Chapter 36
TOWNSVILLE
Two days until the hearing. Five o’clock alarm.
Ronnie emerged from her tent down by the creek, ran around the perimeter trail, then lifted weights behind the barn for an hour.
The blue quandong sapling hadn’t died from neglect yet.
Someone must water it. She still felt tight beneath the incision scar. Exercise cleared her mind.
She drove up the hill past brown grass and sun-scorched orange clay to Stone House as the sun rose. Barefoot, she pressed the gas pedal and rolled up the gravel drive. A few hundred ewes looked up from grazing.
She left her dogs at Nev’s, filling her water bottle from the sink on her way out.
Maya and Matilda darted about the house like kids in a bouncy house.
Nev was still asleep, but Gaia and Blair wagged their tails hopefully.
Nev’s black collies looked eagerly between Ronnie and the metal bin that held their food.
On the Bruce Highway south, radio news personalities chatted about the sugar harvest. Cane harvesting season, what locals called “the crush,” had begun.
She arrived in Townsville by noon. She parked at the beach, eager to get on the swell now that she could see it.
It was a bigger day. The Great Barrier Reef made this part of the coast bollocks for surfing, but she was in luck; rough weather here yesterday made the waves larger.
From the car park she could already see surfers riding two-meter swells.
Good intervals today, not too close together.
The sun was out. Blue skies, turquoise water, couldn’t ask for better weather. She wrestled into her wetsuit, waxed her longboard. She loved the smell.
Hot sand underfoot, then wet sand along the waterline. Water was colder than air, a shock to her bare feet and ankles, then felt nice.
Holding her board under her arm, she jogged out past the first wave, then paddled out to where the other surfers were. She had been worried about the paddle out, but it wasn’t bad. The wetsuit insulated her core and kept her warm.
Surfers out on a good day with clean break. She spotted Mikey, paddled over, then sat next to her, boards side by side. They rode sets while their other friends arrived.
They took a break in the early-afternoon to eat falafel from a food truck on the beach, hit the public toilets, then went back out on the water again.
Ride a perfect set in, paddle out, spot another set on the horizon.
The golden hour before sunset, sky on fire. Saturation dialed up all the way.
Orange and pink clouds, rainbow sherbet.
Sea on fire, burning waves.
The board bobbed up and down beneath her on the waves like Dreadnought walking. She let it carry her toward land, toward the dark shore.
Mikey bobbed next to her, straddling her own board. “Nervous about the hearing? It’s so soon.”
Her back hurt. “A little, yeah. Thanks for volunteering to come to the courthouse for moral support. You know I haven’t been in a courtroom in ages. I’m glad we’re hanging out today. I won’t be able to talk much the day of the hearing. I’ll be disassociating and trying not to poop my pants.”
“No worries, mate, I’ve got your back. Least I can do, as her fairy godmother.
” Mikey had been by Ronnie’s side every day in juvie before Rainbow was born and had been with her the following day, when she didn’t have a baby anymore, and the day after when her milk came in.
Mikey had been with her through the mastitis. Worst two years of her life.
The sunset was pretty, but they should probably start paddling in before dark.
“I’m thinking of buying land in Lionheart, or maybe a little further out where land’s cheaper.
If I build a house and start my own farm, you two should come live with us.
It would be fun for the kids. Rainbow would love that.
She’s been after me for a little brother. ”
“Aw, really? That’s so sweet. Jesse would love that. Sure, maybe. I don’t see why not. If you’re serious, ask me again.”
“Totally.”
After sunset, they paddled to shore in the dark.
She imagined sharks watching them from below. Surfers ignored sharks the way farmers ignored fires and floods. You could be a smarty pants and plan, but in the end the elements controlled your fate. Danger was the price of admission.
She moved her truck to a different parking spot on the Strand, then lay down in her sleeping bag in the bed.
She loved how soft and warm nights were here as opposed to up on the Tablelands in the mountains.
Her lower back kept her awake. She stretched until the painkillers kicked in, then drifted off to the sound of waves, nose and lungs full of sticky salt air, sand between her toes.
Safe.
At dawn a cop woke her by squeezing her shoulder. “Oi! Oi!” The officer ordered her to move along.
Nowhere was perfect.
Dawn at the beach—pale pink, pearlescent. Ocean spray on her face a mist like horizontal rain, cold as her dream of flying. Mikey sat on the back of her camper van, smoking. Ronnie walked over and joined her in looking out at the waves. Mikey passed her the joint.
Low drone of waves crashing on the shore, eternal white noise machine inhuman, older than life. Ronnie envied people who lived near the beach.
She relaxed. She had pushed herself yesterday, so her lower back hurt, but that was part of the healing process. She hadn’t done any permanent damage.
Mikey took the joint back, gesturing to Ronnie’s longboard. “Want to go for a surf?”
She studied the ocean. Glassy offshore. Two-foot-tall, short-period waves breaking softly and slowly. “Mush burgers?” Kiddie stuff. It wasn’t stinger season yet, so she could get by without shoving herself into a damp wetsuit.
Mikey killed the joint, slid heavily down from the van and stretched with a loud groan.
“Rock and roll.” Ronnie’s mom friend who worked as a mechanic hadn’t been athletic ten years ago, but had joined a gym and had been working out.
Mikey appeared to have more energy this spring than she had last summer.
Mikey was kicking so much butt in life, showing what a badass a single mom could be.
When Ronnie returned wet to her dented F-150 later that morning after surfing and rinsing off in the public showers, the side doors of her friend’s van were open and her friends were inside smoking. As she walked closer, she smelled pot.
Reg stood chatting with her friends from juvie, his hairy arms crossed. His truck sat parked nearby.
She pulled the hood of her sleeveless hoodie up against the midday sun. “What’s up?”
Reg’s face brightened when he saw her. They hugged.
“Everything all right?” she asked.
“You didn’t answer your phone, kiddo.”
She pointed over her shoulder towards her truck.
Reg had shadows under his eyes. “Big day for the family tomorrow; everyone’s on edge, mum reglazing windows, Blaise blasting ABBA…”
The man drove ten hours round-trip to check on her. He thought she would do something stupid.
“You worry too much,” she said.
“I know. It’s a problem.”
“I’ll be there. Trust me.”
Reg deflected. “You’re my baby girl. It’s hardwired into me. Don’t forget you have that suit fitting in Cairns at four. It was big of your brother to set that up. He doesn’t like to throw his weight around like that, so show him that you appreciate it by not being late, eh?”
Godlike Mattie, the perfect son.
“I’ll be there. I have another thing at two.” Tattoo removal appointment. What time was it now? She needed to jet.
“Better leave now, or you’ll be late.” Reg looked guilty, rubbed his nose. “Listen. I brought Nev.”
“What?” Ronnie walked over to the passenger side of her dad’s truck. Nev looked up from her phone and waved. Dark sunglasses made it difficult to tell if she was there voluntarily or if she had been kidnapped.
Reg was in full papa-bear mode. She didn’t know why she was surprised.
“Thought you might want company on the drive,” he said. Not quite an apology, but almost. Reg glanced out at the ocean. He thought she was going to stuff this up between now and tomorrow. That hurt.
She stared at him in disbelief. “You brought a babysitter?”
Nev got out of Reg’s truck. She had showered and combed her hair. She looked fussy and posh in her jackaroo boots and button-down work shirt, and frowned. “I’ve been demoted. Don’t look so excited to see me. I got roped into this. Did I miss surfing?”
Ronnie laughed, then felt self-conscious about how grunge she must look barefoot in board shorts. Her wet hair was a mess, and she had sand in her arm hair.
“Hiya babe.” She squished Nev against her chest, accidentally drowning the shorter woman in boobs. “Come meet my mates.”
Nev shook hands with Mikey. “G’day, g’day. How ya going?”
Mikey looked impressed. Some of the others smiled. One snickered.
Nev jammed her hands in her pockets. “Did you tell them about the thing?”
Ronnie was confused until she remembered.
“I have a hearing in front of a judge tomorrow.” Why was it so hard to talk about? “I’m trying to get more time with Rainbow. They might give me my parental rights back. You know, legally.”
Her friends stared at her blankly for a minute, then jumped up grinning when they understood. “Aw, mate! Good luck! You’ve got this!” They piled out of the camper to hug her. They were big on bear hugs.
“I’ll let you know how it goes.”
Mikey had to pick up Jesse and decided to drive her own car to Lionheart.
Nev held out her palm for the keys. “I can drive. I’m fresh.”
“Nah, that’s all right,” Ronnie said. “I like to.”
Nev tossed her a bottle of ibuprofen from the passenger seat. “How was church?”
In the driver’s seat Ronnie’s back was making it hard to think, but other than that she was high on happy brain chemicals from pushing her body past the point of exhaustion two days in a row. She searched for words to explain this feeling to someone who had never surfed before.