Escape

by Anna Fienberg

  'I think he's scared, Clara. He's trying to cut you out because he can't face you. It's as if, I don't know, he'll be revealed to himself. Maybe he feels he won't survive that. As if he's an illusion that only exists as long as everyone believes in him. Like the emperor's new clothes. It must be frightening to live like that.'

  'I suppose.'

  We're quiet, trying to imagine this person we've never known.

  'I'm sure he loved you as much as he can love anyone, Mum.'

  'Mm.'

  'Oh well, it must be getting late there now. Have you had dinner?'

  'No, I'm not hungry. Not yet, anyway. It's good to talk about more ordinary things, though. Let's do that for a sec. How is Lucia? Does she know about all this? What does she say?'

  'Oh she's fascinated, can't believe it. She says she saw a miniseries once involving the Mafia and a man who came back from the dead, went into witness protection or something. Anyway, she reckons this is the closest thing to it.'

  'Hardly a miniseries. This is our lives!'

  'The Days of Our Lives . . . Oh Mum, there's no need to get all snooty about it. She's not inside it like we are. And anyway, she's been really supportive. Kept telling me to ring you, even before I got the phone card.'

  'And what about Marisa, have you told her?'

  'Yes, she's been great. It's helped to make it more real somehow. You know, Mum, for all the awfulness of it I feel this kind of thrill, well, not a thrill but . . . You know, that all of me is awake when a lot of me used to be asleep. It's painful and strange but it started even before I found all this out. This stuff about Dad has just enhanced it or made it gallop to the surface, laid it out clear. It's something about dealing with the truth, facing it, do you know what I mean?'

  'I think so. It's scary, but it makes you feel stronger, doesn't it? I mean, it's one thing to distance yourself from the past, it's another to have the courage to understand it. For most of my life I've just been drifting around on clouds of unknowing.'

  'But you couldn't have known!'

  'Oh, Clara, there are so many things in life that can squash you, not just one. I mean, look at it this way. You've got this chance now to uncover the people who are your family. You can see the parts you like, the parts you don't – what's their stuff , what's yours. Seems the more clearly you see patterns of the past, the more you get to choose how to live your future. You can have a voice. I lost mine, but lately I'm finding it again. You have to take care of your voice, Clara. Don't lose it. Even if you have to hide it under something sometimes, don't forget where you put it.'

  There's silence again. We're both breathing, thinking. It's a nice kind of quiet, I don't mind it. I don't mind it at all. It's not rustling with little creatures with bad wings. It's peaceful, truthful.

  'I think you and Sophia would get on well,' says Clara. 'We spent the past three days just talking, like this. Mum, do you think you might come to Italy? I always thought it would be Dad, but somehow I reckon it would be more important for you.'

  'Maybe. I'm doing all kinds of new things. Guess what, I'm going to be the magician at Saraah's twenty-first party! She says hi, by the way.'

  'See? I always told you. Of course she had no idea what you were like to live with! Just kidding, Mum. Well, I guess I better go to class.'

  'Yes. And Clara? I love your writing. I think you're wonderful.'

  'Thanks, Mum. Buona notte.'

  'And Clara? Well, I was thinking, you could take a couple of the characters from your Book Club notes and follow them into their lives, so there'd be interwoven stories of travelling and discovery—'

  'Mum? Let's just leave it at buona notte?'

  Part IV

  The Resurrection

  Chapter 35

  I walk along the bush track that overlooks the bay. There's the smell of eucalyptus, a whiff of cinnamon as leaves crush underfoot. I don't need to run, I take my time. The track winds round the edge of a cliff , walled with vines and peppermint trees. At the lookout I stop and close my eyes. I take gulps of crystal air and tear a new leaf from a gum, crush it in my fingers and smell the lemon. It shoots up my nose in a spray, making me sneeze.

  Simon told me about this track. I'd seen it marked on maps before, and Doreen had mentioned it years ago when the girls were little. Somehow I'd never got around to exploring it.

  The path leads me on, down to a slatted wooden bridge and I stop halfway to look at the creek trickling under my feet. A water dragon rustles the bushes, quick as a wink. You can stand on this bridge leaning your arms comfortably on the rail and look through the trees to the water. You can just stand and lean and watch. You can use all the minutes and the hours of your life, the gift of time we are given. Sometimes, now, I notice the hours and live inside them, right inside the earth and sky and cinnamon air, instead of skating on the surface, expecting disaster, listening to the voice.

  The path is sandy, strewn with grey-green leaves. I find a yellow mushroom, round and flat as a table. Clara used to imagine gumnut babies sitting at mushrooms like these, eating their dinner. Crows swear overhead, there's the sudden crack of a whipbird. I walk next to stone boulders 200 million years old, created during the Triassic period, when there were dinosaurs and jungles of conifers and ferns. A brachiosaurus might have scraped its claws over a rock like this.

  The stillness here, now, is magical, inhabited, whispering. I continue along the track, past old man banksias with their lumpy ancient skin and red bloodwoods and stop to read the wandering poems of the scribbly gums.

  Wooden stairs lead down to the bay. Rocks to sit on, emerald moss and yellow lichen. So smooth, the bay, laid out like silk. There's a houseboat to the left , a chair on the deck, a pillow. What a dream place to live. I slip off my shoes, hike up my skirt and wade in. The water is soft around my knees like a sigh. I can see down to the bottom, the wrinkles of sand worn by the tide. I have wrinkles like that, but they are not the essence of me.

  'I no longer look like myself,' Rita moaned to me yesterday. 'I had my glasses on in the bathroom and discovered a whole new sag under my chin. I'm not good at coping with change.'

  'Me neither,' I agreed. 'It would be easier if we were elephants. They don't have to adjust, they're born looking old.'

  'You sound just like Doreen!'

  We were sitting at a new cafe where there is magnificent coffee, strong not bitter, and you can linger for as long as you like. I appreciate that and the warm steamy room, the comfort of my friend's face opposite me. 'You know, I've been thinking, it's like we're getting to be the elders of the tribe, the ones with the stories. We've earned our place, haven't we? So perhaps we could spread ourselves around a bit, share the knowledge? We could do worse.'

  'How's that going, with the Sudanese kids?'

  'They're gorgeous, I love it. Every Wednesday they come to my place and we read. Sometimes we go for walks and find leaves and sticks and things to make into letters. And sometimes I get sad afterwards, imagining how they feel, going back to a strange new family. But I can't imagine it, not really. I've always been so hung up on that – trying to live inside the heads of other people, trying to fix everything, work out why, make it better. But you can't, can you? You can't control anyone else but yourself. It's taken me a long while to see that! You have to let go, don't you, at least for a while, even with the people you love. Cut off . I mean, after you've done all you can, you have to draw a line around yourself. Like a fence.'

  Rita sighed. 'Yeah, pity we didn't know that early on. When I got married, I just gave myself away. Thought I would get him, in return. Such a waste, when I was young and wrinkle-free.'

  'Well, it's hard to keep your self as well as a husband. A real balancing act.'

  'I suppose.' Rita laughed suddenly. 'Being busy gives your children space to breathe, too. I notice how happy Jenny sounds when I tell her how taken up I am with climate change.'

  I laughed. 'Yes, and lately I find it easier to let Clara be away, Guido go, Harry stay buried—'


  'Who?'

  'I mean, when I'm teaching, I'm teaching. When I'm reading, I'm reading. I'm not fantasising so much about what other people might be feeling.'

  'You know, Rachel,' Rita said slowly, 'that doesn't sound to me like cutting off . It sounds like connecting.'

  'Yes, you're right! Me with me, in the moment.'

  We sat back in our chairs, beaming at each other. I looked at Rita's face and felt a rush of fondness. I wanted to say, I like that roundness under your chin. I've been there with you all the way, and you will always look like you, to me. Lovely you.

  'I had a dream last week that I married myself,' Rita said. 'I was incredibly happy, in this white dress. I felt sort of holy and blessed, but my guests stood around looking embarrassed.' Rita grinned. 'I'm glad I can tell you that, I wasn't going to.' She stretched and sipped the last of her coffee. 'Good aren't they, our conversations? I wonder how many we've had over the years, trying to work out our lives.'

  'If you want statistics, you'll have to ask Lena.' We laughed then and I had a sudden thought. 'You know, learning how to let go and stay connected – that's a tricky balance.'

  Rita thought about it. 'Balance. It's not easy. My mother used to say, "Everything in moderation, dear". I don't know what she would have said about my dream.'

  We smiled at each other. I looked down at my empty cup. I'd already had two coffees that morning, but I decided to have another. Not everything in moderation. Not every day.

  *

  The water in the bay is so still, the swish swish of my legs the only movement. A school of silver whiting flick past my toes. I stop swishing to get a better look. Gone. The bay opens out into the flat blue sea.

  On the horizon a crowd of white boats rock, their masts lit by the sun like candles on a birthday cake. A solitary dinghy weaves its way through the masts, and I follow it with my eyes, counting the candles, all through the years. Maybe they're not wasted, the years that seemed so useless, trying to make something out of nothing, love out of stone, magic from mud. If I can have this.

  I stand with the water lapping about me and think how in a couple of hours I will see Maria. Last night, before I went to bed, I spoke to her on the phone. 'I'm sorry I didn't come to the funeral, Maria,' I said. 'I went to the wrong one.' When she finished laughing I told her about my sliding sensations that have almost gone and Clara's going away and the discovery of Guido's living relatives and how strange it was that I was no longer angry. She told me about her variety of careers after teaching – actress, singer, celebrant, which is what she is doing now.

  'What do you celebrate?' I asked.

  'Oh anything – births, menopause, driving licence, divorce—'

  'How do you celebrate a divorce?'

  'They're often the best parties. You know how women do things. Solidarity, loud music, dancing, talk. No wonder men are scared of us as when we come into our power. Call us old crones—'

  'Witches—'

  'Bitches. I celebrated a Bitch Coming Out party last year, it was wild . . . but not bitchy. We often get those things mixed up. That's where I come in . . .'

  We were right back to where we started, connected, like fifteen years ago.

  I wade back to the shore and dry my legs. The sun is warming now on my skin. I sit on the sand and lean against a Triassic rock, holding my face up to the sun. Peace. How good it is to let my mind wander where it likes. I don't have to be careful.

  Facing yourself is not the worst part, I think, it's the energy you have to find, day after year, trying not to. So much energy. I look at the water and think of nothing. What I notice is the absence. The clear water, the bare sky. No voice.

  Nothing is forever. Now and then the voice returns, like the vampire in a horror movie. Just when you'd thought you'd struck it through the heart. But I'm learning to shoosh it away, back to where it came from.

  Guido still hasn't talked to me about his mother. Not directly. He says living is a subjective experience, and he has his way of interpreting events, I have mine. He talks a lot about detachment, which to me used to be like dying, but to him is life. I can see the use of detachment. Divorce. I can say it now. Maria celebrates divorce. A good divorce is the art of letting go. When you have done everything you can, you're allowed to escape with your life. That's what Doreen did, together with her extension cord and her diaphragm tucked into her sock.

  Clara asked me again the other day if I'm angry. Simon, who flares at even the mention of Guido, is bewildered by my lack of anger. But he didn't see the wrecked kitchen and the smashed glass all over the floor. What I've noticed is that the anger tends to evaporate when you stop seeing someone else as the key to your life and start living it yourself.

  Lately I prefer to uncover spiky historical events that lie under the sand before I step on them with my whole foot. I don't want a terminal infection spreading from a single festering wound. But Doreen says one person or event doesn't have the power to shape us – there are so many moments, so many possibilities for change. 'Life is a terminal illness,' she says, with a laugh. I don't think that poet Giacomo Leopardi was laughing when he said much the same thing.

  It's so good to laugh. Better than sex, says Rita. I don't know that I agree about that any more. We've been practising, as Simon suggested. I look down at my body, a source of pleasure these days to us both. There's a small stain on my white top. But I'm fond of this shirt. I wore it over my holey jumpers each night when I was writing about magicians. Some things you just have to live with. And it's not my only shirt.

  *

  If you saw me, a middle-aged woman walking back along the bush track, you'd pass me without a glance. A mild person, you might judge, who does the right thing and puts her paper in the right bin. But inside, I am luminous. There is the bay with the boats and masts standing up to be counted like the years, and ideas for magic and plans for travel, Italy, maybe Africa, and Saraah's twenty-first and Clara with new words in her mouth that will belong just to her. There is so much to look forward to. Soon there'll be Maria's celebrations and the children's progress and Sunday roast at Simon's house. There is Danny not dead but head waiter at the Park Hyatt and Guido with the script he has always wanted to write. There are my mother and father with their long love and my beautiful friends and me being whole and alive and unplundered, steady inside my skin.

  I always thought it would be so big, the moment of being me, but it's small and quiet, something other people wouldn't notice. They wouldn't see that I am rich inside, not sliding but still as a stone, and just for this moment, free.

  Acknowledgements

  Grateful thanks to my editor Elizabeth Cowell for her perception, intelligence, hard work and remarkable ability to see the whole in the detail, Vanessa Mickan-Gramazio for her initial invaluable structural advice, and Nikki Christer for her enduring editorial integrity (and patience!), always.

  I also want to express my gratitude to: Jytte Beauman for her extraordinary insight and wisdom; Fiona Inglis, Barbara Fienberg, Marie-Claire Marquis and Kathy Muir for their extremely helpful suggestions and responses; Noah Sharwood for his professional expertise and panache in magic; Barbara Bertini for her assistance in Italian; and always, my family, for their sustaining encouragement and stamina over the years.

  Thanks also to Ruth Brandon for her fascinating book, The Life and Many Deaths of Harry Houdini. The unique interpretations and portraits were inspirational in the development of this novel. (It's also a great read!) Many thanks, too, to the magician and author John Novak for his books on magic: The Art of Escape, Volume 2, 'Selected Chain Escapes'; Volume 4, 'Escapes from a Straitjacket'; Volume 5, 'The Bohemian Torture Escape'; and Volume 8, 'The Protégé (A Full Evening of Magic and Escapes!)'. His generous breadth of advice and step-by-step instructions were fundamental to my understanding of magic.

  Although all the characters in this book are fictional, the 'Climate Coolers' and their 1 Million Women campaign are real and existing at this time of publishing
. Every woman can join. For more information, see the website www.1millionwomen.com.au.

  Finally, I would like to acknowledge Anita Jeram for her lovely book, The Most Obedient Dog in the World, and make apologies, too, for changing names and situations in it slightly to suit my plot.