Page 17

Claire

Now

“Shit.”

Ellery doesn’t usually swear. It was something I found so incongruous about her when we first met—her tough exterior, all heavy black eyeliner and facial piercings combined with her sweet, childlike personality. So I can tell now that something’s really wrong.

“There are wildfires in Northern New South Wales and the southern part of Queensland. Our flight back to Sydney has been cancelled. And so are the ones for tomorrow. The next one is Friday.”

Two days from now. The day I’m supposed to return to Chicago.

“Shit,” Declan chimes in. “Are there any other airports around?”

Ellery is already on it. “It looks like there’s one in Alice Springs, but that’s eight hours away. And”—her fingers dance across her phone’s keyboard—“yup, those flights are cancelled until Friday as well.”

Declan punches the steering wheel, hard. I jolt back, never having seen anger like that from him before.

“Sorry,” he mutters. “It’s just really inconvenient.”

I don’t say anything, but I agree, making a mental note to call the airline later to reschedule my flight.

The news must have reached the rest of our caravan because Kyan lifts his arm out the driver’s side window, signaling for us to pull over. Once we stop behind him, the others are out of their rental and next to our windows within seconds.

Adrien doesn’t bother asking if we’ve heard.

“I’ve already checked the contract for the rental cars. They don’t allow drop-offs more than ten hours away from the originating destination.” She sighs. “And there aren’t any hotels in Rollowong. The closest one is in Jagged Rock.”

“Where?” I ask softly. But I already know what she’s going to say. The twist of fate lodges like a knife between my ribs.

“The Inn.”

***

We stop on the way at a grocery store right outside of town, grabbing wilted premade salads for lunch and stocking up on supplies that are mostly alcoholic in nature.

We try to ignore the sideways glances and cold remarks from the teenage cashier, evidently the sole employee in the shop, before filing back into our cars.

The asphalt sizzles as we enter Jagged Rock.

I’m instantly transported back in time—not to a decade ago when we were last here, but even further.

Everything about this place seems like it’s stuck in the wrong century.

Squat one- and two-story buildings line the road, mostly in neutral colors, aside from one large building with a wraparound porch that’s painted a faded salmon pink.

A clock tower lies at the far end of the street, and the omnipresent red dirt skitters across the road.

I feel a pinch in my heart as I take in the number of boarded-up buildings.

Graffiti patterns the various shuttered businesses, which outnumber their open counterparts nearly three to one.

I’m expecting it, prepared for it after all, but even so, my breath catches in my throat as it comes into view at the very end of Main Street.

The Inn itself is largely unimpressive, a nondescript two-level building.

But it’s the mountain that rises up behind it, its tip ascending into the sky like a spindly finger, that brings everything crashing back.

That’s what surprised me most when I first came out here.

My mind always associated the desert with vast expanses of sandy flats.

But the Outback is a different animal entirely.

The bush covers everything, worn down in spots by pathways and eroded by wind, but thriving and dense in others, with no apparent rhyme or reason to its patterns.

And just when you think bushland is the only thing the eye can see, the rocky brunt of a hill that the locals refer to as “Big Beulah” bursts out of the ground without warning, dominating everything surrounding it.

“He would have loved it here,” Ellery says quietly from the front seat.

I don’t need to ask who she’s referring to. I know. Tomas.

“He would have,” Declan says lightly, resting his hand on hers.

I picture him then, his smile so big it took over the whole lower half of his face, chocolate brown eyes always eager behind his glasses. So curious, so innocent.

A sadness lodges deep in my stomach, mixed with the longing for what we had back then, back before it all went so wrong.

The car jolts as Declan turns onto the path that leads to the Inn’s parking lot, transitioning from smooth pavement to unpaved dirt. And within moments, we’re back. Kyan pulls in next to us, and we empty out of the cars, all of us unusually quiet, taking it in. The memories.

The life that ended here.

“Want to take bets if Randy’s still here?” Kyan asks, cracking a smile and propelling us towards the building.

No one answers. I completely wiped Randy, the Inn’s owner, from my memories. But I know the bet’s a solid one. Jagged Rock isn’t a place most people leave.

Phoebe included. My mind leaps to the thought before I can stop it.

A bell chimes above our head as I follow Adrien into the Inn’s lobby, and the smell hits me instantly. A mix of dust, of rooms that desperately need to be aired out, and an underlying sourness. A scent that involuntarily lifts my nostril.

“Hmm,” I hear Josh murmur. “No Randy, no anyone.”

I look around, taking in the faded carpet, the peeling wallpaper, nothing apparently changed in the ten years we’ve been gone. My gaze lands on the front desk, the top a mess of peeling wood, the rickety computer chair behind it unoccupied.

“Maybe it’s no longer in business,” Declan poses. It’s not an unreasonable thought. It doesn’t look like this place has welcomed a single guest in the decade since we left.

I take in the wall behind the desk, the various cubbyholes, each of which is filled with a key—one per room. I scan the twenty cubbyholes before stopping on the middle row. One cubby sits empty, its key nowhere to be found.

I clear my throat. “Well, it looks…”

Slam.

The noise explodes like a gunshot through the small enclosed space and we all jump in unison, the thought lodging in my throat.

We turn towards the source of the sound.

A door just steps away from the front desk—one I don’t remember having noticed all those years ago—ricochets against the wall, and in its wake stands a familiar lanky man, his dark hair slicked back from his face into a low ponytail that hangs to his shoulders.

“Well, looky here. Most business this place has seen in years.” And then his smile slips. “Wait. I remember you.”

“Hi, Randy,” Kyan says. “We stayed with you a few years back, the group from Hamilton College?”

“Couldn’t stay away, I reckon?”

“We, uh, we’ve found ourselves back in Jagged Rock, and we would love to stay here for two nights if you have rooms available.” Kyan’s eyes flick obviously to the cubbyhole chock-full of keys. A lack of vacancy doesn’t seem to be a problem.

I see something flash in Randy’s eyes that I can’t quite identify. There was always something about him that made me squeamish. The way his eyes would track us from his stoop behind the front desk, or how he always seemed to be hovering on the outskirts of our conversations, listening.

“Well,” he says resignedly, as if he has no other option. “Let’s get yous sorted, then.”

We do the whole song and dance of surrendering our passports and Kyan’s credit card—he’s again insisted on paying—while Randy fiddles with the desktop computer. After what feels like an eternity, it’s time for him to divvy up the rooms.

He starts with me.

“I figured you’d like to be in the same one you were last time,” he says, handing me a key, his crepey skin brushing mine.

How could he possibly remember the room I stayed in ten years ago? But before I can ask, he’s already moved on, talking to Josh.

I barely wait for the others to collect their keys before heading towards the staircase, gripping mine so tightly my knuckles turn white.

I’d forgotten how heavy it was—a single silver key looped onto a wooden engraving of a hand-carved raven, overly large and ostentatious, so it would be more difficult for a guest to lose.

My body moves of its own volition, following the pathway I took so many times without thinking.

I turn right at the top of the staircase, barely stopping to take in the hallway and its faded green carpets and peeling flowered wallpaper—a mix between what you would find in a funeral home and a crime scene—and pause in front of the third door on the left.

A brass 13 stares back at me from the center of the red framed door, tarnish breaking through the metal’s dull sheen.

I pause, bracing myself for the memories that will rush back as soon as I open the door. I take a deep breath and blow it out slowly. And then I shove the key into the lock and turn.

What a dump.

The memory of Phoebe’s words hits me like a slap in the face as I push open the door.

Her bed is the first thing I see. It’s in the same position it was back then: the headboard shoved against the wall, diagonal from the other twin bed in the room, leaving nothing but a small dresser and a wide expanse of faded carpet between them.

And then I see her. Phoebe’s impossibly thin body spread out on the twin-sized mattress, her head resting on her hand, staring over at me.

I shake my head, and the image disappears.

I sit down on her bed, trying to ignore the puff of dust that escapes from beneath me as I do, and take another look around the room.

My eyes scan the maroon-colored walls, the door that leads into the small bathroom, the painting of a raven done in glossy colors so that its feathers appear greasy, its beady eyes staring from its perch on a bending tree branch.

A shiver runs through me; something about that painting always creeped me out, but now it’s as if I’m drawn to it.

I get up off the bed and walk until I’m right in front of it.

My brain seems to register something off, but I can’t determine what.

I reach a cautious hand out towards it and—

A vibration pulses against my leg, and I jump back before realizing it’s my phone. I pull it out, the screen lighting up with a number that looks too long by American standards.

“Good evening. Am I speaking with Ms. Whitlock?”

I recognize the voice instantly, and my spine goes rigid. I manage to squeak out a noise of affirmation.

“Ms. Whitlock, this is Inspector Villanueva from the Australian Federal Police. I’m calling to see whether you could come back into our office tomorrow morning?”

The dampness in my palms comes so suddenly that I almost fumble the phone. They’ve found out.

“Ms. Whitlock?”

When I force the words out, they’re tight, strained. “I…I’m not in Sydney.”

“Oh,” Villanueva says, her surprise evident. “May I ask where exactly you are?”

I look through the small chest-height window that faces the back of the Inn. Land stretches, marked with sun-bleached bushes and the odd half-dead eucalyptus tree, until it seemingly erupts out of the ground into the dominating mold that is Beulah.

Villanueva would be furious if she knew we’d come back here. In fact, she’d told each of us to stay local until the AFP had finished their investigation.

“I’m visiting an old friend out of town,” I say after a second-too-long pause. “We’d organized it before our…conversation yesterday.”

Despite the bile rising in my throat, I manage for the lie to sound somewhat truthful. I guess I’ve had enough practice over the years.

“Hmm.” I can hear the skepticism in her voice. I’m afraid she’s about to press me further, and my mind races, eager to remember the name of any Australian towns I can use to support my fake trip.

“Well, I didn’t want to do this over the phone.” Villanueva sighs. “But we received more information from the coroner’s office this afternoon on Ms. Barton’s case.”

“Oh?” I ask. Anxiety swirls in my chest.

“The tests are far from conclusive. Given the state of the remains, the coroner can’t be certain. But…”

The possibilities dangle in front of me as she trails off. Saliva pools in my mouth and I swallow hard, fear rising in time with the bile in my throat.

“Ms. Barton was likely pregnant at the time of her death.”