The Nowhere Girl: A completely gripping and emotional page turner

by Nicole Trope

  She has been telling herself that the reason she talks to the baby is because right now she’s not talking to anyone else. She has asked Peter to wait until the twelve-week scan before he tells his family. She doesn’t want to have to go through what they went through all the other times she was pregnant. Emma was so excited the first time that she turned up the day after they’d told her with a bagful of baby clothes and toys. ‘I couldn’t help myself,’ she said, her eyes sparkling. ‘I’m going to be the best second cousin and I’m going to tell her that I’m the reason she was born.’ Telling Emma about the miscarriage was excruciating. Her eyes filled and tears spilled down her cheeks. ‘I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have bought anything, I’m so sorry,’ she sobbed. Molly found herself comforting Emma; in fact, she found herself comforting everyone around her, spouting the platitudes she had read and heard over and over again, all the while trying to conceal her own devastating heartbreak.

  They have told fewer and fewer people with each subsequent pregnancy, not wanting to raise anyone’s hopes but also not wanting to open themselves up to discussions that seem to inevitably take place. Molly knows that if Peter hadn’t told her to take a test this time because he had learned to recognise the signs, it’s possible she wouldn’t have even told him.

  She would love to tell everyone now, would love to be able to discuss their happy news with her mother and her sister. At the thought of her family Molly feels a moment of dark despair. Who is her family? Who is she? Why were her parents so scared about her past? She pushes the thoughts away and heads to the kitchen where she fills the kettle and switches it on. She hasn’t had the road dream for a few days and she’s trying not to think of her parents’ revelations because every time she does, she can feel her pulse race and anger rise inside her. It can’t be good for the baby.

  It’s better if she doesn’t talk to her mother. It’s better for her to keep the pregnancy a secret for now. She doesn’t want to admit the flower of hope pushing stubbornly through the concrete inside her. She doesn’t want to admit to herself that she is starting to plan a nursery, that she’s painted the walls a neutral beige and decorated the room with a frieze of Disney characters. That she’s imagining her eyes and Peter’s mouth, that she dreams of little fingers grasping her thumb. She wishes she could tell her parents, wishes she could talk to Lexie. Lexie will be over the moon to know that they’ve seen a heartbeat and that this pregnancy has a real chance at success.

  In the kitchen her phone is on the counter, missed calls from her mother and sister listed. She picks it up and considers taking the first step. She wants to know the truth about who she is, needs to know. She is bringing a child into the world and knows nothing of its genetic legacy.

  Her father telling her they were afraid of what she would find if she went looking for her parents comes back to her. How terrible a family must they have been?

  More than anything she wants nothing her parents told her to be true. She wants to be Lexie’s sister and her parents’ daughter in every sense of the word, but she knows wishing won’t change anything.

  Her own future motherhood colours everything now. She is filled with love for everyone one moment and furious with everyone the next. She has never cried as much as she has cried over the last few days, tears of joy mingling with tears of devastation, and she can never be entirely sure which particular tears are dripping off her chin. She would like to concentrate on just this baby growing inside her.

  Even her work holds little interest at the moment. She has sent off the last story to the editor and hopes that the publishers accept it. Now she will wait months before she begins editing. She can feel there is a new story brewing, a story about dreams fulfilled and a family created, but she is afraid to write down the words. She is afraid to create a character who succeeds at something she has been trying to do for so long, lest she, herself, fails at holding onto this baby, this child.

  ‘We’re planning publication in July next year,’ her editor, Sandra, has informed her. Molly has calculated that the baby will be six months old by then. She would like to tell them that they need to allow her to finish editing the book before the baby is born but she cannot mention it to anyone yet.

  She scrambles herself an egg and covers a piece of toast in peanut butter. She would like a cup of coffee in principle but right now coffee smells wrong to her, as though it’s been burnt. A common side effect of pregnancy, she has read. She makes a cup of green tea instead. She has never allowed herself to read past the first trimester of pregnancy websites, not after the first miscarriage. Now she finds herself skimming through advice for the second trimester and then feeling guilty, as though she is doing something she shouldn’t.

  After breakfast she clears up, puts a load of washing on and distracts herself with a crime series on television. She falls asleep in the middle, something that happens often, which she attributes not just to the pregnancy but also to the stress of waiting for the twelve-week ultrasound and trying hard not to think about all the questions she has about her past.

  The doorbell wakes her and she sits up, dazed, not sure if she’s heard it, but it chimes again. She stands up and wipes her mouth. She has no idea what the time is. She peers through the peephole to see her mother and Lexie. Their worried faces loom through the tiny circle of glass.

  Molly thinks about pretending she isn’t home.

  ‘We know you’re in there, Moll,’ calls Lexie. ‘Peter called us.’

  ‘What?’ she says, yanking the door open. ‘When?’

  ‘Oh, Molly,’ says her mother. Her arms are filled with a cake tin, and Lexie is holding Sophie and a bag of groceries.

  ‘Moiee,’ shouts Sophie, flinging her arms up at her aunt.

  ‘No, Soph, Aunty Molly can’t hold you now. She has to rest.’

  Before Molly can mount an argument, her sister and her mother have bustled inside. Lexie puts Sophie on the floor and surrounds her with toys Molly keeps in a basket by the couch for when she visits. Her mother puts the kettle on and opens up her cake tin to reveal a sumptuous carrot cake with cream cheese frosting – the same cake Molly has requested for every single birthday from the time she was five years old.

  ‘You just sit down, darling,’ says her mother. ‘I’ll bring you a slice of cake and some tea.’

  Molly cannot summon a reply so she sits on the couch, trying to stop the turmoil going on inside her. She has specifically told her mother not to contact her, and yet here she is. She also told Peter not to tell anyone about the pregnancy, and yet from the way her mother and sister are treating her, they obviously know about everything that happened at the hospital. She is furious with everyone but desperate for a piece of cake and overjoyed at the sight of her sister. Her mother and sister chat brightly in the kitchen as Lexie finds cups for tea and boils water in the kettle. Molly can hear the forced joviality.

  Once they are all sitting down, silence descends. Lexie and Molly and their mother exchange glances like strangers at a party, waiting for someone to make the first move. Finally, Anne says, ‘I have something for you, love. I’ve kept it for a long time because it was always my intention to tell you the truth.’

  She gets up, goes to her capacious handbag and pulls out a folder. Inside is a series of news articles.

  ‘You can read them now or after we’ve left, and I will try to tell you everything I know and remember. There aren’t enough sorrys in the world, I know. I cannot apologise enough for keeping this from you, but I also can’t lose you, Molly, not over this. Your father and I won’t survive it. So, whatever we have to do to make this right, we’ll do. I won’t let this get between us, Molly. You’re my daughter, regardless of your biological composition you’re mine, and nothing is going to take you away from me.’

  Molly recognises a streak of hidden fierceness that occasionally surfaces in her mother. Her mother is always calm, always serene, always busy helping others and keeping her house and her family running smoothly. But there have been times whe
n she has shown a side that made everyone in the family aware of just how formidable a force she could be.

  ‘I just can’t think about you right now, Mum. I need to get this straight in my head,’ she says slowly. She clutches the folder lightly, not wanting to hold too tightly onto something that will cause her pain.

  ‘I understand how angry you are,’ says Lexie. ‘When Mum told me, I was just as angry as you are. They’ve done the wrong thing. They should never have kept the truth from you, it was very unfair. I yelled a lot.’

  ‘She certainly did,’ replies their mother lightly, although Molly can see the pain of that exchange on her face. Her parents have let Lexie down as well.

  ‘You and Dad lied to me my whole life,’ says Molly, mashing a bite of her cake with a fork, concentrating on mixing the rust-coloured cake with the snow-white icing.

  ‘We did,’ agrees her mother. ‘We did and it was a terrible thing to do to you and to Lexie, especially when we have always been honest in our family, but I’m hoping you will eventually see that the decision came from a place of love.’

  ‘Molly might find that a little difficult to do right now, Mum,’ says Lexie. She lays her hand softly on her sister’s arm. Molly stills herself, understanding the gesture means she has her sister’s unequivocal support.

  ‘I know that,’ Anne whispers.

  Molly looks at her mother. Her shoulders are hunched and her face is pale, her lips almost white. Her mother has not eaten any of her cake and her mug of tea remains untouched. Molly glances at her sister, who has also been studying Anne, and without having to say anything, they can both see how burdened their mother is. Through the whirl of emotions inside her, Molly feels sorry for her mother. She shakes her head at Lexie, indicating they should just leave this now.

  ‘So, Peter told us about the hospital,’ says Lexie with a small smile, and Molly can see she is switching gears.

  ‘He shouldn’t have done that,’ says Molly woodenly. She takes a bite of the carrot cake, comforted by the familiar, sweet taste and grainy texture. It feels like another betrayal. She doesn’t want to discuss the pregnancy yet, but she also desperately does. She wants to talk about it with her loved ones and so part of her is grateful that Peter has taken this out of her hands. Now that there is finally a chance of things working out, Molly hated that she was hiding things from her family.

  But your mother hid things from you, she thinks and then she grows irritated with herself. Stop it, enough now. She takes another bite of cake.

  ‘No, he shouldn’t,’ agrees Lexie, ‘but he’s so excited, Moll, and terrified.’

  ‘We’re both terrified,’ says Molly, tears making an appearance without her thinking much.

  ‘Oh, darling,’ replies her mother, and she comes over to where Molly sits and wraps her in her arms. ‘This is going to be the one. I feel it. It won’t be long until Sophie has a little cousin to boss around.’

  ‘I hope so,’ says Molly and then she lets herself be hugged and she lays her head on her mother’s shoulder, allowing the tension of the last few days to float away.

  ‘It’s going to be fine,’ Anne says over and over as she pats Molly’s back, and Molly is reminded of when she had her tonsils out. She was six years old and frightened of the needle and terrified of the idea of the doctor cutting something out of her throat. Then her mother had held her as well, had told her that it was going to be fine. And it was fine. Molly had absolute faith in her mother’s power and her mother’s love then, and now as she holds onto her, she understands that power and that love have not gone away. She needs answers about her past but she can absolutely count on her mother right here and now. The realisation is a relief.

  ‘I’ll read these later,’ she says, dropping the folder onto the coffee table. It holds her past, the secrets of her life, but she needs to be alone to focus on that.

  ‘So how are you feeling?’ asks Lexie.

  ‘Coffee smells weird.’ Molly smiles and the conversation turns to pregnancy cravings and everything else Molly has to look forward to. Sophie is the centre of attention as usual until she becomes irritable. ‘Sleep time, I think,’ says Lexie eventually.

  When she and Sophie are at the front door ready to leave, Lexie grabs Molly in a hard hug. ‘You’re my sister,’ she says. ‘I don’t care about anything else. If I could have chosen a sister, I would have chosen you, and nothing has changed as far as I’m concerned. If you need to talk, just call me, okay?’

  Molly nods and Sophie protests at being slightly squashed between her aunt and her mother.

  ‘I think I’ll go too, darling,’ says her mother, gathering up the empty cake tin. ‘You and Peter finish the cake.’

  Molly cannot help feeling awkward now that her sister has gone.

  ‘I hate that we’ve done this to you,’ says her mother. ‘I can’t apologise enough, Molly. All I can do is let you know how much we love you and tell you that if you want to find your biological family, we will do everything we can to help you. The government has a registry for adopted children but…’

  ‘But?’ asks Molly.

  ‘But they never found your family. The police… the social worker would have told us if they did. We asked to be told because we were so worried. Read the articles because they explain a lot. Read them and then call me and we’ll talk.’

  Once her mother has gone, Molly slumps onto the couch, resting the folder on her lap. What horrors can it hold? She opens it up, reads the first headline and feels her lungs expand with shock as she confronts her past.

  Twenty-One

  18 January 1987

  Margaret

  * * *

  She wakes from an afternoon nap, or early evening nap, something. The streetlight shines through the gap at the side of the curtains and she kicks her legs to remove the light blanket that is making her sweat in the heat. She can’t remember if she went to the shops that morning or two days ago or two weeks ago. She slides out of bed, shuffling out of the bedroom, noting that she’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt so she must have gotten dressed today, or some other day. Her head pounds with each step she takes. Her mind flits briefly to her daughters. She has a ten-year-old and a two-year-old. She really should know what day it is. She really should know a lot of things.

  In the kitchen she drinks two glasses of water quickly. The pounding intensifies. She rifles through the cupboards, chancing on pain pills, swallowing five without thinking. She holds her head and starts her slow shuffle back to bed when she hears a sound. A muffled cry, a whimper. The sound of hurt, the sound of pain.

  She doesn’t want to know, doesn’t want to see. She just wants to return to bed but her feet carry her to the girls’ room, where the door is open just a crack. She pushes it, hearing the hinges protest.

  She is immediately assaulted by the dirty nappy smell that pervades the whole house. It is strongest in here where Lilly and Alice sleep. Margaret knows that this room is very different to the lovingly decorated room Alice had at the old house. There, she and Adam had painted the walls a light rose pink and thrown a bright pink rug on the floor. There, toys lined the walls and the room carried the sweet smell of baby powder and shampoo even when Alice got older. Adam used to love bathing her when she was a baby. He would hold her in his hands, tightly enough to make her feel secure but gently enough so that she knew she was loved, moving her tiny body through the water. He would sing a lullaby his mother had sung to him. The words were in Polish and he couldn’t remember what they meant anymore, but Alice loved the song, would smile her gummy smile up at her father, and Margaret would understand that this was what true love looked like.

  This room has smoke-stained, peeling painted walls because the last tenants were heavy smokers and Vernon told the landlord he would paint the house in return for a reduction in rent. He never has, of course. He will ‘get to it when it fucking suits me’. The smell of cigarettes lingers but is overpowered by all the other smells that Margaret would never have tolerated once upon a tim
e when her life was a fairy tale.

  The soft whimper comes again. She thinks perhaps one of the girls is having a nightmare.

  There is a nightlight in the room, miraculously working after all this time. Margaret’s eyes adjust to the dimness and she is able to see everything.

  She can see Lilly’s bed, empty with the covers thrown back. The pounding in her head makes her teeth ache. She hopes Lilly hasn’t fallen out. I should check, she thinks but then she looks over at the other bed and her daughter’s wide eyes capture her. In the nearly completely dark room, Alice’s eyes are large circles of black in her small face. Her daughter is staring straight at her but not moving.

  He is there. He is above her, moving, grunting, sighing. Margaret feels the vomit rise in her throat.

  ‘What?’ her voice cracks. She slams her hand over her mouth, cursing the word that has escaped.

  He stops moving and she sees Alice give her head a little shake, telling her mother she shouldn’t be here.

  ‘Run,’ Alice mouths. ‘Run,’ says her ten-year-old child as she’s being brutalised. ‘Run.’ But Margaret cannot move.

  He stands up and she can see what he’s been doing. Oh, it’s sick, sick, sick. Her little girl, her little girl is being… The word disappears, too awful to think.

  She keeps her hand over her mouth, holding in the vomit. He stands tall, defiantly staring, willing her to say something else. Willing her to confront him, to tell him to stop. Willing her to show that she is something other than the empty husk of a human being she is.

  The three of them are frozen in the dim light from the nightlight, a tableau of horror. Alice on the bed, her skinny legs slightly open, bony knees angled, Margaret in the doorway, her body hunched in horror, and Vernon with his trousers around his ankles.

  A howl escapes from behind Margaret’s hands, a scream of anguish, and he is jolted into action. He yanks up his trousers and lurches towards her.