Mick’s made a beeline for the store, but instead of following directly after him I walk in a zig-zag pattern just for the hell of it, just because I can. When I get to the store, there’s an old bloke sitting in a chair to the left of the door. He’s wearing a pair of old footy shorts, a blue singlet and a green cap with Jimmy’s Bait and Tackle written in gold letters across its front. I hear him talking to Mick as I approach.
‘Snapper are on, they reckon,’ says the old bloke. ‘Coming in to feed. One of Hendo’s boys landed a five kilo off Wisemans.’
‘Bank or boat?’ asks Mick.
‘Boat,’ says the old bloke.
‘What bait?’
‘They’re not saying.’
It’s like they’re speaking another language.
Mick nods his head and the old bloke turns his attention to me.
‘This the troublemaker you were telling me about?’ he says. ‘Katie’s boy?’
It’s been a long time since I heard anyone speak my mum’s name, and an even longer time since I heard anyone call her Katie. Something explodes inside me and I see her in my head wearing a pretty red dress. I try to cling to that, to the red dress and her beautiful brown hair, but that rainy day comes rushing back – the phone call, the hospital and the cold of her hand when I touched her for the very last time.
‘That’s him,’ says Mick, his gruff voice pulling me back. ‘Singlets, this is Nate. Nate, Singlets.’
And just like that, Mick leaves me stranded. He heads into the store and I look at Singlets, not sure what to say. My mum never talked much about her teenage years in Oyster Bay so I’ve got nothing to go on. Whenever I asked her to tell me stories, she was always guarded. She gave me snippets and bits and pieces. She told me stuff about swimming and jumping off a jetty, and she told me how beautiful the river was. But she never said anything about the people.
‘So, you knew my mum?’ I ask.
‘A long time ago,’ says Singlets. ‘When she was a girl.’
He looks out across the gravel, as if there’s something out there actually worth looking at.
‘She was different,’ he says.
‘What do you mean, different?’ I ask.
‘A real dreamer, she was.’
Singlets smiles, then raises a hand up and points to something behind me. ‘You see that lamp post over there?’
I turn my head and follow his finger to a single wooden pole that’s seen better days.
‘What do you reckon?’ he says. ‘Got to be, what, twenty metres of clear space around it?’
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I s’pose so.’
‘Well, one day, I was sitting right here, and I see this young girl, your mum, walking along, singing a song. She must have been nine or ten, I reckon. Like always, she’s got her head in the clouds, daydreaming about something or another. Anyway, she’s walking along, like I said, singing her song and blow me down if she doesn’t walk straight into that pole.’
I’m not sure what to make of Singlets’ story. I’m not even sure why he’s telling me, but I try to picture the scene in front of me. I stare at the pole for a bit then turn back to Singlets in his chair.
‘Are you a dreamer, Nate?’ he asks.
‘Nah,’ I say. ‘Not really.’
‘Can you cook?’ he says.
I don’t know what’s weirder, the question itself or the fact that I have to think about the answer.
‘Ah, no,’ I say. ‘I can’t.’
‘Then you’d better learn,’ says Singlets. ‘Fast.’
I’ve got no idea what he’s talking about, and I don’t stay to find out.
I say goodbye then push through the plastic fly strips and walk through the door of Chester’s General Store. It’s cold inside. There’s an ancient air-conditioner vibrating against the side wall, its white vanes sweeping slowly left and right.
When my eyes adjust from the glare outside, I see a girl unloading packets of bait into a waist-high ice chest. She turns around when she hears me, and it’s like someone’s knocked the wind out of me.
She’s all wrong for Oyster Bay, but there’s something about her that says she doesn’t care. And there’s something about her not caring that makes her interesting straight off. I snatch subtle glimpses without making it look creepy. But she’s onto me.
‘Are you right?’ she says.
I drop my eyes down to my shoes then look back up. ‘Who? Me?’
‘Yeah you,’ she says, glancing over her shoulder. ‘What, your mum never tell you it’s rude to stare?’
She looks me up and down for a bit then goes back to work. But I can’t get enough of her.
She’s roughly my age, I reckon, with smooth olive skin, and although I’m a newcomer to wherever the hell we are, she seems beautifully out of place. She’s wearing a dark-green knee-length tartan skirt and a black leather jacket with red Doc Marten boots. Her hair is black and buzzed short, except for a wisp of purple that hangs down the left side of her face.
Thankfully, Mick’s busy gathering supplies so I’ve still got some time to think of something interesting to say.
I shuffle off to the magazine rack in my itchy nylon pants, grab a magazine and pretend to flick through it.
After off-loading the last of the bait, the girl returns to the counter a few metres from where I’m standing. She ditches the box, and Mick calls out from the fridge down the back.
‘Where are those chicken thingies, Gem?’
‘Where they always are, Mick,’ she replies. ‘They’re next to the mince. Dig around a bit. Don’t make me come down there.’
She rolls her eyes and slides a knife blade along the tape line on a new box of bait.
I can’t drag my eyes from her face.
‘I take it you’re the nephew, then?’ she says.
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I suppose I am.’
It’s been a while since I spoke properly with a girl. Before Croxley I had a thing with Amy Medcalf, but I knew all along she wouldn’t be there when I got out. We were company, mostly – warmth. She was someone to lie next to, someone to talk to at night.
I’m not usually shy or anything, but this girl in front of me is different. I’m not really sure what to say, so I stare at the small oven behind her filled with pies and sausage rolls.
‘So, you got a name?’ she asks.
‘It’s Nate.’
It’s not what you’d call a stare exactly. She looks at me just long enough to make me feel uncomfortable, then she nods her head to Mick at the back of the store.
‘You want some advice?’ she says.
I shrug my shoulders. ‘Sure,’ I say.
‘Your expectations,’ she says. ‘I’m not sure where they’re at exactly, but now might be a good time to lower them. Like, really lower them.’
I sneak a quick look over my shoulder. ‘That bad, huh?’
‘Yep, that bad. Of course, he does have …’
Her voice trails off as Mick makes his way back to the front of the shop. He’s carrying some chicken fillets, a loaf of bread and a couple of bags of bait.
‘I think that’s everything,’ he says, dumping them onto the counter.