see?’ she said, standing up and taking him by the hand. ‘You do understand the painting.’
• • •
Later, as his heart beat slowed, Asif was staring at the ceiling in the semi-darkness, still seeing the painting in his mind’s eye – the deep reds of the desert and the striking blues, pinks and greens of the ocean.
‘It’s more than just me,’ said Asif. ‘It’s us.’
‘What is?’ she murmured, her eyes closed.
‘The painting … it’s both of us.’
‘You think so?’
‘Of course. We are a contrast but also a coming together of different lives and cultures.’
She was silent for a while and he thought she had fallen asleep, but then she said, ‘We’re not so different. We share the same values.’
Asif was immediately confronted with a vision of Razzaq’s angry face. Tanya shared his Habal Tong philosophy but knew nothing of the cell.
‘Mostly,’ he agreed.
‘Not mostly,’ she laughed, ‘… totally. I couldn’t love a man who didn’t share my values and I know you do.’
‘But what about our work?’ he said. ‘You create and I destroy.’
‘You’re being deliberately superficial,’ she chided. ‘You don’t destroy. You mine minerals to create the basis for modern life.’
‘Through destruction … and I enjoy destruction.’
‘You create also … in the most important ways imaginable.’
‘I’m not very good.’
Since he’d been with Tanya, Asif had tried his hand at sculpture – carving and polishing the oddly shaped lumps of silvery magnetite he brought home from the mine and releasing their inner lives and beauty.
‘You’re better than you know,’ she said, then changed the subject.
‘When you get your citizenship, we should go to Sydney.’
‘What?’
It was a bizarre idea. Sydney was a mythical place – the Emerald City in the Land of Oz.
‘To live?’ he asked.
‘No … at least, not yet. I haven’t finished my work in OC … and there aren’t too many mining jobs in Sydney.’
‘Then why go there?’
‘Because Sydney is where I come from. My family are there and I’d like you to meet them.’
‘I’d like to meet them also,’ he agreed, with a sinking heart as he remembered his own family back in Bangladesh. He had sent money over the years but they had never accumulated enough to bring the whole family to Ord City. His mother could have come. His younger siblings could have come. But always they wanted more money so the entire extended family of aunts, uncles and cousins – half the displaced village – could all come out together. And in the meantime, the money was spent on survival.
‘Will your family like me?’ he asked.
‘They already like you,’ she said, snuggling her bottom up against him and moments later her breathing was long and deep.
Asif enjoyed several seconds of indescribable bliss as he basked in the glow of his love for her.
Then he remembered Razzaq.
Tuesday: Eleven Days Before the First Wave
Chapter 3
The Faded Flotsam
of Absent Lives
The heat was unbelievable.
Conan had landed in Ord City on the Monday afternoon and gone to the Kimberley Grand Hotel where he had a room on the 11th floor.
The next morning, he opened the door onto his small balcony and was assailed by the crushing heat and humidity. Within seconds the sweat began to bead on his brow and under his arms, but he stayed outside to acclimatise and get a feel for the city, which looked and smelled like Hong Kong or Bangkok. Buildings were clustered together in a riot of town planning and the hot breeze brought him wafts of car fumes, blocked drains and alien cooking. The streets below were choked with traffic and people, and Conan was momentarily shocked that a modern first world country like Australia could allow so much haphazard progress with so little order. Once the doors were open to the teeming desperate hordes the planning and order would always be in catch-up mode.
The city was mostly characterised by apartment blocks and bamboo scaffolding, but there was a CBD of some taller towers, the football stadium further south, and the Army of God cathedral with its huge red and yellow neon cross – that always reminded Conan of hamburgers.
Allowing his eyes to wander, Conan beheld the sun sparkling on Lake Argyle. To the far north there was maybe a glimpse of the Timor Sea. To the far south, the Ord River disappeared into the dim red distance, but in the middle, Ord City seethed and bubbled – two and a half million getting rich or getting by, as they always had at home.
For many of them – the First Wave as they were known – full citizenship was only days away.
And the city was getting nervous.
• • •
Edward Loong was the Head of Mission at the AFP headquarters in Ord City and was not overjoyed to make Conan’s acquaintance.
‘You must be Tooley,’ he said, ignoring Conan’s hand.
‘Call me Tools,’ said Conan. ‘Everyone else does.’
‘Call me Loongy,’ said Edward, ‘Very few call me that.’
‘Doesn’t really roll off the tongue,’ said Conan, unsure of whether Loongy was being friendly, or not.
‘You’d think it would by now,’ said Edward. ‘I’m sixth generation Australian after all … what about you, Buddy?’
‘Dunno … third or fourth … not that it matters.’
‘Oh, it matters,’ insisted Edward, ‘… more than ever.’
Conan laughed, still uncertain whether ‘Loongy’ was having a laugh or oddly paranoid about his ethnic heritage.
‘What’s so funny?’ demanded the head of the AFP mission.
‘Oh, nothing. Anyway, what’ve you got for me?’
Edward’s eyes narrowed. He suspected Conan was taking the piss somehow.
‘I don’t know why Sydney thought they had to send someone up here,’ he complained. ‘This case is already designated
