by Lily Malone
‘Did Will say he was going away?’
‘No.’
‘And what did Dad say?’
‘You know your dad. He never says much, but I was awake all night thinking about it. I’m worried about Will.’ Her mother’s voice hitched. ‘If, darling … you know. If he wasn’t here. If he got so sad that he …’ She couldn’t say the words. ‘Just, if he wasn’t here.’
‘I don’t think Will is suicidal, Mum. I don’t think he’d do that.’ Then an image of her brother yesterday hit her, his skinny hands working at the blinds. He’d been so panicked.
‘But it was so out of the blue, you know. Will hardly ever phones us. It was the middle of the night. Dad was watching telly but I was sound asleep, till the phone rang, of course. Then I couldn’t get back to sleep.’
‘I saw Will yesterday afternoon. I was over at his place,’ Taylor said.
‘Oh good.’ Instant relief lifted the clouds in her mother’s voice. ‘How was he then?’
‘He was all in one piece, Mum,’ Taylor said carefully, because the truth was Will had been terrible. Terrible. But the talk with Amanda’s ex had helped him, hadn’t it? She’d thought so. She’d said it did to Abe last night. ‘I’ll give him a call, okay? I’ll go round to see him after work. I’ll let you know how I go. Have you talked to Will today?’
‘That’s the thing, Taylor. He isn’t answering his phone. Should I try the office?’
If her mum got the same message about Will not working as Taylor got from Alex yesterday, it would only worry her more.
‘I’ll try to get hold of him, okay? Leave it with me.’
‘Would you? Thank you, darling.’
Taylor ended the call and sat in her chair, thinking, eyes on the movie-poster-sized print of a little girl in a ballerina pose on her wall.
What the heck are you up to now, Will?
* * *
A cold wind gusted up Will’s street when Taylor climbed out of her car, sending a tin can rattling beneath parked vehicles. Bin lids that had fallen open after the rubbish truck had emptied them rattled and banged against deep green plastic.
Will’s rubbish bin wasn’t on the street.
Taylor picked her phone out of her handbag and checked the screen. There were no new messages. No response to texts to Will that she’d sent earlier in the day.
On impulse, she rang his number one more time. The call went straight to voicemail, same as all the others.
She strode to the front door and knocked. No answer. She tried the windows but, no surprises there, the blinds were closed and the windows locked.
She walked around to the side gate and into the backyard where several t-shirts flapped on the clothes line beside skinny jeans and a week’s worth of jocks and socks.
Will’s green wheelie bin sat near the garden shed.
Taylor stared at the bin and tried to fight off a dull ache where her neck met her spine.
Slowly, she forced herself to close the distance to the bin and when she was near enough, she tapped the plastic side with her knuckles.
It rang hollow and she almost sobbed with relief.
It’s empty. He’s already brought the bin in.
It meant he must have been here today, since the rubbish truck had done its rounds. He couldn’t be far away. Maybe he’d forgotten to take his phone with him. Maybe it was out of battery. That happened sometimes.
But as Taylor stood in front of the bulky green rubbish bin, doubts crept into her mind. Will lived alone and ate pizza out of a cardboard box. It wasn’t as if he had much heavy rubbish.
She should check the bin had already been emptied.
Taylor took a breath, opened the lid and peered in.
The scrap of dead rabbit stared up at her with its one glassy eye and she slammed the lid on the buzzing black flies and the horrid, rancid smell.
* * *
Abe was in the middle of his bookkeeping, trying to sort out BAS and GST, when his phone rang. Taylor’s name on the screen gave him a warm rush but the rush faded once she started to speak.
‘He’s not answering his phone. I’ve spoken with the neighbours and I’ve called all his mates I can think of and nobody’s seen him,’ Taylor said, talking fast. ‘No one’s seen him since we left his place last night. He rang Mum and Dad late, talking about a book.’
‘A book he borrowed?’
‘A book you can buy. It’s a sign, though, Abe, and I should know it. Of all bloody people I should know it. He rang to tell Dad about a financial advice book, like he was trying to look out for Dad and Mum’s investments if he wasn’t around to do it for them anymore.’
‘Do you seriously think Will might top himself?’ Abe said, because someone had to say it just to make sure that’s what they were all talking about.
She hesitated. ‘You saw him yesterday. He’s not in a good head space. I’ve pushed him. I had to push him, didn’t I? I don’t think he’d … God, I don’t think he’d …,’ a sob burst through the sentence she couldn’t repeat.
‘This isn’t your fault. Don’t put that on yourself. You can’t, okay?’
‘I’m supposed to be a professional. I studied four years for my qualifications. I’ve been in private practice longer than I studied. I know this stuff, Abe. I know the signs …’
‘Where are you now?’
‘Sitting in my car outside Will’s. I’m just sitting here. Doing nothing.’
‘Deep breath. Calm down.’ He tried to think through what he knew about Will Woods, which wasn’t much.
‘Where does someone go, Taylor? If someone was thinking about … ending it. If they were really down in the dumps. Where would they go?’
She was quiet while she thought about it. ‘Usually to some place familiar, where they feel safe, where they won’t be disturbed, but it depends. Some people overdose at home and just go to sleep. Some people jump off buildings or cliffs.’ Her voice rushed again. ‘People go for a drive in the country and run off the road at a hundred kilometres an hour and the only way we know it wasn’t an accident when they hit the tree is because there aren’t skid marks from them trying to brake.’
‘Maybe he’s at the library,’ Abe said.
‘The library?’
‘You said he talked to your dad about a book. Yesterday he told us he’d been spending time at the library, and that he likes it there.’
‘I don’t know which one is his local.’
‘Check his rubbish. Maybe there’s a docket for a book he borrowed. That’ll tell you.’
‘Okay. I’ll do that. I’ll call you back.’
* * *
Taylor tipped the cumbersome rubbish bin, laying it on its side on the patchy lawn near Will’s small garden shed. She walked round to the bottom, checked for spiders near the wheels, leaned over to pull the lid open and then she lifted. She had to put her back into it to get it high enough to hear things inside start to slide … and she had to close her mind to the dead rabbit and all the flies she knew sat right there on top.
The sliding sound stopped. She lifted higher and gave the bin a shake, and when nothing else happened she stepped gingerly around to the front.
Hard to see anything past the rabbit, fur matted with dry blood.
Hard to breathe beyond the rotten meat stench and that horrible bin smell that was like the bottom of an ashtray, even though Will didn’t smoke.
Taylor hauled the empty bin upright, found the same shovel Will had used last night, scooped up the bunny and hurled it back into the bin. Then she shut the lid and had to breathe again.
The dead bunny smell loitered.
Cardboard pizza boxes were splayed at her feet. Three of them. Taylor slammed all three back into the depths of the bin and again closed the lid.
That left one solitary shopping bag, plastic handles tied in a knot.
Taylor picked the knot apart and spread the bag.
Shopping dockets. Tissues. Papers. An overdue electricity bill. Wrappers from a kilo of cheese. Th
e crust of a loaf of bread. Tomato sauce on bakery paper. Soggy cereal.
Her stomach wanted to heave. She forced herself to trawl deeper.
And finally, several small scraps with printed numbers and book titles, issued from City of Gosnells The Knowledge Centre.
Taylor stuffed everything back into the plastic bag and dumped it on top of the other trash. Then she washed her hands under the tap in Will’s backyard, dried them on her skirt and ran back to the front of Will’s property to her car and her phone.
What was The Knowledge Centre anyway? It sounded too airy-fairy for a library.
Taylor entered the place into a Google search on her phone. A website loaded.
She clicked the map and started her car, drove south through the city, across the river and kept going on Albany Highway way past where she’d normally turn towards her own place. Gosnells was closer to her house than Will’s. Why the heck would he choose a library so far away?
Slowly, the moving arrow of her car crept up on the glowing blue raindrop that marked her destination.
From the outside, the place looked … not like a library. There was a tower pretty much smack bang in the parking lot and a clock at the top of the tower that showed Taylor a time way too close to closing.
As she ran for the building, she scanned the carpark for Will’s car. Didn’t see it. She wasn’t paying too much attention anyway because all she could think of was getting inside before the library shut. If he wasn’t here, they might have a record for whether he’d borrowed something today. She could ask the staff how he’d been, how he’d seemed.
At least she’d know he was still … alive.
The automatic double doors slid aside to let her in, and her gaze took in men, women, children, employees.
She turned a circle seeking one familiar red-haired head.
He isn’t here.
In the warm hub of the busy library she was suddenly stone cold.
‘Can I help you?’ a woman with a thin, kind face enquired from where she’d been stacking books on a shelf.
‘I was looking for the person who borrowed these books.’ Taylor held out the library tags.
The woman checked the tag and scanned the barcode through her computer.
‘Will? Yes he’s here. He’s right over here. Follow me.’
‘Will’s here?’ Relief welled in her throat.
The librarian paused as she caught Taylor’s tone, and she was suddenly uncertain. ‘Well, he was here earlier and I haven’t seen him leave.’
He’s here. He’s okay.
I’m going to kill him for giving me a heart attack.
Taylor kicked her feet into gear, following the librarian—who was moving faster now—past row upon row of books and desks and chairs, cutting a hard left towards the big windows and another left through a space that had no windows at all. At the far end was a nook lit by a working lamp mounted on the wall.
‘Here he is.’
Will looked up, blinking.
He started to say, ‘Is it closing—’ but he never got to end the sentence because his eyes met Taylor’s and he swallowed the word.
‘Thank you,’ Taylor said to the librarian, who told her not to mention it and headed back towards the main entrance.
Will sat on a small green couch facing two or three beanbags still imprinted by the backsides that had used them that day. He had the look of someone who’d been there a while, books splayed all about him.
She put her hands on her hips as she checked Will over.
‘You don’t look dead,’ she said by way of greeting.
‘Um … because I’m not?’
‘Why didn’t you answer your phone?’
‘Did you ring me? Sorry. My battery’s dead. It’s on the charger at home.’
Taylor sat. The couch cushions were so comfy they immediately tipped her weight into the backrest. Since when did libraries have spaces like this? Where were the chairs and desks, the files, the catalogues and queues? Where were the signs telling everyone to be quiet?
Her handbag sprawled to the floor and she put a hand to her temple as if she had a headache. Actually, she did have a headache. ‘I’ve been so worried about you. We didn’t know where you were. I’ve been round to your place.’
‘Sorry. I’ve been here all day. How did you know where to find me?’
‘I found a docket for library books in your rubbish bin.’
‘Oh. Eww.’
‘Yes eww. I had to sort through a dead bunny and wet tissues and sour milk and three-day-old weetbix.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Why on earth did you join a library on the other side of town, anyway?’
Will’s gaze slid away. ‘It’s a long way from my old office and my clients. I didn’t want to run into anyone I knew.’
Taylor’s annoyance leaked away.
‘You look better than when I saw you yesterday,’ she told him.
‘I feel better than yesterday. I feel actually okay.’
His face was brighter. He’d lost that haggard look. ‘You rang Dad in the middle of the night. Mum thought you were talking him into buying a finance book because you wouldn’t be around anymore to take care of their superannuation.’
Will blinked. ‘It wasn’t the middle of the night. Dad said he was watching Q&A. It’s a good book about value investment and it was the last few hours of it being the Kindle Daily Deal. I’d be a pretty lousy financial adviser if I didn’t advise him to save sixteen dollars on an investment book when it’s on sale. It’s the book Warren Buffett recommends and that man’s the guru.’
Taylor exhaled heavily. ‘Mum.’
‘Did she overreact?’
‘Well, you can’t blame her, Will. We’ve all been worried about you this last year. I was worried enough about you to stalk you from your work to Amanda’s place.’
Will had a book open on his lap and he closed it and moved it to the thick arm of the couch.
‘Mum thought you were suicidal. I thought you might be suicidal.’ She tried to make herself relax because it was building up again. All the worry. Not knowing where Will was. The drive. ‘I went to your place. Your rubbish bin wasn’t out—that awful stinking dead bunny was still in there—and all the other bins on your street were out. I thought you hadn’t been home since last night. I thought you could be hurt somewhere. I thought you could be planning … you know … to end everything.’
He put his elbows on his knees and leaned forward so his forearms flopped to the front, with his fingers linked loosely together. ‘I won’t lie to you and tell you I haven’t thought about it.’
‘Crap, Will!’ Taylor said. ‘Why didn’t you talk to me? I could have helped. I’m trained to help.’
He shushed her. ‘It’s okay. It’s me who didn’t ask for help, okay?’
Taylor got her first look at the cover of the book he’d put down.
The WA Law Handbook.
There were other books beside him too. Evidence: Commentary and Materials. Alternative Dispute Resolution.
Taylor indicated the books with her chin. ‘Light reading?’
Will grinned. There was a speck of the boy she’d grown up with in that grin. ‘Not the most riveting storyline, it’s got to be said.’
She prodded his ankle with her boot. ‘Law books, Will?’
He pulled in a breath deep enough to suck all knowledge from The Knowledge Centre. ‘I’m going to pursue Amanda for the money. I’ve decided. If she doesn’t pay me back, I’ll press charges.’
‘Oh thank God,’ Taylor said, as her shoulders slumped into the backrest in pure relief.
‘I’ll tell Mum and Dad the truth about what’s been going on. It’s not fair that you have to lie for me. I’ve never told them I haven’t been working. They don’t know what happened.’
‘It’s up to you what you want to tell them, but I think it makes sense.’
Shoving himself off his seat, he held out his hand to help her out of the green couch, and as he
did so a sudden thought hit her brain. She clutched his elbow. ‘Don’t empty your rubbish bin, Will.’
‘Well I can’t now, can I? I forgot to put it out this morning. It’s there till next Tuesday.’
‘I want that rabbit. It’s evidence.’
‘Evidence of what?’
‘There was a dead bunny on the doorstep of my clinic yesterday morning. We asked the gardener to move it. We need to tell the police about the rabbits. They could be evidence that proves Amanda has been harassing both of us.’
‘I hate to break it to you, Tayls.’
She swung around to face Will, hand on her hips. ‘What now?’
‘That rabbit at my place was your garden variety run-of-the-mill grey bunny. Vermin. The rabbits Amanda has are pets. Annie and Albert are Vienna Lops. Unless you got a dead Vienna Lop at your clinic, I think you’re out of luck. She could have scraped it off a roadside anywhere. No proof.’
‘So we’re back to square one?’
‘Not quite. I never did write a Letter of Demand to Amanda. I lied to you about that, but I’ll do it now. I’ll get the ball rolling.’
‘What if she tells you she’ll pay you back fifty bucks a month?’
‘I’ll work through the process, okay? I’ll find out what’s fair and reasonable. That’s what I got these books out for.’ Will picked up the library books and put them in his bag. ‘And I’ll go to the police. I’m not sure what they can do, but they might know how I report what happened to me. At least I guess it gets it on file somewhere, doesn’t it? It should put Amanda Whittler on a scammer database somewhere, although I guess she could just change her name. She probably already has a few different names she goes by.’
‘I’m proud of you, Will. I want to say that.’
He slung his arm around her shoulder. ‘I should have done it sooner.’
CHAPTER
34
Taylor hooked her coat over the rack in her hall when she got home and dropped her handbag to the floor two steps inside the door. It landed as if her purse, keys and phone were made of lead. Bruno’s barks welcomed her from out the back and for those seconds all she wanted to do was cuddle into her dog and forget everything about the day.
