by Fiona Lowe
None of them had ever seen Edwina cry like this. No one had ever seen her cry like this because she’d never allowed herself to cry in front of anyone. Not even Richard—especially not Richard. In the early months after Susan was stolen from her and when tears had hovered so close to the surface, she’d only allowed them to fall in the privacy of her room. It had been the start of her very controlled public demeanour—the behaviour everyone in Billawarre thought was a combination of good breeding, finishing school and innate grace and style. It was the start of her emotional void.
She blew her nose, hoping she could seize control and reassure Charlotte, Xara and Doug that she was all right. But whenever she tried to speak, it seemed to spark a harder crying jag. She cried for the consolation and comfort that helping Charlotte gave her and for the joy this wonderful new life—Teddy—brought her. All of it went some way toward tempering the enduring loss of baby Susan.
She keened for all she, Doug and Michelle had missed out on over the years but at the same time she gave thanks for Harriet, Xara and Georgie. She shed old tears for Tasha and for Eliza. She wept anew for Harriet—for the pain and heartache James had inflicted on her and for the pain and heartache she was inflicting upon herself by cutting Charlotte out of her life. She mourned the now shattered dream that one day she and Harriet would share a closer relationship. It hurt so much to have sacrificed that for Teddy but like most sacrifices, they didn’t come with much of a choice. She cried for all her daughters and their families, because no one was immune from the legacy of secrets and lies.
‘Should we call the nurse?’ Charlotte asked, her voice shaking.
‘Do we have a paper bag?’ Xara glanced around. ‘She’s going to hyperventilate.’
Doug’s hand gently gripped Edwina’s shoulder and his other hand rested under her chin. ‘Eddy, look at me.’
His face was a blur of creases and lines, salt and pepper stubble and dark, warm eyes. Eyes that understood. A breath shuddered into her lungs and with it came a semblance of calm. She harnessed it and was able to control the next breath. Slowly, her ragged breathing eased and the flow of tears lost their noisy accompaniment. Accepting a damp face washer from Xara, she pressed her hot face into the cloth, welcoming the cool.
‘Better now?’ Doug asked quietly.
She nodded. ‘It seems that becoming a great-grandmother is rather overwhelming,’ she quipped with a wobbly smile before standing to take Charlotte’s hand. Her chest, which often felt like a lead weight was sitting on it, suddenly felt remarkably light. ‘Darling, I’m honoured.’
‘I’m scared,’ Charlotte said.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you.’
‘You didn’t. Not really. I mean I’m scared about being a mum.’ Her large eyes implored. ‘What if I make a mistake?’
‘Darling, motherhood is all about mistakes. It’s how we learn.’
‘But what if I hurt him or—’
‘Babies are pretty tough, Charlie,’ Xara said with a laugh as she passed Teddy back to her. ‘Once I dropped Hughie and he bounced.’
Charlotte looked aghast and Edwina added, ‘Being a mum is all about love. There will be times when you don’t like what Teddy’s done and he won’t like a decision you’ve made, but as long as he knows he’s loved, it makes up for a lot of blunders.’
Does it? Edwina thought about Harriet and the deep and abiding love she felt for her eldest daughter. A love that fear had held back for so long that when it had finally defeated the debilitating barrier, Harriet had found love elsewhere and bonded with her father instead. It was a love inured by the repercussions of secrets and lies and in a misguided attempt to protect her, no one had ever told Harriet the complete truth. She looked down into the large dark eyes of her great-grandson. It was too early to know whose eyes he’d inherited but he was a part of her. She owed him the opportunity to grow up knowing his grandmothers.
Charlotte bit her lip and said softly. ‘Do you think Mum still loves me?’
‘Yes,’ she said firmly as Xara echoed her. ‘She loves you very much. She’s just struggling to accept you’re an adult making your own decisions.’ She dug her phone out of her bag. ‘I need a photo to show Harriet.’
‘She probably won’t look at it,’ Charlotte muttered, hugging Teddy so tightly he gave a little cry.
‘We’ll never know if we don’t give her the chance,’ Edwina said with more confidence than she felt. ‘Smile, Charlie.’ She snapped the photo.
CHAPTER
32
Harriet poured herself a glass of wine and took it outside, wanting to be away from the stacks of packing boxes that dominated Miligili’s surfaces. With only two weeks until she moved out, she’d intended to spend this evening packing but she couldn’t settle to it. She couldn’t settle to anything.
She disliked being distracted and it took a lot to derail her concentration. When she was operating, being preoccupied by anything other than the surgical field in front of her wasn’t a good thing and years of training enabled her to tune out distractions. This afternoon had put all her skills to the test. The early evening continued to challenge her. It had all started when she’d checked her phone in between cases at three pm. She’d only done it because she was chasing outstanding pathology results for an anxious patient and his family. When she accessed her voicemail, instead of hearing the apologetic voice of the pathologist, she’d heard Edwina’s rounded vowels telling her that Charlotte was in labour. Concentrating on anything else since had been an uphill battle.
She’d immediately rung the labour ward to enquire about Charlotte and was told things were progressing nicely. Harriet had thanked the midwife and rung off without leaving a message. After all, what did one say to a daughter after a seven-month silence?
I hope you finished your exam before the contractions started?
You should be getting ready for schoolies not motherhood?
Your life’s about to change forever?
Despite Harriet’s fervent belief eighteen years ago that motherhood wouldn’t change her life, Charlotte’s arrival had upended it. She’d spent years feeling torn between work and Charlotte’s needs, not that she’d ever admitted that to anyone. Female surgeons who wanted to rise through the ranks didn’t have that luxury. Men didn’t drop everything for a sick child—their wife was at home to deal with the inconvenience. In London, she’d had a nanny and on the weekend, James. In Billawarre, she’d had Edwina, Xara and James. It hurt to remember the man who’d once been so besotted with his young daughter was the same man who’d wanted to use her to help him repair his shattered reputation.
And now that little girl was having a baby.
The familiar nausea that came whenever she thought about the baby rolled through her. How could Edwina and Xara expect her to embrace it when its existence was going to make Charlotte’s life so hard? For the tenth time since arriving home half an hour ago, she picked up her phone and checked the time. Seven fifteen. Was Charlotte still in labour? It was very possible. First babies rarely rushed. She’d expected Edwina to have called by now to leave an updated message, but the phone remained silent.
It suddenly buzzed in her hand, making her jump.
On call tonight. Need to avoid froufrou fever. Going to new Lebanese joint with ortho crew. Join us? Andrew.
She stared at the words, both surprised and discombobulated. She hadn’t received an invitation—social or otherwise—in six months. Before James’s actions had knocked her off Billawarre’s social pedestal, she’d been someone people sought out. She’d had the connections people valued and needed. Invitations had poured in not just from Billawarre and environs but from Geelong and Melbourne too. She was often invited as the guest speaker at dinner functions, at opening events, and at fundraisers. Often, she was invited because her name on an attendees’ list encouraged others to accept. Part of Nicki’s job had been to manage her diary so she wasn’t double booked. How things had changed. She had few friends in Billawarre
now and it was a driving force behind her decision to go to Sydney.
Did you have friends before?
She wanted to say yes, but if the last seven and a half months had taught her anything, it was that she’d had acquaintances not friends—people who were either useful to her or vice versa. There was nothing like a scandal to expose expediency over true feeling. Although Jenny had stayed in touch, it had been Xara and Georgie who’d stayed true. Thinking of Xara made her reach for her glass of merlot. Anything to do with her family made her reach for wine. Hoping to divert her thoughts, she reread Andrew’s text.
Apart from that one time at the auction, she only saw him at the hospital. And ‘saw’ made it sound like they had a lot more contact than they did. Although he’d increased his hours and was at the hospital more often than when he’d started, any time they spent together was minimal. It consisted of brief conversations at the scrub sinks if their cases coincided or a quick sandwich and a coffee in the lounge if they happened to be taking a break at the same time. But when they did chat, his easy company and non-judgemental manner took the edge off her isolation. The other day she’d caught herself glancing at the board to see if he was operating and she’d found herself smiling when she’d overheard his country drawl explaining a procedure to a patient. The sad truth was that the sum total of these brief moments made Andrew the closest thing she had to a friend.
Dear God! She drained her glass and wished she’d brought the bottle outside. Once, if someone had disclosed something like that to her, she’d have considered them to be totally pathetic. She considered the dinner invitation. It’s not a dinner invitation. He’s invited you to join a group from the hospital.
Her surprise at his text had devolved from delight as doubt infiltrated. Did she want to spend the evening with a group of orthopaedic staff listening to their in-jokes?
She should be so lucky. Based on the headline splashed across the front of yesterday’s paper, the likely scenario was a café filled with hostile faces and difficult questions. Every time she thought James’s fraud story had faded and she dared to believe she was getting respite from the ordeal—at least until the court case—the local paper somehow managed to find something new to print. It was as if the journalist had a monthly reminder set on his phone: Find new dirt on James Minchin.
Yesterday’s headline was Ex-Mayor’s Cayman Caper. The article had been accompanied by a photo of James and Harriet taken on Seven Mile Beach during their holiday there two years ago. Although she was wearing a hat and dark sunglasses, anyone with a memory that lasted longer than a year would know it was her. The paper had previously used the photo in an advertising feature about travel.
She’d immediately telephoned Angela. ‘I want that bastard paper sued for defamation.’
Her lawyer had sighed. ‘There’s no case, Harriet. They haven’t defamed you in any way. They haven’t even mentioned your name.’
But the law didn’t live in a small town. The article had brought back the hushed conversations and the pointed stares. Did she really want to go out for dinner tonight and face all that?
I want to know if Charlotte’s had the baby.
She didn’t want to see the baby but she needed to know that Charlotte was okay. Decision made, she texted an apology to Andrew and was just about to call the labour ward for an update when she heard the distant buzz of the doorbell. It was faster to walk around the veranda than to go through the house.
As she made her way along the beautifully ornate tessellated tiles, she breathed in air redolent with the heady perfume of her Mr Lincoln roses. It was such a familiar late-spring scent and a tug of regret caught her. She’d miss her roses. She’d miss Miligili. She’d miss—
Stop it. There’s no family to miss. Dad’s dead and everyone else has let you down. Sydney has roses and Rose Bay. It has a harbour to die for and a job that will challenge you. More importantly, there are over four million people living there who don’t know you.
‘Hello, Harriet.’
Her mother’s voice cut into her thoughts and she realised with a start that Edwina was standing by the front door. Her usually smooth bob was in disarray, with strands of hair pointing in all directions. Her face was devoid of makeup although there were traces of smudged mascara around her eyes—eyes that were puffy and red. Her linen pants, always pressed with knife pleats, looked like they’d never known the touch of an iron, and her silk blouse had some sort of stain on the shoulder.
A knot of fear clenched her stomach. ‘Is Charlotte—’
‘She’s fine,’ Edwina said quickly. ‘Very well, in fact.’
Harriet’s heart slowed to its normal speed and the knotty and prickly distance that was a permanent part of her relationship with her mother re-established itself. ‘You look like hell.’
‘I do,’ Edwina said with an unfamiliar easy laugh. ‘I could have gone home and freshened up but I wanted to come straight here to see you. It’s been a rather momentous day.’ Her wide smile lit up her eyes like sparklers on a birthday cake. It wasn’t a smile Harriet associated with her mother. When Edwina smiled it was always done politely and with an air of refined restraint. There was nothing muted about this smile—it was open and full of joy. Harriet’s chest cramped as hard as it had the time she’d been winded by colliding with a polo mallet. Edwina was happy.
So? It’s not like you’ve never seen her happy before. Except she wasn’t certain she’d ever seen her this happy. A slow pain started in her gut, radiating through her although she couldn’t tell if it was pain for Edwina or pain for herself. She tried to shrug it away as an irrelevancy.
‘So she’s had the baby?’
‘Yes. The official time was eight minutes past six.’
The steel trap around Harriet’s heart snapped its jagged teeth shut and she saw spots. She felt her hands clench as she willed anaesthetising cold to rush in and deaden all her contrary feelings about this baby—a child who’d changed everything for her and for Charlotte. She told herself she didn’t need to know any more about the baby other that it was alive and healthy but she found herself asking, ‘Boy or girl?’
‘A beautiful boy. Edwin. Teddy for short.’
Her hand wrapped around the veranda post for support. ‘Named after you and Great-Great-Grandfather?’
‘Yes.’ Edwina hesitated before adding, ‘And your father’s name is in there as well.’
Edwin Richard. ‘So she does have some sense of family tradition after all,’ she said, blinking against suddenly itchy eyes.
‘It seems so.’ Edwina reached into her handbag. ‘Would you like to see a photo?’
Yes. But a photo would give too much reality to something she only ever wanted to think about in the abstract. ‘No.’
Given the last conversation she’d shared with her mother, she fully expected Edwina to try again and insist she look at the photo of her grand—the baby.
Edwina slipped the phone back into her bag and glanced over at the stile. ‘The wildflowers are beautiful at this time of year.’
‘The damp spring helped,’ Harriet said automatically, her mind still stuck on Edwina’s wordless acquiescence.
‘Come for a walk with me on the Stony Rises, Harriet.’
A walk? By default, a walk implied talking and as Edwina had told her the baby was a boy named Edwin, what else was left to say? Not much. Too much had been said at Easter and then at the hospital. Her relationship with Edwina was now so badly fractured that the only course of action was amputation. Going to Sydney would be the final severing.
She’d grown up sharing a private understanding with her father about Edwina. When Edwina experienced what he’d always referred to as ‘an episode’ or ‘the can’t copes’ he’d give Harriet a conspiratorial smile and say, ‘We know what your mother’s like.’ And she’d smile back knowing exactly what he meant and feeling that special bond with him. From the age of twelve, she’d felt a mixture of affection and frustration for Edwina’s vagueness and melancholy a
nd she’d taken over the mantle of responsibility for her after her father died. Everything changed when she’d discovered the reason for her mother’s periods of detachment. Michelle.
Now, the mess of feelings she felt for Edwina had coalesced into a seething mass of betrayal—not just for herself but also for her sisters and her father. Hadn’t any of them been worthy of Edwina’s love?
Every time she thought about her mother, Michelle and that man, she wanted to punch something and cry at the same time. She hated allowing her emotions to rule her so she did what she always did and blocked errant thoughts about her mother’s other family. She did the same with Charlotte and the pregnancy.
It’s Edwin Richard now. A hot and cold chill raced across her skin. She shivered and pulled her light jacket tighter around her.
‘Come for a walk,’ Edwina repeated. ‘I’d like to say goodbye to Miligili.’
‘You can do that without me.’
‘Actually, I can’t. Or at least, I don’t want to. Xara says you’re moving to Sydney and there’s some things I want to say before you go.’
‘I doubt I’ll want to hear them.’
‘It won’t be easy for me to say them.’
Harriet narrowed her eyes, not prepared to have the same argument she’d already had with Edwina and Xara time and time again. ‘You can talk until you’re blue in the face but I’m not changing my mind about Charlotte and the baby. You wanted her to keep it so they’re your responsibility now.’
‘It’s not about Charlie and the baby. It’s about me. By default, it’s also about you, me and your father.’
‘I’m not tramping across the Stony Rises with you, Edwina. And I’m not playing games with you either. Whatever you have to say, you can say it here.’
‘You’re right. I could say it here but I think it’s better for both of us if we walk and talk.’
‘Why?’
‘Because …’ She jerked her head toward the Stony Rises. ‘Both of us are calmer when we’re out there.’
Her mother’s unexpected perspicacity gave her pause. Harriet ran out there to think, to regroup and to try to find a sense of peace that had evaded her for most of the year. Edwina always had her hands in the soil of her garden and she walked in the bush twice a week.
