The Quiet Between Footsteps

“Some exits aren’t escapes. They’re invitations with quieter handwriting.”

As the evening’s formalities tapered off—speeches concluded, dessert plates cleared, applause dutifully offered—the room exhaled. The tightly choreographed rhythm of the night loosened, replaced by the softer cadence of conversation, clinking glasses, and the occasional laugh rising above the ambient hum. Structure gave way to scattered movement as guests untethered themselves from their seats and flowed into social orbit like moths drifting towards fresh sources of attention.

Jarod, unsurprisingly, came alive with the shift. The man could sniff out small talk like a bloodhound and treat it like performance art. He reached for his glass of beer with a fluid, almost theatrical ease, the amber liquid catching and refracting the muted light as though it too had been invited to the afterparty.

"I'm going to mingle. Care to join me?" he asked, rising with the buoyancy of someone who saw these events not as obligations, but as opportunities—social ecosystems where he was always at home.

"Not particularly," I replied, barely giving the question time to settle.

The dinner had been... fine. Palatable. But no amount of perfectly poached duck breast or locally sourced beetroot salad could soften the fact that I’d reached the absolute limit of my tolerance for curated small talk. The thought of diving back into the crowd, exchanging pleasantries about volunteer programmes and summer homes, made my teeth itch.

Jarod’s lips puckered into a pout—playful, exaggerated. A familiar expression. One I’d seen enough times to know it was less about actual disappointment and more about theatre. Still, something about it tugged faintly at the edge of my resolve. He held the pose for just a beat too long, then shrugged it off with a well-rehearsed ease.

"Suit yourself then," he said, tossing the words over his shoulder like a silk scarf as he turned and melted into the crowd—no doubt already calculating whose shoulder to touch, whose ego to polish.

I watched him go, lips curling into a small, involuntary scoff. Typical. Ever the social butterfly. The man could charm a stone. And often did.

He’d always been the more sociable of us, that much hadn’t changed. What had changed, perhaps, was the margin I had for pretending to match him. Whatever energy I’d once summoned for these things had long since been siphoned off by grief, by time, by the necessity of quiet.

A hint of envy curled at the edge of my relief—envy at the ease with which he still played the game. But even as I acknowledged it, I felt no urge to follow. Not tonight.

Some of us were born to dance. Others knew when to sit the song out.

Allowing myself a moment of respite, I tilted my head ever so slightly, my gaze drifting—casually, discreetly—towards the wrist of the man seated beside me. His watch gleamed under the soft lighting, its face a sleek blur of silver with a streak of gold. It wasn’t subtle, the way I checked it, but it was instinctive—an old reflex from a time when I’d mastered the art of making an exit without causing a stir.

Shit. The word escaped before I had time to dress it in decorum. Soft, breathless, and entirely unfiltered.

Already ten-fifteen.

The numbers hit like a sucker punch to the chest. A spike of panic surged through me, sharp and electric.

I have to collect Gladys.

In my distraction—the dinner, the delivery, Jarod’s relentless social orbit—I’d let time slip through my fingers like sand through a sieve. Now the grains were gone, and my focus snapped back with a vengeance.

The room around me, once neatly arranged in symmetrical tables and polite conversation, had evolved into a humming hive of movement and low laughter. Chairs had been pulled at odd angles. Voices layered over one another like music with no conductor. Napkins abandoned. Glasses half-full. Structure had given way to chaos dressed in finery.

I scanned the room for Jarod, heart already shifting into second gear.

There he was.

Centre of a cluster, naturally. Animated hands carving shapes in the air, his voice undoubtedly weaving some tale or joke or anecdote designed to enthral. His audience leaned in like flowers to the sun, utterly absorbed. Classic.

Centre of attention as usual.

I didn’t have time for farewells or explanations—or worse, questions. What I needed was a clean break, no ripples.

With a decision fuelled by urgency, I pushed back my chair. It gave a soft scrape against the polished floor, a quiet betrayal, though no one turned. I rose smoothly, a whispered excuse me to no one in particular, and began threading my way through the social thickets—shoulders turned towards one another, drinks clutched like accessories, eyes locked in the currency of performance.

I kept my pace steady, my focus singular. The staircase in the far corner—the one I’d clocked earlier—beckoned like a back door in a dream you’re trying to wake from.

A final glance over my shoulder.

Jarod, still holding court, his back to me. Unaware. Unconcerned. Perfect.

Relief wrapped itself around the urgency, steeling my steps as I slipped through the final veil of conversation and candlelight.

With every stair I ascended, the pressure eased incrementally, the air cooler, cleaner somehow. The crowd receded beneath me like a scene behind closing curtains.

I didn’t exhale until I reached the landing.

Upon reaching the lobby, the contrast hit like a cold compress to the senses. The clamour of the function room had faded to a dull throb behind me, replaced by a more subdued murmur—conversations now diffused into quieter clusters, the frenetic pulse of the evening reduced to a gentle, sustained hum.

The lighting here was cooler too, more functional. The sparkle and artifice had been left behind with the table linens and curated flower arrangements. In this in-between space, everything felt more exposed. Less forgiving.

My strategy was simple and well-rehearsed: don’t stop, don’t engage, don’t look up. Keep moving like someone who knows exactly where they’re going. Eyes downcast, I focused on the neutral palette of the floor tiles, my heels tapping a steady rhythm that I hoped would blend with the ambient noise. Any eye contact—any flicker of recognition—might invite conversation, delay, obligation. I had neither the time nor the patience for that.

The ushers stood ahead, positioned with the stoicism of ceremonial guards, their tuxedos still unnervingly crisp despite the evening’s length. The sight of them anchored me; they marked the edge of the evening’s social stage, and beyond them—freedom.

I gave a barely perceptible nod as I passed them. A small courtesy. The kind one offers to the people who stand still so you can move forward unnoticed.

Then I stepped through.

The night air hit with a bite—crisp and unapologetic. It curled around my bare arms like a reprimand, seizing the warmth I’d gathered from the hours inside and replacing it with something sharper. I didn’t flinch.

Compared to the manufactured heat of the function room, the cold felt honest.

As I navigated through the dimly lit carpark, the orange glow of scattered security lights cast long shadows across the rows of vehicles, their silhouettes warped and stretched like something out of a half-remembered dream. My 4WD stood ahead, the only thing in this concrete wilderness that felt remotely familiar. It loomed like a beacon, promising warmth, escape, and clarity in a night that had offered precious little of any.

Then—“Psst, Beatrix.”

The whisper sliced through the quiet, too precise to be wind, too intentional to ignore. My body reacted before my brain could catch up. I spun around, arm raised, purse swinging wide like a blunt-force pendulum.

A blur of motion. A hand—long, lean, and terrifyingly familiar—emerged from the shadow of my car and hooked me in with uninvited intimacy. My breath caught somewhere between panic and reflex. My muscles tensed for a fight that was already too close.

“You really think hitting someone with that thing is going to make any difference?” Leigh’s voice, dry and laced with that infuriating edge of amusement, grounded me in a heartbeat.

Of course. Him.

The pulse thundering in my ears didn’t subside so much as recalibrate. Now it beat to a rhythm of rage.

“What do you want?” I hissed, too sharp for the setting but too fed up to care. My voice cracked with the kind of irritation that comes from pent-up adrenaline and too many unanswered questions.

“Did you deliver the package?” he asked, still in that maddening hush, like we were co-conspirators in a spy novel I hadn’t agreed to be in.

“Yeah,” I snapped, the confirmation yanked from me as my hands curled into fists. “So, why me? Why couldn’t you do it yourself? And why make me come here?” The words were bullets—fast, hot, and fuelled by frustration. I’d been playing a part all night, and now that the curtain was falling, I wanted answers. Real ones.

“I just wanted to see you dressed up all pretty,” Leigh replied, casual as you like. A joke? A distraction? A deflection wrapped in mockery?

Whatever it was, it landed like a lit match in dry grass.

Without thinking, I swung the purse again—this time deliberately. It struck with a satisfying thwack, the sound muted by layers of fabric and fury. “Seriously!”

The volume betrayed me. My voice rang out too loud, ricocheting off the metal surfaces and into the night like a challenge.

“Shh,” Leigh hissed, raising a finger to his lips as if we were huddled in some wartime trench. His eyes, always too quick to dance with mischief, now flicked across the carpark with sudden sobriety. There was something in his expression—caution, maybe even fear—that made my anger hesitate, if only for a second.

Whatever game he was playing, it wasn’t just with me.

"Then why?" The question shot out of me, sharper than intended, cutting through the carpark’s silence like broken glass. I was trying to keep my voice low, to honour the supposed need for discretion, but restraint had its limits. The entire night had twisted itself into knots of half-truths and veiled motives, and I was rapidly losing patience with the mystery of it all. Leigh, as always, seemed content to dangle answers just out of reach.

"I couldn't do it myself. Their eyes and ears are everywhere. Besides, he's seen me before. I needed someone he didn't—"

"Hang on," I interrupted, my thoughts slamming into a new wall of comprehension. A part of the tangled narrative snapped into place with a cold clarity, though it brought no comfort. "You mean he knows who you are? He knows about your... thing?"

I tilted my head meaningfully, my eyes drifting briefly to the left pocket of his coat. I didn’t need to say the word. That particular object didn’t belong in sentences spoken out loud—not here, not now, not surrounded by who-knows-what kind of surveillance. Still, the implication hung in the air like breath on cold glass.

A small, maddening smile pulled at the corners of Leigh’s mouth—playful, knowing, irritatingly pleased. The bastard was amused.

And of course, he would be.

Before I could stop myself, my arm swung in a tight arc and landed another satisfying thump against his upper arm with my purse. It wasn’t exactly tactical, but it got the message across.

"What was that for?" he asked, still grinning like he was in on a joke I hadn’t been told. His voice held that infuriating edge of laughter, like he’d already decided my anger wasn’t to be taken seriously.

"You know what," I growled, tired of being the only one playing the straight man in this absurd theatre. "I was trying not to say Portal—"

His hand was on my mouth before I could finish. Quick, firm, not rough—but enough to still the words in my throat.

"Best you don't say them now," he muttered, the glint in his eyes momentarily snuffed out by something colder. His voice had shifted—lower, anchored by real concern. It wasn’t often Leigh dropped the act, but when he did, it got my attention.

I blinked once. Twice.

He lowered his hand slowly, his gaze scanning the shadows like they might answer back.

"And no," he continued, more measured now. "I don't think he knows that much. He is connected somehow, I just haven't been able to work out how yet."

A muscle in his jaw tightened as he spoke, brow furrowing with a seriousness that sat uneasily on him. The levity had drained from the moment, leaving in its place something heavier. Something real.

And suddenly, the night didn’t feel so cold. It felt... watched.

"So, what was the package? Why so important? And why here?" The questions burst out of me in rapid succession, propelled by a need that had nothing to do with small talk. It was no longer about curiosity. It was about understanding where the ground beneath my feet ended and the trapdoor began.

Leigh, of course, responded like I’d asked him the weather. “Haven’t you ever heard of hiding in plain sight?” he said, that damned smirk reappearing like a reflex, as if the entire puzzle was child's play and I’d simply failed to look at it upside-down.

"Ah," I said, drawing the sound out slowly, testing its weight as a half-formed realisation started to tug at the corners of my thoughts. Bits and pieces shuffled into place, though the larger picture still swam in shadows. "I get it. I think. But it would make more sense if you answered my other questions."

My tone was firm now. Less asking, more demanding. I was the one who’d walked into that building. The one who’d smiled, lied, and delivered that damned box. I’d earned more than breadcrumbs.

“I will,” he said, but it was a promise on ice—cool, slippery, and not much help in the present moment.

Before I could press him further, a voice rang out—jarring, bright, and horribly well-timed.

"You're not even going to say goodbye?" Jarod.

Of course.

His voice bounced across the carpark with the ease of someone who’d had just enough to drink to think volume was charm. It hit the space between Leigh and me like a thrown stone, shattering what little stillness we’d maintained.

Leigh reacted instantly. His body dropped lower into the shadows, spine coiling like a threatened cat. My own reaction wasn’t far behind, instincts taking over as I crouched beside him, breath caught somewhere between dread and embarrassment. It was a ridiculous image—two adults hunched by a car like kids caught sneaking out after curfew.

“No,” Leigh hissed, his tone sharp with urgency. “Stand up. Go.” His hand pressed against my back, gentle but insistent.

I resisted for a second, turning to him with a look that might as well have been a slap. “But…” My voice wavered with everything I wasn’t saying: You’re leaving me with him? After this? Now?

Leigh met my eyes, and for once, there was no smirk—only seriousness. “Tomorrow,” he whispered. “I’ll find you and explain.”

It wasn't reassurance—it was a placeholder. But I took it. Because it was all he was offering.

And I was already standing before I knew I’d agreed.

Reluctantly, I acquiesced, stepping out from behind the safety of the vehicle and into the open, where the cool bite of the night air did little to soothe the sudden spike in my heart rate. The bubble of secrecy I’d shared with Leigh vanished like vapour, leaving me exposed beneath the carpark’s dim lighting and the buzz of expectation I hadn’t asked for.

My heels clicked softly against the asphalt as I moved to open the door of my 4WD, the motion deliberate—an anchor in an otherwise disorienting evening.

Then—Jarod.

His presence materialised out of the half-light with the kind of timing that felt scripted. He was suddenly there, close. Too close. The faint scent of his cologne still clung to the wool fibres of his jacket, the same one I’d worn only hours earlier. The intimacy of the memory contrasted jarringly with the reality of his looming figure, standing like a question mark on the threshold between one world and the next.

I felt the jolt of adrenaline before I registered why—my body reacting before my mind had caught up. The sharp transition from clandestine whispers to social civility, from Leigh’s veiled warnings to Jarod’s steady gaze, sent me spinning internally. And yet, I couldn’t let that show.

"No," I replied sharply, the edge in my voice an armour I didn’t have time to polish. I swung the car door open with unnecessary force, as if momentum alone might carry me out of the conversation. The night had worn thin, and I was seconds away from escape.

But then he said it.

"Come to Wrest Point tomorrow night. For old time's sake," he said, hands clasped in front of him, not dramatically but sincerely—an unguarded gesture from a man who rarely did anything without calculation.

And that… that cracked something.

The audacity of the request. The specific invocation of place and past. It caught me off-guard in the way only nostalgia can. My lips betrayed me first, tugging upward in a smile that felt foreign and automatic and altogether unwelcome. But it was there—cheeky, disbelieving, and alive.

I hated that I felt it.

Butterflies. Actual, bloody butterflies. Somewhere in the hollow of my stomach, a flicker of something like anticipation stirred, dusted off by the mention of that place. Wrest Point.

Of course it would be Wrest Point.

The place where it had all started—Jarod, Brody and me and a night fuelled by adrenaline and absurd courage. The place where we'd made our first memorable dollar and told ourselves it was the start of something beautiful. And maybe, for a moment, it had been.

Or rather, we’d taken the money. Jarod and me.

Brody hadn’t known that part.

And now Jarod was asking me to go back.

"You have to admit we made a fine team, you and I," Jarod continued, his voice low and tinged with the golden varnish of nostalgia. The words curled through the air like smoke—dangerous in how easily they could obscure reality. "You have quick, deceptive hands."

"And you have a fine, deceptive mouth," I scoffed softly, the reply slipping from my lips before I could temper it. It held a bite, but the kind born of history, not venom. There was affection woven into the barbs, a grudging acknowledgement of the mischief we'd once shared. My gaze drifted, unbidden, to a space somewhere past him—the carpark lights hazy now through the lens of memory.

And there it was again: the sound of chips clinking into stacks, the buzz of the tables, the glint of stolen glances and subtle nods. I could still feel the way the adrenaline hit just beneath my ribcage as we'd leaned too close, played too cool. The breathless silence before someone noticed—or didn’t. It had been a life painted in quick decisions and quicker exits, our partnership a delicate choreography of diversion and finesse.

"We never did get caught. We didn't have to stop," Jarod said, almost to himself, his voice wistful as though replaying old tapes in his mind, rewinding to the highlight reels.

"Yes, we did have to stop. You know we did." My voice had sharpened, though I kept it low. "It was all about the numbers. We knew that from the start." I met his eyes, a deliberate act. "As easily as we helped people to misplace their chips without them even knowing, we could have easily been caught."

The last part hovered, incomplete. I didn’t say it aloud, but it echoed all the same.

I did get caught.

The memory of it—it still clung to me like smoke to clothes. The look on Brody’s face that day. His voice as he’d tried, and failed, to find words for what he’d discovered. There hadn’t been shouting. Just the quiet breaking of something vital. Trust, maybe. Or love. Or both.

"Just one more time?" Jarod's voice cut in, soft but insistent, his question a familiar rhythm. He wore that smile—half charm, half challenge—the one that once made it far too easy to say yes.

I bit my lower lip, catching myself. A small, involuntary gesture, but it betrayed more than I liked. My eyes flicked downwards, then sideways, anywhere but at him. My silence swelled with everything I wasn’t saying.

The truth was, Wrest Point hadn’t seen me since the night before Brody died.

And that last night... he'd known. Not all the details. But enough. Enough to know that the money I’d used to help us start the antique store wasn’t some windfall. He never said the word stolen, but it hung between us, unsaid and undeniable.

We hadn’t fought. Not really. But his disappointment had been worse. His silence the kind that echoed louder than any slammed door. He was dead the next day.

And now, here Jarod stood, whistling up ghosts and inviting me to dance with them all over again.

"Fine," I finally conceded, the word slipping from my lips like a reluctant sigh, hollowed out by fatigue and resignation. It tasted of surrender, bitter and edged with something far older than this night—an echo from the person I used to be. "But not tomorrow. Let's do Friday night."

There it was: the line in the sand I pretended was a compromise rather than an admission. Some dormant part of me, the reckless fragment that used to live for that humming adrenaline, couldn’t bring itself to say no. Not to the game. Not to him.

"Deal," Jarod said, too quickly, the grin that broke across his face alarmingly boyish, disturbingly familiar. His hand shot out towards me—a mockery of a handshake, a silent pact that seemed to glow faintly with the heat of old crimes and unburied temptations.

I didn't take his hand. I rubbed my arms instead, brushing away the goosebumps rising in protest to the cold, or perhaps the company. The chill wasn’t just in the air anymore—it had burrowed in under my skin. "It's freezing out here. I need to go." The words came out blunt, like a slammed door. I didn’t have the energy for artifice.

Slipping into the driver's seat, I shut the door with finality and twisted the key in the ignition. The engine thrummed awake, a low, comforting growl that seemed to answer the unspoken scream building in the back of my throat.

Through the windscreen, I watched Jarod take a step back, raising his hand in a jaunty little wave—as though we’d just made plans for brunch, not a dance with whatever ghosts we’d both been running from. The disconnect between his cheer and my inner storm made my jaw clench.

I exhaled through my nose, sharp and shallow, then eased the car forward.

As I drove down the long gravel stretch leading away from the event, the rows of grapevines flanked me like a gauntlet—bare-limbed and spectral in the headlights, like sentinels watching me flee a battlefield. The warmth of the function room was already a distant memory, replaced by the cold, quiet hum of the engine and the simmering realisation that Friday had just been carved into something inevitable.

I glanced in the rearview mirror, half-expecting to find nothing but shadows. But there he was. Jarod. Still standing in the carpark, a lone silhouette haloed by the faint spill of exterior light. Watching me. Not moving. Not turning back. Just watching.

A shiver crawled down my spine like a warning.

He’s going to get me into more trouble than I need.

The thought formed with terrifying clarity. It didn’t feel like speculation. It felt like a promise already halfway fulfilled.

"Shit!"

The word ripped from my throat as I slammed the brake pedal down, the tyres skidding slightly on the damp earth. My heart jumped so violently it felt like it might punch through my chest.

A small wallaby stood stock-still in the centre of the road, caught in the sudden blaze of my headlights. Its eyes, wide and vacant, blinked once. Then, with slow reluctance—as if offended by the interruption—it hopped lazily off into the vines and disappeared.

I sat there, frozen, one hand still gripping the wheel, the other braced against the dash. The sharp jolt of the moment lingered like static on my skin.

It was just an animal.

But it could just as easily have been something else. Someone else.

The road ahead seemed to blur, the path uncertain, the danger not behind me, but waiting, somewhere up ahead.