The Tea Chest

by Josephine Moon

  La Sophia was as beautiful as Elizabeth had read it would be. A smart black metal fence with gold spikes on top greeted her at the footpath. Through the windows she could see wooden parquetry floors, warm hues on the walls and around the tables, a spiral staircase, soft chairs and soft lighting that illuminated the long dining rooms. Detailed mirrors, burnt oranges and greens and shiny curtains gave it a feeling of the Orient, or Middle Eastern caravans.

  She crossed her arms, partly to keep warm against the slight chill and partly to stifle her nerves. She was still in the vintage dress she’d worn to the shop that day, though she’d changed her heels to shiny black ones and added a short-sleeved black top for extra warmth and to cover her bare arms. Cars whizzed up and down the street and couples strolled past, walking hand in hand.

  What was she doing? What on earth had possessed her not only to agree to meet Haruka but to demand he take her to an expensive restaurant? It was cheeky and bold and very unlike her.

  Then again, perhaps it was exactly like her. She’d been independent in another country only briefly when she and John started dating and she’d never looked back. She hadn’t been asked out on a date in more years than she could count, so she couldn’t possibly know if this was like her or not.

  But she had no more time to consider this because Haruka was walking towards her. She was astonished at how her body reacted to the sight of him. Everything felt like a romantic old movie.

  Oh no.

  If she was the heroine of a romance, then this man, this Japanese man, was her hero. The big guy upstairs certainly had quite a sense of humour at times.

  She braced herself as he reached her, smiling.

  ‘I’m so glad you’re here,’ he said. ‘I was afraid you wouldn’t come.’ His face fell and he looked away as if he’d just realised he shouldn’t sound so needy and uncertain. ‘Not that I . . . not that I think . . .’ He laughed. ‘You know.’

  She heard herself laugh in response, noticed her hand reach to her hair to adjust it, and felt her skin burst with warmth and her heart quicken.

  She’d turned all silly and girly.

  This was terrible. How did people do this? She was right back in high school, desperately grateful for a two-minute conversation with Steven Jacobs, unable to take her eyes off him or stop giggling and feeling she might faint when his hand brushed her arm as he reached for the paintbrush in art class.

  ‘Should we head on in?’ Haruka said, tilting his head towards the door. ‘Maybe start with a drink at the bar?’

  Elizabeth nodded. Great rivers of Egypt, yes.

  Haruka ordered a mojito and Elizabeth a vodka martini and it only took a sip and one brief pause for each of them before the conversation began to flow.

  ‘I’m a ceramicist. Functional pieces only. I’m quite dreadful at figurines,’ he said. ‘My mother’s English and my dad’s Japanese. I was brought up here, mostly in boarding schools. My dad’s an engineer on oil rigs and travels a lot, and my mother’s a concert violinist, so she also travels.’

  ‘Did you miss them while you were away at school?’ Elizabeth asked, twirling the olive in her glass.

  ‘Of course.’

  Elizabeth popped the olive in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully. Her parents were right nutters but at least they’d been there. She couldn’t imagine being thrown to the wolves and draughty halls of a cold boarding school at such a young age. Moreover, she couldn’t imagine finally getting the baby she wanted so much only to ditch him a few short years later at a boarding school. It made her heart ache.

  ‘Can you play the violin too?’

  ‘A little.’ He looked at his fingers. ‘I think I play best when I’m drunk, actually.’

  ‘Will you show me? Later on. We’ll have to get you many more of these, though,’ she said, signalling the barman.

  ‘What about you?’ Haruka said. ‘What’s your hidden talent?’

  ‘Hmm. I’m not sure I have one.’

  ‘Everyone has one.’

  ‘Well, if you must know, I can juggle babies.’

  ‘That’s random.’

  ‘I signed up for circus training a few years back, in Brisbane. My friend, Annie, thought it would be good for me, for stress release. I went every Saturday for eight weeks and they taught us to juggle. I happen to be able to juggle three babies at once.’ She demonstrated, miming juggling three infants above her head.

  ‘I don’t know whether to believe you or not.’

  ‘It’s true . . . the circus training part, anyway. I can also do a complete backward bend.’

  Haruka’s eyes lifted as if to an imaginary screen; he was clearly picturing her bending over backwards.

  ‘I don’t actually juggle babies. They’re far too likely to vomit and I really despise washing.’

  Of course, she couldn’t entirely ignore the tug of pain in her womb at the mention of babies. But it was a tug she was learning to live with. She wasn’t able to ignore it, or push it down or make it go away. It was part of her. And she was learning that it might always be. Somewhere in the past couple of months she’d learned that she could go on living and go on experiencing and—shock, horror—go on enjoying life and it could all happen at the same time as the pain and loss. It didn’t have to be one or the other.

  ‘I’m afraid I’m going to need some proof,’ Haruka said sternly.

  ‘Of the juggling?’

  ‘No. The backward bend.’

  ‘Well, let’s see how dinner goes first.’

  Dinner, as it turned out, went fantastically well. So well that now Elizabeth was heart-struck to realise that a big moment had arrived. The moment when another man, someone very much not her husband, was going to kiss her.

  Her breath caught in her throat so she couldn’t even begin to utter any words of refusal. Because there he was, standing before her, illuminated by moonlight, the shifting shadows of the leaves of a willow tree above them caressing his face. A quiver ran through each intake of her breath. He was going to kiss her alright, no doubt about it. Right here on the footpath.

  He was so close now she could smell the rum of his mojito mixed with the sugary syrup and she leaned towards him, wanting to taste it on his smooth lips.

  Somehow, Haruka wanted her when her own husband had found her deficient and unworthy.

  He lay his long fingers along her collarbone, smoothing over her skin to her shoulder. She erupted in goose bumps.

  His gaze rested on her lips. His brow creased in serious concentration.

  This was it. The moment was here. Part of her wanted to pull away. She was a married woman. But her feet held fast.

  He reached up his other hand so that both cupped her gently on either side of her neck, a firm but gentle pressure drawing her in. His face came closer and she closed her eyes in anticipation as their lips met for the first time.

  She supposed, somewhere in the distant edges of her mind, that this must surely mean she’d now moved on from John.

  My husband.

  She shooed the voice away and melted even more deeply into Haruka’s embrace. There would be plenty of time in daylight to analyse this moment. Right now, she just wanted him to keep kissing her.

  17

  Fullerton Frat House report: Keats decides to share new talent of flipping the bird with younger brother in back seat of car. James picks 130 kg bikie to practise on. Bikie rolls up beside window at lights. Dad practically wets himself. Kids cower in back. But bikie only wants to offer master class in the one-fingered salute. Laughs heartily. Kids squeal with delight. He waves goodbye and bares missing teeth. Kids fine. Dad’s seen better days. Please come home soon and take control of your children. xx

  Kate and Leila booked into a bed-and-breakfast in a small village of charming stone cottages with shingle roofs. Mighty willow trees hung over a river crossed by arched stone bridges; wooden coach wheels lay against the buildings; leafy green vines wound their way up walls; and window boxes overflowed with bright flowers. It was like walki
ng through the set of an English country drama.

  Kate was overwhelmed by the beauty and wished for the hundredth time that Mark and the boys were here too so they could share this adventure. She hadn’t had an inkling of where her new job would take her after that first meeting with Simone at the Emporium.

  Mark and Keats had been lying on the couch watching Finding Nemo when Kate returned from the Emporium. It was Keats’s nap time and he lay sprawled over Mark’s chest, sleepy but fighting to stay awake. She leaned over the back of the couch to kiss her baby. The sound of his tiny breathing was like the ocean, regular, soothing and hypnotic. She stroked his blond hair away from his forehead, which was damp with the summer heat, and was flooded with awe at how utterly adorable he was.

  Mark reached out and touched her arm. ‘How’d you go?’

  Her eyes filled with tears. She nodded.

  ‘You want it?’

  ‘I really do.’ Her throat clenched. Mark peeled himself off the couch and hugged her tightly. He smelled of oranges and play dough and she remembered thinking that this was surely what heaven smelled like.

  ‘That’s great,’ he said quietly. ‘Go, Katie.’

  She pulled him into their bedroom. ‘But what about Keats?’ She winced with the pain of saying it out loud and sat down on the edge of the bed. It was not made, the sheets in tangled bunches. Above her, the rusted ceiling fan was clicking as it turned slowly around.

  Her mother was out of the question. Age had slowed her right down till it was difficult for her to manage many simple tasks. Keats would be too much of a handful for her. Her father was in Cairns—and barely even knew his grandchild—and so was her sister. And Mark’s family was in Melbourne, so that counted them out.

  ‘We’ll have to find childcare,’ Mark said.

  ‘No. I don’t want strangers raising our child.’

  ‘Agreed.’

  They sat in silence for a few moments.

  ‘What’s the job like, anyway?’

  Kate smiled for the first time since walking in the door, as she described Simone and the Emporium and the job, her excitement rising again.

  ‘Imagine what we could do with the money,’ she concluded. ‘Leave this.’ She gestured around the room. ‘Buy our own place. Do it right. Go on holidays. Buy Keats a guitar or a pony. Build your business into an empire.’ She stopped, the smile shrinking on her face. ‘It’s true what they say, you know. Money really does buy freedom.’

  Mark’s brow folded in on itself. ‘Freedom buys freedom, Kate.’

  ‘Of course, I know.’ She waved him away impatiently.

  ‘Never take a job for money. Only for passion.’

  ‘I just mean it gives us more options, more opportunities. But yes, absolutely that is just the icing. It would be a creative dream come true.’

  ‘The working from home option is great. You can be here half the time, and on the days you go to work I’ll stay home and look after Keats. I’ll just tell my clients I’m not available those days. It’s easy.’

  For a second, Kate’s world brightened. Of course—Mark’s mobile acupuncture practice was as flexible as he wanted it to be. He could work whatever hours he liked. But then the light faded. Sadly, she shook her head.

  ‘Think about it,’ she said. ‘On the days I’m home I’ll actually have to be working. Looking after Keats is a full-time job. I can’t work while he’s running around and stealing my paper and drawing funny faces on it. If I’m going to do this job then I have to commit to it fully.’

  Mark took a deep breath and leaned his head back against the wardrobe.

  ‘And what about the new baby?’ she said. ‘It’s the perfect job at completely the wrong time.’

  ‘You really want this? Really, really want it?’

  ‘Really, really,’ she nodded miserably.

  ‘Then we’ll make it happen. I’ll look after Keats and the baby. I’ll change my business hours to nights and weekends only.’

  ‘You can’t do that,’ she said. ‘You’re just getting momentum. It would be disastrous to stop now.’

  He shook his head. His eyes were firm. ‘Tsunamis, bushfires, earthquakes—those things are disasters.’

  She recognised that look. It was one she couldn’t argue with. ‘But you love what you do.’

  ‘And I’m not giving up. All I’m doing is changing my hours. I’ll still be at the markets each week.’ He smiled and reached for her hand. ‘If it’s important to you, then it’s important to me.’

  Outside in the lounge, Kate could hear Nemo coming to an end.

  ‘But I’ll never get to see you,’ she said, her heart aching already. She and Mark spent so much time together. They didn’t just live together; they shared their lives.

  ‘We’ll make it work,’ he said. ‘Lots of couples do it. And it’s not forever. If it doesn’t suit us, we’ll change it. We’ll re-evaluate as we go along. Besides, you might not even like the job. You might want to chuck it in after a week.’

  The music for the credits was rolling and Keats appeared in the doorway, his eyes heavy, sucking his pinkie finger.

  ‘Come here, pumpkin.’ Kate opened her arms and he wandered in silently and leaned into her. She kissed his head and held him close, rubbing her cheek against his soft hair.

  ‘So it’s decided.’ Mark clapped his hands together once. ‘We’ll do it our way. I will have my job. You will have your job. Keats and baby number two will have the best of everything. You and I will meet up for clandestine lunchtime rendezvous. It will be perfect.’

  ‘Baby,’ Keats said, pointing to Kate’s belly with his wet hand.

  ‘Yes, that’s right,’ she said. ‘It’s your baby brother or sister in there.’ Then he kissed her belly in a gesture that made her want to hug him till he popped.

  ‘So we’re agreed?’

  ‘Agreed,’ she said.

  ‘Problem solved?’

  ‘All but one,’ she said, rubbing her hands in circles on Keats’s back as he lay across her lap. ‘I’m going to miss my pumpkin.’

  Kate and Leila were having dinner at the local pub—chicken curry on chips—when Kate’s phone chirped. There was a message from Susan in Brisbane, just passing on how cold it was when she opened the store that morning to start the annual stocktake, and one from Bryony, asking whether she should put in an application for The Tea Chest to have a marketing tent at an upcoming Sydney food and wine festival. Kate sent commiserations to Susan, along with a weather report from the glorious Cotswolds, and an affirmative text to Bryony. Those stalls cost a lot, but they paid for themselves many times over in exposure. Or so Simone had always said.

  There was also one from Mark.

  Fullerton Frat House report: Have abandoned washing experiment. Buying new clothes instead.

  Her phone chirped again and the next message was a picture of Keats’s open mouth with another tooth missing from the bottom row.

  ‘Oh . . .’ Kate was capsized by maternal angst. With each new tooth gone, she was hurtled back through time to those long nights holding her boys as their bodies burned with fever and their roars protested the pain of each eruption. So many hours soothing and singing and kissing away tears to have their hard-won prizes fall out such a short time later.

  And James couldn’t be far behind. Any day now he’d begin to lose teeth too.

  Keats had taken to keeping his teeth in jars of water, lined up on the windowsill of the bedroom, a habit Mark found disturbing, but Kate found reassuring. Perhaps Keats wanted to hold on to his childhood just as she did. It was kind of nice to have the teeth around, these little buds she’d worked so hard to help bring into the world.

  Leila’s phone vibrated and she tapped it to read the message before blushing and snickering.

  Kate raised an eyebrow at her. ‘An admirer? Lucas?’

  Leila’s face flickered. ‘No. Someone else.’ She reached for her pint of cider.

  ‘Have you heard from him lately?’

  ‘Lucas?
Mmm-hmm.’

  Kate took a mouthful of curry. She’d wanted to ask Leila more about Lucas for a long time. ‘Go on.’

  Leila groaned and dropped her head into her hand. ‘I’m stuck,’ she said.

  ‘Stuck?’

  ‘As in a rock and a hard place. I really like Lucas. Always have. And I think we could be really great. And up until now, I would have jumped at the chance to have a go.’

  ‘So, have you two, you know . . . ?’

  ‘No. But it’s not for lack of wanting to.’

  ‘Then what’s the problem?’

  A backslapping round of laughter and good-natured ribbing burst forth from a dim corner of the pub where three Scotsmen clanged their pint glasses together. Kate took a moment to soak up their thick accents and ruddy faces and file them away in her memories.

  A noise that was half whimper and half groan made its way from Leila’s throat and brought Kate’s attention back.

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere.’ Kate smiled, settling herself into the chair.

  ‘Well, there’s a roadblock of sorts to us getting together and I’m both the cause of it and the solution.’

  ‘Okay, I’m intrigued,’ Kate said. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a truly juicy piece of gossip to mull over.

  Leila went on to tell her about Achara and the email and Kate couldn’t help but gasp with shock as Leila described deleting it.

  ‘Oh, Leila.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ Leila said mournfully. ‘I didn’t have time to think properly. I just reacted and now I’ve trapped myself because I hold the piece of information that could set Lucas free from this cage of duty he’s built for himself, but I shouldn’t have the knowledge in the first place and he might never forgive me. And now he’s booked a flight to Thailand. What should I do?’

  ‘Gosh, I don’t have the foggiest idea where to start with that tangled web.’ Kate pushed herself back from the table and leaned against the tall wooden bench seat behind her.