Smaller fires were still burning on the western side of Cook Creek Road. In the unstable, fickle conditions, the most direct route to Alison’s house from town was blocked. The back road twisted around the mountains with sheer drops up to twenty meters on the eastern side. The vertigo-inducing twister was usually masked by scrub and saplings, but the sedimentary rock was exposed now, black ash and trunks the only indication of what had been. Sal’s car hugged the inner shoulder, going carefully to avoid the odd log that had fallen from above, blocking the way again, even after the dozers went through.
On her way into town after the fire, in the growing dark, her head filled with the outline of Simone’s face, the curves of her pale cheeks, the matte stare, the blond braid, the smooth crisp of paper with Alison’s address heating the space between her fingers, the main road hadn’t given Alison a true sense of the extent of the damage. Now she was shocked all over again. Where the flames had caught, running over huge tracts of land, nothing was left. The papers had the death toll up at one hundred fifty. More than four hundred people were injured, and Alison had read in the Age as she ate her Weet-Bix that morning that more than two thousand homes were estimated destroyed. Lake Bend was luckier than some towns; the fire front headed right for it before it swerved at Alison’s back door and went another way. But everyone knew someone who knew someone who hadn’t been heard from since the fire. Alison still hadn’t heard from Meg.
Alison had already left her a lot of messages, but they weren’t returned, the acid in her stomach building with each unanswered attempt. Alison checked the morning papers for news again this morning, but there was nothing she hadn’t already gleaned from the grapevine. The internet wasn’t so reliable right now, and most people were getting their information the old-fashioned way, or directly from the journalists sent from Melbourne to cover the story. At the pub the night before she’d noticed a few unfamiliar faces, drinking in a corner.
Last night.
At first, Sal hadn’t said anything when Alison had turned up drunk the night before, her hair a mess. When Billy called the house not five minutes after she walked in, Sal watched Alison shake her head in horror as she stretched the phone out toward her, and then pulled it back to her own ear, said Alison was home, and she was all right, but she didn’t want to talk. After hanging up, she looked in Alison’s eyes and read her face. Then she’d made them a cup of tea and ran Alison a bath. As Alison soaked in the lukewarm water, Sal had sat outside the bathroom door and talked through the wall.
“Billy sounded pretty upset, Al.” She didn’t respond. Sal tried again. “You two have been mates a long time. I’m sure if you talk to him, you’ll be able to sort it out.”
Alison sloshed the water around her, sinking as far down into the tub as she could, her knees sticking up in the air as she tried to immerse her whole torso. She didn’t reply.
“I think you’re going to regret ruining your friendship when you’ve got a bit more distance. Right now, you’re not really thinking straight.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about Billy getting shot?”
There was a long silence on the other side of the door. “I thought you knew, love; it was the talk of the town when it happened, but I guess you weren’t here.”
Alison clenched her fists tight, tried to calm herself down, stop reliving the stupidity of asking about the scar. Stop thinking about how selfish she must seem, how angry she was with Sal, with her parents, for never saying anything, with herself for never bothering to find out. As though the years she was gone from this place hadn’t existed at all.
“Sal. I’m fine, really. I just want to be left alone. Please.”
It was true, but it also wasn’t. She heard Sal scuffling about in the hall, and then the soft retreat of her footsteps.
In the bath, Alison traced the lines of her body with her hands, her eyes closed, trying to get back the feeling of safety, the warmth and strength she’d felt as she’d walked back from Billy’s, the moment of invincibility that came after the fact. It was long gone. All that was left was carpet rash and the deep burning shame of her ignorance blooming across her face.
She dunked her head under, holding her breath for as long as she could, and then emerged again. After all the warmth had leached from the bath, Alison pulled out the plug and turned on the shower. She rinsed off and, totally sober, toweled down and headed for bed. The sheets on her back were cool and light, and as she drifted in and out of sleep uneasily, her phone beeped. It glowed on the bedside table. It was Billy.
12:17 am
Night Al. Call me in the morning. x
Alison had turned the phone over so she couldn’t see it glowing and flicked it to silent. There was no coming back from some choices; she knew that well enough by now. She hoped this wasn’t one of them.
Alison closed her eyes and tried to think of something else, but as she pushed Billy to the back of her mind, the fire clawed its way to the front, more vividly than she thought possible. The deafening blasts that sounded like the ominous rat-tat-tat of firefight in a war movie as the gums caught and exploded. The screeches of birds—she imagined parakeets, and magpies and lorikeets, eagles and wrens—trying to flee, overtaken by the heat and the smoke.
“Ally, you sleeping?” Sal asked her softly.
“No, sorry, I just couldn’t look at the trees anymore.” She shifted in her seat, pulled out her phone to check if there was any service.
She had two bars, and five texts. Shit. Billy needed to give it a rest.
9:13 am
We need to talk. U at Sal’s?
9:21 am
I’ve got the day off. Can I come see you?
9:46 am
Al, please?
9:55 am
Are you really doing this?
10:12 am
I’m here, when you’re ready to talk to me.
She started drafting a response. Deleted it, tried again, deleted it again. Finally settled on something that she hoped would get the message across.
10:17 am
I’m sorry Billy. There’s nothing to talk about. It was what it was, but I don’t want anything more than that. I think we’d be better off giving each other some space.
She saw the little bubble pop up. He was typing back, but no message came. Alison put the phone down and looked out the window. The damage stretched out across the ridges like scars across the land. She slouched down in her seat and closed her eyes again, waiting for the drive to be over. Sal fiddled with the radio, eventually found a fuzzy FM signal; “Bat Out of Hell” came through weakly. They hit the long, flat stretch of highway, just a couple of clicks from Alison’s property, and she felt her shoulders tense up. Sal, not often quiet, was mercifully silent for most of the drive.