Chapter 2

They left the stuffy air indoors for the backyard garden in search of Mrs Reid.
She was a keen gardener. Her hands were often cut, grazed or dirty from work with her vegetables, roses and herbs. Sneaky dirt fingerprints often found their way onto her face, her neck and even the back of her knees. She enjoyed the open air, only entering her house to clean, sleep or eat when she wasn’t working. Today, however, she was no where in sight.

It was near silent. No rustling of leaves. No traffic from the street. No birds. No footsteps. No human voices. No breeze. Not even the noisy four year old that lived next door. It was if all they could hear was white noise. Only one sound. A buzzing in the background that they couldn’t place. It wasn’t coming from their house, the garden or the neighbour’s house. It was just there. A light buzzing noise that drilled into their ears.

The sky was now a bright grey and overcast, having been blue and cloudless when she was woken by Fingal. It was now over an hour later. The clouds made everything flat and eerie, adding a certain gloom to landscape despite the brightness of the clouds.

“Scott…” Rowan whispered and grabbed Scott’s wrist as she tried to swallow the dryness in her mouth. “Are you sure my mother didn’t say she was going somewhere?”
The air seemed hollow and empty. Flat. Dry. It didn’t feel right.
Scott was just as taken back by what he did and did not see and hear. He finally answered with, “No. She didn’t.”
Clasping tighter, she whispered, “Something’s not right.”

Just as the word’s left her mouth, a loud crash emitted from the second storey of the house. In a swift moment, Rowan let go of Scott and they both turned in the direction of the house. Rowan felt like she had nearly jumped a foot in the air and she gulped, again and again, as if swallowing would get her rapidly beating heart out of her throat and back in place.

Her wide eyes stung as a sudden gust of wind ran past, forcing her to close them. The wind filled her ears and all she could hear was the sound of her own heart and the bellowing of the air. A hand, Scott’s, grabbed hers and before she could see through her watering eyes, her feet were struggling to keep up with him as he dragged her along behind him.

There was another loud bang. She blinked hard. When she opened her eyes again, the back door to the house had been opened by Scott. He ran towards the stairs with her struggling to keep up and maintain balance.

Inside, she cringed. Her eyes strained to adjust to the house's comparative darkness. She doubted they could make it up these stairs in such a rush. They were sure to fall either forward to carpet-burn their bare skin or to fall back and tumble down. The one arm she had for balance was tucked beside her for whatever protection it might provide should she fall. The other was stretched to its limit; the wrist stringing from having the skin stretched and pulled. A weak “Scott” escaped from her throat but his mind was too focused to hear her.

Unscathed, they reached their destination: Rowan’s room. Scott immediately let go of her wrist. She cradled her sore wrist in her other hand as she fell to her knees panting.

Before her, Scott ran to the window but with her eyes to the floor Rowan did not see why. What was going on? Sounds out of nowhere? Her mother missing? Some birthday this was turning out to be.

“Row,” Scott finally said, quietly as he if was stirring her gently out of sleep. “I think you should look…”
Before he finished, her head raised and as she understood what she saw, her jaw dropped.

The top right drawer from her chest of drawers was on the floor. At each joint, it had splintered and the sides had fallen to the ground just like the pieces of wood they had been before. All the snowglobes were on their sides. Some still rolling from the collision to the ground but none of them were broken. Still on her knees she scuttled across the floor to it. Slowly and carefully, still in shock, she placed each upright and once she had, breathed in a gasp. There were only fourteen.

She felt Scott rest his hand on her shoulder. He knew how much they meant to her. Now, one of them was gone and she didn’t know why or where. Who on earth would steal such a thing?
“The window,” he answered to her thoughts and, from her position on the floor, she peered up at him curiously. His head nodded towards the window.

The frame had been lifted and the window was open. The curtains were lopsided and the right hung lower than the left, as if someone had pulled on it enough to break it from the curtain rod in places.
“What?” Rowan didn’t understand. Someone had been her room. Someone had broken the drawer and taken a snowglobe. That she knew for certain but she was still confused.

“I think,” Scott began to say, sounding like he didn’t believe what he had seen, “I saw someone.”
Rowan stood before him, trying to make eye contact but he refused to look at her. He was speechless. Just as she didn’t understand what had happened, he didn’t understand what he had seen out of the window.
“What did she look like?”
Surprised, he looked straight at her, his mouth slightly ajar. He didn’t answer.
“White hair? A lot of white really, like she was a ghost… or an angel?”
Looking at his own shoes, he nodded. “How..?”
Rowan nodded knowingly. “She was in my room earlier.”
“Sorry I didn’t believe – ” he blurted.
“It’s okay. Where was she?”
“Down the street. I could barely make her out but she was that bright…”
“You couldn’t miss her.”

9:45am

With the door of number 14 locked securely behind him, Scott began walking down Kynastan Road. As he walked, the sound that had previously been absent rushed back into being as a Ford Falcon roared past. Number 12's jack russell ran to the crosswire fence and barked at Scott. It's little body jumped and shook in its territorial determination.

Scott had devised a plan. He would visit the neighbours and knock on their doors, hope they would answer and should they answer, he would ask if they had seen her. He knew that the people of this area weren't the most observant neighbours but it was worth trying. Should it be futile, he would quickly weave his way through the town looking for her. First, the houses of her friends, then her regular haunts and finally the bushland only a street away from her house. It wasn't likely to be a productive one but he hoped that it would be the quickest way to find Mrs Reid.

She didn't have her mobile phone on her nor did she drive away. She had sold the car two years ago following the industrial accident that made her incapable of working. Once she had received compensation, she had remained at home and due to her permanent limp in her right leg, only walked as far as Doreen's house a block away. Scott hoped this meant she hadn't gotten far and that she wasn't hurt.

He walked up the neighbour's driveway to their door whilst the eager dog continued yapping at him. The door was answered by a portly old man. His grey hair a wispy wreath around the shiny and smooth centre.





-under construction-


Ambrose Avenue
Merten Street
Sawney Road

8:59pm

Rowan sat in the corner of her room with her knees up to her chin. Her hands clasped at each other tightly around her legs. Every so often she moved slightly as a shiver passed through her. She hadn’t spoken for hours.
Occasionally, she would stand to peer out the window, hoping to see the familiar red head approaching the house but now it was too dark to recognise anyone outside, even with the faint glow of the streetlights.

“Fin?” She said quietly. Rowan’s eyes lifted slightly from her hands but did not look at Scott, who sat on her bed watching her.
“Yes?” He sounded tired.
Rowan licked her dry lips and said with a raspy voice, “Do you think she’s okay?”

Fingal considered the possible answers: the truth or what Rowan wanted to hear. Which would be the better choice? She had barely moved and she hadn’t eaten since her mother disappeared. Whilst he had searched the nearby streets and asked the neighbours, she had sat there, staring at her snow globe collection. Her expression hadn’t changed. There was still worry and cautious hope in her eyes.

He gulped, trying to clear his throat from the dry feeling that was clawing at it. He changed the subject. “Are you hungry?”
In the years they had known each other he had never seen her so quiet. She was not the type to back down and do nothing. Her fingers twitched in a mixture of anger and despair. There was nothing she could do but wait, and that scared her.

“Why don’t we go search for her again?” He asked uncertainly, “Both of us this time. I could go get a torch…” He trailed off as thumbed in the direction of the door and realised Rowan was again looking at her feet.
She sighed. “Sorry, I just don’t know where else there is to look. I feel like something’s happened.”
“She might have forgotten to leave a note.” He had to admit it was getting harder for him to act positive.
“She never forgets anything like that. After Dad… she’s been sure to let me know if she’s going anywhere.”

Scott cleared his throat, stood up and walked up to her. Without another word, he grabbed her by her forearms and with a heave, dragged her to her feet. He gave a hard, fierce glance into her eyes whilst she protested and tried to pull away before he pulled her by the wrist out of her bedroom door. “You’re coming if you like it or not.”

Down the steps, foot over foot and leaning forward to increase the pace. Past the orange trees and white railing, under the glowing lights of the hallway, they stepped, finally, on the mat at the front door and took in a breath. Fingal, with his hand still firmly across her wrist, dragged Rowan beside him and looked at her. She was squinting as the bright light of the streetlight outside illuminated her face through the stain-glass windows in the door.
“So, are you ready?” he asked with his hand posed on the doorknob.
Rowan nodded and stared intensely at the door as he opened it.

What they found on the other side startled them both. A woman with half closed eyes, frazzled red hair, flecked with lines of white and grey, around hunched shoulders, draped in pale grey clothes and a faint glow of green. She suddenly collapsed onto them both.
“What? Wait – ” Rowan blurted. “Mum?!”

Together they caught her and heaved her up from her knees with all the strength they could muster to look at her face.
“So it is you.” Fingal remarked. Mrs Reid’s eyes opened briefly. Once again, there was a faint green glow. It was coming from beneath her blouse.