Tomorrow 7 - The Other Side Of Dawn (7 page)

Ryan was strong, but Gavin kept him honest. He kicked and punched and struggled and bit, until Homer helped by grabbing Gavin’s arms. They held him for five minutes, Gavin rigid and swearing at us in his funny throaty voice. Ryan tried to reason with him, but of course he was behind Gavin and none of us had bothered to tell Ryan that Gavin was deaf.
So all his calm patient words of advice were wasted.

In the end we decided to divide and conquer. We were getting nowhere arguing with them, our group against theirs. So we made a secret agreement to split them up. Homer scored Gavin.
Fi
got Natalie, Lee got Jack, and I ended up with Casey.

I don’t know what tactics the others used. At first I was pretty unscrupulous with Casey. I promised her anything and everything. The war would end in a couple of weeks, I’d come and get her from New Zealand, I’d bring her back here, she could stay on our farm ... I felt my heart sink lower with each promise, wondering what would happen if I couldn’t keep them, which seemed more likely than not. I pictured Casey’s tragic face as she sat in front of a hostel in Wellington waiting year after year for me to turn
up ...

I guess I’d read too many V.C. Andrews novels. But I was seriously worried about the future for Casey and her friends. I didn’t know how well they’d be looked after in New Zealand, with so many refugees there and everyone frantically busy. And after the war, there’d be a whole new set of problems. How on earth I’d get back in touch with
her,
and what I’d do then, if she hadn’t found her parents, I hated to think.

Making it worse was the little voice inside me saying, ‘You only want her here for your sake, because you’ll miss her so much. You know the best thing for Casey is to go to New Zealand, even if she doesn’t know it.’

The whole time I was talking Casey sat there with the most miserable
expression.
It was all very well for me to imagine her looking tragic while she was in New Zealand: she was doing a pretty good job right now. I sat gazing back, wondering what on earth I could do. A strange memory came into my mind. It was of me at the age of seven wanting to know where Mum was. I knew something funny was going on, because when I got home from school Dad was in the kitchen looking at recipe books, trying to work out what we could have for tea. He was acting really oddly, and when I asked where Mum was he said she’d gone away for a bit of a rest. He stuck to that story till she came home a week later. And when I asked her, she said she’d needed some time off. I guess they’d had a fight, but what really annoyed me was that they didn’t tell me the truth. I might have been only seven, but I knew something complicated was happening, more complicated than having time off, or going away for a rest. And I felt that whatever it was I could understand it, I could deal with it. What I couldn’t deal with was being treated like a stupid kid who had to be fed a lot of lies and doubletalk.

I think if you grow up in the bush you can deal with the truth. After all, you see it all around you, all the time. I stopped believing in Santa when I was still pretty young. I couldn’t believe in a guy who gave you something for nothing. You never get that when you’re dealing with Mother Nature. So I took a deep breath and told Casey the truth.

‘Case, I love you so much that it’s like you’re my own sister. If it was up to me, maybe I would just stay with you somewhere safe until the war’s over, one way or another. But the thing is
,
we all belong to something bigger than ourselves. We belong to our families, our friends, our country, our religion ... oh, help,
I
think I put those in the wrong order. Anyway, I don’t think it matters what the order is. The main thing is that life isn’t as simple as me saying “I want it, I’ll have it”. While my parents, and your parents, and your brother and sister, and even your guinea-pigs, are prisoners, while this country’s still in the hands of our enemies, we can’t put ourselves first. We can’t even put ourselves second. About three
thousandth’d
be more like it. That’s why you have to go back to New Zealand. I couldn’t fight this war
properly,
do what I have to do, if I was worrying all the time about whether you were safe or not.’

I walked her back to the clearing, telling her again how good life in New Zealand was: how she could watch TV and eat McDonald’s and no-
one’d
try to kill her. It seemed like a pretty good deal we were offering, and although she was still teary I think she’d finally accepted that it was going to happen.

Our tactics had worked fairly well. By convincing each one individually we’d robbed them of the power to resist us as a group. Natalie and Jack were red-eyed, Natalie whimpering every twenty seconds or so, and Gavin was sulky, but the fight had gone out of them.

Casey’s last comment on the situation was to walk up to Ryan, kick him hard in the ankle, and walk away again. She didn’t look at him again from that moment on.

We had to reorganise our packs. In our scramble to get out of Hell we’d grabbed anything and everything, and now we had to sort ourselves out. Every item we carried had to be carefully chosen, because by the time we added some of the stuff we’d hidden in the wetlands we’d have a lot of weight. So we spent half an hour doing that while Ryan kept watch. I smiled as I watched
Fi
carefully rolling a jumper and stuffing it deep into her pack. For a moment I thought back, remembering how
Fi
had been so hopeless about packing when we first set out for Hell. Had she really brought a dressing gown? I could hardly believe it, but when I searched my memory, there it was:
Fi
on the top of Tailor’s Stitch, looking embarrassed as we gave her a lesson in outdoor living.

This time roles were reversed:
Fi
caught me sneaking in the rock Lee gave me for Christmas.

‘Oh you can’t take that!’ she said.

It was such a beautiful rock though.
The size of a tennis ball, but flatter, and green or grey or shades of both, depending on the light.
And on the back, down in the corner, in impossibly tiny writing, a message that I had only seen a couple of days ago: Lee’s initials and mine in a tiny heart. I’d been lying on my bed when I saw it, and fair dinkum, I prickled like I was wearing a woollen blanket against my bare skin. I felt myself go red and hot. If Lee had been there at that moment he might have got lucky, for the first time in a while. He hadn’t said a word about the message when he handed me the rock.

So no way was I leaving it behind. But
Fi
caught me by surprise and I couldn’t think of anything to say.
Fi
just sighed and shook her head. ‘This is the most complicated relationship since Romeo and Juliet,’ she complained. ‘You’re both hopeless. I mean, what is the big problem? You love him. He adores you. You get together and live happily ever after.
Any questions?
No, of course not.
That’ll be ten dollars, thank you.’

‘It’s the war,’ I said.

‘No it’s not,’
Fi
said.

‘Oh really?
Well, OK Miss Smartypants, you tell me then, if you’re such a big expert all of a sudden.’

Without so much as pausing in her packing
Fi
said: ‘It’s because you’re scared that this is for real, you love him to the max, and you’re running away from that. This isn’t just kidding around any more, this is serious business.’

I stood there with my mouth open like a baby
maggie
. After a minute
Fi
looked up from her pack, gave a little sly grin and said: ‘See? I’m not as stupid as you think. I’m right, aren’t I?’

‘I don’t think you’re stupid,’ I said automatically, trying to buy time, but not sure that
Fi
was as right as she thought.

Fi
, who was obviously in an extremely aggravating mood, just shrugged and started rolling up her black
T-shirt
.

‘I was in love with Steve,’ I said.

‘No you weren’t. Oh, you liked him, and you had a crush on him, and he got you hot, but it wasn’t serious love like this.’

‘How do you know what I feel for Lee? I never talk about it.’

‘No, but you talk about him. Three-quarters of your conversation is about him. Even if you’re criticising him, you’re still talking about him. You’re obsessed with him. Sometimes I wish you’d find someone else to talk about.’

I stood there sucking on the corner of my sleeping bag. It was true that I thought about Lee a lot. I was always watching him. When he appeared on the scene I’d straightaway be distracted from whatever I was doing. When I was teaching the kids about question marks and all that punctuation stuff, in our homemade bush school, I’d lose the thread as soon as Lee came walking through the trees. I’d have one eye on the kids and one eye on Lee. If he brushed a fly away I’d be
wanting
to know what kind of fly it was.

Was that love? I didn’t know. Maybe it was. It sure was something.

A lot of the time I was extremely irritated with him, but I’d learned enough to know that irritation could be just another symptom of love.

I felt like I was on my toes more when Lee was around. If I was half asleep and he wandered in from somewhere I’d snap wide awake. Every time he said something I’d respond, either in my mind or out loud. Usually by arguing with him, but sometimes I was moved, or deeply impressed, by what he said.

Sitting there thinking about all this I told myself not to be so silly: it was the worst possible time to be getting emotionally involved again, just as we were going out to fight. I needed my full concentration to stay alive; never mind this love stuff. It was no good thinking about love as a storm of bullets came at you.

That didn’t work though. Shoving my sleeping bag into the pack I sighed. You couldn’t escape your feelings. I just wished I knew what my feelings were. I thought again of the two steers on the ramp going up to the abattoir killing floor.
One mounting the other; the two of them still trying to mate, even though the conditions weren’t exactly ideal, in more ways than one.
We were on the ramp to the killing floor too, but at least we weren’t steers. I ought to be grateful for that much.

I finished the packing without much thought. After all the fussing I’d been doing, now I didn’t care much what went in.
Fi
didn’t say another word, which was lucky for her.

At dusk we plodded off towards the wetlands, on our way to the helicopter rendezvous, each walking in our different ways. I felt better, knowing that here in the paddocks, in the dark, we should be safe. The kids weren’t happy though. They whined and whimpered and dragged their feet, except for Gavin who insisted on coming last, and in fact came so far last that we lost sight of him from time to time. Lee and Ryan, on the other hand, were so far in front that we almost lost sight of them too.
Fi
was very quiet and I think scared of what was to come. Kevin made stupid jokes and talked too loudly. Homer was serious, like he was miles away.

About halfway to the island, as we paused again waiting for Gavin, Homer said to me: ‘I think we’re heading into big trouble.’

I glanced at him. He made me nervous, the way he said it.

‘Why do you think that?’

He shrugged.
‘Male intuition.’

I thought for a moment,
then
decided to bite. It had been a while since I’d given Homer the satisfaction.
‘Male intuition?
Is that like the Prime Minister before the war, when he said there was no threat of invasion?’

‘That’s different,’ Homer said, suddenly losing the distant look in his eyes. ‘That’s politicians. Male intuition is what told me you were in trouble at the airfield. It’s what tells me when a girl’s melting with lust for me.’

‘When’s a girl ever melted with lust for you? You’re in fantasy land.’

As Gavin arrived we started off again, but I couldn’t resist saying: ‘It was the sound of the shotgun that told you I was in trouble at the airfield. And the only girl I’ve seen melting for you was that old black and white milker you had for years. The one you nearly killed with
Ratsak
.’

‘You don’t understand guys,’ Homer said. ‘You’re a typical girl; you think you’ve got us figured out, and I’m here to tell you that no girl has ever figured out any guy yet.’

‘This is in your wide experience, huh?’ I asked.

We sniped at each other a few more times, but it was too much like hard work thinking of good comeback lines against Homer, as well as trying to stay on course and keep an eye on the kids. The trouble was, with all that happening I forgot about Homer’s warning.

Maybe it did influence me a bit though. Suddenly I got sick of the sloppy way we were travelling. It wasn’t the right approach for this all-important trip. So I called a halt, got Ryan and Lee back, waited for Gavin,
then
gave them a lecture about how we had to do it. Ryan and Lee in front still, me at the rear, Homer out on the left, Kevin on the right, and
Fi
with the kids in the middle, and the same code as usual: if one person stopped everyone stopped. Then if it seemed safe behind you, you started moving back. It was the way Ursula and Iain taught me in
Wirrawee
, even if it hadn’t quite worked there.

They
agreed,
some of them kind of sulkily, but I got my reward when Ryan said to me: ‘You just beat me to it. This is good now. You guys are pretty impressive. I can see how you got your reputation.’

I blushed, wanting to tell him some of the other things we’d done, but knowing that’d be a bit of a wank. I knew he was patronising us, but I was still glad he’d said it.

It was a slow way to get along. By 11.30 pm we were clear of the wetlands again, our packs creaking at the seams with grenades and plastic explosive, detonators and ammo. Just past midnight we left the track and struck out across the paddocks. We were in Burnt Hut, one of the
paddocks that used to be on Mr Cooper’s place but was
now ours. Well, before the war they were ours. I didn’t know who the new owners were.