‘Are you drunk?’ Stirling asked, looming over her.
‘No, I’m stone-cold sober.’ And irritable and bad-tempered.
‘Mmmm …’ he said.
ARGH! Why did he do that? It was so irritating.
‘I think I’ll walk,’ she said. ‘Get some fresh air.’
‘You can’t walk all the way to Polly’s Plains – not in that get-up and definitely not in those shoes.’
‘What’s wrong with my shoes?’ Jaime knew she was being unreasonable, but she really wanted to yell at somebody and Stirling was right there. ‘I’ll have you know these are Jimmy Choos and they cost a fucking fortune!’
‘They could be Princess Mary’s for all I care. You can’t walk in those heels. You’ll kill yourself, or do some injury to a passing possum when you throw them away.’
‘I don’t like your tone, Mr Marble Man.’
‘Mr what?’
‘You heard me – Mr Marble Man. That’s what I call you behind your back. You’re always going like this.’ She pulled a cold, stern face.
‘I do not!’
‘Do too!’
‘Look, I’m not going to stand here arguing like a child. Are you getting on the bike voluntarily or do I have to pick you up and put you there?’
‘I’m walking,’ she said and started to move off.
She heard a sigh, then found herself being hoisted into the air.
‘Way to go, Stirling!’ shouted Jean from the hall door. ‘I wish Bluey’d try that caveman stuff on me!’
Jaime belted the back of the man who held her in an iron grasp. ‘Put me down, you … you … Neanderthal!’
‘Gladly,’ said Stirling, dumping her on the bike and handing her a helmet. ‘Here, put this on or else.’
‘Or else what?’ she goaded.
His expression darkened and his flinty blue eyes raked her tiny skirt, teensy-weensy top and spread legs. ‘You don’t want to know.’
She got off the bike and pushed the helmet into his chest. Be damned if he was going to dictate to her.
Jaime tottered off down the road. It only took about twenty metres before she knew the Jimmy Choos had to go. Pulling them off, she suppressed the desire to throw them away, because Stirling had said she would and – damn it! – they’d been so expensive. She slung them over her shoulder instead. The moon was out, giving her some light, and if she kept to the tar, hopefully her feet would stand up to the trek.
The V-Max blasted past and soon all that was left of Stirling McEvoy was the scent of a hot exhaust and a puff of road dust.
Fifteen minutes later, she was wishing she hadn’t been so hasty in pissing Stirling right off. Her feet were a shredded mess. And in her bravado she’d forgotten she was afraid of the dark. She sat down on a nearby stump and wished with all her heart she was somewhere else. Like Cairns, or Daydream Island. At this stage, even Foster or Cowes would do.
A distant rumble caught her ears. She perked up at the thought of someone coming, until she saw the V-Max appear around the bend again. Damn. Stirling McEvoy always managed to see her at her worst.
The man pulled up beside her. ‘Want these, Princess?’ he said, holding out her Colorado boots in one hand, a pair of socks in the other.
‘Thanks,’ she said. Why did he have to be so damn considerate? Just when she wanted to hate him. She looked at the boots, but didn’t do anything about putting them on. She’d discovered they were another reminder of her dad. He’d worn lace-up boots when they went fishing.
‘You still grumpy?’ asked Stirling.
‘I’m not grumpy.’
‘Mmmm …’
Oh God, there he went again.
‘Well, you would be too if you had to put up with all that Christmas stuff back there!’ she said.
‘And your point is?’
‘I don’t like it!’
‘Well, hello there, Jaime Hanrahan, but it’s the festive season. Just because you don’t want to celebrate doesn’t mean the rest of us have to suffer.’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, you’d be like this too if you lost your father at Christmas!’ And for the second time in a week Jaime started to cry. Howl, really. It was embarrassing but she couldn’t help it. The tears poured out of her like water breaching a dam wall. She couldn’t have stopped them even if she’d wanted to. She just didn’t care anymore what this man thought of her. He’d witnessed every other stupid thing she’d done in the last couple of weeks – what was one more? And this wasn’t stupid. This was real. A grief she’d barely allowed herself to indulge. Now she was letting it fly into the wind, setting it free.
After a time, his quiet voice came from right beside her. ‘Jaime?’
She looked up and there he was. His hand wiped away her tears and pushed her hair back from her face. She must have been a sight, but his expression was as soft as she’d ever seen it, his fingers gentle on her skin.
‘Let’s get you home.’
She nodded. Slowly got up, staggered a bit, then allowed herself to be guided to the bike. Once he got on, she mounted up behind and dropped her head against his warm, solid back. A big hand came down on her bare knee and gave it a re assuring pat. And they were off, riding the last kilometres to Polly’s Plains.
When they arrived, she refused to look at the lights she knew would be glowing over the gateway and from his house. She kept her head down until the bike stopped at the homestead’s garden gate.
‘Thanks,’ she said as he handed her the boots he’d stowed in a pannier.
‘You going to be alright?’
She looked up into his concerned blue eyes, and her legs nearly gave way. Hold me, hold me tight and make all this grief go away, she wanted to say. Instead, she stiffened her resolve and tried to smile. ‘I’ll be fine. Good night.’
Sometime later, after she’d downed a comforting mug of hot chocolate and at least four caramel Tim Tams, she fed The Cat its Dine and crawled into bed. Tried to stop the tears from coming again, to no avail. They ran freely, and she made her way through an entire box of tissues. Finally, after an hour so, she hiccuped to a stop, curled up in the foetal position and closed her eyes.
The last thing she was aware of was a melodious meow, a dip in the bed as something landed gently, and the feeling of The Cat’s fur somewhere near her head.
Her lips curled into a little smile.
Chapter 14
It was late morning on Christmas Eve and Jaime was making an ambrosia salad. According to Valerie’s recipe book, it needed to sit for twenty-four hours before you ate it. It was also the only salad in the book that she had all the ingredients for. Who but the mysterious Valerie would have tins of mandarin slices in her pantry? Seriously? Obviously ‘think ahead’ was a cook’s motto out here, where you couldn’t just pop down the street if you ran out of ingredients.
She shut the book and looked at the partially made salad with satisfaction. She wasn’t going attend tomorrow’s lunch regardless of what anyone said, but at least her salad would do her proud.
A glint off a car windscreen caught the crystal hanging in the kitchen window. Who was this? Maybe Stirling had got Valerie’s ute back and forgotten to tell her? She peered out the window, trying to see through the cloud of dust swirling out near the front gate. She couldn’t see a thing. She grabbed a pair of binoculars that were sitting on top of the fridge and zoomed in on the commotion.
The front of a Mercedes … then the bullbar of a ute. Her dad’s old ute. What the …?
She took another look and jumped in fright, dropping the bins onto the tiled floor. CRACK! Shit, shit, shit! She’d busted the binoculars, but worse still, the visitor was her mother!
Stirling got to them first. He must have come to check out the clouds of dust. He stood with one hand on his brow and a guarded look on his face as the pair of vehicles pulled up.
Blanche was out of the car first. ‘Helloooo, and you must be Stirling. How lovely to meet you. I’m Blanche, Jaime Hanrahan’s mother.’
&nb
sp; A man climbed out the ute and ambled up behind Blanche, holding out his hand. ‘And I’m Dave, her stepdad.’ He laughed self-consciously. ‘That’s Jaime’s stepdad, not Blanche’s.’
Jaime arrived right at the moment Stirling shook redneck Dave’s hand. She noticed that the men resembled one another: tall, broad, without an ounce of spare flesh, and both dressed in matching khaki-green workshirts, jeans and boots.
That was all she had time to observe before she was grabbed by her mother and hugged near breathless. ‘Jaime! We had to come. Say you don’t mind. We just had to be here with you at Christmas, didn’t we, Dave?’
‘Yes, siree. Blanche here didn’t want you spending this Christmas without your family, particularly after your father and all, so we thought we’d best be getting our sweet butts up this way.’ He cast a quick glance towards Stirling. ‘I mean, we hope that’s okay with the boss?’
‘I’m not the boss,’ said Stirling with a smile. ‘And I don’t mind at all. In fact, you’re very welcome. We do Christmas in a big way here in the bush.’ His eyes caught Jaime’s. ‘Well, of course that’s only if you want to –’
‘Of course we want to,’ cried Blanche. ‘Don’t we, Dave? It’ll be so much fun. I thought you said they didn’t do anything up here, Jaime? We’ve brought everything with us – that’s why we’ve got two vehicles. Turkey, ham, prawns, pudding, bonbons, beer, rum, presents, lights, decorations and Dave even threw in a Christmas tree.’ Blanche included them all in her delighted grin. ‘Now, where do we unpack?’
It was much, much later before Jaime managed to find a peaceful spot away from her full-on mother. Her slice of paradise was a rock pile on a ridge just a little way from the main house; a quiet and beautiful place that looked down over the river, where, if she gazed hard enough, she could see Stirling and Ryan setting up trestle tables for Christmas lunch under the massive red gum trees. She sighed. Christmas was all around her. Blanche had taken over Valerie’s house and turned it into something resembling a Myer Christmas window. Along with Stirling’s lights, the damn festive season now confronted her on all sides.
‘Jaime, I’m coming up.’
She groaned. It was her mother, calling from the bottom of the rock pile she was perched on. So much for finding peace.
Blanche climbed up and sat down beside her daughter. She silently took in the view for a little while, then said, ‘It’s beautiful here.’
Jaime squinted her eyes. There were some birds swirling and flapping above the river. They looked like magpies from this distance. But they might be currawongs?
‘I’ve been wanting to get you on your own,’ Blanche went on, ‘to talk with you …’
The birds were moving away from the river now, taking flight across the flats, heading for the mountain beyond.
‘… about Dave.’
The ridge they were flying towards was knobbly with rocks. It looked a bit like a dinosaur’s backbone.
‘You’re making this very difficult,’ said Blanche.
Jaime wasn’t going to give an inch. This was a discussion they should have had before her mother upped and got married again.
‘Look. I know you don’t like it that I got married so quickly.’
Yep, pretty much, thought Jaime.
‘And you obviously think I’m trying to force you to accept Dave taking your father’s place.’
Right again.
‘But I’m not. I loved your father. Very, very much. And after he died so suddenly …’ Her mother stopped and gazed across the grasses waving in the breeze towards the rugged mountains surrounding them. ‘Well, I was lonely. You had your life in the city. I was stuck in the suburbs like a good little wife, but a good little wife to whom? No one needed me anymore.’
Jaime shifted uncomfortably. Finally she said, ‘I did. I needed you.’
‘Yes, but not in the way I need to be needed.’
Jaime rolled her eyes. Yeah, whatever.
‘Don’t you roll your eyes at me, young lady! Kids think their parents don’t have emotions. But we do. We need love just as much as you young people do. Sometimes more so.’ She fiddled with a loose stone, before chucking it down to bounce over the pile of rocks. She seemed to be considering what to say next.
Jaime waited. Felt her mother pick up her hand.
‘When I met Dave, he … well, he filled the gap. He’d lost his wife and was looking for someone else too.’
Jaime snatched her hand back. She didn’t want this conversation, but seeing as they were having it she may as well just come out and say what she was thinking.
‘Well, why didn’t you just go out with each other? Why did you have to rush in and get married?’
‘You know when it feels right,’ said her mother defensively. ‘And at our age we’re too old to be doing the whole one step forward, two steps back courting thing.’
‘But Dad was barely cold in his grave!’
Blanche pursed her lips. ‘Oh, Jaime, grow up. I loved your father, but I needed a man to take his place. I’m not like you. I can’t do this “on my own” thing. I’d been with Jack for twenty-eight years and suddenly he was gone.’
‘But, Mum, you loved him. How could you just up and marry Dave?’
‘I married Dave because it made everything okay. I’m Mrs Dave Bennett now, and I have a place in the world again.’
Jaime swung her head to gaze reproachfully at her mother. Took in the perplexed look in her eyes. Realised that Blanche truly believed she’d done the only thing that would set her world to rights again.
‘Dave says his wife was a homemaker, just like me,’ she went on. ‘They weren’t able to have kids, so he thought with you, maybe, he had a second chance. That since you’d lost your own father, he might be able to step in.’
‘Well, he thought wrong.’
‘Obviously.’ Her mother’s tone was wry. She stood up. ‘I can see I’m wasting my time. You know, Jaime, it would do you the world of good to think beyond yourself. I know it’s been hard for you losing Jack, but there are others in this world hurting too. It might pay you to remember that.’
She began to climb down the rock pile. Jaime felt tears welling in her eyes. Why hadn’t they had this talk before her mother had flounced down the bloody aisle?
Blanche was nearly at the ground when Jaime said, ‘I loved him so much, Mum. He was my rock, my filter for the rest of the world. He taught me everything I know. I miss him so much.’
She started to sob, racking gulps that wouldn’t stop. She felt like nothing had stopped in honour of her father’s death; no one had understood what his loss meant. And so she had soldiered on too.
Through the waterfall of tears, she was aware of Blanche climbing back up to her side. She stared down at Jaime for a bit, seeming to be making some sort of decision, then she sat and hesitantly took her daughter’s hand once more.
‘I miss him, Mum. I miss him so much.’
Blanche’s arms came around Jaime and she whispered into her hair, ‘I know, honey. I do too.’
They stayed like that for a while, mother and daughter on their rock pile, until Jaime’s sobbing subsided.
‘I don’t not like Dave,’ she stuttered. ‘It just takes a bit of getting used to, seeing you with another man.’
She felt her mother nodding.
‘And Dave’s so different to Dad. I couldn’t understand why you chose him.’
‘But, honey, he’s not that different.’
Jaime glanced up to see Blanche was crying too.
‘They’re both loving, thoughtful, caring men. Of course there are some differences, but essentially, inside,’ her mother tapped her chest above her heart, ‘they’re the same kind of bloke.’
Jaime nodded slowly. Perhaps her mother had a point.
Blanche went on. ‘And regardless of the fact we live in the suburbs, their hearts are in the bush. I think I’m attracted to the caveman thing. I’m the homemaker while they go and do their hunting and gathering.’ She sniffed a
nd gave Jaime’s hand a squeeze. ‘I’m just blessed to have been so lucky in love. Well, that’s what Dave says.’
‘He does?’
‘I remember the first time we met at the RSL. He said, “You remind me of my wife”, and there I was thinking he reminded me of Jack. I think that’s what brought us together.’
A bit like her and Stirling. He reminded Jaime of her dad. And when she’d seen him and Dave shake hands, she’d been jolted by the instinctive thought that all three were cut from the same cloth.
‘I reckon this Stirling fellow hasn’t dropped too far from Jack and Dave’s tree either,’ said Blanche.
Jaime gave her mother a sharp look. What was she really saying? Sometimes you never quite knew with Blanche.
‘They often say a woman’s attracted to a man like her father,’ she added with a smug smile.
Jaime didn’t respond. In this case ‘they’ weren’t far wrong, but she wasn’t going to admit that to her mother.
She and Blanche got back to the homestead just as Stirling, Ryan and Dave were downing a cup of tea. Jaime went to turn off the sprinklers she had watering the vegie patch, before joining them all in the kitchen.
‘Your mum’s just been telling us about your plan to avoid Christmas,’ said Ryan. His expression was reproachful.
Jaime glared at her mother.
Blanche held up her hands in mock defence. ‘I just said it’s the first anniversary of your father’s passing on Boxing Day. You didn’t want to do Christmas. Dave and I are here to help you acknowledge both. We think it’s important.’
Jaime glanced sideways at Dave. He shrugged apologetically.
Next she took in Stirling, who was appraising her with a calculating look. He jumped up, saying, ‘Don’t look at me. I had nothing to do with it. In fact, I need to go. I’ll walk back to my house, Ryan – thanks for your help.’
And with that he grabbed his hat and departed without a backwards glance. He didn’t even stop to pat The Cat, who was coming in the screen door. Dodge looked affronted.
Jaime couldn’t help but laugh as she called Dodge over. Now she knew he loved Dine, they’d become best friends and the least she could do was call him by his proper name. The British Blue ran into her arms and she rubbed between the pads of his paws, which she’d discovered he adored. The cat stretched out his leg and claws and purred with pleasure. It sounded like she had a gently humming motor in her arms.
Rose River Page 10
