Cody woke in a semi-comatose state staring at the ceiling of the shed. Lack of emotion consumed him. He knew he had to move, to get up and feed the hens and the dog.

Feed himself.

But he couldn't move and he didn't want to think. If he thought then reality would come beating back and he'd want to die. All he could think about was the intruder in his house. She had done this. She had opened the door to his past without his permission.

She had betrayed him.

Cody wondered if some kind of evil surrounded her. He thought about words his mother had often said, "What you put out there is what you'll get returned."

That woman inside his house had a life full of disappointment and cruelty. Did it follow her? Had she been cursed at birth and she had transferred it onto him and his life? Was she like a poisonous substance leaching into the very pores of anyone involved with her? Loathing burbled in his chest. Resentment knocked at his self-conscience and uproars of revulsion lapped at the fringes of his mind.

A light shake of the shed door switched on his brain. It brought him back to awareness but he remained silent focused on the roof. The door rattled again.

"Cody."

The sound of her meek voice dispelled his previous thoughts. He sneered. There she was again, controlling his essence with one word said in her sweet innocent tone.

He knew she couldn't come in because he had locked the door. It shook again. He covered his face with his pillow and held its thickness against his ears. If he didn't hear her voice, she couldn't control his senses.

The sound of the generator spluttering stirred Cody into movement. He climbed from the back of the truck and fed the animals. More eggs were in the coop so he gathered them while he listened to the woman pull on the cord. She hadn't turned on the fuel. The switch was well hidden at the back. She was an invader. Let her work it out for herself.

Once he had cooked himself some eggs, he climbed back onto the truck, lay on the swag and looked at the inlaid box he had made. If he opened it everything would crash down on him. If he didn't open it everything would still crash.

Hadn't it already?

Cody took a deep breath and pulled the box closer. He hadn't looked inside since he had put everything in it two years ago. He thought of his brother as he ran his hand over its smooth exterior. They had both made one the same.

A tight knot formed in his stomach as he lifted the lid. The first photo was of his sister and her daughter Suzie. They smiled at him. Cody lay back on the pillow with his arm across his forehead and smiled back at them. He thought of his sister. Sometimes he'd seen fear in her eyes. Why? He couldn't remember each moment but he felt regret.

Suzie would now be four, such a sweet child. A memory of talking with the woman about having a baby came to him. Had that happened? Had he said he wanted to be a father? To have a little girl just like Suzie who looked like her...

Fin...

There she was. In his head, directing his thoughts. A pain in his skull turned to anger. Resentment surged again.

He tossed the photo and lifted the next. His whole family; mother, father, Cod Fish, his sister, Suzie and his younger brother J. A talented musician. Give him any instrument and he'd know how to play it. Drums were his speciality.

Cody felt tears bubble over his eyelids as he laughed. J. the Jukebox Man, they had called him, because he had such an array of songs memorised, that he could play anything asked for. If J. didn't know it, he'd make up something out of the title.

Again, memories of an anguished face rushed at him. Cody sucked in a breath and studied the image of his mother.

J. had her hair colouring. A huge gulp of sorrow exploded from his chest. The sound echoed throughout the shed. What had he done to her? How had she coped with losing not one child, but two? Because that's what he had done, removed both of them from her life.

He looked into the eyes of his father. A strong, gentle, man who played the guitar. A true patriarch. Stalwart. A beam for the rest of the family to lean on. He had instilled his love of music in each of his children. How had he coped with losing his son?

Cody had seen reports about his instability, the medication he was prescribed and that he required medical assistance. It was true, there had been a time when he needed that shit to quell their fear that he might be unstable.

But not now.

He'd never understood why they cared after all the trouble he had caused them. Did they think he was dead? Were they happy with this thought? Had they held a service and prayed that his remains be found?

He burst into tears at the memory of Beau killing their son. It crushed his soul. He'd never forget the gun held in his hand. Blood seeped from the hole in his head.

There was nothing else for it. Beau Hawkins had to be killed off and buried so he couldn't hurt anyone else.

Images of blood. Blood everywhere leached over the screen of his mind. Cody gripped his skull and squeezed his eyes shut. "Fuck off! You did right! Fuck...!"

Blood on the ground. Blood on his hands. Blood from the hole in his head as dead eyes stared into the abyss.

The throbbing pain in his crown caused Cody to once more wretch and vomit over the edge of the Ute. The chickens scurried towards it.

"Fuck." He gasped again and lay back on the swag taking deep steady breaths. He'd had to do it. There was no other way because Beau would have kept hurting his family.

Once he had settled, Cody continued to go through the box of photos and by the time he came across the picture of him and his dead brother, his chest was so sore from his fight for breath that he thought it would crack open.

He hugged the photo to his heart. "I'm so sorry. Please know I didn't mean it to happen. Please forgive me."

The last thing he pulled from the box was a death certificate, age twenty-two and three months. The impersonator, Cody Compton, convulsed with his grief. He buried his face in his pillow and cried like he had never cried.

The photo above is mine but the actual drawing, and therefore copyright to the image, belongs to a homeless man who had his drawings laid out on the streets of Sydney. I do not know his name but he is an amazing artist.