Beyond Carousel (28 page)

We arrived at WAAPA by three as the sky clouded over and winter threatened a final stand. I followed Georgia and Claudia inside and watched as they reacquainted themselves with their former home. They moved through a foyer decorated to promote an upcoming production. Down hallways lined with workshop areas and framed headshots of alumni. Past a box office where they had plundered the snacks and drinks more than a year ago now. And finally into a backstage area with change rooms, a shower and, amid the shelves of garish props, a cluster of couches and blankets that had been their home.

Claudia tried out a couple of the hanging lights. They worked first time. She shrugged as if to say,
of course they do
.

‘Are you guys cool if I take the first shower?' asked Georgia.

‘Yeah, George. Enjoy,' said Claudia.

I gave her a smile and she trudged off into the bathroom. Claudia sat on a couch while I tried to stretch out the rocks in my calves.

‘Do you know if we are meant to be performing the play at the time the portals open?' she asked.

‘No. Sorry. I'm not sure,' I replied.

Claudia sat there seriously. Perfect posture in spite of her exhaustion.

‘Do you believe it?' I asked.

She shrugged, honestly.

‘Do you?' she asked.

‘Yeah. Definitely,' I replied.

‘Because of the Curator?' she asked.

I thought about it and shook my head.

‘I mean, I don't think Ed would make it all up. But he never said to me that the portals would definitely happen,' I said.

Claudia waited for me to continue.

‘He just said that the art world was at a crossroad. That artists needed a new kind of residency to produce the art of the future,' I said.

‘You believe it because of the art you have seen here?' she asked.

I thought about all of the art I had experienced. The darkness and pop of Taylor & Lizzy's new album. The haunting charcoals of Peter Mistry. Kink & Kink and all of their weirdness. Photos Kirk had taken of the memories of jet planes. The hulking windblown sculpture we had hauled all the way from Fremantle.

‘Yeah,' I replied. ‘That's exactly why.'

Claudia considered this for a moment, then nodded.

‘Will you watch us rehearse the play tonight?' she asked.

‘That would be awesome,' I replied.

I had showered and changed and now sat nervous in a theatre of empty chairs. Georgia was onstage already. I could just make her out in the darkness. Claudia was somewhere offstage beside her. The set dressing was stark. Just a writing desk and a beaten-up couch. I held my breath and waited. Long and important seconds ticked by.

Claudia struck a light and Georgia's head snapped upright.

‘What good is the wind if it does not bring her smell?' she boomed.

My skin rippled. It was electric.

The whole play was, really. A biting, witty exploration of a famous writer beset by insecurity and expectation. Claudia ran it at a dazzling pace and, despite not having rehearsed it for months, Georgia's delivery was fantastic.
With her bouncy hair and accent she came off a bit like a young Laura Linney. When Claudia eventually faded the lights I had completely forgotten that the theatre was empty.

Afterward I found the pair of them hugging and beaming backstage. The bubble I had seen around Taylor and Lizzy with their music now surrounded Georgia and Claudia too. It struck me then that theatre existed for the moment even more so than music. Sure there was writing and rehearsing, and sets and costumes, but in the end it was an hour or two on a stage somewhere, before it disappeared into oblivion. Even for prolific actors or directors, these hours were tiny blips in a lifetime of hustle. For Georgia and Claudia I think that rehearsal had been like waking from a long and fitful slumber.

I congratulated and complimented them both, then drifted away to let them debrief and bask in the moment.

It was quiet and still amid the concrete of the props warehouse. I packed a bag ready for the morning, then lay awake thinking about home. The tiny dot on the ground that I had searched for all those years ago. It was all we had then. And it was all I had now. I realised that I had to go back there after the others had gone. It wouldn't be easy, but I felt like I was ready to deal with whatever it threw up. And I finally felt like I would be ready to write then too. Not for status or acceptance, or to buy my way home. But because it felt like something I could do.

I held onto this and found the strength in it to take me to sleep.

Late into the night Georgia woke me and we tiptoed into a classroom to fool around like teenagers on a school camp. For those few, suspended hours we built a bubble that the world couldn't penetrate. A glimmer of infrared heat in a desert of space and darkness. More than anything I remembered the brush of her hair across my forehead. The echo of her whisper. The flicker in her eyes before each smile.

I rode southwards beneath a patchy, broken sky. It was early and the suburbs were static like paintings in a lobby. I had a direction and a destination, but hadn't yet considered my route. Eventually there would be a bridge, then some roads and a highway. The road back to Carousel felt sure and inevitable.

I pulled up at a hill on the fringes of Mount Lawley. I was sweating and shed a couple of layers into my bag. The weather was shifting and humid. Where I stood was in sunshine but storm clouds roamed the city just ahead. There was the blink of lightning and washes of rain down there too. I finished my water and circled around towards it.

I was just a suburb away in Northbridge when lightning struck gas and the entire city erupted.

There was no escalation or warning. Just the hint of a light in the sky, then a chilling and immense boom. I veered into a shopfront and cowered from the noise more than anything. Waves of it saturated the air in a
way I didn't think possible. My eardrums bulged inward. I covered them with my hands and cowered even lower. I felt the heat then too. The street tunnelled with a scorching desert wind. I edged out and peered down its length.

The city was gone. Replaced with a heaving black netherworld. Fizzing red embers danced like insects by a thousand light bulbs. Smoke eked from the darkness and dripped with a sickly yellow. I was both awestruck and terrified.

There were more explosions. First distant, then one that felt right on top of me. I flinched and kicked at the door of the shop where I sheltered. The lock buckled, then snapped. I pushed my bike and bag inside, then rammed the door shut. It dangled loosely on its hinge. I shoved a trolley of dried noodles up against it and a box of something else against that. Through the glass I watched as the street was lost to smoke and embers.

My ears didn't ring, rather delivered everything to my brain on a sloppy delay. The whistle of wind beneath the door. Droning smoke alarms. The rattle of windows at the back of the store as I raced around to seal myself inside.

I was in a leaky Asian mini-mart. There were aisles of dried goods, sauces and spices, a counter by the entrance and a storeroom and kitchenette at the back. The store was untouched and heavy with dust.

I sniffed at the air.

Smoke was drifting inside. I jittered about from front door to back, wondering if I should stay put or get the hell out of there. The plumbing was long gone and the only water I could find was a half row of Mount Franklin in the Coke fridge. I found a rusty old fire extinguisher on a wall in the storeroom and sat by the back door reading the instructions over and over again. The words were shaky and blurred. I was shivering in spite of the warmth outside. I put the extinguisher aside and took a bunch of long, slow breaths. The air didn't taste great, but at least it calmed me a fraction.

From what I could see, the smoke was still thick outside. I would have to stay put for a while. If a fire started I could use the extinguisher and some water bottles to put it out. If these didn't work I could take one of two exits and try my luck outside.

Although it had happened right in front of me I still couldn't process the fact that the city had exploded. Month on month of seeping gas had finally been ignited. If it had happened last summer we would have watched it curiously from the safety of the hills. Or the summer before and we might have shrugged it off as just another noise outside the walls of Carousel. But now, just days out from the portals reopening, it had caught me dangling and exposed. Others too, probably. A blast like that could have easily taken out the freeway or surrounding bridges.

I thought of Sophie and the Finns, screeching to a
halt in the suburbs and staring northward at the carnage. Of Georgia and Claudia who I left just that morning. Wishing they had asked me of my route so they knew how much to worry. And then Cara Winters. Holy shit. She was probably still living in that basement. Was it low enough to withstand an explosion like that? Would she have air to breathe until the portals opened?

Perth was crumbling at the final hurdle and it felt like the proper apocalypse had begun. I realised then that my life after the portals would be as much about physical survival as it would anything else. It was lonely and daunting. Again I saw Luke Skywalker dangling alone in the universe. I slunk down low and held the extinguisher in my arms like a pillow.

I knew it was dark outside when the smoke took a hue of red.

I had sat through the entire day watching the same blanket of grey out the window. A layer of it rested on the ceiling inside now, despite my efforts with a roll of packing tape. Low to the ground it was still fine. But I had little idea of what was happening outside. The city was on fire, I could tell that much. The temperature was well above normal and there was a rumbling noise that was akin to the hills burning. Thankfully it didn't seem like it had jumped the train lines that separated the city from Northbridge. The glow I saw in the smoke now was dull and from the left, rather than all over.

Still, I was stuck. There was no way I could find my way through that level of smoke. Plus I didn't know how far I would need to travel to be clear of it. If there was a breeze outside I could try to head upwind until I found clean air. But, from what I could see, the smoke was fat and static.

I was too wired for sleep but needed something to take my attention from the minutes ticking by on the barman's watch. As well as food, the shelves had some random stuff like cooking utensils, ornaments and party supplies. I dug around and found some receipt books and a pen. I didn't feel like it – at all – but sat down and started rewriting the novel I had begun at the Collective. It felt mechanical and soulless, but kept me busy through the night until eventually I slept.

Waking was disorientating. Hours had passed yet the shop looked the same. Smoke still covered the windows. A red glow still emanated from the city. There should have been daylight, but the sun had been blotted. I stood and stretched, then paced about the store. Right now there was still time to get back to Carousel, but eventually, inevitably, there wouldn't be. For the first time since the casino it seemed possible that I might not see the Finns again.

I grabbed some waters and the writing pad and pushed the thought right out of my mind. Instead I concentrated on the writing. I tried to remember what
I had already written, but also free myself up within the process. The writing had worked before because I found a tone I could pull off and a character that felt honest and real. I focused on rediscovering these things first and foremost.

As the city burnt to stumps and ash beside me, my novel grudgingly came to life. I wrote hunched over on the cold concrete floor. Standing like a cashier at the shopfront counter. On a milk crate with a box of soy sauce for a desk. I took breaks every hour to survey the smoke and find food on the shelves.

Night came, again. Still my view didn't change. I was getting quietly desperate, but the writing was helping. I spiralled eagerly into its oblivion. The pages held warmth and safety, but also control. I set an alarm on the barman's watch and slept for just two hours. When I awoke the date on the watch had changed to September.

‘Screw it,' I said.

I packed the notepad safely into my bag, took a long drink of water and got ready to leave. There were disposable face masks in aisle two. I taped two of them together and wrapped them tightly over my mouth and nose. Sophie had given me two torches along with the radio. I strapped them both to the handlebars and switched them on. The radio was on already. So far it hadn't picked anything up, but I clipped it to my belt regardless. Lastly I took a packet of battery-powered party lights from a tub near the counter. They were
kitschy and ridiculous, but offered additional light and I couldn't be fussy. I coiled the globes around the frame of the bike and plugged in a battery from the dwindling stash in my bag. Suddenly my bike pulsed like a Christmas tree. I was about to leave when I remembered something I had seen on the shelves.

Hacky sacks. There was a small array of them on a shelf amid the party supplies. I raced back over and picked one out for Rocky. With this packed safely into my bag I pushed my way out of the mini-mart.

The smoke enveloped me almost immediately. It had a sharp, metallic smell that hung in the back of my throat. I walked the bike down and out of the store, then took a moment to assess how much I could see.

Next to nothing.

Just smoke and the giant red glow of the burning city. This would have to be my guide. If I could keep it on my right side I should eventually make it through to the river. There were bridges there that would take me into the suburbs where the smoke might lift or maybe even disappear.

I set off slowly, walking the bike rather than riding. My torches cut a swathe through the immediate smoke, but simply found more and more ahead of it. Without proper sight I ran the front tyre along the side of a kerb to keep my bearings. It was slow and clunky. Often the kerb disappeared into a side street or driveway. Sometimes there were cars in the way. At one point I lost
the kerb completely and fanned out until I hit the other side of the road.