Small Spaces

by Sarah Epstein

  Once the carousel hides me from Morgan’s line of sight, my pace quickens. I shiver as a breeze kicks up. It coaxes creaks and groans from the rust-eaten rides, whispering along the deserted walkways like the ghosts of carnival patrons. I spot the graffitied toilet block ahead, silent and ominous like a slumbering creature not to be disturbed.

  As though sensing this, Mallory has stopped a few metres from the entrance. I slow to a creep and pull up alongside a wooden stand that used to sell popcorn and fairy floss. It’s exactly where I was standing the day I watched Sparrow tug balloons from the wrist of a trusting six year old and release them to the sky.

  I glance above me now like I might actually see them there, one pink and one yellow. Irretrievable pieces of our childhood drifting away.

  I scrape my shoe in the gravel to make my presence known. Mallory’s shoulders twitch, yet she doesn’t turn around, as though she knew I was here all along. I consider backing off and leaving her alone, but if there’s a more fitting time to question her about this I sure as hell don’t know what it is.

  “Mallory?” I say to her back.

  She turns slowly at her name, body as tense as a coiled spring. Her nostrils quiver as she struggles to contain tears, glancing above her at the sky as though she, too, might spot her balloons floating away.

  “What is it?” I ask, moving a step closer. “Is something coming back to you?”

  I’m not sure I’m even prepared for her answer. She remains motionless like she hasn’t heard me.

  “Mallory, do you remember something about this place?” I urge. “About the moment you were taken?”

  She finally looks my way and nods confidently. Aggressively. Her piercing eyes drill into me as she raises her hand and points a finger at my chest.

  Her mouth forms a single word.

  You.

  20

  THEN

  13 MAY 2008

  TRANSCRIPT FROM THE OFFICE OF DR INGRID BALLANTINE, PHD CHILD AND ADOLESCENT PSYCHIATRY, NEWCASTLE CHILDREN’S CLINIC

  PATIENT: NATASHA CARMODY, 9 YEARS OLD

  IB: Let’s talk about Mallory. She’s the little girl who went missing for a few days, isn’t she? For about a week?

  NC: …

  IB: Her face was on the news a lot, wasn’t it? Pictures of her were on power poles and noticeboards. Did you see some of those?

  NC: Mm-hmm.

  IB: Everyone was very worried about her. She got a lot of attention, didn’t she?

  NC: Mm.

  IB: You were all alone that day at the carnival, weren’t you? You weren’t really getting any attention from anyone.

  NC: …

  IB: It feels good to get attention, doesn’t it? To feel like someone is listening to us?

  NC: Umm … yes?

  IB: And you told the grown-ups at the carnival that you think you saw Mallory just before she went missing?

  NC: I did see her. With Morgan. Mallory was holding balloons.

  IB: Was she?

  NC: They were tied around her wrist so they wouldn’t fly away.

  IB: So you were quite close to them to see all of this. Did you say hello?

  NC: No.

  IB: So Morgan and Mallory didn’t see you following them?

  NC: I don’t think so.

  IB: Why did you follow them?

  NC: I was scared. I wanted to go home.

  IB: Did you?

  NC: I didn’t know anyone else there. Aunty Ally wasn’t coming back for me until later so I thought Morgan’s mum might take me home. I wanted to ask Morgan if I could go home to Port Bellamy in their car.

  IB: You wanted to go home because you’d got trapped in the wooden box?

  NC: Yeah.

  IB: I understand. It must have been a bit of a fright.

  NC: I wanted to tell Mum and Dad.

  IB: But they were busy with Tim, weren’t they?

  NC: Yeah.

  IB: Telling them you’d got trapped in a box and saw the little girl being taken – that’s a lot of news to tell your mum and dad, isn’t it? You’d have all their attention with some news like that.

  NC: …

  IB: Sometimes when we tell people our news we like to include lots of details to make the story sound exciting, don’t we?

  NC: It wasn’t a story. I didn’t make it up.

  IB: Okay.

  NC: I saw him do it. He took her.

  IB: Did anyone else see this happen?

  NC: I don’t think so.

  IB: Why is that?

  NC: I don’t think anybody else can see him.

  21

  NOW

  I jog Benny home, my mind in freefall, unable to shake the image of Mallory’s accusing finger, like she was picking a criminal in a line-up. I try to analyse what Mallory communicated from every possible angle: she remembers I was at the carnival. Did she see me at the moment Sparrow took her?

  Was I involved?

  Did I follow her into those toilets?

  I shake the last thought from my mind. It’s impossible – I’d remember if that were the case. It was definitely Sparrow who took her.

  Yeah, exactly – your imaginary friend who doesn’t exist.

  I’m shaking by the time I reach Ally’s driveway, my head pounding wildly. It takes much longer than it should for me to catch my breath.

  On the back verandah, I spend fifteen minutes composing text messages to Mallory that I end up deleting without sending, ignoring a bunch of texts from Sadie that pop up when I’m trying to think. I recall how Morgan interrupted our little stand-off at the carnival’s toilet block, excited about his sketches and keen to catch up again tonight. When he invited me for dinner I fell over myself with reasons why we should do it here instead. There’s no way I can sit across the dinner table from Mallory, her parents flanking her on both sides.

  Leaving Benny in the backyard to doze underneath a tree, I unlock the garden shed to find the bicycle Ally mentioned during yesterday’s tour of the house. The shed is poky and cluttered, and I have to shift an old dog cage and three bags of mulch to get to it – an exercise in clumsy panic in my efforts to get quickly in and out.

  The bike is a rusty old thing with white wall tyres and a large wire basket, hopefully sturdy enough to get me to Greenwillow’s supermarket and back without falling apart. I return the shed key to the kitchen and lock up the house behind me, grateful for the distraction of organising dinner, even if I’m just replacing nervous thoughts about Mallory with a whole other set about being alone with her brother.

  It takes me thirty minutes of wandering the supermarket before I finally choose ingredients for a pasta dish, my earlier headache intensifying as I dither over my decision. The searing pain in my head makes it difficult to steer the handlebars on my ride home, and I can barely see straight by the time I reach Ally’s front door. I dump the groceries in the kitchen and take two Panadols before collapsing on the couch for a minute to close my eyes.

  When I open them again, it’s dusk. The living room is cloaked in shadows.

  No, no, no. It’s done it again. This house is always shifting and changing on me.

  I lunge from my seat and swipe at the light switch on the wall, then move around the room to switch on every single lamp I can find. In the kitchen, I yank open the back door and whistle for Benny to come inside. There’s barely fifteen minutes until Morgan’s due to arrive and I haven’t prepped dinner yet or even showered.

  After filling Benny’s dog bowl, I tap my fingers against the stainless steel as I carry it out onto the verandah. I feel horrible that I’ve left him out here for hours – some dog-sitter I am. It’s only after I’ve placed the bowl on the steps and done a full circuit of the garden that panic sets in.

  Benny’s not in the backyard.

  The gate is securely latched, there are no gaps in the fence, no holes dug signalling an escape. He can’t get under the house and I seriously doubt he could scale the wall up and over the garden shed.

  “Benny?�
� I attempt to whistle but my lips are quivering. If he got out he could be miles away by now. How am I supposed to find him in the dark with nothing except Ally’s ancient bicycle to get around on? “Benny? Here, boy. Come on!”

  There’s a faint whine behind me and I turn to find the yard empty. Something in the bush? I call Benny’s name again and hear another weak cry in response. I spin and run towards it, not even sure what I’m looking for. Only when I’ve reached the garden shed do I notice the door is slightly ajar.

  I closed it after I got the bike out. I mean, I locked it, right?

  Nudging the door open, I fumble for a light switch, dreading the idea of stepping inside. I hear Benny panting, weak and shallow, a moment before the fluorescent bulb hums to life. White light bleaches out the cupboards and work benches, illuminating the cardboard boxes and piles of junk. And there, crammed between an old fridge and the wall, I spot a mound of golden fur.

  Not just golden.

  Patches of crimson glisten all over his coat.

  I launch myself towards him. “Benny? Oh, god. What have you done?”

  He’s somehow ensnared himself in a coil of fencing wire. It’s looped around his neck several times, the sharp barbs snagged deep in his fur. The more he’s struggled, the deeper the barbs have dug, piercing his skin to create gaping wounds. As I attempt to loosen the wire, Benny releases a low growl.

  “I’m sorry. Am I hurting you, boy?” My hands are shaking so much I’m probably doing more damage than good. I scour the workbench for something to cut the wire, trying not to think about Benny struggling out here for hours while I dozed on the couch. It’s cramped here in the corner, and sweat breaks out across my top lip. The shed feels even smaller this far away from the door.

  My hands find a pair of rusty pruning shears and I set to work on the tightest loop of wire. Benny must have really panicked to get it so dangerously constricted. The wire bends and buckles under the blunt blades. It’s not even close to severing. Benny growls again and nips at my hands, his limited mobility the only thing stopping him from taking a bite.

  “I know, I know,” I coo. “I’m so sorry.” I drop the shears and lean over to hug him in a bid to calm us both down. “Sshh. Ssshhhh.” The shed walls press in on all sides and the metallic tang of Benny’s blood is making me woozy. He whines, his breath laboured. He struggles to sit up and it pulls the wire tighter.

  “I’m going to get my phone, boy.” I give him a reassuring rub behind the ears and my hand comes away sticky. “I’m going to call someone, get some help.”

  I practically crawl out of the shed on hands and knees, dry-retching on the weed-riddled pavestones.

  The kitchen glows with golden light, though there’s no warmth inside the house. A roaring fire might stave off the cloudless night but wouldn’t touch the chill in my bones. I glance towards the hook by the back door where the shed key is kept. It’s not there. It wasn’t in the shed door, either. None of this makes any sense.

  I scour the kitchen benchtop for my phone, then riffle through my backpack, leaving smears of Benny on everything I touch.

  Where the hell is it?

  I dash into the living room in case my phone fell out of my pocket while I napped, careful to wipe my bloody hands across my jeans before upending the couch cushions. Nothing. I dart in and out of every room searching for a landline.

  Frustrated, I whimper at the pointlessness of my time-wasting. I need to get on Ally’s bike, ride to the closest neighbour and raise the alarm. Grabbing the house keys from the kitchen, I turn and run flat out for the front door. As soon as I reach the hallway, a figure lurches into my path. I hit it hard, ricocheting clumsily into the wall.

  For a moment everything’s black – a high-pitched wail in my ears, skull aching at the point it connected with the wall – and I hear a groan and think it must’ve come from me. I glance down, surprised to see I’m still on my feet, the tangle of house keys firmly clutched in my hand.

  Weapon, my brain thumps. Intruder.

  I blink away the white dots encroaching on my vision, threading two keys between my knuckles. I turn to face my attacker, swinging my hand up to strike.

  “Whoa!” he says, raising his forearm to block my blow. “What are you doing? It’s me. It’s just me.” Morgan backs into the wall, dropping his shopping bag in surprise. A carton of ice cream rolls across the floor.

  Lowering my hand with the keys, I raise the other to the growing lump on my forehead. “How did you get in?” My voice is raspy, on edge.

  “I knocked a few times. You didn’t answer,” Morgan says. “The front door was unlocked …” His words trail off as he takes in the rusty smears on my arms, the patches of crimson on my T-shirt and jeans. He moves towards me, his hands hovering near my waist. “What is–? Are you–?”

  I shake my head quickly, pulling away from him. “It’s not my blood. Benny’s got himself tangled up in barbed wire in the shed. He’s really hurt and I need to get help. I can’t find my bloody phone.”

  “Show me,” Morgan says.

  I lead him outside and wait by the shed door while he crouches to examine Benny. I want to comfort Benny while he does it, but I can’t bring myself to set even one foot inside the doorway.

  “We need to get him to a vet,” Morgan says over his shoulder. “Like, right now. Do you know where one is?”

  “In Ellenbrook – I saw a magnet on the fridge,” I tell him. “There’s a cage thing, a dog crate we can use. I saw it when I got the bike out earlier.” I lean around the doorway and point underneath the workbench, finding nothing but a patch of dusty concrete floor. What the hell? “It was here. I swear it was right here.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Morgan says. “We can’t stuff him inside a cage when he’s hurt like this. Better to lie him down in the back of my dad’s car.” He crouches in front of Benny, strokes him gently around the neck while assessing how to move him. “Better yet, let’s see if the vet can make a house call. I don’t know how to get this wire off without making things worse.”

  “Okay.” I rake shaky fingers through my hair, my heart thumping fast as I throw another doubtful glance at the empty space under the workbench. “Okay. I’ll go and call.”

  I’m about to run back towards the house just as Morgan stands and catches hold of my hand. He squeezes it gently before pressing his phone into it.

  “Take a deep breath,” he assures me. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

  *

  It’s after eight and pitch black by the time the vet – a matronly fifty-something named Margaret – has administered Benny a sedative and disentangled him from the barbed wire’s chokehold. She and her assistant load Benny into the back of their white van while Morgan and I light the way with torches. Margaret explains she needs to stitch Benny up back at the surgery once they’ve properly cleaned his wounds.

  “It’s all right, sweetheart,” she assures me. “He’ll be okay. Stop beating yourself up.”

  “I left the shed door open.” Even as I say the words I don’t really believe them. “I’m supposed to be looking after him and I let him get in there and into all that stuff.”

  Margaret removes her latex gloves with a snap of authority. “I’ve seen a few things in my time,” she says. “Animals in all sorts of scrapes and mishaps. They do get up to mischief, no doubt. But my gut feeling is this was a deliberate act.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  Morgan steps forwards. “Someone did this to him?”

  “That wire was wound pretty tight,” Margaret continues. “Even if he got his head through the looped roll, I can’t see how he managed to pull it tighter and tighter around his own neck until he became incapacitated.”

  I gasp. “Who would do something like that?”

  “Bored kids?” Margaret shrugs. “Some kind of prank gone wrong? I know Sergeant Blake dealt with a case in Jamison recently where a cat was tortured by a guy trying to punish his ex-girlfriend. Can you think of anyone who might be trying
to get your attention?”

  The dead bird on my doorstep. Sparrow at the shops.

  “No,” I say, shaking the ridiculous thoughts away.

  “Have you been home all afternoon?” Margaret asks.

  “I left Benny here when I went to the supermarket around one o’clock. I was gone for maybe an hour.”

  “Was he in the backyard when you got home?” Morgan says. “Did you notice the shed door open?”

  “I–I don’t know. I had a headache and fell asleep on the couch.”

  “What? For three hours?” Morgan’s tone is dubious. “You didn’t notice anything unusual?”

  “No!” I snap. Why are they grilling me like this? “I was asleep.”

  His face softens. “Sorry, Tash. It’s not your fault. I just don’t like the idea of you falling asleep in a strange house with the doors unlocked. Especially if some sicko is prowling around the backyard.”

  “The house was locked,” I say, but my voice has lost any conviction. I can’t seem to recall anything from this afternoon beyond that debilitating headache.

  Morgan squints. “Okay. But the front door was unlocked when I got here …”

  Glancing towards the house, I suddenly feel exhausted, suddenly unsure if anything I’m saying is reliable. Margaret closes the door of her van and turns to me, notepad in hand.

  “Benny’s not one of my regular patients,” she says. “So I’m going to grab your aunt’s details. Do you have a number I can contact her on?”

  “I’ve misplaced my phone,” I mumble, realising how much of a space cadet I must seem to her. “And I don’t know Ally’s number off the top of my head. She’s in Byron Bay for the weekend and will be back on Monday. I’ll call you in the morning to check how Benny’s doing. I’m sure I’ll have found my phone by then.”

  Margaret reaches out and pats my arm. “You go ahead and get cleaned up now. Benny’s in good hands.” She glances at Morgan. “You keeping her company tonight? I think she’s a bit shaken up.”