John Marsden - Incurable

I guess it was Gavin’s recent lifestyle that convinced him to head for the bush. The only bush available of course was the park. If he’d thought about it, he would have been safest in a crowded place. A shopping centre would have been ideal. Or, if he was so determined to go to the park, a dive straight into the middle of a football match would have been just as good. But during the war Gavin had learnt to go for cover, to get away from people, to avoid trouble, to hide. And since the war he’d learnt to trust the outdoors, and he’d developed a confidence in himself when he was in the open. So he wasn’t thinking shopping centres or football teams.

We sprinted two and a half blocks. That is a long long way. Crossing one street Gavin nearly got hit by a taxi. The guy swerved and hit the brakes, letting off enough smoke from the tyres to attract the CFA. At the next crossing I nearly belted straight into a woman on a bicycle. She had to swerve and brake pretty fast too. The way she abused me! I didn’t even look around.

I did think though, as I raced on, that there was one positive about these near misses. At least there were now two witnesses to our mad sprint. I don’t know if they saw the guy chasing us, but if we both got murdered, then the taxi driver and the cyclist could give evidence at the inquest. Maybe then they’d start checking to see why we were running.

It wasn’t a very comforting thought. I decided I’d better concentrate on getting away from the weaselly guy.

Ahead of me, Gavin belted across the road next to the park. He was still running strongly, driven by demons that I didn’t know about. But he was pretty fit. This road was wide and looked like it would normally be very busy, but there wasn’t a car to be seen. I didn’t dare look around again, but I knew the guy was even closer to me, probably within ten metres. Gavin was no more than twenty-five metres ahead, so we had gained on him, probably because we were both bigger and stronger and took longer strides. But the way the guy was panting, I’d say he was feeling the strain, and the way my chest and legs felt, I was definitely feeling the strain, and I thought Gavin would be reaching his limit too.

I was praying for him to head left, towards the football games, but he headed right, into the trees.

Of course it was nothing like the bush. These were nice old trees, elms and oaks and things like that, not a lot of leaves on them at this time of the year, but big thick trunks. Gavin ran straight down a bitumen path, then veered off across the lawn. He was heading for the thickest clump of trees, but I couldn’t see how this was a good plan. Wherever he hid, the guy only had to look behind a maximum of a dozen trees to find him. It was a pretty short-sighted strategy.

I glanced back again at the man. He still had that look of absolute determination, his face focused on one thing only. And he must have been fitter than I thought, fitter than his panting had suggested. He looked full of running. Ahead, Gavin had disappeared. He’d chosen one of those trees and was behind it right now.

I swerved left, ducked behind a tree, then used it as cover to get behind the next one. This was like a childhood game of hide’n’seek, except it was no game. I’d seen expressions like this guy’s before. To me it meant only one thing. He wanted to do grievous bodily harm.

He came after me. He skidded around the tree I’d just left, and when he saw I wasn’t there came straight for the tree I’d chosen. Watching with the corner of my eye, I saw that one thing had changed. He was now carrying a knife. The blade must have been twenty centimetres long, if not thirty. That is a knife.

I broke cover and bolted across another path, swerved behind a gum tree, and zigzagged around a couple more trees, getting a glimpse of him at one stage. But he didn’t see me. I was now behind one of the English trees, a thin young one. I took the risk of going back across the path again, hoping to find Gavin. Now the man saw me. So much for all that zigzagging. I’d wasted my advantage. I headed back towards the first couple of trees, but as I did I saw Gavin. The man must have flushed him out because Gavin was now running like crazy down the second path.

The man was following Gavin. I set out on a different route, to meet Gavin at the fountain. I don’t think the guy saw me at any stage. He’d somehow hidden the knife again. I don’t know how he did that, unless it was one of those trick knives that retract into the shaft. I guess he could have shoved it into his tracksuit pocket, but he’d want to be careful. He was gaining on Gavin. Gavin reached the fountain about three seconds before me, chucked a right, and went down another path, then immediately charged off to the left. I followed him. I’d say the guy was about three seconds behind.

Gavin had disappeared again, behind one of the trees. I chose a tree at random, knowing the guy was too close and he’d see me for sure. But I was close to my limit and couldn’t do much else. I did at least choose the widest tree I could find, a big pine.

We started another one of those childhood games, except that I don’t think this one has a name, just me circling the trunk, and him doing the same, me trying not to meet, him trying very hard to get closely acquainted. It was bluff and double bluff. Rock scissors paper, trying to anticipate what your opponent will do. I edged around to my right, then looked back and realised he was following. I went faster, and nearly ran into him as he came the other way. He had the knife again, but instead of stabbing with it, he tried to grab me with his free hand while pulling back the hand with the knife, so that he’d get velocity. I pulled my hand away, shrank back, then ran to the next tree, round the other side of it. The game continued. This tree was much thinner, so there wasn’t much room for bluffing and counter-bluffing. It was just me spinning around the tree, trying to keep away from his hands. Then, as he changed direction again, I jumped back and raced to another tree. All the time I was thinking that someone would come along, see what was happening, intervene, save us. This seemed like the quietest park I’d ever been in.

Suddenly, like a wild little creature from the forest, Gavin raced up, kicked for the man’s balls, missed, but by a miracle got the knife instead. It spun through the air and bounced on the bitumen path. But it was too close to the guy for either of us to risk diving at it. Gavin had already taken off again so I followed him, the man losing a couple of seconds as he got his knife back.

I’d only looked into his face for a second, but I thought I would remember it forever. The heavy eyelids, the thin eyebrows, the sharp nose, the badly shaved chin, but above all, the expression of cold hatred or, even worse, of no feeling at all. The total focus on one objective, getting rid of two people, and the sense that, nothing else existed, everything else in the world could take care of itself until this mission was accomplished. He was the ugliest, most horrible human being I had ever seen, but I guess I was biased by the fact that he was trying to kill us. If he’d been collecting for the Salvos I might have felt differently. If he’d been bending over me in hospital administering life-saving antibiotics… but no, I felt sickened at the image. That wasn’t in his face, kindness wasn’t possible for him.

Yet we were in a dance. The sun suddenly spread light over the whole park and over the three of us. There was no real warmth in it, but it felt warmer than the shade we’d been in, the shade of the clouds. And I was plenty hot enough. So we kept dancing. Gavin ran across the stage, from tree to tree, but in the distance. I couldn’t work out how he’d got so far ahead. But it looked like he was doubling back towards the road we’d crossed a few minutes before. I hoped so. Any place where we could find humans was OK with me. His instincts, to run and hide, to be furtive, were not working well for us.