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This writing was accepted for publication
in the 84 page perfect-bound issue...
cc&d magazine (v211)
(the August 2010 Issue)

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We have what you want

Deborah Sheldon

    The roadhouse sat in the dirt on the side of the highway with nothing around it for fifty kilometres in either direction. Out front of the roadhouse was a tin roof that sheltered twin petrol bowsers and behind was a bungalow of three motel rooms.
    The ute pulled off the highway, coasted next to a bowser and parked. A hand-written note taped to the bowser read, ‘Relax! We serve you!’ The driver of the ute, a boy barely out of his teens, picked at his fingernails and waited. His hand hovered over the horn but then the screen door of the roadhouse flapped open.
    The owner was an older man built wide and square. He walked to the bowsers with his shoulders rolling and his head down as if trudging up a steep hill. He was puffing and blowing by the time he got to the driver’s window.
    ‘What do you want?’ the owner said.
    The driver glanced at the owner’s nametag and smiled. ‘You tell me, Gordon.’
    ‘I don’t want to play games. Do you want me to fill her up or don’t you?’
    The driver rubbed at his nose. He had an indented scar where the tip of his nose should have been. ‘You’ve got a big sign back there on a sandwich board. Don’t you know what it says?’
    Gordon straightened up and put his fists on his broad hips.
    ‘We have what you want,’ the driver said. He drummed his fingers against the steering wheel and laughed. ‘That’s what it says. We have what you want. Well, do you? Do you have what I want?’
    Gordon turned and began slogging his way back to the roadhouse. The driver released his seatbelt and leaned out his ute window.
    ‘Fill her up, thanks,’ he called.
    Gordon came back to the ute. He wrenched off the petrol cap and rammed the bowser nozzle into the tank. When he was finished, he pushed his meaty hand through the open window and said, ‘Twenty-eight dollars.’ He had to back-pedal when the driver opened his door and got out.
    The driver pointed to the roadhouse. ‘It says on the window you got meals here. I think I might have me some breakfast.’
    ‘Breakfast isn’t on today,’ Gordon said.
    ‘The sign says you have breakfast.’
    Gordon shook his head and held out his hand. ‘Twenty-eight dollars.’
    ‘I’ll have a hamburger,’ the driver said. ‘Or a pie. Anything you’ve got.’
    Gordon huffed. Then he stumped his heavy legs and rolled his heavy shoulders across the lot to the roadhouse, and the driver ambled along behind him. Gordon flung open the screen door but didn’t hold it. The driver caught the door, grinned, and strolled inside.
    It was dark compared to the outside glare. Opposite the door was a counter top containing an empty bain marie. Behind the counter ran a long stove and grill. To the driver’s right were shelves stacked with canned and packaged goods, and to his left, four tables with plastic chairs.
    The driver perused the blackboard menu on the wall. Gordon went behind the counter.
    ‘Twenty-eight dollars,’ Gordon said. ‘You can’t eat till you pay me for the petrol.’
    ‘Okay.’ The driver pulled a wallet from his jeans pocket and handed over a fifty-dollar note. Gordon opened the register and gave him his change.
    ‘So what do you want?’ Gordon said.
    The driver smirked. ‘You tell me.’
    The back door of the roadhouse opened and a girl struggled in. She held a mop and bucket, and the bucket slopped water and grey suds. The driver took the bucket for her and put it on the floor. She smiled at him.
    ‘Narelle, get back to the bungalow,’ Gordon said.
    Narelle leaned the mop handle against the counter. ‘I’ve finished in there. I’ve changed the linen too.’
    The driver appraised her. She had a dumpy build and wore her dark blonde hair pulled into a ponytail and she had freckles dusted over her round cheeks and she couldn’t have been more than seventeen years old.
    ‘What are you staring at?’ Narelle said.
    ‘All the tasty things on your menu,’ the driver said and Narelle giggled behind her hand.
    Gordon said, ‘Do you want to order something or don’t you?’
    The driver looked at the blackboard menu and rubbed at the stubble on his face. ‘I’ll have the breakfast special.’
    ‘I told you before, breakfast isn’t on today.’
    ‘Mum’s gone into town,’ Narelle said and picked up the mop and bucket. ‘She does the breakfasts.’
    ‘Then I’ll have a burger with the lot.’
    ‘The stove’s not ready,’ Gordon said.
    ‘I can wait,’ the driver said. He walked to one of the tables and sat in a plastic chair.
    Gordon turned to the stove and rattled at the controls. Narelle hefted the mop and bucket through the swing door to the kitchen. Gordon followed her. After a moment they both came out again. Gordon carried a box. He went behind the counter and began unloading onions and bags of lettuce and other foods into the bain marie. Narelle had a feather duster. She flicked it around the shelves and saw the driver was watching her.
    ‘What are you doing out so early, anyway?’ she said to him.
    ‘Go finish up the bungalows,’ Gordon said.
    ‘Dad, I told you already, they’re done.’ She smiled at the driver. ‘So where are you going?’
    ‘Melbourne,’ he said. ‘For a birthday party.’
    ‘I really love parties,’ she said. ‘Is it a twenty-first?’
    ‘Actually, it’s a ninety-fifth,’ he said.
    Narelle laughed. ‘Wow, that’s pretty old, isn’t it?’
    Gordon hurled the empty cardboard box to the floor. Narelle rolled her eyes and gave her father a sulky look. Then she sidled her gaze to the driver. ‘So who’s turning ninety-five? Your nanna?’
    ‘My Dad’s aunty,’ the driver said. ‘Everyone reckons it’ll be her last birthday, so we’re having a party.’
    Gordon tossed a handful of onion rings on the stove. The onions hissed and sizzled. He shouldered through the swing door into the kitchen. Narelle put the feather duster on a shelf and pulled a cloth from her apron pocket. She approached the driver and started wiping down one of the nearby tables.
    ‘So where’s the party at?’ she said.
    ‘The retirement village,’ the driver said. ‘She lives in a single room now. She used to have a unit but she can’t see or hear that well any more. They had to move her.’
    ‘Oh. That’s really awful, isn’t it?’
    ‘Yep, but it’ll get worse. Next stop for her is the nursing home. And then a wooden box.’
    Gordon came out of the kitchen holding a meat patty wrapped in paper. He tore the paper off the patty and slung the patty onto the stove.
    ‘Narelle, go tidy up the kitchen,’ he said.
    She sighed and pulled a face. The driver winked at her. She pocketed her cloth and walked slowly to the kitchen door, knowing that the driver would be watching. She glanced at him with shining eyes and pushed through the swing door.
    Gordon shovelled at the onions with tongs and cracked an egg onto the stove. The driver slumped in his chair and stretched out his long legs. He said to Gordon, ‘What kind of a birthday present do you buy for a ninety-five year old woman who lives in a single room?’
    ‘I wouldn’t know,’ Gordon said.
    ‘It doesn’t seem right for anybody to live that long,’ the driver said. He waited a while and then said in a louder voice, ‘Well, does it, Gordon? Does it seem right to you?’
    ‘I wouldn’t know.’
    The driver got up and sauntered over to the shelves. ‘She had a whole life once. She ran a hotel. She had a husband and kids to look after, and friends to visit and things to do every day. Now she’s got nothing. She sits in a tiny room by herself and she’s got nothing at all.’
    Gordon opened a bread roll and put the two halves on the stove. He flipped the meat patty, flipped the egg and shoved at the onions again with the tongs.
    The driver said, ‘What do you think about that?’
    Gordon turned to him. ‘When your time’s up, it’s up. And her time isn’t up. That’s all.’
    The driver stopped at a shelf. He lifted cans one at a time and inspected them. Gordon watched him. Narelle came out of the kitchen and headed straight to the shelves. She picked up her feather duster and started flicking it again.
    ‘You can mop the kitchen,’ Gordon said.
    ‘It’s mopped already,’ she said. Then she said to the driver, ‘Do you live anywhere around here?’
    ‘We’ve got a farm.’
    ‘What sort of farm?’ she said.
    ‘Wheat.’
    ‘What kinds of things do you do on a wheat farm?’ she said.
    The driver shrugged. ‘Lots of things. You’ve got to know how to use all sorts of machines. And you’ve got to hunt.’
    Narelle’s eyes widened. ‘Hunt?’
    ‘For sure,’ he said. ‘We get rabbits. And foxes follow the rabbits. Then there’s long-billed corellas and little corellas and magpie geese. If you don’t keep them culled, they take your whole crop.’
    ‘Do you have a gun?’ she said.
    He nodded. ‘Rifles.’
    Narelle leaned close and whispered, ‘Did you get that scar from hunting?’
    The driver touched at his nose. Narelle flushed.
    ‘I fell off an ag-bike,’ he said at last. ‘It rolled on me. I broke my collarbone too. See?’ He pulled aside the neck of his t-shirt to reveal a buckled collarbone but it was the fine blonde hairs peppering the brown skin of his chest that made Narelle gasp. The driver smiled and let go of his t-shirt. ‘The handlebars smashed into my nose,’ he said and ran a fingertip across the scar. ‘This is the best the doctors could do.’
    Gordon slammed the hamburger wrapped in a bag onto the counter top. ‘Five dollars,’ he said.
    The driver approached the counter and took out his wallet. He gave Gordon a note and said, ‘Could I have a plate?’
    ‘You can’t stay. That ute is blocking my bowser.’
    The driver swivelled on one heel and squinted out the roadhouse window. ‘I can’t see that it’s bothering anybody.’
    Gordon slapped the hamburger onto a plate and pushed the plate across the counter top.
    ‘And I’d like a coffee too,’ the driver said and sat at one of the tables and unwrapped the hamburger.
    Gordon went through the swing doors into the kitchen. Narelle put down the feather duster and took out her cloth and started wiping tables again. Gordon came back with a bag of ground coffee.
    ‘I think it’s really nice that you’re giving this old lady a party,’ Narelle said.
    ‘She won’t even know we’re there,’ the driver said. ‘Her mind is slipping on her.’
    ‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ she said.
    ‘She’ll die soon anyway.’
    ‘That’s a shame too.’
    The driver bit into his burger. Gordon clattered with the dials and levers on the coffee machine. Narelle watched the driver as he chewed and she bit at her lips and kept wiping at the same section of tabletop. He lifted a corner of his mouth at her in a half-smile.
    ‘So what’s your name again?’ he said.
    ‘Narelle.’ She beamed and forgot about the tabletop.
    The driver swallowed and said, ‘Narelle, do you know the government keeps track of how everybody dies?’
    ‘They do?’ she said.
    ‘Yep. They have warehouses full of death certificates and there’s people with computers that work out what kills people the most.’
    ‘Heart disease and cancer,’ Gordon said.
    The driver sat up in his chair. ‘See? Your old man knows what I’m talking about.’
    ‘Everybody knows that heart disease and cancer are the biggest killers,’ Gordon said. ‘Any idiot knows that.’
    ‘Dad,’ Narelle said. ‘Don’t.’
    ‘But what you don’t know,’ the driver said, putting his burger on the plate, ‘is that the government reckons that most people die before they’re supposed to. They call it premature death.’
    ‘So what?’ Gordon said.
    ‘Think about it,’ the driver said. ‘Heart disease, cancer, car accident, boat accident, drowning, drug overdose, everything. Premature.’ He took a bite of his burger and talked around the mouthful. ‘But then you’ve got people like my Dad’s aunty who just won’t give it up.’
    Gordon stomped over with the cup of coffee. ‘Yeah? Well, so what?’
    ‘Daddy,’ Narelle whined.
    ‘Go on to the bungalow,’ Gordon said. ‘Do as I say. Right now, missy.’
    Narelle tried to stare down her father but couldn’t. Her mouth twisted a little and she went out the back door. Gordon thumped the cup onto the driver’s table. Coffee sloshed into the saucer.
    ‘Two dollars,’ Gordon said.
    The driver strummed his fingers on the tabletop. ‘The government thinks everyone should be dying of old age. That’s a cruel way to go, if you ask me. But if all the other ways to die are premature, then how does anybody get to die at the right time? Tell me that.’
    Gordon sighed hard. ‘I wouldn’t know. Now I’d like you to pay for your coffee and take your burger and leave.’
    The driver regarded Gordon carefully. ‘We have what you want. Your sign says that. Now what I want is an answer.’
    Gordon picked up the burger and threw it into the driver’s lap. The driver jack-knifed in his chair as if stabbed.
    Gordon’s face was red and his temples pulsed with blue veins. ‘You smarmy little bastard,’ he said, spittle flying from his lips.
    The driver started to laugh and didn’t stop. Gordon balled his chunky hands into fists. Narelle opened the back door and uttered a shocked little peep.
    ‘Daddy, what’s going on?’ she said.
    ‘Get outside,’ Gordon said.
    ‘Tell me, Gordon,’ the driver said, thumbing away tears of laughter, ‘when is the right time for somebody to die?’
    ‘All right, goddammit, I’ll tell you,’ Gordon said, his chest heaving as the breath rasped in and out through blue lips. ‘One day you walk in front of a bus and that’s the end of it, and it doesn’t matter a stuff what the government thinks because you’re dead.’ He swiped at his brow with the back of his hand. ‘Happy now? Have I given you what you want?’
    ‘Almost,’ the driver said. He put the hamburger back on the plate and picked shreds of lettuce and onion from his lap and dropped them onto the mangled burger. Then Gordon and the driver stared at each other for a long time. Narelle took a few steps towards the table.
    ‘Dad, why don’t you go and lie down?’ she said.
    Gordon turned his florid face to her. The meat of his jowls shook and when he spoke, his voice was strangled. ‘You shut your mouth, you little slut.’
    Narelle flinched and for a second it looked as if she would start crying. Then she steeled herself, came closer, and put a hand on the driver’s shoulder.
    ‘Don’t worry about your clothes,’ she said. ‘I can wash them for you.’
    ‘Want to go this party, Narelle?’ the driver said as he stood. ‘You can come with me if you like.’
    Gordon swung his fist with all the weight in his heavy body and the driver took the blow on his chin and crashed backwards through the plastic tables. Narelle screamed. Gordon advanced and stood over the driver.
    ‘Get off my property,’ he hissed.
    The driver gathered his long legs beneath him and got up. His chin was already turning purple. He bent down and grabbed the hamburger from the floor. He put the burger on the counter top, then reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out some coins. He placed a couple of coins on the counter top.
    ‘That’s for the coffee,’ he said.
    ‘Good,’ Gordon said. ‘Now piss off.’
    The driver pushed through the screen door and Gordon watched him walk across the lot to the ute. Then Gordon turned to his daughter.
    ‘Straighten these tables,’ he said. ‘And then you’d better go out back before I do something I’ll regret.’
    Narelle, mewling, picked up the scattered tables and chairs one at a time. Gordon stood rigidly and took deep breaths to calm his galloping heart. The door of the roadhouse swung open and the driver came in with a rifle in his hand. The driver rammed the tip of the barrel into Gordon’s neck and drove him back to the counter top. Narelle dropped the chair she was holding.
    ‘I’m that bus you talked about,’ the driver said, and his smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘You just walked in front of me.’
    Narelle stumbled through the tables and chairs and fell against the back door. It opened and dumped her onto the dirt. She scrabbled and crawled then pitched herself against the wall of the roadhouse. She screwed her eyes shut and jammed her fingers into her ears until all she could hear was the roar of her own blood.



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