All That Rule: Chapter Two

Chapter Two

The shadows of the trees lengthened and shortened, the moon rose and fell. Where rivers hadn’t rediscovered themselves, there was mud. Or a wallaby, frightened out of its sleep by my approach, banging its head as it quickly scrambled away. I twisted my ankle twice, the whispers in my head fading only as the hot/cold shakes of fever replaced them. It was all I could do, lurching up and down hills, to put one foot in front of the other, one foot in front of the other…
As I reached the road, the thinning rain disappeared. In the silence, you could hear a sound, a sound that didn’t… I don’t know, blend. Man made sounds don’t blend. They’re easy to pick in the bush, because they’re just so different. It’s like picking a heavy smoker.
It was a car. A big, huge, black beast, roaring out of the thick bush like a scared child out of a closet.
Blinded by its headlights, I stumbled out of the way, the tangy taste of blood filling my mouth. My body was such a chorus of pain, that I didn’t know what hurt the most.
That car turned my sprained ankle into a fractured one. A fractured ankle that had made me thirst for the warm bed . and there was a bed in Mr Mac Kenzies house, I thought to myself, standing in the middle of his musty goat smelling paddock. And good meals too.
But I had needed my Sofu. Mr Mac Kenzie could deal with the fever, the tiredness, and the hunger. But he wouldn’t recognise the disappearance of the Exhaustion-That-Was-Not-Exhaustion. And I needed that recognition, just to confirm it.
I kept going, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other, the crunching sound of droughty grass louder then everything else as sounds merged, becoming faint and guttural.
Plonk, plonk, went my water logged shoes. Plock, tch, tch.
I opened my eyes, staring at the gravel beneath my feet. Slowly, ever so slowly, I raised my head.
Our L shaped house was barely visible, the light of the candle, which normally played across our only set of glass windows, shrunk to a small ghostly globe in a puddle of wax. Sofu had left it running for far too long.
“Kira!”
The hunk of wood that passed for a door slammed open, knocking the candle to the ground as Sofu raced towards me.
Despite his age, he sprang over the wire gate, his feet landing firmly on the gravel as I toppled forward, his arms, dry against my clammy skin, catching me.
“Kira.” He took in everything: the fever, the badly sprained ankle, and most importantly: the absence of the Exhaustion-That-Was-Not-Exhaustion.
Sofu half carried, half dragged me through the corridor to the living room, laying me on the stale couch, whispering to me softly in Japanese. Trying to understand it made my head hurt, so I stopped.
Natcha Herins perfume no longer clung to the couch like a blanket.

The rest of the night flew in fits of waking and sleeping, of sweating and breathing. I spent most of my time trapped in a world of hot and cold, half imaginary, half real worlds. I saw mum lying on the hospital bed, Shane yelling soundlessly at Rachel to get the zappers. I saw the man from the bush, and the woman the red hair. And over all of that, flashes of that seal, the one burnt into his boots; over and over again.

The sun woke me mid morning, the heat suffocating beneath my itchy blanket. I had a blurred memory of someone washing me and getting me dry, but thinking about it made my head hurt.
I sniffed my skin, screwing up my nose. I smelled like a preserves jar, all vinegar, cloves and cinnamon. Homemade disinfectant did have its uses, but a perfume was not one of them.
The blur of sound, light and shape had disappeared with the fever, and the room looked like a coffin again, not a kaleidoscope of the senses. The couch I was on was opposite four bookshelves, banged together by Shane about a week before mum died.
I waited for the Exhaustion-That-Was-Not-Exhaustion to return as I looked at her books. For the grief to come flying back.
But it was gone.
I sat, floating. I was still sitting like that when Sofu came though the door, a chipped green plate in his hand. As he put it down, my eyes latched on it, stomach rumbling.
Sofu looked older then normal, which wasn’t surprising, considering the last week. The wrinkles around his slanted, dark eyes no longer came from laughter. The ones beneath his shock of white hair might even have come from worry. I’m not sure. I paid more attention to the food.

The sound of a car made me look up. This could be either very good, or very bad. There were two people in town that had a car: Natasha and Shane.
Shane came through the door, smiling as he bent his large frame to avoid hitting his head. He had brown hair, green eyes, and was looking surprisingly well for a thirty five year old who had just lost his future fiancé.
‘Hiya Kira,” he said, kneeling beside me, looking at the now empty plate. “Good food?”
As he talked, his hands slowly slipped my pants up my leg. I tensed, gripping the side of the couch tightly.
His false cherry mood disappeared with his smile as he raised my ankle, watching me wince.
“It’s my ankle,” I said, ignoring him. “I think it’s broken.
Shane pressed it, studying my face, trying to get a measure of the pain. When I first met mum’s new boyfriend, I had declared open war. Now we were partly relying on his surgeons salary to keep the farm going.
“How bad?” Sofu asked.
“Fractured. Greenstick. I’d give it about a month before she can do any proper work.”
A month; I could almost hear the money pouring down the drain. Well, at least I would miss the Ebition exhibition…

“Puntito, she has to go. People are asking about her. If she doesn’t show up, who knows what could happen.”
“My granddaughter not going Ebition.”
Natacha Herin’s voice grated on my nerves like a sharpening iron over a blunt knife. Groaning, I looked through the Hessian covered window, to where Sofu and Natacha were standing under the big red Banksia, a big black car behind them. It was not Natacha’s car.
“You brought him.”
“He would have found out sooner or later.”
“Why he want to find her?”
Natacha straightened slightly, dangly earrings jangling. “Her uncle Ronin didn’t turn up for the first time in years because her mother died, Punito. And this man hasn’t been asking about her because he’s concerned.
“So why bring him here? How work that? And how you know he want what Ronin wants. How you know what Ronin wants.”
“I don’t, but I know Chris wants it, because Casey’s sister wants it too, and he vanished into the Warbies yesterday, with Casey’s sister. Casey’s not blind, just disabled.”
The car door slammed, and someone got out. Natacha bent closer to Sofu again, whispering, before striding towards the approaching man. The same black man I had seen yesterday.
Taking his arm, she led him away from Sofu, who sagged, then righted himself, disappearing around the side of the house with the stub of the candle. As soon as he was gone, I dragged my self behind the couch, listening through the Hessian.
“Well, am I aloud to talk to the girl?”
“no need, no need, besides, she needs to recover. Shane, the local surgeon, visited yesterday, and said she’s in no condition to see anyone. You’ll see her when she comes to the Exhibition.”
“I won’t be there.” Gravel grated under his feet as he pivoted towards the house. “I have to talk to her now.”
“You won’t get much out of a delirious girl. Besides, her family doesn’t particularly like Ebition.”
“Really. Why not?” I almost feel Natacha’s brain go into over-drive.
“Her family doesn’t like it, that’s all, which isn’t surprising, considering it was the Manda bomb which gave Saffier the radiation sickness”
Silence. “That’s her grandfather’s reason for not wanting her to come?”
“Yes. The only reason. And she’ll be there, don’t you worry. I’ll even arrange the transport. Will you be there? At the exhibition?” Natasha was losing her composure, no longer waiting for the man to answer her questions.
“No, that’s why I want to talk to her now.”
“About what? How she doesn’t like the game?”
She curved his steps towards the car. “Come home with me,” she said, striding out, dragging the man behind her. “Chan makes the most delicious sweet corn and chicken soup…”
I sat on my heels, head spinning as I tried to sort everything out. Uncle Ronin had been here, wanting something. Something the man wanted, something that had become available after mum had died…
I looked up, sensing Sofu’s presence. He stood at the living room door, looking at me with a thoughtful expression on his face.
“Sofu?”
Silence. “Most people go to Exhibition?” he asked, “Different not to?”
I nodded, my hand steading myself as I squatted.
‘We not need to be different now Kira. We need be normal. When Elite gone, and life normal, we be different again.”
I opened my mouth to ask why but closed it when I saw his face.
It had been worry lines on his brown forehead, of that I was now sure. I hadn’t seen him look like that for a long time, not since the banner announcing Natacha Herin’s engagement to Lee Chan had appeared on the Rowan Street Underpass. The resulting explosion from her parents was the closest the little town of Wangaratta had ever come to open war.