Nowhere But Forward

“I don’t know what we passed or what we lost—but whatever it was, the road didn’t wait for us to notice.”

We must have passed it. Or stopped. Or turned back and gone a different way entirely. I don’t remember exactly.

Maybe I’m not supposed to.

What I do remember is the feeling of something slipping—like a page torn from a book while you weren’t looking. Like we skipped a part, and no one wanted to talk about it afterwards.

The road was different after that. Not better, not worse. Just… changed. The air in the car felt thinner. Mum looked like she hadn’t blinked in hours. Mack had stopped asking questions.

By the time we reached Hermidale, the sun was almost gone.

Not set—just slumped low enough that everything looked exhausted, worn thin by the day’s slow crawl across the endless sky. It wasn’t the dramatic kind of sunset that made you want to stop and take a photo. It was the kind that made you feel like the world had exhaled and forgotten to breathe in again.

The light had changed in a way that made everything look… bleached. All the colour seemed to have leached out of the world, sucked dry by the sun’s retreat. The road, the scrub, even the gravel—it had all dulled, the usual shimmer of scattered quartz and mica now dimmed to a sullen, unremarkable grey. It felt like someone had turned the contrast knob on the world all the way down.

My stomach gave a quiet groan, a slow, sour reminder that the single muesli bar and handful of dry crackers hadn't exactly counted as proper lunch. I pressed a hand against my middle, not even trying to silence it—just holding it, like maybe that would help.

I didn’t know if Hermidale was a town or just pretending to be one.

There was no sign welcoming us. No declaration of population or local pride. No roadside mural of sunflowers or a war memorial dressed in wreaths. It just appeared around a bend that didn’t feel particularly necessary—a few tired buildings dropped at the edge of nowhere, as if someone had set them down and then never bothered to come back.

One of them stood apart—a squat little pub with a rusted corrugated roof that pinged softly in the cooling air, like it was trying to talk to itself. Its bricks were the dark red of dried blood, chipped and flaking like scabs, and someone had once tried to make it cheerful: a mural, peeling now, stretched across its western wall. It showed a man shearing a sheep. Or it had, once. Most of the man’s face was gone—just faded outlines now, a hollow where the eyes had been. The sheep, oddly enough, was more intact. Its wool looked ghost-pale in the dim light, its face strangely mournful. It looked like it knew it was unfinished. Like it had never wanted to be painted in the first place.

Two old fuel pumps sat out front. They had the kind of shape I recognised from old movies, with domed tops and peeling paint that might once have been bright but was now the colour of sunburnt bone. Taped to the sides were messages scrawled in black marker: PRE-PAY ONLY – NO EFTPOS. The tape had gone brittle and brown, corners curling like autumn leaves, and the handwriting was a bit shaky, like whoever wrote it had been cold or tired or just done with explaining things.

That was it.

That was Hermidale.

You could take it all in with one glance, like a diorama someone had half-finished in school and then left in the back of a cupboard. It didn’t feel like a place people lived. It felt like a pause. A breath held too long. Like someone had once thought about building a town here and then changed their mind halfway through, but the buildings had stubbornly stayed behind.

I sat very still in the back seat, Ribbons cradled in my arms, watching this almost-place slide by the windows as the car slowed. I had the distinct, unsettling feeling that we weren’t just passing through Hermidale. We were being watched by it. As if the buildings and gravel and that mournful sheep had noticed our arrival… and were waiting to see if we’d be leaving.

Mum slowed the car and eased it into the space beside the Hermidale Hotel, the tyres crunching over gravel in long, drawn-out sighs. The sound bounced briefly off the bricks before dissolving into the vast emptiness around us, as if even echoes here had a limited range, unwilling to linger longer than necessary.

There was a man outside the pub smoking a cigarette, the orange ember at the end flaring in the half-light like a warning, or a signal, or maybe just a habit too ingrained to break. He leaned against the wall with one foot braced up, boot sole planted flat against the faded red brick, the way people do when they’ve been still for so long their posture’s become a kind of furniture. His high-vis vest hung open, its neon yellows and oranges dulled by dust and wear, swinging slightly in the breeze like a forgotten flag. Underneath, a once-blue shirt had rolled sleeves, their edges so tightly bunched they looked like he’d knotted armbands around his forearms. The fabric bore the stains of something mechanical—grease, maybe, or oil, or just the kind of grime that comes from working with things that don’t behave.

He didn’t react when we pulled in. Didn’t smile. Didn’t frown. Just watched. The way animals do—quiet, assessing, unbothered. He blinked once, slowly, like a goanna warming itself on a stone, eyes half-lidded in that way that said: I’ve seen plenty. You’re nothing special, but I’m watching anyway.

Mum cut the engine. The sudden silence hit like a wave, rushing into the vacuum left by the car’s steady rumble. My ears rang with the ghost of the motor, a phantom hum that pulsed in the quiet like something trying not to be forgotten.

No one moved.

We sat there for a beat too long, suspended in the moment like puppets whose strings had gone slack. The dusk crept in through the windscreen, flattening everything into two dimensions, casting soft shadows over our faces, like the sun was trying to erase us gently before night properly arrived.

Inside the car, the air felt used up—warm and stale, thick with held breath and tension that had nowhere to go. My thighs clung to the vinyl seat, sweat cooling in patches beneath my knees, and the small of my back prickled with the sticky discomfort of hours spent trapped in one position.

Mack shifted beside me. His arm brushed mine—just barely, just enough to remind me he was still there, still real—and I flinched before I realised what it was. He didn’t say sorry. Didn’t even glance at me. Maybe because he didn’t think it needed acknowledging, or maybe because all the usual manners and niceties had been peeled away by the day’s slow grind.

Mum sat still in the driver’s seat, one hand still on the gearstick as though she’d forgotten to let go. Her gaze was fixed ahead, not on the pub or the man, but on something further, something I couldn’t see—something only she seemed to know was there.

I reached for Ribbons without looking, wrapping her arms around my own like she might hold me back.

And still, nobody said a word.

The man outside the pub took another drag from his cigarette. The ember flared again, briefly illuminating the contours of his face—creases etched deep into sun-darkened skin, a mouth neither smiling nor scowling, and eyes that watched everything without giving anything away. They didn’t judge, but they didn’t welcome either. Just took us in like scenery. Like another passing moment.

Eventually, Mum moved. She opened the door with the kind of movement that didn’t want to be noticed, as though even that small gesture had to be rationed. The hinges gave a tired groan, and the cold air rushed in immediately, slipping past her legs like something trying to escape, or perhaps trying to get in.

It hit my skin like wet paper—thin but strangely penetrating, clinging to the warmth I’d hoarded during the drive and peeling it away in layers. I shivered. The temperature had dropped quickly, like it always did out here once the sun gave up. The change wasn’t gradual—it was a decision made by the land. Day’s over now. Time to feel your bones again.

“Come on,” she said.

Mack opened his door too, slower, with the deliberate caution of someone unwrapping something fragile. I didn’t know if he was bracing for an argument, or just testing the ground. Either way, he didn’t speak.

I slid out after him. My legs wobbled under me, unsure whether they trusted the ground after being folded beneath me for so long. The gravel shifted with each step—tiny clicks and crunches as the stones settled beneath my weight, like the ground itself was whispering gossip about us.

The light spilling from the pub doorway made a pale yellow square on the gravel, like an open trapdoor to a warmer place. It lit the bonnet of the car in a way that made the dust on the windscreen shimmer—tiny motes catching the light and holding it for just a second before they vanished again. Everything else outside that square was slipping into night. The outlines of the road disappeared first, dissolving like chalk under running water. The spaces behind the buildings felt too dark too quickly, as though the dusk didn’t want to be observed. The paddocks beyond had already surrendered to shadow—just vague gestures of trees and fenceposts against the deepening sky, skeletal and strange.

I looked up.

I don’t know why. Maybe I just needed something bigger than this town. Something steadier.

And there it was—the sky, so full of stars it didn’t look real. It wasn’t just dark with dots, the way it was in the city. This was something else. A sheet of black velvet riddled with silver pinpricks. A dome so wide and clear that I couldn’t tell if the stars were coming down or if we were floating up.

Behind me, the car ticked softly as the engine cooled.

And for a moment, I just stood there in the fading light with Ribbons tucked under my arm, staring up into the sky, trying to remember if I’d ever really seen it before.

Mum walked round to the boot and popped it with that soft, familiar thunk that somehow echoed louder than it should have, bouncing off the brickwork and the rusted corrugations like the place was empty enough to notice every small noise. She began pulling out the bags with fast, clipped movements—her body moving before her thoughts could catch up, like she was afraid of what might happen if she gave herself even a second to stop and reconsider.

The bags came out in a quiet parade, each one bearing signs of fatigue. My pink suitcase, once bright and cheerful, was now dulled by red dust, the unicorn sticker half-peeled and clinging on like a survivor. Mack’s sports bag had a busted zip that gaped open at one end like a mouth too tired to close. Mum’s overnight case was streaked with what looked like sunscreen smears, and the plastic shopping bags—sagging and overstuffed—crinkled faintly with the soft indignity of being asked to carry more than they were made for.

Mack stepped forward to help, one hand reaching for the heaviest of the bags.

“I’ve got it,” Mum snapped, not quite looking at him. Her voice was low but taut, as if each word had to fight its way through clenched teeth.

“But—”

“I said I’ve got it.”

There was something shaky in her tone, a defensive edge that wasn’t really about the bags. It was about everything else—about control, and exhaustion, and the weight of being the only adult in a situation spiralling too fast. Mack backed off without another word, his jaw tightening in that way I’d started to recognise—when he wanted to push but knew now wasn’t the moment.

The man outside the pub took one final drag from his cigarette, the end flaring bright for a second before he dropped it casually and ground it into the gravel beneath his boot. The motion was slow, unhurried, like he’d timed it just for effect. He didn’t move from his spot, didn’t say a word. Just kept watching us with the neutral detachment of someone for whom strangers were just part of the furniture—interesting only if they started a fire or broke something.

Mum gathered the bags in a bundle she could barely carry and marched past him without making eye contact, heading for a side door marked MOTEL ROOMS in flaking blue paint. The letters looked like they’d once tried to declare something proudly, but now they were giving up, dissolving back into the timber like the whole place was being reclaimed inch by inch by disinterest.

I stayed near Mack. His presence was a kind of gravity that kept me anchored in the unfamiliar. Everything else felt thin here. Fragile. Like the buildings might blow away in a strong wind and the sky might fall a little lower just to see what it could crush.

“Is this where we’re sleeping?” I whispered, the words slipping out into the chill.

He didn’t look down at me. Just kept scanning the motel rooms, the doorways, the fence line.

“Looks like it,” he said, careful not to commit too much emotion either way.

“Is it a hotel or a house?”

“Bit of both, maybe.”

The smell of the place had changed with the drop in temperature—less warmth, more depth. It came in waves, like something exhaling through unseen cracks: dry dust and engine oil, the stale tang of beer soaked into porous wood, and a sweet-sour scent that might’ve been old meals or melting sugar or something once pleasant gone just slightly off. It wasn’t awful. Just… tired. Like everything here had been used too many times.

Mum vanished round the corner toward what must have been reception, her footsteps brisk but unsteady, the kind of pace that made noise but didn’t want to draw attention. The light from the pub caught her shadow and stretched it along the gravel behind her until it slipped out of sight.

We looked toward the back of the building, where the motel rooms were lined up like containers in a depot yard. Squat and unadorned, as if decoration had been voted unnecessary. The doors had numbers hand-painted in white, some lopsided, some faded, none of them matching in size or style. Like no one had cared enough to start over.

Two of the overhead bulbs were working. One flickered with that irregular stutter that made it feel alive—nervous, unsettled. The other glowed steady and dull, the light inside caged by wire like someone expected trouble and wanted to be ready for it.

Mack stayed still beside me. Not frozen—calculated. I could tell he was making mental notes: number of doors, how far to the fence, which bulbs worked, which rooms were already lit. He’d learned this from watching Mum. From the way she checked windows without looking like she was checking. From whispered instructions about where to keep your backpack in case we had to go quickly.

There wasn’t much to catalogue. A long fence with old paint peeling like dead skin. A sagging clothesline with nothing hanging from it. A bin with no lid. All of it slumped in the same posture—resigned, as though even the objects here were tired of pretending.

I reached for Ribbons and stayed close to Mack, listening to the quiet, to the buzz of the dying light above the nearest door, to the hush of a place that seemed to be holding its breath.

The land behind the pub stretched flat into the horizon, an unbroken canvas of dusky tones and quiet menace. It didn’t rise or dip, didn’t promise anything. Just extended endlessly, scrub-lined and indifferent, with splinters of old fencing marking boundaries no one seemed interested in anymore. The posts vanished into the dark like disappearing thoughts, the wire between them sagging under the weight of disuse. There were no houses back there. No buildings of any kind. No lights in the distance. No playgrounds or schools or any signs that children had ever belonged here. It didn’t even look like a place that expected people.

Just land.

Endless, silent, waiting land, with a patience that made my skin prickle. It had been here long before Hermidale. It would be here long after it crumbled to dust and memory. It didn’t care about us, and that was what scared me most.

I clutched Ribbons tightly, and breathed in her dusty scent. It wasn’t pleasant, but it was ours. Known. And in that moment, it was enough.

I stepped closer to Mack. Close enough to feel the warmth from his jumper against the thin sleeve of mine. Close enough that our shoulders nearly brushed. He didn’t look at me, not directly, but I felt him glance down and shift slightly so I fit better into the space beside him. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. Sometimes, especially lately, just being was the best kind of comfort he could offer.

Then Mum reappeared, walking briskly from the side of the building, her arms stiff by her sides and her footsteps clipped and purposeful. She held a key looped through a cracked plastic tag—one of those oversized motel fobs you always imagined were invented to keep people from walking off with them, though no one ever said as much. It swung like a pendulum in her grip, catching the yellow light of the pub windows and reflecting it back in dull flashes.

“Room four,” she said. Her voice was lower now. “Round the back. Not much else open.”

Her eyes darted briefly over her shoulder, not just a glance but a proper check—quick and birdlike. I followed her gaze without moving my head. The man was gone. Vanished, as if the night had swallowed him. All that remained was the stale tang of his cigarette smoke clinging to the air and that strange sensation of having been observed too closely for too long.

Mum lingered in the pub’s spill of light, caught between warmth and darkness, a figure half-lit and unsure. The tag dangled from her fingers, flicking gently with the wind.

“Let’s get inside,” she said finally. “It’s cold.”

Her tone was flat, but I heard something beneath it—something more urgent than the weather. The cold was real, yes; it pressed in against my ankles and bit at the tips of my fingers. But that wasn’t what she meant. It wasn’t the kind of cold that could be fixed with a jumper. It was the other kind—the kind that came from being watched, being chased, being unsure if you’d made it far enough yet.

We gathered our things without speaking, a quiet choreography of lifting and shifting and balancing, like we’d done it a dozen times already. The sound of our footsteps on gravel was louder now, as if the silence had deepened around us. Room 4 waited ahead like a hollow tooth in a crooked smile of doors.

As we moved towards it, I felt the weight of all the questions piling up inside me—questions I wasn’t supposed to ask. About where we were going. About why we were really running. About why Mum sometimes stared into the rear-view mirror longer than the road ahead. They sat heavy in my stomach, like stones swallowed whole.

Behind us, the stars swelled brighter still, dense and cold and silent. More of them than I could count. More than I could even imagine counting.

And in front of us—just a door, a lock, and whatever kind of night lay on the other side of it.