Growing Up in Flames Read online

  I add a few pictures of the pills and caption them Weekend Plans. That should raise an eyebrow or two. I’m not done, though. Not even close.

  It’s sad, really—and personally I don’t agree with it—but it seems like there’s not much that’s worse for a teenage boy in Kimba than to be questionably gay. It’s not the actually being gay. Everyone’s fine with Thomas Jackson in Year Eleven. It’s when it’s questionable that they go nuts. People are so uncomfortable with uncertainty.

  I scroll, all thumbs on the screen as I search for what I need. Nothing pornographic. Nothing too…overt. I want people to feel like they’ve stumbled onto something hidden. People hide the things they’re ashamed of. They pretend they don’t exist.

  There.

  Art is full of this crap. Half-shaded nude figures; a burst of darker lines stopping too much from being revealed. My screen is filled with dozens of them. I choose three.

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  I half-expect people to work out that Noah didn’t draw these but it doesn’t matter either way. I’m not hunting Noah, really; I’m just throwing chum in the water.

  ‘Truth’ doesn’t matter online—all it takes is the smell of blood. We believe in whatever is interesting, and when enough people believe something, it becomes real.

  We choose our truths. We can’t help but choose the ones that hurt most.

  16 likes

  noah.brightspark_ Just a little something I drew. #art #charcoalsketch #livesubject #bestmodel

  king_kang99 wtf u gay bro?

  View more replies (13)

  courtcolemann this is really good!

  bebe897 #bestmodel? Who? He’s hot!

  _sammy_f01 What a fag! This is what I was talking about. All artists are fags. All that painting and watching people and shit.

  igotfrenchie Bold Noah – real bold.

  View more replies (9)

  frieswiddat check out those abs! wait, you already did, didn’t u?!

  senoralberto_420

  gigi_lola_ Stop it! He’s actually really good. Drawing a man doesn’t mean he’s gay. It’s art. You’re all being douches.

  View more replies (22)

  avocadoz4dayz This. Explains. So. Much.

  thenigothigh_024 The curves, the eyes, the way they pierce my soul. I’m moved by this – it lights a fire deep in my loins.

  surf.all.day_ Noah: ‘take off all your clothes. I need it for my…art.’

  mariejennison Come to think of it – I have never seen you with a girl.

  someorallofit I haven’t seen him with a boy either – he’s never around. Draw me like one of your French girls Noah!

  caughtjesting Awww sweetie, oh baby, you should have told us. We would have understood.

  p0pc0rn.n.flix…and then the great flood came…

  View more replies (3)

  This diary belongs to Ava Olsen

  There’s nothing I can do to fix it. I do the washing, I clean, I cook dinner. None of it makes a difference. Every time he sees Rob’s leg, it’s like it happens all over again. My fault.

  Dad is all I have left, and he hates me.

  I wish Mum was still here.

  Kenna’s Phone

  Mum

  16 FEB, 7:27 AM

  I missed you this morning – didn’t realise you’d left early. Did you get breakfast? xx

  Yeah. I’m fine.

  Sweetie, I’m sorry about last night. I’m just worried about you. You don’t talk to me like you used to. I want you to be happy.

  I am, don’t worry about it.

  I’m worried you don’t talk to anyone.

  Mum, I have school, I have to go.

  Okay. Talk later. Have a good day. Love you to the moon and back my darling girl xxxxx

  19 FEB, 11:13 PM

  You on your way?

  Just leaving now.

  Ok. Drive safe. xx

  20 FEB, 12:04 AM

  Where are you? You said you’d be home by 11.

  Almost there. Heaps of traffic.

  Don’t text when you’re driving.

  24 FEB, 11:08 AM

  You get there alright? They’ve closed the highway now.

  Yeah. I’m going to go for a swim.

  Everything okay up there?

  Yeah, all good so far. Pretty smoky up here. Fire engines everywhere. They’re using the school oval as a base. I can see the ridge on fire from here. It’s all still pretty far away though. I’ve cleaned the gutters and I’m going to watch a movie.

  Okay. Probably don’t watch Volcano

  24 FEB, 7:13 PM

  We got the call to evacuate. The fire’s gone down into the valley. I’m going to stay and defend the house. Lots of fire trucks and helicopters bombing the bush. One pulled water from the Johnson’s pool so I got to see it up close. The dogs went nuts so I brought them inside. You okay? Miss you, but glad you’re not here.

  Be careful. Take photos for me. I’m fine.

  Pretty quiet down here. Hannah and I

  had dinner and are watching a movie.

  Sounds like you girls are having a lovely time.

  What did you have for dinner? xx

  We made pizzas. It was nice. x

  Okay – thank Hannah’s parents from me. Will keep you updated as things change here. Lots of noise at the moment but can’t see any fire. Love you to the moon and back xxxx

  25 FEB, 12:06 AM

  Fire’s getting close. The street’s full of firefighters now. The bush at the end of the road has gone up. I wet down the roof and everything until the water pressure ran out – Firies are using it all. Lucky I filled up the bins and bath earlier. I’ve been going around the yard looking for embers. Pretty scary. Love you xx

  25 FEB 9:21 AM

  Woah! That’s close. You okay?

  25 FEB 10:04 AM

  How close did the fire get?

  25 FEB 10:32 AM

  Call me when you get a chance.

  25 FEB 11:01 AM

  Hello, it’s me, your daughter. If you could

  give me a call to let me know that you’re

  alright, I’d really appreciate it, okay?

  2 JUN 3:01 AM

  I think about you a lot. You might not

  know that, but I do. I miss you and home

  and the dogs. It’s weird up here. I saw a

  fire tonight, just up the street. A store was

  burning down on the corner. By the time

  other people got there they couldn’t do

  anything but watch. Was it like that for

  you? Did people watch? People usually

  don’t know why fires start, but I know how

  this one did.

  I saw something.

  I’m going to take care of it.

  Miss you. Love you lots xx

  Noah

  Present Day

  It didn’t take me too long to find her. I was born here. I know this place.

  I didn’t get a clear look at her last night. In the flickering shadows she was more like a demon. An ancient furie. In daylight she’s smaller than I thought. She’d only stand as high as my chest, though I don’t get close enough to measure. Around my age, maybe? Just shy of legal drinking age. She’s a heck of a lot prettier when she’s not attacking me. Her hair is the colour of eagle feathers and hangs to the middle of her back. I’m close enough to see the freckles across her nose. She won’t see me, though. I’m good at going unnoticed.

  That’s what I thought last night, too. Stupid. I shouldn’t have stayed to watch. It wasn’t part of the plan. It should have been enough to know that it was burning. But it was my last ‘fuck you’ to Dad, and I wanted to feel the heat on my face. Hear the timber cracking. It felt good, and because of that, I lost the pills.

  Stupid.

  She’s wearing her school uniform. I still have mine at home. I wear it when Mum’s up and I need an excuse to go out, then I change clothes down the road.

  I catch her name from the woman who waves goodb
ye at the front gate. Kenna. It suits her. She doesn’t say anything in return, just walks out with her backpack on, headed towards school. I follow at a distance. There’s no one much around this early in the morning, but it wouldn’t matter anyway. I stick to the shadows.

  She walks past the store, where the smell is strongest. It hangs like a stain on the air and my heart thumps at what I’ve done. The building is a shell. Half the poles are gone; the rest hold up charred tin, and huge sections of the walls now let in air. Most of it’s charcoal and ash with odd bits of stuff poking through. Wisps of smoke rising from coals that haven’t died yet. They will soon.

  It didn’t spread, though. I made sure of that.

  Kenna looks at the wreckage with her head cocked to one side, as if puzzling something over. There’s not much to think about.

  Fire fixes everything.

  With a rise and fall of her chest, she moves on. I follow her up the street. She passes by the road most people take to the school and turns later, pushing into a wall of cane and disappearing. The stalks bend and snap back into place after her, closing her in.

  I know this way, although there’s no path. I walk the cane quite a bit. It’s a good way to get around unseen. You have to keep your head and go straight through, but then you come out directly on the other side. If you lose your bearings you could come out anywhere, or wander around indefinitely. The fields are usually only an acre or so, but it’s easy to get lost.

  I leave Kenna to walk the rest of the way to school. I have her face now, and her name. That is what I came for. Anything more can wait. I can’t afford another mistake.

  I know something’s wrong as soon as I get home. The pot plants out the front have been knocked over and smashed, soil spilling through the cracks to form mounds on the grass.

  Mum’s having a bad day. I bring the motorbike in closer to the house.

  Then I see the writing on the wall. FAG. Spray-painted over the bricks between the kitchen windows in capital letters two feet high.

  Fag? Whatever.

  But people were here. Some time in the last couple of hours, while I waited for Kenna, someone has come to my house.

  Maybe one of the neighbours saw something. They probably wouldn’t tell me if they had, though. They’re pretty over Mum. I get it.

  Mum.

  I park the bike and run inside. Tongs and saucepans hang from the hat rack. There are dresses and underwear draped over the dining table, arranged by colours like a rainbow. I find her pouring herself a drink in the lounge room.

  ‘Damn plants keep moving.’ Her hands are shaking; she’s having trouble with the bottle top. ‘They know I don’t like it. Wrecks the grass. Leaves big dead circles all over it. Like smallpox.’ She looks at me pointedly, as if smallpox and I have some special connection.

  ‘Just to the line, Mum.’

  She pours the drink unsteadily but leans close to measure against the line I’ve etched on the glass—on all the glasses. She pours, in slurps and drops, until she’s happy. Then she rights the bottle, screws the cap back on and puts it away in the kitchen cupboard. Just like I taught her.

  ‘They’ve been stalking me online again too. And on the phone. I’ve been thinking about time—how do we know it’s a Wednesday, really? Are we just trusting that someone kept count since the first day? Suddenly all of the ads I see on the internet are for watches. Watches everywhere. Messages too—time’s almost up, make time today—that’s one of the ways they get to you. They make you feel crazy—’

  ‘Have a drink, Mum. Slow.’

  She does what I tell her and sips the amber liquid.

  ‘Warms you up.’ She wraps both hands around the glass and blows on it: hot tea on a winter’s day.

  It must be thirty degrees outside.

  I look around the room. It’ll take hours to put everything back in its place and clean the house. Still, could be worse. She didn’t go out. She didn’t burn anything.

  My chest tightens. I can smell petrol even though I’ve washed my hands quite a few times since last night. I shake my head. There’ll be time later to air that particular demon. For now: things to do.

  ‘…light some candles, but I couldn’t find the matches. Where are they? Every time I put them away somewhere, they seem to move. People are coming into the house now—it’s getting worse like that. They used to have some respect, at least. I mean, trash your reputation, sure. Make it so people never look at you the same. But they never used to actually come inside—’

  ‘Why don’t you go out and feed the birds Mum? I’ll make us some breakfast.’

  She nods, downing the last drops of her drink. ‘Birds.’

  I take the glass. I have her trained to only pour one drink at a time, but still, not worth the risk. I inspect the bottom of the glass. No sediment. Good.

  It takes me until lunchtime to get Mum calmed down and back in her room, listening to music. She wanted to pick flowers and leave them on the neighbours’ doorsteps. I’ve encouraged her not to do stuff like that.

  Fag?

  Who calls a woman a fag? Unless it wasn’t about Mum.

  I get to work scrubbing the letters off the bricks. Mrs Maxwell from next door catches my eye as she gets in her car, but she doesn’t say anything. I reckon I’ve got a good relationship with the neighbours. We leave each other alone. I don’t ask them for help. Ever. In exchange, they don’t call the police when they hear Mum yelling or plates smashing. It works.

  Fire fixes everything.

  The thought comes to me as I’m trying to fix the pots. I pause and crouch, letting the memory come. I put my hands into the loose soil and feel the heat trapped underneath.

  I smell petrol, the stink of it everywhere. It’s in my eyes and on my clothes.

  Mum is flapping around in a billowing shawl that catches the air like a cape. Stretched between her arms and over her back, the patterns look like feathers.

  She is talking to herself—or me—it’s hard to tell.

  ‘Matches. Why can’t I ever find the matches? I swear—’

  I’m sitting in the middle of her bedroom floor like she told me to. The floorboards are slick around me. Liquid trickles through my hair and falls in drops onto the ground.

  I hear the front door downstairs. Then footsteps.

  Dad’s home.

  I clap the dirt from my hands and stand, looking around the yard. There’s not much I can do about the broken pots. We don’t have any to replace them, and I can’t carry anything that big on the motorbike. They’ll just have to stay broken.

  I go inside and collapse on the lounge, looking at everything I have to do. The dining table is still a rainbow. The hat rack still hangs heavy with metal fruit.

  The tinny ringing of my phone snips my thoughts. I check the caller ID and answer immediately.

  ‘Hey! I was just going to call you. Look, I know I said it was the last time, but I need—’

  She interrupts with a string of agitated protests: something about a photo and what an idiot I am. It’s hard to make sense of the angry whispers over the background noise. She must be at work.

  I crush my temper in my fist and make my answer slow and clear. ‘We have a deal. I need more—just what you gave me last night, same again. A bottle of each.

  That’ll—’

  I can hear panic rise in her voice. Fear of being caught and having to explain it all. There’s a hissed ‘goodbye’. It sounds final. The call ends.

  But I need the pills, I want to scream down the dead line.

  What the hell was she talking about? What photo?

  I lie back and look at my phone.

  I have messages. I never have messages.

  I watch Kenna Olsen from a tree where I’m perched like fruit ready to fall and rot. She’s opposite the husk of the store again, head tilted to the side. Her eagle-feather hair spills over her right shoulder. She’s chewing a nail.

  I can wait.

  The street is quiet, caught in the lull between the
flush of kids getting out of school and the wave of evening dog-walkers along the river. The odd car trawls by, taking the back roads to avoid the roadworks. Only locals know to do that.

  Kenna moves and I’m ready. I crawl along the branches like a possum and slip down onto the top of a fence. I left the motorbike at home and walked. The clank of the old engine kind of rules out stealth.

  I was reluctantly impressed by her cleverness. A few words and images, a sketch stolen from my Facebook page and my name. Such small things.

  The sketches of topless men got my house graffitied. Comments are still coming in on the post, though I’ve stopped reading them. Still, it was the photo of the pills that screwed me with Christine.

  As if I’d ever be that careless.

  I’m crouched under a mulberry tree. Berries squish under the soles of my shoes and birds pick at the fruit above me. I watch through the gaps in the leaves.

  Kenna passes the road to school and continues along the edge of the cane. She picks her spot and pushes her way in. The stalks clack behind her, closing the gap until she disappears from view.

  I move quickly across the street and into the cane. I slip between the stalks, barely moving them, until I am enclosed in the green. I can hear her close by, pushing forward, step by step. I keep my movements silent.

  Mum barely slept last night. Which means I barely slept. I let her have another drink, some time after dark, and that calmed her a bit. She slowed down like a sports replay but didn’t stop completely until early this morning. She won’t be fully right for days. She won’t forget ever. Real events only support her theories.

  I don’t know if I can get more pills. Christine hasn’t answered her phone since yesterday morning. Maybe she’s just sleeping off the night shift. I definitely can’t afford another photo.

  It takes me a minute to find the jerrycan where I left it this morning. I lost the good one, but there was another in the shed. I splash petrol behind me as I cut a line straight across the field, parallel to the road. I finish with a puddle when I hit the irrigation trench.