Already Dead

by Jaye Ford

  Oh no. No, no.

  He sucked in a long, dragging breath.

  She tightened her hands on the wheel. ‘Brendan. No.’

  He pulled in another one – a loud, gulping rasp. She wanted to snatch the gun away from him. She wanted to see Zoe again. She clenched her teeth, kept her eyes on the road.

  The next sound made her jaw go slack. It wasn’t a deafening blast, it wasn’t shouting, nothing close to what she’d expected. It was an anguished sob.

  When she realised he wasn’t going to pull the trigger, when she could drag her eyes from the lane ahead, she saw his head bowed, his body slumped forward as though his chest had caved in, the curve of his spine shuddering. He was crying. Not a men-don’t-cry, holding-it-back kind of thing. Not a sniffling, hiccupping wailing, either. It was a heaving, silent, internalised agony.

  Jax glanced back and forth a couple of times, indecisive, anxious. Anyone else and she might have put a comforting hand on their sleeve, muttered soothing, empathetic words. But she wasn’t sure it wouldn’t have the wrong effect, wouldn’t make him rage at her or shoot himself. Maybe leaving him alone with his distress was her best option.

  Then the sound of it changed and she realised he was talking. Repeating something. She couldn’t make it out over the hum of the engine, didn’t know if it was to her or to himself but as she listened, as it droned on, she understood – the words, not the meaning behind them.

  ‘I didn’t know. I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t. Christ, I didn’t even know.’

  Was that what was stuck in his head? The it he couldn’t get out? Going round and round in his brain until he lost his hold on everything else. Fear and sympathy pounded in her chest as his repetitions got slower, fewer, finally petering out. Then he sat mute, staring through the windscreen. Or at it. Or at something in his mind.

  The rapport-building, the talking, the car games had all ended badly; there was no reason to believe desperate crying would be the forerunner to a better outcome. So she didn’t disturb his silence, just inched over the speed limit, unnerved by another pendulum swing of his mood but less terrified now he was finally still and quiet and the gun was resting in loosely curled fingers.

  The grey nomads were behind her again, still in the outside lane. Sedans, utes, people movers sped past on the right. The driver in the dark-blue sedan with the headlights on was still in her lane but had dropped back a bit. She didn’t blame him. She thought of her phone, wished she could reach it, talk to Zoe, hear her voice, tell her she loved her.

  She’d spoken to Tilda only moments before Brendan got in the car. It’d taken longer than Jax had expected to finish up at the house – more because of the pausing for memories than the actual packing – and she told her aunt it would be a couple of hours before she got to Newcastle. It might be another after that before Jax was overdue enough for Tilda to check on her – and Brendan had turned the phone off. Would Tilda think the battery was dead? Maybe it’d be three or four hours before her aunt started to worry. If Jax couldn’t stop, if she couldn’t get away, if she kept driving at 110 k’s, she’d be a long way from home by then.

  She glanced at the glove box. Could she convince Brendan to turn the phone back on? A suggestion to check Google Maps maybe, for destinations or directions or … Would he let her answer it if Tilda rang? What the hell would she say? It wasn’t a movie, there was no version of, I’ll be home late, don’t wait up, that Tilda would interpret as, I’m in trouble, call the police. Jax had lived with Tilda for two years after her parents died and on weekends for the two semesters she’d spent at Newcastle Uni – and until the last twelve months, their get-togethers had been haphazard and social. Her nickname was as close as they got to family code.

  The twin service stations must be close now. Jax checked the clock on the radio and felt a jolt of surprise. 5.12: she’d only been on the motorway fifty minutes. It felt like days. She was exhausted. Her top was wet under the arms and down her back, and the coffee she’d bought before she hit the Harbour Bridge was letting her know it would need a release before long. Not desperate yet but another near-miss and it might be an uncomfortable story.

  The last exit to the Central Coast came and went. Brendan didn’t move. Neither did the gun. Then she saw the sign she’d been waiting for. Big and blue, lots of symbols: petrol, food, coffee, toilets. Two kilometres.

  She waited until she could see it in the distance then took a breath, broke the silence. ‘There’s a service station up ahead. I need to stop.’ She figured if he flipped out, she could hit the accelerator, screech into the parking area, throw herself out and hope to God someone came to her rescue.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘I had a coffee before you got in. See?’ She tapped the plastic sipping lid on the cup in its holder, flicked the blinker and began to drift into the outside lane. ‘I need a bath room.’

  ‘No.’ Firmer.

  ‘The next stop is another forty minutes, at least. I can’t wait that long.’

  He angled his face to the left-side mirror, tension stiffening his neck. Behind them, the grey nomads were well back, the dark-blue sedan in the space between.

  ‘I can’t hold on much longer. We have to stop.’

  His breathing sharpened, his fist closed around the gun. The entrance was up ahead. She was taking it, whether he liked it or not.

  He didn’t try to stop her. Just watched the road and the mirror as she slowed on the entry road and bumped over a speed hump, her heart pounding as petrol bowsers came into view. There? Should she pull in there? Only two cars, no drivers pumping fuel or walking about. Up ahead was better. She knew the parking area – six or more rows of slots, cafes along two sides. She’d never seen it anywhere close to empty.

  As she passed the petrol station, Brendan did the front-and-back thing. Maybe he’d seen the dark-blue sedan. It had pulled off the motorway behind them and made her wonder briefly if Brendan was right and someone was after him, but the sedan turned towards the pumps.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Brendan asked.

  ‘There’s a cafe around the back. The toilets are clean and the food’s good.’ Organic produce for the health-conscious traveller.

  ‘No food. Drive in there.’ He pointed to the first lane, maybe wanting to make the decisions again. She didn’t mind, it was where she’d planned to go.

  Plenty of cars, a man and a woman walking towards the cafe, three bulky, twenty-something men walking towards them. She wanted to hit the button for the window, shout at the top of her voice. Not yet, she told herself. She was strapped into a seatbelt; she had to be able to move fast – and she needed protection, something solid she could throw herself behind.

  Choosing a slot between a chunky work ute and a family-size car, she searched for an escape route as she steered slowly in. If she stayed low when she threw herself out and kept below the passenger window while she ran, she might make it even if he fired the gun.

  She stopped nose-to-nose with a car in the next lane. Her fingers were on the door handle as she pulled the handbrake. She shifted her other hand to the seatbelt clasp, ready to release and run … then something warm and strong closed around her wrist.

  ‘You’re in this with me, Jax.’ Brendan’s grip held her arm in place; his voice made her raise her eyes to his. ‘It’s fate, remember. Your car was there. We do this together.’

  7

  Whatever had loosened inside him to make him sob had been screwed back on tight. There was no trace of tears now. What Jax saw in his eyes was flat, hard and unnerving.

  Her fingers were still on the door handle. She still had a chance. ‘Yeah, sure.’ She leaned away from him, tugged on her arm.

  It didn’t move. Brendan’s grip was a vice, crushing her flesh. He bent towards her, his face in her space, his voice low and measured. ‘We stay together. Do you understand?’

  She swallowed on the fear wedged in her throat. ‘Yes.’

  ‘When your belt is released, you climb across the
seat and get out my side.’

  ‘I won’t –’

  ‘I need to get home, Jax. We do this together. I can protect you. Okay?’

  She needed protection from him. ‘Okay.’

  ‘Unclip your belt. Leave your handbag.’ He kept his hand around her wrist as she lifted one knee then the other over the gearstick and shuffled across. ‘Wait,’ he ordered.

  Still holding her arm, the gun at the small of his back hidden from outside view, he stood, head above the doorframe, body moving as though he was scanning the car park. Jax did the same from inside, desperate for a way out, someone to shout to, a place to hide. The three young guys passed the rear window and kept walking. A woman in the next lane was helping two young children. At the cafe, the couple disappeared through automatic doors. There were more people in the car park but too far away to be of any use. The twenty-somethings were her best chance. But the kids were close. And Brendan had a gun.

  ‘Now.’ Brendan dragged on her arm, pulling as she clambered out beside him. He wasn’t as tall as she’d thought. She was a little above average, he was only half a head more.

  The sun was blazing in the west, filling the air with humid January heat. It felt sweet and clean after the stifled tension in the car. Jax squinted in the glare, swinging her head to look for the twenty-somethings. They were two cars past hers, opening doors: one on the driver’s side, two with their backs to her, all three with their heads down, balancing food as they pulled handles. She looked the other way. The kids were playing statues in the next lane, arms in the air, striking poses in the gap between the vehicles in front of Jax’s. A straight line from here to there. She imagined gunshots and small bodies bleeding on the tarmac. Christ, she couldn’t run that way. And the other direction, towards the young guys, meant getting around Brendan first.

  Then it didn’t matter which way she went. The pistol was pressed into the curve of her waist and she had no chance at all.

  He whispered in her ear, ‘Give me the keys.’

  She passed them.

  ‘The gun goes in my pocket but it stays in my hand.’ He raised his eyebrows at her. She nodded. ‘We walk together, like a couple.’ His grip on her wrist slid to her hand. It was strong and hot and crushing her fingers. He swung the car door shut, walked ahead of her to the lane, pulled her alongside with stiff-armed force, spoke quietly as they headed towards the cafe. ‘I wait for you while you go, then we come straight back out to the car. Okay?’

  She nodded again. A lie: it wasn’t okay.

  The car park had been her best chance and he’d taken it away. Up ahead, a man in a high-vis work shirt walked out through the automatic doors, aimed a ball of rubbish at a bin. Okay, there were people inside. She didn’t want anyone to get shot, she had to avoid that, but maybe she could create a diversion, whisper a message: I’m a hostage, call the police. And she was going to the bathroom. She’d used this one before – long sink, three or four cubicles, overhead windows. He couldn’t stay with her the whole time.

  The glass doors slid open and the smell of fresh coffee washed over her. There were tables on the left, most of them empty. Open fridges on the right, a single customer inspecting sandwiches. At the counter in front, the couple from the car park was placing an order. Jax took her sunglasses off and hooked them onto the front of her singlet top. She wanted her face on display, wanted someone to see the terror in her eyes.

  Brendan dropped his mouth to her ear. ‘Just keep your cool. You’re doing great. Great on the scale of no-one-will-pick-it.’ He winked.

  She wanted to be sick. Wished she could unclench her stomach enough to actually do it. That would cause a diversion.

  As Brendan walked her shoulder-to-shoulder through the centre of the cafe, she searched for faces, anyone looking her way. There were none. Every single customer ate or drank or stared at newspapers, phones, the distant horizon. Avoiding eye contact, like she did when she came in for a break from the driving. Brendan steered her past the counter as though he’d been here before too. Maybe he had. Maybe he preferred organic produce when he wasn’t thinking about killing himself.

  There were no doors to the restrooms, just a gap in the wall and left to the Men’s, right to the Ladies’. He turned right, marched her into the women’s bathroom, stood in the narrow corridor between the long sink and the cubicles and said, ‘Which one?’

  They were alone. All four doors were open. She walked to the one furthest from the exit. ‘I’ll meet you outside.’

  ‘You’ll meet me right here. I’m not leaving you alone.’

  ‘It’s the women’s toilets. You can’t stay here.’

  ‘I can stay where I like.’

  Yes, he could. The gun gave him permission.

  ‘Don’t be long,’ he said.

  She had to pee, for God’s sake. ‘I’ll take as long as I need,’ she snapped back. She pulled the door, turned the latch, looked up at the row of windows above. High and narrow. She’d have to stand on the seat, drag herself up by her fingers. And there was no point: the glass was reinforced with wire mesh. Bad. All bad.

  She heard footsteps on the other side of the door – Brendan pacing the corridor, stopping outside her cubicle. She shut her eyes, held squeezed fists in the air and clenched her teeth on a long, internalised scream. There was no escape here. No gaps under the doors she could belly-crawl through. No lipstick in her pocket she could write a note with. No keys to scratch a message. Tears filled her eyes as she sat. She gave in to them this time, her face crumpling, breath jagged, mouth open in a soundless wail.

  The crash on the door jerked her out of it.

  ‘Come on!’ he hissed. ‘We need to …’

  More footsteps: the click-clack of high heels.

  ‘Oh.’ A woman’s voice.

  ‘Yeah, sorry,’ Brendan said. ‘My wife’s sick. I want to make sure she’s okay.’

  Jax stood, yanked at her underwear. ‘No. I’m okay, I’m –’

  ‘Morning sickness,’ he said, talking over her. ‘Actually, all-day sickness.’ He laughed a little.

  ‘Oh, right. No problem. I’ll come back.’ Footsteps moving away.

  No, stay! Jax fumbled the lock, pulled the door, saw Brendan filling the space. Stepped past him in time to see the swirl of a floral skirt disappear around the corner.

  ‘It’s all right, she’s gone.’ He placed a firm, solid hand on her shoulder as he spoke.

  Shoving it off, she watched herself in the mirror as she washed trembling hands at the sink. She looked like shit. Pretty much the way she felt. Sweaty and dirty and panicky. She splashed her face with water, wiped mascara from under her eyes, their pea-green dulled and darkened by fear and exhaustion. She tugged the band from a shoulder-length mess of blonde hair and refastened it, pulling herself together, steeling herself for the next bit. Hoping there was a police tactical response team armed and waiting for them in the cafe.

  There wasn’t. It was just the same crew: eating, drinking, waiting, staring. She thought about shouting – and about the gun. She couldn’t duck, Brendan was holding her too tight; she didn’t want to get shot and she didn’t want to be responsible for a massacre. So she searched faces again, passed customers and staff, food in the fridges, three cappuccinos waiting to be collected. She wanted one. She wanted all three. And a stiff drink followed by a lie down.

  At least Zoe wasn’t here. She could be grateful for that.

  There was a smoker at the single table outside. A semitrailer blowing exhaust. A queue for the McDonald’s drive-through. Way down, in the slot where the three twenty-something guys had been, a man was talking on a mobile. As she walked beside Brendan, his arm holding her close to his side, she watched the man. He was between two vehicles, only head and shoulders above it – dark hair, sunglasses, collar and tie, phone to his ear. As they approached, his head turned and he faced them over the roof of a dark-blue sedan.

  Her pulse picked up. Was it the guy from the centre lane? The one who’d turned off the moto
rway behind her? Hope swelled in her chest – and an impulse to wave and shout. But Brendan’s hand was clutched firmly around hers and she remembered his words: rambled ones about people looking for them, about being a target.

  The guy lifted an arm and rested his elbow on top of the sedan. Jax couldn’t be sure where his eyes were behind the sunglasses but she fixed her own on him, willing him to see her desperation, hoping he wasn’t there to pick her off. Three cars from her own, another two from his, she watched as he pulled the phone from his ear, tapped the screen and laid it on the roof. He didn’t leave, made no move to walk away or open a door. He just turned his head left and right in a brief, casual glance around the car park, then back to her. Or Brendan. Or the lane they were in. Maybe he was waiting for someone in the cafe. Maybe he was waiting for another call.

  Definitely watching and waiting.

  She checked the parking area. There was no-one else in her lane, no-one in the next, no-one close enough to hear her if she shouted. The guy by the blue sedan was her last chance. Trained people who won’t stop, Brendan had said. He also thought he had nano spiders in his head. Was any of it real? Some of it? Which bits?

  As she passed the bumper of the car beside hers, the guy turned his face away. Forearm on the roof, phone still there – another person not wanting to make eye contact. Brendan steered her ahead of him between the two vehicles, pressed her back to the passenger door and released her hand to reach into his pocket for the keys. She looked to where the kids had played earlier. It was two car-lengths from here to the next lane. The gun was in his pocket. Could she make it?

  ‘We get in the way we got out.’ Brendan’s voice was in her ear and something hard pressed into her thigh. Glancing down, she saw he’d taken out the gun, was holding it low and out of sight as he fumbled the keys on her ring.

  No running, not with that there. Christ, she was going to end up back in the car with him. She took a brief glance over her shoulder, saw the guy by the blue sedan, his face turned towards them again. There was no mistaking it this time, even with the sunglasses. He wasn’t bored with waiting and casting his eyes around. There was no attempt to shift his attention when she saw him. Not anything like every other person she’d seen. He was watching them. Both of them. Taking in the whole scene as though he’d paid tickets to see it.