‘Fin, darling, I know but I can’t help them. I’m sorry.’ She stands up. ‘Bring Max back here, I’ll have something organised.’
‘Mum.’
‘Fin, look at me. I want to help them. They’re children, of course I want to help them. But this—’ She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. ‘That screen out there, it’s showing footage captured by a drone sent into the region where the blasts were. There’s nothing left. It’s thousands of miles of dust. Whole countries have been obliterated.’ She opens her eyes and I can see that she’s holding back tears. ‘The atmosphere’s choked. Electricity substations the world over have been crippled by the temperature drop and the carbon in the atmosphere, there’s no more fuel being refined, therefore no transportation for the little food that the world has in reserve. Long term, crops will fail,’ she continues. ‘Resulting in worldwide famine for those that survive the next twelve months. Fin, we have to make decisions about what portion of the population we can sustain… I can’t just… I can’t even know their names, I can’t do this if I know their names.’ She takes another deep breath and squares her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I can secure you and Max, but beyond that my hands are tied.’
I have no words. I stare at her. This is not what I had imagined. In the brief moments where I had dared to envisage actually finding her I had pictured her sweeping Max, Lucy, Noll and I off to safety, to a haven of inventive strategies for preserving society. What they would look like, I don’t know. Wind turbines, cycle-powered generators, communities living off mushrooms grown in the dark, I don’t know. I hadn’t imagined this calculated surrender. In all those hours spent wondering how the powers that be could do this to people, their own people, I never imagined her as being complicit in it all.
She grips both my hands in hers.
‘Go,’ she says, ‘and get Max.’
Thirty-eight
Noll is sitting on the ground where I left him. As I cross the road he gets to his feet, picks his backpack up and puts it over his shoulder.
He reads the expression on my face. ‘You didn’t find her.’
‘No. I did.’
‘Really? You look… shattered.’
‘Probably ’cause that’s how I feel.’ I pull my bike up from where I left it lying on the pavement.
‘Why? What happened?’
I stand, holding onto the bike like it’s the only thing that’s keeping me upright. ‘She wants me to come back with Max.’
‘And? What’s wrong?’
I feel the pressure of tears behind my eyes. ‘She says she can’t help you and Lucy. This whole thing is completely fucked and she’s part of it. She’s working with the military to keep people out of the city. She’s onboard with letting half the fucking population starve. If it really even was her. She has the same name but that woman was not my mother. I’m…’ I push my fingers through what’s left of my hair, scrunch my eyes shut. ‘I’m really sorry. She’s… I’m sorry.’
I get on the bike and start to pedal. Noll is behind me. ‘Fin, stop. Talk to me.’
‘What’s there to say? I’ve got a safe haven for me and my brother, but sorry, you can’t come? You reckon it’ll be that easy with Lucy too?’
Noll smiles.
‘Why are you smiling? What is wrong with you?’
‘Fin, you found her. You’re going to be okay, you and Max.’
‘Do not be all Zen about this, Noll. I’m not going to be fine. I’m not bloody going.’
‘Yes, you are.’
‘No, I’m not. Not without you and definitely not without Lucy.’
‘You have to, Fin. Did you really think she’d be able to save us all? I knew the moment we got to the border, when we first met Matt, I knew then it wasn’t going to work out that way.’
‘Then why come with us?’
‘Well, I’m still better off in the city, aren’t I? Fin, it’s okay. Take Max back to your mum.’
‘It’s not fucking okay! You’re going to starve, Noll, if you don’t get caught first. And I can’t leave Lucy, I would never, never get over that. No matter how long I live.’
The shopfronts and office buildings flash past as we speed through the streets. Noll doesn’t say any more. We hit ANZAC Bridge, the Golden Gate wannabe that stretches out over the water, linking the CBD with the inner west. I pedal the ascent and my legs scream in protest, we sail down the other side into the city suburbs, the affluent terrace-lined streets strewn with rubbish. I jump the gutter turning a corner and the bike comes down hard, I feel the grind and wobble of my front tyre gone flat.
‘Fuck.’ I stop, get off the bike, kick it to the ground. ‘Fuck, fuck, FUCK!’ I pick the thing up and fling it at the nearest wall. I open my lungs and let out the biggest sound I can, screaming until there is nothing left.
‘Language, Mr Heath.’
The voice comes from behind us. When I hear it, it’s like everything in me stops, the breathing, the blood in my veins, everything. I turn around and there, beneath a mountain of overcoats, is a man.
‘Surely, Findlay, it isn’t a problem that can’t be solved with decorum,’ he says wryly. A tear streaks from the corner of his eye and is caught by the thick grey beard.
‘Mr Effrez,’ I whisper.
‘You both look exhausted. Come with me.’
The whole apartment wouldn’t be more than thirty square metres, with piles of books and papers crowding the shelves that line every inch of available wall space. The air is thick with the tart scent of cigar smoke. He leads us through the narrow hall into a kitchen the size of a large cupboard. Cans of food are stacked and grouped according to their contents on the bench. Rice is portioned and bagged in individual servings, stored in a clear plastic container. There are also several jars of small fish, which I figure to be anchovies.
‘This has been the season for us closet fans of preserved fish,’ Effrez says. ‘Never had to fight it out for those. Are you gentlemen hungry?’
We both shake our heads. I am still dumfounded by the fact that we are standing in his kitchen. Effrez crouches down and reaches into the back of one of the cupboards. He pulls out a jar.
‘Perhaps I can tempt you with some coffee?’
Instant coffee was one of the first things to disappear from supermarket shelves, I can’t believe that there’s any left in the entire city. Effrez reads my expression and steps away from the cupboard.
‘I was very careful to stock up,’ he says.
I look down into the cupboard and see rows and rows of jars.
‘Never used to drink instant. What ugly creatures this has reduced us all to. Care for a cup of the devil’s drink?’
‘Yes, sir,’ we reply, almost in unison. ‘Thank you.’
He takes a saucepan from a hook on the wall and goes into the next room.
‘My bathroom has become a fireplace,’ he explains. I stick my head in the doorway to see the vanity sink filled with charcoal and ash. Plumes of black soot coat the tiles and mirror above the vanity. A hole is punched through the plaster ceiling above: an improvised chimney. Effrez takes some small pieces of wood from the bathtub and places them in the sink to light a fire.
‘I suppose you’ve noticed that matches are in short supply these days,’ he says.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I remember reading that we had lost the technology to visit the moon, that if we wanted to go back we’d have to reinvent the wheel, so to speak. I suspect the same is true of matches. We are going to have to rediscover how to conjure fire ourselves.’
‘Thank God for Survivor, sir,’ I say.
‘Useful tutorials with people in bikinis building fires,’ says Noll.
‘Ha, yes.’
He makes us coffee and leads us into the cramped sitting room. The three of us sit and sip our drinks.