Rural Dreams Read online

  ‘I go fishing every night. Near the old trawler,’ he cocks his head toward the harbour and rubs his hands.

  Big paws and a thick covering of yellow hair all over his legs and arms. Long eyelashes; the girls, if there were any, would love him.

  ‘You can come if you like – show ya the best spots. Be good. Be good fun Sandra.’

  Hot tears spring unbidden.

  ‘You look like him,’ she says, and she can tell he likes it.

  ‘Fishing? Tonight? You want to come?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘I want to come. I would like that very much Ed.’

  He nods, spins around on his thongs and walks away in slow, long steps. She puts down her fag, butts it out. Folds the Gaytime wrapper and gives a little laugh. A bark. She has a brother, a younger brother and in a few hours she’ll be fishing with him. She itches underneath the colostomy bag and looks at the dunes, glowing in the remains of the day. Sand will cover us all in time, her dad used to say, but at least in Fowler’s Bay you can watch it come.

  A soft breeze blows up. Westerly. She puts her face toward it and breathes in the warm air and gritty particles of sand. Year by year, day by day, minute by minute she thinks. It’s coming for us all and it’s a beautiful, annoying, terrifying thing and all we can do in the meantime is live.

  COACH

  ‘Get in there Ryan! Back up your team mate. C’mon. Call for it! Call for it! That’s it, that’s it, nice handball Hunter, well done – now pass it on, that’s right, look to the wing – Logan’s on his own! Hey Logan! Get your hands out of your pockets! Never mind, next time mate. C’mon Doggies, I can’t hear you, get the talk up talk, talk, talk! Stay on your feet. Don’t go to ground! Up ye get Alex– up, up – that’s it. Now hunt the ball.’

  What’s the score mate? Eh?

  Yeah we should do quite well this season. Got a couple of gun recruits from St. Therese’s and what with the two boys from Year Ten we’re allowed now, we should do alright.

  Hands up. Simon! Hands up!

  Last season was a complete mess. Had kids playing who didn’t know a handball from a sponge cake. It’s the soccer of course, slowly killing our game.

  Kick long Bohdi! Angus, Protect the space! Protect the space!

  You can’t complain though. As long as the kids’re out there playing sport it’s ok – that’s what I say to the other parents. They’re only young – plenty of time to school them in our game.

  Hunter – Hunter…yes! Great goal! Well done mate!

  That Hunter’s a good player. I first saw him kick a ball in kinder and I just knew – he had it you know? That ability that some people have – that ability to just read the ball. And that speed and grace that just a few are blessed with. It’s in the genes, that sort of football talent, it’s been passed on from proud father to son and father to son again. It’s funny how that works out.

  ‘Score mate?’

  We should win today. If Hunter keeps his head and passes it on occasionally. I like his drive, I like his competitiveness, but that’s not what it’s all about in the under 14s.

  ‘C’mon boys – Hunt the ball! Hunt the ball!’

  He’s got to learn to pass it on, to share it with his teammates. See Josh over there? Wing? Hasn’t got a kick all game.

  ‘What’s that mate?

  Oh, I stand corrected, he’s had two handballs. Yeah, no kicks yet, but when he does, you’ll know about it. Torpedos like you’ve never seen. Imagine when he’s in the…

  ‘Carn Josh mate! Get in there!’

  Well, at least he tries…I remember when I was their age. Just the same. Every Saturday morning dressed in my socks and footy boots, jumper tucked in, Eye of the Tiger on the record player – as eager as you like. Couldn’t wait to get out there. Just like these kids.

  See Tyson over there? Half back flank? Lives in a caravan down the river. Single mother, three kids, Tyson the eldest. I pick him up each week; mum doesn’t have a car and he’s there in his footy gear, clutching that yellow Auskick bag like it’s a golden ticket. He’ll do ok. He’s got his head screwed on right. As for young William on the wing – now what he needs is some boundaries. I’ve spoken to him about talking back to the umpires, how it’s best just to put your head down and carry one – ahh, but we’ll see.

  They’re good boys. All good boys. Known most of em all their lives. Played footy with a lot of their dads – and seen how talent can be hereditary. Hunter there, he’s got a run on him just like his dad and Fraser is the spit of his old man. Funny though, how biology can sometimes trip us up. Ned’s dad played for Footscray but his kid can’t kick to save himself.’ In a decade or so these boys’ll all grow up and leave this town – for some of them it’ll be an escape and for others a wrenching so hard it’ll never quite go. Saying goodbye to their school mates, their mums and dads, the same girlfriend they’ve had since they were 14… The sound of the cockies, the sharp smell of gum and hot dirt after a rain and the everlasting stars. This place, this place, it gets to you.

  ‘Give him room Bohdi!’

  But all of them will remember their footy, you can be sure of that. They’ll remember the rindy half-time oranges, the frost on the oval, the goosebumps from cold or nerves and the day they got ten or more possessions. They’ll remember running with the flight of the ball – that wide arc and the quickened breathing, the long, slowing strides and when they finally mark it, ten metres out from goal, it’ll be a birth of sorts.

  The call of the old bush ovals – I hear it still. I can’t drive past a game without slowing down and half wishing I could pull the boots back on – in spite of the crook back, the Achilles, and the shoulder that’s never fully healed. Because it never really leaves you, that love for the game.

  You see them of course, blokes in their 40s, filling up the seconds – chasing the younger blokes down the ground with the look of the old farm dog that knows he’s beat.

  ‘Look for your team mate Tyson!’

  I had my time, had my fair share of physio appointments and deep heat. It’s coaching now. These kids and the thirds. I’m here most days for training and for the games on the weekends. In the evenings that I’m not at club meetings my wife goes crook when I get the whiteboard out.’

  She says I’m obsessed. Obsessed? Now that’s a funny word.

  ‘You right mate? Need a drink? Hold the cup with two hands, two hands mate – that’s it. Good boy. What’s that mate? No, you need to drink. Drink for Dad.’

  Obsessed. We first knew there was some sort of problem with Jeremy here when he was about two. Didn’t speak, didn’t play with his toys – just liked opening and shutting the drawers on the coffee table. He’d open and close those bloody things all day if we’d have let him.’

  ‘Talk, talk, more talk Doggies!’

  That was hard, the repetitive stuff. But it was the lack of communication that got us. No cuddles, no kisses, no bedtime stories. And no football of course. Couldn’t stand to be with the other kids on the ground and didn’t like the feel of the ball. Hated it. Hated all team sports, especially soccer – which is fair enough.

  He’s the same age as the players. Born the same week as Hunter.

  I see the other parents come to watch their boys play. Standing in the rain with their arms crossed, trying to keep a lid on their pride. Dads mostly. Looking at their sons and remembering their own time as a boy and the glory days still to come off the field and on it.

  Don’t know what glory days Jeremy’ll have. I’d like him to have a friend over for a play one day.

  ‘Run with the ball Fraser!’

  Like him to have a kick to kick with me, that’d be good. But you know what? In his own way, in that locked up, private world of his, Jeremy does see the beauty in the game. It’s just a beauty in numbers that I don’t see so well. He knows the full name, age, weight and number of every player in the team. He knows the scores, can tell you every stat and will replay every game touch by touch whether you ask or not.

&nb
sp; ‘Look for your team mate! Good boy Ned.’

  We make a good team on the sidelines, Jeremy and me. Come rain, hail or shine he’ll be here beside me, calling the stats. And as the boys in this team grow up and leave, go on to play footy in other cities and towns, my boy will stay with me. Here in this little old town of ours.

  Of course, I do wonder what it would’ve been like to have a son like Hunter or Fraser. And then I look down at my little bloke here, my beautiful boy and I think – well, I’ve got about the best son in the world…

  Call it obsession or love, but we’ve got it in spades in the coach’s box. You could say it runs in the family.

  TWITCHER

  ‘The Barking Owl. Ninox Connivens. Rare but not endangered. Not protected but possibly should be according to some. He’ll be looking for a mate. Highly unlikely around here, what with all the noise. End of football season. Hoodlums in cars head up this way for drinking parties and god knows what else. Disturbing the peace. I cannot wait for it to be over.

  I wrote a letter to Park Rangers Victoria about this place, quoted from another letter I’d received from the Twitchers Tribune – ‘This environment is unique for birdlife being warm enough for the Rainbow Bee Eaters and cool enough for the Dollar birds. Surely this is reason enough for the authorities to make this area into a Wildlife Heritage park; free of cars, motorbikes, dogs, guns, generators, campfires and drinking parties. I have been bird watching in this area since I was a boy and have witnessed the devastation wrought upon the native species.’

  Apart from the football parties at the end of the season not many people come here. There’s a peace in this part of the world that’s all too rare now. I like it. There’s no bustling, no pushing, no prying. I do meet other twitchers here occasionally, mostly men. They know just to nod and move on, perhaps discuss any Regent honey eater sightings. Twitchers understand the importance of quiet. Of the wait.

  I waited for a letter back from Park Ranges Victoria – received nothing in the mail, nothing at all.

  But did get a visit from the police.

  Yes, the police. I was surprised. But I’ve always respected our force and so I fixed myself up as best as I could and came down from out of the tree I was in.

  ‘You make a habit of that?’ he said, all surprised when I jumped down beside him.

  ‘Well yes,’ I said. ‘It’s the best way to scout out the natural surroundings.’

  ‘You do a bit of that?’ he said, ‘Scouting around?’

  Well I thought that was a peculiar sort of question. How else do you observe the birds if not by watching, waiting and scouting around? It’s an acquired skill, bird watching. It takes patience and time. You have to be dedicated. It can take hours, days, weeks even to find the perfect bird. I’ve had to learn to adapt, blend in with my surroundings, take up little space and wait.

  He asked me if this area is good for birds and I had to chuckle. Good for birds! Does a Boobie Frigate have spurs? Wait! Listen! Thought I heard something.

  I saw a couple of Spur Winged Plover chicks last week. Little things, left all alone in their scrape. Mother must’ve been killed by foxes.

  The policeman asked me about the football trips in the bush, all the shenanigans they got up to and whatnot. I told him all I could, all the details of the drinking games and the huge bonfires and the songs. I couldn’t help but get the impression that he wished he had have been on one of the trips too.

  The policeman asked if I’d ever seen any girls with them.

  Oh, I’d seen them. Seen more than I wanted to of them as a matter of fact. Barely 16 and the things they were getting up to in the bushes with those football yobbos. I told him that I’d seen them. Two young girls. Dressed like Common Babblers and shouting like a pair of Bush Stone Curlews.

  The policeman asked me to make the sound.

  I made it, it’s a chilling sound. Listen! Magnificent.

  The policeman wrote something down and went and made a phone call. He asked for my address. I live with my mother, so I gave him her details. He asked me did I ever get lonely when I’m out in the bush all by myself.

  I said no.

  Well, I’m not by myself I said I’ve got the birds and they talk to me.

  The little tweets and shrills, I’m beginning to understand them – get to know their movements, their habits. After all these years, I’m beginning to communicate with the birds…

  The policeman asked me if I’d heard about the missing girls.

  There it goes again! That Barking Owl – it’s here somewhere. Always looking for a mate. It will be hard for him, but he’s cunning that owl – he’s a predator and he is the master of stealth.

  I hadn’t heard about the missing girls. Told him I don’t bother with the radio and newspapers so much. I read the Twitchers Tribune, but that’s about it by the way of current affairs for me. He said one of them lives near me. The Morrow girl. Freckle faced, like a Spotted Mink.

  There was a scratching in the tree house above us and the policeman grabbed at his side, like an American cop in a movie. He asked if he could see my treehouse and I said yes and showed him the ladder I’d made.

  Up he went. Up, up the policeman climbed – and me right behind him.

  I could see the bottom of his shoes and some African love grass stuck to his sock. That shoe would have to be cleaned before he left. Cleaned and scrubbed so that not a speck of the love grass could contaminate the land.

  Up the policeman went, and me right behind. When he got to the top he held tight to the tree branch stared at the little box I’d made in the corner. There they were. The two little chicks that were left all by themselves in the bush. Still huddled together and frightened despite all my efforts at communication.

  It’s high in my tree house. My bird viewing platform is almost ten metres from the ground. But heights don’t bother me. At boarding school in the city when I was ten, the bigger boys pushed me onto the roof of the cathedral and closed the hatch. It was cold. And dark. And high. At first, I was afraid. I shouted and shouted and called out, but after a while they forgot about me.

  A Nun saw me there the next morning and some men had to help get me down. My mother was very cross and the other boys were punished. But that night on the cathedral, I learnt something important – once you forgo your terror, there is no need to be afraid of the open spaces, the endless air and the wind. I could transport myself back home just by listening.

  ‘Well,’ the policeman was saying, ‘look at that. They’re just two little birds.’

  And while he was going on about investigating all leads I could already imagine just stepping off the platform and diving into the air – feeling the gust of cool wind beneath my beating arms.

  The policeman asks me what sort of a bloke I am but…listen!

  There it is! There it is!

  Me?

  I can hear it!

  I’m just a bloke who likes birds.

  OVERCOAT JOE

  In the car on the way to the Mallee town where my husband grew up, we don’t talk much. We watch as the land becomes wider and flatter and redder and we take turns to drive, leaving the engine and handbrake on as we run around to swap drivers every couple of hours. It’s Christmas time and we see a few hay bale Santas in the paddocks we pass, there’s red tinsel chains tied to tractors, blowing in the wind. I’m liking the trip, but my husband becomes quieter as the kilometres pile up.

  My husband left this town as he finished school and rarely came back. His parents are still there, just moved into a new place when the family home burnt down, not long after they’d sold. Terry warns me that the new place won’t be much, but I don’t mind. His parents are friendly people and while we don’t see them often, I like talking to them on the phone. Every year his mother comes to the gardening road show in Melbourne and we have a good afternoon there together. I remember to check the contents of the boot in one of our swapping drivers routine. There’s salvia and rosemary shrubs I’ve potted up for Barb’
s new garden. Tough plants which don’t mind the heat – but I’m conscious that five hours in the boot might be a stretch too long and so I spray them with a little water pump thing I’ve bought from home.

  And all the way, those big, flat paddocks red brown and baking in the heat. The trees grow shorter, become shrubbier, become yellow grass, and in the last hour there’s barely any vegetation at all. From inside the car it looks expansive – you could run for miles and miles, you could dream big in country like this. But outside the heat is stifling and we’re forced back in the car when a gust of red dirt smacks us in the face. It’s a sharp reminder; wake up, we’ve left the city! I glint through sandy eyelashes to the big world beyond. Back in the car, we’re lulled again. I fall asleep.

  ~~~

  After five hours we turn off the highway and my husband points to a block of land to the left. ‘See there,’ he says. ‘That’s Overcoat Joe’s.’

  The place he points to is badly neglected. A weatherboard with the roof caving in and a chimney falling apart. Plants and weeds cover the front path and the trees sink into each other as if they’re drowning.

  ‘Location, location, location,’ I say.

  Terry doesn’t respond. He slows down and I see a couple of bird baths in the front yard, under the trees. There’s crab apples, scrubby gums and Mallee shrubs. Two windows are smashed in.

  ‘Overcoat Joe,’ Terry muses and we turn into the town.

  Terry’s parents’ house doesn’t have a garden. It is full of stones and hot dirt. There’s a tree there, but it’s dying for lack of water. A northerly springs up and a broken blind bangs against a window.

  His parents come out to meet us, faces red and parched. ‘Come in, come in!’ They urge us to get out of the heat. We stumble into the small lounge room where the air conditioner pumps out a rhythmic beat of freezing air. Photos of Terry and his sister at their deb balls adorn the wall. It’s all white and lace and big hair and soft focus.

  We stand around the air conditioner and then we sit around it. We talk about the harvest (bad) and wheat prices (slumped). There’s a smell of stale water. We drink hot tea and eat corn beef sandwiches. There’s grapes, half frozen, in a metal bowl and fruit cake. The air conditioner chokes for a moment and we all hold our breath before it chugs back into life.