Read an extract from Southern Aurora

PROLOGUE

Tippy was a super dog. Best one we ever had. 

A kelpie, black as ink with a white patch on his chest. Nothing and no one could stop him. Best dog in town. Easy.

Only thing was, sometimes he liked to run away.

Mick reckoned he was going out rooting, because it’d mostly happen in spring and he’d usually be gone for a  couple of days at least. Sometimes he’d come back with long welts across his back, like someone had given him a whipping. 

After the fourth or fifth time, Mick reckoned we couldn’t have him loose in the backyard anymore, so he chained him to the water bowl, with a padlock and everything. Tippy’s water bowl wasn’t a normal one like people get from the shops. It was this enormous cast-iron pot we scavved from the tip. Really heavy.

We found him miles away, dragging that cast-iron pot along the road like a complete mental case. He must’ve been desperate for a root, to drag it all that way. It still had some water in it, so he could have a drink when he got tired. That’s what Mick said.

Mick’s my older brother, and he has an opinion on most things, even if he’s wrong sometimes. Mick’s real name is Michael, but everyone calls him Mick, even Mum. He really cracks it if you call him Michael. 

Only Nan called him that. She’s the only one who could get away with it. She’s the one who called me Jimmy too. My real name’s Jim, but it was Jimmy that stuck. Mum says I was named after Jim Hawkins in Treasure Island, which is a movie and a book. She says she’s only seen the movie, though.

When the water bowl didn’t work, Mick chained Tippy to the fence out back. He didn’t like it much. He barked a lot. Then he’d go quiet for a bit. Then he’d start up barking again. 

I realised later that the quiet time must have been when he was thinking about what he was gonna do. Planning it all out. 

So when I took him off the chain to put him in Mick’s car, Tippy took off like a shot. It was like he thought, You can stuff that for a joke, I’m not going back on that chain again! and he bolted down the side of the house and out into the street like a rocket. Mick yelled out and we all ran after him. Even Mum and Sam. Sam’s my younger brother. 

But there was no catching Tippy. He was way too fast and way too smart for us.

Someone caught him in the end, though.

It was about a week later when Mick found him. I remember because Mum was at work and Mick came home with these big eyes that didn’t blink for ages. 

Then he said, ‘Tippy’s dead.’ Just like that.

I held in my tears, swallowed them down. I tried to be tough because otherwise Mick would say I was being a sook. I knew it was my fault Tippy had got away, and I felt sick in my guts. I asked what happened.

He shrugged. ‘Someone shot him.’

‘Really?’

‘Yep. I found him near the back road to the tip. He’s still there.’

I asked Mick to take me, but he reckoned he was too busy because he had to go pick up his Pacer from the mechanics. Then I begged him. So he said okay, but made me promise to make his bed for the rest of the year. That turned out to be a pretty good deal, because he went to jail not long after. 

•

The tip is a fair way out of town. There’s a couple of good ways to get there, but the quickest on the bikes is the fire access road, which is out near the rifle range.

I’m always a bit scared going past the rifle range. Mick told me once that some kid got hit by a stray bullet that went right through his heart. ‘Dead before he hit the ground,’ he said. That story was almost definitely bullshit, but it still made me nervous.

Mick rode about twenty metres ahead and was going pretty quick, even with the shovel across his handlebars. The shovel was so we could bury Tippy properly. I’d asked him if we could take it.

Mick never liked it if I rode too close. It was the same if we walked somewhere, I always had to stay a bit behind. I didn’t mind. He had a much faster bike anyway, a cruiser. He got it from one of his mates. Mine’s just a BMX and it’s a few years old and too small for me. Mick put the seat up as far as it could go, but it’s still too small. 

We got to the start of the fire access road. The road wound through the bush, all loose gravel and dust. I gritted my teeth and listened out for the crack of a gun. I thought for sure I was gonna get shot. Or maybe Mick would get shot, and then it would be my fault for making him take me, and Mum would never forgive me. Even if Mick upsets her sometimes, I know she really loves him. I could almost see her face if I had to tell her Mick was dead. It’d be pretty awful.

I slowed down a bit because I thought it was better if we rode further apart, so we’d be a harder target. But then I remembered it was a stray bullet that killed that kid, so it wouldn’t make any difference.

Mick stopped his bike and waited for me to catch up. The sun was getting hot and I was starting to sweat. Mick took off his t-shirt and stuffed it down inside his jeans. His back was long and arched and deep brown from the heat of summer. I wished my skin was like that. I could see the bones of his spine, almost
like he was a lizard.

He nodded toward the side of the track.

‘There,’ he said.

I couldn’t see anything.

‘Where?’

‘There,’ he said, and pointed this time. The scrub was pretty thick, all prickly bushes and old gum trees that were twisted and dry. Most of them were too close together, so the trunks were skinny and sick looking.

We left our bikes and walked through the scrub toward an old fence. It was one of those really old ones with grey posts that are almost falling over. The barbed wire was rusty and loose. 

When we got close I could see. Tippy was lying down almost like he was asleep, except his mouth was open and his tongue was hanging out. There were flies on him. Mostly where his fur was matted, where the bullet went into his side, but in his mouth too. 

Mick hocked something in his throat and spat it out.

I wondered why someone had shot Tippy, but I couldn’t really talk. My eyes started to burn and I swallowed hard, trying to stop the feeling inside my throat that always comes before I cry. I didn’t want to be a sook.

‘Who did it?’ I said.

Mick shrugged. ‘Dunno. Some prick.’

Even if some prick had shot him, I knew it was my fault. If I’d been more careful, Tippy wouldn’t have got away. If I’d been more careful, he wouldn’t have got shot.

We stood there for a bit, not saying anything. I could hear the heat almost as much as I could feel it. The hum of blowflies, the crackling of bark, and that slow, lazy call the magpies make when it gets hot. Like they’re bored with the world and everything in it.

Mick passed me the shovel.

‘C’mon,’ he said. ‘Better get started.’

•

Mick didn’t ride as quick on the way back. And he let me ride a bit closer. Not right next to him, though. Just a few metres behind.

About halfway home, when we got past the rifle range, he stopped and turned to face me. He looked me in the eyes, which he almost never does. 

‘You all right?’ he said.

‘Yep.’

I think it’s the only time he’s ever asked me anything like that, so I remember it really clear. It was nice he asked, but it made me sad too. I’m not sure why. Then he said I could go to the mechanics with him to get the Pacer, as long as I kept quiet. 

When I think about it now, I wish I hadn’t seen Tippy like that. Because some things can’t be unseen. But more than that, some things can’t be undone. That’s what Mick says. 

And even though he’s wrong about some things, most things really, he’s probably right about that.