Free On the Run by Tristan Bancks Page B

timber, black metal.
    â€œGot some stuff for it yesterday down the coast. Cleaned it up this morning.”
    â€œHave you ever used one before?” Ben asked.
    Dad shrugged. “Can’t be that hard. Your pop used it.”
    â€œDid he ever show you how?”
    â€œNo,” Dad whispered.
    â€œWhy are we whispering?” Ben asked.
    â€œRabbits,” Dad said. “You seen any?”
    Ben thought about the light gray rabbit he had seen the day before at the river. He shook his head. “Nope.”
    â€œI saw one just up there,” Dad said, pointing. “Gray. Missed it. Ran off. Waiting for it to come out again.”
    They sat, quietly waiting for rabbits. Ben hoped that the rabbit was way underground, settling in for a bunch of carrots and a long nap. He wondered where rabbits would find carrots around here. He looked at the gun, Dad’s grubby hands gripping it.
    â€œWhy do people shoot rabbits?” he asked.
    â€œEat ’em,” Dad said. “They’re a pest.”
    â€œOlive’s a pest and we don’t eat her,” Ben said.
    Dad looked out over the bumpy bark of the fallen tree in front of them, dirty blue cap with the gas company logo sitting limply on his head. He had creases and blackheads around the edges of his eyes. He looked more like a dog than a rat today, Ben thought. He wondered if dogs had hair growing out of their noses like Dad did. He couldn’t remember ever seeing a dog with nasal hair.
    Passports.
    Ben wanted to ask why they needed them. He could say that he’d overheard his parents talking last night, but Dad would get angry. Ben did not want to anger a man with crow’s-feet, nose hair, and a gun. He would have to be smart. He squeezed his bottom lip. Interrogate, he thought. Get him talking.
    â€œI love it here,” Ben said.
    â€œReally?”
    â€œYeah.” Ben was only partly lying. He liked being at the river by himself.
    Dad raised his brows.
    â€œDo you?” Ben asked.
    Dad thought about it, adjusted his cap. “No. I don’t.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œKeep your voice down,” Dad said, annoyed.
    Ben asked again. “Why not?”
    â€œI just don’t,” he said. “Your grandfather planted these trees thirty years ago. Thought a pine forest would make him rich. He thought a garlic farm would too. But he died poor.”
    â€œIs that why you don’t like it here? Because of Pop?”
    â€œNo. I just like hot showers and cold beer.”
    Ben saw his chance. “So why don’t we leave?”
    Dad looked at him and then back to where he thought the rabbit was hiding.
    â€œWe will,” he said.
    â€œGo home?” Ben asked.
    Long pause. “Not necessarily.”
    â€œWhere then?”
    â€œI don’t know,” he said.
    â€œA long way away?”
    â€œToo many questions, Cop,” Dad said, a note of warning in his voice.
    Ben stayed silent for a moment as the tension drained away, down the hill and into the river.
    â€œI was just asking,” he said.
    â€œWell, don’t ‘just ask.’”
    What would a detective do? He knew what he wanted Dad to tell him—where they were going next, why they needed passports. He just needed the questions that would unlock the answers.
    Ben closed his eyes for a moment, concentrating. The curtains opened on the movie screen at the back of his eyelids. He imagined Ben Silver, Sydney’s toughest cop, the hero from his movie, cross-examining Dario Savini, zombie thief. Ben Silver needed to get a confession of Savini’s crime without being infected and turning into a zombie himself. Ben wasn’t sure if zombies could speak, but in this part of his movie, they could. What would Ben Silver ask?
    â€œHow did you get like this?”
    â€œLike what?” Savini would say.
    â€œLike this. Don’t you want a normal life—kids in school, soccer on weekends, a regular