Mothers and Daughters (6 page)

Amira had nodded. ‘The Bungalow, on Dampier Terrace. It’s a bit dodgy, though.’

Morag wasn’t keen, Janey noticed, but Fiona was adamant. ‘It’s the first night of our holiday! And,’ she added, sneaking a sly glance at Amira, ‘our last in civilisation. Don’t be pathetic.’

‘What about the girls?’ Janey’s mother had asked, but Fiona had an answer to that too.

‘Amira can walk them back while we have another drink. They’ll be fine, as long as they keep the door locked and stay away from the porn channel. It’ll come up on the bill, you know,’ she said, wagging a finger at Bronte, who had flushed to the roots of her hair.

‘There you go,’ said Amira now, pushing open the door to the room Janey and Bronte were sharing. She handed the
key to Bronte. ‘You heard your mother. Keep it locked.’ She stepped back to let them go in, impulsively touching Janey on the arm as she passed. ‘It’s lovely to see you again. Tess has been so looking forward to this week.’

‘Me too,’ mumbled Janey, because she knew it was expected of her, and ducked inside before Amira could get any ideas about kissing her goodnight.

‘You’ll be fine then?’ Amira asked, turning to go. ‘You’ve got our mobile numbers. We won’t be late. I hope. Sleep well.’ She disappeared back into the night, her footsteps fading after her.

Bronte carefully turned the key in the lock, then drew the chain across for good measure.

‘You scared?’ asked Janey.

‘A little,’ admitted Bronte. ‘Mum was saying that a girl got raped up here a month or so ago. A tourist, like us.’

‘Tourists get raped in Melbourne, too,’ Janey said. ‘Lots of people do.’

Bronte grabbed some stuff from her bag and went into the bathroom without replying. When she came out again she was wearing a t-shirt and pyjama pants with a motif of two pink teddy bears tucked up in bed, a line of Zs above their heads.

Janey smirked.

‘Nice,’ she said. ‘Did your mum pick those out for you?’

‘My grandmother,’ Bronte muttered, reaching for her hairbrush. ‘I like them. They’re comfortable.’

‘They’re too hot for up here,’ Janey said, pulling off her own clothes and kicking them under the bed. ‘I’m going to sleep nude.’ She moved so she could see herself in the mirror attached to the wardrobe door. Bronte went red and turned
away, furiously dragging the bristles through her long dark hair. Janey smiled to herself. Little prude.

She looked into the mirror, admiring her reflection. She liked her body. Long blonde hair, flat stomach, tight arse. She ticked off her attributes one by one. Good legs, firm and shapely from all those laps in the pool. They weren’t as long as Bronte’s, sure, but Bronte was a mutant. Great tits. That’s what Darren in year ten had called out anyway, when he passed her in the corridor before school broke up. Janey’s hands reached to cup them. They
were
nice. Round and high, the nipples a dusky pink, not brown and used-looking like her mother’s. Her mum had caught her peeking at them once as they got changed for the beach, and pulled a face. ‘Children,’ she’d said. ‘That’s what you get from pregnancy and breastfeeding.’ If that was the case, Janey was going to adopt.

The light snapped out.

‘Hey!’ Janey said.

‘I want to go to sleep. It’s after midnight in Melbourne.’ Bronte’s voice was muffled. She probably had the covers pulled up to her nose, hiding from all the rapists. ‘Go into the bathroom if you want to stare at yourself.’

She was just jealous, Janey thought, but slid into the second bed anyway.

An hour later she was still awake. It was too hot. The air pressed against her face like a warm wet sponge, congealed beneath her knees and in her armpits. She sat up and turned on the bedside lamp, then went over to switch on the airconditioner, but it shook itself to life with such a combination
of clanking and wheezing that Bronte woke up and complained. Fine, Janey decided, shutting everything off and grabbing her bikini from where she’d left it in a damp heap on a chair. If she couldn’t sleep she’d go for a swim. Fiona had only told them to keep the door locked, after all. She hadn’t said anything about actually staying in the room.

A small green frog hopped away from her feet as she followed the pathway outside her door. The sky was a deep navy blue dusted with stars; the pool when she came to it was still and serene. Janey dived in and swam underwater, revelling in the luxury of not counting her strokes or rushing to the surface as she usually did, mind fixed on the session or the race ahead of her. Guided by a blue underwater beacon, she made it to the far end, turned and got halfway back before coming up for air. She rolled onto her back and floated, catching her breath. A bat wheeled past overhead, lit briefly by the light reflected from the water.

‘Are you part mermaid?’ someone called, and Janey stood up, looking around.

‘Over here,’ came the voice again, and then Janey saw him, sitting on the edge of the pool, half hidden in the shadows, his feet dangling in the water. ‘I was lying on the banana lounge when you dived in. Sorry to scare you.’

‘You didn’t,’ Janey said. She lay back in the water again, annoyed at being disturbed.

‘My mates are all in the bar,’ the man continued. ‘I was sick of the smoke; came out here for a breather and a bit of a lie-down. Didn’t know I was going to get woken by a mermaid. Show us your tail.’ He grinned, white teeth and gleaming eyes
all she could see in the darkness. Seventeen, Janey thought, judging by his voice. Maybe eighteen. It was hard to tell, but she liked his smile.

‘No way,’ she said, holding her legs tightly together and splashing water towards him. ‘You’ll sell me to a museum.’

‘Do mermaids fetch a good price?’ he asked. ‘I’ve been hunting for a bunyip, but maybe I should change my tack.’

‘Heaps,’ Janey said. ‘Even more if you can catch one alive.’

‘OK, then,’ he replied, then stood up and dived into the water, still clothed, before she could blink. Janey struck out for the shallow end but he was onto her in a moment, reaching for her feet. She shrieked and giggled, kicking spray into his face and wriggling away.

‘Powerful, too,’ he said, wiping his eyes. ‘You’ll make me a fortune!’ He took a deep breath and dived under again. Janey felt his hands on her ankles, on her calves, sliding up towards her thighs . . . and then heard a new voice, a loud and very angry one.

‘Janey!’ her mother bellowed from the paved area at the far end of the pool. Fiona, Morag and Amira stood beside her, Fiona swaying slightly. ‘Janey,
what
are you doing? You’re meant to be in bed!’

Janey’s companion surfaced beside her, took in the situation and slowly breaststroked away.

‘See you, mermaid,’ he whispered.

‘Janey, come here right now,’ said Caro. ‘I’m very disappointed in you. This trip was meant to be a treat, but you’ve already let me down.’

Janey sighed and pushed her hands through her hair, squeezing out the moisture. Silver drops ran glistening down her fingers and back into the water.) She trudged towards the steps, wishing she could join them.

‘You could have hit your head,’ her mother was saying. ‘You could have drowned! Where’s Bronte? And who was that boy? Do you even know his name?’

She was only getting started, but thankfully Janey was spared the full tirade; at that moment Fiona groaned, bent over, and vomited all her cocktails into the pool.

Monday

Fiona pressed her head against the glass of the troop-carrier window and wished everybody would just shut up. Amira had gone all tour guide on them and was pointing out the paltry sights of Broome, Bronte was dutifully nodding and asking questions, and Caro was still exclaiming—when she could get a word in—over the fucking mango she’d had for breakfast. Fiona stifled a groan. The memory of watching Caro shovelling it into her mouth, juices dripping onto the table, fingers sticky and gleaming, made her stomach contract. All Fiona had been able to force down was a lukewarm coffee, and at every bump in the road she feared that she would soon be seeing it once more.

She belched cautiously. It had been good of Amira to make sure she had the front seat, though with the fumes coming off her the others would probably have offered it quick smart anyway. Amira had also got her into the shower last night after
she’d thrown up by the pool; had hunted around for a skimmer and removed the worst of the floating vomit. Fiona closed her eyes. Sadly, that wasn’t even her most humiliating memory of the evening. That honour belonged to the moment after her third cocktail when it had seemed a good idea to invite one of the locals propping up the bar to dance with her. He must have been about twenty-three, with shoulders as broad as his accent, and he’d certainly been friendly enough when she’d sidled up beside him and ordered a Sex on the Beach.

‘Pretty exotic, eh,’ he’d grunted when the bartender had no idea what she was talking about. She’d pouted and cooed that she was on holiday, and there was a beach here, wasn’t there, so with any luck she’d get it anyway. He’d laughed at that, but later, when a Michael Jackson song came on and she approached him again he turned her down flat.

‘I’m too bloody young for that shit,’ he’d said, cocking his sun-bleached head at ‘Blame It on the Boogie’. Then, giving her a once-over, he added, ‘And you.’

Fiona had felt heat and rage rise inside her. How
dare
he?

‘Your loss,’ she’d slurred, yanking down her strappy singlet top to give him a quick flash of her tits, which were still in pretty good shape. Then she’d stormed back to their table and got riotously, recklessly drunk.

It hadn’t taken long. She’d barely eaten all day, and it was so hot in The Bungalow—the lack of air-conditioning no doubt a ploy to encourage the patrons to spend more on drinks. Fiona didn’t remember much after that, just Amira and Morag trying to keep her upright as she stumbled back to The Mangrove, and the look on Janey’s face when she’d
almost chundered over her in the pool. It would have to be Princess Janey, wouldn’t it? Always so perfect, the golden girl . . . not so perfect now though, she thought, smiling for the first time all morning. That look on Caro’s face when she’d realised her precious daughter was breaking the rules—and with a boy, what’s more. Welcome to the real world, Caroline. It sucks, doesn’t it?

The troop carrier shuddered to a halt and Amira tapped her lightly on the shoulder.

‘Are you awake? We’re going into Coles. Do you want anything?’

Fiona shook her head. All she wanted was to be left alone, and a nice cool bed. Predictably, she’d hardly slept last night, resorting to a sleeping tablet around three am. Having to take it pissed her off—she was trying to cut down—but enduring the way she was feeling for another minute was a far worse option. Besides, she wouldn’t need any at Kalangalla. There wasn’t any chance of getting drunk there every night.

‘Last Liquorland for a thousand kilometres,’ Amira teased, as if reading her mind.

‘Go away,’ Fiona said, then, when Amira did, called after her, ‘Coke. Get me some Coke and some chips—crinkle cut, plain. And Berocca,’ she added, head falling back against the seat. She already had a tube of B vitamins in her case, but that was buried somewhere in the back of the vehicle, no doubt wedged between the spare tyre and Caro’s fucking pillow. The thought of standing out in the heat in the middle of the supermarket car park, sorting through all their bags to get at it, made her want to heave all over again.
She must have nodded off, because the next thing she knew Amira was once more tugging on the handbrake before the carrier had completely stopped, jolting Fiona forward.

‘All out!’ Amira announced jauntily.

Fiona pushed her sunglasses back up her nose and resolutely turned her shoulder away, trying to tug her slumber back around her as if it was a blanket that had just slipped off.

‘Come on, Fiona,’ Amira said, shaking her. ‘You’ve got to see Cable Beach. You’ll feel better if you get out of the car, anyway.’

Fiona was inclined to disagree, but Bronte had come around to her door and was pulling it open, so she had no choice. Reluctantly she lowered herself from the car. They had driven right down onto the sand, which stretched golden and vast in both directions as far as she could see. Tiny crabs scurried away from her feet, their bodies translucent.

‘It’s beautiful,’ said Morag. ‘This is what we saw from the plane, isn’t it? Do we have time for a swim?’

‘Sure,’ Amira said. ‘The water’s gorgeous at this time of year—twenty-seven, twenty-eight degrees or so. Tess and I saw two huge mantas just off shore when we were last here, in September.’

‘Are they dangerous?’ asked Bronte.

‘Nah. They look like they should be, but they don’t have a barb like stingrays do. They’re gentle giants—stunning to watch. People pay to swim with them further down the coast, at Ningaloo.’

‘I haven’t got my bathers on,’ complained Caro.

‘So go naked,’ suggested Amira, smiling. ‘This part of the beach is for nudists, anyway.’

Fiona glanced around. There were only two other cars besides theirs, but sure enough the elderly couple sitting back in their deckchairs a hundred metres away didn’t appear to have any clothes on. The woman’s large breasts lolled almost to her lap, like deflated airbags. Fiona winced. Sunburnt nipples. Nice.

‘It is lovely,’ she conceded, ‘but I’ve got to go to the loo. I’ll meet you back at the car.’

She hurried away before they could protest. Yes, it was pretty, but her bladder was bursting and the glare was giving her a migraine. A small plane flew overhead, shattering the stillness.
Coast Watch
, Fiona read on the side of the plane, and thought of whales, then saw the smaller lettering on the tail:
Customs
. It was watching for people, not animals; refugees, illegal immigrants.
Keep up the good work
, she thought silently. Australia was already too crowded. Well, not here, maybe, but it was.

The public toilets were empty, save for a backpacker rinsing her plates directly under a sign that read,
Please do not wash dishes in the hand basin
. She smiled blithely when she saw Fiona and continued rinsing. Fiona went into a cubicle and pulled down her cargo pants, the phone in her back pocket falling to the floor. As she stooped for it, head pounding, it occurred to her that she should probably ring Todd. She hadn’t called yesterday, and they were about to disappear up into the Dreamtime or something, where there was apparently no reception . . . Fiona sat down on the toilet, relaxed her bladder
and punched in the numbers. Who cared if the backpacker heard her; she probably couldn’t even speak English.