The long wail of the siren was interspersed with a maniacal whirring trill, and it was getting louder. The emergency vehicle sounded like it was coming down the beach road. Sylvia got up from the couch where she and Dan had just sat down. At the window, the rolling flash of red and blue lights was showing though the trees. An ambulance. It stopped just as it passed her driveway. She went into the kitchen and from the top drawer she took out her torch.
‘I’m going to have a look.’
‘Okay. I’d better stay here,’ said Dan.
Sylvia picked her way up the rutted driveway, following the torch beam. As she neared the road, Rita Perotta, her neighbour opposite, almost collided with her. She was dragging her mad Border collie on a leash.
‘Sylvia! I was just coming to see you. Annabelle told me not to, but I don’t think she’s making sense.’ Rita was breathless, speaking in a fierce whisper.
‘What is it?’ Sylvia felt a prickling sense of dread moving down her arms.
‘Annabelle – she’s sick. I found her collapsed on the road. She couldn’t breathe properly. I thought she was having a stroke or something. I called the ambulance and waited with her.’
The paramedics were talking to Annabelle in low tones about fifteen metres further along the road. She was sitting on a stretcher that had been lowered to ground level and was facing the other direction.
‘Is she all right?’ Sylvia tried to ignore the sinking feeling of guilt that had gripped her. She took a step towards the ambulance, but Rita held her arm.
‘She’s really agitated. When she stopped hyperventilating, she started sobbing. Told me not to bother you. Insisted I didn’t.’
They both stared at Annabelle’s back, listening to snatched words from the paramedics, until Rita’s dog began scratching at something in the dirt and then bucking and bouncing like a rodeo bull. She jerked him sideways onto the road. ‘Stop it, Biscuit!’
‘I should check,’ said Sylvia, as the dog settled momentarily.
‘Just let her have a few minutes with them,’ said Rita decisively. ‘She seemed a bit out of her mind, actually.’
‘What did the paramedics say?’
‘Nothing much. I just told them how I found her and they suggested I step back for a bit. They’re taking her blood pressure, I think.’
Sylvia felt her own pulse racing. Annabelle would need Dan, but she could hardly go back into the house and get him now. It would be bad enough with a normal neighbour, but Rita was an intolerable gossip. Cold fear whispered at her consciousness. What if Annabelle had seen them? She pushed the idea aside.
‘I heard she collapsed at the garden meeting last week too,’ said Rita.
‘Did she?’ asked Sylvia.
A scurrying sound emerged from the bushes on the hill, and Biscuit began pulling violently at the leash, whimpering with excitement.
Rita heaved him back with both hands. ‘Yes,’ she panted. ‘Had a turn or something. Didn’t she tell you?’
‘No,’ said Sylvia. She had banned Dan from mentioning Annabelle when they were together. She knew she could hardly take a moral stance on anything, but the whole thing felt worse, even more traitorous, if her sister’s name was mentioned between them.
‘Carted off in an ambulance. Hellie Beacher told me. Biscuit! No, boy!’
‘I’ll go in and ring Dan,’ said Sylvia, sighing. She turned the torch back towards the house and shone it at the driveway, wondering what on earth she was doing. She should have insisted on speaking with Annabelle, checked she was all right, but something strange was going on. What was Annabelle hiding from her? What had caused this? Why was she sobbing? Surely she couldn’t have seen Dan inside the house. His car was parked down at the surf club behind the toilet block, so she couldn’t have spotted that either. Sylvia needed to think. She needed to speak to Dan.
When she walked back into the house, Dan was sitting on the patchwork chair, fiddling with his phone.
‘What’s the emergency?’
‘It’s Annabelle. She’s had some sort of turn. Collapsed and hyperventilating. Down on the road.’
Dan was quiet for a moment, then he let out a huge, heavy sigh.
‘Rita Perotta found her,’ continued Sylvia. ‘Said Annabelle didn’t want to disturb me. Said she was sick last week, too.’
Dan brought both his hands to his head and slid them through his hair. He stared at the floor in silence.
‘Rita said she went to hospital during a garden meeting. What was that about?’
Dan stood up and put his phone in his pocket. ‘Doctors said it was a panic attack.’
‘What? She doesn’t suffer from anxiety, does she? Well, apart from the usual…’
‘I don’t know. Sounded like crap to me, but the doc said she had to see a psychologist.’
Sylvia flinched at his offhand tone. ‘How did that go?’ she asked.
Dan didn’t say anything.
‘Dan?’
‘I don’t know. Look, I’m going to head down along the beach and get the car. I’d better go home. Maybe it is panic attacks.’
‘Poor Anna. Maybe she…’ Sylvia shook her head, barely able to finish the thought.
Dan said, ‘Hopefully she didn’t work out that I was here, but if she did, I’m not going to lie about us.’ He came across the room and placed a finger under her chin. ‘Syl—’
‘You’ll have to drive past her on the road to get out. I really don’t want her to find out you were here.’ Sylvia’s whole body was rigid with fear.
‘Syl, I’m yours. I’m only keeping this secret because you want to.’
She flicked his finger from her chin with an irritable swipe.
A loud knock startled them both, and Sylvia spun around to face the door. Dan took a step backwards, just as she whispered, ‘I’ll ignore it.’
‘Your car’s there, and it’s probably Rita,’ said Dan quietly. ‘I’ll wait in the bedroom.’
The knocking sounded again, more forceful this time. Dan walked into the bedroom and closed the door. Sylvia took a deep breath, then went to open the front door. A paramedic was standing there, the bright white of his shirt stark against the night. He was holding a powerful torch.
‘Sylvia?’
‘Yes.’
He took a step sideways and turned back to face the driveway. Behind him, in the dark, the second paramedic was supporting Annabelle.
‘Your sister felt unwell. We didn’t think it was wise for her to drive just yet. She’s going to be all right, though.’
The second paramedic walked forward holding Annabelle. In the light of the porch, she looked pale and shaken. She was staring down at the ground, and when she looked up at Sylvia, there was such a raw, desperate pain in her eyes that Sylvia wished a crack would open up in the earth and swallow her. Annabelle knew.
‘Come in,’ she said.
The paramedic brought Annabelle inside and took her to the couch. Annabelle sank into it and looked up at the men. ‘Thank you. I’m so sorry to have wasted your time.’
‘No trouble, love. It wasn’t a waste at all. You make sure you get to the doctor tomorrow, okay?’
Annabelle nodded, and a tear rolled down her cheek. She swiped it away and stared at the floor again.
As Sylvia showed the paramedics to the door, she thought: please don’t leave. This is the end of something. The beginning of something else. I’m not ready.
The scene felt strangely familiar, and yet it had been more than forty years ago that the whole thing had played out in reverse. She still remembered the jumpsuit she’d worn to Alice Tarraby’s hen’s night. Its plunging neckline and flared pants with a huge belt – a bright yellow outfit to celebrate the beginning of how things were going to be. The weddings amongst her friends were starting, and she knew Dan was keen for them to be next. He was older, twenty-four, and ready to settle down. They’d been together now for nearly three years and she’d been waiting for her father and Annabelle to be ready to manage without her before she let Dan propose to her properly.
Annabelle would leave school soon, get a job probably. Maybe at a dress shop. She wasn’t as academic as Sylvia, but she adored people. She cared about making them happy.
Everyone knew Dan was a catch, but what they didn’t know was how much he and Sylvia needed each other. It hurt them to be apart. He was so smart and so devoted to her. Which was why, when it happened, it felt like the whole world had collapsed on top of her in great piercing shards of rubble.
She’d been out with Lillian at the party. They’d taken Lillian’s car – a slightly battered Kingswood that Lillian treated like a pet. She renamed it every week or so, depending on her mood. They had been drinking at the party, glasses of Porphyry Pearl, but not so much that she couldn’t remember what happened afterwards, in all its hideous, crushing detail.
Lillian had dropped her home and she had dashed across the front of the garage trying to avoid the rain that was pelting down. Mud splattered up her boots and clung to the hem of the jumpsuit. She let herself in the front door. In the hallway, at the rear of the house, she stopped. From the light of the bathroom, she could see that Annabelle’s door was wide open.
‘Anna?’ she whispered into the gloom of the bedroom. It was late, and usually she would have crept past, but Annabelle had always slept with the door firmly shut since their mother had died. At first it was probably so she could cry herself to sleep in private. But after the first few months, Sylvia decided it must have made her feel safer.
From the glow of the bathroom light, she could see that Annabelle’s bed was empty. The bedspread looked as pristine and neatly made as Annabelle left it every morning when she got up.
‘Annabelle?’ She said it more loudly, but there was no answer. She flicked on the bedroom light. There was nobody there. She walked further down the hall to their father’s room. Through the crack in the door she could hear his irregular grunting snores. She walked into the lounge room, flicking on the light as she did.
‘Anna?’ The house remained silent. Sylvia sat down in her father’s armchair. It was past midnight. She took a cigarette out of the packet on the mantelpiece and lit it. Where could Annabelle be? She wasn’t allowed out to parties. Soon it would be different, she kept telling Sylvia. Soon she’d be sixteen! She would twirl around the kitchen hugging herself and imagining the glorious life that lay ahead of her – boys, parties, beautiful dresses. Sylvia wished her little sister wasn’t so extremely pretty, and so trusting. It hurt to watch her dream like that. Annabelle’s nature meant that people would take advantage of her – she just wanted to please everyone, and that was a dangerous thing.
Sylvia took a drag on the cigarette and blew the smoke towards the fireplace, drumming the fingers of her other hand against her knee. Where was her sister? Worry began to gnaw at her. Should she wake her father and ask? Or had Annabelle slipped out with friends after he’d fallen asleep? There were no neighbours for miles, so she wouldn’t have been able to walk anywhere. But one of the Palfrey boys might have come to pick her up. Or Eadie Bentley. She’d got her licence last month and was getting around in one of their family’s farm utes. Annabelle had wanted to go roller skating in Burnie with Eadie tonight. Maybe she’d managed to persuade their father to let her, but it was doubtful. He worried about her going in cars with other kids. And anyway, it was way past any curfew he would have set.
Sylvia finished the cigarette and flicked the butt into the fireplace. She turned off the light and went into the kitchen. When she opened the fridge, the smell of something sour hit her. Ignoring it, she pulled a huge jug of milk from the top shelf and poured some into a glass, then turned off the kitchen light and sat on the window seat sipping the milk and wondering what to do. What would Mum have done? She wanted to phone Dan, but it was late. He had been stressed all week. Work stuff seemed to be getting on top of him; he had an urgent matter in court on Monday and needed to spend the weekend preparing for it. This had been good news for Lillian, who had pressed Dan into sitting with her dad for the night so she could go to the party with Sylvia. Len needed help getting out of the wheelchair, and occasionally he had seizures.
Sylvia wondered how Dan had managed tonight with Len’s nightly routine. She’d done it a few times herself, when Lillian had things to go to. Len was quiet, but he was kind and had a wicked sense of humour. He’d joke about the pills he had to take with dinner that made his arms feel like liquorice and his head go fuzzy. Then he’d joke about the whisky he wasn’t meant to be drinking on top of it, which all added to the difficulty of getting him out of the wheelchair and onto the bed when the time came. Sylvia didn’t mind sitting with him. He was a good listener and he didn’t waste time feeling sorry for himself.
Sylvia settled into the soft surface of the old window seat. She put a cushion behind her head and lay back, resting her eyes. Annabelle would be all right. She was just wanting to grow up too fast. That was all. She saw what Sylvia had with Dan and she wanted that too. When Dan slung his arm around Sylvia and drew her close – if they were washing up in the kitchen, or mucking around in the dairy helping to milk the cows at the weekend – Annabelle looked so wistful. She was like a puppy dog wanting to join in with its master. She adored Dan. It was sweet that she was so devoted to him.
Sylvia let herself relax. She wished Dan was here, holding her. He had been a bit grumpy this afternoon, she had noticed. He was busy and really didn’t have the time to go and sit with Len, but he could squeeze in some work over there, and he wouldn’t refuse Lillian. They were old friends as much as work colleagues.
She noticed the occasional set of headlights along the main road in the distance as they curved around the headland towards Sisters Cove. It was so quiet here; so removed from the world. One day she would travel. She hoped she could persuade Dan to go with her, but he seemed to want to stay around here, practise law, settle down. She knew she could change his mind.
She let her eyelids drop closed, and as she was drifting off, she had a fleeting thought. Perhaps Annabelle had told Dan her plans for tonight. Dan had been sitting at their kitchen table with her dad, finishing his cup of tea, when she and Lillian had left for the party. Annabelle had been dancing around the kitchen, chattering about something of little importance. Perhaps Dan will know where she is. Her eyes were heavy and her mind was thick from the wine.
Sylvia must have been asleep for a while when the crunch of tyres and headlights sweeping through the kitchen window woke her. Her neck was stiff and her mouth was parched. She straightened up and looked outside, rubbing at her eyes. The moon had emerged from behind the blanket of clouds and she could see that the car that had pulled up was Dan’s. The headlights went out and she was momentarily blinded in the blackness.
She got up and crossed the kitchen to the front door. She wasn’t sure what stopped her from going outside to meet him. Perhaps it was the cold that had set in during the afternoon and plummeted further while she was at the party. She was shivering in her jumpsuit, even though it was still late summer. She stood at the window inside the closed-in porch that faced the driveway. As her eyes adjusted, she could see Dan’s silhouette in the driver’s seat. The rain had stopped and the moon was bathing everything outside in a deep navy-black light. Another figure was sitting in the passenger seat. Waves of hair were silhouetted around her shoulders, and Sylvia could see it was definitely a girl. They were facing each other. Talking. She moved closer to the hat stand that was obscuring her view and ducked in behind it, leaning against a bed of coats.
Suddenly Dan leaned over and took the girl into his arms. Sylvia’s stomach plummeted. No. After a minute, he straightened up, but they sat in the car for another five minutes or more. Sylvia lost track of time. She was cold, transfixed, turned to stone. What were they talking about? After a while, Dan leaned over again and the two heads came together – a terrible, faithless silhouette. Dan sat back after a moment and raised his hand to the girl’s face, caressing it, touching her. Sylvia wanted to scream.
Without warning, he sat up. The girl opened her door a crack and the interior light came on. Sylvia thought her eyes must be deceiving her. She stared, but it was as if she was watching a film. It was a joke, surely? Annabelle swivelled and got out of the car. Dan stood too, but stopped at his door and said something that Sylvia couldn’t hear. She stepped backwards, and the hat stand swayed madly. She grabbed at it, righting herself, then stumbled into the kitchen. Her whole body was shaking. As she headed towards the hallway, hot, angry disbelief was pulsing through her head. How dare they? How could they? Cowardly, treacherous bastard! And with her sister. Her own sister!
She heard the latch move on the front door. Her chest swelled with the enormity of the betrayal. She leaned on the dining table for support. Annabelle hadn’t turned on the light. She must have been hoping to sneak back in without waking anyone. Above the pounding of her heart, Sylvia could make out soft footfalls, and saw a silhouette against the window in the moonlight.
‘You little slut!’ The words came out like hissing bullets.
Annabelle froze.
‘Sylv—’
‘Don’t!’
‘Syl, I—’
‘How could you? I’ve been sitting here for hours, worrying about whether you’d driven off a cliff with Eadie, and then I…’ Sylvia felt a rush of pain.
‘Dan was just driving me home—’
‘If you say one more word about Dan, I swear, I will strangle you with my own hands.’ Sylvia felt herself becoming completely calm. The white-hot anger was bubbling beneath a blade of perfect clarity. She was now the carer, the mother. She was supposed to teach Annabelle right from wrong. She had failed, but so had Annabelle. She couldn’t think about Dan now.
‘Please, Syl.’ A sob escaped from Annabelle, echoing in the night-time quiet.
Sylvia turned on the hallway light. Tears were running down Annabelle’s face. She was flushed and dishevelled. Of course she was. And she was wearing Sylvia’s favourite platform shoes. Little slut.
Annabelle put her fingers to her eyes to shield them. She spoke in a whimper. ‘Don’t be angry at me. Please, Sylvia, I didn’t mean—’
‘Go to bed.’ Sylvia’s voice was icy. ‘We will never speak of this. Do you hear me, Anna? We will never, ever speak of this again.’
Sylvia dragged herself out of the distant memory. It was as clear as cut glass. Now, Annabelle was still bent forward on the couch, looking at the floor. Sylvia sat down in the patchwork armchair, her head spinning.
‘Annabelle, are you all right?’
Annabelle looked past Sylvia, to the wood stove. Her face was vacant. Her make-up was ruined, and black smudges pooled in the creases under her eyes. She’s aged, thought Sylvia. Annabelle was fifty-eight, but strangers usually guessed her to be early fifties. Tonight, though, she looked like an old woman.
Annabelle fixed her eyes on Sylvia. They were a piercing blue. There was something in them that made Sylvia blanch. A steely determination. Despite her blotchy skin and the mess of her face, there was something in the way she looked at Sylvia that cut into her soul.
‘Anna, I’m sorry. It’s unforgiv—’
‘No.’
What did that mean? Sylvia needed to make this right. The past didn’t excuse what she was doing with Dan. Nothing excused what she was doing. She needed to let her sister know that she was sorry. That she would go away. That she had no place in this town.
‘Anna, please, I know—’
‘I have a lump,’ said Annabelle.
‘What?’
‘In my breast. The doctor seems to think it’s cancer.’
‘No. That’s awful… That’s—’
‘And I need some of your herbs. Some powders or whatever. I came to find out if you have something that might help.’
‘Anna, if you saw—’
‘Yes. I saw the doctor. She said I needed to go to the breast clinic for the tests. And I will. But I thought you might have something herbal, maybe something from that Ayurveda thing you talk about.’
Sylvia stared at her, mute.
‘Well, do you?’
‘I suppose so. But you’d only take them after your other treatment. You need meditation and yoga now. Maybe I can order you some incense and oils, but—’
‘Fine. Let me know when they arrive. I need to be getting home. Dan will worry if he gets back from his meeting and I’m not there.’ Annabelle caught Sylvia’s eyes and held them.
Sylvia forced herself to speak. ‘Anna, the ambulance guy… he said you shouldn’t drive.’
Annabelle stood up. She wobbled slightly and steadied herself on the edge of the couch.
‘I’m fine.’
Sylvia stood too, but Annabelle held up her hand.
‘No need to see me out. I have my phone for a torch.’ She lifted her chin and walked towards the door. She opened it, letting the cool of the night air blow into the house. ‘I’ll see you soon. For the oils or whatever.’
‘Okay,’ said Sylvia.
‘And Sylvia, please don’t talk about what’s gone on tonight. I couldn’t bear it.’
Sylvia felt the guilt spreading hotly through her stomach.
On the porch, Annabelle turned back. ‘You’ve probably forgotten what it’s like to live in a small town. But I’ve lived here all my life. If you tell people about my little… episodes,’ she paused and took a deep breath, and her voice wavered, ‘it will make things difficult. For ever. It wouldn’t be good for Dan either. And I won’t let anything bad happen to him. He’s my husband, Sylvia. If you talk about this, any of…’ – she glanced back into the house, her eyes landing on the bedroom door – ‘this, it could ruin us. Do you understand?’
Sylvia looked down at the ground, framing her next words.
‘Sylvia, did you hear what I said?’
She opened her mouth to speak, but Annabelle cut her off.
‘Be careful or you’ll ruin everything.’