One of the horses whinnied and she rolled her eyes and headed back into the kitchen, where the kettle had now boiled. ‘Romper. Such a handful.’
‘The chestnut one?’
‘Yeah. The grey one’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever met in my life. Romper, on the other hand . . . Well. He’s got a mind of his own, that one.’ She handed me a mug.
I laughed and took a swig of coffee. Bitter and hot and comforting. ‘Thank you,’ I said.
She glanced out the kitchen window. It was starting to rain more heavily, now. ‘So what do you like to do, Gwen?’
My hand tightened on the mug. ‘I like to run.’
***
FROM THE DIARY OF GWENDOLYN P. PEARSON
When Jamie died, Mum said she didn’t do it. She swore she didn’t.
We knew she was lying, Dad and me. We knew she was. But we knew she didn’t mean it. Mum was easily distracted, like a moth around too many flames. And Mum loved Jamie, loved him more than she loved Dad or me. She loved her Little Pearlie, she loved me more than most mums loved their children, but she loved her Jamie more.
Even though I was little, too, I knew Jamie was something special and I never resented him having Mum’s love. He rarely cried, and when I was upset he’d put an arm around me and say, ‘Shh . . . Pearlie . . . Shh . . .’ Just like Mum said, even though he was only tiny.
He was the peaceful, gentle core of our house and then he was gone.
I walked home on the day he died, because Dad hadn’t picked me up from school. I’d waited for an hour and I could tell Biddy was worried. She offered to drive me home, but I saw a resentful, hurt look plaster itself across Tyrone’s face. He’d so patiently waited for me to be collected by Dad so that he’d have his mum to himself. So, I shook my head, grabbed my bag and started walking.
It was nearing dusk when I got home. A white van was parked in the driveway. I knew something was wrong, but nothing serious. It was too quiet to be something serious.
‘Dad?’ I called. His ute was out the front, parked at a weird angle to the gutter, so cars passing had to swerve not to hit the back of it. The rear light had already been hit and there was plastic on the road.
‘Dad?’ I walked towards the front door and heard a noise that I’ll never be able to forget. It sounded like the wild keening of a wounded animal. I stopped. Ambulance officers were wheeling something out then one man noticed me and everything went still.
His hesitation scared me more than anything else did. He said something to the man at the other end of the stretcher, and that one called deeper into the bowels of the house and then Dad appeared.
At first, I didn’t recognise him because his face was so grey and he walked strangely, stiffly, the way I’d imagined zombies walked after years of confinement in a box.
I tried to scream, tried to run, but he scooped me up and I could feel his heart beating.
‘Dad . . .’ I whispered into his neck, clammy with sweat.
Dad took me away, around the side so that we were near the garage door, which made grating sounds when it opened and rained rust. He pulled out his phone and dialled a number, swearing as his shaking fingers repeatedly hit the wrong buttons.
The evening was calm outside. I could still hear the wild keening coming from the house and the distant sound of a soccer game at the local park. My nostrils were filled with the smell of cooling concrete and the hot, sour smell of the rubbish bins.
‘Hello?’ It was a familiar voice, but I couldn’t work out who it was. It was a woman’s voice. I wondered where Mum was. I heard the wild keening again.
‘It’s Eddie – Gwen’s mum, I mean dad . . .’ He took a deep breath, his chest shuddering. ‘I need to ask you a favour.’
‘What is it?’ Her voice was calm and warm. It was Biddy and I thought of Tyrone seated somewhere near her, in their house, and envied him. There was another screeching wail from inside and Dad’s arm tightened around me.
‘Could you please take Gwen for a few days?’ His voice was pleading. ‘I already tried Mau from in town, but she’s not in a good way and . . .’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I’ll be right over. Where are you?’
He told her and hung up, leaning against the garage door. He swallowed over and over.
‘Are you coming?’ I asked him, tugging at his sleeve. He shook me off sharply, opened his eyes and his expression softened. He squatted down.
‘No, kiddo,’ he said.
‘Why?’
He stroked my hair. ‘Shh . . . it’s okay, Gwen. Everything’s going to be okay.’ His voice cracked and I thought no, it’s not. ‘Now, I want you to sit here. Come on – sit.’ I sat obediently. The concrete was cooling fast. It made the backs of my legs itch. ‘I’m going inside for a few minutes. I’m going to bring your things out. Is there anything you want?’
‘No,’ I said, watching him with big eyes. ‘Can I come in with you?’
‘No. Just stay here and promise me you won’t move.’
‘Okay.’
‘Say it.’
‘Say what?’
‘Say you promise.’
‘I promise.’
‘You promise what?’
‘I promise not to move.’
He ruffled my hair with his shaking hand. ‘That’s my girl,’ he whispered, his voice cracking again like an old radio. I gazed up into his face, but wasn’t sure what I was looking for.
I latched onto the front of his shirt.
‘Please, Dad! I love you! Let me come with you, please!’
He disentangled himself. He was looking away from me, looking down the street and at the sky and at his car.
I fell back onto the concrete and grazed my elbow. I was sobbing.
‘Where’s Mum? Where’s Mum? I want Mum, I want Jamie! Where’s Jamie?’
‘Stay,’ he said.
So I stayed. I did laps of the driveway, stopping short of the front of the house, where the white van was.
There was a police car there, now. Martin, in his police uniform, walked over and gave me a juice box.
‘You okay?’ he asked, patting my head.
I nodded.
‘Just hold tight,’ he said, and gave me a handful of biscuits.
There was another police car with a broken headlight and Biddy cradling the sobbing shape of Mum while Dad stood back, watching. My teddy-bear bag dangled from one of his limp hands.
But I’d been told not to move.
A smaller figure was standing in the gutter, hands dug deep into the pockets of jeans he would later grow into. He squinted down the driveway and spotted me, then began walking, his head bowed.
It was Tyrone, and for once he didn’t look smug or exasperated. He looked sad and worried. He sat down cross-legged next to me and there was silence. Not the dignified silence we kept as our parents laughed and bantered on the other side of the room, it was the silence of two friends who have said everything they have to say to each other.
I felt Tyrone put his hand hesitantly on my back. He gave me an awkward pat.
‘I’m real sorry, Gwendolyn.’
My hanging head snapped up. ‘How come?’
‘I’m sorry about . . . you know . . .’
‘Huh?’
Tyrone’s face was not like I’d ever seen it before. He looked so uncertain and unhappy. Panicked, almost.
Tyrone’s eyes flickered towards my two parents and his mum and then back to me.
‘Jamie’s dead, Gwen. Jamie’s dead.’ And he was crying with me, because he knew my little brother and loved him just like everyone else. ‘He drowned, Gwennie. My mum says he drowned.’
***
Amber came into the kitchen at Songbrooke and looked startled when she saw me. She dumped her bag on the table and kicked off her boots, not looking directly at either of us.
‘Well, hello!’ said Elsa. ‘Been down at the beach?’
‘Over at Ruby’s,’ Amber said.
‘Have a good lunch?’
‘Want a drink?’
‘No. No, thanks.’ Amber picked up a laptop that was on the table and Elsa raised an eyebrow.
‘I have homework,’ said Amber.
‘You can do it out here.’
Amber glanced at me. She looked embarrassed and furious in equal measures. ‘You’re being too noisy.’
‘I can go,’ I said, putting down my mug. The idea of chatting to Elsa with Amber huffing and rolling her eyes across the table wasn’t all that appealing. ‘Thanks so much, Elsa. For everything.’
Elsa smiled. ‘It’ll work out well. See you tomorrow.’
***
After Songbrooke, I went for a run past the town. By the time I neared home, it was just before dusk. Elsa had offered me a job, travelling up and down the beach every morning, finding scraps of things for her installation and then dropping off whatever I’d found to her and taking care of the animals while she worked inside. She’d been trying to get Amber to do it, but Amber was refusing and she said Ben already had his hands full trying to get the property up and running before Grace came home.
Apart from the obvious bonus of being able to bump into Ben, I loved the idea of feeding the horses. Of brushing them and rugging them and caring for them. Maybe I’d study something like horse management or equine studies. Those hours, spent wandering from property to property for the feeling of velvet lips taking apple and carrot from my fingers.
Mum had loved them. She’d be happy, thinking of me working with horses.
When she died, I stopped having anything to do with them. I didn’t tramp along the wide verges of the roads outside town with my pockets full of apples and carrots anymore. I didn’t go for rides, the press of the stirrups against my feet. I’d missed them, without realising it. I was soothed by the idea of taking care of them.
By the time I finally made it home, it was dark and I was damp from the drizzling rain. The house smelled like quiche and my stomach tightened. I knew this smell, the caramelised pumpkin and spinach and egg and cheese.
It was one of the few things Mum had cooked. It made me think of our cramped, busy kitchen on Lockbank Street. It made me think of the sink full of scorched pots and sticky, eggy fingers, and my dad, not able to stop smiling because Mum cooking was such a novelty.
It was Mum’s hugs and a full belly and being able to take something to school for lunch, wrapped in baking paper, trickling egg crumbs into the depths of my bag.
I swallowed hard.
Evie came skipping out of her bedroom and frowned at me. ‘You okay, Gwennie?’
‘Yeah, I’m okay.’
‘Mum’s made quiche!’
I backed out of the house. ‘I’m going out,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you later.’
She blinked at me. ‘Out?’
I didn’t answer. I ran to Loretta’s place. It was dark, still and icy cold by the time I rang her doorbell.
I used to run to Loretta’s place a lot, when I was younger. And her parents always just pulled out another chair at the table for me, like it was no big deal that a wild-haired twelve-year-old kept turning up on their doorstep.
‘Gwen!’ Loretta’s mum was beautiful and warm and kissed my cheeks almost before she’d opened the door. ‘You’re looking dark under the eyes. You doing okay?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Just not sleeping well, that’s all.’
‘We’re having apricot chicken. You hungry?’
Loretta came down the stairs and grinned at me. ‘I was wondering when you’d gatecrash dinner! We’ve been feeling all put out. What’s up?’
‘Not much.’ We went up and sat in her room. ‘Biddy made dinner,’ I said, very solemnly.
‘Um. Okay.’ Aside from all the unfinished knitting projects in her room, Loretta was obsessed with growing things. I ran my fingers along a peace lily she had in a pot on her bedside table.
‘It was my mum’s recipe,’ I said, counting the potted herbs she had on her windowsill.
‘Oh.’ Loretta nodded.
‘One she actually cooked, you know? And I didn’t know what to do.’
‘So you ran here for apricot chicken.’
I lay back on her bed. ‘So I ran here for apricot chicken. Which smells really good, by the way.’
Loretta lay down next to me. ‘It sucks that you’ve got to deal with all this,’ she said, really quietly.
I just sort of nodded.
‘I was at your house, earlier,’ Loretta said.
‘Were you?’
‘While you were at Songbrooke. Evie gave me some brownie for Mr Hounds.’
‘Oh, you’re not!’
‘I bloody well am,’ said Loretta. ‘He’s failing me because I rolled my ankle!’ She held up her leg. Her ankle was puffy and bruised.
‘You should really have that wrapped, you know,’ I said.
She waved her hand. And then it was time for dinner. And there was the hushed talk of her parents and the smells of things that didn’t remind me of anything other than Loretta’s family. Their warmth, their kindness. Dinner there calmed me down. It made me feel balanced. For the first time in ages, I didn’t think of smashing glass or mermaids or huge, dark waves.
***
FROM THE DIARY OF GWENDOLYN P. PEARSON
At first, I’d hated that it had been Tyrone who had told me that Jamie was dead. It made me feel, in a weird way, that I owed him something.
But then I thought on it more.
And I decided I was thankful.
Thankful for the tears in his voice and the feeling of his hand on my back, awkwardly patting me the way you’d pat an upset horse. Thankful for the week that followed, of me in his house, sitting in my room silently and flinching if he or Biddy looked in on me. He never complained. Not once.
We hadn’t spoken about it since. It was in that quiet place of Evie’s pirate party and the CDs full of violins so beautiful that they sounded like they were singing.
***
When I got home, everything was dark and still. I pulled the leftover quiche out of the fridge, set it down on the bench and stared at it.
Tyrone came home, stumbling in through the door and shushing himself. I heard a car full of his rowdy friends take off down the road. They played bad music, too. Tyrone came into the kitchen and stared at me and at the quiche and then back at me.
‘You’re a freak,’ he said, cutting himself a slice. He smelled like the pub.
‘What’s it like?’ I asked.
‘Have some!’
‘I don’t . . . I can’t . . . but what’s it like?’
‘It’s like pumpkin soup, but a quiche.’ He dusted his hands and yawned. ‘Night, Gwen.’
It took me a long time. Eventually, I snapped off a little corner and put it in my mouth. I sucked it until the taste disappeared and it was like I’d never tasted it at all.
***
FROM THE DIARY OF GWENDOLYN P. PEARSON
My name is Gwendolyn. My name is Gwendolyn. My name is Gwendolyn. My name is Gwendolyn.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
On Monday, I woke up and stared at my uniform, which was still scrunched up on my dresser from Friday. I thought I still tasted quiche in my mouth, although I knew it was imagined.
It was only just on dawn and the house was very still. I went out onto the beach with the bags that Elsa had given me. Ones that slung across my shoulders. I found flecks of driftwood and smooth pieces of sea glass. I kicked through piles of seaweed to find shells and slaty bits of rock.
I walked all the way into Clunes, picking things up as I went. I saw the police car parked by the main pier. Martin often stopped there, during the off season. He’d never told me, but I knew it was because people liked to do dodgy things underneath it.
‘Look!’ I said, waving my bags at him.
He wound down the window. ‘What’s that?’
‘A severed head.’
He sighed. ‘What�
��s it really?’
‘Shells and driftwood.’
‘The shells and driftwood you’re not meant to take from the beach because they’re part of our native flora and fauna?’
I dropped my arm. ‘Well, yeah.’
‘You’ll be the death of me. Go on, get out of here before I have to write you a fine.’
‘This one’s my favourite,’ I said, pulling out a massive mother-of-pearl shell.
‘Scoot.’
‘Bye, Martin.’
He waved me off and locked his car doors.
I was jogging back to Songbrooke when out of the blue a shadow appeared next to mine. Startled, I tripped and the bag went flying onto the sand.
When I finally looked up, I saw Ben staring at me in horror. ‘I’m so sorry!’ he said. He tried to hurl me upright, but caught a handful of my hair instead.
‘Yow!’ I yelled, struggling free.
He meekly handed me the bag and stuck his hands in his pockets. ‘I’m really sorry,’ he said.
‘It’s okay.’
‘Is that for Elsa? I can carry it back.’
‘Thanks, but I’m fine.’
He fell into step next to me. He kept looking out at the sea. ‘Your stepbrother’s out on the water a lot.’
‘Yeah. No one knows why. Also, just to be very clear, there’s no genetic link whatsoever.’ I heaved the bag higher up over my shoulder.
Ben laughed. ‘Yeah, well, if my stepbrother tried to hijack a horse, I’d want to disown him, too.’
‘I think he was actually telling the truth when he tried to use it as a seat.’ I said, surprising myself. ‘That’s so something he’d do.’
‘So, is he big into surfing? Like competing or something?’ Ben asked.
‘No. I don’t think he’s ever competed. I’ve given up asking him about it. He says he’s seen something out on the water.’
‘What sort of something?’
‘Well, all the grizzled old guys around here say it’s either a shark or a dolphin, but Tyrone doesn’t think so.’ I bit my lip. ‘And he’s been around this area forever. He knows a dolphin or a shark when he sees one.’
I chanced a glance at Ben, expecting a look of pity or exasperation, but he looked interested and serious. ‘That’s so eerie.’
‘Yeah,’ I said.
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