23
He edged closer to her, taunting and spiteful, spit tearing from his lips with each weaponised word. The colour drained from Francesca’s face, a sickly green beginning to settle across her cheeks as she swallowed through each sentence he sliced her with.
“You’re rancid, Cole,” she said, voice stern. “And if you ever touch me or Rabbit again, I swear I will tell my father. My father who will ready his bow in a heartbeat and chase you through these very woods until he finds his target in your beating heart.”
A smile crept across his lips as he regarded her, something sinister within his eyes. He gripped her face, thumb pressing into the sharp bone of her jaw as she squeaked beneath his touch.
“I do love it when you threaten me,” he said, pressing his mouth to her cheek, running his tongue across her sweat glistening skin. “Let’s see who’s the bigger threat.”
He pushed her away, her body slamming into the timber clad wall, a groan escaping her. She looked so fragile as he slunk from the cabin, rabbit mask gripped in his shaking fist.
She turned to the window, eyes cast to the midnight sky, chest heaving as she collected her dignity. And for a moment, I forgot myself, leaning into the window to see her more clearly. In a flash, our eyes met, before I ran from the forest with shame festering beneath my skin.
The excitement was like a blister ready to rupture inside me, pulsating beneath my ribs as I collected my sacred belongings.
I was ready to move on, to start a new life with my restraints shed and a glistening future laid out ahead of me.
With Francesca, hope swelling in my chest about what our new life might mean.
The evening smelled so sharply of fresh rain, the swaying eucalypts filling the air with scents of winter and hope.
I had become the Rabbit again, my courage woven into the fibers of that mask.
It bolstered me with determination as I slid through the woods that night.
The ribbon itched my neck, rubbing rough edges against my skin as it shifted with each of my rushed footsteps, the belly of the forest dragging me forth as my heart raced and fingertips tingled.
There was an insistent chill in the air, and before I left the safety of my childhood home, I had hesitantly donned the coat I had stolen from Cole that last time in the forest.
The fibers still scratched my skin in warning, though tonight, I wasn’t sure of what.
So, I pulled the hood up, tucking it behind the rabbit ears as I continued through the dense trees, eyes searching for signs of Francesca.
I was a mere child when I had crafted the first rabbit, and when I attempted to replace it with hasty fingers, I had made the fit of it much too small.
It dug rough paper edges into my skin. The eye holes jagged and uneven, the curve of the nose pressing against my airway.
A shadow cast across the edges of my vision, making it near impossible to see in the deep night.
As our hideout came into view, my heart hammering with excitement, I stopped. My ears rang as I witnessed something I couldn’t have prepared for, a sight so surprising I had to press my hand to my chest to remind myself to breathe.
Through the small eye holes of the mask, I could see Francesca pressed against a tree, a smile dancing on her lips as she laughed. Not ready to leave this place, with me as we had planned. As she had promised.
Instead, another mouth was against hers, hands trailing her arms, her thighs, her throat. She tilted her head with an open mouth, her breath ragged in pleasure, knee bent as fingers roamed beneath her black skirt.
As I stepped closer, a fallen twig snapped beneath my toes – a sharp sound that scythed through the hush of the bushland. Francesca’s eyes sprung open, dead on me as time suspended.
She pushed her lover away, a smirk ghosting her lips, whispering into the shadowed frame before they slipped into the darkness and Francesca stepped forward. The sight of her straightening her shirt and smoothing her dark hair made my mouth sour, both anger and jealousy making my fingertips throb.
“Cole?” Francesca whispered, her voice carrying through the trees with distilled contempt.
I tipped my head, confused and taken aback as I tried to make the pieces fit together.
I stepped forward, words clinging to the walls of my throat as I tried to calm my racing heart. I steadied, my body shaking within the shelter of the shadowed trees as Francesca studied me with stern brows.
“You shouldn’t be here Cole. Go home,” she said, louder now. Fierce and unyielding.
I stepped forward again, mind spinning in circles, feet slipping in the damp earth. Francesca stepped back, eyes wide as I closed the distance, fear stitched across her face.
“Stop, don’t come near me. We’re done Cole, go home!” There was anger there, as she spoke to me not as Rabbit, but as a lover scorned.
I drew a breath to reply, to remedy her fear with assurances of who I was. But as words reached my tongue, a thread slipped across my throat, dragging me backwards as my breath caught in my chest.
Earth filled my senses, stars bursting across my vision as panic wove through me.
And as my body crumpled to the floor, I bore witness to something that not only altered life as I knew it, but broke my heart as I struggled for breath.
"Ma’am?” The kind-faced officer sits on our plastic-covered couch, Christmas lights once again reflecting off her saddened eyes. “We have some news.”
Mother ushers her to sit down on the fraying couch, fussing over offerings of tea and biscuits. The officer refuses, urging mother to sit in the chair adjacent to her, a sternness to her voice.
Isabel’s shadow darkens the doorway again as she hovers beyond sight, intently listening.
I lower myself to the coffee table, my body so cold it has begun to ache, an empty worry swirling through my chest.
“F—the body we discovered, in the woods…” the officer begins, her voice wavering.
“Frannie?” I ask, unsure what else could be uncovered.
“Francesca,” Mother confirms, brow bone creasing.
The officer draws a deep breath, closing her eyes as she readies herself.
“Well, about that…”
“Get that mask off him!” Francesca screamed through tears, her voice breaking.
It was as though I were separate from my body – my eyes seeing but mind not understanding. Above me, trees loomed with harrowing stillness. The night slowed, sounds dulled as though id slipped beneath water.
Somewhere on my body, an ache grew. Something scraped against my cheeks, my eyes heavy as I attempted to blink through the sudden gravity.
“Oh my god,” Francesca whispered, fingers pressed to the aching skin of my throat. “What did you do?”
An ominous presence loomed over me as I tried to realign myself with reality. Everything was so heavy – my eyes unable to open, my limbs magnetised to the forest floor.
“I–” the small voice said, so familiar my heart splintered.
Beyond us, wind whistled through the branches carrying a haunting lullaby, a tune that shot through my chest as I rasped for air that wouldn’t come.
“Heather?” it whispered, mousy and afraid.
“Stay there!” Francesca cried suddenly, leaves rustling as she shifted beside me.
“Why?” the voice choked, making a tear slip from my own lashes.
The ground was ice beneath me that night, my bones aching for warmth. It was as though the earth had ceased providing sustenance for me – no heat, no air.
“You killed her,” Francesca whispered solemnly, pressing a hand to my chest.
But I wasn’t dead, was I?
You will be. The forest whispered, warning me of what was to come.
“I didn’t know,” the small voice creaked from somewhere distant. The trees groaned as a sudden breeze rushed through the trunks, carrying the warning of a storm. “I thought it was Cole. She’s wearing Cole’s jacket. You SAID it was Cole!”
Panic gripped my chest as I tried to find air.
Be at peace, sister. The forest cooed, coaxing me into its arms. But I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. I had so much left to see, so much left to do.
“I know. Fuck, I know.” Francesca’s voice turned frayed, the edges of her words biting.
“Okay, go home,” she said after a moment, moving her hand from my chest as she stood wearily. The earth shuddered beneath me again, readying to open and claim me to the forest. “I’ll sort this out. Don’t tell anybody. Not a word.”
The sound of a guttural sob scraped through my ears. It burrowed into my brain, weaving its way right to the tips of my toes as I laid motionless in the weeds.
“But–”
I tried to move, to resist the forests embrace. But I couldn’t, I was frozen, still as if already dead.
“I have a plan, just trust me, okay? Meet me at our secret place at first light, I’ll explain.”
Francesca’s voice softened to something hauntingly familiar – that tone she so often used to lull me into security when I was fearful and anxious. The voice, I thought, she used only for me.
“Francesca–” the small voice squeaked, uncertainty softening the edges of her words.
But Francesca groaned, interrupting her with finality as she shouted –
“ISABEL – GO, NOW!”
Truth is a dangerous thing.
A predator with teeth and talons that seek out its prey with unrelenting patience. No matter how fast or far you run, it stalks the shadows waiting for its moment to strike.
The memories crash into me all at once – an overwhelming, gut-wrenching understanding. All the pieces I had lost, now fitting back together as I realise what it all means.
Death kissing my lips, sucking me dry.
I’m dead. It was me they found, murdered, abandoned in the forest to rot away into nothing. And while I am here, feet planted to the earth as I watch mother wail into trembling hands, I am also not. I am invisible, boundless, nothing.
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