Preloved

by Shirley Marr

  Yeah, it’s Benji’s loss, I wanted to say to her. You could choose any guy you wanted and they would literally get down on one knee and worship at your feet.

  Wish that was me.

  The room had become silent and I was aware of a tapping noise. I looked up to see Nancy glaring at Rebecca as she smacked her purple, glitter-adorned pen against her palm.

  “I didn’t say you could bring her,” Nancy scowled.

  “I invited Rebecca because I think this has something to do with her too,” I said. I put my hands on my hips in case I sounded too wimpy for Nancy’s liking.

  I watched as Nancy stood nose to nose with Rebecca and stared her in the eyes.

  “Only anime characters should have blue hair,” said Nancy, eventually. “Fine. You can stay.”

  Nancy paced the length of the room. It was filled with old metal filing cabinets and too-bright lighting that tinged everything with a strange green. I sat on top of one of the desks in the empty row, with Logan and Rebecca beside me.

  “Our school balls have always been held in September. Logan Feldman and Stacey Gibson were still around then. The yearbook comes out at the end of the year, before school breaks up, so sometime in between, something happened.”

  All Nancy Drew (sorry, I meant Soo) was missing was a trench coat, a magnifying glass and handbag with a gun in it.

  “To be fair, we’ll divide the workload between the three of us. That’s a month each of the year 1988.” Nancy bent down to look at the label on one of the cabinets.

  “Let’s go find a computer,” I suggested, and slipped off the desk.

  “It’s too bad, honey,” said Nancy, and she grinned at me. She slid a cabinet open and pulled out an envelope. “All the old newspapers are on microfiche.”

  I must have given her a confused look because she replied, “When I say microfiche, I’m not talking about really tiny aquatic vertebrae.”

  “Shouldn’t this all be, like, digitalised now?” I groaned.

  “Look all around you. Does it look like it’s been digitalised?”

  Oh, great. This was going to be another bag of laughs.

  “Get a move on girls,” said Nancy. “And I want you to look through everything. It might not have ended up as front-page news, okay? Don’t make me take a stick to either of you.”

  I whacked the pile of envelopes down onto the table and stared at the machine in front of me. I craned my head to look at what Nancy was doing, but she already seemed to be way ahead.

  “Here,” said Logan, leaning over. “Slide this bit out and put your sheet under the glass, then click it back shut. Then move the tray around like this.”

  The magnified image of words and white spaces swirled in the screen in front of me.

  “Ugh. This makes me feel seasick. Hey, how do I … Logan?”

  I looked over my shoulder and he had gone. He was now standing over Rebecca and watching as she tried to read the instructions on the machine.

  “Never mind,” I said under my breath, and concentrated on trying to focus in on the top left-hand corner of the sheet.

  After what felt like hours, I had learned that things hadn’t really changed since 1988. The newspapers were full of depressing stories about war and natural disasters, and lightweight stories they thought would balance it all out, such as Australia’s year-long Bicentennial party, the chart domination of a new pop princess called Kylie Minogue and all the goss on a new TV show called Home and Away.

  I sighed and slid the tray out, removed the sheet of microfiche, placed it back into the envelope and moved onto the next one.

  I was now so good at using this thing that I could give lectures on it. I looked at my watch and blew a piece of hair out of my face. Okay, maybe I couldn’t live in the past after all if it meant that research took hours of excruciating pain, magnifying itsy-bitsy shrunken-down slides of newspapers. If it was all online, this would take Google like, oh, 0.06 seconds.

  I got bored after a while and started zooming in on clothing ads.

  “Pssst,” I said to Logan and made him come over to me. “Look at this,” I said, pointing to a picture of a guy with Rick Astley hair trying to look tough in a studded denim jacket.

  “What’s wrong with that?” said Logan. “That’s fashionable.”

  “Go back to your corner,” I said, flashing him a grin. “And play with your Rubik’s cube.”

  “Rubik’s cubes are so 1983,” replied Logan, looking down his nose at me. “By 1988 we had the Rubik’s clock.” I watched as he walked away with his hands in his pockets, turning back once to grin at me.

  “Amy, stop whispering to yourself. You may be your own best friend, but it’s distracting for the rest of us!” Nancy yelled at me.

  Someone really should remind her we’re in a “Quiet Study Area”.

  Meanwhile, Rebecca was taking a break, lying on her back across three desks, her electric-blue hair fanned out. She was staring at the ceiling and eating M&M’s. She looked so perfect and beautiful, like a modern, edgy Sleeping Beauty.

  A scrunched-up ball of paper bounced off Rebecca’s forehead.

  “Hey!” Rebecca scowled and sat up. “You just ruined my cool moment.”

  “Oh, get over yourself, Rebecca,” replied Nancy. “Stop pretending that there’s a camera pointing at you 24/7 and that you have to always look filmic. Get back to work.”

  Rebecca preened her hair and went back to her station.

  I dared to glance at Nancy. I watched her determined face as she slipped another sheet of microfiche into the machine. I felt my lips rise a little in the corners. It was nice having friends.

  “Oh my God!” yelped Rebecca suddenly. Everyone stared at her. “It’s me!”

  Everyone got off their butts and raced towards her.

  “Look! It’s me,” she said, and she pointed at the screen.

  The face of Stacey Gibson loomed from the screen, with her permed hair and hoop earrings. I looked at Rebecca and then back at the photo. I swallowed. Even Rebecca recognised the other girl as looking like her.

  She pointed to the photo next to Stacey’s. “And this is … Lo …” Rebecca stopped, as if she suddenly lost her train of thought.

  “Logan. I’m Logan.”

  I moved out of the way so that he could slide past me and kneel next to Rebecca.

  “How do we get a copy out of this stupid thing?” said Nancy, looking around and then banging her fist on the microfiche viewer.

  “Put a two cent coin in here, get the article within the rectangle on the screen and it’ll print out there,” said Logan, pointing. He kept staring at Rebecca, hope on his face. I couldn’t look.

  Two cent coins haven’t existed in forever, so I took a five cent coin out of my wallet and put it into the slot. Silently, I manoeuvred the article into place and pressed print. I went to stand at the other end of the machine with my arms crossed, staring at my feet.

  “Every time I think I should give up on you,” said Nancy, “you come out with these unexpected acts of genius. Try to keep it up full-time, Einstein.”

  The printout fell into the paper tray and I handed it to Nancy, who snatched it off me and started reading.

  “Local Teens Still Missing: Police Puzzled,” she read slowly. “It’s been more than a month since the disappearance of teen sweethearts Stacey Gibson and Logan Feldman, but Middlemoore authorities are no closer to solving the mystery. The couple failed to return home following what was reported to be a trip to the beach.”

  Rebecca went white and clammy. Nancy was still reading the article, but the words had stopped coming out of her mouth. I watched the exact moment when her face, pink and warm, suddenly drained of colour. She folded it up and tried to tuck it inside her hand.

  “Show me that article,” I demanded.

  “Settle down,” said Nancy. “It’s late, we’re all tired, so let’s just leave it, okay? I know this great ramen place we can all meet at tomorrow and–”

  “No! I don’t wan
t great ramen. I want that article, so give it to me.” I was shouting and startled even myself. I didn’t know there was this force inside of me.

  Nancy looked at Rebecca and knew she had no choice.

  I took the sweaty bit of paper off her.

  The part that Nancy had been reading said:

  “The third missing teenager, who disappeared at the same time, has since been identified as sixteen-year-old Amy Lee. Eyewitnesses have stated that Lee was last seen having an argument with Feldman and Gibson at a bus stop, but police have declined to comment.”

  I felt dizzy, like I was about to vomit and pass out. In the confused maze of my mind, I was sure that I had just seen my name. But that could just be my imagination. I was sure that recently, I had been seeing and hearing things that simply weren’t there.

  “How come she wasn’t in any of those ball photos I looked at?”

  “Maybe she didn’t go to the ball.”

  “How come she’s not mentioned in the yearbook at all? How come there’s no tribute to her?”

  “I don’t know,” said Nancy.

  “How come she has the same name as me?” I demanded.

  “I don’t know,” repeated Nancy and she looked pained.

  Something deep down inside of me was whispering otherwise. Logan Feldman is a ghost. Stacey Gibson has been reborn as Rebecca Starling. And Amy Lee was … me.

  It made so much sense. Why in this lifetime I was attached to Rebecca even though on the inside I didn’t like the person she was at all and there was no reason why we should be friends. I had done something that day. It was because I owed her.

  “I know that you’re putting two and two together right now and getting six shades of wrong,” said Nancy. She swallowed. “This is just some random cold case from the past. It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  “If you look closely at the photo, this Stacey chick doesn’t really look that much like me. I’m much prettier,” said Rebecca, encouragingly.

  “But it fits too perfectly. What about Logan?” I pointed to him, slumped in the corner on a desk.

  “Amy, you’re pointing to nothing,” said Nancy, softly.

  I felt her hand rest on my shoulder and I shrugged it off violently.

  “What did I do? Who am I? What is happening?” I blurted out. Even I knew I sounded incoherent and crazy.

  “Enough!” Nancy grabbed the article from me. She shut down all the microfiche machines one by one. Then she folded her arms and stood in front of me.

  “Look Amy, this is not what I bargained for. I thought I was helping you to find out more about that locket of yours. I don’t know how on earth you’ve inserted yourself into the story, but you have to stop it.”

  The caring eyes of the girl I once played with as a child bored into me.

  “Listen to me. I know Rebecca is infuriatingly shallow and self-serving, but she doesn’t deserve you making up some elaborate story inside your mind to justify why you should hate her.”

  Nancy was talking to me gently, like a nurse. The light above me flickered uncomfortably.

  “And if you really want a boyfriend, you don’t have to invent an imaginary one. I mean, even I can tell that Michael Limawan is interested in–”

  “I’m not making this up.” I pulled away from Nancy and I looked around wildly.

  Was I?

  I covered my mouth as if I was scared of what words would come out.

  “I think it would be a really good idea if you went and saw the school counsellor on Monday. It’s nothing to be ashamed of to admit you need help. Rebecca and I care about you. Now, you go home to your mum, okay?”

  “No.” I looked down at the newspaper article, between my trembling fingers. I looked at the police hotline the Lee family pleaded with the public to ring. And maybe I was going mad, but scribbled in handwriting in the margin was another telephone number. A home number.

  I squinted at it. It looked like my own handwriting, I shook my head.

  I had to go.

  Outside, the sky was starting to turn pink and purple. Gasping, I leaned against one of the sculptures outside the library. It was shaped like a giant stripy, upside-down “U”, a frowning mouth.

  “Amy!” Rebecca shouted after me.

  I turned and pulled the locket off. “Please, take it back. It’s yours.”

  “Amy, I’m sorry,” said Rebecca.

  I threw the locket away. I didn’t wait to see where it landed. I just hurried down the steps.

  I stood at the door of a house on the abnormally quiet Blueberry Street.

  It was so close to my place. And I felt so close to the truth.

  My hands trembled as I knocked.

  “Yes?” A woman with a short bob stood behind the thick security screen.

  “Hi. I – I was the one who rang you before. Saying I have information. I found something while researching for, um, a school project.”

  “You’re Ivy Lee’s daughter, aren’t you?”

  I nodded. I leaned in towards the screen, hoping that I would recognise this woman, hoping that it would mean we had a connection.

  “I haven’t seen you since you were a little girl. Your mum doesn’t really associate much with anyone any more – not that we do much either.”

  I felt for her. I did. I knew what it was like to run away from the whispers while just trying to buy a loaf of bread.

  “What did you say your name was again?”

  “Um, Valerie,” I said, and winced.

  “I’m Grace. Come in. Let me fetch my mother.”

  I left my thongs on the doormat. It wasn’t a neglected home on the inside, but there was just something about it, some sort of sadness that seemed to pervade the air and make everything hang heavily. Like none of the people could really move on. It was difficult not to drag my feet against the tiles inside this house.

  I followed her up the hallway, but I stopped as I passed the arch of the dining room. On the mantle, flanked by a pair of Temple Lions, were a row of framed photographs.

  I held my breath and slipped quietly into the room.

  No one had dusted the shelf for a while. I picked up the photo closest to me, which looked like a high school photo with a daggy fake-sky background. A teenage girl stared back at me. Pink hoops in her ears, braces on her teeth, smiling for the camera under the weight of her curly poodle perm.

  “That is my sister, Amy,” said Grace from behind me.

  For a moment I thought she was referring to me, but she was talking about the girl in the photo.

  I wiped the dust from the glass with my fingers.

  The girl looked nothing like me.

  “I’ve made a mistake,” I managed to splutter, and I hurriedly dropped the photo back onto the mantle.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t have any information for you. I was thinking about the wrong person. I have to go.”

  I almost bowled Grace over in my hurry to leave. Once again, I found myself running, but this time I knew that I wasn’t running away from a monster or a wicked spirit. Not when I had myself to fear.

  Chapter 11

  I sat on a seat by myself in the bus. I had hoped to catch one of those newer ones that have air-conditioning and nice plush seats, but after fifteen minutes of waiting, only this clunker rocked up. I didn’t want to skip it, on the off-chance nothing else came along and a serial killer picked me up.

  Ugh. Shut up, Amy. No wonder everyone thinks you’re a drama queen.

  I watched as the grey scenery slipped by. By habit, my hand went to my throat. It didn’t matter. Mum had heaps of lockets in her store. I’m sure if I carefully looked over all of them I could find one I liked, then hint at the fact that my birthday was coming up. It would be something beautiful and expensive, vintage, and made of real gold or sterling silver. Not just a cheap fake thing with a plastic rainbow.

  I reached into my bag and pulled out my MP3 player.

  “You know, for someone who likes The Smiths, bloody oath you have some stinker
s on there.”

  I turned my head.

  “Hi again, Miss Matey,” said Logan.

  “Hi, product-of-my-psychological-break,” I said cheerily. “You know, Logan, I think there’s a reason we have the same taste in music. If I had it my way, I know that I’d want at least an eighty per cent overlap in bands. And no Panic! At The Disco.”

  Logan was sitting in the empty spot next to me, his arms draped lazily over the seat in front.

  “So,” I said. I swallowed. “Did I make you up to help or destroy me?”

  “Maybe both,” replied Logan, looking me in the eye. “Facing the truth is never easy, Amy, but you need to reach a breaking point in order to make it to the other side.”

  “So why aren’t you with Rebecca?” I said, as if everything was still perfectly normal.

  “She’s changed. Or should I say Rebecca is different from Stacey. I guess we get a chance to become a different person each time, and maybe that’s a good thing.”

  I vaguely remembered something Mum said to me about choices and lifetimes.

  “I threw away the locket. Why are you still here?”

  “Because I’m not attached to the locket; I’m attached to you.”

  I smiled weakly at him. I looked down at my MP3 player and scrolled aimlessly through the songs.

  “Back in my day,” said Logan, “music had two sides. The first side was the one that contained all the hits, all the popular tracks. Then you had the B-side, which was where the musicians could be creative, even experimental. Life had a nice symmetry, back then.”

  “Now life is just one continuous, endless loop,” I said. I could have been talking about myself. “Without much order. You can skip things if you’re impatient. Or you can totally disregard order and shuffle things to suit yourself. It’s all so … meaningless.”

  The words felt bittersweet on my lips.

  “It’s not that bad, Miss Matey,” said Logan. “I see you still make playlists. They’re like mixtapes. There’s order and meaning in that.”

  “What’s a mixtape?”

  “It’s when you record a bunch of songs, selecting them with someone in mind and making sure you put the songs in an order that, well, tells a story.”