by Vera Loy
Beach Apples
by
Vera Loy
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All rights reserved by the author, Vera Loy, any unauthorized distribution or selling of this ebook constitutes as an infringement of copyright.
Copyright © 2015 Vera Loy
This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to Aarathi Prakasen and Magali for your help with editing.
Any mistakes are, of course, my own.
Dedicated to Demelza, Elena, Nika Yaya
and all my friends at the UWSC, without whom many of these stories would never have been written.
Contents
Introduction
Love at First Sight
The Present
Fire Sticks
Refugee
Marvellous Matilda
Dancing Robber
A Werewolf Ate My Teacher
Introduction
Beach Apples are native South Australian berries which grow in the sandhills by the beach on running ground cover. They are often called “Muntries,” based on the aboriginal word for the fruit, from the Kaurna and Ngarrinderi peoples. They taste like apples and are high in anti-oxidants. All the stories in this collection have an Australian flavour.
Love at First Sight
Lachlan Wentworth didn’t believe in love at first sight. Attraction? Certainly. But not love, not the big “L.” He firmly believed you had to know a person before you could possibly fall in love with them. What if the person you fancied turned out to be a mass murderer? Okay, that was a bit extreme, but what if they were a bigot or a racist? Hated dogs? The attraction would quickly fade.
He stopped for a moment while Bob, his half-breed Australian blue heeler, completed his business on a small pile of seaweed. He picked it up neatly in the plastic bag he was carrying specifically for that purpose and tied it off. Bob was already pulling ahead, ears pricked, eager to get to the next exciting scent on the beach. Lachlan came down every Sunday morning to give Bob a long walk on the beach; if there weren’t too many other people about, sometimes he would let him off the leash so he could have a swim. Bob loved the water. Unfortunately, he also loved to nip at ankles‒part of his heritage as a cattle-dog‒so that usually meant Lachlan had to keep him on the leash. Dogs were allowed to run free before 10 am, but only if they were under control.
Unfortunately for Bob, today was a lovely sunny day and there were dozens of dog owners on the beach, walking their pets and themselves along the foreshore between the Henley Beach and Grange jetties, a distance of about two kilometres each way. Lachlan had left his sandals and his shirt in a heap on top of his towel, a few hundred metres back on the beach. He was just wearing his yellow sunset-patterned board shorts and enjoying the early morning sun before it got too hot and burnt his pale skin. Not for the first time, he wished he had darker colouring so he could get a tan, not the red hair and freckles he had been born with. He never browned, he just got red and burnt and then peeled if he stayed out too long.
Lachlan kept walking at a brisk pace, his mind going back to what had started him down this particular train of thought in the first place. His best friend Jessica had announced she was getting married of all things, to her boyfriend whom she had known a total of three months. Three whole months. Lachlan gritted his teeth. Not that he had anything against Evan, he seemed nice enough, he just didn’t think three months was long enough.
“But Lachlan,” Jessica had explained to him patiently, “I feel like I’ve known him for ever.” And then her clinching argument, which never failed to make him roll his eyes. “And after all, when we met it was love at first sight. I just knew he was the one.”
“Have you met his family yet?” Lachlan had asked, trying, and failing, not to sound like a stuffy Victorian father. But he knew she had been worried that Evan didn’t speak about his family. Almost immediately after they met, she had introduced Evan to her friends and taken him round to visit her mother, even though they weren’t getting on particularly well at the moment. But Evan hadn’t reciprocated. Maybe he didn’t have any family‒maybe they were dead or just interstate‒but Lachlan felt strongly that Jess should have been told what the story was, instead of being left wondering what was wrong.
Jess had hesitated for a moment and then told him. “Evan hasn’t got any family. He’s a ward of the state‒well he was, until he turned eighteen. He’s been on his own since his last foster family.”
Lachlan knew that wasn’t Evan’s fault, but he couldn’t help it. Alarm bells went off loudly in his head. He made himself stop and count to five before blurting out anything that he would regret later. “All I’m saying is that I think you should wait a bit longer before getting married. At least live together for a few months until you know each other better.”
“We’ll be fine. I know what I’m doing, Lachlan,” Jess had insisted, rather stiffly.
“It’s only because I love you that I’m worried,” he replied. “You know that, right?”
Jess had softened. “I know. Love you too.” And that had been the end of the conversation. He was still worried, but he’d done all he could without damaging their friendship. It was Jess’s life, he couldn’t live it for her.
His arm nearly jerked out of its socket as Bob took off in a different direction, dragging Lachlan along for the ride. He only just managed to hang onto the leash. What had caught Bob’s attention? He looked around quickly, scanning for a runaway ball or a brazen seagull flaunting itself on the beach.
He almost trod on the young woman sitting on her striped beach towel as Bob skittered to a halt, scattering sand in all directions as he sniffed noses with a handsome schnauzer. Tails wagging furiously, both dogs proceeded to greet each other in the way of dogs, sniffing each other’s butt. It was immediately evident to Lachlan that perhaps handsome was the wrong word for the schnauzer. He was a ‘she’, and she was just as interested in Bob.
“Ow!” exclaimed the young woman as Bob trampled her leg in his excitement.
“I’m so sorry!’ Lachlan apologised, his face scarlet. Major fail in beach etiquette 101. Definitely not the behaviour of a well-mannered dog under his owner’s control.
The woman struggled to her feet, trying to escape the excited animals. Luckily, she was smiling. “I think it’s love at first sight!” she joked.
Lachlan rolled his eyes then laughed, “Not you too!” he exclaimed.
Oops, what had he said? The woman was now staring at him with a very interested expression in her eyes. Her eyes were hazel, with a touch of green around the iris, and they were definitely checking him out. She had dark blond hair, drying at odd angles after an earlier dip in the sea, and that light brown skin Lachlan had so envied. Her dark blue board shorts hung low on shapely hips, beneath a flat stomach and a bikini top, and there were a few flecks of seaweed drying on her shoulders.
“I’m Samantha‒Sam,” the stranger introduced herself, putting out a hand. “And this is Lily.”
“Lachlan. And Bob.” Lachlan replied awkwardly, still flushing as he realised how his words could have been misinterpreted. It had sounded just like he was hitting on this rather gorgeous looking stranger. How embarrassing!
“So, Lachlan,” Sam continued with a smile. “I’m not sure I believe in love at first sight‒for humans I mean‒but maybe we could go and talk about it over a coffee. I was just getting ready to walk down to the Grange cafe,
the dog-friendly one. Maybe you and Bob would like to join us?”
