two mates sit in the front, Rose and Mary sit in the back with Abel next to them, contemplating the seatbelts (he’s never been in a car with back seatbelts), after a moment’s hesitation Abel grumbles to the girls: Put your seatbelts on, the sisters exchange a glance, decide not to push their luck, then click the belts into place … The kids drive to a burger joint, pool their money and stock up on burgers, chips and shakes, then drive to an empty parking lot, turn up the radio, open all four doors and tuck in, the boys drinking stolen warm beer from home and flicking cigarette ash out the open doors, and the girls gorging on flavoured milk. In the men’s world of the empty factory complex the boys miss their usual banter about girls that they know – who, where, how and what they’d like to do to them, which girl lets you go goal-to-goal and which wastes time with arm-wrestling – but Abel shrugs, What can I do? … Rose and Mary feel the heavy silence and know that they’re in its centre; Rose glares at the charcoal factory complex with the silent, empty chimneys, but Mary eyeballs the two boys, catching their quick glances, challenging them to face off. On the way back the boys need to release some pent-up testosterone so the best mate – Mary’s eyes stroking the back of his neck – drives too fast in his dad’s hot car, taking back roads to avoid cops; they hit something and the car bounces up, the passengers yell, the driver swears I’m fucking dead meat, and tyres squeal to a halt. Jumping out they run back into the dark, towards a pitiful yelping dog; when they reach it, it scans the three boys asking them with silent, crazy eyes Am I about to die? … Abel starts when his sisters grip his arms – he’d momentarily forgotten about them – he wants to shield their eyes but can’t tear himself away from the bleeding dog … Looks just like Wags, Rose whispers, digging her fingers into his flesh; Abel turns to stare at his sister in the dark – how the hell would she know? She was only a tiny tot when Wags disappeared during the bushfire … Just like when Wags lay down and played dead, Mary agrees – Not bloody likely, Abel thinks, but realises his sisters are referring to Wags’s framed pictures in his bedroom, next to 5×M+D. His best mate returns from inspecting the car, Dad’ll kill me, side fender fucked – Abel asks, What are we going to do with the dog? Now that his sisters have implanted Wags’s image onto the injured dog he can’t leave it to bleed so pathetically on the road. His best mate checks the boot: There’s no blanket. Abel takes off his shirt, his two mates do the same; they clumsily bandage the dog but when they lever him up, he yelps and snaps at their hands. We need to tie up his mouth, a moment’s hesitation, the three boys are already bare chested, Mary slips off her top and a long second later so does Rose. Rose’s arms snap shut tightly across her bare chest – but not Mary, whose boobs are now well and truly burgeoning. The two mates are stunned. Abel blushes, it’s been years since he’s seen his two sisters topless, but Mary – Geeze … let’s do it, Abel shakes himself, and his mates out of their reverie, they pull Rose’s top over the dog’s face and they tie Mary’s sleeves around the dog’s neck, he looks like he’s been to war … The dog yelps in heartbreaking pain as they place him in the boot, then they screech towards the vet in the town’s centre and the three bare-chested guys carry the dog inside, then slip away without giving their names or details, driving with the lights off. In a nearby street they stop, turn on the radio, open all four doors, with great sighs they light up cigarettes, the dark starry sky signalling that the status quo has changed, they now have two topless girls among them … Bare-chested Mary is offered a smoke and takes it without hesitation, flicking ash with the boys; Rose shakes her head, covers her chest and looks away … We’d better get back to your place, Abel, red-faced, flinches at the snapped glances of his two mates at Mary’s bare chest, floods with uncontrollable memories of Mum – he flicks away his half-finished smoke and tells everyone to hurry up … His best mate loans them t-shirts for the ride home that look like mini dresses on the sisters, Mary wiggling as she slips hers on. A week later Abel can’t resist a phone call to the vet – the dog has lost a leg but will survive – but the warm and fuzzy feeling for having saved a life lasts only about a year … Mary gets pregnant; Abel’s best mate is the father … Did you know this was going on? Mum accuses Abel, with words, this time, well, he did and he didn’t, if he hadn’t taken the girls that night … From Rose it’s If you hadn’t taken us that night – from Mary, We’re a team again, and this time I’m in your gang, Ali … But Mum has found legitimate leverage: I thought you looked after your sisters. All in all it hadn’t been a good night out – sure, he’d saved the dog that didn’t look anything like Wags, but he’d lost his two sisters and his best mate, who was of course barred from coming anywhere near Mary Marvin or her pimp brother ever again.
Just as scary as your first shag, right matey? Old Abel grins from the back seat of the driving instructor’s car, one steering wheel in front gripped by the driving instructor, a big guy with motley-veined face, suffering a permanent hangover, young Abel gripping the other. On a dare with himself old Abel extends his right hand through the whirling fog but the steam sticks to his fingers like wet glue; the more he strains the further the front seats stretch out of reach … Been driving for two years, mate, this is just to get my licence … Scratch of swollen red nose, But that other, first time, was terrifying, right? – bloodshot eyes grin – Those smooth young legs opening wide and the job is laid out to be done, right? … Scary or not, both Abels know that the first time was nothing notable; a few blind jabs, camouflaged by alcohol, cloaked in darkness beneath bushes, but the second time – a mammoth second time – was a lesson in itself, before obtaining that other licence – the one to know how to get women hot. But first things first, how he got here, with Granny Annie’s help of course … For the past few months, young Abel has been living with Granny Annie, in her big house raised on stumps, a heavy, brown wooden-beamed place, its hefty windows that take effort to lift, a place that groans with the wind, and smells from sweating wood in the summer. As a kid Abel’s dad used to play hide and seek under the house with his siblings, amid huge heating ducts like bloated silver caterpillars; Dad once confided, You can hear the grown-ups talk through the kitchen duct
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