The Plough Star and the Fence

THE STARS OVERWHELMED HIM. He'd been so long in a place of crushing weight and darkness, a black hole swallowing all the light and letting none out, that he now felt he'd been freed and nothing would ever be bad again. He looked over his shoulder into the spotlight illuminating damp dust, and checked that the guide wheel of the disc plough was running in the furrow made by the castor wheel in the previously ploughed row, and then looked back to the stars. The tractor rocked beneath him, its pneumatic seat covered in an oily hessian sack absorbing some of the impact. The huge dual rear wheels threw up clouds of soil which impacted on the mudguards and added to the confusion of engine, cut and movement. But up through the floodlit vision of unploughed and ploughed field, there were the stars. He could only recognize two constellations: The Saucepan-Orion's Belt and the Southern Cross; but the rest filled him with a hunger to know and name. His old thirst for knowledge was back with a vengeance.When his best mate's father, Serge, had suggested he head up to their farm to do some ploughing, he'd filed it away where he filed away most things, outside drugs: in the can't- do, won't-do, not-interested place. Scratching his chin, his face, his arms, his chest, he said, Nah, mate, I'm not suited to that kind of work.Then what are you suited to? asked Serge. Not much, he laughed. Normally his mate Jess would laugh along with him, but he didn't. Jess'd stopped laughing along, months and months back, when he got straight. Now Jess wouldn't even lend him twenty bucks when things were tough, and they were always tough. In fact, he'd only seen this so-called best mate twice in three months: not that Jess was avoiding him, rather that he avoided Jess. Best stick with those who understand, and the only ones who understand are those using; not those who once used, but those who were hanging or stoned.But things weren't good. His own family had cut him off after he sold the complete contents of their houses when they were over east. And his girlfriend had OD'd and dropped dead on him. There'd be an inquest about that, but he hadn't injected her or even scored the dope that killed her. She'd been earning enough to keep them both high, but that was gone now. He'd resorted to petty dealing and "doing favors" for those further up the food chain. Sometimes when he could manage it, he drove girls from his dead girlfriend's agency to clients and waited outside in the car to make sure it all went smoothly. But once, he got so stoned that he missed a girl being beaten to a pulp, and the agency didn't want much to do with him. It was a long way from his uni days, when he'd been studying for Honors, writing a dissertation on "Satan and Redemption in Paradise Lost."What's more, he had no idea how to handle a plough. He'd scarcely been out of the city. It's not hard, his mate chimed in behind Serge, you just keep it straight and learn how to figure- eight the corners of the paddock. We'd put you on nightshift, said Serge. We start when the rains come-I reckon in four or five weeks. Get off the shit and come up. Free board and lodging, and I'll pay you a hundred bucks cash a day. It's not much, but it's better than the crap you're doing.Being a person of extremes, and with the world and the law closing in on him in so many ways-a small bust and a failed deal in the same week: the cops and a dealer after his blood-he went cold turkey. He'd done it before, but it hadn't lasted. It's not the way if you're serious, the counselors had often told him. Come into the drug unit and do it under supervision. And take up the program in the months, or even years, that follow. We'll see you through to good health. You make the decisions, you do the work, and we'll be there. But that wasn't his way.He'd been ploughing that night for about five hours when the ground started getting tougher to work. He dropped the gear range to get through boggy low ground. …