The 13th Descent: Book One of The Rosefire Trilogy (11 page)

I fling around
to inform him otherwise and whack my head on the pantry door. “Ow! Shit!” I yell, rubbing my temple. “You know what, Mike. I am staying here. I’m not going anywhere until Georgie Pa finishes his treatment,” I announce to him.

“No one
will be allowed in to see him for the first few weeks, Ren. And we’ve got to go and see the Avalon’s, soon,” he says, pulling up a chair at the kitchen table. “Besides, don’t you want to see your mum, and meet Josh?” he asks, curiously cocking his head to the side.

“Of course
, I want to see Mum,” answering what I know for certain. “I just feel that Georgie Pa needs me more right now.”

“
Hmmm,” he thoughtfully murmurs, repressing smirk.

“
And, I have absolutely no interest in seeing my Bloodstone father,” I snap.

“Where did
that
come from?” he asks, baulking.

“Aunt Romey said that he’s never been able to stay away from Mum for long
, so I have a feeling that I’ll be running in to him sooner rather than later,” I answer, scowling. “How is it that the two people I have most wanted to meet have now become the last people I want to see?” I groan.

“
Your father, I get. But why don’t you want to meet Josh?” he asks, gesturing for me to sit too.

Desperately ne
eding a cuddle, I pick up Chip, put him on my lap and say, “Let’s face it. I’m nothing like the woman he was married to. Her faith. Her courage. Who I am now doesn’t even come close. Look at him, and look at me. Talk about serving up a can of sardines to a man who’s expecting lobster!” I exclaim.

“What?”
he snaps, clearly taken aback by my little speech.

“I’m just saying that p
eople are going to end up very disappointed,” I admit.

“
If everyone trusts what they know, then no one will be disappointed,” Mike adamantly says as he reaches for my hand. The warmth of his golden fingers lacing with mine glows red on my cheeks. He chuckles as I try and skirt his gaze. “Look, Ren, all you have to do is meet him. What happens after that is entirely up to you. Remember free will? That’s what it all boils down to. Regardless of who you were, how you decide to live this life is still your choice and your choice alone. And, if it turns out that Josh won’t be a part of it, well, so be it,” he says matter-of-fact.

Relieved
, I exhale a breath I didn’t even know I was holding. Thank God our first meeting is not going be like the medieval fix up I had conjured up in my head.

But
then that gets me wondering about Josh’s assumptions, and his expectations.

“Yeah, but
what does he expect?” I tentatively ask.

“
Strangely, nothing,” Mike says, shaking his head in disbelief. “When you were in talking to Georgie Pa, Rhoda told me about what Josh remembers-” His smile grows big, “and what he doesn’t,” he cryptically adds.

I
sit on the edge of my seat, tightly hugging Chip until he squeals telling me, “Too hard!” and wiggles his way out of my arms. I quickly throw him a few treats and go straight back to eyeballing Mike. Seeing him this happily wired has to be a good sign.

“And?” I prompt.

“Ren, when Josh meets you, he will be meeting a total stranger. He doesn’t remember you at all,” he starts to explain.

Mike
recommends that I start packing.

“Where
are we going?” I ask with my hands on my hips.

“
It’s sunny this time of year, but the nights can get cool, so pack a jacket,” is his infuriatingly broad answer.

We are smack-bang in the middle of an icy winter here, so where we are headed has
got to be a very long plane ride away.

“
Sunny, huh. Should I pack bikinis too?” I ask, syphoning for more.

“
There’s water there, so sure,” he replies with a shrug as he makes his way down the hallway towards the bathroom.

“Taking a shower?”
I ask.

“Yes,
Ren. I’m taking a shower. I’ll probably have a shave too. And, I plan on wearing my red boxer-”

“Alright, smart arse,”
I grumble, stomping into my bedroom and slamming the door for added effect. I hear his laugh striding away from me and the bathroom door closing behind him.

After a
minute or two, I hear the pipes whine, the shower water gush and Mike’s deep voice reverberating behind it all. At first, I think he is singing, but then I realise that he is talking. My ears prick up even higher. He murmurs a few broken sentences and then he goes quiet.

Who
the hell is he talking to?

That spark of curiosity
is quick to ignite my resting anger. My spine stiffens, my hands clench and my teeth clamp down so hard my jaw aches.

This is total bullshit!
Here I am struggling for scraps when he knows
everything!
Everything about me and the twelve me’s before this one: this one screwed up mess who has had a gut full of suffering from this serious case of past-life dementia.

T
he titbits he threw my way used to be enough to satisfy this hunger to know it all yesterday, but now they only accentuate the fact that I’m here starving to death.

Can’t he see that
, now, nothing is too tough for me to swallow? That I have become a shameless glutton for punishment? That I am still made up of more thorns than petals? 

But he
insists that he must keep denying me until I stop denying myself.

What the freakin’ hell does that
even mean?

One slurry riddle after another
...

Truths?

Half-truths
?

Untruths?

Now e
very time I try and nut it out, the only clear mental image I get is of me standing on the shadowy bank of a mucky, bottomless swamp filled with human bones bobbing on top of the sludge, as my mirror image swathed in light is happily waving to me from the lush green sunlit bank on the other side.

Completely s
ick of it all and myself in general, I long for the deliriously happy thirty minutes between being told Mum is alive and sitting down on Aunt Romey’s couch. Then I find myself pining for the hours and days before that tiny window of time, back when those I chose to let into my little world could give me medicine or poison and I would take it with a hopeful heart, swallowing it in one gulp, believing that the agony or relief that came with it would at least be true.

Now m
y first reaction is to slap it out of their hands.

A small p
art of me understands why my ignorance is keeping me out of the loop, but now, as the loop tightens around my neck, those who vow that they are in this with me leave me blindfolded fumbling around for the knife I know is there, all because of a choice I made when I wasn’t myself.

Why c
an’t they see that I am choking on every breath she took before me?

Why
can’t they kick the friggin’ knife a little closer?

Then
it hits me head on. It’s because they can see I am struggling. It’s because they can see my defiance. It’s because they’re not sure if I’ll use the knife to cut the rope, or cut my wrists.

But, r
ope or wrists, I need to be free of where I am, of who I am this day: a terrified, scatty eighteen-year-old girl who is expected to make one mother of a choice that could make all the difference in the world.

A
choice that will be made with one step: one step forward to fight or one step backward to flee?

But e
ven if I decide to fight for a day or run for eternity, sitting here uselessly bound, gagged and knifeless, I’m completely screwed.

How I can I make them see that
I don’t want cut myself free of my choice? That I need the damn knife to make it?

A
t the very least, I need it to hack through all of the bullshit to get a glimpse of my truth.

I’m pacing. I’m seething.
Mike with his huge arsenal of secrets refuses to give me the one tool I need. Instead, he’s having sneaky bathroom conversations now scheming in French is no longer an option...

I wince
as my new character flaw slaps me across the face. Maybe it’s not so new, but maliciously allocating blame is fast heading to the top of a very long list.

I pull the one
blade I do have a firm grasp on out of Mike’s back and point it at the culprit. It doesn’t waste time cutting to the quick. It seems I should move selfish bitch to the top of the list too.

It’
s hard to believe that only two short days ago, we all had our own version of a life. Every conversation wasn’t about what is going to happen to Ren next. Mike could be hiding away in there so I’m not hovering over his shoulder while he catches up with his parents or one of his mates. For all I know, it could have been Alyssa “I’m back!” Lloyd on the other end of the line.

It surprises me
that the thought of Mike talking to Alyssa doesn’t infuriate me the way it once did. Strangely, the idea of him finding temporary solace in a conversation with a normal, sane, uncomplicated girl actually alleviates a smidge of the remorse I’m still yet to fully understand.

It’s like that
painful stitch, I always believed was guilt, I get in the pit of my stomach when Mike falls off the grid for a week or two. Even though the big, dark bear always comes back to me fresh faced and smiling, I can’t help but hound him, asking him if he is alright, if something, someone, pushed him into wanting to be on his own, and his response is usually the same, “Ren, just because I was alone doesn’t mean I was lonely.”

I always thought
he meant he wasn’t lonely because he was busy being
alone
with a girl. Just another example of how he hasn’t spelt it out for me and I’ve managed to get it completely wrong.

The mere thought of being
on my own for a day or more makes me feel lonely: lonely, empty, lost and terrified. Mike and I can see the world so differently. Where I see grey, he sees blue. What I see to be the darkest and coldest of caves, he sees a place of peace.

Maybe he needs to hibernate now?
God knows he must be sick of the sight of me. Twelve lifetimes of snapping me out of my amnesia, dealing with my temper tantrums and me relentlessly hen-pecking him with my “Why’s?” “Where’s?” “Who’s?” and “How’s?” would be enough to make anyone want to fall into a three month coma.

I
go back to fossicking through my chest of drawers, desperately hunting for some decent summer clothes and something monotonous and painless to focus on. But, it doesn’t take me long to uncover a small curiosity and an even smaller pair of denim shorts.

How long he has had that
water running for?

Our near-
dead hot water system would be well and truly drained by now and that shower water must be freezing. I think of how athletes bath themselves in ice sometimes. Maybe Nordic showers are a new part of his footy training regime? Or maybe he has slipped and hurt himself? Curiosity, and, of course, concern, is quick to overtake my respect for his privacy.

I
fling open my bedroom door, sprint down the hallway, and bang on the bathroom door. “You OK in there, Mike?” I call out.

“Fine. Why?” he
calls back over the patter of the water.

I didn’t hear the shower screen
slide across. Is he showering with it open? Does the idiot like mopping up puddles?

“It’s just you’ve been in there a
long time and the water must be cold-”

“
God, Ren! Can’t a man have a shower, cold or not, in peace!” he shouts.

“OK,
” I squeak back, embarrassed and sorry that I can’t seem to leave him alone for more than a few minutes. I scurry back to my bedroom.

I plonk down on the bed and throw my
burning face into my cold, trembling hands. I am so conscious of him now! I am constantly wondering: What is he doing? What is he thinking? What is he remembering? What is he feeling? I beg for my memory to catch up, so Mike and I can get back on the same page, or at least on the same chapter.

I hear his
lowered voice echo through our paper thin walls and I sit bolt upright. Irked by my knee jerk response to be still and extend my hearing, I slap myself on the thigh, hard. Going against every fibre in my being, I go back to packing and trying to tune him out.

Listening. Ignoring. Listening. Ignoring.

Feel it. Fight it. Feel it. Fight it.

My internal
tug of war completely scrambles my moral compass.

Then
, I hear him laugh.

A
nd with one blow, the war is over.

I turn on my stereo, crank up the volume and grab the remote. I put on a dance track with a heavy bass that
shakes the walls and I bolt for my bedroom door. I slowly open it just enough to slide through it, leaving it ajar so he won’t hear the latch click back into place. Then I tiptoe down the hallway and wait by the bathroom door.

“
Ren! Will you turn that shit off?” Mike yells. He hates techno music with a passion.

Repressing a snigger,
I turn the stereo off with the remote.

“Thank Christ for that,” I hear him say
. I have to clap my hand over my grin.

I
compose myself and silently stand with my ear to the bathroom door. I can hear his footsteps. It sounds like he is pacing.

Minutes pass.

The water is still running.

He is still pacing.

I am still waiting.

It seems my e
avesdropping is a complete bust, but it has proven that I need to take a serious look at my growing stalker tendencies. I shamefully turn to head back to my bedroom, but freeze mid-step when I hear the buzzing of a phone.

“Hello?
” I hear Mike say.

“
Mike?” the other male voice asks.

Speaker phone!
Yes! He has always said that holding the phone up to his ear for too long gives him a headache, so he must think he is in for a long chat…

“Fizz
?” Mike asks

Fizz? I’ve heard that name before...

He snorts and says, “Yeah, man. It’s me.”

“You on a
secure line?” Mike asks.

“Yep.
I’m on a throwaway,” Fizz answers.

“Same here.” Mike says, perking up. “Holy crap, it’s good to hear your voice. How are you, mate?”

“
I’m good. You?”

“G
etting there.”

“Happy to hear it.
”

A
noticeable pause.

“
It’s been too long, brother,” Mike says.

“
Yeah. Yeah, it has. No one has called me Fizz in ages,” the increasingly familiar male voice says chuckling. “On that, how are your olds?” Fizz warmly asks.

Olds is right.
Mike’s parents are nearly as old as Georgie Pa. They were trying to have a baby for years until their wish finally came true when Mike’s mum, Paula, was forty eight and his dad, Stuart, was fifty two.

Thinking of
Paula and Stuart Kuldey and the name “Fizz” reminds me of a story they once told me about a practical joke Mike played on one of his mates: something about a shower, stolen clothes and the poor guy only being left with only a roll of toilet paper to dab himself dry, and thinking it was just him and Mike in the house, he hurried, in his birthday suit, to the linen closet to get himself a towel only to stumble in on Paula’s Saturday afternoon book club, and one of the old duck’s sitting by the door smilingly handed him the bottle of bubbly in her hand to shield his privates from a room full of shocked stares and gasps.

“
That would be enough to make any guy lose his fizz,” Stu sniggered when he retold the story and that’s how this guy’s nickname came to be.

“They’re good.
Besides a bit of arthritis, Mum is still the same. Dad turned seventy a couple months back, but he’s still chopping wood for the fire,” Mike answers with smile in his voice.