Please Don't Leave Me Here (34 page)

‘You sound funny. Are you all right?'

A pause.

‘Brig, are you still there?'

‘Matt?'

‘Yes?'

Silence.

‘Matt, if anybody asks, can you say I was with you last night?' Words she regrets as soon as they're out.

‘Tell me what's wrong.'

She grips the receiver tighter.

‘Brigitte, it doesn't matter what's happened. Just please come home.'

Home?

‘Tell me where you are, and I'll come and get you.'

‘It's OK. I just have something to do, and then I'll come.'

‘Brig?'

‘Yes?'

‘Di had her kittens this morning. I wish you could have been here.'

Cars drive by out on the road, just like every other day.

‘I don't think Lucy and Henry should go through with it,' she says.

‘What are you talking about?' he says, panic back in his voice.

‘The characters in your book — they should just run away together.'

A courier, with a package for reception, walks through the door, and a warm breeze blows the Christmas cards off the desk. She opens her mouth to tell Matt she's sorry, but it hurts to speak; her throat is too tight, and the words get stuck.

‘I'm coming to get you right now. Where are you?'

She doesn't want to hang up on him. But she does.

Now Nana. She clears her throat as she dials. Papa answers. ‘Where are ya, Brigi? Ya phone's not working. Been trying to find ya. Nana had another heart attack. She's in hospital. Not too good. Askin' for ya.' He sounds frantic.

The nurse is calling her.

‘OK, Papa. I've gotta go now, but I'll be there as soon as I can.' She hangs up.

The nurse pushes a box of tissues at her, and she takes one. It feels soft against her fingertips. The tissue box is covered with blue butterflies.
Sorry, Matt. Sorry, Nana.
The nurse ushers her into a cubicle area with a bench seat, and leaves her to change into a shapeless, disposable gown. A poster about safe sex is Blu-tacked to the wall. She folds up her clothes and places them in a neat pile on the seat. Still not too late.
Yes it is, Johnnie Walker. Yes it is.
Of all the women there for 8.00am, she's the last in line to be operated on. From her little cubicle, she can hear the sounds of surgical implements clashing around.

The nurse comes back to escort her to the operating theatre. Brigitte takes off the disposable gown and starts getting dressed.

‘What are you doing?' the nurse says.

‘I'm sorry. I've changed my mind.'

The nurse frowns.

Brigitte runs out through the waiting room, past the row of empty seats, the fish tank, and the reception desk, still buttoning her shirt.

She glances at her watch: 9.30. A tram slows for the stop out on the street. If she's quick, she'll make it. One of her heels gets caught in the tram track as she runs across the road. She bends to pick up her sandal, and doesn't see the blue, out-of-control Camry swerving into Wellington Parade.

Black.

Nana stands at the end of the operating table under the bright, cold theatre lights.

‘God, you scared me. I thought you were meant to be in hospital,' Brigitte says. ‘Is it over yet?'

‘Nearly.' Nana comes around and kisses her. Brigitte hears a monitor stop beeping. Hers? No, it's Nana's. How can that be?

Sweet voices of little children sing about the train whistle making a sleepy noise, the sunshine, and the day. There must be a kindergarten or school nearby.

Brigitte opens her eyes. Car tyres are going past slowly. Somebody is screaming. A siren howls. The nurse said the anaesthetic might cause hallucinations. The nurse? But she changed her mind.

The long, lonely wail of an air horn
.
The hiss of air brakes. A red-and-white Kenworth pulls up across the road, with ‘Dan Weaver' painted in swirly script on the door. Dan jumps onto the running board, young and strong and handsome. He crosses the road, his hand held out to help Brigitte up. Watch the traffic, Dad. He bends to pick up the yellow bunny rug from a pool of blood.

Warm blood flows down the insides of her legs. Where's her baby? Where's Matt? He said he would come and get her. Matt …

In her safe place, Brigitte feels the warmth, the rocking of the truck's motor.

Red.

Black.

Not going to make it to Morningtown, Dad. It's too far away.

Blank: everything broken, everything gone.

48

Dull electronic sounds ripple through the amniotic greyness in which she swims. It's warm and comfortable here, floating.

Blip, blip, blip.

She opens her eyes. The curtains are drawn around the bed. Kurt Cobain sits beside her.

‘What's going on?'

‘You tried to kill yourself.' He's lying. She loves her children; she would never do that. He's standing up and leaving.

‘Come back. Don't you leave me here!' she screams and tries to follow him, but she's hooked up to drips and monitors.

‘Shh. It's alright. I won't leave you,' says a deep, soothing voice from the greyness.

But she swims back down to Kurt. She hands him the red dog-collar and the key on the letter-J key ring. ‘I kept them safe like you said. I didn't lose them.'

Kurt puts the key into his pocket, but tells her to keep the collar.

‘Where's Matt?'

‘Not here.'

‘Can I stay and wait for him?'

‘Don't know. Might be a long time.'

‘I don't care. I have to tell him I'm sorry.'

‘We all have things we're sorry for. It's just life.'

Kurt fades away, turns into Sam, and Sam turns into Dan. Dan takes the red dog collar. ‘Here, boy.' Digger comes running, and Dan clips his collar back on. He takes Brigitte's hand and she walks with him, out of the hospital and along Degraves Street. Nana's a bit further up, holding a tiny baby swaddled in a yellow bunny rug. Brigitte wants to hold that baby, but Nana doesn't offer it to her.

‘You should let go, Brigi,' Nana says.

‘But Matt …'

‘No,' says Dan.

‘I can wait.'

‘Let go now. You can't leave your babies. They need you, and that's more important than something that never was.'

‘You left me!'

‘Let go now.'

A long bleep sounds in the greyness. And an alarm, the sharp scrape of a chair, footsteps running.

She lets go of her father's hand, forgives him.

***

Blip, blip, blip.

The sounds of muffled voices and echoes disturb the surface tension of the greyness.

Footsteps. Paper rustles. A scrape. ‘It's OK, mate. She's gunna pull through.' The deep, soothing voice is here again. Or still here?

‘Fuck.' Another voice, louder. ‘What happened? What'd she take?' Keys jangle.

A third voice, in a foreign accent, says, ‘Zoldipem, dextro-propoxyphene, diazepam, and — '

‘What?'

‘Sleeping tablets, painkillers, Valium. And alcohol. Large quantities. Lucky Detective Serra got there so quickly.'

‘Fuck,' says the one with the loud voice. There's another scrape, a thud.

‘We've pumped her stomach, had her on dialysis, and now she's getting fluids through the I.V.' It's the one with the foreign accent.

‘Fuck. God.'

‘She'll feel terrible when she wakes up.'

‘How long till she wakes up?'

‘Should be sitting up by this time tomorrow. Be home for Christmas,' says Foreign Accent.

An electronic alarm. Squeaky footsteps.

‘Where'd she get all that shit from?' Loud Voice says.

‘Had scripts for it all,' says Deep Soothing Voice. ‘From a dodgy bloke in Richmond who'd have had a visit from one of my mates by now. Reckon the AMA'll be having a chat with him soon.'

‘Fuck.' A sigh. More scraping. ‘Where're the twins?'

‘Campbells'.'

49

Motion. Not swimming. Flying? No, rolling. Wheels, echoes, bursts of light, grey amorphous shadows around, above. An alarm sounds, a telephone rings, a conversation is whispered.

Then the rolling stops, with a click, a jerk.

Crack: a blind furls up. Different shadows move around, attached to the two familiar voices — she recognises them now.

‘How come you've got no kids?' Ryan asks. He's here a lot.

‘Wife didn't want them,' Aidan says. He's always here. ‘Career more important.'

‘I hear you.'

‘Fair enough, though. Can't all want the same things.'

‘You wanted kids?'

‘Of course. That's why she fucked me off in the end.'

‘What?'

‘Nagging, I think she called it.'

‘You do come across as a persistent sort of bloke.'

Aidan's unfitting squeaky laugh. ‘One of the reasons.'

‘What else?'

‘Preferred architects to cops. And builders, electricians …'

‘How'd you find out?'

Another squeaky laugh, no answer.

A scrape. ‘I reckon Rosie's having an affair.'

‘Really?'

‘With a woman.'

‘Fuck.'

‘Wish we'd had more kids. Lucky Brigi's got two.' A sigh. ‘She
will
be OK, won't she?' Ryan says.

‘Yeah.'

‘Not like — '

‘It was just the drugs. Doc says she'll be fine.'

‘Thank God you were there.'

‘Nothing to do with God, mate.'

‘Wish she'd hurry and wake up.'

‘Soon. Just thought of something might help.'

‘What?'

‘Be back later.' Footsteps.

50

Wheels rattle past. A toilet flushes, water runs, a door opens and closes.

‘Back again? I thought cops didn't get time off.' Ryan. A scrape.

‘Been working. Finally closed that case.' Aidan.

‘Eric Tucker?'

‘Yeah. She didn't do it.'

A long pause, and then Ryan speaks softly, ‘Are you sure that's true?'

‘What it says on the file, mate. Has to be true.'

Shuffling.

‘Somebody came in after she left,' Aidan says.

‘The caretaker?'

‘After the caretaker.'

A bird twitters, traffic rumbles, a plane flies overhead.

‘But Sam …'

‘At first I reckoned Sam covered up for her because he had a thing about domestic violence,' Aidan says.

‘I knew it had to be more than just because she was a cute twenty-year-old.'

‘Because of his father.'

‘Doug?'

‘Doug's the stepfather.'

‘I never knew that.'

‘Biological father was violent. Hit him. And his mother and sister. Put him in hospital one time when he was a kid. Almost killed him.'

‘God. Poor bastard.' Another long pause. ‘But how could he have got it wrong?'

‘He didn't. He wasn't covering up for
her
.'

‘What?'

‘Found some old stuff wasn't meant to be found. Personal documents, that kind of thing. And had a chat with the caretaker's mum.'

A pause.

‘Tucker was still alive when the caretaker found him, but not when the uniformed officers got there. In his statement, Sam said he was first on the scene, after having received a call from D24 — half an hour before the uniforms arrived. He just happened to be driving past? I don't think so. Reckon he was paying a visit, and came across an opportunity too good to resist.'

‘But … I don't understand.'

‘The family took Doug's name. But Sam's original birth certificate says Tucker.'