‘Why?’ Eddy asks weakly. Horrified for his upright, dignified father-in-law and appalled for little Anna.
Anna shrugs and just stares blankly, like she doesn’t want to see the place in focus even from a car window. ‘I think he just gave up. It almost destroyed him, you know, watching this fishing village he grew up in become one of the most deprived towns in the country.’ Anna folds her lips against her teeth. ‘It got worse. Once, Sami opened the door to a pimp looking for one of his girls. Sami and I weren’t allowed out on our own after that, even though we were teenagers. We were bullied at school for being stuck up, for having this overprotective dad. Then one day I recognized one of the girls; she was only two years above me at school and she was standing out there in just her bra and short white skirt. She went missing a couple of weeks later. I remember her mum asking if we could put a “Find Charlotte” poster in our front room. We did, of course, but then a few days later I heard my mum crying in the kitchen; the poster had been taken down. No one said why and we moved soon after.’
Eddy doesn’t know what to say but knows he should say something. ‘God, Anna, I’m so sorry.’
Anna turns in the driver’s seat to look directly at him. ‘This is what I’m afraid of, Eddy. Of this same thing happening to Waverly.’
The thought that Waverly with its tourists, art galleries and lazy brunch cafes could ever fall like Ruston is almost laughable, but Anna’s face is so serious and she seems to read Eddy’s thoughts as she says, ‘I mean it, Ed. Ask my dad. He always says that if this could happen to Ruston, it could happen anywhere.’
Eddy thinks about pointing out that her father had told him the reason Ruston fell so hard was because the community was dependent on the fishing industry and when their small boats were overtaken by the huge trawlers, they didn’t stand a chance. Overnight, it seemed, everyone was unemployed, which of course led to poverty, which in turn led to all the other problems. But one look at Anna and he can see that she won’t want to hear it. Her reasons are emotional; she is motivated by trying to protect her sons from some of the things he now knows she experienced in her own childhood. Her fears might not be grounded in reality, but that doesn’t make them any less important.
He takes her hand where it rests on the gear stick between them. He feels a wonderful tenderness. He can respect, even love her fire about this whole Seb mess now he knows where it comes from. ‘Why didn’t you ever tell me any of this, Anna?’
She shakes her head, sadly. ‘I don’t know; they’re not the best memories. I try not to think about it.’
He nods. He knows those reasons all too well.
She turns to him, curious to see if he understands her better now, and he smiles at her and nods to show that he does.
‘I just want to protect my community and our kids’ childhoods for as long as I can. And if she hasn’t been forced into it, then she is simply a woman who makes bad choices. Most women’ – Anna says the words carefully, implying that what she means is ‘most good women’ – ‘most women would do anything other than sell their bodies. I’d stack shelves, clean toilets, whatever, if I had to. You know I would,’ she says, warming to her own righteousness. ‘But Abi didn’t. She chose to open her legs for whoever paid her, putting herself and her own children in danger. If she’s capable of doing that, then she could be involved in anything – organized crime, drugs – and God knows what she’s like when it comes to parenting. Thank God I cancelled Albie going over to their place when I did. It would break me if the same thing happened …’ She glances towards the door that used to be her front door but there’s a crack in her voice, she can’t keep talking, so he leans towards her, takes her in his arms, clumsy over the gear stick, and he kisses the side of her face and doesn’t make her finish, but instead he says, ‘Come on, I can’t miss that train.’ And Eddy keeps his eyes on the road and neither of them talks as they drive back to the safety of their lovely little town.
Eddy waits on the platform for his train and after checking there’s no one around who might overhear him, he calls Seb. Just when he thinks Seb’s answerphone is going to click on, like it has every other time Eddy’s called since Saturday night, Seb picks up. ‘Hi, Ed.’ His voice is flat, his tone grey, exhausted.
‘Seb. Mate, good to hear you,’ Eddy says and out of habit adds, ‘You OK?’
‘Um, not really, no, not really. Look, Ed, I really want to talk, I’ve got something to ask you, something you can do to help this whole horrible thing, but I’m about to meet with a parent so only have a couple of minutes …’
‘That’s fine. That’s fine.’ Eddy knows he should start by telling him how sorry he is that all this is happening, gently ask what Seb’s plans are, perhaps suggest that he take some time away from work to focus on his family, prepare the ground for Eddy to imply that he should resign. Or perhaps he could tell Seb that he’s just been to Ruston, the things Anna told him, the things that helped her reaction make more sense to Eddy. But those words are jostled and pushed to one side, making way for other, more boisterous ones that leave Eddy in an undignified whine, ‘Listen, Seb, I … Anna told me that you think what happened in Singapore was the same thing as … you know, this thing that you’ve done.’
There’s a brief pause on the other end of the line, Seb doing that thing where he quietly considers what’s just been said.
‘Ed, you know I’m going through a horrific time, I don’t really have the energy for your relationship prob—’
‘You meant it?’ Eddy can’t help it; he cuts Seb off.
But Eddy stops talking because to his dismay and irritation, on the other end of the line, Seb starts laughing.
‘What? What’s so funny, Seb?’ Eddy squeaks, sounding like the twelve-year-old he was when they first met at the bike park.
But Seb can’t answer because he’s laughing too much, a little manic.
He takes a couple of deep breaths to calm himself before he says, ‘That is literally the most selfish thing I’ve ever heard. My life is falling apart and you want to talk about yourself?’
Now it’s Eddy turn to pause.
He’s selfish? Seb’s calling him selfish when Seb’s the one who has lied again and again, Seb’s the one who rented a damaged woman, like that girl, Charlotte, Anna told him about, and Seb’s the one who gambled his children’s well-being for a quick shag? For most of Eddy’s life, Seb has been the golden boy – athletic, clever and kind – while Eddy felt like a grasping, hunched, lowly sidekick whose only attribute was to do the stupid stuff others were too frightened to do and to say the stupid gags to make people laugh – and, even then, only sometimes. But now, with these revelations, Seb has fallen from his cloud with the other rare angels, face first into the mud where Eddy has always stood.
‘My life, everything I love is hanging by a thread and you, my best mate, are worried about something your insane wife said about you?’
That word, ‘insane’, kicks Eddy in the guts. Seb doesn’t know Anna, not really; he doesn’t know that she knows more about the dark side of prostitution than any of them. What it can do to people, to a place. He thinks again of Charlotte.
‘That’s not fair,’ Eddy says, his jaw tense.
‘No, Ed, I’ll tell you what’s not fair. Being hounded by your wife at work when I need friendship, support more than ever. What’s not fair is my best mate thinking only of himself …’
Eddy hangs up.
He thinks about his arthritic, white-haired father-in-law slowly clearing away used condoms in the jacket and tie he always wears. Of Anna’s young face watching girls being driven away by strangers, that poor, poor girl Charlotte, and then he thinks about Seb. The circumstances might have been a bit different but he still knowingly got involved in an industry that treats women like commodities, like some kind of human spittoon. Anna is right: he isn’t so different to any of the men driving those desperate young girls away somewhere quiet and lonely where no one would hear them.