Reluctant Hallelujah Read online

  ‘Give it here,’ I said, reaching over and pulling the shoe roughly out of Minty’s hand. ‘It’s not yours.’

  Before I could say anything else Minty put her arms around me and Jools hugged me from the other side and a huge plug in my throat made it difficult to breathe. I tipped down on the floor like a glass of spilt milk and sobbed enough tears to make a sodden puddle on the carpet under my face.

  Houston. We had a problem.

  Mum had a pair of mint-condition, never-been-worn runners.

  But Houston, something didn’t add up.

  There were no keys inside them.

  None.

  We’d checked and double-checked. We’d taken them down to the kitchen and hacked into them with Mum’s poultry shears.

  Enron was right about the runners, but he was wrong about the key.

  ‘What did he say?’ Jools asked. ‘That the key opened a door to the basement? Is that right?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Except we don’t have a basement. And no key, either. And now Mum really doesn’t have any runners,’ I said, putting them beside the bin.

  ‘How about we check if there’s a basement?’ Jools asked. ‘See if he was right about that? If there’s no basement we call the police.’

  ‘And if there is a basement?’ I asked.

  Jools shrugged.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  We walked into the lounge room. The three of us looking for a basement that I’d never heard of. And I’d known this house all my life. My mum was born here. Well, not here exactly. She was born in a hospital, but she grew up here. We moved in about six years ago when my grandma died, which you might think is creepy, except it’s not.

  It’s a big rambling, slouchy, old joint that could do with central heating, a new bathroom, kitchen, carpets, a whole lot less of the ‘charm’ that Mum said it had and a whole lot more of the ‘mod-cons’ that every other house in the entire developed world has. The front yard was in permanent shade even on the hottest days of summer because of a gigantic Moreton Bay fig tree whose branches stretch from fence line to fence line. The forget-me-nots I had planted with my dad way back when I was a kid blossomed blue and pretty under the Moreton Bay. Hanging from one of the monstrous, Russian-gangster-thick arms of the tree was an old car tyre, a cringe-inducing reminder of my swinging-upside-down-with-my-dress-around-my-ears-in-front-of-the-neighbours days.

  Our lounge room was pretty much the same as it had been since my grandma and pop lived here. It had the same floral carpet, although there was a new rug on top of it that Mum and Dad had bought a couple of years back. The windows were old and rattly but with plantation shutters that Mum had put in.

  It was kind of a mishmash of old lady and old man interior decorating mixed in with Mum and Dad’s taste. Strangely, it seemed to work. It definitely had a cosy feel to it, even if it was always freezing cold, winter, autumn and summer. And spring, it went without saying.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ Jools asked, coming up behind me and sitting down on the arm of one of the couches. Minty leant by the French doors that led onto the side courtyard, her arms folded in front of her chest.

  The courtyard had been grandma’s little mecca, where she’d planted camellia bushes and azaleas whose blossoms were now bouncing on their branches in the warm spring breeze.

  A shiver wriggled up my spine.

  ‘Shut the shutters,’ I said. ‘In case someone’s watching.’

  Across the road, I imagined the people in the churchyard crossing themselves: Father, Son, Holy Ghost.

  ‘Although we can’t shut them for no reason,’ I thought out loud. ‘If someone’s watching, they’ll know something’s up. That they’ve got the right house. How about we put something in front of the window instead? Something to block the view. Like, maybe I’ll get an easel and pretend I’m doing a painting or something.’

  Jools frowned at me.

  ‘Yeah, right,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Because you do that all the time.’

  ‘Constantly. She’s constantly painting,’ Minty agreed. ‘Besides, an easel won’t cover those windows. They’re too huge.’

  I thought a moment.

  ‘How about we go up the street and come back with a DVD and popcorn,’ I said, ‘as if we’re having a movie afternoon? That would explain the closed blinds. To create a mood.’

  ‘We’re not going up the street and choosing a DVD,’ Jools said. ‘We’re going to have a quick look for the basement and then we’re calling the cops. Just shut the blinds. Don’t worry about it.’

  But we needed to have a reason for closing the blinds. We couldn’t just shut them in the middle of the day without a reason.

  ‘Ker-ching,’ I said. ‘I’ve got it. Wait there.’

  I ran upstairs to my bedroom, took some dresses from my wardrobe, and ran back downstairs.

  ‘So,’ I said to Jools, ‘you’re going to strip off in front of the window and put one of my dresses on. Twirl, look at us to see what we think, then take it off, start to put on another dress, then look around as if you’ve only just thought of it, and shut the blinds. Reason – explained. Blinds. Shut.’

  Jools folded her arms and tilted her chin at me.

  ‘You want me to strip in front of your window? Why me?’

  ‘Because you love getting your kit off.’

  Minty nodded.

  ‘That’s true,’ Minty said to Jools. ‘You’ve got to admit.’

  Jools raised her eyebrows at us.

  ‘That’s true.’

  She reached down and hauled her school dress up by the hem and over her head, then clicked her fingers in the direction of the dresses on the couch as she stood in her bra and undies.

  Minty threw a dress at her – my favourite floral cotton dress – then came over and sat beside me, quietly squeezing my hand.

  Jools zipped the dress up, tilted her hips at us and raised her hands in the air the way she always did when she wanted to show off.

  ‘Whaddya reckon?’ she asked.

  And even though my folks were missing and I had bigger things to worry about, I did note with some satisfaction that my dress looked better on me than it did on her.

  Come on, when things aren’t going your way, you take your uplifting moments wherever you find them.

  Minty gave the thumbs-down and Jools put her hands on her hips, pouted at us, unzipped the dress and pulled it back over her head.

  ‘Next,’ she said, clicking her fingers.

  Minty threw the next one at her.

  A bright green mini-dress with lace trim on the hem. Jools caught it, pushed her hands through the sleeves to pull it on, then turned towards the window, shock registering on her face as she clasped the dress to her chest, then closed each of the shutters with a push of her hand.

  She tossed the green dress over the back of a chair, pulled her uniform back on and looked at me, ready for further instructions.

  ‘Okay, so,’ I said, ‘we’ll move all the couches, pull up the rug, and see if there’s a trapdoor underneath. And if there’s not, we call the police.’

  And if there was, I didn’t know what we were going to do.

  I went and stood at one end of the couch, ready for some heavy lifting. Minty hunched over and picked up the other end while Jools starting moving Grandma’s side tables into the corner of the room.

  A click.

  We all heard it. A click at the door.

  The inserting of a key into a lock.

  The three of us stopped where we stood. My end of the couch weighed heavily in my arms, but it didn’t occur to me to put it down.

  It was Mum. Coming home from the market. Her arms would be full of shopping. She was going to look at the three of us and declare us officially mentally deranged.

  And then she’d make us some lunch.

  The front door clicked quietly shut.

  Enron stood looking at us from the hallway, a bunch of keys dangling from his hand.

  Yoi.
/>   It’s an expression our karate sensei uses. It means to be ready. To be on high alert, aware that something might go horribly wrong and be ready to act however necessary to keep yourself safe.

  ‘Yoi’ had me tensed up like sail-rigging when Enron stepped into our lounge room.

  ‘What the hell?’ I said, dropping my end of the couch onto the floor.

  ‘My mum gave me a key,’ he said.

  As if that explained everything. It didn’t. In fact, it made less sense than if he hadn’t said anything at all.

  ‘And she gave me this as well.’

  He held out his hand like a peace offering, unfurling his fingers like big sausagey petals.

  Resting on his palm was a heavy, iron key. Not your average Whitco job. It was old. Ancient. Under normal circumstances I would have admired the prettiness of it, the ornateness, the designs that were carved into it, curlicues swirling around what looked like the letter ‘A’.

  It looked familiar. I’d seen it somewhere before but couldn’t think where.

  ‘I waited for you at lunchtime,’ Enron said, looking at my mouth, my chin, my ears, but not my eyes, ‘but when I realised you weren’t coming I called my mum. I wasn’t sure what else to do.’ He shrugged. ‘She gave me this key and told me to come straight over.’

  ‘You didn’t think to knock?’ I said, my voice like a blade. ‘Like a normal person would?’ I added, my mouth tasting metallic.

  ‘Mum said whether or not you were here I had to use the key, go down to the basement, move what needs to be moved, and then call the police.’

  He looked at his feet.

  ‘You know,’ he added, an embarrassed tinge in his voice, ‘I’m as unhappy about this as you are.’

  Everything about him annoyed me. Everything. Everything he said was wrong.

  ‘I doubt it,’ I said, snipping through the air, chip chop with my words. ‘My parents are missing, and you’re the only one who knows jack-shit about it. I’m pretty sure I’m way more unhappy than you at this particular moment.’

  He kept his eyes hangdog on the floor.

  ‘Fair enough,’ he said quietly.

  And just like that, something about the curve of his shoulders made me feel sorry for him. I realised it must have been difficult for him to be standing in my lounge room with me and Minty and Jools. We’d barely said ten words to each other in six years of high school. If I’d had to go stand in his lounge room with his friends, I’d have felt pretty crap about it as well.

  I looked down at the ancient key in his giant hand.

  ‘I don’t get it,’ I said, taking the key out of his palm, trying to soften my voice. ‘You said it was in my mum’s runner. Why’ve you got it?’

  Enron sighed, his big mouth pulling in like a purse string.

  ‘This is our key,’ he said. ‘I don’t know. Maybe your mum forgot to put her one back after she used it last.’

  I wanted to argue with him, but there was a better-than-even chance he was right.

  A dim thought nudged me. I went to the mantelpiece. Hidden behind grandma’s old clock was an ancient key. Not your standard Whitco job.

  Of course it hadn’t been in Mum’s runner. As if it would be, when Mum could just as easily put it on the mantelpiece and then forget all about putting it back in her runner. I’d seen the key loads of times, but never really seen it till then. It was one of those things from way back when Grandma and Pop were alive; one of those things you don’t even notice because it’s always been there.

  Just a pretty key that served no purpose.

  I picked up the phone and dialled that so-familiar number.

  ‘Hi. I can’t get to the phone right now,’ said my mum, ‘so leave a message and I’ll call you back.’

  Hot tears pressed against the back of my eyes before spilling over my eyelashes. Hearing my mum’s voice. So chirpy and absentminded. Where was she? Was she hurt? Was she with Dad? Were they holding hands? Were they lying somewhere? Was she hugging his back?

  I put the phone on the mantelpiece, went to the couch and picked up one arm.

  ‘Okay,’ I said, turning towards Enron. ‘Let’s find this basement, and then the police can start looking for my mum and dad.’

  Enron helped me move the couch. We pushed all four of Grandma’s tables to one side. Enron hoisted the coffee table off the floor with one hand and left it on the couch with all the cushions; something Mum would definitely not have approved of.

  ‘Last thing,’ Minty said, nodding down at the Persian rug that took up a large chunk of the lounge-room floor. Enron took one corner, Minty took the other and we peeled it back, like the pastry lid of a pie dish.

  In the middle of the carpet was a neatly cut square, slotting perfectly into the pattern so you might miss it if you weren’t looking, but easy enough to find if you knew what to search for.

  We stepped back from it a moment. Instinctively I looked towards the front windows, even though the shutters were closed.

  We lifted the square of carpet, and there it was.

  A solid iron trapdoor. With a lock. An ornate, old-fashioned lock that would fit an ornate, old-fashioned iron key perfectly.

  I’d seen enough NCIS to know that two missing parents and one locked trapdoor is a combination for great TV but not so great in real life.

  I slung a glance at Minty. She was watching me carefully, ready to sweep me up in case I fell to pieces.

  And at that moment, we heard another key in the front door. Turning in the lock.

  We looked to see who it was. More than anything, I wanted it to be my mum. I wanted it to all be some ridiculous misunderstanding. I didn’t care what was in the basement. I didn’t care that we had a lock in the middle of our lounge-room floor. Mum could tell me it didn’t involve me, and I’d be fine with that. Better than fine. Great. I would never peel that Persian rug back again. We could put that ornate old key back on the mantelpiece and forget about it. We’d put the couch back. Put everything back the way it was.

  Including my life.

  The front door clicked shut. Not so quietly this time.

  Coco walked down the hallway, heading for the kitchen. Eyes down, headphones in, texting as if everything was good with the world. No problems here, thanks for asking.

  I felt like smacking her.

  ‘Are you right there?’ I said, feeling furious that she didn’t even care whether Mum and Dad were okay. ‘Texting like everything’s tickety-boo.’

  She looked at the furniture all butted up against each other, and peeled her headphones out of her ears.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Mum and Dad still aren’t home.’

  She faltered for a moment, looked over at Minty and Jools and Enron, the white cord of her iPod dangling from her hand, and I could see her brain starting to grasp the fact that something was wrong, but struggling with what that could mean. She plunged her iPod into the side pocket of her school dress and zipped the pocket up, an instinctive reaction. I could feel myself getting teary again.

  They say you can take the measure of a man by how he deals with stress. Well, here was my measure: I was a basket case. I couldn’t stop crying. It wasn’t my problem anymore. Coco was going to have to deal with it. It wasn’t fair that just because I was two years older I was supposed to take control. Didn’t mean I was two years better at coping with stuff. In fact, being older made it worse, because I felt more pressure. If something happened, I was expected to deal with it.

  I wasn’t up to it.

  ‘Dodie,’ Coco said, dragging my hands away from my face to look me square in the eye. ‘Have you called Mum and Dad? Have you tried to ring?’

  ‘There’s something down there,’ I said, and nodded towards the trapdoor. ‘Once we’ve got rid of it, we’re calling the police.’

  Coco didn’t say anything. It was as if she didn’t trust her mouth to come up with any kind of response.

  ‘They were looking after something,’ Enron was saying, his voice s
oothing and deep. Calm. ‘Something for the church. I’ll get it. You don’t need to come down, and once I’m gone you can call the police.’

  I looked across at Coco to see how she was reacting. She was frowning at him, not saying a word.

  And then Enron knelt down and put the old key into the lock in our floor.

  He opened the trapdoor, lifting it to the side as if it was the cover of a gigantic hard-cover book. Where the title page should be was a ladder leading down into the darkness of the room below.

  Enron craned his head forwards, peering through the hole to see what was in there. And then he yanked his head back up as if someone had taken a swing at him.

  ‘What is it?’ I said.

  ‘I’ll go down,’ he said, putting his hand up to halt us stepping any further forwards. ‘You stay up here.’

  ‘Who died and left you in charge?’ Coco said. A taunt we often made if one or other of us was getting extra-bossy, only this time it stung as the words came out of her mouth.

  Enron looked past Coco towards me, his eyes trying to express something urgent. He came over, taking me to one side by my elbow.

  Coco followed.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said to him, ex-cu-yoo-oos-me, five syllables in that three-syllable phrase, the sharpness of her tongue mirroring the narrowness of her eyes. ‘You can’t have private talks about this. Whatever you have to say to Dodie, you can say to me.’ She folded her arms and looked at him.

  I hadn’t noticed how giraffe-like she’d become. She was as tall as me now. Her legs were as long as mine. She had the same neck that people said I had. Her cheeks were chiselled, her arms were lanky. Her boobs were bigger than mine, which was pretty annoying.

  Enron looked down at his shoes and frowned, then started speaking without looking at either of us.

  ‘There’s a coffin down there,’ he said, and he pressed his lips together, reluctant to push the words out. ‘And I don’t know if it’s your parents’ or not.’

  And that’s the moment Coco folded. Her features slid down her face as if they’d been velcroed onto ice and couldn’t get any traction. Her brow plunged to where her eyes should be. Her mouth slipped right down her face to somewhere just above her jawline, and her chin was nowhere to be seen.