Read Online Perfect Victim by Megan Norris, Elizabeth Southall - Free Book Online
Authors: Megan Norris, Elizabeth Southall
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mid-morning before we left home. We thought it important to have some thinking space. What had we missed? Police had asked for lists of Rachel’s friends and apparently contacted several of them. Why would any of Rachel’s friends want to harm her? We felt dreadful for having to include them on a list.
Richmond police contacted us on Friday morning to say they were coming to search Rachel’s bedroom. We thought of being present for this, but as my mother was in the house we decided not to waste any more time and get on with our own inquiries. We were all, family and police, working together.
I laugh now at the memory we have of replacing Rachel’s mattress and bed base back on its legs before the police came through. I was conscious of her room looking bare, but Rachel was in the process of redecorating it, changing it from a young girl’s into a young woman’s room. In late December she had been excited to find polished wooden floorboards beneath her carpet and begged to be allowed to pull it up. ‘You know I’ve always wanted a wooden floor. Please, Mum.’ One of her greatest unfulfilled wishes – practising her dance exercises on her own wooden floor.
I agreed, and absolutely everything, and I mean everything, was dragged into the hallway. Her bed base dismantled. Her desk given to Ashleigh-Rose. Picture books and unread novels handed down. Her special autographed picture book, A Lion in the Meadow by Margaret Mahy, remained. In rushed a big, roaring, yellow, whiskery lion. ‘Hide Me!’ it said. ‘A dragon is after me!’ The lion hid in the broom cupboard . Rachel was the big, roaring, yellow, whiskery lion. ‘Boo!’ she would squeal, and rush out giggling. If I missed one sentence, even one word, she knew she’d been cheated.
Her favourite junior and teen novels by Margaret Clark remained on her bookshelf. I pulled Diary of a Street Kid off in case the police got the wrong idea. And I hid the unfinished manuscript I’d encouraged her to write.
‘It’ll have swear words in it, Mum … I’ll write it like a Margaret Clark.’
‘Go for it,’ I’d said, thinking, anything to make her brain do a daily workout.
She stripped the room bare. Packed childhood belongings into boxes and stored them in the cupboard under the stairs. Manni ripped up the carpet, under her instructions. She gave Wally, her baby-blue soft toy whale, to Manni. Special Teddy, Nutmeg, and Yellow Teddy remained on her bookcase, with a sequined clown, make-up, dance shoes and Manni mementos. Wooden-sculptured flying machines stayed suspended from the ceiling.
Rachel had lifted her op shop mirror, a metre in diameter, off the wall and onto the floor beside her mattress, so that she could study her feet while dancing. The Revoke , a print of naughty fairies and koala bears; the glass-framed Giselle which Rachel had painted out with bright pink lipstick during her ‘I hate ballet’ stage; the photograph Nanny Joy took of us all at a dance concert in September 1998; and the ‘Rachel loves Manni’ collage – these remained on her walls.
She asked me if I’d take her to Ikea, whose furniture offered the young adult look she was after. During Rachel’s disappearance my mother lay staring at Rachel’s night sky, the luminous stars decorating her ceiling, wondering where our Rachel Star was.
On the Thursday night at the dance school we found an old pair of pants in the lost property box, the same design as Rachel’s new pants. Vicki suggested we take these to the police so they could see what she was last seen wearing. We thought we’d go to the Malvern shop, a few doors from my work, Books In Print, where I had bought the little blue top she was wearing.
On our way to the dress shop we put up more posters. Mike had it in mind to place a poster at the dance school Rachel had attended for six years but I was apprehensive about this. Rachel would cringe if we hung a poster there. There had been a time when Rachel had admired
Richmond police contacted us on Friday morning to say they were coming to search Rachel’s bedroom. We thought of being present for this, but as my mother was in the house we decided not to waste any more time and get on with our own inquiries. We were all, family and police, working together.
I laugh now at the memory we have of replacing Rachel’s mattress and bed base back on its legs before the police came through. I was conscious of her room looking bare, but Rachel was in the process of redecorating it, changing it from a young girl’s into a young woman’s room. In late December she had been excited to find polished wooden floorboards beneath her carpet and begged to be allowed to pull it up. ‘You know I’ve always wanted a wooden floor. Please, Mum.’ One of her greatest unfulfilled wishes – practising her dance exercises on her own wooden floor.
I agreed, and absolutely everything, and I mean everything, was dragged into the hallway. Her bed base dismantled. Her desk given to Ashleigh-Rose. Picture books and unread novels handed down. Her special autographed picture book, A Lion in the Meadow by Margaret Mahy, remained. In rushed a big, roaring, yellow, whiskery lion. ‘Hide Me!’ it said. ‘A dragon is after me!’ The lion hid in the broom cupboard . Rachel was the big, roaring, yellow, whiskery lion. ‘Boo!’ she would squeal, and rush out giggling. If I missed one sentence, even one word, she knew she’d been cheated.
Her favourite junior and teen novels by Margaret Clark remained on her bookshelf. I pulled Diary of a Street Kid off in case the police got the wrong idea. And I hid the unfinished manuscript I’d encouraged her to write.
‘It’ll have swear words in it, Mum … I’ll write it like a Margaret Clark.’
‘Go for it,’ I’d said, thinking, anything to make her brain do a daily workout.
She stripped the room bare. Packed childhood belongings into boxes and stored them in the cupboard under the stairs. Manni ripped up the carpet, under her instructions. She gave Wally, her baby-blue soft toy whale, to Manni. Special Teddy, Nutmeg, and Yellow Teddy remained on her bookcase, with a sequined clown, make-up, dance shoes and Manni mementos. Wooden-sculptured flying machines stayed suspended from the ceiling.
Rachel had lifted her op shop mirror, a metre in diameter, off the wall and onto the floor beside her mattress, so that she could study her feet while dancing. The Revoke , a print of naughty fairies and koala bears; the glass-framed Giselle which Rachel had painted out with bright pink lipstick during her ‘I hate ballet’ stage; the photograph Nanny Joy took of us all at a dance concert in September 1998; and the ‘Rachel loves Manni’ collage – these remained on her walls.
She asked me if I’d take her to Ikea, whose furniture offered the young adult look she was after. During Rachel’s disappearance my mother lay staring at Rachel’s night sky, the luminous stars decorating her ceiling, wondering where our Rachel Star was.
On the Thursday night at the dance school we found an old pair of pants in the lost property box, the same design as Rachel’s new pants. Vicki suggested we take these to the police so they could see what she was last seen wearing. We thought we’d go to the Malvern shop, a few doors from my work, Books In Print, where I had bought the little blue top she was wearing.
On our way to the dress shop we put up more posters. Mike had it in mind to place a poster at the dance school Rachel had attended for six years but I was apprehensive about this. Rachel would cringe if we hung a poster there. There had been a time when Rachel had admired
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