Ballad for a Mad Girl Read online

  Dad was afraid.

  When we left the farm I worried it would give up my secrets to the family who moved in: the Johnsons’ farm manager Brett O’Malley, his wife Mandy, and their three children. Paige is my age. She goes to Sacred Heart. She has my room. She sees the faded constellation of stars above my bed and looks out over the house paddock where I took my first steps and learned to drive. If she’s gone exploring she would have found my name carved into trees, concrete slabs, fence posts and rocks.

  Cody has managed not to speak during the whole drive. He won’t give me my phone and it’s driving me crazy wondering what Kenzie has said.

  ‘They’ve killed her plants,’ I say. The driveway up to the farmhouse is two hundred metres long. The year before she died, Mum had painstakingly planted rows of English box seedlings along the last fifty metres on either side. They struggled to take root, but now they’re really gone.

  Cody finally speaks. ‘They never belonged here. Fancy plants—they needed too much looking after.’

  I jerk my head around but he won’t meet my eye. He’s not talking about the plants. ‘You’re talking about Mum.’

  He shrugs. ‘True.’

  ‘I hate you.’

  He closes his eyes for a second. It wouldn’t matter if he closed them for a whole minute—we could both still drive this track blindfolded. Probably the entire property, all six hundred acres.

  ‘She loved Dad. She loved us,’ I say.

  He turns the wheel sharply to hit the ditch he knows is there. ‘Yeah. She loved us all so much she threw herself under Dominic Aloisi’s truck.’

  Now it’s me who can’t speak. I have to get out. I turn the handle and the door swings open. Cody has me by the back of my jumper and somehow I wriggle out of his grip and jump. He’s braking, but I still hit the dirt hard enough to drop and roll into the shallow ditch alongside the driveway, taking out another few of Mum’s seedlings.

  I sit up, breathing hard, and throw a clump of dirt and roots at the car.

  Cody stops long enough to make sure I’m okay and takes off again, leaving me to walk alone. Alone is where I want to be. I can feel tears making tracks on my dirty face and my chest is heaving with the effort to stop myself from running after the car and taking a swing at him.

  I’ve never said those words aloud. Except, the way he said it, I know he has. And maybe Dad has, too.

  He’s gone for about half an hour. I wait, sitting on a fence post, watching the light change over the fields, my hand in a fist around the star in my pocket. The farm doesn’t really belong to us anymore. I practise the words I’ll fire at Cody when he comes back—have them all lined up, ready to go, like a wave of soldiers. He can’t be allowed to think that way; Mum’s not here to tell him it isn’t so.

  A breeze picks up, carrying whirlies of red soil into the sky. We used to chase them when we were kids. We used to build castles out of hay bales and make crop circles in the paddocks; we’d wait for storms to roll in, lying on our backs on the hay shed roof, tempting the lightning—and fate—by holding star-droppers up to the sky.

  Cody wasn’t always my big brother—once he was my friend.

  When he comes back to pick me up he looks miserable. He throws an engine part in the back of the car and slides into the driver’s seat, handing me my phone.

  I’ve had so much time to think that my words have deserted. All that’s left is the ache and frustration of being alive—it must be the worst kind of hell to be dead, and not to be heard.

  Cody heads straight for the garage. I let myself in as Diesel watches my every move from under the dining-room table. I bolt upstairs, wash my face, empty my pockets of dirt, and throw myself onto the bed.

  Cody is probably regretting what he said, but there’s no taking it back. He can stew in his juices until he falls apart, for all I care.

  My outgoing log shows no recent call to Gummer’s number. The last one registered was the night of Tamara Fraser’s party when I set up the pool prank. I don’t know what I hoped for from Kenzie—an apology, or at least a ‘we need to talk’—but her voicemail messages are disappointing. Her tone is chirpy but guarded, and I imagine Mitchell looming over her, holding a script.

  ‘Hey, Grace. It’s me, Kenzie. Just checking up on you.’ And, ‘You’re not answering your phone? Well, okay then. Bye.’

  The texts were sent yesterday afternoon, around the time Gummer and I were at the mall. She wouldn’t have known my phone was missing.

  Call me when you’re free. Okay, not urgent. Half an hour later: WHERE ARE YOU? Genuine concern, or does she need to talk?

  I log in to my Facebook but there’s not much activity apart from the usual insults. Insta’s full of pictures from last night’s round of parties and car park hangouts. I check Kenzie’s Facebook. The only recent post is a picture of Mitch and her from four days ago. They’re lying on his bed. Behind their faces is a poster with one of those inspirational quotes like the ones in Call Me Connie’s office.

  Michael Jordan: ‘I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life…and that is why I succeed’.

  Mitch doesn’t even like basketball.

  I try to check Amber’s Facebook and apparently we’re no longer friends.

  I send Pete a message: Wassup?

  I call Gummer and it rings out.

  If I could only speak to one of them before I call Kenzie—to see how the land lies—but it’s like I’m the last person on earth.

  ‘Just call her,’ I say to myself.

  I’m surprisingly nervous as I wait for her to pick up, but of course she doesn’t. I leave her a message.

  ‘Hey, Kenzie. It’s me, Grace. Just checking up on you. You’re not answering your phone? Well, okay then. Bye.’ It’s the same message, word for word—but hers was chirpy, and mine sounds vicious. And there’s no taking it back.

  Dad’s cooking liver and onions, dinner of champions. The smell makes me feel sick. Mum couldn’t stand it either.

  I close my bedroom door and open the window; outside there’s a grating sound. My escape platform, the tree branch, has grown and it’s rubbing against the gutter. If Dad truly wanted to keep me in he’d only have to lock my bedroom door and saw the branch off. It’s a long way down. I’d be like Rapunzel in her tower.

  I open my laptop. Did Susannah Holt cut down the branch outside Hannah’s window herself? Was it before or after Hannah disappeared? Was it obsession that drove William Dean to climb the tree outside and watch her?

  I trawl through articles and there’s one common theme: William Dean wasn’t right in the head, people said. He was smart enough but something was off about him. That’s the word that keeps cropping up. Off. Everyone knew he had something to do with the disappearance of Hannah Holt but there was no real evidence. Every clue led to a dead end. Her body was never found.

  September is traditionally a month of dry, sunny days in Swanston, but on September 18th 1993, the night Hannah Holt disappeared, an unseasonal storm rolled in and it rained. When the rain stopped, the surrounding paddocks were hit by several thousand dry lightning strikes; dozens of spot fires broke out across a hundred-kilometre radius. Between the hours of midnight and three, Swanston burned and Hannah Holt vanished. Almost a year to the day later, William Dean took his own life to pay the debt he owed Hannah Holt—at the same time, he took the secret of her resting place with him to the bottom of the gully.

  The story of a missing girl and her killer’s suicide was spread through whisper and rumour. Even twenty-three years later, it still gathers details. It’s difficult for me to find much in the way of straight reporting—it was a crime that divided the media and the community. An alleged crime. A possible murder. The only thing most people could agree on was that it was an undeniable tragedy for Hannah’s mother.

  Search parties continued looking for Hannah for months. Dams were dredged, houses searched, backyards dug up; cadaver dogs were brought in to scour the gullies and surrounding paddocks and ditches. William
Dean was arrested twice and brought in for questioning over nine times, but there was no solid evidence apart from the samples taken from the back seat and boot of his car. But William had a reasonable explanation for everything—except his strange behaviour.

  Nobody could say for sure why William Dean decided to jump. After Hannah Holt’s disappearance he’d dropped out of school—out of sight, if not out of mind. His body wasn’t discovered for two days until a crop duster spotted his car, dumped, in the bottom of the quarry. He hadn’t been reported missing—it wasn’t that unusual for him to vanish for days at a time.

  There are only a few photos of him online. Each one makes me shudder. His eyes, dark and empty, stare straight into the lens. His hair is long in the front and blue-black, so dark it looks dyed, the colour in stark contrast with his pale skin and the raw patches of acne on his neck and cheeks. He wears plain white T-shirts with tight black jeans, accentuating his skinny chest and legs. He looks at least six feet tall and his arms are unusually long, covered with coarse hair. In close-ups I can see tracks of blue veins under his skin.

  ‘Grace,’ Dad calls. ‘Get down here.’

  I print out several articles and photos, tucking them into a folder. As I close the flap to cover his face I almost feel sorry for him, except his appearance fits the profile of a damaged, psychopathic loner. William Dean wouldn’t survive Swampie Public today. They’d tear him apart.

  ‘Grace!’

  ‘I’m coming!’

  I take the stairs two at a time and, from halfway, ride the banister to the bottom. I’m feeling energised and inexplicably happy. Dad looks up smiling as I hit the last step and bound into the dining room. Diesel has come around, his tail settling into a slow wag, his tongue hanging from the side of his mouth as if he’s drunk. But Cody hasn’t forgiven me yet.

  ‘What’s up?’ I say, glancing between Dad and Cody.

  ‘What do you mean, what’s up? Dinner is what’s up.’ Dad pulls out a chair at the table. ‘Sit.’

  The blood leaves my face. ‘You know I don’t eat offal.’

  Cody scowls. ‘It’s offal with gravy.’ He picks up two pieces of bread and slaps them onto my plate. ‘Sit!’

  ‘I’m not a dog. A dog wouldn’t eat that.’ I fold my arms. ‘And you’re not my father.’

  ‘Nobody would choose to be the father of a brat like you.’

  ‘I’m right here,’ Dad says quietly. He picks up his plate and moves to the couch.

  ‘See what you did?’ Cody hisses.

  I flip him the finger and stuff a slice of bread into my mouth. As I pass under the light globe in the lounge room, it pops and goes out.

  ‘Dodgy electrics,’ Dad says. ‘Bloody cardboard houses.’

  Hannah Holt is standing at the foot of my bed. She’s wearing white cotton shortie pyjamas, her face hidden behind a veil of matted hair. Her hands are cupped together—she looks like she’s begging, or saying a prayer.

  At first I’m not sure if I’m awake or asleep—if she’s finally showing herself or if I’ve made her up, a composite of all the horrors I’ve ever seen or imagined.

  Thump. Bump. Bruises blossom like flowers on her skin, only to fade and turn yellow, then bloom again in a different place. Smack. Her head snaps backwards like she’s been hit, and she flops like a rag doll. Click, click. Her bottom jaw slips from side to side as if she’s grinding her teeth.

  I crawl across the bed, trying to capture one of her fluttering hands, but it dances out of reach. I still can’t see her face and she’s starting to fade. Desperate, I grasp handfuls of hair, scooping it aside. I feel like I’m swimming through a forest of seaweed, but the hair sticks to my hands and twines around my wrists. I pull back, and clumps of hair come away in my hands, leaving weeping patches of flesh on her scalp.

  She claws at my face. Is she trying to get away? Or is she trying to climb inside my skin?

  Her shape flickers. It reappears across the room, as if a group of stagehands had moved the props and set up a new scene. She’s sitting quietly, chewing a fingernail, her arm hanging across the back of a seat, facing away. Rivulets of rain dance across a window and shapes streak past, illuminated by flashes of light: trees, fences, white lines. She’s in a car, staring out of the rear window. Looking back. Leaving. She turns her head and spits out the fingernail.

  Then, it’s dark. She’s curled up on her side, her hair still covering her face. I smell dust, rubber, oil, metal, fear. Pinpricks of light flicker like distant stars and every few seconds she’s jolted out of position. She can’t stretch her legs. I hear her breathing—and mine. And I hear a wheezing engine followed by a sound like a gunshot. She jerks, and the darkness surrounding her glows red.

  For too long, she’s still. I’m sure she’s dead. I’m no longer on the bed but in the dark place, with her.

  Clunk. A latch releasing, a rush of air and moonlight. Hannah slowly turns over and her hair falls away. She looks up, and her features have changed—she’s aged by twenty years or more, and she’s staring into the face of William Dean.

  This is where the scene ends. I’m awake, sitting up in bed, but my room still has the grainy light and blurred edges of a dream.

  I wake early and spend the morning checking off the list of chores that Dad left pinned to my door: dusting, vacuuming, washing. Dad’s and mine. Not Cody’s. He can clean his own room. I shut his bedroom door. There’s still so much to do, including a stack of work I need to finish before school goes back, but the bus to South Swanston leaves at 9.15. There isn’t another straight run until 11.45.

  Diesel’s watching me, bemused. This new industrious Grace must be as confounding as the one he wants to bite. I keep him at bay by chattering to him and throwing treats.

  I cart the vacuum upstairs to my own room. On the floor, right where I dreamed Hannah had curled on her side, there’s a greasy outline and a fine layer of grit. I vacuum the grit and buff the grease away with a dirty towel from the bathroom. I’ve accomplished more in the last hour than I have in a month; it’s like the night I wrote the essay—as if by letting fear run its course instead of trying to block it, I’ve tapped into a source of energy.

  I realise I’ve spent most of my life marking dot points off an imaginary list, trying to prove I’m not afraid of anything. I’ve flown down steep hills on skates and skateboards, and played chicken with cars. I’ve walked the pipe and jumped off Morley Bridge to prove I wasn’t afraid of heights or drowning. I take risks—breaking into Sacred Heart, sneaking out, stealing cars, playing pranks—to prove I’m not afraid of authority. I’ve stolen, lied, and cheated people for laughs, because if you’re laughing, it means you’re not afraid, right? My own mum died crossing the street, but sometimes I’ll shut my eyes and step off a kerb because I believe nothing bad will happen if it isn’t my time.

  But I remember when I was small and Mum got her first mobile phone—she taught me to play a game called Snake. It starts easy: avoid running into walls and running over your own tail. But your tail becomes the main obstacle; every time you change direction, the space within your walls grows smaller as your tail grows longer and longer, until your tail isn’t following anymore. It has become an entity of its own. It’s chasing you.

  I’m thinking I’m this close to crossing my own tail. All the fears I thought I’d faced down are back on the list, plus a few I’ve never acknowledged before, like being alone and seeing things that might not be real.

  Now I know what Kenzie meant when she said she was suddenly aware of her own mortality, but the strange thing is: I’m not afraid to die. It seems like something I’ve done before.

  The bus stinks like baby puke and exhaust fumes. It’s standing-room only. I can’t remember the last time I used public transport. I haven’t missed it. Mornings during the holidays are always a seething mass of children; anyone between twelve and twenty is probably still in bed.

  One boy says loudly, ‘Does that lady have a disease?’ and his mother digs her elbow into his ribs.<
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  I smile, recalling the time Mum made me apologise for calling an old man a hunchback, but his wide eyes meet mine. He’s talking about me.

  ‘Can we catch it?’ he says. ‘Don’t let her touch me.’ She smacks his hand, mouthing an apology and recoiling at the same time. She switches seats with him, distracting him by playing Spotto.

  I clutch the overhead rail, trying to avoid landing in anyone’s lap, feeling like a creature from a different species. When the bus reaches Swanston Central, the midway stop on the line, everyone gets off, except for me and two women at the front with babies on their laps. I settle into a sticky seat at the back, pull out my phone and click on camera, reversing the view. I do look sick, gaunt, and my eyes are hollow and pouchy underneath. My hair is matted, a nothing-colour, no gloss. A red rash has developed on my neck, as if I’ve been scratching, and my lips are so badly cracked it’s a wonder they don’t sting. Until now, I haven’t noticed the flower-shaped bruises on my arms—some old, some fresh—a similar pattern to the bruising on Hannah Holt’s skin in my dreams.

  Are they from the bike accident?

  I get up and peel down the waistband of my jeans. The edges of the graze are healing, but in the centre of the wound there’s a deep hole, as if it’s ulcerated. It looks like it should hurt.

  Why don’t I feel pain?

  I’m standing in the aisle, jeans half down. The bus driver pulls up at a red light. He stares at me in his rear-view mirror and the two women at the front turn around in their seats.

  ‘Is she okay?’ says one.

  The other woman looks familiar, but I can’t place her. She gets out of her seat, holding out her hand. No, she’s holding it up. The complicated language of a simple gesture: out says let me help you. Up means keep away.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I tell her.

  The baby starts crying.

  The seated woman covers her mouth but I hear her as clearly as if she was sitting next to me. ‘Junkie.’

  I button my jeans and press the bell for the next stop. The kid was right. Nobody touch me.