Promise

by Sarah Armstrong

  She turned the corner and ran across the road; she’d miss her bus if she didn’t hurry.

  He sighed. ‘Okay, okay. So . . . sounds like you don’t feel like we’re all that solid.’

  ‘Well, we’re as solid as we could be after six or whatever it is . . . seven weeks . . .’ She worried that he had some fantasy of their relationship. Which was strange, given he dealt with the law and its evidence and rationality all day long.

  She saw her bus in the distance and picked up her pace. Then stopped. She couldn’t have this conversation while boarding the 310 to the city. ‘I’m not sure your kids would be dying to meet me anyway.’

  He said, ‘Okay, if that’s what you want. But let me worry about my kids and whether they want to meet you.’

  She felt a lurch of distance between them. There it was again, that faint hesitation she’d felt before.

  Shit. Being single was so much easier. ‘It feels like we’re heading towards solid . . .’ she said.

  This was mad, all this talk of degrees of solidity. What the hell did solid mean anyway? She watched her bus pull in at the stop.

  ‘Look, I’m happy, Dave. I’m really happy with us. We’re just at the beginning of things, that’s all.’ She wanted things to work out with Dave. She hadn’t felt this way since Ben, which was all the more reason not to rush in and screw things up. ‘There’s no hurry, is there?’

  ‘Nah, no hurry. It’s all good. Don’t worry about it,’ he said. His cheerfulness sounded forced.

  ‘Have a good day,’ he said. ‘And let’s talk later. I’ve really got to go. My meeting’s about to start.’

  She hung up and walked slowly to the bus stop, feeling a bit sick. Had she just fucked things up? Outside the halal butcher, she dropped onto the bench and fished in her bag for a clip. As she tied her hair up into a messy bun, she pictured herself from above, a 37-year-old woman sitting quietly and waiting for the next bus, her dilapidated rented house around the corner, and her neat desk, piled with work, waiting for her in Redfern. A woman without children and unlikely – it would seem – to ever have them, someone whose greatest pleasure came from growing a garden from cuttings and cheap plants she bought at the hardware store.

  She was not ambitious. Anna knew that about herself and she knew that some saw it as a flaw.

  This life is the rest of my life, she thought. When she was twenty, anything had seemed possible, but she’d been certain she’d be a mother at some point. Even at thirty, she had sensed hundreds of different paths her life might take. Now, she guessed that this – more or less – would be her life. Maybe she’d always be on her way in or out of a relationship. Even so, this was a good, simple life, surely. Surely.

  •

  She was late to work and sat straight down to a phone call with a new client, Vita, a wellness blogger. Instead of taking notes, Anna found herself drawing the chives, their slender stalks and the small tightly packed buds that she knew would come. Anna made agreeable noises while Vita talked on and on about how clean and fresh the design needed to be, and she checked her phone in case there was a message from Dave. Nothing.

  •

  When she got home at dusk, the air was still balmy and the girl was running around the backyard, leaping over the sprinkler, her t-shirt stuck to her belly and back. Charlie skidded on the long grass and stamped on a pile of dark, wet cardboard boxes. The plastic milk bottle sat on the path, still half full. Anna’s heart skipped at the sight of red blobs in the grass, then she saw they were rose petals. All the blooms had been stripped from Helen’s roses and were scattered around the backyard.

  Chapter Three

  After watching the news, Anna made herself a chicken salad and poured a glass of wine. She imagined Dave at the restaurant with his kids. She’d seen photos of the eleven-year-old twins, a girl and a boy, both white-blond like their mother. He’d pointed her out once, jogging along the water’s edge at Bondi Beach. From a distance, in her black exercise gear, the ex-wife had looked very serious, and beautiful in a bony kind of way. Anna tossed the dressing through her salad, and thought that she should have just gone to the bloody dinner. Maybe she would have done a perfectly good job of appearing warm and witty to a couple of teenagers. As she dropped onto the couch in front of the television, there was a quiet knock on the back door.

  The girl from next door stood on the top step in pink shortie pyjamas. She offered a small, tight smile as Anna slid the glass door open.

  ‘Charlie!’

  The backyard behind the girl was completely dark. She must have climbed the fence or come in the gate from the back lane. ‘Come inside.’

  The girl tiptoed barefoot across the doormat and stood on the lino, arms pressed close to her side, thin shoulders slightly hunched.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Anna crouched beside her. The girl’s small feet were muddy and she smelt of cigarette smoke. In one hand, she gripped a small plastic doll with purple hair.

  ‘I’ve lost Bunny.’ She looked straight at Anna with that unblinking, unsettling gaze.

  ‘Is Bunny a toy?’

  The girl nodded.

  ‘Where’s Mummy?’

  She didn’t respond.

  ‘Who’s at home with you?’ Anna pictured Charlie’s mother asleep in front of the television, unaware that her child had drifted out the door and into the night.

  Charlie rubbed a finger on the wooden tabletop. ‘Have you got any biscuits? I’m hungry.’

  ‘Yeah, sure. I’ll get you one.’ Anna stood up. ‘Who’s home with you?’

  ‘Mummy’s gone out and I can’t find Bunny.’ Her bottom lip wobbled. ‘Can you find him?’

  ‘Let me get you that biscuit.’ She found an unopened packet of Iced VoVos her dad brought the last time he visited. Charlie took a biscuit and examined it before taking a huge bite. Shredded coconut dropped to the floor. She chewed steadily, her eyes fixed on Anna. Her tufty short hair was a similar shade to her skin, which gave her a strangely washed-out appearance.

  ‘Where’s Mummy?’ Anna asked again.

  ‘She’s home soon.’

  ‘And Daddy?’

  The girl shrugged as she finished the biscuit and took another two from the packet. ‘Do you have any fruit tin?’

  ‘Like tinned peaches, you mean?’

  The girl nodded, chewing steadily.

  ‘No, sorry. I don’t.’

  ‘That’s what Nella always has.’

  ‘Let’s go and see if we can find Mummy.’ She didn’t have any choice, did she? She had to go next door. Anna had a horrible vision of finding the mother dead. She was thin enough to be a junkie. ‘Come on,’ she said to Charlie, and grabbed her phone.

  ‘What’s that?’ The girl pointed to the table and the sketch of the chives Anna had brought home.

  ‘A little drawing of a plant I have out there.’ She nodded towards the backyard.

  The girl touched a finger to the drawing and followed Anna out the front door. Anna slipped on her sneakers and set off down the path. The girl lagged behind, taking small steps. Anna waited, then reached for the girl’s hand. Charlie didn’t hesitate. Her hand felt dusty and so small in Anna’s, like a doll’s.

  The front gate creaked and the sensor light snapped on as they climbed the steps. Anna hoped that the man wouldn’t be there. She hadn’t seen or heard him since the night before.

  Anna knocked on the door and called out, ‘Helloooo? Hello, Gabby, are you there?’

  Charlie stood very still by Anna’s side. Around them, on the front porch, was a pile of flattened cardboard boxes and a rolled-up disposable nappy. Was the girl still in nappies?

  Anna peered in the window. In the glow coming from the television she saw the outline of an armchair, and in the hallway, light shone from what must be Charlie’s room.

  She really did not want to go inside. But what if the mother was in there, sick? What if she’d overdosed or something? Anna’s gut clenched as she tried the front-door knob. It was locked.

&nb
sp; ‘Which door did you come out?’

  ‘Back door.’

  ‘Okay. Let’s go around the back.’

  The back door was wide open. Anna paused at the bottom of the steps. The hallway was dark but for faint light coming from the girl’s room and the flickering TV. She climbed the steps and leant in through the doorway.

  ‘Hello? Gabby? It’s Anna from next door. I have Charlie.’

  Anna made herself step into the dim hallway.

  ‘Hello?’ she called again. She groped for the light switch and prepared something to say if the man appeared: Your daughter knocked on my door. I was worried. What’s going on?

  In the kitchen, dirty dishes were stacked in the sink and on Helen’s old formica table sat a couple of bulging black garbage bags. Anna walked up the hall, Charlie trailing behind her, the carpet strangely spongy underfoot. They passed Charlie’s room where there was a single mattress on the floor and clothes strewn everywhere. A night-light glowed pink on the floor.

  In the living room, the massive television was on mute, showing a shopping channel. Anna glanced into Helen’s old bedroom. Her wardrobe and dresser were still there but the bed was gone. There was a double mattress on the floor, the bottom sheet half off, revealing a grubby mattress cover.

  Where on earth was Charlie’s mother? Had she just ducked out? Had something terrible happened? Anna resisted the curling dread in her gut. She remembered the story of two toddlers who’d survived for days in their apartment after their single father nicked out to the shops and was hit by a car and killed.

  ‘Which is your room?’ she asked Charlie, although she already knew.

  The girl pulled on Anna’s hand. ‘Come.’

  In the bedroom, Charlie knelt and grinned up at Anna. ‘This is my fairy castle.’ The bright pink plastic castle with pointed turrets and triangular flags was the kind of thing Anna would have loved as a kid. ‘Mummy gave it to me.’

  ‘Wow.’ Anna knelt and touched a turret. A sweet, synthetic smell reached her. Could the plastic be perfumed? Surely not. ‘How old are you, Charlie?’

  Charlie wound a small handle to lower a purple drawbridge. ‘Five.’

  ‘Right.’ She looked quite a bit younger than the five-year-old daughter of Anna’s friend, Emily.

  Charlie looked up. ‘How old are you?’

  ‘Thirty-seven.’

  The girl nodded matter-of-factly, a small plastic princess in each hand. She pointed one over Anna’s shoulder. ‘That’s your window.’

  Anna turned. Through Charlie’s window she saw her own kitchen, with the new paper lightshade and blue bottle on the windowsill. She hadn’t realised the view was so very clear.

  ‘Did you see me there tonight, cooking my dinner? Is that why you came over?’

  ‘I saw you eating something red.’

  ‘Capsicum.’ A car throttled down the street. God, she hoped that Gabby or the man weren’t about to come home and find Anna there. What the hell was she doing in some stranger’s house?

  Charlie put the princesses down and lifted some clothes off the floor. ‘I put myself to bed.’ She sounded on the verge of tears. ‘And I need Bunny.’

  ‘What does Bunny look like?’

  The girl glanced at the ceiling. ‘Grey. A rabbit.’

  Anna lifted the quilt off the bed and the ammonia smell of urine hit her.

  It was an uncharitable thought, Anna knew, but if the girl’s room was on the other side of the house, and her window looked out to the other neighbours, then the girl would have gone there – to the elderly couple that Anna sometimes saw out walking their two small dogs – and they’d be the ones dealing with the mother’s disappearance. And undoubtedly better qualified to do it.

  Anna saw something grey and fluffy under a piece of pink clothing. ‘Is that Bunny?’

  Charlie snatched up the toy and hugged it to her chest. The girl looked small and fragile in the chaos of clothes and toys. She gazed at Anna with a fixed smile, and disquiet flowered in Anna’s gut again.

  Anna made her voice light and cheery. ‘I’m going to write a message for Mummy and let her know you’ll be at my house. Okay?’

  ‘Ohh . . .’ She chewed her lip.

  ‘Yes,’ said Anna firmly. ‘I’m not leaving you here by yourself.’

  She might be irritated that she’d been dragged into this, but she was not irresponsible. Anna led Charlie out the front door and scribbled a message on Helen’s notepad that was still in the meter box. She wedged the note into the screen door.

  By the time Anna settled Charlie onto her couch, the girl’s eyes were drooping. She ate two more Iced VoVos and a handful of dried apricots. The toy rabbit tucked under her arm smelt of beer.

  Anna sat beside her but didn’t try to make conversation. What did you say to a child whose parents have disappeared? If the mother or father didn’t turn up by morning, Anna guessed she’d have to call the police. Charlie fell asleep, a half-eaten apricot in her hand.

  Anna removed the apricot and lifted the girl’s feet to lie her flat on the couch. God, she reeked of cigarette smoke. The poor kid. And her legs were spotted with bruises. What had she been doing? The pyjama shorts rode up her thigh and Anna saw it: a dark purple circle, no, two half-circles that nearly joined. Teeth marks and a small scab. A bite mark.

  Anna fell back on her heels, blood thumping in her ears. Was it a human bite? Someone or something had bitten the girl hard enough to draw blood. She gently bit her own forearm and compared the size of the marks. They looked the same.

  She pressed her fingers hard onto her eyelids for a moment, her mind whirling. Then she retrieved a cotton blanket from the linen closet and laid it over the girl, and knelt on the floor for what felt like a long time, watching Charlie’s chest rise and fall, wondering if it could really be a human bite.

  In fifth grade, Anna had bitten a boy. Gordon Patterson had teased her all year, and one day, as he flicked her cheek, she grabbed his arm and sank her teeth in. There was no doubting the savagery of biting. It was not something that happened accidentally; you had to decide to bite someone, and you had to keep biting for a while to draw blood.

  A car door slammed outside, and Anna pulled back her front curtain. A car pulled away and Gabby opened her own gate. Anna stood on the porch and called, ‘I’ve got Charlie here.’

  Gabby wore all black, her hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. ‘Oh? How did that happen?’ she drawled.

  Anna could smell her cheap perfume from a few metres away. Gabby crossed to the low paling fence between them, wobbling on her high heels. Was she out of it? How Anna wished that it was still Helen living next door.

  ‘She knocked on my door.’

  Gabby grimaced and tottered about on her stilettos. ‘Sorry about that.’ A truck’s air brakes blurted on the main road at the end of the street. ‘She’s normally fine on her own for a little while.’

  Who the hell leaves a five-year-old on their own? And who the hell bit her? Gabby must know about the bite; it simply wasn’t possible she’d missed it. What if it was Gabby who’d bitten her? Oh, what a nightmare this was.

  ‘Is she asleep?’ asked Gabby. Her eyes were heavily lined in black, which made her look even more wan than earlier.

  ‘Yes.’ Three teenagers walked down the footpath on the other side of the road, laughing loudly.

  Gabby scrabbled in her little handbag and moaned, ‘Shit. You haven’t got a cigarette, have you?’ She was definitely stoned.

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  Gabby tried to close her bag. ‘Just pass her over the fence.’ Her voice was flat. ‘Or will I come ’round and get her?’

  The air between them felt jangled.

  Anna turned back to the house. ‘I’ll bring her out.’

  Charlie didn’t stir when Anna picked her up from the couch; she was warm and floppy limbed. As Anna reached the front door, the girl jerked awake and sat up in Anna’s arms.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Anna said. ‘I’m just taking you to
your mummy. She’s home.’

  ‘Okay,’ the girl whispered. Charlie’s breath was bad, not just sour but slightly rotten. Anna trod carefully down the steps in the dark, Charlie’s arms tight around her neck. She walked in the front gate next door and passed the girl to Gabby. Charlie tucked her face into her mother’s shoulder.

  ‘Ta,’ said Gabby. As she turned away from Anna, a car passed by, lighting up the pale trunk of the solitary gum tree on the verge. It was such a dismal, lonely sound, a car driving away into the night. Anna watched the woman and child as they disappeared inside and the door closed behind them.

  •

  She woke at three – insomnia hour – and lay motionless for a moment, listening hard in case it was a sound from next door that woke her. But there was only the drone of traffic from the M1. The air felt thick and soupy. Most people died around 3 am and she understood why; the day was at its lowest ebb.

  Her mother had died at 3.30 but Anna didn’t find out until dawn, when her dad woke her by sitting on the side of her bed. Anna noticed that he smelled of mint toothpaste and that he had his clothes on.

  ‘Mum’s gone,’ he said.

  She half sat up. ‘Gone where?’

  ‘Dead. She’s dead.’

  And Anna’s head had ballooned until it seemed to fill the room, blood pulsing in her ears.

  She’s dead.

  From that moment on, for years, everything around her was slightly off-kilter: the shape of the front door, the smell of her bedroom. Even the way the water shot out of the kitchen tap was wrong. And she couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that Luke had ten years with their mother while Anna had only eight. She would never ever get those two extra years.

  Chapter Four

  Anna leant on an elbow, doodling. She was supposed to come up with a new logo for an IT company, and she’d covered the page with circles, all versions of her laptop’s ‘on’ button.

  She was alone in the office; Russell and Monica were in the meeting room with a new client and Clay had the flu. She kept doodling and came up with a clichéd version of the company’s initials. She clicked through to their website to look for inspiration, then, before it finished loading, she typed in a Google search: child bitten. She tried another search, and another, until her huge screen offered up a photo of a child’s face: a dark, bruised bite mark on a plump cheek, the eyes obscured with a black box. The child’s skin was grey, and with a cold wash of horror, it occurred to Anna that it might be an autopsy photo. She closed the tab and walked away from the computer, her chest tight.