The Forevers

by Chris Whitaker

  ‘I’m always okay. It’s just … I used to dream of more than that. I’ll see you around, Mae.’

  Mae sat by Abi’s grave until the last of the church people left, until they were alone. She told Abi how close she came to being there for her, all the roads she had run down. She told her about the Forevers, how they’d given hope to so many. She talked about Sail, how she was going to a school dance. At that point she imagined Abi turning in her grave.

  She stood by the far wall and saw the beach a long way below.

  The light of a fire.

  She knew Sail would be down there waiting for her, and maybe Betty and Matilda and dozens of others. Time had never been more precious, but right then Mae knew where she was needed most.

  She knocked on the cottage door, waited a long time before it was opened.

  ‘Some people think the world is cruel,’ Mae said.

  Sally blocked the doorway, her face pale and drawn. ‘And you?’

  ‘I really wanted to believe in karma. I mean, I needed it to be true. I needed there to be balance.’

  ‘Matching tattoos don’t fix everything, Mae.’

  Mae glanced around at the picture-perfect scene, the wildflower lawn, the wishing well in the centre.

  ‘I know,’ Mae said.

  At that Sally closed her eyes.

  ‘You’ve got me, and I’ve got you. Whatever you need to say.’

  Sally, her tears fell then. ‘You don’t want this, Mae.’

  Mae took her hand.

  ‘I thought I could disappear. If I ate enough.’ She looked at the stars. ‘I thought I’d be someone new. People still look, but they see something else.’

  ‘Your stepfather –’

  Sally smiled. ‘He still saw me, Mae. How could anyone want this?’ She held up an arm and grabbed a fistful of the flesh that hung from it. ‘How could he still want this?’

  Mae stepped forward.

  Sally cried harder. ‘Please, Mae. Just turn around and go to the beach. Be with Jack Sail.’

  Mae took Sally’s hand. ‘That’s not how this works, Sally.’

  They walked through the house in half-darkness, up stairs that groaned under Sally’s weight.

  There was a nameplate on her door.

  SALLY, spelled in pink letters.

  Mae thought she was ready.

  And then Sally opened her bedroom door.

  And Mae closed her eyes to the scene.

  Oliver Sweeny lay on his stepdaughter’s bed, face down, his trousers around his ankles.

  A large kitchen knife buried in his back.

  So deep only the handle showed.

  Mae stood there for a long time, just looking, taking in the pink wallpaper, the thick white rug, the blood soaking into the mattress.

  ‘Sally. Where’s your mother?’

  Sally’s eyes never left him. ‘She said I was making it up. All those years ago. Even afterwards. She said he only confessed so I wouldn’t have to go to court. She said he was selfless, that he was protecting me. Barbara. Barbie. She wanted to play happy families. There’s only a few days left, Sally. You can be good for a few days. Isn’t it nice to have your father back?’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Where she always is when things happen. Lying in bed, pretending to sleep.’

  Mae left Sally in her room, then crossed the hallway. She took a deep breath before she opened the door.

  She saw the shape in the bed.

  Mae felt her heart thundering.

  Barbie lay unmoving, her eyes open, her mouth fixed in a scream.

  Mae pressed a hand to her and felt the cold skin. Then she turned and saw Sally at the door. ‘What did you –’

  ‘I sat on her. Right on her chest. I just sat there and asked her why. She didn’t answer, Mae. For the first time in Barbie’s life she couldn’t say a single thing to me. Couldn’t tell me I was disgusting. Greedy. Vile. That I was ruining everything.’

  Mae steeled herself as she thought back to Oliver Sweeny’s file. The things he’d done to Sally. The things he’d made her do.

  ‘Have you called anyone?’

  Sally seemed to shake herself out of it. ‘Sergeant Walters will come. I have to tell him what I’ve done.’

  ‘He’ll lock you up. You’ll die in a cell, Sally. Your … Oliver. You can say it was self-defence, but Barbie. I mean, temporary insanity or something. Sergeant Walters, he’ll follow the letter of the law. Selena will come and you’ll die alone.’

  ‘I’ve lived alone.’

  ‘Not any more.’ Mae looked at her, her mind beginning to turn. ‘When’s he coming?’

  ‘Tomorrow morning at eight. Oliver’s out early on parole. He comes into the house and has a coffee.’

  ‘You’ll say they left town. They’re leavers.’

  ‘He’ll come in. He’ll check the house.’

  ‘Then we have to get them out of here.’

  ‘Us?’

  ‘Not just the two of us. We’ll need help.’

  ‘You’re not thinking clearly, Mae. This … If Saviour 10 works then you have to live with this.’

  Mae took her hand. ‘We do what’s right. We made a promise to do what’s right.’

  Sally cried again.

  Mae hugged her tightly.

  ‘But who’ll help us? Who’ll help me?’

  ‘You’re not alone any more.’

  She found Sail on the beach.

  He stood with Matilda and Betty and read the look on her face.

  ‘Sally’s in trouble. She needs help.’

  ‘Okay,’ Sail said.

  ‘Okay,’ Matilda and Betty said.

  ‘It’s serious. Like, the most serious. And even asking you to do this is –’

  ‘We said okay,’ Matilda said, and took Mae’s hand. ‘It’s not like any of us were heading up anyway, doll.’

  In the old cottage Matilda clapped her hands briskly. ‘Sometimes it comes in handy having a mother who runs a cleaning business.’

  Sail had taken charge quickly, poured Sally a large drink and sent her into the garden where she sat on her swing and watched the stars.

  If they had been horrified, which they were, when they saw the position Oliver Sweeny was in, they quickly, and grimly, put the pieces together. Matilda’s eyes burned for a moment, and then she went to her mother’s small van and returned with a host of cleaning products.

  Sail took off his jacket and worked quietly, wrapped the bodies in bedding and did not look at their faces.

  Oliver was heavy.

  Mae felt her heart pumping as they struggled down the stairs and out to Sail’s idling Mercedes.

  Betty found the CD player and cranked the volume.

  ‘Blondie?’ Mae said, as Barbie’s shoe fell off.

  ‘Our love … it’s divine,’ Betty said, and winked at Matilda, who pulled on a pair of latex gloves and shook her arse in time to the music.

  They dropped low when car lights swung in front of the house.

  Breathed again when they faded into the distance.

  They left Matilda and Betty dancing and climbed into Sail’s car.

  ‘You think there’s something wrong with Matilda and Betty?’ Sail said, looking back at the house.

  Neither mentioned the back seat, or what would happen if Sergeant Walters was out and pulled them over.

  ‘I had no right to ask for your help with this,’ Mae said, still coasting on the shock.

  Sail drove slow. ‘They deserved it.’

  ‘That’s it?’

  He nodded.

  They limped the car through the gates of Sail’s house and down a service road that curved through the rocks and came out by the jetty.

  ‘I wanted to get them on the boat, but it’ll be light soon.’

  ‘What then?’ Mae said.

  ‘The caves.’ Sail pointed up the beach a little.

  It took them an hour to manoeuvre Sally’s parents across the beach.

  Above them the sheer clif
f rose to St Cecelia. ‘And if someone finds them?’

  ‘The tide … We’ll be dead by then,’ Sail said.

  ‘And if we’re not? DNA?’

  ‘We are an army of each other.’

  ‘But this … what Sally did, what we’ve done. I dragged you into this,’ Mae said. ‘I’ll find a way out.’

  Sail took her hand. ‘Whatever happens, people like this don’t deserve our Forever.’

  ‘And if we get caught.’ Mae looked up at the church.

  ‘Then we’ll pray for a miracle. I think it’s time for God to prove his worth.’

  They lay together on the jetty.

  ‘I thought you were soft, when I met you,’ she said.

  ‘I am.’

  ‘You’re not, Jack Sail.’ When he slept she leaned over and touched the water. And for the last time she crossed the town and broke silently into the Silvers’ pool house.

  Hunter’s bed was made, Mae guessed she’d spend her last nights with Hugo.

  The jewellery box was hidden at the back of an antique wardrobe.

  Mae took the moon necklace from her pocket and placed it back carefully.

  And then she noticed the false bottom.

  She lifted the panel out carefully, and gasped when she saw it.

  43

  When she got home she washed her face and stared into the mirror and did not know the girl who stared back.

  She changed her clothes and opened the fridge and found her hands shook so much she almost could not mix the batter.

  ‘Pancakes,’ Stella said, from the door. ‘Is it my birthday?’

  Mae attempted a flip. ‘It’s stuck to the ceiling.’

  Stella applauded as the pancake gently unpeeled and landed on the green tiles with a splat. Lady appeared and gulped it down in one bite.

  That morning there was a picture so big Mae switched off the television and the radio. She did her best to shrink their world by so much it was just the two of them, sitting in the garden and eating their pancakes on a perfect summer morning.

  She tried not to think of the night before. It seemed like a different world, Sally’s parents and where they were. Maybe they’d crossed over, maybe they were burning. Or maybe they just existed in the kind of nowhere Sally had spent much of her life. Unable to feel, unable to see or hear or enjoy anything at all.

  ‘It’s the concert tonight.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘And the Final.’

  ‘And the Final.’

  Stella took a large bite of her fifth pancake. ‘You know I finish at lunch today? Don’t forget to collect me.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘And you have to dress up for my show.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Are you going to wear black? You always wear black, but Miss Hart wants the room to be filled with colour and happiness and –’

  ‘I know.’

  Mae felt hollow on the walk. She was aware of her bones, how they fit together, the way her heart pumped her blood.

  She tried to smile at the old ladies who came out of their front doors and waved to the children of West Primary as they passed, like some kind of dying parade.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Stella said.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Lady stayed beside them instead of running ahead.

  Mae kept her eyes down as they neared the school, willed all the mothers and fathers to keep their shit together as they packed off their children for a last morning of normal.

  ‘I’m worried about my dance,’ Stella said.

  ‘You’ll be brilliant.’

  ‘Felix said he’s the lord of the dance, but I asked Miss Hart and she’d never heard of him.’

  Mae hugged her a little tighter that morning.

  And then she held her hand.

  And ran her finger over the Forever on her sister’s tiny wrist.

  ‘Permanent marker,’ Stella said. ‘All the girls did it. Miss Hart is going to go crazy.’

  ‘Ask her to join.’

  ‘I think my glasses are too big to dance in. But if I take them off people will see my eyes.’

  ‘You have beautiful eyes.’

  She watched her sister walk into school.

  They cut that day.

  Every single kid at Sacred Heart.

  Five hundred of them went down to the beach, stripped their uniforms off and lay on the sand. Dozens had left town.

  ‘If God created the universe, then who created God?’ Lexi said.

  ‘Sometimes I think we should leave,’ Hunter said.

  ‘And go where?’

  ‘Somewhere. I want to be doing something.’

  ‘If they stop Selena, do you think we’ll be different? Maybe we’ll appreciate –’

  ‘Don’t say life,’ Mae said.

  ‘Each other.’

  ‘No. We’ll make exactly the same mistakes over again. We’re flawed by design to ensure we live our lives racking up the kind of debt that can never be settled.’

  She cupped the breeze with her hand as Sail lay beside.

  ‘Matilda and Betty stayed with her.’

  Sail nodded.

  ‘We have one day left,’ Mae said. ‘We can dwell on the past –’

  ‘We have no past.’

  At lunch they collected Stella.

  Mae had brought her swimming costume and watched Felix, Stella and Lady splash in the shallows.

  ‘I let her down,’ Mae said.

  Sail turned to her.

  ‘Abi. I let her down.’ She looked across at the sea of bodies. Hugo tossed a frisbee with Liam, while Hunter and Candice sunned themselves. ‘I needed it to be more than just suicide. I needed someone to have done it to her.’

  Sail milled the sand with his fingers. ‘We can’t all be well, Mae.’

  ‘I know. I didn’t –’

  ‘Equal and opposite.’

  ‘For every happy person, someone has to be sad?’

  ‘It’s not about happy and sad, bad and good. There’s a bigger picture today, right? The news this morning, across the world, people are queuing at the Louvre, the Guggenheim. Thousands are surrounding the pyramids. They cut to garden parties, families coming together.’

  ‘The closer you look, the less you see.’

  ‘The less you need to see.’

  That afternoon they sat with their grandmother.

  Mae brought out Stella’s favourite books and read to her of Lucy and the wardrobe and Max’s search for his family. Stella did not say much.

  They stood together when they heard the heavy thump of the helicopter above.

  Stella waved frantically.

  Mae watched it pass.

  ‘Where’s it going?’

  ‘Somewhere.’

  At three o’clock they turned on the television and watched as Morales took to the stand for the final time. He had cropped his hair close, shaved and put on a smart shirt and tie. Gone was the lab coat, the sense of despair and urgency. He wished them good luck, told them to remember who they were, and he told them to pray if they had faith. It would work or it would not, there was no second chance, the time had come to focus on what was important, family, friends, loved ones. He spoke of his team, some of the greatest minds this world had known had gathered and worked alongside him for the past decade, and they would be there till whatever end came to be.

  Morales signed off with a smile, with a final goodbye and another weighted line.

  Tomorrow will happen.

  ‘What the hell are you wearing?’ Felix said.

  The dress was pink and poofy. She’d found it in Stella’s dressing-up box. On her head was a pink tiara, also borrowed from Stella. She carried a wand, at the end was a silver star which she aimed at Felix, attempting to turn him to stone.

  ‘I need to get my camera,’ he said.

  ‘Do that and I’ll cut off your hands.’

  They walked across the street. Felix kept having to stop, he was laughing so hard.

&nbs
p; They fell in with a crowd of princes and princesses.

  ‘Stella’s nervous about the dance. You did teach her the waltz, right?’

  Felix nodded. ‘I’m doing the music, and the lights. Perks of being president of the AV Club.’

  ‘President and only member.’

  She took a seat in the front row. Mae saw familiar faces, kids from school, Hugo sat a few rows behind with his grandparents.

  ‘Are you going to wear that tonight?’ Sail said, as he sat beside her.

  ‘I don’t have anything to wear tonight. And I have no idea how to do make-up. Or style my hair. You got a problem with that?’

  He shook his head quickly.

  Mae felt her stomach tighten when the curtain opened and Stella appeared, wearing old rags and pushing a broom around the stage.

  Mae mouthed every word her sister spoke, clapped her hands and laughed and lived Stella’s perfect performance.

  And as Stella slipped the glass shoe onto her foot, and Prince Charming asked her to dance, Stella turned to Felix and told him to hit it.

  Prince Charming held out a hand, only for Stella to slap it away. ‘Boys make everything worse.’

  Mae sank low in her seat.

  ‘I can dance on my own.’

  There was nervous laughter.

  ‘Felix was supposed to teach her to waltz,’ Mae said, watching from between her fingers as her sister spun a dozen times, then offered a hand to the ugly sisters and told them not to be defined by their looks.

  Mae closed her eyes when the speakers crackled and Barry White rang out loud.

  There were gasps when Stella gyrated, winces when she slut-dropped.

  ‘Felix is a dead man.’

  The other kids stopped waltzing and stared.

  The Fairy Godmother pressed a hand to her mouth.

  Sail got to his feet. ‘Stella’s a Forever, right. I’m going up there to join her.’

  He crossed the floor and climbed up onto the stage.

  Mae looked into the audience with something like pleading in her eyes as it slowly dawned on Stella that her perfect moment was being met with a stony silence.

  And then Theodore stood, and people turned as he began to sing.

  Sail took Stella’s hands and she stepped onto his feet as they danced together.

  ‘You know how badass you are,’ Sail said.

  ‘Totally badass,’ Stella said.

  Mrs Abbott stood and began to clap her hands.

  The other kids moved around them, spinning and laughing.