Luke
Preston spent most of his twenties as a freelance writer and listening to rock
‘n roll. He drinks heavily on occasion, is a half decent musician and his idea
of a good time involves a jukebox designed to bleed ears.
Luke’s
work has been recognised by The Inside Film Awards, MTV and The ATOM Awards. He
writes in cafes, bars and in parking lots on the back of old fuel receipts and
cigarette packets. He doesn’t believe in writers block or in the magic bullet
theory and his favourite album is Exile on Main Street.
Luke’s
writing is as much influenced by AC/DC and Johnny Cash as it is by Richard
Stark and Raymond Chandler. He is undertaking a Master of Screenwriting at the
Victorian College of the Arts and has absolutely no intention of moving to a
shack in the middle of nowhere. He likes bad traffic, noisy neighbours, cheap
beer, loud bars and has been occasionally known to howl at the moon.
“Dark
City Blue,” Luke's debut novel, was longlisted for the Ned Kelly Award and
garnered critical acclaim from around the world. His follow up, “Out of Exile,”
is available now.
As I am writing this, it is 2:43 AM and I
am sitting in the downstairs bar of Tony Starr’s Kitten Club. The upstairs band
are murdering a Stevie Wonder song, the crowd is starting to leave and I’m
starting to think about doing the same. Although getting out of the city of
Melbourne at 2:43 on a Saturday night can be as dangerous as Alcatraz in the
30s, Iran in the 70s or Ikea around Christmas time. Melbourne in the heart of a
Saturday night is one filled with danger and darkness, fear and ugliness; women
with too much make-up and men with too much to testosterone.
Getting home anytime after midnight is
always a gamble.
I sit at the bar, order another drink and
way up my options. I could catch a taxi and in theory, that sounds like a plan
but I know from experience the trails and tribulations of implementing this
logical train of thought. Empty cabs are scarce and if I were lucky enough to
stumble across one, the bastard wouldn’t let me in until he knew my
destination, and upon hearing my address, they speed off in search of a bigger
fare. Nope, cabs are out.
Melbourne does not have a 24 hour public
transport system. To supplement this embarrassment, they run the ‘Night Rider’
service, which is nowhere near as cool as it sounds. The ‘Night Rider’ is a
series of busses that specializes in ferrying drunks out of the city and back
to the suburbs. They’re flooded with blue light to stop poor junkies from
finding a vein and shooting up, but as a result they make the drunks nauseous
so there’s a faint air of vomit in the air. These booze busses may get you out
of the city but any chance of them getting me anywhere near where I live is
slim, so as tempting as that mode of transport sounds, I am still in for a
walk.
And speaking of a walk, that seems to be
the only option I have left. I generally have a violent reaction to anything
even remotely exercise-esk but hell, when all other options are exhausted I may
just have to endure. Like many Melbournians before me, I have made that drunken
trek home in the middle of the night. It is a journey fraught with Hobbit like
perils of in the middle of the night. It is a journey fraught with Hobbit like
perils of danger and mayhem. Violent packs of drunken men prowl the concrete
streets, many of whom have been kicked out of a club and continue their
frustrated search for a good time on the streets but in the meantime will
settle with starting a fight with anyone who they think has looked at them
wrong.
It’s almost 3 AM and these are my options.
I ask the bartender what time the bar is licensed to and he tells me it’s 7 AM.
I order another drink, peel open the pages of the book in my pocket and am
happy to wait out the night until the sun is in the sky and the streets are
laid bare from the night before. For no matter how dangerous the streets of
Melbourne are on a Saturday night, there is always a warm bar to seek refuge in
and with a book in one hand and a drink in the other, what more could you want.
Luke—guest posting on Sunday
