Watermark

by Joanna Atherfold Finn

  • • •

  When her tea was grey and forming a film, when she’d paused long enough to catch the sobs of the baby next door ready for her ten o’clock feed, Miranda went back to her office. She tried to think of herself as one of the rational work-from-home brigade, but she was becoming more of a recluse. A loner. Rob worked in the respiratory ward while she worked at putting a positive spin on the real reason behind their move. She was applying her skills as a career adviser to a savvy online market. She didn’t need to see her clients; in fact, she preferred not to. She was in the business of smoothing over imperfections with the backspace key, bulleting deficient lives into independent clauses. Most of her work came from people who wanted a résumé rather than advice, and that suited her perfectly. Who was she to give it? Her inbox was cluttered with messages like: I’ve been given your details by Maureen. I’m the wife of Tim, a plumber. He can do sheeting and roofing as well as all your usual lavatory issues. Maureen said you can weave magic. I hope so for Tim’s sake. Some of them gave her very little to work from, but she’d gently prompt them or, when all else failed, use a fair degree of artistic licence.

  Her customers were a bland assortment of redundant executives and trades assistants, but now and then she was given a challenge. A recent pinnacle had been conversing with the man formerly known as Fat Cat from the long-running children’s series. In a brief email he’d explained that after the heady heights of his career in the late eighties, things were never quite the same. She couldn’t resist calling, somehow seeing him as a link to her childhood. A link to infancy in general. She let him know she’d switched allegiances early on, repulsed by the slurping milk break on Romper Room. She said she’d been impressed, as a child, by his silent, carefree dancing, often joining in, thinking he could see her through the screen. He said, given her age she’d probably witnessed one of his forebears. Fat Cat had been willing to unload; in fact, he was quite the talker. His own memory of the experience was intense and bitter. The broadcasting tribunal had had issues with his taciturn interpretations. They felt he seemed increasingly bewildered in the role. He’d had sporadic acting and commercial work since, but depression played a part in his employment gaps. At his lowest point, he confessed, he was admitted to an institution that encouraged various group activities: snow-dome construction and plant propagation, among other things. The internment wasn’t wasted, apparently; he thought he’d be a good horticulturalist. Miranda had listened, her occasional hums of confirmation weaving through his morose rant. When he finally ended his tirade, she gently advised him that retraining seemed inevitable. She then offered a generic résumé and they both paused before saying goodbye, perhaps wanting something more but not sure how to express it.

  She paused the same way now, pressing her ear into the silence, trying to hear the baby, but there was only the sound of Bess snouting her way through the undergrowth, seeking out a blue-tongue lizard. Miranda was never quick enough to intervene, though she often made futile threats to Bess. She’d take her to the pound. She’d chop off her tail. Bess was dogged, dragging her victims under the house, her secret safe until it was too late, the stench rising through the gaps in the floorboards, headier than compost.

  Now the lack of movement next door was affecting Miranda’s workflow. It was rare for the neighbours to be so quiet. Perhaps they’d gone for a walk, but it wasn’t the right hour. They usually left closer to lunchtime to get Suhbi off to sleep. She’d watch them through the curtains. Sway-backed Harko with a cigarette in one hand, casually holding his daughter like a football, and Bella waving the dummy seductively saying, ‘Does Suhbi want her chuchi?’ ‘Which way?’ Harko would always ask, and Bella would sigh and shrug. The last time she’d said, ‘Who cares, it’s not like we’ll see anything.’ Miranda had been annoyed at that, thinking of the whales breaching off the headland, the dappled ocean, the white-breasted gulls moulding hollows in the sand.

  Their sounds weren’t always to do with caregiving or lovemaking. Sometimes there were arguments. Harko had a cash job as a deckhand for a local fisherman, but the work was sporadic. Miranda sometimes heard Bella read Centrelink letters to him as they stood by the letterbox. They wanted him to attend a welding program with a new training provider; there was a group recruitment session or a mandatory self-esteem training course. Miranda heard all of this. She also heard Harko’s rough, defensive shouts. ‘Why can’t they leave us alone? Who’s gonna put me on?’ Miranda knew the exact wording of those letters. They sounded different now, read out loud in the context of a life. She recalled the files on her work computer, before she’d resigned: First Breach, Second Breach and Final Warning. Tidy Word documents that could be linked to a jobseeker number, two agendas merged together and printed out in Arial. She guessed Harko couldn’t read, but she knew there were crueller things than lost words on a page. If only her neighbours knew the effect this life of theirs was having on hers, intersecting it like a series of punctuation marks, causing her to stop and sigh and backtrack.

  • • •

  Miranda opened the window a bit wider. Torn clouds trekked across the sky. Up the road, a bird trilled and a bus shifted gears. The local radio broadcaster spoke through the static, predicting a strong southerly in the afternoon. Miranda heard them then, their voices sweeping up and scattering over the paling fence. Harko’s tone was rising incrementally, sliding in and out of Bella’s taunting beat. The words were muffled and Miranda pressed her ear closer to them and caught just a few. ‘Formula . . . shit everywhere . . . they’ll cut us . . .’ A door slammed and then another.

  Miranda went back to her desk, typed, stopped and tapped her fingers; she stood up again and started to wipe grit from the window sill. She listened for Suhbi, but apart from Bella and Harko, there was only her bathroom tap dripping and, in the distance, the gentle lap of the bay. Bella’s voice travelled, moving through rooms. ‘Why did you do that?’ she yelled. ‘You could have told them.’ Miranda heard a persistent banging then, with Harko’s shouting interposing each dull thud. Was he pounding his fist? Bashing his head? She saw herself in that moment, pressing then slamming her forehead into the mirrored built-in of her old home, clutching a hospital wrist band, a damp inky sphere spreading across her chest. That afternoon she’d gone back into the room to lie down and the slanting sun had reflected her grief back to her. She’d rubbed the mirrored surface with her sleeve, trying to remove the imprint, but instead it had spread, diluting and enlarging her sorrow. Miranda pressed the palms of her hands against her eyelids and crouched on the floor. The neighbours’ door squealed its own form of protest. ‘Yeah, why don’t you hit me?’ Bella said. ‘Then I’ll drop her.’ Miranda felt a sob rise within her. It was a bleak and brittle sound like the muted cry of a dream. Oh, God, she thought. She wouldn’t. That baby meant everything.

  Bella’s voice spilled into the front garden. There was another slam and then she screamed, ‘Just like your dad. Lock it, then. That’s the way, you idiot.’ Moments later Miranda heard the shatter of glass. She tried to press her panic down with reason. It was just an argument. Kids always had arguments. Maybe she should call Rob? But what was the point? He hardly ever answered. She checked the time, a habit left over from her old workplace. Efficiency neatly delineated into fifteen-minute slots. Time and motion recorded for future reference.

  Miranda’s doorbell chimed. The unbearable Oh Lord our God melody that she didn’t know how to disengage. She breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth, another form of timing in which she’d had practice. Through the peephole she saw Bella’s smooth-limbed frame with the baby nuzzled within it. The baby. She opened the door self-consciously. She was still in her pyjamas. She hadn’t even brushed her hair.

  ‘It’s just me,’ the girl said. Then, unnecessarily, ‘From next door.’

  Miranda at first thought she was wearing a purple sarong, but Bella was dripping, wrapped in a bath towel, with Suhbi propped against her forearm. Miranda scanned what she could see of
their bodies for damage, but all she picked up was the thread of a spent tear dissecting the girl’s right cheek. Behind her, in the front garden, a rosella dangled like a trapeze artist, guzzling nectar.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Bella continued. ‘We’re locked out. Were you having a sleep?’

  ‘God no. No, I’m a bit young for nanna naps,’ Miranda said, feeling the need to justify herself. ‘For heaven’s sake. Come inside. Get the little one in out of the wind.’ Little one? Wind? It was barely more than an autumn breeze. In an effort to appear composed, she’d turned into a syrup-tongued Mothercraft nurse.

  ‘I didn’t know where else to go,’ Bella said, moving through the hallway entrance, pulling the towel down against her legs with her spare hand. ‘Not dressed like this.’

  Miranda noticed that Bella was shivering a little, while Suhbi sucked methodically on her – What did Bella call it? – her chuchi. Miranda tried to reconcile the girl with the sounds that had come from next door just moments before. She looked as chaste as Lippi’s Madonna. She smelled like apple-blossom. The girl was exquisite, even now, and that made Miranda’s voice harsher than she intended. ‘Just through here,’ she said, leading them into the lounge room, motioning for her to take a seat, but Bella shook her head and instead walked around the room, swaying gently, shifting Suhbi now and then from one shoulder to the other as her eyes lingered on Miranda’s possessions. Miranda followed Bella’s gaze, taking in the framed black-and-white landscapes as though for the first time. Scanning colour-coordinated books and ornaments on her timber buffet. In Search of Lost Time was propped up by a white oil burner. There was a photo of her and Rob on a tour boat, the blanched wall of Geikie Gorge behind them. And another, of her and her mother in pirate hats, their limbs splayed out on a checked rug, sunbaking.

  ‘Wow, great photos. And all those books,’ Bella said. ‘Are you the reader?’

  Was the girl just being polite? ‘Oh, we both read. Rob likes biographies and I … well, I guess I prefer novels. You know, entering someone’s life that you’d never normally have exposure to.’ God. She was rambling. ‘Bella, is there anyone you need to call? I’ll grab the phone. You can go in the office if you like, for some privacy.’

  ‘No, there’s no-one to call,’ the girl said.

  ‘Okay. Are you sure, honey?’ Honey? Why was she calling her that? It sounded so patronising. She’d been called that by the hospital social worker. Honey, I know this is hard but you need to fill out these forms. Honey, you’ve missed this section, it goes over the page. It was the same treatment she’d meted out to people in her old job. A bit of coercion to fulfil the department’s administrative needs. ‘Bella? What can I do for you?’ She wondered if Bella knew how much she’d heard. ‘I can make the call if that’s easier? Maybe your mum?’

  ‘God no,’ Bella said. ‘That’d be really uncomfortable.’

  Uncomfortable? Perhaps that word meant something different to a nineteen-year-old. ‘Okay. Then a cup of tea? Coffee perhaps?’ She thought of her mother again, how she’d know exactly what to say. Sit on the pouffe.

  ‘Tea. I don’t drink coffee, thanks.’

  ‘Right. Good,’ Miranda said, now sure she didn’t even have any. ‘I’m the same. I love the smell but not the taste.’

  ‘Yeah, jinx,’ Bella said. ‘Though the funny thing is, when I was pregnant, I switched to coffee.’

  Miranda nodded and went to respond, but then she walked into the kitchen and put the jug on. Bella followed her, staring out at the backyard.

  ‘You’ve got a cubby,’ the girl said.

  ‘Chook house actually,’ Miranda corrected, ‘though it’s currently vacant. I need to fence it. I had great intentions when we moved in, but, I don’t know. I’ll get around to it.’

  ‘It’d make a great cubby,’ Bella insisted. ‘Wow, and look at your beautiful lawn. Our house is so crap. There’s holes in the yard. And shells everywhere.’

  Miranda nodded. Maybe it’s a midden, she thought.

  ‘We get cheap rent because it’s such a hell-hole.’ She went to sit down at the kitchen table and then looked down at her towel. ‘Miranda, I don’t really want to sit down. I’m not wearing any clothes.’

  Oh God, Miranda thought. Bella had had to articulate the bleeding obvious to her, but she couldn’t think of a suitable response. She took the milk out of the fridge and reached into the cupboard to take down two floral mugs.

  ‘We were getting ready to go out. We were going to catch the bus to the Marina and have some lunch. We never do stuff like that, and then Harko told me … well, he just makes me so mad.’

  ‘Men,’ Miranda said.

  ‘At least yours has a job. Harko just wants to hang around with me.’

  Miranda thought about Rob’s long shifts. He always had some excuse. Had to wait for the in-service nurses to get back. A bit of a bingle on the road home. Traffic was bumper to bumper.

  ‘Anyway, no-one will give him a go. He’s not stupid, you know. He’s really good with his hands.’

  Miranda allowed herself a small smile. So I’ve heard, she thought. She jiggled the teabags up and down with pinched fingers. What was she supposed to do now? She added milk and then passed the cup to Bella and the girl effortlessly readjusted Suhbi to hold it. Miranda cupped hers in front of her and leaned against the kitchen bench. ‘What are we going to do with you?’ Miranda said, as much to herself as to the girl from next door.

  ‘I think you’re about my size,’ Bella said.

  • • •

  Miranda rummaged through her clothes, trying to unearth something that would not be too repellent to the fashion-conscious Bella. She pulled out a lace-and-cotton bat-winged top that was so outdated it could possibly be ‘in’ again, and a jade-green skirt. She’d never had the heart to throw the clothes out. Rob had bought them for her during their west-coast stint. She’d been too self-conscious to try the clothes on in the market’s open-air change room and when she put them on later in the campsite amenities block, jumping so she could see her body in the tiny pitted mirror, the skirt did nothing for her hips and the top made her feel like a moth. Whenever they went out, Rob always went on about it. ‘What about that nice green skirt I bought you? You always wear jeans.’

  Did the girl have underwear on? Miranda didn’t really want to know. She fossicked in her drawer and pulled out a faded black pair, then decided they were too drab and put them back again. When she went back to the kitchen, holding the top and skirt up as though seeking approval, Suhbi was snuggled into Bella’s shoulder.

  ‘Swap you while I get dressed,’ Bella said. ‘Cool top. Those sleeves are great.’

  Miranda tried to reconcile the girl’s enthusiasm, her complete willingness to put the baby into her care, with her own fracturing heart.

  ‘Thanks. Bella, I don’t think … I don’t have any experience with babies.’

  ‘Well, she’s all gums, so she can’t bite,’ Bella said. ‘Anyway, she’s completely out to it.’

  ‘You could just put her on the bed while you get dressed,’ Miranda offered.

  ‘No, she’ll wake. You’ll be right. You don’t have to do anything.’

  They clumsily shuffled the baby from one set of arms to the other. Miranda scooped Suhbi’s warm, pasty body into the folds of her own. She nodded down the hallway and told Bella to take the first door on the left. Then she moved, shakily, to the lounge room and lowered herself onto the couch. Hunched forward, she took in Suhbi’s creased thighs, her matted hair and the bare patch at the back of her head. She rested her fingers across the cradle of the baby’s skull and traced around the kite-shaped fontanelle. Suhbi’s scalp was scaly, as fragile as the membrane of an egg. She hummed and swallowed in her sleep. Miranda breathed with her, counting her exhalations, forty per minute, and she worked her finger into Suhbi’s closed fist until the baby was clutching her tight. Listening out for Bella’s footsteps, she pressed her face into the delicate hollow of the baby’s head. With closed eyes she inhaled. />
  Jesus Sandals and Anchovette

  You look out the back window of the lime-green Galant to the curved struts of the rusting balcony, the top step where you grinned (gap-toothed) for your first-day-of-school photo, the pine tree with its dying centre. Behind the gate is your cubby house with foundations so deep it can’t be moved. Next door, Mr Carter is spraying his cumquat trees. You picture Mrs Carter inside, sitting at the kitchen table doing a crossword, and Jesus hanging from his cross, observing her forlornly. She has told you he is all-knowing. You wonder why he doesn’t drop a hint now and then.

  Some weeks ago, you told Mrs Carter that your dad had spread his arms out wide in front of your mum and said, ‘What’s this?’ She said she didn’t know and he said, ‘A hell of a way to spend Easter.’ You knew, somehow, that this was a very bad thing to tell Mrs Carter, but you thought perhaps she might have explained what he meant. She just touched her forehead, then her chest and her shoulders and said, ‘There are no non-believers in the trenches, Josephine.’ That didn’t make any sense to you either. The only trench you knew of was in your pa’s backyard. He had stocked it full of food tins because, according to your dad, he was a hording lunatic waiting for a famine or a war.

  You think about Mrs Carter’s dishes draining in the rack and her clock ticking away the moments until morning tea. You wonder if she’ll still arrange the sponge, the scourer and the plug on top of one another – blue, green and white – once you’re gone. Last night she gave you a porcelain angel as a goodbye gift. In your haste to get home, you tripped and the angel fell into the rockery and broke her wing. You buried her in the backyard under the liquidambar tree.

  You say goodbye to these things. They are neatly ruled into sections by the car window’s demister grid. You want to write the word that explains how you feel. Write it with your pen licence, row after row, so it fills up all those lines running across your white weatherboard house and your garden. Your eight-year-old self doesn’t know the word, and has to make do with feeling it.