chapter 5

“Put down that phone! You could kill yourself and your friends!” Madeline used the exact same tone she used on Chloe when she was being extremely naughty. She reached in the car, grabbed the phone and tossed it to the openmouthed girl in the passenger seat. “OK? Just stop it!”

She could hear their gales of laughter as she walked back to her SUV. She didn’t care. She felt pleasantly stimulated. A car pulled up behind hers. Madeline smiled, lifted her hand apologetically and hurried back to be in her car before the lights changed.

Her ankle turned. One second it was doing what an ankle was meant to do, and the next it was flipping out at a sickeningly wrong angle. She fell heavily on one side. Oh, calamity.

That was almost certainly the moment the story began.

With the ungainly flip of an ankle.

Jane’s resistance vanished entirely.

She liked this woman. She wanted to help her.

(Although, what did that say? If the woman had been a toothless, warty-nosed crone she would have continued to feel resentful? The injustice of it. The cruelty of it. She was going to be nicer to this woman because she liked her freckles.)

The woman’s dress had an intricately embroidered cutout pattern of flowers all along the neckline. Jane could see tanned freckly skin through the petals.

“We need to get some ice on it straightaway,” said Jane. She knew about ankle injuries from her netball days and she could see this woman’s ankle was already beginning to swell. “And keep it elevated.” She chewed her lip and looked about hopefully for someone else. She had no idea how to handle the logistics of making this actually happen.

“It’s my birthday,” said the woman sadly. “My fortieth.”

“Happy birthday,” said Jane. It was sort of cute that a woman of forty would even bother to mention that it was her birthday.

She looked at the woman’s strappy shoes. Her toenails were painted a lustrous turquoise. The stiletto heels were as thin as toothpicks and perilously high.

“No wonder you did your ankle,” said Jane. “No one could walk in those shoes!”

“I know, but aren’t they gorgeous?” The woman turned her foot at an angle to admire them. “Ouch! ****, that hurts. Sorry. Excuse my language.”

“Mummy!” A little girl with dark curly hair, wearing a sparkling tiara, stuck her head out the window of the car. “What are you doing? Get up! We’ll be late!”

Glittery mother. Glittery daughter.

“Thanks for the sympathy, darling!” said the woman. She smiled ruefully at Jane. “We’re on our way to her kindergarten orientation. She’s very excited.”

“At Pirriwee Public?” said Jane. She was astonished. “But that’s where I’m going. My son, Ziggy, is starting school next year. We’re moving here in December.” It didn’t seem possible that she and this woman could have anything in common, or that their lives could intersect in any way.

“Ziggy! Like Ziggy Stardust? What a great name!” said the woman. “I’m Madeline, by the way. Madeline Martha Mackenzie. I always mention the Martha for some reason. Don’t ask me why.” She held out her hand.

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