‘I love you, Dad,’ I whisper. ‘I’ll never forget what you tried to do for Jamal and Bibi.’
Dad hugs me tight.
I struggle not to cry in case this is the last time Dad sees me for a long time. I want him to remember me as a proud daughter.
Then I remember Jamal’s dad.
I crouch and peer down into the tunnel. I can see him in the pipe, still struggling to shift the grating.
He’s not going to get to his family in time.
I turn to the approaching vehicles, silently begging them to take a few more minutes to arrive.
They don’t.
They come into view almost immediately, and for a brief crazy moment I think I really am seeing things.
This is incredible.
Unbelievable.
I’m so excited, I’m almost Bulgarian jelly.
The vehicles roaring towards us across the desert aren’t troop carriers and tanks, and mostly not police cars. They’re ordinary cars and campervans and utes and buses and minibuses and motorbikes.
Hundreds of them.
And they’re not full of SWAT teams and anti-terrorist units, or police, apart from the few dazed-looking officers in the few outnumbered police cars.
Most of the vehicles are packed with ordinary members of the Australian public, waving and shouting at us.
‘Hey, parliament house girl,’ yells an old lady from the window of a bus full of old ladies. ‘Saw you on telly, love. You’ve got us off our bums.’
Menzies’ eyes are almost bigger than his glasses.
Dad’s eyes are pretty big too.
Menzies’ father and Dave obviously weren’t expecting this either.
‘Incredible,’ croaks Menzies’ father. ‘The power of a child’s voice and a nation’s conscience.’
‘And telly,’ says Dave.
People are jumping out of their vehicles and heading for our hole.
‘Leave it to us,’ says an old bloke with medals on his bowling club shirt. ‘My mates didn’t die fighting for an Australia that locks up kiddies.’
‘Too right,’ says a woman pushing a baby in a stroller. ‘I’ve been fretting about this whole business since it started, but now I’ve had a gutful.’ Her friends, all pushing strollers as well, agree in loud voices.
A bunch of blokes who look like builders’ labourers are digging with big spades, widening our hole so people can walk down into it more easily.
‘You must be Bridget,’ says a voice behind me.
I turn round. An elegantly dressed elderly woman is smiling at me. A uniformed chauffeur is supporting her elbow and holding a large picnic basket.
‘I’m Chantelle’s nana,’ says the woman. She smiles at Menzies as well. ‘I just want to say how pleased I am that Chantelle has made such admirable friends.’
She gives Menzies’ father a sharp stare, then gives us all a little wave and joins the queue waiting to get along the tunnel and into the pipe.
Over the bobbing heads of all the people crawling through the pipe, I can just make out a couple of burly blokes in singlets up front removing the grating.
They help Jamal’s father up into the detention centre, then stay there, ready to lift the people in the tunnel and their eskies up after him. Or the people in the detention centre down into the tunnel.
I hold my breath.
Through the fence I can see a crowd of refugees, men and women and children, hurrying towards the edge of the empty grating hole.
I can also see uniformed officers pouring out of the buildings.
I remember what Gavin told me about the dangers of trying to escape and the misery of life on the run.
The uniformed officers all have weapons.
I can hardly look.
But the refugees don’t try to leave the detention centre.
They stand watching, smiling with amazement and delight as we go in and embrace them.
Several of the journalists here have told me that nothing like this has ever happened inside an Australian detention centre before.
I can believe it.
There probably hasn’t been this much hugging anywhere in Australia before.
And nobody’s been arrested, including us. The government must have decided that with so much media here, and so many voters, mass violence and arrests wouldn’t look so good.
Dad’s helped a lot. Handing out battery-operated Bulgarian personal massagers to the officers as well as the refugees has really helped keep the atmosphere light and friendly.
Menzies’ dad is really impressed. He’s planning to resign from the government and stand as an independent at the next election and I think he wants Dad to help him. He was saying just now that seeing all these ordinary Australians hugging and laughing with refugees gives him some really good clues about how a lot of people are going to vote.
Me and Menzies finally met Jamal and Bibi.
It was really emotional. I’d never seen a photo of them, and yet I knew it was them as soon as I saw them. I think it was the way Jamal was balancing a plastic bag soccer ball on his head and the way Bibi threw her arms round me and knocked me over.
It was Jamal’s eyes as well.
I’ve never seen eyes that sparkle as much as his. For the rest of my life, whenever things get tough, I’ll remember that it’s technically possible to stay hopeful no matter what.
Bibi’s sparkle a fair bit too, specially now Menzies’ dad has told her he’ll get her toothache fixed up quick smart. He’s still a member of parliament, so he can arrange an x-ray on humanitarian grounds.
And a hip specialist for Jamal.
Me and Menzies have just played soccer with Jamal and Bibi. They hadn’t started their hunger strike, so apart from Jamal’s limp they were both at match fitness.
They beat us eighteen nil, even though Menzies asked Dave to play on our side. We don’t mind because they taught us some great ball tricks.
We’ve left Jamal and Bibi to have some quiet time with their mum and dad. Dave and Menzies and his dad are meeting some of the other refugees, and because Dad’s still busy handing out massagers, I’m taking the chance to have a quiet moment myself.
The time is approximately 11.40 a.m. and I’m proceeding in a westerly direction along the inside of the detention centre fence, gazing out at the stream of cars and buses that are still arriving, and planning a really important letter to Gavin.
Dear Gavin,
Thanks for the encouragement about the job. It went really well and I’ve learnt a lot.
One of the things I’ve learnt is that sometimes people go to jail just for trying to make things better for the people they love.
I know that’s what you were doing, Gavin, when you nicked that cuckoo clock. You wanted to show people we were a real criminal family so they wouldn’t laugh at Dad behind his back. You didn’t realise that Dad is someone who does what he believes is right no matter what other people think. Mum is too.
I think you understand that now, Gavin, and I think one day you’ll be like that yourself and I’ll be very proud of you.
I want to be like that too. I’ve decided to spend my life trying to make things better, even if people laugh at me behind my back and even if I have to go to jail at some point.
I’ve met people who don’t ever dream of making things better for other people, and I think that really is criminal.
Love,
(Only forty-nine days to go)
Bridget.
Teachers’ Notes
For Girl Underground and Boy Overboard Teachers’ Notes which include a historical and cultural background to the events in this story, visit the Puffin website:
www.puffin.com.au
Morris Gleitzman, Girl Underground
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