Cydonia - Seven

Seven
We take our time on the road, not wanting to push ourselves or the tin too far, each one of us taking time to get used to the feeling again. The feeling of movement. The road is the same, silent, unchanging and utterly real. It takes us where we want to go, it guides us with its scorched metal signs and stained tarmac grain, our passing is its voice, that gentle drone that tells us we’re moving. Without us and all the others it is nothing. And without it we are lost amongst the spiders and the snakes and million other poisons that feast fire from the blaze above. We pass dead things on the side of the road and sometimes in the middle. Mostly roos, poor broken bodies twisting wrong ways, dry tongues in the sun and dead eyes watching us pass. When that blaze burns highest the smell fills the air. That rotting stink hangs heavy all around. Our windows are up but it penetrates metal and travels inside. The little one in the dust bin says hello, its voice somewhere amongst the stink. I wonder what’s left of it now, picked clean by the yellow army, just dry hair and memory.

We slowly approach a great bird in the middle of the road, standing there beside a smashed brown haired dead thing. This bird is tall and strong and he fixes us with a stare that tells us he will not move, not for us. We accommodate his demands and drive slowly past. All the time he watches us, impatient and threatening. In our rear view mirrors he continues to eat.

We stop in Pine Creek. The evening is uneventful. We all enjoy that blissful feeling of our hangovers finally subsiding. We languish happily in front of the television, not really watching anything, just enjoying the way we feel. I smoke cigarettes outside. The campsite is quiet, just a few tents and handful of tins. On the red brick wall beside me sits a moth the size of a sparrow. The black sky above is sprayed with uncountable white light. I gaze over the universe, wondering if it ends.

The next morning and my breathing is tighter than ever. My blue inhaler does nothing, its usually reliable cold puffs failing to relieve me for the first time in my life. It’s alarming but I tell myself not to worry. I drink iceed coffee and watch the highway as my brother and Pete get ready to leave. I don’t smoke a cigarette, fearing it would kill me right here. I swallow the cold coffee slowly, imagining it soothing my tubes, coating it with the ice that will free me. But it doesn’t help and I’m getting worried.

We drive long through the day, passing more dead things, more sacrifices to the road below. I keep puffing my blue inhaler and it keeps refusing to help. We stop for lunch; we’re in Litchfield National Park. My brother picks up a pamphlet for a billabong cruise, an hour long boat ride along a river filled with wild things and tourists. We agree to go.

I sit outside while they finish their lunch. I want a cigarette and even though I fear it might kill me I give it a shot. I light up and drag softly, like a child for the first time. It doesn’t kill me but it tells me it’s not right either. It tightens me a little more, it tells me I’m a fool. I heed its warning and crush it under my foot. The dry air that replaces it doesn’t feel much better.

Our billabong cruise is an interesting experience. The boat turns out to be more of a large canoe, the kind we pulled up the gorge in Katherine. We sit two to a row as we putter delicately past the wild things, who watch us back with little interest. We come across a large croc, sunning himself on a muddy bank. Our guide cuts the engine and we all sit there, watching this beautiful dinosaur that could kill us if it cared. My breathing begins to wheeze a little, I imagine getting taken under and barrel rolled like Tarzan. I wouldn’t last four seconds.

After the cruise we walk through a rainforest. Its air is so different, it is cold and clean and wet. We walk slowly, reading information plaques and looking for the sky but all we can see is the green. The rainforest air slips down like milk, coating and healing. The forest sings from a million mouths, all around, above and below. It’s hymn is soaring and we’ve never been surrounded by such purity

It’s not far to the campsite. Tomorrow we will reach Darwin, we will reach the sea. The campsite is in a forest, but the woman who works reception tells us it’s not part of the rainforest. Maybe it was all in my mind but my breathing begins to tighten again. We eat pasta and watch the outdoor TV. My brother is cold. He brings out his sleeping bag and watches TV sitting on a chair, inside his sleeping bag like a great purple worm. We laugh at him but my breathing gets tighter.

I lie in the white tin but quickly realise that it’s even worse when lying down. I return to the TV. I tell them that I am worried, that it feels like it’s getting worse and worse. My brother tells me to relax. He tells me if it’s not better by morning we’ll get to the nearest doctor or hospital.

I try to relax. It’s easier if I don’t speak. So I sit there in silence, looking at the TV but not watching it. My brother and Pete go to bed. I remain there. Sitting and breathing, wheezing, worrying that it might get so bad that I will suffocate. Midnight passes. I can’t sit still this long. I get up and I walk slowly about the campsite, past sleeping and snoring and sniffing. I want a cigarette but now I know for sure that it would kill me right now in the night. I return to the TV. I turn it off; I need to concentrate fully on breathing. It feels tighter still. I close my eyes. I feel like I am breathing through a straw, and that someone is pinching it in the middle.

I open my eyes. I am not sure if I have been sleeping. Standing just clear of the forest is a roo. He’s small, half my height. Maybe he’s not a roo but a wallaby, I’m not sure. He’s foraging about in the grass, looking for something to eat I imagine. Hi, I say to him, alarming myself at the sound made by the struggling word as it crackles from my mouth like ash. He looks up, alert, annoyed with himself for having missed me. We share the night for a moment before he turns and bounds gracefully back into the darkness.

I wake them at six am, I couldn’t wait any longer. It hasn’t gotten any worse but it certainly hasn’t gotten any better. I need to see a doctor I tell them, something clearly isn’t right. They’re good, my brother and Pete, there’s no complaints or grumbles. The man who has replaced the woman at reception tells us that Darwin is the nearest doctor, three hours if you put your foot down.

My brother does just that. The white tin flies. I have the window and the rushing air might be helping. I start to tire, my head dropping and my eyes closing. Pete struggles with the radio, he paces up and down along hiss and spit until eventually finding a distant news broadcast. A man has been killed in Katherine Gorge by a salt water crocodile. I think about Rob.

The sun begins to burn and the tarmac sighs. The road is forever our guide, rushing us towards the water like returning sand. We are ready for the sea.