litlinks 2022

The Hungry Sky

by Joanne Cook, Amaroo School

As if in a dream, she walked through the saltbushes, the brittle branches desperately clutching at her bare legs. Occasionally, she stumbled. Her eyes were transfixed on the mirror which glowed eerily in the harsh landscape. In the mirror, she could see her reflected image approaching, but also, other, smaller images that danced around her reflection in the twilight of the all-consuming sky. Briefly, she glanced back, but the barren land stretched out behind her, absent of all other life.

***

The sky hung heavily over the empty ribbon of road, devouring the land in petulant silence. The landscape being consumed was that of the Hay Plains, which stretched out infinitely: flat, infertile, oppressively hot. Saltbushes clung in terrified clumps below the ominous spectre of the looming sky. Despite the small mounds interspersed like decomposed dwarves across what was left of the earth, flatness prevailed. The sky prevailed.

Charlotte shivered in the air-conditioning, as she shifted her hands restlessly on the steering wheel. She was on the way back home from a funeral in Adelaide: her brother and his wife had buried their daughter – her niece – who was stillborn at 31 weeks. Charlotte thought back to the funeral: the memory of a sky that was smaller than what she now saw before her, but just as heavy. She recalled the oppressive heat as the tiny casket was lowered into the earth; the slowly swirling wind which laboured around the semi-circle of mourners. The memory clutched at her chest, pulling her ribs closer together, as if to crush her.

With a gasp, Charlotte returned to reality as she sat in the contrived, artificial air of her car. She’d been driving for at least two hours, the distance barely registering in the harsh landscape. She couldn’t remember the last time she had seen another car, either in front of her, or travelling in the opposite direction.

“Odd,” she said aloud. Her voice cracked and echoed strangely in the empty space.

Silence resumed: there was no reception to play music through her phone, and she had unsuccessfully tried to tune into a radio station. The void of the car was lacking sound made by any living being. There was only the sound of the car engine, gently vibrating, and the sound of the air-conditioner fan, breathing. Charlotte tried to dispel the silence by lowering the window to allow fresh air in, but instead the menacing heat rushed in and displaced the cool air. She quickly wound the window back up, and the hum of the air conditioner resumed. Still, the road was empty. Out of desperation, Charlotte looked down to have another go at finding a radio channel.

***

The automatic tuning function on the car’s radio spun through the channels, sweeping through the expanse of empty radio waves, then started again. Charlotte left it to cycle through again and again, occasionally glancing down as the crackle of a distant radio tower caused a stutter in the speed of the rotation.

Charlotte was unsure how many times the tuner had tried to locate life in the nothingness, but as she glanced down, she saw the numbers slowing, then starting to tune backwards, as if searching. Eventually, the numbers slowed, then stopped…

“Hello?” a child’s voice echoed in the space.

Charlotte instinctively lifted her foot off the accelerator and gripped the steering wheel. “So weird,” she thought.

She lifted her hand to retune the radio when the voice continued: “Is there anyone there?” More small voices muttered and whispered in the background.

Must be outback kids playing a prank. Even though it wasn’t a two-way radio, Charlotte smiled to herself, feeling compelled to answer.

“No,” said Charlotte, “no-one is here.” She looked out on the empty road. True enough.

She jumped slightly when she heard the giggling that responded to her comment. “You’re funny,” said another child, voice high-pitched and musical.

Charlotte tugged the steering wheel awkwardly in surprise, and the car pulled dangerously to the left-hand side of the road, where the wheels hit the edge of the gravel. Small stones were spat out the side of the car, and she wrenched the car back into the lane with an unsteady wobble. Charlotte’s heart was beating frantically.

“Would you like to come and play?” said the first child.

“No!” the word burst forth, urgent and unbidden.

“No. No, thank you,” Charlotte stuttered. “I need to get home.”

“But you have to pway with us now,” said a third, younger, voice.

Immediately, the car stalled. All that was left was the sound of wheels rolling gradually to a stop on the hot bitumen, and Charlotte’s heart hammering in her ears. She tried to start the car, but the engine did not even turn over. She gazed apprehensively through the windscreen; the road was still empty, except for the heat haze rising like translucent ghosts. She checked her phone; still no reception. As she was looking down, there was a tap on the driver’s side window. She glanced up quickly, but there was only the road and the trailing out beneath the enormous sky.

Charlotte opened the door, as if in a daze, and stepped out. She could feel the heat of the black bitumen through the soles of her shoes.

“Come and play!”

“We’re over here!”

“Come on!”

The chorus of voices echoed like loneliness in the dead air. They swirled like the wind at the funeral, heavy and slow, so that it was impossible for Charlotte to determine their direction.

Across the road, and in the distance, Charlotte could make out a figure standing, arms crossed tightly in front of the chest. Hesitantly, she started making her way towards the shape.

“Hello?” she called out. “Are you okay?”

Giggling answered her.

The shape in the distance separated into four. ”We’re okay, but we want you.”

“Want me?” she said, moving closer to the shapes, which she could now see were contained within an enormous mirror, which stood in solitude amidst the sand and saltbushes. She could see herself, approaching herself, but she could see more than that.

As if in a dream, she walked through the saltbushes, the brittle branches clutching at her bare legs. Occasionally, she stumbled. Her eyes were transfixed on the mirror which glowed eerily in the harsh landscape. In the mirror, she could see her dark image approaching, but also, other, smaller, images that danced around her reflection in the twilight of the all-consuming sky. Briefly, she glanced behind her, but the barren land stretched out behind her, absent of all other life.

As Charlotte approached the mirror, her reflection, as well as the reflection of the children dissolved into clarity. In her reflection, blood seeped from a wound in her head, and trickled down her cheek. She put her hand up to her head, and then pulled away. Nothing.

The reflected children were featureless, but their grey eyes were piercing and looked directly at her physical embodiment. They shuffled and clustered around her reflected self, reaching their hands out, chubby fingers outstretched.

“Come here,” one shape said.

“Play with us,” said a second.

“I don’t want to,” Charlotte whispered.

“But you have to,” said the third.

“We want you…” Their voices shifted strangely, echoing softly in the expanse of space.

“What do you want me to do?” Charlotte said.

“We want you to wake up,” said the second.

“What?”

“We want you to wake up!” chorused the children.

Charlotte collapsed on the ground. Her eyes were open, and she stared across the plains where the sand swirled.

***

“Wake up,” said a distant voice.

Charlotte kept her eyes closed, but the voice persisted. She could feel thick, warm liquid dribbling down her forehead, and over her cheekbones. She could hear the dripping of liquid on a tight fabric surface.

“You need to wake up.” The voice became clearer, firm and insistent.

Charlotte blinked as she tried to get the fuzzy and white world back into focus. She could see the shape of an arm come across her face and could feel a hand applying pressure to her head.

“You’ve been in an accident.” The authority in the voice was reassuring in the confusion of the moment.

“You’re going to be fine.”

Charlotte closed her eyes again, then opened them. The piece of the world that she was looking at finally came into focus. She could see the taut fabric of the airbag stretched across her vision. She could see the rear-view mirror, which had snapped off, and lay, twisted towards her.

Image sourced from Flickr: The road to Ivanhoe vanishes by Tim J Keegan