I don’t see much of the Aboriginal family that lives down the street; except sometimes when a noisy uncle comes to stay. On Saturday night just as daylight was fading I saw a young couple, I guess in their late teens, coming up the street on a pushbike. She in a little black dress looking very smart and made up for a night out I reckon. He in a pair of fresh black cargo pants and a crisp green shirt.
She is sitting on the handlebars, with feet pointing forward and hanging on for her life.
Suddenly right in front of my house their back wheel locks up, with the chain in a tangle - and in an instant she is shot off the handlebars. Somehow she manages to hit the road running and stays on her feet.
He curses a few times as he fiddles with the bike, and she sits on the edge of the road waiting. He does a few circles and makes some more adjustments and they are off again, with her bum back on the handlebars and her feet pointed down the road.
They build up speed quickly and when they get to the corner he hardly slows to look each way, and the bike shoots across the traffic and heads down the main road and out of sight.
***
It’s hot, and the gentle evening breeze is wafting the smell of barbecued fish from somewhere across the neighbourhood.
And somewhere in the distance I can hear the faint strains of a brass band.
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