The Other Side of Nowhere Read online

  I lay down in the tent and my mind drifted back to the time he and I were playing cricket in the backyard. We used to spend hours out there, bowling and batting and mimicking our favourite cricket commentators. And we’d make up names for ourselves like Aquil Keepittoyourself and Murali Smackyaintheheadagain.

  This one time, Matt was batting and he was on a roll. I was so pissed about having to keep crawling into the bushes to find that bloody tennis ball. So when I saw an old leather ball hidden behind a pot I grabbed that instead.

  On my next bowl, I covered the ball with my hand and ran, deliberately overstepping the crease and hurling it as hard as I could. It was a full toss. The ball flew high and as Matt swung to hit it the ball clipped the top edge of his bat and shot up into his head, catching him just above the eyebrow. He went down, blood pouring from the deep gash on his forehead.

  Scared I’d really hurt him, I turned to call Mum. But Matt yelled at me to keep bowling. He went on to score another ten runs with blood streaming down his face before I managed to bowl him out. He’d spent the rest of the day in the emergency room, getting a dozen stitches in his head. Yep, Matty was tough all right. Tough and stupid, maybe. But definitely tough.

  I slept fitfully. I kept waking at the slightest sound, and by the time the sky began to lighten I was wide awake. Nick woke up soon after, looking even worse than I felt. Our arms and legs were covered in scratches and bruises and caked in splotches of mud. I ran my fingers through my hair. It felt matted and was sticking up in spikes. I was tired, hungry and sore all over.

  We took turns going for a swim and then sat hidden behind a tree at the top of the beach, waiting for George to return. At first we both kept a keen lookout, alert and expectant. But as the hours dragged, we grew bored and anxious.

  Finally I couldn’t wait any longer. ‘She’s not coming. We’re just wasting time sitting here. We have to get back to Matt.’

  ‘And do what?’

  Nick’s lack of enthusiasm made me mad. ‘I don’t know, but we have to try. We can’t just wait around and do nothing.’

  Nick rested his head on his knees.

  I realised that I desperately wanted him to come up with an idea and sweep me up in its genius. But deep down I knew he was probably feeling as useless as I was. ‘Okay, look,’ I said. ‘Let’s grab some stuff from the camp and then go see if we can find George. We’ll have to stick to the tree line though. We can’t just wander around in plain sight.’

  Back at our camp, we pulled down the sheet, coiled the rope and shoved them both into Matt’s backpack along with a torch and Matt’s Swiss Army knife. All there was left to eat was half a banana, a couple of peaches at the bottom of a tin and a few scrapings of peanut butter. We refilled the Gatorade bottle with the last of the water from the barrel.

  As we walked along the tree line, the sun started to get hot. Even in the half-shade of the trees it beat down on us. I was sweaty and uncomfortable, and my head started to ache. But it wasn’t just the sun making my head hurt. Random thoughts of Matt, George, water, food and home poured through my head in a vivid stream. I was so distracted that I barely registered a small, unmistakeable noise. The sound of a twig snapping. Nick reacted immediately though, diving into the trees and pulling me after him. I fell to my stomach behind a mangy bush.

  Snap.

  There it was again, only closer this time.

  Nick scraped around in the dirt and dug out a good sized rock. He held it in his fist like a hand grenade.

  ‘George?’ he called in little more than a whisper.

  No reply. I pushed up a little, partly to get a better view through the trees but mostly to be ready to run. Nick cleared his throat and this time almost barked her name.

  A voice called back from the trees up ahead, small and cautious. ‘Nick?’

  Nick punched me, grinning, and jumped to his feet. ‘Yep, it’s us. Come on out.’

  No more than thirty metres in front of us, just on the edge of the tree line, a tangled mess of hair poked out from behind a thick trunk.

  As soon as she spotted Nick, George beamed and ran towards him, flinging herself into his outstretched arms. ‘Oh god, I’m so happy to find you,’ she said, burying her head in Nick’s shoulder.

  I hung back from them, feeling awkward. Of course, I was thrilled to see her safe, but I was also struggling with a mix of emotions at the sight of their embrace.

  George looked up from Nick’s shoulder and she smiled broadly at me. Peeling herself away from Nick, she ran forward and smothered me in an enveloping hug. I squeezed her tight, feeling a lump rise in my throat.

  When she stood back, grinning at both of us, I was surprised I had even recognised her. Her hair hung in matted dreadlocks. One side of her body was caked in drying mud. The skin that was visible under the dirt was covered in welts, scratches and bruises.

  ‘You’re really getting into this Robinson Crusoe thing,’ Nick commented with a wry smile.

  George looked down at herself and then chuckled. ‘Looks worse than it is. But what about you guys? Are you okay?’

  ‘Pretty much,’ said Nick as I shrugged.

  As amazing as it was to see George smiling and safe, I could feel a terrible sadness building inside me. It was like the three of us being together again only made Matt’s absence that much more noticeable.

  ‘George, did you see Matt? Is he okay?’

  She reached out and clutched my hand. ‘Right, yeah. Look, honestly I don’t know,’ she said, sounding almost apologetic. ‘I saw the two of you running off down the beach without Matt. And I thought those guys would come after you. But then they didn’t. I couldn’t see them, but I could hear them. They were shouting like crazy. But, Matt … I don’t know what happened to him. I didn’t hear him. I’m sorry, Johnno, I just don’t know.’

  My eyes stung white hot, and the tears that had been building just spilled over.

  George wrapped her arm around me as Nick stood back, watching. ‘Johnno,’ he said after a moment, so assertively that I looked up. ‘We’re going to get him. Now. Just as soon as George is ready to get moving again.’

  We sat down at the edge of the sand. Nick passed George the water bottle. ‘So what happened to you? Nice escape plan by the way.’

  George laughed, almost choking on the water. ‘I wish I could say it was a plan, but I had no idea. Definitely didn’t figure on the snake.’

  ‘What? A snake?’ I said.

  ‘Yep,’ George said, leaning back on her elbows. ‘It was enormous and, just, right there, staring at me like “who the hell are you?”. I totally freaked out,’ she said. ‘But then it gave me an idea. That maybe I could be a distraction.’

  Nick grinned, looking impressed. ‘Well, it worked.’

  ‘Yeah, I wasn’t sure whether it had or not. I just bolted. There’s a sort of gully, muddy as anything, where the water runs down from the top of the cliff, I guess. I just stuck to that and went up and up. I was about a quarter of the way up when I saw you guys running.’

  She paused to take a drink, and I found myself just staring at her in admiration. I seriously doubted I could have done any of that. I realised ruefully that hanging around with the incurably brave was never going to do wonders for my self-esteem.

  George sat up hugging her knees. ‘It’s as flat as a pancake at the top of that cliff. I found a sort of path that goes right around the edge of it and had a good view of those guys’ camp. It was directly below me so I sat there for a bit, watching them. I didn’t see Matt, though.’

  ‘What were they doing?’ Nick asked.

  George frowned, then shrugged. ‘Nothing, really. I mean they went in and out of the tents a few times. Then they’d sort of disappear for a while.’

  ‘Disappear?’ Nick questioned.

  ‘Well, not like vanish into thin air. But they’d kind of hang round the stream, chatting or whatever – lots of talking on the phone. But then sometimes I couldn’t see them.’ George looked like she was trying to rem
ember. ‘They’d walk towards the cliff and then I couldn’t see them anymore.’

  Nick was leaning forward, like he was hanging on every word. ‘Go on,’ he said eagerly.

  ‘Well, I couldn’t really see where they went,’ she said abruptly. ‘I mean I couldn’t lean over the edge of the cliff without falling.’

  George took another sip of water and then frowned. ‘It was weird, though … sitting there on the top of the cliff. I could hear water. You know, like running water. I couldn’t work it out at first. I couldn’t see any, but it was loud. Like I was sitting right on it.’

  ‘How weird,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ George said suddenly, her eyes shining. ‘I forget to tell you the best bit!’

  ‘But wait, there’s more,’ teased Nick in a deep voice. ‘What else? Don’t tell me you found a set of steak knives?’

  George looked from Nick’s face to mine, beaming. ‘Better than that. When I was looking around for the best way back, I went the wrong way up a path. And I found a whole house!’

  Even as we stood in front of the small hut, Nick was still shaking his head in disbelief. He kept saying he’d never heard of any buildings being on Lion Island. And he’d definitely never seen one. But there it was.

  It had taken a while to get to the hut, with the sun beating down on us the whole way there. Standing in the hut’s overgrown garden, I took a sip of water and surveyed the building. It was the kind of place that was probably ramshackle the day it was built. Now it was decrepit.

  It wasn’t much bigger than a caravan, with grey walls stained all over by blotches of green moss and black mould. The roof was rusty, and paint flaked from the window sills. At the front of the hut, on its small timber verandah, were piles of lobster pots and coils of rope. Fishing rods and netting hanged from nails by the front door. There was even an old snorkel and mask.

  Nick stepped lightly onto the verandah, and the boards groaned under his weight. The front door opened with a slow creak when he gave it a gentle shove.

  ‘Anyone home?’ he called softly. When there was no answer, I was unsurprised but relieved.

  George and I followed Nick onto the verandah and through the door. A cross-hatch of light filtered through the holes in the roof, easing the darkness in the single-roomed hut.

  At the back of the room was a single stretcher bed, and next to it a wooden crate with a couple of things on it – a kerosene lamp and a small clock which had stopped forever at half-past ten. In another corner was a small cane sofa with faded floral patterned cushions covered in dust. There was a tiny kitchenette and a saucepan sat on a camp stove. On the tiny fold-away card table was a knife and fork.

  ‘This place is creepy as,’ Nick said, staring at the cutlery on the table.

  ‘I think it’s kind of cute,’ said George, running a finger along the table and leaving a long smear in the dust.

  Nick and George seemed relaxed, but my head was buzzing. Something about this place didn’t add up. Next to the stove were three empty beer bottles lined up in a row. There was a dark green sleeping bag spread out on the bed. Something flashed through my mind, a fragment of a memory. But it was gone before I could make sense of it. Then I noticed the dog-eared pages of a newspaper half tucked under the bed. I went over and picked it up.

  My heart skipped a beat. The paper was only three days old. It was dated the same day we had left Shell Harbour.

  ‘Someone’s been here,’ I said in a hoarse whisper.

  George snatched the paper and she and Nick stared at the front page.

  ‘Those guys on the beach?’

  Nick scratched at his neck. ‘Maybe one of them.’ He nodded towards the bed. ‘I doubt the fat one would fit in there.’

  ‘Or maybe it’s someone who can help us,’ George said, sounding excited. ‘Maybe we should wait here a bit?’

  ‘No way,’ I said quickly. ‘We’ve gotta find Matt.’ It wasn’t just Matt that was making me want to move on, though. This place was giving me goosebumps.

  Nick nodded. ‘Okay. You’re right. Let’s keep moving. I’m just gonna take a quick squiz around outside first.’

  I really just wanted to get the hell out of there and find Matt, but Nick was out the front door before I could protest. I sat down on the bed. As I toyed with the zip on the sleeping bag, it came back to me. The flash of memory. The two men on the pier at Shell Harbour. The one with the rucksack on the little runabout.

  I remembered thinking he’d been stowing a sleeping bag. I strained hard, trying to visualise him, but couldn’t get a clear picture. I was certain it wasn’t Zaffar, though, and there was no way it could have been Baldy. I would have remembered someone that size for sure.

  I told George about the guys on the pier, and she sat down next to me, chewing a fingernail.

  ‘Something weird is going on,’ I said. ‘I think those guys on the pier have got something to do with Baldy and Zaffar.’

  ‘But Nick doesn’t think Baldy and Zaffar are from Shell Harbour. He’d know if they were. Maybe it’s just a coincidence that they’re here at the same time.’

  ‘That’s some coincidence,’ I said, gruffly. ‘C’mon George. Look at this place – it’s a total dump. Why would anyone come here?’

  George just shrugged, unconvinced. ‘Don’t jump to conclusions.’

  I had to admit that I was good at jumping to conclusions. Especially sinister conclusions. But I did feel like I had some strong evidence this time. Whoever that guy on the runabout was, I felt sure he was mixed up in all this somehow. And I was almost a hundred per cent sure he had something to do with Baldy and Zaffar.

  Nick appeared in the doorway. ‘Check this out,’ he said, grinning. He was holding up what looked like an oversized starter’s pistol.

  ‘What’s that?’ George asked, running over to him.

  ‘I think it’s a Very pistol,’ Nick said, examining it closely.

  ‘A what?’ I asked.

  ‘Like a flare gun … You know, for sending up a distress flare. They used them in the navy, I think. This thing must be thirty years old at least.’

  Nick turned the pistol over in his hands, admiring it but cautious at the same time. ‘Looks all right,’ he said, nodding. ‘Anyway, those numb nuts wouldn’t know the difference. We can just –’

  But George interrupted him. ‘No. If anyone starts waving guns around, someone will get hurt.’ Folding her arms across her chest, she tried to stare down Nick with her fiercest George glare. But Nick looked equally defiant. They started to argue in heated voices.

  As I stood watching their argument, anger sparked up inside of me. What the hell were they playing at? The day was half over and we were no closer to Matt.

  ‘For Christ’s sake,’ I yelled over them. ‘Just shut the hell up!’

  They both spun around to me, looking startled.

  ‘None of this is helping Matt. We’re just wasting time.’ I ran my hands through my hair, feeling like I wanted to yank it out in frustration. I looked from one face to the other. ‘I mean what are we doing here anyway? We don’t even know how we’re going to rescue him. Or even where he is … And, Nick, I don’t care what you think, that stupid thing is not going to help one bit.’

  ‘Johnno, listen –’

  ‘No, Nick,’ I barked, backing away from him. ‘You listen! He’s my brother … we’ve gotta find him,’ I pushed past Nick and strode off outside.

  Scooping down to collect a handful of small rocks, I stood there pitching them as far and as hard as I could into the dense undergrowth, trying to figure out our next move.

  Nick appeared beside me but didn’t speak. I just kept throwing stones.

  ‘Bet you can’t hit the skinny one,’ he said, nodding to a spindly trunk about twenty metres away. He bent down and grabbed some stones too.

  Without acknowledging him, I eyed the stones in my hand, picking out a smooth flat one. I took aim and hurled the stone at the tree. It flew straight and true and slapped into the middl
e of the trunk about halfway up.

  ‘Nice one.’ Nick stepped forward and let fly. His stone arced perfectly through the air before veering at the last moment and plummeting into the scrub. ‘Argh! Robbed,’ he groaned.

  We’d been doing this forever. There wasn’t a tree, lamppost or fence in our street that didn’t bear the scars of our target practice. Picking out another stone, Nick took aim again and this time hit the tree.

  He gave a satisfied smile. ‘Now, do you think we can talk without getting pissed at each other?’

  ‘Doubt it,’ I replied.

  ‘Well, okay. Then I’ll talk and you listen,’ he said, pinging another stone into the undergrowth. ‘I have a hunch about where Matt might be.’

  Nick paused as George came walking up. Even though I was making out I wasn’t paying attention, I was busting to hear what he said next.

  ‘I’d bet that there’s some kind of cave down there, at the bottom of the cliff,’ Nick said, excitedly. ‘That’s where Fat and Skinny kept disappearing when George was watching them. They were going into a cave inside the cliff.’

  I glanced sideways at Nick. ‘So what if Matt’s in a cave? How do we get him out?’

  ‘Remember how George said she could hear water at the top of the cliff, but couldn’t see it? Well, tell me, where was that water?’

  George and I looked at each other.

  Nick raised his eyebrows. ‘I think it flows under the ground – inside the cliff. It must run from the top to the bottom, where it comes out as that stream on the beach.’

  I bought what Nick was saying. He knew the island pretty well. But I still didn’t understand what he was getting at. ‘What’s that got to do with getting Matt out of the cave?’ I asked.

  George piped up before Nick could reply. ‘You think there might be a way to get down to the beach inside the cliff? That there are caves inside the cliff?’

  ‘Exactly,’ Nick said. ‘A back way. So we can get to Matt without Zaffar and Baldy seeing us.’

  I shook my head. ‘Nick, no offence, but that idea is insane,’ I told him. ‘I mean, it’s at least a hundred metres from the top of that cliff to the bottom. So what? We trek underground in the dark through caves inside the cliff?’