Dust And Distance

“Some moments don’t feel like goodbye until the dust starts to settle and you’re still standing there.”

The tyres hummed against the bitumen, a steady rhythm broken only by the occasional thump of a seam in the road. We moved fast—faster than I’d ever seen Grandma drive. The trees and street signs blurred past the window, and the ute vibrated just enough to make the rear-view mirror tremble.

Inside, the cab felt tight and rattly, the windows wound up against the cool morning air. It smelled like old leather and metal—like Grandpa's shed: WD-40, something oily, and the faint ghost of eucalyptus drops from the glovebox.

Grandma's hands were locked on the wheel, her knuckles pale against the cracked steering cover. Her face looked stretched tight across her bones—drawn, unreadable. Her jaw was clenched like she was holding something back.

She didn’t speak.

The ute bucked slightly as we hit a shallow pothole, and I bounced in my seat. My seatbelt scraped my collarbone. I didn’t complain. None of us did.

We were still somewhere in town. I knew that. I saw familiar things out the window—the low fencing around the oval, the edge of the schoolyard, a peeling sign for the servo where Grandpa bought the milk and the paper. But it didn’t feel close. The faster we went, the more stretched the road seemed, like someone was unrolling it ahead of us to keep us from turning back.

Mack was silent beside me, his knees pulled up, arms folded around his backpack like he was guarding something precious. He wasn’t looking at the view. He was watching Grandma—her eyes in the mirror, her hands on the wheel. Every time she checked behind us, he tensed, just slightly, like he was expecting something to catch up.

I didn’t ask where we were going.

I wanted to. My mouth was ready to say the words, but they stuck. Something about the way Grandma’s eyes didn’t blink enough, how her mouth stayed shut so tightly it made her cheeks hollow, told me this wasn’t the time for questions. She was running, even if I didn’t know from what.

I turned back to the window.

The houses thinned out, then vanished altogether. No more kids on bikes, no shopfronts, no dogs barking from behind wire fences. Just dirt. Scrub. The occasional stunted tree, branches reaching out like they wanted to grab the car and stop it. Saltbush dotted the land like tough little clumps of resistance. It wasn’t the middle of nowhere, but it was heading that way.

A few old letterboxes stood on the side of the road, some rusted, some leaning. One was made from a milk can, another from a broken toaster. One had a crow perched on top, glossy black and perfectly still, watching us as we passed like it was taking notes.

I squeezed Ribbons in my lap. Her ears flopped sideways, and her button eye was dulled by dust. I rubbed it clean with my sleeve. She felt smaller than usual—less like magic and more like fabric. Like a toy, not a friend.

The road changed without warning. Bitumen turned to gravel with a crunch under the tyres, and the car bounced harder. A spanner slid across the floor with a loud metallic clank. My stomach jumped, not from fear exactly, but from the sudden sense that we were going somewhere we weren’t meant to go. A place that hadn’t been waiting for us.

Grandma turned the wheel sharply. We veered off the main road and onto a narrow dirt track, mostly hidden by scrub. She didn’t slow down. It wasn’t a detour. It was planned. Expected. The way she gripped the wheel tighter told me she'd been looking for that turn.

The track twisted between low trees and brush. Mulga branches scraped the doors with a nails-on-metal screech. We dipped and jostled, the suspension groaning with every ridge and dip, and dust billowed up around us, thick and red. It clung to the windows and crawled into the vents. It tasted dry on my tongue—like iron and sun, like Broken Hill itself was trying to follow us.

The Stephens Creek Reservoir sign flashed past—bent, sun-bleached, the words barely hanging on. I’d been there once on a school trip. It wasn’t far. That’s how I knew—we hadn’t gone far at all. But the world felt bigger now. Wider. And emptier.

No one said anything.

Mack shifted in his seat, and I saw the tension in his hands, curled tight on the edge of the cushion. His eyes never left Grandma.

She hadn’t looked back in a while. Whatever was behind us didn’t matter anymore. Only forward did.

And I felt something in the air change—not in the temperature or the wind, but in the feeling that pressed down on my chest. Like we’d crossed a line. Not a line on a map, but a different kind. One that said: after this, things aren’t the same.

I thought about grandma’s house. The smell of toast and butter. The hum of Grandpa’s radio. All of it now tucked into a different world, getting smaller and smaller in the rear-view mirror even if I couldn’t see it anymore.

But the sun was still climbing. Morning hadn’t gone yet. We were only just outside Broken Hill, a handful of kilometres if that. Not far. Just far enough. Far enough to feel like we couldn’t go back.

The car slowed to a crawl.

At first, I thought we were stopping because something had gone wrong — a flat tyre, or maybe an animal on the road. My stomach clenched with that sudden, sickening feeling you get when something unexpected happens. But there was nothing. Just the open land and the creak of the suspension as Grandma turned the wheel and pulled off the track. The ute shuddered beneath us, its old bones protesting one final turn.

She parked beneath a twisted gum tree that leaned like it had grown tired of standing straight. Its branches were long and crooked, stretching out like the fingers of a giant hand. The bark peeled away in grey curls, and the leaves barely rustled in the air. Everything around us was quiet. No birds. No insects. None of the usual chattering chorus that fills the bush. Just the engine ticking as it cooled and the soft crunch of dirt as the tyres settled into the red earth.

We were at a fork in the road. Three ways — none of them signposted. Just narrow strips of gravel disappearing into the bush, each identical to my eyes. No markers, no painted arrows, nothing to suggest which one might lead somewhere safe. Just the vast emptiness of the outback stretching in all directions, indifferent to our presence.

Grandma didn't turn off the engine straight away. She sat with both hands on the wheel, staring straight ahead. Her knuckles were still pale, but her shoulders had dropped slightly — not in relief, more like resignation. Like she'd reached the edge of a map and wasn't sure what monsters lay beyond. The key ring dangled from the ignition, the little wooden koala Grandpa had carved swinging gently with the vibration of the idling engine.

She finally switched off the ignition. The sudden absence of mechanical noise was so big I could hear my heartbeat in my ears.

Then she turned to Mack.

“Come on,” she said, gently. “Hop out for a minute.” Her voice was steady, but there was something new in it—something I'd never heard before. A brittleness, as if one wrong word might shatter it completely.

Mack looked at me, a flash of something unreadable in his eyes, then unbuckled his belt and opened the door. The coolness hit us immediately — a dry blast that smelt like dust and eucalyptus and something burnt. The air shimmered above the ground, distorting the horizon into wavy lines. He stepped out, and she followed, leaving her door wide open. I watched from the back seat, clutching Ribbons in one hand and the handle of my bag in the other.

Grandma didn't move like usual. She didn't bustle or fuss or tell anyone to hurry up. There was none of her kitchen quickness, no efficient movements or gentle scolding. She walked slowly, like every step had to be placed carefully. Like she was walking on thin ice or ground that might give way.

She knelt in the dirt in front of Mack.

From the pocket of her cardigan, she pulled out a small piece of folded paper and an old phone — her Nokia, the chunky grey one with the worn buttons and the little screen that sometimes froze on a snake game. The one she'd refused to replace even when Mum got her a new one for Christmas, saying, “It still works, doesn't it?”

She handed both to him.

“This is the address,” she said, her voice low but clear. “You follow this track — the one to the left. Keep walking until you see the building. It won't look like much. Just go inside. Stay there.” Her finger pointed to the leftmost fork, the one that seemed to disappear into thicker scrub, barely distinguishable from animal tracks.

Mack opened the paper and stared at the writing. Just a number. A road name. Nothing else. The paper trembled slightly in his hands, though whether from the wind or his fingers, I couldn't tell.

He looked up at her. “For how long?” His voice cracked in the middle, betraying his fear despite his effort to sound grown-up.

“Until I call.”

“Grandma—”

“Don't stop for anyone. Don't answer the phone unless it's me.? She cut him off, her voice firmer now. Not unkind, but brooking no argument. Her hand went to his shoulder, gripping it tightly, as if trying to transfer strength through touch alone.

“You remember how to tell if it's me?”

He nodded slowly. “You said to check the number and count the threes.”

“That's right.”

I didn't understand what that meant. Count the threes? It sounded like a secret code, something from Mack's spy books. Adult words for adult fears.

Grandma stood again, her knees creaking audibly in the silence. She brushed the red dirt from her skirt with hands that didn't quite manage to be steady. She turned to me, her face softening just for a second. Her eyes were shiny, but no tears fell. They stayed trapped behind a dam of determination. She reached in through the open door and brushed a curl from my forehead, her fingers lingering for just a moment longer than usual.

“Come here, Rosie-girl.”

I slid across the seat and into her arms. She hugged me tight — tighter than usual — but still gentle. Her jumper smelt like soap and the faintest hint of onion, like she'd been cutting some hours ago and never washed her hands properly. Underneath was her usual scent—talcum powder and lavender hand cream and something uniquely Grandma that I couldn't name but would recognise anywhere.

“I want you to be brave,” she whispered in my ear. “You're going to look after each other, alright?”

I nodded into her shoulder. I wanted to ask her if we were coming back. If Grandpa would be there when we did. If the testing people with their beeping machine would be gone. But I didn't.

Because I already knew she wouldn't answer. Or worse, that she would, and I wouldn't like what she said.

She let me go and turned to Mack.

She pulled him into a hug too, shorter, firmer. Almost adult-to-adult, acknowledging something I wasn't part of yet. Her hands gripped his shoulders, and I saw her whisper something in his ear that I couldn't hear.

“Take care of your sister,” she said aloud. “You hear me?”

“I will.” His voice was small but steady.

“You're smart. Use that.”

Then she turned away. Just like that. No big goodbye. No explanations. No promises. No “see you soon” or “it'll be alright” or any of the things grown-ups usually say to make children feel better, even when they're lying.

She walked back to the car and climbed in, hands back on the wheel like she hadn't just handed her grandchildren over to the wilderness.

Mack opened the rear door and pulled out both our bags. He didn't say anything. Not “it's okay” or “don't worry.” Just handed me mine and slung his over his shoulders. His eyes stayed fixed on the road ahead — the one to the left, the one that looked like all the others. Just scrub and dirt and sky stretching into forever.

The engine started again.

The sound startled a flock of galahs from a distant tree. They rose in a cloud of pink and grey, screaming their indignation before wheeling away toward the horizon.

I turned back toward the car, already dusty from the road. Grandma didn't look at us. Her face was set forward, her profile like one of those stone carvings on a church—beautiful but unreachable.

She shifted the car into gear.

Then she was gone.

The silver ute turned and rolled forward slowly, then faster, until it was swallowed by the dust and heat and the bend in the road. She didn't honk. Didn't wave. Just disappeared, leaving nothing but a cloud of red dust that hung in the air like a question without an answer.

I stood with my bag slung across my back and Ribbons tucked into the crook of my arm, staring at the space where the car had been. The dust settled slowly, coating the sparse vegetation with a fine layer of rust-coloured powder. The wild scent of the outback surrounded us—eucalyptus, dry earth, and something else. Something ancient and indifferent.

The silence grew.

It expanded outward from where we stood, filling the space between us and the horizon. No tyre tracks remained visible on the hard-packed earth. No sign of direction. Just three paths and a crooked tree.

And us.

Two children alone at the edge of nowhere, with nothing but a paper, a phone, and each other.