She looks to her feet; she’s wearing Len’s socks.
No worries, come by when you’re ready.
She pulls damp hair back behind her ears, squeezes her feet into runners. Trudging across the campground, she is conscious of how loud her shoes are on the gravel road. Between the cabins and the reception office there is an unlit expanse, the unpowered sites that would be crowded with tents in summer. Her footsteps are quietened by the grass and she stops, looking up to the sky, a pale umbrella above the campground hemmed in by cliffs and trees. She sees the brightest stars first, the yellow of Jupiter perhaps, and only a slice of cutglass moon. The smaller, duller stars appear slowly as her eyes adjust, and she remembers Lotte correcting her years before. They weren’t necessarily smaller, those stars, just further away, many of them bigger than the sun itself. She had gone on in a long explanation of red giants and white dwarfs, the way stars become more unstable as they age, shrinking and cooling until the centre forms a black heart of dense diamond and ash.
How many of those black dwarfs haunt the heavens? Lotte hadn’t known. She was more interested in the spectacular clouds of the planetary nebulae like Orion’s Horsehead Nebula and the Cygnus Rift: the carcasses of dying stars that reflect and scatter starlight into glorious, billowing canopies. Every single star will eventually go out, Lotte had said, and with the last one will depart all possibility of life in the universe. She had laughed at Eve declaring it a miserable thought: after all, there would be no one around to witness it. The stars would continue as observant bystanders long after humans have taken their leave, just as they had played silent witness to the universe’s slow becoming.
Len answers the door, letting himself out as he directs Eve in.
Jordie, you remember Eve.
Jordie briefly looks up, nods, and returns his gaze to the iPad in his lap.
I won’t be long, says Len.
Eve sits down on the couch beside Jordie. He’s not wearing his helmet, soft hair curling over his ears.
What are you watching?
Pluto. A spaceship has gone really close and taken photos of it. Look!
He tilts the iPad towards her, wanting her to see but not taking his eyes off the video. A gif flicks through the history of images of Pluto, from pixellated blocks of light to a densely detailed image of the planet, a distinct love-heart etched into its face.
It’s the smallest planet, isn’t it? Eve struggles to think of something to say.
It’s not a planet. It’s a dwarf planet. Jordie is full of scorn. It has a sister. One that’s almost as big.
She knows this; it must have been Lotte who told her. Pluto, the lord of the underworld, and Charon, the ferryman of the dead.
It’s very exciting, says Eve. And Jordie nods his head vigorously, presses the screen to start another video.
Soon, Len returns with two paper parcels held in front of him; the assaulting smell of chips claws at Eve’s empty stomach.
Do you want to join us?
Len gestures at the kitchen. She wants to stay on the couch beside Jordie’s warm feet, stuffing as many chips into her mouth as possible, not make polite conversation. But she nods, pulls herself up off the couch and follows him across the room.
Len unwraps the paper, piling chips and a potato cake into a plastic bowl, squirting it with tomato sauce and delivering it to Jordie.
We usually all eat at the table, Len apologises as he comes back to the kitchen. Don’t tell your mum, he calls back over his shoulder.
The first chip burns the roof of her mouth, the second does the same to her tongue. They eat in silence for several minutes before Len gets up and puts a DVD on for Jordie.
They’re delicious, Eve says.
Best fish-and-chip shop on the coast, says Len.
Is it the one by the roundabout? Or the one by the golf course?
You know the town? He is surprised. Near the roundabout, he says. The other one only opens in summer, for the tourists, and it’s not as good. Have you been down this way a bit?
Not for a while. And only in summer. I was here a few years ago, with my husband, just before my daughter was born.
She breaks the battered flake with her fingers, jerking her hand back as the hot steam is released.
She must be around the same age as Jordie, says Len.
Eve shakes her head.
She’s younger. About four years ago. She was almost four …
She waits for him to ask, before realising that he isn’t going to. And she wishes he would.
She died, my daughter. Mina.
Mouth thick with oil, her fingers coated in it so she can’t brush away the tears.
Len shakes his head. I’m sorry to hear that, he says. He wipes his hands on a tea towel and puts them in his lap.
What was she like? Mina? Was she a little terror? He smiles at Eve. I was hoping for a girl when Jordie was born but my wife reckons they’re worse. That boys are straight up and into everything, but girls have got the smarts — they wind you around their little finger before you’ve figured out what’s happened.
She was a bit of both, says Eve.
She licks the grease from her hand, wipes at her cheek with a sleeve. She used to be so bossy, always telling me, Mum, sit! every time she wanted company, though she couldn’t sit still herself for five minutes. Eve nodded at the doorway. Every time we put a DVD on she’d be dancing around; she wouldn’t sit like that and watch anything from start to finish.
As they talked, Eve could hear Mina’s tuneless voice, picking up at the chorus, which always got belted out with due emphasis. She remembers Mina’s initially wary then tragically besotted love affair with Peppa Pig; remembers the crumpled face she could pull the instant she was overcome with tiredness. And then she finds herself laughing, rolling her eyes at Len’s description of Jordie’s breakfast routine, comparing it with Mina’s insistence of only eating her toast when it was cold and soggy.
There is a knock at the door.
Excuse me, must be a late arrival, says Len, getting up from the table. Won’t be a minute.
All the good humour scoots away with him. Left with her own thoughts, not stories for a stranger, Eve can again only see her action. Hauling up the roller door, pulling herself into the driver’s seat.
Eve.
Lotte has come into the kitchen, her cheeks flushed, just a scruff of hair visible beneath her woollen hat. Even beneath the knitted jumper, Eve can see she’s thinner than she used to be, and her eyes dart to Lotte’s chest, wondering. But all she can think is that she’s here. She came.
Lotte.
Stumbling as she gets up from the chair, falling into Lotte’s arms, hugging her fiercely, thinking her grasp is too hard — she’s been sick, after all. But she doesn’t want to let go, relief coursing through her, and something more, something close to joy.
I’m so glad to see you, says Eve.
Me too.
Eve looks up to see Len standing in the doorway, apprehension clear on his face.
I found her number in your phone, I called this afternoon, he says.
Thank you, Eve smiles at him, letting Lotte go. She cannot understand what she’s feeling, except relief that she’s feeling anything at all.
How are you? The surgery, everything, I’m so sorry, I should have—
Don’t worry about it, everything’s fine, says Lotte, cutting her off. I’ve come to take you home to Dad — Tom. I’ve been staying with him since you left. He’s worried about you; he wants you back.
She looks like she is going to say more, but Eve just nods, relieved. Home. It’s the only place she wants to be.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Solar System Drive was conceived of by Coonabarabran astronomer John Shobbrook, and created by the Warrumbungle Shire Council and local astronomy enthusiasts in 2007. It consists of
multiple drives beginning with Plutos in Dubbo, Birriwa, Merriwa, Tamworth, and Bellata, with all drives ending at Siding Spring Observatory.
The writing of this book was made possible through the assistance of the Australia Council, Creative Victoria, Writing Australia, and Varuna. Many thanks to Orange City Library and the Central West Writers’ Centre, Jasmine Vidler, and the hospitality of Anne and David Hopwood.
This novel has been many years in the writing, and I want to thank those who have patiently given their time and consideration to reading early drafts: Rajith Savanadasa, Ian See, Naomi Saligari, Emma Wakeling, Alanna Egan, Myfanwy McDonald, Maria Tumarkin, Naomi Bailey, Leigh Hopkinson, Andrea Gillum, Jane Jervis-Read, Annette Joosten, Hannah Hogarth, and Stephanie Joosten — your kind and critical efforts are much appreciated.
This is a book about parents, siblings, children, and families of all kinds. I wouldn’t be anywhere without mine, so thank you to each and every one of you for your support.
I am indebted to Henry Rosenbloom and everyone at Scribe for believing I could get this book written. In particular, my gratitude to Marika Webb-Pullman for her careful, assured, and intelligent editing — thank you for understanding exactly what I was trying to do and edging me that little bit closer. And thank you to Laura Thomas for the beautiful cover.
Finally, thank you to Rajith, who saw how difficult this one was to write and whose support never wavered. Writing love has nothing on living it; thanks for teaching me this. And for Mala.
Gravity Well Page 26
