The washup, p.19
The Washup, page 19
‘Oh, right.’ Shane paused. ‘You have it though, don’t you? You showed it to me at the Strand?’
‘Yeah. It’s at my house. But it was a weird phone call. She said CASA’s been looking for it, but I thought they were finished with their investigation. Does it sound weird that they’d suddenly be looking for Jack’s phone?’
Shane went quiet for a while, thinking. ‘It does sound weird,’ he said at last. ‘I haven’t heard anything about them opening the case back up.’
‘You think she could be lying?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Why would she want Jack’s phone?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘There must be something on it.’ Eve wanted to shout, I was right after all. It wasn’t a fucking accident. ‘Now can you get your hacker people to look at it?’
‘It’s not quite that simple, but it’s worth keeping an eye on. Why don’t I come over after work? I get out of here in a couple of hours.’
‘Um, I don’t know.’ Eve’s mind went back to her bedroom. Sandra had opened the windows, but she suspected it still smelled of possum piss. What if he ends up in my bedroom? she thought. I’ll have to go home and deal with the sheets. ‘Are you sure?’ she said. ‘You’re not feeling some misplaced sense of obligation?’
‘No,’ Shane said. ‘But in the interest of full disclosure, your shrine bear is still in my car.’
‘Oh god,’ she groaned. She wanted to put her head in her hands, but her hand hurt. ‘That stupid bear. Hey, maybe that bear really is bad juju. Since you came into contact with it you’ve been bitten on the face and punched in the nose. Maybe it’s all the bear’s fault and not mine.’ Shane didn’t answer and Eve realised what she’d said. ‘But I’m the one who took it. Right, never mind.’
‘I want to see you,’ he said quickly. ‘I’ll come over when I finish my shift. I can text you when I’m on the ferry.’
When Eve got back to the table, she found a man standing over Sandra. He was middle-aged and wore a button-up shirt with iron creases down the arms. Tourist, she thought. Too neat-looking to be a local. He saw Eve and grinned with all his teeth. ‘I’m telling your friend here I’d like to buy you ladies a round.’
Eve was only half listening. ‘Okay.’
‘Oh, great,’ he said and nearly ran to the bar.
‘Eve.’ Sandra shot daggers from her eyes. ‘I was trying to get rid of him. I told him we didn’t want any drinks.’
‘Oh. Sorry.’
The ferry was unloading now. The carpark had gone from empty to overrun in under a minute. People were lining up for the buses and spilling out into the carpark.
‘He told me he’s got a penthouse on the Gold Coast,’ Sandra said. ‘Reckons he’s a hedge fund manager.’ She turned in her seat so she could watch him at the bar. ‘I don’t believe it, though. I bet he’s got a pocket full of Rohypnol.’
Something at the terminal caught Eve’s attention. It was a woman, slight but muscular, walking past the buses into the carpark. It took Eve several seconds to recognise her because she wasn’t wearing black. Instead, Aimee wore a caramel-coloured hat with a large brim. Her shirt was green with long sleeves that covered her tattoos, and she had gold sandals on her feet. Eve had never seen Aimee in a pair of thongs, let alone a pair of sandals so feminine. She said she was at the office packing up her things. Not only had Aimee lied about her reason for wanting Jack’s phone but she had lied about where she was and what she was doing. Eve watched her cross the carpark. She didn’t stop, didn’t look around, and she moved fast. Clearly, she had somewhere to be.
Eve had seconds to make up her mind. She could stay, drink her sugary cocktail and watch the yachtie hang out the rest of his laundry, or she could follow Aimee, find out what she was doing on the island and why she was trying to look like a different person.
Sandra was still watching the man at the bar. Her car keys were on the table. Eve grabbed them and stood up. ‘I’ll be back.’
‘What?’
‘I’m sorry. I’ll be back. Promise.’ She ran out to the carpark as Aimee approached the driver’s side of a small SUV. Eve got into the pink topless car and went to put the keys in the ignition, but her bandage got in the way and the keys fell to the floor. ‘Shit.’ She reached down and felt around with her left hand. Aimee was pulling out of the carpark now, headed for the exit. Eve grabbed the keys and, after three attempts, got them in the ignition. She saw Aimee turn left at the roundabout and head in the direction of Picnic Bay. As Eve reached the exit, Aimee was two cars ahead. She followed her down Sooning Street, past the pirate-themed cafe and the post office complex, past the doctor’s clinic and the supermarket. Aimee reached the hardware store and pulled into the carpark. Eve pulled over in the vacant block beside it and left the engine running. Nobody comes all the way to the island to go to the hardware store.
The first stop for most non-locals was the beach or one of the pubs. Something was going on. First there was the photo of Bruce having lunch with Murray. Now, here was Aimee hiding her tattoos and lying about CASA’s investigation. Five minutes passed and she didn’t come out.
Eve’s phone rang on the passenger seat. It was Sandra. ‘Just letting you know I’m walking home.’ She was puffing and sounded angry.
‘What? Why?’
‘Jesus, Eve, you ran off and left me there with that skeezie guy.’
‘Okay, but I saw Aimee get off the ferry.’
‘So?’
‘She’s wearing a big hat and a long-sleeved shirt.’ Eve could hardly believe she had to explain it. ‘It’s a fucking disguise.’
‘Oh, a big hat, hey?’ Sandra’s voice was thick with sarcasm. ‘In February. That totally sounds like a disguise. Where are you?’
‘Outside the hardware. She’s been in there for five minutes.’
‘You’re stalking her?’
‘No. I’m sitting in the car outside, waiting for her to come out. Who gets off the ferry and goes straight to the hardware? There’s something going on, Sandra, and if it has anything to do with Tilly and Jack, I—’
‘He touched my thigh.’
‘What?’
‘The guy at Peppers. He touched my thigh because you left me with him.’
Aimee came out of the shop and Eve ducked below the steering wheel. ‘Did you tell him to fuck off?’
‘Of course I did.’
‘Okay, so I don’t understand what the problem is. You told him to fuck off, and he was hardly going to try anything serious in the middle of the day. Meanwhile, I spoke to Aimee on the phone, and she said she was at the skydive office but she clearly wasn’t. She was on the ferry. And she asked me if I had Jack’s phone. She made up a whole story about CASA needing it for—’
‘You could have told me where you were going.’
Eve poked her head up above the steering wheel and saw Aimee pulling out of the carpark. She had her indicator on to turn right, back in the direction of the ferry. ‘Okay,’ Eve said and sat up. Holding her phone against her ear with her shoulder, she started the car. ‘Maybe I could have told you I’d seen Aimee get off the ferry.’ She let three cars pass before she pulled into the road to follow Aimee. ‘But remember when I told you I’d seen Murray get off the ferry? How you bailed me up at the terminal? Yeah, you remember that? You wouldn’t let me talk to him because you thought I was going to shout at him. Meanwhile he was going to Bruce’s house for lunch.’ Eve could feel herself getting angry. ‘I might have got answers off him, Sandra, answers about what happened to Jack and Tilly. But you’re more interested in keeping the peace. Maybe if I’d been able to have that conversation, I would have known Matt wasn’t responsible for the crash. Maybe I wouldn’t have gone to Jack’s funeral with a knife in my bag and fucked up my hand.’ She took the phone with her left hand and used her right wrist to operate the steering wheel. ‘You know how hard it is to drive this ridiculous car with a fucked-up hand, Sandra? Really hard. But I’m doing it because I have to. Because you wouldn’t let me talk to a man at the ferry terminal.’
‘You know what, Eve?’ Sandra’s voice was cold. ‘You make it sound like no one in the world cares about what happened to Tilly and Jack except you. You don’t own being sad. You don’t own grieving.’
Ordinarily, Eve would have been angry to hear words like that from Sandra. She would have shot back, accused her of being insensitive, but Aimee was coming up to the turnoff to Mandalay Avenue. Was she going to turn? Eve slowed down just in case, but Aimee passed the turnoff and kept going along the main road. She’s going over the hill to Arcadia or Horseshoe. ‘I never said I did, Sandra.’
‘Did you ever stop to think that maybe I might be hurting too? That maybe I might need a friend? Jack was my friend too and God forgive me if I want to wear a pair of shiny pants and day drink with my best friend. Tilly and Jack are gone, Eve, but I’m still here and you don’t run out on a friend like that. I would never do that to you.’
‘Okay, Sandra,’ Eve said, doing her best not to shout into the phone. ‘So, a guy hits on you at a bar and you tell him to fuck off. Big deal. Maybe I should have said where I was going. That’s my bad and I accept that but let’s not forget the pants were your idea.’ The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. In the back of her mind Eve knew she’d crossed a line, but she didn’t care. She was angry and her hand hurt. ‘You made me put them on and you made me go to Peppers.’ She paused to let Sandra speak but all she got was dead air. ‘You’re walking home right now because you dragged me out of the house. All of this could have been avoided if you’d let me stay in bed, but here we are.’ Eve heard the bleep of a cop car siren behind her. She looked into the rear-view mirror and saw lights flashing. ‘Fuck,’ she whispered. Aimee was still ahead of her, approaching the base of the Arcadia hill.
‘I’m charging you for the car,’ Sandra said. ‘Full price, too. No mate’s rates.’ She hung up.
Eve took the phone away from her ear and pulled up beside the ice cream shop. She wanted to cry. Aimee went through the roundabout and disappeared around the first bend of the hill, and Eve slapped the steering wheel. ‘Fucking Sandra.’
Tony pulled up behind her and got out of the car. ‘Oh shit,’ he said. ‘I thought you were a tourist. What are you doing driving around on your phone?’ He looked at her hand. ‘And what happened there?’
‘I cut myself cooking the other day. It looks worse than it is.’
Tony frowned. ‘You know the kids here look up to you, Eve. You can’t be driving while you’re on the phone, especially in a car with no roof where everybody can see you.’
‘I know, and I’m sorry, Tony.’ She put the phone in her bag and closed it. ‘It won’t happen again. I promise.’
‘I’m supposed to give you a ticket.’
‘Okay.’
Tony looked at the bonnet and touched the edge of the windscreen. ‘You know, I really hate these cars,’ he said. ‘Don’t tell Sandra I said that.’
‘It’s okay.’ Eve wondered if Aimee was over the hill yet, or if she’d got stuck behind a bus. ‘She hates them too.’
Tony drummed his fingers on the glass. ‘I’m not going to give you a ticket. This time.’ He looked at her hand again. ‘I think you should go home. That hand doesn’t look safe for driving.’ He got back into his car and headed for the base of the hill and Eve turned around and headed for home. She expected to see Sandra on the way, stomping down the street, using her new exercise pants for their intended purpose. Eve would blow past her, maybe give her the middle finger if there was no one else on the street, but she made it to her house without passing anyone she knew. Still angry, she parked on the street, stormed up the front steps and went to the third drawer in her kitchen. Jack’s phone was still there, right where she’d left it.
What’s in here that Aimee wants so bad?
The phone was a mid-range model, not too cheap and not too expensive, for the person who favoured reliability over storage capacity, backup ability and speed. Basically, it was a phone for the person who hated technology, for the person who wouldn’t even bother to change the ringtone away from the default. Too many times Jack had reached for his phone when it turned out it was Eve’s that had been ringing. Too many times he’d laughed and said he really needed to change the ringtone. He never did change it. Neither did Eve. Well, it’s probably not a photo or a video, she thought, unless Aimee forgot that stuff gets automatically backed up in the cloud. She went to the couch and tried several passcode patterns. No dice. It must be something in the text messages. She tried three more times. The phone would not give up its secrets, so she put it on charge beside the bookcase.
Eve picked up her own phone and was sending Sandra a message – You can come get your shitty car now. I’m not filling up the tank – when a scratching sound came from the ceiling. It was Peanut getting comfortable in the insulation. ‘Shit,’ Eve muttered, remembering the sheets. Bundling them up, she carried them downstairs and under the house. The washing machine was down there, along with more cobwebs than Eve cared to count.
She stuffed the sheets into the machine and then went looking for something to clean the mattress with. In the cupboard under the washtub she found three sleeping frogs, one large huntsman spider, a fat startled gecko and an ancient-looking bottle of bleach. The cupboard beside it housed a beaten-up garden spade and half a bottle of spray disinfectant. None of these things looked promising but she filled a bucket with hot water and tipped in some bleach. She was studying the side of a box of bicarb soda when she heard tyres on the gravel driveway. A car door slammed.
‘Eve?’ It was Bruce.
She put down the box of bicarb and rinsed her hands under the tap. She was about to make her presence known when she heard him on the front steps. He was going up into the house.
‘Eve?’ He was on the verandah.
Eve didn’t know why she stayed silent. Something in her gut told her he hadn’t dropped in for a cup of coffee. His work van was visible through the golden cane that grew by the front steps.
‘Hello? Anybody home?’
Eve heard the screen door open. Footsteps moved into the kitchen. The house was all wooden floors, which meant from underneath the house she could hear practically everything going on upstairs. Eve waited to hear him turn around and head back down the steps, but he stayed where he was. She strained to hear him moving around but the only sound was the wind in the trees. He must be looking at the family portrait by the fridge, she thought, and the footsteps started again. But they didn’t go for the steps. They went in the opposite direction, down the hallway.
A knot formed in Eve’s stomach as Bruce walked down the back of the house and into her bedroom. He walked around her bed and stopped at her wardrobe. The hinge on the wardrobe door creaked and there was silence again. Oh my god, she thought. He’s going through my clothes. Slowly, as silently as she could manage, she made her way to the back steps. She heard Bruce come out of her room and walk back down the hallway to the living room. When Eve found him, he was standing by the bookshelf.
‘Oh, hello there, Eve,’ he said, visibly startled. ‘I popped in to see how you’re going.’
‘I’m fine.’ Eve didn’t smile. ‘Just doing some laundry.’
‘That’s great. Need a hand?’
‘No thanks. Why were you in my bedroom?’
‘Your bedroom?’ Bruce smiled and brought his hands together. ‘Eve, I wasn’t in your bedroom. I just got here.’
‘You’ve been here for, like, five minutes. I heard you walking around.’
‘You probably heard a possum in the roof. Honestly, Eve, I dropped in to check on you.’
‘So, you weren’t in my room going through my wardrobe?’
‘Of course not.’ He put on the enquiring face of a therapist.
‘Don’t give me that look, Bruce. I know you were in there.’
‘Okay, I can see you need your rest.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I’ll head off and give you your space.’ He went to leave but she grabbed his arm.
‘No.’ Bruce’s skin was damp and smooth like a gecko. ‘I know there’s some shit going on, Bruce.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
Eve let go and put her fingers to her temples. She was getting very tired of lies. ‘Do you know Aimee?’
A dismissive laugh, but Eve pressed on. ‘At Jack’s funeral you introduced yourself to her like you didn’t know her, but I saw her go into your shop this afternoon. She got off the ferry wearing shit she doesn’t usually wear, like she doesn’t want anyone to recognise her, and went straight to your shop. Nobody comes over here to go to the hardware store. They go to the beach or the pub. And she didn’t come out with anything, so that has me thinking she went there to see you.’
Bruce had stopped trying to leave but the bored expression on his face said he wasn’t about to give up any details. Eve would have to do that work herself. ‘I know you know Murray,’ she said. ‘You had lunch with him the day Sandra and I ran into you on the forts walk. His watch was in the picture you posted to Instagram.’
‘That could be anyone—’
‘No. I know what Murray’s watch looks like, right down to the colour. It was him in that photo. So, you know Murray and now you know Aimee. Aimee called me earlier. She wanted to know if I had Jack’s phone. She said CASA wants it for their investigation, but I know for a fact their investigation is closed. So … they don’t want the phone. She does. Then ten minutes after that conversation I see her get off the ferry and go to your shop. Then she drives off in the direction of Horseshoe and ten minutes after that here you are going through my shit.’
Eve stopped, waited for him to say something, but he crossed his arms and stared at her.
‘Were you looking for Jack’s phone, Bruce?’ She took a step closer to him. She would make him crack. ‘Or was it my undies you were after? Is it the clean ones or the dirty ones you’re into?’
