Crossfire (6 page)

‘Really, I think you should go home,' were the nurse's final words.

But that was a problem. There was no one to take him home and he didn't have a single cent in his pockets. He pointed this out to the nurse. She put on the mask of those who work daily with the helpless, the hopeless and the demanding, then pulled the telephone over towards Luke.

He rang his father's number. This would solve the problem. His dad could take him home, then make arrangements for the next few days — which, Luke dimly started to realise, would be chaotic. But the voice which answered was female.

‘Hello, Danielle. It's Luke here. Can I speak to Dad, please?'

‘No, you can't, Luke 'cause he's not home.'

‘But I thought… '

‘I know, I know. We came straight home after the footy, but we had an argument and now your father's stormed off in a huff. God knows when he'll be back.' Luke did not have to see Danielle's face to know it was tight with anger.

‘Would he be at Jacko's, do you think?' Luke was already plotting the necessary moves. He would need Jacko's phone number from Danielle, and, damn it, he would have to ask the nurse if he could make a second call.

‘What's so important that you have to speak to him tonight?' demanded Danielle irritably.

‘I need him to drive me home from the hospital,' said Luke.

‘The hospital! What's happened?' Immediately worry and concern drove the anger from her voice.

Luke explained as best he could.

This news brought Danielle to life. ‘Look, I'll come and get you instead.' She didn't give Luke a chance to protest, or refuse her offer, just made sure she understood where to collect him, and hung up quickly.

Damn,
thought Luke. It was good of Danielle to do this for him but why couldn't his father be at home?

Danielle would be at least half an hour, and in his restlessness, Luke began exploring the wider environment of the waiting room. He ventured out to the ambulance arrival area and observed the visitors shuffling into and away from the hospital.

He was watching an ambulance man check the equipment in the rear of his vehicle when the distant drone of a siren drew his attention like a circling mosquito. The insistent sound quickly grew and the staff began to emerge anxiously from behind the inquiries desk. The siren became deafening as the ambulance entered the parking bay beyond the glass doors, then died in mid-wail, causing Luke to suck in a sudden breath. Without realising it, he had crept over towards the entrance to watch the attendants wheel in the trolley. He could see the head of a young woman protruding from the sheet as they rushed past him; instantly he forced his eyes away. One side of the girl's face was crushed to a red pulp and the pillow and the sheets all round were saturated in blood. Luke knew immediately. Everyone there knew as well. The girl was dead.

The trolley rattled swiftly away to the cubicles where Luke's mother had been taken. A few moments later, the glass doors rolled back again and a second victim entered the ward, a young man about the same age as the dead girl. He was able to walk and a nurse was ushering him towards the cubicles, holding a wad of bandages to his forehead and urging him to keep his head up to slow the flow of blood. ‘What about Kerry' he kept calling miserably. ‘Is she all right? What about Kerry?' The bandages and the blood which escaped from beneath them were blinding the poor youth. He stumbled, and his arm was taken firmly by a policeman who had followed him in through the doors. The trio disappeared into a curtained alcove but Luke could still hear the same two pleas: Kerry — would she be all right? No one seemed keen to answer him.

When he emerged from the cubicle, the policeman spoke briefly to the nurse at the desk, the same one Luke had tussled with. She nodded and wrote something rather deliberately on the form she was filling out. The policeman strode over and sat calmly amongst the waiting outpatients.

The excitement was over, but Luke felt the need to say something, just to utter a few words about what he had seen to let out his distress. He wandered over to the old man, who had also watched the whole episode carefully. As Luke joined him he whispered, ‘See that copper? Know why he's here?' When Luke shook his head, the low voice continued. ‘Those two that just came in. Car accident for sure. Girl didn't look too healthy.'

‘I think she was already dead.'

‘Well, I bet the policeman's here because he thinks the bloke who was driving is drunk, and they want the hospital to take a sample of his blood so it can be tested.'

‘What'll happen then?'

‘Well, since the poor girl has probably been killed as a result of drink driving, the man may end up in gaol.'

‘But she was his girlfriend or something.'

‘Yeah, seemed like it.' The old man considered this. ‘Poor fool. He'll have punishment enough whether he sees the inside of a gaol or not.'

There was an uneasiness inside Luke which made him restless. There was some thought, some fear in his memory which he wanted to examine. It had nothing to do with his mother's trauma. He knew that, at least. But before he could examine his discomfort any further, he spied Danielle approaching the glass doors from the car park.

five

It was Danielle who took over, giving Luke the help he needed to see his predicament more clearly. Earlier, when he had tumbled into the pit of his own shame after finding his mother desperately ill and abandoned, he hadn't thought to muster the willing hands which would have rushed to his aid. But Danielle had asked as she drove him home, ‘Do any of your grandparents live close by?'

‘Mum's mother is dead, and her father — well, I don't know. Never seen him,' reflected Luke. ‘Dad's parents are a fair distance away and they don't have a car. But Mum's sister Belinda lives pretty close.'

So Luke rang his Aunt Belinda, who volunteered to come immediately. By the time Alison's sister drove her ancient Cortina into the garage, Danielle had begun to cook a welcome plate of sausages and eggs for a ravenous Luke.

Luke held open the front door for Belinda as she hurried up from the car. She was unmistakably Alison's younger sister. She was the same height as her sister, with identical grey-green eyes and the same narrow cheeks and chin. More than the physical resemblance, Luke sensed a hardness in his aunt's face which more and more he detected in his own mother's.

Luke saw little of his aunt, since she and his mother seemed unable to spend more than a few hours together without finding some point to argue over. After one such falling out, when the younger woman had stormed off in the battered blue Cortina she had driven for years, Alison had turned to Luke and said, ‘I guess I love my sister, Luke, but I don't think I've ever liked her much.'

‘Luke, why didn't you call me earlier?' were Belinda's first words. ‘This business with the cat all happened this morning, you say.' She was looking around quickly as she said this as though she expected to find the culprit still present, or Alison lying prone on the carpet.

‘I'm sorry, Aunty Belinda. Things sort of got a bit confused.'

Luke heard his own voice say ‘Aunty Belinda' and he cringed. It made him sound so childish. He had been hoping for over a year that she would quietly give him permission to drop the ‘Aunty', as many of his friends were allowed to do with their relatives. But no such invitation had yet been issued.

Luke hoped he wouldn't have to tell the story of the attack in detail, but knew this was a forlorn wish. His aunt was about to burst forth with the dozens of questions which welled inside her when Danielle emerged from the kitchen.

Luke reacted quickly. ‘Aunty, this is Danielle. She picked me up from the hospital and brought me home.'

‘Hello, Danielle,' beamed Luke's aunt. ‘I'm Belinda Watty, Alison's sister. We can't thank you enough for leaping into the breach. Luke would have been in real straits without you.'

Danielle managed a smile but Luke could see that she was suddenly uneasy, even embarrassed. ‘Oh, please, anyone would have done the same. Luke has been no bother.' Indicating with a shrug of her shoulder the kitchen behind, she went on: ‘Your dinner is nearly ready, Luke. Then I'll have to be off. Your aunt's here to stay with you now.'

While Luke ate his sausages, Belinda and Danielle fell into a predictable discussion over the bizarre attack, but even as they talked, Danielle retrieved her handbag from an armchair and made for the door. Belinda followed to see her out. She looked a little puzzled. ‘Thank you again, Danielle. Alison is fortunate to have someone like you so close at hand.'

Danielle's face coloured, but she was safely out of the door now. ‘I was glad to help out, Belinda, but actually, I've hardly even met your sister. Goodnight!' she called, by this time at the bottom of the stairs. Then she was gone, leaving Luke to explain that last remark to his perplexed aunt.

He knew why Danielle had looked so uncomfortable when Belinda walked in. It all had to do with the divorce. It was stale news to him now, but he knew that its power still lingered to distress the rest of his family.

‘Luke, what did she mean just then? I thought she lived here, as a boarder.'

‘That's Sally you're thinking of, Aunty Belinda. Danielle is Dad's friend.' Luke was determined he wouldn't give away any more than he had to.

‘Your father's friend? You mean his girlfriend?'

Luke shrugged. No one ever used that term. It was never said. There didn't need to be a word. Danielle lived in the house that Wayne rented and they went everywhere together. But Luke never actually thought of Danielle as his Dad's ‘
girl
/friend'.

‘Why did she need to be here?' demanded Belinda, as though Danielle was some kind of petty criminal who shouldn't be allowed through the door. Only a few minutes before, Belinda had been chatting away pleasantly with her, making gentle purrs of gratitude.

‘I needed help to get home from the hospital. Dad wasn't home, so Danielle volunteered to pick me up. Pretty good of her, really. We're not her family, after all.' Luke thought it was unfair of his aunt to take this tone when Danielle had gone out of her way to help. He was becoming angry.

Belinda's next remark didn't help. She was just warming up. ‘That would be right. Your useless father. He was never around when he was needed years ago. It doesn't surprise me that he hasn't changed.'

‘But Belinda,' said Luke, deciding in his annoyance to dispense with the childish ‘aunty' whether she liked it or not, ‘It isn't his fault. He doesn't know anything about the cat attacking Mum. He's just gone out. What's wrong with that?'

‘I bet he's stuck in some pub somewhere, too drunk to drive home. That would be true to form. He always was totally irresponsible, towards himself and everyone else. He's never given a thought to anyone but himself since the day he was born.'

‘That's not so! He cares a lot about me. He says so and he gives me things all the time.' Luke was shouting now. ‘He's getting me the sweat shirt I wanted. Mum wouldn't. Just said I didn't need it and I couldn't have it, and not to nag her about it. My Dad's a good bloke. I'd rather be with him than here with Mum.' Luke was startled to hear himself say it out loud. He wondered if it was really true.

‘You don't have a clue what you're saying! Your mother takes better care of you than you could ever imagine. And if you're going to shout at me so rudely, you can just get off to bed.'

Luke was still amazed at his own defiance. He had seen and heard his mother lose her temper with her sister, but he had never spoken to Belinda as he did just then. And he was still perplexed at what had come forth from his own lips. He slipped into his bedroom in a daze, his retreat bringing no sense of humiliation or defeat.

Despite such an early dismissal to bed, Luke fell asleep quickly and slept until late the next morning. When he emerged, tentatively poking his head into the kitchen, Belinda was quietly sipping a cup of coffee while she scanned the weekend newspaper.

It remained one of the great mysteries which Luke hoped one day to understand, that even after the most ferocious rows, the next time Alison and Luke saw Belinda, she would behave as if nothing distasteful had occurred. Perhaps, once the human contact was broken, her need to fight and argue had nothing to feed upon and instantly died away. Whatever the case, his aunt greeted him cheerfully with the news that his mother was recovering well and that they would visit her late in the afternoon. Luke wondered if his aunt carried a little box inside her handbag into which she emptied all her anger and spite when it wasn't needed, but which would be ready at hand when it was.

‘Has Sally been home?' Luke asked.

‘Yes, she came in at midnight,' said Belinda. ‘She's gone off now to the hospital to see your Mum. She had an extended shift at work, it seems. It was just bad luck she didn't come home at the normal time. She might have found Alison a lot earlier.'

Just bad luck,
Luke thought to himself and winced.

Halfway through the morning, Luke's father rang. Thankfully, Luke answered the phone himself. If relations between his mother and aunt were cool at times, between his father and Belinda they were like an Arctic winter, and last night's row was hardly likely to cause a thaw.

There was not much for Wayne to say. He was sorry he hadn't been home last night, and he promised to take Luke to see his mother in hospital, though when he realised who he would face when he called to pick him up, he sounded doubtful. When Luke explained that Belinda had organised a visit, it gave Wayne an excuse to back out. Luke was as relieved as his father.

Sally returned at lunch time, only to tell Belinda and Luke that the doctors had forbidden any further visits to Alison's bedside until the next day. Though he kept it to himself, Luke was relieved.

There was another problem to be faced that Sunday as well. Alison would be in hospital for at least a week and Luke would not be allowed to stay in the house alone, despite his protests that he could take care of himself. And there was the prickly topic of his suspension from school to be skirted around. He would need company not just at night, but during the day as well. Belinda had commitments at her office which could not be abandoned, and of course Sally had to work too. Finally, Belinda struck upon the solution, and after a brief phone call it was settled. Luke was to travel to his grandparents' house in the western suburbs of the city. They were, of course, his father's parents. Since the divorce, Luke had seen little of them despite their frequent begging phone calls that he be allowed to come and stay with them during the holidays. It was quite an adventure to get to their house — Luke would have to take a suburban train. Belinda helped him pack a bag, then saw him to the local train station. He had to find his way into the city centre then change trains and travel almost to the end of the line, where his grandparents met him.

Luke was untidily stuffing his clothes into the chest of drawers in his grandparents' spare room when he heard the phone ring and wondered if it was Belinda checking to see that he had arrived. He slid his carry-all under the bed and drew back the curtain to survey the yard outside. He was still peering through the window, assessing his chances of climbing the mulberry tree near the back fence when his grandmother, Gwen Aldridge, popped her head into his room. ‘That was your father on the phone, Luke. He's coming round to have tea with us tonight. He'll be here quite soon, in fact.'

‘That's great,' said Luke, and he meant it.

Luke did climb the mulberry tree, clambering as high as the branches would support him and cursing the thorny texture of the bark. From near the top he could look down on his grandparents' house. They had moved here ten years ago, when their old house, not far from where Luke now lived, was bought by a company keen to build a supermarket. The house was very small, and from high in the tree, the sorry state of the corrugated iron roof was easy to see. An ancient coat of red paint had almost completely peeled and worn away, leaving broad patches of angry rust, and the guttering was missing all along one side. Grandad must be too old to climb up there any more. I could paint it for him, thought Luke. I'm not scared of heights, and maybe Dad could help fix the guttering. Dad probably hasn't noticed.

Luke stayed in the tree, enjoying the cool breeze and the panorama of the neighbourhood observed as only the birds would know it. His father's panel van pulled into the yard and made a full circle around the clothesline as the old couple came out to greet him. Luke called to the three of them from his vantage point and delighted in the surprise on their faces as they stared up at him.

‘Luke, be careful,' called his grandmother. ‘If you fall you could kill yourself.'

‘Don't worry, Grandma, I know what I'm doing.'

‘That doesn't matter. You shouldn't be up there,' his grandmother shouted back. There was a mixture of fear and annoyance in her voice — and a little of something else as well. She was embarrassed in front of her own son that she had let her grandson put himself at risk, however mildly.

Wayne didn't care. ‘Oh Mum, you were always telling me not to climb trees, but you could never keep me out of them, specially mulberry trees. During the season I'd be covered in mulberry stains from head to toe. God, didn't you tell me off, but I'd go climbing again regardless.'

Wayne's mother smiled at this, laughing more at herself than the situation. ‘I suppose you're right, Wayne. We never did stop you doing exactly what you wanted to. It never mattered what we thought.' Looking up at Luke, so proud of himself in the tree, she added: ‘Maybe your son will be the same. Alison will have a hard time with him if he is.'

Luke began to climb down. He was conscious of the eyes of the other three upon him but he felt free and confident. He enjoyed their anxiety, grinning to himself as he paused for a final drop to the ground from the last branch. As he jogged up to his father and grandparents, his grandfather took him playfully by the upper arm and rustled his hair, saying, ‘Look at the size of this young man. He'll be taller than you soon, Wayne.'

‘No chance. Not in a million years,' smiled Luke's father; the idea that Luke would match him in height in a year or two had obviously never occurred to him. He looked at Luke and seemed to see for the first time how big he had already grown.

‘Come on inside,' said Gwen Aldridge. ‘I suppose you could do with a beer, Wayne.'

‘Thanks, Mum. Just the one, though. Need a clear head tomorrow. Me and the guys are off shooting. Have to be up at four to drive out there.'

They were inside now. Luke and the two men sat at the kitchen table while Gwen busied herself with dinner. The conversation roamed around Wayne's new gun, then whose property they would camp on and finally the need to be careful. This last comment came from Gwen, of course. Luke took it all in, happy to hear the stories he had heard a dozen times before. Then out of the blue, his grandfather asked, ‘When are you going to take Luke with you on one of these daredevil safaris?' Looking at Luke, he added, ‘You'd love to go, wouldn't you, Luke?'