Double Exposure (8 page)

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned …

As she turns the corner a few blocks further on, she can hear the sound of a siren. Her final backwards glance catches the blue and red lights of an emergency vehicle reflected in the black mirror of the wet road.

*

Chris's story

I answered the door at half past one in the morning and she was standing there like a drowned stray, rain pouring from her hair, clothes soaked.

‘Abby?' I asked. It was a reflex. Cain always reckons dumb rhetorical questions are my standard response to surprise.

‘I hear you're looking for a model,' she said and walked past me into the room. ‘Make me a cup of coffee and we can discuss terms.'

Part Two
Drawing From Life

A true work of Art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.

- Michelangelo

Fourteen
Someday I'll be Saturday night …

Cain's story

It was three in the afternoon. She answered the door when I knocked, dressed in an oversized blue tee-shirt – and not much else.

‘Forget your keys?'

I stood there in the doorway, staring at her in disbelief. Her hair was wet from the shower and the water had soaked into the shirt, darkening the material down her back and across her shoulders and breasts.

‘It's you,' I said dumbly and watched the slight frown pass across her forehead.

‘Who were you expecting? Mother Teresa?' Those familiar eyes were staring a challenge. I couldn't look away.

‘No … I … I mean, I recognise you. From your picture. I …' Suddenly the confidence drained from her face.

‘Chris, you're scaring me. What are you talking about?'

After eighteen years of mistaken identities, you'd think I'd be used to it, but this time, standing face to face with her in my brother's doorway, I was unprepared. I'd stared at her image so often it didn't occur to me that we'd never actually met.

‘I'm sorry. Of course you wouldn't know. I'm not Chris. I'm his twin brother, Cain.'

I put my hand out, but instead of shaking it she looked me up and down, sussing me out.

‘Yeah, right. Look, I appreciate your help last night, but if you've changed your mind, just say so. I don't need any more bullshit in my life right now.'

I moved past her into the living area. The sofa bed was open and her clothes were laid neatly on the arm of the chair. I turned towards her. She hadn't moved from the doorway, but her eyes had followed me.

‘Seriously,' I went on, trying to break through the suspicion that masked her face. ‘People mistake us all the time. Have done all our lives. You mean he didn't tell you?'

She closed the door but kept her distance, wary, ready to react.

‘It was late,' she said. ‘We didn't talk much.'

I'll bet …

The thought surfaced, but then it dawned on me. The sofa bed was open. She'd slept in the lounge room …

I looked at her more closely.

‘You're the girl from the picture. I mean –'

‘What picture? If you mean the photos, he takes, I guess –'

‘I mean, “the picture”. Don't tell me he didn't show you.'

‘He didn't show me shit. I told you, it was late. I was in trouble and I couldn't think of anywhere else to go. He'd given me his address once and I needed a place to chill for a while. He gave me a bed and I went to sleep. When I woke up he was already gone.'

‘Then I came.'

‘Then you came.'

I moved towards the curtain.

‘I think you should see this.'

There's something inherently theatrical about a curtain. You can't just pull it back without it seeming like a flourish. She moved towards the opening and stepped past me, brushing deliberately against my arm as she passed. She smelled like shampoo.

Once inside, she stopped. Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. She was staring at the pair of pictures on the end wall and as I moved in beside her I caught the whisper.

‘Holy Christ …'

She moved forward a couple of steps, then stopped again.

‘He wasn't kidding. He really is … He really does …'

The pictures stared down at us. Two halves of the same whole. The sinner and the saint. The wary and the benevolent.

I looked at her looking up at herself and in that moment she was neither. No hard shell, no benign confidence. Just a young girl, seeing herself for the first time as he saw her, when he looked beneath the surface to the heart of things.

My brother the artist.

And I think I finally understood the passion that drove him to create.

Twenty minutes later I had the whole story.

‘Do you know what it's like, turning up to school every day, trying to pretend that everything's normal, when you know what's waiting for you at home? Trying to convince yourself that there's some purpose to doing your frigging … algebra, when all the time, all you can think of is …' Her eyes slid shut and she shook her head, as if to dislodge a lingering memory.

I wanted to reach out and touch her shoulder, to offer some kind of comfort, but she opened her eyes and my hand stopped halfway, hanging in the air like an unanswered question. She stared at it and I let it drop.

‘So one day I nearly killed him,' she went on, almost matter-of-factly. ‘He was lying there in his bed afterwards and I'd just come out of the shower. I'd scrub myself raw every time and stand there under the water until it ran cold, but it was no use. I still felt … dirty. Like there wasn't enough water in the whole world to wash off the filth.

‘He hadn't even bothered to cover himself and I wanted to throw up. Then this detached feeling came over me, like I was standing outside myself, watching.

‘I went down to the kitchen and picked the biggest, sharpest knife in the block. I remember standing there selecting it. I ran my finger along the blade and it sliced the skin like paper, but I didn't feel a thing. It wasn't me. I was just an observer. I wasn't a part of my own body.

‘I walked back up to the bedroom and stood over him, staring down at him. At it. And there was absolutely no emotion. His head had fallen back and he was snoring. His whole neck was exposed. All I had to do was draw the blade across his throat and it would be over. But it wasn't worth it. I stabbed the knife into the plasterboard above the bed-head and left the room.'

As she described the action, her hand formed a fist and she rehearsed the stabbing motion, but I don't think she was aware of it.

‘Before he woke, I packed a bag with some clothes and a few things of my mother's and left the house for good.'

She paused, then looked up at me. I don't know if she was waiting for me to say something comforting and supportive, but at that moment I couldn't think of anything that didn't sound completely inadequate.

‘I guess the knife in the wall had the desired effect,' she continued eventually. ‘He didn't come looking, or if he did he never found me.'

The question that had been troubling me finally found its way out.

‘If you ran away to escape … what he was doing to you, how come you … you know …'

‘Started turning tricks?'

Straight out. No subtle playing with words. She stared straight at me, daring me to look away. Which I did.

When I looked back, she was still staring, waiting. I nodded. My mouth was dry.

She went on.

‘You ever listen to Bon Jovi, Cain? ‘Street-life ain't much better, but at least I'm getting paid.' My mother had an old copy of
Cross Road.
I almost wore it out when I was a kid. I could feel then. Actually feel. Emotions. Pain. Love.

‘But at some point you have to stop feeling. You learn to distance yourself from what's happening to your body. Like it's happening to someone else. It's a survival technique and I learned it young. If you can disconnect from the emotions, the physical act can't touch you. If you can't, you end up like Tess.'

‘Tess?'

‘One of Sal's other girls. You see, Tess never learned the trick. She lives through it every time. And it's killing her. She wears these lace gloves so she doesn't have to touch the johns and she drinks to kill the feeling. But it doesn't work. Nothing works. I found that out when I was fourteen.

‘But remove the emotion and it's just physical. There's no shame, because it's not you they're doing it to. It's your body. It's a service industry, like waiting tables or cleaning houses.'

‘But what if you actually cared for someone? I mean …'

She laughed then.

‘You mean love? Carve your initials in a heart, chocolate and roses, romantic walks in the moonlight? That kind of thing? Who knows? Maybe it's possible. Maybe not. But I doubt it. Everything's a trade-off. Anyway, the whole discussion's pointless at the moment. After last night, I think I'll be needing a new job.'

She looked up at the pictures one last time, then turned away.

‘Maybe I'll become a supermodel.'

As I watched her move back through the curtain into the living area, I wasn't really sure that she was joking.

*

Eight-thirty.

Abby is cooking dinner when he comes in. She turns towards him and catches the expression, before he smiles unconvincingly to hide it.

‘What is it?' She removes the frypan from the burner and turns off the heat.

No answer. He drops the newspaper onto the table and slides into one of the chairs, without taking his eyes from her. His expression is impossible to read.

‘What?' A sudden dread is tightening in her chest. She moves across and picks up the paper, sitting down to read the headline.

Bashed to death

Salvatore Princi, described by police as ‘a well-known underworld identity', was found in the early hours of this morning bashed to death on a busy Sydney street. Responding to an anonymous phone-call, police discovered Princi's body lying on the kerb in William Street. Homicide squad detective Alan Pollock says that police are following a number of strong leads and that investigations are centring on known associates of the victim …

Her head is shaking in disbelief. She looks up and catches a slight hesitation in his expression. Just a moment, but definitely there.

‘He fell …' His eyes are searching her face for clues. She can feel the doubt as a physical force. ‘I didn't … What do they mean, “bashed to death”? He hit his head as he fell. He was drunk. He just lost his balance …'

Even to her own ears the words sound desperate. An excuse. A story.

‘Chris? You believe me, don't you?'

Still he doesn't speak. His eyes haven't left her face and she feels the sudden anger rising.

‘Screw you!' The words explode as she stands, knocking over the chair. Her hands are fists beneath her, as she leans forward over the table. ‘You don't know me and you weren't there, so don't go judging …'

His gaze is piercing but gentle. He reaches out and touches her cheek – lightly, the merest brushing of the fingertips – and as suddenly as it came, the anger dissipates.

‘I didn't do it,' she finishes weakly.

‘I know,' he replies.

Fifteen
Emotional harmonics

The stairwell is deserted, except for the smell of soiled nappies and stale cooking. T.J. pauses at the foot of the final flight and looks up. The once-familiar door is directly above her, its chipped white paintwork scarred by years of abuse, like the skin of a leper's face.

You can do this. Quit being such a wuss for once. You have to do this …

Her foot takes the first involuntary step, and she follows it up the stairs.

There is no reaction to her tentative knock and she pauses, fighting the urge to turn and run.

Get a grip …

In her mind she rehearses her lines, like a first-time actor at an audition.

Leave us alone. It's over, so just accept it.

If you come near him … If you so much as touch a hair, I swear I'll kill you.

I'll do it. I mean it. You don't scare me any more. And you don't have any part of his life, so stay away …

In the security of her bedroom, it had sounded so much stronger. In the security of her bedroom, she had convinced herself she could do it. Front the lion in his own den; conquer her fears and end it once and for all. But now, with only the thin barrier of the door between them, the bogus courage is dissipating.

You have to do this. For Ty …

She knocks again, louder this time.

‘Ian, open up!'

Silence. She imagines her words echoing impotently inside the empty cave of the unit.

Again she hammers her fist against the scarred paintwork, more in frustration than hope.

‘Bastard!' she shouts. A cry of frustration and relief. Then she repeats the word in a whisper, as the tension drains from her, and she turns from the door towards the stairs.

‘You got that right.' The voice belongs to a middle-aged woman, standing a few steps below her on the staircase. She is stocky and sweating in the afternoon heat. ‘Total bastard. Did a moonlight a week ago. Owes me a month in arrears. Bond won't cover it, though. He left the place in a shambles. Friend of yours?'

T.J. shakes her head and moves past her down the stairs.

‘If you see him, tell him I want me money.'

The words follow her, as she makes her way out into the sunlight.

If you see him …

The last of her confidence has drained away, and she looks around her. He could be anywhere, watching her, waiting for his moment.

If you see him …

What if you don't?

*

Cain's story

I was almost at the corner when Dusan pulled his SX in to the kerb next to me. The compulsory techno was thumping like a manic heartbeat from the pair of fifteen-inch, box-mounted subs, which took up most of his boot-space.

‘Need a lift?'

He didn't wait for an answer. He leaned over to open the passenger door and I nodded gratefully. I was running late for once and it was a long walk to Stocklands. In the eighteen months or so since he'd moved in across the street, Dusan had owned three different cars – and wrecked two – but given the choice of risking death and dismemberment or the long walk on a hot day, well … I mean, how much trouble could he get into in a fifty zone?

‘Thanks,' I said, sliding into the seat and struggling with the racing harness. It clicked in just as Dusan hit the gas. The tyres protested as he took the corner, ignoring the give-way sign and moving through the gears, accelerating towards the steep hill on Edensor Road.

‘I met your brother Chris last night,' he said, turning the volume down a touch on the console, so that the decibel level was only deafening instead of life threatening.

He had a can of Coke between his legs and he paused to take a swig, slipping it back into place in time to change down, switching to the wrong side of the road to overtake an old man in a smoking Kingswood.

No two panels on the ancient car were the same colour and it was struggling to make the hill. The old man glared at me as we sped past, like something was my fault. Guilt by association. I shrugged, but by then I was watching the old Holden disappear in the wing mirror.

‘I took Helen to Inferno and he was clearing the glasses,' Dusan shouted over the music. ‘I thought it was you, so naturally I insulted him. You didn't tell me he worked there.'

‘Sometimes,' I replied, ‘when he needs the money, but it's not a regular thing anymore. He's too busy. He's getting his shit together for one of the galleries. If they show him, he's on his way. If he ever decides he's ready, that is.'

He double-clutched down and turned into Allambie, missing the pedestrian island by millimetres, then slowing for the school zone. At the crossing, the woman with the lollypop sign stepped imperiously into the centre of the road and we rolled to a stop.

A stream of little kids in uniform surged across.

‘There was a girl there with him. Sitting on one of the bar stools, watching him work. Annie, I think. Something like that. Looked a bit young for Inferno, but she was a fox. Sensational eyes.'

‘Abby?' I corrected him.

‘Yeah, that's right. Abby. You know her?'

‘You could say that. A lot of guys could say that.'

It was an aside, a thought that had slipped out unintentionally and I glanced at Dusan with a look that I hoped neutralised the words. He didn't push it.

‘She just sat there and watched him as he worked. Like she was studying him. You never said he had a girlfriend.'

‘She's not his girlfriend.'

Was the reply too abrupt? I went on speaking to cover it.

‘She's a temporary … room-mate. She needed a place to crash for a few days and if you knew Chris … Well, let's just say he's always been an easy mark for strays and charity cases.'

His eyes lit up.

‘No kidding? Well, tell her she can room with me anytime. She's hot.'

The stream of kids thinned gradually. A lone straggler hurried across, hauling his huge bag behind him like an afterthought. The lollypop woman looked at Dusan, nodded and stepped back towards the kerb. He blew her a kiss, eased the car gently over the speed hump and accelerated away.

‘What about Helen?' I asked.

He smiled, arching his eyebrows in a typical Dusan expression.

‘Dude, I don't think she's Helen's type.'

When he dropped me off at Hoyts, T.J. was waiting for me. She looked nervous. I kissed her and she held me close.

‘I went around to Ian's place. I wanted to face him. To end it once and for all … Cain, he's moved out. Disappeared. No one knows where he is.'

I put my arm around her and moved her inside.

‘That's
good
, isn't it? After Chris's little
kufu do
demonstration, he probably got scared. Maybe he's found his vocation, shovelling shit in Townsville. But you shouldn't have –'

‘I wish I could believe that, Cain. I really do, but … It's not like him to just give up. I mean … Hell, I don't
know
what I mean. He's crazy. You never know what he's going to do. It's like …'

‘Waiting for the other boot to drop?' I was trying to ease the tension, but she didn't get it.

Dave was sweeping up a popcorn spill in front of the candy bar. He smiled at us as we passed, but T.J. was somewhere else. She walked past him like he was invisible. I shook my head in a gesture of apology. He shrugged and carried on sweeping.

*

T.J.'s story

When I was five, I got lost in K-Mart.

One minute I was holding my mother's skirt, the next I was moving towards the toy shelves, and when I looked around she was gone. I don't suppose it was more than a couple of minutes in real-time, but terror-time doesn't obey the same rules. By the time she found me and hugged the tears away, I was convinced I'd lost her forever.

A common enough experience, I guess, but it's one of my earliest memories and it's as vivid as if it happened yesterday. Not so much the fear itself, as the sense of emptiness and loss that reinforces the fear. Like … emotional harmonics.

Or like one of those viruses that sit inactive in your system until something happens to release them and they come back with all their past ferocity to add their weight to whatever else is happening.

When I told her about Ian's disappearance, my mother tried to put a positive spin on it, just as Cain did later, but it was too late. All the old feelings were already rising and I was a five-year-old kid again, looking down an endless aisle with no one in sight that I knew and an empty terror settling into the pit of my stomach.

Which was why I found myself at Hoyts, with Cain's arm around me and a cup of coffee on the table in front of me, pouring out my fears to a small group of the others. It was almost time for the shift-change and they were sitting around the table offering moral support and making all the right noises, but it was Cain's touch I needed most.

When Amy came out to give them the compulsory hurry-up, Shamerin ran the backs of her fingers down my cheek, like a big sister offering tactile support, and in a weird reversal of roles Leonie winked at me and flashed an encouraging smile.

‘Don't worry, Teej,' she whispered, as she leaned in to kiss me. ‘If he shows his face around here, we'll gang-tackle him and beat the crap out of him right here in the foyer.'

Hearing Cain's words in her mouth made me smile in spite of myself, but the empty feeling remained.

For the rest of the afternoon, instead of heading for TAFE I called Thi and asked her to make up an excuse, and I stayed at the table in the coffee-shop, with the activity of the cinema all around me, drinking a steady stream of discount coffees, exchanging a few stolen words with the guys as they moved about their work, and watching the endless loop of coming attractions on the foyer trailer-screen until I knew every word.

*

Nine o'clock.

The key scratches inside the lock, the door swings inward and Chris steps into the living area, shrugging off his jacket and hanging it on the hook behind the door.

Abby looks up from the art book she is half-reading, but she doesn't speak straightaway. She is watching him, trying to interpret his body language.

He has paused with his back to her, staring at the jacket and drawing a deep breath.

‘Did you find her?' she asks finally.

‘She's disappeared.' He turns to face her. ‘I asked around, but no one's seen her since that night.'

She shifts on the lounge, curling her legs up underneath her and allowing the book to slide down onto the cushion next to her.

‘Did you talk to Carla?'

‘Eventually. She wasn't exactly cooperative at first, but when I showed her your ring, she opened up. It's like you expected. None of the other girls saw anything. The cops are all over the street and she says they were asking particularly about you and Tess.'

‘Now there's a surprise.' She seems unnaturally calm. He watches her face for a sign of the tension she should be feeling, but he can see nothing.

‘What do you mean?' he asks.

‘They found him dead on our pitch and we're both missing. It's not exactly rocket science.'

He picks up the book, closes it and places it onto the coffee table, then he sits down beside her and touches her knee. It is an intimate action and its significance is not lost on her. Something is wrong.

Other than a manslaughter rap, you mean?

She forces down the inner voice. He is tracing the figure on the book-cover with his finger. A Waterhouse. Pandora on her knees, opening the forbidden box.

‘Carla told me something else. Apparently, they're telling people they've found the murder weapon. That they sent it away for forensic testing.'

‘Murder weapon? But –'

‘That's what she said.'

‘But there
was
no weapon. I told you. He tripped and hit his head on the bin. How could they have …? What kind of weapon? Did she say what kind of weapon?'

Chris shakes his head. His hand is still on her knee and he squeezes gently, a tiny gesture of comfort.

‘She didn't know.'

‘What the hell's going on? I mean, it doesn't make any sense.'

The mask of calm has slipped now and for once she looks her age. Barely more than a child. He speaks to reassure her.

‘Maybe it's a bluff. Let out a bit of false information and see who bites.'

‘Nice try, Chris, but you watch too much TV Something's wrong. I can feel it.'

‘Maybe …' He hesitates, swallowing hard, as if the words are sand in his mouth. ‘Maybe it's time to think about turning yourself in. It was an accident. Self-defence. They know his record. It wouldn't even get to court.'

She pulls away from his touch, standing and moving towards the door.

‘Are you willing to bet my life on that? Look, Chris, if you're getting cold feet, I understand. Just say the word and I'll leave. I don't want –'

‘For Christ's sake, Abby!' He stands to face her. ‘I told you. You can stay here for as long as it takes, but think for a minute. It's not going to go away. How long do you think you can hide out here? Another week? A month? Six months? You didn't do anything wrong. He was a sleaze and he died. Where's the great loss? He got what he deserved. They'll find Tess eventually and she'll tell them exactly what happened. Then it'll all be over.'

Slowly she moves back towards the lounge. He pushes the hair back from her face and kisses her cheek. Gently. Like the brother she never had.

‘Think about it?'

She nods slightly.

‘I'll think about it.'

Then she leans forward to kiss him, pressing her body hard against him and probing his lips with her tongue. She feels his body respond, but then he pulls away.

‘You don't have to. I didn't take you in for that … reason. There are other ways …' His face is flushed and his breathing is uneven.

She closes the gap between them.