Page 60 of The Vanishing Place
Idiot. Effie scoffed. Everyone knew that crayfish were actually dark green.
“I think we should sing ‘Happy Birthday’ first,” said Tia. “It’s Effie’s birthday. She’s twelve.”
Effie set a pile of plates on an upturned wooden box, and Asher looked at her for the first time.
“Happy birthday,” he said. “I hope you’re having a good day.”
“I don’t care what you hope.”
“If I keep my eye open really wide, like this, will it turn black?” asked Aiden.
“No.” Asher touched her brother’s knee. “It doesn’t really work like that.”
“Oh,” said Aiden, looking disappointed.
“Let’s sing,” said Tia.
Effie looked up at Dad, who stood in the corner, watching. He didn’t like Asher either, Effie could tell.
They sang “Happy Birthday,” Tia’s voice louder than everyone else’s, and ate cake. Then Effie did the dishes. Aiden asked if Asher could sleep on the sofa and Dad said no. Not a hope. Then Tia asked and Asher was allowed to pitch his tent behind the hut.
Tia tapped Effie’s arm as they were getting into bed, her skinny body buzzing with sugar and excitement, and she put her mouth right up to Effie’s ear.
“I think he’s beautiful,” she whispered, her words wetting Effie’s skin. “Like an elf with magic eyes.”
Effie swatted her sister away, then she rolled over.
“That’s gross.”
—
Asher’s stupid little tent was still there three weeks later.
Effie kicked a foot full of dirt against it whenever she walked to the compost toilet, but Asher never mentioned it, not even when he caught her in the act one time. He just held his arm out and offered her a peppermint Snifter like she was a stupid six-year-old. Effie had turned away, pretending not to notice. Aiden and Tia had probably finished the bag later, rotting their teeth. Not that Asher cared.
Dad barely spoke to Asher, and Asher was made to eat and sleep in his tent, but Dad let him stay. Asher was WWOOFing or some bullshit. Dad said that he needed help with the garden and fixing a few things around the hut. And in return, Asher got to eat their food.
It was stupid. Asher and his freaky black eye were stupid.
And it didn’t take a genius to work out that he was a lousy gardener. Stuff kept dying and being ruined by possums. Dad had never needed help before; Effie had always done everything. And she never let the vegetables die.
Asher was probably a spy for one of those child-protection government places. One of the parents in Koraha must have dobbed on Dad, said he was an unfit parent or some lie.
Like they knew shit.
2025
Effie held thedrawing in shaking fingers, the bush breathing around her.
The bush was never fully quiet—there was always the hum of insects and the tweet of birds—but Effie couldn’t hear anything beyond the fierce rush of her thoughts.
Dad was out there. Waiting. Watching. Shackled to the hut and the trees.
Effie steeled herself, then she looked at the drawing again, peering into the mind of a child. Seeing what Anya had seen.
She had drawn the inside of the hut. The sofa. The kitchen area. The curtain to the sleeping nook. On the floor, his chest bare and his eyes drawn as twoXs, was Four. The cross was carved into him with a red pencil, pressed so hard that it had gone through the paper, leaving a hole. Next to the depiction of Four, splayed out with her head resting in a puddle of blood and twoXs for eyes, was a body labeled “Mum.”
Tia.
