Gibber’s Creek Gazette, 14 November 1972
Letter to the Editor
Dear Sir,
On my last visit to Gibber’s Creek someone told me your paper was referred to as The Gibberer. Reading your election coverage I can see why. Thank goodness for the articles by Ms Jed Kelly. Perhaps ‘it’s time’ for decent journalism in The Gibberer too.
Yours faithfully,
Julieanne Durand (Ms)
JED
Jed and Julieanne sat in the (illegal) outside seats of Gus’s, slurping iced coffee against the heat breathed down by concrete walls and bitumen, ignoring the flies and the wolf-whistles from the construction site across the road.
The wolf-whistles would stop when smoko was over. The flies would not.
‘You’re really leaving before the election?’
Julieanne nodded, using her spoon to scoop up the ice cream in the bottom of the glass. ‘Three thousand calories well spent. Yes. Jed, darling, new government or not, Australia’s a backwater. It always will be.’
Jed had a sudden vision of the leaf-dappled billabong, the song of frogs and time. ‘Backwaters can be peaceful.’
‘I may be anti-war, darling, but I don’t want peaceful either. I want challenge. A place with a movie industry, a proper publishing industry. I need to be where things are happening.’ She scraped out the last of the coffee froth with her finger. ‘And you are still going to bury yourself in Gibber’s Creek.’
‘Scarlett needs me. And Matilda . . .’
‘You’ve said yourself that Scarlett can stay at Nancy’s. Look, why not come just for six months? After the election, if you really want to stay for it. We could have a white Christmas together.’
‘Does it snow in London at Christmas?’
‘Who cares? We’ll hire a car and drive till we find snow. What’s the use of having money if you don’t use it? You could fly back in a couple of days.’
For the first time temptation nibbled. It had been hard, handing in her last assignment. She did not want to become an academic. Probably. But just a few months in England . . .
‘We could take the ferry over to France too. Christmas in Paris instead.’
Just a few months. And if — when — Nicholas was elected, she would be away till all the fuss died down. Would not have to see him, hand in hand with Felicity . . .
The breeze changed. A waft of wombat, more pungent even than Gus’s coffee. The scent of sausages and wood smoke. She didn’t even look over at the construction site to see if someone had lit a fire.
A voice whispered, ‘Stay. Stay . . .’
The mutter of Canberra cars faded. She heard once more the deep long boom of a powerful owl.
‘I need to be at home for a while. Maybe I’ll come to England next year. I don’t know. Julieanne —’ She stopped, unwilling to say the words weighing on her tongue.
‘What?’ asked Julieanne gently.
‘Don’t forget me. You’re the first true friend I’ve ever had. Will you write? Telephone even. Reverse charges.’
‘You’re the first true friend I’ve ever had too. I don’t think friendship ever vanishes.’
‘But as our lives grow apart?’
Julieanne took her hand. ‘Everyone always has vanished from your life, haven’t they, until the last few years? Which is why you want to go back to Deadsville. Look, you idiot, you and I are as different as possible already, except in the ways that matter.’
‘Which are?’
‘We are brilliant, beautiful, can stop a male chauvinist pig with a flick of our fingers, have impeccable taste in clothes, and know what friendship means. And I’ll write every week, I promise. Friends forever.’
She would not cry. ‘Friends forever,’ said Jed.