The Safe Place, page 12
Nina fussed at Aurelia’s back. “I mean it, Aurelia. Come away now.” She spoke firmly, as if her daughter was carrying a loaded weapon. We have you surrounded. Step. Away. From. The Help.
But Aurelia held on, her skinny forearms locked like a vice. Emily winced as Nina grabbed at Aurelia’s hands, trying to break them apart. “I said, that’s enough!” she yelled, and pulled hard. And suddenly it wasn’t funny anymore. Nina was furious, and the tussle was becoming awkward. Her efforts to forcibly remove Aurelia were causing them all to lumber around like a three-headed dancing elephant.
Aurelia’s grip was now becoming uncomfortable. “Oof,” Emily said, as the breath was squeezed from her lungs. Her head began to swim. They lurched again and crashed into the table.
“Aurelia! Get off!” Nina gave one more gigantic pull, and they all broke apart with such force that Aurelia flew backward and landed on her bum.
“Well,” said Emily, panting. “That was—”
But she didn’t get to finish, because at that moment Aurelia lifted her fists to her temples and let out a yell so loud, so ferocious that the air between them seemed to vibrate. Her face went red and her knuckles turned white. Then she scrambled to her feet and ran.
Nina hurried after her.
Emily stared at the half-finished lunch, unsure of how to proceed. She didn’t know if either of them would be coming back to eat, but there didn’t seem any point in wasting it, so she gently lifted the fish from the grill, the whole thing peeling away neatly in one piece. Placing it on a platter, she covered it to keep it warm, then seasoned the mango salsa and the rice before covering them, too. Next she wiped down all the surfaces and packed away Aurelia’s “shop,” folding all the clothes and stacking the homemade labels into neat piles.
Feeling terrible about causing another drama, she fussed and straightened and polished until everything looked just right. When it came to Aurelia, even though Nina had urged her several times not to take things like this personally, Emily felt that she was causing more problems than she was alleviating. The noise the kid made was just awful, like nails on a chalkboard—but it was a relief to know she had a voice at all. Whatever caused her muteness, there was nothing wrong with that voice box.
After half an hour or so, Nina came jogging back down the steps, her face flushed. “God, I’m so sorry about that,” she said, one hand pressed to her forehead. “I don’t know what happened. The medication is supposed to calm her down, not wind her up.”
“No, she was fine,” Emily said, absentmindedly touching her bruised waist. “Who doesn’t like a hug?”
Nina frowned, hands on her hips. Then she shook her head. “Look, I know it must’ve seemed like I overreacted, but Aurelia doesn’t know her own strength. And honestly, it freaked me out. I’ve never seen her do that before. Not with anyone outside of the family.”
“Oh, please. I used to do things like that all the time when I was a kid,” said Emily. “I was worse, though. I used to walk up to strangers and ask if I could go home with them. Juliet was mortified.”
Nina laughed, the tension draining from her face. “Far out. That’s probably how your parents think you ended up here. You just walked up to your boss one day and asked if you could live with him.”
“Ha. Probably.”
Nina looked like she was about to say something else but stopped, noticing the kitchen. She raised her eyebrows in approval at the spotless sink, the countertop, and the beautifully set table.
“Oh, yeah. Lunch is served.” Emily smiled modestly. It was a novelty, this feeling that something she had done, even if it was just putting food on a table, might be worthy of admiration.
“Nice work,” Nina said. “I can’t wait to taste that salsa. Do you mind if we wait for Aurelia, though? She’s just up in her room taking a breather. I’ll give her some space, then go get her in a few minutes.” Drifting away to the edge of the pool, she dipped her toe in the water.
“You know,” she said, after a quiet pause, “despite what just happened, Aurelia’s actually been a lot calmer since you’ve been here. Things have been easier. I’ve had more time for lessons, exercises, activities, games. She’s been loving it.”
Emily joined her. “That’s good.”
“I’ve been more relaxed, too. Actually, that’s probably got a lot to do with it. We spend so much time together that we’ve become like E.T. and Elliott: one always feels what the other is feeling.”
They stood contemplating the horizon. The ocean threw a gentle breeze at them, cool and salty.
Emily stretched her arms to the sky and stifled a yawn. “So what’s on after lunch?” she asked. “Shall I head up to the guesthouse and crack on with the painting?”
“All good, no hurry,” Nina replied, lowering herself gracefully onto a sun lounger. “Why don’t you chill for a while?”
Emily didn’t need to be asked twice. It was a beautiful day; the last thing she wanted to do was paint. She took the adjacent lounger and lay back, placing her arms above her head and closing her eyes.
The sun shone orange through her eyelids. The sound of her breath made itself at home among the white noise of the ocean, the whisper of the trees, and the gentle slop-tap of the pool filter.
After a while, Emily heard the creak of Nina’s lounger and the pad of her feet on the tiles. In the kitchen, the fridge door squeaked and then she was back with a bottle of rosé and two glasses. There was a tinkle and a glug, and a frosty glass was pushed into Emily’s hand. “Cheers,” Nina said.
They clinked glasses and Emily took a sip. Best. Job. Ever.
“Are you close to your mum?” Nina’s voice was sleepy.
Emily felt her jaw stiffen. Every time her mother came up in conversation, her whole body tightened up. It was like a tic. She shrugged. “No, not really.”
“And why is that?”
“I don’t know … we’re just very different. She doesn’t like to talk about things and I’m all over the place. I make her feel uncomfortable.”
“Now how could that possibly be true?” Nina said. “She gave birth to you.”
“Actually, she didn’t. I’m adopted.”
“Really?”
Emily took another sip of wine. She could feel Nina looking at her.
“Can I ask at what age?”
“They fostered me when I was two and made it legal when I was eight.”
“Do you ever think about them?” Nina asked. “Your birth parents, I mean?”
“Sometimes.” Emily usually dodged questions like that. Maybe it was the wine or the heat, or maybe it was just Nina’s company, but she was too relaxed to censor herself. “They’re dead, though, so it’s not like I can go and find them. I wouldn’t anyway. They weren’t very nice, apparently. Alcoholics. Hit me and stuff.”
Nina was quiet.
“It’s okay, I don’t remember it,” Emily continued. “Or at least, I don’t think I do. Juliet made me see a child psychologist because they thought for a while that maybe I did.”
Nina shifted in her lounger. “Did what? Remember your biological family?”
“Yeah. Or what they did to me, anyway.”
“What did they do to you?”
Emily swallowed. “I’m not sure, specifically. No one ever said. I think they were all waiting for me to tell them.”
“But how could you possibly remember?” Nina said. “You were so little.”
There was a pause. Emily drank more wine. She could see the psychologist’s office clearly. Wood-paneled walls covered in pictures drawn by children. A sand tray. A Play-Doh table. A serious-looking woman with short gray hair and red-rimmed glasses: Dr. Forte. After every visit, Juliet would peer intently into Emily’s eyes, searching for a sign that she was different, that the doctor had fixed her.
“They told me they thought my body might have retained some memory of the abuse,” Emily said. “Like, not the kind of memory we have as adults or older children. Something different. There’s a word for it.…” She tried to think but her brain felt foggy. The sun was making her drowsy.
They lapsed into silence again. Emily felt as though she should say something else. “It sounds weird but sometimes I wish I did remember. It’s like having a blank space inside me.”
“Have you asked questions?”
“Yeah, kind of. Juliet told me some stuff when I was younger, but she doesn’t like talking about it. Neither do I, to be honest. It’s pretty depressing.”
“I can understand that.”
They sipped their drinks. The wine ran down Emily’s throat, glacier-cold.
“Why do you call her Juliet?” Nina asked. “Why not ‘Mum’?”
Emily hesitated, remembering the moment she’d decided never to use that word again. She’d been ten years old, a little ball of fury. “Just didn’t feel right.”
“Does she mind?”
“No.” Emily crossed an arm over her stomach. Something was flipping around unpleasantly in there, like a dying fish. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Just a thought,” Nina said quietly, “but maybe you should go a little easier on her. No one’s perfect. And it sounds like you’re a lot better off with her than you would’ve been otherwise.”
“I know. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. I know I’m lucky, it’s just … it’s like I was never enough for her. She always wanted more.”
“What do you mean?”
Emily thought about the few times she had seen Juliet cry. Always after hospital appointments or on the phone to doctors, sometimes in strange places like cafés or the supermarket, often behind almost-closed doors at home (Emily remembered pressing her face against the gaps and trying to peer through). Never an outburst; more like a teary stillness followed by a mad tornado of fake happiness: a spontaneous trip to the ice-cream shop or a crazy dash around the adventure playground, Juliet following Emily up ladders and across rope bridges with a shaky smile and sad eyes.
Some part of Emily’s brain poked a hole in her boozy stupor. Maybe a little bit of censorship wouldn’t go amiss.
“Oh, nothing. Forget it, I’m just being weird.” She yawned and turned to look at Nina. There was a thin white scar just next to Nina’s eye that Emily hadn’t noticed before, a silvery line from her temple down to her jaw. “How about you, anyway? What’s your family like?”
Nina laughed softly. “Not much to tell,” she said. “Grew up on the Northern Beaches. Do you know Sydney at all?”
“No. Not even a little bit.”
“Well, let’s just say it’s very white bread. Picket fences and bake sales. Mum, Dad, me, my brother. Couple of dogs. Pretty boring, really.”
Emily closed her eyes again, feeling as though she might doze off. The Northern Beaches … she imagined big houses overlooking the ocean and dads washing their cars out front, families surfing together and having barbecues on the beach. Tall blond mums like Nina and gorgeous sun-kissed children frolicking in the waves. (No wonder the Dennys didn’t live there; if poor Aurelia struggled in Europe, she certainly wouldn’t last long in Australia.) She could see it all so clearly, could even smell the sausages and the smoke from the grill.…
Her eyes snapped open. She really could smell the smoke.
“Hey…,” she said, sitting up. She craned her neck to see into the kitchen. “Is something burning?”
“Mmm?”
A breeze pushed past them, bringing with it the dry, acrid stench of charcoal.
“Nina, I think something’s burning.”
But Nina had already caught the smell. She jumped up, knocking over her glass and spilling the contents. “Bloody hell,” she said, breaking into a run. “Not again.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
EMILY
BY THE time they reached the playhouse it was already engulfed in flames.
Just meters away, Aurelia sat cross-legged and open-mouthed, tracing circles on the ground with her finger as the smoke billowed into the sky.
Nina sprinted straight to her. Hooking her hands under her daughter’s arms, she dragged her backward and away from the blaze, then, once they’d reached a safe distance, swung her up and over her shoulder. With an intensity Emily had only ever seen on the faces of elite athletes, Nina staggered over the sandy driveway to the family house and deposited Aurelia on the steps. “Stay there!” she yelled, and dashed inside.
Emily knew the command wasn’t meant for her, but she obeyed it anyway. She stood rooted to the spot, unable to think of a single thing she could do to help. It’s going to spread, she thought dimly as the flames rose higher, crackling and spitting at the surrounding dry leaves.
A few seconds later, Nina reemerged from the house brandishing a small fire extinguisher. “I called Yves!” she shouted as she ran back over the sand. “He’s on his way.”
Yves? Emily thought, surprised. Surely they would need more than just Yves? “What about the fire brigade?” she shouted, but her words were cut off by the guttural roar of the extinguisher.
Pointing it at the playhouse, Nina let loose a stream of white foam until the cylinder was empty. Suds pooled on the ground, but the flames seemed to climb even higher, tearing at the floral curtains and ravaging the little window boxes. The miniature door knocker fell off with a clank, and then the door itself collapsed. The air became thick with heat.
“Get another one!” Nina shouted.
Another one? Another what? Emily’s brain had frozen.
“Emily, what the hell are you doing? Guesthouse. Top of the basement stairs. Go!”
Finally, Emily’s adrenaline kicked in, and she hurried inside to fetch the second extinguisher while Nina ran for the hose.
Between them, they managed to put out the worst of the fire before Yves hurtled through the gates in his white utility truck. Still, he attacked the remains with a vigor that bordered on comic; he seemed to leap from his car before it even came to a stop and came tearing toward them carrying a huge gray blanket and an extinguisher of his own. “Bouge! Bouge toi!” he yelled, throwing the blanket over the burning mess. Then he stalked around with his extinguisher, snarling as he sprayed the foam.
Afterward, they all stood around the charred, soapy mess, their skin shiny with sweat, extinguishers hanging at their sides like guns.
“Who needs the fire brigade?” Emily grinned proudly. “We are the fire brigade.” She turned to catch Nina’s eye, but the smirk soon fell from her face. Nina was bone white, her lips thin and colorless.
Emily looked away, chastened, but not before she caught something pass between Nina and Yves—a look, a pulse. Something obscure and ephemeral, like a flash of reflected light from an unknown source.
Spinning around to where Aurelia was still sitting quietly on the steps of the house, Nina marched over, her limbs stiff with rage. “What did you do?” she spat, grabbing her daughter by the shoulders. “Tell me! Look at me! Why would you do that? Why?” She raised her hand in one furious movement, and Emily held her breath.
But at the last minute, Nina seemed to check herself. She lowered her hand and burst into tears. “Oh, Strawberry, I’m sorry. Are you okay?” She pulled Aurelia into a tight hug. “Are you hurt? What happened? How did you even…?” Releasing her grip, Nina stared into Aurelia’s eyes again, her fingers fluttering over her daughter’s body like butterflies unsure of where to land. “How many times do I have to tell you, bubba? You mustn’t play with fire! Please don’t ever scare me like that again.”
Emily watched as Aurelia melted into her mother and sobbed. Tears streaked down her face, and Nina swept them away with her fingers. As they pressed their heads together, lost in their own private world, Emily experienced a wave of compassion so strong she nearly wept herself. Aurelia’s condition was, of course, tough on Aurelia herself, but perhaps even tougher on her mother. The constant hard work, planning, and forethought; all the emotional battles: it was a wonder Nina didn’t break down more often. But she kept on going because there was nothing that mattered more to her in the world than her daughter.
Suddenly, Emily felt terrible about not having phoned home yet. Juliet would be losing her shit.
As soon as all the tears had subsided, Emily jogged over. “Hey, Nina?” she said. “Could I possibly use your phone?”
* * *
Nina took Aurelia inside to watch a movie and returned a few minutes later with a slim cordless landline phone in her hand.
“What a drama, hey?” she said, with a tight smile. “You okay?”
“Yeah, fine.” Emily pressed her fingers against her forehead and felt a gritty sheen of dirt and ash. She needed a shower—a cold one. Possibly it was the effect of standing near a raging bonfire for so long, but it seemed to her as though the heat of the sun had intensified since lunch. Maybe this was the start of the dreaded humidity. “How’s Aurelia?”
“She’s fine. No harm done, thank god.”
They stood facing each other for a moment, Nina tapping the phone thoughtfully against her chin. Behind them, Yves poked at the scorched earth with a shovel, scraping up what was left of the playhouse.
“Look,” said Nina, her voice lowered. “About what just happened. I should’ve said something when you first arrived but, I don’t know, I guess I was hoping I wouldn’t have to. The thing is, Aurelia can be…” She stopped. Took a breath. Started again. “Remember I told you she got sick as a baby?”
Emily nodded.
“Well, there were some … aftereffects. Besides her medical condition, I mean.” Nina closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them again they were bright with tears. “Sometimes she does things that don’t make sense. Things that seem…” She trailed off.
Emily waited, unsure of what to say.
Wiping a finger under her eye, Nina smiled. “She makes me so mad, but then she looks up at me with those dark eyes of hers. Her father’s eyes, really. She looks so much like him, don’t you think?”
“The spitting image,” Emily said.
