Yellowcake - Margo Lanagan [4]
The other boys talked in Traveller, bubbles and scraps of noise. Billy lay on the hillside, gripping the ground with his hands, with the skin of his back, with the back of his head. Above him everything swirled in the aftermath, and a few stars sang, restoring the world to stillness.
‘Hum-humnah-Billy?’
‘Wait,’ he said sharply.
‘Oof. Arf,’ said Castle. ‘I’m all gone to petals and come back again.’
Yes, thought Billy, they’re about the words for it.
‘How does Jo go?’ he said. It was hard to shape his mouth around all that meaning.
‘Me?’ said Jo, in his normal voice. ‘I’m all right. I’m very all right. Don’t worry about me.’
‘It makes him feel good,’ said Shai. ‘It gives him jollies. He’ll be impossible, these next few days.’
Jo clapped and rubbed his hands. Both sounds seemed to happen right inside Billy’s head. ‘So what else have you got for me?’ he said.
‘What was that one, first?’ said Castle.
‘’Twas a rose. An old Bourbon rose called “Zéphirine Drouhin”, soft mid-pink in colour, with a strong fragrance. A little fussy in its habits and prone to black spot. The absence of thorns makes this rose ideal for children’s play areas, and—’
‘All right, give it a rest,’ said Shai. ‘Get back on your table.’
‘No, I’m down now. I’m ambillant. I’m good.’
‘Well, turn around, then.’
‘I tell you, I can’t see. It’s like a black curtain—well, dark grey, with branches and trunks.’
‘Turn around so we know. This is a scientific test.’
‘Sheesh, can we wait a bit?’ muttered Alex in a mooshed voice. He must have his face in his hands.
‘Not too long,’ said Shai. ‘He’s on his roll now. Billy, get that rose back and put out the next object.’
Billy pushed the spinning part of his brain into a corner. He bent and retrieved the rose from the bushes. He sniffed deeply of it as he took it to the INDIA 4 STORM rock, but no, it was only the merest hint of the rose-ness that had passed over and through him. It was nearly nothing in comparison, yet it was something enough to send him mad with sniffing and trying and yearning, if he let it.
Pumfter regarded him kindly, and he patted the dog’s worn cloth head. Then he laid the rose beside Pumfter and took out the ashtray.
It tinked and rattled as he pushed it into the bush.
‘It’s a cowbell; that was easy,’ said Jo.
‘Don’t be cheeky,’ said Shai.
Jo paced back and forth. His chest was narrow and bruised looking. ‘Are we ready, then? Are we good?’
‘Shut up, Jo. Alex, how are you coming?’
‘I’m a bit better.’
‘What about you, Billy?’
‘I’ll be all right,’ said Billy stoutly.
‘Right, Jo. We’re ready for you.’
A jittery silence fell. The forest sounds flowed into it.
Jo stood poised, as if about to take a step, or to bend forward and vomit.
‘Gawd,’ said Castle under his breath, ‘what will he make of this?’
‘He doesn’t make anything,’ said Shai. ‘He told me. He just connects. The object uses him to find, I dunno, something else. Something bigger. Oops—’
Jo had swung away from them, had started down the far slope.
‘Quick, after him!’ said Shai. ‘Sometimes he whistles along. Billy, you bring the object.’
Billy caught up with them at the forest edge. Jo moved on ahead, indistinct as a marsh-candle, as quietly as if he were flowing around the trees, floating over the ground, and the others thudded after him, grunting and swearing.
‘Where is the bugger?’ said Shai. ‘I’ve lost him.’
‘Down there,’ said Billy. ‘Headed for the brook. See?’
‘Good man.’
When they reached Jo, he had dropped his pants and belt on the thin crescent of sand. He stood up to his calves in the shallows of a pool, which a lacework of tiny waterfalls spilled into. A star-reflection rocked jauntily over the ripples he made.
‘Watch him,’ whispered Shai. ‘He can’t swim. When he’s like this he thinks he can, though. Fly, too, sometimes.’
Jo stood, bent as if cold, his hands dark on his knees. He turned and looked straight at them, his face skull-like and