Page 99 of Power Moves
‘It’s been six years,’ Dad says, standing next to Jessie. His eyes are so heavy with sadness, it feels like another truckload of guilt has been dumped on my head.
‘I know!’ I yelp. Can they just leave me alone? They’re making this bigger than it needs to be. I am fine. They are fine. We’re all fine. Well, apart from Mum, who had her life ripped apart by fucking cancer—but apart from that WE ARE ALL GOOD.
‘Mill, you need to deal with what happened to Mum,’ says Maxy.
He stands next to Jessie, and it’s a wall of Hattons. ThegoodHattons. I suddenly wish woman-Alex would appear with the wine and break up this ambush. ‘You don’t need to always pretend everything is fine,’ Maxy says.
Jessie adds, ‘You can’t keep working so hard to avoid what happened.’
‘You’re burning out,’ agrees Dad.
Maxy’s voice is tiny. ‘We’re worried about you, Mill.’
My own voice—when I hear it—is not mine. It’s an animal. A pterodactyl. A shrieking cyclops, or something else subhuman. It terrifies me, because it’s been inside me all this time—for sixyears—and I’ve never wanted it to get out. I’ve tried to ignore it for six years, hoping that if I stuck my head down and tried my hardest, everything would go back to normal. But that can never happen, because normal is Mum. Normal is Mum.Normal is Mum.And she’s never coming back.
‘DON’T WORRY ABOUT ME!’ I scream. ‘I don’t deserve it! I don’t deserve your pity. It’smyfault Mum’s not here! I could have saved her, but …’ A giant pain cracks me in half and I stumble backwards until I crumple against the bookcase. ‘I let her die.’ I sink onto the floor, as if the reality in my conscience has toppled me.
Dad’s callused hand grabs mine. He crouches beside me. ‘Mill, what do you mean?’
His eyes flit across my face, searching for clues, and I realise that I can’t take it back now. I have to tell them the secret I’ve been hiding for six years, even though they’ll never speak to me again once I do. I’ll have lost everyone I ever loved and I’ll die alone after spending my life working for a narcissist to get just enough money to afford rent on a matchbox-sized apartment.
I sigh, staring at my feet. ‘It’s because I was too lazy, just like Mum always said.’
‘Mum never said that,’ says Jessie, sinking down next to me.
‘You could have picked up the pace,’ I mimic. ‘You’re distractable, you’re careless.’
‘Oh Mill,’ says Maxy, crouching next to us. ‘You got distractedbecauseyou cared. I think you’re literally the only person who ever cried after being crowned age champion because they felt bad for beating the opponent.’
‘But Mum never criticised you guys the way she criticised me.’ I realise I sound like a petulant child, but that’s how I feel: like a kid who could never understand why she wasn’t good enough.
Jessie gives a rueful smile. ‘That’s because Mum knew how to get the best out of you. Some people are motivated by praise, some are motivated by challenges, but you’re motivated by both. Mum never thought you were lazy.’
I look up to meet her eyes and she nods. Dad and Maxy do the same. I think of all the times Boss told me I was his secret weapon, and how I worked harder to impress him every time he raised the bar. I think of all the times Mum told me my smash shots were awesome, and then one day she mentioned I wasn’t hitting them as hard: I came back to the courts after the tea break and broke three strings on my racquet. I think of all the times Archie sniffed out a scoop about Boss, and I ran myself into the ground trying to outwit him.
‘You think so?’ I ask quietly.
‘I know so,’ says Dad. ‘We talked about it all the time. She was so proud of all you kids. She loved you all so much.’
My chest is heaving with dry sobs. It’s like as soon as someone mentions Mum, my body reacts on behalf of my conscience, sucking all the tears back into a sand-blasted desert of regret. My sadness is so deep I could fill an ocean and the Mississippi with salty tears, but my body knows that’s a luxury I don’t deserve.
I take a deep breath. ‘It’s still my fault,’ I repeat, rubbing my eyes. They’re prickling and sore, like I’ve just binged too much TV.
‘How can it be your fault?’ asks Jessie softly. ‘Mum had cancer, Mill. There was nothing we could do.’
I swallow hard. There are no words to convey the shame, the sadness, theguilt. It feels like the cornerstone of my existence. I guilt, therefore I work. I guilt, therefore I am.
I can’t imagine a life without this gnawing anxiety in the back of my brain, somewhere behind my left ear, as pervasive as tinnitus, ringing constantly, sometimes a hum, sometimes a din, reminding me every day that I stuffed up and nothing can fix it. I stole my mother from my siblings. I stole a wife from my dad. I stole a tennis coach from thousands of unsuspecting kids with freckles on their noses and grass stains on their shorts. I was so lazy and careless that I ruined it for all of us. I can’t say this in words, so I haul myself up, stride over to the wall and pull a framed photo off its hook: three kids in neon cossies wrapped in the arms of two beautiful parents, the colours of Wet’n’Wild like a carnival behind us.
I pull the backing off the frame.
CHAPTER 47
This location has been lodged in my brain for more than half a decade, like a childhood phone number you never forget. The backing squeaks as I lever it out.
Dad, Maxy and Jessie are watching me with a mixture of confusion and mild alarm.
A folded A4 page comes loose. Despite six years of being squeezed flat, there are still faultlines across the page, showing that it was once scrunched into a weird shape. There’s a stain on the left corner. My guess is it’s from Macca’s Sweet and Sour Sauce.
