by Barker, Dawn
Tony said his name. Then he said nothing. Finally, ‘I understand. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
She breathed out, then put the box on the kitchen bench. She looked at her husband and daughter. Lisa had tears running down her face; Jim was slowly shaking his head. She swallowed, then she walked out of the kitchen and down the hallway towards her son. Tony was standing still, staring at the phone in his hand as if he’d never seen anything like it before. His mouth was slightly open but he didn’t appear to be breathing. Ursula was afraid that if she spoke he’d shatter into a thousand brittle pieces.
‘Anthony? Who was it?’ She was practically whispering.
Tony didn’t move; he just stared at the phone.
‘Anthony?’
It seemed like an age before he lifted his gaze and turned towards her. His face was pale grey and waxy.
‘The police.’
She gasped involuntarily, then clasped her hand to her mouth.
‘I have to go back to the hospital straightaway.’
Until then she’d never believed that a person’s heart could actually stop for a moment, but she had no doubt that her own did as Tony covered his face with his hands.
‘Why? What’s wrong? Is Anna …’ She stopped as Tony shook his head. He took his hands away from his face and held them in front of him, recoiling as if they were stained with blood.
‘They’ve found him.’ His voice broke into a wail and he looked up at her. ‘I’m too late, Mum, it’s too late …’
Somehow she managed to reach Tony without collapsing, then she put her arms around his broad back and cradled her sobbing son to her chest.
There was nothing she could say.
CHAPTER SIX
Six weeks before
Tuesday, 4 August 2009
Anna had assumed that it would happen naturally. Her contractions would start in the middle of the night and, just like in the movies, she would shake Tony’s shoulder and he’d jump up with his dark brown hair all ruffled from sleep. She’d kiss him and whisper, ‘The baby’s coming.’ Tony would grin, rush out of bed, dress quickly, help her to the car, then drive them to the hospital.
They were on their way to the hospital now, but there was no rush. There was no panic, no speeding, no weaving through the traffic. The road was quiet as they drove against the dregs of the Sydney evening peak hour. She was nine long and heavy days overdue. She had tried everything to start labour: long walks, raspberry leaf tea, curries, even sex, despite feeling huge and unattractive. But none of it had worked. She was being admitted tonight, and her labour would be induced tomorrow.
She touched Tony’s left arm. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart,’ she said, staring straight ahead.
Tony turned to look at her, frowning, then looked back at the road as he indicated left, towards the hospital. ‘Sorry? What for?’
She shrugged. ‘I didn’t want it to be like this. It feels so unnatural.’
‘Babe, don’t be silly, please.’ He placed his hand on top of hers and squeezed it. ‘It’s just the way it is. Tomorrow, this’ll all be over and we’ll have our baby.’
She nodded. He was right, of course he was. There was nothing she could have done differently. She busied herself with changing the radio station as the hospital building appeared in front of them.
They parked the car easily on the ground level of the nearly empty multistorey car park. Opening the door, she swung her legs out and eased herself onto her feet. She put her right hand under her swollen belly, and closed the door with her left hand. The thud echoed and bounced around her, as did the high-pitched bleep as Tony locked the car. She looked around at the grey concrete walls, shining in the sallow fluorescent light, and shivered.
‘Ready?’ Tony said.
She nodded again.
He picked up the two bags at his feet and they walked out into the twilight. They crossed the quiet hospital grounds. A few smartly dressed people walked quickly, looking at pagers or talking on phones. An elderly lady held a bunch of yellow tulips as she stared at a board with a map of the hospital on it. A quiver of excitement pierced her disappointment: no, this wouldn’t be the natural labour that she’d wanted, but her baby would finally be here tomorrow. She smiled and walked forward to push open the heavy glass door into the maternity building.
They checked in at the reception desk then took the lift to the tenth floor. The doors slid smoothly open and they walked out into the ward. The smell of fresh paint made her giddy. The soft, grey carpet was springy, and muffled the sounds around them. A nurse showed them to a room, asked Anna some questions then left them to settle in.
She looked around her. The room was tiny, the single bed taking up most of the space. On one side of the bed was a tall locker with a faux-wooden laminate, and on the other was a bedside cabinet with a beige plastic phone on top of it. A sliding door led to a small ensuite bathroom.
‘Ooh, a chocolate!’ She picked up the foil-wrapped square on the pillow. ‘Only one, though. Do you want it?’
Tony laughed. ‘No, you can have it. I think you’ll need the energy.’ He put the bags down at the foot of the bed, and looked out of the window over the hospital grounds, towards the lights of the city. ‘You’re easily pleased. Just like a hotel, eh?’
‘Well, kind of. All we need is a bottle of wine and the overpriced Toblerone and we can imagine we’re on holiday.’ Noticing the oxygen tubes and plastic mask on the wall near the bed, she turned away. She opened the bar fridge door and laughed as she took out the two bottles of water. ‘This will have to do us for tonight!’
Tony winked. ‘I wonder if they’d notice if I stuck a six-pack in there for later?’
‘They’ll probably let us off if we have some champagne ready on ice.’
As soon as she mentioned champagne, her joy drained away, replaced with a jolt of dread. They didn’t have a cause for celebration yet. She couldn’t ignore the nagging feeling that something was wrong. But at least things were moving now, she told herself. There was no reason to feel so apprehensive.
While Tony fiddled with the television she started to unpack her bag. She refolded her clothes and placed them in the drawers under the window seat that converted into a small bed for Tony. She kept the smaller bag aside to take with them to the delivery suite in the morning, and handed Tony a t-shirt and boxer shorts to change into later.
He raised his eyebrows and smiled. ‘You thought of everything.’ He kissed her forehead and smoothed her fair hair back off her face.
‘You know me,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to stay here tonight if you don’t want to, you know. They won’t be doing much – nothing will happen until tomorrow. I don’t mind if you want to go home, have a good night’s sleep and come back in the morning?’
‘No, I want to be here with you. You need to stop worrying and try to get some rest.’
She smiled in relief. Of course she didn’t want Tony to go home. She wanted him right here with her, and their baby. She looked over at him and reminded herself how lucky she was. Realising she was staring, she turned back to her bags and took out a new novel.
She hadn’t finished the first chapter when the nurse returned with the gel to start the induction. She laughed at Tony’s alarmed face; he went to wait outside while the nurse put on a pair of gloves. She lay down on the bed and prepared herself, closing her eyes and imagining she was somewhere else.
She thought of their honeymoon in Margaret River. She and Tony had sat at a small candlelit table at the edge of a wooden deck, from where she could make out the lean limbs of grapevines stretching into the night. She could taste the sweet fizz of cold champagne and the tang of salty olives, and feel her excitement when Tony agreed to start trying for a baby. Then, like now, she had imagined that it would be easy, that it would all happen the way it was meant to. She had stopped taking her contraceptive pill straightaway and there began the monthly cycle of hope, followed by tears of dismay and an overwhelming sense of failure when her period
started.
When the nurse finished and told her she could get dressed again, Anna shrugged off the memories. They didn’t matter any more. Eventually, she had become pregnant and her baby would soon be in her arms.
She and Tony had a cup of tea and shared the chocolate, then he kissed her and they got into their respective beds. Tony laughed as his feet poked over the edge. ‘I feel like I’m sleeping in a kid’s bed.’
Smiling, she switched off the light. Soon, Tony was snoring gently while she lay awake. She watched the numbers on the digital clock change and counted down the hours until morning, willing her mind to rest while her body started to work.
CHAPTER SEVEN
That day
7 P.M.
The hospital, so alien to Tony only hours before, was now horribly familiar. The paediatric emergency department was a Lilliputian version of the area in which Anna still lay. The walls were covered with paintings of brightly coloured butterflies and spaceships, but it couldn’t conceal that this was a place of tears and grief.
Tony couldn’t cry any more, though.
He had listened in silence as the doctor said in hushed tones that there was nothing anyone could have done. But he knew that wasn’t true: the police could have organised a helicopter immediately. Then they would have seen Jack where he’d been the whole time, so close to them, hidden by a rocky crag further down the cliff.
Or he could have stayed home that morning.
Outside the hospital, he leaned back against the rough brick wall and slid down until he was sitting on the cold concrete with his knees bent up in front of him. He held his head in his hands. He felt numb. Something inside him had shut down when they took him in there to see Jack.
Words swirled in and out of his memory. Tragedy. Police. Coroner. Autopsy. His head throbbed. He prayed that this was all a dream. If only he could wake up, Anna would be with him and she’d tell him it wasn’t real.
Anna. She was still lying in that bed, in that room. He now knew why she couldn’t speak; she was as broken as he was. Whatever they’d given her to knock her out, it couldn’t anaesthetise her as much as this pain did. Something terrible had happened to her and Jack. The pram was still in the car; she hadn’t gone to those cliffs for a stroll. Something terrible had happened, and she’d been running. Perhaps she’d seen Jack fall and knew that she was too late, she couldn’t reach him. No wonder she was silent.
Some things were unspeakable.
He gripped his hair in his hands, then rubbed his burning eyes with the heels of his palms. He sensed someone sit down beside him and knew it was his dad. For a moment he imagined he was a kid again, sitting with Jim on the beach with their fishing rods wedged in the wet sand, silent except for the occasional comment about the flathead biting. They had never needed to say anything. Tony would sleep soundly on those nights with the smell of salt and fish in his dreams.
They didn’t need to say anything to each other now, either.
He raised his head and looked over at Jim, whose eyes were bloodshot and glistening. He’d never seen his dad cry before. He looked old, gaunt; his hair was greyer than Tony remembered. There were tiny flakes of tissue paper stuck in the silver stubble on his upper lip.
‘You OK, Dad?’ he said.
Jim let out a sound that was at once a laugh and a deep moan. ‘Bloody hell, don’t ask if I’m OK! I just …’ He shook his head. ‘I’m just so, so sorry. I don’t know what to say.’
‘Where’s Mum?’ he croaked, before his own tears had a chance to start.
‘She’s with Lisa – they went to make some calls. They won’t be long.’
‘How are they?’
‘Don’t worry about them. They’re all right. We’re all here for you, whatever we can do …’ Jim’s voice cracked and he looked away.
Tony dropped his head too. Every night when he was a kid his mum had hugged and kissed him and told him she loved him, the same way Anna did with Jack. His dad had always been more reserved. But Tony knew there was another way to show you loved someone; you just needed to be there. He looked up again.
‘Take Mum and Lisa home, Dad. There’s nothing you can do tonight.’
‘I know, but we want to be with you.’
‘Please.’ He wiped his eyes. ‘I just need to be here with Anna, get my head around this —’
‘Tony, you don’t need to be here on your own.’
‘I want to, Dad. I just can’t … can’t talk or think for now. Please. Go home with Mum, come back in the morning.’
Jim raised his voice and Tony could hear the pleading in it. ‘Come home with us.’
‘No.’ Although he wished he could, Tony shook his head. ‘I need to be here when Anna wakes up. But thanks. Thanks for everything.’
Jim put his arm around Tony and pulled him close. ‘If you won’t come home, then we’re staying. We won’t get in your way, we’ll leave you alone, but we’ll be here if you need us.’
He nodded, relieved. He struggled to his feet, then held out a hand to Jim to help him up. They looked at each other for a moment, then Jim clapped him on the back. Tony turned around and headed back into the hospital.
* * *
He didn’t need help to find Anna this time. He walked into the emergency room he’d been in earlier – was it only that afternoon? – and the chatter stopped. He shrugged off the sympathetic looks and kept walking, towards Anna’s room. The door was propped open by a chair, and on that chair sat Constable Pagonis, who he’d met earlier.
The policeman stood up and offered his hand to Tony. ‘Mr Patton. I’m so sorry for your loss.’
Tony stared at him, saying nothing. A police guard? What the hell were they thinking? But as soon as he thought it, he knew exactly what they were thinking. A searing heat burned away his fatigue.
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked, pulling his hand away from Pagonis’s. This man wasn’t a colleague or a friend; he was accusing his wife of … of what? He couldn’t let himself finish the thought.
‘Sir, this is standard procedure. Until we can interview your wife —’
‘Interview her? You’re kidding!’ His voice rose, and his hands began to shake. ‘You can’t … Look at her! Jesus, she can’t even talk, they’re doing scans on her …’
The room had gone quiet except for the rhythmic beeps and hisses of machines. He didn’t need to look behind him to know that everyone was watching them. Anna had always hated a scene; he felt a fleeting sense of relief that she couldn’t see this, that she didn’t know what was going on around her. Well, let everyone listen, then they could go home and gossip to their partners. Anna had done nothing wrong; they had nothing to hide.
Staring at the policeman, he spoke slowly and loudly. ‘I don’t know what you’re thinking happened, but you’re wrong.’ He stepped forward until he was only centimetres from Pagonis’s face. ‘You will not talk to her. I am her next of kin, and I will decide when you can interview her.’
Pagonis’s jaw bulged, but Tony held his stare until the policeman sat down again. ‘I understand. I’m just here to make sure she’s safe tonight. The detectives will talk to you some more and take it from there.’
Tony nodded, no energy left to even think of a reply. He took a step past the chair, then heard someone clear their throat behind him, a false, high-pitched noise. He wanted to ignore it, but instead turned around to see a young female nurse.
‘Mr Patton, I just wanted to warn you …’ She looked at the floor.
‘What?’ he said, unable to keep the weariness from his voice.
‘Anna was pretty restless earlier, quite agitated. The doctors gave her something to help calm her down. So she’s sleepy now, and you might not get much out of her.’
‘Agitated? When I saw her earlier, she was barely moving!’
‘We needed to take some blood from her, she got very distressed …’
‘Did she say anything? Anything about what happened? Or my baby?’
The nurse bit
her lip and shook her head. ‘Sorry. No, she didn’t. She was just … screaming.’
Tony looked into the room again. Screaming? Anna had the most self-control of anyone he had ever met. She was mortified if they had any sort of row in public, or if she started crying. What the hell had happened to her? What had happened to his Anna, to make her scream so loudly that the doctors had to knock her out? He waved the nurse away with his hand, then walked into Anna’s room. Pagonis had the sense to move his chair and Tony closed the door on the bustle behind him.
* * *
Anna was asleep. He stared at her peaceful face, and finally let himself weep quietly. He held her limp hand, then dropped it. He silently willed her to wake up, hoping that somehow she could hear his thoughts. Wake up, talk to me. Anna didn’t move. The next instant, he wanted to shake her, hit her, make her tell him what was going on. Could she have done this? The police obviously thought so. He was immediately ashamed to have even thought it: Anna would never hurt Jack. It was impossible. What had she seen?
He suddenly realised how incredibly tired he was. He wanted to get into the narrow bed beside his wife and hold her, feel her warmth and her heartbeat and her breath. They would cry for Jack together.
He hated to think of her waking up alone earlier; she would have been so confused, so terrified. That was why she’d been agitated, it was the trauma of everything: the police, the tests, whatever she had witnessed today. It was possible that she didn’t even know that Jack was dead. A shudder ran through him. How could he tell her?
His phone vibrated in his pocket. He lifted it out and saw his mother’s mobile number displayed. He disconnected the call, switched the phone off, then put it back in his pocket.
Some time later, someone brought in a styrofoam cup of watery tea, which he let go cold. Someone else told him that his dad was outside, but he shook his head; he wanted to be alone. Faceless nurses padded in and out of the room, checking Anna’s temperature, her pulse, her blood pressure. She didn’t wake up. He shivered. There was a chill in the room, and he noticed through the small window that the doctors and nurses had put cardigans and jumpers over their scrubs. He pulled Anna’s blanket up to her neck and tucked it around her body. He moved his chair closer and laid his head down on the bed so it was touching her arm. When she woke up, he wanted her to know that she wasn’t alone.