by Jane Abbott
And he spoke.
There was a creaking, a whining protest of bending metal. Opening his eyes, he smiled for the first time that day, the first for many days. The machine was more battle-scarred than before but it was sound and would work.
But on what? he wondered. Against the tonnes of timber that needed clearing, the chainsaw would be as useful as a nail file. Ten chainsaws wouldn’t be enough to deal with the debris, not in an afternoon. Even if he did manage to cut it into sizeable pieces, he’d never be able to load and stack it all on the truck by himself. Not in a few hours. And there was no way he was coming back to this place.
Michael swore, loud and crude, the word just as potent as others he’d spoken, because it brought a surge of anger that was all too familiar.
Calm down. He breathed deep, inhaling the sharp scent of eucalyptus and resin, the stench of tree blood. Calm down. Sitting on a log, he closed his eyes to the mess and concentrated.
His power was sharper than any blade, stronger than metal, greater than a machine, but it was also more dangerous, more deadly. With this sudden doubt came a quickening in his blood that beat and knocked and hammered. Tap, tap, tap. Fear. He was too scared to do what he knew he could, terrified he’d lose control again, that it would overpower him.
Michael, be careful. Cait doubted him too. He thought of her words spoken weeks ago at school, when she’d first taught him about himself. Some things he’d mastered. Some things had come easily: his hand, the kangaroo, the chainsaw – even healing Cait, once he’d swallowed his fear. He’d been able to focus the power, narrow it down to singular tasks. Sometimes he’d been barely aware until after it was over. But this was different. This was no wound. This wasn’t something that could be healed in an instant, at a touch or with a spoken word. This was destruction, metres wide. This was carnage, wrought by his hand, in terrible anger and bitter frustration.
Michael had never meant to break Casey’s arm. Sure, he’d wanted Casey to let go of Jenny and leave them alone, but everything had gone wrong. There’d been that pounding in his head, the hideous pain as he’d struggled against his anger, and the surge of power building within him, knocking to be let out. Tap, tap, tap. Just as it was doing now. He could feel it pushing, nudging, whispering and taunting, daring him to challenge it, tempting him to deny it. And it seemed the more he ran from it, the worse it got. The angrier he grew, the stronger its hold. He’d become something he couldn’t recognise, a thing he hated, a monster. And it terrified him.
I have a power I don’t want and don’t know how to use.
But he did know. Sometimes. And those times he hadn’t felt fear or rage or helplessness but strength and purpose. The times when it had worked, he’d been at peace.
You either accept it or are consumed.
Accept. Consume.
Accept.
Michael laughed, and it echoed in that empty place. He knew now what she’d meant. It wasn’t about control. It was about trust. He wasn’t supposed to master anything; he had to surrender to it. It was the missing part of him – who he was, what he’d once been – and now he had only to take it back.
And if you’re wrong? Doubt poked at him, jeering, and his head pounded again. He looked around at the mess and thought of Cait in the truck, then shrugged; things couldn’t get much worse. The pain eased, fading to a dull ache, and he smiled. He knew he was right.
The chainsaw redundant, he walked to the centre of the clearing, turning in small steps to survey everything, take it in. Accept it. Letting all the guilt and fear and regret and anger wash over and through him, Michael waited for it to build, bearing the pain, absorbing it before opening the door to its beating. It rushed out, sparking and flaring, biting with hot yellow tongues, and he let it burn, breathing to fan the flames so they raged and blazed, bringing more pain and a terrible heat to melt and reshape him; he screamed with the agony. And as the fire danced and spread, consuming everything, he surrendered himself to it until he was utterly cleansed, scoured and cauterised, and he and it were one.
There was no noise. No fury, no wind, no tempest or storm. In his mind he saw the truck, the wood Cait had stacked, the bloodstained floor. He saw the scattered debris, the half-torn limbs, the shredded branches, and he brought them together: the truck and the timber, the timber in the truck. Neat. Cut. Split. Stacked. But he didn’t speak. There was no need. The word was in him and he was the word.
When at last they drove from that place, they left behind a neatly felled area, a common enough sight in the bush. Birds flitted across the ground, snatching insects and grubs. The clearing seemed almost tranquil, normal except for a small scorched circle of earth marking the place where, finally, Michael had bowed to his fate.
Cait’s head lolled on his thigh, and he took care not to disturb her too much with every shift of clutch and gears. But she barely murmured as the truck, laden with its cargo, rolled and bumped over the field, axles groaning under the weight of the timber. Michael glanced down at her a few times. She looked small and defenceless, a mangled animal, and he knew he couldn’t take her back to the house like this. And if they returned too soon with a fully laden truck, Jim was sure to ask questions.
The waterhole was too far, the track too narrow for the truck and too slippery after the rain. Dams were muddied from the heavy tread of cows and the run-off of water. That left only the troughs, and he headed for the closest one he knew – an old bathtub rescued from a junkyard and used now to water stock. The paddock was empty of cattle and the rain would’ve flushed the worst of the dirty water.
‘Come on, Cait. Let’s get you up,’ he said.
He kept the jackets around her and pulled her to a seated position, but she cried out and fell against him, and he had to carry her out and across to the trough. He sat her on the edge, keeping hold of her so she didn’t topple over.
‘Cait? You need to open your eyes.’ He patted her cheek and she groaned again, but her eyelids fluttered and lifted and she tried to focus. Her face was white. ‘How are you feeling?’ he asked stupidly, and she took her time answering.
‘Sore. Dizzy.’ Her voice was low, a tremor, and she looked first at the truck, then at him. Raising a hand to his face, her touch was light, her eyes dark as she searched his. ‘So you did it,’ she said.
Her sadness confused him. Why wasn’t she pleased? Hadn’t he done what she’d wanted?
She dropped her hand and looked around. ‘What are we doing here?’
‘You’re covered in blood. If you go back looking like that, Jim will murder me.’ His tone was surly. He’d hoped for praise, not reproach.
She looked down at herself, seeing the jackets and her stained jeans. She moved slowly, her breathing shallow, everything an effort. ‘Yes. Okay. Do you have a rag I can use?’
Michael shook his head. ‘You’re going to have to get in and soak it off. Your hair’s caked in it.’ When she glanced at the dirty water and wrinkled her nose, he added, ‘Or I can take care of it.’ But her sudden frown warned him not to push it. ‘Then the trough it is. Don’t be a baby. It’s not that bad.’
She grumbled a bit, and when he pulled her up, cried out again.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, no longer angry but alarmed. She shook her head and bit her lip, trying not to cry. Michael stripped away the jackets, and stared in horror. Her body was welted and bruised, already purpling. Even her arms hadn’t been spared, her flesh blotchy like rotting fruit. He turned her slowly to see her back was the same. Splashed in red and blue, as though someone had thrown paint at her. ‘Shit. Take off your jeans.’
She fumbled with the button and zipper, tried wriggling them down, and stifled another cry. ‘It’s my side,’ she gasped. ‘It hurts too much.’ When he prodded her gently, she moaned.
‘It’s okay,’ he said, but it wasn’t. He hated seeing her like this. Covering her ribs with his hand, he rejoined them, too quick for her to argue. Then, crouching in front of her, he lifted her feet to remove her boots and soc
ks while she held his shoulders, before he peeled off her jeans. Her thighs were mottled too and one shin bore a long, raised welt. He felt queasy, sick with shame.
She squeezed his shoulders. ‘It’s all right, Michael. They’re just bruises. They’ll heal. And most of it’s probably blood.’
He looked up, desperate to apologise, needing to see her gentle smile. But Cait wasn’t there. In her place stood another and he knew it wasn’t the first time he’d kneeled before her. Then, it had been upon cold stone in an ancient hall. She wore a woollen gown, dyed green to match her eyes. Her hair wasn’t white like Cait’s but the gold of autumn leaves and bound with a circlet of silver. She was young, not much more than a girl, but a queen also, and he saw himself with bowed head, swearing fealty, pledging his life and his sword. Beside her, a man greater than he curled an arm around her waist and Michael felt a red rush of guilt while other men, armed and armoured, moved together to enclose the three of them, condemning him.
He blinked and the vision was gone, and there was Cait, standing in an open field in her underwear. Rising on his knees, Michael wrapped his arms around her, pressing his face to her stomach. He felt her flinch, but she didn’t move back or try to push him away.
‘Michael? What is it?’
‘Why did you do it?’ he cried, the words muffled against her skin. ‘Why’d you put yourself in danger like that? I could’ve killed you.’
Her hands hovered over his shoulders and hair, as though unsure of how best to comfort him. ‘You might’ve killed me, anyway. Your anger is terrible, Michael, your vengeance too. They’re your worst faults. But your love is always greater. I had to trust to that.’
‘It was a stupid thing to do,’ he said, his voice hoarse. ‘I can’t lose you, Cait.’
‘Oh, Michael,’ she whispered, and he buried his face into her, tightening his grip. Her fingers finally came to rest upon his head and she held him to her.
‘Not yet. Not now.’
‘No, not yet,’ she promised, and they stayed like that until she squirmed in his arms. ‘I’m cold.’
‘Sorry,’ he said, but when he placed a hand on her leg, she pulled back and shook her head. ‘Let me do this, Cait. Please. I have to.’
The wind teased her hair, and she shivered again before giving a quick nod. ‘Okay, but just the bad ones.’
He sighed, letting go of his anxiety, and slowly, gently, cupped her calves, running his hands up and around her legs, dispelling the welt on her shin, thinning the heavy haematoma on her thigh. He skimmed her hips, banishing the bruise that wrapped her waist, the ache in her narrow ribs, brushing over her breasts – not touching, just touching – to her chest, where the wood had staked her, and the cut on her shoulder, sliding behind and down, following the long sweep of her back, healing and soothing, grazing the top of her pants, and his hands dropped away.
She met his gaze and smiled. ‘Thank you.’
Turning her, brushing aside her hair, he unclasped her bra while she hooked her thumbs into her knickers and pushed them down. Cait had never been a prude; growing up on a farm didn’t allow for it. Even so, she covered herself with her hands as best she could while Michael stood her in the trough.
‘God, it’s freezing,’ she cried, lifting her feet.
‘Sorry,’ he said, wishing he’d thought to warm it before. But when it came to Cait, he couldn’t seem to do anything right. He dipped his hand into the trough and they both watched as bits of chewed grass and lichen and dead insects bubbled to the surface. Again, he sank his hand and the water cleared. Again, he apologised.
She lowered herself and leaned back with a sigh, almost floating while he held her head and teased the blood from her hair. The water tinged pink. She avoided looking at him, and he was trying hard not to see too much, remembering Gabe’s accusation – Jenny’s, really. He was confused again, because this was Cait and he didn’t feel that way about her. Did he? Steam curled and vanished and, resting her head against the end of the bath, she stretched out her legs.
‘I’m hungry,’ she said, and Michael nodded, relieved to have something to do.
Unwrapping a tuna sandwich, soggy and pungent, he offered it to her. Cait held up wet hands, so he broke off sections and fed her, before handing her a can of soft drink to sip. When she’d had enough, he finished it off, gulping the sugary liquid.
‘You’d better wash too,’ Cait said, and sat up to make room. ‘Your hands and your arms.’
He looked away. ‘After you’re out.’
‘Help me up?’ she asked, her hand on his.
Michael turned back and, relieved to see her other arm covered her breasts, gripped her hand and dragged her to her feet. Water fell from her and she shone wet and silvery beneath a cool sun. An ice maid, melting. He threw his jacket around her, quickly pulling it closed, and steadied her as she stepped out. ‘No towels, sorry.’
‘Well, I’m not coming back here again,’ she joked, but he didn’t smile.
Bending over the trough, he scrubbed the last of her blood from his skin, then unscrewed the plug from the base of the trough, draining it of his crime. And he’d gone and broken the fourth rule.
He rehooked her bra, and when she shivered again, stripped off his T-shirt and pulled it over her head. She looked strange in black, the darkened silver of her hair whitening in contrast.
‘What about you?’ she protested.
‘It’s okay, I’ve got my jacket.’
‘But it’s wet and I have a jacket too.’
‘You need to keep warm. I’ll be fine,’ he said.
‘Thank you, Michael,’ she said, and cupped his cheek. When he twisted his head to kiss her palm, she snatched her hand away.
No, not yet. Her voice like a sigh.
He didn’t mind the sticky damp of his jacket as he drove back to the house, because before that it had been around Cait. She sat next to him quietly, resting against the door of the truck. His beanie covered her head, and below it her hair hung in long tangles, framing her face and neck. Michael tried to summon the image he’d seen before – of the girl in the green gown – but there was only Cait, meek in black and white.
He dropped her off at the house so she could change, and took the truck to the shed, where he unloaded the wood as easily as he’d loaded it. Then he swept the floor and rid it of her blood with a single thought, just as Jim came to check their work.
‘Good job,’ he admitted, surprised that they’d already finished. He eyed the tools, making sure everything had been returned in good order. ‘Any problems?’
Michael shrugged. ‘The usual.’
She came to him most nights, slipping past the guardian of dreams and holding him close. She was familiar now, and as he peeled the green wool from her shoulders and unbound her hair so that it fell in thick amber waves, as he removed the circlet from her head, releasing her from her oath, and kissed her, as she clung to him and returned his love, he felt he almost knew her. Sometimes he sought her, other times she surprised him, stepping from the shadows, taking his hand and leading him down staircases and along stone passages to the cover of dark woods, away from the eyes of those who suspected. For their devotion was illicit.
Sometimes she came as another: older, darker, fairer, poorer, in the heat of a desert or the white cold of winter. He learned all her guises, though he never knew her name. They never spoke. Those words were past and he’d long forgotten them, and their nights were for other things. But he remembered her passion, better than words and more enduring than any declaration of love.
A few times it was Jenny who met him, and Michael found comfort in her embrace. But even as he loved her, his thoughts were always of the golden-haired girl in the green dress – the girl whose want of him had once laid waste to a kingdom.
iii
All he needed to freeze time was timing. The passing of a single second – tick – and her poise would blur, the portrait just another picture to be deleted. It had taken him years to perfect his timing and To
dd knew, better than anyone, the value of patience. Because didn’t all good things come to those who waited?
Good things –
munch
crunch
No one knew. Why would they? Gabe’s warning to stay away had come years too late; Todd had been to the Webster property plenty of times. He knew it better than he knew his own home. How else could he have amassed so many pictures of her? He giggled from his chair, his ergonomic throne; flicking through every shot, every scene, he was a god overseeing his creation. And no one, not even Golden Boy, was going to put a stop to that.
His collection was filed and stored on three external hard drives: photos of his muse flattened to pixels, shiny white and cold to touch. He couldn’t forgive her, of course, but oh how he yearned for her, even more since she’d revealed her dark heart – a sick, black thing that only Todd might appreciate. So sick –
sick, sick, sick
– because didn’t he have one of his own? And didn’t he harbour secrets, just like her? They were the same, he and she, made for each other, and he would claim her eventually. All good things …
Nightly, when he clicked through the files, to ease his heart and fuel his imaginings, he’d notice something he hadn’t before: a shadow to mar her paleness, or an errant speck on the lens that blossomed to a blemish on his screen, and he’d be forced to erase the mistakes made by a split second of indecision –
split, split, split
– like his arm. He rubbed at it now; in the bright glow cast by the screen, it was red, almost purple, a big fat worm with its guts pulsing, sluggish and slow to move. Every click of the mouse made it ache, and his skin was sore to touch, as though stuck with a thousand pins. Fucking Webster!
Shutting off Caitlin’s beautiful face – don’t go anywhere, I’ll be back – Todd opened another file. There were only a few pictures but all of them good. And he’d soon add more. Selecting one, he sent it to print; it was the best of the lot, with Webster’s hand deep inside the slut’s uniform, holding her tit. Todd closed his eyes for a minute, imagining the feel of that flesh – his mouth on hers, his tongue probably halfway down her throat. No doubt about it, the new telephoto lens had been worth every cent. Gabe wanted him to keep his distance? No problem, arsehole.