Brandon has just graduated from university as a primary school teacher. As he travels to his first teaching post, he wonders what he’s got himself into. From the airplane, the tiny town of Gunnanilla looks no bigger than a cattle station. And when he lands, he steps into heat such as he has never encountered before. Sweating and feeling faint from the extreme temperature, he meets his new boss Mark Petersen, the racist principal of the only school for miles around. Then he meets the school’s other teacher, Mark’s wife Trina, and the students, most of whom are Australian Aborigines. Life in the small town is no picnic. In the summer, the heat is unrelenting. In the wet season, the town is cut off from the outside world and all deliveries are brought to a halt. There is only one television channel. To top it all off, there are any number of poisonous creatures around, such as snakes, scorpions, and spiders. How’s a poor city boy like Brandon, who’s interested in fashion, music, and clubbing and none too confident with his sexuality, going to cope? Enter the handsome, rough-around-the-edges miner, Frank. When Mark warns Brandon that Frank is gay, it seems this town might finally have something to keep him entertained. But how can he meet Frank without drawing attention to his own sexuality? How can anything possibly happen between them in such rough, tough, and macho surroundings?

Desert Country

Brandon nodded. Jenny and her husband socialised with Mark and Trina. It would be stupid to complain about or condemn what he’d just witnessed. Jenny would eventually tell them and then they’d think he’d been whinging about them. Damn, this bloody probation!


At that very moment something dawned on him. A seed of doubt had been planted. Perhaps teaching wasn’t for him after all. 7: The Waterhole


On Friday afternoon, after a particularly busy week of marking tests and writing end of term reports, Brandon walked back to the pub and was both surprised and excited to see Frank’s red Toyota Land Cruiser parked under the tree near his room. He opened his front door, wearing a radiant, expectant smile, only to find the room empty. ‘He’s over at the pub,’Brandon concluded as he put down the programmes he was going to work on over the two-week school break.


Chapter 13