Read Texas Online

Authors: Sarah Hay

Tags: #FIC019000

Texas (19 page)

‘Cookie choked down pretty quick eh,' said Tommy.

He was sitting on the edge of a rolled swag, elbows resting on his knees.

‘You seen Texas?' she asked.

He shrugged. ‘Maybe.' He took a drink from his can. ‘Might've been him in a car. A brown car, with a few other fellas and a nanny-goat mob.'

She frowned. Dribble was leaking out the side of Cookie's mouth and little flies dipped in and out.

‘Maybe go fifty-fifty. With you, eh.'

‘What?' she asked.

Tommy's light-coloured shirt was streaked with sweat and it hung loosely from his skinny frame. For the first time she noticed a leather thong around his neck, fastened with the small head of a silver longhorn bull.

‘What?' she asked again, something she didn't want to know struggling to take shape in her head.

‘Yeah well. How about it? He's not here, is he? Probably gone off with some other woman. Don't have to tell him.'

His lower lip was wet with beer. She flung back at him the words he used so often, and in that moment it felt good to use them. They echoed in her head as she left, clasping the beer, holding it out in front so that she wouldn't spill it. It was hard to determine the lie of the land when the light was fading and grass grew in such unpredictable shapes, but somehow she

Texas negotiated her way towards the rodeo bar which was now lit by a row of coloured light bulbs. The bar itself was surrounded by hessian so that she couldn't see clearly, only the shapes of people inside. There was a small opening and men looked up from their drinks, she couldn't see any women, and the men resembled Tommy, so she turned and walked out again. She drained the can in her hand and threw it in the dirt, trying to look purposeful and brave for the benefit of the people she passed.

She returned to the Toyota. A star had appeared between the fork in the branches. There was someone in the dirt beside the vehicle. She moved quietly towards it and was relieved that it was Cookie, still sleeping, and that Tommy seemed to have gone. Where was Texas? How could he leave her like this? The darkness crowded around and forced itself on her and she was frightened. How he could love her, claim that she was his wife, and then leave her? She thought of other men, other boyfriends, and how she always knew when it was over. There was always some sign. But with Texas there had been nothing, no sign at all. If only she had her bus pass, her air ticket, her passport, but they were in the cupboard back at the station. She could walk out across the creek and to the highway where the roadhouse was, where the bus would pull in. She'd never run away from anything before, but she'd never felt like she didn't have a choice before either. She must think of something, work out a plan. Her mind struggled to form an idea. All she could think of was lying down. She took her swag off the back of the Toyota. On her hands and knees, she pushed it under the vehicle and rolled it out behind the tyre. Hopefully they wouldn't find her here. She must have slept because she didn't hear anyone return; she woke when the darkness started to lighten behind her eyes and the smell of a campfire seeped into her consciousness.

Cookie was squatting over thin wisps of smoke, snapping twigs in half and arranging them carefully over fine licks of flame.

She moved out from under the vehicle. He looked up.

‘What were you doing under there?' he asked.

He had a smudge of charcoal on his face, his lips were dry and his eyes squinted as though the light was too bright. She smiled a little sheepishly and when she stood up, her head ached. She realised she hadn't even taken off her boots before she went to sleep.

‘Where's Tommy?'

Cookie flicked his head to his left towards a canvas cocoon about twenty metres away from the vehicle.

‘Looks like he's got company,' he said.

‘Good,' she murmured as she moved towards the fire.

‘What's that?'

‘Oh nothing,' she said.

He reached into the back of the Toyota for the billy and filled it with water from a twenty-litre container that was lying at the end of the tray and nestled it into the small scattering of coals.

‘Where's Texas got to?' asked Cookie.

‘That's what I'd like to know.'

‘Ah don't worry. He's probably just gone for a wander. You know. Catching up with a few people.'

The water started to boil. Cookie threw a handful of tea into it.

Texas ‘Grab a couple of mugs there in the box.'

They sat with their tea and Laura noticed around her the slow movement of people. Where there were vehicles, men leant against them or walked between them, talking in pairs or in threes, and sometimes there was a woman, kneeling, helping a child to put on its boots. The soft hazy light blanketed the flat and the air was crisp but she knew it wouldn't last. A car being driven noisily from a distance became louder, its engine sounding as though it had something missing. It emerged from between the trees by the creek and lurched over the lumps in the track, swinging around towards them. It was a brown station wagon full of people and its tail end sunk low over its wheels and dust caught up with it when it stopped near their Toyota. Doors opened wide and Texas stepped out on the passenger side, and men and women and children spilled from the openings. His hand went up to his hat, to steady it, and he walked in a careful, measured way. She stared into the fire. His hand reached for her shoulder and she shrugged it off.

‘My woman Laura.'

He was turning back towards the group that followed and they found places around her and she looked up and they smiled. The only one she recognised was Jimmy.

‘This one here,' said Texas, ‘he's my cousin brother and this here, uncle and aunty and them two, they're my kids.'

‘What? You got kids?' She turned to him.

He sat in the dirt beside her and draped his arm across her shoulders. She saw then that his other hand held a large bottle of rum.

‘You didn't tell me you had kids.' She spoke softly now, but urgently, embarrassed that there were people watching. ‘What about their mother?' she whispered. ‘Where is she?' Glancing quickly up at the woman, Texas's aunty, with the wide open face and hair that wisped gently around it. She stared back impassively.

‘That wife with another fella.' Texas held the bottle up by its neck. ‘Cookie, you want some rum eh?'

Tommy emerged from the direction of his swag with a woman who was barefoot, wearing a shapeless floral dress. She sat in the dirt beside Laura, giggling, glancing around shyly.

Her name was Mary. She was Peter's cousin. Laura watched rum being poured into pannikins. They were passed around and since there weren't enough pannikins for everyone, they used empty beer cans cut in half to make cups. It was overproof rum and it brought the heat to her cheeks. And when that bottle was finished there was more in the car. A dry wind started and it rolled the leaves around in the dirt.

VII

Together they lay on their swag in the shade of the creek. If she lifted her head she could see over the shallow ridge of the bank to their vehicle which seemed to have been deserted. Texas stirred. Since they'd been asleep, the shade had extended across the sand, from one side of the creek to the other. The tops of

Texas the trees wavered in the breeze but it was still where they were lying. Occasionally she heard women's voices, high-pitched, maybe shouting. They came from the other side, away from the rodeo ground. His hand reached for her leg and he rubbed it along her jeans. She smiled and placed her hand on his. He turned, facing her.

‘Pretty lucky, eh.'

He raised his head, supporting it with his palm, lying sideways. She was on her back and his face filled her vision, and the eyes that looked into hers were dark and the whites were coloured with blood.

‘Last night,' she said, ‘Tommy wanted me to go with him.'

‘Did he?' He seemed amused. ‘What did he say?'

‘First of all he said he wanted to go fifty-fifty or something like that, and then . . .'

Texas laughed. ‘Those words, old fellas used to say them. Maybe they want something you know, like smoke, grog, and the old fella, he say, here, you have my wife for a bit, we share.'

‘Really. No woman should put up with that,' she said. Not knowing whether to believe him, feeling disappointed that he wasn't angrier with Tommy.

‘That woman, she still with her husband.'

She sat up and the movement created spots before her eyes. The fuzziness caused by the rum hadn't left her and it created a comfortable barrier between her old self and the new. Sitting, he crossed his legs.

‘I got you this thing in town.' He brought his hand up to his chest pocket. ‘Here, look.' He held up a gold necklace. ‘Show him to Tommy.' Hanging from the chain was a heart-shaped pendant. He laughed quietly and dropped it into her palm.

She threaded it through her fingers. Texas looked past her.

‘There was this outlaw fella, Major, one time, long, long time ago, he had a cave in those hills over that way. That fella, he took all the women from around here. There was this big fight, big shoot-out, and one woman, she was shot in the bub, she a relation to my mother. They shot him too. Lots of fellas killed. That woman, she was meant for some other fella, you know, in the tribal way, but Major come and took her. He was from Northern Territory. This fella Kelly brought him over.

‘See all that business, it broke up the tribal way. Aboriginal people they got to marry that person with the right skin, like eagle skin or snake.'

‘What do you think?' she asked, fastening the chain around her neck, wanting him to look at her.

And when he did, his eyes seemed distant, as though he was still thinking of something else. She remembered what he'd been saying.

‘You were talking about what it was like in the past,' she said, wanting him to continue, feeling guilty she'd interrupted him.

But it seemed he'd finished. Perhaps he was trying to tell her something but now the moment had moved on and she wasn't sure of the right question to ask and she didn't see the connection between him and the people he was talking about.

He was looking at the pendant and he smiled as he fingered it against her chest.

‘You're my woman,' he said.

For the heir to
triumph the father
must fall

I

Susannah kept the fan spinning fast above her head while she prepared the meal. Clouds appeared that afternoon, towering sculptures of cumulus, but they never ventured further than the northern corner of the sky. The heat had changed. It was thicker and denser. She could hear the noise of unhappy cattle and, occasionally, men shouting. They had returned to clean up the home paddocks. The last load of cattle would leave tomorrow, marking the end of the season. When the shearing finished on the farm there was always a cut-out, her father providing beers for the shearers, and in later years when there were more New Zealand shearers, they often had a hangi as well. She wondered if John intended to do anything for them before he sent them off. And what would happen to Texas and Laura?

She heated the oil in a pan on the stove and fried some onion. The couple had returned with the men last night. She hadn't seen Laura yet. They appeared to be sleeping together in Laura's quarters and eating across the creek in the camp kitchen. Last night John repeated what the grader driver had said. That Laura was begging for it. John saw his wife's smile and she could tell it made him angry. Susannah was smiling because she knew that neither man could cope with the idea that Laura had chosen Texas. She was no longer available to them. Not that she probably ever was.

Susannah couldn't understand how men's minds worked.

She wondered what they thought of her, how she compared with Laura: the mother who kept the house, who had the keys to the cool room and the medical chest but not the means to escape. She corrected herself, she did have the means to leave; there were vehicles, bank accounts. It was just that she was unable to believe that she could be anybody else.

There was the solid sound of boots stepping onto the veranda and a light tap at the door. Through the flywire she saw the shape of a man. She pushed it open and he stepped back, removing his hat. It was Texas.

‘Boss left his notebook up here.'

‘Has he?' Her face reddened. ‘I'll have a look.'

Dark curls pushed out from under the flattened hair around his head. His shirt was a deep blue with sleeves rolled to below the elbow. She handed him the notebook and saw that his wrist was narrow and wondered why she was unable to look him in the face. She stepped outside after he left and looked into the

Texas fading light. There was something about being on the veranda that made her feel like she was on a stage. How many women had stood there before her? And did any of them feel that perhaps they'd been given the wrong role? Her eyes settled on something closer, a pale pink patterned gecko that steadily traversed the wall in search of insects brought in by the light. The gecko's large protruding eyes reminded her of a mammal embryo. Its translucent fingers and toes spread out to stick to the wall. She remembered the documentary about a kangaroo joey and how its hairless pink body clung to the fur of its mother, its mouth wedged tightly over her large nipple, sucking relentlessly while she carried the creature until it grew to a size that altered her shape completely. She didn't resent her children. Not really. And she couldn't imagine being without them. Perhaps she just resented other mothers for not telling her what it would be like. She became aware of the fact that she was standing looking at the wall. Hastily, she stepped off the veranda.

She looked at her image in the bathroom mirror; the reflective material was flaking off in patches and she couldn't see all of herself. Laura's return made her feel as though she'd never been anything other than a mother. Her thoughts were interrupted by the shrieks of her children. The boys drove boats into each other in the bath. When they were dried and dressed in their pyjamas she let them run ahead of her towards the kitchen.

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