006

The five minute drive home passed in a blur as my mind swirled with questions and ideas and disbelief. I had begun to realise that it was less likely that I'd been talking to some alien creature with a basic grasp of the English language, and far more likely that I was experiencing hallucinations due to some unknown medical condition. Perhaps I had a brain tumour, or was experiencing a psychotic break, or maybe I had carbon monoxide poisoning. I'd heard of that happening, leaving people with bizarre hallucinations and gaps in their memory. As I pulled into our driveway, I resolved to call my doctor and book an appointment as soon as could be arranged. Clearly this was not the kind of thing that I should just shrug off. It could be serious. Maybe this was just a gigantic sign from the universe that I really, really needed to get my crap together.

I parked the car and leaned over into the back seat to grab my bag. As I turned back to the front, I gasped, adrenaline shooting out to all my extremities for the second time that day. There he was again, standing in front of my car, lit up by my headlights. By now I was so convinced that he was either a figment of my imagination or a bizarre alien life form that I forgot to be afraid, and instead felt ticked off that he'd popped up again so soon. I sighed, flicked off the headlights, and climbed out of the driver's seat of my trusty little Hyundai sedan. I slammed the door, hard, then squared up to him.

"What the hell are you doing here, Buddy?" I asked, hands on hips.

"I am here for you," he said, a smile spreading across his face.

Somehow, he looked slightly different. Older, maybe. Thinking about it, he hadn't looked like so much of a teenager during that backseat episode, either. I couldn't quite place it. Maybe it was just the fading afternoon light.

"Yeah, well, I don't want you here," I said rudely. I didn't care about being polite anymore. He'd started it by materialising in the backseat of my car, and anyway, hallucination or alien, he wouldn't know anything about etiquette.

I heard the sound of a car nearby, and turned to see Lena's small SUV turning into our street. I gasped, panicking, and threw my weight against Buddy, pushing him roughly around the corner of the house and out of sight.

"Move!" I hissed, pushing him further back as he stumbled over the old, uneven brickwork masquerading as a path. Lena absolutely could not see him. Absolutely not. I was not ready to try to explain his presence to her. I couldn't even explain it to myself. And her rather vivid imagination would have her making all sorts of assumptions that could make things uncomfortable. That's assuming his presence was real. And even if he was a hallucination, he felt real enough to me that I felt I had to hide him.

He certainly did feel real, I noticed, as I realised my hands were still pressed against his chest. Definitely real. Definitely solid. I looked up at him, our eyes locking for a moment. Heat rushed up my neck and across my face, and I quickly stepped back and dropped my hands to my sides. I sighed and ran my hands through my hair.

"Look, I can see I'm not going to be able to get rid of you any time soon, so I'm going to lay down some ground rules." I spoke quickly and quietly, hearing Lena's car approaching. "You do not enter my car without my permission. You do not enter my house without my permission. And you cannot let Lena see you." I narrowed my eyes at his blank, smiling face. "Do you understand?"

He smiled widely.

"I understand. But why must I not let Lena see me?"

"Because," I said, poking a finger at his chest. "You are weird. I can't explain you to her. And I don't want her asking weird questions. And I don't want you to to scare her like you scared me. And I don't want you to hang around me all the time."

He looked almost quizzical, his face showing some expression for once. I heard Lena's car pull into the driveway, but considering her usual habit of sitting in her running car for several minutes, I didn't panic.

"What do you want me to do?" Buddy asked seriously.

I paused, wondering what the answer to that really was. I was tempted to tell him to leave and never come back, but I knew in my heart I didn't truly want that. If nothing else, I was wildly curious about this strange phenomenon. And I still couldn't deny the way I felt drawn to him, attracted like a magnet. Somehow, mixed in with the anger, the confusion, the frustration, was a desire to be with him, get to know him, spend time in his company. I shook my head and looked him in the eyes.

"I want you, Buddy, to wait out here, out of sight, until I come and get you. Okay?"

His smile returned.

"Okay, I will wait for you."

I nodded, and stepped back out of the narrow path down the side of the house.

"What are you doing, Bea?" Lena's voice hollered.

I jumped and spun around, tripping on the bricks and almost falling over.

"Lena, hey! Hi!" I straightened up and brushed my hands on my pants. "I was just, the bricks, I was checking the bricks." I stammered uselessly.

Luckily for me, Lena was not particularly paying attention. She held up two bags of takeaway.

"Food's here! Can you get the door? My hands are full."

I fumbled in my bag for my keys, dropping them twice in my haste before I swung the door open and we hurried inside. I peered out the door, checking that the coast was clear, before locking it behind us. I couldn't be too safe. He seemed to actually obey my instructions, but there were no guarantees. Although, I realised belatedly, if his past exploits we're anything to go by, a door lock seemed unlikely to be able to stop him.

I got out bowls, spoons and chopsticks while Lena set out the dishes on the table. Before long we were slurping up noodles and sipping streaming bowls of pho.

"How was your day?" Lena asked between mouthfuls.

"Ok. Long. Weird. Tiring." I crunched down on a spring roll wrapped in lettuce.

"Hm. Sounds like a lot," Lena said, eyeing me.

I was taking another bite when I saw Buddy's head in the kitchen window above the sink. I choked on my spring roll, coughing violently. Lena hurried to the kitchen to get me a glad of water, and I started gesticulating madly at Buddy to hide. His head finally popped down below the window frame as Lena glanced up from the sink, turning off the tap and riding back to me.

"Thanks," I croaked as she handed me the water. I gulped it down quickly, heart still beating quickly, but relieved that we hadn't been caught. I coughed a few more times to clear my throat, realising that I wasn't cut out for this kind of excitement. My heart would give out in a few days if I kept going on like this. We finished our meal, and I thanked Lena, saying I would wash up tonight, even though we had both known that would be the case. We cleared the table and I ran a sink of water, squeezing in a couple of drops of dishwashing detergent and watching the bubbles multiply and rise. I began to wash, enjoying the mindless task and the time to get lost in thought. Lena interrupted once to offer me a gin and tonic, which I accepted and sipped at as I worked. I was completely in my own world when Buddy's face suddenly appeared at the window again, causing me to yelp loudly.

"What is it?" Lena asked, looking up from the TV show where two people were trying to make moves on each other while surrounded by a camera crew.

"Gosh, it was-" I spun my head back to the window to check that Buddy wasn't grinning stupidly straight at her. Thankfully he was gone. "I almost cut myself on a knife, that's all. All good!"

Lena went straight back to her TV show, and I smiled, noticing I was already getting better at lying. Maybe not a trait to be very proud of, but something I needed right now.

As for that Buddy, I thought to myself, we needed to talk, pronto.