Small Spaces

by Sarah Epstein

  Nine years since my disastrous summer at Willow Creek. Nine years since Mallory disappeared. Nine years since Sparrow flew through my window in the dead of night and asked me to play a game.

  I double-check the date Patrick Jonas was arrested – 16 January 2008. Four days after Mallory went missing from the carnival, and three days before she was found. It’s thought she wandered alone in Barrington Tops National Park for up to forty-eight hours by herself. Patrick Jonas lived in the vicinity of Greenwillow at the time of his arrest.

  It’s like jigsaw puzzle pieces of my childhood are scattered all over the floor and I just need to pick them up in the right order to form a picture that makes sense.

  I google “Patrick Jonas ice arrest” hoping for a photo from his trial. I click the Images tab and my screen fills with dozens of mugshot thumbnails. Scrolling through pages of faces, I enlarge the photos of any men that could be a similar age to Ally back in 2008. None of them are Patrick Jonas though, according to the file names and accompanying web links. They are frighteningly familiar nonetheless.

  Gaunt faces. Sallow skin. Some with sores on their foreheads and noses. Scabs dotting their cheeks and trailing down their necks. One man is smiling for the camera revealing a mouth of rotten teeth, most reduced to black nubs receding into diseased gums. A few images show multiple arrests of the same person on different occasions, each subsequent mugshot capturing the rapid deterioration and premature ageing of the addict. It’s impossible to pinpoint how old they actually were when the photos were taken.

  Further clicks take me to a site about ice addiction, to an embedded YouTube video recorded by a bystander as police intercept an ice-affected man on a train. The addict is jittery and aggravated, unable to keep his hands still as he digs at the skin on his arms. He wheedles and begs and bargains with police, before turning on them the next moment, his hollow eyes flashing with rage.

  I’m almost breathless with a soaring rush of recognition. Validation.

  This man, these mugshots, remind me of Sparrow.

  I place my phone down and drag fingers through my hair, trying to connect the dots.

  Me, Mallory, Sparrow. Patrick Jonas and Ally. That summer afternoon at the carnival.

  My headache surges as theories knock against the inside of my skull, echoed by the rhythmic clang of the old water heater refilling after my shower. If Benny were here, he’d be down the hall and outside that cellar door giving it a piece of his mind.

  I glance up from my phone, my fingers finding the collar of my vomit-speckled pyjama top.

  I haven’t showered yet.

  Whatever that sound is, it’s not coming from the water heater.

  *

  In all my circuits of the house looking for Mallory, I never checked the cellar. Why would I? It’s a dank, dark dead end. Nothing down there and nowhere to go. Being on this side of the cellar door is bad enough, without whatever claustrophobic underground horrors await me on the other side.

  I only ever ventured into the cellar once when Gran was still alive, the time Dad helped her move some antique furniture out a year before she died. I tagged along to explore while Dad and Gran carried a set of walnut dining chairs out to her truck. I lasted less than three minutes down there before the water heater hissed, sending me running for the stairs convinced the ghost of a dead Scotsman was on my heels.

  What I do remember is this: there are no doors leading outside. Not even so much as a window. If Mallory went down there voluntarily, it was to hide.

  And if it wasn’t voluntarily …

  Drawing in a breath, I turn the cellar doorhandle, closing my eyes briefly as I release it from my hand. Wooden steps descend into the shadows below. I grope for a light switch, a musty scent rising to greet me. Chilly tendrils coil around my face and shoulders, drawing me down.

  There are several lightbulbs dotted across the low ceiling beams, revealing crude walls of stone and render. At some point a concrete floor has been poured, and some of the structural beams replaced with newer wood. Tucked beside the stairs is an old workbench piled high with broken appliances, an old fridge with the door removed. The water heater stands in the opposite corner, rusty and innocuous, water dribbling down one side into a puddle on the floor. It’s like some poor incontinent old soul, and I feel a weird sense of pity.

  Funny how, when in the face of real danger, those things we once feared seem so trivial.

  The other half of the long room is a mess of second-hand furniture, a haphazard arrangement of mid-century nesting tables, art deco bar stools and floral winged armchairs. A country-style buffet unit is pulled away from one wall on an angle. In one dimly lit corner, a makeshift bed is set up on top of an antique dining table, topped with a mattress and bedding I assume was pilfered from the bedroom upstairs. There are food scraps and empty packets, the stench of decaying fruit skins. Empty water bottles are lined up against the wall like a game of skittles.

  Someone’s been staying down here?

  The hairs on my arms stand on end.

  “Mallory?” I say cautiously. I stop in my tracks and still my breath. There’s a single second of pure silence as I cock my ear to listen. It’s quickly interrupted by a series of muffled clangs. I spin around to face the water heater, my pulse spiking.

  “Mallory?” I say again, louder this time. The clanging noise responds to my voice. I sweep the room scouring for its origin. It sounds like it’s coming from inside the walls.

  When I reach the pine buffet unit, the noise grows louder. I slip into the wedge of space behind it and press my ear up to the wall. It takes me a second to realise it’s not stonework here. I shove the buffet unit aside so more light can fall behind it, uncovering a basic wooden door.

  What the hell is this?

  Backing away from the door, I search for something to arm myself with – there’s no telling what I might find on the other side. On a small table in the corner is a pair of foot-high pillar candlesticks. I snatch one up. The turned hardwood feels robust and formidable in my hand.

  I press my ear against the door again. The clanging noise has stopped, replaced by an urgent humming sound like somebody trying to hit the high notes of a song.

  Raising the candlestick with my right hand and turning the handle with my left, I flick the door open and take a step back. Glaring daylight hits me in the face and I throw a hand up in front of my eyes.

  Two horizontal windows near the ceiling flood the storage room with light. My mind tries to reconcile exactly where I am in relation to the house’s floorplan. How did I not notice these windows from outside?

  But, of course, I have noticed them before. The weekend I looked after Benny. I found him outside barking at these very windows, tucked away at ground level on the lower left side of the house.

  I blink as my eyes adjust, registering more antique furniture: a mahogany bedhead, matching bedside tables, an empty bookcase reaching ladder-like up to the windows. A smell hits me, ripe and unclean, like a service station toilet. The familiar smell of urine-soaked clothing I know all too well from my childhood.

  Somebody’s been in here.

  Somebody could be in here right now.

  To my right is the back of a large cabinet, blocking my view into the other half of the room. I take a hesitant step, then another, all the while holding my candlestick high enough to strike. The tuneless humming sound starts up again, louder now that I’m inside the room. There’s a shuffle and scrape of something against the concrete floor in a corner I can’t see. I want to call Mallory’s name again, but my instincts warn me to stay silent.

  I’m only a few steps past the large cabinet when I see it: the wire dog cage that disappeared from Ally’s garden shed last time I was here.

  Mallory is crammed inside.

  I lurch forwards, my first impulse to run to her. Then I hear the scraping sound again and realise it’s not Mallory who’s moving. Something else is in here with us.

  Creeping the last few steps, I peer around
the front of the cabinet. A few metres away from the cage, somebody is hunched against the wall. Her back is to me as she works away at something in front of her, but I recognise the patterned fabric of her skirt, now soiled along the edges. Her hair hangs in long greasy strips across her shoulders.

  “Ally?”

  My aunt’s head whips around at my voice, eyes wide with fear. Grey duct tape covers the place where her mouth should be. Her attempts to talk are reduced to urgent hums, her nostrils flaring with effort. I rush to her side as she flexes her whole body in communication, one filthy foot kicking out sideways to clang the water pipe running down the wall.

  “Oh my god. What is this?” My fingers tremble as I gingerly peel at the corner of the duct tape. “What’s going on?” I barely have a grip when Ally yanks her face sideways, pulling the tape off in one swift motion. Her skin is raw underneath, her lips flaky and cracked. She gags on a wad of gauze still stuck inside her mouth. I quickly pull it out for her.

  “He’s coming back!” she says, her voice like gravel. “He’s coming back!” Her chest heaves and she’s racked by a fit of dry coughing.

  “Who?” I say. “Who did this?”

  Ally winces. “PJ.”

  “Your high school sweetheart?” I think of the article about his arrest. “What? Why?” I glance at Mallory scrunched inside the wire cage, her head tucked into the corner as though she’s napping.

  “Hurry. He could be back any minute,” Ally says, jerking her arms back and forth. Her hands are tied with orange plastic cord, the kind my dad uses in his whipper snipper at home. It’s looped around each wrist several times, and then round and round the water pipe, finished with an impossible twist of knots. “You need to find something to cut me free.”

  Dropping the candlestick, I look around for something sharp. My eyes fall on the wire cage again, a chrome padlock secured on the door. “Mallory? Can you hear me?”

  “She’s out of it,” Ally says. “He drugged her. He drugged you both.”

  “Drugged? What do you–?” Then I think of how wasted Mallory and I both felt after that single glass of red wine last night. We left our glasses on the kitchen table while we went upstairs to change into pyjamas and check the locks. “He spiked our drinks?”

  “Don’t know how you’re even awake,” Ally says. “I lost about fifteen hours when he did it to me.”

  I touch the collar of my pyjama top again, the sour smell lingering. “I puked my guts up before bed. I must have got some of it out of my system.”

  “Thank god.” She jerks her head towards the cage. “He brought her down here last night. I’ve been waiting for him to drag you in here too.”

  I think of my achy shoulders, the mystery scratches on my ankles. “He dragged me somewhere. I woke up locked in the bathroom.”

  “Too heavy,” Ally says, looking me over. “Too hard. Probably clicked you and I are the same size. Be thankful you didn’t get bumped and dragged down two flights of stairs. I woke up black and blue.”

  I glance at Mallory, her petite frame in floral pyjamas. The idea of him carrying her, touching her–

  “Come on!” Ally says, making me flinch. “You need to hurry! Find something to cut with. Now.”

  I turn to search behind me. The floor here reeks of urine and faeces, and I spot a soiled bucket in the corner I have no intention of getting anywhere near. There are more food scraps here too, scattered water bottles and empty toilet roll cores.

  Against the wall, beneath the windows, there’s a large wooden chest full of vintage kitchenware. I rummage through rusted baking trays and painted cookie tins, hoping for scissors or a large knife.

  “How long have you been down here?” I say.

  “Weeks.” Ally grunts, trying to loosen her shoulders. “Since that weekend you came to look after Benny.”

  I jerk my head to look at her. “But you’ve been texting me since then. You asked me to come here for Easter.”

  “That wasn’t me.” She jiggles her bound hands as evidence. “It was him. He needed to get you back here.”

  “Me?” I say, gaping. “Why?”

  “Things didn’t go as planned that first weekend you stayed. He dragged me down here on the first night, and he was going to bring you down the following night once he got that cage in place.” She nods in Mallory’s direction. “He couldn’t get to you, though, because someone else was here.”

  “Morgan,” I murmur. I can’t believe I entertained the idea Morgan was dangerous. He actually prevented any harm coming to me that night. “He stayed with me because I was upset about Benny.”

  Ally strains against her binds to look at me. “Tash,” she says. “I haven’t heard Benny since the day I woke up down here. What did PJ do?” Her voice cracks. “What did he do to my dog?”

  “No, no, Benny’s fine.” I feel distracted and frantic as my brain struggles to keep up. Benny had been barking at the cellar windows and scratching at the cellar door. He must’ve been in the way. “He was injured – we got the vet out here. He’s being fostered and we can bring him home any time you like.”

  A look passes between us: there’ll be no homecoming for Benny if we don’t make it out of this cellar.

  Giving up my search of the wooden chest, I move to a walnut dresser in the corner. I yank open the top drawer and riffle through it, shoving aside pens and elastic bands, rolls of duct tape, piles of paper that flutter to the floor. The middle drawer contains nothing but musty board games, a pink cardigan, grubby sandshoes, all useless junk that makes me swear under my breath. When I reach the bottom drawer I’m rewarded with the jangle of cutlery. I dig among cake forks and soup spoons until my fingers close around a large silver breadknife.

  Pushing myself to a stand, my foot slips on some of the debris from my search. I peel a Ziploc bag from the sole of my foot and almost fling it aside before something catches my eye. Scrawled across the top in wobbly ballpoint are the words 11 BORONIA AVE.

  The Fishers’ old address in Port Bellamy?

  The handwriting is familiar. The letter “O”s have diagonal lines in the middle like zeroes.

  Curled inside are a few lengths of creamy-coloured ribbon. I hold the clear plastic bag up to the window, the shimmery organza catching the light.

  No, not ribbon.

  I squint at the bag.

  Is that …?

  I glance at Mallory’s head pressed into the corner of the cage.

  “That’ll do,” Ally says. “Quick. Hurry. Hurry!”

  I blink at her. She’s nodding at the serrated breadknife in my hand.

  Bundling the Ziploc bag into the pocket of my pyjama pants, I scurry back to the water pipe, dropping to my knees on the filthy floor beside Ally. I glance uncertainly at the knife’s blade. It might cut through the plastic cord around Ally’s wrists but I have no idea how to remove the padlock from Mallory’s cage.

  I swallow panic rising in the back of my throat.

  Breathe, Tash. One thing at a time.

  “Who is he?” I say, working the knife like a hacksaw over the cord between Ally’s wrist and the pipe. “Who is he really?”

  She sags against the wall. The skin on her wrists is rubbed raw where she’s struggled to get free. “My soulmate,” she says, shaking her head like it’s a hopeless joke. “Full of bullshit and promises. We’ve been splitting up and getting back together since high school. I told you about him last time I saw you. His name is Patrick Jonas. You …” She exhales, long and low. “You know him by another name.”

  I stiffen, the knife hovering over the cord.

  Ally looks away from me. “Sparrow. Patrick is your Sparrow.”

  My throat tightens. I almost can’t get any words out. “My Sparrow?”

  She says it like he’s mine and mine only, a figment of my imagination that no one else can see. That’s not true, though, is it? It never was. And Ally’s just admitted it.

  I yank her by the shoulder so she has to look at me. “You knew?”

&
nbsp; Ally stares at the wall, her voice oddly detached. “It was a delicate situation and–”

  “You knew?” I toss the knife aside and stagger to a stand. “All along you knew what he was doing and you said nothing?”

  “He didn’t really do anything, though, did he?”

  Gasping, I say, “He taunted me, Ally. He terrified me. He nearly drowned me in the creek!”

  “I didn’t know he–”

  “I told you! I told you. You let people accuse me of lying and attention-seeking. I had nightmares for years because nobody believed me. My own parents didn’t believe me.”

  Ally hangs her head, avoiding my eye. “I know. I felt sick about the whole thing. It was better for everyone to forget about it all. PJ was in prison anyway, far from being able to harm anyone.”

  “Harm anyone? He broke me, Ally. I was never the same after that summer.”

  “But you’re okay now, see? You got over it.”

  “Do I look like I’m over it?” My voice cracks. “You know nothing about my life.”

  “Look, Tash–”

  “God, I trusted you.” It’s impossible to keep the tremble from my voice. “You made out like I was different. You said we were alike. But I am nothing like you. I would never want to be.”

  Ally yanks at the cord, growling in frustration. “Look, he’s coming back, you get that? Once we get out of here you can tell the whole world what an evil bitch I am–”

  “Well, it won’t come as any surprise to my parents.”

  “Yeah? No shit.”

  I turn away from her, biting back things I’d love to say. My anger is dizzying. I’m choking on tears I don’t want her to see. I place a hand against the large cabinet to steady myself, my fingers finding a delicate rosette carved into the door. I stare at the rosewood grain beneath my splayed fingers, letting my gaze trail upwards along a decorative border. It curls its way around an inlaid keyhole, a brass key nestled in the lock, before finishing near the top of the cabinet’s elegant arch.

  Stepping back, I look at the piece of furniture in its entirety.

  It’s the Victorian wardrobe from Mallory’s drawings.