Ruined (Family Untied Book 1)

by S. A. McEwen

  11

  When Griffin next calls her, Natalie is neck-deep in Buffy the Vampire Slayer DVDs and self-pity.

  “I’m sick,” she tells him. Her voice does indeed sound scratchy and hoarse, but this is actually from the many bouts of crying she has experienced, rather than from any virus.

  The tears make no sense to Natalie. It’s not like she had wanted a baby. Nevertheless, she feels bereft.

  She does not feel like sex, with clients or with Griffin.

  “I’ll bring you some soup,” he tells her, and even though she doesn’t want him to see her in her flannel pyjamas with her red-rimmed eyes, she also longs for someone to come and look after her. So she tells him her address, and unlocks her door.

  When he arrives, he busies himself in her kitchen, locating bowls and utensils. The smell of rich tomato-based soup fills the small apartment.

  “I can’t claim to have made it.” He smiles at her, his proficiency in both the kitchen and the caring stirring something deep inside her. “But it’s my favourite comfort food when I’m in Sydney and feel a bit lonely.”

  He carefully places two bowls on the coffee table, then returns with some fresh, buttered bread.

  He raises his eyebrows at Buffy, frozen mid-fight on the screen, her face fierce and focused. “Shall we?” he says, indicating the remote, and Natalie’s heart flutters.

  It’s just because I’m feeling vulnerable, she tells herself, the general anaesthetic and the diversion from her usual routine playing havoc with her mood and with her energy levels.

  But she can’t remember the last time she gave herself up to being nurtured by someone.

  She can’t remember the last time there was someone there who wanted to be nurturing, let alone was capable of succeeding at it.

  She snuggles into Griffin, with soup and Buffy, and feels something dangerously close to longing. For this to be the norm, not the exception in her life. For this to result in stirring feelings of contentedness for what she has, rather than longing for what she wishes she had more of.

  For a moment, she feels the overwhelming urge to tell him about the baby. Their baby. To share the burden, and the pain, and the confusion. Though she doesn’t frame it as such, it’s a desire—for once—to hand her care over to someone else, to trust that they’ll look after her soft and vulnerable parts. An almost childlike request: Can you look after this for me for a while?

  Please?

  It’s too big for me right now.

  But she’s never experienced such a thing, and she doesn’t even know the words to use to ask for support, let alone have any trust that someone will hold her the way she needs to be held.

  She laps up the physical comfort of Griffin. But she stays silent on the topics that might soothe her to talk about. The ones that might help her to fulfil the yearning for connection that she doesn’t understand.

  The next morning, Griffin has to leave early.

  After spooning her all night, his body warm and solid against her, he slips out from under the bedcovers and is dressed before she even stirs.

  He plants a kiss on her forehead, murmuring “Get well,” and eases out of the room.

  For a moment in the kitchen, he stares again at the pile of mail addressed to someone who’s name is not Ivy, on the otherwise sleek and sparkling kitchen bench.

  Then he quietly lets himself out.

  Natalie sleeps for another few hours.

  She sleeps better than she has in a long, long time.

  12

  January 2018

  Christmas comes and goes, and Natalie still hasn’t gone back to work.

  Letitia joined her family for Christmas lunch, her own parents being in Jamaica, and it made the day surprisingly tolerable. Old and new wounds and habits were disrupted by her presence and kept at bay. Natalie avoided mentioning Grant Boyd, or even glancing at number seven as she pulled up outside her parents’ house that morning. And if her parents had encountered him, they kept that to themselves.

  Letitia’s easy laughter rang out from the backyard all afternoon. Even the lies were easy: Letitia stating she’d switched to an engineering degree; that she was living on savings so she didn’t have to work.

  Alex was thrilled to have an additional guest, only making a couple of inappropriate comments. But Natalie had worded Letitia up on the impact of his brain injury long ago—the impulsiveness, the lack of inhibitions, the difficulty concentrating and remembering things—so she was neither surprised nor uncomfortable.

  On the way home, Letitia had been quieter.

  “Your parents are very patient,” she observed softly, and Natalie had nodded.

  They drove in silence for a while.

  Whatever issues she has with her parents herself, Natalie knows this is true, and is grateful. She hates to imagine what would have happened to Alex without them. She tries not to think about what will happen after they pass.

  It’s hard to describe to other people exactly what Alex needs support with. He can present so differently, depending on the context. He holds down a permanent job, he gets himself ready for work every morning. He looks well-groomed—handsome, even.

  But these things have taken so much time. So much support. Occupational therapy. Neuropsychology. Speech therapy. Even physiotherapy, for support with movement and balance. Support for the family to implement strategies.

  And repetition.

  So much repetition.

  Not to mention the exorbitant costs.

  “How did it happen?” Letitia asks eventually.

  Natalie had already told her about the assault. What she was asking was why. But somewhere deep inside, she already knew the answer.

  Natalie had stared at the road, her chest tightening the way it always did when she thought about Alex. Her big brother, who was always looking out for her. Who was so optimistic, so joyful. So full of life.

  When kids at school had teased her, or tried to push her around, he would appear as if by magic, shoeing them away without fear or anger. He was quiet, but big for his age. Usually, though the boys taunted him, they weren’t physical with Alex.

  “He was riding his bike home from school one day. I had stayed home sick. So he was by himself. One of our neighbour’s kids was waiting for him. He always shouted at us, called us monkeys, or abbos, and told us to go back to where we came from. Which just shows how stupid he was. But anyway. Sometimes, he threw rocks at us. He’d do it in front of his parents, and they’d just laugh, like it was a big joke. My parents never confronted them. Just said that it was only names. Little stones. No harm done. That some kids were just mean. To try to make friends with him. Like you can ever be friends with a person like that.”

  Silence had filled the car, with all the things that could be said in that space. How even twenty-odd years later, Letitia’s experience wasn’t so different. It wasn’t quite so overt. But it was still there, nonetheless.

  It wasn’t until Natalie had stopped the car outside Letitia’s sharehouse that she continued, still staring straight ahead. “This one day, Alex had stood up to Grant at school. Had made him look foolish about something. So Grant was waiting for him. He pushed him off his bike as Alex rode past. Then kicked him. In the face, the head, the body. He was a bloody mess by the time another neighbour saw what was happening and pulled Grant away. They were both only sixteen. Grant got a rap on the knuckles, basically. He said that Alex fell off the bike trying to run him over, that’s why he beat him.”

  As if that would have ever happened.

  “But Alex wasn’t capable of even talking at the time, there was so much damage to his face and jaw.” The bitterness and rage and hopelessness felt as intense to Natalie as she spoke the words as it had on the day it happened.

  “No one came forward as a witness,” she continued, still staring blankly in front of her. “The police were very lenient. Charged Grant as a minor. Called it a schoolyard scuffle. He didn’t even serve time.”

  Letitia had reached out,
gripped Natalie’s hand.

  They had sat like that quietly, for a while.

  Today, Natalie ignores another booking request, her mind playing over Christmas, Letitia, Alex.

  At the time it happened, her parents had tried to claim expenses through the state transport insurance scheme, but they had pushed back, armed with Grant’s claim that Alex had been at fault. So all the medical and therapy expenses beyond Medicare fell to the family. Natalie had watched the bills come in. Her parents were well-off, and there was no question of Alex going without what he needed to function as best he could. But recovery was slow, and progress was slower.

  And there was so much to learn about brain injury. For a while it seemed like he might be fine. When he finally went back to school, he picked up maths subjects like nothing had even happened. He chose physics for years eleven and twelve. He grasped complex problems and could work them out.

  But then, as the years past, it became clear his social functioning was not developing. Behaviours and responses that you’d expect an adolescent to grow out of, remained. And despite how quickly he could learn new concepts, he just as quickly forgot them.

  He was overwhelmed in loud environments.

  His anger was fast and brutal, and functioned like an on-off switch.

  His planning and problem-solving were very poor.

  He started having seizures.

  The appointments were endless. Upeksha left work to care for him. To learn the strategies. To help implement routines every day. To organise appropriate supports.

  It was clear that Alex would not thrive without a lot of input.

  Upeksha knuckled down and gave it her all.

  Natalie is very, very grateful for that.

  13

  Griffin disappears overseas for five days in the New Year, and Natalie is at once bereft at his absence and confused about that.

  She feels on edge, and puts it down to not having told him about the termination. As a new guy on the scene—she can’t bring herself to even think the word boyfriend yet—she thinks what she decides to do with her body is none of his business. It doesn’t even occur to her that her edginess is due to the fact that she has been upset, and shared it with no one.

  That perhaps sharing her confusion and pain about the baby might bring her comfort of some sort.

  Instead, she arranges to have lunch with her aunt, who happens to be in Sydney for the holidays.

  Aunty She greets her joyfully. It’s been at least a couple of years since they’ve seen each other in person, but once the main catch-up questions are dealt with (Natalie lying about work, of course), she launches straight into the reason she made contact, before she loses her resolve and plays by the rule that has been drummed into her since birth:

  Don’t ask.

  Not that it’s stated like that. Her parents are evasive, and respond in a way that ensures she feels uncomfortable, disrespectful, bad for asking.

  Aunty She has only ever given her a warning look when she’s edged too close to unspoken topics, and her love and respect for Aunty She have seen her retreat obediently at once. But today, she’s spurred on by some kind of urgency. Perhaps it’s losing the life inside of her; perhaps it’s a need to create some order out of chaos. She can’t articulate it to herself. All she knows is that it feels critical to her feeling better.

  “Mum never talks to me about Sri Lanka. She evades every single question I ask. I just want to have some idea about where I come from,” Natalie says. “Can you tell me about her life there?”

  Shehara’s wide smile fades somewhat. She gazes at Natalie, not speaking, her eyes taking on a faraway look, almost glazing over. Minutes pass.

  Finally, Aunty She focuses back on Natalie. “She doesn’t talk about it for a reason, Natty-Noo. She doesn’t want you to have to live with that stuff.”

  “But it’s like this whole part of my life is missing. I don’t know anything about what made her who she is. I don’t know why she’s so blind to race. I know it must have been bad. But I just want to know where I came from. I want to understand our family more. Because I do live with it. She might refuse to talk about it, but I can feel it. I can practically smell it. It seeps out of her pores. Her whole life revolves around something she refuses to acknowledge, refuses to talk about.”

  Shehara shakes her head, her eyes filled with love and sadness. “I can’t, Noo. She’s my sister. But you’re a smart girl. You can find out enough. You can get the picture.”

  “I’ve got the picture,” Natalie says, frowning. “I want the details. I know it’s awful. I know it will hurt. I just want to be able to feel closer to her. To know where she came from. To be able to connect with how she is. To understand why she’s so…white.”

  “Why now?” Shehara asks, not blinking at the intended insult, and Natalie knows she is not going to hear any details from her. Her face is warm and open, but what she’s inviting is for Natalie to share what has brought her here, why she wants these answers now. In a way, it’s too late, Natalie knows this. She’s nearly forty. Her mother is not going to change now. She’s not going to suddenly want to be closer. Closeness involves uncertainty. It involves dealing with somebody else’s internal, emotional world. It involves messiness and risk and heartache and loss.

  Upeksha is certainly not going to want to have anything to do with that.

  Natalie knows this.

  What she doesn’t notice is that while she fights to extract this from her mother, she avoids it in every other relationship herself.

  Despite her disappointment about that conversation, Natalie spends as much of the next week as she can with Aunty She.

  She often wishes they’d lived nearby growing up, imagining big, warm family gatherings, laughter and stories. Would her parents have embraced that, if it was just the way it was from the start?

  She finds it hard to believe they settled in different states and different cities, and doesn’t really buy the explanation of job opportunities. In a new country, in a whole new culture, wouldn’t you want to hang on to the few family members that you had?

  Still, she doesn’t pursue it. And though they don’t talk about the past again, Aunty She is happy to talk about recent visits to Sri Lanka, what it is like there, the things she loves and doesn’t love about it. In turn, she wants to be a part of Natalie’s life, accompanying her to the gallery, drawing out of her deep responses to different styles and subjects. She’s curious less about the art itself than what it means to her niece, and though she’s there on a solo holiday (“Uncle Pu had no interest in coming!” she laments), she sees Natalie at least every second day. She even sits with her in the park one afternoon, handing her cheese on biscuits as she sketches, the silence long and comfortable between them, the warm sun on their skin.

  By the time she leaves, Natalie feels nourished.

  It’s bittersweet, though, because it contrasts so starkly with how she usually feels after spending time with family. So as nourished as she feels, she is also left with a yearning greater than it was before.

  14

  February 2018

  The man is watching.

  Finally, it might be time.

  It has never taken this long before.

  He makes a mental note that Christmas is a bad time for sticking to routines. It’s been hard to find the right day. But he hasn’t rushed. Rushing is for losers. Rushing means mistakes.

  But also: his work is worth the wait.

  He watches the woman leave her apartment.

  A tingle of excitement starts in his groin.

  15

  “What do you think about children?” Griffin asks suddenly.

  Natalie jumps so much she sloshes her wine.

  They’re out at a fancy restaurant, enjoying nice wine, excellent views, and overpriced food. A waiter glides up to her with a fresh white napkin, surreptitious and silent.

  “Why?” she says faintly, the foetus they co-created hanging there between them, weighing her down. />
  “Well, I guess I feel like there’s not much time left for me. I mean, I know there is physically speaking. But in terms of when I think it would be good, I suppose. I don’t want to be an old dad. And I’m guessing we’re similar ages. So I wondered what you thought about it. If it was on the cards for you.”

  Natalie shakes her head, looking down. She stills feels inexplicably sad about the baby. That it is gone, yes—but even more so because of the abnormalities. It feels tender and heartbreaking and fragile and…needy. Like that little being needed her love.

  “No. I’ve never wanted children. Not even when I was younger. It didn’t seem like something I would excel at.” Natalie looks back up, watching Griffin carefully.

  “I don’t think you have to excel. Isn’t ‘good enough’ the modern catchphrase?”

  “Well, I mightn’t scrape in with those accolades, either.” Natalie smiles ruefully and shrugs, resumes sipping her wine. “My parents were…different,” she says, her face neutral. “They were very focused on what they wanted for us, rather than what we needed. I feel like something got lost in the process. I just don’t feel very maternal or like I could cope with children. All their needs.”

  Griffin nods thoughtfully. “Okay,” he says, shrugging, picking up his fork.

  Natalie waits. For him to declare she’s not the right woman for him, for him to criticise her lack of womanliness, for him to list all the reasons she ought to want children, the way that most people do when she drops that news on them. Even strangers try to tell her that she doesn’t know her own mind, and that of course she wants them “deep down,” or that she’ll “regret it one day.”

  But Griffin moves on to another topic, as intense and interested in her thoughts on the next subject as ever.