The Sweet Life
the
Sweet
life
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Rebecca Lim
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Rebecca Lim
This edition published in 2011
First published in 2008
Copyright © Rebecca Lim, 2008
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.
The Australian Copyright Act 1968
(the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or ten per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (
CAL
) under the Act.
Allen & Unwin
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest nsw 2065
Australia
Phone
(612) 8425 0100
Fax
(612) 9906 2218
Email
[email protected]
ISBN
978 1 74237 770 4
Design based on cover design by Tabitha King and Bruno Herfst
Text design by Bruno Herfst
Set in 12.5/16 pt Fournier by Midland Typesetters
Printed in China at Everbest Printing Co.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Leni, with love always
Contents
For as long as Janey could remember, it had just been her and her mum.
They’d been a unit. A force to be reckoned with, the Gordon Girls. Best friends. And now her mum was gone and only Janey was left.
Everything was a nightmare. She felt as though the sound had been turned down on her world, with all the colour and joy drained out of it. Like she was moving alone through a fog, with everyone else going at normal speed around her. Janey just couldn’t fathom a world without her mum in it.
Mourners filed past Janey in the chapel foyer, murmuring their sympathies. The church had been packed. People had laughed and cried at the songs and stories Janey’s mum had chosen for her own service. She had so many friends.
‘Friends are so important,’ she would always tell Janey fiercely. ‘You can’t
ever
pick your family, sweetheart. But you
can
pick your friends. And the best ones will see you through anything.’
Janey had taken that advice to heart. Her best friends, Em, Gabs and Ness, were as different as night and day, but they were like her sisters. Emily Clough was petite, quiet, dark-haired and dark-eyed, and passionate about everything to do with film and theatre. One day, she wanted to be a famous director. Gabriela Epstein was a curvy, red-haired siren with an awesome singing voice and the ability to strike up a funny conversation with just about anyone. A life skill Janey wished she had. And Vanessa McAdams? She was the gorgeous, fashion-mad clothes horse of the group who worked part-time after school just to afford the latest everything. If a trend changed anywhere, she was onto it.
Which left Janey. The tall, slightly plain, very practical one with unruly red-gold shoulder-length hair and an uncontrollable case of freckles. She didn’t think she was good at anything in particular, but the others always seemed to turn to her for advice, as well as the best minestrone soup in the universe.
Her three best friends stood by discreetly now, as Janey shook the hands of people she’d never met before and would probably never see again.
When it was all over and the chapel was empty, Emily and Ness each put an arm around Janey’s shoulders while Gabs led the way from the silent building.
‘I don’t know what I should be feeling,’ Janey said tearfully. ‘I always thought she’d beat it, you know? She could do anything, my mum. She was a superhero.’
It was kind of true. Janey’s mum, Lydia, had fallen pregnant at sixteen – the same age Janey was now – and instead of giving in to intense pressure to get rid of the baby, she’d cut off all ties with her ultra-conservative parents, moved states, lied about her age to get work,
and
kept her baby. Her boyfriend had been seventeen and never wanted to be in the picture. All her life, Janey’s mum had worked hard to make sure that Janey never felt like she was missing anything. And she hadn’t.
‘I would
never
have had the guts to do what your mum did,’ agreed Emily huskily. ‘Going it alone like that. She was the strongest person I’ve ever met. I thought she’d beat it too.’
Ness nodded, tears welling in her eyes. They all loved Lydia Gordon, with her funky dress sense, her fantastic cooking, and her enormous laugh. It didn’t feel quite real that she developed leukaemia so quickly and was gone in a matter of a few short months. She was so young.
‘The hardest part’s coming up,’ replied Janey with a catch in her voice. ‘You sure you guys want to come? I might lose it totally.’ So far, she’d held herself together pretty well but she was thankful her mum had asked to be laid to rest privately, just the same.
Her friends nodded. ‘We ’re with you all the way, Janes,’ Gabs said. ‘It can’t be any worse than what you’ve been through already. Come on. She wouldn’t have wanted you to be sad. There’s no more pain where she is.’
To match Janey’s mood, rain began to stream down out of the sky as she and her best friends and their parents climbed into the waiting hearses.
Janey sat cross-legged on her mother’s bedroom floor in the fading light of late afternoon.
She’d spent the whole Saturday going through Lydia’s papers, alternately laughing and crying at the crazy things her mum had thought important to keep. The house seemed so cold and unfamiliar without the smell of Lydia’s favourite sandalwood incense burning, or the sound of classical music playing low somewhere in the house.
She stared at the letter she held in her hand in disbelief. It was over three years old, headed with the name of some crusty law firm in Sydney, together with the ominous words
Private and Confidential
.
Janey read the letter through several times. The words made absolutely no sense to her numb brain.
Dear Ms Gordon,
We are writing to determine whether you are the same Lydia Cromwell Gordon, birth date 9 January 1975, formerly of ‘Clewes House’, 18 Berkeley Crescent, Double Bay, New South Wales 2028. A family member wishes to make contact in regard to a matter that may benefit you materially. Please contact the writer on the direct line below to discuss the necessary proof of identification and to arrange contact.
That was pretty much all the letter said. But it was the words
family member
that made Janey’s mind reel, because Lydia had told her several years before that Janey’s grandparents had died in a car accident. Lydia had seen an article about it in the newspaper the day after it had happened, and although her eyes had been sad, her voice was hard.
‘They were most likely on their way back from the country house in the Hunter Valley,’ she’d said in a detached monotone, chopping vegetables furiously. ‘Seems they collided with a fruit truck. Dad would’ve hated that. He hated mess. That’s that then. We ’re the only Gordons left now.’
Janey had seen her mum furtively wipe away a few tears, blaming them on the onions, before she changed the subject altogether.