point. Once they sedated him, he slept. And they said they wouldn’t let him wake properly for a while. So I caught a taxi home.’ She turned to look at me. ‘I don’t like seeing him like that.’
‘No.’ I thrust my hands in my pockets.
‘He has paranoid schizophrenia,’ she says. ‘I thought he was taking his medication, but apparently not. After I got home last night I found a pile of pills stashed in one of my pot plants.’
‘Will he be home soon?’
‘Not for a couple of weeks. They have to wean him off sedation and then stabilise him on medication before he can come home.’ She looks up at me and I notice dark patches under her eyes. ‘Thank you for what you did for us,’ she says.
‘That’s all right.’
She glances at Jess snuffling up on the bank and then she gazes along the beach. ‘Do you mind if I walk with you?’ she asks.
I’d rather be alone, but what can I say? I shrug. ‘Okay.’
We wander along the sand, not exactly walking together, but not completely apart. Laura strolls along, distracted. At the end of the beach, she follows me up along the cliff trail. I feel a bit awkward, but I try to pretend she isn’t there. Unperturbed by the addition to our party, Jess trots quietly ahead.
The bush along the cliff is drier and we see thornbills and scrub wrens. A butcherbird chimes from high in a straggly eucalypt. I keep hoping Laura will turn back, but she comes all the way to the next beach and we walk back together along the road. At my driveway, I bid her farewell, but she stops and looks at me.
‘That was nice,’ she says. ‘Can we do it again? Maybe tomorrow?’
‘I’m not sure what I’m doing tomorrow,’ I say. What if Emma’s here? Laura could go walking by herself. She doesn’t need to come with me.
‘I’ll look out for you if I’m up,’ she says. ‘Walking’s good for me. I feel a bit better already.’ She stares down at her house where it snuggles behind a string of tree ferns. ‘It’s so quiet without Mouse,’ she says. ‘I suppose I should enjoy the break.’ She smiles at me sadly and I feel the weight of her loneliness.
‘I’d better go,’ I say. ‘I have to get ready for work.’
‘Thanks again for last night,’ she calls after me.
When I leave the garage that afternoon, the car is in a rush to get to the antdiv. I try to slow it down, but it takes corners recklessly and drives too fast along the highway towards Kingston, swinging into the carpark.
As arranged, Emma is waiting on the pavement in front of the building. But there’s a complication: Nick is standing there too. He’s standing too close to her, staking his claim. What did she say about him not owning her? I stop the car at the far end of the carpark, about fifty metres away, and sit, watching them converse. Neither of them has seen me yet and I’m unsure whether to stay or go.
Nick is leaning in towards Emma as they talk, and even from here, I can see him gazing at her intently. They look accustomed to being in each other’s space. Their body language makes my suspicions harder to deny. I want to think of Emma as my girlfriend, but really, I have no idea what goes on during the day when she’s at work. For all I know, she could go home with Nick at lunchtime. There are many hours in a day during which Emma could explore options other than me. I’ve been a fool to imagine that Emma could be mine. A few dinners and a night away together and I’m gone.
Finally, I move the car forward. I might be outshone by Nick’s predatory masculinity, but I won’t sit by watching like this. Emma asked me to pick her up. And if she asked me, then she didn’t ask him.
Nick notices the Subaru before Emma does, and scowls when he sees me behind the wheel. He murmurs something in her ear. She turns and looks at me, her face flushing pink and her body tensing. The intimacy between them is erased as she pulls away, holding him off with her hands. ‘I’m going with Tom,’ I hear her say.
‘What?’
‘You heard me.’
Scooping up her backpack, she bounds towards the car, pulls the door open and flings herself inside, closing the door with a thud. Nick bangs the