Excerpt

The First Intervention

Client A sat in the kitchen of the rented apartment Theresa had found for her. Her oldest child cooked the dinner; it smelt so good Theresa hoped they'd invite her to stay, although she'd say no, to maintain the boundaries. One child was at the table doing homework; the other two, watching cartoons.

"My husband used to manage all the finances. The rent, all that," the woman told her. "I looked after the people, he looked after the things. We always did it that way."

Theresa said, "I lost my man, too. That's an emptiness that can't be filled. We can only try."

"We were saving for a home," the woman said. Most of that went to medical and funeral expenses. "He was going to do all the cabinet making. It would have been beautiful. He wasn't a clumsy man. How could they say it was his fault?"

The woman spoke quietly. Her children had not seen their father's body; that was an image none of them needed.

The phone rang. "Mum, it's the man from the real estate."

Client A sighed, and Theresa thought she caught a glimmer of something shifting near the fridge.

"He wants to do another inspection."

"Do you want me to be here?" Theresa asked.

"No. I need to be independent. I can do it."

As Client A talked, Theresa could see the ghosts coming for her. Crawling hand over hand, broken legs trailing behind them, the more she talked the closer they got. And around the 15 year old were what appeared to be teenage girls, pregnant, blood pouring down their thighs.

Curiosity sparked by the ghosts, Theresa waited in her car until the real estate agent arrived. Faces from every window watched as he walked up the path. Searching for information on her handheld, she found nothing but praise for his work and his dedication, but as he walked, ghosts scooted around. They knew an ally, hurry up, pushing him forward, get it done.

Theresa followed him for three days as he visited clients. She asked discreet questions, took the occasional photo. When even a forty-eight year old bikie's widow was surrounded by beaten ghosts after he visited her, she knew this man was a destroyer; perhaps one who preyed on widows.

"Can I help you, love?" she heard. A gentle, masculine voice.

A man dressed in leathers, long beard, tattoos. He held a cigarette between two yellowed fingers and, incongruously, balloons tied to the handles of his motorbike.

"Oh," she said.

"It's just that you're staring in at my mate's wife. And my mate's dead, so we're watching out for her. And she's not keen on being stared in at."

Theresa thought, Am I going to do this? The real estate agent left the house, wiping his mouth. The woman's ghosts leaped up and down, broken legs buckling, trampolining their excitement and she knew she had to intervene.

"It's that man. I've been following him. I've seen some terrible things."

The real estate agent fought back; he was strong and wiry. But he was never going to win. Theresa was there to watch; if they expected her to call a halt they were surprised.

She didn't regret the intervention, but she physically reacted to it, coming out in boils. She considered it worth the aftermath because of the solace it brought her, and because when next she visited Client A, there were no ghosts to be seen.

Even after five years working at the refuge, barely a morning dawned when Theresa didn't wake thinking of who she would help that day. When asked why she did it, why she made such sacrifices for others, she said, "I just want to help," but truthfully, helping others helped her to forget, distracted her from her empty life. It made her feel good.

She listened well, mostly because she didn't want to talk about herself. She had an extra skill; she could see the ghosts of beaten women around those clients who would die that way.

Some surprised her. A bossy woman in an office, a famous athlete, a respected dancer; they all had ghosts.

It wasn't only the women. Men, too, had ghosts. Some of them beaten, many of them ill, many of them murdered. Join us, join us, she sometimes heard. And the children; she saw the ghosts of molested children but what could she do? She couldn't adopt them all, keep them all safe. Her crazy aunt Prudence sent her greeting cards periodically, with instructions on them like "Let Fate Be," as if she had any control over it. These cards went straight into the recycling bin.

Theresa did what she could for her clients, and sometimes the ghosts would vanish. More often, though, they'd be replaced by others. The ones beaten with a baseball bat would replace the ones drowned in the bathtub. Or the ones kicked to death would replace the ones gutted. It was exhausting, depressing and emotionally draining. So many times she wanted to say, "Go. You don't need to be a victim. Leave. Find a new life."

But she knew that couldn't work, that it was a letter to the editor opinion, and she'd help no one by expressing it. All she could do was watch the ghosts, help house the clients and sometimes, if it was called for, intervene.

So many times she didn't intervene and most often she knew this was right. Other times, she made small choices, small changes, and hoped these were enough.

Then her inaction led to the death of a client.