After the Darkness

by Brown, Honey

  Bruce and I crept home without being noticed. We were left alone to weave and stagger across the finish line.

  Down the drive.

  Into the carport.

  And stop.

  I turned off the engine and sat back. The sun had set. I closed my eyes. In my ears I had that high buzz you get after a concert.

  With my eyes still shut, I pictured our ten hectares and our two-storey weatherboard home. It was a big timber house, painted a light, creamy yellow, with white windows and white balconies, white finials and turrets, and a soft grey roof. The curtains were the storybook type – off-white with wide yellow ties. The home was meant to invoke a feeling of family, with lots of entrances and exits to cope with heavy traffic, nooks and crannies to provide a sense of adventure, multiple living areas, over-stuffed armchairs, eight-seater tables, a long kitchen bench, and a parent’s retreat. You’d think we’d planned having a dozen children, and not stopped at the traditional three. There were even twelve hooks in the laundry. My reasoning had been that a family home could never have too many coat hooks. And, as it turned out, there was never a spare hook available. Had I factored in horse bridles, leads and saddle rugs, I might have filled every wall in the house with coat hooks. Outside there were paved areas, a half basketball court, and gardens in need of weeding. The shed was in the same style as the house, as was the stable.

  As I sat there, the horses would be at the side gate, expecting all the family to be home. If I listened I would probably hear them whinnying and making that low thudding sound in their throats; talking, we called it. They often sounded like a couple of politicians muttering, ‘Hear, hear,’ during question time. I realised I would have to feed them. I remembered our cats. They would be on the veranda steps, tails up, rubbing their sides on the railing, getting ready to meow their wish to be pampered after two weeks on their own with nothing but a big bowl of dry food beside a locked cat door.

  These homecoming rituals held no comfort for me now. I wanted to walk in, get under the shower, fall onto the bed, and not move until what had happened had gone away, forever. Was I really going to have to feed out hay, open tins of tuna and pour bowls of milk? Yes, I was. Which route was stranger – returning home after what we had experienced, or being taken into custody and questioned?

  ‘You did such a good job,’ Bruce was saying. Emotion had closed his throat and made his words tight.

  ‘It would have been pretty silly to die in a car accident.’ My attempt at lightheartedness only drew attention to how grave our situation was.

  ‘How are we going to tell the children?’ Bruce said. ‘What are we going to tell them?’

  ‘Maybe after telling the police it won’t seem like … such a …’ The sentence disintegrated on my tongue.

  ‘I don’t know if I can, Trudy.’

  ‘We should ring the police now, before we get out of the car. That way all we’ve done is driven home. There’s nothing wrong in that … is there?’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Do you still feel drugged?’

  ‘Trudy, he —’

  Bruce’s voice didn’t fade away at the end of this. The words had jammed in his throat.

  ‘He —’ he said, trying again.

  I reached for my husband’s arm and held it, knowing his hand would be too sore to squeeze. The pain and fear I could see in him, it hurt me. But instead of softening and weakening me, it steeled me. My heart would have to beat for two.

  ‘How many people will have to know?’ he whispered.

  I said, after a moment, ‘There wasn’t another car in the garage, was there? There were no cars on the road. No one saw us turn in there. Check everything is here again, check your wallet.’

  He opened the glove box and took his wallet out.

  ‘Go through it.’ I saw that his hands were shaking. ‘Make sure everything is there. Did you have your sunglasses on?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Where are they? Make sure they’re in the car.’

  ‘They’re here.’

  ‘He put everything in the car so there was no evidence of us in the house. If no one saw us go in there, and no one saw us leave, and there’s no evidence of us in the house …’

  ‘There’d be our fingerprints.’

  ‘It’s a gallery; there’d be lots of people’s fingerprints.’

  ‘How will we …’

  I could see what he was thinking – what would we tell the children? How would we explain his injuries? How was it even possible to go back to normal life?

  ‘We could say we were … you were … in a fight.’ There was zero confidence in my voice. I was trying to convince myself.

  ‘What about your eyes?’

  I’d forgotten about my eyes. I touched my fingertips to the corners, pressing the sticky, swollen skin. ‘We can’t do it, can we?’ I said. I thought again of Bruce at a police station, this time being led away into another room, handcuffed. That, more than anything else, was easy to envision. ‘You can’t tell them he was unconscious, Bruce – you can’t tell them that. You’re going to have to say he was getting up, or that he was moving. You can’t say you wanted him dead. You wouldn’t say that, would you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Once in an interrogation room, under pressure, being questioned, it was impossible to know what he would or wouldn’t say. He knew that. Add to that his shame and humiliation, and I truly doubted Bruce would do himself any favours. I even feared he would go out of his way to undermine himself, as punishment for allowing himself to become a victim.

  I sat straighter in the seat. I pinched and wiped my nose. ‘Let’s just go inside.’

  We didn’t move though. We fell silent. I leaned back again.

  The enormity of what had happened swept over us. We didn’t talk. Vocalising our awe and disbelief would be stating the obvious. I wasn’t sure I had any clear-cut emotions to express. We sat beside one another in silence, contained within our heads. It was intimate and personal to be together, yet absorbed in our own all-encompassing thoughts. In my mind I was a speck floating on a dark sea, and Reuben’s attack, his death, was the head of an octopus, and the eight writhing tentacles were reaching in every direction and suctioning on to whatever they found, dismantling my life, taking apart my home, my family, tearing the heart out of my husband. I’d always been both fascinated and repulsed by those massive squid-like creatures dragged up from bottomless oceans. They made me question my view of things. Each unblinking eye seemed to hold the secret of life, and it wasn’t something they’d found looking skyward.

  Just as depression could take the form of a black dog, or addiction the form of a monkey, my fear took the shape of a deep-sea octopus. I internalised it. So did Bruce. We did it together, as a couple. And we went inside our house. We were jumping to escape the fire behind us, with no thought as to where we would land.

  6

  Steven, our eldest, was almost sixteen. Hormones were more of a problem with him than with our girls. If anyone in our house had a monthly cycle, it was our son. He also spent longest in the bathroom, out-shopped us all, gossiped with the most enthusiasm and threw temper tantrums that shook the house. We did encourage his wilful behaviour, though. We called him ‘problem child’ to his face, lovingly. With affection we retold stories of his childish rages.

  I’d come to pick up the kids in our second vehicle, the smaller wagon. Steven heaved his schoolbag onto the back seat and peered over at the empty boot. He got into the front passenger seat of the car and slammed the door shut.

  ‘Haven’t you been to Gran’s yet to get our stuff? I’ve just wasted two weeks of my life there. I don’t want to waste any more of it. And, just so you know, I’m staying home next time you and Dad go away. I don’t care what you say.’

  He was not the calm boy I’d spoken with yesterday on the phone, although his hair was as ridiculously tousled as I’d imagined. More than ever, his adult voice didn’t suit him.

  ‘So do we have to
go there now?’ he continued. ‘Couldn’t you have gone before picking us up? I’ve got so much shit to catch up on, Mum. You and Dad can’t just take me out of my life because you feel like time away. It’s fucking selfish.’

  ‘Don’t swear like that,’ I said, on autopilot.

  The sunglasses I wore were narrow and dark, fashionable five or six years ago, extremely unfashionable now. They were all I could find in the house. I was hiding behind them. I had my hair pushed forward to cover my face. My make-up felt like clay on my skin. My lipstick was a sickly coating. I was struggling with sounds beyond the car window, distracted by a dry leaf stuck under the corner of the bonnet, and feeling light-headed. The mobile phone sitting in the console was the cheap prepaid device that floated around at home as a spare. It matched my sunglasses in terms of its age.

  ‘Why are you wearing those sunnies?’ Steven asked.

  He hadn’t looked at me. He didn’t need to; the boy smelt bad fashion. It raised his hackles and offended him on a fundamental level.

  ‘I broke my sunglasses.’

  He looked at me with disdain.

  Any other time his mood would have caused me to smile. I’d have brushed off his teenage behaviour, and explained that he couldn’t be trusted home alone because he was so immature. I might have even gotten out of the car with the sunglasses on, to annoy him further. But that day I was unsure how to act. My mind wandered. I forgot for a moment what we were talking about.

  Steven crossed his arms and appraised me. ‘What is up with you? Did you even tell Dad about the AIS camp? Why didn’t he ring me?’ His face dropped a little. ‘What’s the matter?’

  The rear doors swung open. Renee and Summer lifted their schoolbags in. ‘Mummy!’ Renee squealed.

  Renee was fourteen – taller than me, heavier than me. She was ballsy and brassy, with a mane of brown hair. She didn’t normally call me Mummy. She came running around to my door and pulled it open and embraced me where I sat behind the wheel. She might have even grown bigger in the time we’d been away. ‘Oh my God I missed you so much! It felt like you were gone for ages.’ She let me go. ‘Freaking hell, Mum, why are you wearing those sunnies? Are they your old ones? Wow, you look absolutely ridiculous.’

  Summer climbed into the back seat. She was our youngest. Her name reflected how warm and sweet she had been ever since she’d come into the world. Steven and Renee had been loud, snotty-nosed toddlers mashing biscuits into the carpet and throwing sipper cups from their highchairs. Beautiful, breezy Summer had come painlessly into the world through Caesarean section. A mysterious blonde (there were no other true blondes in the family) and enchantingly small, she had been happy to bob around in the wake of her dark-haired siblings. She was yet to cause us any grief whatsoever.

  ‘Those sort of frames are probably back in,’ she said kindly. ‘Hi, Mum.’

  Steven choked. ‘No. No,’ he said. ‘No …’ He was speechless. I was beyond redemption with my fashion faux pas.

  Renee leaned away from me. She’d felt my distance. I hadn’t squealed her name and played at being young and hip, firing off questions, commenting on her hair, saying things like cool, excellent and OMG. I liked relating to my eldest daughter as a friend; it wasn’t kosher – all the parenting books advised against it. But we got on well, we had things in common, we planned to travel together one day. I couldn’t muster anything friendly that day though. I felt small in my body. My skin didn’t fit. The kids, the school parking lot, the day was overwhelming me.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Renee said.

  Summer leaned forward, between the two front seats, to stare closely at me.

  ‘Are you all right, Mum?’

  So much for teenage children paying no attention to adults. They were like a team of beagles sniffing out drugs at an airport.

  ‘Are you and Dad fighting?’ asked Steven.

  ‘No. Please get in, Renee.’

  ‘What’s wrong with your eyes?’ Renee made a grab for my sunglasses. I quickly brought up my hand and held the glasses firmly to my face.

  ‘Why won’t you take off your glasses? Have you got a black eye?’

  The three children fell silent.

  ‘I haven’t got a black eye.’

  Renee got into the back seat beside Summer. I sensed the two girls staring at one another behind me. Steven was mute.

  ‘I haven’t got a black eye,’ I repeated. ‘Stop thinking that.’

  I backed the car out of the parking space. There were cars and students and parents everywhere. I heard someone call out my name.

  ‘Mum, I think Mrs Murdoch wants to talk to you.’

  ‘I don’t want to see anyone.’

  ‘She’s running up to the car, Mum.’

  I backed up faster, braked with a jolt, and accelerated away. In the rear-view mirror I caught a glimpse of Sue Murdoch standing in the gutter, her mouth open. The children grew solemn.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I said. ‘Everything is fine.’ I waited until we were away from the school traffic, then I said, ‘Your father and I were mugged.’ I shook my head. ‘Please don’t start asking a million questions. I don’t want you going on about it. They didn’t take anything. Your father stopped them. It was a quick tussle and that’s all. But they sprayed me in the eyes with … capsicum spray, or whatever they use. And that’s what’s wrong with my eyes. Your dad has some bruises.’

  ‘You were mugged? When? Where did it happen?’

  ‘In the city. Last night.’

  ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe you were mugged. Have you been to the police?’

  ‘The muggers didn’t get anything. There was no point going to the police.’

  ‘Did Dad fight them off?’

  ‘Is Dad okay? Show us your eyes.’

  ‘You’ll see them when we get home. Please don’t tell Grandma.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t want to worry her.’

  ‘But what happened? How did it happen?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what happened, but one time only. And this is me saying it for Dad too – so don’t start pestering him when we get home.’

  ‘I want Dad to tell us then,’ Steven said.

  Renee said, ‘Of course he’ll tell us. They’ll talk about it.’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘no, we won’t. You’re not listening to me. We don’t want to talk about it. I’ll be angry if you don’t respect us on this.’

  ‘Mum, you’re acting weird. Are you freaked out?’

  ‘Is Dad freaked out?’

  ‘No one is freaked out,’ I said. I tightened my hands on the wheel. It wasn’t going the way we had hoped. My delivery was all wrong. ‘This happened to Dad and me,’ I said as calmly as I could, ‘and it’s our decision not to have everyone asking us about it.’

  ‘You do seem really freaked out, Mum.’

  Renee said, ‘We just want to know what happened.’

  ‘Kids, please. You should be happy I tell you these things in the first place. Your father and I think you’re old enough to know about some things, and understand —’

  ‘Mum …’

  ‘I shouldn’t have to spell everything out to you now that you’re older.’

  ‘Did Dad hurt one of them?’

  ‘Okay, Mum,’ Summer said, ‘we won’t talk about it.’

  ‘We want it this way. We’re busy. These things can …’ My voice fell away.

  ‘Well, it’s a lot to tell us you’ve been mugged and had stuff sprayed in your eyes, and then tell us we can’t even talk about it,’ Renee said.

  My driving was erratic. An approaching car beeped as I crossed over the centre white line. I swerved back onto my side of the road. The children braced as the car lurched sideways.

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought it would be too much to ask, but obviously it is. So if you feel you have to tell, and you feel you have to ask, well, you do whatever you have to do to make it all right for you. Okay? I can’t stop you.’ Tears were slipping down my cheeks. I angril
y brushed them away.

  Summer leaned forward. Her fingers rested a moment on my shoulder. ‘It’s okay, Mum.’

  There were no more questions from the kids.

  ‘Tell Grandma I’m not coming in. Tell her I’m sorry. I’ll catch up with her as soon as I can.’

  So concerned that seeing my mother would unravel things completely, picturing in my mind’s eye her anxious gaze at the sight of me, I parked out on the street and didn’t turn down her driveway. I left the motor running. Mum would take one look at me and there’d be no fooling her. Sunglasses or no sunglasses, she’d see straight into me. Her love would make me break.

  There was a trimmed hedge along the front boundary. It blocked a view of the house. The narrow driveway had a bend in it, and the turning circle in front of the garage was tight enough to excuse me for staying out on the road. We often parked by the letterbox. The children walked down the driveway.

  It was the house I had grown up in. It was the place Bruce had proposed to me, down on one knee in the lounge room, my mother in on the surprise and my father lying on a single bed set up in the corner, bedridden with cancer, smiling despite his pain. I doubted that Bruce would be able to go in either if he were in the car with me. To pull this off, to keep private what had happened, to hide what we had done, we needed a few days’ grace to ground ourselves, time to work out what we were doing.

  Summer was the first to return. As well as her bags, she was carrying a cake container. ‘Grandma says welcome back. She made Dad’s favourite cake.’

  Bruce had the TV on the twenty-four-hour news channel when we got home. The children unloaded their bags and luggage inside the doorway. He was sitting at the kitchen table with his laptop open, searching online news sites, but he closed the computer as we entered. His hands were swollen and bruised. When he rose gingerly to his feet, the children began to slow their steps. When he winced at some internal pain, they stopped completely. Steven in particular seemed to know there was something to hide in all this.