by Emily Brewin
As the ambulance rounds the corner she peers up at the flats.
The dickhead from next door is leaning over the landing again, his fat guts pushed out by it. He shouts something at her and she wishes the railing would give way.
She climbs the stairs slowly, trying to figure out how to explain it all to Petey, and how she’ll function without Mr Granthall around.
Later she uses the spare key he’d given her to get into his place. She wants to check Churchill and collect a few things to take to the hospital.
‘Churchy,’ Petey calls in a voice croaky from crying. It had taken almost an hour to explain that the ambos had taken the old man and not Churchill. He couldn’t seem to imagine one existing without the other and it made him frantic.
He pounded the wall in the process of figuring it out. All she could do was watch and wait for him to run out of steam. When he did, she was there to catch him like always. She enjoyed holding the hot breathless heap of him in her lap again, despite the energy it sapped.
So here they are and the place is eerily empty, as if it hadn’t been inhabited in a long time. Violet’s eyes follow her around the room while she searches for the old man’s reading glasses.
‘He’s not here, Mum,’ Petey says in a high voice, hair still damp with perspiration.
The glasses are under the armchair.
‘He must be somewhere.’ She forces cheeriness into her voice as she bends down to lift the lacy cloth draped over the coffee table. ‘Check the bathroom.’
‘A dog in the bath,’ he repeats in a singsong voice, then laughs.
She smiles too, hoping to hell he is.
‘Churchill,’ they call together, searching the bathroom and kitchen. There are so few places to hide.
‘Biccy.’ Petey opens the pantry, emerging with a packet. She catches sight of the shelves. They’re crammed full of tinned dog food, family-sized packets of Arnott’s Cream biscuits and chicken-flavoured two-minute noodles.
How has the old bloke survived so long? Then she thinks of Vera’s diet of soft drink and ciggies and knows it’s possible.
Petey tears open the fresh packet of biscuits and, sticking one in his mouth, circles the flat yelling, ‘Biccy, Churchill. Churchill, biccy.’
She lets him go and walks into the bedroom. It’s like invading a sacred space, going through the huge wooden wardrobe in the corner to collect clothes.
‘God.’
There’s a row of Violet’s dresses perfectly preserved in plastic wrapping and an ugly brown suit. The inside of the robe stinks of mothballs and vegetable soup, and there’s a fine layer of dust over everything.
She holds her nose and turns around. Despite the pong, the bed’s made and there’s a pile of books stacked neatly beside it. The edge of a slipper sticks out from under the bed. When she kneels to retrieve it, she spots a tail and a fat fluffy arse. She exhales and gives it a poke. Churchill twists to look at her sadly but doesn’t budge.
She pats his rear end and calls Petey.
‘Biccy, Churchie,’ Petey says, disappearing under the bed. He rests his head against the dog and feeds him the biscuit while she bags slippers, a pair of striped pyjamas and the reading glasses. She almost takes the brown suit too, because there’s no sign of any other clothes, but thinks twice when the plastic bag splits open.
‘He’s sad, Mum.’
She sighs. ‘We gotta go, mate. Visiting hours’ll be over before we get to the hospital otherwise.’ And ties a knot in the top of the bag.
She checks the tray Churchill shits in then tells Petey to say goodbye. It’s surprisingly easy to convince him to leave. But before they go he runs to the kitchen and takes a can of dog food from the pantry.
‘I know how,’ he says, peeling back the top and emptying the sloppy lot of it into Churchill’s crusty dog bowl.
She’s impressed and a little taken aback at seeing him feed the dog. She bites her lip. Usually she’d take over in case he mucked it up. It makes her feel guilty that she underestimates him.
Petey even rinses the can in the sink before chucking it in the recycling bin. For an instant she sees a normal kid, one who can function without her. And her heart aches in a way she should be ashamed of.
‘Good job.’ She ruffles his hair as they head for the door. ‘We’ll take him for a walk tomorrow.’
‘Bye, Churchie,’ Petey calls as they leave.
She holds the plastic bag under one arm and whispers to the portrait of Violet before closing the door. ‘We’ll make sure he’s right. Promise.’
Isobel
THERE WAS A THUNDERSTORM the day she had the abortion. It rolled over the city, dark and ominous, as she got into her car. By the time she hit Punt Road the sky hissed and fizzed with it, and some primal part of her tensed despite being encased in metal.
She felt strangely removed but at the mercy of the pregnancy in the same way, as if it were happening to someone else’s body. But the light-headedness and queasy morning sickness persisted. Her breasts turned tender and swelled, and suddenly Marcus couldn’t keep his hands off them. It irritated then disturbed her, because her body felt as if it wasn’t her own anymore.
And it was as if Marcus was subconsciously joining the dots, despite the fact the baby couldn’t be his. His badgering had paralysed their sex life, and for eight mad weeks all she wanted was Bernard.
For a while it was easy to overlook the fact she was cheating on her husband and risking her job. The affair dominated her mind so completely it was hard to think of anything else.
But the pregnancy set her straight. She pictured it simply as a group of cells dividing inside her, moving towards some inevitable end that she had to intersect. In the beginning, it was almost impossible to imagine an actual baby. Babies were Marcus’s domain. But as the pregnancy progressed she noticed them everywhere.
The sky exploded as she pulled into the clinic, a double-fronted terrace house with a neat front lawn that might have been a family home. Rain belted the windscreen and it was easy, sitting there waiting for it to lighten, to imagine she was alone in the world. As the earth’s scent unlocked and the car’s cabin cooled, she thought of Marcus in a hotel room on the other side of the world and felt lonely.
It was always in the background, a hangover from her high school days. Usually it was easy to ignore but now it surged through her so she wondered if it might be best to put her keys back in the ignition and drive home. But the feeling passed with the rain and when she checked her wristwatch it said she was late.
There’s purpose to the way she chooses fruit and vegetables now. In the organic store around the corner from her house she smells then examines a bunch of wax-tipped bananas as if conducting a science experiment. She checks them for splits, thin openings that might breed contamination, and makes sure their colour is right. The slightly green ones give her indigestion.
It’s not just grocery shopping—everything she does has new-found purpose, as if she’s moving through the world on some kind of mission. She’s acutely aware that the life she’s sustaining is flimsy and fragile. One slice of soft cheese could set it adrift, a bump could knock it from its lining. Everything she does centres around maintaining it.
It’s taken the place that work occupied. She studies it with the same level of intensity. Hours pass while researching its development. At six weeks, the foetus has buds for arms and legs, and a tiny heart that beats a hundred and fifty times per minute. It keeps her mind occupied, away from her sick mother and inattentive husband.
There’s a small thrill as she places the bananas gently in her shopping basket. In less than eight months she’ll be a mother and Marcus a father. In the meantime, the changing shape of her body will announce it to the world. Some nights she can barely sleep for dreaming of it, a big belly, a newborn, a giggling toddler, a child getting ready for school. When she shares this with Marcus he nods, carrying on whatever he’s doing, and she gets a sense of how he felt all those years before. He’ll come around t
hough, she’s sure of it.
She strolls down the grains aisle and tries to recall the nutrients contained in quinoa. The store has the feel of an old-fashioned pharmacy, heavy dark shelves lined with glass jars and paper bags. Muted light streams through the shopfront window and people stroll quietly down the aisles with small woven baskets. There’s a stack of them near the counters. The whole place smells pleasantly of spices and damp soil and has the atmosphere of a church.
She scans the shelves for red quinoa. Marcus thinks it tastes like sand but this time she’ll try to get the consistency right. There’s a recipe her naturopath gave her that, paired with fish, is rich in essential vitamins. She smiles to herself. If it was good enough for the Incas then Marcus can put up with it, although she doubts he’ll be home until late. She reaches high for the quinoa, pushing the thought from her head.
Her stomach twinges as she retrieves the packet and she has to put her basket down. She closes her eyes, takes a few deep breaths to expel the pain and tells herself it’s normal; the doctor said some discomfort is common.
But the pain grows steadily worse until she’s perspiring with the effort of staying calm. She takes hold of the shelf in front of her while a large woman strolls past, her basket overflowing with green leafy vegetables.
‘Are you okay?’ she quizzes Isobel. ‘You look very pale.’
Isobel nods. ‘It’s just morning sickness.’ She does her best to smile and wishes the woman away.
‘Oh, bless.’ The woman’s plump hands tighten around the basket handle. ‘Can I get you a drink of water?’
‘No, no.’ Isobel waves her hand dismissively. ‘Thank you.’ And the woman wanders away, glancing back over her shoulder with a knowing smile.
By the time she makes it to the overlit public toilet down the back of the store there’s a wet sensation down below and a clanging fear in her chest she can’t shift. She hurries into a cubicle and slams the door, dumping her handbag on the chipped white tiles before unzipping her jeans and yanking them down.
There’s a smear, red and ugly, blooming like a horrible flower against her white lace underpants. She stares at it, air streaming out her nostrils, then squeezes her eyes shut, willing the stain to vanish. It doesn’t, and all she can hear is the sound of her heart slamming against her chest and the continual bubble of the cistern next door.
She sits heavily on the toilet and hangs her head between her legs, closing her eyes so she doesn’t have to see the stain. When she finally wipes and stands, she notices blood pooling rich and dark at the bottom of the toilet bowl.
Her head spins so she has to rest it against the grimy door. Somewhere beyond the toilet block, people are walking their dogs and driving their cars and eating their sushi in the park. It seems impossible that this is happening.
The sour smell of urine and unemptied sanitary bins fills her throat when she inhales, forcing her into autopilot. Do up jeans, pick up handbag, walk to car, drive to doctor. It’s a plan. She repeats it over and over because it’s the only thing she has to hang onto. She won’t ring Marcus, not yet.
Her GP said miscarriage was a risk. But it had been easy to believe otherwise, with the tingle of her breasts against her bra and the soft drag of her womb. She ignores the squeal of a door opening and groans too loudly.
‘All right in there?’ A woman bangs on the cubicle.
Isobel eyes the door. ‘Yes. Fine.’
The woman begins to hum cheerfully as she turns on the taps then the hand dryer. The familiar sounds are reassuring. For a moment Isobel thinks everything will be okay. The blood and the spasms are part of the process. All the books say it happens sometimes, a little blood loss. She layers her underpants with toilet paper and tries to ignore the stuff soaking through. When she flushes the toilet, some of it stays at the bottom.
The main door squeaks then slaps shut and the woman’s humming fades into the background so the place is almost quiet again. Isobel thinks she might stay here, in this safe space, where she’s still pregnant as far as she knows. But the brassy scent of blood forces her out after a while.
She opens the door slowly. In the wide speckled mirror opposite her pale face stares back, a deep line etched between her brows. The hand dryer starts again automatically, making her jump and sharpening her senses so that reality hits her like a fast train. She holds onto the basin until the room stops tilting. The baby’s gone and there’s nothing she can do.
Rosie
IF SHE WERE A BETTER MOTHER she wouldn’t be here. But some days he wears her down until all she can say is yes. After lunch, they walk across the patchy ground beneath the flat to Dulcy’s grocery store at the yard’s edge.
Churchill still refuses to come out from under the bed and Petey is convinced the pigs’ ears Dulcy stocks are what he wants. Dulcy gets them from an abattoir in the country and keeps them in a plastic bucket next to the cat food.
The ears are stiff and leathery and the veins stand out when Rosie holds them up to the light. She wants them in a bag so she doesn’t have to see them, but Petey insists on holding them. He likes the way they curl at the edges.
Rosie’s toey. Joel in his peaked hat and tracksuit pants haunts the narrow aisles. Every time she turns her head she expects to see him.
‘Don’t go running off, mate.’
Petey takes off anyway, back towards the pet food aisle, pigs’ ears in hand.
‘He not been back,’ Dulcy said when they walked in. But she still can’t shake the feeling he’s watching them.
Petey reappears, coming to a sliding stop on the highly polished floor with two small packs of gourmet dog food. The kind that looks like beef casserole and costs a bomb, ‘Please, Mum.’ The ears are nowhere in sight.
‘Where are the ears, mate?’
‘Churchy’ll like this stuff better, Mum.’
‘The ears, mate.’
A customer drops a tin nearby making her jump, and a light buzzes above. The sooner they’re out of this place the better. ‘We’re not here for those. C’mon, put them back.’
Petey stiffens and she just knows she’s in for a fight.
‘Now, mate.’ She’s not in the mood.
He begins to whine, loud enough that a woman pushing a stroller past frowns at him.
Rosie grabs his arm. ‘Shhhh,’ and tries to prise the packs from his hands. It’s the wrong thing to do but she’s beyond caring. He drops them and they clatter across the floor. The whine becomes a howl.
‘Jesus,’ she hisses. ‘You got the ears,’ she says, even though she knows it’s useless. Her throat tightens.
‘He frightening the customers.’ Dulcy rounds the corner, eyes like lasers, tugging the collar of her pink work shirt.
Suddenly it’s all too much. Dulcy’s rage, the threat of Joel, her screaming kid. She slaps Petey hard, harder than she ever has, across the cheek. The release is instant. It takes brute strength not to do it again.
His screaming stops abruptly, and for an instant the silence is golden. Then he looks at her, the dark freckles on his nose standing out against his too-white skin. An accusation. It won’t be long until the guilt sets in.
Petey turns and runs before she realises what’s happening.
She’s a bad mother. She lets him go, happy for five seconds of peace before the panic takes hold.
‘You still want the ears?’ Dulcy shoots her a look that says ‘you’d better’ and goes in search of them.
Rosie peers over the service counter, out the door. He’ll be on the playground at the bottom of the flats for sure. He waits for her there sometimes while she picks up milk and bread.
From the counter she can see the slide, battered and shiny from a thousand bums, and the old swing set. The wizzy-dizz is out of sight, but he must be on it. He loves the way it spins. ‘Faster, faster,’ he yells until he becomes a streak of colour. It makes her sick just watching. But he’s always had a thing for spinning. It was the first sign he was different, the plastic rings he’d spin for ho
urs on the floor while the other toddlers at the church playgroup fought over trucks and train sets. She thought it was a pretty good party trick until the maternal child health nurse looked concerned when she mentioned it.
Dulcy takes her time, and she can’t hear Petey shriek the way he usually does on the spinner. It makes her antsy.
‘I’ll pick them up next shift,’ she yells into the dim depths of the store.
There’s no reply but she walks out anyway, stopping briefly while her eyes adjust to the sharp winter light. The playground’s empty. A lone swing sways on its chains, creaking, and the slide cuts a diagonal line across the sky. Further back, the wizzy-dizz spins slowly, propelled by the breeze or by the force of a recent push.
She grits her teeth. ‘Petey,’ she calls, and walks closer to the playground, resting a hand on the slide. ‘Mate?’
She shields her eyes and scans the yard. It’s bleaker than usual in the August light. The wire mesh fence surrounding the perimeter is saggier and the scuzzy render of the flats more depressing. They rise high above the muddy earth while trees, leafless and lifeless, dot the path leading to Dulcy’s store. No one else is around.
‘Petey!’ she yells, despite the fact he’s probably hiding close by. ‘Mate!’ She stalks the base of the flats, poking her head around the stairwell and behind the fire hydrant box that stinks like piss. ‘Mum’s not mad anymore,’ she calls into the cold breeze, strands of dark hair sticking to her lips.
She starts to jog then run, blindly, around the fence line. He wouldn’t have gone outside it. He knows the rules. The roads around the flats are choked with cars and taxis, parked or circling slowly for a spot. Beyond them, rich people’s terrace houses line a manicured park. There’s a hint of cityscape over the plane trees.
She stops, spins like a dancer back to the flats, expecting to catch a glimpse of his hair disappearing around the building or ducking beneath the slide. Nothing. How long’s it been? She can’t tell. It seems like hours but couldn’t be more than twenty minutes.
