From the driveway, Jen looks the same as always — flawless make-up, hairdo and pearl earrings — but up close I can see fresh crinkles on her forehead and neck. My mind moves so fast — faster than I can handle mostly — that for a moment I wonder if Mum would’ve had new folds and creases on her face if time had let her. She used to squeal when she spotted a wrinkle in the mirror, then when she noticed me hovering behind her, she’d tell me it’s a gift that only comes with age, and age isn’t a gift that everyone is given so it’s important to treasure it. I didn’t get what she meant until now.
When Jen drags me in for a hug, it’s like she’s breathing me in. Milo watches on, as awkward as ever, before shuffling to his bedroom to call Sal.
Suddenly Jen and I are sitting in the Darks’ living room, alone for the first time in five years. I consider storming into Milo’s room and dragging him back out to join us. Anything to stop me being in the interrogation chair. Instead, I stay, and we cover school, family and friends, with me tiptoeing around the edges of the truth where I need to soften it. I can feel Jen trying to connect the dots, even ones that aren’t there, struggling to solve the riddle of how I ended up in her living room again.
It’s not until she takes my hand in hers that I notice the bracelet hanging from her wrist. It’s loose on her, just like Mum’s was. Gold chain, fine, elegant — the style suited Jen more, but Mum wore hers every day, only taking it off to shower or wash the dishes. She loved it, said it was the nicest thing she owned. But in the chaos after she died, it went missing so we couldn’t bury her with it.
‘It’s been a while since I’ve seen your father,’ Jen says, topping up my tea and pulling me out of my daydream.
I cram a biscuit in my mouth and stammer something about him being busy with work and he doesn’t mean anything by it. My throat is tight as I say it; it’s like stretching a muscle that hasn’t been used for a while. It used to get regular exercise whenever he missed parent– teacher nights, or I was forced to show up to school excursions without the obligatory signed permission slip. I don’t tell Jen I haven’t seen him since Boxing Day.
I’m now glad Milo isn’t in the room. My jaw is already aching from clenching it, and I’m supposed to be the strong one. The one who raided Mrs Landry’s rubbish bin when we thought she was collecting children, hiding them in her back shed and disposing of them when she was done sucking their blood. The one who told Mum that Trent was picking on Milo when we were away at Easter one year and he wouldn’t explain where the bruises on his arms were coming from. The one who did a ten-minute presentation to Jen on Milo’s behalf, complete with props and a scribbled handout, on why he deserved a ten per cent pocket-money increase. I was the lighthouse. The anchor. At least for a moment in time.
‘I know you have a lot of people who love you,’ Jen says, ‘but please know you’ve been in my thoughts.’
I take a sip of tea, unsure what to say to that.
‘I still think of that day often,’ she goes on. ‘It was a beautiful service.’
Tulips are beautiful. A sunset is beautiful. I can never understand why adults say Mum’s service was beautiful.
All this talk takes me back: to sobbing in the church bathroom’s toilet ’cos bright red blood stained my favourite sunflower undies. I couldn’t tell Dad; he was so weighed down with grief he could barely put on his suit. Besides, I was worried. What sort of girl gets her first period on the day of her mum’s funeral? I would’ve thought I was dying too if Mum hadn’t told me it was natural months earlier. With no-one to ask for advice, I stuffed toilet paper in my undies and hoped it would finish as quickly as it started. That was the day I learnt the unbearable thing: that every decision I was going to make from then on, every moment I was going to experience, would be without her.
I was alone. Until Jen came into the bathroom.
She heard me sniffing, but her voice stayed calm as we spoke through the door. She wasn’t going anywhere, she told me, she was going to wait there for as long as I needed her to. When I eventually told her the truth, she passed pads — a thick one and a thin one — under the door for me and checked I knew what to do. Mum had shown me months earlier but I’d forgotten. Her words sang in my ear as I stumbled through it: Periods aren’t that bad. It’s just our amazing bodies doing what they’re designed to do. She’d made me feel like a superhero or a powerful machine. Like my body — me — had been created by the greatest inventor in the universe.
When we left the bathroom together, Jen’s hand touched the small of my back. All I wanted was to splinter into pieces, but she steered me forward and I made it to my seat without buckling at the knees.
‘Layla,’ I hear her saying. ‘Are you okay? We don’t have to talk about it.’
My head is foggy. ‘Sorry … yeah, yeah, I am … but thanks.’
I feel her squeeze my hand. ‘Milo mentioned you’re here for a little while?’
‘Maybe. Probably not.’ I hope not.
‘Oh. Well, maybe’s a good start,’ she says. ‘And what did you two get up to this afternoon? Milo’s lobster-red. I always tell him he needs to reapply sunscreen every two hours or he’ll burn to a crisp.’
‘We didn’t do much, just went to the river. Jumped from the old swing — remember it?’
‘Milo too?’ Jen’s eyes are wide, like I’ve just told her we hitchhiked to Queensland to hit up the casino.
‘He went first.’
Jen almost chokes on her tea. ‘But he hasn’t been swimming there since …’ Her voice trails offs.
Behind me, the kitchen door creaks, but I don’t turn around in time to make eye contact with him. By the time I thank Jen for my tea and charge into Milo’s bedroom, he’s sprawled on the bed checking his phone.
‘All good out there?’ he asks, pretending he didn’t just sneak away.
‘Peachy.’ I shut the door, then collapse next to him. ‘Hear anything juicy?’
He shakes his head. ‘Arrived too late for the goss. I just got off the phone. Well, sorta. There was no answer so … looks like I’m in a relationship with Sal’s voicemail. I don’t want to jinx it, but I think it’s getting serious.’
He laughs. I can tell he’s faking it.
‘You little cheater, you.’
‘Oh yeah, you know me. Player.’
I snort out loud at the thought.
‘So, ladies’ man, your mum said some stuff to me out there.’
‘I knew it! Ignore it all. Unless it was good stuff.’
‘She sorta flipped when I told her we’d been at the river.’
He pauses. ‘What’d she say?’
‘Nothing really — you tell me. Or I might have to tickle you like that time in Bendigo when you wet your sleeping bag.’
‘You’re gross.’
‘Your face is.’
He grins. ‘Whatever, I’m not even ticklish any more.’
‘What happened at the river? Did you spy on Trenticles hooking up with someone there?’
‘What? No.’
‘Your folks hook up there?’
‘Jesus.’
‘Well?’ I hover my hand over his chest, prepared to tickle. ‘That’s not a no.’
‘You serious?’ he says, edging away from me. ‘You’ve committed the sleeping bag saga to memory but this you forget? Damn Mum and her freakin’ mouth.’ He pauses, then mutters, ‘I almost drowned there. When I was a kid.’
I trace over the words before I can stop myself. ‘You almost …’
‘Drowned.’ He rolls his eyes. ‘Just hit me with your jokes about me needing floaties. Get them over with.’
‘Shut up, I’m processing … God, it was … oh, it was the teddy bears’ picnic day … wasn’t it?’
The memory from years ago seeps in, slowly at first, then all at once. I can’t believe I almost forgot. It was the top story on the news. A living nightmare for the Darks. The whole town was on pause to see if Milo had survived.
‘You’d already left the river whe
n it happened, Lay. It’s no big deal.’
At first it had seemed like an adventure the rest of us kids didn’t get invited to join. One boy told me about watching all the flashing lights and how cool it was to see Milo going really, really fast in the ambulance. Apparently all the kids wanted a turn after that, begging their parents for a ride. I also remembered the daughter of one of Mum’s friends telling a group of us, wide-eyed and hanging on every detail, that she’d seen Milo sleeping on the riverbank, and no matter how much she yelled or poked or tickled him, he wouldn’t wake up. When I first heard that I thought it was a miracle, like mermaids in the river had cast a sleeping spell on him. I think I even asked Dad if I could try it on my birthday. Oh God.
The story of what really happened got twisted and turned over the years, especially once the kids at school heard about it. The biggest rumour of all was that Trent had thrown Milo’s teddy bear into the river as a dare, and when the parents’ backs were turned Milo waded out to try to save it, but the river’s current was strong and swept him away. None of the kids, not even Trent, raised the alarm for a while. They didn’t get that his toes couldn’t graze the dirt below.
Despite our lives overlapping for years, Milo and I have somehow never spoken about it so I still don’t know if that’s true. Either way, I should have remembered. I thought I knew everything about this town, about Milo and his family. Maybe things have moved on more than I realised.
‘Dude, we didn’t have to go to the river today,’ I say.
He shrugs. ‘I only know what I’ve been told. And it was ages ago. I can swim — you saw me. It’s fine, Lay, really.’
I raise an eyebrow. Come on.
He waves me away. ‘Relax, I’m not a boy in a bubble. Even if Mum thinks I am.’
‘What you did today is kinda huge when you think about it.’
‘Don’t start.’
‘Okay.’ I cross my legs and take his hands in mine. His palms are sweaty but I don’t let go. ‘Just let me finish then. I want to say something quickly, because today wasn’t nothing, and you can hate me for saying it, but I kind of feel like you hate me anyway, so I’m saying it, even if it makes you hate me more. I’m saying it.’
‘Just say it. And yeah, I hate you.’
‘Good, hate you too. Now, don’t interrupt before I’m finished. I think if you can survive that crappy, crappy thing that happened all those years ago, then you can survive anything.’
‘Lay …’
‘Anything. I mean it. The end.’
Milo chuckles as he looks at his hands in mine. ‘That was so freakin’ cheesy, dude.’
I pounce. He’s stronger than he used to be, obviously, making it harder for me to pin him down. I lean all my weight into it, but it’s not enough. Limbs are everywhere, so I swing one leg over his body until I’m sitting on his stomach.
He chokes with laughter as I tickle his armpits. ‘Ow! Stop!’ he manages between cackles.
His face is flushed pink, his hair ruffled against the pillow. I stop and pull away, suddenly aware I’m alone with Milo in his bedroom, on his bed, where we used to play with our Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures into the night. Yet this time our faces are barely a ruler’s length apart.
‘Anyway,’ I murmur, clambering off him, ‘dinner’s probably ready soon.’
He nods. ‘Yeah.’
I stand up, desperate to widen the space between us, and wander over to the window. You can’t see much. Milo’s view consists of a rusty shed with hints of a rotting wooden fence and a slight glimpse of the neighbours’ backyard.
My old backyard.
When I stand on my tippy-toes, I can see the treehouse, the yellowed lawn in need of a mow, the overgrown pergola. The vines hang over so much I almost expect Mum to rush out yelling, ‘Bring out some secateurs so we can give this beast a haircut!’ The treehouse, like many things in Durnan now, is unkempt and dated. I blink. For a second I don’t see the faded blue splitting wood and the ladder with broken rungs; it’s as fresh as the day Dad painted it into the early hours of Christmas morning.
I catch Milo watching me.
‘It’s gotta be breaking a stack of health and safety rules, right?’ he asks with a glint in his eye.
‘I’ve got a splinter just from looking at it.’
‘The neighbours are away for a fair while, caravanning around Australia, I think.’ He says it slowly, deliberately, like he’s leaving a trail for me to follow.
‘Interesting …’
The door swings open to reveal Jen standing there holding a wooden spoon. ‘Open-door policy, please, you two,’ she says. ‘I’m not ready to be a grandmother.’
‘Jesus, Mum.’
Despite the sunburn, Milo’s face darkens to cherry-red. Even my cheeks feel warm. It’s like I’ve stepped into an alternate universe where everything is backwards and upside-down.
Because this is Milo. Milo.
I pull my phone from my shorts pocket to distract myself. Anything to stop the strange thoughts burrowing into my brain.
No missed calls. No text messages. Guess Kurt’s busy again.
‘Ah, sorry to do this, but I have to go,’ I announce anyway, feigning disappointment. ‘I’ve got a ton of missed calls and messages. I’m such a flake — I forgot I have a thing tonight.’
‘Yeah?’ Milo sounds relieved.
‘Yeah, and I’m already late so … thanks for the chat and stuff, Jen.’
‘You’re welcome, Layla. Sure you can’t stay?’
‘Run before she gets out the baby pics,’ Milo says.
Jen claps her hands together. ‘We do have an adorable video somewhere of you all running under the sprinkler.’
‘Go,’ he says. ‘It’s too late for me, but save yourself.’
‘Risotto smells great,’ I say, and kiss Jen goodbye on the cheek.
Out of momentum, I do the same to Milo, but realise two seconds too late that we don’t do that. My lips press against the apple of his cheek and I feel him flinch, yet there’s a crackle — an underlying fizz. I pull away, noticing a soft dusting of freckles across his nose and his trademark crimson spreading down his neck and colouring his collarbone.
I’m still in the hallway when I hear Jen whisper to Milo, ‘What on earth is going on between you two? Have I missed something?’
‘She has a boyfriend, Mum. It’s just Layla.’
I don’t wait to hear the rest of the conversation.
* * *
Mosquitoes nip at my ankles as I walk across the front lawn of the house, my skin already painted a few tones darker. Milo used to say I could tan under a light bulb. A swirling mess of purples and oranges sweeps across the sky — Durnan’s one redeeming quality: perfect sunsets — but I don’t have long to enjoy it. The front door opens and a barefoot Kurt comes out. He doesn’t say hello or meet me halfway, just plants himself down on the top step of the veranda. Before the move here, he would’ve run at me like a bull, reaching his arms out wide before picking me up and throwing me over his shoulder. I would’ve bobbed along upside-down, hair swinging, pretending I hated it when really I loved every second. But now we’re in the after.
My heart pounds as I climb the veranda stairs. When I reach the top, I’m looking down at him, but he’s looking down at his feet.
‘Hi,’ I say.
‘Hey.’
‘Good day?’
He shrugs, rubbing his right thumb over his left, his eyes still focused on anything but mine.
‘Did you see my whiteboard message?’
‘Yeah, babe — I saw it?’
He looks up at last. His eyes are red again, but I know he hasn’t been crying.
‘I figured you wanted space, so I went for a drive. Then I went walking.’
I don’t tell Kurt that I made it to the corner of Butcher Street, my eyes avoiding the sight of Durnan Hospital looming behind it, before bailing back to the main street to soothe myself with gelato. I don’t know what I was expecting to see on Bu
tcher Street. There were no flowers heaped in a pile like there were five years ago. If anything, the corner’s been done up. The garden looks landscaped, maybe even a new signpost. It looks like any normal Durnan street.
‘Anyway, that turned into more walking, and then … and then I ran into a friend.’
‘A friend? Who?’
I guess I’m doing it … I’m telling him. Anything to cut through the weirdness of whatever happened in Milo’s room earlier. I sit down on the step next to him.
‘Milo,’ I say, before adding, ‘You’ve met him … the guy from the bookshop.’
‘That quiet dude? Didn’t realise ya were tight with another guy here.’
I tell him in a rush that Milo has a girlfriend, that his mum was close with mine, that there’s a whole history I’ll bore him with one day.
Kurt doesn’t say anything, but I’m not sure if it’s because he’s okay with it or because he’s stewing. It’s moments like this I wish I could tap into his brain to read his mind.
‘But,’ I add, trying to use a more upbeat voice, ‘I did see my old backyard.’
‘Yeah? Didn’t think ya wanted to see it again.’
‘It was pretty rundown, but the treehouse is still there.’ My chest pangs as I remember the paint peeling off it.
‘Treehouse?’
I nod. ‘Saw the river too.’ I hadn’t planned on telling him any of this, but now I’m talking, I can’t seem to stop myself. ‘It’s sorta nice down there. More peaceful than it used to be. I guess everyone only goes to the pool now.’
I’m still struck by the eucalyptus trees ruling over everything, and the weeping willows where I could’ve lost myself for hours. Even the caravan park by the river has a certain charm I hadn’t realised I’d missed.
‘Sounds alright. Maybe we could go sometime?’
I pause. ‘Maybe.’
Kurt reaches out, so slowly it’s like he’s forcing himself to drag his hand through the air to connect with mine.
‘Lay,’ he says. ‘You haven’t kissed me properly in ages.’
Before, Kurt’s words wouldn’t have hung in the air in anticipation. His hands would’ve found the turns of my waist and his mouth would’ve found mine. But now, next to me, he’s nervy. It’s like he’s worried he’ll hurt me even more, like all my pieces already need gluing back together and he doesn’t want to do any more damage. He’s seen the real me, I guess — the shadowy dark corners that most don’t even know exist. But he wants me fixed. And I want to feel something other than this for a second or a lifetime, whatever I can get.
Remind Me How This Ends Page 6