As the room begins to get light and hot, I close my eyes, trying to find my way back into sleep. But there is now a car being revved and a football match being discussed, and then someone is whipper-snippering along the pathways. I hear a child’s laugh and someone throwing up. I hear sirens and the tinkling of a bike bell.
***
Zin calls me a little after nine. ‘Brace yourself,’ she says. ‘I have two pieces of life-changing gossip.’
‘It’s too hot for gossip,’ I say.
‘Year Twelve results got released.’
‘And?’
‘Ascott beat Sutherbend with results.’
‘What?’
‘By quite a lot, actually.’
‘Oh my God.’ I close my eyes. ‘We go to a school that’s worse than Ascott?’
‘I know.’ Zin sighs. ‘I think Lara’s parents are having a meltdown. They want to move her to another school.’
‘There’s no other school within an hour’s drive.’
‘I know, I know.’
‘That is devastating. Why would you call up and tell me something so devastating?’
‘I needed to drag you down with me. You know the Sutherbend teachers are going to be on us like fleas trying to improve our results, right?’
‘Ah, well. I’d prefer that to being beaten by Ascott.’ I shudder. ‘Anyway, what’s your next piece of gossip?’
‘Lara’s uncle – The young one? With the curly red hair? Lives in Sydney? – he’s been arrested.’
‘No! How? Why?’
‘Drug dealing!’ Zin says. ‘I know. I know. It’s unbelievable, right? Lara’s a mess.’
‘Should we do something to cheer her up?’
‘Nah. Her parents are taking her down to their caravan park for a few days. Think that’ll calm them all down.’
My stomach tightens, but I don’t say anything. I picture Lara in her parents’ neat, clean little caravan by the ocean. It’s hard not to be jealous, but I manage.
It’s almost Clem’s eighteenth birthday. It’s always seemed unfair, being born so close to Christmas. Normally, I look forward to the little celebrations that Lara, Zin and I throw him, but this year his parents are doing a proper dinner for us all. Although, honestly, all I can think about are the things my friends said about Fairyland and how – really – all I want is to stay away from them for a while.
When I hear Mum come into the cabin, I go into the living area, where she’s easing off her shoes and rubbing her swollen ankles. I hold out the few notes I’d earned at the pub. ‘Here.’
She looks up. We’re waiting for some pasties to cook in the little electric oven. Taylor’s painting her nails with a permanent marker and stares at me.
‘What’s this for?’
‘Board. Whatever.’ I shrug.
Mum shakes her head. ‘No – keep it, Stell.’
‘It’s okay.’ I step away so she can’t press it back to me.
She hesitates, her fingers tight around the money.
‘Take it,’ I say and my voice comes out sharper than I mean it to. But it’s okay – the sharpness is good, really. It’s emphatic. I go out and walk around Fairyland because part of me hadn’t wanted to give the money to Mum. Part of me was mad at her for accepting it, even though I wanted her to. I walk until I’m calm again. I weed some of the garden beds growing along the path. When I get back to the cabin, Mum has her sewing machine out. Her mum taught her to sew when she was little, and for a moment I’m mad that she’s brought her sewing machine along to Fairyland when I wasn’t allowed to bring my books. But then I look at her calm, smiling face and the anger disappears.
It’s been so long since I’ve seen her sitting behind it. It’s been so long since I’ve seen her smile like that. One of the missing pieces of her, sliding quietly back into place. At least for a little while.
‘Where’s Dad?’ I ask.
‘At Ron’s. Or Reg’s. One of them – trying to fix their air-con. Taylor went with him. Think she’s following him around. Do you know anything about that?’
‘No. And Dad doesn’t know anything about air-cons.’
‘He’s trying his best to help people, Stell. That’s what matters.’
‘I guess so. Whatcha doing?’ I ask.
‘Oh, just mucking around.’ She clears her throat and I realise the cabin’s empty and she probably wanted to tuck the sewing machine away before anyone came home. She’s got some light-blue fabric piled on her lap.
I take a step towards the door. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’
Mum props her chin in her hand. ‘Stell?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Would you say you know how to sew?’
‘Um . . . not really. Just, like, by hand. You know? In and out. If I’ve ripped something.’
‘I could show you how to use the machine. It’s easy. Would you like that? You would, wouldn’t you? Sit down.’
‘Nah, it’s okay,’ I say, worried I’ve ruined whatever moment she was giving herself before I came in. Whether I’ve just destroyed a rare opportunity for Mum to engage in some much-needed self-care. ‘You just do what you were doing. I didn’t mean to . . . interrupt you.’
She sits up straight in her chair. ‘No, you should know. You should know how to sew. It’s in your blood.’
She looks at me very keenly, and I’m caught between anger and sadness and a little bit of warmth. Is she lying to me? Or has she forgotten that I’m actually the kid of some stranger?
I can feel the letter against my skin. It smells of lilac. I clear my throat, about to step outside into the sunshine again – to find Zin or Clem or Lara or head to Trisha’s or knock at Richard’s door or run into Matthew Clarke – but I can’t. Mum’s expression has lightened, and she looks almost happy. She looks like a person who does more than fret and budget and work. I pull one of the wicker chairs up to the table.
‘Alright,’ I say, pushing away thoughts of Dad and Taylor and my birth parents and everything else. Maybe Mum said the thing about sewing being in my blood because she doesn’t see me as belonging to anyone other than her. ‘Show me.’
***
Later in the night, I wake up with a start to the sound of more yelling. I hold my breath. I think about going outside, trailing around the dark park. But I know I won’t find anything, see anything. That I’m working out what everyone else at Fairyland already knows; that it’s better to pretend I don’t hear it.
Maybe that’s the secret to living in a place like Fairyland, which has so much beauty and so much sorrow. Maybe the key is to turn away from the darker parts of the place, to stop them soaking into you and somehow changing the fabric of who you are. Maybe that’s the secret that everybody else already knows.
Except it doesn’t make the sorrow disappear. It doesn’t help the person who’s suffering. I kick my legs out of bed and rush out into the night. I don’t see anything and I can’t work out where the yelling is coming from, but as I walk I chant in my head a message to whoever’s being yelled at. I’m here, I’m here, I’m here. It’s okay. I’m here.
***
‘Kris Kringle is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of,’ Taylor says as we walk into the crowded shopping centre.
‘It’s for Mum,’ I say, closing my eyes as the air-conditioner blasts the hair back from our faces. I smother a yawn that Taylor ignores.
‘That’s easy for you to say! I’ve got Dad! Which means you must have Mum. You can’t do KK with only four people. It’s too easy to work out.’
‘Would you just stop?’
‘This is the worst Christmas ever.’
‘Yeah – and whingeing about it makes it so much better.’
‘I’m not whingeing.’
‘You’re so whingeing.’
Taylor takes a deep breath and mutters something I don’t hear over the loud rendition of ‘Jingle Bells’ that’s just come on over the sound system. ‘What?’
‘I don’t know what to buy him,’ she says, not l
ooking at me. ‘I may not hate him, but it’s like, I’ve let myself get so mad with him that I’ve forgotten all the things about him that I should know.’
‘He’ll love whatever you get him.’
‘But part of me doesn’t want that.’ Taylor gazes at a blazer in one of the front-window displays. I realise we’re right in the middle of the walkway and drag Taylor into a swimwear shop. ‘Part of me wants to do everything I can to ruin his Christmas.’
‘You know that you’ll ruin everyone else’s if you do that.’
Taylor ignores me. ‘And then I want to buy him something really special and personal to make up for being such a brat, but I don’t even know what he likes, and then I get mad all over again because if he’d behaved how he was meant to and not gotten us into this mess, I wouldn’t have a reason to be so mad and I’d know exactly what to get him. You know?’
‘I know.’
‘I’m just so mad, Stell. I’m so bloody mad.’
‘Me too.’
She eyes me for a moment and shakes her head. ‘You’re not that mad.’
‘I am too!’
‘You’re not.’
‘I attacked that guy at Lee’s party the other week.’
‘Don’t try to distract me! You’re not angry all the time like I am. I can tell.’
‘I am though. I just deal with it differently,’ I say, although I’m not sure it’s true. If I let myself think about things too much and wallow, I get pretty mad. But I’m not mad all the time. Not always. There’s too much other stuff to focus on. But I suppose I’m a lot more actualised than Taylor. I’d just discovered that word. Actualised.
‘We’ll find something, okay? I’ll help you.’
She nods. She looks young, right now. She reaches behind her and touches a very tiny bikini. ‘What would Mum do if we came home with a pair of these?’
‘Well, if her reaction to your netball skirt’s anything to go by, she’d probably have a stroke.’
Taylor sighs and pulls out her shopping list. ‘Alright. Let’s do this.’
***
Procrastination is on my mind the whole way home on the train. I feel like I’ve stopped planning and started procrastinating with the whole telling-Mum-about-the-letter situation. I can’t live with myself if I’m going to start procrastinating.
‘I need new school shoes,’ Taylor says. ‘Before next term. The sole’s worn through on mine. My feet keep getting all wet.’
‘That’s because you don’t buckle them and they scuff!’ Mum snaps.
‘I don’t scuff!’
‘You do, Taylor. I see you. I can’t keep replacing things that you’re careless with. There isn’t the money.’
‘I’ll get fallen arches or something, wearing shoes with holes in the soles.’
‘Where on earth did you get that crap from?’
‘I need new shoes!’
‘Get a job and buy them yourself, then.’
‘Fine!’
‘Fine.’
‘Kelly Russo sent me a letter,’ I say.
Mum goes very still.
‘Who’s she?’ Taylor asks.
‘My biological mother.’
Taylor laughs, like it’s some sort of joke, but Mum just slowly turns around to face me and I can tell that she’s panicking.
‘When?’ she asks.
‘Before we came here.’ My voice is too calm, too measured.
Taylor stops laughing. ‘Are you kidding me?’ She looks from one of us to the other and back again, but I notice this only peripherally. Mum and I stare at each other.
‘I meant to tell you,’ Mum says. ‘Of course I meant to tell you. But you were too young and then you were too old and it never seemed important. You’re ours.’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask.
Mum startles. ‘What?’
‘You meant to tell me what?’ I swallow. ‘Mum, has Kelly sent me other letters?’
Mum presses a hand to her mouth. ‘We were meant to save you,’ she says. ‘We were meant to stop you ending up in a place like this. That was the point. That was the whole point.’
Then Mum covers her face and sobs.
***
Later on, when Dad comes inside and sees Mum crying, he seems to deflate. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says. And we all look at him and I can’t tell whether it makes me angry or sad that he immediately blames himself for my mother’s pain. He leaves a puddle of rainwater on the floor.
I wait for Mum to tell him what’s been going on, but she doesn’t and neither do I.
He touches Mum’s arm. ‘I’m sorry.’
She violently shrugs him away and mops her face with a tea towel.
I wait for Dad to disappear out of the annex, but he doesn’t. He squats down next to Mum and rubs her back, and she leans into him and cries and cries.
Taylor talks at high speed, but I’m not listening and I’m pretty sure Mum’s not, either. ‘I can’t believe you never told me!’ she keeps saying, her voice getting louder and louder. And she’s making it about her, because everything’s somehow about her. But this time I’m not being drawn in. This time it’s about me.
I wish I’d planned this properly. I know not to be impulsive with stuff that’s this important. I know that and I’d been impulsive, anyway. Mum goes to bed, muttering about a headache, and Dad sits down on the wicker couch and turns the television on low.
A little while later, I crawl onto the bottom bunk with Mum, even though I keep thinking about the letters that I’m pretty sure she stopped me getting. She’s awake and puts her arm around me. ‘What did it say?’ she asks very quietly.
‘Not much.’
‘Oh.’
‘I didn’t mean to make you cry. I didn’t handle it well, Mum. I’m sorry.’
‘I know you didn’t mean to make me cry.’ She wipes her eye with her other hand and I wish I’d kept quiet. ‘I’m just so sorry, Stella. We owed you more than this.’
‘You don’t owe me anything.’
‘If I’d ever thought that this situation was even a possibility . . .’ She shakes her head and I feel her trembling fingers stroking my hair. ‘I love you, Stella. More than anyone. You and Taylor.’
‘I know, Mum.’
Mum speaks too quietly for me to hear.
‘What?’
‘I said, I’m sorry about taking the letters. But I kept them all. I’ve got them. If you want them.’
***
One letter was bad enough, now I have fifteen of them. If you change your mind. I’m too scared to read them. I liked it better when she was a dream, an impossibility. Someone I could never really know. Someone who belonged only to me.
I run them through my fingers and some of them feel thicker than the others; as though there is something other than paper folded into the envelope. I know they’re flowers. Lilacs, perhaps. Maybe different types. I know. I can tell.
Mum’s got all the letters in her special-things file, which she keeps behind the box of fabric, under her bed. She’d offered to dig them straight out for me, but I’d said no. She’d dug them out, anyway, because she was my mum and she didn’t listen when she needed to. She told us who we were; what we wanted. It never went the other way around.
She kept saying sorry and I gave up saying that it was alright. Maybe she needed to just keep saying it. Maybe me saying that things were all okay just wasn’t enough. I wish there was a manual for this situation; a step-by-step book of helpful instructions to guide us through and stop us getting hurt.
‘Anyway, I don’t mind it here,’ I’d told Mum, surprising both of us.
‘Oh, Stell. Don’t lie.’
When I finally go to bed, Taylor is still silently awake. I lie down next to her and wait for her to speak. Instead, I hear the sounds of her uneven breathing.
‘Tay?’
‘Why wouldn’t you tell me?’ she whispers and I realise I may have hurt her even more than I’ve hurt Mum. ‘It’s that letter you said was a report, right?’
>
‘Yeah.’
‘Why would you lie?’
‘I don’t know.’ I reach down next to the bed and pass her the little purse I’d made her, while Mum was teaching me to sew, with fabric that was the same purple as her hair.
She tosses it onto the floor. It’s still raining outside.
‘I don’t want it,’ she says, and I realise that she’s crying.
CHAPTER NINE
Clem and I sit at the café and stare at the pile of letters. We’re both sucking down milkshakes and not speaking because Clem’s processing and it’s important to let him process.
‘So,’ he finally says.
‘So.’ I keep slurping my milkshake. The café is a little, cosy place on a side street between Clem’s house and school. We stopped by it a lot back when I had a part-time job at the bakery. I’ve refused to go there for the last little while, though. I’ve been trying to save money, but sometimes you just need a milkshake.
‘Oh, I made you this. Before I forget.’ I pass him one of the belts I’d sewn. It’s a bit crooked, but it’s the best one I’ve managed.
‘You sewed this?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Since when do you sew?’
‘I just started. Mum showed me and it’s sort of fun.’
Clem runs it through his fingers then reaches down and starts unbuckling his belt.
‘Clem! Jeez!’
He ignores me, pulling off his belt and threading the new one through. He loops the end through the metal loop I’d fastened and stares down at his lap, smiling.
I cross my arms. ‘It’s just a crappy belt.’
‘I love it,’ he says, putting his old belt on the table.
‘The letters,’ I say.
‘I’m getting to that! You distracted me! The letters. Right.’ Clem glances up at me. ‘At least she hasn’t opened them.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Or burned them or something. Are you mad at her?’
‘I’m so mad. I’m furious. But I also feel sorry for her, you know? The other night I went into her room to yell at her and I ended up comforting her. It’s messed up.’ I sigh. ‘Why can’t there be self-help books for this type of stuff, Clem? Tell me, why can’t there be books?’
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