They'd called around to the others, rounded them up as the sun was setting and gathered them in the vacant block down the street. A house had burnt down and been knocked down and the council had said something about turning the block into a playground but it had never happened. The weeds took over and kids from the highschool sometimes came by to smoke, drink or fuck, hidden by the weeds.

Slater’s ute sat in the long grass with its doors open, music playing out of the bad speakers. They’d gotten some wood from somewhere, a shovel and some petrol.

"Don’t use petrol to start a fire, it burns too quickly."

"Shut the fuck up, Roachy. It’s all we got, you got any better ideas?"

They turned over a patch of dirt in the centre of the block and set about starting a bonfire, drinking beer they kept in an old washtub full of ice in the back of the ute. By the time it was dark, and after some arguments on the best way to start the fire, it was lit. Some of the local kids came around and they were given a beer each and told to shut the fuck up and not tell anyone.

"Look at that, man." Roach was lying on his back, away from the fire, pointing up at the sky. No one had been speaking so everyone’s attention was on him.

"Look at what?" said one of the others.

"That. Those stars up there. Just fucken look at them."

"What about them, Roachy?"

"You know once I had some kid tell me there are as many stars in the Universe as we got neurons in our brains. You heard that one?"

"I think you better slow down, mate. How many you had?" Slater was standing with his back to the fire, his back to everyone and watching the street.

"Less than you, man. Nah listen, that's bullshit. There's fucken, you know, infinite stars. More than you can fucken count to if you’d been sittin there countin since time began, right? That shits all over how many fucken atoms we got in our heads, more or less the cells that make it up, right?"

"Roach... mate."

Roach sat up, got to his feet, stumbled a little away from the fire.

"Nah, listen. Right. Each one of those stars is a billion times bigger than you are. Or somethin like that. Fucken huge. We’re all so fucken infinitesimal compared to them. You look up there and they’re tiny, but really they’re so massive you can’t think about how big they are. And you and me, we’re made up of stuff that’s been, you know, shat outta the fucken things."

There were a few moments where no one spoke, except Bon Scott yelling something muffled from the car’s tape deck.

"Look mate, I get what you’re sayin. I mean, I’m not bloody stupid. But why say it? No one wants to fucken hear it."

"I dunno. Just sometimes I can’t fucken deal with it, ya know? Everything seems so pointless. We’re just star farts. The scale’s all wrong."

Again, no one said anything. The music had stopped and the speakers hissed with the silence of empty tape. One of the kids muttered something to another and they all giggled softly. Slater span around, crushed the tinny in his hand and threw it on the bonfire.

"Look what’d I fucken say to you lot? You can hang around if you shut the fuck up. That didn’t sound like you were shuttin the fuck up."

They looked at each other as he stalked over to them, then one, the eldest and biggest, spoke.

"Aw fuck off Slater, your friend’s a fucken retard."

"Don’t you fucken swear at me ya little cunt. I didn’t have to give you the fucken beer. I’ll tell ya fucken uncle what ya been up to, how’d ya like that? Ya mum might not give a shit, but he finds out so will ya Dad, allright? You got it?"

The kid held his gaze for a moment before looking down.

"Yeah, yeah, sorry man. We’ll shut up."

"Yeah."

Slater walked over to the back of the ute to fish around in the tub for a beer. The tape playing in the cab clicked off. Roach, the others and the kids all seemed to be waiting for something. The fire was starting to burn down and someone kicked at it a few times, turned over some logs with a burning branch and threw some more wood on. The tape started up again, something that sounded like Metallica choked through a wet sock and two walls and Slater came back to the fire, glaring at everyone, as if daring someone to speak.

"Slater."

"Roach. Mate. I don’t wanna fucken hear it."

"Nah, Slater. The cops are here."