said they looked everywhere. Where have you been?' She hugged him, her body painfully hot, and he clung to her, shivering.
Meg stood nearby, hands to her face, eyes wide. She was in jeans, T-shirt and cardigan, her hazel curls bouncing loose around her face.
'Let's get him into the bedroom.' His mother's voice faded in and out like a radio off-station.
They helped him to his room at the far end of the house. Meg drew the curtains, blocking out the cracked and shattered windows, the view of the devastated service station.
'Meg, go call for an ambulance,' his mother said.
'That's two hours. Maybe we should drive him ourselves?'
'Just go call triple-0.'
Meg left and his mother told him, lullaby-style, to lie still; to tell her if this hurt; or this, or this. His mother's hands probed and lifted. 'I think you're all right, under all that dirt and muck.' She sounded surprised through the sniffles. 'Let's get you cleaned up.'
'Mum?' he mumbled, reaching tiredly. 'Megs?'
'Relax, Kevin, you're safe now. Safe. I'll be back in a jiffy.'
She brought a bowl and some towels. When she'd washed him down and pulled the blanket up, she sat by his side, holding his hand and feeding him sips of water. It didn't bring much relief. Maybe it was the smoke or maybe the dirt he'd swallowed, but the thirst just wouldn't go away. His throat was so raw and tight; the water hurt like pebbles going down.
'You're cold, Kevin,' his mother said. 'You want more blankets?'
'Hot.' He took another sip of water, choked it down.
'You're okay,' she told him, sniffling, her eyes red and puffy. 'Dehydration, sunburn. Shock.'
'Where's Dad?'
His mother dabbed at her eyes with a bunched tissue. 'He's gone, son.'
'Gone?'
'Found him in the servo, after they'd put the fire out. So they think. Took him to Charleville, to be sure.'
She sniffed and pulled herself straight. 'Thought you were in there, too. The policeman, he said you were both… He said he'd seen you both, before he dragged his partner out, before it burnt down. Thank God he was wrong.'
'I don't understand.'
'They even killed Bill and Ben.'
Kevin closed his eyes against the memories, the scarlet-tinged playback of his world falling apart: his father and the biker talking, gunshots, the sound of Molotovs exploding, the rush of heat and smoke. Boots, pointing to the ceiling, over by the door; scuffed and stained, a split in the side - his father's most comfortable pair, 'still a few miles left in them'. That cheeky grin.
'A gang, the police said. The Night Riders.' His mother pronounced their name as though it was a foreign language; something curious. 'They wanted to get their leader back. Bad luck, the policeman said. Just bad luck.'
'The leader, he was-' More memories: dark skin and white eyes and even whiter teeth. Kevin kneaded his temples as though he could massage the thoughts into some kind of sense.
Meg came back and sat by his side, her brow creased, those honey-brown eyebrows almost meeting. 'I rang Smithy. He's on his way.'
Kevin heaved himself into a sitting position. 'Did he say anything about that city cop, Hunter?' The more he thought about Hunter and his partner Dave, the more he thought that maybe calling the cops wasn't the best idea.
'No, Kev, just that he'd be straight out,' Meg said.
'What about Hunter? He tell you about that bikie? About what happened to Dad and me?'
'Just what I told you already,' his mother said, plucking at the fallen sheet. 'But I don't think Hunter was his name.'
'And I'm okay?' He examined his stomach, his chest, his throat. 'I haven't been, like, shot or cut or nothing?'
'No, nothing.' Her brows wrinkled with concern as she touched his forehead, her hand like a branding iron against his skin. 'A touch of fever, maybe.' She dabbed him with a wet cloth. He was so thirsty! He could suck that towel dry. He reached for it, but his mother had moved away.
'Take it easy.' Meg patted his arm. 'It's okay.'
He caught her hand and pulled her in, her scent wrapping around him, but she extricated herself from his desperate pawing and stood up.
'Rest now, Kev. When you're better, you can tell me what happened with your clothes, eh?'
A kiss on his forehead and she was gone, they were both gone, leaving him alone in the dark, a vague hunger gnawing at his insides, fevered exhaustion smothering him.
As the weariness claimed him, the loneliness swept in; swept him up and threw him, litter in a willy-willy, and dropped him on a different bed, in another house, in another time.
A white woman straddles him in a room smelling of violets and the heavy, sweet aroma of sugar cane. It's him, but it's not him; his skin is black, and yet it is him. Sweat beads on her lip and dangling breasts as she gasps above him. Then her teeth grow, mesmerising in the candlelight, four fangs gleaming. Nails, clear and sharp, slice into his chest where, in another age, he might have worn the charcoal-filled scars of manhood. His mind screams at the wrongness as she bends over him, breasts pointed and firm, stomach flat, hips wide. She pins him, then latches onto his throat. He flows into her. He is in her and she is in him and it is rapture, rapture that tears his soul as a cockatoo's scream slices across their panting. She bleeds for him, binding him to her - for now but not forever.
A flash of white by the bed. A girl - Willa - in bleached blouse and skirt, a ghostly presence in the fluttering candlelight.
'Welcome, Chris,' she says, and places a hand on the woman's sweaty shoulder where her hair sticks like weed on rocks. 'Welcome to the family.'
He screams in fury. In shame. In hate. Then he is free. Free to run. Free, too late.
Kevin jerked awake, fighting the bedclothes, his chest heaving. What the hell was that about? He grabbed the bedhead for support as he levered himself up. Still a bit weak around the knees. And very, very thirsty. Running a fever, maybe, like his mum said. Is this what having concussion meant - weird dreams and a cold sweat? It was so quiet: midnight quiet. He cracked the curtain - just gone sundown. He shook his head - hadn't been out that long, then - and dug jocks and jeans and a shirt out of the drawers. A crow's call rasped like a rusty hacksaw as he left the room. The hallway light was on, making him squint against the brightness. The house was still, like a museum. It felt as if they were leaving, as if everything was just waiting for the removalists to come. It was not a happy move. Tea. He could smell tea. Hear the chinking of china; murmured conversation interspersed with sobs. Voices: his mother and Meg.
He walked faster, bare feet making barely a sound on the threadbare runner, its burgundy faded to brown. To his left, the familiar sofa and armchairs and television, the front door; straight ahead, the breakfast bar with the kitchen beyond; and to his right, the dining room, just big enough for a cabinet and table. The women were at the table, his mother facing him at the kitchen end, Meg on the far side from him near the back door. His father's .243 leaned
