‘It’s someone who changes all the time. Someone you can’t rely on.’
‘Mercurial.’
‘What?’
‘The same thing as fickle.’
‘Where do you get these words?’
‘You don’t have to look that one up.’
He takes a breath. ‘Anyway, I thought the last thing a
real cop
should be is fickle. I thought, if I’m gunna be any sort of a cop I should be one who can be relied upon – that’s what it’s about, right?’
‘I would have thought so.’
‘So …’ he pauses, and pulls an expression of annoyance, as though she’s forced this reasonableness upon him, ‘you can rely on me.’
Rebecca twists her lips and eyes him. ‘Super.’
His face goes red. She leaves him stewing a moment.
‘Starting now?’ she offers.
‘I know,’ he says defensively. ‘I haven’t begun the best way ever. I didn’t know I’d come back to this. I feel like I haven’t had a chance to … find my feet. Everyone at the academy said not to work in your hometown.’
‘So why did you?’
‘I dunno. I suppose I wanted to show I’d changed. I wasn’t gunna crash into power poles any more.’ He glances across at her. ‘Anyway, I want to start again, and I wanted to start first with you, because …’ he shrugs, ‘I know what it’s like to have everyone think a certain way about you.’
She says, ‘Did you go up and visit Aden at the hospital?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Are you friends with him now because of your dad and Kara?’
‘I’m not on the take, if that’s what you’re getting at.’ He shoots her a frustrated look. ‘We never were. Dad’s relieved. As soon as Aden goes he can shut down Nigel properly. Nigel only gets close to people so he can have them pull strings for him. He knew years ago Dad was seeing Kara. Before anyone knew. He caught Dad and Kara up at the old rec reserve,
three
years ago. Nigel never told Aden that.’
‘Did you tell Aden about that?’
‘Yeah. I told him Nigel watches people, and then works out who’s worth knowing. Dad’s just waiting for Aden to get some distance, for Kara’s sake, and then Nigel’s
gone
. But don’t say anything. If Nigel knows he’ll clear out the house and warn the Cummings.’
‘I won’t say anything,’ Rebecca says.
She asks after a moment, ‘Did Aden tell you I’m going away with him? We’re going around Australia. And then he’s going to take me to America.’
Luke falls quiet. They travel in silence.
Rebecca says, to break the lull, ‘Do you drive this slow cause you’re worried you might have an accident?’
‘Shit, Rebecca …’
‘It’s just a question.’
He wants to take her all the way home, but Rebecca thinks the town centre is close enough. ‘I don’t trust you on that dirt road,’ she teases, with the door still open. She leans down with one hand on the roof and looks in at him. His expression is crestfallen. ‘But I can see your skills on blacktop are greatly improved.’
‘Let me take you home.’
‘I don’t think so.’
He goes to speak, but stops himself.
‘Is it really my driving?’ he says as she shuts the door.
Rebecca stands back from the car and gives him a wave.
Kiona is empty of shoppers. It’s getting late. Rebecca steps up onto the footpath. The heat of the day is easing with the light. She stops by the shop and gets a can of Coke, sits out the front to drink it. The plastic chair is split and pinches the soft skin at the back of her legs. She pulls her knees up. A cool breeze moves through town. The table umbrella flutters.
She thinks about Zach, wonders what he’s up to, where he’s at. He’s suddenly so absent, from everything. Even in her head there’s a void where her usual Zach Kincaid thoughts would normally be. She suspects he’s changed a lot. He cleaned up Aden’s blood for her that night. He tidied her house. She came home from the hospital in the early hours of the morning to find the glass swept away, the bookshelf straightened, the blood-soaked magazines in the bin and the curtain rod back up in its bracket. He’d not stopped there, though – he’d pushed in chairs, stood up ornaments, hung the fallen picture and straightened the mats. It’s possible his aunty came across and did it, but Rebecca feels in her heart it was Zach – his way of saying sorry, how if he could he’d put things right. No word after that, though. No sighting of him whatsoever. And the sense it might stay that way for quite a while.
Rebecca can’t help but admire his style in dropping so resolutely off the radar. He’s done it with aplomb. It’s something only well-known people can do – otherwise it’s just as though you’re shamed and resigned to your lonely life. The Kiona youth spend their days talking about the things they used to do with Zach – as though this equates to an insider’s grasp on the current situation. All the while their eyes are peeled, wanting to be the first to spot him – not necessarily so that they can welcome him back into the fold and ease his discomfort, but so they get the chance to say, with nonchalance,
Oh yeah, I’ve seen Zach; haven’t you
? Small-town celebrity. Not all it’s cracked up to be. At least Rebecca doesn’t have to deal with the pretence. There’s something to be said in knowing that those people who seek out your friendship must actually want to be your friend. Rebecca puts her empty drink can in the ashtray beneath the table. She smiles ruefully to herself – the downside being, if Luke Redman is the only person who wants to be your friend … then Luke Redman is all you get.
The town is quiet except for the drift of music from the garage up ahead. The sign above the open barn-style door reads
Newman’s Garage
. Rebecca walks towards it. The music winds up the street. There is a single fuel bowser out the front. Even from out on the footpath she catches the scent of the interior – diesel, grease and engine oil. She can imagine the congealed dust that collects under the edges of the benches, in any gap and in every corner. She knows the oily film that finely coats every doorknob and every tool. There’s no real way to clean it off. She gets closer and sees a section of concrete floor within the door. It’s covered with oil spills in varying degrees of age.
Rebecca draws level with the place, peers in the office window. And she’s sprung. A young woman is standing on the other side of the glass with a toddler on her hip. Rebecca and the woman are less than a metre apart. They look directly into each other’s eyes. The woman’s gaze registers surprise, as Rebecca’s must, but her startled look doesn’t fade – it deepens. Rebecca’s seen the woman around town: she works at the hairdresser’s, or owns the salon, maybe. She stands out in the town because she is so normal. Her hair is always cut in the latest style. She’s always nicely dressed. She looks dishevelled today, though. Her cheeks are flushed and her top is twisted around at the waist. The toddler’s face is red and streaked with tears. There’s a baby in a pram by the desk. The office door is shut.
At the main garage entrance, Rebecca looks in.
It’s one of those sheds with doors at either end so there’s vehicle access right the way through. The rear roller doors are open. The backyard is a parking area for cars and utes either waiting to be fixed or ready to be picked up. The workshop is brighter than Rebecca expected, and cleaner too … or maybe it’s just neat. Tools line the walls in order of size. Tins and cans of lubricants and sprays are spaced evenly along the shelves. Even the chains hanging from the pulleys fall with a kind of symmetry. Rebecca slows her steps. The radio is tuned to a commercial station; INXS is playing.
The man who helped her at Nigel’s house walks out from a caged-in area within the shed. He is wiping his hands on a dirty rag. He stops when he sees her. The light falls in such a way that Rebecca can’t make out his expression. The way he pulls up short causes her to falter. She feels guilty for coming to his place of work – it’s as though she’s stalking him.
The woman steps into view on the other side of the workshop. She has come out through the back door of the office and stands in the shadows. She looks across at the man and then looks at Rebecca. The toddler is clinging to her side.
Rebecca feels the need to explain. ‘Oh, hi,’ she says turning to face them. ‘I’m sorry.’
The man starts forward again. ‘Hello again,’ he says. His voice is still kind, but now with an added courteous clip. He stops midway across the workshop, looks at the woman.
‘I wanted to say …’ Rebecca begins. But she doesn’t know what she wanted to say. She doesn’t know why she’s here. She wishes he’d say something.
The woman swings her gaze to her husband. He rubs his hands on the rag.
He turns and smiles at Rebecca. ‘Good to see you got away from Nigel’s. That place should have a danger sign out the front.’
A middle-aged woman walks in from the backyard. She is rolling a tyre through the open doors. Her head is down. She has on overalls and workboots. It’s startling to see a lady her age dressed as she is. Oil stains cover the knees of her pants. Her shirtsleeves are rolled up. Her fingers, gripping the tyre, are blackened and broad. A girl dances along beside her. She skips and holds her pleated skirt out wide. ‘Grandma …’ she is saying, ‘like this?’ The older woman looks up. She sees Rebecca, slows and straightens. She rests the tyre against her leg and looks at the man. The girl keeps skipping.
It’s pretty obvious that mother and son stand before Rebecca. There’s similarity there. The middle-aged woman doesn’t look to be hired help, and neither does the man.
He says, ‘I saw Rebecca when I dropped the reconditioned pump in for Nigel Fairbanks last week.’
‘Oh, right,’ the older lady says. She rolls the tyre on. She glances at Rebecca from beneath her brow. ‘How are you?’
‘Hello.’
‘You had a big couple of days.’
Rebecca shrugs. She swallows.
The older lady looks across at the man. The three adult family members stand in a triangle, a couple of paces apart from one another. They’re perhaps aware of how bunched together – grandmother, son, wife, kids – they’d form an idyllic family picture, and that would only be a smack in Rebecca’s face.
‘Hello,’ the skipping girl says. She comes forward. ‘Do you like my shoes?’
Rebecca angles her head to see them.
‘They’re for dancing,’ the little girl says. ‘They’re Grandma’s tap shoes.’
‘But they look brand new.’
The girl looks down with fresh appreciation.
The grandmother says wryly, ‘Yes, I didn’t get a lot of wear out of them.’
‘The tap bits are gone,’ the girl states.
‘Does that make them all-round dancing shoes?’ Rebecca says.
‘Hey, that’s what they can be, Roxy.’
‘I knew that, Grandma. Without tap bits – that’s what they are.’
‘I see.’
‘Is your name Roxy?’ Rebecca asks.
‘Roxanne,’ the man clarifies.
‘That’s a rock-star name,’ Rebecca says.
Roxanne’s eyes sparkle. She does an impromptu dance on the spot. It’s a little like Dorothy out of
The Wizard of Oz
, but with some of the unbalanced sway of Chrissy Amphlett.
‘Okay, show-off,’ the younger woman says, ‘that’s enough.’
Roxanne turns away. She strides off to the office, walking in such a way so as to cause her skirt to swing.
Left in her wake, they are silent.
Rebecca says to the man, ‘I don’t know your name, sorry.’
‘Joe,’ he answers.
‘I wanted to say thank you, Joe, for helping me.’
‘I should have done more. I should have hit a couple of the bastards.’
The woman shifts and looks at the side of his face.
‘I thought about going back up there and doing exactly that.’
‘It’s fine,’ Rebecca says.
‘Either way,’ he murmurs, ‘they won’t be getting any work done here.’
His wife stays looking at him. She walks to him. She says quietly, ‘Maybe Rebecca could watch the girls sometime?’
The man doesn’t respond. He doesn’t seem able to look at his wife.
‘Do you need some part-time work?’ the older woman says to Rebecca. ‘Do you think you could handle Roxanne? She’s a handful.’
‘Sure. That’d be great,’ Rebecca says. ‘I’m saving up to go away with …’
She stops. She can’t say his name. It’s stuck fast in her throat. It’s a shock to discover there are situations in which Aden doesn’t fit. A bird flies through one end of the garage and out the other. Rebecca sees the toddler has stopped sniffling and is staring big-eyed at her. She’s a dark-haired pretty little thing. Joe takes his wife’s hand. He squeezes it. ‘We’d really like it, Rebecca, if you were able to babysit for us.’
‘Have you got my dad’s phone number? Or should I leave it for you?’
‘We already have it,’ Joe says.
The Newmans drive her home. It’s not the sort of car trip she’s used to. They own a big seven-seater vehicle, but it still feels squashed. Perhaps to test out Rebecca’s babysitting skills, they sit her between Roxanne and the newborn baby, Chloe. The middle girl, the toddler, is named Francesca; she’s not feeling well. She sits up the back beside her grandmother. Roxanne talks nonstop. She touches Rebecca’s clothes, hugs her around the waist and gets angry if Rebecca responds to the other family members’ questions. There’s a real risk of neck injury, Rebecca twists her head around so much. Chloe is strapped into a safety capsule. She waves her tiny arms and legs, keeps spitting her dummy out. Rebecca puts it back in, but Chloe coos and ejects it.
‘She doesn’t want it,’ Roxanne says with big-sister authority. ‘She doesn’t
always
have to have a dummy in her mouth.’
Joe and his wife laugh at this. ‘Roxanne,’ her mother says, ‘we told you that.’
‘Don’t encourage her,’ the grandmother says from up the back. Her voice is dry and deliberately churlish, as though she enjoys playing the matriarch. ‘You’ll regret it.’
‘Grandma,’ Roxanne says, ‘tell Rebecca how small
I
was when
I
was born.’
‘No, I will not. We’ve all heard quite enough about you.’
Roxanne looks up at Rebecca and rolls her eyes. ‘Grandma didn’t have toys when she was growing up,’ she whispers.
‘What is she saying, Rebecca?’
‘Nothing.’