Playing Lady Gaga, Being Nan Pau. Steve Tolbert

      ‘We’re almost there!’ he screamed again, barely able to hear himself. He could only guess where ‘there’ was before spotting the dam just metres away, the debris-filled water moving in wavelets away from him.

      ‘Just ahead!’ He stopped and turned. ‘Ella!’ He leaned into the wind and smoke, shielding his face with his hands.

      Branches hit him, embers scorched his skin and clothes.

      ‘Ella!’

      Spot fires were merging now; the heat like the air itself was on fire.

      She knew where to go, didn’t she? She had to be there, lying mud-caked in the shallow end, frantic for him to arrive. Not in the middle: no, please not there! She could barely swim. He turned and ran.

      Over the embankment and into the water he went, screaming her name.

      The bottom sloped downwards. At chest-level he went under, but not for long. Short of breath, his face broke the surface. He sucked air and sank down again, images of Ella behind him, not behind him, of his Mum and Dad leaving for New Norfolk hours earlier, Dad’s ‘Back soon’, Mum’s ‘Want anything?’ joining his thumping heartbeat and the firestorm about to come over the top of him. More horror thoughts, of having to choose between being scalded in the water or getting out and being consumed in fire. He rose, breathed deeply and realised the water – bathtub warm – was not getting any hotter, the firestorm no louder. He lifted his eyes to the falling ash, the orange-grey sky. The wind had eased and changed direction. He stood up, his legs shaky and loose. Still smoke and a distant roar, yes, but otherwise just the sound of his gasps and the muck and water dripping off him.

      ‘Ella!’ He waded, dragging his arms through the water, imagining her floating face-down on the surface. Finally he climbed out, sandshoes squishing out water that hissed and steamed on the charred ground. The crackle of fire, sound of moving water, then from the dam a small, quavering voice – ‘Nick.’

      ***

      The kettle whistled inside the house, went quiet.

      ‘Want anything, Nick?’

      The words continually being asked of him, like he was too feeble to look after himself: two hours before the firestorm, driving to and from the Royal Hobart Hospital, and here on the front deck of his Aunt Jenny’s, one of the few places around Gretna spared by the fire. Want anything? Change ‘anything’ to ‘anyone’ and the answer could be tattooed across his forehead – Ella and John.

      ‘Nick, do ya want anything to eat or drink?’ his Aunt Jenny called out again, her shrill voice penetrating his bones.

      Be good if you could keep your voice down to a shout, he thought to say, sitting there on the edge of the veranda, legs dangling. He shouted back, ‘No, thanks!’ Followed quietly by, ‘Commandant.’

      Still the human megaphone jabbered away in there, as she had done since day one of ‘Operation Stay-With-Us-For-As-Long-As-You-Like’. Lately, she’d even started reminding him to wash his hands and brush his teeth, like he was still a pre-schooler too small to see over the wash basin. Next she’d be saying, ‘Bedtime. Be sure to go to the toilet before saying good night, Nicholas.’ Yeah, his mum was right. He should be bowled-over grateful to her and Uncle Pete (a shoo-in Order of Australia winner for unreal patience), and more importantly, show it. But beyond his barely-able-to-utter ‘Thanks’, he just couldn’t muster up the emotion, sincere voice and wooden hugs to convince everyone he really was grateful. ‘Still in shock,’ he’d overheard his mother say to his aunt one night. Yeah, too right I am, Mum, for more reasons than you think.

      He looked out at the rosebushes bordering the entryway, then at two honeyeaters fighting over bottlebrush territory to his right. The old tortoiseshell cat appeared from nowhere and sat next to him, gazing in the direction of that bottlebrush, its tail curled around its feet. Black cockatoos flapped past and landed in the top of the red gums, the only ones this side of Gretna Central not torched, he reckoned. They screeched and tore away at the leaves and blossoms. At least birds had survived what pets and livestock hadn’t.

      A few days earlier, he had stopped by their property and taken it all in. Like a huge incendiary bomb had been dropped. Not a sound. Concrete foundations, brick fireplace intact; otherwise the house and sheds just piles of charred rubble. Everything else blackened as well: the ground, outlying tree trunks, iron sheeting, animal carcasses (Sook’s and Moonshine’s?), mangled husks of John’s Suzuki and Dad’s tractor. No chooks, ducks, native hens. No fruit trees, boxing or play equipment, clotheslines, garden borders, fencing. He had wandered out to the far paddock and spotted his rabbit traps, one smothered in charcoaled rabbit, or something of similar size.

      In his need for space, he’d taken to walking for hours over the blowtorched landscape, sifting through the remains, locating where things used to be. And sometimes during all that locating he’d turn in the direction of the river and his favourite fishing spot – his insides churning – and track the fire’s path.

      That landscape, this deck, night television, his designated mattress, the odd ride into Hobart and back – the extent of his world now. So, want anything, Nick? Yeah. To wake up in his own bed, pull the curtains back and see Ella planting something in her garden, or on the swing instead of being house-bound or in hospital getting her bandages changed. Otherwise nothing. Just being left alone would be good, thank you, Commandant. No one’s arms around him, no one’s confiding words that had about as much chance of clearing his head of the fire as the Sky God dropping off a cloud and fronting up for his birthday.

      The deck creaked behind him, the footsteps recognisable. Two sisters: his aunt the stomper, his mum the creeper. He switched his brain to autopilot.

      ‘You know what I’m looking forward to most?’

      Yeah, he did. If his mum had a religion it was trees and plants and flowers. ‘What, Mum?’

      ‘Seeing the first new shoots and blossoms and watching the valley recover.’ She sat next to him in her King Gees and city-bought t-shirt, beaming her hundred-watt smile; though he didn’t look around to make sure, he just knew it was there. ‘And the valley will recover. Its people will see to it. Such a tight-knit community. Few places in the world where you can go out and leave your doors unlocked and the neighbours will bring in your washing if it rains.’ She was obviously having a good day.

      ‘Well that won’t be happening again anytime soon.’

      ‘But it will happen.’

      Mum the smiler. Brother John and sister Ella, the inheritors of her smiler gene, as well as her ease around people. Not him. ‘You’re so like your father,’ newly-mets said to him on occasion; the newly-mets not bothering to add, ‘Your father the quiet one, the paddock-wanderer.’

      But his dad talked. He just chose the people he talked to and his talking places – mostly Rotary meetings, or up at the hotel – carefully. He had strong opinions too. Often expressed to himself when watching the news or a current affairs program. Opinions on politicians: ‘Couldn’t hold two thoughts in their heads on the same day.’ Opinions on townie populations – their houses butted together, ghetto-blasters blaring, rat dogs barking, P-platers hurtling down the roads at Formula One speeds. And strongest of all, his opinions on ‘new’ technology. It challenged him, and he challenged the need for it. ‘Where’s all this technology taking us? Down the road to digital dementia …’ or ‘There was something I read recently about computer games and social networking amounting to conversation avoidance techniques that threaten to turn the next generation autistic.’

      Dad wasn’t into change. Reckoned after serving in Vietnam he’d left Texas for Tassie – ‘the back of beyond and then some’ – because he’d heard nothing changed here. Thing was, he still hadn’t a clue Mum and the rest of the family were on Facebook and, when he was out, played computer games.

      But what Dad lacked in ATM and computer appreciation he made up for in farming and handyman skills, playing his big, recently replaced Gibson guitar and