Darling Girls, page 18
‘All right,’ Jessica said, with a wink at the others, ‘she’s asleep. Better pick her up and take her to bed.’
‘Boo!’ Amy cried, sitting up again. She lifted her arms up, then opened them wide like a starburst.
This time, when they all squealed, Amy giggled. Giggled. It was so unexpected after months of sadness that they stood still for a moment, appreciating it.
Amy rested her head on the tray again, still giggling.
‘You pick her up, Norah,’ Jessica said.
‘Why? She’s not asleep. She’s laughing.’ But Norah squatted down beside the highchair, so her face was right up next to Amy’s. When Amy opened her eyes, Norah beat her to it. ‘Boo!’
Amy’s laugh reverberated through the house. It sounded like wind chimes. Like joy.
‘Right then,’ Miss Fairchild said, entering the room like a raincloud. ‘Bath time.’ With no regard for the fun they’d been having, she scooped Amy up and carried her away, despite the child’s protests. No wonder the kid was always so sad.
When she was gone, the three sisters remained in the kitchen for ages, trying to hold on to the moment. But without Amy, it almost felt as though it had never happened. As though it had been just a figment of their imagination.
32
JESSICA
BEFORE
‘Huwo.’
Jessica was in the lounge room reading her book when she heard the greeting.
It was Saturday afternoon. Miss Fairchild had put Amy down for a nap and then ducked down the street to do some errands. Norah and Alicia were doing homework in the kitchen.
‘Well . . . hello.’ Jessica lowered her book. Amy stood in the doorway, wearing a nappy and a guilty expression. The teddy she carried everywhere dangled from her hand by a paw. ‘Aren’t you supposed to be napping?’
Amy rubbed her eyes sleepily as she toddled over to Jessica. When she extended her arms, it felt so instinctual to pull the girl into her lap.
‘Aw,’ Jessica said, even as she glanced towards the window to check for Miss Fairchild. But the coast was clear. All she saw was a blue-sky, sunshiny day. ‘That’s a nice cuddle. Thank you very much.’
Amy rested her cheek against Jessica’s chest and stuck her thumb in her mouth. Even though Jessica was the one holding Amy, she had an overwhelming feeling of being warm and held. Safe.
As Amy snuggled closer, Jessica found herself afraid to breathe, in case the moment dissipated. It was as though the child was a part of her. It was as though she was her.
The arrival of Amy prised open wounds for Jessica, picking open scabs of rejection she’d thought had long healed. The cocktail of emotions Jessica experienced when she saw Amy and Miss Fairchild together was overwhelming. Hot, spiky jealousy, followed by all-consuming guilt. Burning shame. Black resentment. Ice-cold melancholy.
She didn’t talk to Alicia and Norah about it because she knew they didn’t feel the same way. Perhaps that was what made the pain so personal? They had never been Amy, after all. They had never failed to live up to Miss Fairchild’s expectations, failed to be her everything. And so, they’d never understand.
The pain was hers and hers alone.
‘I sleep here,’ Amy said.
Jessica was putting on her pyjamas when Amy ran into the sisters’ room and climbed onto her bed. Immediately the girl crawled under the covers and pretended to snore. ‘Night, night.’
Jessica glanced towards the door anxiously. It wasn’t the first time Amy had requested to sleep with Jessica, and Miss Fairchild had made it clear she wasn’t happy about it. Unfortunately, Amy was persistent.
‘Amy!’ Miss Fairchild called. She was still speaking in a bizarre singsong voice, but it was laced with irritation. ‘Where did you go?’
Miss Fairchild stuck her head into the bedroom. She had already narrowed her eyes, knowing what she would find.
‘Amy –’ she started, but Amy got in first.
‘I. Sleep. Here.’ She wrapped her arms around Jessica and looked up at Miss Fairchild defiantly.
Miss Fairchild glared at Jessica.
‘No, Amy.’ Miss Fairchild smiled but her eyes were cool. ‘You sleep with Mummy.’
‘No!’ Amy cried. ‘I sleep here!’
Jessica had to admit, her determination was impressive. She wondered if things would have been different if she’d defied Miss Fairchild rather than bending to her every whim in an attempt to win her love.
It was the humiliation, Jessica knew, that would upset Miss Fairchild the most. She’d always been so aware of how things looked. Jessica was much more interested in how they felt. And she knew this interaction did not feel good.
‘Okay,’ Miss Fairchild said, advancing on Jessica and Amy in a way that made Amy cower. Her little fingers gripped the back of Jessica’s neck. ‘Enough of this silliness. Let’s go.’
Amy flailed and kicked and cried as Miss Fairchild prised her away from Jessica. Jessica suffered the brunt of it, receiving several kicks, but she didn’t mind. It wasn’t Amy’s fault. Miss Fairchild wasn’t as forgiving when she was kicked.
‘Amy,’ Miss Fairchild said sharply. ‘That’s very naughty.’
It was the closest to angry she’d been with Amy since the girl had arrived. A bead of worry formed in Jessica’s chest – one that never truly went away.
Amy had been with them for six months when a car pulled into the driveway unexpectedly. Jessica and Alicia were sweeping the porch at the time.
‘Who is that?’ Jessica asked, squinting.
‘I think it’s Sandi,’ Alicia said. ‘My social worker.’
She sounded mystified. This was justified, as it had been more than a year since they’d had a visit from a social worker other than Scott. Miss Fairchild seemed similarly mystified when Jessica slipped inside to give their foster mother the heads-up.
‘But the place isn’t clean!’ she cried.
‘It is,’ Jessica said, unable to repress the urge to reassure her. ‘It’s fine.’
Miss Fairchild hesitated. ‘Not the basement.’
It was an odd comment. The social workers had never looked in the basement – at least, Scott never had.
‘You need to go down there,’ she said to Jessica. ‘Take the broom. It’s probably covered in dust.’
Jessica stared at her. ‘What?’
‘Go on. You can take Amy for company, since she loves you so much. Don’t come up until it’s spick-and-span.’
She dragged Jessica down the hallway and pushed her through the door leading to the basement. ‘There’s a light on a chain at the bottom of the stairs,’ she said, thrusting Amy into her arms. ‘Have fun, my darling girls.’
The door closed, plunging them into absolute darkness. Jessica was still reeling as she heard the latch. They were locked in.
Amy began to cry.
‘It’s okay,’ Jessica said, reaching for the handrail. ‘We’re playing hide-and-seek.’
Amy clung to her as Jessica made her way carefully down the stairs. She was warm and sweet-smelling and comforting in the dark. At the bottom, as Miss Fairchild promised, she found a chain, and pulled it. The light was a single globe, only slightly better than nothing. Only then did Jessica realise Miss Fairchild had forgotten to give her the broom.
What the hell are we doing down here? Jessica wondered. It didn’t make sense. She didn’t really believe that Miss Fairchild wanted her to clean the basement. Even given the surprise nature of the visit, the social worker would have found a clean house, well-looked-after kids – a vision of happiness, at least from the outside. Instead, she’d find two children unaccounted for.
‘Down,’ Amy said, wriggling to get out of Jessica’s grasp.
Jessica looked at the floor, trying to assess whether it was suitable for a toddler. As Miss Fairchild had said, it was dusty. It was also cold. And mostly empty other than a pile of boxes beside an old bicycle. At the far end of the room was a single window that faced a brick wall and a mattress turned on its side.
‘Down!’ Amy said, louder now, and Jessica had no choice but to let her slide off her hip to the ground.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘But don’t sit, okay? We have to stand.’
Amy showed no indication she’d heard or understood as she toddled towards the bicycle. Overhead, Jessica could hear footsteps and the murmur of voices. Amy spun the wheel on the bicycle and rummaged in the boxes. Unlike Jessica, who was quite unnerved by being plunged into darkness, Amy seemed quite relaxed and happy.
‘Raaaaa,’ she said into the darkness.
She was holding a knitted lion she’d retrieved from a box. It was scrappily knitted – obviously homemade.
‘Lion,’ Jessica said. ‘Can you say lion?’
Amy dropped the lion and dug into another box, this time pulling out a toy duck. ‘Kack kack,’ she said.
‘Quack quack.’ Jessica peered at the toys. She didn’t recognise them. Perhaps they were from Miss Fairchild’s own childhood.
Amy pulled out a knitted doll. It was bigger than the duck and the lion, almost as big as a newborn. Amy settled down and started to play with it, making adorable crying sounds and then patting it on the back, while Jessica listened for what was happening above.
They’d been down there about half an hour when a shaft of light finally broke into the space.
‘Jessica?’ It was Miss Fairchild. ‘You can come up now.’
‘Let’s go, Amy,’ Jessica said, eager to get out of there. As she took the doll from the girl to return it to the box, she noticed it had blonde curls, blue eyes, a blue dress, frilly socks and black Mary-Janes. Across its chest a name had been sewn in block letters.
Jessica blinked as she read it.
AMY.
33
JESSICA
‘Can you all hear me?’
It was the universal greeting of a Zoom call. Alicia, Jessica and Norah responded by saying yes, they could hear their lawyer, but unfortunately their microphone was on mute.
Alicia had called Meera after they left the police station. Meera had managed to find them a lawyer so quickly they didn’t even have time to get back to the city. Instead, they’d had to check back into Driftwood Cottages and meet with their legal counsel via Zoom. Now they sat in a row on the same couch, with Jessica’s laptop in front of them on the glass coffee table.
Their lawyer’s name was Anna Ross. She looked to be in her mid-fifties, with short grey hair and, somewhat unexpectedly, a small silver nose ring. She wore reading glasses, under which her piercing eyes had no eye shadow or mascara. The absence of make-up screamed, I have more important things to care about than my eyelashes! Jessica felt intimidated by her confidence, even though Anna was on her side.
‘All right,’ Anna said, once they’d unmuted themselves. ‘I think I’m up to speed on the particulars.’ She removed her glasses and looked straight into the camera lens. It was clear she was a commanding lawyer. ‘Tell me about the doll.’
Jessica shrugged. ‘What do you want to know? It had blonde curls, blue eyes and Amy written across its chest.’
Anna pinned her with a make-up-free stare. ‘And you just stumbled across it in the basement?’
‘Yes,’ Jessica said. ‘It seemed old. Like it had been there a while.’
‘Bizarre,’ Anna said. ‘What did you make of it?’
‘We thought it was strange,’ she said. ‘But what were we supposed to do? It wasn’t like Miss Fairchild was going to give us any answers.’
‘But you must have wondered about it?’
‘At first. Then . . . I don’t know.’ Jessica looked at her sisters. ‘We kind of forgot about it.’
Anna raised her eyebrows. ‘You forgot?’
Jessica had known this meeting was going to be intense, so she had taken two pills before they started, yet she could already feel their effect draining from her bloodstream. She started to stammer. ‘I – I know it seems strange. But we could only focus on so much. In the scheme of things, the doll just wasn’t very important.’
Anna nodded, replacing her glasses and looking at the file in front of her. ‘But according to my notes,’ she said, ‘the doll would later become very important indeed . . .’
34
ALICIA
BEFORE
‘The doll had the name Amy written on it?’
Alicia and Norah sat on their beds staring at Jessica. It was the first chance they’d had to talk alone since Sandi left, because her visit had put them behind with their chores. It wasn’t until bedtime that they were able to discuss what had happened.
‘Yes. It was written across her chest.’
The visit had been routine. Apparently, Scott was on sick leave and so Sandi had stepped in. She’d asked about Jessica, but she’d been unconcerned when Miss Fairchild explained that she was at a friend’s place. The social worker hadn’t asked about Amy at all.
‘Maybe Miss Fairchild bought the doll for Amy?’ Alicia suggested.
‘But it was old and dusty,’ Jessica said. ‘It looked handmade. Like something you’d find at an old lady’s house.’
‘Amy is a common name,’ Norah said, after a moment’s consideration. ‘Maybe she had a doll called Amy when she was a child?’
‘Probably,’ Alicia agreed.
But as they all fell silent, Alicia had a feeling she wasn’t the only one searching for another explanation.
‘Hello, Barbie,’ Alicia said. ‘I’m Mr Teddy.’
Alicia kneeled in front of Amy, the girl’s teddy in her hand. They had just arrived home from school to find Amy sitting on the living room floor clutching a bald Barbie doll. Miss Fairchild was nowhere to be seen.
Alicia bounced the teddy up and down. ‘Uh-oh.’ She threw the bear up in the air and let it drop to the floor. ‘I fell down.’
It was a pathetic attempt at play, but Alicia was rewarded with one of Amy’s magic giggles. Alicia would have thrown the teddy a million times for that giggle.
It was unusual for Alicia to seek out a moment of joy like this. In the period following Grammy’s death, Alicia had noticed that on the rare occasion when someone showed her kindness – letting her cut in front of them at the shop, a teacher commenting on work well done, someone paying her a compliment – it pushed her to the verge of tears. Her vulnerability had become so embarrassing that instead of seeking kind people she sought out those who disliked her – like Edwina Wooldridge, the mean girl at school who always seemed revolted by Alicia’s very existence. Something about her cruelty fortified Alicia. The certainty and security of what she was getting became like a drug. A much more powerful drug than the agony caused by a desire for love and warmth.
But it was different with Amy. Perhaps it was the darling little face that transformed with her moods, from puzzled to delighted to angry as if at the flick of a switch. Or maybe it was her theatrical gestures – the way she tapped her toe when she was impatient, or cupped her chin to think. Or maybe it was the comfort she brought. It was astonishing how much comfort one chubby little hand on your thigh could provide. Alicia became hungry for it.
‘Wheeeeee!’ Alicia cried, tossing the teddy in the air.
Of course, Miss Fairchild materialised to quash her joy. ‘Oh,’ she said to Alicia, not even trying to conceal her disappointment. ‘You’re home.’
‘Again,’ Amy said, picking up the teddy and handing it back to Alicia.
‘Hello, Barbie,’ Alicia started, bouncing the teddy. ‘I’m Mr Teddy.’
But before Alicia could toss the bear, Miss Fairchild snatched it away.
‘No!’ Amy cried.
Miss Fairchild dropped to her knees beside the girl. ‘I can be Mr Teddy,’ she said. ‘Look!’ She started bouncing the bear frenziedly.
‘No!’ Amy repeated, louder.
But Miss Fairchild just kept bouncing the bear desperately. She was so caught up in it she didn’t even notice Amy picking up the Barbie. Alicia did, though. She saw what was about to happen as if in slow motion, but she was powerless to prevent it.
Amy thwacked the doll hard against Miss Fairchild’s forehead.
Miss Fairchild gasped, tears springing to her eyes. Alicia was about to ask if she was all right when Miss Fairchild lunged forward, slapping Alicia across the face so hard that she saw stars.
Amy seemed to take an active dislike to Miss Fairchild after that. And the girl’s affection for Norah, Alicia and Jessica seemed to increase in correlation to her dislike for Miss Fairchild.
‘No!’ Amy would squeal when Miss Fairchild tried to pick her up, her little body tensing and thrashing. ‘Down. I not like you.’
The more Miss Fairchild smothered her with attention, the more irate Amy became. Alicia realised that she rather enjoyed it, even if it made her worry for Amy, who was too little to understand how dangerous it was to make an enemy of Miss Fairchild.
‘We don’t speak to Mummy like that,’ Miss Fairchild said at first, trying to cajole Amy out of her mood, but after the sixth or seventh injury from a flying Barbie doll, she began to lose patience.
‘That’s very naughty, Amy,’ she said one day, after Amy had tried to slap her. ‘Now you’re going to have a time-out in your highchair.’
Alicia didn’t dare intervene as Miss Fairchild dragged a crying Amy to the kitchen, but she bore silent witness, hopeful that perhaps her presence would temper Miss Fairchild’s anger. Norah and Jessica also appeared, perhaps hoping the same. Miss Fairchild was lifting the girl into the highchair when Amy’s foot – in a patent-leather Mary-Jane – connected with her face.
‘Argh!’
Miss Fairchild released Amy, letting her tumble to the floor. She hit her head with a grotesque crack on the wooden tray on the way down.
For a horrible moment, everything was silent. Alicia and her sisters fell to their knees. Alicia scooped Amy up and held the limp little body in her lap. After a terrifyingly long moment, Amy began to wail.
The girls resumed breathing, looking at each other in relief. Miss Fairchild, who was cursing and holding her chin, barked, ‘Put her down.’
