The Mother-in-Law

by Sally Hepworth

  I thought I’d done everything right. I waited for Tom to get home. Harriet was too young to swim, and besides, I wouldn’t have trusted myself with both kids in the pool at once.

  ‘Tom,’ I said when he walked in the door, ‘can you hold Harriet for me so I can swim with Archie?’

  For someone who is so fond of holding his grandchildren, Tom was surprisingly reluctant. ‘Oh. Can’t you just put her in the pram?’

  ‘I think she’d prefer a cuddle from her grandfather.’

  Archie was already naked, running for the pool, leaving a trail of clothing in his wake. ‘Archie, don’t run!’ I called after him. The floor is limestone and slippery when wet. At one end is a giant fish tank, which I think is over the top, but Tom insisted and the children love it.

  ‘Take Harriet up that end and let her look at the fish,’ I said.

  Tom did, reluctantly. He was in a strange mood; I didn’t know what was bothering him. I slid inflatable armbands onto Archie and he dive-bombed into the pool while I got in slowly via the steps. Tom carried Harriet over to look at the fish. She is a pudgy baby, shorter and much fatter than Archie was. I watched her chunky legs kick insistently as she watched the fish swim past.

  ‘Watch this, Dido,’ Archie said, and I watched him pretend to walk down the street and then accidentally fall into the pool. Funny little fellow.

  I glanced at Tom and noticed he was holding Harriet strangely, sort of using his forearms to press her against him. By the time I realised she was slipping, it was too late. I pulled myself up and out of the pool but I was still several metres away when Harriet slid from his grip and her head hit the limestone tiles with a crack.

  In the ambulance, I sing ‘Old MacDonald’.

  ‘Old MacDonald had a farm. Ee ii ee ii oo.’

  There is blood. A lot of blood. Heads bleed a lot, I remember someone saying that once. Lots of blood vessels close to the surface of the skin or something.

  ‘With a quack quack here, and a quack quack there . . .’

  Harriet is awake, which is a good sign, but she’s very distressed, has vomited twice and a sizable bruise is already coming up on the side of her head. She seems drowsy, but it is her nap time. My job, the paramedic said, is to keep her awake. And so, I sing.

  ‘. . . here a quack, there a quack, everywhere a quack quack . . .’

  It’s funny, the places the mind goes. My mind drifts from the idea that I may have permanently injured my grandchild, to the question of why Tom dropped her at all. Mostly my mind sticks on what I’m going to say to Lucy. I know what it’s like being told that you might not get to keep your baby. I remember that feeling as if it were yesterday. I cannot be the reason that Lucy has to hear these words.

  I run my fingers through Harriet’s soft, baby hair.

  ‘Ee ii ee ii oo.’

  Lucy and Ollie arrive at the hospital in a flurry. Ollie is in his work clothes, minus the suit jacket—he must have come in such a hurry he didn’t stop to put it on. Lucy is still dressed in the tracksuit she wore when I picked up the kids this morning.

  This morning feels like a lifetime ago.

  ‘Lucy,’ I start, but she ignores me, rushing to Harriet’s side. I cringe. Harriet looks terrible. Her head is bandaged but blood soaks through the gauze. Lucy rears back in horror.

  ‘Is she . . . unconscious?’

  At first I think Lucy is talking to me but then I realise there is a tired-looking doctor in the doorway. She’s dressed in scrubs and glasses dangle around her neck on a chain.

  ‘Your daughter has been sedated for an MRI,’ the doctor says. ‘We do that with young children, to make sure they’ll lie still. Try not to worry.’

  ‘Why does she need an MRI?’

  ‘It’s just a precaution. She has a depressed skull fracture, which may require surgery to lift the bone to prevent it pressing against the brain. We also need to check for cerebral lacerations and contusions, which are tears and bruises to the surface of the brain,’ the doctor says. ‘This can happen when the skull is fractured. Your daughter was vomiting in the ambulance, so we want to make sure we don’t miss anything. Chances are, she’ll be fine, but we can’t be too careful with head injuries.’ There is movement in the doorway—a nurse gesturing to the doctor. She nods, then looks back at Lucy. ‘I’m just going to check that we have everything ready here, and then we will be back to get Harriet.’

  Lucy turns back to Harriet. Ollie comes to stand beside her and she reaches out to grip his forearm.

  ‘Lucy,’ I start, but she holds up a hand, silencing me.

  ‘Why were you in the pool?’ She doesn’t even face me to ask this.

  ‘I’m sorry. I know you said no swimming, I just thought . . .’

  ‘. . . that you knew better?’ She whirls around. Her eyes flash wild. ‘That you were entitled to override me in decisions about my children?’

  ‘You have no idea how sorry I am, Lucy. Honestly, I am. But it’s done now and I think it would be better if we could just—’

  ‘What?’ A rush of air expels from Lucy—almost a laugh, not quite. ‘Put it behind us?’

  ‘Well . . .’

  ‘Did you hear what the doctor said? Harriet needs an MRI. My daughter could have died because you thought you knew better than me.’ She takes a step toward me. Lucy is usually hard to pin down—like a child she is in a state of perpetual movement—but right now she’s eerily calm and still. I find myself taking a step back. ‘I know we’ve never been close, Diana. First there was my wedding day. I thought we’d shared a moment when you gave me that necklace. Then you felt the need to remind me that I had to give it back, which I knew, by the way, but pointing it out like I was planning to steal it wasn’t the best way to ingratiate yourself to me.’ She takes another step toward me. ‘You made me feel like a gold-digger when we asked for a money to buy a tiny workers cottage. You know what? I didn’t even want your money. It was Ollie’s idea.’ Lucy’s entire body pulses. ‘You brought me a raw chicken when I had a newborn. A raw chicken!’ I can actually see the sparks in Lucy’s brain, metal on metal, memory on memory. ‘You turned off Archie’s monitor so I couldn’t hear him cry, and ever since you’ve made it abundantly clear that I don’t measure up to you in the mothering stakes. Even so, we might have been able to put all that behind us. But my baby might have brain damage because of you. We cannot ever put that behind us.’ She takes another step.

  ‘Lucy . . .’ Ollie says. I’ve almost forgotten he was here. In the back of my thoughts it occurs to me that Ollie is the fruit of my womb, yet at some point he’s become almost insignificant. He and Tom and Patrick are the cogs and spokes, but Lucy and Nettie and I, we are the wheels. ‘You need to calm down.’

  Lucy takes another step.

  A nurse appears in the doorway. ‘Is everything all right in here?’

  ‘Lucy,’ I say, holding up my hands, ‘just take a breath—’

  But Lucy thrusts a palm out, flat like a stop sign. It connects with my own hands and I stagger backward. I feel a sharp pain in my ankle and then I’m falling. There is a solid thwacking sound. The room swims.

  ‘We need security in here,’ I hear someone call.

  Lucy disappears and people I don’t recognise appear right up close.

  ‘Ma’am, are you all right?’

  ‘I need a doctor in here!’

  ‘Are you all right, Mum?’

  ‘Don’t try to move her.’

  They’re making a big fuss about nothing. I’m fine. I’m on the floor now, I believe. Colour dances in front of my eyes. And then it’s just . . . black.

  35

  LUCY

  The present . . .

  I wear Diana’s necklace to the funeral, the one she lent me on my wedding day. She left it to me in her will. When I tipped it out of its envelope this morning, there was a little note attached: At least this time, you don’t have to give it back.

  I’d planned to wear the necklace with my hot-pink wrap dress, but inst
ead I’ve gone for a simple black shift. There is something to be said for black at funerals, and I did add a pair of hot-pink wedges.

  Outside the funeral home are dozens of people who know my name and who talk about how we met down at Sorrento or at Tom’s sixtieth birthday party or some other such event. I nod and smile and ask after their families but the small talk is achingly limited. All of the normal day-to-day topics are off the table, being deemed too trivial for the occasion, except oddly, the weather, which is freely discussed at funerals, and indeed one of the few safe topics of discussions. The sun is shining down on Diana, today. Or even The sky is crying too. (Interestingly though, the sun is not shining and the sky is not crying, it is merely a dull grey day. I wonder, idly, what this is supposed to say about my mother-in-law.)

  Nettie is in quite a fragile state. She has dressed up at least, in a cream dress and brown leather wedges, but she looks drawn and tired. She dissolves into fresh tears periodically and I wish I could console her. But she won’t even accept support from Patrick, who stands beside her uselessly, smiling politely at people who offer condolences.

  The children mill about at my heels, bored and excitable, pinching and pushing each other, but they quiet down when I hand them a fistful of gummy bears from the stash in my bag. Inside, the crowd is typical upper middle-class folk, apart from the smattering of dark-skinned faces, rare enough among these parts to assume they must be the refugee women Diana worked with. I also notice Eamon as we make our way to the seats at the front. There’s no physical sign of his fight with Ollie, other than perhaps the expression of mild defiance on his face. I would wonder why he bothered coming at all if I didn’t know how into appearances he is. Jones and Housseini are here too, which is a surprise. They wear black suits, and as such should look like any other mourners, but there’s something about them that screams cop. Perhaps it’s that I can feel their presence, like ants crawling up my back.

  The service is slow and dull, in large part because of the lack of hymns. Ollie gives a eulogy that is as heartfelt as it can possibly be, which is to say fairly generic. Lots of ‘I love you’s, lots of stories about Diana’s charitable work. As I listen I can’t help but think of the eulogy Ollie gave at Tom’s funeral. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. Ollie himself became so choked up that I ended up standing behind him for most of it, with my hand on his shoulder. But today he doesn’t manage so much as a misty eye.

  I try to imagine the eulogy I would have given Diana had I been the one to speak. I glance up at the framed photo of her on her coffin. Her chin is raised, her eyes guarded, her lips curved into the barest smile. It is just so Diana that I can’t help but feel something. It’s hard to believe that I won’t see that guarded smile again. It’s equally hard to believe that she might have exited this world on anything other than her own terms.

  I become aware of a flutter in my body, a niggle at first but slowly it fills my chest like a scream. I put a hand gently to my lips but a sob escapes, excruciatingly loud. The children look at me curiously. Even Ollie pauses in his eulogy and frowns. I want to get it together, but it’s like a train. I double over, all at once consumed by it. The stark emotion. The utter, inexplicable loss.

  Ollie and Patrick are pallbearers, along with two friends of Tom’s. The other two positions—apparently there is a requirement for six—are given to the funeral staff. I think briefly that perhaps those roles should have been offered to Nettie and myself, but no one asked me and I assume no one asked Nettie either. And so Diana is taken out and placed in the hearse, and we are forced to endure small talk for another forty-five minutes as my children tear around the lawn like they’re at a garden party. Harriet has climbed a tree and is sitting on a branch with a child I saw in the venue, a grandchild of one of Diana’s friends, perhaps. The hems of their dresses are grubby with dirt.

  People disappear in dribbles, most heading to the function room at the Half-Moon Hotel, where we are putting on sandwiches and drinks this afternoon. But a few people who aren’t heading to the wake hang around to give their condolences. Condolence after condolence, in the absence of alcohol, is quite frankly exhausting. Ollie obviously thinks so, judging by his drawn expression, so I tell him to head off and leave me to farewell the final few mourners.

  ‘What about the kids?’ he says.

  ‘I’ll handle the kids. Go.’

  Finally he does, catching a ride with an old friend of Tom’s.

  I am standing there, with Edie hanging off one leg, when another mourner approaches me. She’s young, perhaps five or ten years younger than me. The man beside her looks vaguely familiar.

  ‘You are Lucy,’ the woman says.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. My gaze moves back to the woman. I don’t think I’ve met her before, but then again, there have been a lot of people here today that I haven’t recognised. ‘Have we met?’

  She smiles. ‘I have seen your picture at Diana’s house.’ She’s wearing a black long-sleeved dress and black boots, with an emerald green headscarf. ‘I am Ghezala. This is my husband, Hakem.’

  ‘It’s nice to meet you both. How did you know Diana?’

  ‘I was pregnant when I came to Australia,’ Ghezala says. ‘Diana was wonderful to me. She was there when I gave birth to my son Aarash on my kitchen floor.’

  ‘That was you?’ I exclaim. ‘I remember hearing about that.’ It’s hard to forget the image of Diana on the floor, let alone delivering a baby.

  Ghezala smiles. ‘She was a very good woman.’

  ‘And what do you do, Lucy?’ Hakem asks.

  ‘I’m a stay-at-home mum at present,’ I tell him. I’ve been asked this a lot today. (‘What are you up to these days, Lucy? What are you doing with yourself now that you’ve finished having babies?’) Usually I don’t care what other people think of me, but given the extent of our debt, I can’t help but wonder, what am I doing with myself? I’ve been so determined to be a stay-at-home mum, so keen to do as my own mother did, that I’ve never questioned it. Now, suddenly, I am questioning it.

  ‘I was a recruiter in a past life—’ I start, but Hakem cuts me off.

  ‘It must run in the family,’ he says. ‘Diana found me my job, several years ago when I couldn’t get an interview in this country. Now I am an engineer again because of Diana.’

  That’s when I realise where I know him from. That day, at Diana’s house. I remember the way he thanked her, the extent of his gratitude. I remember the way Diana brushed it off like it was no big deal.

  ‘Actually, just yesterday Hakem and I were invited to take seats on the board of Diana’s charity,’ Ghezala says. ‘It was her wish that the board have representation from refugees.’

  ‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ I say. ‘Diana was passionate about that charity.’

  ‘We will make sure her legacy is carried on. We will make her proud.’

  I pause, thinking about how that was all I had wanted for the longest time, to make Diana proud.

  Ghezala takes my hand. ‘Diana was in the business of giving people chances,’ she says. ‘But sometimes you can be so busy looking at the problems in the world, you forget to give chances to those right under your nose.’

  I smile.

  ‘I think she might do things differently, given the chance,’ Ghezala says, and the funny thing is, I think she might too.

  36

  DIANA

  The past . . .

  ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ Tom says to me as I slide out of my hospital gown.

  ‘I’m fine. It was a small knock to the head. It was a lot of fussing about nothing. The hospital only kept me overnight in case I sued them for a slippery floor or something.’ I step into the trousers Tom has brought for me.

  ‘I still can’t believe Lucy pushed you.’

  ‘She was worried about Harriet, Tom. As we all are. That should be our focus right now, not this silly bump to my head.’

  I slip on my blouse and start matching up the buttons.

 
‘Are we going to pop up to the ward to see Harriet before we go?’ Tom asks.

  I hesitate. ‘I don’t think I should.’

  ‘Nonsense. You’re her grandmother.’

  ‘Lucy made it very clear—’

  ‘Lucy was emotional. She’ll probably apologise when she sees you.’

  Tom is the eternal optimist and I don’t share his confidence. He didn’t hear the emotion behind Lucy’s words. Since yesterday, the only news I’ve had was a text from Ollie, saying: Harriet awake. MRI looked good. I’ve heard nothing at all from Lucy, despite calling three times. ‘I’m not sure about that, Tom.’

  ‘We’ll stop by on our way to the car,’ he says firmly. ‘It will all be fine, you’ll see.’

  When we arrive at Harriet’s room, Lucy is sitting on a chair that has been pushed up to Harriet’s bedside. Her back is to us. From the doorway I can hear her humming ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’ even though Harriet appears to be sound asleep. Inexplicably, my eyes fill with tears.

  She’s a good mother, I have to admit. It occurs to me that I’ve never told her this before. It’s funny how all your mistakes can crystallise in an instant. All at once I see how I’ve alienated her.

  Tom lifts his hand to knock on the door, but I grab it before it connects. ‘I just want to watch them,’ I whisper. ‘Let’s just watch for a moment.’

  And so, we watch. And for the first time, I really see Lucy. Not a girl who was handed everything. A girl who knew what she wanted. A family. A woman who has stood by my son and her children, and even me, in spite of hardship. A girl a lot tougher than I gave her credit for.

  I think about all my conversations with Jan and Liz and Kathy about daughters-in-law. We’d always focused on how different they are from us, how their mothering is different, their attitudes are different. We’ve never once focused on our similarities. As women. As wives. As mothers. It occurs to me suddenly that there are a lot more of them.