The Glass Kingdom (20 page)

It's a risk, though, a major fucken risk. I wanna keep my legs, you feel me? I'd have to avoid the roads. Ain't like they's leavin' their keys lyin' around no more anyways. Nah, better to get kitted up an' go bush, head inland to Maleny or Woodford, maybes hide out on some hippie property for a couple of weeks or set up camp in the forest for a while until the Kingdom moves upstate. Then I could skip back on down to one of those small airports on the coast an' buy me a ticket out of the hot zone. Virgin Blue down to Radelaide, where they ain't never gonna find me. Shit, that's a decent plan. All I needs is some chedda to see me through an' that's it, motherfucker. I be walkin' right on out this joint. Can't take too much though. Don't wanna make Bruce Banner all green an' angry.

Tonight. S'gotta be tonight. Ben's away, Steph ain't got the game, everybody on the Kingdom be straight-up exhausted—seemed like just about the busiest day of the season so far. Ain't nobody gonna pay much attention to my exact whereabouts. Plus, lookee what I gots right here. Just counted the poke an' I moved almost two g's worth of glass today, plus rolled eight hunnerd buckeroos of legit paper on the hoops.

A'ight, Mikey, here's what you do. Hand the two large to Steph an' tell her you're keepin' the rest to bankroll tomorrow's games. That way she'll call Ben with the report an' then hit the hay, probs tell me to go enjoy myself after a job well done. Pat on the back an' all that shit. Gold fucken star. Lock up the stand an' head west, for the forest, 'cross them paddocks. Reckon I can cover ten, maybe fifteen ks 'fore dawn.

Steph probs won't even notice I is gone till the stand don't open at eleven. That gives me a full twelve-hour start, an' then by the time she asks around an' calls Corporal Wallace, I'll just be 'nother phantom in the woods. Won't exactly be home free, but as good as, brother. They ain't gonna go to all the trouble of launchin' no manhunt, not this time, not for little ol' Mikey Dempster an' his eight hunnerd. I be gone. Disappeared.

In the wind, motherfuckers.

I think there's three of 'em back there somewheres. Ben an' two others, but I can't be sure. They ain't real close but they's a lot closer than I'd like. Fuck me, how'd this happen? Shut up, Mikey, shut up, you dumb prick, you know exactly how this happened. No, I don't, that's a lie, a cruel hurtful lie, I do not know
exactly
how this happened, no need to exaggerate an' make this worse, dawg. I's in enough trouble already over here. Yes, a'ight, I admit, I got an idea
roughly
how this happened—are you happy now? I's not aware of the finer points of the morning's events, how could I be? Well, someone must have seen you, asshole. Someone must have seen you leaving last night. Well, duh, I know that now, a'ight? It's totally fucken obvious. Who, though? Who seen you? You was real careful none of the hands noticed you leavin', an' Steph was already in bed. Her eyelids was droopin' while she was talkin' to you so it weren't likely her now, was it? Well, I don't know then, do I? You know as much as I do.

Probs one of the tweakers. Yeah, that'd be who it was. One of those motherfucking crankheads musta come round again this mornin' lookin' for an early score an' maybes seen me flittin' out last night an' fessed up to Steph or Ben 'cos word was they was lookin' for me. Holy fuck, I hope it weren't that girl I done helped out yesterday. Biatch, do not tell me you sold me out for a point. She probs did, man. She probs did. Wouldn't put it past her. Did you see the look in her eyes when you gave her that point for forty? Like a fucken kid openin' his Xbox on Christmas mornin'. No question she would of sold you down the river, no doubt about it, you dumb-ass motherfucker. What the fuck you thinkin', helpin' her out like that? You know these tweaks'll trade you up for glass in a fucken heartbeat—shit, dawg, ain't you ever gonna learn not to show no moments of weakness?

An' now look at the mess you're in, dickhead. All cut up an' bleedin' from crashin' through the bush like a wild animal, dog tired from not hardly gettin' no sleep an' you even done tore yo' Dockers shirt. Right down the fucken seam at the side. Look at that shit, y'all is a disgrace to the club, boy.

Never mind that, fuck sake, never mind yo' damn Fremantle Dockers, they ain't gonna save you now. Matthew Pavlich ain't gonna swing down out no tree dressed in a fucken loincloth to protect you from the great white hunters. You is on your own, dawg. Keep movin'. They's still a ways behind you, an' they ain't movin' fast 'cos they don't know where you is at, not yet anyways, so don't be makin' no dick moves to tip 'em off neither. Just stay on this old critter trail an' don't stop, you know it's gonna lead to water eventually an' then maybes you can jump off a cliff into the river like in the movies an' get washed downstream.

How come they's always jumpin' off cliffs an' bridges an' shit in movies, usually with a fireball behind 'em, an' they never gets hurt or nothin' when they hits the water, like three hunnerd feet below or whatever? You'd think at least there'd be a couple of broken legs or somethin' but nah, they always bobs back up, shakes their hair an' proceeds to the next scene like it weren't nothin'. Gonna boycott me any movie from now on that's got a fallin' into water from great height scene, that shit be stale, dawg.

Yo, any chance of you concentratin' on the matter at hand, motherfucker? Case you forgot, you is bein' pursued through the forest by what is quite possibly your angry boss an' a couple of bikies with shotties. Might wanna focus up here, homeboy. Try an' filter the choir in yo' head down to just the lead singer, you feel me? A'ight, that's the straight-up dope right there, all you cats step the fuck off, I needs to keep this real. There you go. Quieten down now, boys. This ain't the time for idle chatter. Phase out. Drop the snare, the bass, the string section, lead guitar, back-up singers and ahh, there it is. Just a low hum.

Sometimes you just gots to laugh, right? This ol' wombat trail don't lead to no ragin' torrent. It's just a creek, dirty an' stinkin', hardly even a trickle. Still, don't know if they got a bloodhound or whatever but maybes if I wade upstream I can throw 'em off the scent. That's what a fugitive's s'posed to do, right? Fuck it, I'll give it a go, gots to be worth a try an' least I ain't leavin' no footprints on the trail.

Christ all fucken mighty I damn near split my dome open on that fucken rock. It's slippery as fuck all up in this biatch. Now I's soaked along with everythin' else. This ain't no good, I's gettin' out of here an' back on the trail though hold up, hold up, what's that up there? The edge of a property, maybes? Lemme just crawl up this bank here an' see what I can eyeball. Well, that is a weird sight but whatever, I don't care, it looks like good cover to me an' maybes there's a road on the other side…shit, bad case of déjà vu. I been here before, 'cept this time I ain't got the cover of darkness.

Pineapples. Thousands an' thousands of pineapples, all in rows, stretchin' as far as the eyeball can see. Well, shit. I always thought they grew on trees an' had to be knocked from the branches like coconuts. Apparently not, genius. They grow right out the
ground
. Damn. S'like a footy pitch covered in spiky yellow balls ready to be punted. Better get a hoof on 'fore these motherfuckers burst out the woods behind me. Pick a row, any row. Start runnin', Mikey, think I hear someone comin'.

Damn, I knew all that bein' closed up in the stall would affect my fitness. I's close to beat now, don't think my legs got much more in 'em. Keep goin', dawg, just keep goin'. You still got a jump on them that's followin' you. An hey, there's a car, over there at the edge of the field. Maybes it's the owner of this here place. Maybes I can seek refuge or hide or somethin'. Fucken pineapples, they's all around me an' I can't see straight no more, 'cept here's a clearin' an' the driver of that car musta seen me 'cos here he comes, skiddin' up an' covered in dust, 'cept it ain't no car, it's a ute aww, no, it can't be, can it?

They flushed me out into this here pineapple crop an' now I'm done, I can't go no further, I's exhausted. Can't believe they come after me so quick an' hard, I didn't do anythin' so bad, though, did I? Just snuck off for a little explorin', went walkabout for the night. Ben ain't gonna punish me too hard.

Maybes just a hidin' an' then I's back to square one on Target Ball until a better opportunity to flee comes up 'cos, you know, you gots to see I can't stay there the rest of my days, I wanna be free man, I want out. I's just a kid from Freo, dawg, just let me go, will ya? Please, for fuck sake, I's beggin' you to let me go.

Wait. Oh my God. You're not gonna…Let go of me, motherfuckers. Don't. Ben, please, I know we been here before but don't do this, it's barbaric, it's what they did to slaves an' that's my kickin' foot, my foot and oh, look at all them pineapples all in their rows so pretty an' strange an' unexpected. I never knew.

I see them lookin' with their beady, greedy eyes. I'm one of them now, they's sayin'. Part of the freak show. Peg leg. Gimpoid. Quasi-fucken-modo. Ain't got me no hump or no little hands or hair all over my face like some round here but I s'pose the whispers don't lie. I truly is part of the family now. Least he didn't take to me with no axe. Probs would of died if he had, bled out in the dirt with all them pineapples. Won't never be able to eat that fruit no more, not without rememberin'—though to be honest, I don't remember much.

Woke up in the hospital with some rough-as-guts motherfucker I'd never clocked before sittin' by my bedside, keepin' guard sort of thing. Official story was I'd had an accident on the show, got my ankle crushed in one of the rides. No mention of a psychotic former soldier wielding a club hammer from Bunnings.

Kept me on the ward a couple days 'fore they sent me back to the Kingdom on a crutch. Nervous-lookin' doc said I'd have to keep the cast on for a month, maybe more, but even then the bone would never knit anythin' like it was before. I'd have a limp the rest of my days an' wouldn't be runnin' the hunnerd metres for Straya after all. An' he didn't think I'd ever be able to wear sneakers again. Not enough support, he says. Too painful if I rolled the ankle. Dumb motherfucker obv ain't never heard of hi-tops. Plenty of choice out there for b-ballers an' limpin' cripples like myself. Gonna hit me up Rebel Sport soon as I crack this plaster biatch open.

Music career be on hold for the time bein', I guess, probs TV show pitches too. Doc said I had to be religious with the meds, so there goes my flow. Hepped up on painkillers now, so I's gettin' weird dreams an' I can't really think straight most of the time. Pretty zonked, for reals. Just 'bout all I can handle is sittin' here in Target Ball, makin' up stories 'bout what happened to my foot when the clems ask, takin' their money an' not even botherin' with no ballyhoo to draw 'em in. Tweakers come round as always, a steady stream of balding, toothless assholes seekin' the legendary blue koala. Everyone's a winner, ain't that the truth.

Been like that for a week or two now, kinda lost track if I's truthful. Ain't no real artifice to it no more, neither. Everybody on the Kingdom knows what sort of business goes down here. They turns a blind eye. Most of 'em just ignore me. They don't want to get involved, an' I don't blame 'em. Once in a while someone comes round though, to say alakazam an' maybe bring me a coffee or a sandwich so's they don't have to watch me strugglin' down the alley on my crutch, a reminder to everyone on the show 'bout the price of admission. Ain't even worth statin' what the penalty'd be next time I stray. Not that I could anyways. Be months afore I can walk unassisted an' the doc says I may not be able to drive again without some pain, so I's stayin' put an' everybody knows it, Ben most of all.

Runnin' the blue-koala line without hardly any interference at all now. Tally up the poke at the end of the night an' hand it over, get my re-up in the mornin' and repeat. Now that I's hobbled, Ben trusts me to get the job done. Well, it ain't strictly that he trusts me, more that he knows he owns me, mind, body an' soul. Sad, ain't it? How the mighty Mekong Delta has fallen. Can't really go much lower neither. Course, if there's a way, I'll probs find it. I ain't nothin' if not reliable in that there department.

Kingdom been all over the joint since Nambour. Flittin' around the state, settin' up here an' there, fillin' showgrounds an' bringin' entertainment to the sweaty QLD masses. S'been all a blur to me. I's back to sleepin' on a camp bed in the stall an' pissin' in a bucket in the corner. Can't really roam much further.

Amazin' what you can get used to, though. Tried to do me a full tour of the showgrounds here in Toowoomba yesterday mornin' 'fore we opened for business. Don't want the one good leg I gots left to waste away. S'weird, I kinda got more friends on the show now than I ever did before. Probs they just feels sorry for my ass.