Controlled Hysteria

“It’s one thing to lose your mind quietly. It’s quite another to do it while holding a manifest, sniffing condoms, and standing next to a corpse.”

"I think that's all of them," Luke announced, leaping down from the truck with a finality that I welcomed like a long-overdue exhale.

I exhaled in turn, a deep sigh escaping my lips. Finally. The ordeal—at least this part of it—was over. No more boxes, no more trucks, and no more proximity to a bloodied corpse. My legs, heavy with exhaustion, carried me swiftly toward the open front door of the house. All I could think of was the safety and comparative sanity of the indoors. I needed distance—physical and emotional—from everything that had transpired in that driveway.

But Luke, of course, wasn’t finished.

He veered away from the house and walked around to the side of the truck with purpose. Beatrix, ever the curious one, followed him. The passenger side door groaned open with a mechanical screech that made my stomach lurch again.

"What are you looking for?" she asked, leaning into the truck. Her voice was casual, but I detected a note of tension, as though she was preparing herself for another unpleasant discovery.

I paused mid-step, one foot still hovering over the threshold. My body had almost made it to safety, but my mind refused to let me walk away without knowing. Curiosity clawed at me like a restless animal. My heart thudded in anticipation.

"Oh," Beatrix uttered—quiet, clipped, and far too ambiguous.

"Oh?" I repeated, softer this time, dread curling around the edges of the word. It floated out of me like mist, unanswered, hanging in the thickening air between us.

Then it hit me. A twisting knot of pain clenched in my abdomen, sharp and sudden. I doubled over with a gasp, pressing a hand to my stomach as though I could physically force the discomfort away. A wave of bile surged up my throat, a sickening reminder of the images I had tried so hard to suppress. The blood. The body. Brody. Joel. All of it.

Faltering away from the door, I leaned toward the large red flax plant beside the steps, its spiky leaves swaying slightly in the breeze. I grabbed a slender blade, yanking it towards my face and breathing in deeply, desperate to ground myself in something ordinary.

Nothing.

I frowned and tried again—still no scent.

A flicker of panic stirred. Had I lost my sense of smell? Was it shock? Nerves? Had the wine finally dulled more than my thoughts?

Frustrated, I yanked another leaf and inhaled sharply. Still nothing. No sweet green bitterness, no earthy reassurance. Just silence where smell should have been.

Brilliant, I thought grimly. Just what I need—losing another bloody sense to go with my bloody mind.

I turned my attention back to Luke and Beatrix, who were still peering into the cab, deep in some hushed conversation. Their body language was tense, angled in toward each other with guarded focus. I wasn’t sure if they’d even noticed my near-collapse.

Steeling myself with a deep breath—more for show than effect—I whispered, “Pull yourself together, Gladys,” the words rasping from my lips like an old prayer.

I stepped closer, catching just the tail end of Luke's words, his voice sharp with frustration. "But we need that manifest."

The phrase caught me off guard. Manifest? What now?

Driven by a mixture of confusion and the desperate need to feel relevant in this spiralling mess, I shoved my head into the cab space beside Beatrix, resting it awkwardly against her thigh. “What for?” I asked, genuinely perplexed.

Without a word, Beatrix tried to push me away, her hand firm against my forehead. But I held my position, planting my feet, refusing to be brushed aside yet again. I had every right to understand what I was involved in.

Luke’s eyes met mine briefly, and I saw a flicker of calculation pass through his gaze. He wasn’t just covering tracks—he was weighing risk against necessity, and we were all dangerously close to tipping the scale.

"The company are going to report the driver and truck as missing," he said, lowering his voice, though it carried an urgency that demanded attention. "There's nothing we can do about that, but we can at least make it look like he went missing after he finished his deliveries. The Police shouldn't have any reason to suspect us then."

The logic clicked into place with brutal clarity. “Oh,” I breathed, the realisation dawning. “I see. Good call.”

It was, in a way. Deceptive, yes—but clever. Ruthless. Necessary.

Luke gave a half-hearted shrug, the kind that seemed to say, This wasn’t my plan either, but here we are. He climbed out of the cab without waiting for further comment.

Left alone in the space, I glanced around idly—until something caught my eye.

“Ooh, condoms,” I said, plucking a small foil packet from the console. I brought it to my nose and inhaled instinctively.

Latex. Sharp, synthetic, unmistakable.

I smiled, weirdly relieved. Well, that answers that. My sense of smell hadn’t abandoned me after all—it had just gone selectively mute in the face of nature.

Before I could even process the odd comfort of this discovery, Beatrix let out a loud, exasperated sigh and shoved me hard. I stumbled backward out of the cab, my feet scrambling to find stable ground.

"Alright, alright!" I snapped, straightening myself and brushing off my jeans. My head was spinning again—but this time, from the sheer absurdity of it all.

A body in the truck. A Portal in the lounge room. And now condoms on the dashboard.

What the hell had my life become?

"Beatrix," Luke’s voice rang out from the back of the truck, edged with urgency.

I stiffened, a jolt of apprehension straightening my spine. What now? Why was Luke at the back of the truck again? A cold prickle crept across my skin, and dread coiled in my gut like a tightening spring.

"Yeah," Beatrix responded, her footsteps thumping lightly on the concrete as she made her way to him.

"I need you to help me roll him," I heard Luke say, his tone low, serious.

"Oh!" The sound escaped me in a gasp, my hand flying to my mouth. The manifest. He must think the driver has the manifest on him. My chest constricted around my pounding heart, the weight of that realisation pressing down on me like a lead blanket.

My wine glass trembled in my grasp, the deep red liquid inside rippling with the same unease that coursed through my veins. A single tear spilled from my eye, tracing a line down my cheek. We're going to get caught, I thought, the fear screaming silently through my mind like a siren.

Their voices, muffled but urgent, filtered back from the truck. I couldn’t make out the words, only the rising tension in them. Everything felt warped and distorted, like I was watching from underwater.

And then, through the haze, something sharp and grounding cut through. Snowflake. Chloe. They needed me. They were waiting for me at home, curling themselves up on my bed like nothing was wrong. I couldn’t let this spiral end with Beatrix and me behind bars. I won’t let her get us caught. Not now.

"Beatrix," I called out, my voice breaking as I wiped at my tear-streaked face. I edged around the side of the truck, peering cautiously toward the back.

Luke and Beatrix both jumped, startled by my sudden appearance.

"What?" Beatrix snapped, her tone cold and clipped.

"Help him. I don't want to go to jail," I sobbed, my words tumbling out raw and frantic.

She rolled her eyes dramatically, clearly irritated, but gave a small nod. "Fine," she muttered, as if the word cost her something. Pressing her hand against her mouth, she climbed into the truck with grim determination, crouching beside Luke with visible reluctance.

I stood just outside, rooted to the spot. A thick, suffocating numbness settled over me, wrapping around my limbs like a fog. I felt like I was watching someone else’s nightmare—one I couldn't wake from, no matter how hard I tried.

"You ready?" Luke’s voice broke the tension like a needle popping a balloon.

Beatrix shook her head, eyes wide with dread.

"On three, I need you to grab onto his waist and pull him towards us," Luke instructed, his voice heavy with necessity.

Again, Beatrix shook her head, violently this time, recoiling from the grim reality of the task.

Luke tried to reassure her, though his own composure was fraying. "It just needs to be a few seconds. Just long enough for me to feel inside his pocket."

I stood there, arms folded tightly across my chest, tears blurring the edges of my vision as I fought to remain composed. But the smell—blood and cold metal and something sickly sweet—was starting to claw at my throat again.

"One, two, three, roll!" Luke called out.

With an expression twisted in revulsion, Beatrix gritted her teeth and reached for Joel’s waist. The body shifted, rolling with a grotesque squelch, the sound so visceral that it hit me like a slap across the face.

"Aargh!" Beatrix cried, recoiling. She lost her grip, stumbling backward in panic. Her bloodied hands clung to the denim as if they were glued to it, dragging the body awkwardly along with her.

Time collapsed into slow motion. My breath caught, my skin broke out in gooseflesh. I couldn’t move.

"Shit, Beatrix!" Luke shouted, as he too lost his balance and fell back with a grunt.

The horror unfolding before me was too much. My hand spasmed, the wine glass slipped from my grasp, and it exploded on the concrete at my feet in a sharp, violent shatter. Red droplets splattered across the pavement like a second crime scene.

"Get it off me!" I screamed, the terror finally breaching the surface, raw and unfiltered. My hands clawed at my face, fingernails scraping across my skin as I imagined blood, warm and slick, sliding over my cheek.

"Gladys! Shut up!" Beatrix hissed, her voice sharp with panic.

"Get it off! Get it off!" I shrieked, my body jerking in frenzied spasms as I tried to rid myself of the imagined stain. My mind couldn’t distinguish between memory and reality anymore—it was all bleeding together.

Beatrix stepped toward me, face pale, her sleeve already soaked in red. With a quick, firm swipe, she wiped my cheek.

"It's all gone," she said gently, trying to restore some measure of calm to my spiralling state. "It’s all gone."

I panted hard, my chest heaving as I leaned against the edge of the truck, staring down at the blood-slicked floor. The metallic tang hung in the air like a curse. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. The red. So much red.

Luke moved again, his face grim. His hands, trembling but resolute, reached across Joel’s unmoving form. I watched, unable to look away, as he slipped his fingers into the back pocket of the jeans.

The silence was deafening.

Then, finally, he pulled out a single piece of paper. His movements were swift, clinical. He unfolded it, eyes scanning rapidly.

My breath caught in my throat.

The manifest.

And just like that, we were further down the rabbit hole.

"Is that it?" Beatrix’s voice cut through the thick fog of tension, brittle with hope. Her words seemed to float in the stale air like a question we all desperately needed answered.

"Yeah. We got it," Luke confirmed with a weary exhale, his relief palpable. For a moment, it felt like the world paused—like we could finally breathe again.

"Thank God," Beatrix said, her shoulders visibly dropping as if she’d been holding them tense for hours. Perhaps she had. The manifest—so ordinary-looking in Luke’s hands, yet holding the power to shift the narrative, to tilt the scale away from suspicion and towards survival.

Luke folded it carefully before handing it to Beatrix, as though it were a sacred object, something too important to risk creasing.

"Gladys, get your ass into the truck!" Beatrix snapped, breaking my reverie with the blunt force of her command. She jumped down with a thud, the manifest fluttering slightly in her hand like a nervous bird.

"But… but… the glass," I stammered, my eyes darting to the shards sparkling on the concrete like malevolent confetti. The absurdity of my concern didn’t escape me—of all things, I was worried about broken glass?

"Forget about the glass," Luke said sharply, not unkindly, but with a briskness born of urgency. "I'll clean it up."

"Come on, Gladys. We have to go," Beatrix insisted, her hand finding my arm. Her grip was firm, her tone laced with determination. But I could feel the tremble in her fingers—she was just as shaken as I was.

My legs felt like they no longer belonged to me. They were gelatinous, unreliable things. I could crumble at any second. But then my thoughts turned to Snowflake and Chloe, waiting for me at home with their wide eyes and twitching tails. If I were locked away, who would care for them? They can't visit you in prison, I reminded myself grimly. That absurd but grounding thought was enough to make me move.

"Come on," Beatrix urged again, bumping her shoulder against mine. She was trying to propel me forward, but it only made me dig my heels in—figuratively, at least.

Then, suddenly, something inside me snapped into place. I reached out, snatching the manifest from her grasp. "I'll hold it," I said, the need to have control over something pulsing through me like electricity.

"Ahh! Gladys!" Beatrix hissed, startled. She side-stepped quickly, dodging the nudge I gave her in return. We looked ridiculous—sisters squabbling over scraps of power while a corpse lay cooling in the back of a truck.

Holding the manifest brought me no peace, only a momentary illusion of command. Its weight in my hands was nothing, but its implications were everything.

"Wait!" Luke’s voice rang out, urgent. He sounded winded, strained. My heart sank. Of course it wasn’t over. Why would it be?

"What now?" I snapped, waving the manifest like a white flag I wasn’t ready to surrender. My other hand crept to my cheek, brushing the ghost of the blood that had stained it earlier. The memory of it still clung to my skin like a second layer.

"We need to move the body," Luke said, the words landing like a thunderclap.

"Hell no!" I recoiled, my voice a shriek of disbelief. The mere thought of touching that poor, lifeless form again sent a shiver so violent down my spine that I swayed where I stood.

"I can't move it by myself," Luke pleaded, his tone softer now, the desperation creeping in.

"Gladys," Beatrix turned to me, her voice eerily calm. Too calm. The kind of calm people muster when they're halfway to madness. "We're already involved now. We may as well keep going." She turned to Luke. "Are you going to take him through the Portal then?"

Luke shook his head, slowly.

"Why the hell not?" My words came out ragged and sharp, laced with fear and fury. Every part of me was beginning to fray.

Beatrix looked to Luke, her brows narrowing. “Then what?”

Luke’s gulp was loud enough to hear, a single dry swallow that carried with it the weight of his anxiety. "Jamie isn't ready for the news yet. We can keep the body in the shed at the back of the yard for now."

The shed. The shed. My stomach turned.

"And the truck?" Beatrix asked, still trying to stitch together a logical outcome from a tapestry of disaster.

"I'll clean it out and bleach it while you’re gone. Then I'll drive it through the Portal," Luke replied, spinning his plan out with a rehearsed efficiency that didn’t quite hide the cracks.

"But," Beatrix cut in, ever the sceptic. "If you are taking it through the Portal, why bother cleaning it first?"

I pressed my fingertips to my temple, trying to massage away the ache that was forming like a storm cloud behind my eyes. Morally, emotionally—we were drowning. And here we were debating bleach and body placement like it was just another Saturday chore.

"I'd rather not raise any suspicions with Paul and Jamie," Luke reasoned, and despite everything, I understood. It wasn’t about what made sense—it was about what might be seen.

"Fair call," Beatrix said quickly, though her voice carried a flicker of doubt.

There was a pause, a beat of stillness before Luke cut through it.

"We need a blanket," he said.

The silence that followed was thick with unspoken questions, with dread and duty, with a sense that whatever line we'd crossed… we were now well on the other side.

"Gladys," a deep male voice called out from the front of the driveway, the words landing heavily in the already thick atmosphere.

My heart lurched, the sound of my name spoken so casually under these circumstances feeling like a sudden slap. I stiffened, nearly dropping the manifest in my hands. That voice—familiar, disarmingly calm—had no place in this mess.

"Cody?" My whisper was barely audible, scraped from the back of my throat in a mix of surprise, dread, and a new wave of panic. It was all unravelling too fast.

"Shit," muttered Beatrix, just loud enough for me to hear. Her expletive mirrored the very thought I was having.

As Cody appeared around the corner, his confident stride cutting across the madness like a blade, the air seemed to still for a moment. His presence felt intrusive, like the sudden appearance of a character in a play who wasn’t supposed to be in this scene. Everything about him—his casual stance, the slight smile that tugged at the edge of his mouth—clashed violently with the chaos that buzzed around us like flies over a carcass.

"Gladys, everything okay here?" he asked, his tone light, almost teasing, but his eyes betrayed him. There was concern there, flickers of it behind his playful exterior. His gaze was too sharp, too searching.

I peeked cautiously around the side of the truck, past the doorway and into the driveway. I summoned a brittle smile and called out, “Cody!” My voice was a pitch too high, trembling at the edges. I hated how obvious it sounded.

"Who the fuck is Cody?" Luke’s voice broke through like a thunderclap—laced with suspicion, territorial and tense. The defensive tone of a man who felt a noose tightening.

"Yeah. Everything is great here," I lied, the words sliding off my tongue like oil. They tasted foul. The smile I offered Cody stayed frozen on my face, though every muscle in my body screamed for him to leave.

Luke hissed in my direction, his voice low and venomous. “Get rid of him. Now!”

I floundered for a suggestion, anything that would buy us time, but Beatrix beat me to it.

"Wait," she whispered sharply, grabbing my arm just above the elbow. Her nails dug into my skin. "I think he may be able to help us."

"Help us?" Luke snapped back, incredulous. His disbelief was raw. "How?"

Cody's eyes, still fixed on me, narrowed slightly as he gestured towards the sticky mess at my feet. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked.

"Oh," I said with a forced laugh, light and nervous. "That's just wine," I added quickly, as though the bloodied chaos of my day could be disguised with a spilt drink. "I accidentally knocked my glass over."

“Doesn’t surprise me, really,” Cody said, a wry grin flickering. There was a warmth in his voice, but it barely skimmed the surface of the frost that clung to my spine.

"How about I meet you back at home in about an hour?" I offered weakly, the words tumbling out like scaffolding around a crumbling lie.

The moment was thick with unease. Blood, secrets, fear—and now Cody. The walls were closing in, and I no longer knew what I was trying to protect. Him? Myself? Us?

"Gladys," Beatrix hissed, urgent and unrelenting. The way she said my name made my blood run cold. "Bring him here."

"Huh?" I blinked, disoriented. I leaned back around the side of the truck, needing her to repeat it.

"Bring him here," she said again, and this time there was fire behind her eyes. A terrifying clarity.

A weight settled in my chest. I hadn’t misheard. A leaden dread pooled in my stomach. She meant it. She wanted him here—in this. The insanity of it, the sheer recklessness, made my skin crawl.

Beatrix gave my forehead a small push, the kind you might use to nudge a reluctant child towards a terrifying but necessary act. It was gentle, but firm. Get on with it, it said.

I turned back around. "Cody, wait!" My voice cracked slightly, betraying everything I was trying to keep inside. He stopped in his tracks, surprised. He turned, curiosity clear on his face.

I offered him a helpless shrug, palms raised ever so slightly in a gesture of surrender. I didn’t know what to say. How could I explain this madness?

He returned, slow, cautious, yet undeniably intrigued. And then, as he rounded the rear of the truck and saw the full horror of what lay within, his mask dropped.

“What the fuck!” Cody’s voice rose sharply, the sudden intensity making me flinch.

I squeezed my eyes shut. Maybe if I kept them closed long enough, this would all vanish. Maybe I’d wake up hungover and furious with myself, but blessedly free of this waking nightmare. What the hell was I thinking bringing him into this?

Feelings I’d been too afraid to name twisted in my chest—hope, maybe even affection. But now? Now I could almost see those feelings crumbling, turning to dust under the harsh light of reality.

"Who the fuck is that, Luke?" Cody’s voice cracked like a whip, demanding answers.

Luke looked up, startled. “Wait. You know who I am?”

"Of course," Cody replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "We've been waiting for you."

That word again. We. It hit me like a blow to the ribs. My breath caught.

We? Who the hell is we?

I stared at Cody, trying to read him, trying to reach past the layers of charm and casual indifference. But all I saw were more questions.

"Waiting for me?" Luke echoed, genuinely baffled now.

Cody shrugged, his composure returning like a switch had been flipped. “What happened to him?” he asked, nodding casually as he stepped into the back of the truck beside Luke.

And just like that, he was in it. No turning back now.

I watched in stunned silence as Cody stepped deeper into the chaos, willingly immersing himself in the grotesque scene we’d been desperately trying to manage—or perhaps conceal. His movements were assured, practised even, like someone who’d seen worse and done worse, and it sent a shiver down my spine. My fingers clenched unconsciously around the manifest in my hand, crinkling the paper slightly.

How could he just… slot in like that?

I cringed inwardly, not just at the situation, but at the sharp jolt of memory that struck me then. His voice, soft and urgent from the night before, whispered in my mind like a ghost. "You have to trust Luke. Do whatever he asks you to do." I had thought little of it at the time—chalked it up to nerves or overexcitement, maybe even flirtation. But now, hearing those words again in light of everything we’d seen... I felt sick.

How deep are you in this, Cody? How deep am I?

"Throat looks like it’s been slit. Any idea who did this?" Cody asked, his tone firm and clinical. It didn’t sound like a guess. It sounded like a man who’d seen similar wounds before.

I edged closer, the soles of my shoes crunching faintly against the scattered shards of broken glass. I had to force my breath to steady, to keep my thoughts from spinning into hysteria again. Their voices were low, swallowed by the tension in the air, and I strained to catch every word, as though understanding it all might somehow pull me back into control.

“We don’t have time for this now, Luke,” Cody pressed. There was an authority in his voice that made even Luke falter. “I need to know who he is and what happened. We don’t have much time.”

Luke opened his mouth but faltered, his words catching like a stone in his throat. For the first time since I’d met him, he looked lost. Vulnerable.

“His name is Joel,” Beatrix cut in smoothly, her voice sharp and steady, slicing through the murk of uncertainty like a scalpel. “He’s Jamie’s son.”

The words hit like a slap.

"Is he...?" Cody didn’t finish the question. His glance flicked towards Luke, his meaning clear.

“No, I don’t think so,” Beatrix said, though her words lacked certainty. There was something in her eyes—maybe doubt, maybe guilt—that made my stomach twist.

“What happened?” Cody demanded, the words like hammer blows. He wasn’t letting up.

Beatrix only shrugged. A gesture so frustratingly casual it made me want to scream. How could she be so indifferent? Or was it just her way of coping?

“I’m not sure,” Luke said finally, his voice low. “He delivered a few tents here this morning. I took the opportunity to take them through the Portal while he was in the toilet, then the boys accidentally ran through.”

“The boys?” Cody asked, brow furrowed.

“Dogs,” Beatrix added, quick to clarify.

“And did he see?” Cody’s eyes narrowed.

“Yeah,” Luke admitted, his voice flat. “I’m pretty sure he did. And when I returned, I found him like this.”

“Shit,” Cody muttered, running a hand through his hair as he began to pace. The motion had a strange comfort to it, like watching someone think with their whole body.

“Oh my God!” I blurted, the words escaping before I could stop them. “We’ve both seen the Portal too,” I added, gesturing wildly between Beatrix and myself, panic rising like bile. “Does that mean we’re all going to die?”

“Not today, Gladys. Not today,” Cody replied, turning towards me with an expression that tried for reassurance. But his eyes… his eyes held something else. Something unreadable.

I swallowed hard. The wine I’d consumed sat heavy in my stomach, doing little to dull the dread curling around my ribs like smoke.

"Uh, I am really confused,” Luke said suddenly, rubbing his forehead with both hands. “Who are you again? And how do you know me? Did you have a dream too?”

A dream? My eyebrows knit together. What the hell are you talking about, Luke? The man was barely holding himself together, and now he was rambling about dreams?

Before anyone could respond, Beatrix stepped in with a voice smooth as glass. “I think Gladys and I had better finish making those deliveries,” she announced. Her tone left no room for argument. “I’ll call you later. When we’re done.”

Luke gave a small nod, weary and resigned.

I barely registered Beatrix’s guiding hand on my shoulder as she steered me away. My legs moved on autopilot, my mind still caught in the swirl of voices and blood and revelation. Every step felt like I was leaving behind a different version of myself. The woman who first showed up that morning—clutching a letter, hopeful, desperate—was long gone.

"Be careful. Both of you," Cody called out, his voice rough around the edges. There was a sincerity there that only made my confusion worse.

"We will," Beatrix said, not breaking stride. Her hand tightened gently, not unkindly, as we walked away from the horror that had unfolded before us.

But I couldn’t shake the feeling, deep in my bones, that we weren’t walking away from anything at all. We were stepping deeper in.

Deeper into a nightmare.

Deeper into something vast and unknowable.

And I had no idea where it would lead.