Something prickled in the air. I didn’t know what was going on. I wanted to ask Dad where Cassie was but I couldn’t open my mouth, couldn’t speak. I was supposed to be watching him, only no one had told me that. No one had told me it was my job to look after him, and now Cassie was gone because I hadn’t done my job properly.
Dad made dinner. He put sausages in the frypan, and I watched them snap and sizzle in their own fat. Flecks of oil jumped from the pan and nipped at my arms. The meat oozed from the casings in bulbs, as though the sausages were growing tumours. Mum came out of her room, made a plate for Cassie and left it in his spot at the table. We ate in silence. We watched TV.
‘What’s that?’ Dad said, pointing to my wrist. I hadn’t even realised that Cassie had left a bruise from when he’d grabbed me yesterday. The bruises were like fingerprints. I poked one and felt a little stab.
‘Wally did it,’ I said, covering the marks. ‘It was an accident. We were wrestling.’
I didn’t look at Wally; he didn’t say anything, didn’t tell Dad I was lying. I didn’t even bother sending a brain message. I knew they were useless.
Cassie still wasn’t home when we went to bed. I heard Dad turn off the TV, get out of bed and go into the kitchen. The air outside was fiery, and the smell had seeped into the house. I could see a glow on the grass, a shadow stretching its neck across the lawn. The yellow house was all lit up. Every light left on.
I took Cassie’s plate of food from the fridge, peeled back the plastic that had gone sweaty on the inside. I bit off the end of the sausage. It was grainy on my tongue. I wrapped it in a paper towel and put it in my pocket, went to Cassie’s room. His bed was made and the room was neat. Nothing looked different. Nothing looked as though it was missing. I opened his cupboard and took out his tin of marbles, dug my hands in. The knuckles weren’t there. His most special thing was gone.
Floorboards creaked, and a second later Dad appeared at the door. He put his hand on top of my head, steered me out of the room and closed the door. When I looked down I saw there was a hole in his sock. His big toe was poking through, as though it were trying to say hello.
I went over to the yellow house the next day. I didn’t want to go inside; I just wanted to look around a bit, have a peek through Tilly’s window. I wondered if her bed was made, whether she’d left her toys on the pillow, her play clothes strewn on the floor. When I got to the verandah there was something quiet about the place, something too still.
‘Helena’s gone,’ Dad said, when I got back home. ‘Gave me the key this morning.’
‘Where’d she go?’
‘Staying in a hotel in the city, closer to the police, closer to her family.’
‘What family?’ I said.
‘Her parents,’ Dad said. ‘Her sisters. Tilly’s grandparents, Tilly’s aunts.’
Again, Tilly’s secret before-life was bubbling up.
‘Is she coming back?’ I asked.
‘Don’t think so, mate.’
‘What about Tilly’s stuff?’
Dad pressed his hands to his face, like his head was hurting. Like I was the one hurting it. ‘I don’t know.’
I wanted to ask him about Cassie as well, where he’d gone and when he was coming back. But I didn’t want an answer. I knew he wasn’t just hanging out in the knackery, wasn’t just down the road. I didn’t know where he was, didn’t really want to know where either, because I knew for sure it was nowhere good.
The cops kept coming. Every time the car pulled up I felt a pit opening in my stomach. They were looking for Cassie, kept coming by to see if he’d called or contacted us, to see if we’d remembered anything. When they asked me questions I pretended to be stupid. I didn’t tell them what happened at Christmas, didn’t tell them what I’d heard Ian and Cassie saying in the knackery, what I’d seen in the plastic bag in the paddock. I knew anything I said about Ian would be a bad thing about Cassie as well. Even now, Ian was still in control of everything. I imagined my tongue was carved from wood and only simple words and thoughts could escape, that everything else would be blocked by that lumbering thing that sat behind my teeth like a terrible ache.
Wally and I developed a routine; each night we ate at the table properly, just the two of us. We didn’t see much of Mum, and when Dad got home from work he went straight to the fridge for a beer and sat in front of the TV all night. Wally set out placemats and forks and spoons, and poured us a cup of water each. Wally had started wearing one of Cassie’s jumpers, so stretched it seemed to swallow him right up. It made him look like a stranger.
On Friday I sat opposite Wally at the table. He had his clay in front of him, was rolling a ball of purple between his hands.
I stared at him until he looked up at me.
He didn’t tell me to stop. I needed something to happen. I needed to know I wasn’t all alone.
‘Guess what I’m thinking,’ I said.
‘What?’ he said.
‘Guess what I’m thinking.’
His hands went still. I focused all my concentration, powered my brain message into the universe. I saw it beaming out of my eyes and sinking into Wally’s mind through his skull. I could feel it working, could feel our brains connecting in the way they were supposed to. His eye twitched and I knew it was a sign. He blinked three times quickly and I knew it was a sign. But then Wally picked up a stick of green clay and looked down at his hands.
16.
WHEN THEY FOUND CASSIE’S CAR at Rustvale everything went black, but when the colour came back I was relieved. They didn’t tell us much; that his car was at the side road at the edge of the national park where the walking trails start. His wallet was in the shrubs a few yards from the car, which he’d left unlocked. They said his car was clean, empty, except for his shoes, which were crammed under the seat, but that we wouldn’t be allowed to have them back.
I knew what they thought Rustvale meant, remembered Dad telling us what people did there, why people went there. Mum let out a wail that came from deep in her insides, and Dad’s fist clenched, pushed against his mouth that was opened wide. He didn’t make a sound.
I went to school and did my work, came home and did my homework, and sometimes I went for swims with Wally and sometimes we watched TV. I searched Cassie’s room for his knuckles. It was important that I found them, and I looked in all his secret places. I didn’t even want them for myself; I just wanted to make sure Ian didn’t have them, that he couldn’t get to them. That he couldn’t take away another thing.
For weeks Dad sat on the verandah every afternoon with a cask of wine as the sun set quick and early, while Mum stayed in her room, only leaving it to use the loo. After a while the cops stopped coming by, stopped calling. Dad said they’d stopped looking for Cassie; that he was out there somewhere, but if they hadn’t found him by now they probably never would.
Winter came around quickly, and also slowly, and I didn’t understand how time could be two speeds at once. Dad dropped me into town every Saturday. I had a doctor’s appointment in the city, and afterwards Dad would take me to Main Street so I could buy lollies. I didn’t eat them, though; I kept them in my special box and it was so full that soon I’d have to find somewhere else to keep them. Not even Wally knew what I was hiding. I was going to give them to Cassie when he came home, a welcome back present.