The old white Toyota Hilux skidded in to the car park with loud Middle Eastern music pumping from the broken passenger window. A sticker on the rear bumper bar said, “If it’s rockin, don’t come knockin!”

Ali got out of the driver’s seat and walked in to the manager’s tin shed.

“We come about the job. Called from the Hobart Centrelink yesterday about picking the apples. When do we start?” Ali asked.

Tony Riccobono was a big set bloke. A Huonville apple grower going back three generations. He pushed his lunch aside, sucked his gut in, lifted his eyes slowly and let them fall on a point just above the bridge of Ali’s nose.

“Don’t you people ever say ‘hullo?’”

“I am sorry. We had some trouble with the police,” Ali said. “That is why we are late. All good. Sweet. We are experienced fruit pickers. We work long hours. My name is Ali and my friend is Behnam. You can call him Ben. Hullo. I say hullo now,” Ali said.

Another bloody migrant towelhead, Tony thought. A Cat Stevens look-alike. Morning has Broken – my arse. Jesus. I’ll give ‘em $30.00 a bin and if they arc up, they can piss off.

Ben walked in to the office and pretended to study the faded pictures of old Penthouse Pets blue-tacked on the corrugated iron walls. A tattered Jacaranda map of Italy hung next to them.

“You and your mufti mate can stay in the pickers quarters,” Tony grunted. “$10.00 a night – per head. No dope and no bomb making. Got it? Cheryl, you there girl? Take our Taliban cobbers from Turkistan to the quarters.”

“We’re from Iran, sir, thank you. Now Australia is home,” Ali said.

“I don’t give a shit where you’re from,” Tony snarled. “We start at 7.30 tomorrow morning. Don’t fuck up.”

The outside toilet flushed and Cheryl walked in with one hand on her protruding stomach.

“Coming Dad. Who’ve we got here? Come on. I’ll show you around,” she said. “Don’t worry about old grumble bum here. His bark is worse than his bite. Best to keep away from both though.”

Cheryl was a brunette, green eyed, petite and more than eight months pregnant. No husband. No boyfriend. The father had been a fruit picker. Stayed longer than most. Helped her Dad with the pruning once the season was over. When she started to show, he took off. Said he’d send money. Never did. No one mentioned any of this around Tony. Not if they wanted to live.

Cheryl waddled across the yard with Ali and Ben lugging their backpacks. To the west, bruising storm clouds brought scuds of rain. The Bureau forecast a big storm with gale force winds. The apple crop was a week away from harvesting.

She opened the door of the pickers shed, stopped to get her breath in the cold kitchen and pointed down the corridor to their room. Two camp stretchers sat on the floor. No pillows. No blankets.

“It ain’t the Ritz but once the pot belly fires up, the shed warms up a treat. There’s only you boys here now but once the season starts proper, there’ll be heaps of pickers. You boys done apples before?”

Ali looked at Ben and smiled. “We have bought apples and eaten apples but never picked them from a tree. We lied to your father to get the job.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she smiled. “Don’t pick too hard too early. Work at a steady pace. You boys look fit. You should do three bins a day. I’m off for a lie down – before I fall down. See ya later.”

By eight o’clock that night, wind, hail and driving rain machine-gunned the tin shed, as Ben and Ali lay cocooned in their sleeping bags.

“The owner hates us,” Ben said. “I don’t understand this country. Most people are friendly but some are mad dogs.”

“It’s the same at home. At least here, no one wants to kill us.”

Ben stared at the candle burning between them. “The woman is friendly. She might help us rid the defect notice.”

“Maybe. When I saw the flashing lights of the police car, I nearly shat myself,” Ali said. “Remember how they raided the medical school looking for those Sunni boys?”

“Thought they were spies,” Ben said.

Tony barged in to the room. His green parker was drenched, his face contorted in fear.

“Bloody bridge is down. It’s Cheryl. Her waters have broken and she’s howling. She’s in the car. Fucking unbelievable. Can’t get to the hospital. You gotta help me get her back in to the house.”

Cheryl was screaming in the passenger foot well of the ute. One leg was thrown over the steering wheel column and the other lay on the driver’s seat. Tony leant down over her.

“Love, you can’t stay here,” he said. “It’s pissing down. I’ve got help. I’ve called the Emergency Services. She’ll be right.”

Her words came in a staccato of breaths. “Dad, no – no – no – no time. It’s com-ing. It’s com-ing – now!”

Lightening blew apart a cherry tree in the next paddock. The thunder crack cowered the men as the clap peeled away.

“Mr Tony, we can help,” Ali said. “Your daughter is right. The baby comes. I was a doctor in Iran and Ben is a nurse. There isn’t much time. Have you got some towels?”

Tony looked at Cheryl and then at Ali. Ben ducked as a sheet of galvo from the pickers quarters flew over his head. Tony turned to get the shotgun from the house but turned back.

“If you bastards are having me on, I’ll bury you standing up and run the grader over you. The dogs can play footy with your heads.”

Ali ran around to the driver’s side and lifted the steering wheel. Ben ran back to the pickers quarters, got five pain killers and crushed them in a spoon covered in honey he found in the kitchen and gave it to Cheryl. He held her head in the cradle of his hands.

“Get the towels, Mr Tony,” Ali yelled, “Do it now!”

“Cheryl, make the short quick breaths,” Ali said. “That is right. Again. That is very good. I think you have read the self-help books. Very modern. Very commendable. Short breaths. The baby is coming”

Ben laid the towels under Cheryl’s hips as the crown of the baby’s head appeared.

Ali spoke to Behnam in Farsi, “The head is a little small. Premature.”

“And the colour?”

“The colour is OK. It’s the breathing I worry about.”

“Hey, you bastards, talk English, OK?” Tony growled. “And watch where you put your hands.”

Ben wiped the sweat and rain from Cheryl’s face. She grabbed his wrist like a pit bull.

“This time Cheryl,” Ali said, “it is the mother of all pushes – if you excuse the pun. My first in English, I think. Bear down and push, push, push!”

The baby slid between her thighs and on to the towel. Ali pulled a penknife from his pocket and cut the umbilical chord. He waited for five seconds for the baby to catch its first breath. Nothing. Ben ran around and they held the baby vertically. Nothing. Ben rubbed its back. The little body lay lifeless like a fish thrown up on the shore.

“It needs the kiss, Ali”

Ali pinched the baby’s nose and pressed his lips to its mouth and gently blew. Its tiny hand flicked with life and screamed its lungs out. Ben and Ali held the baby aloft in the pouring rain, as if the storm had delivered a miracle.

Tony did a little jig and slapped his thigh. “I’ll be God damned,” he yelled. “I’ll be God damned. I ain’t seen anything like it.”

They wrapped the baby girl in fresh towels and helped Cheryl in to the house.

xxxxxxx

Tony plonked himself down on the couch after visiting Cheryl and baby girl in the hospital. Another Riccobono, he thought. She looks like my wife. Same eyes. Above the mantle piece were pictures of his father and grandfather. Southern Italians fleeing the aftermath of war. The pictures stared down at him.

He sat for a minute in silence then called the police.

“It’s Tony Riccobono. Yeah, I’m good. That you Ray? A couple of your lads picked up two Iranian kids yesterday and put a yellow canary on their car. Cat Stevens? Yeah, that’s them. They work for me now. Burn the paperwork. OK. See you at the pub tonight.”

He walked down past his wife’s grave to where Ali and Ben were picking apples off the ground.

“You boys gotta learn to drive a tractor. Dinner is at 6.00pm at the house. Be there.”