Red Queen (6 page)

I felt her voice before I heard it: it travelled electric up my spine and lifted every hair on my body. She lifted her head and opened her eyes. Her voice was tentative, but undeniably good – a little bluesy, as I’d expected it would be. It didn’t benefit from the muted volume we had to maintain and I resented Rohan for every rule he imposed and most of all this one; if I wanted to play I should be able to, and if Denny wanted to sing, well for God’s sake, let her sing. Let her belt it out.

The volume crept up with the tempo. I watched her and played just for her, and ached for her to really sing. You could hear the loosening of her vocal chords, the smooth quality working into every note. She had the sort of voice to shimmer under your skin, awe you.

I flipped through my mental playlist for songs that would suit her voice and songs that she might know. If she was unsure of the lyrics she improvised.

And now she looked at me, smiling if we nailed it, her voice natural and strong; she lightly rocked her upper body and I tapped my foot as we formed a connection and began to pre-empt one another. I had the far-off thought that we were loud, that my fingers moved too easily and the music was too sheer in me and that Denny’s bare feet were on the boards and the blanket was forgotten, that she may have moved closer to me, so that we faced each other and held the music between us as we mixed it before letting it go. I thought we might have touched knees, and that she might have brushed my thigh. I could taste what we had and wanted it deeper, knew her voice still had range and strove for it – not ready to stop until I’d pushed her and made her strain. She saw this in me and grinned, teasing me with the ease with which she could hit the notes. There was more than a sniff of playful challenge and the tension was so close to sexual I couldn’t hold her gaze.

Something heralded the end, I don’t know what.

She collapsed back and I rested on the guitar; we grinned like fools, high. She licked her teeth.

‘You think we left our run a bit late for a record deal?’ she asked.

‘Probably wouldn’t sound so good behind the gas masks, anyway.’

‘Oh, I don’t know – worked all right for Michael Jackson.’

A shadow at the corner of the cabin moved. My insides shrunk.

Denny saw my face and turned to look over her shoulder. Rohan didn’t step from the dark, but stayed a broad-shouldered shape leant against the stonework.

‘Am I the only one taking the situation seriously?’ he asked.

Denny’s chair scraped on the boards as she manoeuvred it back into place.

‘Have you any idea how far that’d carry? Why don’t you just plug in the electric, fire up the amps, and have a real go? I’m sure they could hear you in town if you made the effort. Not even mentioning how many could be moving in while you two play Sonny and Cher.’

‘Yeah, righto —’

‘No. Don’t even talk, Shannon, I don’t wanna hear it. I knew you played instead of watching this place, and I let it go. And now we’ve got a freeloading lodger, good for bugger all except, it turns out,
singing
. It’s a bloody joke, and at a time when absolutely nothing is funny.’

He shifted from the wall and Denny pressed back in her chair.

‘I’m not gunna say it, Pup, because you
know
– you
know
what I’ll do if it happens again.’

He turned and was gone.

We listened to his heavy steps as he walked the front veranda and went inside. Denny breathed out.

‘I better go to bed,’ she said.

I could just make out her screwed-up face, the regret in her eyes. She met my gaze. We smiled tentatively.

‘Goodnight, Sonny,’ she whispered.

On the way past she gathered up the blanket from around her and draped it over my shoulders. The backs of her fingers brushed below my ear, her other hand cupped my shoulder. This alone was enough to freeze me, but when she dipped a hand under the long hair at the back of my neck and flipped it out from under the blanket, I shivered with the shock.

It wasn’t until she was inside that I realised it was her only blanket and that at some stage I had to go in and put it over her.

2

‘
HE
’
S ALREADY LEFT
.’

‘But I wasn’t up,’ I said.

Denny pulled a face. ‘I think he trusts me.’

I frowned sleepily at this.

It shouldn’t have seemed sudden – we’d been slotting into a routine for two weeks. Rohan fished and hunted, I clipped my way through the wool-blind sheep and collected wood, and Denny padded barefoot around the yard and had the cabin swept and dusted into a breezy new home.

Rohan included her in conversations regarding the food or changes around the cabin. We all played cards each night. Denny joined me on the veranda once Rohan was in bed, and we talked quietly, or didn’t talk. I didn’t play the guitar. But regardless of the routine, Rohan’s trust seemed sudden.

I didn’t know if I liked Rohan trusting Denny.

She was tall and informal before me. The weight she’d put on showed more in her arms than anywhere else. It was obvious now that she was going to fill out into something impressive. Rohan was more content with her restored strength, and even, to a point, her initiative around the cabin and in the yard – although he’d drawn the line at her taking down the photos in the hallway, and had made her put them back up.

Now, with one foot propped on top of the other, she had a bubbling excitement about her. I thought she might swing around in a circle or bounce on her filthy feet, but she looked to rein it in.

‘That’s good,’ I muttered.

The back door was wedged open and the windows let in broad bands of sun. A cool flowthrough swirled around me. Denny kept what my mother would have called a
fresh home
. Rain, hail or shine the windows and doors were open.

Clutter also bugged Denny. Slowly but surely she was stowing ornaments and clearing surfaces of lace doilies.

I opened the fridge, then spun quickly to look at the sink. ‘Hey? Have you two eaten?’

On the draining-board were a dirty frying pan and two plates.

Denny rubbed behind her ear.

‘I don’t believe it,’ I said. ‘What did you have?’

‘Bubble and squeak.’

‘What?’

‘There’s some in the oven for you.’

‘You ate without me? Did you sit and have breakfast with Rohan?’

‘Yes.’

‘And not get me? What happened to the eating all together rule?’

‘He—’

‘This is so typical of him. I just love the way the rules are final, until he chooses to change them. What if it had been me – imagine the shit I’d cop if I decided one morning to fry up a heap of leftovers and sit down to a huge breakfast?’

‘I think he wanted you to get some sleep. You’ve been working really hard, and I think —’

‘He could have said something last night. God, he was fanatical about meal times. You weren’t here for the lecture I got on the importance of equally sharing the food, no-one eating behind the other’s back. Shit! Did he say anything about it this morning?’

‘Only to tell you that yours was in the oven.’

I walked to the sink and stood staring at the dirty plates. ‘He cooked?’

Denny paused. ‘No.’

I spun around.

‘He let you cook? And he ate it – what you cooked?’

‘I’m sorry if this has upset you. I really don’t think it was meant that way at all. I got the impression that he wanted you to sleep – that he’s been proud of what you’ve been doing, and that you deserved it.’

‘I doubt it. If he was so bloody thoughtful why didn’t he wait an hour or so before going off to play Huckleberry Finn in the bush? We could have eaten together … I would have liked that, for you to cook …’

‘I’m sorry. Sit down and I’ll get it for you. Come on, I’ll spoil you.’

I stayed at the sink, breathing hard, not the least bit hungry.

‘Fuck! If he wants respect for his high and mighty commands he should at least stick to them.’

‘Come on.’ She came close to me. ‘I’ll squeeze you an orange juice.’

‘Did you two have that?’

I scanned the sink for any sign that they had.

‘No,’ she said laughing. ‘But we’ve got enough oranges to cure the world of scurvy – and that might not be an exaggeration. I don’t think he’s going to mind if I make you a glass of juice.’

‘What did you talk about with him?’

‘It was Rohan, and with a plate of food in front of him – we didn’t talk.’

This relaxed me. I stood there a moment, composing, and slowly coming around to the fact that Denny was right inside my personal space and not budging.

‘You’re sunburnt,’ she said, and moved her gaze over my face. ‘You look better though.’ She put a hand to my chest. ‘And you sound better, too. You notice that? You breathe easier. With all that dust gone.’

My heartbeat was too loud for any thought and my throat too closed for speech. There was no reason for her to stay so near to me. My hands had started to sweat and I was sure that she knew how her proximity was affecting me.

‘It’s a sunny day,’ she said. ‘I was wondering if you’d let me wash your bedding. I’d get it dry today.’

‘Sure,’ I managed.

‘Shannon?’

I dragged my gaze round to meet hers.

‘You
can
touch me you know. You don’t have to be frightened of me.’

‘I’m not.’

‘I think it’s more normal if we occasionally touch. I don’t want to be like this. Cringing.’

‘I don’t cringe.’

‘Yes you do. Look at you. You’re about to eat the food I cooked but you won’t even stand near me. I’m not contagious. I’ve never had anything more than the common cold.’

‘The virus could well be a variation of the common cold.’

She stepped back, shaking her head. ‘Okay.’

‘Rohan doesn’t touch you.’

Denny took my breakfast from the oven, flipping the tea towel over her wrist.

‘Does he?’

‘I just thought we were more alike,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to be closed off. I understand how some people only need themselves, but not me. I know you’re the same, and I think our type should stick together.’

‘We are. Sticking together.’

She held the warm plate and looked over at the table. My height and size were more apparent to me as I walked and she followed. She was right: I was healthier, my breathing was clearer. Days of physical work in the sun sapped me at night, but had the cumulative effect of restoring me.

‘I could cut your hair,’ she said, and put the plate down in front of me. ‘I could massage your sore shoulder after a day of doing the sheep. I don’t think those things should be off limits and weird.’

‘Rohan wouldn’t like it.’

My hunger sprung up with the smell of the food. She went for a knife and fork.

‘You’re just saying that,’ she said, ‘because you’re scared of me touching you.’

‘I’m not
scared
.’

‘All right, so you’ll let me rub your shoulder tonight, on the veranda.’

‘Sure.’

She leant in to put the knife and fork down and bumped me with her hip.

‘Nervous already, aren’t you? Girl germs.’

‘All germs.’

‘But don’t you feel you’re conceding somehow if we all start jumping at human touch?’

‘No shame in surrendering to nature.’

‘What if it’s not nature, what if the virus was engineered, a population pill?’

‘Mmm, that’s what Rohan thinks.’

‘It would be interesting, don’t you think, to see what influential people survived. I can’t help thinking the Royal Family is off somewhere frolicking happily with the corgis, and Camp David is wall to wall with ex-presidents. If you can’t swell the world to fit the people, the only logical thing, really, is to shrink the people to fit the world. It’s all just a matter of justification – and tell me humans aren’t the masters of that. There are worse ways to die than in a delirium of fever and with lungs full of fluid.’

‘I heard the symptoms were worse than that.’

‘Did you see much of your parents’ symptoms? Oh … well, I guess not – you’re alive.’

‘I’ve only heard it starts out like the flu. I hope it was quick for Mum and Dad.’

‘Did they die in town?’

‘We were already out here and they had to go back into town to try to get more of my father’s medication – he was diabetic. I had a feeling they knew they wouldn’t return, and that’s why they went together. We’d agreed that they would quarantine themselves for two weeks, the extra week to be sure, before they returned. They set up a camp in the bush near the Mount Tassie transmission tower; you can see the tower from up the bluff. If they came down with symptoms they planned to tie a kite they’d taken around the frame, as high up as they could. So we could see it.’

After a moment, I said, ‘Some of the kite’s still there.’

‘I’m really sorry, Shannon.’

‘It’s kinda nice to have something. The kite, I mean – I think it would be so much harder not to know for sure.’

‘It is.’

We slipped into our own thoughts. Birdsong filtered in. I ate my breakfast and Denny stood at the bench and squeezed oranges.

From across the paddock I could see her walk to the corner of the veranda and sit on the edge with her legs swinging and her face lifted to the sun.