She had no idea what she should be doing under such circumstances, but found the idea of a hot shower appealing. The pain had subsided to a dull ache and she was keen to clean herself up. She cursed when she remembered that she hadn’t bought any sanitary napkins with her. She had been so confident that she wouldn’t need them that she hadn’t even bothered to pack any. She pulled the curtain aside from under the sink, hopeful that she would find some left behind from a previous visit. To her relief, she found three. She doubted it would be enough to last the night, but it would have to do. Tomorrow, she would drive into Morisset to get some more. With a bit of luck something would be open; otherwise she’d have to drive all the way into Toronto.
Maggie turned on the taps and waited for the hot water system to dribble into action. She removed her clothes, carefully stepped over the edge of the bath, and pulled the shower curtain across. So much for instantaneous hot water, she thought, it’s barely warm. She didn’t mind, it felt nice on her clammy skin. She looked down, the water streamed down her body, flowing off a bright red. After a short time, the water became light pink, before finally running clear. Maggie stood under the shower shivering, not from the cold; her skin was still hot to touch, but from the shock of everything. First Peter and Jane, then this. It was more than she could cope with.
She felt the sobs rack her body. Sitting in the bath hugging her knees, she gave in to her tears. What had she done to deserve this? She asked. She couldn’t believe that after more than ten years of trying for a child, it would end this way. It was the ultimate cruelty, especially when she considered what had taken place before it. She tried to block what she’d overheard from her mind, without success. Instead, Jane’s words replayed in her head, over and over, until she wanted to scream. She didn’t scream though, what was the point? The words would still be there to taunt her once the noise had stopped.
“Peter, you bastard, you fucking bastard, how could you do this to me?” she sobbed instead. “All I ever did was love you, and this is how you repay me?” Maggie buried her head in her hands and cried. She cried for the betrayal Peter had bestowed upon her and she cried for the child she so desperately wanted, now gone. Then she cried for the unfairness of it all.
When she was done crying, her skin had pruned up and her eyes stung. She knew she couldn’t stay under the shower all night and willed herself to get up. She had to keep it together; she couldn’t go to pieces, what would happen then? She would collapse in a screaming heap and rot there, that’s what. God knows it was a tempting thought. She figured that it had to hurt less than what she was going through.
She turned the water off and climbed out of the bath. She took a clean towel off the shelf and gave it a shake to make sure that no creepy crawlies had moved in during her absence. She dried herself vigorously before wrapping the towel around her and going back out to the car to get her things. She dragged the suitcase out of the boot and leaving the rest of the stuff behind, went back inside to get dressed. As she re-entered the house, she noticed that the day was getting late. Her tummy confirmed the late hour with a defiant growl. Maggie dropped her suitcase in the lounge room, careful not to place it in the puddle of blood, took out a cotton shift and slipped it over her slim body. By the time she got around to putting on her underwear, a thin trail of blood had reappeared on the inside of her thigh. With a heavy heart, Maggie cleaned it up with a handkerchief from her handbag and finished dressing.
Now fully clothed, Maggie grabbed a rag from under the sink and mopped up the mess she had left on the floor. She felt lost. She still had a tummy ache, but it was now no worse than a bad bout of period pain. She should make something to eat, she thought, despite not having an appetite; it was bound to make her feel better. She gave the floor a final wipe and threw the rag in the sink. She opened the pantry door and pulled on the light cord. The inside of the cupboard lit up from top shelf to bottom. Unfortunately, so much light was not required; the contents of the cupboard could be counted on both hands. There were two tins of Heinz baked beans, half a canister of split peas, a jar of honey – the top half of which had crystallised, an almost empty jar of Vegemite, two cans of Campbell’s condensed soup, and a tin of Spam.
Maggie growled at the sorry collection of unappetising foodstuffs. She usually stocked up on groceries before she arrived, but in her haste to get away she had forgotten to pack food. She looked in the kitchen cupboard in the hope of finding something better on offer. Apart from some bicarb soda and tea bags, the cupboard was bare. “Oh well, I guess its soup for tea,” she said out loud.
She busied herself preparing the soup, while she waited for the kettle to boil. The soup started to bubble at the same time as the kettle began to whistle, so she turned the hotplate down and let the soup simmer on the stovetop while she made a cup of tea. She normally had milk in her tea, but today she would have to drink it black. She took the cup of tea out onto the back veranda, put it on the coffee table and came back for the soup. She remembered the bundle of newspapers she had saved for the trip and went back out to the car to get them. This time she brought an armful of stuff back in with her, but instead of unpacking them straight away like she normally would have, she dumped the lot on the floor and took her newspapers and soup outside with her.
She dusted off her favourite chair and sat down with a weighty sigh. “Shit!” she swore, “I forgot my smokes.” She got back up and retrieved her cigarettes from her handbag before sitting back down again. This time, Maggie took the time to notice her surroundings.
It was still light, but not for much longer. The back veranda was enclosed with fly screen, which was difficult to see through. It didn’t matter. Maggie knew the landscape well enough to make out the familiar scene in the waning daylight. She could just see where the back yard dipped down in the far right hand corner and the Watagan Forest came up to greet it. She could also see the gap in the trees where the walking trailed started, but couldn’t make out much beyond that.
The yard was not like any normal yard, well at least not like any found in Newtown. The cottage was situated on about ten acres, most of which was dense with trees. The cottage itself sat on the only cleared patch of land on the whole property. The cleared area was mostly covered in long grass. Peter tried to keep a small section mowed at the front and back of the house, however, given the time that had transpired since he’d last been there, it had grown long also, making it difficult to tell the cleared section from the rest of the property. There were a number of wattle trees down the back yard, which gave off a remarkable scent. Maggie took the time to savour their rich aroma before lighting her cigarette. As she inhaled deeply through her nose, the competing scent of the gardenias, which were planted either side of the front steps crept in.
The water tank obscured her view to the left. Beside it, Maggie could just make out the roof of the toilet. The small out house was overgrown with choko vines, making it look like more like a green cave than a building. Only the wooden door that hung lopsided on the front showed it for what it was. When Maggie’s mum had owned the place, it had housed a pan toilet. The kids had whinged and whined so much about having to use it – not to mention its god-awful smell – that Peter had a septic tank installed and a transpiration area built in the back of the yard, so that the contents of the toilet no longer needed to be pumped out.
It was obvious where the transpiration area was; the grass grew much greener and thicker there than anywhere else on the property. Peter and Maggie had planted some fruit trees when they had first put the septic in; they were doing beautifully now, almost four years on.
A Magpie flew down and perched on the edge of the veranda railing. It stood looking through the fly screen, casually observing Maggie. Her presence didn’t frighten it, on the contrary, it made a series of twitters and squawks in a manner that suggested it felt it was communicating with her. “Hello there,” said Maggie, obviously feeling the same way. The Magpie cocked its head and stared at her. After a short time, it
took flight. Despite her misery, Maggie felt her spirits rise a little, almost as though they were connected via some invisible chord to the black and white bird.
The Magpie was out of view sooner than Maggie had hoped. No doubt it would be back again, she thought. They always came back. Each season they would return with their offspring to feed from the abundance of insects that shared the property with Maggie and her family. Sometimes she would feed them slices of devon, often straight from her hand. She felt that their bad reputation for pecking at peoples’ heads was unfounded. In the years she’d been coming to the cottage neither herself nor Peter, or the kids, had been attacked by a Magpie. It seemed that each new generation of birds, seeing that their parents trusted this family of humans, were happy to exchange the pecking of heads for a little bit of company and a couple of slices of meat.
Maggie got up and turned the back veranda light on. As soon as she did so, the view beyond the fly screen disappeared and the wide-open space shrank around her. Resigned to sit and read for a while, she curled her feet up under her bottom and reached over and grabbed the pile of newspapers from the coffee table beside her. The newspapers were out of date, but she couldn’t have cared less. She had saved all the ones that she had not had the chance to read over the past couple of weeks and put them in a box knowing that she would have plenty of opportunity to flick through them once she was on holidays.
The first one she picked up had quite a large article about Texas oil trouble-shooter Paul ‘Red’ Adair. The wireless had already told her all she needed to know about the massive fires on Esso’s gas and oil platform off Lakes Entrance, and some. Maggie discarded the paper and selected another one. She flicked through the second paper until a small article about Rosaleen Norton caught her eye. My God, thought Maggie, are they still harassing that poor woman? She recalled the fantastic stories her Aunt Bea told about her friend Roie, or the Witch of King’s Cross, as she was more commonly referred to.
That had been before her and Peter had met. At the time, the woman was causing an absolute scandal with her artwork – most of which contained images of devil worship – and her dealings with the occult. Unlike most people, Maggie had been absolutely enthralled with her work, especially the mural that Bea had taken her to see in the coffee shop in King’s Cross. Maggie admired a woman who dared to be different. She believed it took a lot of courage to live the life of Rosaleen Norton. Maggie had even made a half-hearted attempt to follow her progress over the years, but it had been ages since she had come across anything in the papers and had assumed that the woman must have finally been left in peace.
The article was small and had nothing noteworthy to say. Already bored with the newspapers, Maggie picked up a couple of Tharunka magazines. Peter often bought the student magazines home from work for Maggie to read. She believed that the work of the students was far more interesting, and of a higher quality, than anything she came across in the newspapers. The caption “Engineers have big balls” caught Maggie’s attention and she smiled. The advertisement was referring to the then upcoming recovery and champagne balls held by the Undergraduate Society of Engineers. Okay, she conceded, so not everything they wrote was intelligent and profound, but she had to admire their guts. She could only imagine the stir a caption like that would have caused had it appeared in Altjiringa, the student publication from her college days.
She spent ten minutes or so browsing the pages of the magazine. She skimmed a number of articles about student protests and anti-Vietnam marches, and others about conscription, the pill, and abortion reform. She was not surprised by the controversial subject matter. She had long learned that nothing was sacred in the pages of Tharunka. She was pleased to see that she’d even heard of a couple of the bands mentioned. Ellis D Fogg for example, and Mike Furber; apparently the only major solo pop artist in the country, or so the author claimed. Melbourne outfit the Party Machine was another band she’d heard of, albeit all names she’d only ever heard from Stephen. She even saw a number of job advertisements for graduate engineers and wondered if Jane had applied for any of them.
Jane was the last thing Maggie wanted to be thinking about, so she put the magazine down. She preferred not to think about anything, if truth were told. She considered looking to see if there was any weed in the house and rolling a joint, but quickly dismissed the idea from her mind. It would certainly be an effective way to mask the pain in her stomach, but it was guaranteed to make her think about things more intensely than usual and that was the last thing she needed right now. What she needed, she decided, was to curl up in bed with a book. Even though it was way too early for bed, and she didn’t really feel like reading, she was bone tired. She knew that a book would knock her out as effectively as any drug. At least with a book, she might just manage to keep her mind off things long enough to drift off to sleep. And hopefully, by morning, she would be in a better frame of mind to consider what the hell she should do about the mess she’d landed in.
Chapter 50
Monday, 31 December 1979
Dad wasn’t wrong when he said half the street would be at the Unwin’s. I reckon there must’ve been at least thirty people crammed in, all told. That’s not counting the kids that were off playing somewhere. The adults appeared satisfied to sit around nursing their drinks and smoking cigarettes. The radio played loudly in the background making it hard to hear, so there wasn’t too much conversation taking place. Whenever a song came on that everyone knew, and even some they didn’t, they all sang along. Tom and I came to get some food and drink to take back to the cubby. The others said they’d wait for us there. We told them we’d try and sneak back a whole bottle of Fanta and a packet of chips.
It turned out to be much easier than we thought. Mr Unwin had set up a big drum in the back yard, which he’d packed full of ice. Just about everyone that came bought a carton of beer, a cask of wine and some fizzy drink. All the drinks got piled into the drum together. It didn’t really matter that they got mixed up, that’s just the way it worked. The Unwins also asked everyone to bring their own chair because they didn’t have enough of them to seat everyone. I suppose it’s fair to say that they weren’t really throwing a party; they were just providing a place for everyone to have a party. Everyone even bought lots of food. It was mostly party stuff like Jatz and cheese or chips and Cheezels. There were still at least eight packets of chips and a couple of boxes of Cheezels unopened on the table. I grabbed a handful of peanuts from the bowl and poured them into my mouth.
The parents were taking no notice of us. I went over to say hello to Mum and Dad and to let them know that we were going back to the cubby. I figured if they knew where we were, they were less likely to come looking for us. “Here’s Blondie,” said Dad loudly. “What are you up to this fine evening?”
Mum rolled her eyes at Dad. “Dan, will you keep your voice down please.” Obviously, Mum had drunk much less than Dad.
“We’re just getting a drink and then going back to the cubby, would you like me to get you one before I go?” I asked.
“That would be lovely, thanks,” he whispered.
Mum laughed and handed me her glass. “Here you go, fill me up.”
Somebody had arranged the casks of wine in a straight line across the front of the table so that the glasses could fit under the taps without having to lift the casks up. “Which one?” I asked.
“Any of the moselles on offer will do.”
Paper Lace came on the radio. Mrs Preston poked her husband. “Here’s your song, Bill.” I filled Mum’s glass with wine and got Dad a beer from the drum. I looked around to see if anyone was watching and snuck another can of beer into the waistband of my shorts. It was cold and wet on my back and despite the muggy weather it gave me goose bumps. Hopefully, no one would see it tucked under my shirt. Tom put a bottle of Fanta and a box of Cheezels in a bag that had been left lying around and walked up the driveway to wait for me.
“What time is it?” I asked Dad. He held up his wrist
and put it close to his face. “Here,” said Mum, grabbing his arm and pulling it towards her, “It’s nine thirty-eight.” She dropped his arm, which he let fall limply onto his lap, almost spilling his beer. He was too distracted by the song to take any notice. The chorus came on and everyone sang along. “Billy, don't be a hero, don’t be a fool with your life.” Mrs Preston leaned across and pretended to hold a microphone in front of Mr Preston’s face, while she sang the words to the song. “Billy, don't be a hero, come back and make me your wife.”
I walked past Brian and Ian Preston, who were hiding under the house. “Who’s that walking across my bridge?” growled Brian. He must have thought he sounded menacing, but he didn’t. He still managed to make me jump though, and I had to reach around so that the can of beer didn’t fall through the leg of my shorts. I pretended to kick them as I walked past. “As if I didn’t know you were there.” I said, with one hand behind my back. “Get real.”
I walked backwards towards Tom. As I got closer, I lifted up my top to reveal the can of beer tucked under the waistband. “Unreal, where did you get that?” He slid the can out, deliberately flicking me with the elastic of my shorts.
I whispered in case Brian could hear us. “Out of the drum, when I was getting Dad’s beer. Everyone was too drunk to notice, so I just grabbed it.”
“We’re not sharing it with the others, are we?” he asked quietly.
Summer Page 38
