Through the glass wall, the car park sparkled from recent rain though the sky was void of clouds, stretching on endlessly. A million billion stars winked down on the family of four as they stepped through the automatic doors out of the air-conditioned terminal into the humid car park. A tropical scent hung in the air and static made the hairs on Lilly’s arms stand on end beneath her black hoodie.
“Welcome to Australia.” Her uncle Daine was leaning against his sports car, looking very macho in his tight red V-neck t-shirt and black skinny jeans. His long strides crossed the distance between them in no time and he relieved Lilly of her luggage. She grabbed her younger brothers’ suitcases of them, and her and her uncle began to load the boot.
“Nice hair,” Daine commented.
“Thank you, I grew it myself,” Lilly retorted testily, registering the smirk on her uncle’s face.
“Did Scarlett put you up to it?” Daine asked casually.
“No,” replied Lilly, looking thoroughly annoyed as she raked her fingers through her black and purple tangles. Why would he ask that?
“Sure, sure,” Daine grinned, slamming the boot door shut.
Lilly turned to hop in the car, but a gentle hand wrapped around her wrist. She looked back at her uncle, and his plain brown eyes bore into hers. They flicked downwards, to her wrist, and he began sliding up her sleeve. Ugly purple scars gleamed in the moonlight, ages old, yet not at all faded. He ran his hand down her arm, feeling for fresh cuts, but found none. Daine looked back up at her apologetically. “I haven’t seen you in a while. I had to check.”
If it was anyone else Lilly would’ve been angry. But Daine had always been her favourite relative, the only person in the world she could trust. Though no mind possessed the ability to stop her from entering it, Daine’s mind always seemed the most open. It was almost a pleasure to merge her conscious with his and explore his every thought; there were no secrets, no lies. When Lilly had told her uncle as such, he had laughed and said “I guess your mother really did make an honest man outta me”. She was yet to understand what he had meant.
“Yeah, of course,” Lilly muttered in reply, tugging down her sleeve. “I don’t do that stuff. Not anymore.” She gulped. She hated it, every time she lied because it was what they wanted to hear, it tore a hole in her soul. It was true, she did not cut herself, she never had. It had all been Luke, but if she ever spoke his name again it would be a one-way trip to the loony bin.
The car journey to their new apartment seemed to take no time compared to the long flight over from America, though it must’ve taken hours. Lilly stared sleepily out of the window, watching the city glow on the horizon grow closer and closer, then eventually they left it behind. The world grew cold and dark; Lilly was falling, falling into her childhood.
Wind howled around the old house, causing it to wail and groan in the dead of the night. Lilly curled up under a moth eaten blanket, wide eyes staring at the shadowy ceiling. Music floated in from beneath the crack under the door - the soft wavering notes of a violin. Instantly possessed by the sound, she rolled out of bed. A crack of light split the darkness of the room as she edged the stiff door open. A cold draft blew through the floor boards, but she didn't feel the chill.
Being urged onwards like a snake under a charm, she was led along the vertigo corridor, down the creaky stairs, and up to a large oak door in a small windowless room. The door swung open of its own accord, the room beyond did the beckoning now, though the violin continued to sing.
Moon light flooded through the windows, illuminating the silhouette of a man. No features were recognisable in the dim light, all Lilly could make out was the violin at his chin. The bow glided smoothly across the strings in his slender hands, emitting an eerie tune that tugged at Lilly's soul.
Lilly watched him, entranced by his movements, by the music, by everything about the shadowy figure. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw that the person wasn’t quite a man, but a boy in his late teens, clad in black from head to toe. His straight hair shone bronze in the moonlight, falling around his pointed face.
The song turned sad towards the end, like an angel falling from heaven, it finished in a long poignant note. Silence crept up on Lilly, the roaring kind of silence that did her head in.
"Who are you?" she asked, her voice quiet in the spacious room.
The boy’s dark blue eyes popped open and began gliding towards her through the darkness. A shaft of moonlight fell across his slowly spreading smile, his eyes glinted from the shadows. The boy chuckled, setting his violin down on a dusty, moth-eaten couch. “My dear, I am Luke.”
The violin spontaneously combusted; fire caught instantly to the couch and raised in a roaring mass around him. As the yellow and orange flames licked at his dark blue eyes, he began to laugh. The fire did not burn him, he stood intact in the middle of the blaze. It crept along the walls towards Lilly, the heat of it dried her eyeballs. She licked her lips, turning to bolt out the door, but the door was gone. She was trapped in the room with a raging inferno.
Luke's laughter grew louder as the dancing flames roared. He strode steadily towards her, the flames at his heels. They grew closer and closer until they consumed her entirely.
Lilly woke, panting hard. Sweat dewed on her face though the car window was cool beneath her cheek. She glanced around the quiet car at her sleeping siblings. Eyes stared at her in the rear-view mirror, but as she met them they flicked away, back to the dark road that they gliding smoothly over.
Soon they turned off the back street onto a well-lit road, and turned again into the car park of an apartment block. Once they were parked, Alexis and Daine hopped out to find their apartment number in the darkness.
The slamming car doors caused Daniel to stir, and, realising where they were, he stumbled sleepily from the car. Jake’s face was squashed against the window, mouth open, eyes closed. Lilly smoothed his soft brown hair, wondering if she could carry him to the apartment, but his eyes flickered open.
“Are we there yet?” he moaned.
“Yeah, we’re here, kid.” Lilly unbuckled his seat belt and grabbed his backpack.
“I got it,” he mumbled, stretching like a kitten. He hopped out of the car and slung the bag over his shoulder before slouching over to the open door. His big sister watched him go, realizing he was only a few months off his thirteenth birthday. He wasn’t a kid anymore. He paused in the porch light and turned back. “You coming, Lilly?”
She trailed after him, combing her fingers through her knotted hair, longing for a shower.
“I thought we were getting a house,” Jake sounded disapproving of the small apartment they stepped into.
“It isn’t ready yet. We’re only here a couple of nights,” Lilly reassured him.
A couple of nights stretched into a week, then into three.
Kids played in the car park daily, riding in circles on their scooters or bikes, or playing touch football wearing no shirts and no shoes. Daniel disapproved of their uncleanliness and refused to play with them, but Jake was more than happy to ditch his shoes and rip his shirt off. Lilly was too old to play with them, but watched from her bedroom window drawing in her sketchbook all day.
“I want to get out.”
Lilly didn’t look up from her sketchpad at Daniel’s sudden declaration. “Go play with the ferals then.”
“You and I could go into town and window shop or something.”
Lilly made a scoffing noise at her brother’s suggestion. “Shopping,” she grimaced. “I’d rather let Scarlett have a go with me with her knives.”
“Alright then, I’ll call Scarlett.”
At this point, Lilly looked up. “You know I was joking, right?”
Daniel rolled his eyes. “I meant to meet up and hang.”
Lilly shook her head, the long curtain of dark hair falling in front of her face as she looked back to her drawing. “She hasn’t called – I don’t think she has time for her dorky little cousins with her new Aussie life.”
“Oh don’t be so… so you. I’m sick of being trapped in this apartment. Alexis won’t drive us anywhere, so it’s up to us. I’ll call a cab?”
Lilly’s head jerked in another no. “Too expensive. And seeing as you refuse to take public transport…”
“It’s disgusting!”
“Then we’re stuck here.” Lilly threw down her sketch pad, the pencil rolling away and off the bench. She pulled on her tattered high-top cons and headed for the pool to sit in the cool shade of the palm trees. The climate was so much hotter than she was used to, but still she wore jeans and a hooded sweatshirt.
A shadow passed over Lilly’s closed eyelids. “Searching for your inner-psycho?” inquired a strangely familiar voice from above. Lilly’s eyes flew open, but it couldn’t have been-
“Scarlett!” she sprung to her feet and flung herself at her cousin.
A black denim skirt clung tightly around Scarlett’s thighs. Through the numerous slashes in the black shirt hanging loosely around her shoulders, a deep red singlet was visible. Her hair resembled a pile of large spider legs; it was pinned in random places to her head with large black clips embroidered with red gems. But what stuck out to Lilly most was the blue streaks throughout Scarlett’s black hair.
“Scarlett,” she said again, no longer sounding enthused. “You’re hair isn’t red.”
“Yeah. Cool, aye? Now we match.”
“Sure, cool,” Lilly sighed. She had told her cousin she sought to be unique, and her cousin had told her to dye her hair. She ran her fingers through her black purple-streaked hair subconsciously. No wonder Daine had seemed so smug.
“What are you doing here anyway?”
“I’m breaking yous out,” Scarlett smirked. “Your new house is ready to move into, just in time for school too. Grab your stuff.”
“You coulda called ahead so I had time to pack.”
“Nah, you porbies have got shit-all anyways, dunno why my dad bothered with a moving truck.”
“Gee, thanks,” Lilly muttered, traipsing back to the apartment.
In the end it was true; what little things Lilly had unpacked took moments to stuff back into her suitcase and the boxes that had been shipped over. Then began the task of carrying all those boxes to the truck; Lilly’s thin arms were aching within minutes. When they finally took a break, she was reduced to a sweaty heap, and tore off her hoodie.
“Thank god, I thought you’d never take that thing off,” Scarlett commented when she did so.
Lilly stared at her folded black hoodie forlornly; when life changes so fast your head and heart can’t keep up, the only thing you really have to hold on to is who you are, and that hoodie and her tattered cons were all that was left of herself.
The glinting yellow sun disappeared behind Lilly’s pale hand briefly as she lay on her back, examining her fingernails. The black nail polish was chipping off, revealing how neglected her nails really were.
Scarlett grabbed Lilly’s hand and looked at it. “I have to give you a manicure.”
“Mmm…” Lilly murmured, putting her hands behind her head so it was off the hard concrete beneath them.
Daniel collapsed on the top step, his blonde hair a tangled sweaty mess, having just retired from packing boxes into the rental truck five minutes after the girls. “Looks like Jakob’s buggered off somewhere,” he panted.
“Little twirp, always skiving work.” Scarlett ran her bony fingers through her fine black hair, now void of clips.
“Jake’s only young…” Lilly sighed.
“You’ve got a soft spot for him,” Daniel accused in a sulky manner.
“Do not.”
“Someone buy me a snickers,” Scarlett said abruptly, looking at Lilly. “I’m all out of cash.”
Lilly shrugged. “Nah.”
“What do you mean, nah? Why not?”
“Eh, the shops are all the way over there.”
Scarlett rolled onto her side to look her cousin in the eye. “Luke told me he wants you to buy me a snickers.”
“Scarlett!” Alexis and Daine said at the same time in a warning tone from the back of the truck.
“What? Come on, I was just kidding.”
Lilly sprung lightly to her feet and sauntered around the back of block of units.
“Oh, come on!” Scarlett dashed after her in a swirl of black skirts and blue-streaked hair. “Take a joke, Lilly... Lilly!”
Lilly spun around. “It wasn’t funny.”
“Oh, don’t be a sook. Are you… are you about to cry?” Scarlett’s tone softened. “Hey, Lilly, I’m sorry.”
Lilly glared out at the sparkling surface of the pool, determined not to let go of the tears behind her blue eyes. If she did it could mean the end of everything. She must not cry.
“Is Luke here right now? I’m sorry, Luke,” Scarlett spoke to the air, “I shouldn’t have used you to-”
Lilly spun around, cracking her hand across her cousin’s face. Scarlett blinked in surprise, a red mark already appearing on her cheek.
“There is no Luke,” Lilly said, trying to keep her voice steady. “I made him up. Stop being a bitch.”
The weight in her chest grew; another fragment of her soul had shattered.
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