by Nicole Hayes
‘Just go back. I can’t stand it.’
The corner came up suddenly. Nick yanked at the wheel and the car skidded sideways. A shriek of tyres, the crash of car leaving road, the snap and pull of the seatbelt. The sensation of flying as the car flipped over and over. Up, down, and back. The harsh, unforgiving bush smashed against the doors. The windscreen. The passenger windows. Like some enormous, clawing monster attacking from every angle. Sky became ground, bush turned into sky, flashes of light and dark, red and yellow, hot sun and sudden darkness. And then …
Silence.
It’s late afternoon when the rain stops, like a tap has been turned off. The sun forces its way through the remaining cloud and, bit by bit, it burns a blue streak across the sky. A streak that widens quickly as the clouds beat a hasty retreat.
The relief of the sun warming her skin, drying her clothes, drives her forward despite her legs crying out for her to rest. Nick is fading too, telling her they should stop again, take a moment.
‘I can’t,’ she says simply.
And Nick hears her, truly hears her, as always, and says, ‘Okay.’
She doesn’t have to tell him that she won’t be able to start again if she stops. That the idea of falling to the ground, of letting go, is so intoxicating that she knows she must resist it. She remembers one summer, at the school sports meet, when it was so hot and dry they’d almost cancelled. She was running in the cross country, feeling a new and unexpected power, her legs pumping, her whole body gathering into a coil, twisting tighter and tighter, until she was overwhelmed by an urgent need for release. She remembered the world spinning faster and faster the longer she held on and, rather than fight through it, she’d decided to let go. Just to see. The relief was enormous, but it’d been a mistake. The next thing she remembered she was being helped off the ground by her panicking dad, her steady, reassuring mum. She’d blacked out completely.
But that feeling never left her – the rush of letting go – and it’s the same feeling she has now. But she knows that if she truly lets go this time, lets her body stop moving and her limbs go limp, they won’t rise again. She’ll be stuck there, in the middle of nowhere, so far from the things that matter that she might as well have lived an entire life alone. Worse than this, she knows that if she stops, Nick stops too, and the idea of that is so appalling that her legs continue despite her. One step, then another.
As the hours pass, they cover very little ground. The sun has moved across the sky, and the earth beneath her is dry again. The heat is crisp and sharp as though a whole new day has begun. Nick’s limp is worse than ever, and Tessa’s ankle, now swollen and tender, restricts her movement to short, stilted spasms.
She raises her face to the sky. No clouds now. Just the vast cerulean blue of before. She turns to Nick, notes again how ill he looks. He’s fading to nothing. Skin chalky and slick where it isn’t spackled with dirt or blood. His lips so pale they’re almost white. She mustn’t look much better.
She becomes aware, vaguely, of an eclipsing silence. A frightening silence. She realises she can’t hear properly, that the bush noises that had followed them are muffled and distant, like she’s underwater. Is this even real? she wonders. Are we still here?
She doesn’t care. In that instant, she doesn’t care at all.
A distant squawking of a bird, the harsh cry of a cockatoo. No, birds don’t cry in the dark. Owls maybe? Her eyes are open, or she thinks they are. The dark is so black and complete that she wonders if she’s actually awake.
Slowly, she becomes aware of the sharp edges of the rocks and sticks under her head, the tang of blood in her nostrils. Pain and sadness have their own smell and it’s pungent and cloying. She can’t move – not even her hand. It’s as if her body’s asleep but her mind is awake. So she focuses on the things she can feel, as though clutching to what’s tangible will anchor her in the real world. She didn’t expect to open her eyes again after she’d allowed the darkness to close in. Yet here she is and here they are.
She’s cold. The night a contrast to the brutal sun of the day. The soaking rain eclipsed by an afternoon of unrelenting heat. Such a cruel trick for her to have to suffer at opposite ends – the heat, the cold, the wet. All of them taking turns to defeat her. No escape from the elements, no moment of respite. The ground is not entirely dry in this corner of shade they’ve found, traces of the cyclonic rain clinging to the mossy ground. The dank smell of the earth like death itself, only colder.
But as she lies there, watching the night shift into day, in those delicate moments before sunrise when the whole of the world seems to, quietly, come alive, Tessa finds her body responding once again to the commands she is giving it, the beginnings of life returning to her limbs. The tingle of blood as her body warms and rouses, an ember in her belly spreading outwards, upwards. She wills her arms to move, her back to stiffen, to allow her to sit up. The effort is herculean and laboured, but she manages it, and as her body responds, she hears Nick moving beside her.
‘We’re not thinking …’
‘Nick?’ She gropes blindly beside her and feels his leg. Then his hand, which closes around hers.
‘I’m here.’ A rustle of movement.
Is it him or her? She can’t tell anymore, her body seemingly removed from her mind.
‘Your clothes.’
Something like an idea struggles to the surface of her muddied brain. ‘Yes … clothes …’
She grips a tree to haul herself close to full height. Her backpack is still by her feet, and she removes each item of clothing, still damp from the relentless rain, sticky with the crusts of congealed sunblock, but she doesn’t need their warmth. Not that they were especially useful to warm her anyway. Flimsy blouses, thin T-shirts, cut-off shorts, underwear. Nothing practical or of any use to her. Except for their colour.
Bright and sharp and – she hopes – visible from a distance.
Nick and Tessa scatter her possessions in the rough shape of a cross on the rocky clearing. They considered a circle, or an SOS, but there aren’t enough pieces, and she worried that it might appear random or accidental if it isn’t some recognisable shape.
She considers their handiwork – this brightly coloured distress signal in the middle of a wide slab of ancient rock, a wobbly, sparsely drawn cross that she prays won’t look like somebody’s discarded rubbish. ‘It’ll have to do,’ she says finally.
‘It’s a statement,’ Nick says, a tired grin on his lips. Nods at her red lacy bra by his feet. ‘Not sure what kind exactly, but it’s a statement.’
Laughter bubbles in her chest. ‘Probably not what Victoria’s Secret had in mind.’
They sit under a nearby tree and wait. And wait. Everything is resting on the flimsiest of hope that somewhere, somehow, even from the sky, the bright yellow of her Halsey tank, or the white of her cut-offs is enough to catch a watchful eye. Or the red bra, maybe. They stay in the filtered shade for as long as the hot sun will allow, but by afternoon the heat is too much and they return to where they’d slept, tucking themselves snugly under a narrow jutting ledge. Exhaustion washes over Tessa, through her, until she can no longer hold up her head, and surrenders to her body’s urgent plea for rest. She closes her eyes, wondering if they will open again.
The sound courses through her body. A distant hum that turns into a roar. Everything sounds muffled and removed, but the noise is real and the vibrations are loud and persistent. This time not the whump of a helicopter blade, but the roar of a propeller. Two propellers. Deep, as if it’s rising up from the earth. Except it’s coming from above.
Her eyelids feel heavy and stiff. She can barely keep her eyes open even though the sound has grown louder, more urgent.
‘Plane!’ Nick is standing over her now. His handsome face looking something closer to normal.
Her mind begs her to get up but her body screams to stay still, like one of those paralysing dreams she had when she was little, when she’d woken to a shape in her room, a shadow,
a half-formed thing, and was unable to move a muscle. Keiko used to tell the girls it was kanashibari, a ghost that only comes at night. But this time it’s driven by pain and exhaustion rather than her dreams, so she feels better equipped to fight it. Pain she can touch and feel is the easiest to ignore. It’s the kind inside that terrifies her most.
Tessa drags herself to her feet and moves towards the clearing, towards their distress signal, scanning the dazzling sky for the source of the noise. Sees Nick at the cross, staring up helplessly.
She spies it then, in the distance, going the wrong way. She grabs the nearest piece of clothing and waves it wildly until she can hardly lift it above her chest. As the rumble of the prop plane fades into the distance, all she can do is pray that someone spotted them. She crumbles into a heap, the energy of moments ago deserting her as a wave of quiet fills the space.
‘Maybe they saw us,’ Nick says.
‘Maybe.’ She doesn’t have to look at him to know that neither of them believes this. ‘I’m sorry.’
He holds up a hand. ‘It’s not your fault.’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘No,’ he says, firm. Clear. ‘It’s no one’s fault. It just …’
‘Is what it is?’
He smiles gently. ‘They don’t feel sorry for you.’
‘I know.’
‘They like you.’
‘I know.’
‘Then let them.’
‘Okay.’
Nick slides down next to her, his own weight too heavy to bear. His face frozen in that small smile, and she reaches for his hand, their fingers entwine, her head tips against his, and they sit there, as close to being in each other’s arms as their ruined bodies will allow, surrendering to the silence, together, alone.
Heat presses against her eyelids, forcing them open. The white glare almost blinds her, and she blinks hard. Blinks again. Searing pain digs at the space behind her eyeballs, and she lifts a weary hand to press weakly against them. Gingerly, she drags herself to sit up. She has to focus on a shrub in front of her to stop the world from spinning, so she trains her gaze on a single spot, like a dancer in a pirouette, to trick her mind into believing that the world isn’t hurtling out of control. Except it is, of course. A retch rises up in her and she leans over. There’s nothing to throw up this time. A small mercy.
The trees are the same thick, parched eucalypts of before. Tessa squints at the sky, trying to think back. How many nights have they slept here? When did they escape the car? She thinks three nights, maybe four, though she doesn’t know how long they were trapped there in the first place. She turns to Nick, but there’s no one beside her, and she’s too tired to call out.
Something is tugging her towards the edge of the cascading rock, and incredibly, her body responds. She finds her way to the ridge and looks down, eyes drawn to a shape, a form, with a texture that contrasts with the tangled mess of green and brown. It’s smooth and flat and black. White lines. Barely four hundred metres ahead.
She senses Nick approaching from behind, seeing it at the same time. He looks at her then, eyes shining, his face beautiful and startling despite the mud, the blood, the cuts and bruises. He’s still there, under it all. Still the boy she loved. Loves. Who loves her back. Even if he has to leave – and he does have to leave, she understands this now – it was worth it, to have him, for as long as she did.
She takes his hand in hers, squeezes it, and they make their way down the mountainside, through the brutal, unforgiving bush, towards the broad stretch of bitumen, the road that will take them home.
Ants crawl across her hand, their tiny legs too light to even tickle. Tessa stares at their manic trail, unmoving, her whole body a weight she can no longer carry. There’s no pain anymore, and she wants to be grateful for that. The relentless ache has now faded into a vaguely reassuring numbness. She watches one of the ants scamper along her wrist, her elbow, before disappearing to the underside. She tells her body to twist her arm, to see where it went, but the message gets no further than a fuzzy thought instantly forgotten.
The edge of the road is a metre from where she lies, the heat rising from the bitumen too intense for her to move any closer. As exhausted as she was when she lay down there, she knew not to sit too close, for fear she wouldn’t be seen from a passing car.
‘Get up,’ Nick rasps.
She stares, unseeing.
‘Tess, you need to get up.’
She doesn’t move, just continues to stare at the ants, the dirt, her hand.
‘Right now, Tess. You need to get up.’
She’s surprised by the anger in his voice. Doesn’t he understand how tired she is? How stupid and pointless this is? They’ve been waiting by the road for hours and it’s almost night again. God, they could be here for days.
‘Tessa! I’m not kidding.’
Go away! Hands grab at her. She waves at the sky, towards the hands, pushing at them, shoving them away. ‘Please,’ she says, not sure what she’s asking. A sob catches in her throat. ‘I can’t do it,’ she whispers. ‘I can’t.’
Nick shakes his head slowly. ‘Yes, you can.’
She opens her mouth to protest, but no words come out. And then her whole body is lifting.
‘You can do it,’ Nick says. Further away than before, but still there. Still strong. Strong enough to carry her, and she is now on her feet. Nothing moves the way it’s supposed to – the bottom half of her left leg has buckled awkwardly, but then it’s straight, or straighter, and she can feel them again. Her limbs. Her head. ‘I told you,’ he says. ‘I said you could do it.’
Tessa twists around to see him, but there’s only the vast, clawing scrub, the parched, unyielding bush. ‘Nick!’
‘We’ve got you.’ A woman’s voice so gentle and kind Tessa could cry.
‘Steady on.’ A man this time.
Tessa squints. Focuses. The woman is smiling at her, but her frown is worried and deep.
‘Are you okay?’ she says. Without waiting for Tessa to answer, she turns to the man. ‘We need to get her to a hospital.’
She sees the ute by the road. How did she not hear it?
Tessa stumbles under their grip, and then her arm is being hefted across shoulders – broad, strong shoulders. She thinks for a second they belong to Nick, but these are lower than Nick’s, wider too.
She twists away to scan the bush behind her. ‘Nick!’ she cries.
The woman’s kind, warm eyes are watching her. ‘Is there somebody with you?’
‘Nick …’
‘Who are you talking to?’ The man steps towards the reeds that skirt the bush, leaving Tessa in the arms of the woman. ‘Is someone there?’ He steps up the embankment.
‘Stop!’ Her knees buckle, and she feels the woman stagger under her weight.
‘Hey,’ the woman says, gathering Tessa in closer, securing her grip under Tessa’s arms.
‘Is there somebody else?’ the man asks gently.
But she’s gone now. She can see Nick’s face, as clear as a photo, the angry red of the burns on his hand, his body broken and ruined, pinned by the steering wheel, his legs crushed. And his eyes, those beautiful brown eyes that had loved her, adored her – the eyes that had believed her every time, all the time – open. Empty.
Tessa stands as tall as her frail body will hold her, the daggers of pain now penetrating her chest, her heart, her very soul. She looks to the sky, that achingly blue sky. ‘We had an accident. Up there.’ She waves an unsteady hand at the mountaintop. ‘My boyfriend, Nick … He’s dead.’
Tessa feels every jolt of the bumpy road in her bones as she lies sprawled across the back seat of the ute. The woman sits in the front passenger seat, turning every few minutes to ask Tessa if she’s okay. And because there are simply no words to answer this question, Tessa can only manage a small nod each time, though even this seems to drain every last bit of her energy. She thinks she must’ve fallen asleep at some point because one minute the car was leaving a clo
ud of dust in its wake as they travelled along the quiet road, and the next, they’re stationary at a traffic light, in what looks like the main street of a rural town. She squints at Nick’s watch on her wrist, its wide face telling her it’s six-twenty.
She has no idea where she is, and apart from worrying about what will happen to Nick, she feels an unexpected sense of relief. She feels safe here, caught in a kind of imposed limbo, where she is neither running away from home, nor heading back there. There is no decision to make just yet – the choice has been made for her. She can stay a little longer in this place where she is neither lost nor truly found.
Men and women in white coats and soft, whispery shoes ask her questions in a blur, but she can’t answer them, can’t get past the idea of Nick all alone.
‘Please,’ she says to a younger doctor, who holds her gaze longer than the others. ‘Please find Nick.’
She thinks she speaks, thinks she answers their questions but struggles to follow their words, the flow of their sentences. And then darkness falls and Nick is there again, holding her, his voice telling her she’ll be okay. Until he lets her go, her hand falling loosely beside her, still warm from the press of his palm, and she feels the sliding feeling, the sense of letting go, and the only words she can form are the ones she understood even before she could speak. Possibly the first emotion her heart ever felt.
I want my mum.
She senses a presence before she opens her eyes. Her lids feel like they’ve been glued shut, the rims crusted with sleep. She forces them open when she hears her name. She’s surprised to see Ms Bainbridge’s tall, colt-like frame filling the room, her steady grey eyes reassuring. It takes a long few seconds for Tessa to be sure she’s real.
‘You’re awake.’ She smiles at Tessa, but the lines around her eyes, her mouth, etch out a story of worry.
Tessa tries to lick her lips but her tongue is like sandpaper.