Begin End Begin: A #LoveOzYa Anthology

by Amie Kaufman, Melissa Keil, Will Kostakis, Ellie Marney, Jaclyn Moriarty, Michael Pryor, Alice Pung, Gabrielle Tozer, Lili Wilkinson, Danielle Binks

  ‘It’s okay,’ she says. ‘You’re okay.’

  I’m not okay, but it’s too late to go back. We can’t go back. This realisation makes my chest constrict again, panic flooding my lungs. I squeeze Oona’s hand, and feel her strength flow into me.

  I follow her. I have no choice. But even if I did, I’d still follow her.

  The tunnel opens out into a small chamber, the oldest part of the drain system. It is made from dusty bluestone blocks, a round column of a room that rises and rises above us out of sight. Candles gutter in the gaps and bumps in the wall. Wax drips long stalactites, translucent fingers and tentacles reaching down to us.

  There is a kind of altar in the centre of the chamber, a stone slab mounted with a huge bull’s skull, curving horns reaching up to the stone ceiling. A clay dish of burning herbs releases tendrils of pungent smoke. Rose petals are scattered over everything, floating red in the water.

  Behind the altar dances a solitary woman. She is large-breasted, her face painted with white lines and swirls. Green spectacles glint over her eyes. She wears a top hat and a dress made from hundreds of strips of coloured lace that float around her, like hair underwater. A necklace of tiny skulls hangs low from her neck. She holds out her arms to us, and I see they are ringed with tattoos that seem to writhe and shift in the candlelight.

  The Witch Queen turns her head to greet us, her spectacles flashing.

  Oona steps forward bravely. ‘Witch Queen,’ she says. ‘My name is Oona and I’ve sought you from … from afar.’ She digs in the backpack and I realise I never asked her what treasure she brought to offer. I guess I never thought we’d get this far.

  Oona’s hand opens, and I catch my breath. It’s the purple origami unicorn I made for her in grade five, when her parents were breaking up and she was so sad all the time. I spent a whole weekend watching YouTube tutorials trying to get the folds just right.

  I can’t believe she has kept it, all this time.

  I can’t believe she’s giving it away.

  The Witch Queen takes the purple unicorn and tosses it on her altar without looking at it. It’s gone within seconds, a brief flare of yellow flame, and then just ash.

  Oona glances at me and licks her lips. ‘I want to know my destiny.’

  The Witch Queen raises her eyebrows. ‘I don’t deal in destinies,’ she says. ‘All I can tell you is the reason you came down here.’

  ‘Okay.’

  The Witch Queen takes Oona’s hands and they sink into a kind of dance, a sweeping back-and-forth waltz around the altar. Oona’s eyelids grow heavy, and it’s like she’s hypnotised. As their dance speeds up, Oona’s face changes, becoming unfamiliar to me. The Witch Queen bends down and whispers something to her, then spins Oona out from her embrace, letting her go so she twirls off through the water and the rose petals, and slumps against the stone wall.

  I move to help her, but the Witch Queen stops me with her arm.

  ‘Leave her,’ she hisses. ‘The truth sends you wild, but only for a time.’

  ‘Will she be okay?’

  The Witch Queen doesn’t answer, she just holds out her hand. ‘Now you,’ she says.

  I take a half-step back, shaking my head. ‘Oh no,’ I say. ‘I’m not here to — I’m just here for moral support.’

  ‘Don’t you want to know your destiny?’ she asks.

  ‘I thought you didn’t deal in destinies.’

  The Witch Queen’s mouth quirks in the faintest hint of a smile. ‘You are bold,’ she says. ‘But you still want to know.’

  Her hand is still outstretched, waiting.

  ‘I didn’t bring anything,’ I say. ‘I didn’t bring a treasure.’

  But that isn’t true and she knows it. A mouse tattoo runs around her wrist, circling it three times before coming to rest right on her pulse.

  I can’t give it to her. It’s my only chance. A fool’s hope, I know. But if I hand it over, then I’ll be giving up.

  In the corner, I hear a low growl coming from Oona. I glance over and see her, hunched and twisted, her back heaving with animal breath. I need to get her out of here. My hand moves to my pocket. I’ll give it up for her. To save her.

  The plastic of the ten-dollar note is smooth under my fingers.

  I unfold it carefully, and read the words one last time. Then I give it to the Witch Queen. She flashes her teeth at me, and holds the note to her face, inhaling its scent. Then she casts it onto her altar, where the burning herbs melt and curl it into black smoke and twisted remains. I feel my heart curl and melt and shrink along with it.

  The Witch Queen grabs me around the waist and pulls me up against her full, hot breasts. She leans closer, and I can see dark eyes behind the green glasses. The scent of sweat and smoke and roses is overpowering. She cocks her head to the side, and then runs a long, warm tongue up my face, from my chin to my temple. I feel dizzy.

  ‘You came here for her,’ she says. ‘You would follow her anywhere. She is your first love and your last.’ Her voice is as thick and slow as molasses.

  And even though I already knew that, now I really know.

  And I realise what I’ve done.

  I stole Oona’s destiny. When I turned back from our corner and returned to the cafe. When I swallowed my embarrassment and asked the waiter if I could swap her note for one of my own. I took Oona’s destiny and locked it away in a prison of false hope. She is down here because of me. I am not the wisecracking sidekick in this story. I am the ogre, the dragon, the wicked stepmother.

  I look over at the altar and see the melted plastic that was Oona’s fate. I have destroyed it. It is as black and shrivelled as my own heart. I reach over to it, and it disintegrates at my touch, the pieces crumbling away and scattering in the muddy water at my feet, mingling with the floating rose petals.

  I scatter, too. Bits of me come spilling out into the night. I feel my eyes grow large, hair sprouting along my spine. I turn my head up and howl into the darkness. It’s too much. The roses and water and everythingness of it all.

  The Witch Queen grabs my chin and forces my head up to meet her gaze, jerking me back into the little stone room.

  ‘A storm is coming. Find shelter above the stars,’ she says, and whirls away with a surge of fluttering scraps of lace.

  And suddenly it’s just me and Oona in the room.

  ‘Oona?’ I call.

  She looks up at me, and I feel a cold chill of fear. Her hair has fallen loose from its braided crown, and her teeth are bared. A growl rumbles low in her throat. Her eyes are inky-black. A gust of warm wind lifts my hair from my shoulders and I shiver.

  We never should have come here.

  I grit my teeth and grab Oona’s hand, scared she will scratch or bite me. But she doesn’t, and allows me to lead her back through the narrow tunnel. As it widens enough for us to stand, I stumble and reach out to steady myself on the wall. I freeze, terrified the spiders will swarm all over me. Except the wall is bare and smooth. The spiders have gone.

  We find our way back to the ballroom, but it is empty. No dancers. No music. The candles still flicker on the walls, illuminating feathers and sequins floating on water that glints with a rainbow film of oil.

  Oona turns her face towards me, and I’m relieved to see that she looks normal again. Her eyes are wide and her face is pale. She shivers as the dark tide laps at her thighs.

  ‘Meg,’ she croaks.

  And that’s when I realise that the water has risen higher.

  ‘We have to go,’ I tell her.

  There are eight tunnels that lead into the ballroom, and they all look the same. I don’t know which one we entered by. The water is flowing stronger now, no longer a trickle but a stream with a steady current.

  ‘Downstream,’ I mutter. ‘If we follow it downstream we’ll find our way out.’

  The water has climbed even higher, and it’s bringing other things down from the surface, too. Autumn leaves, sticks, empty chip packets and beer cans. The refuse tugs
and scratches as the pressure of the tide pulls us further and further down the tunnel. It’s up to our waists now. I can hear thunder rumbling, getting louder and louder.

  We have to get out.

  ‘There.’ Oona points at iron rungs in the wall. We scramble up, past a crust of tiny polystyrene balls. There’s a manhole up there, and Oona darts to the top of the ladder and pushes, but it is heavy steel and concrete and she can’t budge it. I squeeze up next to her, and we both set our shoulders beneath the manhole and strain. It’s no use.

  Find shelter above the stars.

  There is a ledge just above the line of white polystyrene balls. It’s only a foot or so of recessed concrete. Oona and I drop down onto it. I shine my torch down into the foaming water. The thundering sound is almost deafening now, and the water turns white and churning. It fills the tunnel, and I can see enormous shapes sucked along with it — a battered rubbish bin, an old TV, a shopping trolley. I hope the man with the Milo is okay.

  Oona and I cling to each other with numb fingers, and I can feel her heart hammering the same desperate rhythm as my own.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I yell over the thundering water.

  ‘No, I’m sorry!’ she yells back. ‘I never should have made you follow me down here.’

  ‘But it was all for nothing.’ I can’t yell anymore, but I need to say it anyway. ‘You didn’t get what you came for, and it’s my fault.’

  Oona’s expression softens and she looks puzzled. She says something, only I can’t make it out over the roaring below.

  And then somehow we are kissing. She curls her body into mine and we just fit, hands and lips and skin and sodden clothes. Oona tastes like sunshine and I forget about the flood and our imminent death because despite all odds, this cold, wet, dangerous prison is exactly where I always wanted to be.

  When the water eventually subsides, we help each other down from the ledge. Astonishingly the torch still works, but the map is useless now, soaked into mush, and anyway, we have no idea where we are. We follow the flow of water at our feet, in the hope that it will eventually lead us outside. I desperately want to know what Oona is thinking, how she feels about what happened. But she is silent, her shoulders small in front of me as she picks her way through the debris. With every step, the taste of her fades, and I grow cold and shivery.

  Eventually there is a dim, grey light ahead. We follow it, and it grows brighter and brighter. The water grows deeper, and I realise that this tunnel opens out onto a large brown river. It’s early morning, and I can hear birds and the rumble of cars.

  I wonder if the world has changed much, since we’ve been gone. I can’t imagine anything will ever be the same.

  Oona steps out of the drain into the river, waist deep in muddy water. She scrambles up the bank, grabbing onto weeds to haul herself up the slope.

  And I hesitate again, because going back out into the light means going back to the real world. The world where she and I are best friends and she holds my hand and I long for something I can’t have. I want to stay in the darkness, just for a few minutes more. I reach into my pocket before I remember that I gave Oona’s note to the Witch Queen. But my fingers touch folded thin plastic, and I pull out the note. It is grimy with silt, but the letters are still there.

  I LOVE YOU.

  I saw the note burn. It melted into a black lump. I saw that happen.

  ‘What did she tell you?’ I call out.

  Oona turns around, squinting to find me in the shadows. Her overalls are brown and grey, wet and clinging to her stomach and thighs. Her hair is drying into fuzzy ringlets, lit up pink and gold by the rosy fingers of dawn. She hesitates.

  Red gumboots slide down the bank and she plunges back into the water again, making her way over to me. When she is close, I hold out the note and see her eyes widen as she takes it.

  ‘Why did you go down there?’ I ask.

  Oona drops the note, and it floats away on the muddy brown tide. When she speaks, her voice is low, barely more than a whisper. ‘I wanted to know if you’d follow me anywhere.’

  She presses her body up against mine, her face tilting to my face, her mouth to my mouth. She feels warm and alive as she takes my hand, our fingers sliding together. Then she leads me out of the drain, up the embankment and into the sunshine.

  LUCY

  5.53 p.m.

  Blisters burn the backs of Lucy’s ankles. She thuds along the footpath parallel to Northbourne Avenue, a veil of sweat decorating her forehead, but she doesn’t bother to wipe it away. Turns out shoes fresh from the box and a school uniform aren’t the best choices for sprinting through the streets of Canberra.

  The bus is shuddering by the time she charges into the Jolimont Centre, suitcase rattling on the tiles and vice-captain badge swinging from her uniform collar. She watches, still puffing, as the last of the passengers pile onto the swollen bus. Heart pounding, Lucy squats down on the concrete to unzip the suitcase. Her hoodie and tracksuit pants are folded on top, in half, then in half again; her attempt to be organised before the trip.

  Before this afternoon.

  Before the spare hours between class ending and arriving at the bus stop had dissolved, thanks to helping her coach pack up the swimming gear after last period and fielding calls about the Year 12 formal every five minutes from the school captain.

  Swearing to herself, Lucy tosses the hoodie and tracksuit pants over her left arm and wheels her bag to the back of the bus line.

  The driver saunters over. ‘Wagga or Albury?’ he asks, grabbing her suitcase.

  ‘Melbourne.’

  ‘In it for the full eight hours, huh?’

  ‘Yeah. Brave, right?’

  ‘Brave’s one word for riding the overnighter.’ He chuckles, warming up a little. ‘Alrighty, Eight, onya get, find a seat. Better get this milk-carton-on-wheels movin’ before the roos take over the highway.’

  Lucy nods. ‘Is there time for me to run inside to change into my …’ She gestures to her tracksuit, voice trailing off as she spots the driver’s raised eyebrow. ‘Never mind.’

  She tugs at her uniform, cringing at the saucer-sized stains radiating from her armpits.

  5.56 p.m.

  The bus is packed. Lucy squeezes down the aisle, sucking in a breath as she dodges dangling feet and a juicebox-throwing toddler. She strains towards her seat at the back, her imagination whirring as she panics about which brand of awful she’ll be wedged in with. A man obsessed with watching dirty YouTube clips on his iPad without headphones? Or maybe a child who loves nothing more than screeching in people’s ears?

  Row after row, Lucy passes the passengers — no signs of anyone clipping their nails onto the floor yet, like her best friend Nate had warned her — although anything seems possible after eight hours trapped together in the dark. Lucy grins when she reaches her seat: there’s not a whisper of another human in the spot next to hers.

  6.01 p.m.

  The bus rumbles as Lucy dumps out the contents of her bag onto the empty seats.

  Buzzzz.

  Her phone.

  Again.

  The twins. Simone, the eldest of Lucy’s family by seventeen minutes, tells her not to worry about packing shampoo ’cause Ana is addicted to collecting the free little bottles from hotels during her work trips. Too late.

  It buzzes again.

  Nate moaning, ‘The Olivia Bensons miss youuuu, Lucy Maree Faris’ in their group’s chat.

  And again.

  More from Nate, this time sending selfies with Tamiko from the back seat of his parents’ car on the way to Maya’s farm for Shabbat dinner and a sleepover.

  Lucy runs her fingers through her thick ponytail as she fights the twinge in her chest.

  It’s band practice for The Olivia Bensons tomorrow, so they’ll be working their way through the Stones, AC/DC and KISS’s back catalogues. Although Lucy wonders whether it’ll even happen without her nagging everyone into position, drumsticks in hand, smashing at the kit until they stop
sliding around in their socks in Nate’s garage. Probably not.

  If they’re the bricks, then she’s the cement.

  6.04 p.m.

  The bus driver walks up and down the aisle counting passengers. Yawning, Lucy curls up against the window, using her bunched-up tracksuit as a makeshift pillow, clamps her eyes shut and jams in her earphones to block out the thick, throaty laughter from a woman a few seats ahead. Lucy buries her face further into the material, nose crinkling at the faint waft of chlorine.

  A tap on her shoulder.

  Her eyelids strain open.

  Through twisted lashes, Lucy sees the bus driver beaming, his scrawny arm leaning on the headrest in front of her. ‘Evening, Eight. We’ve got ourselves an incoming.’

  Lucy’s gaze follows the driver’s fingers as he points towards the front of the bus. In the aisle, right next to the driver’s seat, stands a tall guy in skinny jeans with a backpack hanging off his shoulder. His hoodie is pulled down low over his forehead and he’s absorbed by his phone so Lucy can’t see his face, only a hint of his profile.

  ‘Better late than never, I s’pose,’ the driver continues, ‘although a second later and he’d’ve missed the party.’ The unflattering lights sparking a bright-white glow through the bus aren’t helping Lucy get a better look. Pretty cute, Lucy notes, although she thinks all guys look pretty cute in a hoodie and skinny jeans. A bad habit, really.

  ‘Scoot over, then,’ adds the driver.

  ‘What?’ Lucy rubs at her eye.

  ‘I can’t strap the big fella to the top of the bus, can I?’

  He squeezes his way back down the aisle, announcing to the passengers with a gruff laugh that it’s almost time for take-off.

  Lucy rechecks her ticket.

  Aisle seat.

  Damn.

  As Lucy sweeps her stuff back into her bag, grimacing at her sticky school uniform, she doesn’t know whether to be irritated she has to share her precious spare seat with someone, or panicked that someone is a guy in a hoodie and skinny jeans.