Nix’s butter chicken curry was rapidly cooling on everyone’s plates around the dining table. No one was eating, not even Noah. Instead, her sisters and their partners were opening beers like they were working the bar at a New Year’s Eve party and repeating the same phrases over and over.
“I can’t believe that bitch came here,” Sam said for the millionth time.
“We can sort this whole thing out,” Scott offered in a voice that was clearly meant to be soothing but just sounded annoying in his posho accent.
“How long has she been in Melbourne?” Nix asked no one.
Noah wasn’t saying anything, but he was glowering at the plates of garlic naan like they’d kicked his dog, and he kept cracking his knuckles until all Tabby’s teeth were on edge.
She was also saying nothing. Wasn’t thinking much of anything, either. She supposed it was shock, this blank disinterest in everything. But it didn’t feel dramatic enough to be called ‘shock.’ She hadn’t been in a car accident or a plane crash; she’d just met her mum. And she’d already met her mum—she’d grown inside her body like an extra organ. Plus, she’d been three when Jo—Deborah—whoever—bailed. Just because she didn’t have any actual memories of her didn’t mean she got to act like some refugee from a war-torn nation…
“I can’t,” Sam said through clenched teeth, “believe that bitch came here. To our studio. ToDad’sstudio.”
But she did, Tabby thought.And I tattooed her.
One of the dogs brushed against her leg, and she bent to pick it up. Delilah licked her chin happily, and Tabby hugged her. Usually, Sam would have given her shit about having dogs at the dinner table, but her big sister was now opening a bottle of Shiraz and staring into nowhere.
Now she knew who Jo was, she felt stupid for not putting the pieces together sooner. She was the spitting image of Sam and Nix. Or they were the spitting image of her, but Tabby didn’t want to reduce the twins to Jo’s progeny, even in her head. Their mum didn’t deserve it. She’d bailed when they were little, just packed up her shit and dipped without so much as a ‘Thinking Of You’ postcard.
People were always shocked when Tabby told them her mum ditched her. When someone’s dad wasn’t in the picture, everyone assumed divorce, but when it came to mums, ‘dead’ was the default.
She knew why: Mums were supposed to love their kids more than themselves. Have a bond with them men could never understand. Die rather than leave. And sure, that was sexist and a denial of female humanity, but what was she supposed to do? Throw Jo a feminism parade for bailing on her kids like some shitty dude? Equality was supposed to mean everyone stepping up, not carte blanche to be a feckless cunt.
Maybe it would have been better if Jo had died?
Wanting to feel something, she pictured Toby making out with his two blondes, replaying the scene slowly, grasping at the gory details. But it was like a horror movie she’d seen a dozen times; it couldn’t shock her anymore. No pain, no jealousy, just more numbness. Someone could have stuck a meat fork in her, and she wouldn’t have felt a thing.
“Are you certain it was your mother?” Scott asked Sam for the dozenth time. “Not to be awful, my love, but it’s been years and?—”
“It was her,” Sam said stubbornly. “I’d know her anywhere.”
Tabby looked at Nix. Her eyes were wet, and her left hand was pressed to her still-flat belly. Tabby had been honest about the tattooing session, which meant admitting Jo knew Nix was pregnant. She’d told her mum she was about to be a grandma without knowing it.
God, if she’d known her mother was in Melbourne and wanted to meet her, Tabby would have just sent Jo a fart compilation and called it a day. But now she’d talked to her, seen her face, heard her laugh…
She downed the last of her beer and gestured for Sam’s wine. Scott handed her the bottle, and she drank straight from the neck. She’d had five pale ales, but she didn’t feel drunk; she felt hungover, her chest tight, her heart pounding. Maybeshewas dying?
“I could reach out,” Scott said, taking another stab at problem-solving. “I could find her and clarify that you don’t want to hear from her. Otherwise, she might come back unannounced.”
Sam pounded her fist on the table so hard her wineglass jumped. “She takes one step toward this place, I’ll fly-kick her in the fuckin’ head.”
Delilah whined, scrambling to get out of Tabby’s lap. She let the dog go, still staring at her oldest sister. Sam’s eyes were narrowed, and her jaw jutted. It was almost nostalgic to see her this angry, as though she’d become fifteen again.
“We can’t contact her,” Nix whispered. “We don’t know what she’s calling herself. She can’t still be ‘DaSilva.’”
“She’s not,” Sam snarled. “I’ve been Googling the bitch for years.”
Nix looked horrified. “Youwantedto find her?”
“Iwantedto take her to court for what she owes Dad. If she’s earned a dollar in the last three decades, he’ll get his twenty cents, or my name isn’t fuckin’ Samantha DaSilva.”
That was something Tabby had never considered. Deadbeat Dad was so ordinary; it even had a cute little nickname. But whoever had heard of a Deadbeat Mum? Squeezing cash out of Jo didn’t make much sense. They’d been broke back in the day, but no one needed child support now—at least not enough to put up with the court system. But clearly, that didn’t matter to Sam. She wanted revenge of the old-school, fire-and-brimstone variety.
The twins were eight when their mum left. Old enough to remember. Old enough to have felt that betrayal like a knife.
“I can get in touch with people,” Noah growled. “Track her down. Get her details.”
Tabby bit the insides of her cheeks. Before her dad gave Noah a legitimate tattooing job, he’d been an enforcer for a massive, shit-cunt biker gang. How would Jo feel if some ex-biker heavyweights showed up at her door, asking to see her driver’s licence?
