‘I didn’t want a nanny looking after her, or to have her in after-school care. I wanted a different life for her.’
I picked up my glass, saw it was empty, and he left me for the bar. I considered the line of his back, the way he was put together, his dark hair just above his collar. His belt had missed a loop.
And when he sat down we started again, a sort of faltering conversation that still wasn’t coming out real.
‘What about you?’ I said. ‘Have you ever wanted to live in the city?’
‘I lived in Carlton for six years when I was at uni.’
‘Did you like it?’
‘Some of it. The pubs were good.’
Our meals arrived. Lamb shank pie for him, a bone poking upright through the golden pastry. Salmon fillet with capers and mash for me.
The wine had calmed me. A sepia photo on the wall beside us of a married couple standing outside a logging hut triggered a thought.
‘So you’ve only been separated for a few months,’ I said.
He pulled back and took a thinking sip of his Guinness. ‘What about you?’
‘Nick and I never married.’
‘Why not?’
‘He never asked.’
‘I met him when I dropped off the calf.’
I squeezed lemon across the pink fish.
‘He said you both always wanted a place like Charlie’s.’
‘Did he?’
‘He did.’
I felt accused.
He lifted the pastry lid off his pie, steam rose.
‘He was just visiting, picking up a few things. He lives in Jordan.’
We ate while I talked about Nick, his work and long absences. It was a kind of reassurance to Shane that there was no need to be threatened, in case he was – and besides, it was easier telling unflattering stories about Nick than talking about myself.
‘So why did you separate?’ I asked.
He wiped his mouth with the yellow serviette.
‘Jess didn’t like being on the farm and hated it even more when I was away. And I didn’t want to live anywhere else or stop consulting. The end of all that was I had to sell half the farm.’
‘I guess she was entitled to it.’
‘That’s what the judge said.’ He raised his pint. ‘To Jess.’
I swallowed the last of my wine.
‘If we’re going to the movie,’ he said, ‘we need to leave now. Or we can stay here. Up to you.’
‘I’m easy.’
‘You want another drink?’
I pushed my glass forward.
And so it went. Talking about how he crossed Angus with Charolais and the farm cycle of joining, calving and weaning. And the testing program he was working on measuring methane emissions in cattle.
Anyone watching would have thought we were a couple, but in that small space, with the rosebud between us, it was intense, no laughing, and by the time we were spooning the froth off our lattes, we were sharing secrets. He had met a Canadian girl on the Malabar Coast in India when he was twenty.
‘She got pregnant and at sixteen weeks she left me and went back home. I don’t even know if it was a girl or boy. Sometimes I think of the child, wanting to know. It’d be seventeen now.’
‘Have you tried to locate her, the mother?’
‘She must’ve changed her name.’
And I described the afternoon when Sophie was twelve months old and Nick was away and I was full of flu, burning with a temperature. I’d taken the day off work but needed nappies and milk. Walking up the steps to the apartment with Sophie in one arm and a bag of groceries in the other, I was beyond exhausted and dropped to the carpeted stairs to rest, and lean my face against the cool wall.
‘I must’ve fainted or napped, I don’t know, but I came to when I heard Sophie cry out as she fell and rolled down about ten steps to the landing.’
‘Shit.’
‘When we moved here, it was well and truly time for us to start a different life.’
And with all of that quiet talking, there was a shift – it felt like closeness, a connection. The waitress came with the bill and waited as we reached for our wallets. He wouldn’t take my money, his hand out insisting.
The place had emptied and there was stillness all around us. Shane plucked the red rosebud from the little copper vase.
‘For you.’
We drove across the mountain, feeling the sense of each other – or at least I felt something. My interest in him was confirmed. I liked him. We didn’t talk. It was now dark and too isolated, with kangaroos jumping in small groups out in front, unconcerned by the high-beam headlights. Shane was in profile, with two hands on the wheel, eyes squinting in concentration. The sky was big through the windscreen, with salty stars and a half-moon.
We crossed the cattle grid and he parked outside the back porch.
He kept the motor running.
I turned to him.
It was a hesitant kiss, with us somehow both knowing to lean across. His breath was warm on my face, whiskers soft.
He didn’t drive away until I was inside the back door.
In my bedroom, I stood at the window to listen to the faint sound of his ute, gears rising. A brown moth slapped the window and fell onto the outside sill.
I put the little rose in a glass beside my bed.
From my bag came the bleep of a text.
Shane.
Sleep well x
You too x
I didn’t sleep well. It was more interesting, lying curled and warm, replaying the stories and staring into the block outline of him across the table – the serious way he’d looked at me as I listened to the mellow tenor of his voice.
25
WHEN the Skype chimes finally came for Nick’s weekly call to Sophie, she was slow to leave the game of Hiss she was playing with Enrico. Cards were joined snake-like along the carpet – she was winning, wishing for a purple tail.
I answered. Nick was sitting too high, showing more of his neck and chin than his face. Then he moved back and there he was, so familiar yet different with his greying short hair and thinner face.
‘Hi,’ he said, with a small wave.
Behind him was a white wall, light streaming from a high-set window. He was in Amman and I had no compass for this other unreachable place.
‘She’s coming,’ I said, turning away, calling her.
The slowness from our regional Telstra tower made Nick’s movements jerky.
‘Saw the Facebook photo of the first pick. That’s pretty special,’ he said.
‘The harvest is close now.’
‘Are you ready for it?’
‘Hope so.’
Sophie pushed in front and sat looking at her father.
I stepped away.
But Sophie was distracted, wanting to return to the game with Enrico. It was a hopeless way to be a father, him asking on-the-spot questions she didn’t care to answer right then.
‘How’s Freya?’
‘Good.’
‘Did you have a nice sleep over?’
‘Yes.’
She wriggled in the seat, turning to look at Enrico.
‘Tell Dad you’re now on Level 20 in your reading.’
She told him.
‘Do you want to read for me now?’ he asked.
‘No.’
‘But last week you did great reading for me.’
She shrugged.
‘Is Princess Georgette eating her pellets yet?’
‘Yes.’
‘What else is happening, Soph?’
‘I’m in the concert at school.’
‘What are you singing?’ he asked.
‘“The Little Drummer Boy”.’
‘That’s fantastic.’ He moved closer, his nostrils enlarged.
Sophie fidgeted with the keyboard.
Then Nick started swaying, head moving, tapping the desk like it was a drum set, reggae fashion … a new born king is born, pa rum pum pum. ‘Come on, Sop
h, join in.’
The weak reception made his delayed movements even more jumpy, staccato.
She smiled and looked at me. And Nick kept on, what are the words … new gifts we bring, pa rum pum pum …’
That was the relaxed and playful Nick I had forgotten, the man who would sing as the mood took hold, getting the lyrics wrong and not caring.
Then he sang, still moving, head down, tapping, ‘I’m coming back in January and I’ll see you then, pa rum pum pum.’
She giggled.
I stepped forward. ‘When exactly?’
‘I’ll be home for a couple of weeks in January.’
‘Where’s home?’ I asked.
He smiled. ‘I was going to talk to you about taking Sophie to the beach for a few days, to see Mum.’
Sophie was looking between us, ping pong.
He put his hand up. ‘Just think about it.’
A woman walked behind him, a flash of white shirt. He turned and said he was coming.
‘Have a great concert, Soph. Wish I could be there.’
‘Will you be?’ she asked.
‘Sorry, I can’t.’
‘Bye,’ she said, already moved on, even beyond the game of Hiss.
‘Bye, darling,’ Nick said, but the receiver of that message was me. Sophie had wriggled away. I was leaning in, finger poised to disconnect.
The screen went blank.
26
THE next morning Charlie was at the dining table eating dry toast. Crumbs were at the edges of his lips and down the front of his orange cable-knit painting jumper. There would be crumbs on the floor.
‘Do you want something more than that?’
‘No, love.’
‘The nurse is due at ten.’
‘I’m not interested in any of that palliative business.’
‘But you agreed.’
He shook his head.
‘She’ll help.’
‘I don’t need help.’
‘I might need help.’
He pushed his half-finished toast forward, and I had the feeling he wasn’t going to finish his breakfast out of stubbornness, perhaps to spite me. Surely he was hungry.
I sat opposite, and he looked at me stone-faced, as if tired, wanting to be left alone.
‘The harvest is about to start and I’ll be busy. I just want to know someone is keeping an eye on you. Enrico and I will be distracted over at the orchard.’
‘But I’ve got the right tablets. They’re doing the job.’
‘Can you do this for me? Meet with her once and we’ll take it from there.’
She was wearing a uniform of sorts, although I couldn’t quite describe it – the mix of shirt, skirt and leggings with black lace-up shoes. The logo on her shirt gave her authority.
She stepped inside.
Her nametag confirmed who she was, Frances de Jong.
I’d been checking the irrigation drippers in the orchard with Enrico and had returned specially to meet her. Charlie wasn’t in the house.
‘He’ll be in his studio. He’s a painter.’
‘It’s good he’s active.’
Her eyes were magnified through her glasses and she was smiling – a permanent benevolent grin that implied there was a joke in everything. Yet I didn’t mind her – she felt strong and there was no one else.
We walked through the front garden, under the dappling shade of the elms and maples and beyond to the roses. There were things I wanted to tell her, and perhaps this was my chance.
‘He doesn’t eat,’ I said.
Her face became soft with understanding.
‘And he …’ The words didn’t come because it would be betrayal, like owning up. I wanted to say he was terribly dependent, that everything was done for him; his washing, cooking and every little thing, as if he were entitled somehow – and that I had a blueberry harvest breathing down on me, and worries about by my growing debt, and how it was all going to work out.
‘I’m just worried about him,’ I said.
‘Of course you are.’
She followed me into the studio.
Ray Charles was on, singing with fast piano. It amazed me that Charlie could paint with such energetic music at ten in the morning – as if he lived in another place and time, with Ray Charles and every other muso, hammering it out in the way they felt.
For the first time, I turned his music off.
‘Charlie, this is Frances.’
He glanced at her and slowly wiped his hands on a dirty turpentine-smelling cloth. A surly teenage boy would have done a better job hiding his feelings.
‘I’m very happy to meet you,’ she said.
There was nowhere for the three of us to sit.
‘We can go to the garden seats or back to the house,’ I suggested.
‘Here will have to do,’ Charlie said.
And so we stayed in the studio. Charlie and Frances sat at either end of the chaise lounge and I squatted on an upturned plastic crate.
She opened a folder and uncapped a pen. The questions started and Charlie crossed his arms.
‘How is your pain today?’
‘What pain?’
She wrote notes, ticked boxes.
‘And your appetite?’
‘There’s no problem. I’m good.’
‘I worry about Charlie’s eating,’ I said. ‘He’s wobbly when he walks and I know he doesn’t always sleep well at night.’
Charlie turned to me, his mouth agape.
‘I’m worried about you, Charlie. That’s all.’
‘What’s she going to do? Make me better?’
Frances explained how she supported her patients, that physio might be something to consider and how Charlie should try to eat several small snacks during the day instead of three regular meals. ‘And a wheelie walker will assist with your balance, and a chair for the shower.’
Charlie stood up quickly with his arms at his side, acting out that he could manage on his own. He closed his eyes. Something hurt.
‘I’m done with this,’ he said. ‘I’m doing the best I can. I’ve got no pain at the moment. All I want is to be left in peace.’
Frances’s smile didn’t change.
‘I guess that’s it, then,’ I said.
She reassured Charlie she was only a phone call away, and followed me out.
From the studio door, I looked across the vast green expanse of the orchard, and it was impossible to imagine how I’d bring all that fruit in and do what I was doing now for Charlie.
We walked through the rose garden.
‘Let’s sit,’ Frances said, pointing to the garden setting.
Two scarlet robins darted away from the table.
‘So how are you coping?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Charlie seems very independent and stubborn. I find it common in the elderly men. They’ve had their wives taking care of them and don’t like asking for help.’
‘He’s not the least bit independent. He relies on me for everything,’ I said. ‘But I’ve taken him on. I have, willingly. I love Charlie. But he pleases himself and I’ve got a harvest any minute and I won’t have the time to do things for him. Maybe I will. I just don’t know.’
Some things were agreed. That she would call in once a week to check on him and arrange for the delivery of a wheelie walker and a chair for the shower.
‘Call me whenever you need,’ she said.
An urge came over me to give her a hug, and she must have felt the same because we quickly embraced. She smelled of Dove soap.
I took Charlie a cup of milky sugared tea and a plate of small offerings – a banana, apple slices, macaroons and cheese on biscuits – to keep him going until I returned from the orchard. Ray Charles wasn’t back on. Charlie was standing away from his easel, staring into the half-done canvas of pinks and yellow. He had poured a glass of whiskey.
‘Charlie, it’s only ten-thirty.’
‘That doesn’t matter.’
‘
I brought you this.’
He waved for me to put it on the bench.
‘You shouldn’t be drinking with the tablets. The doctor said. And it’s too early, anyway.’
‘Go on with you.’
He half turned to the palette knives, about to choose one.
‘Charlie?’
He picked up a knife, and with his fingernail scraped some green paint off its tip.
‘I want you to eat this.’
We stood in silence.
‘Damn it,’ I said. ‘If I’ve gone to the trouble of getting it for you, the least you can do is bloody well eat it.’
He was standing side-on, statue still, with stooped shoulders, and his white hair was thin and too long.
He turned to me, those sad eyes.
‘I’m trying,’ he said.
‘Well try harder.’
And I backed away and hurried to the orchard, clenching my jaws and shaking my fists, angry and ashamed.
The tensiometres were at either end of the orchard and I went to each one and read the gauge. I was keeping daily records of the soil moisture, rainfall and temperature, trying to figure out how often I should irrigate. I wasn’t sure if I should just water every day if it didn’t rain, and how that would affect the blueberries – whether too much water was a bad thing. I had read about root rot. The readings were high, in the fifties, which meant the soil was dry.
The pump was in the corner of the shed and a thick pipe rose out of it with gauges and valves, and a filter case the size of a laundry bucket. Step-by-step I went through the process of turning the blue valve anticlockwise and selecting a station. I hit the red button and the pump thumped to life. Some seals spat stinking water and the small tin shed vibrated.
I went looking for Enrico, who was somewhere near Row 28. Down beside the tee-tree and the handsome ghost gum, grass flicking on my boots, came the girly squeals of a few black cockatoos, six or seven. They flew slowly with deep wing-beats, and settled on the branches of a spindly black wattle that could barely carry their weight. I stopped to watch them, the yellow panels in their long black tail feathers. They were all facing west as if they knew exactly where they were headed. Then, together, they lifted, and flew gracefully towards the packing shed and the direction of Shane’s paddocks.
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