Car Trouble

Melanie Hobbs

Audrey’s phone is dead. Her eyes adjust to the darkness. Above her, ghost gums brandish skeletal arms as a full moon casts long black shadows across the empty road. If she follows the road, she’ll make it back to town. If she weren’t alone, she could hitch a ride. It wouldn’t be so dangerous then. She starts walking. The car she will deal with tomorrow.  

The rhythmic, haunting hoot of an owl joins the crunch of her footsteps in the gravel as unseen creatures scurry in the adjacent bushland, a thick forest of native trees and escaped garden vines. If she had a better sense of direction she could try cutting through the bush. She has a vague inkling there are houses out that way. No. Better stick to the road.

The foreboding forest reminds Audrey of the tales of her childhood. She’d lived her earliest years in a wetter, greener land of endless summer where the air was thick and the days were long. In that place, dense jungle had given way to houses, highways, and palm plantations. But as the jungles shrank the tales only flourished. What little wilderness remained seemed to hold great power over peoples’ imaginations. She hadn’t believed the tales then, why was she even thinking of them now? Well, they all had the same message. Do not go into the wilderness alone.

Polong, Hantu Pujut, and of course, the dreaded Pontianak – a bloodthirsty female spectre with long, black hair and long, sharp fingernails that she would use to disembowel her victims. Even grown adults were terrified of the Pontianak. Audrey’s mother always made her keep her hair and nails short for Audrey’s pale complexion and jet-black hair reminded her mother too much of the mythical vampiress. If she could see me now, Audrey thinks, her long hair flailing in the breeze.

The low hum of an engine fills the air as headlights bleach the nightscape. Just keep walking, she tells herself. A ute whooshes past then slows to a stop. She freezes, heart racing. A voice calls out. It’s a man. 

‘Are you alright?’

‘Yeah, car trouble.’

‘I can give you a lift into town.’

She hesitates. He’s just trying to help, she reasons. Still, better to be safe. 

 ‘Can I borrow your phone?’

‘Sure thing, it’s just in here.’

She moves toward the car then, her hand clasped around the keys in her pocket as voices in her head whisper things like stranger danger, and don’t go out alone at night. She opens the door, scanning the ute for a phone.

 ‘Can I borrow that phone before we get going?’

He groans then, slapping his forehead. Audrey observes his large hands. He claims he must have left it at home. Her stomach lurches.

‘I don’t think this is a good idea,’ she says apologetically, shutting the door and backing away. He persists, listing off the dangers of the bush – falling branches, snakes, feral pigs – not to mention the many people who simply disappear into the bush, never to return. And he has a point. Here was this guy trying to help her and she was treating him like some sort of serial killer. The voices in her head chime in. You’re being paranoid. Hysterical. He looks harmless enough, all freckles and floppy golden hair. She doesn’t want to hurt his feelings but she has to think of her safety.

‘I don’t mean to cause any offence. I would really just feel more comfortable walking.’ And with that she sets off. 

A car door slams behind her. 

‘Don’t be stupid, it’ll take you ages. Just come back and get in the car.’ There is an edge of aggression in his voice. She hears footsteps rushing toward her and darts into the bush. The leaf litter beneath her is slippery as she desperately pushes past saplings, vines and bushes in the undergrowth. It is hard work and she doesn’t stop to catch her breath until she is sure she can’t hear his footsteps anymore. 

But Audrey is lost. She jumps at every rustle, every hoot. She catches a glimpse of the full moon through the canopy of gum trees and tries not to think of how often people go missing in the bush. She doesn’t want to be another statistic. Then, something else catches her eye. A woman’s face amongst the trees – bright white, like the moon. Is she going insane? She moves closer and sees it is a statue. In fact, she recognises the statue.

They’d called her Suicide Sally. A fibre-glass woman that perched above the gates to the local swimming pool when she was a teenager. She remembered Sally, blue eyes and golden hair, in her iconic red swimsuit poised to take a dive, right into the bitumen outside the pool. She had to be replaced regularly due to theft. Audrey had not been allowed to spend her summers at the pool with other kids her age. Even if she promised to wear her rashie and board shorts – it was always a firm no. At the time they’d only arrived in the country recently and it was yet another thing that marked her as different from her peers. She hadn’t thought about that pool in ages. The statue is tangled in vines of morning glory, crunchy leaves and spider webs, her bone-white skin glowing in the moonlight. Audrey imagines the daredevil who’d stolen her. How satisfying it must have felt when the bolt cutters clicked and Sally was freed. She’d never done anything so rebellious.

Audrey hears movement in the bush. This guy is not giving up. She clutches Sally, wishing herself invisible. Then something odd happens. Audrey sees herself get up and go to the man. She tries to speak but her mouth won’t move. Tries to move but she is frozen. She realises her arms are above her head. She’s traded places with Suicide Sally. She is now a statue in the bush.

‘I’m sorry I got frightened, you were just trying to help. Thanks for coming after me. I’m so lost,’ she hears herself say. Her voice a sickly-sweet nectar.

‘S’alright, stranger danger and all. I know how it is,’ he says. She’d been so stupid. So scared of what this strange man might do she’d ran blindly and allowed this ghost – this demon, whatever it was – to take over her life. She is one of those poor souls who wandered into the bush never to return. No one will even know she is alive. Am I alive? she asks herself.

As she begins to process the enormity of what she’s done, she sees the man reach an arm towards the imposter, wrapping it around her shoulders in what looks like a comforting embrace. The imposter shrugs him off but he does it again, this time his hand clasps her neck. Her hands – the imposter’s hands – reach for his. In a flash her fingers sprout long, curved nails – claws – ripping his hands away from her throat. Then with a guttural groan she picks him up, drapes him across her shoulders like a slain deer and stalks off into the bush.

At some point in the night Audrey loses consciousness. She wakes up beside the statue. Its eyes are now closed. Some kookaburras erupt into an echoing chorus. Normally she finds their cackling song eerie but today she just chuckles. Pulling herself up with noticeably jagged nails crowning her pale fingers, she starts walking. She is unsure about the direction but trusts in the wilderness, trusts her intuition to guide her. She makes it back to the road, spotting the ute sitting empty on the gravel. Another statistic. Another soul claimed by the bush.