Page 75 of Barre Fight
“You’re okay,” he said, the words muffled against her shoulder. Her shoulder-length grey-brown hair, damp, was pulled back in its usual no-nonsense low ponytail, and she was wearing a hoodie he recognized as belonging to Missy.
“We’re all okay,” Shane said, and Justin looked up from his mum’s shoulder to smile at his stepdad. Despite his habitual workman’s tan, Shane looked pale and tired, but his deep-set brown eyes were warm with affection as he looked at Justin, his crows feet crinkling all the way to his hairline as he smiled. Shane was as uncomfortable in the commotion of a city as Justin was, but Justin could tell his stepdad was glad to be here. Justin disentangled himself from his mother and gave Shane a quick hug, which Shane punctuated with the usual hearty thump between Justin’s shoulder blades.
“You look like hell, though,” Missy said, rising from the armchair and grinning.
“Missed you too,” Justin grumbled.
“Fine, you look like a ballet superstar who just flew across the world in coach.”
“So, like hell,” he sighed. “And I’m not a ballet superstar.”
“Oh, shut up, we all read that review,” Missy rolled her eyes affectionately, and slung an arm around his shoulder. “Missed you for real.”
He kissed her temple. “Missed you for real, too. Thanks for going up to get them. Where’s Steen?” He knew his aunt had come back with them, but she was nowhere to be seen.
“She’s napping in my bed.”
“And Chopper’s napping on yours. Might not let you share it with her.” Shane grinned apologetically. Ah yes, Chopper, the tiny, fluffy white dog his mum and Shane had brought home a few years ago. Chopper, who Shane always claimed was a symbol of marital compromise: his mum had chosen the breed, but Shane had had naming rights. The result was a dog who looked like she should be named Tinkerbell or Princess, but had instead been named after a notorious gang leader.
“She can have it. I’ve got a place to stay.”
“Ricky and Matty are letting you crash?” Missy asked, pulling a notepad off the coffee table. Justin saw the wordsSHOPPING LISTprinted across the top of the page in his mother’s neat handwriting. Beneath the title, he saw a list of baking essentials. Flour, confectioner’s sugar, chocolate chips. His chest tightened a little. His mother might be laughing now, but everyone knew she liked to bake when she was stressed.
“Um, yep, Ricky and Matty,” Justin said quickly, distracted by the reminder that his family had endured a true ordeal while he’d been away. Too late, he heard how unconvincing his answer sounded.
Missy looked up from the shopping list, eyes narrowed. She flicked a quick glance over at his mum and Shane, who had sat back down on the couch. Shane was scrolling through hisphone, no doubt looking for news about the town. His mother was busy examining one of their throw pillows.
“That’s nice of them,” Missy said. Her voice was neutral but her face was not. She was giving him a look that plainly said, You’re full of shit but I’m generous enough not to point that out in front of Auntie Narelle and Shane.
“Very,” he agreed, giving her a look that said, just as clearly,Keep your mouth shut and I might tell you where I’m really staying.
Missy gave him a tiny, reproachful shake of her head. No doubt she’d wheedle the whole truth about him and Ivy the moment they were alone. He wanted to be annoyed by the knowledge, but he couldn’t bring himself to mind. He wanted Missy to know what had happened with Ivy in New York—well, not the private, hotel room parts. But the general gist of it. The part where he thought he might be falling for her. That wasn’t something he wanted to keep from Missy.
“What was so funny?” He directed the question at his mum and Shane, knowing that if he couldn’t distract Missy from her curiosity, he could at least distract his mum from her worries. “You guys were pissing yourselves when I walked in.”
“Oh, your mother was doing a spot-on impression of Steen chasing Chopper around the evacuation center. Bloody dog took a liking to one of the Emergency Services workers and decided to follow him around the joint,” Shane explained.
His mum let out a laugh that bordered on a cackle. “Steen’s back was bothering her, but she insisted on running after the damn dog, so she was hobbling around shaking her fist like the grandpa fromThe Simpsons. ‘Chopper! Chopper!’” she croaked, wobbling her torso from side to side in an imitation of a lumbering run.
Justin smiled ruefully and the sharp splinter of guilt in his gut eased a little. His mum could find humour ineven the darkest of moments; she’d been doing it his whole life. When he was a kid and they’d moved in with her sister, that house had been full of laughter, even as the two single mums pooled their resources and stretched every last dollar. He realized now that those years he’d spent living with Missy like she was his sister had been out of necessity. But his memories of that time were soft and warm, his mum’s worries only visible at the edge of the photo in his mind in the form of banana bread and chocolate chip biscuits. Now, it was the same story. Their home might be destroyed, but she had Shane and Steen, and a silly little dog to laugh at, and soon she’d have their kitchen counter covered in scones and muffins and pull-apart bread.
An hour later, Missy had gone to the supermarket, shooting Justin a “we’re not done here” look as she removed her keys from the hook by the front door. Justin had heaved his dirty winter clothes in the laundry hamper and thrown a few pairs of shorts and some T-shirts into an overnight bag, doing his best not to disturb a slumbering Chopper, who snored louder than any tiny dog had the right to. Now, he was sitting on the couch with his mum and Shane, who was recounting how quickly the Rural Fire Service had issued the evacuation order.
“The fire snuck up on them, I reckon, even though we all knew it was moving fast. Lucky we were ready and it only took us a few minutes to get all our gear into the car and get on the road.”
“And lucky the roads were still drivable,” his mother added grimly. Justin knew that after the last bad fire season had ripped through some mountain towns, local governments had dug fire trenches along the sides of any roads that people would need to use as evacuation routes when the next fire came.
“Thank god for that,” he said quietly, looking at his mum’s tired, lined face. Thank god they were all safe.
“That’s what matters,” Shane nodded, and then he let out along sigh and cast another glance at his phone. “But I think we need to prepare for the worst. I don’t think there’s going to be much left when all’s said and done.”
Justin pictured it, all that smoke and ash where homes and businesses had once stood. The playground equipment twisted in a heap, the school oval blackened and razed. To his horror, the image made something hot flare in his stomach, something queasily close to furious… satisfaction? Justin looked away from his parents as that ugly feeling was chased by guilt. He hadn’t been home in years, had hated the place for all the hell he went through there, but surely he didn’t actually want the place to burn.
The ugliness of the idea, and the shame of it, made his cheeks flare with heat. He ducked his head and studied his feet, sure that if he looked his mum and Shane in the face they’d see the awful possibility that had just unfurled itself, like some poisonous plant, in his mind.
He couldn’t stay here with them. Not when his mum wanted to stress bake and Shane wanted to scroll endlessly through his phone, hoping for any hint of good news about the town.
He stood up from the couch so quickly that his mother started and stopped in the middle of whatever it was she’d been saying. “Everything alright, darling?”
