by Jaye Ford
‘My name is shit!’ he finally bellowed. ‘My name is totally fucked. It’s all fucked. Fucked and gone to hell. Blown up and coming back down in bits of bone and guts. That’s going to be me. I’m already dead. That’s my name now. That’s what they called me. That’s me. Nice to meet you. I’m Already Dead.’
2
Jax held tight to the wheel and tried to focus on staying in her lane as the man beside her went crazy. He thumped the dashboard, yanked and shoved at it like he was trying to tear it off. He kicked at the centre console, the glove box, the door. Slammed his elbow backwards into the seat as though it’d jumped on his back and he was trying to heave it off. All the time grunting, hollering, bawling out sounds from deep in his chest.
Then he started with his head. One hard bash against the passenger-side window was followed by another and another. Sideways knocks, skull against glass, a crushing beat. Jax couldn’t tell if he was trying to break the window or get rid of what was stuck in his head. And all the time, the gun jerked and juddered in his hand.
She watched him, watched the road, panic mounting. Would he give up on the window eventually and remember the gun? Stupid to sit here and wait for it to happen.
She hit the brake, not sure where to stop but desperate for something, anything that might get her away from him. The shadow of a semitrailer darkened her rear-view mirror, the blast of its air horn making her cringe. Her foot found the accelerator again as she searched the motorway for a place to pull off, trying to block out the head-banging on the other side of the car.
There. A narrow strip of verge beside a sheer wall of rock, the remnants of the hill that the road had been cut through. So narrow she’d have to wait for a break in the traffic before she could open her door and get out, but fuck it. She tapped the brake pedal a couple of times, flicked the indicator, wanting to give the truck behind her as much warning as she could. As her left-hand tyres slid off the tarmac, gravel sprayed the chassis.
The crazy guy forgot the window. ‘No!’
Jax ignored him, tightening her hands, locking her arms, sensing the speed and the loose surface under her tyres and the rock wall coming at them fast.
‘No!’ he roared again. ‘Drive. Drive.’ Lunging across the car, he shoved the wheel. One hard push and the car was jerked back onto the tarmac, leaping across the outside lane in front of the semi and into the next one. A screech of rubber and Jax’s head was thrown sideways as the rear wheels lost traction, swinging the sedan back the other way, fishtailing as she held on – as the tipping, sliding start of a roll built underneath them.
Don’t brake. Don’t brake. Shit, don’t brake.
Then she was hurled in the other direction, the weight of the chassis thumping down hard – and she was driving again, hands clamped, eyes wide, breath frozen in her lungs.
Horns were blaring. Long, angry blasts as vehicles jockeyed to speed around her. She was taking up two lanes, pissing people off. She thought about waving her arms, trying to get someone’s attention, but she couldn’t bring herself to take her eyes off the road or her hands off the wheel, so she just steered back into the outside lane in the wake of the semi, sucking on the smell of sweat and fear.
Beside her, the crazy man was knocking his head against the window again, yelling and banging. ‘Drive.’ Bash. ‘Drive.’ Bash. ‘Drive.’ Bash.
‘Stop!’ she yelled. As he backed up for another go, she grabbed a handful of his sleeve. ‘For God’s sake, stop!’ It was enough to make him pause, and she claimed the moment to talk loud and fast. ‘Stop, all right. Just stop. You’re going to hurt yourself or I’m going to run off the road. So just fucking stop.’
He watched her with narrowed eyes, breathing hard. When he answered, his voice was flat, resigned. ‘I’m already dead.’
As he started on another thrust, she hauled on his shirt again. ‘Yeah, well, as far as I can see, you’re still breathing. And you’re freaking me out. I can’t drive if you freak me out. I don’t know where you want to go but we’re not going to get there if you smash your head open and I have a panic attack. So sit still for a goddamn minute and let me calm down.’
Still clutching his sleeve, driving one-handed, she pulled in deep, shaky breaths, surprised he didn’t try to pull away, unnerved at what she’d just done and said. Christ, the gun was in the hand of the arm she was gripping, dangling between them like a child’s mobile. She’d never held a handgun, but the rifle safety that’d been drummed into her as a kid hadn’t included being casual with a trigger. A flick of this guy’s wrist and a bump from a pothole and she could have a bullet inside her. Maybe it would go right through and she’d be dead before her car slammed into the semi that was now towering above them in the next lane.
No. That wasn’t going to happen. Zoe needed her to get home. Their new home.
‘Have you finished?’ she asked firmly.
‘Yes.’ It was little more than sound pushed out between locked teeth.
‘You won’t throw yourself around if I let go?’
‘No.’
She loosened her fingers, testing him, ready to keep hold if he went off again. He didn’t. He sat facing forward, his breathing not so much panting as forced, frustrated exhalations.
Hers, on the other hand, was hard and fast, pumped up by fear and adrenaline and an intensifying urge to get the fuck away from him. If he was ‘already dead’, what did that make her? Dead woman driving? If he thought he was going to die anyway, what was to stop him shooting her at the wheel or forcing them into a truck? Not a lot of difference between death by bullet or death by car.
So you have to stop him doing that, she told herself. Somehow. For Zoe’s sake. Because Zoe couldn’t lose her, too.
She fumbled for the window button.
‘Hey!’ he hollered.
‘I need some air,’ she snapped, keeping her thumb on the switch until the glass had disappeared and hot January air was blasting in her face. She pulled hungrily at it, sweat cooling on her forehead, the tips of her fingers tingling and trembling.
Okay. Okay. She had to try to keep him calm until she could find a reason and a better place to pull over. And soon, because the fidgeting was starting up again.
The talking had seemed to ease that – right up until he went ballistic. Had she caused it? She’d only asked him his name. And he’d gone nuts earlier when she’d asked if he was going to hurt her. Maybe it was best not to ask anything. Just talk without questions. Great. It was her life’s hobby to ask stuff. It was possible she’d never had a discussion that didn’t include questions.
He was looking front and back and murmuring to himself again. Some kind of private debate this time. She couldn’t make out words, just the tone: reasoning followed by reprimand. Maybe she should leave him to it. Maybe he wouldn’t appreciate being interrupted. And she sure as hell could do without the talking. Every conversation she’d had in the last year had been laden with grief and loss and frustration and, right now, she had no idea what to talk about that wouldn’t wrench her heart or get her killed.
‘What the fuck is that?’ His body had gone rigid, his gun pointed at the dashboard.
She frowned. ‘The radio.’ He’d tried to kill it. Now he didn’t know what it was?
‘No. That.’ The gun aimed lower.
Taking her eyes from the road for a second, she saw the bottom edge of her mobile phone. It was plugged into a car charger, tucked into a recess, and the tip of the gun barrel was touching the lead that stuck out. Glancing at him, wondering how far his mind had slipped, she said, ‘It’s a phone.’
‘What the fuck is it doing here?’ There was anger in the way he said it. And something else. Confusion, bewilderment.
She hesitated and, for a tiny moment, sci-fi movies and time travel and visiting beings slipped through her mind. Don’t be fucking stupid. He’d lost his mind, maybe he’d lost his memory, too. ‘It’s a mobile telephone. You take it with you.’
‘No, no. How did you get it? How the
fuck did you get it?’
How had she bought it? ‘Everyone has one.’
‘It’s bullshit. Fucking bullshit. It shouldn’t be here. Not here.’ He slammed the power lead with the gun on the last word, hard enough to knock it out.
‘Careful,’ she snapped. Reprimand on reflex and, as soon as it was out, she wished she could take it back.
Eyes glared at her, then he grabbed the phone, held it up, turned it around. And around again, as though he really hadn’t seen one before.
She wanted to snatch it away, keep it out of his reach. It might save her. It might be her only lifeline if she crashed. If she was trapped or injured, somewhere isolated and alone. If he …
She sucked in a breath, glanced his way. ‘Is there someone you want to talk to?’
He jabbed the mobile at her. ‘Not with this.’
‘I could get them on the phone for you.’
He didn’t answer, just turned it off like he’d done it a hundred times; wrenched open the glove box, stuffed it inside, slammed the door. Sat with his fists clenched, one of them hard and tight around the gun. She locked her own fingers around the steering wheel until they hurt, trying to keep down the panic, telling herself he hadn’t smashed the phone or tossed it out the window. She still had that.
‘No-o-o!’ The word was a growl, stretched out, rolling on as he scoured his forehead with the butt of his gun. Back and forth as though he was rubbing a channel into the skin. ‘No. No. No. No –’
‘I used to love this bridge,’ Jax said quickly, urgently, speaking over him. ‘When we went to the coast for the holidays, this was the first water we’d see.’ She lifted a hand from the wheel and pointed at the wide, blue expanse of the Hawkesbury River. ‘It’s nowhere near the beach, at least not where we used to go, but we’d all chant, “Water, water,” and it felt like we were nearly there.’
She flicked her eyes sideways. He was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, the gun cradled between both hands.
‘And, ah, we’d always stop at the old Oak Factory at Peats Ridge. It’s not there anymore but everyone who ever came up here remembers it. It was a factory for milk and ice-cream and … and it had a milk bar where they made these unbelievable milkshakes. Thick and creamy like you just can’t get anymore.’
He was sitting back in his seat now, head against the baluster, eyes open and staring at the windscreen.
‘We did a tour of the factory one year. We had to wear these paper hats and bootees on our shoes, and they walked us past huge vats of milk. The smell was disgusting and my mum almost threw up before Dad could hustle her out.’
God, she hadn’t thought of that in years. It shouldn’t hurt. Twelve months ago it wouldn’t have, but grief had sharpened the edges on everything. Her parents had been gone almost twenty years but in the last one she’d missed their presence more than she had in a long, long time. Still, age gave it some distance, and in her thirty-second pause his twitching and shifting had started up again.
‘We used to go to Port Stephens at Christmas,’ she went on. ‘Rent a caravan at one of the beaches and surf and fish and ride bikes and just laze about. If my Aunt Tilda was in Newcastle, she’d come and see us. Sometimes I’d go to her place and let Mum and Dad have a bit of time on their own. Her house is right near the beach, nearly as much fun as a caravan.’ Jax smiled to herself – Tilda’s house was almost a mansion – and kept talking when she saw the sharp turn of his head to the back window. ‘When I was older, I lived with her in Newcastle for a couple of years, then at uni I’d stay with her on weekends. That’s where I was going today. To my aunt’s house.’ Not just Tilda’s anymore. Miranda and Zoe’s, too.
It was sanctuary, Jax told herself again. Not defeat. And not a subject she wanted to discuss with him. She closed her window, searching for something else to talk about. But he beat her to it.
‘Is your husband going too?’
It was the first time he’d spoken in anything resembling a conversational tone but her spine still stiffened with caution. She didn’t know whether it was a sign he was settling down or a prelude to another freak out.
And she didn’t want to talk about Nick.
‘We went other places too. Port Macquarie, Coffs Harbour …’
‘Are you meeting him in Newcastle?’ he asked more firmly.
Would he smash his head through the window if she ignored his question? ‘No.’
‘Why not? Where is he?’ Demand, not query.
And it was none of his damn business. ‘I’m not married.’
‘Don’t lie to me.’ Anger and agitation in his words now.
‘I’m not lying.’
‘You’re wearing a fucking wedding ring.’
She curled her left hand around the steering wheel, too late to hide the slim, gold band she still wore. ‘I’m visiting my aunt. She lives minutes from the city but just up the hill from the beach. You can’t buy houses like that in Sydney anymore. Not unless you’re a billionaire.’
There was no obvious escalation, no sliding up the volume scale, just a deafening roar. ‘Don’t lie!’
It made her duck away from him, taking a quick, precautionary flick to the rear-view mirror as she moved. ‘I’m not lying. I’m not married. I –’
‘You’re all liars. All of you. Everyone.’ He yelled like it was her fault, squeezed his eyes tight, rubbed the heels of his hands up and down his face as though he couldn’t take it anymore – whatever it was. ‘I thought if I went outside –’ He stopped, started again. ‘I thought if I found someone outside of it … I thought someone sitting in a car, just sitting in the traffic … I thought you’d be … I just want the truth. Why can’t you tell me the truth? Why?’
Jax watched the road and the gun, back and forth, too scared to speak – but in that moment, despite her fear and his mood swings, she felt sorry for him. She knew how it felt to have questions going round and round, unanswered, unexplained, unsatisfied. And he was a mess. She knew what that was like, too. She hadn’t lost her mind in the last year, at least not like this, but she’d known grief and obsession that were so overwhelming she’d sounded crazy even to herself.
The empathy lasted for about three seconds. Until he turned angry, irrational eyes on her, lifted the pistol and pointed it at her face. ‘Tell me the truth! Where is your husband?’
Would he pull the trigger if he didn’t like her answer? ‘Put the gun down.’
‘Tell me.’ The gun didn’t move.
‘Please. Look –’
‘Tell me the –’
‘Okay, okay. I’ll tell you but put the gun down first.’
‘I put it down when I get the truth.’
The truth. She wished she could give him the truth. Something that was complete and hopeful. Something that would make him calm down, not remind him he was ‘already dead’. But as she opened her mouth, all she could think of was the unedited, unanswered story. ‘I’m not married. I’m a widow. My husband’s dead. Someone killed him.’ Then she braced herself.
3
Jax expected a bullet, a grab for the wheel, the deafening crush of metal. There was nothing but the hum of the engine and the ringing of her ears in the sudden quiet.
‘He was murdered?’ the man beside her finally asked. Calm, quiet, almost deflated.
What the hell?
Telling him didn’t matter now. Reopening the wound wasn’t nearly as scary as the prospect of imminent death. ‘Murder. Manslaughter. Someone is responsible.’
‘How was he killed?’
‘He was hit by a car. The driver didn’t stop. The police are treating it as a homicide.’ As though giving it a category and assigning specialist detectives was enough to claim they’d achieved something in twelve months.
‘On a bike?’
‘No, running. There was no footpath and he was on the road.’ She’d thought the words would hurt more but his direct, unflinching Q-and-A took the emotion out of it. ‘The car came from behind. No skid marks, no apparent at
tempt to brake. Crash investigators say he hit the grille, went over the top and bounced off either the back window or the boot before he landed.’ The Homicide cops hadn’t added anything more.
Jax kept her eyes front, the car ahead turning briefly blurry as tears came and receded again. He didn’t speak for a while, just sat sideways in his seat, his stare fixed on the rear window, the taut agitation replaced with something almost calm.
His face was different when he wasn’t freaking out. Softer, gentler. Dark, liquid eyes matched hair that kinked into curls above his ears. He was broad through the shoulders but thin, the kind of sinewy spareness that suggested lean fitness, not malnourishment.
‘I knew a guy once who hit a pedestrian.’ He spoke without looking at her, his tone matter-of-fact, as though they were swapping hit-and-run tales, not the horrific details of her husband’s death. ‘He said the noise, the bump-bump on the chassis as the bloke hit, kept him awake for months.’
She gritted her teeth as the sound she’d imagined over and over for a year ran through her head again. Then, as it passed, as his meaning sank in, she turned sharply to him. He might have been in the middle of a breakdown and his delivery was gut-wrenchingly tactless but he was on the same thought process she hadn’t been able to get off since the day Nick died.
‘It’s not something you’d miss, right?’ she said. ‘The driver had to know they’d hit him. If they were texting or turning around to a kid in the back, they might not realise it was a person, but they’d know they’d hit something. You’d brake and check the rear-view mirror, wouldn’t you? And a grown man lying in the road wearing a fluorescent vest can’t be mistaken for something else, can it? Which means they either stopped and saw and left the scene or they meant to do it and kept driving. A cruel, self-serving, insensitive prick or a different kind of cruel, self-serving, insensitive prick.’
The injustice of it started heating up inside her again. And relief – at saying out loud what friends and detectives kept telling her she needed to let go of. When she glanced back at him, she thought she saw a little more sanity behind his eyes. Logic maybe, something other than anger and volatility. Then she turned her head all the way around to the cars speeding past in the other lane. What was she doing searching for solidarity from a crazy man?
