by Elle Croft
I’d woken up the morning after with my head and heart still tender from the previous day, but with a single thought running on a loop in my mind: we could adopt. I’d been nervous to bring it up in the stark daylight, in case Dylan thought it was just a fleeting, drunken idea, like the time a few years ago, before trying to start a family, when we made the wine-fuelled decision to sell our house and go travelling. We were adamant about it at the time, had written a to-do list and everything. But after that night, we never spoke of it again. The list disappeared, along with our temporary enthusiasm for upheaval.
I knew this idea wasn’t like that for me. But I couldn’t be sure how Dylan felt. I half expected him to argue the necessity of passing on his family name, or keeping his genes alive, or whatever macho platitudes men tend to default to when thinking about reproducing. I’d tiptoed out of our bedroom and to the kitchen, where I’d made a French press of strong, black coffee. I’d brought two steaming mugs into our room and kissed Dylan on the forehead, placing a mug on his bedside table.
‘Morning, handsome.’ I’d smiled.
He’d groaned in response. ‘My head.’
‘I know. Me too. There’s coffee.’
‘Thank you. You’re my hero.’
We’d sat up in the bed, sipping our coffees to clear away the cobwebs, my mouth filled with words I was too nervous to speak, in case my hopes were, like so many times before, shot out of the sky, landing with a dull thud on the ground at my feet.
‘Honey,’ Dylan had said quietly, tentatively. My stomach clenched in preparation. He was going to let me down gently. ‘Remember what we talked about last night?’
I’d paused to make it seem like I was dredging up the memories; a ruse, a kind of self-protection. After a couple of seconds, I’d nodded. I couldn’t trust myself to speak.
‘I don’t know about you, but … I can’t stop thinking about it. I think I want to do it.’
I’d stared at him, unable to stop my smile from spreading. ‘Really?’
He’d nodded. ‘I want to adopt a baby. I really, really do.’
I’d burst into tears, then. Elated, I’d flung my arms around him, spilling hot coffee across our white bedcovers. I didn’t care. Nor did he. He’d been worried to bring it up again, he told me, because he thought I’d want the experience of being pregnant, of childbirth, of that natural, instant connection. But all I ever wanted was a family. I didn’t care how it happened.
We’d started making calls that same day, and for the past six months we’ve been meeting with organisations, filling in paperwork, taking training courses, asking friends and colleagues for references. And, miraculously, we’re both still just as excited about the idea as we were on our kitchen floor all those months ago.
‘As you know,’ the support worker says, ‘you’re a great match, and you’ve ticked all of the right boxes, so to speak. So, if we are seeking a permanent family for a child, you stand a very good chance of being matched. It’s just that foster care is the primary route.’
We’ve been told all of this before. A child’s reunification with their birth family is always prioritised, which I can understand, especially given the government’s appalling history with forcibly separating children from their parents. During the majority of the 20th century, countless indigenous Australian children, now known as the Stolen Generations, were removed from their families and communities without cause. And between the 1950s and the 1980s, babies born to unmarried mothers were taken away and forced into closed adoptions. The consequences of these practices were devastating and far-reaching, and although this wasn’t the only reason why adoptions had become so rare, it was the one I most understood.
We’ve talked about fostering. We’ve discussed and debated it for hours at a time. We’ve considered all of the pros and cons. But, in the end, I don’t think I’m strong enough to love a child and let them go. It would break me.
And so we’re going to go home and wait and hope, and try to manage our expectations.
‘We’ll be in touch,’ the woman says as we leave her office, and I cross the fingers on both of my hands as we walk to our car, and all the way home just for good measure.
‘Right,’ Dylan announces when we get home. ‘So now what?’
I flop onto the sofa and frown.
‘I don’t know,’ I say, genuinely unsure. For so long – two and a half years, now – we’ve been trying to fulfil our dream of starting a family. First we were trying to get pregnant, doing all of the right things, monitoring and abstaining and testing and supplementing. Then we were undergoing tests and making decisions. And since we decided on the path we wanted to take, we’ve been filing and interviewing and learning and researching and applying. It’s been all up to us. Until now.
Now we wait. Now we get on with our lives and try not to obsess over the phone call that might never come. We hope. But beyond that, there’s no action we can take that can hurry this along, that can change the outcome. It’s a strange feeling. I’m not the most patient person generally, but when it’s something this enormous and overwhelming, I don’t know how long I can cope with the constant butterflies in my stomach before I explode.
I turn the TV on as a distraction. I’ll have to take up a hobby, I think. Something so that I don’t spend all of my free time fantasising about bringing a baby home with us, our own little bundle of joy who we’ll love with everything we’ve got.
I’m not really concentrating as the news headlines are announced. I’m immersed in my daydream starring a little boy – we said we‘d adopt either gender, of course, but I can‘t help picturing a boy – whose room we’ve painted blue, with little elephants painted along the wall. I’m picturing the crib, the little animal mobile we’ll hang over it, and the tiny outfits all folded up, ready for day after day of adventures together.
‘Kat!’
I snap out of my imaginary parenting. ‘Huh?’
‘I said, could you please change the channel? I’m done with hearing about these sickos. I don’t understand why they give them all this airtime. They don’t deserve a second of it.’
I bring my focus back to the TV. It’s a clip of Sally Sanders, the sweetest-looking devil the world’s ever seen, walking towards the courthouse in Melbourne. I make a hiss of disgust and hand the remote to Dylan. He’s right: they shouldn’t be getting this kind of notoriety, not after what they’ve done.
It makes me so mad, the fact that there are people out there who can reproduce without having to consult anyone, who then abuse and torture and murder their helpless children, while Dylan and I, who want nothing more than to love and protect and cherish a child, have to go through months of rigorous and invasive questioning.
I get it. I know that children can’t be given to just anyone. But surely, by that same logic, not just anyone should be allowed to have their own children? At least not twisted, vile humans like Sally and Tim Sanders. Their deeds have shocked the country, but more than what they did, it’s the fact that they got away with it for so long that has left everyone reeling. How many others are out there, committing unspeakable crimes without consequences?
Dylan flicks the channel over to a footy match, and I sit in silence, stewing on the injustice that Sally Sanders could have children without trying, and here I am, waiting for a phone call that I’ve been told is highly unlikely, desperately wanting the same thing she was happy to throw away like garbage.
And for just a moment – one shameful, secret moment – I’m actually jealous of the monster whose crimes make my stomach turn. I want what she has.
And, more importantly, I deserve it.
Chapter 34
SALLY
They made me sign my children away, as though they were used cars I was handing over to new owners. That day is still seared into my memory, every detail as vivid now as it was when it happened.
The woman who came to extract my signature was a timid, weak little thing. She had mousy hair pulled into a bun, rectangular glasses
that were far too wide for her face, and a single dark hair protruding from her chin. Even in prison, I pay more attention to my appearance than she did, but then again, she was one of those do-gooder types, more concerned with saving the world than looking presentable.
A whole lot of good she was doing that day, legally separating a baby from her mother.
‘We have to look at the facts,’ she’d said quietly, her trembling voice confirming my suspicion that she was terrified of me. She wouldn’t look me in the eye. Perhaps she was worried that evil was contagious. Or maybe she was nervous that she’d see a little of herself in me, if she looked hard enough. ‘You’ve been sentenced to life without possibility of parole.’
‘Yes, but there’s an appeal process,’ I’d said slowly, as though explaining something to a small, slightly stupid child.
‘That may be so,’ she’d replied, distaste for me dripping from her words, ‘but that could take years. And even if you did manage to win an appeal, the government would never allow you to look after your own children.’
‘They’re mine,’ I’d snarled. ‘I’ll see them if I want to.’
Her eyes had widened in alarm, and I’d felt the reassuring warmth of satisfaction. I’d scared her. She’d scurry away and leave me in peace.
Except she didn’t.
To my surprise, she looked me directly in the eye. Her own were hazel, sort of bland and nondescript, but they were full of emotion. She’d tensed her jaw and a muscle in her cheek had pulsed.
‘Sally,’ she’d said, the tremor gone from her voice. ‘Do you have any idea what it’s like for children in care?’
I didn’t say anything.
‘Well, I do. I grew up in care. I never knew my dad, but my mum was an addict, and the government decided that she couldn’t care for me. I was angry, and scared, and I was placed in home after home, because every new placement unsettled me and I acted out and pushed away anyone who tried to look after me. I had no stability. I didn’t make any friends because I moved so much. Sometimes I’d go into group homes because they couldn’t even find an emergency foster carer. This is what will happen to your children if you don’t sign these papers. There’s no way you’re getting them back, so the best way you can protect them now is to make sure they have some stability. I know you must care, somewhere deep down, about what happens to those babies of yours. And if you have any concern for their futures, I urge you to sign these papers. This has nothing to do with you any more. It’s about them.’
Them. My little flowers. Out in the world, exposed to the dangers that lurk around every corner. It hurt to breathe when I thought about it, when I considered what could happen to them.
I hated to admit it, but the bland social worker had a point. I didn’t care about her sob story. But I did want to protect my babies.
My biggest wish was that I’d had some warning that they were going to be taken from me, so that I could have prepared, so that I could have kept them safe. If I’d known, they would have been resting with their other brothers and sisters, free from danger, released from the burden of growing up in the hands of strangers.
But I hadn’t known. And I was going to be locked up for the rest of my life, with Tim behind his own bars, while my innocent children were passed around, exposed to dangers I couldn’t bear to think about. I knew what I should do. But still. The idea of signing them over to strangers, of relinquishing ownership of what was rightfully mine … it was unbearable.
‘If I sign this,’ I’d said, and the woman had straightened, surprised even by the hypothetical, ‘I want to still see my children.’
‘I’m afraid that can’t happen,’ she’d said immediately. ‘There’s a clause in the child protection act about protecting the physical and mental well-being of a child, which trumps just about everything else in the act. You having access to your children is too dangerous, I’m afraid. We can’t allow it. This is going to be a closed adoption. No access. No records.’
I’d pressed my lips together and shaken my head.
‘Then I can’t sign them.’
‘You know,’ she’d snapped, ‘this isn’t actually a negotiation. You don’t get to dictate the terms of this. It’s either sign the documents and give your poor children a chance of having a normal, stable upbringing, or don’t sign them and practically guarantee a life of turmoil and chaos and not having a family to call their own.’
I’d folded my arms across my chest and leaned back in my chair.
‘It might be too late for Kimberley and Brad,’ she’d continued talking, as if my body language wasn’t screaming that I was finished with her. ‘But what about Amy?’
I didn’t react.
‘She’s too young to remember you,’ she said. ‘So whatever happens, you’ve lost her. She’s not yours, and she never will be. What can you possibly gain by not signing these papers?’
Out of nowhere, my ribs felt like they were shrinking, compressing my heart. Amy wouldn’t remember me. I didn’t know if that was true or not, but she was just a baby. I don’t remember anything before I was three or four, so in all likelihood what that woman was saying was right. And even if, by some miracle, I got out of prison, that wouldn’t be for years; long enough for her to have formed a new identity, have a new life.
She was right. Amy was lost to me.
I’d wanted to wail, but I knew that wouldn’t achieve anything. Instead, I’d slumped, defeated, my shoulders hunching forward and my chin dropping. And, just like that, the fight just left my body. My stubbornness evaporated. Pride dissolved. It didn’t matter any more; I’d lost my baby, my perfect little girl. And none of what had once been so important to me mattered any longer. I’d be imprisoned till the day I died, I knew that. I acted like I was going to appeal, but it was just something to do; something to keep me busy. It was delusion to believe I could fight to keep Amy close to me. Her best chance at having a childhood as different to mine as possible was for me to sign the papers, and let her be taken to a set of strangers. It was my greatest nightmare, and yet they were asking for my permission to make it come true. I hated myself for giving it to them, but I couldn’t see another way.
‘Fine,’ I’d snapped. ‘Where do you want me to sign?’
I’d lost Tim. I’d lost my freedom. I’d lost my rose bushes. I’d lost the trust of my Kimmy. And, although I didn’t realise it till then, I’d lost my babies, too. They’d been taken from me. Stolen by strangers. And I knew that one day, somehow, I’d find a way to make them pay.
Chapter 35
KAT
‘Bye,’ I call as Dylan and Jemima walk out the door. ‘See you later.’
My conscience whispers at me to come clean, but I ignore it. Dylan’s car roars into life and makes that familiar whining noise as he reverses down the driveway. I’m still in my dressing gown, my hair dishevelled, bed unmade. Dylan asked me, in that calming, concerned voice he’s taken to using with me now, what I’m planning to do today. I assured him I’d be OK without him here. He insisted that his crew needs him at work again, and Jemima is going to school. I pretended to argue, but eventually conceded that they needed to carry on because – and only because – when Imogen comes back, I want her to return to life as normal.
I wait for thirty seconds to make sure they’re safely off our road and then rush around the house like a whirlwind, showering and dressing in record time, pouring my coffee into a travel mug and packing a few snacks and other essentials into a backpack. Within ten minutes I’m in my car, breathing heavily, trying to remember why I thought this was a good idea.
‘It’s for Imogen,’ I whisper at my reflection in the rear-view mirror. Then I nod once, firmly, and reverse out of the driveway, tapping my destination into the satnav as I edge the car onto the road.
As I drive through Brighton, I peer at every face I pass, hoping, against logic, that one of them will be Imogen. Or Brad, assuming that I’d even recognise him, having nothing but the photo of him as a child to go by. But it’s j
ust stranger after stranger, disappointment after disappointment, until I’m safely in the hills where there are no more pedestrians to pin my hopes on.
Everything up here is dead. Even the gum trees, usually a greyish green in the middle of summer, are brown and sparse, like languid skeletons, exhausted with the effort of staying alive. The grass is scorched and dusty, the golf course a small green oasis in a world of brown.
I make it onto the highway and breathe a sigh of relief, flipping the car into cruise control and pulling a bottle of cold water from my backpack.
With shaking hands, I reach for my phone, resting in its Bluetooth cradle. I select the number I saved in my contacts last night and tap the call symbol.
The phone rings a couple of times and is answered by a bright-sounding woman.
‘Good Morning, Peltzer, Griffin and Associates, how can I help?’
‘Hi, could I speak with Owen Griffin, please?’
‘May I ask who’s speaking?’
‘Just tell him it’s about Sally Sanders.’
There’s a pause, then a sharp intake of breath. Another pause, longer this time.
‘One moment.’
Hold music fills the air as I overtake a couple of cars, and then there’s a click.
‘Owen Griffin?’
The deep voice at the other end of the line offers his name as a kind of question.
‘Mr Griffin,’ I say, concentrating on making my own voice sound assertive, ‘I need you to get in touch with your client, Sally Sanders, and ask her to put my name on her approved visitor list.’
There’s a noise that falls somewhere between a cough and a laugh. ‘I’m sorry. Who are you?’
‘My name is Kathryn Braidwood. Kat. My daughter is Imogen Braidwood.’
There’s another pause. I wait for the penny to drop.
‘Oh, you mean the teenager who’s missing over in Adelaide?’
‘Yes,’ I say, unable to add any more. Hearing it from someone else is startling.