Mrs Tkautz has her hands pressed together, like she’s praying.
Benny’s eyes have a terrible clarity I’ve never seen. His hands pat the air in front of him and he hums, deep in his throat.
To my right, Mum is standing near the doorway to the tower. Why isn’t she moving? Why is she just standing there? I blink and blink.
‘Mum,’ I croak.
I can’t get enough air. No air. There’s pressure on my throat. I put my hands up and there’s the noose, tightening around my neck. I feel a tug from somewhere above me like I’m a puppet on a string. I try to kneel, to relieve the tension on the rope, but there’s a heel on my shoulder. Panic and pressure make my airway close. I wedge my fingers under the rope and pull it away from my skin.
‘Be still, baby,’ Mum calls. ‘Not long now.’
Not long for what? Not long until I pass out? Not long until my eyeballs burst?
Gargoyle’s breath hits me again, mingled with that familiar smell, the one I now recognise. Bourbon. Tarrant’s face peers into mine. Burn blisters make him even more hideous and up close I can see how truly crazy he is. In that look I know he’s going to kill me for what I did.
I whimper and Gargoyle looks at me, then back at Tarrant. He’s poised for a command and I think if I move again it might set him off. So much for karma. So much for our understanding.
Needles of numbness are beginning in my fingers and toes.
Mum’s fixed stare.
Gargoyle’s confused eyes flick back and forth.
Tarrant says, ‘What are you doing?’
My vision growing dark.
‘Put it down, woman. Put the crowbar down.’
Dizziness.
A rush of movement, waves of sound.
Growling.
Black.
Black.
Screaming.
Sweet, sweet air.
Sideways in the mud.
Warm hands.
Blood pounds to my brain, my throat burns.
I’m crying.
Rain.
‘Is she okay?’
Gargoyle’s wise eyes.
Mud-spattered calves. Bare feet and purple toenails.
Rivers of red. And Donna Tarrant, an angel in a blue dress.
‘She’s okay,’ Mum says.
‘I think I killed him.’
‘God knows he had it coming, Donna.’
A little man and a giant that blocks out the sky.
Rain.
My mother, cradling my head in the rain.
TWENTY-TWO
Sometime during the night, the rain must have stopped. I can still taste what’s left of it in the air. All night I’ve been trying to put the pieces together in my mind. Nothing fits.
I rest on the couch, my ankle strapped and raised on a pillow. Mum brings me cool drinks and painkillers at regular intervals. Her bedside manner is less than comforting, though; she huffs and sighs like she’s got a slow leak.
‘Do you need anything?’ Mum asks. She runs a gentle finger over the swelling around my throat.
I shake my head. ‘No. I’m fine.’
She plumps the pillow, sending a jab of pain through my foot.
‘Geez, Mum. Take it easy.’
‘You’re all right. It could have been worse.’
‘I know.’
‘You’re a bloody fool, though. I have to say it.’
‘I know.’ Her gaze burns but I hold it. At least it’s something. ‘Mum, what happened? I can’t work it out. Is Mick Tarrant dead? What happened to Welles?’
‘Of course he’s not dead. Everything’s been taken care of.’ She nods to herself. ‘Welles has been warned. Feeney said to tell you he’s sorry he was late, but if you’d done what you were told it wouldn’t have been a problem. And I told him, next time assume she will do the opposite and we won’t need Plan B. It’s probably best for everyone if you don’t work it all out. Just do as you’re told, next time.’
‘So Donna hit Mick?’ I keep thinking of my angel. I can see her standing over Mick, the crowbar all set to keep swinging for as long as it takes.
‘And Gargoyle attacked him.’
‘How bad was it?’
‘Poor Mick,’ she says, lips twitching. ‘He slipped and fell.’ Then she laughs, a harsh sound that echoes in our nearly empty lounge room. ‘He walked into a door.’
I can hear Mum’s voice: God knows he had it coming, Donna.
‘Wow,’ I whisper.
Mum shakes her head. ‘That woman’s been living scared out of her mind for more than a decade and she decided in that moment to do something about it. You have no idea the courage that took, Mim.’
‘I think I do,’ I say. If I could stand, I’d wrap my arms around her middle and just sink into her. ‘Mum?’
‘What?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Sorry for what?’
‘Sorry for everything.’
She comes back. Stands in the doorway.
‘No, Mim. Not good enough. Spell it out for me. What are you sorry for?’
‘Sorry for being a bitch. For going behind your back and being rude to the neighbours. I’m sorry I lost your package.’
She sucks in her breath and I think, Here it comes, finally. Please let her blow. I want her back in all her fierce, beautiful, vein-popping glory.
‘That’s what you’re sorry for? Those things don’t hurt me, they hurt you. It’s the rules, Mim, the bloody rules! I saw them. I knew you used to hang out at that signal tower but I never suspected it was the control room for your big plan. Your bloody escape plan. I saw it. What was it? Rule number one. I will not turn out like my mother.’
I can feel the blood drain from my head and pound in my foot. It leaves me feeling light-headed, like I could just waft away.
‘I know they’re stupid.’
‘Oh, I’m not finished with you. Some of the others, I can understand. No drinking. No drugs. No tattoos. Don’t trust anybody? You think it’s that simple? Do the exact opposite of everyone around you and that’s your ticket?’ She paces and the floor shakes. ‘You already had your ticket, babe. Your people, that’s your ticket. Because you can fly all you want, but if you’ve got nowhere to land, you’re fucked. And you’ve always had somewhere to land. That, my darling, is salvation. Good and bad, drunks, witches, tarts and drug dealers. We are your people. One day, you’ll get that.’
I get it. I can still see my fat mum, swinging her club, ready to take on three blokes and a crazy dog, for me. There was never a tag team, like the wood pigeons. Just her.
‘I get it,’ I say.
‘Do you? Do you really? At least I understand now why I’ve been living with a shadow for the last couple of years.’
‘I broke the rules. Most of them, anyway. They were just something I hung on to until I could figure some stuff out.’
‘Which ones?’ she barks.
‘What?’
‘Which ones did you break?’ She pulls up my T-shirt and checks me over. ‘None that I can see, so that leaves the other.’ She puts her hands on her hips, a human kettle, blowing steam.
I can tell her all of it now.
I’ll tell her I almost went all the way with a guy I thought I loved. The way Jordan treated me, like I was a second-class citizen, that’s the way I treat people. I’ll tell her that I gave my trust to a beast with a broken spirit, and that trust was returned. I get that being a drunk doesn’t define the whole person. Nor does being a witch with one eye. Good girls get tattoos and best friends aren’t perfect reflections of one another. Being uneducated isn’t the same as being stupid. There are no neat little boxes.
For now, I tell her, ‘I did a drug deal.’
‘You what?’
‘You know. The package. That was the start of it all, really.’
‘That’s what you think? I made you pick up drugs?’ She shakes her head.
‘You said not to open it.’
‘I would never, ever ask you to pick
up drugs.’
The package. That elusive thing, the first domino. I fought so hard for it and it’s not what I thought it was. Did that make this whole week pointless?
‘So, what was it?’ I ask, trying to keep control.
She lifts her chin. ‘It doesn’t really matter now. You’ll figure it out, in good time.’
‘Mum?’
‘What?’
‘That woman. The one from Welfare. Is she going to put me in foster care?’
She snorts. ‘Where the hell did you get that idea?’
‘Benny said.’
‘You’ve always thought of Benny as some kind of sorcerer. Don’t you get it? Things aren’t always what they seem. Would it help if I told you the truth about the legend of Mr Benetti’s vegetable patch?’
‘What about it?’
‘Benny didn’t piss on it. He didn’t curse it either. He poured a full gallon of weedkiller over it and that’s not sorcery, that’s plain old spite.’
The truth. There’s been a lot of that this week. ‘So she is from Welfare? Benny said she takes kids away.’
‘Yes, and she gives them back, too. She’s assessing me for adoption. Will. Matty’s baby. His mum has put him into care because she can’t cope. I’m not losing another one.’ Mum plumps the pillow again.
‘Geez, leave it, Mum. Is Will coming to live with us?’
‘I hope so, yes.’
‘And where is it? The package? What’s in it?’
‘It’s safe. So if you’ve figured out so much, smartarse, why the hell did you dive off the tower?’
I laugh. ‘Benny said it wasn’t far down.’
‘Fuckin Benny,’ she hoots.
Hobbling, I stand and reach for her. I put my arms around her middle and rest my face on her big, warm boobs. Her skin is as soft and warm as I remember it. Shoot me if I don’t turn out just like her.
She rubs her hands over my head and face like she’s trying to read me with her fingertips. Gruffly she says, ‘Go on. That’s enough.’
She lumbers off to the kitchen and I hear the crackle of a packet. A little later, the smell of pancakes. The sure and steady thud of her moving around, like there always was.
TWENTY-THREE
Seventeen is just another number.
I need to get my driver’s licence, but the truth is, I’ve never imagined myself driving anywhere. Flying over mountains, sailing the seas, riding a horse or a camel or a yak along the edge of a steep and crumbly hillside somewhere in Nepal, yes. But not driving. It seems so… mundane.
Birthdays are like Christmas and Easter: I wake, stretch and shift until my feet butt against a satisfying weight at the end of the bed. There’s always been something there, before and since I figured out that Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy were in fact a fat woman who loves me.
Today, I stretch my legs and my ankle throbs. I poke with my good foot but there’s nothing there. The house is silent. There’s a terse note by the kettle that reads: Clean out the shed. No excuses. Happy bloody birthday.
I take a lukewarm shower and dress. Choke down some cereal and limp out to the porch with an instant coffee. Seventeen is just another number, but today it’s my number. Where the hell is everybody? It’s past ten o’clock, for crying out loud.
Benny’s cockpit is empty. Further up the street there are a few cars parked outside the Tarrant place. I’m curious, but not enough to check it out. I feel flat and empty inside. I put on some thongs and grab a broom and a bin bag.
A sudden bang makes me jump. I stand and peer around the corner of the house. The shed door is open. It’s always locked. Always.
I put one foot in front of the other despite the tingling in my gut. The wind catches the door again and the impact makes me flinch. I stop. Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe Mum’s just forgotten to lock the door after her. Surely this adventure is over.
The gnome has fallen over and his nose has snapped off. I reach inside him but the key is missing. My instincts are screaming at me to go back into the house, lock the door and pretend this isn’t happening.
I reach my hand around to the bench and pick up the metal file I left there. Step into the half-light. Breaths of cool air, petrol, old grease…and something else.
The door closes behind me and it’s dark, so dark the old panic lurches in my chest and my hands fly up in defence—of what? My eyes adjust and I see warm light and flickering shapes on the walls like dancing fireflies. A crooked path of tea light candles and scattered red, white and blue confetti. What the hell?
I follow the path of candles to the entrance of the pit. Each step down into the oily blackness is marked with a gift; seven of them, wrapped in red and white paper. I look around but I’m alone. I sense it.
My hands are shaking.
I pick up the first gift and feel it. Small, flat and oblong. The next is long and cylindrical. The others, incrementally larger, all lead towards the Holy Grail: at the far end of the pit, warmed by the glow of a tall red candle, is the package. Still in its original wrapping, torn at one end and spattered with mud. When I pick it up it’s still damp and curling at the edges.
I skip the other gifts and sit down on the grease-caked floor. My fingers are shaking, my vision blurred. I keep waiting for someone to scream ‘Surprise!’ but it’s just me and the package. I unwrap it slowly.
Inside the soggy box I find two official-looking manuals with uncreased spines. A spiral-bound sheaf of papers. Lots of paper-clipped pages with dotted lines for a signature. An application for a passport. A passport!
I go back to the other gifts to stretch the moment further, but realisation is dawning and the feeling is exquisite.
The smallest gift is a folded Visa Debit card application form. The next is a map of the world. A new Lonely Planet guide. Two sets of striped thermal underwear. A French–English pocket translation book. A fur-lined jacket. A spanking-new suitcase.
I sit in the pile of shredded paper like a child on Christmas morning.
I pull the package onto my lap and start at the beginning. On top there’s a letter addressed to me: congratulations, your exchange student application has been successful, you will be required to attend an interview at this office prior to your induction course, blah blah, we hope you will find this experience educational and rewarding and trust you will enjoy your twelve months…in PARIS, FRANCE!...blah, blah. The Morneau family, your hosts, are…
I can’t read any more. I whoop like an Indian and outside there’s a chorus of smothered laughter.
France.
I’m going to Paris, France.
Mum comes in, crying.
‘Did you do this?’ I ask. I’m weightless with joy. I could fly.
‘Me. Feeney, mostly. And others. I forged your signature on the exchange application but you’ll have to sign for the passport.’ She wipes her tears on her sleeve. ‘There’s lots to do. You start the induction course next week.’
‘What about school?’
‘No more school. Not here, anyway.’
Clack, goes another rule.
TWENTY-FOUR
I love the smell of airports. I love watching people saying goodbye. I love the eight dollar coffees and yesterday’s cream buns. I love the souvenir shops and the toothbrush machine and the militant rows of boxy seats. This is where great journeys begin and end; an airport over-flows with anticipation and love and despair.
It’s been two months since I jumped off that tower and the pieces are still falling into place. The boys have been keeping a low profile since they got out and Dill even has a job as a courier. A legitimate courier. Matt’s learned to change a nappy (with a dollop of Vicks smeared under his nose) and Mum’s back to her tyrannical self.
We arrived at the airport three hours early. Mum hasn’t let go of my hand in over an hour. Tahnee has a toothbrush and a sewing kit that someone left in a machine. Matt holds baby Will like he’s a sock full of cow dung, but they’re still getting to know each other. Kate is hove
ring around the edges of our noisy group, unsure of herself as always. I smile at her and beckon her closer.
Dillon is staring at Tahnee with a look I’ve seen before. I slap his stomach and he doubles over, laughing.
‘No way. Keep your hands off her. That’s just too weird,’ I tell him.
Tahnee blushes and crosses her legs primly.
Mrs Tkautz holds Mum’s other hand.
‘It’s nearly time for you to board,’ Mum says. She’s biting her lower lip and fussing over my hand luggage.
‘I know,’ I choke out.
Tahnee and I try to eat sugared jam balls without licking our lips, for old times’ sake. Tahnee wins. She uses her toothbrush to clean her teeth straight after.
A month ago Benny and I went back to the lake to rescue my bike for the last time. For its funeral. The lake had filled up to halfway and the bike lay like a yellow submarine, embedded in mud. When we finally got it out, a few treasures came with it: a deflated rubber ring, a baseball cap, and notably one green Billabong thong that had hooked on to the handlebar.
The next day the police dredged the lake and found bones. In the end, Ashley Cooke’s disappearance turned out to be just another innocent tragedy, when people in Tudor Crescent are so used to expecting the worst of human nature. She would never come home, but at least the urban legends surrounding her disappearance were put to rest.
At the same time, I asked Benny why he was humming through my attempted hanging. He smiled his gappy smile. Told me Gargoyle had trouble choosing between love and loathing, that one wasn’t stronger than the other, and that’s why he got stuck choosing between Tarrant and me. That’s why he couldn’t move. Benny looked at me really hard when he said that. Said he was just helping Gargoyle make his mind up, told me the dog’s jaws had closed so tight around Mick Tarrant’s kneecap that he’d take one step forward, half a step back for the rest of his life. He reckoned it’d take Mick a whole lot longer to get anywhere. It’s the first time I ever heard Benny take the long way around a short thought.
I sent Kate’s CD to my deejay friend. Now she’s the poster-girl for every muso-nerd with precision pleats who can’t tell dope from lavender, and her Friday night gigs attract quite a crowd.
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