Free Ironbark by Barry Jonsberg

she’s been robbed, but can’t quite work out how. It’s a long shot, but I try to get a carton of smokes stuck on the tab. She looks absolutely thrilled when she turns me down, like it’s the one bright spot in an otherwise bleak day.
    â€˜Done deal,’ I say to Granddad when I get out. He hasn’t moved as far as I can tell. ‘Just a case of reporting in to the cop shop, stopping off at the bottlo and we’re ready to split the scene.’
    Granddad steers me to this little rinky-dink building just off the main street and behind the supermarket. A thirtysecond walk. There’s a police car parked outside, otherwise you’d never know this was a cop shop. It’s almost quaint. The building is really small. Unless there’s some serious warping of the space–time continuum behind those walls, there’ll be no rows of cells waiting for public wind-breakers, serial disabled-parking villains and sexual abusers of domestic appliances.
    I’ve seen bigger public toilets.
    The front door is locked. I am not kiddin’. And – get this – there’s a hand-printed notice on the door’s top panel. ‘Please ring for assisstence’, with a little arrow pointing to a buzzer on the doorframe in case you’re a complete moron and can’t find it by yourself. I wouldn’t be surprised to see another notice saying the cop shop’s only open on Mondays, Tuesdays and half-days Wednesdays when there’s an ‘r’ in the month.
    I love that. Please ring for assisstence. It’s an emergency, officer. Get me someone who can spell. Quickly.
    Granddad rings. We wait. Good job I’m not slitting his throat because by the time ‘assisstence’ arrives, rigor mortis would’ve set in. Eventually we hear the thump of approaching footsteps. Somewhere a needle is registering 5 on the Richter scale. The door opens and a mountain steps out. I instinctively take a step back.
    The police officer is huge. I don’t mean well-built. I don’t mean stocky. I mean huge. He’s so tall he should have a red, spinning light on his head as a warning to lowflying aircraft. He’s so broad he’s a one-man solar eclipse. He’s got snow drifts on his shoulders. He’s . . .
    Trust me, if he toppled onto you, they’d have to peel you off the bitumen. I risk neck strain and scan the mountain’s summit. There’s a lumpy head up there, and teeth arranged in what seems to be a smile. You probably don’t want to know this, but my bowels loosen slightly.
    â€˜G’day, Richie,’ says Granddad. ‘How are you?’
    â€˜G’day, old-timer,’ says the colossus. ‘Never better. Never better.’
    I worry slightly about someone who apparently still uses the term ‘old-timer’. I thought no one said that outside of fifty-year-old American films.
    â€˜This here’s my grandson. I reckon you’ve been expecting him.’
    â€˜Sure have. Sure have.’ I’m beginning to think this guy says everything twice. ‘Welcome, young fella. Put it there.’
    This huge ham of a fist hovers around my abdomen. I transfer the shopping bags into one hand, put out the other and shake his. His grip is firm, but not too strong. That’s a relief because if he had a mind to, this guy could leave me with a soggy stump full of splintered bone. As it is, my hand disappears entirely in his. I check him out as we shake. I know I’ve already mentioned it, but he really is big. It’s not the kind of bigness you see wandering around shopping centres either; you know, the huge gut hanging over the belt, all wobble butt and multiple chins. This guy is solid muscle. His uniform, which probably had to be made specially, since I doubt he fits regulation sizes, is tight with the strain of keeping it all in. Listen, if I was recruiting a team member for tug o’ war, I wouldn’t pass him over,