Hapi by Cari Waites

About this book

Jayden Sanders is a dead man.

Jayden is trying to reach Cairns when his car dies on the highway and leaves him stranded in a caravan park in Innisfail. As the rain comes down and the crocodile-infested river rises, Jayden becomes fascinated by the strange man who lives across the river—Hapi. What Jayden doesn’t know is that Hapi has already marked him for his own.

Hapi and his brothers, the sons of Horus, prepare the souls of the dead for their father, and each claim protection over a part of the body. When Hapi pulls Jayden from the flooded river, he claims Jayden’s lungs, and his breath, as his due. But what happens when he decides he wants more than that?

Jayden refuses to believe it when Hapi tells him he’s dead, but his only hope of getting out of Innisfail alive is by playing along with Hapi’s delusions. And with Horus due to arrive any day, time is running out for Jayden.

Or maybe it already has.

“Where you headed?”the truck driver asked as Jayden climbed up into the cab.

“Cairns,” Jayden said, pulling the door shut behind him and holding his knapsack on his lap.

His piece of shit car had crapped out on the side of the highway between Townsville and Ingham, and a truckie had brought him as far as Cardwell. With any luck, he’d only need one more ride to get to Cairns.

The truck driver’s face was shadowed by a cap, but his crooked mouth curled into a smile as he started the engine up. The truck thrummed, and Jayden fastened his seat belt. The driver turned the wheel, his big tanned hands crossing over one another as he navigated the truck out of the parking area of the service station. His right hand was darker than his left, with prominent, ropey veins—sun damage on one side of his body from spending so many hours behind the wheel.

“Tony,” the guy said as they pulled onto the highway. He lifted a hand to scratch the stubble on his chin. His eyes were still in shadow. He was a big guy—middle-aged. Jayden couldn’t tell much else about him.

“Jayden.”

The day was overcast and grew darker as they headed north. Between Townsville and Ingham the trees and bushes at the side of the road had been brown, dry, and scrubby. Here, though, north of Cardwell, everything felt much greener. Bursts of tropical flora encroached on straight-edged cane fields—rubber trees, massive fan-shaped palms, along with clumps of vines smothering the trees underneath them—in a relentless battle between nature and agriculture. Jayden saw a rusted car body at the edge of someone’s property, half consumed by leaves and vines. It felt like a whole different world up here.

“How long you been travellin’?” Tony asked after a while.

“About a week,” Jayden said, but it felt like longer. Maybe because even though he’d only been on the road for five days, he’d been drifting for years now. He could hardly believe Cairns was so close. A part of him wanted the next few hours to go by at the speed of light, so he would already be there. Another part of him never actually wanted to arrive. Maybe his dad was still living in Cairns, but there was no guarantee of that. And there was no bloody guarantee he’d want to see Jayden, even if Jayden could track him down. For years now, he’d told himself that he’d make it to Cairns and find out for himself, and now that he was closer than ever, he was almost afraid of being there.

He chewed on his lip and jiggled his leg and listened to Tony talk about nothing much as they drove. Signs counted down the kilometres to go until Innisfail, and Jayden slowly relaxed as the long minutes slid by.

On the outskirts of Innisfail, the truck crested a rise, and a shaft of sunlight pierced the low clouds. Tony reached up and flipped his visor down. There was a photograph of a woman pinned to the flap. She was wearing lingerie and licking her lips.

Tony glanced at Jayden. “That’s my missus. I like blondes.”

Jayden made some sort of noise he hoped was neutral as Tony’s glance slid over him. He couldn’t mean that… Jayden was blond, too, he supposed, though his messy, tousled hair was darker than the woman’s platinum locks. He hadn’t gotten his from a bottle.

“Blondes are hot,” Tony continued, his mouth tightening for a moment before it relaxed into another crooked smile. “You know how hitchhikers used to pay for rides, right?”

Jayden froze, suddenly very aware that Tony was twice his size.

“Back in the old days,” Tony said, “a bloke could get head all the way up and down the coast, just for giving someone a lift.”

“I want to get out now,” Jayden said, his voice rasping. A cold, heavy weight settled in his stomach.

Tony laughed. “I was just joking, kid.”

And then his worn, leathery hand settled on Jayden’s thigh.

“I want to get out now,” Jayden repeated. He felt as small and vulnerable as the kid Tony had called him. His heart raced and his skin was clammy.

“It was just a joke,” Tony groused, but the compression brakes on the truck hissed and groaned as he pulled off the highway into the truck parking area of a service station.

Jayden clambered down out of the cab as soon as the truck came to a halt, pulling his knapsack with him.

“Fucking cocktease,” Tony said.

Jayden slammed the door shut, clutching his knapsack to his chest.

Then, just when he was wondering what to do next, the rain that had been holding off all morning suddenly began to pour down.

* * *

The run-down River BendCaravan Park and Tourist Resort was nestled in a sinuous curve of the North Johnstone River, on the edge of Innisfail. North Queensland in late October was low clouds and humidity, and swarms of mosquitoes and flying ants. The caravan park was thick with mud, and the palms fronds shone a brilliant green in the rain, almost luminescent against the grey world. Grass grew from the mud and was flooded again, like reed beds. It had taken Jayden an hour to walk there from town.

“Here ya go,” Barry said, splashing through a puddle before climbing the steps to a wooden cabin and pushing the key in the door. “Rent’s due every Friday. If you don’t pay it, you’re out.”

“Thanks.” Jayden hugged his knapsack to his chest in a vain attempt to protect it from the rain as Barry jiggled the key and finally pulled the door open. He waited until Barry huffed and stepped away, and then he darted up the three shallow steps into the cabin.

Barry peered up at him, the rain flattening his combover to his scalp. “Righto, then.”

“Thanks,” Jayden said again. He reached around and wiggled the key out of the lock, then pulled the door shut.

Outside, Barry grumbled under his breath as he sloshed away again.

Jayden sighed and set his knapsack down.

He was dripping wet and from the look of the puddle growing underneath his knapsack, he didn’t have anything dry to change into, either.

Jesus, what a fucking day. Maybe he should have tried for another lift from a passing truckie, but after his near miss with Tony it felt too much like pushing his luck. A couple of days here wouldn’t be so bad. And he might need the time, to give himself a chance to work up the courage to get into another stranger’s truck.

Jayden wiped the rain from his eyes and blinked around.

Barry had called the cabin ‘budget,’ but that seemed like overstating it. It was a narrow, dark room with a bed at one end and a small kitchenette at the other, and a stained couch filled the space between them. But there was a kettle and a microwave, and a TV on the wall across from the couch, and Jayden had slept in plenty of worse places. One corner of the ceiling was mottled with mould spores, but for fifty bucks a night what the hell did he expect? Something about beggars and choosers, right?

Jayden crouched down, his wet jeans sticking to his legs, and unfastened his knapsack. He pulled everything out, spreading his wet clothes out over the couch and the rail at the end of the bed, though nothing would dry in this weather anyway. He didn’t have much, just clothes and a couple of paperback books he’d picked up in hostels along the way. The books were still dry, at least, because they’d been in the middle of his pack. His notebook was dry, too. Jayden flipped through the pages. His dad’s old address was still there: White Rock, Cairns. The closer he got to Cairns, the more Jayden found himself taking out his notebook and reading the address again, as though he was afraid it would vanish. And maybe a part of him wanted it to disappear. If Jayden couldn’t find him, his dad couldn’t disappoint him.

His stomach clenched, and he closed his notebook and set it on the couch. He took his battered old mobile phone out of the pocket of his jeans and put it beside his notebook. His thin wallet followed. He stripped out of his wet clothes next, ignoring his growling stomach, and then climbed under the blankets on the bed. The sheets smelled a little musty, but they were clean.

It wasn’t cold enough to shiver, but tremors ran through his body anyway; they were from exhaustion rather than temperature. A few hours of sleep would fix him up, and then he’d venture out to the vending machines by the main office and buy something to see him through until morning. He’d detour by the shower block, too, just to check it out. Showering seemed pointless since he was already soaking wet, and he didn’t have any dry clothes to change into after—and no way to keep them dry on the walk back to the cabin. Tomorrow he’d go into town, buy some cheap groceries and maybe an umbrella. Or he’d at least grab some big garbage bags to turn into makeshift raincoats as he needed them.

He tugged the sheets up, closed his eyes, and dozed.

It was dark when he fought his way back into wakefulness. The sheets were damp and sticking to his skin. Jayden crawled out from under them. When slightly more awake, he picked over his clothes for the driest ones he could find, settling on a pair of boardshorts and a T-shirt. He pulled them on, grimacing as the damp fabric clung to his skin. Then, he grabbed his wallet and phone on his way out of the cabin.

It was still raining, though it had eased while he’d slept. It was night now, and the caravan park was dark. There were cracked solar lights set in the paths that led up to the amenities block, but they were dim. Wet gravel crunched under Jayden’s bare feet.

Jayden’s cabin was at the end of a long row. Only one or two other cabins had lights on; he doubted occupancy rates were high, not in the wet season, and not when the place was so run down to begin with. This wasn’t the sort of caravan park tourists stopped at. Jayden guessed that a place like this relied on seasonal workers, not holidaying families.

He hunched over as he walked up to the amenities block, water sluicing down the back of his neck.

The manager’s office was tacked on at the end of the Besser-brick building. The screen door was locked, and there was a notice pinned between it and the inner wooden door that gave Barry’s mobile phone number in case of emergencies. The paper was spotted with damp and mould, and curled at the corners.

Jayden inspected the vending machines near the entrance. He bought a Coke from one machine and a packet of chips from the other. The food cost more money than he wanted to spend, but he was hungry. Tomorrow he would get groceries, nonperishable stuff like cups of noodles and soup packets. Some bread, maybe, and peanut butter. He couldn’t remember if the cabin had a small fridge or not. He hoped it did because that would give him a lot more options.

He drank his cold Coke while he checked out the rest of the amenities block. There was an open sort of under-cover area with a couple of old vinyl couches and a dartboard hanging from the wall. There was a rusted old tin overflowing with cigarette butts, a gas barbecue, and not much else.

Jayden headed back to his cabin and was dripping again by the time he got there, but the packet of chips made the trip worthwhile. He was pleased to note that his cabin did have a small fridge. He also dug around and found an electric hot plate stashed at the back of the tiny kitchenette cupboard.

Yeah, he could work with this for as long as he needed, and if it turned out the place had washing machines and dryers, even better. Dryers, mostly, would be a cause for excitement because Jayden could easily get by washing his clothes when he showered, but drying them was going to be a pain in the arse in this weather.

He stared at the mould spores on the ceiling, grey and mottled like the scales of a reptile. A flying ant, long wings as thin as gossamer, crawled over his forearm, and he flicked it onto the floor.

He stripped off his wet clothes and wrung them out as best as he could in the little sink. Then, naked, he laid his clothes out along the back of the couch and hoped at least something would be dry again by morning. He drank water from the sink, and then he crawled back into bed and pulled the clammy sheets up.

He drifted off into sleep at last, listening to the tap-scrape, tap-scrape, tap-scrape of a palm leaf on the roof of his cabin.

* * *

The next day dawned overcast,with the low clouds pressing down heavily. The air was warm and damp, and the leaves on the palm trees dipped toward the muddy ground like shivering divining rods. Jayden walked up to the amenities block, his empty knapsack slung over his shoulder. His stomach growled.

There were a few vehicles in the car park in front of the manager’s office. Jayden wondered if any of their owners would be heading into Innisfail anytime soon, and if they’d be willing to give him a lift. He checked the office to see if Barry was in, but the door was closed and locked. There were no signs of anyone else around, so Jayden figured he’d start walking. As far as he could tell, the caravan park was at the end of the road, so if he heard a car behind him at any point it would probably be one of his new neighbours. Places like this had some weird people, and usually Jayden preferred to keep to himself, but to save an hour’s walk to town, he figured he could play nice.

He’d been walking for about ten minutes when he heard the sound of an engine on the road behind him. He stuck out his thumb and looked back.

An old battered sedan pulled up, and Barry’s grizzled face peered out at him. “You need a lift into town?”

“If you’re heading that way, thanks.” Jayden pulled the passenger door open—it squealed—and slid onto the cracked vinyl seat.

“Nowhere else to go,” Barry said.

From the road behind them, a black ute approached, drove around them, and then sped off into the hazy, drizzly day.

“Where’d he come from?” Jayden asked, tugging his seat belt on. “I didn’t see him back at the car park.”

“Hmm.” Barry put the sedan into gear and they began to rattle forward. Gravel crunched under the tyres. “That’d be one of the Horace boys. They live across the river. They park at the boat ramp and take their tinnies back and forth. It’s a long drive to the nearest bridge from here.”

“Oh.” Jayden squinted out the dirty windscreen, but the black ute was already gone from sight.

“Yeah, they’re an odd bunch,” Barry said with a frown and didn’t seem inclined to elaborate. He tapped his stubby fingers on the steering wheel. “You got any transport back?”

“No, I’m probably gonna walk.”

“Ah,” Barry said. “Well, I’ve got some stuff to do in town, but if I’m still in the Queen Vic when you’re looking to head back, I’ll give you a lift.”

“Thanks,” Jayden said. “I appreciate that.”

Barry was a lot chattier today than yesterday. He gave Jayden a rundown of the town: where to find the supermarket and Centrelink. He even offered to put the word out with his mates at the Queen Vic to see if anyone knew if there was work going around.

Jayden’s impression of Innisfail today wasn’t any more charitable than it had been yesterday. The town was like any other along this stretch of highway in North Queensland, with weatherboard houses on stilts, a main street overrun by faded facades—some art deco, some older, some new and bland—and palm trees, all wrapped up in the dark, low clouds of the wet season and the rain that already felt interminable.

Barry dropped him off outside Centrelink, and Jayden walked inside. He took a number and waited, sitting in a chair with his gaze fixed on the worn carpet. It took about twenty minutes for his number to get called, and then he updated his address with a woman who told him he could do this online—“Not with my shitty data plan, I can’t.”—and he got the address for the nearest employment agency that might be looking for banana pickers in a week or two.

If he was still here in a week or two.

Getting to Cairns had been his goal for a while now, but Jayden wasn’t exactly confident he’d be able to track his dad down. His dad was always moving on, from what his mum had told him, something Jayden had apparently inherited along with the stubborn cowlick in his hairline. And even if Jayden did find him, there was no guarantee it would be a happy reunion. Jayden hadn’t seen him in over ten years, and his parents’ relationship had been volatile. Lots of shouting and screaming and dramatic slamming of doors. Dad had walked out for good when Jayden was nine. Then, when Jayden was fifteen, his mum had died.

Jayden had couch surfed with friends first. When Child Safety had caught up to him, he’d been put in a foster home. That had lasted for a few months until he’d butted heads too much with his foster parents. He’d been put in a group home until he’d aged out. The group home had been worse than the foster home because most of the kids there had cycled in and out via juvenile detention centres. It had been a novel experience for Jayden, being one of the good kids for once.

Somewhere along the way he’d picked up the idea of going to find his dad again, once he was free to leave. It gave him direction—literally. He’d just head north, picking up work as he went, and eventually he’d find himself in Cairns. He’d first gotten cold feet around Townsville. The idea of doing this had sustained him since his mum’s death, but now that it was really happening, now that there was nothing stopping him from going to Cairns, he had to face the possibility that it wouldn’t work out. It was possible that either he wouldn’t find his dad, or his dad wouldn’t want anything to do with him, or even worse, that his dad would be someone Jayden didn’t want to know. The third possibility was the one he was most afraid of being true: that dad would be an old drunk or an addict, angry at life and lashing out at the people around him, and Jayden would hate him.

But he still had to know, right? He’d been told when he was fifteen by some woman from the Department of Child Safety that they’d contacted his dad, but that Jayden wouldn’t be sent to live with him. She wouldn’t tell him if the Department had made that decision, or his dad had.

There was something in Jayden that wanted to know.

Just… maybe he didn’t want to know just yet. The hope his dad wasn’t a total deadbeat might have only been a small one, but it had carried him for years, and he wasn’t ready to extinguish it too quickly.

He walked to Coles, the sudden chill of the air conditioning bringing up goose bumps on his damp skin. He headed for the two-minute noodles first because they were cheap, light, and easy to carry. Then, he found packets of soup, a bag of the cheapest frozen vegetables, and peanut butter and bread. The sweet chilli sauce he tossed in his basket felt like a luxury, but it was on special and would make his noodles and veggies feel more like a meal and less like a concession to his dire monetary situation. The two litre bottle of Coke was absolutely a luxury, but Jayden bought it anyway.

He was in the line for the self-service checkout when he felt the weight of someone’s heavy gaze on the back of his neck. He turned.

A man stood at the end of one of the aisles. He was older than Jayden—in his thirties, maybe. He was tall, wearing faded jeans and a thin T-shirt that pulled tight across his well-defined chest. His black hair was wet and slicked back, and his features were sharp, his nose hawkish, and his dark gaze intense as it suddenly landed on Jayden. Jayden felt transfixed, a prey animal held by the powerful stare of a predator about to strike. He froze.

And then the woman behind him huffed loudly, and whatever strange spell had caught Jayden was broken. He hurried forward to the next available checkout, mumbling an apology to the woman, and scanned his groceries with shaking hands. When he turned back to look again, the man was gone.