The Family Next Door

by Sally Hepworth

  Lucas had been somber on the phone—almost reverent, as if he’d been calling to give his condolences after someone had died. The conversation had been stiff and awkward and had lasted a total of forty-seven seconds. Ange had wanted to make a joke, or tell him to stop and pick up some milk on his way over—do something that made them feel like them again. But then, they weren’t them anymore, were they?

  Over the past few days she’d formulated a loose sort of plan. She would stay in the house; Lucas would find somewhere else to live. Heck, she might even help him find a place! Part of her liked the idea that she would be the bigger person for the sake of her sons, another part of her longed to stand on an upper floor and hurl Lucas’s belongings out of the window while screaming like a fishwife. She looked at the armchair opposite her, where Lucas normally sat. They’d bought these armchairs as a pair when they were newly married—the first items they’d actually purchased rather than inherited from their individual homes or from their parents. Ange remembered sitting in them in the store, side by side, talking about how one day they would sit in these chairs with a pair of toddlers in their laps—first their own kids, then their grandchildren. That was their future, she’d been so certain of it.

  She was still sitting in her chair a few minutes later when she heard the knock at the door. That was a surprise. Lucas still had his key, why wouldn’t he just let himself in? Perhaps he was setting a boundary. I don’t live here anymore. From now on, I knock.

  She opened the door. Lucas’s cheeks were pink and it wasn’t just the heat. He looked like he’d been crying. Another surprise. “Lucas,” she said. “For goodness’ sake. Come inside.” She led him back into the front room. The boys were in the lounge room out back, engrossed in their game. Without being directed to do so, Lucas fell into his armchair and dropped his head into his hands.

  “Come, now,” she said. “You don’t want the boys to see you like this.”

  “I’m sorry, Ange,” he sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”

  Ange reluctantly put an arm around him. There were many bizarre things about finding out your husband had an illegitimate child, she realized, not least of which was patting his back while he sobbed in your front room. “I never wanted this to happen,” he said. “I want to keep our family together.”

  “Shh,” she said watching for the boys. She hadn’t expected this level of upset. He hadn’t been this upset after Josie. As much as she didn’t want to buy into it, Ange found it giving her hope.

  “This wasn’t the first time, Lucas,” she said, to herself as much as to him.

  “I know,” he said, looking up. His face was anguished. Infuriatingly, it made him look even more handsome. “I can’t explain it. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  I don’t know what’s wrong with me. The words were surprisingly healing. It occurred to Ange that for years, she’d felt like Lucas’s infidelity meant something was wrong with her.

  “You never did anything to deserve a husband like me. You were so … so—”

  “I wasn’t pregnant.”

  Lucas stilled. Even his tears appeared to halt halfway down his cheeks. “What?”

  “With Ollie. I told you I was pregnant because I knew you were going to leave me for Josie.”

  Lucas scoffed, dismissing her admission out of hand. “But you were pregnant. We had Ollie.”

  “Remember how much sex we had after our reunion, Lucas? I got pregnant pretty quickly. Within a few weeks.”

  Lucas stared at her. She could tell from his face that he still didn’t get it. Of all his wonderful qualities, Lucas had never been quick.

  “So you weren’t pregnant,” he said slowly. “But you said you were so I wouldn’t leave you.”

  Congratulations, darling, she thought. You finally got there.

  “Yes.”

  It was surprisingly therapeutic, airing all these truths. Ange exhaled back into her chair, feeling the weight of the secret leave her. Lucas stood up and walked to the mantel.

  “Okay,” he said turning to face her. “I forgive you. And I have to ask … would you consider … forgiving me?”

  Lucas didn’t look quite so desperate anymore, Ange noticed. Her admission had been therapeutic for him too. After all, they were equals again now, weren’t they? He’d lied; she’d lied. Now they could bury the hatchet. Even-stevens. She knew that was what he was thinking, because she knew everything about Lucas. Ange thought back to the day in the store. The two plaid chairs side by side. The imaginary children and grandchildren in their laps. She thought about forgiveness. How much was too much in a marriage? How much was not enough?

  Ange heard the thunder of feet in the hallway.

  “Dad!” Ollie cried, tearing into the room. “Will! Dad’s here!”

  A mass of head rubs and sweaty hugs followed while Ange looked on. If the boys noticed their father’s face was tearstained, they didn’t show it—they were too busy telling him the level they’d made it to on the Xbox. Little narcissists.

  “Can we have pizza for dinner?” Ollie asked him. “Mum let us have pizza yesterday.”

  He met Ange’s eyes over the tops of their heads. She might have been imagining it, but it looked like he was giving her an admonishing look. “Two nights in a row?” he said. “That sounds a bit—”

  “Great idea,” Ange said. “Hawaiian for me.”

  Ollie and Will gave each other the side-eye. “Hawaiian? But—you and Dad always get Greek salad or fish. You never eat pizza.”

  They weren’t wrong. Ange tried to remember the last time she’d eaten pizza. Probably back in college. Definitely sometime before she’d met Lucas. Before she started drinking the Kool-Aid about her body being her temple. Before she started trying to maintain a body that would stop her husband from straying. Fat lot of good it had done her.

  “Well, guess what?” she said. “I eat pizza now.”

  50

  BARBARA

  The road in front of Barbara was hazy from the heat. The wind had picked up. Barbara could feel it all around them, pushing and pressing the car as though trying to sweep them off the road. Barbara glanced at Mia in the rearview mirror, staring boredly at her lap, fiddling with the hem of her skirt. Her features—her reddish hair, her clear blue eyes, her delicate build—were so at odds with Barbara’s own. It was so obvious and yet, Barbara hadn’t paid much attention to it before.

  As she drove, Barbara cast her mind back to the day she found out she was pregnant with Essie. She’d had two pregnancies before, both of which had ended in miscarriage during the first trimester, but this one, she was certain, was going to stick. She’d been married for three years by then. The first year had been average, the second worse. The third year had been unbearable. She’d met John at a casino at 1 A.M., a few weeks after her father’s death. John had just won a game of cards and he’d insisted on buying her a drink. Their wedding, six months later, was a knee-jerk reaction to losing her parents’, she knew that now. She wasn’t used to being alone, and the desire to create a new family to replace the old was stronger than she imagined.

  They lost the car first, on a horse that “just couldn’t lose.” Next was the house they’d bought with her inheritance. They ended up renting a one-bedroom apartment. She questioned the logic of a one-bedroom when they were about to have a baby but John said they’d make do. The yearning for her parents was unrelenting. Her mother would have brought her home and cared for her during her pregnancy, and her father would have given John a stern word, then taught him how to better manage money. They may have even loaned them money to buy another modest house, in exchange for letting them oversee the finances. It would have been a learning experience and they would have done better in the future.

  But Barbara’s parents weren’t there.

  John wasn’t there a lot either. He’d been emotionally absent for most of their marriage, but as her pregnancy progressed he was physically absent a lot too. Everyone seemed to be absent. Barbara had had friends earlie
r in her life, but one by one, she stopped visiting them, instead spending all of her time holed up in the apartment, worrying. She worried about what would happen if they were evicted from the apartment for not paying the bills. She worried she’d have nowhere to bring home her baby. It started to get inside her mind, the worry. The only thing that got her through the worry was the knowledge that a baby was coming.

  She found a crib for the baby at the charity shop, a few items of clothing, and a teddy bear. She set it all up in a corner of the bedroom. Some days she’d just sit in the bedroom and look at the things she’d set up. It comforted her, somehow.

  John had disappeared by the time Barbara went into labor. She’d been was getting ready to go to bed when she felt the first contraction—so strong it took her breath away. By the time her taxi arrived to take her to the hospital, she couldn’t talk.

  “It’s early,” she remembered telling the nurse. “Thirty-five weeks.”

  The nurse nodded. There hadn’t been time to fill out the paperwork, to talk … to do anything but push. It didn’t take long. Barbara tried once again to remember the way Essie looked when she was placed in her arms, but she couldn’t. She remembered other things. The averted eyes of the hospital staff. The coldness of the room. She remembered the feeling of the baby in her arms, the barely-there weight against her hospital gown.

  Why couldn’t she remember her face?

  And just like that, the face started to come. Perfect closed eyes. Bright red, blistered skin and deep purple lips. She was tiny. Too tiny.

  “Why … why does she look like this?” she’d asked.

  “Maceration,” the doctor said. “The epidermis has started to separate from the dermis. Judging by the color of her skin, she probably died four to six hours ago in utero, around the time you went into labor. I’m sorry but your baby was stillborn.”

  Stillborn.

  Barbara swerved off the road and onto a side street, pulling up sharp.

  Your baby was stillborn.

  No. That wasn’t right. Barbara glanced in the rearview mirror. She was there in the backseat. Essie was right there. She wasn’t stillborn. She was healthy and perfect, a toddler now.

  “Where are we?” she asked. She looked hot and bothered and on the verge of sleep.

  “Sorry, honey. Mummy just had a horrible daydream.”

  Essie looked puzzled. “Did she?”

  “We’re going home now, baby,” Barbara told her. But when she looked around, nothing looked familiar. How far had she drifted while daydreaming? Was she even in Sydney anymore?

  She got out her road map and tried to get her bearings.

  When I got home from the hospital, everything was exactly as I’d left it. A half-drunk glass of water sat on the end table; my pajamas lay on the floor of the hallway where they’d been discarded. I came inside and set your basket on the sofa. Your eyelids flickered in sleep and I felt a sense of peace. I wasn’t alone anymore.

  John had been gone for three months. The other woman’s name was Laurel. She was his hairdresser, of all things, and I knew her. Whenever John went in to get his hair cut, I always poked my head in and said “not too short,” and Laurel laughed. Then, as I headed off to the greengrocers, Laurel always waved at me through the window, her shaving blade still in her hand. I should have known that was ominous.

  Laurel wasn’t especially attractive. She had brassy-blond hair and she always seemed to be wearing a floral dress covered by a black PVC apron. I had never looked closely enough to notice whether Laurel had an ample bosom or nice hips under than apron. John obviously had.

  “But I’m pregnant,” I’d told John, when he’d made the confession. He knew that, of course, since I reminded him every day. Not to mention the fact that for the first time I actually had a bump. I called John the day you were born and told him he had a daughter. He’d seemed pleased and said he’d put an announcement in the paper. But there was no request to visit. No offer of financial assistance.

  If it weren’t for Esther, my generous aunt in Melbourne, giving me rent money, I wouldn’t have survived as long as I had. It seemed as good a reason as any to name you after her.

  That day as I sat in my apartment, I lifted you out of your basket and placed you to my breast. When you were finished, I realized you’d need a fresh diaper, which meant a trip to the store. I hadn’t expected you for a few more weeks so I was unprepared. But the idea of a trip to the store filled me with anxiety. The only time I’d been out of the house in the past few months was to go to the hospital and to go to the grocery store. It was at the grocery store a month ago that I’d run into Laurel. She’d smiled at me for a quick moment before recognition had come to her face. I’d abandoned my shopping cart immediately and run back to the car.

  I needed to call Esther. She’d offered to come to Sydney to help out for a few weeks after the baby was born. Without any other help, I had no choice but to accept her offer. Or did I? After I finished feeding, I could pick up the phone and call Esther … or, I could get on a bus to Melbourne. In Melbourne I wouldn’t have to worry about who I’d bump into in the street. I wouldn’t have to worry about what people thought. I could make new friends. Start over somewhere a long way from here where no one would know us.

  51

  ESSIE

  Essie looked up when she saw movement in her doorway. But it wasn’t her mum and Mia standing there, it was Ben and Isabelle. Somewhere in the back of Essie’s mind, it struck her that they were an odd pair to arrive at her door together, but she was too worried about her mum and Mia to address it.

  “No word from Mum?” she said.

  Ben shook his head.

  “Well … where’s Polly?” she asked.

  “I left her with Ange.”

  Essie felt her panic rise a notch. If Ben had left Polly with Ange then obviously he was worried too. “Well, I think we should call the—”

  “I’ve called two hospitals,” Ben said. His facial muscles were tight, she noticed, making him look older. “And I’ll keep calling. But the road is clear between home and the hospital. And your mum would have had ID on her, someone would have called us.”

  “What about Lois?” Essie suggested. “Have you tried her?”

  “I don’t have her number.”

  “I have it.” Essie retrieved the phone number and gave it to Ben and he walked into the hallway to make the call.

  “Are you all right?” Isabelle asked Essie when he was gone.

  Essie wrung her hands. “It’s so unlike Mum to disappear like this.”

  “Is it?”

  Essie looked at Isabelle for a long moment. “Isabelle, I know you think that Mum kidnapped me, but it’s just not possible. I accept that it’s possible that we are sisters, and I want to take my own DNA test to confirm this. But if we are, it’s not because Mum kidnapped me. If anything it’s—”

  “I confronted her.”

  Essie blinked. “You confronted my mum?”

  “I was going to wait until you had a chance to digest the news, but then I saw her outside my house and I couldn’t hold back. I just—”

  “And?” Despite Essie’s confidence that her mum was an innocent party, she had to admit she was curious. “What did she say?”

  “She denied it,” Isabelle admitted. “But she seemed … confused. When I told her I had proof she seemed very rattled.”

  “Rattled?” Essie said. Her mum was never rattled. She might have laughed (politely, of course). She’d have been puzzled as to why Isabelle thought she’d kidnapped a baby—who wouldn’t be? Essie imagined her inviting Isabelle in (for tea!) so they could sort the whole misunderstanding out. But she wouldn’t have been rattled. “How do you mean?”

  “She sort of glazed over,” Isabelle continued. “Then she put Mia in the car and left. That was a few hours ago.”

  “Lois hasn’t heard from her today,” Ben said, reentering the room. He tossed the phone down onto the bed with more force than necessary.

&nb
sp; “Mom seemed rattled?” Essie repeated. “And then she put Mia in the car and we haven’t seen her since?”

  Isabelle looked like she might cry. Ben pressed a hand against his forehead. A nurse peeked her head around the door, assessed the situation, then ducked away again.

  “You’re telling me my mother is a child abductor,” Essie said slowly. She was looking at Ben and Isabelle, but she was talking to herself. “And now she’s missing and she has my daughter?”

  Ben looked from Essie to Isabelle and back again. Finally he reached for the phone again.

  “All right,” he said. “I’m calling the police.”

  52

  FRAN

  No good will come out of this, Fran told herself, as the phone rang in her ear. No good at all. And yet, she continued to wait on the line.

  Nigel was gone. He’d left a few days ago, ostensibly on business. It was good timing, he said. They both needed time and space, and this trip—to a conference in Brisbane, would give them that. Fran didn’t know when he was coming back, or if he was coming back. All she knew was that she was bereft without him. So was Rosie. Even Ava seemed down in the dumps.

  Ange hadn’t returned her calls. If Essie hadn’t been in the hospital, she might have tried her. She couldn’t speak to any of her former work colleagues, for obvious reasons. But there was one person she hoped she could count on. If only she’d pick up the phone.

  “Hello?”

  Fran cleared her throat. “Mum? It’s me.”

  “Francesca?” There was a pause. Fran pictured her, making eyes with her father, showing her surprise. “What is it? Is everything all right?”

  In her defense, it wasn’t a ridiculous question. Fran and her mother didn’t call each other to chat. They didn’t bother with casual niceties or “catching up.” They spoke on the phone to make arrangements or report facts. “Just a reminder that it’s Rosie’s birthday on Monday.” “Did Dad get the results of his blood work?” “I passed my final exams.” Fran had always told herself it was because they were all busy people; too busy to make idle chitchat. But the fact was, these last few months, Fran had plenty of time to talk. She just didn’t have a lot of people to talk to.