Precise (24 page)

C
an’t be
, I repeat, unable to take my eyes off the shaped detailing of my dress. My fingers trace the curve at my waist that pinches in with careful gathering. It naturally adds the appearance of hips on me as it fluffs out below, resting just above my knees. The idea of a plunging, draped neckline is one I reserve for the celebrities of the world, so I have trouble trusting what I see in case my reflection is trickery. The neckline covers my humble breasts, outlining, yet elegantly lifting the size and shape of them. Without the need for exposure, I am the illusion of an hourglass.

Nancy stares for a couple more seconds after I wave my hand in front of her eyes, then bats her eyelashes. I ask her to repeat her last words slower this time. She speaks again, audible on the second attempt, “
A-may-zing.”

I turn back to my reflection, leaning my head in closer to see that the voluptuous figure is really me. A quick scan yields a positive result. Even my brown hair has volume. The locks spiral down and rest over my chest. My dull face, yet to be made up, indicates I’m not dreaming.

“Do you recognize it?” she questions me.

“We picked it out for Paul’s thirtieth,” I say, flicking my skirt and letting it flop.

“Hey,” Nancy says, upbeat, “at least it’s getting the occasion to be shown off. A dress like that doesn’t deserve to collect dust in your closet.” She wiggles her finger at me.

This isn’t how I imagined it. But Mom would love the vibrant color. Nancy clearly loves the style. Ella would love the pleats and ruffles. And Liam would love it all.

“Your mom gave me your house key,” Nancy says, reading my mind as she flings a key at me. “I think I chose wisely.”

I tell her about the questions burning in my head. She’s done so much for me. She cares, a lot. The first thing I say is about Liam’s confession: does he really love me or did he say it to stall time as he had been requested?

“Don’t hit me if I say this, okay?”

“Mm,” I say.

“I always had my bet on him second.”

My chin drops. “What do you mean?”

“Like after Paul.” She pauses, seeming careful to craft her next words with tenderness. “If you ever broke up, or something happened or . . . oh no, I didn’t mean it like that. Shit.” She slaps her forehead. “No, just that he was somehow
different
around you. Not romantic or cheesy. Didn’t cut Paul’s lunch or anything, but deeply cared for you. I could tell that you sort of acted the same way back. Now that situations have changed, well, I can see where he is coming from, how something innocent could have blown out into love. You’re stunning.”

I remain quiet.

She continues to powder my cheeks and tells me to pout my lips as she dabs a sweet gloss over them.
The eyes
she repeats, shaking her head reflectively, each time sighing. Liam laughed off the accusation about liking me from her years ago. I did too, back then. Paul, Liam and I were like one big family. I thought it ridiculous to consider us together romantically
a few hours ago.

“And . . . done!” she exclaims, dropping the bronzer brush into its snug zip-up purse. “You can look now,” she tells me, before shouting out hurried objections and thrusting a pair of peep-toe pumps at my feet. I slide my feet in, wiggling my toes toward the tip of the shoe.

We agree on bordering sexy, but still appropriate. I thank her over and over for the smoky-eye look she created.

We’ve spent almost an hour shut away from the music and chattering, at the other end of the house. The party seems so insulated from Liam’s bedroom.

The click of our heels against the hallway is impossible to hear because the music is louder now, and the sky a little dimmer. Liam is the first person I see. He’s walking back from a room toward the back of his house, outside of the celebrations. Why was he there? Did he hear Nancy and I? One of Ella’s cousins, Ryder, tugs on his pants, and Liam squats to his level. Liam’s thighs seem larger as he rests on his haunches, his arm the texture of a mountain range, and my eyes are drawn to the gap between his legs.

I gag reflexively.
I do not want that.
I don’t want any man because they all let me down in some way.

As Nancy follows behind me up the hallway back to the party, I stop abruptly in my tracks.

Nancy trips over the back of my heel. Normally, I would yelp as my skin peels back.

Normally, only friends should be invited to my thirtieth party.

Not potential rapists.

Not people who deal drugs.

Nancy’s body creates an ugly
thwack
sound as she stumbles and hits the wall. Normal circumstances given, I would be helping her up already. But my legs are twisted in my stomach, my stomach folded up my throat and my mind wrapped in the pretzel that is me.

Nancy’s body slides to the floor. Her voice sounds sharp, accusing, when she says something, but I don’t hear because I’m not concentrating on her.

Brent is behind
him
. Still the kind person I’ve always known. Let everyone in first.

Why did he bring him? Why did Liam
invite him?

His eyes skitter over my family and friends. They are ones I want to hold back, protect them from this man who has torn my confidence and pleasure away.

My mouth must have hit the floor. That’s what my mind feels. On the outside I’m a statue.

Marble.

Shutting out anything he wants to read from my emotion.

I swear Cooper’s eyes blaze with the same shock.

T
he lights are dull. The chatting soft. Michael Jackson’s voice sounds like someone covers him with a blanket. The square table had before held glowing tea-light candles, drinks, condiments and wine glasses, each of the latter with alternating balloon or cake pictures hanging off its base. Now it’s a square lump in the middle of the meals room with two shrunken lumps on either side.

Cooper looks me over. Once. Twice. Then gives an odd look before Brent clamps him on the shoulder and they maneuver around the balloons, streamers, and signs for my
birthday
.

My birthday.

This party is now the last place I want to be.

“Are you all right?” Nancy asks, although I’m the one who should be pouring my sorrys out to her.

I nod, although it feels more like my head is bobbling about.

Nancy lingers for a bit, before mumbling something and walking off.

Brent approaches with Cooper.

They are four meters away.

Aunty Mia smiles at Brent then slides out of the way for them.

Three meters away.

I almost trip in my heels. I’m so used to flats and it doesn’t help that my legs are trembling like I’m being made to walk the plank.

I push each leg forward, determined to be the one who shocks him. I push my shoulders back. Dad might have called out if I was okay sitting somewhere, someplace, but I can’t be sure I heard him. I extend my hand politely when I speak to Cooper.

“Katie Anselin,” I say. Two words. My voice sounds so kind.

Cooper has his arm looped around Brent. He is laughing to the side of Brent’s face. It seems so innocent. A manly joke. Except, Brent’s face is taut. His muscular frame is rigid with the same strength an animal assumes just before they pounce.

What is going on?

Cooper looks to me, distracted by his “thing” with Brent. Brent is trying so hard to be interested in the kids zooming around us. Each of the kids waves quarters of fairy bread in their hands. They scream, “You can’t get me!”

Brent’s face is strained as he looks at the trays of lasagna, salads, vegetables, and barbecued meats amongst other things. He produces a tight-lipped smile as he sees other people he recognizes.

His taut expression won’t melt off no matter how hard he tries to seem fine.

I am staring through Cooper, since he really can’t be bothered to pay me attention. He turns back to Brent. If I hadn’t been suspicious about Cooper, I might have missed it, but as he mouths something too low for me to hear into Brent’s ear, I notice something else.

Cooper’s fist is white, the color squeezed out of it. It’s pressed so hard into Brent’s back that the poor guy arches in pain.

Brent. Arched.

The only time Liam won fistfights with his brother was when something lowered Brent’s strength: a cold, drunkenness, a broken wrist.

Brent’s face is hard to watch as he arches in pain. The blood vessels in his neck pop.

The whole time, Cooper’s face is smiling like a clown.

“Oh! Kates,” Cooper says, “Fuckin’ ages!” He grins.

I want to cut open that grin, find out what secrets are behind it. “I know,” I force myself to say, teeth gleaming, “seven months.” Oh my God. I sound like a computer. “Or so.”

He leans in to me. My words are those of a baby. My brain working like a fried engine. He hangs delicate fingers on my waist to steady himself. He kisses my cheek with a pucker. It’s not a cheek-to-cheek contact where the sound is clucked by habit. He presses his lips to my cheek, his fingers strong against my hipbone, then he pulls away.

This must be the usual for him. He has no insecurities. Doesn’t care that I’ve had another flash from my rape. That I’m pinned against Tim’s brick wall from his house and his fingers are worming under my underpants.

I push through my panic and another thought occurs to me. When I saw Liam, a few moments ago. Ella wasn’t with Ryder, and she wasn’t with her other cousins, either. Where is she?

Liam says something to Ryder, waggling his finger with stern eyebrows and points behind, where he’d emerged from. Hm, maybe Ella is there? Liam presses his hands together, as if praying, and then tilts his head to rest on them.

Odd, that Ella is sleeping. That girl never stops.

M
y rapist at my party.

That was the final kick. That, and my best friend who admits he loves me, who even shook Cooper’s hand on his way out. I don’t care that Liam doesn’t know Cooper did it.

Liam just should
know.
I’d asked Mom what happened with Ella and Ryder but she was vague about a fight and now she’s resting. When I went to check on her, she refused to let me leave the party or disturb Ella. It’s not like my mom doesn’t have my daughter’s needs as priority one. I, at least, trust she’s made sure Ella is okay. I’d only cause a scene if I went against Mom. She’s more stubborn than me when she’s set on something—right now me letting myself celebrate and enjoy.

“Has he spoken to you?” Nancy asks.

“Liam?” I say, looking over to see him loading up food on his plate. Nancy, her husband, Lachlan and I were one of the first lucky ones. “Besides him thinking I haven’t noticed the staring all night, no.” I remember him from ten minutes ago and my fists clench, the knife in my hand more like how I’d hold a dagger.

“Sorry about before,” I say, remembering I still haven’t apologized. “I saw someone, a guest whom I hate. And he came by. I don’t know what came over me.”

Nancy waves the incident away. “It’s cool. You did look like you saw a ghost, though.”

“Did you hear what happened with Ella? I think she’s sleeping?”

“Oh, Rochelle told me that too. Don’t worry, Ryder and her got into a fight and she refused to come back out. I think she’s calming down in there. Or sleeping. Stress less. She’s a big girl now.”

“Mm.” Something doesn’t feel right. I know it.

Brent is still at the counter choosing food. Thankfully, Cooper has left. He ducked out of sight, and I hadn’t found him again since, leaving me unsure why he came, or what his business was being here. Clearly it wasn’t for my celebrations.

Because I’m thinking of Cooper and Brent, my ears pick up Anna’s voice above the music and over other conversations.

“It’s sad he put so much of him into his café. He took out loans and . . . ” Just as instinctively, my brain blanks out the rest. A loan. Now Brent is working part-time shifts as a security guard somewhere and he has money owing on a business that doesn’t exist.

Cooper and Marco deal drugs. I put together the clues. If Cooper has money to throw around, wouldn’t he have helped his mate? And how would Cooper deal with the lapse of repayments when Brent couldn’t pay that back?

A gasp escapes my lips. Nancy is feeding something in Lachlan’s mouth. So in love. Completely unaware. I am curled over, drawn into their PDA, when I feel a vibration buzzing from our table. A phone, wiggling along the edge. The three of us exchange inquisitive glances, all still looking lost in the end.

I’m closest, so I check.

The phone screen is still lit by the time I pick it up. All I see is “Cooper” before the screen goes dark. I click a button and the screen lights up again. This time I look straight to the message. It reads:

COOPER

Reminding you not to say shit about Tim’s party. I know you won’t. You still owe me. Ella is fkn calm now I gave her . . .

By the end of the text message, which ends after “her” unless I enter in a four-digit code to unlock the phone, my body thuds with each heartbeat. Each word slaps me across my back until my spine feels like it punctures the skin: a sharp stick, ripping me apart.

Slap. Pain. Slap. Red raw. Slap. Split me apart.

You can’t accuse innocent people.

Except, I feel like a schoolteacher and Cooper is my pupil who I’ve just caught cheating on a test.

Rage surges through my spine and snowballs until it hits my knuckles. I’m shaking. What has he done to my daughter? Guilt pours through me. I feel as if icy water has been poured over my naked skin. I’m the world’s worst Mother again. How could I let this happen to her?
What
has Cooper given her?

How dare he?

Brent has a serving spoon, cramming potato salad onto the last white section of his plate. As I watch the cream drip onto the plate, Brent’s finger shakes even more. It’s then, as he tries to stop from shaking that I see his fingers have been quivering all along. Something snaps in me.

Cooper has done something to my daughter. It’s clear he’s been ruining Brent’s life, too.

Heat flushes through my cheeks and I want to shrink inside myself.

Brent is a victim, like me.

I have no distinct plan but it doesn’t matter. I have to do something before it’s too late. I
can’t
miss this boat. I push the phone back over to its original spot. It’s over above the unoccupied seat, the bottom of the phone running parallel to the edge of the table. Perfect. As if nothing ever happened.

Nancy swivels ninety degrees. Her fingers trace the shape of Lachlan’s face. My manners yell at me to stop but my anger toward Cooper incinerates anything that should be appropriate. I flip Nancy’s shoulder around.

“What the—” she says, her eyes squinted together.

“I’m sorry I have to do this but I need to leave.”

If any of them slip a hint, Liam and Brent will start being protective. I need as much time as I can get to figure out what Cooper is doing before anyone discovers I’ve vacated my own party.

“Something’s come up. I need to go.”

“Was it that message you got?” Lachlan asks.

“Kind of. But no, that was Brent’s phone. As far as he is concerned, none of us read that message.
None
.”

Liam is up, a few plates and some cutlery in his hands. He and Brent are chatting. Brent’s plate has a fork and knife shoved under the food.

The wall clock ticks in my ear.

Time.

“I just remembered that I left my phone at my house.”

Craig Dayle bellows a laugh, claps his palm on the table. Party. People.

“And . . . and I have friends who said they’d call today. I’m going to duck home quickly and grab it. I’ll feel terrible if they think I’m ignoring them.” I turn directly to Nancy as she stares at me baffled.

Nancy’s lip begins to move with the beginnings of questions for which I have no time to respond to. “Hon, don’t worry,” she waves her hand at me. “It’s your birthday. You can do whatever you like. They’ll understand.”

Tick.

“Some of Mom’s family from England couldn’t make it. My family over there are whiny.”

“Oh, pl
ea
se. It can wait. You can’t leave!”

Tock.

“I need to check on Ella anyway. I don’t feel right. She’s my daughter; I should check on her.”

She makes a face. “She’s seven. I’m sure she’s fine. Let her come back on her own.”

My palm makes abrupt contact with the table. I clench my jaw. “It’s my party. I can go if I want.”

Nancy jerks back in shock, blinking rapidly. “Sure.”

Brent is calling to Liam, walking backwards to our table. As I think about leaving, my legs suddenly feel of lead.

I remember Liam’s kiss. It lingers between my cheek and lips. “Can you tell Liam I’m fine, just checking out that ‘friend’ . . . no, never mind.”

Brent walks to our table. Ryder has his thumbs to his ears, wiggling his fingers above as he runs from another cousin, smack into Brent’s leg.

The potato salad is first to go. Each piece of potato flies up in different directions, raining down, followed by the rest of his carefully chosen meal. The slice of lasagna sinks first. Other pieces of food explode into the air somewhere in between.

The moment feels perfect. Too perfect, if I let my mind analyze my chances. I slip off my chair and duck behind a wall that separates the meals room from the front of the house.

I should be cleaning this up. But the child in me reminds me that it’s my party and I’ll only be shooed away anyway. Maybe, just maybe, I have bought myself a little more time away.

As everyone gasps in the direction of the shower of food, I continue to the front door unseen. I suck in a breath. The easiest part is over.

I rip open the front door, knowing it doesn’t creak. I hold the handle down and only let it slip into place when I know the lock is resting in the hole. Thankfully, it clicks so softly, even I barely hear it.

The weather has cleared up. While I jog around the path hugging Liam’s house, drizzles of rain fall intermittently. My only choice was to go this way. The entry only leads outside, and that was my only chance to get away.

After I notice the side gate is locked, I scale up, over and down. My heels are the biggest hazard, the pointy tip wedging once between the slats. Despite the fact that these shoes cost two or three months worth of groceries, I don’t care if these Jimmy Choos chip or scratch. As I maneuver over the wood and nails, my knee grazes.

My hands grip the back door, about to rip it open, but I stop myself. Eerily, the chatter and music is muffled, only aiding my heartbeat to ramp up. I slip through the door quietly and feel a dread rising, rising, and swallowing me up.

I try the spare room opposite Liam’s bedroom. Ella is slung over the bed. For a moment, I’m not sure if she’s breathing. Her hand hangs off the side, motionless.

Her chest expands, and mine deflates a little. I sigh.

“Ella?” I sit on her side and rub her shoulder. “You tired, darling?”

She mumbles.

This image of her, seeing her sleepy, resting, it should ease me. It doesn’t, and I’m bent on trusting my instincts. Sometimes, you have to.

“Hey.” I rest my hand in my head and lie by her side. “Tell me what happened before.”

She turns over. Her ringlets fall over her face. She’s silent again, except for her heavy breathing. Weird. How did she fall asleep that quickly? I roused her. It’s only dinnertime; she never gets sleepy this early.

That dreads bubbles up again, surging panic through me. What has Cooper given her? Has he poisoned her? I gulp. How can he do this?

Calm
, I think. You don’t know yet.

“El . . . ” I say, sitting up. I lift her dead weight and prop her over my knees.

“Go . . . away . . . sleeping.” Her words are slurred. I hear because only a mother understands some incoherent things her child says.

“El?” I fling off her curls and study her face. Her features are expressionless again, her mind somewhere deep in sleep.

This isn’t right. She’d be telling me off by now for waking her. Not some flimsy “Go away” mumble. Actually, if she were mad, I doubt she’d come in here by herself. But I knew that before. This is something I’d do as a child. Stamp my foot and refuse to come out of here until someone felt sorry for me. In any case, I wouldn’t have been calm enough to rest. Ella, far from the quiet-type, is in trouble.

My grip has turned Ella’s hand a pale color during my thoughts, squeezing her without realizing. Shit! Why hasn’t she woken or yelped?

“Wake up, wake up!” I shake her as I would my phone if it weren’t working. Horrible as it may seem, I’d rather she froth at the mouth or vomit. Some solid proof I’m not a mother overreacting.

Ella stirs. “Mommy? What’s going . . . I . . . ” She licks her lips and closes her eyes. “Tired.”

“No, stay awake, please.” My head begins to spin. I must be hyperventilating. I hold my breath, count and exhale. I do this two times. “Tell me who took you here. Did a man give you something?”

“A man,” she says.

“Good. A man.” Not good. Actually, I choke on my saliva the first time I try to speak. My chest is tight. “What did he look like?”

She tries pushing me away. “Tired, Mommy.”

Thank God she’s speaking and moving. “What color was his hair?”

“Like mine. I don’t know him.”

Coop took her here. He’s the only one with blonde, surfer-looking hair. I swear profusely in my mind, reeling off every word I know. Somehow, it calms me. I stroke Ella again and sit her up in front of me. Her head slumps against my shoulder.

“Nana was busy telling off Ryder. He said mean things to me.”

I try to put it together. Maybe the fight was Ryder’s fault. Maybe everyone was concerned telling him off? Then it hits me. Of course, Coop, being the gentleman he is, could have offered to take Ella somewhere else to cool off. He was the guest. Unknown to others here. How
kind
of him to look after Ella while the rest of my family dealt with family issues.

Where was Liam? “And Liam? Why didn’t he look after you?”

“Liam was cleaning the juice Ryder spilled everywhere. He was so naughty. Liam was on the floor like a doggy.”

Of course. And Coop could poison my daughter. He must have given her sleeping pills. She’s not ill, or delirious. Just sleepy. Really sleepy. I try to formulate a plan, but I don’t know what to do. Where has Coop gone? Should I find him?

Hm.

But I can’t do that. I can’t leave Ella. Part of me is anxious to get Liam’s car keys and speed to Coop’s house in a flash, find out what he gave my baby and make it better. But I don’t know his address. Don’t know if he went back home. And I couldn’t take Ella with me.

“Stay here,” I say. It’s such a silly thing to tell her. Where else is she going to go? Going to do? Plus, she’s already back asleep.

As a kid, I went to the hospital when I had debilitating stomach cramps. My father told me he could do nothing but rub my shoulder and tell me I’d be okay for two hours, while we waited to be seen. I can’t remember anything but the pain and the pattern in the linoleum flooring.

I’m wondering if it’s worth uprooting my daughter and ruining this party to put her through the same agonizing wait when Nancy opens the door and we almost bump heads.

“Oh!” She presses a hand to her chest and gasps. “I didn’t know you were here.”

“Sorry.”

She looks at me, quizzing, figuring out what I’m thinking. “Why are you here? I thought . . . ”

“I wanted to check on Ella. Like I said.” The image of Cooper and my daughter makes my fists ball up. “Something isn’t right.”

“I—I was going to get my phone. To text you.” Nancy hangs her head down, flicking her hair.

“It’s all fine.” Really, it’s not, but an idea has come to mind, and it’s going to have to be good enough.

“Well, you get your toosh out there now. People are wondering where you are. I’ll look after Ella.”

I love the idea of Nancy looking after Ella while I hunt Cooper down to interrogate and then kill him, but I can’t leave my baby girl. I have to see if she gets worse. Ask if she remembers swallowing anything.