Sydney Harbor Hospital: Zoe's Baby

by Alison Roberts

  Yes, there was hope in Zoe’s eyes but it was snuffed out in a heartbeat as the door to the kitchen opened behind them and the senior police officer stepped into the room.

  ‘We’ve had reports in from all the northbound trains,’ he told them. ‘I’m sorry, Zoe, but there’s no sign of your mother. We don’t think she got on a train. Not to go home, anyway.’

  ‘Where…? What…?’ Zoe whispered. She felt Teo’s arms tighten around her.

  ‘So what are you doing about it?’ Teo asked.

  ‘We’re widening the search. Checking other trains. We’ve got an APB out so all stations and patrol cars are aware of the situation. It’s a matter of waiting. Hoping that Celia will get in touch.’

  Teo could feel the frustration clawing at him again.

  ‘Not good enough,’ he growled. ‘For God’s sake, man. There’s a baby out there who needs her mother. I’ll get out there and start searching myself.’

  ‘Let us do our job, son. You do yours.’

  ‘What…sitting here and waiting while nothing happens?’

  ‘No.’ The police officer smiled gently. ‘Looking after Zoe. That’s your job and you’re doing it well.’ He raised an eyebrow as he backed out of the room again. ‘That coffee would be great when you’re ready.’

  Teo was staring at the door as it closed again.

  He’d just been given permission to do nothing but care for Zoe. To hold her and comfort her and…love her.

  It was the right thing to do.

  And maybe Zoe was right and it had been the right thing to do for his beloved mother as well?

  The thoughts were confusing. They were washing up against years of deeply buried guilt and sorrow. But they were wonderful, too, because it felt like absolutely the right thing to do to gather Zoe into his arms and hold her against his chest. To rock her gently.

  ‘We’ll get through this,’ he murmured. ‘Together.’

  Zoe could feel the steady thump of Teo’s heart against her cheek. She could feel the unwavering strength of the arms that held her. And she could hear the echo of his words, telling her that he loved her and he wasn’t going anywhere.

  Somewhere, amongst the new despair of the bad news of not finding her mother and Emma on a northbound train, there was something warm deep inside her.

  Teo loved her. He didn’t believe she was going to end up like her mother but even if the possibility was there, he wasn’t going anywhere.

  ‘I’d better make that coffee,’ she murmured finally.

  ‘I’ll do the kettle,’ Teo said. ‘You find the mugs.’

  It was when Teo snapped the lid back onto the kettle that he paused and looked at Zoe.

  ‘Where would you go?’ he asked suddenly.

  ‘Home,’ Zoe said.

  ‘What if you didn’t know where home was exactly? If you were confused?’

  ‘What are you getting at?’

  ‘I’m trying to think. Let’s say your mother is confused and she really believes it’s you she’s looking after. That she’s a young mother again with her new baby but it’s all a bit weird. Where would you go?’

  Zoe didn’t have to use her imagination to conjure up the scenario. She’d been a new mother herself only recently and she’d been frightened and confused.

  ‘I wanted my family,’ she whispered. ‘My mum.’ She had to blink back tears. ‘But I was too scared even to think about her. Too scared that I might see what I was becoming.’

  ‘You weren’t,’ Teo said gently. ‘You aren’t. You’re you, Zoe, not your mother.’

  Zoe nodded. But she was thinking about something else. She was using her imagination now. Thinking of her mother nearly thirty years ago. With her own baby. Wanting her own mother?

  She licked suddenly dry lips as she caught Teo’s gaze again.

  ‘I think I know where she might have gone.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  ‘WHERE are we going?’

  Teo was driving his car. They had made coffee for the police officers and her father and then said they needed to get out of the house for a bit. A change of scene. Some fresh air. They would have their mobile phones and would come back instantly if they needed to.

  ‘Watsons Bay. I own a piece of land up there.’ Zoe’s hands were trembling in her lap. This was such a long shot and what if she was way off base? They’d be back to square one. Worse than square one because maybe this was the only possibility that offered some hope.

  There was an astonished silence as Teo absorbed the information. ‘You own two properties?’

  ‘Only one house. There used to be a house on this land. It was my gran’s.’

  ‘Your dad’s mother?’

  ‘No. My mother’s mother. That’s why it only occurred to me after you asked me where I might go with a baby.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say anything to the police?’

  ‘Because it might waste valuable time when they could be looking somewhere else. It’s totally on the wrong side of the city from where she left the car. It would be quite a mission to get trains and buses from there with a baby but at least it’s an idea. A place I can look.’

  ‘We can look,’ Teo corrected, taking his eyes off the road long enough to smile at Zoe. Then he frowned. ‘Why didn’t your dad say anything about it?’

  ‘He’s probably forgotten. It got left to me when Gran died and we weren’t allowed to talk about it again. Mum said she didn’t want it. She’d never set foot on the place again. It’s not as if there’s a house there any more. It’s a few years since I went to look at it and there was nothing more than a burnt-out shell then. It’s probably fallen down completely by now.’

  ‘What happened to the house?’

  ‘It was left empty for too long. It got vandalised. And then it was a target for an arsonist. I was at the point of trying very hard to leave my family and all the memories behind so I could start a new life. It felt…I don’t know…cursed or something. I’ve barely thought about it again until tonight.’

  Another silence as memories crowded back on Zoe. Her grandmother’s protection had been wonderful but she hadn’t understood her own daughter.

  It’s all in her head, for heaven’s sake. If she had a bit of backbone, she’d get over it.

  The acceptance of and treatment for mental illness of any kind was so different now. If her mother had had the kind of treatment and support Zoe had had, would that have made things better?

  ‘Which way here?’ Teo asked as they approached some traffic lights.

  ‘Stay on Oxford Street. After Bondi, it’ll lead onto the old South Head road. I could be wrong.’ Zoe was twisting her hands together in her lap. ‘It’s only a possibility if it’s really true that Mum’s confused enough to think she’s back in time. Before the fights.’

  ‘What went wrong?’

  ‘Gran was a wonderful woman but she was pretty old school and as tough as they came.’ Zoe’s smile was poignant. ‘She told Mum she was being a drama queen and it was time she snapped out of it. That she didn’t deserve a beautiful child if she couldn’t pull herself together. She’d arrive and take me away to stay with her here in Sydney and then a few months later Dad would turn up and take me home again because Mum was out of hospital and couldn’t stand the thought of her mother taking care of me. She stopped talking to Gran before I was old enough to really know what was going on.’

  ‘And you got handed around like a parcel?’ Teo sounded horrified.

  ‘I loved Gran. She…wanted me. She loved me.’

  ‘Your dad loves you. I’m sure your mum does, too.’

  Zoe shook her head. ‘Dad thought it was my fault that Mum went crazy in the first place.’

  ‘What?’ Teo took his eyes off t
he road again to flick an incredulous glance at Zoe. ‘You are kidding, right?’

  ‘No. I heard someone say it when I was about five or six. Some women from the church brought a casserole around when my mother had gone into hospital again. “It all started with her having that baby,” one of them said. “That triggered the depression and it’s been a downward slide ever since. No wonder John wishes it had never happened.”’

  ‘Malicious gossip,’ Teo snorted. ‘I’ve only just met your father but I can see how much he loves you. And Emma. He’s desperate to look after his family. His whole family.’

  ‘It didn’t feel that way when I was growing up.’

  ‘No.’ Teo was silent for a minute. ‘But we don’t understand a lot of stuff when we’re kids, do we?’

  He sounded as though he had more on his mind than this mission. Of course he did.

  Had he always carried the guilt that by loving his mother he had somehow contributed to her death? He’d become a man who had devoted his life to saving people. He even factored in a long journey back to the land of his birth at regular intervals to try and make sure what had happened to his mother never happened to anybody else. He wanted to be the one to pick up the early signs of something like cancer and ensure that one of his own people got the treatment they needed.

  Good grief…did he feel the same way about Sefa? That he’d missed something he should have picked up? There must have been a point there when he’d been afraid of losing the little boy he clearly loved so much. No wonder he’d pulled his professional role around himself like a cloak. She could understand now and it felt like the volume of her love for this man had just been turned up to full power. Her heart ached for him. She would be there for him from now on. She would give him all the love he’d never allowed himself to accept since he’d been that lost, guilty child.

  ‘Did you see Sefa today?’ she asked suddenly.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘Doing really well. It’s a fast-growing tumour so it’s responding fast to the chemotherapy. Finn said he’d bring the specialist in to look at doing the cryotherapy possibly as early as next week.’

  ‘So he’s going to be all right?’

  ‘Yeah…’ Teo’s voice was gruff. ‘He probably won’t even lose his eyesight. We have you to thank for that, Zoe. You’re not going to believe the kind of party you’ll be having the next time you’re back in the islands.’

  Would she? Would she ever party again if something had happened to Emma?

  ‘Take the next turn,’ she told Teo. ‘There’s a sign there for The Gap.’

  Zoe felt her blood run cold as the words left her mouth. She gasped.

  ‘What?’ Teo swerved the car towards the curb and slammed on the brakes. ‘What is it, Zoe?’

  ‘I didn’t think. I… Oh, my God…Gran’s house is so close to The Gap.’

  ‘What difference does that make?’

  ‘Don’t you know? You must know. You’ve lived in Sydney for so long.’

  Comprehension was dawning. ‘It’s the spit of land that makes it look like a harbour entrance. Where that ship got wrecked way back.’ His voice was trailing away. ‘The place with the cliffs.’

  Where about fifty people a year went to commit suicide. Zoe couldn’t bring herself to say the words aloud. She didn’t need to. With a wrench Teo put the car back into gear and put his foot down on the accelerator. The engine of the little sports car growled in response and responded with a smooth burst of speed.

  Apart from the terse directions Zoe gave Teo, nothing else was said for the rest of the journey.

  Because there was nothing else to say, was there?

  The garden had been her grandmother’s pride and joy but the masses of trees were overgrown now and made a suburban jungle that covered a large piece of land. What had once been lawns and flowerbeds was now a knee-high tangle of weeds. A kind of track had been trampled through the growth. Vandals? Her mother?

  Zoe followed Teo towards the blackened stump of the old house. Surprisingly, it still had most of its exterior walls. Steps to the veranda were broken and dangerous and Teo kept a firm grip on her hand. With his other hand, he angled the torch he’d brought from the car. The small spotlight roved over what was in front of them. A desolate ruin of a family home. The front door of the house hung on one hinge and every window was a gaping hole with a few shards of broken glass.

  ‘We shouldn’t go inside,’ Teo said heavily. ‘It’s too dangerous.’

  Zoe was shaking all over now. Shivering with both the chill of the night and an unspeakable fear. If her mother had come here, she couldn’t help but be forced back into the present time, could she? She would feel the emptiness of this house and know that it had been a very long time since it had been lived in. She would know that she wouldn’t find her mother here. She would remember why.

  She would feel…desperate?

  Zoe felt desperate. Her mother wasn’t here. Emma wasn’t here.

  She sank down onto the edge of the bottom step. She buried her face in her hands. Teo paced, shining his torch over the house. Around the menacing darkness of the garden. He wasn’t going to give up. Not yet.

  ‘There,’ he said. ‘Where would that go?’

  Zoe raised her head. The cobbles of an old path showed between flattened clumps of grass. ‘There’re steps further down the hill. There used to be a goldfish pond and a summer house. And there was a gate that opened onto the track to the reserve. If you go far enough, you get to the cliffs.’

  They were so far away from any other house that she could hear the way Teo pulled in a breath. The night was so still at this moment. So dark. So quiet and…dead.

  And then they heard it.

  A tiny whimper being carried who knew how far in the still night.

  Zoe was on her feet in a heartbeat. Her heart recognised that sound. ‘Emma.’

  Teo had heard it too. He was already moving down that old path.

  Zoe caught up with him as he went through the gate. Hand in hand, they ran along the track. A public place this, and it was clear and easy to navigate. It led to a lookout. There were signs here warning people not to go past the fences but everybody knew how dangerous these cliffs were. Nobody went out of the safe area—unless driven by a force so powerful it was greater than the will to survive.

  The way it had driven her mother.

  Celia Harper was standing on the other side of the safety barrier. Only a few feet away from the edge of one of those famous cliffs.

  Zoe was dragging in a breath ready to scream at her mother. She was gathering her strength to leap over the fence but something stopped her.

  Teo.

  ‘Don’t rush her,’ he said, his voice low. ‘Stay right where you are.’ He put his fingers across her mouth. ‘Don’t even say anything.’

  Zoe pressed her own hand to her mouth as Teo’s grip pushed her into a crouch. She wrapped her other hand around her body and stayed there, hunched and frozen. She had no idea what to do.

  Did Teo?

  He seemed to. He stood there silently for a long moment and then he spoke.

  ‘Hey…you’re Celia, aren’t you?’

  Her mother’s head whipped sideways. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m Teo.’ He didn’t elaborate any further. Was he trying to find out if Celia was back in touch with reality yet? Whether she knew that the baby she was holding was not Zoe?

  Was he smiling at her mother? She was staring at him.

  ‘Bit cold out here, isn’t it?’

  Celia nodded.

  ‘Would you like to go somewhere warmer?’

  She shook her head. ‘I went to my mother’s house but…’ Another headshake, confused this time. ‘But I don�
��t think she’s there.’

  ‘I could help you find her, maybe.’

  ‘No. She wouldn’t want to see me anyway. She hates me.’

  ‘Mothers never hate their children.’

  ‘She thinks I’m weak. And she’s right. I don’t deserve to have a baby.’

  Zoe’s heart stopped as she saw her mother move but all she did was pull whatever was covering Emma into place.

  ‘Nobody thinks you’re weak, Celia. We understand.’

  ‘No. Nobody understands.’

  Maybe that was true, Zoe thought suddenly. Her mother had lived in a small community. She’d had her husband but the only other member of her family had been impatient with her and offered no compassion. Had her grandmother been afraid, as so many people were, that mental illness was somehow contagious?

  How grim had life been for her?

  Maybe her mother had never known what family could be like?

  Zoe hadn’t known, until Teo had opened that door into another world. He’d made her baby laugh. He’d taught her to relax. She’d been so afraid. Trying so hard to cope and be perfect and the stress had made it impossible to include joy in her life. She had it now, thanks to Teo. Joy and the love that created it.

  What joy had her mother ever had?

  Had Teo caught something of her thoughts? He was looking at her now. There was a depth of compassion in that look. A touch of helplessness but also a strength that Zoe could hang onto.

  She stood up very slowly.

  ‘I understand,’ she said. ‘I’ve been there.’

  Celia’s head turned as slowly as Zoe had moved.

  ‘Who…? What…? I don’t understand…’

  ‘It’s all right.’ Teo’s voice was gentle. ‘Everything’s all right, Celia.’

  ‘No…’ Celia looked agitated now. She moved again and this time it was her feet. She stepped backwards and then turned. Towards the cliff.

  Maybe Emma could sense the danger. Her cry was loud and demanding.

  ‘Shh…’ Celia rocked the baby. ‘Shh, darling.’

  Zoe started moving. She felt Teo’s hand catch her arm but then let go.