The Boy Under the Table Read Online Free PDF Page A

thought that he might be having a heart attack but the ache never changed. It just stayed that way day after day. When the lambs began to appear he thought of Lockie feeding the babies whose mothers rejected them. When the canola was ready he thought of Lockie running hell for leather through the plants with the pure joy of energy and space.
    When Sammy said something funny he thought of Lockie laughing.
    He thought of Lockie.
    He thought of Lockie.
    He thought of Lockie.
    When his son’s birthday had come along he had tried to be strong. He had helped Sarah wrap the presents and put them in Lockie’s room but then he ran out of strength.
    He had taken a six-pack and gone to the shed. In the morning he had stayed away from the house. When he finally did go home he found his wife curled up in his son’s bed. Sammy was eating peanut butter out of the jar with a spoon. The house that Sarah was so proud of was littered with dirty clothes and empty packets of biscuits. Sammy was wearing the same clothes she had worn the night before. Bits of chocolate biscuit clung to her cheeks.
    ‘Mum is sleeping and sleeping and sleeping,’ said Sammy.
    They were falling apart.
    Doug heard his father’s voice then, reminding him of his role. ‘The man of the house keeps it all together, boy. Do you understand me? When the stock are dying and the heat bakes your bones you have to keep it all together so that when the rain falls again your family is still there with you.’
    Doug had kept it together. He stopped drinking and he took over for Sarah. If she got up and looked after Sammy he went to work, but on the days she stayed in bed he looked after Sammy and got her to school. Or he called Pete’s wife, Margie.
    He got through the day by sticking to the routines Sarah had established and he didn’t hope life would go back to normal one day. He knew better than that. Regardless of what he told Sarah and Sammy, he knew that this terrible sense of desolation would be his for life.
    He tried to imagine being an old man and telling someone about the boy he had lost but he could never picture it. He could never picture Sarah sitting next to him on the veranda, watching over their grand children, though he had been able to picture it once. The image had been so clear to him, and on nights when he felt he might be losing her it had been a comfort.
    Now he could no longer see them together in some bright future. He could not see them together at all. All he saw was himself—alone with only the faintest memory of his golden family.
    He saw a man who had lost everything, and it had only taken sixty seconds.

Tina
     
    Two burgers and two cartons of fries later, Tina was basically asleep on her feet. She knew she should have tried to fit in a few more jobs before she headed home but it was freezing and the streets were nearly empty.
    Winter in the Cross was a lousy time to be alive.
    Tina pulled out a packet of cigarettes and gave herself a treat. Each pack had to last a week. They were so fucking expensive. She gazed up at the ceiling of McDonald’s and waited for the manager to kick her out for smoking. She and Arik were almost friends. He would slip her some extra food if he could, but he always kicked her out for smoking. Rules were rules. Tina didn’t mind. She still remembered a life where everyone imagined that the world could be controlled by rules. She thought back on that life and now she knew what she had given up, how much she had given up, and there were times when she questioned her choices. Not all the time, just every day and every night. Tina allowed herself a grim smile.
    She watched the empty streets and enjoyed the smoke filling her lungs.
    The rain had stopped but the wind was making up for it.
    She didn’t think about the boy. Every time his short, dirty blond hair and runny nose crossed her mind she didn’t think about him. The man could not be the boy’s father. Any evil fuck could have a child but Tina could not bear