dirt, and Billy stared at me with wide eyes. “Boss? I didn’t mean nothin’ by it,” he whispered.

I saw the corner of Travis’s lip curl up and I rolled my eyes. “Oh, for shit’s sake. He’s joking, Billy.”

Billy’s eyes shot to Travis, and Travis’s frown became a slow spreading grin. “I’m just pullin’ your leg,” he said with a laugh. “You’re not the only one who can spin one, Billy.”

“Your grandfather never cut down a Christmas tree?”

Travis shook his head, still grinning. “My grandfather would tell everyone we were going to pick a perfect tree, but he’d take me fishing instead and we’d just buy some random tree from a lot on the way home.”

Billy dropped the tree into the dirt and pushed Travis’s shoulder, which of course led to them trying to put each other in a headlock, which was only made more difficult because they were both laughin’ so hard. I looked at Texas, Trav’s horse. Even he didn’t look impressed. He just twitched his ears and swished his tail in a yep-they’re-idiots kind of way. “I know,” I told him. “You have no idea what I have to put up with.”

“Who are you talking to, Charlie?” Travis asked. They’d apparently stopped wrestling and were lookin’ at me.

“Your horse,” I answered seriously. “He thinks you’re both dickheads.”

Travis brushed himself down, though why, I’ll never know. Red dust got into everything here; there weren’t no escapin’ it. “I’ll never get used to the Australian display of affection of calling the people you’re supposed to like horrible names.”

I snorted out a laugh. “You’d think after a year you’d be used to it.”

Billy picked up his shovel and offered it to Trav. “Wanna shovel shit?”

“Um, gee, thanks, but no,” Trav replied, with an I-ain’t-stupid look on his face. “I have a Christmas tree to put up. Considering Christmas is three days away and no one seems to give a shit.”

I lifted up the horseshit covered shovel. “Texas does. Bags of it.”

He rolled his eyes at me and wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. “Tell me, how damn hot is it? You know, Christmas should be cold, not one hundred and thirty freakin’ degrees.” Without waitin’ for an answer, he reached behind his head and pulled his T-shirt off. It was one of my old shirts, kinda threadbare, but I didn’t mind him wearin’ it. It clung to his body when he got all sweaty… Nah, I didn’t mind him wearin’ it at all. I minded even less when he took it off. Wearing just his jeans, boots and hat, he wrapped the shirt around the tree and lifted it easily onto one shoulder. I watched as the muscles in his back and arms flexed, all shiny with sweat, the way the red dirt smeared on his skin, and a lucky drop of sweat as it ran from the back of his hair, right down his spine and disappeared where his jeans slung low on his arse.

Jesus
.

Billy snapped his fingers in my face. “You in there, boss?”

Travis turned around and, realising I’d been busted totally checkin’ him out, he grinned. And seeing that Billy wasn’t lookin’ at him, Travis licked his lips all suggestive like, and ran his free hand over his abs as he turned to walk out.

I flung horseshit at him.

He didn’t even turn around. He just laughed. As he walked away, he asked, “I can put this in the living room, right?”

“Would it matter what I said?” I called out after him.

His reply was distant as he reached the house. “Nope.”

Billy laughed, and I grumbled as we went back to shovelling shit. When we’d heard the screen door shut, Billy looked up to make sure Travis was gone. “He got no idea what you plannin’, does he, boss?”

I smiled as I kept on shovelin’. “None.”

* * * *

I found Travis in the lounge room. He was still shirtless, holding Nugget, and they were staring at the tree. Trav had stuck the tree in an old five-gallon oil drum filled with red dirt and it was shoved in the corner.

“I moved Nugget’s bed box,” he said. “He’s not happy about it.” He handed me the said-disgruntled wombat, who snuffled and blinked his disapproval. Travis was still frowning at the tree. “Have you got some tinsel or something?”

“I’m sure we do somewhere.” I put Nugget back down on the floor and went in search of Christmas decorations. Truth be told, we hadn’t used ’em in years. I got to the hallway and stopped, not sure where to start looking. “Um…”

“Check the linen cupboard,” Ma called out from the kitchen.

“Thanks!” Of course that’s where they were. Behind the spare blankets on the top shelf was an old plastic tub filled with tinsel and ornaments. I pulled it out and blew the dust off as I walked back into the lounge room.

“Good Lord,” Travis mumbled. “When was the last time these were used?”

I shrugged and put the box on the floor. “Dunno. Years, probably. I told ya, we don’t really do much in the way of Christmas decorations, Trav.”

“You don’t do much in the way of Christmas-anything,” he mumbled. He reached into the box and pulled out the tinsel. It kind of fell apart in his hand. “Jesus. How old are these?”

I shrugged. “Dunno exactly. Probably as old as me.” I rummaged through the box and found some Christmas art I’d done as a kid. It was some Paddle Pop sticks glued into a square with red and green cellophane paper stuck to it with a pipe cleaner looped so it would hang on the tree. I handed it to Travis and rummaged some more. Next thing I pulled out was a glass bauble thing that was faded and all the glitter had long ago fallen off, but you could still read my name.

Travis took it from me. “Oh, Charlie,” he said softly. “Is this from when you were a baby?”

“I think so. It’s been here forever.”

“It has to go on the tree,” he said, putting it right on the middle branch. “What else you got in that box?”

I pulled out a knotted string of ball-things. “I think these are older than me.”

Trav cringed. “You know, it’s too late to order Christmas decorations online and hope to have them delivered before February, but I promise you Charlie, after Christmas, I’m ordering a shit-ton of stuff for next year.”

I’d never get tired of hearin’ him talk of our future together. “Fair enough.”

“Do you really not do anything for Christmas?” he asked. Then he looked at the box of dust-covered ornaments. “Never mind. I can’t believe you don’t even do gifts.”

“Well, we just never really saw a reason for it,” I admitted quietly. I was starting to feel guilty about it. “I mean, things are different here now, since you got here. It’s more like a family than it ever was, and there were a lot of years even when my dad was alive we still never really did anything. It was just another day.”

Travis was frowning. “I know. I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I didn’t mean anything by it. It’s just that Christmas is such a big deal in my parents’ house.” He tried to smile. “I don’t care about gifts or anything like that, but I just thought a tree would be nice.”

“The tree’s great.” And it was. “And who knows, maybe we can start doin’ it every year. Or something.”

“Like a new tradition?”

“Sure! I mean, it’s like I told ya before. We still have a breakfast, then do morning chores, but we usually have the afternoon and evenin’ off.” I shrugged. “It’s different here to what you’re used to, I guess.”

“I get that, I do,” he said gently. He rubbed his hand on my back. “Can I see what I can make out of these?” he motioned toward the box of decorations.

“Go for it.”

Just then Nugget put his two front paws on the oil tin that was holding the tree, reached his little nose up as high as he could and sniffed it. Then he tried to climb up to sniff a little better. “Oh no you don’t,” Trav said, grabbing Nugget. He shoved him into my arms. “Take him before he trashes everything.”

I walked to the door with the fussin’ wombat, then turned back to face Travis. “And Trav?”

“Yeah?”

I looked over his naked torso and licked my lips. “I really do like my presents unwrapped.”

* * * *

Knowing Ma would be yellin’ for dinner any time soon, I headed back to the house. It was stinkin’ hot, my throat was dry and full of dust, my face felt baked by the sun. To be honest, I’d forgotten all about Travis tryin’ to Christmasfy the house. But I kicked the dust outta my boots on the front veranda steps, dusted off my jeans, opened the screen door, and stopped.

There, stuck to the front door, was a homemade Christmas wreath. Now, it was the most Australian lookin’ Christmas decoration I think I’d ever seen. It was a wire coat hanger bent all outta shape into a sort-of circle, and wrapped around it was some of those red baubles-on-a-string, silver tinsel, and a bunch of twigs of eucalyptus and peppercorn from the trees out the back.

It made me smile just lookin’ at it.

“You like it?”

I didn’t realise Trav had seen me lookin’ at his handiwork. “It’s great. Very Australian.”

“Funny that,” he said with a laugh. “Just so happens the only trees I had to get leaves from are Australian.”

I leaned in closer to the wreath and breathed in deep. It’s funny how the smell of something can run a memory through your mind like it was yesterday. “It smells like summer when I was a kid, climbin’ those trees and playin’ for hours.”

Travis grinned at me, the kind of grin that told me I’d just said somethin’ completely right. “Thank you.”