The Memories We Hide

by jodi Gibson

  ‘You have newsprint all over your face,’ he said quietly as he wiped her cheek with his thumb. He leaned closer, his face so close it made Laura’s palms sweat and voided her mind of all thought. She closed her eyes, leaning in to meet his lips, losing all her senses in the warmth of their touch. At that moment, the ring of the doorbell caused her to jump and break the moment.

  ‘I’ll get it!’ she said, quickly ducking under his arms and almost running to the front door, her heart in her throat. She took some deep breaths to calm herself and steady her shaking hands. What just happened? She was filled with a mix of emotions—adrenaline, excitement, confusion. She didn’t know how to feel. She pulled herself together, tucked her hair behind her ear, and opened the door. As she did, the color and excitement quickly ran from her face.

  ‘Rachel?’ Laura said, staring at the face she hadn’t laid eyes on in so long. Gone was the long blonde tussle of hair, replaced by a sharp bob. Her eyes were still a vibrant blue, yet were now flanked by dark circles and fine lines. The denim shorts and cropped tee were replaced by black trousers and a black Banyula Pizza Parlor polo shirt with a colorful cartoon pizza slice on her right pocket.

  ‘Hi Laura,’ Rachel said in a soft voice. ‘I've been sitting in the car for ten minutes trying to get the courage up to knock on your door. Sorry. I hope your pizza's still hot.’ Rachel’s smile flickered, a flush falling across her cheeks.

  Laura tried to think of something to say, but her mind was a mess of thoughts crashing violently into each other. That night. Ryan. The unanswered questions. So much hurt. Laura's hands began to shake.

  ‘Oh-kay,’ Rachel said awkwardly when Laura failed to respond. She tapped on the pizza box. ‘Um, that's eighteen twenty-five,’ she said.

  Laura took the box silently and handed her the twenty-dollar note she'd put in her pocket earlier. ‘Keep the change,’ she said, and stepped back to close the door.

  ‘Laura, wait.’ Rachel put her hand out to stop the door.

  Laura shook her head. ‘I can't do this, Rachel. I'm sorry.’ Laura closed the door and felt emotions catch between her chest and shoulder blades, the smell of salami and cheese making her stomach churn. Rachel. The person she thought was her best friend. The person she'd trusted with every secret. The person who’d betrayed her. She took a deep breath and swallowed it all back inside.

  ‘You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,’ Tom said as Laura plonked the pizza on the kitchen table.

  ‘Here, have some pizza. I'm not hungry anymore,’ Laura said, sliding a plate across the table. Her initial shock had quickly turned to irritation.

  ‘Ah, what just happened’ Tom said, taking a slice of pizza and biting into it, the cheese stretching from the pizza to his mouth in a long, melted thread.

  ‘You know who delivered the pizza?’ Laura said, her eyebrows raised.

  Tom licked the cheese off his lips. ‘Ummm … is this a trick question?’

  ‘Rachel. That's who. Why didn't you tell me she was back in Banyula?’

  Rachel had left Banyula around the same time as Laura. Or so Judy had told her. Laura had assumed it was because she couldn’t take the shame of what she’d done with Ryan behind Laura’s back. Served her right. After Judy telling Laura to try and smooth things over with her a few hundred times, which Laura had ignored, of course, time passed and it—she—was forgotten. Or at least pushed into the farthest corner of Laura’s mind.

  Tom stopped chewing and put down his slice of pizza, eyes wide.

  ‘Wow! Well, I mean, I'd heard she was back in town, but I didn't know she was working at Mac’s.’

  ‘So, you knew?’

  ‘Well, yeah, I guess, but I didn't think you'd want to know.’

  Laura sighed. She shouldn't be angry at Tom; it wasn't his fault. ‘Yeah, you're right. I wouldn’t have wanted to know. It was just a shock, opening the door and seeing her face. I haven't seen her since …’ Laura pulled her sleeves over her hands and tucked her legs into her chest on the chair.

  Tom took another bite of pizza. ‘What did she say? What did you say?’

  ‘I didn't say anything. I couldn't.’ Laura's eyes welled.

  ‘Maybe you should give her a chance. I dunno, let her apologize properly?’ Tom shrugged as if it were as simple as that. ‘You know, closure.’

  ‘Closure? Are you kidding? She's had ten years to get closure.’ But so had Laura. She knew the vast distance between them was as much her fault as it was Rachel’s.

  ‘Yeah, well how do you know she didn't try and contact you after you took off? You wouldn't speak to anyone, remember? Not even me.’

  Laura hung her head, knowing it was true. She'd cut everyone from her life after Ryan's death. Everyone except her mum. But that was the only way her seventeen-year-old self knew how to deal with all the emotions.

  ‘I guess I don't know if she tried to contact me. I wouldn’t have talked to her anyway. What did you expect me to do? It was a whole hell of a lot to handle, you know.’ Laura's voice had risen. She grabbed a piece of pizza and took an angry bite to quell her emotions. ‘The sooner I'm out of here the better.’

  Tom paused eating. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Out of Banyula and back to the city.’

  Tom's shoulders dropped.

  ‘There's nothing here for me, Tom. Nothing but hurtful memories.’

  Tom shook his head. ‘That’s all you would see.’

  ‘What's that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Tom said as he rose to his feet and put his plate in the sink. ‘I'm really sorry about everything, Laura.’ He walked toward the hall to leave.

  ‘What do you mean you're sorry?’

  Tom stopped in the doorway and turned around, the dull yellow light from the kitchen highlighting his misty eyes. He scratched his head and sighed as if he needed to choose his words properly.

  ‘What?’ Laura asked.

  ‘I knew,’ he said softly.

  ‘You knew what?’

  ‘I knew about Ryan and Rachel.’

  Laura felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. Like the time she fell off Tom's horse on the farm when she was fourteen. Only this time, her breath didn't return as easily. ‘You knew?’ Her face contorted as the realization hit her. The only person she thought had been honest through everything had betrayed her.

  Tom looked to the ceiling as he slumped his shoulders. ‘I didn't know how to tell you. I knew I should have. I knew it was wrong. But Ryan promised he was going to sort it out.’ He paused. ‘None of it matters now. I just … I just didn't want to be the one to hurt you.’

  ‘You didn't want to be the one to hurt me? You knew and you didn't tell me! How long had you known?’ Laura's throat constricted as she pushed the words out. She knew she was being irrational, but in a split second she'd been transported right back to that night. Her emotions were seventeen again.

  He hung his head. ‘Too long.’

  Laura covered her face with her hands.

  ‘I loved you, Laura,’ he said, almost whispering. ‘I—’

  ‘No. No. That's not true. If it was, you would have told me!’ Laura didn't want to hear another word out of his mouth. She'd heard enough words to last a lifetime. She pushed past Tom, ran down the hallway, and flew out the front door, tears streaming down her face.

  ‘Laura!’ Tom called from behind.

  She stopped at the edge of the porch and stared into the rain, which under the arc of the streetlight looked like a sheet in the black night. The cool air did little to relieve the heat surging inside her, the urge to run.

  ‘Laura, don’t. I’ll leave. I’m sorry.’ Tom reached out to her, but Laura shrugged him away, thankful the rain blowing on her face hid her streams of tears. She heard Tom’s footsteps as he ran down the path, him opening the door of his Ute, followed by the rumble of the engine as he drove away. Laura went inside, closed the door, dropped to her knees, and felt more helpless than she ever had.

  Chapter 1
4

  After a restless night, Laura pulled on her running gear and headed out into the morning air. A fine mist of rain fell feather-like from the gloom overhead, but it wasn’t enough to deter her.

  After Tom’s admission last night, Laura was bombarded by emotion. She felt seventeen again—naïve, stupid, emotional, and irrational. She kept trying to summon memories from that year. Memories that could, in hindsight, make her see what was happening. Maybe Tom did try to tell her and she just didn’t listen. The only night she remembered Tom acting a little strange was the night of Rachel’s eighteenth birthday.

  The lawn tennis clubhouse had been lit up like a Christmas tree, straining with the weight of bodies and loud music that it was seldom used to. Black, purple, and white helium balloons clung to the ceiling, their gold ribbons tickling the heads of the partygoers. And silver fairy lights twinkled around a foil sign with the words “Happy 18th Rachel.”

  After a few too many vodka cruisers, and another argument with Ryan about why he was late to the party, Laura stepped outside to clear her head. Ryan had turned up an hour late, drunk. The smell of beer seeped through his pores. She wasn’t going to say anything at first, but he had stumbled and almost knocked over the table of presents, so she’d pulled him aside and told him to go outside to sober up. He’d ignored her and told her she was being lame.

  As she stepped outside, Laura’s eyes stung in the cold air. Another fight. That was all they seemed to do lately. It was like they were on different pages. In fact, Ryan's book was closed. She'd found it almost impossible to get him to talk about anything lately.

  Laura walked toward the nearby playground and noticed Tom’s shadowy figure swinging on one of the swings.

  ‘Hey,’ she said as she wandered toward him.

  He looked up. ‘Hey.’

  Laura joined him on the adjacent swing, and they both rocked back and forth in unison. The moonlight threw a blue hue over their shadows on the mulch, and the breeze tickled the oak trees overhead. The dull boom of the party still thumped through Laura's chest. Her stomach had begun to churn from the alcohol, so she slowed herself down to a more subtle movement on the swing.

  ‘Good party?’ Tom said, his words slightly slurred. Laura wasn't sure if it was a question or a statement.

  ‘Yeah,’ she replied. ‘Rachel's having a blast.’

  ‘Yeah, Ryan too from what I saw.’

  Laura didn’t answer.

  ‘He just slammed down a whole bottle of Jack before,’ Tom said, shaking his head. ‘I dunno what's with him.’

  Laura twisted her mouth. ‘I know. I think he's struggling with school, that's all. All the pressure. His gran's always reminding him he'll be the first in the family to go to uni and all that. He's just really stressed, I guess.’

  Tom grunted.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘You're always making excuses for him, Lauz. He's been a real jerk lately. To everyone. Especially to you.’

  ‘I'm not making excuses for him. I just understand what he's feeling. You need to give him a little bit of a break. It's not like he's got something like a family farm to fall back on like you have.’

  ‘I'm not falling back on anything. It's what I want.’

  Laura's shoulders slumped. ‘I know. I didn't mean that. Ryan hasn’t got much though. And sometimes he still doesn't even know what he wants. I know he's been acting weird. I think he needs space. That's all.’ Laura saw Tom's eyebrows rise. ‘As soon as exams are done and all the stress is over, he'll be back to the Ryan we know, right? And anyway, it’s not like you’re Mr. Innocent. How many beers have you had?’

  Tom ignored her comment, and they sat in an uncomfortable silence, Laura wondering why this year was so much of a letdown. Instead of being the fantastic senior year she'd thought it would be, things just hadn't turned out that way. Everyone was acting weird and stressed. Even normal, laid-back Tom she could usually crack a smile from hadn’t been himself. This was their final year of school. It was supposed to be fun and carefree before they became adults and headed off into the real world. But it was nothing like that.

  After a few more moments, Tom broke the silence. ‘Lauz, I need to tell you something.’

  Tom’s tone caught Laura off guard. He was too serious. Her mind raced, trying to figure out what it could be. She hoped it wasn't his parents. His dad had been unwell lately.

  ‘What is it?’ she said, trying to be upbeat, hoping it wasn't bad news.

  Tom stopped swinging and stared at the ground, digging his heel into the bark chip below him, but he didn't say anything.

  ‘Tom?’ Laura prompted, the worry pricking at the hairs on her arms.

  ‘I really care for you a lot, you know,’ he blurted out. ‘I don't want to see you get hurt.’

  Laura furrowed her brow, puzzled by his ambiguous meaning.

  ‘Okay.’ She paused. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I don't think Ryan's the one for you.’

  The words floated around Laura's ears. She wondered if she'd heard wrong.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Ryan. I just don't think you and him are, y'know, a good match.’ He shrugged.

  She hadn't heard wrong, and all of a sudden it felt like the world had stopped turning. She couldn't hear the music in the distance or the cars passing on the nearby road. All she could hear were Tom's words. Why would he say that?

  Tom remained silent and kept digging at the ground. The thud was beginning to annoy Laura.

  ‘What are you talking about?’ she said, snapping at him. ‘I mean, why would you say that?’

  ‘I have my reasons.’

  ‘You have your reasons? What the hell?’ Laura's voice was increasing in volume and agitation, her knuckles white as she gripped the swing chain tightly.

  ‘Forget it. I shouldn't have said anything.’ Tom stood up and threw the swing behind him. It clattered into the steel frame, echoing in Laura’s ears.

  ‘Hang on. You can't just say something like that and not justify it.’

  Tom stopped and turned around. Even in the pale moonlight, Laura could see the anger flash in his normally happy eyes.

  ‘There's things you don't know, all right?’ He paused. ‘You know what? I thought I should tell you, but I'm not the one you should be asking. And what would it matter? You wouldn't believe me anyway.’

  ‘Tom!’

  Tom turned away, ignoring Laura's calls for him to stop. He walked straight past the clubhouse and to his Ute. The engine roared, and the wheels screeched as he took off into the distance.

  That night, Laura had swallowed back the emotion and ignored Tom. She put it down to too much alcohol and Tom just being weird. Now, as she pounded rhythmically on the footpath, the rain catching on her eyelashes, she wondered if he’d been trying to tell her about Ryan and Rachel. She wondered if maybe, deep down, she knew and she just didn’t want to hear it.

  She paused at an intersection as a car signaled. Sucking in oxygen, Laura looked at the street sign and realized where she was. Ryan’s street. Nostalgia tingled through her. She pictured her and Ryan walking hand-in-hand toward his grandmother’s house, laughing, joking, talking about school and the latest crazy gossip. She had a sudden urge to turn around and run home, but she had a stronger desire to see Ryan’s grandmother. It was something she should have done well before now. Well, there was no time like the present.

  She turned down into the street and followed the worn footpath in large strides to avoid stepping on the joints as she and Ryan used to do, and then she saw the house. A simple cement sheet-clad, flat-roofed building. Pale pink walls and potted plants full of pink and white geraniums lining the verandah. The same lace curtains hung from the front windows, and Mrs. Lincoln’s old brown Toyota Corolla took its usual place in the driveway. Laura walked to the front door and was just about to knock when a voice came from somewhere.

  ‘Can I help you there?’

  Laura spun around to see Ryan's gran emerging
from the side of the house, her frown quickly turning into the wide eyes of recognition.

  ‘Laura?’

  Laura looked at Ryan's gran. Her face harbored more wrinkles than she remembered, and her hair was much grayer, but the warm smile and friendly eyes were the same. Laura swore she was still wearing one of the hand-knitted jumpers she always used to favor. ‘Mrs. Lincoln,’ Laura stammered as her face heated.

  ‘Laura!’ Mrs. Lincoln repeated as she shuffled up onto the porch, her aging now even more evident in her hunched-over posture. She stopped and regarded Laura, a soft look gathering on her face as she grasped her hands.

  ‘Let me look at you. Well,’ she said, smacking her lips, ‘if you don't look more like your mother every day! Rest her soul. I was so sad to hear of her passing. I was visiting my friend on the coast for a week or so and only heard about it when I came back the other day. I’m so sorry, Laura. Oh, come here.’ She pulled Laura into a hug.

  As Laura broke the hug a few moments later, she noticed the wetness around Mrs. Lincoln's eyes.

  ‘Bah, look at me! An old sook!’ she said, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘It's just … when I see you, I can't help but think of Ryan.’ She squeezed her face tight, prompting Laura to put her arms around her.

  ‘I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—’

  ‘It's okay. It’s so good to see you,’ she said, swatting the emotion away. ‘Come inside.’

  A few minutes later, Laura was sitting at Mrs. Lincoln's kitchen table. The decor hadn't changed. The orange benchtops and brown Laminex cupboards were still spotless, and the royal-blue carpet only faded where the scraping of the kitchen chairs had worn it down. Laura remembered Ryan bringing her here for the first time. They'd stolen two chocolate Tim Tam's from his gran's not-so-secret stash.