Roadside Confessions

"She offered to fix the window. Like replacing broken glass could somehow patch the hole Cody left behind."

"I've arranged to have your window replaced," Sarah informed me, her voice slicing through the suffocating silence like a scalpel. It took a moment for the meaning of her words to register. I lifted my eyes to the rear-view mirror where her reflection hovered — composed, flat, and unreadable. There I sat in the back seat of the police car, hands cuffed, spine pressed rigid against the leather upholstery, feeling like a ghost haunting the remnants of my own life.

Her words echoed, oddly mundane against the backdrop of everything that had happened. A window replaced — as though a broken pane of glass could patch over the bleeding hole in my world. I didn’t speak. I didn’t blink. I didn’t move. Outside the window, the scenery unfurled in silence, suburban and ordinary — in brutal contrast to the chaos that raged inside me.

The interior of the car felt oppressively small, like the air was thickening by the second. I sat motionless, each breath drawn slowly as if through syrup. The chill of the morning pressed in from the windows, but I felt nothing. Numbness had made its home in my bones.

"It was you, wasn't it?" I finally asked, the words brittle, cracking as they left my mouth. I didn’t expect an answer. Not a true one. I wasn’t even sure what I meant by “it”—the break-in, the cover-up, Cody. My accusation hovered, more for me than for her. I needed something. Anything. I needed to tug at a thread, even if it unravelled everything.

"No," said Sarah, curt and clipped. Her tone was final, a slammed door. She didn’t turn to look at me — just kept her eyes trained on the road ahead. If the accusation rattled her, she gave no sign of it.

I watched her through the mirror, gauging her knuckles as they whitened against the steering wheel. Every tick of the indicator, every creak of the seatbelt felt like an extension of our silence, charged with unspoken truths. I studied her face, but it remained impassive — except for the tension that had crept into her jaw.

"But you were there," I said quietly, the words trembling on my lips. I bit down hard on my lower lip, trying to steady it, but it betrayed me with a quiver. The sting in my eyes rose again, unrelenting. I turned my face toward the window, willing the tears not to fall. The outside world blurred into muted streaks — power lines, eucalyptus trees, the occasional figure on the footpath — all dissolving into the haze of my grief.

"Why haven't you reported it?" Sarah asked, her voice unexpectedly softer, yet laced with something sharp beneath — suspicion? Guilt?

Her eyes flicked up to meet mine again in the mirror, and for a moment, I thought I saw something flicker there — uncertainty, perhaps. Or doubt.

"It's complicated," I replied, barely managing to push the words past the knot in my throat. They sounded pathetic even to me, but they were the only ones I had.

"No shit," Sarah said bluntly, the words tumbling from her mouth with a rough edge. Despite myself, I almost laughed. The absurdity of it all was staggering. Two women in a car, handcuffed and haunted, speaking in clipped phrases like nothing out of the ordinary had just occurred — like there wasn’t a body, still and broken, hidden beneath a suburban staircase.

Silence crept back between us, heavier now, suffocating.

Then the car veered sharply to the left.

I lurched in my seat, heart slamming against my ribs. My hand reflexively gripped the edge of the door, nails digging into the vinyl. Gravel crunched beneath the tyres as we came to an abrupt stop on the shoulder of the road.

"What now?" I breathed, low and wary. The stillness after the sudden motion felt loaded — like the moment before lightning strikes.

The engine ticked softly as it cooled. And in that quiet space, every nerve in my body stood to attention.

Sarah's hands rested tensely on the wheel.

And I waited, pulse roaring in my ears, the pounding rhythm echoing in my temples like a war drum. The stale air inside the car was thick with the residue of everything left unsaid.

Then she turned.

Her seat creaked beneath her as she twisted to face me, her expression set in a mask of professional resolve. There was no warmth in her eyes—only calculation. "Here's the thing," she began, her voice calm, clipped, and practised. Her gaze locked onto mine with unsettling precision, her beady eyes sharp and unrelenting, like a bird of prey that had finally cornered its quarry. "I have to take you in for questioning, but if you answer a few of my questions now, I'll make sure that the interview is easygoing and you'll get released immediately."

The words lingered between us, straddling the line between an offer and a veiled threat. My stomach twisted as I tried to interpret her angle. Was this leverage? Sympathy? Manipulation?

Battling with the dull ache in my skull, I struggled to make sense of what she was really offering. Could I trust her? That question had become the refrain of my life. My mind flashed back to the glass of wine she’d accepted from me. She had alcohol on duty. That was something. Not definitive, but it scratched a faint tick in the ‘maybe’ column.

"Fine," she huffed, breaking the silence with a rush of irritation. “I was there. But I didn’t kill him. He was already dead when I found him.”

Her confession hit me like cold water. My breath caught as I tried to process the blunt admission. I thought hearing the truth—or even a version of it—might ease the pain, might provide some clarity. But it only carved the loss deeper.

"And what were you doing there?" I snapped, my voice cutting through the air, jagged and raw. The words surprised even me with their venom. It wasn't the question I meant to ask, but it was the one that slipped free—fired from the cannon of grief I had no control over.

Sarah’s jaw tightened. Her cheeks flushed with that particular shade of anger that suggested pride bruised more than guilt. She turned back to face the road, and without another word, pulled the car back into motion. The tyres whispered against the bitumen as the car glided forward, the moment sealed away behind clenched lips and unanswered questions.

The silence returned, weighty and absolute. The longer it stretched, the heavier it felt, pressing down on my shoulders, my chest. My thoughts ran wild, looping back on themselves, refusing to settle. I couldn’t help wondering—was she trying to protect me… or herself?

"His name was Cody Jennings," I murmured eventually, the syllables so soft I barely heard them myself. But speaking his name out loud made it real. Too real. And with it came the full weight of what I had lost—of who I had lost. My throat constricted, and I blinked against a fresh wave of tears that burned their way down my cheeks.

"Thank you, Gladys," Sarah said, and this time, her voice carried something unfamiliar—gentleness. I didn’t expect it. That tiny flicker of humanity from her, however brief, found a small crack in the armour of my sorrow and settled there like a splinter of solace.

Wiping my face with the back of my cuffed hand, I slumped against the car door, worn down by fatigue and grief. The movement was automatic, but it felt strangely meaningful, as though I were trying to erase everything—to press 'undo' on the past twenty-four hours. But no matter how hard I scrubbed, the pain clung to me, heavy as wet wool.

The tyres thumped over the uneven asphalt as we entered the station's carpark. The jolt jarred me back to the present. Back to the cold inevitability of where this ride ended.

"Another thing," I said suddenly, the words tumbling out before I could second-guess myself. My voice was clearer now, steadier—urgency giving it structure. This might be my only window, and I couldn’t afford to waste it. Please, Sarah. Just listen.

"What?" she asked, her tone level but open.

"Luke doesn't know," I said, each word measured but aching with implication.

She flicked her gaze at me through the mirror again. "Know what?"

The answer pressed at the back of my throat, trying to spill out all at once. But I had to be careful. I had to protect Luke. I had to hold something back. I had to do something.

"Any of it," I finished simply, letting those three words carry the weight of everything I couldn’t yet explain.

Sarah didn’t reply. But for the first time, her eyes lingered on mine just a second longer than necessary.

And in that silence, I wondered if I had just made a powerful ally—or a dangerous mistake.