Nightmares of Caitlin Lockyer

Part 62

62

I stood at the garage door, wishing I didn't have to drive the car Caitlin hated so much. Maybe I should sell it and buy something so different this one will only be a distant, bad memory. I looked past it and my eyes fell on the dusty cover shrouding the car beside mine. Alanna's car, untouched since they took her. The car she'd never come home to drive again.

My feet moved of their own volition as I reached out automatically to take the cover off. I shook my head as I saw the car. I still didn't understand our parents' reasoning behind giving me the solid, dependable sedan while Alanna got the sporty convertible. She'd never had so much as a speeding fine driving this thing and there was no way she'd let me touch it.

I touched the smooth white contours of her car, wishing she was here to say, "Don't even think about it, Nathan," as she shook her keys at me. I wished I could ask her about Caitlin, and whether she thought I was as crazy as Chris did. Would Alanna have let me take her car, when mine scared Caitlin so much? Or would she have told me I was being stupid and to leave the poor girl alone?

I'd never know. Alanna wasn't coming back and her car would sit here, gathering dust, until we got rid of it. Unless I got rid of my car and kept hers…

I wiped my eyes, which were tearing up in the airborne dust from shifting the car cover. I could feel my throat choking up, too. The dust must have been pretty thick.

I found Alanna's keys and turned them in the ignition. I got nothing. It hadn't been driven in months, so a flat battery didn't come as a big surprise. I hunted around the garage for jumper leads to jumpstart her car from mine. We'd never needed them – they were still sealed in the packet. I ripped the plastic open with a pocket knife.

Hooking up the cables, I started my engine, before clipping the last clamp to Alanna's car battery. I slid into the driver's seat and shifted it back, so there was enough space for me, tossing the pocket knife into the glove box. This time, the ignition caught and as I revved the engine, I realised her little car had far more power than mine. Perfect Alanna, never a foot wrong, to the point where our parents had trusted her with a high-powered sports car when she'd turned twenty-one. God, I missed her. She'd have been able to tell me what to do.

I turned the Mercedes off and put the cables away. I climbed back into Alanna's car and headed for Caitlin's house.

Maybe half a kilometre from home, I decided to take the top off. I'd never driven a convertible before, much less a topless one, and it seemed like a really good idea right now. Maybe the air flow would help clear my head, or even just the dust from my eyes, which were still streaming.

Five minutes later, I could barely feel my hands in the freezing wind. When I stopped at the traffic lights, I looked around for something to wrap around me to keep warm. An old padded jacket, with a logo from an airline company that had long since gone out of business, was spread across the back seat and I struggled to put it on before the lights went green. I managed to zip it up before I took off. I wondered who'd left the jacket in Alanna's car, but I realised I'd never know. It smelled faintly of her perfume, so I knew she'd worn it in the past. Or cuddled up real close to someone who had. I laughed aloud at the thought of Alanna doing anything like that in this car. She'd have insisted on dinner, a movie or a show, before even considering suggesting he provide a luxurious bed, several dates later. The exact opposite of me.

I took the onramp to the freeway and cheered as the car responded perfectly to the accelerator. It was a heady contrast to the slow, steady speed increase of my sedan. I checked my mirrors before merging and realised my hair was standing on end, blown everywhere in the breeze that had frozen me to the bone. Caitlin would laugh herself silly – never a bad thing – if I turned up with a crest like a cockatoo, but I didn't want to take her out to dinner looking like a cocky. I spotted a cap on the floor by the passenger seat and stuck it on my head, praying it would flatten my hair or at least hide it.