Winter in Mason Valley

by Eliza Bennetts

  Trav nodded. He failed to understand what this had to do with him.

  Tim continued. ‘The thing is, Travis, that person was me. I’m kinda new here, and I’m going to be entirely honest with you, I’ve spent the last two days begging every real estate agent in a twenty-kilometre radius to find me something, anything.’

  Travis looked out the window at the buzzing factory and clenched his back teeth, frustration fizzing under the surface. He had shit to do.

  ‘Listen, Tim, I feel for you, mate, I really do. I hope you find somewhere for her. But I’ve got a target to meet and I need to get things in order for a shift change.’

  ‘There’s nothing out there,’ Tim spat. ‘I’m desperate.’

  ‘Did you try the hotel?’

  ‘She stayed there last night. It’s not very …’

  ‘It’s a dive,’ Trav said.

  ‘Yes, and it’s not what was agreed upon.’

  ‘Right,’ Trav said, his impatience beginning to balloon. This Tim guy sounded like a good bloke, but the phone call was turning out to be a massive time-waster.

  ‘I’ve been looking at the company records and I see that you live in town.’

  ‘Yes.’ Travis felt the hairs on the back of his neck begin to prickle.

  ‘Do you … is it a house you live in?’

  ‘It is.’ Trav’s tone must’ve given away his suspicion because Kerri looked up from her paperwork, removed her glasses and focused on him.

  ‘I see,’ said Tim. ‘Do you have a family?’

  ‘I have a little girl. Look, I don’t know what you’re getting at here.’

  ‘We’d pay you,’ Tim injected. ‘We’d pay you the full rental allowance. Three hundred dollars a week, that’s more than twelve hundred a month.’

  Travis’s blood stilled. That was a lot of money. He’d long been wanting to open a savings account for Annie, a little kickstart to give her options in life, but he hadn’t been able to get it off the ground. Expenses kept coming up, birthday parties, gas bills, school excursions. It never seemed to end.

  ‘It would be added directly into your pay, and as soon as something more suitable came up …’

  ‘Let me get this straight, Tim. You want me to take my boss in?’

  ‘To allow us to rent a room on her behalf for the short amount of time it’d take us to find an alternative arrangement.’

  Travis paused, shifted his denim-clad butt against the desktop and raised an eyebrow at Kerri’s questioning gaze. ‘See, I have a daughter. I’m a single parent and I just don’t know if it would work for her, having a stranger around. It might feel a little weird for her.’

  ‘I understand,’ Tim said. ‘But it would be a temporary solution, and you’d be very well recompensed for your trouble. I hate to admit it, mate, but you’d be pulling me out of a bind, too.’

  Travis felt for the guy, but he didn’t know him from Adam. If he agreed to the arrangement, it’d be based on what was best for him and Annie. Tim from head office wouldn’t factor into his decision-making.

  ‘How long would we be talking, Tim? If you had to guess.’

  Tim took a moment to answer. ‘That’s a little hard to say. The rental market in the Mason Valley area is quite stagnant at the moment. According the agents I’ve spoken to, there’s not a lot of movement. It could be a few months, a little more maybe.’

  ‘A few months!’

  ‘It could be shorter.’

  ‘Could be longer, too. You just said so,’ Travis countered.

  He took a deep breath. At some point, Kerri must’ve decided the conversation was of no interest to her and she’d returned her attention to her paperwork.

  Travis thought about what it would be like having his pretty blonde boss staying with him. He couldn’t picture it. He couldn’t picture anything much outside the happy little cocoon he’d built with Annie. Living with Dee Lovelace could lead to all kinds of weirdness.

  And yet, the extra money—not for him, but for Annie—would never go astray. In fact, the money would be really good, and maybe Annie would like having a woman around to help her do her hair and other things. He couldn’t think what right then, but he was sure there’d be other things.

  ‘How much did you say again, three hundred?’

  ‘That’s right, three hundred a week, indefinitely.’

  Travis pursed his lips together. ‘And does Ms Lovelace know about the arrangement yet?’

  Tim paused. ‘Er, no. I haven’t broached the subject with her yet. I wanted to get the nod from your end first.’

  Trav didn’t know why, but the thought of her not knowing about the plan made him smile. He imagined her pretty face flushing pink just as it had when they’d all stripped down to their bare torsos earlier. For some reason, imagining that same pretty face in his house made him smile even more.

  ‘You can count me in, Tim.’

  2

  Once in the safety of her office, Dee removed the hard hat, shed the high-vis vest and flopped into her office chair. Her cheeks were still warm, heated by an unappealing cocktail of embarrassment, anger and an unwelcome yet hefty shot of desire.

  The scene she’d just encountered had been like a late eighties Madonna film clip. So many sweaty, partially clad bodies surrounding her, and yet, despite the scene unfolding only moments earlier, there was only one body her memory could discern with any detail. The foreman’s physique, his jaw and blue eyes were etched in her brain. Travis. What an arsehole.

  She looked forlornly at the black monitor of her computer and sighed. She didn’t have access yet. If she did, she’d be searching up the creep’s human resource file to … she didn’t know what. She was pissed at him for making her look stupid and wanted to see what his story was, to use the upper-hand she had by way of her position to … creep in his personnel file?

  What a sad and unprofessional thought. She’d imagined her first day at the factory would be awkward, but so far it’d been awkward, strange and next level embarrassing. The whole scenario had been nightmarishly uncomfortable, not to mention hugely disappointing.

  She would have never gone about things like that at her previous job managing a hotel. She’d been known for her fairness and her ability to work hard while appreciating the work of others. Only five minutes into her new role and she’d managed to put her greatest asset, her workers, offside.

  It really was the foreman’s fault. He should’ve been supportive and understanding of her. He should’ve had her back. Instead, the arsehole had defied her, and not just that, he’d coerced all the other workers to defy her as well.

  Her private loathing-the-foreman session was interrupted by the sound of movement in the office next to hers. It was clear the paper-thin walls would not allow for an ounce of privacy, so she decided to end her loathing session and head into the adjacent office to see who or what was in there.

  She was met with the sight of a trouser-clad bottom waving at her like a lumpy flag. When she cleared her throat, the bottom transformed into a full-sized male human, a smiling specimen who seemed to wink at her, but as she took in the sight of his smooth jaw and brown eyes, she came to see that the wink was innocuous, nothing more than a nervous tick.

  ‘I’m Vince,’ the man said, his smile warm and unwavering. ‘Vince D’Augusti.’ He held out a hand for her to shake and she took it, her mood instantly calmed by the safety of a friendly and welcoming presence.

  ‘Dee Lovelace,’ she responded.

  ‘Yes, I thought as much,’ Vince said, tilting his head to the side and appraising her, though it wasn’t the same judgemental appraisal she’d been given by the workers. It was a perfunctory but warm once-over of her face, not her body. Dee reciprocated, allowing her gaze to roam over his soft, slightly pudgy features.

  ‘I’m your money man, the financial controller,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, great. It’s really good to meet you.’ And it was. Dee had been brought into the factory because she was a known quantity—to the Olsen Corporat
ion, at least. The owner Anders Olsen and his son Christian trusted her, and she’d proven herself to them time and time again. When they’d told her they had a position going at the flailing new business they’d just acquired, she’d jumped at the challenge. But she needed to speak to the numbers man to know exactly how big of a challenge this was going to be. She knew the factory was struggling and that she was here to turn things around, but as to the extent of the problem, she had little clue.

  She cut to the chase. ‘How bad is it?’

  Vince rammed his hands in his pockets and dragged his right shoe against the grain of the cheap, worn carpet. To his credit, he didn’t shift his gaze from hers.

  ‘It’s pretty bad,’ he said. ‘The problem isn’t the factory overheads. They really are quite reasonable. And productivity is good. The workers and systems are top rate and efficient, but it’s the dispatch and transportation that’s killing us. Hauling to the metro areas from way out here.’

  Vince ran a frustrated hand along the back of his neck and Dee’s stomach sank. If it were overheads or productivity that was the problem, there were things she could do to help immediately. She could make cutbacks easy enough, or look at processes on the factory floor to increase efficiency. But transportation? That was not an easy fix. Mason Valley was where it was and no amount of effective management could change the distance between the small town and metropolitan Melbourne.

  ‘Wow,’ she whispered. ‘No one from head office gave me the heads-up about this.’

  Vince laughed nervously. ‘Well they wouldn’t, would they? You might not have come if they had.’

  Vince smiled his warm smile and Dee couldn’t help smiling back. She noticed something spark behind his irises, a hopeful glimmer, perhaps.

  ‘I’m glad you’re here,’ Vince said. ‘The last guy, Gary. He was a bit of an arse.’

  ‘How do you know I’m not an arse, Vince?’ Dee shot back. She shouldn’t have—this guy might turn out to be the only ally she had in this town—but Vince didn’t seem phased. His warm smile remained in place, and Dee considered that his kind, genuine demeanour made him somewhat attractive.

  ‘You don’t seem like an arse. You seem like a smart cookie, and I’m thankful there’s someone here other than me. We don’t have a receptionist, so it’ll just be you and me in the office.’

  Something about the way he spoke told Dee that the prospect of spending his workdays alone with her in the office excited him, or made him happy, maybe both.

  ‘What are your plans for dinner?’ he asked.

  Dee paused. ‘I don’t … I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘But in all honesty, I just want to get through today, get the address for my rental and get settled. I arrived last night and stayed at the hotel.’

  Vince screwed up his nose, an expression of knowing sympathy. ‘Yikes, that place is a dump.’

  Dee tried to remember the last time she’d heard a grown man use the term “yikes”. It was kind of cute.

  ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘My car is still loaded up, too. What I really need is to have a hot shower, unpack, go to bed and get ready for tomorrow.’

  Sharing her plans with Vince may have been a little forward given that they’d only met moments earlier, but she felt comfortable enough with him, and as he’d said, they were going to be working together, just the two of them. There was nothing like opening up to create a bond.

  Vince nodded. ‘Okay well, let me know if you need a hand. I don’t have kids or a partner.’ He mentioned it so pointedly, Dee almost laughed. ‘So, if you need some help, I’ll be free. Here’—he pulled a business card from his pocket and handed it to her. ‘You need me, give me a call. Until then, maybe see if you can get onto head office so that you can get computer access, and afterwards I’ll go through some of the spreadsheets with you.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Dee said, adding a grateful smile. She was genuinely pleased to have someone on her side, even if she did feel slightly uneasy about Vince sending vibes that were more than platonic.

  ‘I’ll let you know when I’m on the system,’ she said before heading back to her office.

  It took twenty minutes or so to get through the process of gaining access to the system. Once she was ready to go, she asked the IT expert to put her through to HR.

  ‘Tim speaking.’

  ‘Yes, hello, Tim. This is Dee Lovelace. I’m the new general manager at Olsen Paper in Mason Valley.’

  There was silence, a silence that made Dee frown. ‘Tim?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Hello, Tim. As I was saying, I’m the new manager in Mason Valley. I’d like to get the address of my rental and the name of the real estate agent, so I can pick up the key. I did email you guys about it last week, but you must’ve been busy.’

  ‘Yes,’ Tim said hurriedly. ‘We’ve been very busy.’

  Something about his tone made Dee nervous. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Well, can I grab those details from you now?’

  ‘Yes!’ Tim’s voice went up an octave. ‘There’s just some other, finer details I need to share with you first.’

  Dee shifted in her seat. ‘I see, and what are those details?’

  ‘Er, well, finding a rental for you has proven to be quite difficult.’

  ‘I’m not staying at the hotel.’ She knew she sounded like a snob, but the thought of spending another night in that dirty, seedy Petri dish of a place made her skin crawl. She’d rather sleep in her car.

  ‘No, no,’ Tim said. ‘Not the hotel. I have found a place to rent, but I’m afraid, given the stagnant nature of the rental market in the area, we were not able to secure you a property of your own.’

  ‘I have to share?’ Dee shrieked. She pressed her thumb and index finger to the bridge of her nose. She wasn’t opposed to the whole share house thing, but she’d lived on her own since the age of twenty-five. That made for fifteen years of habitual, blissful aloneness, and she didn’t know if she could deal with the stress of starting a new job and learning to share with another woman at the same time. What if her flatmate was dirty, or worse, a clean freak? Day one of her new life was proving to be an even greater challenge than she’d anticipated.

  ‘That wasn’t what I was promised.’

  ‘I realise that,’ Tim replied. ‘But it’s the best we can do at this point in time. The person you’re sharing with is a single parent, so you can be assured of a house that keeps reasonable hours.’

  Dee groaned. ‘How old is the child?’ Not only would she need to share with someone, she’d also need to contend with a screaming child at all hours of the day and night.

  ‘I’m not too sure,’ Tim said. ‘Not a baby and not a teenager, I think.’

  Dee sighed. ‘So how long am I staying there?’

  ‘Not long,’ Tim said cheerily. ‘A few months.’

  ‘A few months! Oh no. No, no. It will not be a few months. It’ll be a much, much shorter time than that.’

  ‘We will look for other options but—’

  ‘But nothing,’ Dee snapped. ‘Listen, Tim, you sound like a nice enough guy, but from today, your main priority really needs to be finding me somewhere to live. My own place. Got it?’

  ‘Sure, I’m on it!’ Tim said brightly.

  Dee rolled her eyes. This Tim bloke had no idea about the world of pain he’d be in if he didn’t come through with the goods.

  ‘Email me the address,’ she said eventually.

  When she’d hung up, she leaned back in her chair and looked out the window. The vista was so pallid, so industrial and suburban and uninspiring, that Dee decided she’d rather look at the wall. So she did. She looked at the wall. On it hung a wide-angled, black-framed print showcasing the Grand Canyon. Beneath the photo, in bold, gold print was the word PERSERVERANCE.

  Dee’s eyes stung as tears threatened. Her career was important to her, the most important element of her life, and this job was her sole reason for being here in Mason Valley. Coming here to run the factory was the right move for her career. It w
as a stepping stone, the next rung on the ladder, but Dee couldn’t help wondering, if that were true, why did it all feel so wrong?

  3

  At the end of the day, Dee was thankful for the refuge of her hatchback. She hadn’t quite prepared herself for how huge the challenge of running the factory would be.

  She’d spent all afternoon going through the figures with Vince, and things were not good, not good at all. But, she was determined to make the most of it, to do what she could to ensure the place kept running. She needed to think of what the success of a large employer like Olsen Paper would mean to a small community like Mason Valley and the families who lived and worked here.

  The experience of driving through the township did nothing to ease the pressure. This place was a far cry from the boutique-style quaintness of her hometown of Blaxland Falls. The main street featured a few decrepit looking shops, a petrol station that doubled as a vet clinic, and a singular restaurant bearing the appalling but possibly appropriate name of Tammy’s Tops Tucker.

  ‘What on earth was I thinking?’ Dee whispered as her gaze floated over the miserable scene. A few people wandered about, and like the setting, they looked sad, unloved and as though they hadn’t bothered to keep with the times.

  Google Maps told her she needed to turn right up ahead and that she was only a minute from her destination. One minute away from a sharing a house with a stranger. Cold fingers of anxiety walked her spine and she shivered with nervous excitement. The situation was less than ideal, but sharing with a single mum shouldn’t be too bad. After all, Dee’s best friend was a single mother, and Dee had nothing but respect and admiration for these women who, quite frankly, made what she did for a living look like a cakewalk.

  She pulled into the driveway of 30 Leigh Road and was met with the sight of a neat, but rather soulless, nineteen-seventies brick veneer house. She turned the engine off.

  ‘Damn,’ she whispered.

  She should’ve thought to bring something for the mother or the child. She should’ve stopped and bought food or a toy or … something. It felt wrong to walk into this woman’s house, to stay here indefinitely, without something to offer.