by Claire Gray
‘Do you think they just arrested the bomber?’ I say.
Steve exhales and shrugs his shoulders. ‘I have no clue. But God, I hope so.’
Chapter Thirty-Nine
That evening, Steve cooks up a batch of white, faintly slimy oven chips which we all share from a large blue bowl. The four of us have squeezed onto the sofa. Dolph and Maliwan are curled together beneath the patchwork quilt that I’ve been sleeping under since the bomb went off. Steve has his laptop propped up on the arm of the sofa. He’s scrolling his way through Twitter, shaking his head and occasionally typing with jabbing fingers. I’m squashed between them, resigned to having my leg pressed against Steve’s on one side, and Maliwan’s feet practically in my lap. I’m trying to watch a black and white Cary Grant film on Steve’s small TV while the clicking keyboard and the soft sound of kissing goes on around me.
‘This is old. I don’t like it,’ Maliwan says.
‘It’s good if you give it a chance,’ Dolph says. ‘Really funny.’
‘Is this the one with the leopard?’ Steve asks, looking up from his laptop for a moment.
‘Yes, and Katharine Hepburn too. It’s honestly very good,’ Dolph says. He picked it out for us to watch from a pile of DVDs beside the television. Steve’s sister sends DVDs to him occasionally, packaged up with bubble wrap and American comfort food.
‘We should go to the rental place, get something new,’ Maliwan suggests.
Dolph looks at her. ‘You must rest.’
‘It’s not even nine yet. It’s early.’
‘Aren’t you tired?’ he asks her. ‘You must be.’
‘Very tired. But I don’t think I can sleep. My head.’
‘Mine too,’ I say. My thoughts won’t lie still. When I close my eyes, I see flashing lights and unhappy faces. More than anything I want to know what is happening in Australia, but the news is silent and Kadesadayurat hasn’t sent us any updates.
We’ve told Dolph and Maliwan about our conversation with Kadesadayurat. We’re cautiously hopeful that the fates of the Shuttleworths will soon be resolved, and that Dolph, Maliwan and their baby will not have to be involved. But we don’t know. And not knowing has made all of us restless.
‘I want to see the bombsite,’ Maliwan says, out of nowhere. She, more than any of us, is struggling with the knowledge that life is carrying on outside while we stay huddled inside this little house, frightened and unsure what to do next.
‘Not tonight,’ Dolph says. Then he mumbles: ‘Maybe not ever.’
‘Were you in town when it happened?’ I ask them. We haven’t spoken about this yet and it feels important to know this part of their story.
‘No, we were at our hotel, lying on the bed. I’d been staying there for a couple of weeks so that we could get some privacy. I share a house with four other guys and they’re always in and out of my room. And Maliwan doesn’t like the bathroom there.’
‘Very dirty,’ she says.
‘Did you hear it?’ I ask. ‘The bomb?’
‘Yeah. Maliwan was looking through photographs on my iPad; an old album from back in college. I was trying to answer her questions about why I used to style my hair that way, who those girls were in my car, and what kind of seal that was exactly. And then we heard the explosion.’
‘So loud,’ Maliwan says.
‘Loud enough to make the windows shake. And then afterwards, when it all went quiet again, everything in the room seemed different somehow. The power didn’t go out immediately but then it did and when Maliwan grabbed my hand I could feel her shaking.’
‘Did you realise that it was a bomb?’ Steve asks.
‘We guessed it was. We went down to the dining room and all the guests were gathering down there. No one actually said it but I think we were all scared that there was going to be a follow up; another bomb or men with machine guns. You never know, do you? You hear about that shit all the time now. Everyone thinks the worst.’
‘It didn’t used to be this bad, did it?’ I say.
‘The world has always been this way,’ Steve says. ‘Just it used to happen in places you’ve never heard of.’
‘It feels worse when it happens in a place you know, doesn’t it?’ Dolph says. ‘We stayed in the dining room all night, wrapped in our blankets. The power came on just before dawn and the manager served breakfast. None of the usual waiting staff were there. And it was weird how everything had changed; the air was flat and the piano music, filtered in the same as always, somehow couldn’t reach our ears; it sank to the carpet and hung there like a fog. Do you know what I mean?’
‘I think so,’ I say. Dolph has a weird way of describing things, usually horrible things, but he does it well.
‘All we could hear was the muttering about how many people had died, which terrorist group was responsible and then just the screeching of chairs as people got up to leave forever. And a news channel was on, playing on a TV above the bar. There wasn’t any sound so we were just staring at pictures of Main Street, destroyed from different camera angles. People were stepping around puddles of blood. I phoned my parents to tell them I was all right. It hadn’t occurred to them that I wouldn’t be. My mother actually laughed and said they know I don’t spend my time in bars.’
‘That’s horrible,’ I say. I can’t even remember what I said to my parents when I phoned them that night. I just remember how hollow my voice sounded, like something had fallen out of me as I left the hostel.
‘I started crying after breakfast and then I couldn’t stop,’ Maliwan says. ‘I never cry usually.’
‘It was hard not to cry. There was such a weird atmosphere,’ Dolph tells us. ‘These elderly European ladies who were drinking at the bar gave us some tissues. They’d been glaring at us just the night before. There’s a look I often get when we’re together; like people think I’ve bought my girlfriend. It’s funny, because in fact she’s refused all the money I’ve ever offered. Haven’t you?’
‘I don’t want your money,’ she says. ‘I’ve told you this.’
‘And then we went to the golf resort, to try and get her pay sorted. The rest you know.’
‘I don’t like remembering this,’ Maliwan says. ‘I don’t like talking about it. Let’s go out.’
‘We can’t. Not yet,’ Dolph says.
‘I guess Lucy and I could go to the DVD rental place,’ Steve says. ‘And we’ll pass by the Grand Hotel; just a little look. What do you think, Lucy?’
‘Yeah.’ I nod, agreeing only because I think Pamela Shuttleworth will be far away from the hotel by this point; if the police can’t find her it’s unlikely that we will. I don’t think I want to see her again. I’m able to replay her voice inside my head, and it makes me shiver, makes my stomach feel tight. I’m terrified of her.
‘I like action movies,’ Maliwan tells us. She wriggles her toes and I feel them grinding against my thigh. I find myself wishing that they would all just shut up.
‘Maybe comedy would be better though, don’t you think?’ Dolph says, oblivious to the speed of my heart. ‘I don’t want to see any violence right now, really.’
So, we hand the bowl of chips over to Dolph and Maliwan, who spread themselves out on the sofa, their fingers entwined. Maliwan tries to give me her knife as we’re leaving. She tells me to put it up the sleeve of my cardigan.
‘In case you see her,’ she says.
‘No, I’m not taking that,’ I say.
‘Then I’ll come with you.’
‘No,’ Dolph says, a little too loudly. He still has hold of her hand and he pulls her down into the cushions beside him. Maliwan frowns but stays put.
‘We won’t be long,’ Steve says.
The second we step outside I feel like we’ve made a mistake. The darkness is thick and there’s a sour taste in the air. A smell of smoke puts us on edge but we decide that it’s the sort of smoke that comes from a bonfire, like people often used to have on the beach.
‘That’s good, isn’t it,’ Steve
says, ‘if they’ve started doing the bonfires again?’
But nothing feels good as we walk beneath neon signs, no stars in the sky. The bars are quiet but there are some people in them, and the beat of the music gets sucked up through our feet like metal to a magnet, while the hum of anxious conversations floats from the courtyards and from people sat in the darkness at benches, eating hot, sticky food, animals creeping out of the shadows to grab leftovers, large insects clinging to the buildings, lit by streetlights and the headlights of passing vehicles.
‘Of course, the video store is near to the bombsite,’ Steve says, clearing his throat.
‘I know.’ I’ve already thought of this. The store is just off Main Street. It’s a little place with a sloping roof; it gets so low that you have to duck at one side of the room where they keep the Kungfu movies. They sell Asian sweets behind the counter and big boxes of beers from sticky refrigerators. I used to like going there after work and then watching films on the flickering TV in the communal room at my hostel, while lizards climbed across the ceiling and a beer grew warm in my hands.
‘We won’t see her,’ I say. ‘Will we?’
‘No,’ Steve says, but he doesn’t sound sure. I want to go back to the house but I stay silent. Another part of me needs to see what happens next. I feel my tired heart start to beat harder and faster.
Silently, we walk across town, avoiding eye contact with the people we pass. The video store, where we reach it, is closed and dark.
‘Shall we?’ Steve says, nodding towards Main Street.
‘I guess.’
We come out roughly halfway between the Grand Hotel and the bombsite, and everything seems abruptly quieter and darker. Only a week ago, this place would have been busy with mopeds, tourists and backpackers, laughter and music. We’re beside a scuba school office, which is closed, litter piled up by its front door like no one has been in or out for days.
Not far away, the wreckage from the bomb is sitting inside a wreath of flowers. We can faintly see shapes moving, people looking at the hole in the ground, and at the burned tarmac around it. Occasionally we see a camera flash, but the buildings around the crater are all unlit.
‘They’ve put up barriers,’ Steve says. ‘Makes it looks worse somehow.’
There is a chemical scent in the air, and an underlying odour of soot, quite different to the bonfire smoke that we smelled earlier.
‘Let’s go to the hotel,’ I say. We’ve come this far.
Chapter Forty
‘Do you think Pamela realises she’s wanted by the police?’ I ask, as we get closer to the hotel; red awning out the front, spiky plants in pots and a stray dog lying in the gutter, licking itself.
‘Yes, that’ll be why she was so desperate to have someone else confess for her,’ Steve says. ‘And I would assume she’s aware that they have her car. That’ll be why she was riding the little motorbike. It didn’t seem to fit with her character.’
‘What do you think she’ll do if she is here and she spots us?’ I say. We’re standing across the street from the hotel now, staring at the building and its dark rows of windows.
‘She’ll try to hurt us,’ Steve says with certainty. He presses his forehead with the palm of his hand. I can see him sweating, even through the darkness. My stomach makes a little flip and there’s a burning in my throat. I remember how it felt to wake up in the back of Steve’s car, certain that I was about to die.
‘She won’t be here though,’ I say. ‘She’ll be gone by now. She’s probably on a flight back to America.’
‘Maybe,’ he says. ‘But I think, maybe not. I believe she’s a woman on a mission. I think there are things she wants to do here.’
‘She seemed crazy. Maybe she wouldn’t have the sense to flee. So, shall we just go inside and ask about her?’
‘Why don’t we go in there and have a drink,’ Steve says. ‘They have a really nice bar. They probably wouldn’t let us in, usually, dressed like this. But I imagine they’re not being too picky at the moment, with most tourists having fled to safer destinations.’
‘Okay,’ I say, trying to keep my voice from shaking.
We cross the quiet street, the gutter dog raising its head to look at us and then resuming its grooming.
‘Don’t worry, Mrs Shuttleworth will be long gone from the hotel. She’ll be hiding somewhere. Maybe in one of the temples. This is safe for us. Nothing’s going to happen. And doesn’t it feel a little bit better to be out of the house, doing something?’ Steve says, but there is a tremor in his voice too.
‘I don’t know,’ I say. Actually, being near to my hostel and seeing the place where this all began, has got me feeling like we’re being chased, and like I need to keep looking over my shoulder. How does Steve know that this is safe? It might not be.
We pass through the revolving glass doors and the air conditioning dries my flushed face. There’s a gentle drone of conversation beneath the sound of clinking glasses and jazz music. I can see through to the bar, where a television is playing Sky News, and people are drinking at tables. People bled in here the other night. I wonder if that man, the one sipping a martini beside the tropical fish tank, knows that a girl was shaking right where he’s standing. She was missing some of her fingers and staring very quietly at the exact same Japanese Fighting Fish he’s looking at.
A man is working behind the reception desk. He has a large, bald head, and is tapping on a keyboard.
‘Let’s get some drinks,’ Steve says.
‘I’ll catch up with you.’
I watch Steve walk away and then I wander towards reception, my eyes on the man behind it. I’m going to ask him if she’s here, just flat-out ask him, because I have to know. But I lose my nerve at the last minute, stopping beside a stand advertising off-shore scuba diving. I pick up a leaflet and stare at it.
And then, all around me, people’s phones begin to ring. News crews gather like flocking birds and move towards the door. This must be where they all have been staying. Vans pull up outside. I catch snippets of conversation as people rush by.
‘Was at his own address in Melbourne, cocky bastard.’
‘I know where we can find the parents.’
The leaflet falls out of my hands and I complete my journey to the reception desk where I try to get the man’s attention. He’s watching as his guests leave in a flurry of elbows and smart phones.
‘What’s going on?’ I ask, leaning across the desk to meet his eyes.
‘I’m not sure,’ he says, and then does a double take at my face. I suppose the horrors of the last few days can be seen there, in my pale skin and my unsteady eyes, my dried-up lips and the scrapes and bruises. There’s a lump beneath my hair, hard like an elbow, where I fell when Pamela Shuttleworth was chasing me on that bike. The man says: ‘Are you okay? Are you staying here?’
‘I was actually staying here for a bit after the bomb. Just one night.’
‘Oh, I see,’ he says in a respectful little whisper.
I look at the people hurrying past. ‘Have they caught the bomber? Is that what they’re saying?’
‘I think so.’
I still can’t quite believe that it could be possible. The bomb was such an evil thing that I find it hard to accept a person, a real human person, was behind it. Surely it had to have been a monster of some kind. I whisper, like the crazy person I’m becoming: ‘But people are monsters.’
Steve is approaching from across the lobby, holding two brightly coloured cocktails.
‘What do you know Pamela Shuttleworth? She was staying here,’ I ask the man.
‘Oh, yes. I checked her in. They think she killed her husband, the old man who owns the golf resort. He turned up dead yesterday and they think she did it. Shocking stuff.’
‘Was it only yesterday? Where do you think she could be now?’ I have to clamp my fingers around the edge of the desk to keep them from shaking.
‘I don’t think anyone knows. The police came here to see her. They
took her car. She stole a moped or something from one of the porters. No one knows where she went.’
‘Try one of these,’ Steve is suddenly saying very loudly into my ear. ‘They’re called Fear Cobras.’
I look sideways at the frothy, purple goo in the glass he’s holding towards my face and realise that I need to get outside immediately. Time has snapped like an elastic band, and it’s the middle of that night again. I was standing right here, people were bleeding and crying all around me, and I didn’t know if another bomb was going to go off. I trip through the doors and out onto the pavement. My lungs feel like they’re filled with sand as I suck on the hot air and stare hard at chewing gum stains and discarded cigarettes on the pavement.
A young woman is beside me, dressed in neat khaki shorts and a vest top that somehow manages to look expensive. She’s fiddling with a bulky camera and looking up every so often at the vehicles passing by. I can tell she’s a journalist before I even notice the ID badge around her neck.
‘Have they arrested the bomber?’ I say, shuffling to her side and putting one of my grazed hands against her arm. She pulls away and holds her camera tight against her stomach.
‘Excuse me,’ she says in an Australian accent, before stepping towards a van that has stopped beside us, its doors sliding open.
‘I’m from the Koh Star,’ I say, which sounds like a lie. ‘I left my phone at home. I’ve missed all this. Just tell me his name. Please, I need to know.’
‘I don’t know,’ she says, moving away from me. I know that she knows.
‘Please.’
‘I don’t know,’ she says, frowning at me. ‘But they have got him. You’re right about that.’
The woman gets into the van and stares at me as an arm reaches across to slide the door closed. She sees that there is something wrong with me. But I used to be just like you, I think. I had a job just like yours once, before everything changed and I had to become a different sort of writer. A different person.