Yesterday's Dust by Joy Dettman Page B

me.’
    â€˜I can’t stay here.’
    â€˜I did what I had to do, and you have to help me to keep doing it – wipe him and May and Narrawee from my brain. I have to if David and I . . . if this baby is to have a chance.’
    â€˜And what about Mum? I’m supposed to lie to her?’
    â€˜What about Mum?It’s always about Mum, and I don’t know her. I don’t know what I feel for her any more, or if I feel anything.’ She had looked at the door, at the walls. ‘This house used to be full of Mandy. You should have known her, Johnny. This house belonged to her. Toys all over the floor, little giggles from beneath the table, little dresses in the laundry. She’s gone.’ Her fingers raked the hair from herface, her eyes travelling the floors, the walls.
    â€˜I can’t look at Mum these days without feeling anger. She used to say to me that Mandy was Liza reborn. Every time she saw her. She’s Liza all over, love, she’d say. Every time. And maybe she was like her too, but I wouldn’t see it .
    â€˜But I saw it when she died. She looked like Liza when she died. Little red playsuit, blood on her golden curls.And . . . and do you know what Mum said to me, Johnny? I’m so sorry to hear of your loss, love . No kiss, no hug, no bloody nothing. I’m so sorry to hear of your loss, love . She lost about as much sleep over Mandy’s death as she did over my life. So don’t ever try to use Mum as a cheap weapon to bludgeon me with.’
    â€˜What happened to the little girl I left on the road?’
    â€˜You left her on the road,and life happened to her, and death happened, and years of searching for you happened. I didn’t carewhat I might find either, just as long as I found you, knew you were alive, safe. I didn’t expect to find a fifteen-year-old boy. I wouldn’t have cared if you’d sold cars, ran a brothel, yet you expected to come back here and find poor little dumb Annie still waiting for you.’
    â€˜It’s all gone.All changed,’ he’d said. ‘Hating that bastard is all that’s left from back then. Everything else is lost. If I let him get away with what he’s done I’ve got no reason to wake up in the morning. Can’t you see that?’
    She had walked to the sink, filled the jug and set it to boil. ‘Have a cup of coffee with me. Sit down and let’s start again.’
    â€˜Come to the police with me. That’s all I want fromyou.’
    â€˜Look at me, Johnny. Inside I’m still that little kid and she’s standing here still screaming out to you. For God’s sake, listen to her!’
    â€˜Help me to put him away and I’ll listen. He killed Liza. He killed his brother. He’s a murderer, Annie.’
    She had sighed then, swiped at the tears now trickling. ‘Liza took a blow aimed at her rapist who was using her as a shield. Dad didn’t want tohurt Liza. He loved her. The day Mandy died I understood what he has had to live with. He loved Liza.’ The jug had boiled, boiled, turned itself off. ‘Maybe a priest can’t understand that sort of love, that sort of loss. You’ve probably buried little kids in the cold bloody earth and watched the mothers cry, blessed them and told them that their child was in a better place. What better place thansafe in her parents’ arms, Johnny? I watched Dad dying the day Liza died. I can still hear him crying.’
    â€˜He’s not crying now. He’s down there playing the toff, having a ball. He’s got everything he always wanted. He’s got that mansion, that property, and May.’
    â€˜And he has to look at that rose garden, that cellar every time he steps outside the door, and he has to do it stone-cold sober. Maywon’t let him drink.’
    He had laughed then. ‘So he’ll come back.’
    â€˜If he sets one foot in Mallawindy, I tell it as it was. He and May