Finding Kerra Read online

  I dressed in country clothes for The Cup—jeans, shirt and Mrs Townsend’s boots. As I was doing up the laces, I paused, remembering Kerra repeating Blake’s words. Was she telling the truth?

  I was late getting to the kitchen. Mr Townsend was already cooking porridge.

  ‘Sorry I’m late, Mr Townsend.’

  ‘No worries, love. I usually make it when you’re not here.’ He smiled at me, but there was an inquiring look in his eyes.

  ‘Hi, Kerra.’ She was sitting at the table, watching her dad and her words rose again in my mind. I ruin everything. Mum would still be alive if it weren’t for me. She had been only five—surely, she had misunderstood Blake’s meaning.

  At the race track Blake was full of explanations about the camels, the races and what went on. He smiled at me and his eyes were warm as if he were thinking about our kiss as well.

  ‘Even the army have a camel in the races.’

  I watched one lanky camel driver stride down the track, leading his beast to the starting line. His hair was the colour of camel fur and he wore jeans and sweater—a modern camel driver, yet for me he still had that ancient presence of being one with himself and his animal like the first camel drivers.

  Blake lifted me up onto a high bench so I could see. ‘The camels all have to kneel before the race can start.’

  I laughed. As the last camel scrambled down on its haunches—groaning the whole way—a few others promptly stood again. ‘They’re not very cooperative.’

  ‘Nup. Never know which way they’ll run either.’

  Like an emu, I thought sombrely.

  After the fuss of getting the six camels to kneel, the race was on, before anyone was ready, not even the commentator.

  ‘Oh, here comes Curry on the side. No he’s gone west…now it’s Priscilla, Queen of the Desert in front…but no, she’s worse than a drunken driver…it’s Curry again, no, what an idiot, he’s stopped to check the oil…’ The caller’s voice came across the loud speaker, just before the winning camel crossed the finishing line.

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘Yep, it only takes fifteen seconds. Have to be watching or you miss it.’ Blake tipped back my hat. ‘They have heats like that all day to see who gets into the Cup Race. C’mon, I’ll get you a drink. It’ll be ages before they’re set up again at the other end.’

  ‘Have you ridden a camel, Blake?’

  ‘Sure. When I was younger I used to race. Too heavy now. Every year we sponsor one of them to race. All the stations help out.’

  Just then Zack saw us and brought some of his cousins over to talk. Well, they tried to talk but, even though it wasn’t lunch yet, most of them were ‘as drunk as skunks’, as Blake explained later. ‘Great guys,’ he said. ‘Hearts of gold…do anything for you. They just like their beer.’ One of them kept poking me on the shoulder to make sure I was listening, but I couldn’t understand his slurred words. If I didn’t already know Zack, I would have been uncomfortable, not knowing what to do.

  After some time, the guys got interested in the races again and while Blake went to get steak sandwiches for lunch, I wandered back to the benches.

  ‘Jaime.’ I swung round to find Zack’s mother, grandmother, and heaps of other people, smiling at me. ‘These are some of our relatives from Port Agutta,’ Zack’s mother said. Everyone said hello and by the time they’d all hugged me I couldn’t remember their names. Nazzi took my face in her hands and kissed me on the cheek. We’re having a party tomorrow night, why don’t you come?’

  I smiled my thanks and sat beside Nazzi. She was full of her own commentary about the camel races. ‘Never seen an ugly brown one like that before. And the handlers take longer and longer getting them down.’

  Zack’s mother laughed at her. ‘Mum, only one thing goes down on time up here, and that’s the sun.’ Sitting beside Nazzi like that made me want to ask her questions, lots of them. About ageless things, like ‘how do you know what you’ve come from when you’re born in a different place?’ or ‘how do you cope with not knowing?’ But she was too happy watching the ridiculous antics of the camels and I didn’t want to break her mood.

  That afternoon, soon after we’d gone to rented rooms at the pub to change, Kerra came to me dressed in white for the Cup Dance. I was glad. I’d been worried about her since there must have been so much on her mind. Mr Townsend had done his part, in his own quiet way, by the sound of it, but I knew there was a lot more lurking under the surface. She didn’t say anything at first, just went over to the dresser and stared out the window.

  ‘She loved me, Mum did.’ I stood behind her. It was the first time I’d seen Kerra in a dress. I hoped she wouldn’t get cold in the night but I didn’t nag her about dressing for the weather, since she seemed happy. She looked like a flaxen princess ready for a ball.

  ‘Yes, and I’m sure she’d want you to be happy.’ She looked up at me while she digested that, then I saw the smile. The hug, when it came, was as good as any one of Elly’s. It was the first time Kerra had hugged me of her own free will.

  ‘We have lots of time,’ she said, prattling almost like Elly would have done, and guiding me to the bed. ‘Dad won’t be in to get dressed for ages. He’s talking to all the other men.’ I knew what she was leading up to.

  ‘So you want me to tell you another story?’

  She nodded. ‘It might be too late tonight. Blake likes to stay out late.’

  ‘Does he?’ I guessed if Mr Townsend brought her home, I’d stay at the dance with Blake. The evening stretching ahead was holding all sorts of possibilities. ‘Why don’t you tell me a story for a change?’

  She frowned at me.

  ‘What are you thinking?’

  She lifted her shoulders and sighed, too big a sigh for one so young. ‘Just that I wished my brother loved me like Prince Hamid loved Princess Noori and like Mr Kimberley loved Liana and Abbas loved…’ I let her go on as I realised she’d just called Blake her brother.

  ‘Righto. Everybody ready then?’ It was Mr Townsend at the doorway. ‘Thought I’d find Kerra in here.’ He was shaved and gleaming clean; in his hand was the Akubra that everyone wore up there, even in winter. ‘Blake’s in the Cruiser.’

  That was our cue. Kerra literally jumped off the bed. Mr Townsend watched her, shaking his head. ‘First time I’ve seen her do that in a while.’ The look he passed me was one of thanks, as if he thought I’d done it all, worked a miracle. But had I? I suspected her happiness was as fragile as a whisper in the wind.

  I wasn’t ready for the rush of noise from the band. It was set up on the back of a huge truck on the race course. At first, the figures dancing round the fires looked bizarre against the backdrop of the night sky—like an ancient rite of the Celts. But when I drew closer, I couldn’t wait to join in. Guys in jeans and the hats that never seemed to fall off, girls too, were dancing to country songs round the campfires. The line dancing was wild, the guys with thumbs stuck in the loops of their jeans, concentrating on the steps, the girls laughing, hair swinging. There were tons of people, even tourists from Adelaide and interstate.

  Blake led me by the elbow and before I had a chance to sit by a fire, he’d swung me into the dance. It was fun; a lot like the dances Mr Kimberley used to teach us at school in Pakistan, but nothing like the stuff we danced at the Year 12 dinner in Adelaide. It didn’t stop, either. Before I knew it we were in another dance, then another that changed partners, like one of those folk dances in primary school, in and out the window, except it was in and around the fires. I was definitely beginning to wilt by the time I reached Matt in the barn dance. He could probably tell by the way I was stepping on his toes and when he said, ‘Want to have a rest?’ I didn’t care if I sounded relieved.

  He took me to have a drink in the shed where beer and soft drinks were on sale until ten. I wondered why he didn’t take me outside. It would have been cool
er.

  Instead he indicated chairs, sat down beside me and asked, ‘How’s it goin’?’

  It felt like the night he found me in the scrub. There was so much I wanted to say, knew I could say, but not just then. How easy it would be to have a crush on him; how much simpler life might be with his steady personality. Then I shook myself out of that thought. He was my mate. Blake was the one I liked.

  Matt answered his own question. ‘Kerra seems happier. I was dancing with her before.’

  ‘You?’

  He chuckled. ‘Yup. She’s quite a kid.’

  ‘She’s still a worry, though.’

  ‘Yeah?’ It was a question, not his usual grunt. His eyebrows rose.

  ‘You were right, I think, about Blake and Kerra. About it being to do with their mother. But knowing hasn’t fixed it. Something still has to be done.’

  ‘But only they can do it, right?’

  I took a sip of my juice. ‘I think so.’

  Blake was there then, pulling me up with a nod at Matt, taking me to supper in the next shed. Halfway through all the egg-and-lettuce sandwiches and party sausage rolls, I wondered how Kerra was doing. No doubt she was with her dad; supper seemed to be on tap and maybe they’d already had theirs. Supper wasn’t the only thing I found on tap. Outside, as Blake steered me over to a bench, there were a few whistles and laughs from a group of guys crowded round, drinking from green tins.

  Blake laughed. ‘Sure. Some of them will get drunk, but most of them are just having fun.’

  ‘Have you seen Kerra?’ I supposed I shouldn’t have started our time alone with Kerra but I was worried by then. I had a fleeting thought that maybe our peaceful day out was due to me not mentioning Kerra. He hadn’t seen her, nor did he seem very concerned about it.

  ‘You worry too much about her,’ was all he said, like she’d been okay before I came. I almost bristled, then calmed myself and asked him a question instead. I was still riding on the closeness I felt with him from the day before.

  ‘Blake, when your mum died, did you think it was Kerra’s fault?’

  He sighed, as though lifting a heavy stone, and stretched out his legs. I had a sudden vision of the fight we had at the gorge, but I couldn’t leave it alone, not after the stuff Kerra had been saying.

  When Blake did speak I almost jumped.

  ‘Yeah, I did. But I was barely thirteen years old. Sure, I thought it was her fault, but not only hers. If I’d been there, it would have been different. Maybe if I’d been home, if it were holidays—’

  ‘If you’d never gone away to school?’

  ‘That too, I guess. But I knew I had to go to school. It’s just stuff you think about. What if, what if.’

  ‘Kerra feels guilty about it too, like it was all her fault.’

  ‘What can I do?’ I heard his defensiveness rise like a castle drawbridge. ‘I can’t turn back the clock.’

  I didn’t care that he’d raised the bridge, I jumped into the cold water anyway. ‘You could give her a second chance. Don’t you think five years is long enough to bear a grudge? Kerra is just a kid.’

  He looked at me as if I’d said arsenic wouldn’t kill because it came in a lolly jar. It shocked me, to find that the blame was still present. But I could see Kerra, scared and defenceless, and I knew it was tied up with him.

  ‘Maybe you don’t outright blame her now, but what if that thirteen-year-old boy in there still does. No kid deserves to believe she’s evil like Kerra—’

  He stood up, the movement sudden, tipping the bench back. ‘Yesterday I thought you were beginning to understand—’ He stopped. ‘Look, what’s done is done. Just leave it alone!’

  I thought he’d be annoyed, but nothing prepared me for the look on his face. It was more than anger, there was hurt and pain as well.

  ‘I don’t have to justify myself to you, but you’re so wrong. I don’t consciously think it’s her fault. That’d be dumb…it’s if she gets in my face…it’s just a feeling I get. It’s the way things are.’

  I didn’t try to be gentle. ‘Surely it’s not the way things have to be.’ Maybe it was grief that had never been worked out. But there was Kerra, so young, she didn’t know how to cope with all the feelings she had.

  Blake was too quiet, his arms crossed, eyes shut. His whole body was taut and I knew deep inside he wasn’t quiet at all. His meaning was clear: subject closed. It unnerved me.

  If I’d said all that to my friend, Jasper, I think he would have ranted and raved even more, maybe got over it quickly, but I sure would have heard about it. But this was worse than the picnic at the gorge; this was a Blake who was so upset he didn’t even trust himself to speak to me, maybe never would again. I’d lost something I wanted, but how could I have a relationship with him when there was so much that couldn’t be talked about? The place he wouldn’t let me in would affect everything we did together. Would even yesterday have ended like this if I’d mentioned Kerra?

  I didn’t even touch him as I went back to the bonfires. I headed towards the music and dancing but I didn’t make it to the race track. There was this apparition, dancing all by itself, outside in the shadows, humming. Kerra. I watched her for a while. She hadn’t worn a jumper and the white dress made her look like a flower piskey. Her aloneness tugged at my soul, paralysed me so I couldn’t break into her spell.

  She saw me as she twirled and stopped, breathless and smiling. The smile made her a child again and I found my voice.

  ‘What are you doing over here?’

  She didn’t seem a child as she answered. ‘Need you ask? I’m practising my dancing to save Blake. Like Liana saved her brother and you.’

  Her tone and the way she had remembered such a detail, when I’d said so little about it, made me nervous. I tried to laugh but it came out as a croak. ‘Those are just stories—’ I didn’t get any further, as she danced closer.

  ‘Or I can be like Mariama. I could save Blake like she saved Abbas in the storm.’

  What did Kerra think she was going to do now? Just save Blake? How would she do that? I wondered then if it was ever possible to save anyone without dying in some way first.

  I took her by the hand. ‘Don’t you think we should dance by the fires where it’s warm?’ I felt like going home. Nothing had turned out like I’d expected. My first country dance: I’d had visions of dancing with Blake at midnight, coming home at some unearthly hour, kisses in the garden, maybe even fall in love. Now I knew it was finished.

  When we found Mr Townsend to go home, the last thing I saw was Richelle leading Blake into the dancing; the music was quieter and I was determined not to cry. Let her cheer him up after I’d pulled him down—she was his mate, wasn’t she? What did I care? But as I rode home in the back of the Cruiser I realised I did care. Too much.

  16

  Blake wasn’t around the next morning. I was glad. There was nothing more to say. Kerra had already gone by the time I woke. It had been so late when we arrived home that she and I had dropped off in my bed. If Mr Townsend noticed how quiet I was when he came in mid-morning, he didn’t comment on it, only asked if I’d enjoyed the dance.

  ‘It was different from what I expected,’ was all I said. That was true, at least. He went out after his smoko, back to finish stacking the hundred bales of hay he’d ordered in for horse feed.

  ‘We need rain,’ was his parting comment.

  The morning got more depressing as it wore on. Richelle turned up. I had expected a run-in with her. Even though the last time she came she seemed more accepting of me, I knew she must still be wary of me. You can sense things like that about people just the way you can tell if you’re being stared at. Also, she was a thermometer when it came to Blake’s wellbeing.

  I made all the right sounds and motions; got out the coffee, salty crackers with cheese, pickled onions and pepper, the way the Townsends li
ked them. She looked civil but I sensed there was a lot on her mind. She couldn’t keep her hands still. The trivia about the camel races didn’t last long.

  ‘And you, Jaime, what do you think you’re up to?’ She suddenly came out with it as if she’d caught me stealing from the station safe.

  ‘What do you mean?’ She breathed heavily, only just managing to stay calm.

  ‘Blake was fine all the other times he came home, before you arrived. Now he’s flipping all over the place.’

  ‘That’s not my fault. There’s stuff he needs to—’

  ‘Bullshit!’ Her calm shattered. ‘You’re an interfering bitch. This is our life. Who do you think you are to come and dig up stuff like this? To ruin everything.’ She was nothing like Matt. He didn’t share her view, did he? He said Blake should talk; that it may as well be to me.

  ‘But—’

  ‘He was doing fine. He’d put it all away. It has to be forgotten, you have to get on with life. Then you come along, you’—she even clenched her fists—‘you know nothing. You weren’t even here. Just because you thought you liked the look of him at school.’

  That stung. She made me sound like a thirteen-year-old airhead. I wanted the best for Blake, though I wasn’t about to tell her that, and the knowledge spurred me into defence.

  ‘You can’t sweep stuff under the carpet. Look at the way Blake treats Kerra—’

  ‘She’s a brat. He’s a good brother. No one’s ever understood what he’s been through. And Kerra was just a little kid. She wouldn’t even remember what happened.’

  Richelle had to be wrong. No one had ever bothered to find out what Kerra thought of it all.

  ‘I think she does.’ I believed what I said, knew that even if Kerra didn’t understand all that happened, she remembered how people felt at the time. But it sounded improbable and Richelle stared at me as if I were muttering insanities.