1 Life 2 Die 4 (16 page)

Then I felt my anger surge.
Damn
her!
Why did she have to stick so stubbornly to a plan she
knew would cost her her life? Why had she stayed here in the city
where Baseball Cap Man and his mates could so easily keep up with
us? Once we got in that car she should have just kept on driving!
We could have been halfway to Sydney by now … hundreds of miles
from those killers and both still alive!

I could feel myself trembling with bitter
rage. All the more bitter because deep down I knew Veronica had
done the right thing. As difficult as it was for me to comprehend,
according to her, without me in the future the entire world was in
grave danger. She hadn’t sacrificed herself just to save me. She’d
also done it to save the billions of innocent people being
oppressed under Sahissi’s ruthless future regime.

I just wished to God she could have found
some other way!

Frustration and anger continued to swell
inside me until I felt sure I’d explode. Then, as swiftly as it had
come, the raw, angry emotion abruptly left me. I still felt utterly
devastated, but I found I could suddenly think clearly again, and I
realised my mental ranting about potentially being halfway to
Sydney and both safe was little more than a sadly misguided
delusion.

No matter where we’d gone, Sahissi’s men
would have followed us … and killed us both.

Now I felt a sudden blaze of pride for the
beautiful woman who had saved my life. Veronica had planned it all,
down to the last minute detail, exactly the way she’d had to. And
she’d executed that plan to perfection, despite knowing that it
would end her life. Just the thought of her going through
everything while carrying that awful knowledge was nearly too much
to bear.

Although I hated the thought of what had
happened, at least most of it made perfect sense now that I could
see, in hind-sight, why Veronica had done it. As I looked ahead at
the crossing, however, it suddenly seemed odd to me that this whole
insane ‘game’ had almost come full circle: following our wild and
convoluted flight, here I was standing less than twenty metres from
where it had all begun.

Out of the blue, it occurred to me that it
was almost as if Veronica had planned that too, though the idea
made no sense at all to me.

“Are you okay?”

Startled, and suddenly feeling terribly
self-conscious about my watery eyes, I roused myself from my
baffled thoughts and turned to see a woman of about forty peering
sympathetically across at me from the pavement nearby. Mortified
that someone was seeing me in this state, I hurriedly turned away,
wiping roughly at my eyes.

I was still in a public place – I really
needed to get my act together!

A second later, I looked back and blinked
when I sensed something vaguely familiar in the woman’s face. Then,
while I puzzled over whether I knew her from somewhere, my eyes
flicked across to find a gangly teenage girl standing just behind
her, giving me a concerned look.

For one endless, astonished second, I peered
into those strangely familiar brown eyes. Then it felt oddly as if
the sun rose inside me; like it was the dawning of a brand new
day.

Despite everything, I felt myself smile.

“Umm … actually, I’ve just had a pretty
crummy day,” I stammered, turning back to the woman while my mind
did summersaults. “I came into the city to go to the dentist and
got caught up in all this madness. Now the buses aren’t running and
I’ll have to call my parents then wait till one of them can pick me
up. I guess I’ll be stuck here for a couple more hours at
least.”

“Where do you live, dear?” she asked
sympathetically.

“Sherwood,” I replied as an intense sense of
expectation flared inside me. “Park Terrace.” I threw another smile
at the girl and she grinned back shyly.

“Well that’s just amazing,” the woman replied
with a wide-eyed smile of her own. “Almost like it was meant to be!
We’re heading home to Laurel Avenue – it’s just over the train line
in Graceville, only a couple of minutes away from Park Terrace!
Would you like a lift, dear?”

I glanced at the girl and her grin widened
into that wonderful smile I’d grown to love so much during the last
few hours.

“Yes. I’d like that, thanks,” I said as the
last piece of this crazy puzzle finally slotted into place. And
despite my misery at what had happened today, I found I couldn’t
wipe the grin from my face as I headed off across Edward Street
with Veronica and her mother.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Thanks for reading my story! If you liked it, please
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1 Life 2 Die 4
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sneak-peek at the first few chapters ...

I’d thought I’d come to terms with it all. But I
hadn’t.

Not by a long way.

The full force of it only hit me once I was
well out of the City centre, sitting opposite teenage Veronica in
the back seat of her family car and staring out at the slow-moving
waters of the Brisbane River flowing along-side us. Out of nowhere,
crazy visions began racing through my mind. Visions of insane
things that before today I would never have believed possible, even
in my wildest dreams. Or nightmares. Visions of things that had
happened to me during the last few hours while I’d raced madly
across the CBD with a woman I now felt convinced was the very same
person sitting beside me as a gangly teenage girl!

A woman who’d insisted she was my wife!

With my mind reeling, I turned to teenage
Veronica and found her peering intently, though a little shyly,
back at me. Then, like a B-grade movie fade, her face seemed to
slowly dissolve to be replaced by a vision of her gorgeous older
self staring up at me with wide, unblinking eyes while I cradled
her lifeless body in my arms.

It was too much. I spun away and peered out
the side window again, embarrassed by the tears I could feel
pooling in my eyes, blurring my view of the sleek CityCat ferry
slipping smoothly past along the River, heading back towards the
City. Back toward the chaos I had left behind me.

I’d never felt so confused. I didn’t know
whether to be overjoyed that the younger Veronica now sat safely
beside me, or devastated that earlier that afternoon her older self
had been brutally murdered by an assassin from the future. And it
was killing me that her murderer had escaped with barely more than
a scratch! I’d never really thought of myself as an overly
aggressive guy, but right now I felt like I’d gladly do unspeakable
things to that guy if I was given the chance.

“So, Daniel, what was it you said you were
doing in the City today?”

Jolted back from my vengeful, confused
thoughts, I flicked my eyes across and noticed Veronica’s mum
tilting her head slightly, trying to see me in the rear vision
mirror. Without turning, I leaned away a little while pretending to
scratch the side of my forehead, doing my best to obscure her view
of my eyes.

“Just a check-up at the dentist, Mrs Kale,” I
reminded her, thankful that at least my voice didn’t betray my
dismal state-of-mind.

From the corner of my eye I watched
Veronica’s dark-haired, well-groomed mother frown faintly.

“All on your own?” she asked, though I’d
already explained that this was the case. Clearly she was having a
little trouble accepting the fact.

I nodded. “Yeah - my parents are both really
busy people. Dad lectures in Engineering at UQ and he’s always
doing some research project or other on the side. And Mum’s always
got more work than she can handle for her web page business. Most
days, I hardly get to see them at all.”

I noticed Mrs Kale's eyebrows rise a
little.

“My goodness … they do sound terribly
busy.”

Her eyes went back to the road as she caught
a green light and turned right onto Moggill Road, heading sedately
past the shops lining both sides of the street.

“You must get pretty lonely,” Veronica
commented after a few seconds thought. “I don’t know what I’d do if
Mum had a job.” She smiled at her mother. “She’s always there for
me when I need her.”

Mrs Kale smiled too. “We’re always there for
each other, dear,” she pointed out, her fondness for her daughter
clearly evident in her voice. “You know you help me out at least as
much as I help you.” She grinned suddenly as her eyes flicked back
from the road, trying to find me in the rear-view mirror again. “I
don’t think I’d ever have gotten on-line if Veronica hadn’t been so
patient and helpful. And she taught me how to use my mobile phone,
the I-pod, the … what’s it called again … oh, yes, the PVR, …” She
chuckled. “To be perfectly honest, without Vee, I’d still be
trapped back in the twentieth century!”

I turned to Veronica and couldn’t help
smiling. She looked really good, even though her early-teenage body
and face still only hinted at the rare beauty she would become. And
it wasn’t just her looks that made me smile. Even at this age, she
was showing the same loyalty and devotion to her mother that she’d
shown to me during the few short hours I’d known her. Despite her
brutal death earlier today – no, I corrected myself - because of
it, I knew I was damned lucky to have her in my life at all!

I blinked. Despite peering at Veronica, I’d
been so completely lost in thought that I'd missed the confused
half-smile she was directing at me. When I finally spotted it, I
swallowed uncomfortably - I’d been staring at her with the kind of
idiot grin that probably had her wondering whether I was some kind
of half-wit stalker-type!

My embarrassment deepened further when her
smile wavered and I realised she’d noticed my reddened eyes.

Spinning back to the window, I cringed,
hearing the older Veronica’s words echo inside my head:
nothing
is set in stone
.

Lucky to have her in my life. Who was I
kidding? She was as much 'in my life' as I was in the life of the
old, balding guy with the bad breath, who’d sat beside me during my
bus ride into town today. And if I didn’t stop acting like a
complete moron, she’d never want to see me again once her mother
dropped me home.

The realisation shook me to the core. And it
finally drove home just how attached to Veronica I’d become during
the few short hours we’d spent together. She was – or at least,
would be - my ideal mixture of Lara Croft action hero, Playboy
centrefold and devoted friend. A one-in-a-billion lady. Hell …
before today, I was more devoted to my skateboard than to any girl!
Now I suddenly discovered I couldn’t imagine life without Veronica
in it.

When I snuck a look back at her, she was
staring ahead through the windscreen and I had the awful suspicion
that she might be thinking about what a dope I was. Unable to help
myself, but feeling a little guilty about it, I flicked my eyes
down over her lithe body then back up to rest on her lips. Deep
down, things began to stir - even at this age those lips already
had that full, sexy, Jessica Alba pout.

I heard her words inside my head again:
nothing is set in stone
. If I really wanted her to become a
part of my life – and I
really
did - I needed to start
giving her some reasons to want to be a part of mine.

*****

2

Before long, we were gliding down the hill towards
the Indooroopilly roundabout. Behind it, the huge Indooroopilly
Shopping Complex sprawled across the side of a low hill, almost
filling the vast area between the two roads that speared out almost
at right angles from the far side of roundabout. While I wracked my
brain for some way to win over Veronica, her mum veered onto the
first of these roads - Coonan Street – and headed on towards
Sherwood.

Summoning my courage, I turned to Veronica.
With maybe three or four more minutes left to make an impression
(other than the ‘I’m an imbecile’ one I’d already nailed!), I
really had to get a move on.

“So, what does your dad do?” I asked before
wincing uncomfortably at how tense I sounded.

Before replying, Veronica gave me a long,
quizzical look, as if she sensed something odd in my manner but was
unsure what it meant.

“He died when Vee was six,” Mrs Kale replied
for her.

Nice one, Dan, I thought miserably. While the
car headed down beside the Eldorado Cinemas, with the Indooroopilly
railway station disappearing past on our left, I looked out the
window and wracked my brains for some way to recover. Ahead, I
could see the old Walter Taylor Bridge stretching across the
western reaches of the Brisbane River. I’d always been fascinated
by the Bridge which was unusual in that it had living quarters
built into the main supports above either end. It reminded me a
little of London Bridge, though it didn’t lift up in the middle and
was nowhere near as grand. Still, ever since I was a little kid,
I’d wondered what it would be like to live up there. Of course, now
that I was a bit older and wiser, I’d realised ‘noisy’ would
feature pretty prominently in the description, but the idea
continued to fascinate me.

I peered absently up at the living quarters
closest to us, barely noticing the figure standing way up on the
rooftop balcony. I knew time had pretty much run out for me to
think of something to say that would let Vee know how awful I felt
about her Dad having died and would have her pleading to be my
girl. But I still had nothing! Then I squinted as a bright, green
light flitted briefly across my face. My worried eyes focussed on
the figure up on the balcony and I noticed he had some kind of
laser mounted on a stand! After everything I’d been through, my
heart went ballistic while my eyes swivelled madly about, nervously
searching through the car windows for signs of danger.