Chapter 1: Gone, Gone, Gone

Christ it's cold. It's near dead mid-winter, at two in the morning, and I'm starving hungry. My feet hurt, the road is empty, and there is no chance of a lift. And this is the New England Highway, for Christ's sake! It's the major route from Sydney to Brisbane, it's never empty!

I've since looked at so many stories of school kids who had it hard off because they were in the wrong clique at school: rockers, bodgies, surfies, long-hairs, or whatever. Well, I'm not bitter; not any more, that is. One has to take life as it comes. Think of me in my youth, if you will, as my own little clique of one. I could put up with being lonely, bullied and/or ignored; or, I'd just get out.

I got out. It was not the first time I had run away. You can talk to your folks until you're blue in the face. If they're not interested, and aren't listening, you'll begin to see the point of going independent. Let's just say I divorced my old life, and married my new.

The early 1960s was a time when hitching a ride was easy. Seeing as I'd never had a friend I didn't become lonely. But, at that very moment, if I had two more pairs of socks I'd be wearing them! I was so hungry that my stomach thought my throat had been cut. That's putting a light face on it, as I had eaten ... two days ago. If anyone is waiting for some cogently logical line of thought here, you must have forgotten what it is like to be twelve years old!

I won't go into my life's little quibbles, other than to state the fact that I am the second of three (at that point in time) children, and my older sister by two years was paid three times the allowance that I was, had no chores to justify it, and had everything bought for her whenever requested. My home chores were three hours daily of assorted work, jobs which were fair enough for a kid to do, to justify an allowance. My older sister never had to do any of them.

My younger brother had been spoilt rotten since he was born. I heard the fuglys' agreeing that the new baby would be Dad's responsibility to rear. We two older kids loathed going fishing at three o'clock on a winter's morning, in the rain, just to bait his hooks and clean his catch. We were not actually allowed to attempt to catch fish, so we all refused to go. So did Mum, so in that, he was shit out of luck. Mum's hobbies were less solitary, as it later turned out.

I'd complain and someone would ignore that I whinged, except for putting another chore on for me for the weekends, as well as mowing the lawns and washing the car and doing a load of washing and stripping the beds and vacuuming the floor and ... because Dad was getting home too late and I'm the oldest son and mother had better things to do during the day; like making babies. My brother is too young, and mother raised my sister to be a lady. She certainly failed in that one fine little detail, didn't she?

The street lights ran out after two hours trudging, and I'm finally through that largish town of Tamworth. I had planned on buying food while I was in the town and the only thing on were the lights. There was bush on both sides of the road now, dense, black and ominous looking, I could barely see the road under my feet. I could hear a train a distance away, so the main north-south, Sydney-Brisbane line is over there, somewhere a little ways. It ran in a straight line as compared to the highway's irrational curves. A patrolling police paddy wagon had a long look at me, and decided I was harmless, so I began looking for somewhere to throw my sleeping bag. The town cops wouldn't normally come outside the town limits so they must be looking for someone specific.

A city boy like me doesn't realise how dark the night world is, or how many stars there are up in the sky. If I'm going to sleep, it is not going to be anywhere near the road. The scrub on the side of the road is so thick that I knew, that if I walked, waded, struggled about a hundred yards into it I will be lucky if I could find my way back out again, much less anyone coming in to find me.

If I peered far enough back toward the last town, I can now just see a tiny distant street light, and the glowing sky from the town centre. This will be far enough to get some undisturbed sleep, so I waded through long grass and freshly cut scrub, climbed over an old burnt out log, my bum on top, swinging my legs over. I landed on something soft ... soft, like a body soft, with hard bits inside. It was trying to wriggle away from me, but was having trouble making its body work properly, as it was shaking uncontrollably.

Which/whoever/whatever, couldn't stop shaking. It was trying to move away, get away, and was not even able to make a noise. I knew these signs, even at my age. The last time I'd shot through, the cop who picked me up down south (in Eden) said I was in danger of it. He was trying to make himself sound like a hero, and me like a helpless lost lamb. Hypothermia: I hadn't known what it was, so I had looked it up. This is a kid half my size, and showing the symptoms, perfectly. I couldn't see well, the only light was starlight, but it was small, young, and completely helpless.

I threw my sleeping bag onto some leaf litter. I felt for any sharp sticks, and smoothed out the rough bits. I opened the zipper, lifted the shaking body, and put it on the open bag.

Shit! Shorts and a tee-shirt, in mid-winter? He's got to be mad; or very desperate! It snows up here. I pulled the body to one side of the bag by his armpits, and even his armpits were cold.

I tucked myself behind him and grabbed the large plastic bag I had found beside the road, during a shower yesterday. I was lucky to find it at the time. By wearing it over my head, only my legs to my thighs got wet. I pulled the bag over the top of us and down to the sleeping bag. That was awkward but doable. I knew that it would hold our body heat in. Whatever was kept in that plastic bag before, though, was a bit suspect.

I cuddled up close to the body. It was still trying to escape until it felt my body heat, and the 'any port in a storm' syndrome kicked in. He pushed himself back to me, to share the warmth. He may not be thinking logically (hypothermia will remove intelligent thought and reactions), but I was warm. At that moment, that was enough.

I wrapped my arms around him to share the warmth, and realised that those things my hands found were boobies. She, not he, was going to cause trouble. I could feel it in my water, but at that moment, I was too tired to care.

When I woke, I could feel that my lower legs were damp. I could hear spasmodic raindrops hitting the plastic bag, best to stay where I was, as most of me was still warm and dry. The body had tucked into me like a sleeping koala. It was still cold to the touch, to an extent. It was more that her clothing was cold. My arms, tucked under her armpits, felt her warmth. That's got to be a good sign. She began to wake up, the symptoms were obvious. The fact that she was not shaking was even better. She turned her head to look over her shoulder. I can't really say what little I could see was pretty. She was filthy dirty. As she opened her mouth to say something, I placed a finger over her lips.

"Shhhh!" I hissed.

Many men's voices, calling out, were in the distance and getting closer. They sounded like a herd of wild buffalo making their way through the dense scrub.

"Maria! Police Rescue, Maria! You can't run away! Stupid fuckin' bitch! Maria! Can anyone hear anything? Everyone quiet! Listen for anything out of place!" Someone picked that time to have a coughing fit, "Shut up, you idiot!" A muffled curse, then silence for two minutes, "Okay, keep moving, she can't have gone far! Stay in your search line, together as one! Maria!"

Slowly the noise went away from us. I waited a few more minutes.

"Maria?"

"Yeah ... um, you've got that thing sticking in my bum. Reckon you can move it?"

"I'm bustin' for a pee, and I'm a boy. The two things tend to go together in the morning. It ain't personal, just biological."

"Well, turn yourself around so your biology is pointed elsewhere."

"You're lucky I decided to not strip us both last night or otherwise you would be wearing that biology like an internal heater this morning."

"So, you big brave hero, are you going to rape me now?" she didn't sound nervous or scared, just annoyed.

"Not if I have my way. If I had my way, I would open the bag's zip and piss out the bag but I'm afraid it'll snap off when it freezes."

She giggled and sounded very young. The noises were coming back on the other side of us and in the other direction. The whole thing had me wondering why they hadn't seen the bag even though it's green; they had felt so close that I thought I could have touched them.

Maria pulled my arms around her tighter and pushed her thinly covered bum hard against my piss hard. Jesus, does that feel nice! We sort of dry rooted, with two pair of pants between us. The noises went away, and all that was left behind were the noises of early morning currawongs singing after the rain. I opened the zip and raised the plastic bag to look out. They didn't see us because the bag was under, and in between, a fork of a large burnt out scribble bark. They would have had to do summersaults to find us in there. I could have climbed out and had my piss anyway, of course, as long as I was quiet.

I jumped out, immediately opened my fly, and pissed against the tree. I groaned in sheer relief. I looked behind me to see what the girl was doing, and she had squatted to the side of me, dropped her duds and was pissing like a horse on a rock but watching me the complete time, her eyes not moving above my hips.

Having her watch me was making my spent erection reanimate. But, if you look at the reality of it all, watching her tits move due to respiration would have given me a hard on. She's female. Her saying hello to me will give me a hard on. Yeah, true and all, but I was looking straight at a girl's pussy and may not be able to get my monster back into my fly. I felt my face heating up in embarrassment.

I suddenly realised I had finished my piss, and so had she. We were just staring at each other's genitals while she remained squatting in my direction.

"In the town, they have a juvie detention centre. I escaped, yesterd'y. There's fifty girls down there, who would kill each other to see what I can see right now. Come to think of it, some of them did."

"Well, far be it for me to be the practical one, but I can honestly say that that is the prettiest thing I've seen for a long time, too. But we're going to have to get away from here unless you want to go back in there. Take this," I threw her a jumper out of my haversack, "and we'll stay as far as we can in the bush so you don't get caught, but still keep near the highway. We can play 'I'll show you mine, if you'll show me yours, ' when you're a bit safer."

She nodded, stood up, and caught the jumper without pulling her shorts up. I couldn't take my eyes off her pubic hair, and my erection was becoming exquisitely painful. She wrapped the jumper over her shoulders, and wiped her pointer finger between her sparsely haired pussy lips without taking her eyes off my cock, then inserted her digit between her lips and tongue. She took one step towards me, and wrapped her hand around my dick. I instantly came a river against the tree, in what seemed like twenty or more large forceful spurts. I saw yellow, blue and green spots in front of my eyes. It felt like I was going to pass out.

"I gotta have some of that, but later. You're right, I don' wanna to go back in," she pulled her shorts up: dark green, no undies. I almost came again. "Do you know where we are?"

"No. Don't need to know, as the highway is just over there. I can hear traffic, and if we keep that noise just as loud over that way, we will be following the road."

"Smart arse!" friendly sarcasm with a smile but she was still watching me try to stick my still hard as a rock erection, back inside my jeans. I gave it up as a losing battle and undid my belt and top button, and closed it up again so the head was poking me in my belly button. She groaned out loud, and walked away forcing her eyes to look elsewhere. She should whinge! Think of how I feel!

I tossed the sleeping bag over my shoulders to allow it time to dry, "Do you want to wear this thing so you'll feel warmer?" she looked back at me. My old jumper finished down near her ankles and rolled up to her wrists in a huge bunch, frankly, it had been too small on me for the last year, but a new jumper hadn't been on mum's knitting list. She had been knitting baby things that she wouldn't need for seven months. I know they would have missed me this morning, as I wouldn't be there to fill the coal scuttle, set the fire, feed the chooks or wash the dishes. I wonder who made all the beds this morning?

"Yeah, thanks. I can't seem to get warm enough!"

"What do you expect? You almost froze to death, last night."

She didn't comment.

We wove our way through the bushland, where the bush had been cleared to make the highway was much thicker, telling us where the road was as well. "Have you got any food?"

"Nope I have been travelling mainly at night, and keeping my head down. The road noise has stopped so we had better check where we are."

We ploughed through the kangaroo tails spikes, waratahs and waist high scrub grasses, and found the highway had done a ninety degree turn to go under the main northern railway line. A cop car was parked near the viaduct quite some distance away.

"Christ girl, they want you bad! What were you in for?"

"Murder. I killed my father because he raped me. Mum lied, and told them he'd never done such a thing, as she had been there. She'd been right there, alright, because she'd watched as the bastard raped me."

"Well, we'll have to make sure you don't go back, won't we?"

She looked over at me, "What do you want?"

"Well, a fuck wouldn't be out of the question, would it?"

She stared at me in disbelief, then realised that I was joking, and we laughed together.

"I'll tell ya what. I can always use a friend. If we stick together long enough, we'll see how things work out. But up to now, you need someone like me, just to survive. Stick with me, kid, and we'll go places. Come on, we'll cross the railway further up. They might have people watching, and be using the line as wall to stop you."

"What's yer name, hero?"

"Call me David. And, Maria, I don't rape little girls."

She looked at me for what seemed an age, then said, "Won't need ta, will ya."

I laughed, as frankly I didn't trust or believe girls worth a damn. My sister used to tell Mum I watched her getting dressed. I wouldn't have if she had ever closed her bedroom or the bathroom door.

"Come on, Short Arse, we'll go up line a few miles just in case."

Maria grasped my hand with both of her tiny little ones, which are the size of a six year old's and she stood on a log and kissed my cheek,

"Whooee, girl! You need to brush them fangs. Come on, before I'm tempted to kiss you back, anyway."

We were lucky that there were lots of streams, and by how cold the water was, probably the result of melted snow, although we haven't seen any on the ground. The water kept our bellies full at least.

There had been a few SES (State Emergency Service are volunteers from the public, who do rescues, bush fires, searches, all in their own time, even the training) blokes in bright orange overalls (good camouflage) watching the line, but it's a long line. We waited for a while for a train heading north, to block their view. Then, seeing the train was almost stopped due to a steep incline gradient, we hopped inside an empty coal wagon. We rode it for a full two days, to a siding on top of a mountain where it was freezing. We climbed out when it slowed then stopped for a signal and the driver and co-driver swapped staff in the brake van. The further we descended down the mountain the warmer it became.