The Making of Christina

by Meredith Jaffe

  ‘CC, what a surprise seeing you here.’

  Christina banged her head against the roof of the car. Clutching her throbbing skull, she spun around. There, in the semi-darkness, she saw him lounging on the bonnet of a car.

  He continued to speak in that warm familiar way. ‘It’s been months, CC. Life’s been lonely without you.’

  Jackson left a gap for her to reciprocate but she could not. His soft voice, reminiscent of a time of love and longing, hurt. A thousand times she’d imagined what it would be like when she spoke to him again. It would be in court, she would be in control, steely in the face of the monster who had hurt her child. But here was the old Jackson, with the crooked grin and the merry eyes, poking holes in her defences.

  Except that Jackson was not real. ‘You’d better get used to being lonely,’ she snapped. She scrutinised the car park but saw no one. Where was her phone? Christina felt her pockets but came up empty. As Jackson sauntered closer, she realised how stupid she’d been to park in a corner spot.

  ‘C’mon, honey, you can’t switch feelings on and off just like that,’ he said, clicking his fingers in front of her face.

  She flinched but held her ground. ‘There’s an AVO out against you, Jackson. You’re not allowed anywhere near me.’

  Jackson ran his hands down his face. When he looked at her, his eyes were filled with sadness. ‘Can you hear yourself, CC? I never thought we’d come to this.’

  ‘Come to what?’

  He raised his arms and let them fall to his sides. ‘Did you stop, even once, to think about what you’re doing to me?’

  An elderly couple battling a trolley with a wonky wheel steered it to the car opposite hers. Options whirred through her mind: beg the couple for help, call the police, run back to Andy’s or jump in the car and drive. Where were her keys? Jackson paused and they watched the couple put the shopping bags in the boot of the car. His wife beamed at Christina and gave a little wave. Jackson returned the old man’s salute as they exited the car park.

  She watched their brake lights disappear.

  Jackson leaned against the rear passenger door, stretching his arm along the roof, inches from her. ‘How could you believe for one moment that I would hurt a hair on Bianca’s head? I’ve always treated her like one of my own. The three of us built a world together and you want to throw it all away before you’ve checked your facts.’

  His fingers were close to her head and she swore they were creeping closer. Christina leaned away but the open car door trapped her. Her only option was to brave it out. She reminded herself he had never physically hurt her. It made breathing a little easier. She said, ‘What facts would they be, Jackson?’

  He looked confused. ‘The ones you’ve used to manufacture these trumped-up charges, CC. If you had issues with my behaviour, why didn’t you raise them with me face to face? After thirteen years, surely you owed me that. But no, instead you conned Bianca into playing your stupid games.’

  His words cleared her head. ‘I haven’t conned Bianca into anything, Jackson.’

  He shrugged. ‘Honey, c’mon. Let’s stop this charade. You love me. I love you – despite all this craziness you’ve put me through.’ He cracked his trademark crinkly grin.

  Anger spread through her like a shot of hard liquor. ‘You’re in breach of your bail conditions, Jackson.’

  His grin faltered but he pressed on, ‘You’re not listening to me, CC. Drop these silly charges and let’s go back to the way we were.’

  Christina laughed. ‘How, Jackson?’

  His left leg twitched and she knew it meant he was losing his temper but he continued speaking in an even and persuasive voice.

  ‘I want to marry you, CC. Declare our commitment in an open and public way. I’ve let this loose end dangle for far too long.’

  She spotted her mobile phone half hidden beneath the towel she’d used to make a nest for the mangoes. She grabbed it and began dialling. ‘Why, Jackson? So you can shut me and Bianca up and save your own sorry arse. I’m calling the police.’

  Jackson lunged at her, pinning her to the car and twisting her head sideways in one movement. She had never seen him move that fast. Pain stabbed above her eyebrow and blood trickled from a cut. Jackson dug his thumb into the soft skin inside her wrist as she tried to tighten her grip on the phone. His face loomed in front of her, teeth bared like a rabid dog as he squeezed harder and harder until she screamed and let the phone go. It fell to the ground and smash into pieces.

  Grabbing her by the hair, he shoved her inside the car. She tried to twist her hips to get a shot at kneeing him in the groin but he figured out what she was trying to do and used his weight to crush her. Twisting her hair in his fingers, he jerked her head back. His breath was hot and moist on her skin.

  Wedged between Jackson and the seat, there wasn’t much she could do but she scratched and screamed, and felt her fingers gouge a track down his face.

  Catching her free hand, he wrenched it backwards and held her there. Frightened, unable to move, how she hated him, hated how easily he could do this to her. Her throat thick with tears, it was all she could do to breathe as he crushed her chest.

  ‘You’re going to regret you ever knew me,’ Jackson hissed and pushed away. He kicked the pieces of the phone under the car and stalked off into the dark reaches of the car park.

  Fuelled by adrenaline, she scrambled out of the car and ran after him. ‘Jackson!’ she yelled, her voice echoing off the concrete pillars.

  He stopped. Her breath was laboured, her voice untrustworthy, but she mustered as much malice as she could. ‘I won’t be the only one living with regrets, Jackson. Millionaire surfwear magnate? Your reputation won’t protect you. The media are going to spread your name all over the newspapers. Soon, people won’t think “creative genius” when they hear the name Jackson Plummer. They’ll only think one thing: “paedophile”.’

  Christina stumbled to the car to discover the keys had been in the ignition the whole time. She accelerated out of the car park. If she had a phone, she would have rung DS Rushmore, but since hers was in a thousand pieces, she chucked a right hand turn and started the two hour drive to Kitchener police station. At Bilpin, she finally stopped crying.

  Anne Rushmore read Christina’s statement in silence. This was the first time Christina had been in the detective’s office. She wondered why there were no humanising touches: photos, a pot plant or a kid’s crayoned scribble. The detective pushed the statement to one side and helped herself to another cream-centred biscuit, offering the plate to Christina.

  ‘Well I’ll say this, Christina,’ she said, leaning back in her chair, ‘I never thought I’d see the day you stood up to that man.’

  Christina touched the hard lump forming under the gash in her forehead. ‘I can’t believe he had the gall to front me like that.’

  The detective seemed less surprised. ‘Up until the arraignment, Jackson Plummer could tell himself that this matter would disappear.’

  Christina went to protest but the detective held up her hand ‘Yes, I know, I know but that doesn’t change the fact that this is a man who is used to getting his own way. Here he is, with the best lawyer money can buy, against a sixteen-year-old girl and her mother. One is hiding out at school, the other he has cut off all funds to knowing she has no financial means of her own. As in most of these matters, the crime has been perpetrated in private, so it’s his word against a child’s. His lawyer no doubt buoyed his hopes, reminding him that only a tiny proportion of cases make it to trial. So Jackson Plummer was convinced the case would never see daylight. Except that’s not what happened. Instead, in a couple of months he will face these charges. My guess is that today’s events in the car park are a direct result of Jackson Plummer’s lawyers convincing him that he is in strife.’

  The one in ten. DS Rushmore’s constant mantra. No wonder Jackson was shocked
things had got this far. But his method of dealing with it? ‘How could he be so stupid?’

  ‘Not stupid. Just good old-fashioned denial.’

  ‘So what do we do now?’

  ‘We’ll ask the magistrate for a tightening of his bail conditions. His side will probably offer an explanation to avoid more stringent conditions. My guess is that they’ll take an AVO out against you.’

  ‘What? He attacked me! He should be locked up.’

  DS Rushmore folded her arms on the desk and pinned Christina with those eyes. ‘Every time he breaches bail, it goes on the record. What’s important is that when we go to trial, there’s history. Making threats and physically assaulting witnesses or victims is not behaviour judges take kindly to.’

  ‘Isn’t that stating the bleeding obvious?’

  ‘I think the fact that you refused to be intimidated will stop him trying such a stupid tactic again. That, and his lawyers reading him the riot act. My bet is that they’ll be able to keep him out of gaol for now but they know he has increasingly little wriggle room.’ The detective helped herself to another biscuit and chewed in silence. ‘It’s interesting he contacted you and not Bianca.’

  ‘Are you are kidding? Mrs Hardcastle has Valley View secured tighter than Fort Knox.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’ DS Rushmore picked up another biscuit but halfway to her mouth changed her mind and put it back on the plate. ‘In the beginning, Jackson used you to get to Bianca. All those years, he kept Bianca quiet by telling her she’d ruin your life if she spoke out. But now he’s blaming you for the criminal proceedings? He knows you’re nothing more than a witness. It makes no sense.’

  ‘I don’t get your point.’

  ‘If he honestly believed you were in control, he would have attacked Bianca. That way he’d be betting you’d drop the charges in order to protect her. But instead he hurt you.’

  The detective sighed and gave in to the urge for another biscuit.

  ‘Because threatening me was his way of sending a message to Bianca?’

  ‘Yes.’

  In a convoluted way, it made sense.

  ‘I think you should stay with a friend until after the trial. You’re too isolated out there in the middle of the bush.’

  ‘But he doesn’t know where I am.’

  The detective frowned. ‘Christina, he turned up at your local shopping centre. Of course he knows where you live. I told you right from the beginning that Jackson was a volatile man and you said he’d never been violent.’

  Christina blushed. She had, hadn’t she? She shook her head. It was unbelievable how dumb she’d been.

  ‘I can’t afford for you to be hurt weeks out from the trial. How would we explain that to Bianca? Let alone the consequences for the prosecution’s case.’

  ‘I guess so.’ Although moving again was a complication Christina didn’t need. ‘I’ll ask Della,’ she said, gathering her keys and automatically feeling for her dead phone. Christina couldn’t afford to replace it, she could ill afford not to. ‘Well, thanks, DS Rushmore,’ she said at the door.

  The detective smiled. ‘It’ll be okay. These things have a way of working themselves out. One step at a time.’

  Christina wasn’t convinced.

  chapter twenty-eight

  Two Days Till Christmas

  She opens the door and there stands Della, arms open and rushing to fold them around her.

  ‘Merry Christmas, darling!’ she gushes, examining Christina for reassuring signs. ‘You’ve lost weight,’ Della announces, before turning to yell at Tony to hurry up.

  Tony raises his arm, letting Della know he’s heard. Izzy and Tom struggle up the drive, each holding one handle of a large canvas bag. They collapse on the bottom step, ignoring the honking geese nudging at their heels.

  Rosa hobbles up behind the geese, clapping her hands and yelling in Italian.

  ‘Mama, I told you to rest,’ Christina admonishes. ‘We can manage this ourselves.’

  Yesterday Rosa slipped on the way back from the chook yard and twisted her ankle. She insisted her mother rest on the couch with the swollen ankle iced and elevated, but Rosa was old school. Declaring it was better to be mobile, she was back on her feet an hour later.

  ‘Hello Rosa, how are you?’ Della coos, kissing Rosa’s cheeks three times. ‘Everyone’s hot and bothered. Can I trouble you for some water?’

  Rosa beams and hauls herself up the stairs. Christina can see the pain in every step. There is no way Rosa can manage a heavy tray, so before she reaches the screen door, she says, ‘Stay here in the shade. I’ll bring out a jug of something cold.’

  The children collapse on the verandah, their legs weighed down by shiny new runners. Della holds an arm out to Rosa and helps her over to the wicker chairs. She plumps and positions the cushions behind Rosa’s back and puts one on the footstool, lifting Rosa’s foot to rest on it. Christina sees this through the kitchen window and knows that if she attempted such tender ministrations, she’d get a smack on the wrist.

  It is a relief to be in the cool darkness of the kitchen. As familiar as these people are, their invasion into their quiet rhythms is unsettling. Rosa might have been too ambitious inviting them to stay at the house. Perhaps they should have booked in at the motel in town or driven down from Launceston for the day. And Mary-Lou and her brood are still to come. So much noise and bustle, neither Christina nor Rosa are used to entertaining on such a grand scale. It’s a large task to manage, especially now Rosa’s twisted her ankle. These thoughts rush and crowd Christina as she lays out a tray of glasses and she bursts into tears.

  Rosa warned her that she had no idea whether Bianca would come with Della but Christina had convinced herself that this was the planned surprise. Arriving in Sydney, Bianca would go straight to Della’s place, catching up with their oldest friends before coming home. The car that brought them here is jammed with baggage and mountains of gifts wrapped in festive paper. There is no Bianca.

  ‘Do you need help with anything, darling?’ Della appears at the kitchen door, startling her.

  Christina drags a sleeve across her eyes. ‘I, ah, I was wondering whether the kids might prefer a soft drink or some iced tea?’

  Della laughs, ‘Well anything with zero calories is fine by Izzy, which reminds me, Tony’s brought a case of Peroni and champagne, real champagne. Let’s ditch the whole soft drink thing and go straight for the hard stuff. What do you think?’ Della takes over, swapping highball glasses for champagne flutes. She says nothing of Christina’s tears.

  ‘Mama doesn’t drink champagne, it gives her reflux,’ Christina begins.

  ‘It’s Christmas, darling, everybody drinks champagne at Christmas, except for my father who only drinks ouzo or red wine. But he’s a stubborn old man who thinks he is still back on Mykonos.’ She taps her temple with a finger.

  Rosa drinks the champagne. Forever contrary, she follows the first glass with another. Christina puts together an antipasto plate to absorb the alcohol, listening behind the obscurity of the lace curtains to her mother flirt with Tony and answer with delight when Della asks all the right questions about the poultry and the garden.

  Apart from cases of wine and beer, Della and Tony have also brought crayfish and slabs of King Island steaks that Tony barbecues as the sun droops in the summer sky. Rosa supervises Izzy and Tom as they collect tomatoes and rocket, basil and mint. Christina is flustered, unused to so many pairs of helping hands. She brings a canteen of cutlery to the outside table then hovers beside Tony, unsure what to do.

  Della stands on the verandah holding a bottle of pinot noir. ‘Come and sit down,’ she insists, patting the vacant chair next to her. ‘Everything is under control.’

  Christina drops into the chair, accepts the proffered glass of pinot.

  ‘You seem sad, darling,’ Della says behind the veiling dusk.r />
  Christina twirls her glass, studies the rich red of the wine. There are so many absences in her life. She imagines these physical holes inside her, hollowed-out places where love once resided. She can’t bear to think of them and instead deflects Della.

  ‘Sarah Plummer came to visit.’

  ‘What? Here?’ A spilt drop of wine spreads across Della’s capri pants. She pours mineral water on it and holds the fabric away from her thigh.

  ‘Yes. Here. Turned up in a hire car and wanted to speak to me.’

  ‘About what?’ Della’s eyes shine in the growing darkness, round with the possibility of gossip.

  ‘I’m not sure.’ Christina smacks at a mosquito. She should light a coil. ‘She has breast cancer.’

  Della shrugs. Perhaps it is a bit harsh but then Della has always been an eye for an eye kind of girl.

  ‘I’m guessing she still lives in Sydney somewhere, but –’

  Della leaps in, ‘Well not in the house you dollied up for them, darling. Did you know she put it on the market straight after the trial?’

  Christina has no room to feel anything about the house at Forty Baskets. It is too long ago and it was never a part of her the way Bartholomews Run was.

  Della carries on in an appalled tone, ‘There she is on page three of the real estate liftout with the three kids gathered around her, all of them looking like an ad for a dental practice. When I read the story I couldn’t believe it.’ Della raises her eyebrows. ‘No loyalty lost there then. I reckon she made a premium of at least six hundred thou. Not that she needed the money but you get my drift.’

  Christina ignores her insensitivity; she knows that’s not what Della means. Having an investment banker for a husband has allowed her to leverage the couple into a substantial property portfolio. Della devours the property pages the way most women read glossy magazines.

  ‘My point is,’ Christina interjects, ‘Tasmania is a long way to come for no good reason.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Della slops more wine into her glass. ‘She’s got cancer so she’s had a come-to-Jesus moment and decides to fly down here and say sorry.’