TWENTY-ONE

When I opened my eyes, it was dark. The house was quiet except for the whirr of the air con and every now and then something creaked. I’d forgotten where I was so when I tried to sit up, I smacked my head on the bottom of Jonny’s bed. I yelped, half in pain, half confused. Once I’d remembered where I was, I swung my legs to the side and wriggled out from under the bed.

The footsteps I’d heard in my dream were real—they belonged to Dad. I opened the bedroom door a little and saw him and Mum sitting at the dining-room table. He must have calmed down and come home.

I watched Dad rub his face and shake his head. I dunno if he’d turned round before he got to the Smiths’, or if he just couldn’t find them. Mum was talking, real quietly, and she looked sad. I couldn’t hear everything she was saying, but it had to be about Sissy and Gil. I felt my belly flip as I realized they looked a bit like when Jonny had the accident. After a while Dad said Gil Smith out loud, like he was trying to learn a new word. Mum sighed. Dad was just sitting there, with his mouth open. That’s when Mum said, “People will talk.” Dad said, “Gil Smith?” Mum nodded and said it made sense. “The timing’s right.” Dad shook his head. Mum said people would gossip. Dad stared. Mum reckoned they’d have to tell people—she said the bush telegraph would work overtime when everyone found out. Dad didn’t reply. They both just sat there, not looking at each other.

After a minute or two Dad said, “I can’t have this feral baby under my roof, Sue. I can’t. It’ll have to go.” Mum said that maybe we could all keep it a secret. She reckoned no one had to know the baby was a gin. She reckoned that because Gil was fair and had lighter skin than most of the other Blackfellas, the baby might be white. But Dad shook his head. He said he reckoned it didn’t matter what color the baby was because him and Mum were probably the last to know the truth, and that he wouldn’t be surprised if the rest of the Territory had already heard what Sissy had been up to with that mongrel bastard. He shook his head and said he couldn’t believe Sissy could do such a thing. “Gil Smith,” he said again, like it was a question.

After a minute or two, he said Mum should phone Aunty Ve in Alice and get her to have Sissy to stay until things had calmed down. Mum started to cry a bit then. I hated that. I didn’t want Sissy to go to Aunty Ve’s. Not really. Not forever, anyway. Just until she had the baby, maybe. Then she could leave it there and come home, like normal.

Dad stood up. He went toward Emily’s room. I kept real quiet. He must have gone through Emily’s room and opened Sissy’s bedroom door because for a second I could hear her music. He came back out with Sissy waddling behind him. She didn’t have any shoes on and her feet were real fat. He held a chair out for her to sit on.

I thought Sissy would blub again—but she didn’t. Dad spoke real quietly. He told her that there was no way he was having her and her gin baby living under his roof. He said she’d have to go to Aunty Ve’s for a while. Sissy stared right back at him. Mum said, “Derek, please?” But Dad was having none of it. He said Mum should phone Aunty Ve straightaway and get things organized as quickly as possible. I saw him look at Sissy’s big belly and then look away again. He looked at his hands and said Sissy would need to be in Alice for when the baby came anyway—this way she’d just be there a bit earlier than originally planned. That’s all.

Mum twiddled a hanky round in her hands. Sissy didn’t move. Mum blew her nose and her voice went funny when she said everyone would find out who the father was. I guess she reckoned Sissy would be embarrassed or sorry, or something. Sissy just shrugged, like she didn’t care if the whole of the Territory knew she was a gin-jockey. I reckoned Dad would get angry about that—he hated it when we answered back or anything. But he didn’t.

After what felt like ages, Dad said he still needed to go to see Mick and Gil. When Sissy heard that, she looked scared and said, “What for? If I’m not here, what does it matter?” I guess we all knew he wanted to beat the crap out of Gil. Sissy looked at Mum, like she wanted her to do something to make Dad change his mind. But Mum didn’t say anything. I think she reckoned Gil deserved a hiding too—whatever the law said. Sissy must have known there was nothing she could do about it, so she looked at her big belly. She asked if she could get down from the table. Mum looked at Dad and he nodded, so she got up and waddled back to her room.

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When Aunty Veronica rolled up in her car at Timber Creek, it took her a few minutes to haul herself out from behind the steering wheel. She walked across the yard and grabbed the rail to pull herself up the steps to the door. Dad held the door open for her. He said g’day. She smiled, but he didn’t. I guess he couldn’t find one to give her. I was told to go out and play with Emily while they talked to Aunty Ve.

Emily sat like a crow on the fence eating an apple, while I hung around with Buzz wondering what was happening in the house. I knew Sissy was packing to go to Alice Springs.

After we’d all eaten lunch without anyone saying anything at all, Mum, Aunty Ve, and everyone else were busy washing up, so I went to Sissy’s bedroom. I stood outside the door not knowing what to do. In the end I knocked on it, like the Pommie would. Sissy’s voice came through real quietly asking who it was. I said it was me—Danny, and she asked what I wanted. I didn’t know what I wanted—not exactly, anyway. I tried to think what to say. In the end I just asked if I could come in. I heard Sissy’s feet get louder on the wooden floor inside, until they stopped on the other side of the door. After a second or two, the door opened and her face was there in front of me. “What?” she asked. She’d been crying. I shrugged and asked if she was OK. She shrugged back at me. Neither of us said anything. Then she said she still had a load of packing to do, so I nodded. She looked at me again. I dunno, I was going to say something about how I didn’t want her to go or that I was sorry, or whatever. But I couldn’t get it straight in my head. Instead I kind of half shrugged at her. We looked at each other again and then she closed the door, so I went outside to practice my bowling. I was still out there when the women all came out of the house like a flock of galahs at dusk.

Mum carried Sissy’s bags for her. She and Aunty Ve loaded them into the back of her car. Aunty Ve began shoving her big body behind the steering wheel. Mum went round to the passenger side and helped Sissy in. She looked like a mirror to Aunty Ve at the other side. Mum stood there, fidgety and awkward, fussing around, flicking Sissy’s hair off her forehead. She helped Sissy with the seat belt, and as she leaned over that big belly of hers they finally hugged. That’s when Sissy really started to blub. She kept saying over and over again how she didn’t want to go. “Don’t make me. Please. Please, Mum. Don’t make me go. I don’t want to go. I’m scared. I’m so scared.” Mum undid the seat belt again and helped Sissy out of the car. She rubbed her back and stroked her hair. Emily started wailing too, so Aunty Ve got out and picked her up while Mum whispered things in Sissy’s ear I couldn’t hear. Aunty Ve looked over at Dad and shook her head a little. Dad looked down at the ground when he saw her. I turned back to the car and Mum had got Sissy back into the front seat. She’d stopped sobbing.

Mum said Sissy had to call her when they got to Alice and as soon as anything happened. Dad watched from where he was working. Once he saw Mum let go of Sissy, he walked over to the car too. The door was already shut when he got there, so he tapped on Sissy’s window and sort of waved at her. He didn’t smile. Sissy looked at him, but she didn’t wave. She had this weird, kind of blank face. Like she couldn’t see or hear anything. When she opened the window as the car moved away, she leaned out a little bit with her hand waving like a broken wing.

As they left us behind we didn’t shout, Bye! See ya soon! Drive carefully! like normal. That was how we always used to wave Sissy and Jonny off when Aunty Ve came over to take them back to boarding school after the holidays. I guess we couldn’t pretend everything was normal any more. Nothing was normal. I guess it hadn’t been normal for ages. I wondered if it would ever be normal again.