CHAPTER FIVE

BONNIE twisted the silver rings on her swollen fingers. Even though she never slept well on planes, Bonnie adored travelling. She enjoyed the surge of the plane lift-off and the anticipation of landing at her destination. Bonnie didn’t even mind the fourteen-hour flight from Los Angeles to Brisbane. She readjusted her shawl, and smiled at the person beside her, her long-lost daughter, Katharine.

This trip, Bonnie’s anticipation was mixed with anxiety.

‘You’re going to adore Sofia and Carol,’ Bonnie said to Katharine, not for the first time. ‘Although I’m not sure how they’ll react when they hear our news.’

‘I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell them when we found each other.’ Katharine yawned, taking in a deep breath of air.

‘This news is too important for a phone call and it’s complicated.’ Bonnie had difficulty explaining to Katharine why her friends didn’t even know she’d had a child.

Once, Bonnie would have known exactly how each would respond, but now she wondered whether they would be surprised, pleased or angry with her. Perhaps all three.

‘You’ll need to be prepared for Carol, who is likely to ask endless questions about how this happened and why she wasn’t told. Sofia will greet you with sympathy and welcoming words.’

Her apparent confidence belied Bonnie’s lack of surety about how her oldest and dearest friends would react to being lied to (by omission) for nearly forty years. She braced herself for the inevitable questions about why she didn’t tell them she’d had a baby and why she didn’t fight to keep Katharine.

Bonnie had told Katharine her father died in an accident and that was why Bonnie agreed to her adoption. It was the story Bonnie had told herself so many times over the years she almost believed it.

The remote control stuck as Bonnie flicked through the menu. She’d already watched the new releases of interest and was now going through the old movies. When the icon for Beaches came up she stabbed at the button to turn it on. Memories flickered through her mind while she watched the childhood friends. There were many similarities to her own friendship with Sofia, who bore some resemblance to Barbara Hershey, and Carol, who completed their trio. Bette Midler had been Bonnie’s solace when she was feeling down. Bonnie had hated her red hair until she saw Bette strut across the stage with wild red hair flowing.

When Bonnie was six years old, her mother married and her stepfather made them move to a suburb on the south side of Brisbane. The kids at her new school called her a ranga, short for orangutan, making fun of her red hair. To think, she’d been close to punching Carol and Sofia’s lights out when she first saw them giggling on the sidelines, only to become best friends.

Sofia, Carol and Bonnie had been inseparable through primary school and most of high school. It was when Bonnie discovered her passion for art in fifth form that cracks appeared. Art led her on a journey that separated her from her friends in more ways than one.

Tapping her foot to the song, ‘Under the Boardwalk’, Bonnie was reminded of December 1973 when she holidayed with Sofia and Carol on the Sunshine Coast. She’d had a ball partying all night and inspecting properties during the day. She would never forget the thrill of buying her own unit on the Sunshine Coast.

A year or so earlier, she’d given birth to Katharine and then her own birth father died and unexpectedly named her in his will. That’s when she found out he’d been a muso and pissed off overseas when Bonnie was born. He’d promised to return and marry her mother when he’d ‘made it big’. He never did return, but he left Bonnie, who barely knew his name at that point, a loft in Manhattan and a good whack of money. Bonnie buried the adoption of her child in a dark corner of her mind, knowing she could not reverse the decision. She used the inheritance to change the course of her life.

As the tension between the on-screen friends rose, Bonnie remembered how shocked she’d been when Sofia became enraged with her over Dave. It was only once and wasn’t even that big a deal as they were drunk and it was obvious that Dave preferred Carol, even if he didn’t know it at the time. Straight after their fight Bonnie bought a one-way ticket overseas. She rented out her Sunshine Coast unit, settled into her Manhattan loft and enrolled in the Art Students League in New York. Several years later she set herself up as a graphic artist.

She’d lived overseas since then but had missed her childhood friends more than expected and returned for important family events. While unable to attend Carol’s wedding, which was a small informal affair, she’d been a bridesmaid at Sofia’s lavish wedding and attended the christening and graduation ceremonies of Sofia and Carol’s children. This time was different. This time was about her own family.

The plane lights came on, the stewards served breakfast and Bonnie picked at her omelette, mini sausage and soggy tomato. When Bonnie looked at Katharine sitting next to her, watching an old movie about tap dance, she felt the same flood of love she had when she met her. Katharine had been tap dancing when Bonnie first saw her at the dance studio. Up until then, Bonnie had suspected the contact from the adoption intermediary service was a hoax. It was too much of a coincidence that the child she’d tried to forget about would be living in New York at the same time Bonnie was there.

Her doubts were swept away when she watched Katharine move in front of the dance class and saw her red hair escaping from the sweatband. Bonnie felt in her core that the young woman had once been part of her, a part that had been missing for forty years.

She’d carried an emptiness with her all these years without realising what it was, despite countless counselling sessions. She tried to fill it with travel to unusual locations, with interesting jobs and alluring men. They filled the gap for a while, but when they became routine, the hole was still there.

The last six months since she’d met Katharine had been the most challenging and exciting of Bonnie’s life. A plethora of emotions had swamped her and she’d struggled to work out what her role with her daughter was. She felt a void deep inside her that only Katharine could fill, but feared letting Katharine know how much she needed her, so she tried to stay light and chatty and asked her daughter to call her Bonnie. When Katharine agreed to travel to Australia, Bonnie was blissful, but covered her deep feelings by pretending they were girlfriends or sisters going on a holiday to the Sunshine Coast. Katharine made arrangements for her ex-husband, who was still her business partner, to operate their dance studio for several months without her.

Now here Bonnie was, cocooned in a plane with her daughter, and about to expose her hidden past to her dearest friends.

At the petrol station near the international airport, Carol filled up the tank of her Peugeot. She bought a coffee and ate an iced donut while watching the new tap-dance routine on her phone in the service station carpark until it was time to meet Bonnie.

She was envious of all the travel Bonnie had done and had kept all the postcards she sent from overseas. Whenever Bonnie returned she acted as if they’d never been apart. Carol wondered if this time Bonnie’s surprise would change their relationship.

Carol took the card her mother had given her for her thirteenth birthday from her handbag and re-read the quote, The highest compact we can make with our fellow is – ‘Let there be truth between us two forevermore.’

That’s what Dave and I have, she reflected, truth between us. Carol prided herself on being straightforward. ‘With me, what you see is what you get,’ she was fond of saying. She tried to think before she spoke as her mother had urged her to, but she couldn’t put a roadblock between her brain and her mouth. She sometimes wished she could be more like Sofia. Carol admired Sofia’s quietude. What a great word, she thought, quietude. She looked it up on her phone. A state or quality of being quiet, peaceful, tranquil. That was Sofia, so composed and polite. Ever the peacemaker. Not like Bonnie, who spoke as if she was out to upset people.

Carol returned the card to her handbag, put the remains of the coffee and donuts in the bin and drove to the parking station at the airport.

If I had a penny for every time Sofia and I had to get Bonnie out of scrapes when we were growing up, Carol thought. Bonnie’s motto was in for a penny, in for a pound and she said that if you’re going to get in trouble, it might as well be for something worthwhile. Well, it isn’t pennies anymore, it’s cents. I wonder what children think of some of the old sayings. Spend a penny, save a pound and a penny saved is a penny earned. That’s what Dave and I did, mended things as soon as they broke and saved as much as we could.

Now Bonnie was coming back with a secret person after jaunting around the world. It’d be her luck to have married a millionaire. Not that she resented Bonnie’s inheritance, but Carol and Dave had worked hard for everything they had. They’d scrimped and saved to buy the old house and extend it as their family grew. She’d made clothes for the children when they were growing up and driven second-hand cars. Now, with the sale of the business, she had money for their future and could afford her sporty car as well as do some of the things she’d always dreamed about, like travel overseas.

Carol stood on the other side of the barrier in the arrival hall. Each time she collected people from the airport she wished she was travelling overseas. She’d picked up brochures for a trip to Europe once. When she told Dave, he said there was too much to do around the house, the business was starting to take off and the kids would miss school. When the kids were older, there was always something else; the need to grow the business, high school activities and charity events. Carol had almost visited Brett when he was in the UK, but her father became ill and she was too worried to leave him. It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy being with and helping her family, but Carol couldn’t bury the thought that she wanted more and sometimes she longed for Bonnie’s carefree lifestyle.

The first passengers came through the doors and along the walkway. Most of them were in suits or smart casual wear: the first-class passengers. People of all backgrounds, shapes and sizes followed, their blurry eyes searching for a familiar face, their mouths turning into a wide grin when they saw a banner with the words Welcome home or a relative holding flowers.

Carol spotted the woman with long red tousled hair that was escaping from a purple headscarf. She saw the familiar hazel eyes through the turquoise and orange glasses and heard the tinkling of Moroccan jewellery. Bonnie waved.

‘Darling, beguiling Carol. My dearest, oldest friend. You are the oldest, aren’t you?’

They hugged, close and tight. Carol looked up and saw a second Bonnie – a younger version wearing understated sports clothing and with her hair tamed into a bun, but the same height and eyes.

‘Darling Carol, this is Katharine, my daughter.’

Katharine manoeuvred the trolley load of bags, which was about to topple over.

‘We should have gotten two trolleys,’ she said with an American accent. ‘Hi, Carol, is it? Bonnie has told me so much about you.’

‘Well, she didn’t tell me anything about you.’ Carol gave Bonnie a dirty look. ‘Sorry to be rude, it’s just –’ Carol stopped herself. She held out her arms to hug Katharine. ‘Never mind, welcome to Queensland.’

‘So, where’s Sofia?’ asked Bonnie.

‘She had another commitment and couldn’t come. She’s invited us to an early dinner at her house.’

‘Brilliant. Gives us time together with you. And another surprise for Sofia later.’

Carol was longing to grill Bonnie about how and when she had a daughter but could almost hear the parking metre ticking over. ‘Come on, we’d better get out of here,’ she said.

They pushed the trolley through the crowds of people out the sliding glass doors, across the road and into the car park. They managed to fit the bags into Carol’s little car, although by the time they finished, Katharine was almost buried beneath them in the back seat.

Carol drove through the traffic and onto the freeway.

‘Now you can tell me –’ started Carol.

‘Darling, it’s so balmy here and look at the colour of the sky. See Katharine, I told you it was the bluest you would ever see.’

‘Uh, huh,’ Katharine replied sleepily from the back seat.

‘How did this situation –’ Carol tried again.

‘Darling, look at the tropical greenery. Stunning. You don’t see that in New York,’ continued Bonnie.

‘Why didn’t you …’

‘There’s the Glasshouse Mountains. How spectacular they are,’ Bonnie said sleepily.

Bonnie and Katharine dozed while Carol drove the rest of the way in silence. She manoeuvred her car into the underground carpark at the Mykonos Apartments and helped haul the bags up the stairs.

‘Blooming hell,’ exclaimed Bonnie when she opened the door. ‘I’d forgotten how outdated and scruffy this place is. It’s a throwback to the seventies. Abominable. Katharine, we’ll have to take this in hand.’

The unit still had lime green feature walls and an orange kitchen bench top. Three framed faded prints of Impressionist masters hung on the walls. The sunflowers, cornfields and waterlilies competed with the sea scenes on the lounge suite. Bonnie opened the yellow and orange striped curtains to reveal the ocean.

‘What a view,’ said Katharine. ‘And I don’t mind the decor. Retro is back, you know.’

‘I can’t believe the seventies is regarded as retro,’ said Carol. ‘Now stop obfuscating, Bonnie, what’s the story?’

‘Darling, I’m buggered. I desperately need to take a shower, and I’d murder for a nap.’ Bonnie dragged her bags into the bedroom. ‘Can I tell you the full story tonight, with Sofia? But don’t breathe a word to her about Katharine.’

‘So, I take it Sofia doesn’t know you had a child either?’ Carol felt strangely comforted that Bonnie had lied to both of them.