Excerpt: The Basement Tapes

“Daddy.”

Little hands curled around the brass doorhandle, pulling it downward so that the door could be pushed inward. The room beyond was darker than the rest of the flat, the drapes at the window pulled tightly closed. Into the room tiptoed a six-year-old girl, carrying a mobile phone in one hand and the ears of a fat purple stuffed rabbit in the other.

“Daddy?”

The hand holding the ears of the rabbit let go of the toy, and the girl raised herself up on tiptoes. She felt around for a lightswitch with the very tips of her fingers, drawing her bottom lip in through her teeth, and pushed down on the switch when she had located it. Bright fluorescent light flooded the room, lighting up all that was contained within – a built-in wardrobe with mirrored sliding doors, a dark blue plastic laundry hamper that was close to overflowing, a dark grey hard shell guitar case, a queen size bed with a black bedspread, and a set of pine night tables.

The girl reached up onto the bed and put the phone down atop the bedspread, climbing up once her hands were free. The object of her quest lay very close to the middle of the bed, facing the window and almost buried in the covers. Only a shock of light brown hair and the sound of someone breathing gave any indication that the occupant of the bed was anything that could even remotely be considered human.

She grinned widely, before creeping up to the head of the bed on her hands and knees. Once she was seated, she grabbed a handful of hair and lifted it upward, and leaned in very close.

“Daddy!”

And with that, Taylor Hanson was wide awake.

“Jesus Christ!” he all-but-shouted. He twisted around in bed only to come face to face with his daughter. “Miki, for hell’s sake,” he groaned. “What time is it?”

“Don’t know,” Miki replied. She scrambled back to the end of the bed and retrieved the phone. “Uncle Zac’s on the phone,” she told her father, holding out the phone to him.

“You mean that he was on the phone,” Taylor corrected. “Did you hang up on him again?”

“Uh huh.”

Taylor let out a rough chuckle. “You, Michaela Maree, are an absolute terror,” he laughed softly before flipping his phone open. It wasn’t long until he was scrolling through his phone directory in search of his brother’s number, and was soon dialling.

“Hello?”

“Your niece hung up on you,” Taylor informed his younger brother. He glanced across at Miki, who had climbed back down off the bed and was now contentedly playing with her toy rabbit. “She pretty much screamed in my ear to wake me up.” He rubbed at his free ear as if Miki’s shriek had given him an earache. “So what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Only that I’m on my way down there right now. Train’s just pulled into Helensburgh.”

“Shit,” Taylor muttered. “Well, thanks for the heads up. I have to get dressed now.”

“Yes, please do,” Zac said, his tone vaguely disgusted. “The last thing we need is for everyone in Wollongong to be scarred for life.”

“Oh, you know you love it.”

Zac let out a bark of laughter. “Right. Anyway, you get some pants on, and meet me at the station. And I hope you’ve got breakfast going, because I am starving.”

“You’re coming grocery shopping with me in that case. There’s almost nothing in the kitchen.”

“What, your last orgy cleaned you out?”

“Do you want to walk all the way to my place?” Taylor asked pointedly.

“Okay, sorry. I’ll see you soon.”

“See you soon,” Taylor confirmed, and hung up. “This should be fun,” he muttered.

“Daddy?”

Miki had now abandoned her toy, and was peeking up over the edge of the mattress at her father. “Yeah Miki?” Taylor responded.

“Is Uncle Zac coming to visit?”

“Yes, Uncle Zac is coming to visit. Which means that you need to get dressed, and I need to have a shower before I get dressed.” He kicked the covers off and raised himself up, swinging his feet over the side of the mattress. “You go and watch TV for a little bit, okay?”

“Okay!”

Taylor watched Miki run off out of his bedroom, dragging her rabbit along the floor behind her, before running his hands through his hair and letting his eyes drop closed. Based on past visits he knew that it typically took Zac’s train forty minutes to travel between Helensburgh and Wollongong. He also knew that it took him around five minutes to get from Keiraville into the centre of Wollongong, longer if the traffic was backed up. “Dear God, give me strength,” he muttered as he opened his eyes and stood up.