Page Turner Winning Entries 2010

WINNER under 21’s -
DIRT STREAMS by Aidan Beiboer (16 year old)

Many have told me never to become too attached to a place, now, after all these years, I understand why.  

The trip home had been the worst experience of my life. At least until I found myself here. As a child this barren ditch was the life of our farm, now it is the corpse. A skeleton, that is all that remains. Stripped of its heart, soul and precious liquid the parched round bones scattered amongst the dirt are the only remnants of the life that once flourished, the river that once thrived. Those cascading rapids of translucent purity may never be seen again. Like humans, rivers can only take so much hardship.  

It's always hot where Mum and Dad live, well lived, but today must be a record, the heat is radiating off the surface of the cracked river bed in hypnotic waves. So different to the waves that once rushed over the rocks and boulders half buried beneath the fine sandy bottom.  

It was the crops that began to die first. Crops require a lot of water, ours did at least, so when the river began to dwindle away into a stream and then from a stream to a series of puddles the crops withered away in the summer's relentless heat. The cattle soon followed, the water insufficient for the older cows to fight on.  I hear with indignation the rumble of trucks pull into our road, dust clouds bellowing above the tree line in their wake. If only it hadn't come to this. All we needed was water.  

Up at the house I find Mum in tears. She's sitting on the old tyre swing under the lemon scented gum, rocking gently back and forth to soothe the pain. I sit down on the dirt in front of her.  

'Emma,' she sobs, 'why, why us.'  

'Money,' I mumble simply, 'Mum if it weren't for money we wouldn't be in this mess. There are people out there who live for money and they're willing to do anything for any extra scraps they can get. We're at the wrong end of the money hierarchy.'  

'But how can they do this,' the tears are gushing down her white cheeks now, but what can I say. Nobody understands us, they can't see why dad couldn't have got a job in town and payed off the debt. They don't listen to the amount of work he does, the amount of setbacks he's had and the torment he has been through for this farm. They don't understand how much this place means to him, how much it means to us. To them we are merely an investment that didn't pay off and now they've brought in the heavy machinery to get their money back.  

Over by the trucks Dad is begging the men taking our stuff to stop but they won't show any pity. They're taking everything; the TV, the washing machine, the quad bikes, even the tractor is being loaded into the trucks open mouth. I see two men shuffle through the front door, my most prized possessions in their arms. Locked with an old padlock Dad found in the shed and painted by hand one holiday in year five the chest holds my closest treasures, nineteen years of them. From my first lock of hair to my valedictory dinner dress, all my toys, all my photos, all my life is edging its' way out the door. Everything I love that doesn't breath is locked away inside it and they aren't getting their greedy hands anywhere near its precious cargo.   Leaving Mum to comfort herself I race across shouting in fury. The men don't even give me a sideward glance.  

'Get your filthy fat hands off my stuff,' I scream from ten metres away, still running at them. This time one of them casts a look at me and grins.  

'Or what princess, you going to cry to daddy, I'm so scared.' In most circumstances I can cope with being called princess, as a joke, but this guy crossed the line. The two empty heads holding the chest are twice my size and easily over a hundred kilos each but I don't care. I'm too angry to care. With both arms occupied holding his half of the chest the guy who spoke has no defence. So I clobber him one to the nose.  

 He yelps in pain as my fist collides with his malicious face, his vile hands slipping off the chest handle. The thirty kilos of wood and metal can only go one way, down. Judging by the volume of the cracks that resonated from his toes, a bleeding nose was the least of his worries. I move to hit the other stunned removalist but Dad grabs me in a bear hug, restraining any movement of my upper arms.  

'What the hell are you doing, we're in enough trouble as it is without a court case to defend,' I hear concern in his hushed tone more than anger.  

'He deserved it,' I hiss, spitting at the scumbag, tears welling in the corners of my eyes.  

Dad's face is pressed up against my ear, his rough beard scratching me as he speaks, 'I know he deserved it, by our morals. But just remember Emma, the law is on his side, not ours.' His hold on me loosened and eventually broke. When he apologised for my actions the men jeered at him, and then left in a storm of dust, everything that was once ours piled up inside the trucks canvas walls. My chest, my childhood, my memories, were gone forever.     

At the time the fifty thousand dollar loan had been the right thing to do. The farm was flourishing in the regular falls of rain and business was on a high. Expansion was the obvious way to go. Now, after four years of clear skies, the money has shown its true colours and destroyed our lives. Water was what we needed. This is what we got.