There she went, running down that track again.
‘To dump Aron dial 0800 8001,’ someone on the telly was saying. ‘Or, if it’s Michelle you want to dump, add 2, that’s 0800 8002 if you want to say goodbye to Michelle. Who goes? You decide.’
It was a difficult one. Michelle was cruel and wore bikinis. Aron was kind and did not bring anything to the party.
The Drill was that he should do two things when asked to follow it: he should dial Triple Zero, and he should park his wheelchair in the middle of the hall because help would arrive. Help would arrive.
He was never much of a rebel, only and often rebel-adjacent, but was already failing to follow The Drill. He was in his bedroom, looking out at the dust pit he had imprisoned himself in till the end of the world, which was now, apparently – it was even the end for this house, the safest in the Shire, nothing but brick and dirt.
He was supposed to follow The Drill.
‘Hello Google,’ he said.
Fran had installed the device the day after she arrived, along with many of her other suicide-prevention solutions, and had made him practise for over an hour.
The machine was not responding. Oh, he remembered, he 44had to say hillo for hello and Boogle instead of Google. ‘Hillo Boogle,’ he said.
‘Hillo,’ replied Boogle.
Outside was the hell he imagined he’d go to if he swallowed the pills. Armageddon was visibly and rapidly heading this way. The heat from the window panes hurt the parts of him that still felt, and he was surprised not to revel in it. For months he had prayed to feel anything, this … yes, give me agony, and yet he found himself pressing a button and moving away from the heat of the glass, away from the main attraction, the flames that were now visible outside, saying, Ha ha, I know, right? I told ya over and over, yet you were still, ‘She’ll be right.’
‘What is it like to burn to death?’ Gramps said to Boogle.
It sounded bad, and Gramps found himself thinking of his medication, which was in the small bedroom, in a chest, locked.
‘Stop. Call Vonny,’ he said to Boogle, and was astounded when it worked. ‘Vonny, are you okay? Where? Vonny…’ He was cut off, and Fran was calling. She should hide in the monument, he said, praise the Lord he had something to say to his baby girl. ‘See you on the other side in fifteen. Go.’
Boogle went dead, along with the lights and the telly.
He was stoned. While his daughter was napping in the lounge, he had managed to retrieve the vegemite jar and attach a joint to the claw of the reacher grabber.
That’s right, the world was on fire. The windows were rumbling. Tornadoes were flying into the enclosure. Miriam and Ronnie were going bananas.
His wife’s ashes were in a pale-blue biscotti tin on the bookshelf in the hall. He parked his chair beside it and with his finger coaxed the tin until it balanced precariously between 45the shelf and his limpy knee. One wrong move and Sofia would wind up on the gold carpet. He made three carefully considered moves, each involving a finger wriggle and/or chair acceleration. He’d done it. Sofia would be with him.
He made his way to the kitchen bench and removed the landline’s handset with his teeth, dropping it onto the tin in his lap. Having manoeuvred the chair to the correct angle, he was now able to complete part one of The Drill, by pressing the buttons on this mustard relic with his nose.
From the kitchen bench he could see out onto the enclosure. Miriam was running harder and faster than she ever did when enticing Ronnie, which no-one would think possible.
There was no fire in here, no flames near the phone, and yet the skin on his hand was changing.
Gramps was impressed with the accuracy and speed of his nose-dialling.
Outside he saw that Ronnie Corbett’s wing was smoking.
He left the handset dangling from the counter and headed for the hall, where – according to The Drill – he should park himself until help arrived.
‘Thank you for your call,’ an automated voice was saying.
But he was not parking his chair in the hall, he was heading for the door. He was using his teeth to open it.
Where was Gramps Opens a Door when he needed it, Gramps Puts Out a Fire, Gramps Saves His Family? If he ever got this door open, it would be an agonisingly slow journey down the ramp to the ostrich gate, and so far he was unable to grip the smouldering lock with his teeth. He’d heard somewhere that most people are heroes in disaster situations, but that probably didn’t include people who could only open things with their teeth. 46
He sacrificed his lips to grip the lock, and opened the door. As he left the house that he had built for his family, he heard a woman’s voice. It was coming from the dangling handset in the kitchen: ‘Thank you for your call,’ the voice repeated.
And before the door slammed and the telephone lines toppled, he heard the rest: ‘You have voted to say goodbye to Aron.’