Polly was determined to be the very best mother she could, even if that meant spending less time with Jess. Workwasfine. But Nora was right—it was stressful at times, being new; there was a lot to learn. Stress, she knew, was not to be taken lightly. Polly had not always been the best mother. On one occasion, she had even been a harmful mother. It was Nora who’d stopped her and rescued Jess. For a long time, Polly hadn’t even remembered the incident. That was one of the scariest parts. She’d argued with Nora and insisted that it wasn’t true.
“I’m glad you’ve forgotten,” Nora had said kindly. “It’s not uncommon, apparently. It’s a type of psychosis, usually only postpartum, but something to be mindful of in times of stress. You mustn’t worry, though. I won’t let it happen again.”
No, she couldn’t risk it. She would miss Jess like mad, but it was much better that she should enjoy the drama school without the distraction of a visit from Polly.
But Polly had already put in for the time off and hadn’t fancied sitting at home for two weeks feeling sorry for herself. For a day or two she moped, noticing how quiet the house was, tripping over the mother-daughter art canvases she’d bought, ticking off the activities she’d planned to do with Jess.
And then, on a whim, she decided to go for a drive. She threw abag into the back of her car with a couple of changes of clothes and set off west, with no plan beyond heading out through Warwick and down into New South Wales. She traveled through Goondiwindi, Moree, and Dubbo, tuning her car radio to whichever station she could find; when there was only static, she pushed in the mixtape she’d made for Jess. With Belinda Carlisle, Roxette, and the B-52s for company, she made her way through Parkes, Forbes, and West Wyalong, toward the northwestern corner of Victoria: there was a lot to be said for the healing properties of shout-singing “Like a Prayer” as one drove through ever-changing countryside, all of it new to her eyes, the window down and the breeze blasting her hair back.
Somewhere near Mildura, she realized she was getting close to the South Australian border. She studied the map and plotted a course, and before she knew it she was in the Riverland and the landscape had changed from green to red. She arrived in the Adelaide Hills two days after she’d left Brisbane, approaching through the back of Murray Bridge.
Had she always been heading toward Tambilla? Looking back, she wondered whether it had been some sort of unconscious way of dealing a blow to her mother for keeping Jess in Sydney. For having the money and the thought to enroll her in the perfect activity to prevent her from traveling to Brisbane. For having once observed Polly doing an unforgivable thing.
Whatever the case, as she followed the street signs, glancing at the open map on the passenger seat beside her, she felt gripped with a strange sense of rightness about the journey. It was as if she was taking back something that had held her captive for as long as she’d known about it.
She had visited the water hole. She had walked along the creek, inspecting beautiful stones and leaves that caught her eye, and gone right up to the willow tree, stroking the woody trunk. She found that she was easily able to imagine the scene as it must have been that day. The picnic blanket, the family members, the white crib hanging fromthe strongest bough. She ate her sandwich on the grass, lying on her back afterward and closing her eyes, listening to the birds calling and the cicadas ticking, and water tumbling in the distance. A terrible thing had happened there, and yet Polly had felt at peace.
Now, floating on her back in the December-warm water of Sydney Harbor, Polly thought about how that visit had been her second time at the water hole. The first time, of course, she’d been asleep in her crib, in the shade of that very willow tree. She wondered what had happened next—how she’d ended up with Nora. And she wondered whether the reason she’d so often felt alone when she was young, as if something were missing or misplaced, was because at an intrinsic level she had known that once upon a time she had belonged to another, larger family. Or whether it was because the fear and the guilt Nora carried had caused her to focus on Polly to the exclusion and denial of all else, encircling her daughter so completely that Polly couldn’t help but end up hopelessly isolated. Nora’s secret had severed Polly’s relationship with Jonathan; ultimately, it had divided her from her own daughter, too.
From the corner of her eye, Polly caught movement on the beach. It was Jess waving at her from the sand. She swam back slowly.
She felt self-conscious when she reached the shore, not for herself, but for Jess, who was, perhaps, unaccustomed to seeing a sixty-year-old woman emerge from the ocean in her underwear.
But Jess didn’t seem concerned by Polly’s attire. “How’s the water?”
“Lovely.” Polly joined her daughter on the sand and reached for her dress.
“I wasn’t sure if you remembered that Leo Friedman is coming this morning?”
Polly smiled and pressed her dress against first one ear and then the other, drying herself. She was used to Jess and Nora thinking that she struggled with the basics. It was another of those old narratives that had existed for so long as to have calcified. Polly was actually very good at remembering times and dates. Her neighbor, Angie, wasalways asking for reminders about important neighborhood events, shaking her head admiringly and saying Polly had the memory of an elephant.
“Nora’s solicitor?” Jess prompted.
“Yes,” said Polly. “I know. I’m going to make iced tea when I get back to the house.”
Jess frowned slightly, and Polly realized that the talk of refreshments must have seemed insensitive. Jess would be taking Nora’s deception very hard. Her daughter had idolized her grandmother and must be suffering terribly now. She was going to need help, but not too overtly. Funnily enough, Jess was an awful lot like Nora: proud, strong, and fiercely independent. Perhaps she’d got it from Thomas Turner?
Polly pulled her dress over the top of her damp underwear and slipped on her necklace. She held the pendants in the palm of her hand. The silver cat, the jacaranda tree that had been a birthday gift from Jonathan, the bird she’d brought back from Tambilla.
There had been so many lies and secrets. She wanted to be honest with Jess, for better and for worse. To say something that would start to bridge the gap, maybe even soften some of the pain she was feeling in the wake of Nora’s confession, address the charge that Jess had leveled the other night. “There’s something I want to tell you,” she began.
Jess looked at her.
But what could Polly say?I didn’t want to leave you here. I intended to take you with me. I was terrified, because a long time ago, when you were brand-new and I was not in my right mind, my mother caught me standing over your cot with a cushion. I never wanted to risk your safety again; I had to learn to trust myself. I’d give anything to go back in time and do it all differently.What was done, was done. All of the explanations she ran through her head sounded like excuses, flimsy.
Jess seemed to recognize that there was nothing more coming. She gave a small weary smile and started back toward the house.
“Do you remember the time I brought you down here and the tide came in?” Polly said quickly.
Jess turned to face her.
“You were only two or three, completely absorbed in your game, and when you looked up, an island had formed where you were sitting, and hundreds of crabs were crawling toward you.”
It was among the few memories Polly treasured. It had happened not long after she’d moved with Jess to live in the apartment farther up the peninsula. She’d been sitting on the beach readingThe Color Purple, glancing over the top at regular intervals to see what Jess was up to, when suddenly Jess had let loose a shriek of unadulterated terror and Polly had leapt to her feet, her heart galloping.
She’d run to Jess and scooped her up, and as she held her and whispered against her ear that everything was all right, she’d felt her daughter’s little body, rigid with fear, relax. It had been one of the first times she’d acted instinctively and been able to bring comfort to her child.
“You were right over there,” she said, pointing farther along the beach. “I rescued you from that very spot.”
