His dad—had I learnt his name last time? I couldn’t remember—sat at the table and placed his phone beside his dinner plate. ‘I messaged Brian.’
‘Really?’ Elias sounded pumped. ‘That’s awesome.’
I saw Patricia’s lip curl up a little, like she was amused but trying not to show it. There was some inside joke going on. ‘Who’s Brian?’ I asked.
Elias smiled serenely. ‘You’ll see.’
There was no more mention of that. Food got dished out, I fielded the expected questions about where I went to school, about my family. If they knew anything about Frankie, they didn’t mention her. The conversation was relaxed, and I found myself talking more than I meant to.
Elias’ dad—Neil, Patricia called him—laughed when I admitted I had managed to get zero on a multiple choice geography test. He offered me a high five.
‘Now, that’s an achievement. I mean, that’s a very deliberate effort there. Takes a lot of work to get every single question wrong.’
Mum was furious when she found out about that exam result. I got the whole ‘You’re not stupid, why aren’t you trying?’ speech. She didn’t get it at all. Neil understood exactly.
‘Dad likes to think of himself as a rebel,’ Elias pointed out for my benefit. ‘You’re his new hero.’
Hilarious—I was failing every subject at school and was now officially a teenage runaway. I just shook my head.
A message alert sounded. Everyone except me checked their phone. Neil read through a message and got up from the table. ‘It’s happening.’
I didn’t have a clue what ‘it’ was, but I was curious. I followed the rest of the family through to the front room. It was just past seven but still light thanks to daylight saving, and it was immediately clear what was happening.
A tow truck, amber light flashing. The driver had hooked up a large black ute that was parked halfway across Elias’ driveway and began slowly towing it. We watched as he positioned it, very carefully, in the exact centre of the road, leaving space for a single car to squeeze past either side. He unhooked his tow ropes and gave a thumbs-up.
‘I guess that’s Brian?’ I noted.
Elias just grinned at me.
Their street wasn’t busy, and the cars that came along over the next few minutes managed to squeeze past, although not without a fair amount of honking. Then a bus rolled up.
‘Oops,’ said Elias, watching as a queue of cars started to bank up behind it.
Someone had obviously called the cops but it was a good twenty minutes before a police car rolled up. Neil and Patricia had gone back to their dinner, leaving Elias and me watching at the window. Two police officers were directing the traffic when I noticed other movement out there.
‘You said the guy is there for footy training or something?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Well, it looks like training might be over…’ There were several well-built guys making their way to other parked cars in the street.
‘Eeeep.’ Elias grabbed my arm. ‘Let’s get out of the window.’
It was ridiculously childish, but I ran. Away from the front room with the big open window. Elias loped up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and grabbed my arm again at the top, pulling me into his room and shutting the door after us. He was laughing and out of breath. After a second he seemed to realise where he’d brought me.
‘Sorry. I don’t know why I came up here.’
I did. His room was to him what my bunk was to me. A safe place. A good hiding place. It was strange to think we had that thing in common when there was little else.
He took another second to get his breath back. Grinned at me sheepishly. ‘That was fun.’
My heart was still pounding, but he wasn’t wrong. It was a good sort of adrenaline rush. And I couldn’t help myself. I laughed. Not a full-on, out-loud laugh, but more of a snort and a giggle mixed together.
Elias moved a pile of clean laundry off his desk chair and sat down. ‘You know, that’s the first time I’ve heard you laugh.’
I thought about it. When was the last time? I honestly had no idea. There were no friends to hang out with and crack jokes. Even the stuff I watched on TV was always pretty serious.
‘Don’t get used to it.’ I sat on the bed, drawing my feet up so I was cross-legged. I’d already kicked off my shoes somewhere downstairs, so I figured he wouldn’t mind.
‘Yeah, I know, you like to rock the whole dark edginess thing.’
‘Dark edginess? I was going for disdainful.’
‘Yeah, I can see that.’ A pause. ‘Does it work?’
‘Does what work?’
‘The disdain. Does it do whatever it’s meant to do?’
I thought about it. ‘I guess. Most of the time. Not on you, obviously.’
‘Sorry. I’m a bit broken like that.’ He was grinning, though, so not that sorry. ‘What’s it meant to do?’
What wasn’t it meant to do? It was my wall. It was to stop people from talking to me, from wanting to get to know me, from asking the questions they were dying to ask. ‘I don’t like attention,’ I said finally. ‘You may have noticed.’
‘Not at all.’ He grabbed a pair of socks from the top of the pile and tossed it to me. Or at me. I caught the bundle and tossed it back.
He threw it again. ‘Why do you hate the attention so much? Is it because of your sister?’
I returned it. ‘You know I don’t talk about that stuff.’
‘Why not?’ A high toss from him. I dived to try to catch it and missed, and had to pick myself up off the floor. My return pass wasn’t a kind one.
‘Because it sucks. Because it’s not like talking about it will change anything. Because people just want to know all the details. It’s like my life is the plot of some book or movie or something, and people feel like they have a right to all the details.’
‘Okay, yeah. That must suck.’
‘And don’t forget there was all the media attention. It wasn’t just her face out there, you know? It was my face, too.’
‘That’s kinda creepy.’ The sock bundle back to me, a gentle lob that landed in my open hands. ‘Sorry.’
I’d thought he would be more annoying, pestering me for details. It was a relief to find he wasn’t. A relief to actually be able to tell someone about it. ‘It was my fault she disappeared. They never said so, but it was.’
‘How was it your fault? Weren’t you, like, seven?’
I tossed the sock ball back, buying myself time. Debating whether I wanted the conversation to keep going or not. ‘I left her alone,’ I said finally. My voice was steady, calm, devoid of self-recrimination.
Elias gazed at me speculatively. ‘You’ve got a whole guilt-personality built around that, haven’t you?’
‘It had pretty momentous fallout.’
A shrug. ‘So does crossing the road, if you do it at the wrong time.’
‘That’s hardly the same thing.’
A toss. ‘Look, I get it. I really do. Or as much as someone like me can. Everyone else gets a nice normal life and you get that.’ A pause. ‘For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for being one of those jerks who just wanted to know the details.’
There were a lot of words I would have used to describe Elias. Jerk wasn’t one of them.
He went on, before I could answer him. ‘I know I can be annoying…Generally, I mean. I just find people really interesting…Their stories, the things that have made them who they are. Asking questions helps me understand people better.’
I had the sock ball in my hands. I held on to it for a long moment, listening to the whirr of the ceiling fan, studying Elias. He was holding back, but I knew he was itching to ask more. It was just human nature. Somehow I didn’t mind as much as I thought I would. It was different.
Finally, I threw the sock ball. ‘Go ahead.’
‘With what?’
‘I know you’ve got questions. Ask.’
‘You’re not going to get pissed off at me?
’
‘No promises.’
23
My first night in the house wasn’t great. The bare wooden boards were hard, no matter how many of my spare clothes I spread out beneath me. It wasn’t the hottest night but the house was stuffy and I’d worked up a sweat walking from where Elias had dropped me at the top of our driveway. For a second I’d considered just going home, but the thought of facing Mum was enough to motivate me.
I tossed and turned for most of the night, just ending up a stiff, sweaty mess tangled in my dirty clothes. There were no curtains on the window so I woke up just past six with glaring sunlight filling the room.
Still half-asleep, I shuffled my makeshift bedding out into the corridor and shut the bedroom door behind me, blocking most of the light and heat.
It was nearly midday when I woke up again, and I was starving. I’d forgotten to bring any of Aurora’s mangoes or Cherry Ripe slice from Elias’ house, so I had no food. And I didn’t have my toothbrush. If I could have snapped my fingers and magically been back at home with running hot water and a full breakfast spread, I wouldn’t have hesitated a second.
‘Toughen up, princess,’ I muttered to myself. Vogue had sailed through five days in the house and I was cracking it after one.
I checked my phone. I’d switched it off completely while I was with Elias, figuring he was the only one that normally used it to contact me. When I’d arrived back at the house I’d turned it back on and found a single message from Mum. Brisk: six words.
I assume you are okay somewhere?
My response was in the same vein—a simple Yep—and the phone went off again. If it wasn’t for my history—if I wasn’t Lindsay, the Left Behind—I would have just ignored it. But even I couldn’t be that cruel.
I washed my face in the bathroom—peppermint green everywhere—and tried to do something with my hair, then kicked my stuff into a pile and sat down to ponder my options.
Elias had a morning shift at work and then an afternoon class at uni. I had a vague memory of promising I’d do some research tracking down the names Aurora had given us and then meet him after school somewhere. And now I’d slept half the day away.
I locked the house up, tucking the key into my pocket after a moment’s hesitation, and started the trek to the library. And my mind went to Elias, wondering with a sick, panicky feeling what on earth had possessed me to tell him all that stuff. I’d talked for hours. All the stupid little things that had seemed so important, things that only Frankie and I knew. Why had I told him? He’d totally suckered me.
I doubled my pace as I neared the library, despite the heat, because thinking about Elias wasn’t helping anything anyway. I went straight in, not pausing to appreciate the air conditioning, bee-lining for the computers. Got to work on the search.
Some of the friends had changed names. I managed to track down work addresses for most of them, thanks to online résumés and social media references. I didn’t have high hopes that any of them would know anything, considering her parents didn’t, but I figured it was better than nothing.
Elias called at quarter to four. I was still searching for the last two names and had my stuff spread everywhere, so I suggested he come meet me at the library. It was only when I hung up that I saw I had a text. Mum.
Please check in with me at least once a day.
Please. Since when did Mum ask me to do something? Maybe she realised if she issued an order I would just ignore it. I still could ignore it, if I wanted to prove a point. The power balance had shifted. But…
My fingers hovered over the keypad. I would be civil. Not apologetic. Just the facts.
Okay, I typed. I added I’m fine, then deleted it, then typed it again. Before I could second—third?—guess myself, I sent the message and put my phone away.
I had mostly managed to forget about it when Elias arrived.
‘I’d hate to see your bedroom,’ was his first comment as he surveyed the mess. It was quiet in the library and I’d taken over three of the computer desks.
‘I don’t think there’s much danger of that happening.’
‘Never say never.’ He pulled up a chair. ‘What did you find?’
I still hadn’t quite got my head around my most recent discovery. It seemed like an almost unbelievable coincidence and also a bad idea. I was worried because I knew exactly how Elias was going to react.
‘I have workplaces and phone numbers for everyone.’
‘That’s awesome. Why do you have that look on your face?’
I could have argued that I didn’t have a look on my face. But I probably did.
‘Yvonne. The cousin.’
‘What about her?’
‘She works at Prado Systems.’
‘What is that?’
‘It’s a security company, basically. They design and install security and surveillance systems for shopping centres, airports, universities, stadiums, motorways…’
‘Why is that bad?’
I sucked in a deep breath. ‘It’s where my dad works.’
‘We have a connection? That’s awesome.’
‘It’s not.’
‘Why not?’
I’d told him the truth about Frankie, every little thing he’d asked. But I hadn’t told him about fighting with my parents or kicking myself out of the house. That was a whole other thing, and I really didn’t feel like going into the details. ‘Because Dad is pissed off at me. I’m the last person he’s going to help.’
‘Oh. You’re a real people person, aren’t you?’
I gave him a death stare and he backed off. ‘Sorry. Kidding.’
He glanced at the time on the screen. ‘We should try to visit some of them at work, anyway. Before five.’
I’d developed a bit of a headache staring at the computer screen for so many hours. The lack of sleep wasn’t helping, either. Or the text from Mum. And I was still annoyed at him. ‘I’ve got other stuff to do. You can go on your own.’
‘I can’t do that.’
‘Yes, you can. Just put on your big boy pants and go.’
‘No, I mean I don’t want to go without you. We’re a team.’
‘Since when are we a team? I thought I was a contractor. That’s what you’re paying for, right? Well, not that you’re paying me anything at the moment…’ Even as I was ranting I knew I sounded irrational, but it seemed harder to stop it than to let it out.
Elias stood up. I wasn’t sure if he was just going to walk off, or what. But then he held out his hand to me. ‘You need a chai.’
I just stared at him. He reached into his pocket and produced his wallet. Opened it up and plucked out a bundle of notes, folded neatly together. Flipped through to count the total. ‘Seventy five. Is that okay to start? I can get you the rest when we hit an ATM. And seriously, you need a chai.’
I had no idea what the heck a chai was, but I was too tired to argue. And, come to think of it, I hadn’t eaten anything all day. I took the money and shoved it in my pocket, then started to collect my papers. Tried to think straight.
‘We won’t make it to any of their offices by five. But I got numbers. We can call. You can. I don’t talk to strangers on the phone.’
‘Okay.’ He seemed unfazed by my minor meltdown. ‘I’ll put my big boy pants on.’
24
Neither of the two friends that we spoke to over the phone had heard from Sephora in years. We couldn’t get through to any of the others. Elias was surprisingly okay about our failures.
‘We’ll try the rest tomorrow. You want to go get something to eat?’
It was late-night shopping and the Plaza was busy—too busy—but I was hungry so I didn’t complain. Until Elias got excited about sale signs in the windows.
‘I love their T-shirts. Can we check it out? Just two minutes, I promise.’
I endured the first two clothing stores but drew the line at a third. ‘I thought we were here to eat.’
‘We will. But shopping’s fun too, right?’<
br />
I didn’t have to answer. The look on my face did that. Clothes shopping was bad enough, but I was conscious of the fact that I’d slept on the floor and not showered. I felt unkempt, and not in a fashionable way. Elias was in his comfort zone. I was completely out of mine.
He’d spotted something in a shop window. ‘Ooh. I’ve been thinking about trying the bow-tie look. What do you think? Maybe dress it down with some distressed skinny jeans…Is that too obvious?’
I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. This outgoing Elias, gleefully wallowing in ironic metro pretentiousness, was nothing like the one I’d confided in last night. Was this the real Elias? Or was this some sort of fake-extrovert persona he put on? I couldn’t tell. It seemed impossible that he could legitimately be both. I felt comfortable with the other Elias. I wasn’t sure I could even tolerate this one.
Also, my stomach felt like it was eating itself. I shoved my hand in my pocket, checking I still had the money he’d given me. ‘I’ll be in the food court.’
I was perfectly happy to leave him behind, but he caught up with me straight away. Followed me to the food court. ‘What do you feel like?’
‘I can buy myself something.’
‘What did I do?’
I knew exactly what he was talking about, but feigned ignorance. ‘What?’
‘You don’t like me all of a sudden.’
‘Not really.’
‘Why not?’
I didn’t know how else to articulate it so I seized on the most tangible thing I could. ‘A bow tie? Really? And seriously, you’ve just spent ten minutes straight looking at shirts that are pretty much identical. Just buy one already.’
‘Why can’t I care about clothes?’
When he put it like that, it made me seem petty, and weirdly controlling. And why should I care what he wore, anyway? He wasn’t my boyfriend, or even really a friend. I should just let him do what he wanted. It wasn’t any of my business.
I shrugged. ‘You’re right. Go for it. I’ll be here.’
A matching shrug from him. ‘All good. I don’t really need anything new anyway.’
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