SL Huang - Up and Coming - Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors

Candice loomed down. “I don’t understand what you’re doing, when you know how much Julie needs you. But if you can’t do it yourself…” She hefted up the typewriter, crate and all, and carried it over to the attic window. Becca watched, her legs refusing to move, as Candice opened the window and dumped the crate through it into the rain. Sam shuddered at every thump and ping of metal as the crate and its contents burst apart on their front lawn.

“I put your bag away.” Her consonants could have cut steel. “When you have realised there are more important things, I’ll be in the living room, looking after my daughter.” She stalked down the stairs. Becca’s face burned.

Sam shivered. “Does Mum think I don’t love her?”

“No, mate,” Becca rubbed his arms as if to warm him, or perhaps herself. “Your Mum knows how much you love her.” Her voice sounded hollow, even to her.

Becca lay awake on her childhood bed, studying the scrawl on the bottom of Julie’s bunk. Sam slept, the rise and fall of his breath like a tiny piston, but sleep eluded Becca.

The pre-dawn birdsong niggled. They were the wrong birds. She missed the magpie warble, the cackle of Kookaburras as they hunted worms for their young.

Who would raise Sam? Her? Her mother? No, Becca had made too many hard choices to break that cycle, she had to spare him that. But how could she take him away from Julie? Rick would never sign on for a kid, he didn’t even want a dog. And Candice couldn’t care for Julie on her own, not even with a physio-nurse visiting.

Was this her life, now? Walled in with Candice by guilt? Caring for the body of a sister she’d never see again? Becca bit down on her cheek until she tasted blood.

What would Dad do?

Figure it out. Find what you’re missing. Build your decoder.

Typewriter pieces sprang forward in her mind. Where had that astronaut come from? How did he contact her?

You’re just distracting yourself from the problem . She winced at her mother’s voice in her head. If she stayed here, she’d turn into Candice.

She had to leave. They both did. Julie would want what was best for her son, even if that didn’t include her. Becca’d find a school nearby, ask work for flexible hours. Her friends would visit, and Rick…She’d work something out with Rick. He’d come around, he’d like Sam. She’d make it work.

Becca swung her legs out from the covers and felt for a torch. The only dressing gown she could find in the dark was Sam’s blue Thomas the Tank Engine one that barely covered her hips, but it would have to do. She eased open the dresser that held Sam’s clothes and quietly bundled them into his backpack. Candice had hidden hers somewhere. She’d buy a new laptop when she got home. If she didn’t go now, she might lose her nerve. She’d put his backpack in the car, then come back for him.

Becca crept down the hallway, past her sister’s laboured breathing. In her head, Candice’s voice cursed her: selfish child . Becca held her breath and slipped the latch on the front door.

The rain had lifted, leaving a pre-dawn sogginess that clogged the air. Becca tip-toed out to the car, the mud squelching through her toes. Shoes. She should get some shoes when she got Sam. She eased the car door shut, and turned back to the house.

The typewriter still lay in pieces on the grass near the bins. Sam would need it. As if it could somehow fill the void of what she was taking him from.

He’s already lost her.

Not the point .

She picked over the remains, laying out letter-levers and keys in a sad little row. She couldn’t put it back together again; most of it was a twisted mess. She held the ‘A’ in her hand, its long arm bent from impact and twisted in the ribbon. Broken, like her sister, never to be whole. Her ink-purple fingers blurred as hot tears wet her cheeks and neck, and sobs pulled up from her gut. She curled over her chest, squeezing the broken pieces in her hand until her palm cramped, sobbing so hard her stomach ached.

Her mother had been right. She’d just been hiding behind the puzzle. Becca stared down at the ink marks in her hand, drained.

A clear symbol sat on her palm where the A had rested. It wasn’t an ‘A’. Slowly, hand shaking, Becca pressed the A key through the ribbon into her palm.

Another symbol.

Electricity surged through her blood stream. She sifted through the rubble. The decoder had disintegrated in the rain, but—but Sam’s notebook might be salvageable. Trying not to breathe, she flipped the lid off the garbage bin and rummaged inside, dug out the gravy-sodden notebook and wiped the worst of the mess off with the mountain of used tissues.

The gravy had eaten half of Sam’s notes, but with her laptop, she could re-translate it with ocular character recognition. Give it a dictionary and the translations from the notebook, it could take educated guesses at the rest. She could figure it out, finish it for him.

One problem: Candice had her laptop.

Conviction wavered under Candice’s imaginary glare.

You could just leave it. You’re taking him away from everything, he’s probably not going to care . You could just slink away, like always. Because she scares you. Your own mother scares you.

Fist closed around the ‘A’ key, Becca marched inside.

She found her carry-on bag stuffed in Candice’s wardrobe and lugged it halfway to the hall before the lights flicked on. Candice stood in her vermillion dressing gown, one raised hand gripping a leather belt.

“I thought you were…” she began, expression foggy. She glanced at Becca, then the bag, hardened her gaze and drew herself up, setting her face into battle-mode. She let the silence play out, the seconds battering at Becca’s walls like artillery.

“I deserve better than this. So does your sister.”

Becca flinched as the words shot through to her gut. “It’s not about you.” Her voice whined like a child’s.

Candice strode towards her, the belt swinging ominously. “She needs you. You can’t run away because you don’t feel like dealing with it. You don’t get to pretend anymore while someone else cleans up the mess.”

The bag slipped down Becca’s arm like a weight fixing her in place and her mind narrowed to the words, to Candice’s voice, struggling to gain an edge.

Candice loomed within striking distance. “Your sister understood that,” she said. “We had our differences, but she worked hard for her family, for her son. She buried her husband while you ran off to your koalas. And now she needs you, and you’re leaving it to everyone else, like you always do. Leaving us behind.”

Shaking her head mutely, Becca tried to drum up words, thoughts, anything.

Candice leaned close. “You selfish child. Always, no matter what I did. She’s not the one who deserved this.”

Sickening heat flooded up from Becca’s belly, swallowing her.

Candice’s eyes glinted in triumph. “Were you even going to say goodbye to Sam? Or are you leaving that to me as well, to explain why you’re abandoning him.”

Sam .

Becca found an edge. Protect Sam . She clutched it like a spear, lifted her chin, locked eyes with Candice. “I’m taking him with me,” she snarled.

Candice reared back, mouth open.

Drawing her anger from her voice, Becca pulled herself straight. “I gave up every friend I had to move away. My sister. My job. My possessions. I didn’t run away, I made a calculated choice. I paid a price.” She took a deep breath, chin thrust out like she could push the words out and not hear them. “It was worth leaving everything behind to be free of you.”