by J. P. Pomare
‘No. It’s fine.’
‘Well, are you going to stick around for the barbecue?’
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘Okay, I’ll come.’
•
Beau races up and down the yard yapping at Iso’s car as we bump along the driveway. When I get out and go to him, he leaps up in a frenzy, licking my fingers.
I leave him out in the yard and head inside. I’m once again drawn to the photos lining the hall. There’s the photo of Iso with the fish, and the one where he’s holding hands with his dad . . . And I see another photo that my eyes passed over last time. Iso is a child and beside him there is a younger boy. My heart almost stops. I have seen this photo somewhere before – but not here. The boy, I’m certain, is Thom.
‘Evie,’ Iso calls from the end of the hall. ‘What are you doing?’
I look again at Thom’s face, the sprinkle of freckles, the wide grin. It’s him. I know it. And yet at the same time, I know it isn’t. It can’t be.
‘Iso,’ I say, trying to keep my voice steady, ‘who is this?’
He walks back down the hall and leans in close, peering at the photo. ‘That’s Stan, my cousin from Waihi.’ Then he glides past me back towards the kitchen. I pull myself away and head up the hall.
At the kitchen bench, Iso is dragging a knife through sausage links. He looks up with an inquisitive gleam in his blue eyes.
‘So how did you like horseriding? Easy as pie, eh?’
‘Yeah, it was fun. Thanks for taking me along.’
He checks his mobile phone, sitting on the bench in front of him. ‘Mum’s just at the shop getting stuff for a salad. If you want anything special let me know and I’ll buzz her.’
When I look up at him in his ripped singlet and board shorts, his arms lean and muscular, I feel I am intruding on something. That strange day comes back to me when I attempted to hitchhike. When his mother stopped to pick me up, she already knew that I was Evie. What else does she know?
‘Are you sure it’s okay if I hang around?’
‘Of course. There’ll be a couple of others coming by later.’ Iso is rooting around for aluminium foil in a cupboard.
‘Others?’
‘Yeah, just a couple of mates.’
‘Um, okay.’ I could leave but the man in black is still out there somewhere.
‘You’re in for a real treat, Kate. It’s not every day I bust out my famous grilled snapper. Caught it early this morning.’
I’m making an effort with Iso; he’s the closest thing to a friend I’ve got. ‘I’m looking forward to it.’
‘So why’s your, ah –’ he pauses, scratches the back of his head ‘– your uncle out of town, anyway?’
I hold my house keys in my hand, a habit I have when I’m nervous. I stare at him. ‘How did you know that?’
‘What?’ His gaze is fixed on the aluminium foil.
‘I said how did you know that? How did you know he was out of town? I didn’t tell you that.’
He looks up at me. ‘Tiriana. She said she thought she saw him leaving town.’ He’s a terrible liar, his eyes shifty, his teeth chewing at his bottom lip.
‘Did she?’ Jim had left late last night. How could she have seen him?
Iso swallows, rubs the hollow behind his left ear. ‘Yeah, she said something.’
The front door creaks open. ‘Hello.’ The gravelly voice of Donna. ‘Are you home?’
‘In the kitchen.’
Donna comes down the hall towards us. She holds up a bag of salad mix and says to Iso, ‘I got this. Hope it’s enough. I can add a few tomatoes from the garden.’
She turns her attention to me. ‘How was the ride, Evie?’ Her smile is a nose wrinkle.
I force myself to smile back. ‘It was fun.’
‘Good,’ she says. ‘Good.’
I follow Iso outside under the verandah beside the backyard, where he sparks the barbecue. Sitting close by on a plastic chair, I watch him scrape the grill. Beau approaches and rests his head on my lap.
Over my shoulder, the view from the lawn makes me forget where we are; from here you could believe it really is paradise. Although it’s not as high up as our place, the view extends further along the bay, deep blue with white veins where the waves break. There’s a tree at the corner of the yard with low, spreading branches. It looks like a good sitting tree.
Iso drops a whole snapper on the barbecue and a platoon of sausages. He opens a package of lamb chops he had taken from the fridge and, using tongs, sets them on the grill one at a time.
When I walk down to the tree Beau follows me. I grip the lowest branch to heave myself up, then clamber through the limbs to a higher branch. There I sit and look out over the bay.
‘Evie,’ I hear Iso call hesitantly. I turn back to him. Still holding the tongs, he has stepped away from the barbecue. ‘Are you . . . you’re okay up there?’
‘I’ll be down in a sec.’
Monday. I can leave with Iso on Monday. It occurs to me that this might be another trick, that under Jim’s instruction Iso will take me somewhere else, but what choice do I have?
Iso’s friends start to arrive – two guys and a girl who seem about Iso’s age – and I climb down from the tree and walk back up the lawn to join them.
They introduce themselves, Steve, Anaru and Leah. Steve drags over three more white plastic chairs.
‘Want a drink, Evie?’ It’s Anaru. He has a wetsuit draped over his shoulder; the arms and torso drip down his sweater.
‘I’m okay.’
He opens a beer for himself and one for Leah, before walking to the clothesline and folding his wetsuit over it.
‘So how long you in town for, Evie?’ Leah asks.
‘Oh, I live here now.’
‘Cool. We’re over near Pukehina, about twenty minutes away,’ Anaru says.
For the first time since we arrived almost a month ago, I feel close to normal.
Iso is still turning the sausages on the barbecue and Donna carries a bowl of salad over, setting it down on the wooden table. I hear the gate open and close, then Tiriana comes around the corner of the house. Beau rushes over to greet her. I can see the scars on her throat, pink and gnarled, yet with her green eyes and black hair, there is something beautiful about her. I squeeze the cuffs of my hoodie in my fists.
Beau sniffs at her heels, at the extra sausages she carries in her hands. ‘Sorry I’m late. Couldn’t find anyone to cover at the shop.’
‘No worries. Help yourself to a drink.’
Tiriana pours a few fingers of Jim Beam into a glass and tops it up with Coke. She takes a seat beside me. ‘Hey, Evie, I heard you went riding today. Iso texted me and said you were a natural.’
I blush. ‘I don’t know about that. It was quite scary actually.’
Holding her cigarette in one hand, Tiriana reaches down to stroke Beau’s head with the other. Beau ignores her and everyone else, focusing only on Anaru, who has taken a sausage from the grill and wrapped it in a piece of bread and is eating it.
‘Dig in,’ Iso says, putting all the meat out on the table now. We each grab a plate and load them up. I only take a little of the salad, one of the lamb chops. I’m not feeling all that hungry.
Iso piles his plate up last, sits down and pops another beer bottle before taking a long drink, his eyes on the sun descending behind the moss-coloured hills. Heads turn. For a few seconds, we watch in silence.
‘Not a bad view, eh?’ Anaru says.
‘It’s really pretty,’ I say.
Iso pulls his phone out. ‘Speaking of which, take a peek at this.’ He passes his phone around and each of them looks down at it. ‘Oh, wow,’ one of them says, eyes cutting towards me. When Tiriana hands me the phone, I see myself silhouetted by the descending sun flaming through the clouds. I’m sitting way up in the tree and the bay sweeps out beneath me. I could be a boy with my strong legs, my hair short, the hoodie hanging loose from my body. I delete the photo and hand the phone back to Iso.
> ‘Don’t take photos of me,’ I say quietly, looking him in the eye.
No one speaks for a moment.
The glow of the sun is waning beyond the hills like an ember knocked from a fire, as dusk softens the edges of the day. Iso lights the steel brazier and we all turn as the back door closes. A guy with clippered hair and grey unfriendly eyes saunters towards us, carrying a couple of bottles of beer by their necks.
‘Mick,’ Iso calls. ‘You made it. You know everyone, I think. Oh – this is Evie.’
When the man shakes my hand, he narrows his eyes and leans in closer. ‘Did you go to Ohope?’ he asks.
What is Ohope? ‘Me?’
‘Yeah, where did you go to school?’
‘Oh, no. I’m from Melbourne,’ I say.
‘Far out, the big smoke, eh?’ He shakes his head, taking a plate. ‘I know you from somewhere, though. I’m sure I’ve seen you before.’
I shift in my seat, staring down at the grass. They’ll find you. The bag in the bottom of my wardrobe seems so far away now. I will never outrun what Thom and I did. Jim had taken all the sharp objects, anything I could defend myself with, but not the axe. Despite the heat emanating from the brazier, I am suddenly cold. I wrap my arms around myself.
‘Uh, I don’t know, I haven’t been here long.’ I can feel my cheeks burning.
‘You used to have long hair, right?’
A pulse of fear runs down my back. ‘No.’ Within hours of arriving in Maketu I was bald. That was – what? – four weeks ago, I realise. ‘It’s always been short.’
Whiskers poke through beneath his long pink-tipped nose. ‘Maybe it was someone else. She looked exactly like you, though.’ He dips his head but I catch his sly grin.
‘You’re a tripper, man,’ one of the other guys says.
‘So why’d you leave Melbourne?’ It’s Mick again.
Everyone falls silent. I find myself scowling at him. He takes a lamb chop and pulls the meat away with his teeth.
‘We wanted a change.’
He doesn’t wait to swallow before speaking again. ‘A change, huh?’
Can they hear my heart, see the pulse in my neck? I count my breaths slowly in and slowly out.
Mick is looking down at his phone.
I still have food on my plate, but I can’t eat for the foaming anxiety in my gut.
The others begin chatting and laughing, teasing each other. Iso rocks back with his empty plate in his lap and the legs of his white plastic chair bow beneath him.
Donna is busy with her hands and I realise she is rolling a joint. I put my plate down, thinking about running away, but I stay still, with Beau at my feet. Iso tosses him half a sausage and Beau snaps it out of the air. Mick is still staring at his phone, his lips curving in a nasty smile.
‘I’ve been wanting to get one of those,’ Iso says, reaching over and touching the key ring I’m fiddling with. ‘Expensive for what they are, though.’
‘What?’
He takes the keys from my hands and holds the key ring between his thumb and forefinger. I notice it is slightly thicker at one point. ‘This thing, here?’
‘What is it?’ Mick asks, slipping his phone back into his pocket.
Iso tosses my keys to him. ‘That has a chip in it that tracks movement. You pair it with a phone and it has all sorts of settings. I was looking at getting a couple and embedding one in the tail of my surfboard to see how far I paddle and how fast I move along the wave. But some people put them in their car, so if it gets stolen they can track it. That sort of thing. Pretty handy really.’
My stomach sinks. Jim is one step ahead again. ‘Just going to the bathroom,’ I manage to gasp. It comes on quickly, that fizzing rush. I just make it to the toilet in time. Lurching forwards, I aim the spray of vomit into the bowl. It rocks me, leaching my energy and throwing my stomach into jolting spasms.
When the nausea passes, I splash water on my face. I can’t go back out there. I think about running but I can’t leave Beau behind.
He has my keys.
When I return to the table, Mick has Beau on his lap. He watches me take my seat again.
‘Can I have my keys?’ My words slur. I blink.
‘What?’
‘My keys?’
‘Where did I put them?’ Mick pats his pockets. ‘I must have dropped them.’
‘Please,’ I say, willing my voice to stay steady.
‘Oh,’ he says, pulling them from his pocket. ‘Here they are.’ He tosses them to me and continues stroking Beau.
‘Jesus,’ Donna says, rising. The herby tang of pot floats on the air. ‘Evie, you don’t look so good.’ She touches my back and my skin crawls, my shoulderblades rise. Her eyes are half closed.
Someone presses a glass of water into my hands. I take it and sip. Jim was right, as usual. I should have stayed home. I should never have come here. The joint comes around to me and I take a small puff, hoping it will quell the panic.
I rise on unsteady feet. Everyone is watching me but there is something loaded in their looks. I find Beau’s lead on the grass and clip it to his collar. ‘I think I might go. I need to get home and lie down.’
‘I’ll give you a lift, if you like.’ It’s Mick again. He knows.
I shake my head.
‘Are you sure you don’t need a ride?’ Donna asks. ‘I’ll run you back home myself.’
‘No, it’s fine. Come on, Beau.’
‘We’ll see you again soon, doll.’
‘Let me know about Monday, Evie,’ Iso calls.
I look back at him, trying to decipher the expression in his eyes. Eyebrows angled upwards; kind, open face.
‘Sure,’ I say.
As soon as I’m out of sight around the side of the house I quicken my stride, almost stumbling in my haste, up the driveway to the road. I have only moonlight to see by until I reach the bottom of Iso’s road near the beach, where the streetlights glow. The keys I hold firm in my hand. He has always known where I’ve been. I wonder if Jim is watching me now, if I’m a dot on a map that he can follow.
I start up the hill towards the house. The incline is easier now than when I first arrived. I’m fitter and stronger, but still the anxiety burns in my gut and the cold crawls over my hands and face. I try to keep the pace up, reminded of the park, the spot near Thom’s house. Those nights I walked home and my dad told me to take the long way unless I was with Thom. Dad would know what to do, he would know exactly how to escape. Don’t cut through the park; it’s not safe for a girl to walk alone. His warning drew to mind images of grown men waiting in the shadows. There had been incidents there. A team of football players drinking at night and a teenage girl. There were no CCTV cameras and no security. Her word against theirs. I had cut through the park a lot, but always walking quickly, my pulse fluttering. Never looking back. I think of this as I climb the hill in the darkness. A car approaches from behind but I don’t look over my shoulder. I sense eyes staring out the window as it draws alongside and slows a little. Eventually it creeps past and disappears around the bend.
I imagine Mick, with his sly grin, showing everyone his phone. I’m sure he has found the video of me and Thom. Soon enough the whole town will know.
I can hear the harsh strain of air rushing into my lungs, the thrumming pulse in my chest. Inside, I sink down on my heels and Beau leaps up against me as if to hug me, as if to say, It will all be okay.
TWENTY-EIGHT
A SCRATCHING SOUND in the night. It’s coming from up on the roof. Down below, twigs snap. The sounds are amplified by the stillness within the house. Then comes a knock at the door. My heart leaps up into my throat. Beau barks.
I wait in the stillness, holding my breath. Two more firm taps echo through the house.
‘Hello?’ someone calls. Beau’s barking grows louder. ‘Hello? Evie, are you in there?’ It is a woman’s voice.
I climb out of bed silently, my thighs aching from the horseride. I inch towards the front door, leaving the
lights off. My body quakes with the cold.
When I get to the kitchen, I scissor open the blinds and peer outside.
The shape by the front door is stooped, with dark hair, hooded eyes and a pale stare. The eyes turn on me; I am frozen to the spot. My hands tremble and blood thrums at my temples. The figure smiles. ‘Evie,’ she says, her voice thick with booze.
‘What do you want?’ My own voice is high.
She lifts something up. ‘It’s me,’ the figure says, too loud.
‘Tiriana?’
‘Open up, girl, it’s chilly out here. I brought you leftovers.’
With Beau pressed against my leg, I open the front door.
Tiriana is on the doorstep. ‘What took you so long?’
‘I didn’t know who it was.’
‘It’s all good,’ she says with a sniff. The stink of alcohol fills the room; she must have just finished up drinking at Iso’s. She holds up the plastic bag. ‘I brought some sausages and snapper – you hardly ate anything tonight.’
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘But I’m not really hungry.’
Her face seems to fall with disappointment. ‘Well, you can heat it up for breakfast.’ She hands it to me.
‘How did you know where I live?’ I demand.
Her head tilts to the side. ‘You told me, when you arrived. The lodge. Remember?’ She looks about the interior of the house from the doorstep with a grin. ‘Looks a bit different in here these days.’
I glance back towards the oven. ‘It’s almost midnight.’
If Jim were here, with his rifle, what would have happened?
‘Oh, not so late for a Saturday night. Can I come in?’
‘I was in bed.’
She nods, puffs out her cheeks. ‘I see. Well, I’ll get out of your hair then. Just thought I’d say hi. Iso said your uncle was out of town and I thought you might want some company.’
‘Iso told you that Jim was out of town?’ My stomach heaves. Either Iso is lying or Tiriana is.
She takes a step forwards and my fingers itch for the safety of the axe behind the door. Almost unconsciously I find myself stepping towards it.