I remember that hot afternoon when it happened. I was thirteen, staying the week at my friend's farm. It was all sleeping bags, marshmallows and card games until that hot afternoon when, out in the paddock, under an old gum tree, my friend's father handed me the .22 and showed me how to load it; showed me how to hold it, firm against my right shoulder. “Feet further apart,” he said, “That's it.” The parrot was perched on a branch, about a meter out from the trunk and I remember how perfectly I could see it through the scope. I remember holding my breath, trying to make the cross-hair settle on its quivering, technicoloured chest. Every now and then, a bit of branch end would swing across in front of the bird and I would see it as a blurry wisp inside the circle of the scope. My friend's father was instructing me to squeeze the trigger: “Don't pull it,” he kept saying, “Squeeeeeeze it.” My friend was standing behind me: “C'mon, shoot, quick, before it gets away.” I squeezed the trigger and the gun jolted against my shoulder and the bird dropped to the dirt, like a rock. I can't remember the sound of the shot, whether it had made my ears ring or whether it had echoed off the nearby Stirling Range. I can't even remember if I had gone over to look at the dead bird afterwards. The only thing remaining in my memory of that hot afternoon is my friend looking at me hungrily, motioning for the gun with both hands, and his father saying, “Well done, James. You're a natural.”
