Darkness Be My Friend by John Marsden Read Free Book Online Page A

in the world.
    Instead I had Hell.
    I went for a walk that afternoon. Again I had to fight Iain to get permission. I didn't like that, having to ask permission to walk around my own land. It reminded me too much of life with Major Harvey. Of course it was a lot different with Iain. He was relaxed and friendly and easy to talk to. But I still had to persuade him that it was OK.
    "There's no chance of enemy soldiers up here, Iain."
    "Well, the chances are minimal, yes."
    "And I'm not going to get lost. I know this area like the back of my hand."
    "New Zealand Search and Rescue spend most of their time saving experienced trampers."
    "I'll be careful, I promise. No bungee jumping, caving, rock rolling. Trust me."
    When he eventually did agree and I went for my walk
I spent the first fifteen minutes fuming about the conversation. It was annoying being so sure of something but then having to convince someone else. At home my parents had always trusted my judgement. That had been one of the big shocks when I got to school, finding that things were a bit different there. It depended, of course. Depended on the teacher. At Wirrawee Primary, for instance, if we hurt ourselves we'd go to the staff room and borrow the first-aid kit and fix ourselves up. Then this new Principal came when I was in Grade 3. I was sitting outside the staff room with the first-aid box, and I was digging a splinter out of my finger with the needle. The new Principal came past, asked me what I was doing, then cracked a mental when I told him. He didn't only tell me off, he told the teachers off. I could hear him in the staff room, raving about legal consequences and stuff. I thought he was stupid, but after that if we got a splinter we had to ask a teacher to take it out.

    You can never stay angry for too long in the bush though. At least, that's what I think. It's not that it's soothing or restful, because it's not. What it does for me is get inside my body, inside my blood, and take me over. I don't know that I can describe it any better than that. It takes me over and I become part of it and it becomes part of me and I'm not very important, or at least no more important than a tree or a rock or a spider abseiling down a long long thread of cobweb. As I wandered around, on that hot afternoon, I didn't notice anything too amazing or beautiful or mindbogglingly spectacular. I can't actually remember noticing anything out of the ordinary: just the grey-green rocks and the
olive-green leaves and the reddish soil with its teeming ants. The tattered ribbons of paperbark, the crackly dry cicada shell, the smooth furrow left in the dust by a passing snake. That's all there ever is really, most of the time. No rainforest with tropical butterflies, no palm trees or Californian redwoods, no leopards or iguanas or panda bears.

    Just the bush.
    Iain wouldn't move over Tailor's Stitch until it was completely dark. He was right, of course: even in the dimmest light we risked our silhouettes being seen by anyone who happened to be looking in the right direction. But it was frustrating, sitting there waiting, every minute thinking, "OK, it's dark enough now, let's go," then thinking, "Oh no, there's still a streak of grey in the sky, right across the ranges, better wait a few more minutes."
    Then suddenly we were all on our feet, hoisting packs, stuffing pockets, shaking hair out of our eyes. Iain called me over and told me to lead again, which pleased me a lot, although Homer pretended he didn't even notice.
    And so, when everyone was ready, we began the trek, back up the steep side of the ridge, over Wombegonoo, and into my sanctuary of Hell.
    Getting in and out of Hell was never easy because of the steepness and narrowness of the track. Also, it was very slippery in places where the creek flowed along it for a few metres, so that the creek and the track became the same thing. Doing it in complete darkness was really annoying. All that slipping and sliding and, just as