13.

‘You ready?’ Dale asked, smiling.

‘For the last six weeks,’ I said, launching a blower into the tray.

It was a Friday and our last scheduled day on the new area. Consistent with the rest of our luck in the area over the last month, Benjamin had been called in for a random drug test which would take most of the morning. The weather was cooling off and most of the hard work had been done in the previous weeks. No more felled trees, chainsaws and splinters. No more dirty, stinky puddles. No more bugs the size of small dogs. Even I found myself a little excited; I could almost taste Hannah and a beer in the air.

Dale drove and I napped with my cap tipped down, waking as we passed my lawn by the lake. The outlines of trees were drawn in shadows across the water in the morning sun. I smiled and gestured a lazy wave towards it.

‘What are you doing?’ Dale asked.

‘Just saying hi,’ I answered.

We arrived at the new area and began laying hay in its garden beds. Benjamin arrived when the sun was sitting high in the sky, dropped off by two guys in management, Rodney and Matt. I found it strange they’d tasked themselves with dropping him off at the furthest reach of the island and had used Rodney’s blue Toyota Tacoma to do it, but it was Friday and I felt good, so shrugged it off and continued.

Dust billowed from the hay when you patted it against the earth. You either worked slowly enough for it to not reach your nostrils, or held your breath and laid the hay in fast, aggressive bursts. Both were exhausting in different ways under a blistering sun. We began on the final garden. Already I was starving from all the running around, finding myself daydreaming about chicken and biscuits. A branch gave way and fell somewhere in the distance with a deafening, echoing crack, pulling me from my trance. I kept working, clawing handfuls of hay, throwing it down, patting and moving forward, one foot at a time.

We arrived at the fork in the road just before base. Right took you up a side road where the labourers parked; left took you into the compound via a small parking lot with reserved spaces. We turned left as we always did and the trailer wobbled and banged over the speed hump. Rodney’s Tacoma was parked in one of the spots with a group huddled around the tray, blocking it from sight. Dale drove into the compound and parked near the greenhouse. I reached the steps leading up to the lunchroom at the same time some guys who’d been standing around Rodney’s truck did.

‘Mark, dude, you gotta check that shit out,’ one said, pointing back to the Tacoma.

‘Why? What is it?’

‘Go see for yourself,’ said the other with a grin as they went upstairs and disappeared through the flyscreen door.

The few still loitering around the truck started heading for the lunchroom.

‘Ooh, that boy got it,’ one said as they passed.

‘Wish I had a camera!’

I crossed the now quiet, empty parking lot towards the Tacoma. Its rear suspension was riding low, the sidewalls of its tyres bulging. With caution, I peered into the tray and my heart stopped. More scaled spikes than I could count ran back and forth inside. Two times it had to be folded to fit – so much bigger than I’d ever imagined. I reached a hand in, slowly halving the distance over and over until I made contact. It was coarse in a way that made me struggle to believe we were both flesh.

I ran fingertips up a ridged bump, alongside a familiar, dark red shape. Opposite it, a dime-sized hole tunnelling deep and disappearing into darkness – some dried blood streaking away from the opening. There was a lump in my throat. I stroked lightly as if to not wake him, though I knew those eyes would never open again.

‘I’m sorry. I told you not to get close. You weren’t afraid of anything … but you should have been afraid of me.’