Thunder Road (22 page)

IT WAS a long walk. What took a few minutes on the bike took over an hour on foot. By time I reached Paritai Drive it was some time after eleven o’clock. The door was opened by a boy I had never seen before. Fresh from somewhere in Asia, he could not have been more than 14. Like his predecessor he was dressed in white cotton, but seemed to be wearing a lot of gold. Chains, ear studs, rings on his fingers and toes: early days in their relationship, I guessed. The present-buying stage.

‘I’ve come to see Wes.’ This was greeted by a blank smile of incomprehension, then he gestured me in. I had the feeling that this boy was only days out of some hell-hole in Manila. A FOB as we used to say: fresh off the boat.

In the lounge Wes lay back on some sort of antique recliner. Feet elevated, head almost horizontal. He was wearing his
regulation
white bathrobe and carpet slippers but he had his head back with a flannel draped over his face. He looked vulnerable.

‘Who is it?’

I made a shoo, shoo gesture to the boy who seemed pleased to retire.

‘It’s me, Wes. Trace Dixon.’

There was a pause; you could almost hear the cogs of his mind grinding into action.

‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’

‘I feel we have unfinished business.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what might be the nature of that business?’

He hadn’t moved a muscle since I walked in, the flannel still covering his face. His calm was intimidating.

‘You don’t know?’

‘Well Trace, I know what unfinished business I have with you, I just want to … reassure myself that we are talking about the same thing.’

‘I’m here about Devon.’

There was an almost imperceptible sigh beneath the flannel and a minute shake of the head.

‘Trace. Listen carefully. In the parlance of your generation, it’s “game over” as far as Devon’s concerned. I say it with some regret, as I liked the boy, and all I can say by way of commiseration is “it happens”.’

‘So that’s the end of the matter?’

‘Yes.’

I wasn’t sure where to go from here or even what I wanted Wes to say, but I could tell this particular path was sealed off.

‘Well what do
you
think is our unfinished business?’

Wes took the flannel off his face and sat up. He was smiling. He had won some sort of little opening gambit and was
entering
the game with enthusiasm.

‘Like all things in this hungry little world, it comes down to money. You have some money, I believe, quite a hefty sum. I want it. It’s mine.’

‘How much do you think there is?’

‘Possibly half a mill, I am informed.’

‘Who informs you?’

He shook his head as if I had made a basic gaffe. ‘We don’t mention names in this business. They’re irrelevant anyway, what it comes down to is information. The bearer of that information
is only important from a sort of book-keeping perspective.’

He wandered across to the bar and poured himself a glass of wine from an opened bottle. There was no offer of a drink today. It pleased me.

‘I have a wide array of associates. From judges right through to people whose only talent is for inflicting pain. The process of making money is what keeps us all in line. We are all loyal – if in no other sense – to that process. You know the expression “keeping it honest”? Well in my circle it’s making money that keeps us honest, predictable. Not laws or moral codes. Those dictates have a different purpose, and I salute that purpose.’

He raised his glass as if making a toast.

I watched him, fascinated. The vulnerable old man I’d seen on a reclining chair when I first arrived was gone: changed to someone who was in charge. And he knew it.

‘I’ll only say this once. Listen carefully. It’s like this. Devon blundered into our world and he dragged you in after him. You were like his Man Friday. He didn’t know how things worked. He continually overestimated himself. He imagined that you could rip off a large amount of …’ he paused, searching for a word, ‘product and sell it on without being detected.
I mean, they can’t run to the police can they?
’ He stopped for a while as if marvelling over the naivety of the logic.

‘His assumptions, all of his assumptions, were wrong. The drug scene is very regulated at that level. How do you think they keep the prices up? Many livelihoods were damaged by what he did, what you both did, and these were people with a lot to lose. And yes, Trace, they can run to the cops because in some cases, they are the cops. To think otherwise is not naivety, it’s stupidity.’

‘So it’s nothing to do with you, eh? You’re above all that?’

‘You sound petulant. I didn’t invent the game. I didn’t make the rules, but I accept them. They apply to me too. I know what the inside of a cell’s like. I know what you have to do to survive there. Sit around and cry “not fair” and you really
are
history. But enough of this, let’s get to the point. Thank you for
coming
in, Trace, it means I won’t have to send for you. That can be very stressful. What I am charged with doing – on behalf of others – I get no direct material benefit from this, Trace – is recovering as much of the missing proceeds as possible. We call it
damage control
.’

‘You think I have it?’

He looked immediately caught, as if he hadn’t thought of something. He lost his slow dead-pan delivery.

‘I hope you do. For your sake.’

‘Were you the one who told them about Johnno? Who set those two goons onto us?’

‘Trace, there is nothing to be gained from this. I have a deal which I have been wanting to present to you. Can we skip the rewinds?’

‘It
was
you. Nobody else knew about him. So it was just a matter of setting your mate Sloane the task of retrieving the dak. You wouldn’t even do that yourself.’

He raised his hand to shut me up. ‘Not my
mate
, Trace. My son.’

I sat there, open mouthed.

‘What did Pope say? “A little learning is a dangerous thing … fools rush in …” You’re angry because you’re stupid. I treated you two like equals, but that doesn’t mean you
were
equals. In wealth or power or knowledge there was no comparison. It was only your youth I found attractive….’ He stopped for a moment and then added sharply, ‘And that certainly isn’t the case now.’

He put down his drink and sat on a bar stool with his hands resting on his knees. The sharp, white spotlights washing down on his bald head made him look every inch the evil genius from cartoons. I almost laughed at the thought: the unreal sight had helped something to turn for me.

‘The deal is this, Trace. It’s the best deal … the only deal in fact. Drop off what you have. Keep a block for yourself … call it educational expenses and then get the hell out of here. Don’t let your face be seen on these streets again.’

‘What was it like? Being able to sit in this chair and tell Sloane, tell your son… .’

‘Listen to what’s on offer, Trace. Do it now. Time’s running out for you.’

‘I’ve got something for you, Wes, something Devon might have wanted returned.’

I pulled the Yin Yang necklace from my pocket.

‘I don’t want it.’

‘Maybe you can give it to your new houseboy. He looks as if he likes presents.’

‘Get out of here, Trace. This is over.’

‘I’m going, Wes, don’t worry, I don’t like it here. But before I go, you’re going to wear this medallion. I reckon it sort of stands for how things were. The black tadpole, the sign of evil, that’s you. The white one is Devon … and the little spots, they’re your common ground.’

I walked quickly across the room and put the necklace around his neck. In his watery blue eyes I saw something I hadn’t seen before. Fear.

It released something inside me.

Something terrible.

I threw my arms around him in a bear hug, imprisoning his
arms at the same time. I wanted to squeeze hard – hard enough to crush the life out of him. But instead I slid my arms down and picked him up off the floor. He seemed so light he was almost weightless. His screams and kicking came from somewhere far away. I walked slowly out onto the deck.

In front of us were the matchless views of the harbour, the dark familiar form of Rangitoto in the distance. A view to die for. Carefully descending the three or four steps to the lawn, we progressed slowly to the edge of the cliff. The winding harbour front esplanade murmured 30 metres or so below us, the traffic still busy. I became aware of Wes’ frantic kicking.

‘Relax, Wes! Remember what you told me? The right to live here is what it’s all for. All the deals, all the channels you’ve carved, that drag the money in. Enjoy!’

Standing sideways and pivoting with my hips I saw I could toss him a reasonable distance out, but he would still bounce several times before finally hitting the road below. I remember thinking how someone was going to have a good story to tell when they got home that night. ‘We were just driving home, around the last corner before the bridge, when splat!’

As Wes had said, it was ‘game over’.

I swung back to get some real momentum. At the same
moment
there was a stab of pain in my chest. I paused. It was the adze. Searing me like a hot rock pressed against bare skin. I thought of Ra. I thought of what he had suffered and then I recalled his final advice. ‘Eruera. Before long your heart will burn for utu. For revenge. It’s the natural thing. You mustn’t listen to it. It’s no good.’

The kicking had stopped. Wes had given up and lay limp, a dead weight in my arms. He was just so much tired, old flesh, and one day soon, without my help, he would die too. That
would be an end to it. He represented nothing that I feared any more and his death would make no difference to me. I placed him almost gently on the grass and he groaned quietly and held his chest. As he lay there I looked out to sea. I felt the adze, strangely cool now. The million dollar view didn’t seem so special now. I turned and walked back to the house.

In a room off the lounge the Asian boy was playing a computer game in front of a giant TV. ‘You may thank me for this, one day,’ I thought as I slipped quietly out the front door.

IT’S DIFFERENT over here, and I’m a different person. It’s like a frontier, where anything’s possible. On the Gold Coast it’s one season, all year round. Summer. The days are all fine and warm and one runs into another. I can see why so many old Kiwis come here to retire. It has the boring predictability of heaven itself.

I like it here for other reasons. It’s a place for the clean slate, to put all the fuck-ups, all the grief, behind you and aim at doing something fresh. I’ve got this little flat 50 metres from the beach. I live alone but I’m not lonely. Better to be alone than chasing some dream girl, dancing ahead of me into a fake future. I’ve got a job with a rental car outfit: it just hires convertibles and Harleys. People love it. Cruising along the esplanade, the hood down, seeing and being seen. Or maybe playing at being a
hog-riding
bad boy for the day. Fantasy stuff. They pay big though. It’s given me this business idea which I’ve already started. I’ll have a motor bike rental agency which specialises in big British bikes. Not for noters, but for people who know the real thing. People who like the rattle and roar of great bikes.

I used the last of the money to buy a Bonneville and a BSA Goldstar. A few weeks ago I found a Trident; now it’s just a matter of getting the owner to part with it. Of course what I’m really holding out for is another Norton Atlas but that’s going to take a while. Five bikes should be enough to get started. I’ll set up somewhere along the beach front. I’ve already thought of a name. You guessed it. Thunder Road.

It’s been nearly a year since Devon died. I must think of some way of marking his anniversary. I guess what Wes didn’t know, or had long forgotten, was that it isn’t ‘game over’. Devon got so much wrong but they were just details: behind the surfaces, the talk, the act, there was something glowing, something golden. He’s a song that will hum in my heart forever. His cheeky, brazen grin. The arrogant confidence never fazed by what life threw at him. The vision to stick his head up and see a world beyond the glass dome. The courage to go out and live in that world, no matter what.

It was a long journey from the quiet, misty valleys of the East Coast to the midnight frenzy of Thunder Road. But it was in those frantic bursts of speed and screaming tyres that Devon found himself. In the blinding rush to oblivion, where, for a few seconds, we are released.

As the child of school teachers, Ted Dawe moved around New Zealand a great deal – from Mangakino, Ruatoria, Tokoroa, Otaki, Darfield, New Plymouth and finally Invercargill. He currently lives in Auckland with his family.

He’s had numerous jobs: he’s been a builder’s labourer, university student, world traveller, high school teacher but his favourite job was floating above London’s Hyde Park in a hot air balloon. These days he is the Director of Studies at a foundation college in Auckland; a job which he enjoys. Ted Dawe travels, surfs, plays tennis and loves cars and car people, but admits to driving a motor scooter to work.

Thunder Road
was written over 40 days, one summer. Although it came to him in a rush, he had been mulling over the story for some time. The character Devon reminds Ted Dawe of his cousin, Jak, a dynamic, over-confident street racer who died in a car accident.

F
ICTION

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2005

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