Winter Solstice Part 2

 

Jayden shivered. ‘We’ve got hours to wait.’ He switched on the TV. The opposition leader was saying something about nuclear power and renewables. His mouth seemed to move free of the rest of his face. ‘These arsehats wanna kill us all,’ said Jayden. He’d finally enrolled to vote after a summer saturated with Friendly Jordies videos.

  Matt shrugged. ‘Turn it up, then Mr Man can’t hear us,’ he said and so Jayden did.

  ‘Maybe we should get a room at the pub,’ he said, ‘and a counter meal by a raging fire.’

  ‘Yeah, maybe some old geezer will play an Irish fiddle and we’ll all sing and raise our beers.’ Matt chortled. He was starting to warm up. Whatever was bothering him during the drive seemed to fritter into this more recent drama. ‘More likely is the local chapter will get wind of us being here and run us out of town.’

   They sat for a few hours on the double bed, watching culture wars and other wars play out on the TV. Jayden had a bag of kangaroo biltong and Matt, two bags of Samboy chips and their makings were several tiny sandwiches which they gainfully imagined was a complete food combo.

  ‘This is bizarre,’ Matt said at one stage, ‘watching the news on telly. Like, you have no choice about what comes next. You can’t just click on it or click past it. It’s …’ here he held his palms, fingers outstretched, in front of his face ‘ … it’s just like right there you know? Right in your face. Kids getting blown up. Homeless. No choice.’ He leapt up and stalked around the room. ‘Let’s go outside for a smoke.’

  The moon was rising above the karris when they went outside to the car. Matt had chopped up the weed during the drive so Jayden packed the first cone, filled the juice bottle with water and handed it to Matt. ‘Here you go, now chill the fuck out Matt.’

  At around midnight, they drove away from the mill house, heading south towards the Ellis Creek Road. Jayden looked sideways at Matt. ‘Want some M?’

  ‘Fuck yeah.’ Matt was looking at his phone. ‘This guy Mr Man has just put us up on Facey.’

  ‘What? How did you find him?’ Jayden’s stomach stirred, turning.

  ‘Wasn’t that hard. Had a look around town. Who’s renting out. I’ll read it to you right? Think he knows my Dad.’

  ‘Well that makes sense.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’ Matt looked at his phone again. ‘Why would you even think he knows Dad?’

  ‘He just had this …vibe. Like your Dad. Sorry Bro. It’s something I thought when I saw him.’ Jayden hated this. Pale karri trunks flashed by in the headlights of his tinny car and he wished he could slow, pull over the car and make all this right.

  ‘Ok. Here’s what he said.’ Matt read from his phone.  ‘“Just got a couple of young punk pickers turn up at my house. Anyone in?” ‘

  ‘Jesus! What’s his user name?’

  ‘Shroom Daddy! Ha ha ha. What a fucking idiot.’ Matt started poking at his phone.

  ‘Can you call your Dad?’ Jayden asked. A four wheel drive overtook them, white dashes on the road glaring in the headlights. It slowed ahead of them on the bend.

  ‘I can’t call Dad,’ Matt said. He was really shaking now. Jayden tried to concentrate on the road. Dark shapes of micro bats flittered across his windscreen. They crossed the other bridge that demarcated the town, a thwomp as the little Toyota crossed the bridge.

  ‘I really fucking love poaching’, his mother had told Jayden, on a night when they were alone on a river, sitting in a tinny with several metres of hidden net beneath them. Drowned corks and lead weights trained on subterfuge to the bottom. Jayden was ten years old and his Mum was training him, even then. ‘Look. Look around you! Everything is honest her,’ she whispered, her black curls blowing around her head, ‘You’re on Earth. There’s no cure for that. That’s the playwright, you know the guy?’ She began pulling up her illegal nets and piling them into the deck of the boat. Jayden could remember her sudden, angry brown hands moving as fish fell all over the checkerplate and her unmeshing fish into boxes. ‘There is no cure, son. We’re all fucked,’ she said. ‘Still, ain’t this moon alright?’

  ‘The moon’s coming up,’ Jayden said.

  ‘Dad … Dad,’

  ‘What happened Matt?’

  ‘Dad. Last night.’ Matt collapsed into his phone. Jayden checked him as he was driving.

  ‘What? What?’

  ‘Dad, he drove into this bloke last night. He fucking killed him. He was at a BP service station. He saw this guy, he swerved and then he killed him. They say it was deliberate.’

  ‘Jesus fuck. Okay Matt. Let’s stop. We need to talk about this.’ Jayden was putting on his indicator.

  ‘No no,no! Keep going.’

  ‘Honestly, it’s your Dad.’

  ‘My Dad, yeah. My fucking Dad.’ Matt shook his head. He was still looking at his phone. .’Let’s go to Ellis Creek Road.’