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Back The Family Doctor Save as PDF
Chapters (29)
  1. COVER PAGE
  2. PRAISE
  3. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  4. DEDICATION
  5. ONE
  6. TWO
  7. THREE
  8. FOUR
  9. FIVE
  10. SIX
  11. SEVEN
  12. EIGHT
  13. NINE
  14. TEN
  15. ELEVEN
  16. TWELVE
  17. THIRTEEN
  18. FOURTEEN
  19. FIFTEEN
  20. SIXTEEN
  21. SEVENTEEN
  22. EIGHTEEN
  23. NINETEEN
  24. TWENTY
  25. TWENTY-ONE
  26. TWENTY-TWO
  27. TWENTY-THREE
  28. TWENTY-FOUR
  29. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Anita had asked straight out, ‘How did you get those bruises?’

‘Oh lordy.’ Stacey laughed. ‘Clumsy me tripped over in the machine shed, landed on top of this very tractor, sprawled out like a cartoon character.’

Paula and Anita had known the explanation was a rehearsed lie. But they’d both also sensed the shame Stacey was feeling and they didn’t want to embarrass her. So they let all the lies she told that weekend go unchallenged.

The most recent photo was taken on a day trip to Whale Beach. By then Remy was dead, Matt was in jail, and Stacey and the kids had been living with Paula in the Earlwood house for four months.

In the shot, Poppy was posed on the sand with her legs far apart and arms in the air, as if about to do a cartwheel. She couldn’t, in fact, do cartwheels but she requested that Paula take this optical illusion photo now, on the understanding that Poppy promised to learn to actually do cartwheels very soon. Cameron stood closer to the waves, looking back at the camera anxiously. He had heard Stacey’s voice calling out encouragement to Poppy and he was compelled to check it was happy yelling, not frightened yelling.

They should have been safe in Paula’s house. Stacey and Cameron and Poppy should have been safe in her house.

FIVE

PAULA HAD PLANNED TO FLY TO MELBOURNE IN LATE MAY and join two medical school friends for a walking holiday along the Great Ocean Road, figuring it’d be considerate to give Stacey and the kids a break from her, a chance for them to swan about the house on their own.

Now she didn’t feel up to the social duties of being a travelling companion. In the two months since the murders, Paula had excused herself from her book club and sidestepped all other invitations, including dinners at Li-Kim’s place and events with Remy’s extended family—lovely people of whom she was genuinely fond. She had been using cheerful texts and the occasional short phone chat to hold friends at bay. Every friend apart from Anita. For both women, all personal connection had telescoped down to their friendship.

So Paula cancelled the holiday leave and worked on into June, doing fill-in sessions at the practice on top of her regular load. She found that with a busy run of patients through a day, she might not think about Stacey and the children for an hour at a time.