The Ripple Effect (11 page)

“Natty darling, there’s nothing we can do about it now,” he said for the hundredth time. “You wouldn’t have wanted her to have an abortion, would you?”

“Of course not.”

“Well then, we just have to deal with the situation. She needs our help.”

He plopped into the chair opposite with his glass of beer. The stifling heat had been building to a storm all day. He wished it would break and relieve the tension in the atmosphere—might help release some of the tension in the house as well.

“I don’t understand how you can be so…so…unperturbed by it.” She took a slug of the gin and tonic.

“I’m hardly unperturbed,” replied William. “If you remember, I was furious.” He ran a hand over his stubbled head. The hair was growing slowly back but he rather liked the shaved head look. Very trendy these days and cool in summer. “But I regret saying what I did to her. It was cruel.”

“Melanie has never cared about the effect she has on other people. Perhaps she will discover, now, how necessary other people, especially her family, are and stop being so selfish.”

William studied his furious wife. “You know Nat, I always thought Melanie was your favourite of the three. Joelle certainly does.”

“Joelle is just jealous,” she snapped.

“She didn’t seem jealous yesterday, she put us to shame the way she supported Mel.”

“Joelle can afford to be generous; she’s in a much better position than her sister.”

And she’d done it through hard work and good sense, their Joelle. What a treasure and a joy she was.

“I wonder if Bridget knows,” he said. “Would Mel have told her, do you think?”

“She said nothing to me when she called to say happy birthday.”

“Mmmm. She should be told.”

“I’m not the one to tell her. Melanie is. She must do her own explaining.”

“Darling, you’re being very hard. Why? It’s not like you at all.”

“How do you know what is like me in this situation?” she burst out, startling William so much he nearly spilled his beer. “I’ve never been in this situation of a mother with an unmarried, pregnant, teenage daughter.”

A key scraped in the lock and the front door clicked open at the other end of the house.

“Mum? Dad?” came Joelle’s voice, light and breezy, floating down the hall to where they sat in the family room.

“In here, Jo,” called William. “Grab yourself a drink on the way.”

He heard her open the fridge, the clink of ice against glass and the gurgle of pouring liquid. The fridge door shut softly and she appeared smiling in the archway holding a glass of juice.

“Hi. Looks like a storm coming,” she said.

“Thank goodness. How are you?”

“Fine, Dad. Hello, Mum.”

Natalie managed a taut smile. Joelle kicked off her sandals and stretched out on the divan leaning against the cushions piled at one end. She held the chilled glass against her cheek.

“The shop’s so cool I didn’t realise how hot it was until we finished this evening. It wasn’t too bad earlier.”

“No, it’s really built up this afternoon,” agreed William.

Even though she looked relaxed he had the impression she was about to say something—something she was reluctant to bring up but was determined to, nevertheless. If there was one thing he knew about Joelle, she followed through when she’d fixed her mind on something. He waited, positive he knew exactly what the subject would be. The same one he and Natalie had been discussing. She was about to give them a blast about their treatment of Melanie.

William glanced at Natalie. She clutched her gin and tonic like a life preserver. She hadn’t uttered a word to Joelle. He knew she’d hardly slept last night. He’d woken several times with her restless tossing and turning and the last time he’d blearily looked at the red numbers on the clock and read four-twelve am, she hadn’t been in bed.

Joelle took a long swallow of her juice and placed the glass on the floor by the divan.

“Are you staying for dinner?” asked Natalie abruptly. She began to rise from her chair but Joelle said quickly, “Don’t worry about me, Mum. It’s too hot to think about eating yet.”

“There’s a lot of food left over—salads and things. Desserts,” Natalie said vaguely. She sat down again.

“I wanted to ask you about that man who visited on Friday,” said Joelle. “The mysterious one with the flowers.”

William shot a startled look at his wife. Her lips had tightened. She drained her gin and tonic.

“Would you like another, darling?” he asked. He leapt to his feet and virtually snatched the empty glass from her hand. She nodded. He read the fear in her expression. It matched the fear in his own heart. Fear of the inevitable, the reckoning. “Back in a minute.” He headed for the kitchen. How could they have thought this day would never come?

“I know who he is,” called Joelle. Natalie gasped. William stopped dead and spun around.

“How do you know?”

“His name is Shay Brookes and he’s a doctor from Sydney.” Joelle looked from one to the other accusingly and his heart contracted in his chest. “Why won’t you help him find his sister, Dad?” she asked. “That’s very cruel.”

“How do you know this man?” Natalie broke in, her voice harsh.

Surprise and alarm drove Joelle’s next words out in a flood. “He bought the flowers from me and he also invited me to have coffee with him. I like him. A lot. He’s desperate to find his sister and he can’t understand why, when you know who she is, you won’t tell him. Neither can I,” she finished loudly.

“It is absolutely none of your business.” Natalie drew in a ragged breath. Her cheeks had turned a dull red and her fingers, spread claw-like, gripped the arms of her chair. “I don’t understand why this Shay Brookes has told you anything at all.”

“Why shouldn’t he? He’s not ashamed of being adopted.” Joelle swung her legs to the floor and sat up straight with both hands pressed flat against the cotton covering of the divan.

William intervened quietly. “Did he ask you to approach us?”

Any moment now Natalie would say something they’d all regret. Brookes’ deception surprised and disappointed him. He’d believed the man’s promise not to tell Joelle anything. He had not, however, William remembered with a sick feeling in the stomach, promised not to approach her.

“No, he didn’t. In fact he said the opposite. That you would be angry if I became involved, but I thought I knew you better than that.” Her face crumpled in perplexity. “It seems I don’t.”

“It’s a very complicated situation,” said William gently.

“I don’t see how,” she said, stubborn to the end. “It seems very straightforward to me. You know who his sister is and you won’t tell him.”

William picked up his neglected beer, giving himself time to formulate a reply to a statement that was unequivocally correct.

“Why are we discussing this man when your sister is the one we should be concerning ourselves with?” demanded Natalie. “Surely she is far more important to you than some stranger with a story?”

Joelle stared at her mother. Familiar danger signs were gathering. Her brow wrinkled as her eyes opened wide in astonishment. Her mouth took on that determined firmness he knew of old. She’d been a strong minded toddler. Right on cue thunder rumbled in the distance, then again, much closer.

He cut in quickly with, “Did you talk to Mel at all after you left, Jo?”

“Of course, I did,” came the scornful reply. “I told her if she needed any help she could come to me.”

“I’m sorry about how I reacted. Was she upset?”

“What do you think, Dad? Maybe you should tell her you’re sorry.”

“Yes, I will.”

“So we’re supposed to pick up the pieces for her, are we? Melanie has no sense of responsibility, none!”

“Mum,” shouted Joelle. “Why are you so upset? Lots of unmarried girls have babies these days and no-one worries about it. It’s not the fifties when it was a shameful thing. Mel will cope. I’ll help her and you never know, it may be a good thing for her.”

“You think it’s perfectly all right, don’t you? You girls have no idea how it is for the child. All you think is, it’s my right to do what I please, someone will look after me when I make a mistake. Melanie is so selfish she is not even considering the wishes of the father, let alone the wellbeing of her child.” Natalie stood up, her whole body quivering with rage. “I see no reason for you to apologise to her, William. All you did was state your opinion. Melanie never has any problem stating hers.” She strode to the door and paused. “I’m going to prepare dinner now. You’re welcome to stay, Joelle, as long as you don’t discuss that man again.”

“Wow,” Joelle, deflated, said softly after Natalie disappeared. “What’s going on, Dad?”

Lightning flashed. William stood up to peer out the glass doors leading on to the terrace. Giant cloud boulders rolled around in the sky grumbling, rumbling and deciding whether to release the stored up deluge. More lightning crackled across the tortured horizon.

“Your Mum’s very upset. First that Brookes chap came along demanding information which we’re not able to divulge at this moment and then Mel floors us with her announcement…” He sighed.

“But I don’t understand,” she wailed.

“I’m sorry, love,” he said. “Your mother and I decided we can’t say anything unless we both agree to.”

Fat drops plopped on to the sun-hot tiles of the terrace. Steam rose in little puffs from the first few to land, but with a crash of thunder directly overhead which rattled the windows and made Joelle squeak with surprise, more fell with such speed and force they bounced high off the surface. Within seconds, the terrace was awash and Joelle had come to stand silently beside him staring out into the darkened garden.

“I really like Shay, Dad,” she said softly. “I think he likes me, too. I feel as if we have…something…an affinity. I thought so the first moment I saw him come into the shop. How did you feel when you first met Mum?”

William closed his eyes.

Oh. My. God. What had they done?

What had that fellow said—Brookes’ father? ‘Lies become a much heavier burden than the truth ever does?’

Shay left the Glebe terrace at ten on Saturday morning. Even allowing for traffic he was giving himself more than enough time to reach Sunshine Point by one. He knew that. He also knew he was leaving early because he couldn’t stand waiting any longer. The truth was he could have left at six in the morning, or even five, but forced himself to stay in bed until dawn, go for a five kilometre run, have breakfast, do a load of washing, hang it out, fill the car with petrol…

The week had dragged. Time was elastic. It had the property of the chewing gum they’d chomped on as kids—stretchable into the thinnest most fragile of ribbons then rolled into a tiny compact dried-up little lump. All the days since Monday had stretched to infinity.
Seemingly endless streams of patients had walked through his surgery room door, ushered in by the ever-efficient Kavita.

“Many more?” he’d asked on Wednesday to be told with her dazzling smile, “Doctor Brookes, it is only half past eleven in the morning. I have you scheduled to finish at six this evening.”

He must have looked completely stunned because she said in a motherly tone, “I shall bring you another cup of tea, Doctor, with two chocolate biscuits. For energy. A doctor you may be but I don’t think you eat properly.”

“I do,” he’d protested but she went away muttering about young single men’s diets and general cooking inability. He couldn’t figure out how she arrived at the conclusion chocolate biscuits came under good nutrition but he ate them.

He reached Sunshine Point at eleven-fifteen. Traffic was fairly heavy on such a beautiful weekend by the sea and he cruised up and down the beachfront twice before a family wagon pulled out from a kerbside parking space.

An hour and three quarters to fill. Shay stood on the footpath in the sun. Waves crashed onto the beach across the road. Seagulls squawked and cried, whirling about in the crystal clear air. The sand was littered with sunbathers and shade umbrellas, brightly coloured towels and tanned bodies. Out in the water heads bobbed about, appearing and disappearing in the foaming surf. A lifeguard wandered up and down blowing his whistle to herd straying bathers back between the two fluttering red and yellow flags planted in the sand.

Shay wasn’t a beach fanatic. He hadn’t grown up within easy reach of sea and sand and it wasn’t in his blood the way it was for some of his mates from university. He enjoyed swimming in the restless energy of the salt water but failed at surfing. Careering in on a boogie board was more his style. The surf was too flat here today for the hard-core surfers. The riders coming in tamely further up the beach would be kids and learners; he knew that much about it.

Joelle was probably an expert. He hadn’t discovered anything about her away from work activities. She had a fit, trim, golden tanned body topped by that cloud of lovely blonde hair. Swimming and surfing would come naturally to a girl brought up by the sea.

Shay turned his back on the beach. The main street went away at right angles to the seafront on which he stood. The Garden of Earthly Delights was halfway down the second block and the coffee shop was farther. He wouldn’t venture in that direction yet, there were plenty of cafes on the esplanade at which to sit and dawdle over coffee. He sauntered to the right. A couple of surf shops with loud thumping music crashing through the doors, a health food eatery, a chemist, a newsagent. He bought a newspaper and continued on his exploration of Sunshine Point.

Two blocks along, almost at the end of the beach, he came to a pedestrian walkway and a café with outdoor tables under big white shade umbrellas. Perfect. Shay sat down facing the ocean. A gentle breeze wafted saltiness in and around his nostrils. Seagulls strutted confidently across the sun-warmed concrete paving cocking their heads hopefully at the other customers. They barely made way for the waitress who came to take his order of coffee and raisin toast.

There was something to be said for living by the sea. Having grown up inland, accustomed to the harshness of country life with the wide blue sky, rolling brown drought-ravaged pastures, dust, towering gums, bushfires, this country along the coast seemed soft and luxuriant. Always green and lush, the vegetation. Easy life here.