Sitting in my car outside Luke's house, I switched off the engine and was enveloped in darkness. The quiet of the night surrounded me, punctuated only by the occasional distant sound of a car passing by. I had already been here once today, driven by an unshakeable need for answers, but left with nothing but disappointment. Luke hadn't answered the door. In fact, no one had. The house had remained silent, almost eerily so.
I had peered through the ground floor windows, the ones where the blinds weren't completely drawn shut, hoping for a glimpse of anything that might provide a clue. But my search had been in vain. All I saw were ordinary rooms, nothing that hinted at the turmoil possibly unfolding in the lives of its inhabitants.
The garbage bins underneath the kitchen window had caught my eye, filled to the brim, with several more bags piled up in the back bedroom. At the time, it hadn't struck me as particularly unusual; households generate waste, after all. But later, as I prepared dinner at home, the image of those black plastic bags resurfaced in my mind with sudden clarity. I'd only seen them through a narrow gap between almost closed blinds, but there were at least four, maybe five bags. Why so much garbage?
In a split-second decision, I turned off the stove, abandoning my half-prepared steak. I wrapped it in clingfilm and placed it back in the fridge. "Sorry, Jargus," I said to the dog, who sat by the kitchen bench, his tail wagging in hopeful expectation of a treat. I bent down and gave him a pat on the head, a poor substitute for the steak he had been eyeing. But tonight, my mind was elsewhere, fixated on the task at hand.
The garbage bags, the unanswered door, the silent house — they all pointed to something amiss. It was more than just a hunch; it was an itch that needed scratching, a puzzle that demanded solving. I had to return to Luke's house, to delve deeper, to look beyond the ordinary and find the extraordinary clues that might be hiding in plain sight. This was what being a detective was about — following your instincts, even when they led you back to the same place, looking for answers in the shadows. And tonight, those shadows beckoned from Luke's house.
As I sat in my car along the quiet road behind Luke's house, the creek whispered through the wilderness on the other side, its gentle murmur a stark contrast to the silence that shrouded the house.
The first time I drove past, the house had been cloaked in complete darkness. Now, hours later, nothing had changed. It stood there, an enigmatic structure swallowed by the night. The darkness seemed almost tangible, like a thick, oppressive blanket that extinguished any hint of life within. The stillness of the house was unnerving, as if it was holding its breath, harbouring secrets in its shadowy depths.
As midnight struck, I decided it was time to take a closer look. I quietly opened the car door, carefully easing myself out to avoid any noise that might disturb the heavy silence. Standing beside the car, I let the cool night air wash over me, listening to the rustling of gum trees and the distant screeches of possums in the underbrush. Yet, the house remained dark, no lights flickering to life, no signs of movement. The darkness was absolute, unyielding.
Reaching for my phone, the sudden brightness of the screen jolted me, its glow a stark contrast to the encompassing darkness. My eyes adjusted, and I opened a new text message, my fingers hovering over the keypad. I began to type the name of the person I needed to contact: Jamie Gre—
The name stirred a torrent of mixed emotions within me. The stillness of the night seemed to amplify the internal conflict raging in my mind. Was Jamie more deeply involved in this situation than I had initially thought? Was he a victim, or was the truth of his disappearance far more complicated than it appeared on the surface? Standing alone in the darkness, I realised the gravity of the message I was about to send. This single text had the potential to untangle the twisted threads of the case, possibly shining a light on truths that were now shrouded in mystery.
With a deep breath, I readied myself to press 'send', but abruptly, my finger froze above the screen. A deluge of memories from Queensland suddenly overwhelmed me. I was taken back to my nineteenth birthday - a day marred by the absence of Jamie, my best mate. He never showed up to the party, and that absence had opened a chasm of unanswered questions and unspoken tensions between us.
Days later, the confrontation between us had been explosive. I had accused Jamie of hiding something from me, something potentially damaging, something that threatened the very foundation of our friendship. Jamie had vehemently denied my accusations, claiming he had been in hiding, paranoid and convinced that he was being watched. The argument had spiralled out of control, and in a moment of unchecked rage, I had struck him. The punch sent Jamie reeling over the edge of a small bridge and into the river below.
The sharp cries of the possums in the darkness served as a harsh reminder of where I was and what I needed to do. The echoes of the past, the guilt, and the unresolved questions about Jamie all collided in my mind, creating a maelstrom of emotions. The memory of that fateful afternoon on the bridge in Queensland lingered like a shadow. I had watched my best mate, being swept away by the river's current, a witness to the consequences of my own anger and impulsiveness.
That moment had been defined by my teenage naiveté, a reckless mix of emotion and pride. I remembered the small, crumpled piece of scrap paper that Jamie had dropped as he fell. 'Killerton Enterprises' it had read – two words that had haunted me for years, a cryptic message that had never quite left the periphery of my consciousness.
Now, years later, those words seemed to hold more significance than ever. The night around me felt oppressively silent, the darkness deepening as I tried to reconcile the past with the present. The unsent message on my phone, addressed to Jamie, glowed accusingly in the dark. My finger hovered over the send button, a part of me hesitant, but the rational part of my mind knew better. With a swift movement, I erased the message, the bright light from the screen momentarily blinding me in the pitch-black environment.
I shook my head, trying to clear the fog of memories and emotions. I closed the door of the car, the soft click echoing in the silence. The cold night air seeped into the car, wrapping around me like a chilly embrace. I sat there, enveloped in darkness, staring at Luke's house, which remained as still and silent as ever.
As time ticked by, the night seemed to draw its veil tighter around me, the hours stretching on with an eerie stillness. My mind raced with thoughts, theories, and possibilities. This investigation was more than just a case; it was a journey into a past that I had never fully left behind. The answers I sought were out there, hidden in the shadows of the night.
