Shadows

FOR MURRAY

Cover Page

About the Author

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Shadows

Acknowledgements

I’m running along the boardwalk, wind and sand stinging my arms. It’s after work and I have the track to myself. A handful of surfers are battling the choppy waves, and the Williamsons are walking on the beach like they do every morning and afternoon in their matching track outfits and orthopaedic shoes. Their silver heads are bowed against the wind, but they’re still holding hands. It makes me feel emptier than usual.

Dark storm clouds scud across the sky. Next to me the palm trees shake and creak. I keep running, away from town, towards a fork in the track. The main path continues along the beach. A smaller trail heads into the rainforest and turns to dirt underfoot. I know before I reach the fork which way I’m going, even though it will further punish my leg.
I can live with the pain. It wasn’t that long ago I couldn’t run at all. And then I could, and didn’t want to. But sharing the bungalow with Maggie and watching her lace on running shoes every day finally got me off the couch. For a while we ran together, but I was too slow that first month or so. She was adamant she didn’t mind, but she’d never tell me if she did. I made the decision for her by running in the afternoons. Turns out I like the solitude.

In the rainforest, there’s little hint of the gale blowing on the beach. It’s cooler in here, and quieter. Ferns taller than me crowd along the track, and the fronds brush my arms when I stray too close. Fig trees stretch overhead, branches so thick they almost blot out the sky.

I concentrate on the sound of my feet hitting the hardpacked dirt. A butterfly flitters ahead of me, a flash of electric blue near the dark forest floor.

Pandanus Beach is tucked away, well off the highway, bordered by the ocean and closed in by mountains and rainforest. Being able to run along this lush, sheltered path is one of the reasons I’m still here.

I climbed off the Greyhound bus nine months ago alongside a bunch of dreadlocked surfers, not too long after my eighteenth birthday. My plan was to hang around for a few weeks and then move on. It took me a while to find the right place, a place where I wouldn’t be noticed. Almost everywhere reminds me of Jude.

Jude would have loved it here. He’d go anywhere as long as there was a beach and a decent bar. He would have owned Pan Beach in a fortnight.

The pain hits my chest so hard my knees buckle. I stumble, barely managing to keep my feet. I try to catch my breath. But it’s not a lack of oxygen that’s my problem, it’s the weight. The cruel, crushing weight.

I lean against a fig tree, the trunk rough with dried moss. My chest heaves, my throat burns and I let the tears come. For a while, that’s all I do, sob and breathe in cool forest air, fighting the urge to scream. I have to pull it together. I’m stronger than this.

As I straighten, something moves to my left. A flicker. I turn my head and peer into the dense trees, wiping my cheeks with the back of my hand. There’s only a spider web strung between tree trunks, glinting silver. Nothing. Another flicker, at the edge of my vision. It’s gone by the time my eyes track it. I wait, hold my breath. There. A shadow, gone again before I blink. It’s not a wallaby. Way too tall.

‘Hey,’ I call out, but my voice is still thick from crying. If someone
is
here, I need to sound less pathetic. ‘Stop fucking around.’

The silence is unnatural now. I can’t hear the surf or the wind. The afternoon light is fading quickly around me.

‘Fuck this.’ I make my voice hard and sharp, and scan
the vines and trees. Then I take off. My plan is to look like I’m casually jogging back the way I came but, two steps on, adrenaline kicks in and I’m running flat out.

I’ve never noticed how much this trail twists and turns. How close the trees are. The rainforest is full of shadows, so when I see a dark shape flitting between the ferns to my right, it takes a moment to realise there really is someone in here. Shadowing me. With ease.

I can’t turn to look. I can’t take my eyes off the track or the tree roots that sprout out of it. I’m fifty metres from the tree line, ferns and webs slapping against my arms and legs. Thirty metres. A vine hits my face. Blood pounds in my ears and my lungs burn. Ten metres. Almost there. I strain to hear footsteps behind me, but the wind muffles everything now.

I burst out of the trees.

Where are the surfers? I take the beach track, ignoring the jarring in my bad leg. I hit the sand and my feet sink, but I keep going. Halfway to the waterline, my legs finally turn to jelly. My breath is ragged and my chest is about to explode. I collapse to my knees and look back.

No one has followed me out of the rainforest.

‘Hello, love.’

I look up to see the Williamsons on their way back towards town.

‘Are you all right, dear?’ Mrs Williamson has to shout
to be heard over the wind. Her straw hat is clutched between her arthritic fingers.

I hold up a hand. I still can’t speak. I offer a thumbs up, and they both smile, probably chalking up my bizarre behaviour to some new fitness craze. The run-for-your-life-and-collapse-in-the-sand workout.

I stay on my knees, eyes on the trees. As the sun drops lower in the sky the spiky shadow of a palm tree lengthens across the sand.

No one is coming out of the forest. I feel stupid.

I wish it was all I felt.

Maggie and I are in the red laminate kitchen of our bungalow. Mottled shadows from the jacaranda tree flicker across the bench, hiding the scratches and red wine stains. Maggie has pushed her knitting aside while she reads. Outside, the surfis constant, muffled; the beach is down the hill, a block away.

Yesterday’s gale is forgotten. I wish I could say the same about what happened in the rainforest. I keep turning it over, trying to figure it out. I was on edge before the figure shadowed me out of the trees. It’s like my body sensed a threat before I saw that dark shape. But was there a threat, really? It seemed impossible this morning, waking up with the sun in my eyes and a clear blue sky outside. Unreal. Now I’m not sure the figure was even there.

Maggie has been staring at the laptop for a few minutes, her muesli untouched. I move into a patch of sunlight and rinse the dishes in the sink. I can’t help myself—I check over her shoulder to see what part she’s up to.

She looks around at me. ‘You really wrote this?’

I nod, wary.

She sips her coffee. ‘Gaby…this stuff’s in your head?’

‘I have weird dreams.’

‘But what made you put it online?’ She gestures to the screen. ‘Why this website?’

‘Dark Thoughts?’ I wipe my hands on a damp tea towel. ‘The short story with the most votes wins a thousand bucks.’

She stares back at the screen, clicks the mouse and then looks at me again. I’m wearing old jeans and a yellow t-shirt. At least I look harmless. Maggie doesn’t seem so sure anymore. Whatever happened in the rainforest yesterday, I can’t tell her about it. Not now.

She gets up from the table and puts her cup on the bench. She’s still in her running gear, her streaky blonde hair in a neat ponytail. Her skin looks so healthy she’s almost glowing. Maggie is just about an official local attraction, alongside the surf beach and the annual beer and wine festival. She works at the Green Bean, an organic cafe on the esplanade run by her mother. Tourists go there because they’ve read about it in glossy foodie magazines.

For the locals, Maggie is as much of a drawcard.

‘Don’t look at me like that,’ I say. ‘Maybe I like this stuff because it’s not real.’ I run a hand through my hair, which is not blonde or neat. It’s dark and hard to manage. A bit like me.

‘I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it. It’s just a little gory, that’s all. I didn’t even know you liked to write.’ Her smile is easier now. This is firmer territory. ‘Have you got any other stories?’

She means any others not involving hell-beasts and beheadings. I give her a lopsided grin. ‘It’s all right, Mags, I won’t make you read any more.’

Her face falls. ‘Oh, babe, I didn’t mean—’

‘Stop that,’ I say, catching her eye.

‘No, really, if you want to talk about, you know, stuff.’

I
really
don’t want to have this conversation. ‘Margaret Jane,’ I say in my best impression of her mother. ‘It’s not that big a deal.’

‘But it’s getting close, though, isn’t it?’

I keep smiling. ‘It’s okay.’ It’s a lie, but it’s the easiest thing to say.

In eight days, it’ll be a year since Jude died. He was my twin.

‘Don’t you have to work this morning?’ I ask.

Maggie glances at the clock on the microwave and sighs. ‘I’d better get moving.’ She takes two steps towards
the hall and stops. ‘You know you can talk to me, though, right?’

‘I know. Thanks.’

I like Maggie. She’s the only person I’ve felt normal with since the accident. And I know she’s had her own share of loss. But this isn’t something I’m going to chat about over coffee.

She leaves the kitchen slowly, in case I change my mind. I go to turn off the laptop. I know every word, but I have to read the story again, try to see it through Maggie’s eyes. The nightclub draped with corpses. The hell-beast with the glistening teeth and toaster head. Me, cutting that head off with a sword, alongside a guy who has vivid green eyes and smells like sandalwood.

I’m surprised Maggie made it through as far as she did. I’m glad she didn’t ask me how much of it I’d actually dreamed, or how often the guy with the green eyes turns up to fight monsters at my side. Morning after morning, I wake up with him lingering in my thoughts and I feel guilty without any idea why.

I’ve named him Matt. In the end it was a relief to get him out of my head and onto paper.

It’s late Friday afternoon and Rick’s is starting to fill up. It’s the only place to be this time of the week. The bar opens onto the street and Maggie and I are sitting at the window, chatting to people we know as they walk past outside. The sun has dipped behind the headland, leaving a soft purple glow in the sky over the ocean. Down the esplanade, fairy lights shimmer in the old poinciana trees. I love those trees. When I got off the bus last year, I stepped onto their carpet of orange blossom. I felt safe underneath those branches. Protected.

‘Hello, ladies.’ Simon stacks glasses together and puts them on his tray, then wipes down the open window ledge we’re leaning on. ‘How are we this fine evening?’

‘Glad the week’s over,’ Maggie says.

Simon looks at me, waiting. He’s Rick’s younger brother, working shifts to pay his way through uni.

‘Thirsty,’ I say, holding up my empty beer bottle.

He leans around Maggie to grab it. ‘Let me rectify that.’

I let him take it, and pretend not to notice him checking me out. Simon meets my gaze, knowing he’s been caught. He’s the sort of guy most girls find sexy: close-cropped tawny hair, Japanese-style tatts on his arms, and long eyelashes. Easy company. Hot body. And still hopeful I’ll go home with him some night.

‘Imagine what he’d do if you wore a short skirt,’ Maggie says when he heads back to the bar. ‘He’d probably have a heart attack.’

I look down at my t-shirt and cargoes and then at her. ‘We can’t all pull off
that
outfit.’

Maggie is wearing a short denim skirt and a black singlet. ‘You could,’ she says, grinning. ‘You’re just not brave enough.’

‘You’ve got that right.’ I might be toned again, but I’m still not flashing too much skin—for a number of reasons.

After our second beer, Maggie leans in close. ‘Check out the new arrival at the bar. He hasn’t stopped staring at you.’

I turn and skim the faces. Nothing of interest, as usual. But then I see him and stop breathing.

‘Don’t gawk.’ Maggie nudges me, her beer sloshing.

I turn back.

It’s impossible.

He looks like the guy I keep dreaming about.
Exactly
like him: short dirty-blond hair, messy like he’s just woken up, a face too masculine to be pretty, and a lean, muscular body. T-shirt and jeans.

I look again. He’s facing me now, elbows behind him on the worn timber bar like he owns the place. All he needs is a sword in one hand and a severed head in the other.

He’s watching me watching him. He can’t be more than twenty.

I finish my drink. ‘My shout. Ready?’

‘You’re going to talk to him?’ Maggie’s eyes widen, mocking me.

‘Yep.’

‘Wait up.’ She empties her beer and covers her mouth to hide the smallest of burps. ‘Let’s go.’ She heads straight for him.

I follow her, not really sure what I’m doing.

Maggie props her arms on the bar and waits to be served. I position myself between her and the Matt lookalike, and pretend I’m trying to get Rick’s or Simon’s attention.

‘Interesting place.’ The voice next to me is low, with a slight growl to it. He even sounds like Matt. Or how Matt sounds in my head.

I turn to him, trying hard to be casual about it. He’s
studying me, almost wary. His eyes are green, eyelashes long…god, it
is
Matt. This guy is real.

There’s only one explanation.

‘Do I know you?’

His laugh comes from somewhere deep in his chest. ‘Are you seriously chatting me up?’

‘What? No.’ I bite my lip and turn away.

Somebody shoot me, please. I haven’t given anyone a second glance since well before the accident. And here I am blushing because this guy happens to resemble someone I see in my increasingly violent dreams.

He looks past me. ‘Friend of yours? She’s cute.’

Maggie is working hard to pretend she’s not listening, but her lip twitches and gives her away. I take a step back. ‘Don’t let me get in the way.’

‘But I came all this way to see you, Gabe.’

I stiffen. ‘How do you know my name?’

He frowns and looks at Maggie again before his attention settles back on me. He measures his words. ‘I knew your brother.’

‘What?’ The chatter in the room spikes. Loud voices, laughter, clinking glasses: a wall of noise. The shelf of cocktail bottles behind him blurs. I grip the bar.

‘Tell me what happened,’ he says.

I breathe in and out. In. And out. Someone calls Simon’s name.

‘Tell me,’ he says again. ‘You were there, right?’

All the guilt and grief and anger are back in the space of a heartbeat, suffocating me. ‘Of course I was there.’ I clench my teeth. ‘I was in the car.’

Maggie puts her arm around my waist. ‘Back off,’ she says to him with as much venom as I’ve heard from her.

It’s his turn to stare. “The car? What car?’

I give him a black look. ‘I don’t need this.’ I push away from Maggie.

I make it a few paces before he grabs my arm. ‘Gabe.’

I jerk away from him. ‘Fuck off.’

He lets go, and glances at the faces around us. A few drinkers are watching with interest. He takes a deep breath then smiles like nothing has happened. ‘Come on, let me buy you a drink.’

‘Why?’

‘To talk.’

‘About Jude?’ I hate how much my voice still cracks when I say his name.

‘Yeah.’

‘Why?’

His smile fades. ‘Because I miss him.’

And that’s all it takes.