The warning wasn’t an annoying mistake after all. But whoever got that first call or text, very soon we all knew: there was a gunman roaming around on campus. I can’t remember who discovered the alarm was working perfectly. It’s funny how the worst news sometimes gets blanked out. I began to think I’d driven a very long way just to listen to its endless blaring. This racket went on for five, 10, 20 minutes. Conversation was impossible, drowned out every 60 seconds by a screeching siren, followed in turn by: Attention! Attention! An emergency situation has been declared! We waited for technicians to stop the damn thing. Even when our preliminary cuppas were interrupted by the misfunctioning emergency siren, my mood didn’t falter. Reader, as I headed into the Indigenous Centre that September afternoon, I was walking on air. My latest novel had just won Australia’s biggest literary prize, and the Bundjalung mob on campus had invited me down to give a talk. T hree years ago my partner dropped me at Southern Cross uni in Lismore, agreeing to text in a couple of hours.
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