The Rental

by Rebecca Berto

  Stepping back, I tripped over the section where the tiles and the carpet met. I staggered, but his arm shot out and caught me.

  Like a fairy-tale.

  Girl leant back; guy caught her in his arms.

  Leant down like this, I had a direct view past the laundry door window, out to the backyard. And, under a spotlight, I saw Justin standing between Cara’s legs. She curled around his hips and her lips locked with his. Her skirt was fanned over where their hips connected and Justin’s jeans hung at his ankles.

  Rick noticed the sudden tenseness in me and whirled around. He saw it too. “Fuck, Vee, fuck. Here,” he said, holding me to his chest. I hammered at him to let me go. I punched him and tried squeezing his arms to release me, but I wasn’t going anywhere.

  Did it matter if Justin stopped, though? He was lost to me, same as my so-called ‘best friend.’

  I slumped. I didn’t care how fast I hit the floor.

  However, Rick tightened me into his arms and bundled me up. He hiked me up to sit on the bench. He got a cup of water, lifted it to my lips, and urged, “Please, drink.”

  And I did. I stared blurry eyed, unfocused, and gulped it down.

  His bare back tensed with rippling muscles all the way down the V-shape, and his hands fisted by his side. “I’ll be back,” he said, storming out. The laundry door slammed so hard against the doorstop I assumed it would shatter. It didn’t—just.

  I started hyperventilating. If Justin saw me through the window … I never wanted to see him again. This was the last straw. And the end. I rushed back inside the main area of the house. Only breathing once, I stood on the front porch. There, I leant over and rested my hands over the tops of my boots.

  When my phone rung, I thought, Ignore. What could be worse than this? However, that thought only made me wonder if worse could happen.

  I answered in a rush, breathless. “Yes, yes. What?”

  “Vee! Oh, my God.”

  “Mum? What? I’m sorry. It’s so late. I want to come home now. I’m so sorry, and I’ll—”

  “No, Vee,” she said. At least I thought it was her, but her voice was too shrill, and her words were too breathless to properly distinguish. “Stay there. Robert is picking you up right now. He’ll be there in a minute.”

  “A minute? Sure, but wha—”

  “Vee. Just wait. I can’t …” I heard sobbing and wondered how this stranger could possibly be my mum. “He’ll come here with you to the hospital.”

  “Hosp—” but the line was already dead.

  Robert appeared seconds or minutes later—I couldn’t tell. I was pacing circles on the deck.

  He ran out to me. “I’ll take you to see Dad.”

  “Dad? Dad?”

  His eyebrows wrinkled as he leant close. “You mean no one told you what happened?”

  I was going to say how could I possibly hear or care about my mobile in the middle of a twenty-first and witnessing my boyfriend cheating on me with my best friend, but I didn’t know how to say that.

  Instead, I let my brother take my hand.

  4

  ROBERT, MUM, AND I waited.

  We waited so long, I saw shapes floating in the air, and I made up whole stories about them. The waiting chairs, reception desk, mundane patterns in the ceiling—all liquid, and it slipped from my consciousness and never returned. I gazed too long and soon it and everything else was blurry in my vision. The hours flew by and replayed in my mind like a slideshow. The sobs turned into hiccups. Blink. Stinging, raw eyes. Blink. The quiet choke of shock receding. Blink. Reality seeped in.

  Mum sat with her ankles crossed and her foot tapped the linoleum floor just as she had when we arrived. She became restless, and for a while paced in front of the row of chairs. It was lucky there was enough space for her because she didn’t look like she’d move for anyone—or would care if she ran them down.

  I stared at the wall opposite.

  Adrenaline spiked through our bodies for too long, and we were all becoming lethargic. It initially provided a kick, but us three Wylands had been in such a state for almost six hours. Bodies weren’t made to operate on the highest level of alert and panic for that long.

  By sunrise, the doctors still said ‘Sorry’ and ‘We’ll deliver news as soon as we can.’

  “Okay,” I said, finally, “so they’re obviously doing an important operation to last this long then.”

  Mum didn’t answer me. She was now slumped forward in her chair, one foot tapping of its own accord.

  “Mum?”

  She startled. “What?”

  “Dad. Maybe it’s a really tricky operation. Sounds like he’ll pull through though for it to go on this long.”

  “I just … I don’t know. I don’t know why or how or what. I don’t know!”

  “Shh,” Robert said and leant over to rub Mum’s shoulder. “All we can do is wait. Try to occupy your mind with something else. It makes it worse thinking about this.”

  “But I don’t get it,” I said. “Was the other driver drunk or on drugs? Was it raining at the time? Did Dad cause it?”

  I went on and spat out all the questions. Mum said ‘Mmm’ at times, and my brother kept saying he wasn’t too sure. The police, who spoke to us earlier, hadn’t been able to say much.

  I wanted to rip out of the hospital, and I wanted to run until I didn’t remember anything, not even my name. I wanted something to take away the pain that consumed me.

  Then and there, I pulled out my mobile phone and stared at it. Calling Justin was natural to my fingers, but stopping them from dialling him felt strange. He had the contacts to get me some weed or some pills. He had the contacts to get me wasted, and the thrill of it stopped me dead. I saw the rainbows and the laughter—the smiling and rolling around in the dirt just because. I felt the wet kisses on my mouth and the hungry hands beneath my top.

  But here, without any of it, my head thumped from not breathing, then breathing too fast, and the non-stop thoughts at a rapid-fire rate.

  All the medical staff could agree on was the man in the other vehicle died at the scene and Ray Wyland, my daddy, had been taken directly to the hospital in critical condition.

  For hours, that was all I repeated. Truck, accident, critical, dead.

  Accident, critical, dead.

  Critical, dead.

  Dead.

  And then I knew three more things.

  A doctor came to us.

  A doctor said Ray Wyland had passed away from his injuries.

  7.15 am.

  The moment my daddy didn’t exist anymore.

  In one night, I lost my father, boyfriend, and best friend.

  At that moment, my heart stuttered. I felt a sharp pain.

  And then the world continued to beat.

  5

  THE HOURS PASSED, fresh tears rolling down my cheeks. They turned into days and days turned into weeks being housebound by grief.

  I got jobs and disappeared for hours at a time without realising—not until I was fired.

  That all changed when I saw how hard Mum was working in substitution of my woes. I woke up. Funds were diminishing fast.

  One morning, I called up a guy Justin used to buy weed from and bought some myself. It was the day I had two job interviews, one for a bar/restaurant place and the other, a Leisure centre. I had a few drags of a joint before each interview, and then on both first days.

  I should’ve stopped, but I didn’t want to be anywhere but bed, so I continued to self-medicate as a temporary fix. Strangely, it helped me remain focused on the job, dulling the intangible pain that was always there.

  Wake, smoke, work, sleep.

  Repeat.

  It worked for a while.

  • • •

  MIDWAY THROUGH A shift, my boss asked me to meet him in the back room.

  The bar I worked at attracted a mid-range of clientele. The walls had a fresh coat of paint on them, but as I retreated into the corridor, the walls began to mould in the
top corners where rain got in during particularly heavy storms. It had good character, the corridor was thin but the ceilings tall, and the original state of the building had been kept.

  I’d almost been here for three months, so this private one-on-one meeting worried me, making my anxiety hard to swallow. I was a big girl—an adult, technically—so I didn’t ask why. I sucked in a long breath and thought positive. It could have been a promotion because I successfully completed my trial period a couple of weeks early. With the growing bills, Mum and I needed security.

  I waited in a plastic chair. My legs were too shaky to stand. When he arrived shortly after I had, I avoided his eyes to put off the news as long as possible, but he went on and said it anyway.

  “We’ve got bad news, kiddo. The restaurant is closing down and the bar is downsizing.”

  The space was a restaurant up front, but it turned solely into a bar down the end. I worked at both and took shifts wherever they would have me.

  “Oh,” I said. “What’ll happen?”

  “The restaurant-only staff are being let go. Even Jonathan.”

  Jonathan was the manager there. I didn’t think the issues were to that extent. I looked down and shifted my feet inside my ballet flats.

  “Vee …” I begrudgingly looked up. “We have to cut down bar staff, too. I’m sorry, but you’re the newest. We had to keep those who’d been here longer. I’m really—”

  I held up my hand and said, “It’s fine. Tell me when I’m finishing up. I’ll work to my last day.”

  “Oh, um,” he started. He mustn’t have expected me to react so flatly. “That’s tomorrow.”

  Saturday. That was cool. Saturdays were good pay and attracted the most customers. Maybe I would get a decent amount of tips.

  “I understand if you don’t come. There isn’t much point. We get it. No hard feelings.”

  “No, I’ll be there.” I had to. That cash had to be used for my part of the mortgage and bills this week.

  “Well, at least take the rest of the night off. It’s not too busy. Just rel—”

  “I can stay.”

  He placed a firm hand on my shoulder. “We don’t need you. Go and have fun.”

  • • •

  HE LEFT FIRST and closed the door behind him. The moment the door clicked shut, I heaved over and leant my weight on my thighs. My face reddened, from both gravity and the pull of darkness, drawing tears. I inhaled and exhaled in a slow pattern to stem the overflow of emotion. It was Friday night. And I had a twenty-dollar note to burn.

  With strengthened resolve, I squared my shoulders and stepped out, passing a mirror from the bathroom. I paused there and faced my reflection front-on. I didn’t look so bad. When I had shifts at the bar or restaurant, I applied light make-up to give my gaunt face a healthy glow. I was in a black tank top and a black pencil skirt, so I moved the skirt one button tighter for my night out and it sat higher on my thighs. I let out my hair tie and swished my blonde hair out. It had grown below my breasts with neglect.

  The altered reflection startled me. The figure was that of a normal eighteen-year-old out to party, minus the pumps. It seemed like I could be that girl—the one who stared at her destination and not her past. The longer I stared, however, the more I saw beneath the act. My frame looked limp, like if the wind blew strong enough, I could be swept up into the air, folding and fluttering away like a leaf.

  I snapped my eyes away and walked down the corridor. My mobile phone and money were tucked in my pockets already. Bars would be in full swing, and I could blend in with my non-alcoholic drink because I had to drive home tonight.

  I never got there.

  At the door was Rick Delaney. He was dashing in a dark, long coat and dark pants from what I made out under the ill lighting. His dark attire left his face as the spotlight, and it took my breath away. He saw me instantly. Everything about his expression grew happy from his pinched cheeks to the way they made his eyes squint in delight, and topped off with a full-watt beam.

  I stepped away from the group of people entering, and he stepped fully in with me.

  “Rick.”

  “Hey, Vee. How’ve you been? I’m so sorry about your dad.” He looked around, following the crowd with his eyes, and then turned back. “I’m sorry I haven’t visited. I tried to, but it was hard catching you.”

  ‘Hard catching you’ was the kindest way he could’ve described the ability to reach me. Initially, I cut myself off from Justin and Cara, but that turned into avoiding all my girlfriends and their questions. For reasons that stumped me, Justin tried to contact me more than he ever had as my boyfriend. He took up copious amounts of time to ignore. Soon, avoiding them morphed into avoiding life. What else could I call it? I spoke to no one from my past, from those naïve and young schoolgirl days, no one but Mom and occasionally, my brother.

  This time wasn’t like the last between Rick and I. I didn’t miss him—not initially. I hardly existed myself. I drowned in tissues and chocolate, my bed sheets and TV, staring aimlessly for weeks while Mum worked the odd hours she was given. When I snapped out of my melancholy, I knew by then I had burnt any ability to see or contact Rick. I was already avoiding anything and anyone who could lead me to Justin, and after all that time, I’d already gotten a new number and deleted my social media accounts.

  At first, I didn’t care, but lately I craved him like a beer after a stressful week. I craved him so deeply my heart seemed fuller. I missed my other friends, but they were a dull headache, and my ache for Rick was like a migraine.

  Now he stood before me, more tall, charming, and solid than any time in my head for the last half a year. I wanted to cry all over again. And laugh. And disappear. He was more overwhelming than he was in my schoolgirl days.

  I cleared my thoughts and said, “Oh, thanks, but I’m doing fine.”

  “You’re really doing okay and all?”

  I imagined I was reading from my computer screen where I saved my script. I looked down and hid a sad expression, then reeled off, “The first few months were terrible, but Mum and I have been so busy getting on with things, we haven’t had time to let it get to us. We have each other and we’re moving forward.”

  Moving forward, eek! I thought. I ought to edit that. I sounded like a politician.

  “Oh, well. Sounds like the best it can be.”

  “It is,” I said, not a beat after he finished.

  He quirked an eyebrow. He noticed my rigidness and at first, neither of us said anything, but then Rick went ahead and announced the big fat elephant in the room. “I told Justin to give up all the harassing. What he was doing was too far,” Rick said. “Way too far.”

  “What made him stop?”

  Rick looked away, flushed. Justin moved on—was it that? Was it with Cara? Why had he tried so hard for so long, and caused so much pain, pestering and scaring me, if he wanted her all that time? I hoped it was a random girl I had never met.

  “For the record, I hardly spend time with him. I know it doesn’t excuse what he did, but—”

  “Uh, Rick?”

  He looked up.

  “I can’t talk about all that, okay?” I said. “I’m sorry for being rude, but there are some things about me that have changed. And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t bring that up again.”

  He rubbed his forehead into his fist. “Ugh, sorry.”

  Why was I being a bitch after his concern? I said, “There was one good thing about your party.”

  “You liked them, ‘ey?” Rick winked, lightening the mood.

  I spluttered on a chuckle. “I did, but I wasn’t going there.”

  “No?”

  I looked at him then. Really looked. I saw deep and dark pools of care in those brown eyes. His jaw was clean-shaven, and it took everything in my self-control to stop myself from reaching out to smooth my hand over it. A lot had changed, but not our dynamics. He still eyed me intently, passionately, and stood close in a way that felt like he was protecting his grounds
. It was comforting to have all that back. Comfort was something I hadn’t had since that night. No best friend to share my thoughts with and no boyfriend to make me feel loved. Just a Mum who tried to stay afloat who I’d pushed away without realising.

  I was fine with the two former things. I was stronger now. But, just for a few seconds, I stared back into Rick’s eyes and wondered what it’d be like to not say anything, and if I held his hand. Just once. It was stupid and weak, but maybe I’d feel better if I could finally touch him. Guilt free.

  Maybe it’d even feel good to be together with Rick.

  What the hell are you thinking? And where the hell had these feelings come from?

  I hadn’t felt the spike of adrenaline since that night, or the heat between my legs, or the itch to bring a smile on my face, but Rick, right then in the corner of my old workplace, made me feel it all. How could the presence of one guy in one moment make my iron heart bleed red, my body crave such primal needs?

  I remembered he was still waiting and promised myself I would do better to focus when talking. “I meant you, about the party. I don’t have anyone in my life these days besides Mum and my brother, Robert. And I rarely see him anyway. It’s nice I ran into you. Thanks for what you did. It wasn’t much, but to me, sharing that moment with you made it less of a burden. And holding me like that and going out to face them? I just …” I couldn’t think, less form words to describe what I meant. I settled for, “Thank you.”

  He half-smiled and touched my upper arm. Rick got what I was feeling and at the least, it was enough. “So,” he asked, “What was with the frown? Did you get rejected back there?”

  He pointed to the bar, and I couldn’t help but erupt in laughter. I thought about how not funny my situation was and laughed my way into a keeled-over, hands-on-thighs chuckle. Everything was so not funny I couldn’t help but make light of it. “Well, I was a part-time receptionist, lifeguard, waitress, and bartender as of an hour ago. Now, I’m only a lifeguard and receptionist. Smiths Leisure Centre down my way is fine, but not with the little hours I get.”