Bonkers

by Michelle Holman

  They assembled in the lounge where Dillon took out a pad and began to take Lisa’s statement. She was totally unnerved at his professional, unsmiling manner. The Dillon Taylor she knew came to her parents’ house for barbecues and to watch rugby matches. If he occasionally drank too much when he watched a game, he slept overnight on the couch.

  Dan sat beside Lisa, not touching her but there if she needed him.

  Dillon started out by asking Lisa her full name. She looked at Dan helplessly.

  ‘Linda Elizabeth Brogan née Mulholland,’ Dan said.

  Dillon looked at them both strangely and wrote it down.

  ‘Date of birth?’

  ‘June the…’ Lisa frowned, trying to remember what Dan had said in the coffee shop the first time he took her to Browns Bay. ‘Sixth?’

  He nodded.

  Once again, Dillon’s eyes flickered between Lisa and Dan.

  Lisa knew him well enough to know he thought they were both nuts. She felt a bubble of laughter work its way up her throat and covered it with a cough, pressing her fingers over her lips. To the casual observer it looked as if Dan shifted, sprawling more comfortably on the couch and inadvertently bringing his thigh into closer contact with his wife’s. Lisa, however, felt the firm, sharp nudge of warning. Behave yourself or else! She sat up straight and stared hard at Dillon, and was immediately distracted by his new haircut. It suited him.

  It was Dan’s thigh digging into her again that drew Lisa’s attention to the expectant expression on Dillon’s face. ‘I’m…er…Sorry! Could you repeat the question?’ Shifting in her seat, Lisa tried to shove Dan’s leg away. He responded by letting his long, long legs sprawl even wider, crowding her space even more. I’ll kill him when Dillon’s gone, she thought irritably.

  Dillon had to repeat the question again.

  It went on much like this for over an hour.

  Lisa did her best, but she really couldn’t answer the questions—at least not from Linda Brogan’s point of view.

  ‘Did you have a driver’s licence in the States?’

  ‘No,’ Lisa replied, relieved she could answer truthfully.

  Dillon looked to see if Dan disagreed before scribbling something on his report.

  ‘Were you aware you were driving illegally without a New Zealand licence on the evening of March 24?’

  ‘No.’

  Dillon stared at her. ‘Are you sure about that?’

  Dan’s thigh went rigid with tension.

  ‘You thought that when you were driving,’ Dillon paused to check his notes, ‘Mr Jack Millar’s blue Triumph convertible the day of your accident you were licensed to do so?’

  What should she say? What could she say?

  Lisa clutched her hands in her lap and remembered the sight of the little blue car racing towards her. She remembered the bang when it hit her Mazda and the awful buckling of the door as it seemed to keep coming, pushing her and the car sideways until there was another horrendous crashing noise on the other side. A noise like a roar of destruction, tearing at her ears, making her scream with fright. And the pain, the dreadful, dreadful pain in her right side.

  Clapping her hands over her ears, Lisa wailed. ‘It hit me! The blue car hit me! It caved in the door and then the other door caved in…’

  Dan was there in an instant, forcing her hands down from her ears and pulling her tightly against his chest. ‘Sssh. Hush. It’s over. It’s over.’ He rocked her, his lips pressed against her hair.

  Lisa heard him say, ‘I think my wife has had enough, officer.’

  ‘She needs to sign her statement,’ Dillon said in a subdued voice.

  ‘I’ll sign it for her,’ Dan said quickly, and then when Dillon began to protest added, ‘My wife is dyslexic, Officer Taylor. Writing is extremely difficult for her, particularly since her head injury.’

  Lisa felt him nuzzle the top of her hair. ‘Is that OK, honey? Can you tell the officer it’s OK?’

  Lisa lifted her head to look at Dillon. ‘I’m sorry, Dillon.’

  He stared at her, his brow furrowed with confusion. ‘Do you know me?’

  Lisa felt the tears flood her eyes again. This was the way it would always be—she would be a stranger to her friends. ‘No,’ she said dully. ‘No. It’s alright, I’ll sign the form.’

  Dillon began to look suspicious when Dan protested.

  Lisa pressed Dan’s arm reassuringly. She knew what he was frightened of—that she would sign herself as Lisa Jackson. Gripping Dillon’s pen tightly she managed to sign Linda Brogan’s name.

  ‘Sorry,’ she apologized to Dillon. ‘It’s not very legible is it?’

  ‘That’s OK,’ he muttered and packed his things away.

  After he’d gone, Lisa sat in the kitchen at the breakfast bar while Dan made them both some coffee.

  ‘When do you think the court case will be?’ she asked when he carried the two steaming mugs with their delicate pictures of wildlife over to the counter. They looked like toy cups in his big hands.

  ‘I don’t know. They’ll tell us.’ He sat beside her on one of the tall breakfast chairs.

  Lisa nodded and toyed with the handle of her mug. ‘Thanks for coming home. I appreciate it.’

  He swallowed a mouthful of coffee. ‘I wasn’t going to leave you to cope on your own.’ He eyed her keenly. ‘It was tough for you.’

  ‘And you.’ She tried to laugh but it sounded forced. ‘Your leg was working overtime for a while there.’ She raised her mug in a mock salute. ‘And good try at signing for me. You were petrified I was going to sign as Lisa Jackson, weren’t you?’

  He reluctantly nodded.

  ‘I probably would have if you hadn’t reminded me. Thanks.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ he murmured.

  They sipped their coffee in silence, each wrapped up in their own thoughts.

  ‘You don’t remember driving the blue car, do you?’ Dan asked quietly.

  Lisa shook her head, her eyes fastened on her coffee.

  ‘You remember being hit by the blue car, don’t you?’ he said, watching her strangle the fine bone china between her palms. ‘Tell me what you remember, Lisa,’ he said gently.

  After wanting to tell him for so long what had happened to her, Lisa didn’t know where to begin. She hesitated a long time before she started to speak haltingly, ‘I…I…remember slowing down…to give way to the car on my right.’

  Clasping her hands together, Lisa pressed her mouth against them. Dan had to bend forward to hear her muffled voice. ‘The sunstrike was really bad.’ She glanced at him. ‘You know how it is? When it’s so bright you’re dazzled and you can’t even see the car in front of you?’

  He nodded, his clear grey eyes watching her patiently.

  ‘I’d seen Janice Millar that afternoon and she’d told me I had to have a hysterectomy.’

  Dan frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘I had endometriosis.’ Lisa shrugged forlornly. ‘None of the treatments had worked for me.’

  Dan’s gaze flickered, but he said nothing.

  Lisa put her lips against her hands again. ‘I remember looking to my right and seeing the little blue car coming towards me. The driver had long, dark hair blowing in the wind. It was going fast but there was another car on her right that was pulling up to the roundabout, so I…I didn’t bother to give way like I should have. I thought she’d stop for the other car.

  ‘I pulled out and heard a car’s brakes squeal and the honk of a horn. When I looked over I saw the driver of the blue car hadn’t stopped and the other car had skidded to a halt to miss it. She came at me so fast!’

  Lisa’s breath became ragged. She didn’t realize she had started to cry.

  Dan watched a tear plop into her coffee.

  ‘She hit me so…so hard that it pushed me and my old Mazda right across the road. The noise was terrible! It was so loud! Like a monster roaring. And the blue car just kept coming at me. The door on my side was caving in and it was still coming, and then
there was another huge big crash and something hit me on the other…other side and that door began to cave in, too!’

  Lisa sucked in her breath and clapped her hands against her right side beneath her breast. ‘The pain was so bad, sharp and dreadful and…and…’ She breathed raggedly. ‘I didn’t give way, Dan! Everybody keeps blaming your wife, but I didn’t give way like I should have!’

  Dan looked at her hands, his heart pounding so loudly that it was like a drum in his ears. Lisa’s hands were placed right over the region of her liver. The woman in the other car had died from hypovolaemic shock caused by massive blood loss from her lacerated liver. He snatched Lisa against his chest. ‘Stop it. You don’t have to say anything more.’

  She turned into him, winding her arms about his neck. Burying her face against his left ear and the soft dark hair above it she shook her head. ‘I’m not sorry you asked! I’ve wanted to tell you for so many weeks but I didn’t think you’d listen.’ She let out a shuddering breath. ‘You might as well hear the rest now…but it might upset you.’

  ‘Upset me?’ Dan doubted anything could upset him more than imagining her terror as a car caved in around her, that and her unshakeable belief that she was not his wife.

  ‘It’s about Linda,’ she said quietly.

  She told him about the waiting room and Moira and George.

  And about Linda and her baby.

  And how George had sent her back in Linda’s place.

  When she’d finished, she waited silently, still cuddled against Dan.

  His big body felt as tense as an overwound spring.

  ‘That’s quite…a story,’ he said at last.

  Lisa’s heart sank. He didn’t believe her. Placing her hands on his shoulders she began to ease herself away from him.

  Dan tightened his hold. ‘Where are you going?’

  She shook her head and pushed back against his encircling arms. ‘I want to get down.’

  He refused to let her go. ‘How did you know the police officer?’

  She blinked up at him in surprise, her face only inches from his. ‘Dillon? He’s a friend of my sister Sherry; she’s a cop too. I went out with him for a while.’

  ‘You mean you dated him?’

  ‘Yes. For almost two years. But my endometriosis got so bad that in the end I broke it off.’ She smiled wryly and relaxed against him again. ‘It’s not a condition that lends itself to romance.’

  Dan felt a surge of jealousy. Was that a polite way of saying she’d stopped sleeping with the guy? He gave himself a mental shake, feeling like he was once again picking his way through a minefield blindfolded. ‘Sherry’s the woman you shouted at in the car park?’

  She nodded.

  ‘I saw her at the hospital the day of the accident. She was at the Emergency Department. I thought she was waiting to interview me.’

  Lisa decided not to mention she had also seen Sherry outside the resuss rooms as she passed by on her way into Linda’s body.

  Dan took a deep breath that expanded his chest, lifting Lisa up where she lay against him. As he exhaled she rode the movement gently down again. He stroked the fingertips of his right hand around the pale oval of her brow and cheekbone. ‘You truly believe you’re Lisa Jackson, don’t you?’

  Lisa stiffened and tried to pull away from him, pushing her hands against his chest to make him let go of her.

  ‘Lisa…’ Dan reluctantly let her go.

  She gave a hollow laugh, shaking her head as she slipped down from the tall chair. ‘Please, just forget it—forget everything I said.’

  ‘How on earth do you expect me to do that?’ he demanded.

  ‘I don’t know—that’s your problem. I have enough of my own.’

  She didn’t look back as she hopped off to her bedroom. When she reached it, she shut the door firmly behind her and went to sit on the bed, shivering.

  What a bloody idiot she’d been. If somebody had spun her the same story she’d just told Dan she wouldn’t have believed them either. The only reason Sherry had been forced to believe her was because Lisa had been able to tell her too many things that only Sherry’s sister would know. At least Sherry and Lisa shared a history, whereas Lisa and Dan had none.

  The situation she found herself in would almost have been funny if it weren’t so deadly serious. Lisa knew the first thing she would have done was remove any sharp objects from the area if somebody told her they had come back from the dead in another person’s body. Right after she asked for their shoelaces, tie and belt.

  She shuddered.

  What on earth would happen if Dan told Craig Fergusson?

  19

  ‘Has anybody not had their sausage? There’s a sausage going spare!’ Sherry yelled.

  Under her breath, she muttered, ‘That has to be a first.’

  The sausages were Brenda’s contribution to the barbecue Ben had organized. Brenda always brought vegetarian sausages once she’d found out how many were expected. Sausages were the cheapest thing she could supply, and she bought one for everybody. Sherry was outraged that it was possible to buy vegetarian sausages in the first place.

  Because the Jacksons’ barbecues were popular, Brenda could arrive carrying a big bag of food and not break her housekeeping budget for the week. But Ben always overcompensated by buying heaps of booze, which put Brenda in a bad mood for the night. It irritated Sherry that they were having a barbecue when it was well past summer and the nights were getting cold, but a meeting had been called to discuss the wedding. There was no way Brenda would fork out for a cooked meal for so many, and no way Sherry would let her mother cook for Brenda’s horrible family.

  The wind suddenly kicked up and Sherry snuggled more deeply into her big white sweater decorated with tea roses.

  She’d never known Brenda to miscalculate on the sausage count before—well, certainly not in a positive way. She supposed she’d have to put it down to wedding nerves. The thought made her shudder. Sherry wished Lisa were here to snigger with her over the extra sausage and roll her eyes at the idea of Ben marrying Brenda. But instead she was living with Dan Brogan. Sherry remembered the phone call Lisa had made earlier in the week, asking if she could come and live with her. It had kept her awake at night ever since, worrying. For all Lisa’s assertions to the contrary, Dan Brogan could be a pervert and wife-beater for all Sherry knew.

  Brenda glowered at Sherry through the glass doors that led from the dining room to the deck and barbecue area in the back garden. In reply, Sherry hoisted the lone sausage from the hot plate with the barbecue tongs and bared her teeth at Brenda in a cheesy, insincere grin.

  Po-faced Brenda stalked into the kitchen and out of sight.

  ‘No takers on the sausage?’ Sherry yelled, waving it about.

  Ben suddenly appeared beside her. Grabbing Sherry’s wrist he took the tongs and sausage from her. ‘Will you pack it in?’

  Sherry gazed at him innocently. ‘But Brenda went to all the trouble of bringing them. It seems a shame to let it go to waste.’

  Ben glared at her.

  Sherry arched one brow and stared back defiantly.

  Ben was the one who eventually looked away and took a sip from his can of beer. Sherry knew this barbecue to discuss the wedding was his way of pushing their mother and father towards regaining some normality in their lives. Same as the wedding was his way of trying to take their mind off Lisa’s death.

  But Lisa wasn’t dead. She was living just a few kilometres up the road in the house of a stranger.

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about something,’ Sherry said.

  ‘Is that right?’ Ben replied acerbically. ‘I thought you just wanted to piss Brenda off.’

  ‘She’s a tightarse, Ben.’

  ‘She’s careful with her money.’

  ‘She’s a tightarse, Ben,’ Sherry repeated. ‘And not just with her money but with yours too.’

  ‘She can’t help it,’ he said at last. ‘You’ve seen what her family’s like.’

/>   Sherry glanced up at the deck where their parents and Raylene and Denny Buckner were sitting in green canvas chairs sharing a drink. She noticed Brenda’s parents had already hoovered up most of the chips and dips her mother had provided. Christine was hunched on a bench in the corner of the deck, looking bored and picking at her fingernails. Sherry was convinced she’d only come along because she’d been hoping for an argument to break out. Christine knew how much Sherry loathed Brenda.

  ‘So because she was brought up by the Munsters Brenda should be excused for being a bludger and a user?’ Sherry asked.

  Ben stiffened. ‘That’s enough, Sherry!’

  Sherry decided it was time to back off. Ben was so laidback he was almost horizontal, but like a lot of easy-going, placid people, he was a force to be reckoned with when pushed too far.

  ‘OK, OK.’ She turned to switch the burners off on the barbecue. ‘But I do need to talk to you.’

  ‘The wedding is off-limits, Sherry,’ Ben said firmly.

  ‘It’s not about the wedding, Ben,’ Sherry replied quietly. ‘It’s about Lisa.’

  Ben’s expression turned bleak, but she knew he wouldn’t refuse to listen to her. No doubt he thought she needed to offload some of her grief. He nodded. ‘We can sit out here with our plates.’

  Raylene, Denny and Christine were the first to the dining-room table where the barbecued meat, salads and garlic bread had been laid out for people to help themselves. Sherry always made a point of posting herself at the head of the table with the tongs to stop the Buckners cleaning out the meat before anybody else got a look-in. Lisa had always taken over at the salad bowls to ensure they didn’t run into the same problem there.

  ‘There’s a sausage for you, Denny pet!’ Sherry cooed, squeezing hard on the one she held between the tongs so that it split in half. ‘Damn! They’re tender! Where do you get them, Brenda?’ Carefully picking up half a sausage and the smallest pieces of marinated chicken and steak she could find, Sherry transferred them to Brenda’s father’s plate.

  Denny looked between Sherry and his plate, scowling. He was an overweight, stubby man with yellow teeth and a habit of boasting to people that he hadn’t bought a new shirt in twenty years. He was wearing a pair of brown polyester trousers that were too small for him and a bright-blue-and-yellow Hawaiian-style shirt that strained across his hairy belly. He reminded Sherry of a pink, hairy pig.