Short and Sweet

by Kris Pearson

  He knew better than to hang about over the holiday break and get in the second husband’s way, though. He’d tried that a couple of years earlier, with disastrous results. Luke’s girls were twelve now. Hana’s small warm body brought back memories of happier days when things were still fine.

  “How old are you?” he asked the wriggling bundle.

  “Four,” she squealed, holding up a dimpled hand and counting it out on her fingers so there could be no mistake.

  “Four going on eighteen,” Luke suggested.

  Hana giggled. Kyoko looked puzzled and he amended it to, “four now, but growing up fast.”

  She nodded at that and reached over to touch her daughter’s dark hair.

  “Growing up too fast, she agreed. “We had to make visit now or wait very long time.”

  “Have you booked a coach tour? A train trip maybe?”

  “No—fly Wellington and stay in hotel,” she replied. “Big museum, botanic gardens, nice harbour with cruises, easy to see everything. Husband from Wellington.”

  “And some of his family are still there?”

  “Family all gone,” Kyoko said, shaking her head. “Just want Hana to see,” she added.

  Hana struggled off Luke’s lap and began investigating the zips on his bag. Kyoko murmured her displeasure and the little girl stomped off a short distance, sighing mightily and dragging her feet. The adults shared a smile.

  Luke thought of Christmas to follow. Lazy days at Bob and Joanie’s beach house. Games with his niece and nephew. His girls living so far away in another man’s home—seen only when he visited Britain on business.

  How good it would be to wipe the sympathetic smile off his sister-in-law’s face...make her wonder. He could maybe offer to show Kyoko and Hana a little of the real New Zealand instead of tourist attractions full of other foreigners. Did he dare?

  He cleared his throat.

  “If you miss your Auckland-Wellington connection,” he said. “I—er—could offer you a night’s accommodation at my home. As an apology for knocking you over. Nothing more than that. There’s plenty of room for you both in my spare bedroom.”

  She consulted his card and raised her eyes to his. “This is very generous, Mr Matthews. But...”

  Suddenly he saw how inappropriate his proposition must appear to an absolute stranger.

  “Yes, I’m out of line,” he said. “Sorry. Just thought it would make things easier for you, travelling with Hana.”

  Kyoko regarded him steadily for a few more seconds.

  “This is New Zealand custom?”

  “Sometimes. When the house is big enough.”

  “Apartments very small in Japan,” she said. “Even to ask friends for dinner. Much easier eating out. Thank-you—that is most kind.”

  This left Luke unsure whether he had house guests or not. He decided to wait and see if they missed the connection. Sometimes fate took care of things.

  “I’m spending Christmas with my brother and his wife and their two children,” he told her as a slightly awkward silence started to stretch between them. “In a holiday house right on the beach. You walk out the door onto the sand and into the waves.”

  “The ocean? So close?” Her face lit with wonder.

  “Only a few steps away,” he agreed. “We all go swimming before breakfast, and maybe catch fresh fish later in the morning in time for lunch.”

  “Sushi? Sashimi?”

  “More likely barbecued...”

  “So lucky!” She released a regretful sigh, which gave him courage.

  “Come with me and see—just for a couple of days before you go down to Wellington. Hana can build sandcastles and collect shells. It’s a lovely safe beach.”

  He stopped, amazed at how clearly he could picture the scene. “I’m sure my niece Emma would enjoy having another little girl there, too,” he added. “Her brother usually gives her a pretty hard time.”

  “We go swimming?” Kyoko asked.

  “If you like. Or just paddling, walking, sunbathing—whatever you choose.”

  He considered how they would work it. Kyoko and Hana could have the bedroom he usually had, and he’d be fine sleeping on the window-seat squabs in the living area. He’d often lounged there with a book or a glass of beer—he’d be comfortable enough.

  “It would be fun for Hana, and more relaxing for you,” he coaxed. “You’ll get to see a real family home—not just a high-rise hotel. We could drive straight there instead of staying at my place. That’s a more respectable idea. We’ll have other people around as chaperones.”

  She giggled then, and sent him a quizzical look.

  “No-one know in Japan,” she said.

  “There’d be nothing for people to know about.”

  Kyoko made a non-committal little humming noise.

  She sat quietly for a while after that, and Luke had no idea how his invitation had been received. Her face truly was inscrutable... skin like porcelain, those fascinating eyelids, a sharply bowed mouth.

  She eventually broke the silence by asking, “Is really okay?”

  “You’ll be my honoured guests,” he assured her, warm surprise washing through him. “I’d be very pleased if you accepted. Apart from anything else, it’ll stop my sister-in-law producing prospective new wives for me during the holiday. She’ll be amazed to find I’ve invited two pretty ladies to stay.”

  At this, Kyoko rolled her eyes.

  “My mother do that sometimes too... try to get me new husband,” she agreed. “Is better to find own people.”

  Luke smiled a bit grimly. “They mean well, but I wish people wouldn’t keep doing it.”

  He thought of the widows and divorcees and career women that his friends and family sporadically encouraged him to take an interest in. All nice women, he was sure. Just not his nice women.

  “Own people much better,” Kyoko repeated.

  He nodded, and relaxed again.

  *

  And so, on Christmas morning, Luke stretched on the window-seat squabs until his bones popped, and he groaned in mock complaint as Hana tickled his nose with a bunch of bunny-tail grass she and Emma had picked the day before on the beach.

  The weather was glorious. Kyoko’s cautious reserve had slowly dissolved. Bob was being very gallant to her, and Joanie’s nose was way out of joint. Emma seemed thrilled to have someone younger to boss about, and Hana lapped up the extra attention.

  Luke pulled on his navy blue towelling robe and joined the others around the tinsel tree so the wrapping-paper rip-off could begin.

  “For a special young lady,” he said when he handed the Heathrow fairy package to Hana.

  “So beautiful!” Kyoko exclaimed after her daughter had unravelled the bow and prized the box open.

  She turned to Luke with a shy smile and slipped her hand into his. “Nicer than big museum and harbour cruise in Wellington,” she said.

  ***

  PAVING THE WAY

  Lizzie is standing on her front path. Balancing on her front path, really. Her jagged, broken, dangerous front path.

  She wonders how long ago concrete was invented. Before 1913? That’s the year her cottage was built—and somewhere along its life the little house has been lived in by a concrete demon. Someone who obviously had no idea how thick the layer should be, or how much cement should go into the mix, or something. But they’d ripped ahead and made acres of the stuff anyway.

  There’s not just the ratty front path; there’s the broken strip that runs up the north side of the cottage, and the big horrible lumpy area by the French doors, and the absolutely hideous triangular piece that’s crumbling outside the kitchen. There’s very little lawn left—and Lizzie would far rather have green grass and gardens than all this woeful wasteland. She’s had quotes to get the sub-standard concrete removed and partly replaced with modern pavers. No-one seems interested in the work—or at least they’ve quoted so high it’s been way beyond her budget.

  She aims a kick at the rubble
just inside the open gate.

  “Planning what to do about it?” a man’s voice asks. It’s Paul from two houses down—someone Lizzie doesn’t know well. Their middle neighbour, Biddy, has had them over for coffee and introduced them. Invited them for Christmas drinks, too. Paul and his son have been at number eight for maybe three months now.

  “Oh, it’s hopeless,” Lizzie says. “I’ve had quotes, but the prices are a joke.”

  He comes in, squats down, and inspects the mess up close.

  “It got a lot worse last winter after all the rain,” she mutters.

  “How far does it go?”

  “Right around.”

  And somehow they’re walking together up the side of the cottage and inspecting the nasty area at the back.

  “Geez,” he exclaims, sending her a sympathetic glance.

  Next day she gets a phone call.

  “Look, about that concrete,” Paul says with no preamble. “I’m going to be stripping a lot of ivy off the garage this weekend. I’m getting a dumpster. The ivy’ll squash way down if we pile some of your concrete on top. I reckon we can get the front path disposed of anyway.”

  “Who’s ‘we’?” Lizzie asks.

  “Me and Simon. The boy’s just started pre-season rugby training. Heaving some of your concrete around will do him more good than mucking about at the gym.”

  “How much is half a dumpster, then?”

  “My shout—I’m getting it anyway. But you could toss Simon a few bucks an hour if you like?”

  “Ten dollars or so?”

  Paul scoffs at that. “Eight if it’s cash. That’s what his mate gets at the burger bar.”

  “Well...” Lizzie says, and it seems to be on.

  On Saturday the dumpster arrives by Paul’s front fence, and ridiculous amounts of ivy are loaded in. Then, after lunch, there’s a plank leaning against it, and Paul is outside her door with a pick and a sledgehammer and a shovel and a wheelbarrow and his tall shy son.

  “Okay with you if we make a start?”

  “Fine,” she murmurs, somewhat distracted by thigh muscles, and strong hairy forearms, and the delicious scent of fresh male perspiration. A minute or two later shattered concrete tumbles noisily into the orange steel wheelbarrow, and soon Paul’s pushing it out through the gate and up the plank and tipping the first load in. Lanky Simon’s leaning on the shovel, breathing hard.

  Lizzie watches through the blind slats, unused to so much masculinity.

  Inspiration strikes. Beer. Men like beer. She finds two bottles in the fridge and takes them out a while later.

  Is the boy old enough to drink? Of course he’s not, but they’re only small bottles and his Dad’s in charge of him, so she doesn’t think it’ll matter.

  Simon’s T-shirt is soaked through in places. Paul has taken his off. They accept the cold beers with matching grins, and stand there in the sun, tipping the bottles up and practically inhaling the contents.

  They’re a true pair, she thinks.

  The same long legs, the same broad shoulders, even the same big hands. Simon’s got some filling out to do, but Paul’s body looks hard as iron, and his chest is pleasantly hairy. Lizzie inspects him from under her eyelashes. She’d like to touch that hair. Would love to run her fingers through it if she was a brazen sex-mad glamour-puss instead of just herself.

  She sighs and goes back inside. The thump of the sledgehammer rattles the window-glass, the shovel scrapes until her teeth hurt, and the shattered concrete cascades into the wheelbarrow and disappears out the gate, load after load.

  She makes scones. Shouldn’t you make scones for hard working men?

  There’s an old wooden table outside the French doors. She retrieves three folding beach chairs from the laundry cupboard, arranges them around the table, and sets out the scones, butter, strawberry jam and three mugs. The electric kettle boils. She again braves the sight of muscles and the scent of hard working men to ask about tea or coffee. They troop around to the back and look well pleased.

  “You need a timber deck out here,” Simon suggests—almost the first words he’s spoken.

  “You don’t want this much concrete,” Paul adds.

  “I’d like more lawn,” Lizzie agrees.

  “Grass seed’s cheap enough.”

  “Yes, but there’s all this mess in the way.”

  Paul and Simon exchange glances.

  “The dumpsters are a hundred and sixty. You’d need another three I reckon?”

  “Yeah, three should do it,” Simon echoes, slathering butter and jam on a scone. “These are awesome!”

  Lizzie flushes at his praise.

  “Energy for footie,” he adds, checking his watch.

  “Practice?” Paul asks.

  “Four o’clock. If I can still move.”

  After two more scones, he departs with twenty-two dollars, an exaggerated wincing stretch, and a wave.

  Paul suggests they at least get rid of all the old concrete if Lizzie can afford three more dumpsters and some cash for Simon; the deck can happen later. It’s so much better than any of the quotes that she agrees on the spot.

  Paul works on until the rest of the front path has been pulverized and wheeled away.

  Mid-way through Sunday morning he arrives with a trailer load of pavers, some planks, and several bags of sand. There’s no sign of Simon.

  “What?” Lizzie exclaims, embarrassed because she’s in her pink towelling bath-robe. Perfectly decent, but still...

  “Woman,” Paul says, inspecting her with amused brown eyes, “I could try and impress you with a bouquet of roses and dinner at a fancy restaurant and a bottle of foreign plonk. That’d cost me about the same as building you a new front path. Right now you need the path more.”

  Oh I don’t know, Lizzie thinks. I’d rather like the roses and the dinner and the wine. With you.

  She bites down on her bottom lip, stopping the comment from escaping. She’s quite flustered by the thought of sitting across a dimly lit restaurant table from him, eating lovely food and sipping wine. She knows she’s probably blushing.

  Paul’s eyebrows rise. The corner of his mouth quirks.

  “I’ll just get started then,” he says.

  As Lizzie dresses, she remembers what he’d said. He was trying to impress her? She swaps her gardening trousers for a floral skirt. Pulls on a nicer top. Fluffs up her hair.

  She can hear him hammering something. She peeks through the blind and sees he’s making a timber edging to keep the pavers in line.

  Surely she could help? It’d be nice working alongside him. She puts the old gardening trousers back on and chooses a peachy lipstick—not too obvious, but it lights her face up. Well—something has!

  By twelve-thirty it’s time for lunch. They stop for ham and salad sandwiches. So much for the ham she was going to have for dinner...

  By mid-afternoon the front path is complete—smooth and smart and safe to walk on. Lizzie almost doesn’t believe it.

  “I need to pay you for this,” she insists.

  Paul shakes his head. “Nah—Simon’s gone to the beach with friends until late. I was pleased to have your company.”

  “That’s not the point. I want to pay you.”

  “How about cooking me dinner instead? I can’t spring for the restaurant version until next week.”

  Next week? Does he mean it?

  She considers the contents of her fridge and pantry. There’s a tin of smoked oysters and some frozen prawns. “Seafood pasta, and maybe chocolate mousse afterwards?”

  Paul closes his eyes as though he’s sampling the flavours. “And a nice Sauvignon Blanc to go with it? I’ll grab a bottle.”

  When he returns later, he’s carrying a generous bunch of roses from Biddy’s garden, and Lizzie has the pretty floral skirt on.

  “Cunning old matchmaker,” he chuckles, glancing next door to where Biddy is shamelessly peering through the trellis. “I’ll bet she had this planned from the start.”

>   ***

  SILK

  Why was seriously single Liz trying on wedding dresses at eleven on a workday morning?

  She’d admired the ever growing selection of silks in the window of the big new shop next to the café. The lustrous lengths of violet and cerise and cinnamon moved gently as the air conditioning wafted them about, making them shimmer and shine, beckon and tempt.

  At thirty-eight, Liz had a high-flying job and a wardrobe top heavy with black corporate suits; these fantasy fabrics just weren’t for her. But eventually she couldn’t resist a closer look...a brush of her fingers across the luminous surfaces...an admiring inspection of their intricate beading and embroidery.

  Later that day Great Aunt Helen’s birthday card arrived—with its usual twenty dollars and brief instruction to “buy yourself something pretty”.

  Dear Helen. She never forgot—although finding something pretty for twenty dollars became more of a challenge each year. This time, Liz decided she’d buy a part metre of silk for a beautiful scarf.

  When she returned to choose her fabric, she found several racks of exquisite silk wedding dresses near the back of the store. Placed on a small, carved table was a gold framed notice: Our Dresses May Be Tried On For Ten Dollars Each.

  Ten dollars each... To weed out the ‘just-looking’ from the genuine customers, she assumed. She had Helen’s tempting twenty, and no prospect of ever being a bride in a beautiful dress like these. Should she for once in her efficient life do something really girly? She could arrange it for midway between morning tea and lunch, so no-one from the bank would ever know about her frivolous impulse.

  She pushed the hangers slowly along the rails, checking the sizes and styles. One full-skirted lace encrusted creation, she decided. And one sleek body hugging bias-cut slide of simplicity. She approached the manager and said she’d return at eleven next day.

  *

  But when she arrived, he bowed his dark head.