A Family of Strangers Read online

  PRAISE FOR FIONA LOWE

  ‘Fiona Lowe has expertly crafted a world that’s easy to spend time in … If you’re looking to lose yourself in a cosy new novel that shines a spotlight on women’s lives and stories, then A Home Like Ours by Fiona Lowe deserves a spot on your bookshelf.’

  —Mamamia

  ‘Rich, thought-provoking, and extremely absorbing, A Home Like Ours is yet another incredible read from the very talented Fiona Lowe.’

  —Better Reading

  ‘An insightful, warm and engaging story, A Home Like Ours is another fabulous novel from award-winning Australian author Fiona Lowe.’

  —Book’d Out

  ‘Fiona Lowe’s ability to create atmosphere and tension and real relationship dynamics is a gift.’

  —Sally Hepworth, bestselling author of The Mother-in-Law, on Home Fires

  ‘Lowe breathes real life into her characters … a profoundly hopeful tale, one of re-generation, of the strength gained from women supporting women, and of a community pulling together, one that acts as a powerful reminder of the resilience of the human spirit … a deeply Australian story that brilliantly captures our own life and times.’

  —Better Reading on Home Fires

  ‘Part-Liane Moriarty, part-Jodi Picoult, Just an Ordinary Family is a compelling drama about a seemingly ‘ordinary’ family that implodes after a domino effect of lies, betrayals, disappointments and regrets … set to be the next Big Little Lies.’

  —Mamamia

  ‘Fiona’s insight into the fickle nature of life … and how best intentions can so easily come undone makes it simple to identify with her characters and lends an authentic resonance to this rollercoaster story.’

  —Australian Country on Just an Ordinary Family

  ‘Lowe weaves character development and complexity with stunning finesse … this story is not a light read, but it is one that proved difficult to put down.’

  —GLAM Adelaide on Just an Ordinary Family

  ‘Drama, upheaval and family secrets feature in the latest novel by Fiona Lowe, the undisputed queen of Australian small-town fiction … a moving character-driven tale that steadily draws you into its thrall.’

  —Canberra Weekly on Just an Ordinary Family

  ‘Birthright is a complex story that seamlessly intertwines many story lines. It is full of interesting characters that reveal more and more as the story progresses. It is raw, incredibly engaging and reads beautifully.’

  —The Big Book Club

  ‘Distinctly Australian with its power to evoke grit and tenderness, joy and bleakness, tragedy and comedy, all at once.’

  —Better Reading on Birthright

  ‘Lowe is a master at painting believable characters with heart and soul that contribute to creating such an addictive read.’

  —The Weekly Times on Birthright

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  FIONA LOWE has been a midwife, a sexual health counsellor and a family support worker; an ideal career for an author who writes novels about family, community and relationships. She spent her early years in Papua New Guinea where, without television, reading was the entertainment and it set up a lifelong love of books. Although she often re-wrote the endings of books in her head, it was the birth of her first child that prompted her to write her first novel. A recipient of the prestigious USA RITA® award and the Australian RuBY award, Fiona writes books that are set in small country towns. They feature real people facing difficult choices and explore how family ties and relationships impact on their decisions.

  When she’s not writing stories, she’s a distracted wife, mother of two ‘ginger’ sons, a volunteer in her community, guardian of eighty rose bushes, a slave to a cat, and is often found collapsed on the couch with wine. You can find her at her website, fionalowe.com, and on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and Goodreads.

  Also by Fiona Lowe

  Daughter of Mine

  Birthright

  Home Fires

  Just an Ordinary Family

  A Home Like Ours

  harpercollins.com.au/hq/

  To Norm, with love.

  It’s been all the feels across the years!

  CONTENTS

  Praise

  About the Author

  Also by Fiona Lowe

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Book Club Questions

  CHAPTER

  1

  It’s the right decision, Addy Topic told herself as the Spirit of Tasmania berthed at Devonport at the criminally early hour of 6.30 am. ‘You’ve got this,’ she said as she drove off the ferry and immediately found a café with a five-star coffee rating. Never a morning person, she sculled her espresso fast then sipped a latte, taking her time to savour the brew while she scanned The Advocate. Not a lot had changed since she’d last read it—it was still a mix of odd crimes, agriculture wins and losses, and ongoing housing issues.

  ‘Anything to eat?’ the waitress asked.

  ‘Why not?’ Moving house was why not. Addy ought to be maximising her time and getting settled before starting her new job. But knowing she should seize the day didn’t touch the part of her that was in no great hurry to reach Rookery Cove. ‘I’ll have poached eggs with the avocado cup, thanks.’

  Three hours later, after taking a detour through Penguin and dodging phone-wielding tourists snapping photos of the decorative penguins that now lined the Esplanade, she eventually drove into the cove. Then she turned away from the main drag and up the hill before pulling into her parents’ driveway.

  My driveway.

  Addy shrugged the words away. Four years after Ivan’s and Rita’s deaths, the house still felt very much theirs.

  She turned off the ignition, took a deep breath and got out of the car. Despite the weeds on the path, the bulging orange rosehips and the peeling paint—travesties her mother would never have allowed—she still expected Rita to step out onto the veranda, give her sadness-tinged smile and say, ‘Aida, you are home.’

  But Addy hadn’t called the cove or the house home in twelve years; and since Rita’s death, no one had called her Aida.

  After her mother’s funeral—six months to the day after her father’s—Addy had left the fully furnished house in the care of a real estate agent and flown back to her life in Victoria. When people had asked if she’d ever live in Tasmania again, she’d replied ‘possibly Hobart’ while privately thinking not the north-west coast and never the cove. But the universe was wily and the gateway job
for a long-awaited career jump had turned up two towns away.

  Leaving her boxes and suitcases in the car, she walked up the steps and fished a bunch of keys out of her handbag. As she slid the old key into the front door, she got a flash of a brass key on a piece of orange wool that had once hung with great weight around her neck.

  ‘Tell no one,’ Ivan had sternly admonished each time he gave it to her.

  ‘No, Papa.’

  It wasn’t until Addy was nine and had been visiting friends after school that she learned no one in Rookery Cove locked their houses. But Rita and Ivan had escaped a civil war that had turned security into something ephemeral and not to be trusted.

  Turning the door handle, Addy got another flash. This time she was fourteen and standing on the porch watching Rita turning the door handle left, then right, then left, after having previously checked eight times that the windows were closed and locked. Knowing they were already late and that all eyes in the school auditorium would turn to them when they walked in, Addy had screamed, ‘For God’s sake, Mama! It’s locked!’

  The memory faded and regret tightened her chest. Addy wished she’d understood more about obsessive-compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress when she was a teen. Although her parents had talked of their childhoods in Dubrovnik, they’d never discussed the war. Whenever she’d asked about it she’d been told, ‘It’s not important. We are Australian now.’ But the kids at the local primary school, with their white-bread Vegemite sandwiches, had disagreed when they saw Addy’s lunch of salami, cheese and olives.

  The glass front door swung open and the cloying artificial scent of gardenia hit her nostrils. She gagged. Beating down the nausea, she took another breath and got a lungful of the sweet smell of marijuana with a fried food chaser. So much for the reliable tenants the real estate agent had promised.

  Stepping inside she girded herself for anticipated filth, but apart from the walls being brown and sticky with nicotine, everything looked much the same as it had when she’d left at eighteen eager for a different life. The same wide rust-brown velvet couch sat on its rotund feet, although minus Rita’s crocheted doilies. The same framed photo of the old walled city perched on a shimmering bay hung on the wall, except instead of being fastidiously straight it tilted to the right. Addy automatically straightened it as she’d done each week as a child when it was her job to dust.

  Her gaze slid to the upright piano, but with its closed lid and mahogany sheen dulled by layers of dust it lacked familiarity. Despite rising reluctance, her hands overrode her head and she pulled up the lid. She stretched her fingers, struck a chord and flinched at the off-key sound. The piano had been Rita’s pride and joy and it had never been allowed to fall out of tune.

  A stubborn streak of teen rebellion filled her and she played a honky-tonk riff from The Entertainer. The defiance evaporated and she dropped the lid.

  ‘Sorry, Mama.’

  She inspected the rest of the house. The kitchen’s exhaust fan was coated in grease, the shower was host to a colony of mould, and there was a stain of unknown origin on the carpet in the master bedroom. Nothing that sugar soap, bleach, eucalyptus oil and elbow grease couldn’t shift. By the end of the weekend, the house would still be stuck in its nineties-decor time warp but it would sparkle.

  Addy paused in the narrow hall outside her childhood bedroom and stared at the single bed, remembering its ruffled pillowcases and detested quilt cover. At fifteen, she’d begged for a surfing design but had instead been given a grand piano cover. With it had come the full weight of Rita’s expectations. From that moment, her mother’s hopes and dreams, which had already cloaked Addy all through the day, became inescapable at night.

  Stepping into the room, she opened the freestanding wardrobe Ivan had built for her, including a special wooden box to lock away her ‘treasures’. She was surprised the tenants hadn’t torn down the smiling face of Layne Beachley and the other surfing posters she’d pinned there between thirteen and seventeen.

  Was her board still in the shed? Her gaze slipped to her belly and she sucked it in. If it was, she was probably too heavy to use it.

  If you lost some weight … If you drank less … If you were nicer to me … tidier … worked less …

  ‘Go away, Jasper.’

  She released the catch on the window, threw up the sash and leaned out, stretching her arms wide. Cool salty air tingled her nostrils and she gazed down at the half-moon bay with whitecaps flashing across a moody and unwelcoming grey sea. An unexpected shaft of sunshine suddenly pierced the heavy cloud and golden rays lit a narrow band of water, taking it from steel grey to translucent tropical blue.

  Addy smiled, savouring the water’s familiar pull. How many times had she climbed out of this window and run to the moonlit beach? To parties at the surf club? To surf at dawn? Triple the number of times her parents had discovered her gone.

  If Rita and Ivan still lived, what would they make of her return to the cove? Would they be pleased? Confused? Frustrated?

  Addy was still coming to terms with it herself. When she’d accepted the teaching job at the regional vocational training and pathways college two towns away, the plan had been to live close to campus and get fit by cycling to work. After all, the point of living in a small city was to incorporate exercise with lifestyle. The plan didn’t include living in tiny Rookery Cove—population three hundred—and making an eighty-minute round trip each day. But she hadn’t anticipated the tenants moving out and no one else moving in. After weeks of no activity, the agent had suggested she turn the place into a holiday rental.

  Although a good idea, it wasn’t without on-costs. When she factored in the seasonal nature of holiday rentals, it made financial sense to live in the house for three months and redecorate it on the weekends. She could still get fit, drink less and eat better living here. She’d get up earlier and exercise with a run along the beach before leaving for work. She’d carve out an hour from her weekend redecorating schedule to prepare tasty and healthy lunches, dinners and snacks for the week ahead. She’d sleep better with the tang of salt in the air. Living here was the change she both needed and wanted.

  Addy’s fingers itched to crack open her first bullet journal. So far she’d only got as far as caressing the leather cover and smelling the crisp clean pages. She’d bought it, along with washi tape, markers, coloured pencils, paints and stickers, to help her plan each week so her new job, her new healthy lifestyle, the house renovations and herself all got the attention they deserved. This was her year of living intentionally. No more floundering. No more wasting time—she was taking charge of her life. But first, all the windows needed throwing open so the sea breeze could blow through and freshen the house.

  She’d just reached the bedroom door when her phone rang.

  ‘Addy, it’s Grant Hindmarsh.’

  Surprise tumbled with anxiety—Grant was her new boss for her new job. ‘Oh! Hi! I’ve just arrived on the island.’ Did that sound accusatory? She quickly added, ‘I’m really looking forward to Monday.’

  ‘Excellent! I’m calling to touch base and to say again how thrilled we are we tempted you back from the mainland. The students are lucky to have someone of your calibre.’

  ‘Thank you.’ A flutter of appreciation warmed her. ‘I’m looking forward to meeting them.’

  ‘That’s what we want to hear. I know Lyn’s already been in touch. Thanks for uploading your course work before your official start date. Others in the department could take a leaf out of your book.’

  She smiled. Grant had just given her more praise in two short sentences than she’d received in three years at her previous job.

  The line was suddenly silent. Given the cove’s sometimes iffy mobile phone reception she said, ‘Grant, are you still there?’

  He sighed. ‘Yes, sorry. I’m a bit distracted. Our media lecturer was in a car accident yesterday.’

  ‘Oh, no. Are they okay?’

  ‘Sienna’s fractured her pelvis so
she’s off for the semester.’

  ‘That sounds nasty.’

  ‘It is.’ Grant sighed. ‘As you can imagine, it’s thrown us into a spin. She teaches social media marketing and touches briefly on website design. Her class has a waiting list and it’s one of our biggest earners so we’re loathe to cancel it.’

  Addy knew all about the pressures of funding and the appeal of courses that generated income. ‘It all sounds very tricky.’

  ‘How would you feel about taking it on?’ Grant asked.

  The question caught her by surprise. ‘I, um … I’ve never taught it.’

  ‘But everything’s new the first time, right?’

  ‘That’s true—’

  ‘And you’re a digital native so a lot of it’s intrinsic,’ he said.

  Addy doubted it—she knew enough HTML to be dangerous and almost nothing about SEO. What she did know was that she’d spend the entire semester barely staying one step ahead of her students. She already had a full teaching load, but was saying no to her new boss the best way to start?

  She sought some clarification. ‘So this would be a load reshuffle? Which subject am I handing off to someone else?’

  Grant sighed again. ‘Ah, no, which is why I’m asking you. Going on your interview and referees, I get the impression you’re the type of person who steps up. Am I wrong about that?’

  She thought about her employment conditions. Three months probation, and if she aced that, permanency and a shot at the promotion she’d been chasing for a couple of years. ‘Not wrong at all.’

  ‘I didn’t think so.’ His tone was reassuring. ‘Obviously it’s not ideal and it’s a big workload for you, but as we say here in the north-west, there’s no “I” in “team”. I promise we’ll give you all the support you need. Lyn will get Sienna’s teaching notes to you asap, so really it’s just a matter of delivering ready-made content. So what do you say? Can you help us out?’

  Addy’s previous job had been fraught with never-ending budget cuts and infighting. The idea of being surrounded by a committed team all rowing in the same direction was as exciting as it was reassuring.