“Yeah, yeah.”
When Maddy stepped out the front door, grumpy Jack Parsons was shuffling along his driveway towards the letter box, a grubby dressing gown hanging on his skeletal frame, tatty ugg boots on his feet.
He glanced up and Maddy forced a smile, and a nod.
“Social worker, was it?” Parsons said.
Maddy’s heart pulsed once extra hard. “What’s that?”
“Yesterday. Nice looking lady came by, hadn’t seen her before. Didn’t see her leave though.”
“You didn’t see her leave?”
“Went to see my sister across town. I still drive, you know.”
Maddy nodded. “Right. You went out.”
“That’s what I said, are you deaf? I’m the old one. She come to see about your mother, did she?” The old man gave a crooked half-smile as he asked, something glinted in his eye.
You fucker! Maddy thought. You called DoCS on us. “Just routine, I guess,” she said. “I wasn’t in, but she had a chat to Mum then left again.”
“Don’t see your mum much these days. Used to chat over the fence quite often, good to have a yarn, eh?”
“She’s sick. Doesn’t like to go outside any more, not even the garden.”
Parsons nodded, mouth hanging slightly open. Maddy heard his rasping breath as he stared at her. She quickly patted her pockets, then said, “Damn it, forgot my phone.”
“You young people and those things!” Parsons said.
She flashed him a forced smile and ran back inside. She hadn’t forgotten her phone at all, but it was the first excuse that came to mind. “Zack, for fuck’s sake!”
He looked up from his bowl of cereal, milk dripping off the spoon. “What?”
“Jack Parsons saw the social worker arrive!”
Zack’s eyebrows climbed into his hair. “Oh yeah! Nosey bastard was getting in his car.”
“You have to be more careful. If he saw her arrive, maybe others did. Are you sure no one saw you get into her car and drive it away?”
“Pretty sure, yeah.”
“Pretty sure?”
“I’m sure!” Zack’s eyebrows slammed back down, drawing together. “What are you, the fucking police?”
Maddy took a deep breath, decided to calm things down. “No, but they might come around. More importantly, we can’t say she never came here. We’ll have to say she came in, had a chat with Mum, then left again. That’s what I just told Parsons.”
“Okay. That’s what I was going to say in the first place. Easy as.”
She stared at him. Easy as. Was he really so blasé about the whole thing? Maybe it was a defence mechanism. The phone on the kitchen counter rang. Their mother’s phone. Maddy always left it plugged in there. She went over and looked at it, but didn’t recognise the number.
“Might be DoCS,” Zack said.
She glared at him.
He shrugged. “Might be. Answer it. You be Mum. Put them off.”
“Fuck!” She snatched up the phone and answered. “Hello?” She made her voice a little weak, a little croaky. This was far from the first time she’d impersonated her mother. But it was the first time she’d impersonated her dead mother.
“I’m after Mrs Claire Taylor.” The woman on the other end was kind-sounding, her voice soft with a slight accent Maddy couldn’t place.
“Speaking.”
“Ah, good morning, Mrs Taylor. I’m Hilary Wong from the Department of Communities and Justice.”
That’s right, Maddy thought. That’s what they’re calling the welfare these days. “We just saw you lot yesterday,” she said, in her mother’s snappy tone.
“That’s what I was ringing about, actually. You say you saw someone yesterday?”
Zack held up his phone, where he’d typed stefanee belcher into a text message.
“That’s right,” Maddy said. “Woman called Stephanie something-or-other. Beacher? Beacham?”
“Stephanie Belcher.”
“If you say so.”
“Yes, right. So she came to see you?”
“Yes. Unusual to come on a weekend, I thought.”
“Well, our staff tend to try to find times best suited to families,” Wong said. “So she came about what time?”
What time? Maddy mouthed at Zack.
“Lunchtime,” he whispered. “About twelve?”
“Sometime in the middle of the day,” Maddy croaked, then turned her head only slightly from the phone and coughed raucously. She imagined poor Hilary Wong wincing at the other end, but it was the kind of awful thing her mother did all the time. Zack grinned.
“And you all had a chat and then she left again?” Wong asked.
“Yes. I didn’t invite her to stay the night or anything. Honestly, why even send her when you can just email or call or something? It’s an invasion of privacy, you know!”
“What time did Ms Belcher leave, Mrs Taylor?”
“She was here half an hour or something before I was finally able to shoo her out.”
“Did she mention where she was going next?”
“No. Why would I care?”
There was a moment’s pause and then Wong said, “Okay, thank you, Mrs Taylor. Sorry to bother your morning.”
“Right-o.” Maddy hung up the call, then blew out a breath, leaning back against the counter.
“You do such a good Mum!” Zack said.
“Fuck, Zack, that was awful. I have to go to work. You know, it’s entirely possible they’ll report the woman missing now and then we’ll have the police around here too.”
“We’ll just tell them the same thing, right?”
“Yeah, I guess so. And if anyone else does come asking about anything, Mum has gone to see her cousins in Bega and we don’t know when she’s coming back. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“I have to go to work.”
The whole time Maddy was home, Zack had tried to ignore his mother’s wheedling voice. It drilled into his brain, but he managed to tune it out most of the time. When Maddy left again, finally going to work at last, he finished his breakfast, then went and got dressed. He put on his school uniform but had no intention of going to class yet. First he forged a note, signed by his mother, explaining he’d had a dental appointment. He’d use that at the office to get a late note when he finally went in. He tucked it into the side pocket of his backpack, then went around next door and rang Jack Parson’s bell.
His mother still cajoled in his ears, even from this far away, telling him what to do. It took a few minutes, but he finally saw movement behind the frosted glass panes in Parsons’s door. The door opened, then thunked against the chain. The old man scowled out at him.
“What?”
“Good morning, Mr Parsons.” Zack gave his warmest smile.
“Er… morning. What do you want?”
“Do you think you could come around? My mum wanted to have a chat with you. She said she knows you used to enjoy a chat over the fence, but she’s too scared to go out any more. Do you know what agoraphobia is?”
“Of course I do, I’m not an imbecile.” Parsons paused, brows creasing. “Is that it? Why I haven’t seen her for a while?”
“Yeah, she barely even leaves her room these days. But she was asking after you. I don’t know, I think she wants to give you something.”
“Give me something?”
“That’s what she said.”
Parsons stared a moment longer, then nodded once. “Wait a minute.”
He shuffled away and through the gap Zack saw him sit on chair by the door and grunt and wheeze as he pulled his shoes on. Then the door closed, the chain snicked free, and it opened again. Parsons gestured for Zack to lead the way.
They went into the house and Parsons looked around, eyes narrowed. He seemed to be assessing the place, maybe judging their cleanliness. Clearly he thought little enough of them that he’d called the welfare.