Free-Falling Read online

  About the book

  The Fiancée Belinda’s life is in free-fall after the sudden death of her fiancé, Andy. But then ghostly signs begin to appear that suggest he might not really be gone. And Belinda tumbles even further – until she finds his final parting gift. But will it be enough to save her?

  The Mother Evelyn McGavin, Andy’s mum, is also struggling in her bereavement. She copes by shoplifting (once), hating Belinda (constantly) and jumping out of a plane. In her skydiving instructor, Baz, she finds an unexpected friend. But why is he so agitated when he hears how Andy died?

  Two women, united in their loss, separated by their sorrow. And yet still linked in a most unexpected way …

  Free-Falling is a beguiling tragic-romantic comedy of heartbreak and heroism, grief and ghostly dreams …

  Contents

  Part One The First Day

  Chapter 1 Belinda

  Chapter 2 Evelyn

  Part Two Falling

  Chapter 3 Belinda

  Chapter 4 Evelyn

  Chapter 5 Belinda

  Chapter 6 Evelyn

  Chapter 7 Belinda

  Chapter 8 Evelyn

  Chapter 9 Belinda

  Chapter 10 Evelyn

  Chapter 11 Belinda

  Chapter 12 Evelyn

  Chapter 13 Andy

  Part Three The Last Day

  Chapter 14 Belinda

  Part Four Falling Faster

  Chapter 15 Evelyn

  Chapter 16 Bazza

  Part Five The First Day – Again

  Chapter 17 Belinda

  Part Six Finding Solid Ground

  Chapter 18 Evelyn

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  More at Random House Australia

  For Steve

  (of course)

  Prologue

  The sharp beeping of the text message rudely invaded his dreamless sleep. He rolled over and opened his eyes groggily. He blinked until everything was in focus and looked first at his bedside clock.

  3 am. Who the hell was texting him at bloody 3 am? And, more importantly, since when was his phone set to beep that fricken loudly?

  He rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand and reached out for his mobile. The text was from a number he didn’t recognise, and simply said:

  ‘I’m not late for a damn thing,’ he mumbled irritably at his slick-looking Nokia. He was in the middle of switching the phone off so it didn’t wake him again when he heard the noise.

  He was suddenly much more awake.

  Part One

  The First Day

  Chapter 1

  Belinda

  The day after her fiancé died, Belinda drove to the RSPCA and picked out a puppy. She left the radio off and the windows up so that there was a hollow kind of quiet, a quiet that seemed to suck the air out of her chest. She kept thinking she needed her puffer then realising she hadn’t had an asthma attack since she was twelve years old. She didn’t even have a puffer anymore.

  Blossoming trees lined the quiet suburban streets, making the world just that bit too colourful. Garish even. ‘You’re too early,’ she scolded them. ‘Don’t you know spring’s barely begun?’ The trees swayed smugly in the breeze.

  When she brought the puppy home to her apartment, she found herself wondering where to keep it. She had chosen a cattle cross collie. It would need a big backyard with room to run around. ‘What the hell am I doing?’ she muttered irritably. Never mind, figure things out later. For now she just wanted to sit on the couch and hold the puppy on her lap.

  The puppy was one of those scruffy-looking mixed breeds that you might see in a Disney film about an adorable stray that charms its way off the streets and into the loving arms of some rich, lonely aristocrat. In reality, the rich guy would probably phone the council and demand that the flea-ridden mutt be removed from his grounds before it spread disease to his purebred Pekingese.

  The dog looked up at her with trusting eyes. It made her feel sick, the pure responsibility of it all. She put the puppy on the floor and walked carefully, purposefully to the bathroom. She knelt in front of the toilet and waited to be sick. She waited and stared and nothing happened. She put her fingers down her throat, choked and took them back out again. She never could make herself throw up. She’d had one half-hearted go at bulimia in Year Ten but, upon the discovery that it was actually really hard to make yourself vomit, she gave up and decided, quite sensibly, to accept her body for what it was – not that bad really.

  She got back up from the bathroom floor and walked out into the living room. The puppy ran to greet her. It nipped playfully at her ankles and drew blood. ‘Ouch,’ she murmured. She sat down on the floor and pulled her ankle up to rest on her knee so she could examine the bite. She watched the blood as it pooled just above the knobbly bit of her ankle bone. She pressed gently on the skin around it, pushing more out, waiting intently for the moment when it would spill over the smooth lump of her bone and drip to the floor. She pressed harder and harder, but the cut wasn’t deep and the blood was seeping out agonisingly slowly. Finally, when enough had gathered, a single drop slid over the hump, down to her heel where it hung – a crimson tear. And then it fell, instantly staining the cream carpet. The spell was broken; the world came rushing back to her.

  Andy is dead.

  Ssshh, don’t think about that just now.

  But I really should call someone. Mum, Stacey, someone . . .

  Ssshh . . .

  She looked up to see the puppy scratching desperately at the screen door that led out onto the balcony. She lifted it into her arms and walked out of her apartment and along the hall, into the lift. The recorded elevator voice kept them company on the way down: ‘Emergency phone line disconnected. Contact phone company immediately. Emergency phone line disconnected . . .’ That warning had been playing since they’d moved into the apartment block over two years ago.

  When she stepped outside, the sunlight was bright and everything felt stark and white and burnt. She walked across the road to one of the older houses that would surely have a nice, big backyard and knocked on the door. A boy answered, maybe about fifteen. She smiled warmly and handed him the puppy. This was how you pulled yourself together. This was behaving sensibly.

  ‘Here you go,’ she whispered, and walked away quickly, without waiting for his reaction, not wanting to allow him the opportunity to refuse the unexpected gift.

  She wondered if that had been a bit too dramatic – just handing the dog over to a stranger like that. It would have worked if there had been a movie soundtrack playing in the background. Maybe a stirring Coldplay song, causing emotion to well up in the viewer. ‘Oh!’ they would sob, ‘she’s lost her fiancé and now she has to give away her new dog!’ But this wasn’t a movie. This was her life.

  Andy is dead.

  She walked past her apartment block and up the street. If she concentrated on her steps, one foot in front of the other, she could keep that annoying voice at bay.

  She kept walking and walking, and smiled politely when she passed an older couple who were working in their front garden, husband kneeling on one knee, wiping his forehead and frowning as he tugged at something tough and prickly; wife sitting back on the grass, giant sun hat on her head, squinting through the afternoon light to smile back. Their dedication to their tiny little garden soothed her.

  Eventually she found hers
elf at Hunters Hill High School, in the middle of the oval. By now the sun was setting and an orange haze had descended upon the grounds. She wasn’t wearing her watch today, so she had no real comprehension of the exact time. When she had woken up this morning, she had taken it off to shower and made a conscious decision not to put it back on.

  She knelt in the middle of the oval and placed her hands in the grass, pressing down hard into the dirt. Harder. Her hand touched a sharp stone. Harder. The rock pushed into her skin, but didn’t cut her hand. Harder. But it wouldn’t cut her skin. Damn it. She lifted her hand and slammed it onto the stone. Over and over again. It didn’t cut her skin. Her hand hurt and she felt stupid and defeated. She allowed the voice to penetrate her mind.

  Andy is dead.

  She played with the words, sounded them out carefully. They almost lost their meaning, became just words – but a part of her knew that this wasn’t the case. They weren’t just words. They were an icy, cold truth that scraped at her skin.

  You’ll never get to touch him again. You’ll never get to hold his hand. You won’t get to kiss his warm, soft lips under that beautiful big oak tree in Elkington Park when the celebrant announces that it’s time to kiss the bride. You won’t get to have his children one day.

  ‘STOP IT!’ she screamed out shrilly. She fell forward onto her hands and knees as a massive wave rose up in her chest and she began to sob. She took great gusty breaths as she cried and cried. She felt hungry for more. She wheezed as she sucked in the air and then wailed her sobs back out. She dug her fingernails hard into the grass and the dirt and then sat back up and stamped her feet down. She thrashed her head about and allowed her throat to release a most unladylike, deep, primitive sort of bellow. She threw the biggest tantrum she had ever thrown in all of her life, right there in the middle of Andy’s old high school grounds.

  ‘How many kids do you want to have?’

  ‘Where did that come from?’

  ‘It’s just a question. I was just wondering, is all.’

  ‘I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it. How many do you want?’

  ‘I asked you first.’

  ‘Don’t be so immature. Anyway, what if I don’t even want kids?’

  ‘What? You don’t want kids?’

  ‘I didn’t say that. I didn’t say, “I definitely don’t want kids.” I just said, “What if I don’t?”’

  ‘But I always thought you did. I guess I always thought I’d be a dad one day. Don’t you want to be a mum?’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not. Why did you have to bring this up now? It doesn’t matter yet, does it? I mean, we’re, like, teenagers.’

  ‘You’re twenty-two. I’m twenty-four.’

  ‘Thanks. It was just a figure of speech.’

  ‘“We’re, like, teenagers” is not a figure of speech.’

  ‘Can we please just talk about this later?’

  She got up from the ground and had to spit grass out of her mouth. She brushed at her hair and found some leaves stuck in her short, barely there excuse for a ponytail. In fact, today had been the first day that her hair had grown long enough to gather it back into an elastic. The first time since he had cut it for her. Although, admittedly, it had taken her about ten minutes and a good fifteen or so clips just to hold it in place. But now the elastic was sliding slowly backwards, releasing her hair, strand by strand – and then it fell to the grass, allowing her hair to finally spring free, sticking out at all sorts of odd angles.

  I hate you.

  Who?

  I don’t know who. I just hate you.

  ‘Hey, babe, we should really be leaving. We’re going to be seriously late . . . Babe? Babe? Are you in there? . . . Fuck, look at your hair! What are you doing?’

  ‘Nothing, nothing; my hair wouldn’t work. I just wanted to make it work.’

  ‘But your beautiful hair. Why did you do that?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, I didn’t – I just. I had to do something . . . But now look at it.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll fix it for you.’

  ‘Do you really think you can?’

  ‘Yeah, of course I can. I can sort this out. Here, give me the scissors, I’ll fix it for you. I love you, okay?’

  She wasn’t crying anymore. Her eyes were dry and stinging. Her legs felt sweaty under her jeans. There didn’t seem to be anything else to do but head back home. She wasn’t really sure why she had come here to begin with. His old school. As she walked, she realised she wasn’t wearing anything on her feet. When did I take off my shoes? Maybe I didn’t put any on when I left the apartment? But the grass was cool against the soles of her feet and she headed towards home just concentrating on the feel of the soft grass between her toes.

  She kept her hands in her pockets and her eyes on the ground until she was almost home, and then she saw it. A small, dark shape on the side of the road, near the front of her apartment block. There was her puppy, curled up in the gutter. Splattered with blood. It must have been hit by a car or something.

  Inconsiderate little bastard, just let the poor dog out into the street on its own.

  It was easier to blame the teenager over the road than herself. Easier not to think about how ridiculous she’d been, knocking on some random person’s front door, handing over a puppy and just expecting them to take care of it.

  It’s always easier to blame someone else.

  Like him.

  She took off her shirt and wrapped it around the small body of the puppy, averting her eyes from the sticky, matted clumps of fur as she did. There was a twenty-four-hour medical centre around the corner from her apartment. She had no idea where there was a vet because she had never had a pet here in Sydney before. Back home on the farm was a different story, of course, but not here. She walked towards the medical centre with the puppy held against her chest and felt no guilt. She felt nothing at all.

  ‘I’m almost done.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘I just thought I’d tell you.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘That’s all really.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘So I’ll see you soon then.’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Okay . . . bye.’

  ‘Bye.’

  But she didn’t see him soon. She didn’t see him ever again. And their final phone call had been so mundane. So . . . nothing. Her voice, clipped and irritable – she was concentrating on other things, she didn’t know that that was going to be the last time they would speak, didn’t realise she should have been professing her undying love for him.

  She sat in a hard plastic chair and wondered, with genuine curiosity, how he could have lied to her like that. How could he have promised that they would see each other soon when they were never going to see each other again? Deep down, she knew she wasn’t playing fair.

  She noticed a couple about her age, staring at her. She looked down and realised that she was sitting under the bright, unforgiving lights of the medical centre waiting room with no shirt on, no shoes, just jeans and one of her old bras – one that had gone a pale shade of grey when she had washed her whites with her colours. She knew her short, dark hair would be jutting out all over the place as well.

  Her hands were covered in dirt, there was grass between her toes and there was puppy blood smeared on her bra. She lifted her arms to cross them over her chest but, changing her mind, let them drop either side of her, palms up. She stared back at the young couple until they looked away. She felt another set of eyes boring into her and turned to see the receptionist gazing quite unashamedly at her too, her mouth slightly open. A flash of sparkling red caught her attention and, looking up, she realised there were Christmas decorations on display already, just above the front desk. For Christ’s sake, it’s September people.

 
‘Merry Christmas, Bambino!’

  ‘Merry Christmas to you too.’

  ‘Look at the time. I suppose we should get up. You know, last few presents to wrap and what-not.’

  ‘Or we could stay in bed for just a tiny bit longer. What difference is fifteen minutes going to make if we’re already late?’

  ‘Ahh, I see, you want a few more minutes sleep, do you?’

  ‘Ha! No, that’s not exactly what I had in mind.’

  ‘All right, fine, but you’re on top.’

  ‘Lazy.’

  ‘No I’m not. I just know what works best for us, babe.’

  ‘Lazy.’

  ‘Shut up!’

  She got up from the plastic chair and walked out of the medical centre and back towards her apartment. She thought maybe the receptionist called out for her to wait, but she really couldn’t be sure.

  When she got to the door of her apartment block, she realised she didn’t have any keys. She walked around the back and looked up at her balcony. Just three floors up. Not so high. There were ridges in the bricks every four rows. There was also a huge tree growing right next to the building. Some of the higher branches stretched right across, the leaves caressing the railing invitingly. Still, she decided to start with the wall first.

  She couldn’t climb any higher than a couple of ridges. She kept trying but her feet kept sliding back down, her toes kept scraping against the bricks. Her fingers wouldn’t grip. She was definitely no rock climber. She scratched against the wall desperately, then banged her fists against it angrily.

  Where are you? I’m stuck and I need you. You’re supposed to be here for me.

  Let me in.

  ‘God, what a gorgeous night, babe, this has been so romantic! All right, what’s going on? All this effort? Totally not your style!’

  ‘I’ll have you know I’ve taken every one of my ex-girlfriends on romantic, moonlit picnics at the cliffs above Clontarf Beach. And look, over there is where I pushed each one off the edge when they started whingeing that –’