The Accident (21 page)

‘Mum…’

‘I’m all right.’

‘Yeah, sure you are.’

I’m not panicking because it’s obviously not anything too sudden or terrible.
Still
…the trouble feeling starts to burn in my stomach. Is this about Alan?

‘What happened?’

‘Nothing. Nothing happened…I just…’ She’s on the verge. Trembling. And there she goes…She starts to sob. ‘I don’t want Alan to go.’

‘He doesn’t have to go.’

‘It’s not that simple.’

Okay, I’ve never been in a relationship, so maybe I’m not the expert. But I don’t understand how it can be so complicated. I know they love each other. ‘Just talk to him, Mum. He still loves you. He just doesn’t want you to shut him out all the time.’

She sniffs, blows her nose noisily.

‘Go on that holiday with him.’ I pass her the box of tissues. ‘You guys need to spend some time together.’

‘What about you? We can’t—’ she sniffs. ‘We can’t just leave you.’

If that’s her biggest argument I think I’ve pretty much won this one. I watch as she blows her nose, then tries to mop up her mascara.

She looks at me over the top of the tissue. ‘You’re settling in all right, aren’t you?’

‘At school? Yeah.’

‘I wasn’t sure whether a new school would be best for you…’

I’ve never had any doubt about that. Morgan’s comments have only proved me right. I couldn’t have handled going back to my old school, knowing that everybody knew what happened, seeing constant reminders. But it’s more than just that; I’m not the same person I was a year ago. I’m new, too.

before
after
later

Anthony was right. Morgan is good, way better than the rest of the cast. The way she talks, moves across the stage, is assured and commanding, convincing. Kayla didn’t say much in the car, but I’m glad to have her beside me, and at the end she’s on her feet clapping for Morgan when she takes a bow. For the briefest second Morgan catches my eye, and there’s a flicker of something—recognition? gratitude?—before she looks away again.

On the way home we talk about the play, about Morgan. I’m feeling restless after sitting still, and with frustration and uncertainty still jostling for prime position in my mind the last thing I want to do is go home and go to bed.

I climb out of the car and look across the roof at Kayla. ‘I’m going to get changed and go for a run.’

‘Want some company?’

I don’t want to look too eager; I pretend to think about it. For maybe a second. ‘Okay.’

We take a different route this time, a longer track through the valley. I’ve spent my whole life in this suburb, and covered most of it by foot dozens of times, but it’s been years since I’ve gone this way. I let Kayla lead the way, trusting her, feeling safe in the silence as we run. I never realised how different it would feel to have company, to not feel like I’m the only one in the world.

We’re heading down Third Street, about to pass the top of Roberts Road. I gesture to the right. ‘This way.’

It’s been demolished. The long driveway that led to the carpark in front of the indoor pools now leads to nowhere. Just piles of dirt and weeds, a desolate moonscape under the fluorescent street lights. The fence along one side of the outdoor pool still remains, absurdly, with those purple flowers I remember growing on vines entwined in the mesh like a trellis. I can’t even tell where the big brick building housing the indoor pools used to be. Even the banana tree where Lauren and I waited for Mum is gone. It’s as if the fragile foundations of my life are literally being bulldozed into nonexistence.

‘What happened?’

Kayla kicks at a plastic marker flag in the ground. ‘Looks like they’re subdividing.’

Morgan, Mum, Lauren, even Dad…and for some reason it’s seeing this site bulldozed that breaks me. I’m five again and my mum’s late because my dad walked out on her, Lauren’s mad and Morgan’s crying and I’m too scared to say anything. Then and now. The tears that have been a dead weight in my chest for so long are threatening to bubble up.

I swallow hard. Not here. Not now. You don’t cry like a baby in front of a girl, especially when you’re still trying to work out if the girl in question even likes you. If I cry now, she’ll never look at me again. I’ll never be able to look at her.

‘Want to cut through to—’ Turning, she breaks off when she sees me. ‘What?’

I can’t answer her, I just shrug, stare up at the sky and try to think of anything other than the possibility of shameful tears. I can’t do it anymore. I can’t be the only one in the house who is trying to fix things. I can’t even remember a time when I wasn’t caught between Lauren and Mum and Morgan’s tantrums. How is that fair? It can’t just be me, I’m not strong enough. And if that’s too much, how could I even think about having another girl’s feelings to worry about?

I can actually feel the hot tears smarting in my eyes. I turn away quickly, before she can see them. The humiliation burns just as badly. I really am just the weakling Lauren says I am.

There’s debris all over the ground and I reach down and grab the first thing I find. It’s a broken piece of brick. I hurl it as far as I can into the empty lot, watching it bounce and tumble on the rough ground before rolling to a stop. It feels good to do something, so I grab another thing—a stick—and throw that too. A chunk of sandstone the size of a baseball follows that. I’m reaching for another stick when I see Kayla in my peripheral vision, grabbing a large piece of a branch—a few dried leaves still hanging on—and tossing it like a javelin. She lets out a whoop as she tosses a rock after it, exultant. I could be angry that she’s hijacking my catharsis, but strangely, it lifts my spirits. I toss another piece of brick, watching it bounce off a piece of concrete slab downhill and roll out of sight. Beside me, Kayla scavenges piece after piece of debris, tossing them long, high, underarm like bowling balls or swung like a discus, whooping and laughing. Despite myself, I start to laugh too. Eventually we run out of things to throw. She spins a little on the spot, like a little girl making herself dizzy, and I’m half expecting her to fall dramatically to the ground when she suddenly grabs my shoulders and jumps up onto my back, wrapping her legs around my waist, piggyback. I nearly topple with the sudden impact and her weight, but I don’t.

I manage to stay upright, reflexively wrapping my arms around her legs to hold her steady. She doesn’t weigh as much as I expected, once I get my balance. All that energy constantly radiating from her made her seem bigger.

Her laughter dies down but she’s breathing heavily from her efforts. I feel—and hear—her breath at my ear, and then something soft—her lips?—on my cheek.

‘You’re crazy,’ I manage.

‘Yeah, but doesn’t it feel good?’

It does. Oh, it does. If she’d tried to talk to me, if she’d been sympathetic, I think it would have just made things worse. But…

‘You’re going to make a good psychologist.’

‘Thank you.’ And with that, she frees herself from my grip and hops down, brushing herself off. ‘C’mon, let’s walk home.’

We don’t say much on the way back. I’m a bit too overwhelmed to think what to say. All I know is that I want to be with her. Crazy and scary as she is, I think I’m in love.

I don’t know if I’m supposed to kiss her goodbye, but she saves me having to make a move. She just smiles, a coy, teasing smile that is like a shot of vodka warming my insides, and disappears into her house.

Our house is dark, the only light coming from Lauren’s room. She’s standing by her bed with piles of clothes, toiletries and her forty-litre backpack spread out on her bed. Less than a month since she unpacked it, and she’s taking off again already. I’m not surprised.

‘Where are you going?’

She shrugs. ‘Auckland, to start. After that, I don’t know.’

‘What about uni?’

Another shrug. She doesn’t know. I watch her for a second, her hands as they methodically fold and pack. Still with that swift efficiency, but lacking the certainty, the confidence that have always defined her.

‘I can’t stay here.’ Quietly.

I don’t ask her why not. Maybe I already know. I feel it a bit, too. But her way of dealing is just to run away, and I can’t believe there isn’t a better way, something that makes it better for everybody, not just the one.

She stares morosely ahead. ‘She’s not wrong, you know. I mean, the writing thing, it’s stupid. But pouring your life out for a cause…that’s not wrong.’

Even if it makes you hate everyone and everything? I wonder. Even if it wrecks you for anything else?

‘It has to be possible,’ she says, as if she’s read my thoughts. ‘I just have to figure out how to do it. Sort myself out first, I guess. Find inner peace, all that crap. After all…life is short.’

I wonder about the guy she was with before, and try to picture someone brave enough to be with my sister. Did he have the same burning ambition to save the world? And, like her, did he just not know how to make it work?

‘There’s always therapy,’ I quip.

‘Yeah, right.’ Her lip curls up in a smile, and I know she’s thinking the same thing I am. None of us would ever dream of seeing a shrink. We just weren’t raised that way. Mum would disown us.

Most of the time I feel like we’re worlds apart, strangers in the same house. But at times like this the bond between us—at least, the shared memory of the crap we survived—feels firm, inviolable. My older sister is a judgmental control freak and an emotional screw-up whose biggest enemy is her own pig-headedness, but sometimes she can be…all right. I guess that’s what gives me the courage to ask her.

‘When’s your flight?’

‘Sunday morning.’

‘Morgan’s play is at seven tomorrow tonight.’

‘I’m not going.’

After tonight, I feel different. I’m not just the quiet one hiding in my room with the book. I’m the one that Kayla likes. I’m the one that Kayla kissed. What have I got to lose? Why not be reckless, take her on?

‘Why not? Why can’t you do something nice for once?’

My voice is louder than normal, bolder. She looks taken aback by it, but doesn’t answer. Somehow that’s all I need. ‘What did we ever do to you? Why do you act like something terrible happened that you have to keep running away from? It’s like you hate us and Mum and this house so much that you can’t stand to be around us. What did we do to you that was so bad?’

She stands still, hands hanging by her side, just taking it. Her eyes are on the ground, face turned away as if to deflect the words, not have to meet my accusing gaze.

Slowly, she slides her hands into her front jeans pockets, digging them in deep. Looks up, but can’t bring herself to look at me. Her gaze goes over my left shoulder.

‘I got tired of nobody caring.’

I can tell she’s trying hard to keep her voice steady, but I can still hear the tremor in it. I don’t understand. What happened to her happened to all three of us. We were all rejected by Dad, then rejected by Mum. Now it’s a struggle to get even Morgan to acknowledge I exist.

‘I was here too,’ I say, even though I know it won’t be any consolation to her. ‘They didn’t care about me, either.’

She snorts. ‘Are you kidding?’ Rolls her eyes, as if she can’t believe I could be so unaware. ‘You could have asked her’—she points at the ceiling—‘for
anything
. Anything at all. She would have given it to you. Not that you even cared. You always had your own little world where everything had a happy ending.’

Her tone is contemptuously offhand, coloured by the same bitterness that was in Morgan’s voice. I stare at her, feeling stupid for not recognising it sooner. Replaying, in my mind, Mum wandering down to talk to me as I sat on the back step, loading me up with books… Even more reason for Lauren to despise me, for Morgan to feel as though we weren’t on equal footing. But grossly unfair if they thought that was ever something I wanted.

I fumble for words. ‘I never asked for any of that. And I never ignored you. You’re the one who ignored us and just…left.’

It doesn’t seem like an argument either one of us is going to win. I draw a breath and try to get back to my original point. ‘Dad left all three of us. Mum ignored all three of us. Can we at least try to be decent to each other, and go to Morgan’s play?’

She looks over at the piles of clothes neatly stacked on the bed. She’s probably thinking about wherever it is she’ll end up, where there’s no parents or siblings or anybody else who’s supposed to care. Exhales. ‘Fine.’

She takes a step back towards the bed, as if the conversation’s over, but I’m not done. I’ve spent my life being affected by Lauren’s experiences, moods and words. Isn’t it about time I had my own impact?

‘I think Mum should come along. I tried to get her to come last night, she wasn’t interested. Can you try?’

She turns back, visibly impatient with me now. I’m pushing it. ‘Why does it matter so much?’

‘Because it matters to Morgan.’

She glances past me, one way then the other, as if looking for somebody to help her out. Finally sighs. ‘Okay. I’ll take care of it.’

And there it is again, just like when we were kids. I believe her.