Winston. ‘Quite big guns,’
he added uselessly.
‘Maybe a volcano?’ guessed Astrid. ‘I didn’t
know there were any around here though?’ BOOM! BOOM! ‘What do you reckon
Dick?’ BOOM! Maybe two or three seconds between each but it was hard to
tell whether they were constant. BOOM! . . . no, that gap was
definitely longer. BOOOOM! And seemed louder too. ‘Dick?’ He didn’t
answer.
Further up the road other torch beams darted
around. More people had emerged, drawn out to discover what this new sound
tolled for. In five minutes it ended as abruptly as it’d begun.
‘What I reckon,’ said Dick ‘is that we
shouldn’t wait till dawn. We should take off right now.’ This time Leroy didn’t
argue.
Winston had changed his mind too. ‘Can we
tag along after all?’
‘Alright.’ Dick looked at Lord Brown with
extreme distaste.
Winston lifted the blanket from the floor, gave
it a shake then wrapped it around Āmiria’s shoulders. He had to stand on
tiptoes because the Girl Guide was taller.
As dawn approached, they fled the city.
. NIGHT
Chapter Eleven
Servo
WEATHER
BADGE DIARY
Mr Snow says
an isobar is a place where the air is heavier than the bit next door to it. He
said there are shit-loads of them piled up right now, just above us. Krystal
went outside but couldn’t see any. Winston who is part-dwarf said they are
green with horns and a long tail but we think he only said this to make Mr Snow
angry. We are worried about our parents. It was exceptionally dark all day today
except for the lightning. Astrid the bossy-britches got mad when we went out to
look at it. Our temperature gauge says 34 degrees centigrade.
Natasha
T he twins had wanted a picnic, so a picnic they were a-having but it
was hard to get enthused because today there’d been no sunrise.
Winston wondered if he might be the first
person to ever see a day utterly without sunrise. He’d seen seriously dark,
overcast days before; Queensland days, when swirling bushfires met thick, black
tropical storms to completely blot out the sky. Days when you’d imagine someone
had teleported Niagara Falls to pour directly onto the Fires of Hell. But this
was a different kind of darkness: soupy, without the faintest hint of light. It
felt like you could taste it.
He shook his head and slapped himself
lightly across the cheek. What was he thinking? Eskimos do this every winter!
‘Fucking Eskimos,’ he muttered.
Astrid gave him a puzzled look. ‘I don’t
think you’re in a position to criticize minorities.’
They were holed up in a BP service station
on the Hume highway south of Sydney. Not very far south either, it’d taken six
hours on back roads via Warragamba to get this far. You’d probably still call
it Sydney fringe. They didn’t belong here. Fringe dwellers in a gloomy, broken
shadowland. No one belonged, but they had to hole up because ten people and a
dog in a 1978 combie van get way too close after six hours. Especially when the
journey is crammed with an action-packed lecture from Dick Snow on weather hydrology.
And someone had been dropping guts that could’ve peeled paint. He’d blamed
Astrid.
Winston had watched enough gangster and
cowboy films to know this was definitely a time to “hole-up.” And he’d always
wanted to give holing-up a go anyway, so when they passed the servo he said,
‘let’s hole-up here a spell.’
‘You can be a bit of a dork sometimes, can’t
you?’ said Astrid.
But Dick agreed: ‘We need a break and a feed
too. It’s still a fair way to Mulloolaloo.’
The twins had thought this rather funny. The
little shits.
Thunder ripped through the sky above the
servo. A long, grinding crack ending in an explosive bang that seemed to originate
right on the roof. Winston scratched the back of Peanut’s neck. The dog trembled.
‘Doesn’t like this much,’ said Leroy,
tossing a glob of corned beef that hit the rug and mutely splattered stuck. The
dog sniffed the food then
he added uselessly.
‘Maybe a volcano?’ guessed Astrid. ‘I didn’t
know there were any around here though?’ BOOM! BOOM! ‘What do you reckon
Dick?’ BOOM! Maybe two or three seconds between each but it was hard to
tell whether they were constant. BOOM! . . . no, that gap was
definitely longer. BOOOOM! And seemed louder too. ‘Dick?’ He didn’t
answer.
Further up the road other torch beams darted
around. More people had emerged, drawn out to discover what this new sound
tolled for. In five minutes it ended as abruptly as it’d begun.
‘What I reckon,’ said Dick ‘is that we
shouldn’t wait till dawn. We should take off right now.’ This time Leroy didn’t
argue.
Winston had changed his mind too. ‘Can we
tag along after all?’
‘Alright.’ Dick looked at Lord Brown with
extreme distaste.
Winston lifted the blanket from the floor, gave
it a shake then wrapped it around Āmiria’s shoulders. He had to stand on
tiptoes because the Girl Guide was taller.
As dawn approached, they fled the city.
. NIGHT
Chapter Eleven
Servo
WEATHER
BADGE DIARY
Mr Snow says
an isobar is a place where the air is heavier than the bit next door to it. He
said there are shit-loads of them piled up right now, just above us. Krystal
went outside but couldn’t see any. Winston who is part-dwarf said they are
green with horns and a long tail but we think he only said this to make Mr Snow
angry. We are worried about our parents. It was exceptionally dark all day today
except for the lightning. Astrid the bossy-britches got mad when we went out to
look at it. Our temperature gauge says 34 degrees centigrade.
Natasha
T he twins had wanted a picnic, so a picnic they were a-having but it
was hard to get enthused because today there’d been no sunrise.
Winston wondered if he might be the first
person to ever see a day utterly without sunrise. He’d seen seriously dark,
overcast days before; Queensland days, when swirling bushfires met thick, black
tropical storms to completely blot out the sky. Days when you’d imagine someone
had teleported Niagara Falls to pour directly onto the Fires of Hell. But this
was a different kind of darkness: soupy, without the faintest hint of light. It
felt like you could taste it.
He shook his head and slapped himself
lightly across the cheek. What was he thinking? Eskimos do this every winter!
‘Fucking Eskimos,’ he muttered.
Astrid gave him a puzzled look. ‘I don’t
think you’re in a position to criticize minorities.’
They were holed up in a BP service station
on the Hume highway south of Sydney. Not very far south either, it’d taken six
hours on back roads via Warragamba to get this far. You’d probably still call
it Sydney fringe. They didn’t belong here. Fringe dwellers in a gloomy, broken
shadowland. No one belonged, but they had to hole up because ten people and a
dog in a 1978 combie van get way too close after six hours. Especially when the
journey is crammed with an action-packed lecture from Dick Snow on weather hydrology.
And someone had been dropping guts that could’ve peeled paint. He’d blamed
Astrid.
Winston had watched enough gangster and
cowboy films to know this was definitely a time to “hole-up.” And he’d always
wanted to give holing-up a go anyway, so when they passed the servo he said,
‘let’s hole-up here a spell.’
‘You can be a bit of a dork sometimes, can’t
you?’ said Astrid.
But Dick agreed: ‘We need a break and a feed
too. It’s still a fair way to Mulloolaloo.’
The twins had thought this rather funny. The
little shits.
Thunder ripped through the sky above the
servo. A long, grinding crack ending in an explosive bang that seemed to originate
right on the roof. Winston scratched the back of Peanut’s neck. The dog trembled.
‘Doesn’t like this much,’ said Leroy,
tossing a glob of corned beef that hit the rug and mutely splattered stuck. The
dog sniffed the food then
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