‘I should’ve been glad to see she was alive and unhurt. She was alive, and she could’ve died. She came so close to dying. I should’ve run to her; instead, I didn’t want to go to the hospital at all. I should’ve held her like I did when she was a baby and fell out of the cot or fell over, and she would sob, and I’d hold her to my chest and everything would be alright again. Those moments, the warm smell, the press of her body into mine — it was everything. But I didn’t open my arms to catch her and she didn’t run to me. I didn’t hold her, I couldn’t make everything right again. I wanted to run away.’
‘You and Jo will work through this. It’s still so raw.’
‘The last four or five years she has been awful — she’s been such a bitch to live with. But I kept on loving her, supporting her… Driving drunk, the accident, was too much.’ Mandy paused. ‘I saw Ashleigh’s grandparents walking down the street yesterday. I was on the other side of the road. I hid around the corner. I told myself it’d be painful for them to see me. But I’m a coward. I’ve no idea what to say to them. What can I say? “I’m sorry my daughter killed your granddaughter?”’
‘Jo didn’t… you shouldn’t say “killed”, Mandy. It was an accident.’
‘The point is, I am ashamed. Ashamed of being Jo’s mother and ashamed of Jo. I can’t help it. I used to envy Rae. She’s so confident. Whenever I talked to her I felt like I was a child and she was the adult. Like I was back at school… like any moment she might tell me off for not behaving like a lady. I’m not saying — I mean, she was nice and friendly and good to Jo, and I was good to Ashleigh. She was a little stuck-up, Ashleigh, I mean, sometimes, but I was good to her…’
‘I’m sure you were, Mandy, you’re a kind person.’
‘No, sometimes I’m mean. Sometimes I was mean to the girls. They got on my nerves, so irresponsible. Now I’m constantly going back and forth between wishing I was nicer to them and regretting not being more of a tyrant, not putting my foot down. Not stopping them. I should’ve stopped Jo from taking the car… I didn’t even try. I didn’t even say, “If you’re going to drink, don’t drive.” I could’ve given them taxi money.’
‘If we had the foresight, we’d all do things differently, but we don’t. None of us knows what is around the corner.’ Sarah hated platitudes, but she didn’t know what else to say. Why hadn’t Mandy — sensible Mandy, who she’d grown to like — why hadn’t she said anything? Why didn’t she take the car keys and stop her daughter from driving?
‘I heard a story,’ Mandy said, ‘of a man who was driving when he noticed the car in front of him was swerving from lane to lane and even into the gutter. The driver was drunk or drugged or falling asleep, so when they stopped at the lights, the man jumped out, ran over to the car in front, and knocked on the window, and, when the driver rolled down his window, he reached in and took the key and threw it as hard and as far as he could. And then he jumped back into his car and drove away without looking back. He probably saved a couple of lives that day.’
‘You have to stop blaming yourself, Mandy. It doesn’t help either of you. Let’s hope you hear from her in the next day or two,’ Sarah said. ‘Try not to worry before then.’ Sarah put down her cup and picked up her handbag. She hated to leave Mandy like this, but she was running late for her next appointment with a new client, a young man charged with drug dealing. He’d been caught outside a local school and his parents were in a panic. And there were only so many hours she could fudge before Eric would notice.
On her second day in Portarlington, Laurie and Sue drove her to Drysdale and she bought a cheap phone. She sent her mother a text letting her know that she was okay. Five minutes later, there was a call from a number she didn’t recognise. She ignored it. A minute on, a text: It’s Sarah Cascade. I need to talk to you now.
Jo hesitated before pressing ‘call’.
Sarah wasn’t angry. ‘I need to know where you are. It’s part of the bail conditions. The police need to be notified of your new address, and you’ll need to go to the police station and report to them.’
Jo told Sarah where she was staying. ‘Please don’t tell my mother. I don’t want her or my grandmother to come.’
‘They’re worried.’
‘I know, and I’m sorry, but I’m fine. I need a break. I can’t be at home at the moment.’
‘You need to talk to your mother.’
‘I can’t, not now.’
‘Okay, well, you’re an adult. It’s your choice. But you need to promise me that you’ll send your mother a text every couple of days to let her know you’re okay, can you do that?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you need to promise that if I ring and tell you to come home, you’ll come home. Court dates can be shifted with little notice.’
‘I promise.’
‘Okay.’
‘Can I work? I have a job in a restaurant.’
‘Yes, that’s fine.’
‘I don’t want anyone to know… I mean, will the police here tell people?’
‘No, as long as you stay out of trouble.’
On her way to The George, Jo went to the police station. Nervous and shaking, she reported to the front counter. They were expecting her, and they had her sign a form with the date. Of course she signed Jo Neilson. Would they find out she was using Ash’s name?
When Sarah walked, she watched her feet, waiting to avoid a fall. When she walked, she saw only what was caught in her peripheral vision, in side glances. She looked up momentarily in reaction to a car horn or a shout, to follow the smell of curry or pho, to move around oncoming pedestrians. She should wear a neon sign above her head — obese woman walking — so people knew to avoid her.
Even though she walked regularly, she didn’t lose weight. You walk too slowly, her mother said, and without purpose. It was true Sarah didn’t power walk like other women; their determined striding made her wince. They circled the botanical gardens, and sometimes even the streets of the city, in pairs, with leg and arm weights. She did wear her runners, and sometimes she took her iPod. But no matter what she did, she would never look like them. She walked because walking was how she thought, how she found her way around life. If she didn’t walk, she became stressed and overly anxious and smoked and ate too much. Besides, her one-bedroom apartment was tiny. And the balcony was narrow — no room for a table, just one chair and one plant, a tall prickly cactus that survived both her lack of care and the city smog.
On the street, she was part of the city, not alone. As she strolled, she looked in windows. Sometimes she went into shops, or through parks. Sometimes she walked in circuits around the city centre. Occasionally she ventured down to Southbank, making her way along the Yarra towards the casino. The river, brown and thick, was a long stretch lined with restaurants and bars. She liked the city best at dusk, when the lights came on and the river reflected the city back on itself, when people transformed into indistinguishable silhouettes and holograms.
She thought about the phone call with Jo earlier that afternoon, and her reluctance to ring her mother. She liked Mandy; they were becoming friendly. It was the first time since Ada died and Laine left that Sarah had felt the possibility of friendship. But Mandy was Jo’s mother, and Jo was a client. She’d considered passing Jo on to one of the other lawyers, but that felt like a betrayal of both mother and daughter. And it wasn’t, Sarah told herself, as if she was sleeping with her client, which had happened before in the office — though not to her, of course. It wasn’t even as if she was socialising with Jo or Mandy, not really; she and Mandy just talked. Mostly they talked about Jo and the accident, but increasingly they were confiding intimacies, stories and dreams. And Sarah had warned Mandy that Jo would likely go to prison and there was nothing she could do to prevent it, so it wasn’t as if she was making false promises or setting herself up as some great lawyer who could perform miracles.