Food for Love

by C. Fonseca

  Leaning against the doorframe, Jess winced as pain shot through her leg. She hadn’t fully adjusted to the time difference or the stresses of the long-haul flight. She bent and stretched her left knee a few times to relieve her tight muscles. The local roads looked steep enough to provide a moderate workout and put her new carbon-frame bicycle to the test.

  A bird’s harsh screech and a flash of blue and red drew Jess’s attention skywards. Exuberant child’s laughter followed, punctuated by a high-pitched squeal. Jess turned towards the sound as the little girl skipped along the deck next to her.

  “Good morning, Ru.”

  Ru waved her arms and pointed to the brightly coloured birds. “Look, look,” she yelled.

  “Yes, I see them. Are they king parrots?”

  “No, Jess. It’s rosellas.” Ru tugged excitedly at the hem of Jess’s shorts. “They have blue cheeks.”

  “I always did get them confused,” Jess said, staring at her for a moment. “Are you out here alone?”

  “Cussik-cussik. Cussik-cussik,” Ru cried out, imitating the rosellas. She shook her head, seemed to contemplate her answer, and scrunched her nose. “I am allowed out on the deck by myself but no further. Mama said so.”

  “Okay, good to know. Where is your mother?” Jess sat down on the step, and Ru joined her.

  Ru bit her bottom lip and pointed to the other end of the house. “My mama is still asleep. I tried to wake her. She opened one eye, said ‘ten more minutes, please’, and fell asleep again.” She jabbed at the symbol printed on the front of Jess’s T-shirt. “What is this?”

  Oh. The Un-Chained T-shirt she’d slept in. “That’s a bicycle wheel.”

  “I want a bicycle.” She reached over to trace the surgical scar on Jess’s left knee and gently prodded the two incision marks on either side of the slightly raised skin. “Does it hurt?”

  Jess flinched at the unexpected touch. She gazed into Ru’s concerned eyes and shook her head. “They don’t hurt anymore.”

  Ru kissed her palm and pressed her damp hand to Jess’s scarred knee. “Poor Jess.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m okay.” She took Ru’s hand in her own and squeezed.

  Ru sat pressed close against Jess’s side, and together they watched flocks of rosellas and galahs diving, making spirals, and swooping through the treetops.

  Ru toyed with a delicate chain around her neck, and sunlight glistened on the polished surface. A small heart-shaped pendant hung on the chain, partially obscured by Ru’s pyjama top.

  One glimpse of it, and Jess froze. It looked exactly like the blue filigree heart that had always hung from her mother’s neck and she’d played with as a child. She reached out and brushed the locket with her finger. The silver was slightly tarnished, but the turquoise face was smooth and still in incredibly good condition. And it was definitely her mother’s.

  Jess had always assumed the precious locket had been buried with her. But then, she’d been too young when her mother died to be included in on those sorts of questions, she supposed. Someone must have given it to Ben when she died. But who?

  “Jess?”

  She felt a gentle tug on her arm, and only then did it register that she’d grasped onto the locket so tightly, she was pulling Ru towards her.

  “I’m sorry.” Jess loosened her grip and turned over the small piece of jewellery. The Sanskrit symbol of Vajra was etched into the silver, just as she remembered. “Where did you get this, Ru?” she asked.

  “Mama gave it to me. It was a special present from Ben after he went to heaven.” Ru’s eyelids half-closed. “It was in an envelope with my name on it.” She sighed and eased the locket out of Jess’s hold. “Mama cried a lot when she put it around my neck. It’s mine, Jess. The envelope said, Aruishi Helen McAllister.”

  “Is that your name? Aruishi?” She clenched her fist so tightly, her nails dug into the palm of her hand.

  “Yes. That’s why I got the envelope with the locket.” Ru placed her hand over the pendant, as though to protect it.

  Jess stared wide-eyed at Ru—Aruishi—for several seconds. Her dark hair, dimples, and big brown eyes. And that smile. How had she failed to notice the resemblance to her own mother? And Ben? God, now that she thought about it, Aruishi was so much like her brother as a child.

  “Aruishi, can I please have a closer look at your locket?”

  “Sure.” Aruishi lifted it over her head and handed it to Jess. “You look funny.”

  “I just want to check…” Jess slowly unclasped the tiny catch to reveal a small black-and-white photograph of her mother, Aruishi Annand Harris. The other side of the locket held a faded snapshot of two children. She stared at the miniature portrait of a boy with his arm protectively around his young sister. Ben and Jess.

  Jess took a slow, drawn breath, closed the locket, and placed it around Aruishi’s neck. She carefully tucked it back and patted her pyjama top.

  “Why are you sad?” Aruishi reached out and touched Jess’s face.

  “Ru, where are you?”

  Aruishi turned her head towards her mother’s call.

  “Could you come inside now? Please?” Lili’s voice was stern.

  “It’s Mama.” Aruishi tugged on Jess’s arm. “She will make you better. She gives great hugs.”

  “Aruishi, I’m waiting…” This time her voice was louder. Insistent.

  “You’d better go inside,” Jess urged.

  Aruishi kicked the wooden step with the toe of her red slipper.

  “Go on, your mother wants you.” Jess gave her a gentle push, and Aruishi ran inside.

  She closed her eyes. Why had no one told her Ben had a child? Why had Ben never told her? She had a niece. She was an aunt.

  Several moments later, Jess stood under the shower, gripped the tap, and increased the heat until the room filled with steam. He should have told me. He should have.

  All right, she’d been making excuses, refusing to meet up with Ben for nearly twenty years, except for that one occasion in Spain, when he’d turned up unannounced. She’d kept him at a physical and emotional distance all that time. And you think that you deserved for him to tell you? Now she had lost her chance to reconcile with him. Forever.

  Jess flinched at the burn on her skin and turned the tap to cold, her mind stuck replaying a loop of that last day in Melbourne in 2000. The departure gate at Tullamarine Airport. Her father pulling on her arm to board the plane to England, pulling her along like one of his suitcases as Ben watched through the glass security gate. Her muscle memory still felt the gut-wrenching emotional pain from that day when she and her father had turned the corner of the aerobridge and Ben vanished from her sight.

  Unlike Jess, who had had no choice, Ben had chosen to stay in Australia after their mother’s death. How could he have picked his chef’s apprenticeship over her? Who left his baby sister, not even a teenager, to fend for herself in a new country, especially without her mother?

  Seeing the locket again after all this time released a flood of traumatic memories, ones she really didn’t need now that she had this news to deal with: he had named his daughter after their mother, for God’s sake, and he had never told Jess about it.

  A flash of ice-cold water jolted her, and she jumped out from under the spray, shutting off the taps altogether. She stared at the tile wall and it hit her: she’d thought her entire family was gone.

  Now there was Aruishi.

  Aruishi sprinkled her porridge with chopped dates and cashews, and stirred the mixture roughly with a circular motion, while she sang at the top of her voice.

  “I love your singing, but we have a visitor. Jess was really tired, and we should let her sleep for as long as possible.” Lili planted a kiss on Aruishi’s forehead. “Sing quietly, please.”

  “Jess is already awake,” Aruishi whispered, adding a few slices of banana to
her bowl.

  “Oh? And how do you know that?” She placed her hands on her hips. “You didn’t wake her, did you?” Lili lifted Aruishi’s chin until she held her gaze. “Did you disturb her?”

  She shook her head. “No, Mama, I promise. She was already awake. We watched the birds on the deck.”

  “When?”

  “Earlier.” Aruishi squeezed her eyes shut in an almost wink and scooped a heaped spoon of porridge into her mouth.

  “Okay,” Lili said. She hadn’t seen Jess on the deck earlier.

  “Mama?”

  “Yes, sweetie?”

  “Jess is sad.”

  Lili squatted down beside her daughter. “Yeah, she is. Did Jess say something to you?”

  Aruishi brought her shoulders up to her ears in an exaggerated shrug. “I showed her my heart, and then she looked really sad.” She pulled the silver locket from inside her T-shirt and held it out to Lili. “Why did it make her sad? Does Jess know Ben’s not coming back?” She stared at Lili, her eyes wide.

  “Yes, baby, she does know.” Lili tugged at her ear. And she’s just found out she has a niece. Why had Lili been so dense? She should have realised last night that Jess hadn’t a clue. Ben hadn’t told her. She should have put the locket away until she had a chance to tell her.

  “I miss Ben.”

  Lili blinked back her tears and tugged Aruishi into her arms. “I miss him too.”

  Aruishi held on to her. “You need to give her one of your special hugs, Mama.”

  “Maybe later.” Lili tightened their embrace. She considered Aruishi’s suggestion that sorrow could be resolved with a simple hug. If only things worked that easily. She could no more imagine hugging Jess than drinking a cup of cold instant coffee. But Aruishi was right: Jess really did need a hug.

  Lili lingered outside the guest bedroom door. She took a deep breath and raised her hand, ready to knock. Should she wait for Jess to come out of her room? No, she had to do it now. She knocked firmly.

  “Jess,” she called. She waited for an answer, then knocked again. “Jessica…can I come in, please?” She turned the handle and stepped inside. The room was ultra-tidy, the bed immaculately made. The only indication that Jess had been in the room at all was the clothes she’d borrowed, neatly folded on the dresser.

  Lili walked onto the balcony and closed the sliding door, leaped off the deck, and headed for the north paddock that led down to the beach. She strode the quarter kilometre across the field, taking a chance that she’d find Jess near the water. Visitors to the farm found it hard to resist the gently undulating slope that led to the water’s edge.

  When she arrived at the boundary gate, Lili checked to the left, where five hundred metres along, the creek flowed through a narrow lagoon and crossed the sand. No sign of Jess; just a few pied oystercatchers digging for treasure amongst the reeds. She walked back along the wire fence and searched right, towards the wooden jetty.

  Lili spotted Jess, striding along the beach. Even from this distance, she noticed her lean, wiry figure and the way she moved with the confidence and lightness of the athlete that she was.

  As if sensing she wasn’t alone, Jess looked up, clearly surprised to see Lili, and she raised her arm.

  Lili waved back. Dreading the conversation she knew they had to have, she held the metal gate open and waited for Jess to pass through.

  Before she had time to fasten the gate, Jess turned sharply and glared at her. Her lips were clamped together in a thin line, and her eyes flashed.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked in a slow, measured tone. “About you and my brother’s relationship? You had his child.” Jess leaned towards Lili intimidatingly, her arms crossed tightly in front of her chest.

  “Whoa…hang on—” Lili held her hands up.

  “Are you going to stand there and deny that Aruishi is Ben’s child?” Jess demanded. “Aruishi?”

  “Hold on. Just give me a chance to explain.”

  Jess scowled at her. “Were you and my brother in a relationship?”

  “No.”

  She looked startled and took a step back. “So, you’re denying she’s Ben’s child?”

  “No. Yes, Aruishi is Ben’s child.”

  “Make up your mind.”

  “Look, it’s not what you think.”

  “Not what I think? I don’t know what to think.”

  Lili leaned heavily on the gate. “What is your problem?” She pointed a finger at Jess and said, “You know what? It’s not my fault you were estranged from your brother—”

  “She’s four years old, and I didn’t even know she existed,” Jess snarled.

  Lili blinked and lowered her gaze. “It’s not my fault. You don’t understand,” she said through clenched teeth.

  “I feel like a total fool. Why didn’t your parents tell me yesterday? I mean, they introduced me to your daughter and didn’t bother to tell me. Does she know who I am?”

  Lili looked out over the bay. “She does know Ben has a sister. She just hasn’t put two and two together—she is only four.”

  “You could have told her who I was when I arrived.”

  “I can understand that you’re upset, but how could we have known Ben hadn’t told you? I’m so sorry you didn’t know.” She kept her voice low. “Look, I’m not prepared to stand out here and have you yell at me. We can discuss it back at the house. Helen is with Ru now and taking her to play group in around fifteen minutes. We’ll have the place to ourselves.”

  Jess nodded stiffly and moved alongside her.

  Lili held up her hand. “I’ll go ahead,” she said. “Meet me in half an hour.”

  How was it possible that Jess’s life had tilted off its axis so spectacularly? The crash. Her injuries. The danger of losing her career. Her brother’s death. And now this.

  She closed her eyes as a gust of wind blew sand in her face. “Damn it.” She never let anyone see her cry.

  The earth seemed to mock her. Sunlight glistened on the tranquil water, and the fragrance of the fresh grass under her feet taunted her with memories of her childhood and happier times. She dusted herself off and headed back along the shale path to the house.

  Ten minutes later, Jess stood on the deck outside her room and stared at her reflection in the window. There were dark circles under her eyes, and her windswept hair resembled a bird’s nest. She wanted to return home. For the sake of speed and simplicity, she should let Lili set the terms for repayment of the money owed to Ben’s estate and get the hell out of here. But now she had a niece. What was she supposed to do with that information?

  Jess leaned over the basin and splashed water on her face. She traced her finger along the thin line near her collarbone, then bent down to touch the incision marks and scarring from her knee surgery. The doctors had assured her the scars would fade in time.

  She pulled up the hem of her running shorts and brushed her palm across the small marks along the top of her thigh. The cuts were marginally raised and only barely visible. She hadn’t cut herself for a very long time, having found refuge in her sport and music. Her life had changed, and she’d come away from that dark, lonely pain—but Jess knew her triggers and acknowledged she was heading for a roller-coaster ride that in the past would unquestionably have tested her mettle.

  Jess brushed out the tangles and tossed her hair over her shoulder. When she’d first arrived in England, her hair had been so long that it had touched her lower back. Her mother had always liked it that way. But on her own, it had been hard to look after and impossible to make into the two braids her mother had woven so deftly for her every morning.

  On the last day of school, before she was to return to her father’s home in London, Jess had caught the bus to the town barber and got it chopped off—super short. She’d read about the Hindu ritual mundana, and even though she wasn’t a newbor
n and she wasn’t Hindu, she’d wanted her hair to be shorn to signify that religious ceremony—freedom from the past and moving into the future. Eventually, it had grown back with a slight crimp, and it now rippled below her shoulders. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and glanced into the mirror again. Composed. Calm. Collected. Years of practice at keeping her feelings hidden allowed her to mask her emotions. It was time to face Lili.

  From the door of the light-filled office, Jess watched Lili hold a pencil between her perfect white teeth. She gazed through the window, her shoulders slumped, as if she carried an enormous weight upon them. She wore a coat of vulnerability at that moment—contradicting the resilience and toughness Jess imagined it took to run a successful business. What could Jess anticipate from this woman?

  Lili spun around in the chair. “I really do wish you’d stop doing that.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Lili’s china-blue gaze bore into her. “That is the second time you’ve crept up on me.” She pointed to the empty chair across the desk, and Jess sat.

  “I regret what I said before. I had no right to make accusations.” Jess crossed her legs, sat upright in her chair.

  “And I am so sorry you didn’t know about Aruishi.”

  “Ben never told me he had a child,” she said. “After our father’s death from a heart attack six years ago, we should have grown closer; we were all the family we had. But that didn’t happen. And none of that was your fault. I’m sorry too.” She tucked her hands under her thighs. “Had you separated from each other?”

  “What?” Lili squinted and tilted her head to one side.

  “You weren’t travelling with Ben when he died. And he had a girlfriend, the one who died in the accident with him.”

  Lili stood up and paced the floor. “Ben and I were very good friends, but we were never together. We loved each other like family, but we were never lovers.”