Perfections (18 page)

‘What do you need us to do?’ Jacqueline asks.

‘Don’t you start. How many times do I have to say it?’

‘I’m talking about palliative care. Have you organised anything?’

‘I have Dr Chiang for that side of things. He’s prescribing me drugs for the pain, says he can give me something stronger when it’s needed. You remember Dr Chiang?’

Jacqueline remembers him. A nice man, a good doctor. She remembers his kind, soft-lined face. His hands which were always warm, always gentle. His sad, sympathetic smile as he talked her through the results. So many tests, so many procedures. All of them leading down a singular dead-end path.
I’m sorry, Miss Paige, but it’s extremely unlikely you will ever be able to have children.
She remembers, too, the lecture from her mother as they drove home. Her admonition that Jacqueline not consider her circumstance to be a Get Out of Jail Free card. That there are worse things to be caught from sex than pregnancy. That – when the time comes, of course – she should be careful nevertheless. Protect herself. Always protect herself.

What would her mother think now, if she knew of all the times her eldest daughter had ignored that advice? Those hurried, hopeful encounters in her teens. The desperate calculation of her early twenties. Until she could no longer convince herself that Dr Chiang may have been wrong. Until, finally, she forced herself to give it up. To pack it away. The desire, the longing, the
need
which she felt for near her entire life. Curled within her heart. Within her broken, bloodless womb. Only rarely, now, does she hear them. The ghosts of those children she can never conceive.

Jacqueline clears her throat. Pushes such thoughts aside. ‘Have you thought about where to go?’ she asks her mother.

‘I have everything right here, I don’t need to go anywhere.’

‘Mum,’ Ant’s voice is wavering. ‘You can’t just . . . you need people to take care of you. People whose job that is, you know?’

‘What, you think I want to die in some hospital? In one of those horrible homes, stinking of disinfectant and stale piss?’ Their mother snorts. ‘I think not, missy. I intend to die right here, right in my own bed.’

‘All right,’ Jacqueline assures her. ‘No one is saying–’

‘You can’t make me go to one of those places. Neither of you can make me. I still have all my faculties; you don’t have the right to shuffle me off to some
nursing
home just because it’s more convenient. It’s my right to refuse whatever care I please.’ Her mother coughs, loud and phlegm-filled, then sits back in her chair. Crosses her arms over her chest. ‘It’s my
legal
right, I checked with my solicitor.’

Ant looks as though someone has slapped her. Pale, eyes wide and brimming with tears. Jacqueline moves to sit beside her. Takes her sister’s hand. ‘We’re not saying that.’

Their mother glares at them. Her lower lip quivers.

‘What we’re saying . . .’ Jacqueline pauses. ‘What we’re saying is that you do need to think about it. That
we all
need to think about it. If you want to stay here, that’s fine and we’re not going to make you leave–’

‘Damn right, you’re not.’

‘–but you
are
going to need help. Professional help. This is going to get worse, a lot worse. You have to know that.’

‘Jacqueline . . .’ her sister says. ‘I don’t think . . .’

‘You have to know it as well, Ant.’

In the silence that follows, their mother coughs again. Grimaces and clutches her side. ‘I’m tired,’ she tells them. ‘I need to sleep.’

Jacqueline rises from the couch. Steps swiftly across the room to offer an arm to her mother. The older woman’s fingers seem little more than skin and bones as she digs in. Hauls herself to her feet. ‘I’ve made up your beds,’ she says. Nods towards the kitchen. ‘Don’t know where
he’s
expecting to lay himself down.’

‘Loki can have my room,’ Ant says. ‘I’ll share with Jacqueline.’

‘
Loki?
’ That keen, bright stare is vintage Sally Paige.

‘It’s a nickname.’ Jacqueline rolls her eyes. ‘Don’t even ask.’

Ant swallows, hard. ‘Yeah, you don’t want to know.’

Their mother laughs. It’s not a happy sound. ‘You’ll both be here in the morning, then? Not planning to sneak off early on me?’

‘Mum!’ Ant sounds hurt.

‘Of course not,’ Jacqueline says. ‘We’ll be here for breakfast.’

‘Good, because I’m making pancakes. I bought maple syrup. The real stuff, not that maple-
flavoured
rubbish.’

‘Mum, you’re sick,’ Ant says. ‘Really, you don’t have to get up and make us breakfast when you’re sick.’

Again, that laugh. Brittle as burnt sugar. ‘I’m not
sick
, dear. What I have, it isn’t anything you recover from.’ Their mother reaches out a skeletal hand. Touches her youngest daughter on the cheek. ‘I’m going to
die
, Antoinette; I’m going to die
soon
. Don’t kid yourself into thinking anything else.’

Finally, Ant stops sobbing. Jacqueline smooths her sister’s curls away from her flush-damp face. Shifts herself away from the sag in the centre of the mattress. The old single bed really is too small for the both of them.

Ant sniffs. Rubs at her eyes. ‘The worst thing is that I don’t even know how I really feel. I mean, that’s not the
worst
worst thing, obviously, but I just . . . it’s like there’s this voice in my head saying,
your mother is dying, you should be feeling awful
– and I
do
feel awful, but I don’t know if I feel awful
because
of Mum, or because I’m not feeling awful
enough
about Mum.’

Jacqueline smiles. ‘You think too much about these things.’

‘It’s not funny.’

‘I’m not laughing at you, honestly.’

‘I don’t understand why she didn’t see anyone sooner. All this time, she said she knew something was wrong. Why didn’t she just see someone?’

‘You know how she is about hospitals. I think Dr Chiang’s the only doctor she’s ever remotely trusted. Even then, she had to be at death’s door to call him.’ Jacqueline bites her lip. ‘Sorry. Poor choice of words.’

Ant wipes at her eyes. ‘What are we going to do?’

‘It depends on what she wants,’ Jacqueline says. ‘We can’t force her to do anything against her will.’

‘But she can’t just stay up here on her own. God, that’s bloody medieval.’

‘We can make some calls on Monday. I’m sure there are services that provide palliative care at home. Perhaps a live-in nurse, if she’ll agree to that.’

‘Sounds expensive. I don’t . . . I mean, do you have any money, Jacqueline? Mum can’t have much put aside, not with just the bit of bookkeeping she’s been doing. How do we pay for something like that?’

Jacqueline shakes her head. ‘We’ll find a way. There’s this house for a start.’

‘She’ll never sell it. You heard her, she wants to die here.’

‘Perhaps we can convince her to take out a mortgage against it.’ She rubs her temples. ‘Look, Ant, I don’t have the answers right now. But there will
be
some, I promise. Tomorrow, when we get back, we’ll go online. See what options are out there for people in our mother’s . . . situation.’

‘Okay.’ Her sister frowns. ‘This is why she wanted me to come and stay with her, wasn’t it? Remember, over dinner?’

‘Possibly. Yes, I would say so.’ There’s a weird, nameless tightness in her chest. Not jealousy. Not even its weaker sister, envy. But certainly a distant cousin. ‘You notice that she didn’t ask me.’

‘Oh, Jacqueline, it’s because of your job. She knows it’s hard for you to get time off from the gallery, whereas I’m
only a waitress
.’ Ant grimaces. ‘Why on earth did you tell her I was applying for uni?’

‘I thought she would ease up on you for a while.’

‘And when the truth came out?’

‘Well.’ Jacqueline presses her lips together. ‘That’s not something you’ll have to worry about anymore.’

‘That’s awful!’ Her sister looks stunned. Genuinely shocked.

‘That’s honest,’ she tells her. ‘Besides, it doesn’t have to be a lie. You’re bright, Ant, and you did fine in school. There’s no reason why you couldn’t apply to do, what was it again? Psychology?’

‘And what about Loki? How am I supposed to study full-time
and
earn enough to take care of the both of us? It’s not like he can actually go out and get a job. He doesn’t have a shred of paper to prove he even
exists
.’

Jacqueline recalls the blonde girl from the clothing shop. Her fervent smile as she helped Loki into what would soon become his leather jacket. ‘I don’t think you need to worry about Loki. I suspect he’s more than capable of taking care of himself.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I know you think it, Ant, but I didn’t buy him that new jacket. Honestly.’

‘Where did he get the money then?’

‘He didn’t.’

‘Are you saying he
stole
it?’

‘No, he . . .’ There aren’t any words for how the salesgirl looked as she handed Loki the bag. Eagerness comes close, gratitude even closer. But neither feel right. ‘It’s almost as though he . . .
charmed
her, the girl in the shop. I know it doesn’t make sense, but it seems as though she wanted him to have the jacket. As though she was glad to give it to him. Needed for him to have it, almost.’ Jacqeuline shrugs. None of those words are right either. ‘Sorry, I’m not explaining it very well.’

‘So, what, he just asked for the thing and she gave it to him?’

‘I think so. I didn’t hear what was said, but that’s what it looked like.’

‘He can
do
that?’ Ant’s voice has dropped to a whisper. ‘He can just ask for things and people give them to him?’

‘Don’t look at me,’ Jacqueline says. ‘You’re the one who made him.’

‘You say that like I knew what I was doing.’ Ant sighs. A forlorn, drawn-out breath that hurts to hear. ‘I never know what the hell I’m doing these days. I’m just so bloody tired all the time, I don’t even have the energy to
think
. It feels like I’ve been living on autopilot, you know, just going through the motions and waiting for . . . god, I don’t even know what it is I’m supposed to be waiting for.’ Tears well fresh in her eyes. ‘And now there’s Loki, and this . . .
thing
with Mum, and it’s all such a huge mess, I don’t know what to do with any of it.’

‘It’s all right.’ Jacqueline holds her sister’s hands between her own. ‘We’ll figure everything out, I promise. We–’ On the bedside table, her phone chimes to life. Automatically, she reaches across and scoops it up.
Ryan Jellicoe calling
. ‘Sorry, Ant, I really need to answer this.’ Her sister rolls her eyes. Jacqueline pushes herself up from the bed. Mouths another apology as she taps the screen. Heads towards the bedroom door and the lightless hall beyond.

‘Ryan? Thanks for calling me back.’ She closes the door behind her.

‘Jacqueline, girl, I’ve missed you.’

‘Always the charmer,’ she says, and grimaces. That last word makes her think of Loki. It tastes foreign in her mouth. The door to Ant’s old bedroom is shut, the gap beneath it dark.

‘Always,’ Ryan echoes. She can picture the grin on his face too well.

‘I wanted to thank you for sending those photos through to Dante.’

‘Yeah, he left me a message. Gotta say, your boss doesn’t sound like the happiest little Vegemite right about now.’

Jacqueline wanders back down the hall to the main part of the house. Everything is quiet and still. She has forgotten what it’s like up here on the mountain after dark. No sound of passing traffic. No ambient noise beyond the occasional shriek of a nightbird or the scrabble of possum claws on the roof. ‘Dante is never happy,’ she tells Ryan. ‘But the photos help. He’s reassured that there’ll be a show at least.’

‘Even if he doesn’t much care for what he’s gonna be sticking on his walls.’

She takes a breath. ‘He said that?’

‘Didn’t have to. Could hear it in his voice.’ Ryan chuckles. ‘Tosser, going on about
new directions
and
re-visioning
and god knows what else. Bloody message went on for about five minutes. Already told him I was only gonna be talking to you from now on.’

‘When did you–’

‘In the email, when I sent the shots. Except I used his lingo, yeah?
I prefer to liaise solely with Jacqueline from this point.
So it’s sorted, right? Bastard can’t sack you if the talent insists on keeping you around. I can do prima donna with the best of them, girl, don’t you worry about that.’

Jacqueline swallows a groan. ‘Ryan, I really wish you hadn’t. I appreciate the vote of confidence but that’s not how it works.’

‘Hey, c’mon, lighten up. You should see what I’ve been doing up here the last couple of days. That big canvas is almost done, I reckon.’

‘That’s great.’ She forces herself to smile. Hopes he can hear it in her voice. ‘That’s really good to hear. But honestly, I think . . .’ There’s a dull thumping noise in the background, followed by muffled shouts. Muffled laughter.