The Mother-in-Law

by Sally Hepworth

  Despite my hurt, despite myself, in the darkness I laughed out loud.

  *

  One evening, as I sat in the communal area, I realised I hadn’t seen Pammy all day.

  ‘Matron?’ I said when she came to tell us it was ten minutes until lights out. ‘Has Pammy gone to have her baby?’

  Matron’s lips thinned. ‘Pamela has been moved.’

  ‘Moved where?’

  ‘That’s none of your concern.’ She clapped her hands together twice. ‘All right girls, time for bed, don’t dillydally.’

  ‘Matron,’ I said, louder now. ‘Where has Pammy been moved?’

  Matron’s eyes flashed. ‘Are you going to start causing trouble, Diana? I thought you were one of the more sensible girls here.’

  ‘I . . .’ I start, but I feel Laurel tug my hand. Something in her eyes makes me abandon the conversation with Matron and follow her into the corridor, where she falls into step beside me.

  ‘Has Pammy been saying anything about wanting to keep her baby?’

  ‘No. I don’t think so.’

  ‘Has she said anything about her baby at all?’

  I thought about that. ‘Well . . . she gave her a name.’

  ‘Her?’

  I shrugged. ‘She thinks it’s a girl.’

  Laurel nodded knowingly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It happened the first time I was here. To Josephine. One day she told everyone she’d decided to keep her baby and that she was going to tell Matron. The next day she was gone.’

  ‘So Josephine kept her baby?’

  ‘We assumed so. But I saw her on the outside, a year or so later. She told me they kept her downstairs in a different room—a cell almost—and wouldn’t let her see anyone. They put her to work, night and day—cleaning, doing dishes, cooking. They said that if she wasn’t giving her baby up she’d have to pay for all of her living and hospital expenses herself, and she needed to start working for them right away. They worked her so hard she went into labour a month early. And when she had her baby, she hadn’t paid off her debt, so they held the baby to ransom. Eventually she had no choice but to hand the little thing over. My guess is that’s what has happened to Pammy too.’

  ‘Enough of that chatter,’ Matron said from the other end of the corridor. ‘Off to bed with you all.’

  I never saw Pammy again.

  Mother came to visit when my belly was so round and tight that I couldn’t put on my shoes and I had been wearing slide-on slippers for weeks. Mother was wearing her hat and gloves, as though she was going to church.

  ‘I want to keep my baby,’ I told her as she sat on the vinyl-back chair. ‘But I need your help.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Mother said.

  ‘It’s not ridiculous,’ I said. ‘It’s 1970. Single women have babies nowadays.’

  She smiled, humouring me. ‘Oh? Which women are you referring to?’

  I didn’t know any, of course. But I was certain they existed. The news said things were changing, that women were being granted more rights. Apparently women were able to access welfare to help them support themselves and their babies.

  ‘Meredith is divorced,’ I said, because Meredith was the closest thing I knew to a single mother. My dad’s cousin Meredith had left her husband a couple of years earlier after finding out he was unfaithful. Unfortunately it was not the best example. Divorce had ruined Meredith socially, not to mention financially. She had been tossed out of her luxurious Hawthorn home and now lived in a rented house in Melbourne’s industrial west. She’d got herself a job, apparently, in a factory cafeteria.

  ‘Do you want to end up like Meredith?’ Mother asked, still playing innocent.

  ‘I can just leave here, you know. There’s no lock on the door.’ In fact, I had no idea if that was true. In any case, I certainly wouldn’t be telling Matron about my plans. ‘I don’t need your approval.’

  ‘I suppose that’s true,’ she said, unperturbed. ‘But what would you do then? Bring the baby back to your father’s house? I don’t think so.’

  ‘I’d get my own place.’ I lifted my chin.

  ‘With what money? Who would rent a house to a pregnant single woman with no qualifications to work?’

  ‘I’d stay with friends.’

  ‘Which friends?’

  I said nothing, trying to make my expression defiant, as though I had friends she didn’t know about. But I didn’t. The only friends I had that weren’t overseas or at university lived with their parents. I had nowhere to go. My plan was a giant bluff and my mother was calling it.

  She placed a cold hand on top of mine. ‘Come on now, Diana. You’re nearly there. Have your baby, come home and make better choices next time.’ She kissed my forehead and the matter, as far as she was concerned, was laid to rest.

  I wanted to say: This is my last chance. I need you, Mum. Instead I said nothing.

  And that night, I ran.

  14

  LUCY

  The present . . .

  The funeral director’s name is Pearl. She’s a kindly woman in her mid-fifties with a puff of over-dyed chestnut hair and the patience of a kindergarten teacher. Thank goodness for her because, as it turns out, there’s a lot to do after someone dies. When Tom died, Diana organised everything and I never appreciated how heroic that was until now. How does one, through his or her grief, meet with funeral directors and select caskets, figure out readings and choose flowers, all the while supporting others and managing the minutia of their lives at the same time? I guess I’m going to find out.

  We’ve been at the funeral home for several hours, selecting things, but my mind is elsewhere. Apparently Jones and Housseini also paid a visit to Nettie and Patrick yesterday, and told them about the cancer, or lack of it. Nettie and Patrick agree it all must be some sort of misunderstanding, but I can’t seem to shake the feeling that something isn’t right. Why didn’t Dr Paisley refer Diana to an oncologist? Why aren’t there any records of mammograms or ultrasounds? Why would she lie about it? I keep turning the pieces of information over and over and they just get more muddled up. But Jones told Nettie the autopsy would be done and the body released in a couple of days, so at least we’ll have answers soon.

  ‘What about the wake?’ Pearl asks us. ‘Will it be at your mother’s house?’

  Nettie shudders. ‘No. Let’s do it somewhere else.’

  ‘I agree,’ Ollie says. ‘Knowing Mum died there . . . it’s different now.’

  ‘How about a local bar or restaurant?’ Pearl suggests and we all mutter our agreement.

  ‘Now, for the service. Some people who have nondenominational services like to have a few church hymns. Do you think Diana would—’

  ‘No,’ Ollie and Nettie say in unison.

  ‘Mum wasn’t really into hymns,’ Ollie explains.

  ‘No hymns,’ Pearl says, making a note in her paperwork. ‘That’s fine.’

  While I hadn’t thought about it much in the past, Diana’s harsh rejection of her Catholic upbringing is curious to me now. I find myself wanting to ask her about it . . . and I’m hit by a jarring sadness that I can’t.

  ‘All right,’ Pearl says. ‘Moving on.’

  For the most part, Nettie and I do the choosing. Ollie and Patrick sit there like a couple of teenagers, nodding and grunting and looking at their phones. Around lunchtime, Pearl suggests Nettie and I pop down to the corner store for sandwiches while Ollie and Patrick select photos for the slide show.

  ‘I’m not hungry,’ Nettie says.

  ‘It’s important that you eat,’ Pearl says. She’s entirely firm and also entirely serene. ‘And grab something for the men while you’re at it.’

  Outside, we shuffle along the street. A train track runs along the side of the road and the noise of a passing train takes the edge off the silence for thirty seconds or so. Then it’s gone, and there’s nothing but the sound of our breathing. Nettie lifts a hand to scratch her nose and her shirt sleeve rides up re
vealing a thick purple ring around her left wrist.

  ‘What happened to your wrist?’ I ask.

  Her gaze flicks to me, then back to the footpath. ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Nettie. Come on.’

  ‘Let’s just get the sandwiches, shall we?’ she says quietly.

  We walk a few more paces.

  ‘I hate this,’ I explode, suddenly unable to keep it in any longer. ‘Diana would hate it too. You know she would.’

  Nettie stops.

  ‘Now of all times we should be coming together as a family.’

  ‘Family?’ Nettie squares up against me. ‘You and Ollie and the kids are a family. Patrick and I . . . we’re just two people. Two people who don’t even—’

  ‘I know—’

  ‘You don’t know. You couldn’t possibly know.’

  I sigh. ‘Nettie, I want so much for us to put this behind us. I want to help you through this.’

  I’m not hopeful, but I think I have a chance. Here, without Patrick, without Ollie, I might be able to get through to her. And I want to get through to her. There has already been too much loss for this family. First Tom. Then Diana. I can’t lose Nettie too.

  ‘I don’t care what you want.’

  She turns away and continues walking down the street. It’s not until later that I realise she never told me what happened to her wrist.

  15

  DIANA

  The past . . .

  I‘ve heard it said that a parent spends eighty per cent of their energy on one child, and spreads the remaining twenty per cent among any other children. Ollie has always been my eighty per cent child. I spent most of his childhood wondering if he was eating enough, learning enough, doing enough. He wasn’t the most popular kid in school, but he wasn’t a social leper either. His general contentment, which should have comforted me, somehow only served to baffle me. Did he want to invite his little friend over to play, or did he wish I’d stop inviting that friend over? He never seemed to care either way.

  Nettie, on the other hand, was born so capable and articulate, I never bothered worrying about her. Being her mother was like having a tiny peer who accompanied me everywhere. If someone picked on her at school she’d simply have a quiet word to the bully, telling them that if they didn’t stop being mean they’d have no friends left, and wouldn’t that be silly? When I served them vegetables for dinner and Ollie, five years her senior, refused to eat them, she’d ask him: ‘Don’t you want to be big and strong like Superman?’

  Once, when Ollie was eleven and Nettie was six, they’d been swimming in the pool for most of the afternoon when I had to go inside. Ollie and Nettie were both strong swimmers, it wasn’t a big deal to pop back to the house for a short while.

  ‘Keep an eye on your sister,’ I must have said, or something to that effect.

  I went to the kitchen and started on dinner, peeling potatoes. It was a warm day and the sun beamed in through the window. As I picked up the last potato, a funny feeling came over me. Mother’s instinct, perhaps. I should check the kids, I thought.

  When I got outside, I saw a tangle of bodies just under the surface of the water.

  I didn’t pause even to take off my shoes before leaping into the water.

  I grabbed Nettie first, but Ollie had a hold of her and wasn’t letting go. I pulled and twisted her but he was like an anchor, weighing her down. Finally, I gave Ollie a kick in the stomach and she came free. I pushed her to the side of the pool and a moment later did the same with Ollie. He clung to the side of the pool, blood and water dripping down his face and filling the hollowed-out part of his collarbones.

  ‘What . . . on earth . . . happened?’ I said, panting.

  ‘Ollie did a flip and hit his head,’ Nettie gasped. ‘I saw blood and he wasn’t moving. I tried to save his life and then he tried to drown me!’

  I looked at Ollie, sucking in wild breaths at the side of the pool. ‘Did you panic, Ollie? Is that why you were holding onto Nettie?’

  Ollie didn’t reply. He seemed just as confused as Nettie was.

  That’s when I realised. Some people jumped in and tried to save someone who was in trouble; others did anything they could to save themselves. Ollie hadn’t meant to drown Nettie, he was simply following his instincts, just as she was following hers.

  My children had just showed me who they were.

  When I arrive home, Nettie is sitting on a bar stool in my kitchen, leafing through the newspaper. Her suit jacket is on the back of the stool and her hair is swept into a very corporate-looking chignon.

  ‘Hello, darling,’ I say, jostling with my bags from the supermarket.

  Her gaze flickers up from the newspaper. Nettie stops by like this from time to time on her way home from work, sometimes under the guise of dropping something off, sometimes just because. I don’t really understand it, but I’ve come to quite enjoy the routine of it. ‘Hey, Mum,’ she says.

  ‘I saw your friend Lisa in the supermarket just now.’ I haul the bags onto the counter. ‘She mentioned a bunch of you were going to Hong Kong for a girls trip.’

  ‘I’m not going,’ Nettie says.

  ‘Oh. Why not?’

  She sighs. ‘Money. Time.’

  I nod. But it seems to me that a girls trip might be exactly what Nettie needs.

  ‘Have you seen Lucy and Archie?’ I ask her.

  ‘Not since the hospital.’

  ‘I’ve just been to visit them.’

  ‘Oh.’ Nettie turns the page of the newspaper, studiously uninterested. ‘How are they?’

  ‘I think Lucy’s had better days. But that’s what it’s like with a new baby.’ The clock on the oven catches my attention. It’s earlier than usual. Not even five o’clock. ‘Nettie, shouldn’t you be at work?’

  ‘I left early.’

  ‘Are you allowed to do that?’

  ‘I’m allowed to do anything I like.’

  I look at her. She’s in a strange mood. Her posture is sullen, almost teenage.

  ‘Is something the matter, Nettie?’

  She shakes her head, of course. My daughter, for all her softness and light, is fiercely private, at least with me. She’s actually one of only a handful of people who can make me uncertain of myself. I enjoy this about her, the juxtaposition of it. There was a time though when Nettie used to open up to me. When she was younger, I practically had to tell her to stop telling me things. ‘Some things,’ I’d say, ‘are for sharing with your girlfriends, Antoinette.’ But somewhere along the line she’d stopped sharing so much. Started talking to Patrick, I assume.

  ‘Are you sure?’ I ask.

  She’ll never divulge that she’d dearly love a baby. That she wished it was her holding a newborn instead of Lucy. I know it’s true just the same. The poor girl is so desperate for a baby it’s practically written on her skin. Her polycystic ovarian syndrome makes it tricky to conceive, but there must be things she can do to help. She’s probably already doing things. But she won’t tell me and I won’t ask, instead we’ll just be together for a little while, not saying anything at all.

  ‘Would you like to stay for dinner?’ I ask as I put away the groceries.

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘I need to get home to Patrick.’

  ‘Patrick is welcome to join us too,’ I say dutifully.

  In the early days, Nettie and Patrick would come to dinner often. They’d retire to the den after dinner and Patrick would mix drinks and smoke cigars with Tom. Patrick always seemed so comfortable that, for a while, I worried we’d never have a night to ourselves. But a year or two in, he stopped coming, save for Christmas and family occasions.

  ‘No,’ she says. ‘I’ll go home.’

  ‘You know, if something is bothering you, you can talk to me about it,’ I say. ‘I might not be the best conversationalist . . . but I’m not a bad listener.’

  Nettie looks at me, and for a long moment I think she might cry. Nettie is not a crier, she hasn’t been since she was a very little
girl. But a few seconds pass and Nettie regains her composure, sits straight. ‘Thanks, Mum,’ she says. ‘But everything is fine.’

  16

  LUCY

  The past . . .

  ‘Are you feeling okay?’ Ollie asks.

  I nod gloomily.

  ‘Not carsick?’

  ‘No.’

  I shake my head. I do get carsick, but that’s not what’s bothering me. We’re in the car, on our way to the Goodwins’ beach house for a week. I understand, of course, that it is a privilege to be miserable about this. There are people with worse problems. Certainly, Ollie isn’t unhappy about it. He loves Sorrento. All year he romanticises it, waxing lyrical about how nice it is to have the whole family together under the same roof for a week. He is utterly oblivious to any undercurrents of tension. If I mention anything to him, he always looks baffled. (‘Mum, stressed? No. That’s just how she is! She enjoys the stress.’)

  Perhaps it’s just Ollie who enjoys the stress. He’s been whistling all morning, and his entire body is growing more spongy and relaxed as we inch along the foreshore in bumper-to-bumper traffic, catching the odd glimpse of sapphire blue through the coastal scrub.

  Whenever I tell anyone my in-laws have a beach house in Sorrento, they make appreciative noises. Sorrento, ooh la la. I understand why. Tom and Diana’s clifftop beach house is arguably one of the most spectacular houses on the Mornington Peninsula, a 1900s sandstone braced into the cliff, with manicured gardens and a whitewashed timber path down to the beach. There is a pool, a tennis court and a three-tiered limestone patio with uninterrupted sea views.

  I hate it.

  ‘How on earth can you hate that?’ Claire demanded recently. ‘I would kill to have a beach house down there that I could visit whenever I liked. I mean, I’d literally kill for it.’

  I would kill not to have such a place. For one thing, the Goodwins’ place is entirely child unfriendly. Artwork, pottery and sculptures adorn every wall and surface. I can barely set Archie on the floor without Diana gasping. It’s so foreign to me. My own mother couldn’t have cared less about artwork or sculptures. If she’d had the chance to be a grandmother, all the artwork on her walls would have been painted by her grandchildren, and she only would have gasped when I told the kids it was bedtime. (Don’t be ridiculous, kids, she would have said. You’re staying up late with Nana tonight.)