Alex sat alone in that spot he had found Stevie's car abandoned that cold morning. He had done his best to search the area. He really had no idea where to begin looking for her after that. So he sat in the last place he knew she had been. And tried to think. Something must have happened. Something terrible. Stevie and Grace would not have disappeared like that without telling anyone, or taking anything with them. They wouldn't have gone knowing how much distress it caused everyone at Drovers. Something terrible had happened.
He stopped with that thought, not wanting to imagine all the horrors that could have happened to the two women. Instead he thought silently over all the missed opportunities he had to make things right with Stevie. He thought over all the time he had wasted. It seemed so stupid. He had been stubborn and head strong and arrogant. And he had thrown everything away. She had been stubborn too. And neither was willing to make the first move. But he would have given anything now to have the chance to make the first move, to admit he was wrong.
He sat silently, trying to send her some kind of unconscious message that he was looking for her, that he would find her, that everything would be ok. And as he lamented about his past mistakes he waited for some kind of sign or clue to fall into his lap.
He thought back to that night, if only he had done something differently. He was the last one to see her. He drove often down that road to Drovers in the early hours of the morning. He hadn't slept properly for months. Each time he closed his eyes, there she was. He drove right up to Drovers Run. It tormented him, being so close to her, and yet so far. But it killed him more to be living awake alone in those dark lonely hours. So he began the pointless ritual of driving over to Drovers almost every night of the week. Just being there, close to her. So close, and yet so far.
Over and over he heard the words to a song, and he sang it softly to himself. "One day you'll call her and she will come running, fall in your arms, the tears will fall down and she'll say…"
But he couldn't remember the rest of the words. And he wasn't sure he wanted to know what she would say to him.
He didn't know how to approach her in daylight, didn't have the slightest idea where to begin. Nor even if he could. He'd seen her hatred in that dark stare directed at him, it gave a glimpse of her blackened heart. She wanted him gone. This time for good.
She was good at shutting people out. And she had done it previously to him, many times. She did it to a lot of people. She built walls around herself, and walls around those walls, and it took a lot of effort and time to get inside.
But this time was different. He didn't see those walls. They were long gone. He'd knocked down each and every one. And now what was left when he looked into her eyes was just her. Clouded by nothing. Purely and simply her, broken and untouchable. And that scared him. Walls he could knock down. But now he stood face to face with her, he didn't have the first idea where to begin. He never thought there would be a day those walls would be gone and he still wouldn't be able to reach her. He was supposed to call and she would come running and fall into his arms. It hadn't worked that way.
He'd always been able to reach her, and she him. Almost.
She didn't want him too reach her , so he respected that, telling himself he was doing the right thing, doing what she wanted. Rather then telling himself he was a coward.
And that night, he saw her for the first time since he had begun the ritual drive. She drove right past him. His heart quickened when he saw her ute, he almost swerved off the road. His first thought was that she was looking for him too! And then when she was gone as quickly as she had arrived, his heart sank. And his thoughts turned to the fact that he had been caught in his secret stalking ritual.
It seemed unreal, passing by her in the middle of the night. And for a while he kept on driving towards Drovers, even knowing she was not there. But Drovers wasn't Drovers without her, and he started to wonder where she had been going at this time of morning? Partly curious, and mostly not wanting to get caught hanging around outside Drovers at 2am, he turned around and headed back.
He found her ute along the road to town that morning. There was nothing inside it. Nothing to speak of. Just that silver nokia of Jodi's, and a jacket he recognised as belonging to Regan's sister, Grace.
Alarm bells rang in his head that very moment. Sitting in her car, touching her phone, something was wrong. He just knew it. He headed straight back to back to Drovers to wake them all. No one at Drovers knew anything. No one even knew they were gone until he arrived. And after that they knew only that Stevie, Grace and Regan were not home. The police weren't interested. No one seemed interested at first. Stevie and Grace did stupid things all the time apparently, which did not surprise him. Tess revealed finally that Regan had left early that morning- alone.
Days later when there was no word from Stevie or Grace, when they found that neither of them had taken even their wallet, then people began to worry. Regan had been summoned back from her mysterious trip to find hundreds of tearful messages from Grace on her mobile phone. Messages that were left days ago and nothing since then. Only then people started to worry. They made him feel unwelcome at Drovers, unwelcome in the search, like he wasn't allowed to be worried or allowed to care or even allowed to help them find the missing girls.
"What's it to you?" Regan had asked him, and he couldn't find the words to reply. He thought it self righteous of her to speak like that. She hadn't even cared at first. Didn't even come back from wherever she disappeared to. Kate, Tayler and Tess didn't seem worried, and it made him feel like he was the only one who cared. Or that they knew something they were keeping from him. They all seemed worried now though, but it was no consolation to him.
As soon as he found her car in the early hours of that morning he knew something was wrong. He searched the surrounding area so well that he knew every tree and stone for miles. He examined every inch of the car. It was fine. It hadn't been in an accident. The engine was working well. It was like they had vanished. Like once again Stevie had slipped through his fingers. And he spent his days walking along that road, calling her name, begging her to come back, and turning over and over in his mind wondering where she had gone.