I regret telling Rose about Wally’s nervous breakdown. I’m not entirely sure how it happened. One minute we were eating chicken satay for dinner and talking about how the library was abolishing fines for overdue books, and the next, Rose knew everything. Her gift for getting information out of people is truly astonishing. Owen used to say she’d make a great interrogator.
‘Think about it, Fern. Rocco couldn’t cope with some basic business pressure. He found it so stressful that he had to leave his country, abandon his whole life and start a rudderless existence, living out of his van! What would happen if he were presented with real difficulty, like disease or death? Or a baby that just wouldn’t stop crying?’
I open my mouth to answer the question, then realise I have no idea. She’s right, of course. I couldn’t be trusted with a baby. Neither could Wally. How foolish to even consider it.
Rose stands and takes both my hands in her own. ‘I wish it were different, Fern. I really do.’
I nod.
‘I’m here for you,’ she says, wrapping her arms around me. ‘Now, don’t worry. We’re going to figure this whole thing out. I promise.’
I hold still, waiting for the hug to end. But Rose just continues to hold me, pinning my arms to my sides. I feel like I’m imprisoned, stuck. Wearing a straitjacket.
JOURNAL OF ROSE INGRID CASTLE
Fern is pregnant. The crazy thing is this is an eventuality I’ve never considered. Sadistically, I can’t help but think how different it would be if it were me who was pregnant. If I was suddenly carrying the baby I’d yearned for. Instead of being in damage control, we’d be celebrating. It’s like the universe is playing a game with me, pushing me as hard as it can, seeing when I will break.
I should be used to these kinds of curve balls in my life. Growing up, whenever I got used to one set of circumstances, something happened to throw me off. Like after Mum broke up with Gary. For a while, things were normal again. Better than normal. Living with Mum’s moods seemed a small price to pay to be free of Gary’s abuse. But things didn’t remain normal for long.
I’ll never forget that morning when I was twelve and I woke up and heard Mum singing. Singing! It was too bizarre. Mornings were always quiet at our place. In our normal routine, Fern always woke first – her body clock was very reliable – and then she would wake me. From there, we’d creep around the house, careful not to wake Mum. Mum was bad enough after a good night’s sleep, we certainly didn’t want to poke the bear by waking her up.
But that morning she was singing!
As Fern and I slunk out of bed, even Fern was worried. My sister has always been a creature of habit, and this change to the routine didn’t sit well with her. When we arrived in the kitchen, Mum beamed at us.
‘Good morning, beautiful girls! Who feels like eggs?’
At twelve, I was old enough to know about alcohol, and my first thought was that Mum must be drunk. Drinking didn’t usually make her nicer, admittedly, but there had been a couple of times when she and one of her new friends shared a bottle of something and she’d been something resembling warm toward me (until the next morning). But ‘beautiful girls’? Mum never said anything like that. She occasionally made comments about our looks, but only insofar as they referenced her own. (‘You take after me, Fern, tall and skinny as you are.’ And then, of course, ‘Rosie Round’.) But that day, we were beautiful!
She served us eggs and we ate them in silence as she prattled on about the weather (‘Lovely!’), the day ahead (‘What are you girls doing at school?’), and the things we were looking forward to. Fern answered all of Mum’s direct questions, agreeing that the weather looked nice. I remained suspicious.
That afternoon, when Fern and I got out of school, Mum was waiting for us. That enough was cause for alarm. Mum didn’t pick us up from school – she hadn’t since we were seven. Her smile did nothing to comfort me; Mum always smiled in public.
‘Surprise!’
Both Fern and I walked toward her slowly. She went for Fern first, picking her up and swinging her around in a way that parents did with much younger children. Fern went so stiff it was as though Mum was spinning a metal rod. Finally, Mum let her go and took a deep, excited breath. ‘Girls, I have someone I’d like you to meet.’
She turned and gestured toward a smiling man in jeans and a rugby jumper, leaning against a shiny silver car.
‘This,’ she said, ‘is Daniel.’
My blood ran cold. I knew that Mum wanted to find someone else. After she’d broken up with Gary, she got a computer and was always having Fern or me take her picture for one of those dating websites. Now, it appeared, she had found someone.
‘Daniel is a friend of mine,’ Mum said. ‘We’ve known each other since we were babies–’
‘So a long, long time,’ Daniel interrupted, grinning.
I glanced at Mum – if there was one thing she hated, it was people telling her she was old. But to my surprise, she laughed, a strangely pitched laugh that landed wrong somehow.
‘I have been asking your mum if I could meet you for weeks, and finally she agreed,’ Daniel said. ‘You have a very protective mother!’
To look at, Daniel did not seem intimidating. He was a few years older than Mum, I guessed, with the face of a soccer coach or trusted schoolteacher. He had
