Chapter 42
Nel got a beer and went to the table by the window, scanning the room.
There was no sign of Jimmy. She must have beaten him there.
She tried to ease the tension in her chest, still rattled by her conversation with Sophie, confirmation of her pregnancy.
Nel had the distinct sense that time was running out.
The door swung open. Not Jimmy. She checked her phone for another message, but there was nothing.
Her eyes were drawn to Harry, who was chatting to an elderly couple, a stack of glasses in her hand.
Nel bit her nail, still struggling to reconcile this woman with the girl Maddie had befriended in her final months.
*
‘Your time starts now.’
There was a shuffle as everyone in the class opened the maths paper. Nel scanned the questions on the first page, which all looked straightforward. To her right, Maddie hadn’t even opened the exam. She was just sitting there, staring at the wall. Nel tapped her pen on the desk, but she didn’t move.
Nel reread the first question, entered numbers into her calculator and wrote down the answer, then moved to the next question. As she turned the page, she looked back at Maddie, who now lay with her head on the desk. Was she sick?
Nel looked at Mrs Westerway, who was busy marking papers, then she sighed and got back to work. She was checking her answers when Mrs Westerway said, ‘Time’s up. Pens down.’
Maddie sat up. Nel tried to catch her eye as Mrs Westerway collected the papers.
‘Maddie, can you stay back, please?’ Mrs Westerway said as the bell rang.
Nel hung around outside the room waiting for Maddie, but after a few minutes she gave up and went to her next class.
That afternoon, she went to the ice creamery.
Maddie always worked on Fridays, when tourists would start arriving for the weekend, but there was no sign of her.
Nel waited while Harriet served a Japanese couple.
As she reached forward to scoop the mint choc-chip, Nel noticed lines on the inside of her forearm, some red, some silvery white.
When the tourists were gone, Harriet looked at Nel, her eyes heavily lined behind her black fringe.
‘She’s not here,’ she said before Nel even asked.
‘Is she sick?’
‘No.’
Nel frowned.
‘She’s going through some stuff.’
Nel swallowed. How did Harriet know what was going on with Maddie and she didn’t?
‘What stuff?’ she asked as a family stepped up to the counter.
Harriet sighed as though it was none of Nel’s business. ‘You need to give her some space, Nel.’ She turned her attention to the waiting customers. ‘What can I get you?’
*
‘Can I get you another one?’ Harry reached for Nel’s empty glass and added it to the stack in her hand.
‘I’m fine, thanks,’ Nel said, the memory still with her. ‘Actually, do you have a sec?’
Harry glanced at the bar then back again and nodded. ‘Seems like things are under control.’ She leaned back on a stool, half-sitting.
‘I came to the ice creamery one afternoon when you were working there, asking about Maddie. Do you remember?’
Harry shrugged and shook her head.
‘Sorry, I know, it’s so long ago. It’s just … I’m starting to remember things I’d forgotten. Or see them differently.’ Nel told her about the maths test. ‘I think it must have been when she was in the early weeks of the pregnancy. You said she was going through some stuff.’
Harry frowned and turned the corners of her mouth down, as though she still couldn’t remember.
‘You said I needed to give her some space.’ Nel paused again, but still Harry’s face was blank. ‘Are you sure she didn’t tell you about the pregnancy?’
Harry looked around, then back at Nel and lowered her voice. ‘Okay. I did know.’
‘She told you?’
Harry nodded.
‘She did? When?’
Harry looked up at the ceiling and rubbed her forehead. ‘I’ve been trying to work that out since our conversation the other day. It wasn’t long before she disappeared. Maybe the previous weekend.’
‘She’d done a pregnancy test then?’
Harry nodded again.
‘Did she tell Ryan?’
‘Yep, and Ryan told his dad. Roy was livid apparently.’
Nel’s thoughts reeled. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Because I should have gone to the police.’ Her voice was heavy with regret. ‘I should have told them about the pregnancy. I kept waiting for it to come out, but days passed, and then a week, and …’ She turned up her hands. ‘Nothing.’
Nel shook her head, trying to process what she was hearing.
‘I was scared, Nel. I saw what happened to you. I’d been on the wrong side of the Carrinya rumour mill since I confessed my feelings for the wrong girl the year before.
I was terrified of what would happen if I got involved.
I wouldn’t have survived what you went through, so I just … pretended not to know.’
Nel thought of the ladder of silver scars on Harry’s forearms. Who was she to judge?
The door swung open and Jimmy entered. Harry wiped over the table as he approached.
‘Let me get you some drinks,’ she said. ‘My shout.’
There was a sparkle in Jimmy’s eyes as he sat down. Nel was dying to tell him about her conversation with Harry, but she didn’t get the chance.
‘I got a result on the DNA,’ he said in an undertone, launching straight into it without even saying hello.
‘And?’
‘It belongs to Ryan Jason Warner.’
‘You’re kidding.’ It seemed too good to be true.
‘Direct match. His DNA must have been stored from the assault conviction.’
Nel felt like punching the air. For sixteen years she’d been saying he was there that night. Now they could prove it.
‘So what happens now?’
‘Well, it suggests he lied in his police interview. He said he hadn’t been in the area for over a week, but the condition and location of the hair sample makes that highly unlikely.’
She frowned. Suggests he lied? Unlikely? ‘So you’re basically saying it doesn’t prove anything?’
‘It’s good news for sure.’ His tone was measured. ‘It puts him in the location at the time. It suggests he lied to the police, which innocent people don’t tend to do, but it’s still circumstantial, Nel. Even if he was there that night, it’s possible it was still an accident.’
‘So it’s still not enough for an arrest.’
‘Not even close.’
Harry returned with a beer in each hand. They thanked her as she put them down, then went to pick up some empty glasses from a nearby table.
Once she was out of earshot, Nel told Jimmy about their conversation. He listened intently, the crease appearing between his eyes.
‘Roy Warner knew too. That’s interesting.’ He looked out the window into the darkness. ‘So Harry, Ryan and Roy all knew about the pregnancy.’ He counted them off on his fingers as he spoke. ‘That’s a lot of people all keeping a secret.’
‘I suppose they all had very good reasons to keep it.’ Nel thought of her conversation with Sophie. ‘We were right, Jimmy. Ryan went to the lighthouse that night to tell Maddie to get an abortion. He told Sophie.’
His eyes widened. ‘When did she tell you this?’
Nel recounted what Sophie had told her about the abuse, about why she was scared to leave. She lowered her voice even further before she went on. ‘And she’s pregnant.’
‘Shit,’ he murmured. ‘Maybe I should go around there and speak to him, so he knows we’re watching.’
An image came to Nel’s mind. The mother with the sparkling eyes and smiling children. Just one of countless women from countless news reports about women just like Sophie. She shook her head. ‘The best way for us to help her is to prove what Ryan did to Maddie.’
Jimmy looked at her for a long time. He went to speak, but hesitated.
Nel frowned. ‘What?’
‘It’s not your job to save her,’ he said gently.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I just wonder if maybe you want to save Sophie from Ryan because you feel responsible for what happened to Maddie.’
Nel felt herself stiffen. ‘I want to prove what Ryan did to Maddie because it’s wrong that he got away with it. If it helps Sophie and her kids too, then what’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing. Nothing’s wrong with it.’
‘Exactly.’
‘But what happened to Maddie wasn’t your fault, Nel.’ He held her gaze. ‘You were just a kid who had a fight with her friend.’
She blinked back tears. It felt good to hear him say it, even if she didn’t believe it. He reached across the table and put his hand over hers.
‘You have to let yourself off the hook.’
She nodded as her tears spilled over and ran down her cheeks. She wiped them away with her other hand and shook her head.
‘God, why am I crying?’ she said, half-laughing.
He held her gaze as he started to stroke her hand with his fingers. The air felt suddenly charged. Something stirred deep inside her. She swallowed. What was he doing? No, this wasn’t what she needed. Things were complicated enough right now, without this.
She moved her hand away and picked up her glass. She sat back and took a sip of her beer.
‘I’m no good for you, Jimmy.’
He looked away, rubbing his stubbled cheek, then looked back again. ‘Why not?’
‘I told you. I’m no good at relationships. It wouldn’t work out and then everything would be, I don’t know … weird and awkward.’ A pause. ‘Kind of like now,’ she added with a smile, trying to lighten the moment.
But his expression remained serious. ‘You can’t live like this, Nel. Never trusting anyone.’
She thought of her conversation with Trent. ‘What about you?’
He narrowed his eyes. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You haven’t been honest with me! You haven’t told me what you did in Wollongong.’
He looked at her for a long time. ‘It’s none of your business what happened in Wollongong.’
She shook her head and reached for her bag. ‘And you wonder why I don’t trust you.’