Flinty sat on the Rock, her stick beside her, staring out at the patchwork: long scars of black, the ridges burned almost to mirrors, dead tufts of casuarinas, here and there a swathe of trees and shrubs that, through some miracle, were scorched but hadn’t burned. The mountains behind her were black too, but the ones beyond were green-blue, just as the valley from Rock Farm down past the surgery was unharmed.
Her beloved older brother, dead. It was still impossible to believe, despite the funeral in the tiny church down in the valley. Andy was buried at Gibber’s Creek, among the blackened headstones of the church that had burned in the fire.
She had resented him so much when she was young: the boy who had been allowed so much more freedom than a girl, who had led the brother she was closest to, still underage, into the carnage of war where he had died. Even when Andy returned, he had abandoned her and Joseph and Kirsty to go to Queensland droving and escape the nightmares of the war; and then he came back again, prepared to sell Rock Farm to take on the manager’s position at Drinkwater. Only her marriage to Sandy and the unexpected success of her books had allowed her to save her beloved house and the farm.
Flinty had tried to understand. Pretended she had understood. But she had hated him, because she loved him — and when you loved someone, they were supposed to love you back in the same way. An older brother should protect you, not leave you or sell your home.
But then came better years, when Andy had married Mah, and love and joy for him became uncomplicated. They’d had more than forty years since then. Good years.
She wiped her eyes and blew her nose on the handkerchief she still carried, despite Felicity’s insistence that tissues were more hygienic, and looked across the valley again. She could just see the blanket of black left by the vast fire that ate Jeratgully. It was strange how much the loss of a place that had been such a small part of her life mattered.
But the rest of her family was safe. Her community, safe. Rock Farm had lost its sheds, yards and enclosures, but her house was liveable again.
Yet the true agony of the fire was still being counted: kids who’d have nightmares all their lives. Thousands upon thousands of injured wild animals. Some could be saved, but others were humanely put down, just as thousands of sheep and cattle and horses had been.
Kirsty was flying down for the memorial service. The funeral itself had been a small one, with so many of his friends away, still fighting the fires, though to her surprise the army had sent both a flag and representatives for a man who’d served his country, even so many years back.
But of course he’d served his country all his life.
She’d say goodbye to the man at the memorial. But this farewell was for the boy he’d been.
‘Andy!’ she called and heard the echoes. Andy, Andy, Andy. And then, as she had called to him every dusk, all through her childhood, ‘Dinner’s ready when you are!’
Ready, ready, ready, said the echoes. Flinty stood and smiled at her valley, its present, past and future, then turned to put on her sausages, boiled beans and mash.