Tim Winton - Eyrie

He twisted the handlebars of his reeking bike. At the corner, tattooed thugs were sending their women into the loan joint, and pacing the kerb, flexing their roid-pecs.

He peered into the hock-shop. The store was the size of a big whitegoods franchise, the front window stacked with guitars, golf bags, chainsaws, the legacy of other reversals. What a display it was, this cargo cult. The entire window an altar to defeat. Which sounded a tad grandiose, but there it was. Blame the plonk.

Catching his reflection in the glass he was surprised by how old and dazed he looked. Surprised to be so surprised, truth be told; what did he expect from a seventy-dollar haircut and a shave — to suddenly look invigorated, to have excavated his inner George Clooney? When you felt as abstracted from yourself as he did these days, why not feel strange in your own face? How hard his chin felt, how creepy-smooth his cheeks. And there in the window, plain evidence of where his sorrowful beard had been. So much fresh white skin, he looked as two-toned as Roy Rene or Michael Jackson. High up on his face, where the sun had been, he was dark, especially around the eyes. A veritable boobook owl. Which struck him as funny. Maybe not funny enough to warrant laughter, but there he was anyway, causing passers-by to give him a wide berth on the pavement: a piebald cyclist, chemically augmented, kneading his own chops in a pawnbroker’s window, indulging himself in his very own Knut Hamsun moment, chortling like a loon.

He shouldn’t have been back in there, amidst the boxes of goon, the racks of gleaming bottles; he’d spent money he could not afford to be blowing and he’d regret it, regretted it already, but he wanted something decent, had a little glow on from lunch, and the front window of Cash Converters had kicked him off a bit and he couldn’t settle.

He bought a couple of bin-end McLaren Vales that were crazy cheap, telling himself he’d saved twenty bucks on them, his luck was turning.

Keely had only been in a few hours before, securing the ransom cans, but now the bloke in the bottlo didn’t recognize him without the beard. It was disconcerting at first, but then it struck him as possibly advantageous in a way he couldn’t quite put his finger on just yet.

Stepping back onto the street he was nearly mown down by a cyclist whose expression morphed from irritation to delight in a heartbeat.

Tom!

Keely jerked upright, like a man accused. Just stood there hugging those costly bargains to his chest. The youth’s face was distantly familiar but Keely couldn’t place him. He had a downy soul-patch and girlish arms and his flash mountain bike was laden with wholesome produce.

Damien, said the boy brightly.

Ah, said Keely. The helmet and sunnies, I didn’t…

Wetlands campaign, said the kid. And the mallee fowl thing, remember?

Yeah, of course, he said. You did good work, mate.

He knew the kid now and it was true. He was good value. Environmental science graduate with a real bird bent. Especially good on habitat loss. A straight shooter.

Your ideas, Tom. Your vision.

Didn’t they hate us, though.

Truly. But like you said: if the suits don’t hate you, you’ve wasted your time.

Well, jury’s still out on that.

Wasn’t it Gandhi saying first they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they negotiate?

Something like that. Then you win. Apparently.

You’ve had a few wins over the years, Tom. Shouldn’t forget that.

They let you win the odd skirmish, comrade. To make it look as if the game’s fair. But the dogs bark, circus rolls on.

The youth offered a noncommittal grimace.

Who you with now? Keely asked.

The kid laughed skittishly.

Government?

Ah no, said the boy.

Keely didn’t need to be told what that meant. He’d had his wild years, this kid, his Gandhi-quoting period. If the iron giants hadn’t bought him it could only be oil and gas. These days they were co-opting them as undergrads, paying their tuition. Miners employed more ecologists, marine scientists and geology graduates than six governments. In order to smooth the way, before they literally scraped the place bare. All that harmless data owned and warehoused. It was brilliant.

Still, he said. Look at you, buying organic. Like a trouper.

It’s only for a while, said the boy, stung.

Keely saw young Damien eye the brown bags cradled in his arm. Here was his old boss, ravaged and unsteady outside the roughest liquor store in town. Quite a picture. But the youth, plainly the better man, was charitable enough to refrain from comment. Keely felt like a shit.

He offered up a lame smile.

I know, I know, said the kid. A while’s all we get.

You gotta stop quoting me, Keely replied, straining to relent, to show remorse.

Listen, I’m sorry to hear what happened.

Keely shrugged, graciously as he could.

You were right, you know. It’s all coming out.

We’ll see.

They were nuts to let you go.

I was probably nuts when they did.

Well, good luck to you anyway.

Maybe you could put in a good word at Woodside.

Mate, said the kid, missing the joke entirely, they’d snap you up.

He gave the boy the bravest smile he could manage and watched him wheel his righteous vegetables through the canyon of junk shops and manicure joints until he was gone at the corner. It was Wednesday — a day off, no doubt. He imagined the neat little cottage Damien was headed for, the sleek girl coming home to him tonight, the couscous he’d have waiting on the scrubbed-pine table. It was beautiful.

Enough to make you want to drink yourself a new arsehole.

*

He’d hardly made a dent on the second bottle when Kai appeared at the door, toting his schoolbag. For a moment the kid rocked on his heels as if he’d peered into the wrong flat. The look of alarm on his face was unmistakeable.

It’s me, said Keely. I shaved my beard off, that’s all.

But the kid was gone, his footfalls chiming in the rails of the gallery.

What was that about? said Gemma, suddenly filling the doorway. Christ, look at you.

He doesn’t approve.

Of what — the haircut, or the fact you’re pissed as a squirrel?

Why should he object?

You’re a bloody idiot.

What, leaving the door open to the likes of you? Obviously an error of judgement. For which I need not seek forgiveness. But which I seek all the same.

Get stuffed. The five-dollar words, they don’t make you sound any smarter.

Duly noted.

Christ, what a disappointment you are.

Refresh my memory, Gem. Did we get married at some juncture?

Juncture.

Is there some claim you have, something I signed that gives you the right to stand in my door and wave the nana finger at me? Maybe I nodded off during the ceremony.

Go fuck yourself.

I suspect. This evening. It may come to that. But I am. You might say. A dab hand already.

What is it with you?

I had my bike stolen.

Don’t you dare come over tonight.

Here, he said, reefing her key from around his neck so hard he feared he might have sliced his own ears off. Gemma didn’t even flinch as it bounced off the insect screen.

Pissweak, she muttered, giving him a parting stare he felt in the pit of his guts.

Correct, he said to the empty doorway once she was safely gone. He thought of the last great stand of tuart trees bulldozed and trucked away. Ripped earth as far as the eye could see, and homeless birds, black and wheeling. Cheap work. A Chinese construction deal cost millions in bribes. But here you could buy a new suburb for seventy thousand bucks. Small beans. Price of a Prado for a western-suburbs soccer mum. While she’s waiting on the Audi. Small fucking beans. And still too big for the likes of him.