by Jaye Ford
Condolences? As though he was dead? He wasn’t dead. He was missing. Now Hayden was, too, and . . . ‘Maybe Hayden’s with Max.’
No one spoke for a moment. Three set of eyes flicked from face to face as the concept hung between them.
‘What are you thinking?’ Pav finally asked.
‘I don’t know. Maybe Max came back to get Hayden.’
‘But he didn’t know Hayden was coming,’ Trish said.
‘Hayden tried to call him from the train before he rang here,’ Rennie told her. ‘He must’ve left messages and texts. So if Max had his phone, he’d know Hayden was here.’ Rennie remembered the thud on the back fence last night, the dislodged brick. Was it Max out there? ‘Maybe he didn’t want Hayden to worry about him.’ Like she was worried.
Pav frowned. ‘How would Max find him?’
Rennie shrugged. ‘Maybe they’ve got a favourite spot. Maybe Hayden went there this afternoon and Max found him.’
‘Why would he even look there? Wouldn’t he expect Hayden to be here?’
She remembered his words from this afternoon. He’s just gone somewhere. ‘Maybe Hayden lied about not talking to him. Or they spoke after Hayden took off.’
‘Max’s mobile’s been dead for hours,’ Pav said.
Since mid-morning, Rennie had only got phone company recorded messages when she dialled his number. She shrugged again. ‘If he’s with someone, he could’ve borrowed theirs. He could’ve borrowed a car, too.’ She remembered the mobile she had charging in the bedroom and a new thought crossed her mind. ‘He could have another phone. He could have a whole other life.’ Christ, he could have taken the money and left with another woman.
‘Come on, Rennie.’ Pav wrapped an arm across her shoulders.
‘Don’t do this to yourself,’ Trish told her.
She was grateful for their support but they didn’t know about the missing money and James’s accusation and that the revelations of the day were adding up to a Max that Rennie didn’t recognise. Guilt and dread pounded in her head as she pushed away from them. She had a life Max didn’t know about, that no one in Haven Bay knew about. She’d always figured ordinary people with decent, nice lives didn’t need to keep secrets, that it was just her and her screwed-up family. She’d been so intent on keeping her own skeletons locked up that she hadn’t wondered if Max had any.
With a bad temper and affairs and stolen money.
Could he have taken money from the business?
It felt like a horrible, disloyal thought and she wanted to hear Trish and Pav’s reassurance there was no way he’d do it but after today, she wasn’t sure their reply wouldn’t start with, ‘Well, back before you knew him . . .’
And what about before he knew her? Would he believe it if she disappeared one night and someone from her old life turned up and told him about her trail of destruction?
She walked to the dining table, clung to the back of a chair with a new scenario playing through her mind. Had Max taken the money and left with another woman to set up a new life while Hayden was in Cairns? Was he somewhere buying a new home, planning to pass the news on to his son when he was back and everything was in place? Had he got Rennie’s frantic messages and Hayden’s telling him he was on the train, ignoring her but coming back for his son?
She glanced up at the touch of a hand on her shoulder. Trish’s reflection in the glass was tired and concerned. ‘Rennie, honey, you’re crossing bridges that aren’t even built yet.’
She wanted to scoff at the cliché – there’d never been one that fitted her life. But she knew Trish was only trying to help. ‘The problem is that any bridge that gets built from here leads to somewhere I don’t want to go.’
‘Rennie, stop.’ Trish turned her around and gave her a stern stare. ‘We’re not going there, do you hear me? You need to stay positive. Don’t make yourself crazy.’
Crazy like her mother. ‘Yeah, you’re right.’
‘So we’re going to have something to eat and wait to hear back from James. Then we make a decision about Hayden, okay?’
It was a plan. Plans were good.
Trish served up the cannelloni and Rennie pushed it around her plate until the phone cut short the stilted, anxious conversation.
‘Rennie, it’s Naomi. James found him.’
18
‘Max? He found Max?’ Rennie almost shouted.
‘Hayden. Sorry, I’m sorry. I should’ve said.’
Rennie clutched a hand to her chest, relief and disappointment fighting for a place. ‘Hayden,’ she mouthed to Trish and Pav. ‘Where was he?’ she asked Naomi.
‘Up at the old gun emplacements.’
‘The gun emplacements?’
Trish’s eyebrows shot up, Pav’s narrowed to a frown. Their faces mirrored what Rennie was thinking. ‘What the hell was he doing up there?’
‘James said he was planning to spend the night.’
‘Are you kidding me?’
‘I guess he was upset about Max.’
Naomi was trying to shine a better light but it didn’t work. His father was missing, he knew people were worried and he’d made it worse by hiding in the bush in the dark. Did the kid need glasses to see past the end of his own nose? ‘Where are they now?’
‘On their way to your place. I’d have him here but we haven’t got a spare bed at the moment and the baby could come at any time now.’
‘Yeah, of course. And he should be here.’ This was his home. It didn’t matter that Rennie didn’t want to see him.
‘Don’t be mad at him.’
No chance of that – mad didn’t cover it. ‘We’ll be fine.’
She hung up and filled in Trish and Pav as she paced about waiting for James’s car to pull into the driveway. When the lights flashed on the bay window, she watched from the open front door. James acknowledged Rennie with a brief uplift of his chin. Hayden appeared on the passenger side, shoulders slumped with his standard don’t-give-a-shit body language but – and possibly it was just wishful thinking – there seemed to be a little shamefaced head bowing in it as well. Perhaps James had a word or two with him in the car. She hoped so. It would be better coming from him.
Hayden kept his head down as he climbed the steps.
‘Haven’t you got something to say?’ James called.
‘Sorry.’ It was more grunt than formed word and barely delivered before he’d shoved past Rennie. She watched him skulk down the hall and turn into his bedroom. Did he think that made it all right?
‘I don’t know if he would’ve lasted the whole night,’ James said. ‘The wind’s come up again and it’s pretty blowy at the point tonight.’
She’d been angry at James this afternoon – she still was – but he’d been a one-man search party for Hayden. ‘Thanks for finding him. Do you want to come in? Trish and Pav are here.’
He glanced briefly at the glow in the bay window. ‘No, thanks. I’ll get going.’
She took in the dark circles under his eyes, the shadow of growth on his chin, the stress in the tightness of his mouth and nodded. It’d been a tough day for him, too. ‘How did you know to look up at the point?’
‘I called him.’
‘I called him, too. About a hundred times. When Naomi said he was at the gun emplacements, I figured he didn’t have reception. Ignoring me, obviously. And what, he just told you where he was?’
‘No. That was a hunch. Max and I stayed up there once. I figured he’d heard the story.’
She’d never heard it. ‘You stayed all night up there without telling anyone?’
‘It wasn’t last month, Rennie. We were kids.’
‘Weren’t your parents worried?’ Her mother would have gone out of her mind.
James shrugged. ‘Probably.’
Decent, nice lives in a decent, nice place. ‘Well
, I’m glad you remembered it. Thanks. I say that for Max, too. He’d be glad you were looking out for Hayden.’ Something flickered through his eyes. Concern, disappointment, anger possibly. James had accused Max of leaving town with money from MineLease, maybe he didn’t give a shit what his cousin thought at this stage.
‘I told Hayden he has to stay here to help you,’ he said.
‘Gee, thanks.’ She could do without Hayden’s assistance. James’s help was something she hadn’t expected.
‘I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Max’ll be all right. He’s always all right.’
‘I wish I knew that.’
James didn’t say anything. No point, she knew what he meant. ‘All right’ wasn’t the same as honest and trustworthy, wasn’t the same as, ‘He’s coming back and everything will go back to the way it was.’
When James was gone, Rennie eyed Hayden’s door – what was going through his mind was anyone’s guess. She pushed it wide enough to see him on the bed, shoes smearing dirt on the doona, fingers tapping on his iPad. Pushing down her irritation, she tried to find something compassionate, something Max would want her to say. ‘Are you okay?’
The narrowed eyes that found hers from across the room were the warning before his words. ‘What the fuck do you care? You don’t even like me.’
Okay, she knew nothing about dealing with children; she’d barely had a chance to be one herself. All she knew was that she was sick of being spoken to like that. She walked into the room, stood by the bed, her hands balled into fists. ‘No, Hayden, I don’t like you. You haven’t given me a lot to work with. But that doesn’t mean I’m cheering when you disappear or that I’m happy for you to sleep rough. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, especially Max’s son. This is your home. That doesn’t change because he isn’t here.’
He looked at her as though she’d just shovelled a great load of horseshit. ‘Sleeping out there would be better than being here with you.’
‘No, it’s not,’ she said firmly. ‘You don’t have to like me, Hayden. You don’t even have to talk to me. But believe me, here is better than out there.’
His sullen expression was replaced with a sneer, as though he’d found a hole in her argument. ‘What the fuck would you know?’
‘I know it’s hard and damp and you can never get warm. And you need your head read if you think a concrete bunker at the point is better than what you’ve got here, even with me in it. Besides, I thought you would’ve stayed here just to spite me.’ She turned, not interested in his response. ‘By the way,’ she said from the door, ‘Trish and Pav are here. They brought cannelloni. There’s a plate of it for you in the kitchen if you’re hungry.’
‘Can I have it in here?’
She watched him a second, not sure if it was a final attempt to piss her off or if he actually thought she might bring it to him with a napkin and a glass of milk. ‘If you want it, you can eat it with the people who cared enough to bring it for you.’
Trish and Pav were still at the kitchen counter where she’d left them. ‘He’s fine,’ she told them. ‘Ticked off and smelling like he camped out in a cigarette factory but fine.’
‘Do you want us to go?’ Trish asked.
‘God, no. Please stay for a while or I might have to disappear next.’ She smiled but the irony made her want to throw something. She always knew she’d have to leave, had told Max right from the start she wouldn’t stay. Now it was possible she was the only one who wanted to be here. She took the fresh bourbon and Coke Pav poured for her and gulped like she was dying of thirst.
It didn’t take long for Hayden to appear, slouching and sullen as though he was the one who’d been put out. When Trish wrapped him up in her arms, he pulled his hands from his pockets and held onto her shirt, taking a quick, surreptitious swipe at a tear on his face when she was done. Pav, who didn’t shake hands in moments of high emotion, pulled Hayden into a bear hug and told him he had to let them know where he was until his dad got back.
Rennie watched, thankful for Hayden’s sake they were there, content to watch how other people did it. Was it any wonder Hayden didn’t like her? Standing at his door to ask if he was okay made her seem like a cold-hearted bitch by comparison.
Would she have been any different if her mother had showered her with hugs and gushes of endearment instead of ‘Where have you been?’ and ‘What did you see?’ Not maternal interest but covering their bases and instilling observation skills. Those lessons had kept Rennie and her sister alive and she was grateful for that but wondered sometimes if a little less survival training and a bit more affection might have taught her more.
Trish and Pav stayed another hour, keeping the conversation light and smoothing out Hayden’s mood as he ate dinner off his lap on the sofa. Rennie felt it soothing her, too, the anger dissipating, the tension in her shoulders loosening a bit, the angst easing up enough for her to unlock her jaw and eat some cannelloni. But the late night followed by a long, anxious day had taken a toll on all of them and when Trish stifled a yawn, Rennie called her on it.
‘You guys have been great but it’s time you went home,’ she told them.
‘Are you sure?’ Trish asked.
No, she wasn’t. The house felt empty and unsettled without Max. ‘We’ll be okay.’
As she walked them to the car, she breathed in the cool, slightly salty night air, glad to be pacing further than the length of the living room, bracing herself for the next question of the day. ‘Pav, did you talk to Ed at the sailing club?’
‘It’s okay, Rennie. I spoke to the skipper of the boat that woman crews on. He said she separated from her husband six months ago and has been enjoying the company of a few men at the club. Not exactly how he put it but he was pretty sure Max wasn’t one of them.’
She nodded. One woman, one option she could cross off.
Trish hugged her briefly. ‘Try to get some sleep.’
‘Do my best.’
‘Your shift is covered tomorrow,’ Pav said. ‘But come in if you want. Pull up a chair or work your arse off. Whatever you need to do.’
She was pleased he understood the need to keep on the move. When he was stressed, he chopped and stirred, baked and sautéed, cooking multiple dishes at once. It’d push anyone else’s blood pressure through the roof but he grew calmer and more focused as he worked. Rennie never understood why people recommended rest when you were anxious. How could putting your feet up make you feel better than working or making plans, or running away?
She waved goodbye and started up the curve of the driveway, the gloominess making the hairs on her neck tingle, glad she’d flipped on the powerful outdoor lamps that saturated the carport and front yard with great pools of light. It was Max’s thing – he had lighting all around the house. Darkness brought back bad memories. She understood that more than ever after the last twenty-four hours. Wherever he was, she hoped he wasn’t in the dark.
Up ahead in the carport, the floodlight mounted on the back wall made his big work vehicle almost glow in the harsh glare and as she approached, she frowned at a dark stripe on the driver’s side. Passing the porch, she kept walking, watching the strip. It ran top to bottom as though something had been slipped into the edge of the doorframe. Then she saw it wasn’t an object. It was a shadow. The driver’s door hadn’t caught properly and the bright, white beam behind it was casting a clean line of shadow on the passenger panel.
Rennie stood in front of it, her mind reeling back to the early afternoon when she’d driven in. Had she left the door like that? It wasn’t like her but she’d seen James’s twin cab out front and had thought Max might have been inside.
She gave the handle a light tug. It didn’t move. The lock was partially latched, as though the door hadn’t swung hard enough into the jamb – it was a heavy vehicle, it happened sometimes. Or when you were trying to do it quietly. A soft click to close, another to fully engage
.
Had someone been in the car?
Rennie opened the door, ran her eyes over the interior by the light in the carport: front seats and foot wells, back seat and floor. There were no shoes, no spare clothes, no old receipts or food wrappers. It was Max’s car but she rode in it and kept it like it was hers.
Getting in, she breathed deeply through her nose. No new smells, at least not that she could tell. And it was darker in here than it should be – the internal light hadn’t come on. She pushed the overhead button and, as the fitting on the ceiling lit up, a chill scuttled across her shoulders. Not broken, turned off.
She glanced uneasily around, leaned past the gearstick, yanked open the glove box and snapped her hand back as though the contents were contaminated. She knew what it should look like in there, how she’d left it when she took out the notebook as she made calls from the car park this morning – neat stack of manuals, maps and papers on the left; a torch, a couple of pens and a small first-aid kit on the right. But it didn’t. It looked like it’d been picked up and shaken.
Somebody had been through it.
Sometime in the hours she’d been home, someone had let themselves in, turned the automatic internal light off and searched the contents of the glove box.
She got out, closed the door quietly and looked up at the house. There had been people in and out all afternoon, she was out in the yard and the studio for twenty minutes or so at nightfall and it’d been dark for two hours. She turned around, eyeing the front yard. How hard would it be to push through the hedge and slip into the carport without being seen from the house? Not hard at all, even in broad daylight.
Wariness tightened in her gut. Instinct made her hurry to the house. Her mother’s voice played in her head. What did you see? Rennie wound her mind back to the unexplained: the kid last night, the thud on the fence, the blood in the car park, the man with the camera.
As she let herself in, she remembered that frantic search for the keys Max had mistakenly taken and how the explanation had been obvious. And the ghost of her past whispered another possibility.