I know the where but not the what. I know I’m in the right place, but I still don’t know exactly what I’m looking for. I pick up rocks and squeeze them, checking which ones feel like the right size for Sylvie’s story. Some are too rough or the wrong shape for my hands, so I chuck them into the water. It’s so windy I don’t hear them go splosh. Other rocks are smooth but too big to carry, or too small – way too light for all Sylvie’s secrets. I find one stone with a white spiral on it – a fossil, Dad would know what kind – and I think of the ancient snail shell in The Lorax. I left my bag in Papabee’s car, so I put the fossil-stone into my pocket.
A fossil’s just a stone that remembers. I jump from rock to rock and think about the memories of stones. I wonder if the stones here can remember us, and all those summers before it went wrong and people’s names stopped working. Can the stones remember the feel of Dougie’s bare feet? Sylvie’s too?
I walk right around the headland to the far side, checking stones as I go, and filling my pockets with rocks until each step goes clink clink. The tide’s changing more and more of the headland into rock pools. On a flat rock higher up I find a dead crab claw, turned completely white from the sun. I open and shut the pincer like a mouth. I sniff it. It smells of salt and secrets, so I put it into my pocket with the stones.
Gill
Sylvie says, ‘Dougie’s dead.’
She looks right at me. ‘Those letters weren’t from him, were they.’ She’s telling me, not asking me.
I nod.
‘He didn’t just break his leg.’
I nod again.
I say to her, my voice tight, ‘I’m so afraid.’
‘I know.’ Sylvie breathes in, her nostrils pinched tight. ‘Tell me.’
‘He drowned.’ I hear myself say it. We’re telling each other. ‘He died in the cave.’
She gives a small gulp, half swallowing a sob.
I wait, ready to tell her more. If she asks, I’ll tell her everything. But she doesn’t.
‘How did you know?’ I ask.
Sylvie
There are lots of things that I could say to her. The letters. All of Mum’s silences, and all of her words. Dad being gone for so long. Teddy, and the urgency of all his little bribes and offerings.
What I most want to tell her: I tasted it. I tasted the grief in the mourning notes of cumin, and in the sharpness of the ginger in her lentil soup. I listen to food the way other people might listen to music – the same attentiveness. I’ve learned that a meal can be a love letter or a eulogy or a prayer, or all of those at once. So I ate my mother’s grief.
Gill
She talks about how my food tasted different. She tasted my mourning. She ate it.
‘What about the letters?’ I ask.
‘You sounded a lot like him. But there were just too many of them. He never wrote that often, before.’
Of course. I’d been too conscientious – I got carried away with trying to make it real. He was a good brother, but he was still a nineteen-year-old boy – of course he hadn’t written that regularly.
‘I didn’t want to hurt you,’ I say. ‘I was trying to protect you.’
‘And there was all that stuff about museums.’ She rolls her eyes a bit. ‘That was you, not Dougie.’
I laugh through my sobs. I understand, now, Louise’s measured stare, and why she didn’t push me about telling Sylvie. Louise had given Sylvie more credit than I had.
‘Remember how he complained when you made us go to MONA?’ Sylvie says.
I nod. I’d herded the kids into the car to visit the new art museum. ‘Just this once,’ I said, ‘we’re doing something for me. God knows I’ve spent enough hours of my life watching you kids play sports.’
Dougie had imitated my voice, calling out to Teddy and Sylvie, ‘Pack your bags, kids! We’re going on a guilt trip!’
His voice, our laughter. Dougie. The actual Dougie – funnier and more annoying and more real than anything I managed to conjure in those letters. Dougie. And there’s a noise now that takes me a minute to recognise: it’s me and Sylvie laughing and crying together.
Sylvie
Mum says, ‘I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.’
I shake my head. I know what it is to hide from things. I haven’t told her my secrets. I haven’t even told Teddy, for all his trying.
‘I get it.’ I get that it wasn’t me she was protecting. Or not only me, at least.
‘I was so terrified that you couldn’t handle the news. But I shouldn’t have done it.’ She wipes her face with the back of her hand. She looks old, for a moment. Properly old – older than Papabee. ‘Dad wanted to tell you. I didn’t let him.’ She swallows and stares at me. ‘We’ve got to get better at telling each other the truth.’
She waits, like it’s my turn. Like I’m going to open my mouth and let it all out: all the reasons, all the secrets.
Her phone rings.
Gill
It’s Papabee, calling from his mobile.
‘Gillian? It’s your father.’
‘I know it’s you, Dad. It comes up on my phone.’
‘Not now.’
‘Yes now,’ I say. ‘I’m looking at it right now. It shows on the screen: Dad, mobile. I’ve told you this a thousand—’
‘No, I meant, let’s not discuss that now. I think I may have made a mistake. I rather think something’s gone wrong.’
‘What do you mean? Is it the car again? Have you lost the car?’
‘No – I’m at the car now, in fact. It’s Teddy. I’ve waited, but it’s been a long time now, and I’m wondering where he’s got to. It’s getting very cold, you see. And it’ll be getting dark soon.’
‘Where are you? Dad, where exactly are you?’
‘That’s the thing. I’m not entirely sure.’
Sylvie
‘It’s Teddy,’ Mum says, when she hangs up. ‘He’s missing, and Papabee doesn’t know where they are.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He’s at a car park. And he said something about a beach. He can still see the car. A car park, a beach.’ She’s repeating herself, as though she’s afraid she’ll forget a detail. ‘He says he can’t see Teddy. Hasn’t seen him for a long time.’
Certainty settles in my gut. ‘He’s at the Neck.’
‘How the hell would they get to the Neck? Papabee can’t drive that far.’
‘He’d do anything that Teddy told him to. And he took Teddy there just a couple of weeks ago.’
‘What are you talking about? We haven’t been to the Neck.’
‘They have. Teddy just didn’t tell you.’ Oh Christ, all these secrets.
‘Why would he go there? And why again now? Sue and Dan aren’t even at the house this weekend.’
‘They haven’t gone to the house. He’s at the beach.’
‘He’s probably fine,’ Mum says. ‘It’s probably just Papabee being Papabee. They’ll just be at Nutgrove, and Teddy’ll have wandered into the ice cream shop, or gone off with some friends, or something.’ Nutgrove’s the small, suburban beach just ten minutes away, in Sandy Bay, where there’s only the sluggish estuary, and not the real sea. ‘They’ll be fine.’
‘Of course they will,’ I say. We both know it’s nonsense: people in other families are fine. That isn’t what happens in our family.
We run to the car. As soon as we’re out of the driveway, Mum tosses her phone onto my lap. ‘Call the police.’
I ring 000, and I try to explain to the operator.
‘You have to send a police car. He’s only eleven, and we don’t know where he’s gone.’
‘And this was reported by who, your grandfather?’ the operator says. She asks me for Papabee’s name.
‘Edward Barwell?’ she repeats. ‘We have a note on file – is this about his car?’
‘No, not this time. I mean, it’s sort of about his car, but it’s not lost. He drove my brother to Eaglehawk Neck.’
‘Can we speak to Mr Barwell dire
ctly?’
‘You can – I can give you his number – but it won’t do any good. He hardly ever answers. And he doesn’t know what’s going on most of the time—’
‘But he says your brother’s gone missing at Eaglehawk Neck?’
‘He didn’t say at the Neck. But we think that’s where he’s gone.’
Even as I’m saying it, I can hear how unconvincing it all sounds.
‘You have to do something,’ I say. ‘My brother’s already dead.’
‘He’s already dead?’
‘My other brother. Look, it doesn’t matter. You have to send someone to look for Teddy.’
‘We can let the local station know. But I’m sure you understand that we’re going to need a bit more information before we send anyone out.’
I give them Papabee’s number, and beg them again to send somebody, but she’s saying something about it not sounding like a cause for concern, and telling me to stay calm, and in the end I just hang up, so I can call Papabee again. But he doesn’t answer, and it goes through to voicemail, and I don’t know whether he’s on the phone to the police, or whether he just hasn’t heard his phone ringing.
Usually it takes just over an hour to get to the Neck. Mum does it in fifty minutes, driving our beaten-up old station wagon like a race car. She comes skidding into the car park, bits of gravel flicking against my window.
I don’t know what to feel when I see Papabee’s car there. Relief, because we’ve come to the right place. Or fear, because there’s a reason there are no other cars here, and no tourists to be seen: it’s cold, and already almost dark. Beyond the car park the unforgiving sea is churning the dark with its waves. The tide’s in, turning the tessellated pavement into segmented pools, and the headland is cut off altogether.
Teddy
I climb right to the top of the headland. A few years ago we saw whales from here – two of them, surfacing again and again, making their own islands in the sea. We watched for hours, and the grown-ups let us bring our dinner down to the beach so that we could watch the whales until they’d gone.
Today there’s nothing to see. Nothing to the sea but waves, high and messy. It’s getting dark – like somebody’s colouring in the edge of the sky grey. Getting so dark I can’t tell any more which bits are sea, and which bits are sky.
I look back down. The headland has got a lot smaller, and a lot more island-y. I’ve been here for longer than I’d realised. I scramble down, scraping my knee, and rush to reach the path back to the beach. But the path isn’t there. The tide’s sneaked up on me and snatched it away, and the headland is an island now.
Dougie would have remembered to check the tide. He was always sensible that way – always watching out for the rest of us, in a bossy, big-brother kind of way. That was one of the reasons it’s so stupid that he drowned. He knew all about tides, and water, and not swimming near the rip. I forget to be sensible about things like that. I can imagine what Mum and Sylvie will say, when they hear what I’ve done: Teddeeeeeeee! they’ll say in that impatient way that I’ve heard a million times.
But I don’t have time to worry about getting into trouble. I’m worried for Papabee. I’ve already left him alone on the beach for way too long. If I’m really stuck – truly, actually stuck – the worst that will happen to me is that I’ll get cold and probably a bit scared, when it gets pitch black. But Papabee won’t know where he is, or what to do. He can’t drive home without me. He might not even find the car without me. And when I think about him being frightened and confused in the dark, I start to cry, and I’m crying a little bit for him, and a bit for me, and then the crying gets bigger, and now for Dougie, and Sylvie, and Mum and Dad too. I cry for all of us.
Gill
I leave the car door open and run straight down to the beach, straight past my dad, who’s standing not far from the water. I run towards the island. I’m looking for Teddy’s footprints but the tide’s high and it’s taken most of the beach. Two seagulls are above me, screaming. It sounds like perfect outrage, perfect hunger.
I spot him, a tiny figure on the island. He’s squatting on a rock at the edge, not far above the rough water. He sees me, and stands up, and I shout Teddy for God’s sake stay where you are, stay out of the water, and wave madly with my arms, Go back up up up I’ll get help. But he doesn’t get it, he thinks I’m just waving, because he waves back, and I think I should never have come here because that’s when he does it: steps closer, down onto the small plateau just above the water, and the next wave comes and hides the plateau altogether. At first he’s OK, he braces his little legs wide and manages to stay on his feet, and the wave starts to withdraw and I think Maybe he’ll be OK, he’ll climb back out, but the wave going out takes him with it, sweeps his feet away so he’s dragged on his back over the rocks and I see his arm go up, and then a leg, and then I can’t see him at all.
Teddy
It’s dark and my pockets are full of stones. It’s not just that. The water’s so heavy when it’s on top of me. The cold’s heavy too.
Is it because I tricked the anemone? I should have listened to Sylvie. I should have listened.
Too heavy, too much water pulling down my clothes, my skin, my hair.
And I’m the brother in the water. It’s me.
It’s dark. I’m slipping out of my name.
Too heavy. Stone for bones.
Gill
I see the dark water take him and I shout, Dougie. Dougie.
And I turn back to see Papabee and I think Fuck fuck if I go in and get into trouble, he’ll follow, and Sylvie too. Caught between my father and my children and where are the fucking police.
I shout: Dad Papabee Dad don’t follow me whatever you do don’t come into the water and he waves cheerfully and I turn to yell the same thing to Sylvie but it’s too late she’s already in.
Sylvie
My brother’s name follows me into the water. Dougie, Dougie, Mum yells, and then Teddy and then my name, too, Sylvie.
The water so cold it wrings the air from my lungs. A wave hits me in the face, knocks me down and under the water.
I am not strong. My heart’s not strong. I’m too thin, too wasted, to fight all that water above and around me.
But I have this stubborn body. This faithful body, that has refused to let go, refuses still. I have lost enough, and I will not lose him.
I swim through the dark water. I reach for him. I grab his hand.
Gill
They’re both in the waves. Papabee too, down the beach but in the water now, knee-deep and edging deeper, watching the children.
This is where it ends. Who am I waiting for, to end it? Not Gabe, who isn’t here, or Sue, who has her own children to care for. Not Papabee, of whom I’ve already asked too much. I’m the only one who can end it. The only one who can save them, or myself.
I’m in the water, the outrageous cold making my body a stranger, clumsy and slow. The dark sky squats over me as I search for my children in the waves.
Sylvie’s found Teddy but she can’t hold him up, and she’s being dragged down. When she comes up to gasp for air, her hair is a net thrown over her face. I grope for Teddy in that tangle of water and limbs.
I’m rough with him – no time for tenderness. My elbow hooks around his neck, his jaw sharp against my arm. Sylvie, too, surfacing again now that I have Teddy’s weight.
We drag our bones towards the shore, through the black water. When did water get so heavy? Gabe tried to tell me about this – tried to tell me something about the weight of water – in one of his phone calls. I get it now. I carry the weight until the sand steadies under my feet and all I have to bear is the weight of our own sodden bodies, and I stand.
Teddy
Ever since Sylvie went into the Boneyard, I’ve wanted to know if it’s better to be alive or dead, and how to choose. The water teaches me that it’s not a choice. My body chooses: live live it sends me kicking and squirming but the stones in my pockets can only say down do
wn down. Even when Sylvie grabs me I still can’t stop fighting up towards the air but I only drag Sylvie under with me. My body wants that air it wants to live and Mum’s pulling us up and dragging us to the beach but my body already made the decision for me it was done.
I’m on the sand at Sylvie’s feet. Maybe this is the price I have to pay, the very last one: my body, on the sand.
Sylvie bends to whisper in my ear.
Gill
I slump over, hands on my knees, and take a breath. Another. I’m shaking, in great ungainly jerks of cold. Sylvie is beside me; Teddy lies on the sand between us, breathing in noisy gasps.
Further up the beach, Papabee’s still standing knee-deep, watching the horizon with an expression of vague interest.
I cough up seawater and phlegm. I can still hear my own screams: Dougie. Teddy. Sylvie. I say the words again and again, giving my children’s names to the sea.
Sylvie squats down to where Teddy lies.
She bends to whisper in his ear.
Sylvie
I am not here to drown him in my secrets. There are no easy answers and no simple stories.
I want to tell him: There is never just one answer. I am not just my wounds and my secrets. Yes, there were footsteps on the stairs. But they’re only one part of the story, which is also a story about Cordelia, and the Fool, and Dougie and Ella on the beach, and the way that girls find themselves carrying the weight of being women.
He thinks I’m going to tell him my secrets. They are my own. Instead, I want to tell him about himself. I want to say: Teddy, don’t be like me. I want to tell him: You can live in books, but you can’t only live in books. The price doesn’t have to be everything, or nothing. You don’t have to erase yourself to be seen. You don’t have to seek the answers in the sea, or write the answers with your bones. Your body doesn’t have to be the price.
The Cookbook of Common Prayer Page 30
