by Nicole Trope
Birdy thought she would have to wait until she was free again to see Rose, but now Rose has been convicted of a shocking crime and she and Birdy will be together. Birdy has been saving all her anger for Rose. It is Rose who should have protected her and kept her safe. Birdy was little but Rose was big and she knows Rose could have saved her.
This is a story about monsters who hide in plain sight and about the secrets we keep from ourselves. It is about children who are betrayed and adults who fail them. This is the story of Birdy who was hurt and Rose who must be made to pay.
A provocative and compassionate read from the queen of white-knuckle suspense and searing family drama. You won't be able to put it down.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Grateful acknowledgement is given for permission to reproduce extracts from ‘The Adventures of Isabel’ by Ogden Nash.
Copyright © 1936 by Ogden Nash, renewed.
Reprinted by permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd.
All rights reserved.
First published in 2015
Copyright © Nicole Trope 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.
Allen & Unwin
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest NSW 2065
Australia
Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.allenandunwin.com
Cataloguing-in-Publication details are available from the National Library of Australia
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ISBN 978 1 76011 372 8
eISBN 978 1 92526 666 5
Internal and cover design by Lisa White
Cover photograph: Getty Images
Typeset by Midland Typesetters, Australia
For all the women in my life past and present:
the grandmothers,
the mothers,
the daughters,
the sisters,
the aunts,
the nieces,
the cousins,
and the friends
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
OTHER TITLES BY NICOLE TROPE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Chapter One
She’s coming today. She’s coming here. Right here to where I am.
I thought I would have to wait until I was free to see her. I thought I would have to wait two years to see her. Two whole, long years. I haven’t seen her for a lot longer than that. I haven’t seen her since I was eight years old and now I am thirty-three years old. That’s twenty-five years.
When I was eight, all I wanted was to get away from her, from him. From them. I wanted to go far away and forget them, but even after I moved away they stayed in my head. They stayed in a corner of my brain, not doing anything, just there, but one day something happened, something horrible and awful and bad and then they were almost all I could think about. And I knew I had to see them again.
I had a plan. I was going to catch a bus to her house. First I was going to catch a bus to their house, but now there is only her left. So it’s only her house.
I know about catching buses and trains. I know how to use my phone to ‘get directions’. I can go anywhere I want to, but I can’t go right now because right now I have to stay here. I know that. I can learn and I can remember things if I’m told over and over again. I just need to hear things more than once. Sometimes I need to hear something lots and lots of times. The door to my brain is always open. Stuff comes in but before I know it, it goes out again. I can’t seem to close the door fast enough.
I know things now. More things than people think I know. I’m not that stupid. I can read and write and add and subtract. I know who I am and what I am. I know I am not clever. All through school none of my teachers ever said, ‘She needs to work harder.’ All of them said, ‘She’s doing her best. She’s really trying.’
Sometimes on her report card Lila’s teacher wrote, Lila is not working to her full potential. Potential means what you can do. Lila is clever, very clever, but Mum said she is also lazy. They never wrote that about me. I always worked to my full potential even though that was not very much potential at all.
I’m smart enough to know I’m a little bit stupid, or ‘slow’ as Mum likes to say. I’m smart enough to know I’m slow. That’s how smart I am. I used to get angry about being slow, about not understanding things and about having to learn them over and over again, but now I just accept it. ‘Not everyone can be the top of the class,’ Mum said to me every time I brought home my report card. But I didn’t want to be the top of the class. I just didn’t want to be right at the bottom. But right at the bottom is where I stayed. I never had very much potential at all.
Mum said she was fine with me being at the bottom of the class, but she wasn’t. Not really. Just because she told me she was fine doesn’t mean that was the truth. I knew how she really felt. When I was little I heard her. I heard her tell the truth all the time.
‘How am I supposed to deal with something like this? I don’t have a husband to help me. How can I cope? I’ll have to watch over her for the rest of my life. When do I get taken care of, Violet? When?’
I wasn’t supposed to be listening. I was supposed to be playing next door, but I was hiding and I was listening to Mum talk to Aunty Vi who lived in London. I used to be good at hiding. I could stay quiet for a long time. When I was quiet I would hear lots of things I wasn’t supposed to hear. That’s how I knew that Mum wasn’t fine with me being at the bottom of the class.
‘I know, Violet, I’m not saying I’ve given up on her, but she’s always going to be a little different, isn’t she? I mean, she’s nearly eight now and the other children are already starting to notice it . . . I know that there’s nothing you can do. You live in another country. I’m not asking you to do anything. I just need someone to talk to. You have no idea how difficult it is to be alone in this world, no idea at all.’
I was in the cupboard under the stairs where the winter coats were stored. I was touching the fur coat that belonged to Mum. She never wore it because she didn’t like it, so it lived under the stairs like a lonely pet. It was soft and warm.
‘I don’t know what will happen to her. I’m just not coping right now. I’ve had to sell the house. Did I tell you? We’re moving to a dreadful little shitbox out in some horrible suburb. It was all I could afford Violet . . . I’m not asking you for anything, I’m j
ust trying to talk to you. I am so . . . so humiliated by all this. What have I done to deserve such a life? What?’
Mum’s voice was all wobbly. I knew she was crying. She was crying about the house, because she had to sell it so the bloody bank wouldn’t come and get it. Back then I thought the bloody bank was a giant who could lift up our whole house with one hand and take it away. At night I had dreams about being crushed in the bloody bank’s giant fingers. I had hidden my most special toys behind my chest of drawers. When the bloody bank took the house I was going to grab them and jump out of the front door. Under the stairs I patted Mum’s lonely pet fur coat and thought about hiding it as well. Now I know that a bank is just a building where you keep your money.
I was afraid the bloody bank would take everything away, but I wasn’t sad to be moving. I wanted to leave the big house more than anything in the world. I hated it. We were moving far, far away. Our shitbox was very small. I would still have my own room, but the carpet was grey with sticky patches on it, not like my carpet in my bedroom in the big house. That carpet was peach-coloured and soft. I liked to put my cheek on it and feel it tickle me. I knew that the sticky grey carpet wouldn’t feel nice on my cheek, but I still liked the shitbox better than the big house.
‘Stop talking to me about new beginnings, Violet,’ said Mum. ‘Your husband hasn’t left you for someone else. Your husband is probably sitting in his armchair right now reading the newspaper. This is not a new beginning for me. It’s the end of my life as I’ve known it. He could have had the decency to allow me to live here for another few years, but the bitch he married wants her own house.’ Mum was finished crying and she was shouting at Aunty Vi. She shouted at Aunty Vi a lot after Dad left to live with the bitch. Lila and I never got to meet the bitch. Mum wouldn’t let us. ‘Your father doesn’t give two hoots about either of you,’ said Mum.
I have not seen my dad for almost my whole life. He had blue eyes and he would shave the hair off his face and cut himself and say ‘bugger’.
When I hid under the stairs I was scared of Mum shouting at Aunty Vi and crying. Some days Mum shouted at Aunty Vi and then when she was finished shouting at her she shouted at me. I didn’t like shouting days.
That was so many years ago. Some things stay in my brain even when I don’t want them to. Sad things and bad things won’t go out even when I leave the door open.
They stayed in my brain. They stayed and stayed. I think about him and I think about her. They are both stuck in my brain, but now he is gone and she is coming here.
She is coming here today.
I thought I’d have more time to plan before I saw her. I didn’t expect them to bring her here to where I am. I needed time to plan what I wanted to say and what I wanted to do, but now that I know she’s coming I don’t know what’s going to happen.
No, that’s not true. I know what’s going to happen; I just don’t know how it’s going to happen.
I don’t know who first found out she was coming here, but now everyone knows and everyone is jumpy and excited. The news about her coming was whispered from person to person and ear to ear until everyone knew. No one whispered to me, but Jess told me. She tells me everything I need to know. ‘A real celebrity here, imagine that,’ said Jess, but she didn’t smile so I don’t think she was happy.
For weeks and weeks all the women in my unit have watched her on television and tried to decide: did she do it?
I live in unit seven with Maya and Mina and Jess. They shout and argue and laugh when they talk about the ‘did she or didn’t she’. They shout and laugh and talk about lots of things. They all know about so many things. They know about celebrities and sport and history and the weather. They know about cooking and sewing and people you can’t trust. Jess says, ‘I think . . .’, and Mina says, ‘Well, in my opinion . . .’, and Maya says, ‘I know.’
I don’t talk with them. I am quiet. I am good at listening.
I don’t care if she did or she didn’t. I’m just glad that he is dead and buried under the ground with the worms. I hope they are crawling all over his skin. I have to rub my arms when I think about the worms crawling on his skin. I have to make sure there are no worms on me.
When I think about her coming here I have to swallow and swallow so I don’t throw up.
Last night I lay in bed and I wondered if she would know me or not. I chewed my nails as I lay in the dark and thought and thought. I made my fingers bleed. In the dark I could feel the sting on my skin that means I have torn off a big piece of nail, and now when Jess sees it she’ll say, ‘Oh, Birdy, you were doing so well.’ I hate disappointing Jess. She was going to give me a proper manicure at the end of the week. I had already chosen the colour. It’s a pretty pink colour and it’s called ‘No Baggage Please’. That’s a funny name for nail polish but I like it anyway.
I got some blood on the sheets because even when it hurts I can’t stop myself from tearing off pieces of nail, and I know when Allison comes around to do her inspection she’ll shake her head and sigh but she won’t let me change the sheets. I’ll have to sleep in them until laundry day.
This morning when I woke up I looked in the small mirror over the basin in the bathroom and I knew that it was silly to worry about her knowing me. The me she knew is not the same me now. I dye my hair black and I’m an adult. I take up a lot more space as well. A lot more space.
‘You don’t need all that starch,’ Jess says to me when we make dinner, but I like the potatoes and rice. I like being bigger. Besides, rice and potatoes are cheap. They fill you up nicely. We have to buy all our own food and there is never enough money. I am good at counting out my money. I keep it safe until canteen day.
On canteen day we get to spend our money on things that we want, not just things that we need. You need bread but you don’t need chocolate. Maggie runs the canteen and when she sees me she smiles and says, ‘and what can I get for you today, young Birdy?’ I like Maggie. Once she gave me a free bar of chocolate. It was all squashed but it still tasted the same. Jess doesn’t like to see me eating chocolate. She shakes her head and says, ‘If you would just cut back a bit you could lose some weight.’
‘But I don’t want to lose weight,’ I always tell her. ‘I like being big and strong.’ ‘There’s no one to be afraid of in here, Birdy,’ says Jess. ‘You don’t have to be big and strong.’
I would like to tell Jess that she has no idea what I have to be afraid of, but she knows some things about me and she also knows about being afraid. Everyone here knows about being afraid. We are all locked up in here because of the things we’ve done when we’ve been afraid.
Anyway, I’m not scared of anything here. I’m just making sure that I can be seen. When I was small I couldn’t be seen. Even after I had grown up and I was as tall as Mum, some people couldn’t see me. Mum never really saw me. I wanted to be seen but I also wanted to be light and free to fly away. You can see things that are light and free if you look carefully, but as quickly as you see them, they’re gone. Now I am big and I cannot fly away, but at least I can be seen.
‘Move out of the way, you big lump,’ said Jess when she wanted to get to the kettle, and then she said, ‘Sorry, Birdy.’ I don’t mind being called a big lump. You know a big lump is there. You can’t pretend that it isn’t. When I was light and small there were a lot of things to be afraid of. Now I’m a big lump and sometimes people are afraid of me.
I wonder what she was afraid of. I wonder if she was afraid of him. I wonder if she is afraid of coming here.
It doesn’t matter anyway. I don’t care about her thoughts and feelings. I don’t care about what she did or didn’t do.
Mostly, mostly, I care about what I’m going to do to her.
Chapter Two
This place is really not as dreadful as I feared it would be. It is almost a relief to be here now, to have the waiting over and done with. There were some surreal moments in the last few weeks where I became convinced that I would be locked forever i
n the limbo of waiting to know my fate. Some nights, as I waited for my sentencing hearing to finally begin, I found myself drawn to those lamentable television prison dramas. I watched them with growing horror and I decided that there was a fair chance I wouldn’t make it through the first week of my incarceration without being stabbed in the shower by some woman sporting a giant tattoo of a skull and crossbones. The thought of having to get into a communal shower was beyond humiliating, although I had no idea if the showers were communal or not.
One night I stood in front of my full-length bedroom mirror for nearly an hour, looking at myself from every angle, identifying flaws. I knew as I was doing it how ridiculous it was to worry about such a thing, but I still kept looking. I imagined the eyes of hundreds of strange women on my body, and I wanted to curl into a ball and stay under the bedcovers forever.
‘It’s not going to be like that at all, Mother,’ said Portia when I told her what I was dreading.
‘Then what’s it going to be like?’ I asked, and I had to struggle to keep myself from dissolving into tears. Portia does not tolerate self-pity. She spends too much time with underprivileged children and teenagers and doesn’t think that anyone else has a right to complain. ‘If you had seen what I’ve seen’ is one of her favourite mantras. It ends every conversation very quickly. It is of little value to remind her of my own childhood in a suburb populated by immigrants trying desperately to make a new home for themselves. Perhaps I have glossed over what it was like when I reminisce about those days to my children. I am sure I have never told her of the nights when Lena, our next door neighbour, would knock on the door, waking us from sleep. Her face would always be sporting a fresh bruise. Her three-year-old twins would be by her side, tearful and exhausted, and hasty beds would be made for them all on our living room floor. ‘Sleep it off, Rolf,’ I would hear my father shout through the locked front door when the banging began. ‘Sleep it off.’
Sometimes Portia is insufferable, but lately she is the rock I have come to rely on. Logic rather than sympathy is what I need right now
