Errands from the Abyss

“There’s a point where errands stop being mundane and start looking like instructions in a very polite apocalypse.”

"Last one," I announced, managing a smile that felt like a small victory, a glimmer of light peeking through the cracks of an otherwise harrowing day. The words carried a quiet triumph, like reaching the final stretch of a marathon you never meant to run.

"Thank God for that," Gladys echoed, her voice rich with relief as she buckled her seatbelt. The click of the belt locking into place sounded oddly ceremonial—like sealing a chapter, however grim. Her movements were stiff, deliberate, as if she were bracing not just for the road ahead, but for the emotional aftermath of what we’d just endured.

"You haven't enjoyed playing delivery girl then?" I couldn’t help but tease, the words escaping on a breath that carried more tension than humour. It was a weak stab at lightness, an attempt to break the surreal stillness that had settled between us like dust.

Gladys's response was a glare, sharp and instantaneous. Her eyes flicked toward me, heavy-lidded and weary, but there was no mistaking the dagger in her look. Still, beyond the hostility, I caught the true message—pure, bone-deep fatigue. She was running on fumes, and I wasn’t far behind.

"So, that’s a no," I answered myself, a half-hearted chuckle escaping before I could stop it. It felt awkward on my tongue, laughter shoved into a space it didn’t belong, but it was better than silence. Better than screaming.

"Just drive, Beatrix," Gladys sighed, her words carried more weight than they ought to. It wasn’t just a request—it was surrender. An exhale of all the fear, guilt, and confusion we’d been bottling up since this nightmare began. Her voice sounded older than it had that morning, worn out and worn down.

A smug smile tugged at the corners of my lips as I pulled the truck away from the kerb. Not smug because I felt victorious—far from it—but because, despite everything, we’d almost made it through this part of the plan. A fleeting sense of accomplishment pulsed through me. It was small, insignificant in the grand scheme of what we’d done, what we’d seen. But right now, it was something. And something was enough to keep going.

However, as we travelled in silence, that smile gradually faded, replaced by a furrow of concern that creased my forehead. It was as if the act of driving had shifted from motion to meditation, and with each turn of the wheels, my thoughts twisted further inward. My mind, unbidden, drifted back to the messages from Leigh that I had been trying so hard to push to the back of my mind.

Why did Leigh want to meet so desperately?

The question gnawed at me, unsettling in its urgency. Leigh wasn’t prone to exaggeration. He chose his words with precision, never overstating, never inflating the gravity of a situation unless it warranted it. That word—urgent—clung to me like a burr, pricking at the edges of my thoughts. It meant something. Something real. Something serious.

I tightened my grip on the steering wheel, knuckles whitening as unease settled into my chest. The hum of the tyres on the road, once a comforting rhythm, now echoed the thud of my own heartbeat—steady, but growing louder with every passing moment.

I stole a glance at Gladys, who sat motionless beside me. Her hands were clasped tightly in her lap, fingers interlaced as though she were praying. She didn’t speak, didn’t shift. Her gaze was fixed through the window, eyes unfocused and distant, watching the world blur by in smudges of grey and green. She looked like someone trying to disappear into the scenery, willing herself invisible to whatever came next.

"You'd better send Luke a message and let him know that we're almost done," I suggested. The words carried a mixture of relief—we were nearly through—and anticipation, because we both knew that the end of the deliveries didn’t mean the end of our problems.

Gladys didn’t answer right away. For a moment, I wondered if she’d even heard me. Then, with a sigh that seemed to come from somewhere deep inside, she reached for her phone.

Her fingers moved swiftly over the screen—familiar with the task, if not comfortable with it. "Done," she announced, before placing the phone back in the console with more force than necessary. Then she turned her head back toward the window, resuming her silent vigil, shoulders drawn in tight as though bracing for an impact neither of us could yet see.

The cab returned to quiet, but it was no longer peaceful. Now it thrummed with unanswered questions, with fear disguised as calm, and a silence that said far more than either of us could bear to speak aloud.

Within minutes, the shrill ring of Gladys's phone cut through the cab's silence, jarring us both from our spiralling thoughts. The sound, so abrupt in the tense hush, made me jump slightly in my seat. Gladys, however, snatched the phone up with uncharacteristic speed, answering with a promptness that betrayed just how desperate she was for distraction—any distraction.

"Hey, Luke. What's up?" she said, her tone forcibly light, dipped in a cheeriness that didn’t quite mask the exhaustion painted across her features. I knew her well enough to hear the strain beneath the surface—an attempt to pretend things were normal, even when our entire reality was fraying at the seams.

As I navigated a bend in the road, my eyes darted sideways, stealing quick glances at her profile—tense jaw, pursed lips, the faintest twitch of her brow. Before I could speak, Luke’s voice filled the truck through the tinny crackle of the speaker, bringing him into our cramped, volatile little bubble.

"Hey, Gladys. I forgot to ask you earlier. Can you and Beatrix please collect me a large supply of shelving?"

His words hung in the air like a joke that missed its punchline. Under any other circumstance, it would’ve been a harmless favour—a mundane errand. But now? After everything we’d been through today, it felt like being asked to carry a piano up a hill barefoot.

"In our truck?" Gladys asked, her incredulity sharp and thin, like a cracked plate ready to split in two. The disbelief in her voice was palpable, tinged with the fragile humour of someone who had long since reached her breaking point but was trying very hard not to show it.

"Yes. That’s probably the best idea," Luke replied, his tone maddeningly casual—calm and practical, as if we weren’t already balancing on the precipice of disaster.

Gladys hesitated. Her mouth opened, then closed again, her gaze slipping out the window as though she hoped the answer might be written in the clouds. "I don’t have any more money to spare, Luke. I have the next mortgage payment coming out in a few days," she said finally, her voice softer now, quieter, as though admitting it out loud made it more real.

Before I could stop myself, before logic could intercept impulse, I jumped in.

"Don’t worry. I have money," I said. The words exploded from my mouth louder than I’d meant them to, startling even me.

Gladys swivelled in her seat to gape at me. “How do you have money?” she asked, suspicion cutting through her fatigue like a blade. Her tone wasn’t angry, not yet, but it was poised—ready to tip into something sharper.

"Never mind that," I muttered quickly, eyes fixed on the road as I swallowed hard. Regret coiled in my stomach. The offer had burst out of me unfiltered, a knee-jerk reaction to keep things moving, to prevent any more unnecessary delays. But now it felt like I’d torn open a sealed box without checking what was inside.

"Let’s just get this shit done," I added, harsher than I intended, a brittle shield to deflect further questioning. I could feel her stare lingering a moment longer before she turned away.

Gladys gave a shrug, but it was more indifferent than dismissive—like she’d run out of energy to care. Without another word, she lifted the phone back to her mouth. “Yeah, Luke. Beatrix has money. She’ll pay for it,” she declared, her voice matter-of-fact.

And just like that, it was done. One more commitment. One more weight. One more secret. And no going back.

"Anything else?" I yelled out before I could stop myself, the words launching from my throat with more irritation than I’d intended. They echoed off the windscreen, harsh and accusing, as if Luke were personally responsible for every new complication we faced today.

"I also need you to print me some simple instructions for pouring a slab of concrete for a shed," Luke replied, his voice crackling from Gladys’s phone as if it were the most ordinary request in the world.

“Huh?" Gladys blinked, her face contorting into a picture of baffled incomprehension, as if he’d just asked her to deliver a baby goat to the moon.

"Gladys!" I snapped, louder than I should have, the pressure cooker of our day hissing steam from another crack. "The Bunnings store will be able to give us something. We'll ask them while we're there getting the shelving."

"Oh yeah," she muttered, belatedly catching up, her eyes darting as if she were mentally filing away the errand. With a weary tap, she ended the call without another word to Luke—no farewell, no thanks, just silence. Her usual politeness swept aside by the wear and tear of our escalating madness.

"You're not going to say goodbye?" I asked, one eyebrow arched as I glanced at her. My chuckle was brittle, barely qualifying as humour, but I needed it—any spark to break through the tension gnawing at my gut.

"Huh?" she responded again, momentarily thrown. The look she gave me was wide-eyed and almost comically blank. "Oh," she added, eyes widening in realisation, then turned back to the now darkened screen, as if an apology whispered into the digital ether might still somehow reach him. "Sorry, Luke!" she shouted at the dead phone.

I rolled my eyes for what felt like the hundredth time that day, each movement of those tired orbs like dragging lead. “Gee. You sure you have the volume loud enough?” I teased, the comment half-hearted but necessary, a tiny valve to release some of the emotional steam rising in the cab.

Gladys responded with a pout, turning her head dramatically to the window as though I’d insulted her very soul. Her silence, however, wasn’t the indignant kind. It was reflective. Protective. A soft retreat into the safer territory of her own thoughts as the world outside blurred into a rolling canvas of brick, tree, and sky.

"What was that?" I asked, trying to catch the quiet murmur she’d directed toward the glass.

"Nothing," she called back after a pause, the word soaked in a mixture of resistance and surrender. It drifted between us like a sigh, another unspoken truth neither of us had the strength to untangle right now. We were too tired to fight, too wound up to properly comfort each other. The silence that followed wasn’t awkward—it was necessary.

And so we drove on, two sisters bound by blood, secrets, and the weight of a day that seemed determined to never end.