The Sky So Heavy

Lokey’s Jaffa-red Datsun was parked at the top of our driveway. I navigated my way carefully down the slope. Outside our front door I took off my shoes, my hoodie and the tracksuit pants I was wearing over my jeans. I left them on the porch and went inside. Lokey was in the kitchen eating a bowl of cereal. His shoes had left puddles across the tiles.

‘Dude!’ he said. ‘Snow! Can you believe it? It’s fully awesome.’

‘I can’t believe you drove here, there’s ice on the road.’

‘It was sweet. Bit slidey. I brought my board down.’

‘What? Your snowboard? The snow’s patchy as.’

‘Yeah, but I reckon I could get a sick run down your front lawn.’

Max walked in holding an esky lid. ‘Will this do?’ he asked Lokey.

‘Maximum. That’s awesome, dude.’

‘Hey Lokey, can you put your shoes outside?’ I got a roll of paper towel and then reconsidered and put on some washing-up gloves.

‘Who the hell are you, the cleaning lady?’ Lokey took his shoes off and dumped them on the front porch.

‘Fin thinks the snow is poisonous, radioactive,’ said Max.

‘Serious?’ laughed Lokey. ‘How do you know?’

I blotted up the puddles with the towel and put it in a garbage bag, tying the end. I was pretty sure that wasn’t the recommended procedure for nuclear waste management.

‘We don’t know. That’s the point.’

‘But wouldn’t they tell us?’

‘How? There’s no electricity.’

Lokey let out a low whistle and shook his head. ‘Poison or no poison, I’m going to ride your lawn, man.’

‘I’m coming!’ said Max, holding up the esky lid. ‘Toboggan.’

In my mind I heard my mother shrieking disapproval.

‘No you’re not,’ I said.

‘I am!’

‘No, Max.’

Max threw the esky lid on the floor and stormed to his room, slamming the door theatrically. Lokey was pissing himself with laughter.

‘You are hilarious,’ he said. ‘As if it’s poisonous.’

‘I saw an anti-terrorism website once. It went through the dangers of radiation.’

‘Dude, who the hell looks at anti-terrorism websites? Anyway, someone would have told us. It was on the other side of the world.’

‘I’m telling you. I have to look after Max, otherwise I wouldn’t care.’

‘Hey, where’s Kara?’

‘You’re obsessed.’

‘Admit it, Fin, she’s totally hot.’

‘You’re mentally disturbed.’

‘Where is she?’

‘I don’t know. She and Dad didn’t come home last night. Maybe they stayed at Kara’s mum’s. Maybe there’s ice on the road. I don’t know.’

‘Shit.’

‘Yeah.’ We both stood there in the space left for some sort of meaningful exchange. We didn’t fill it.

‘Heard you had a little study date with Lucy Tenningworth yesterday.’

‘Yeah. I dunno if I’d call it a date… Was kind of interrupted by the whole nuclear disaster thing.’

‘She is way out of your league, man.’

‘Thanks for your vote of confidence.’

He grinned. ‘I mean, are you sure she’s not using you to get to me? I am pretty popular these days.’

‘Again, your belief in me is amazing.’

‘Well, dude, I’m going to go ride your lawn. Watch from the window, you don’t wanna get poisoned.’

I watched Lokey do about five runs down our steep front lawn, each time bailing at the last moment before he hit our house. Then he threw his board in the back of the car and gave me a wave, off to find bigger slopes. The car fish-tailed as he took off up the hill.

I bummed around for a bit, had four slices of bread with jam for breakfast, did some drawing and tried to ignore the worry that was sitting in my gut. Max didn’t come out of his room till after lunch. He pretended it was because he was really pissed off but I think he probably just fell asleep. We meandered through the afternoon, waiting, but not sure what for. It’s amazing how slowly time goes when you have no electricity. Several times I reached for the TV controller, forgetting we had no power. Kara had given Dad a plasma for his birthday. (She said she had bought him a plasma as if she used her own money.) It’s funny how without something as simple as electricity it was completely useless – just a gaping, blank stare of black. Without electricity our house was a box of useless bits of moulded plastic and wiring. I was tempted to listen to my iPod, but figured the power could be down for ages. I wanted to save the batteries.

I thought about Lucy.

By five it was dark and any heat in the house had leached out. I put on an extra jumper and two pairs of socks, found an old Dolphin torch in the garage and set it up on the dining table as a lamp. It turned out Kara’s scented candles were useful after all. I lit a few in the kitchen and lounge room and pretty soon the place smelt sickly sweet with vanilla. Max and I played cards and listened for the sound of a car in the driveway.

Around six-thirty I got us some dinner, leftovers that were in the fridge: chickpea curry, cold sausages, slices of cheese. At least the cold would stop it from going off.

‘This sucks,’ said Max as he picked up a sausage, dunked it in tomato sauce and bit the end.

‘I know.’

‘Where’s Dad, Fin?’ There was a waver in his voice.

I swallowed. ‘They’re probably staying at Kara’s mum’s.’

‘But you don’t know, do you?’

‘No, Max. I don’t know.’

‘What if he’s dead?’

‘He’s not dead, Max. Why would he be dead?’

‘Radiation poisoning.’

‘Too soon, takes a while for radiation to kill a person.’

Max’s eyes widened.

‘I’m kidding, Max. He won’t have radiation poisoning.’

‘But you said…’

‘Look, I know, but… Max, look at me.’

He turned his face to me. He has one of those faces that never really grows up. Big rosy cheeks and eyebrows that tilt up slightly in the centre, giving him an expression of permanent bemusement. At twelve he looked pretty much the same as he did when he was three and I reckon he won’t have changed much by the time he’s thirty.

‘Max,’ I said. ‘I need you to stay with me, man. Whatever happens. We can do it but we have to do it together.’

‘Do what?’ His lip quivered.

‘See this out. Can you do that for me, Maximum? Trust me. Okay?’

He nodded soberly. The torch threw a stark pool of white light onto the wall, like a spotlight. Max and I ate the rest of our dinner in silence.

Four