‘Hellie, I know I haven’t gone into the whole Nathaniel thing with you. I don’t know if I have the energy.’
‘I don’t even have the energy and I haven’t lived it.’ She paused and there was a rushing sound as she moved the phone. ‘Just picking up Ava. She’s hungry. I’m a mobile cow right now.’
‘How’s it going? Is she beautiful? Are you getting more sleep since we last spoke?’
Hellie sighed deeply. ‘You have no idea. No one tells you how hard this is going to be. Why don’t they? I may not have reproduced if I’d known.’
‘I guess that’s the point. It’s a biological imperative to ensure the survival of the species.’ Phoebe thought of Asha, desperate for a baby, Jenna’s shattered dream of a normal child. She felt like telling both these women’s stories to Hellie but her friend had her own journey, and it was hard as well. ‘So, still no sleep?’
‘Not enough. Broken sleep is just torture, really. But here am I whingeing and you’ve just been through . . .’ Ava’s cry ricocheted down the phone line.
‘You need to feed her, it’s okay. Go, go.’
‘You’re not off the hook that quickly. Hang on, I’ll put you on speaker phone.’ There was a little yelp from Ava and then she settled. Hellie’s voice was more distant now. ‘She’s on the boob. Aren’t you lonely down there? Does it feel strange?’
‘No, strangely, it feels right. It’s where I need to be right now.’
Phoebe considered how much to tell Hellie. She knew Jez was her first love. Hellie had a first love too—Marc with a ‘c’ who had been a very sophisticated struggling poet, in the way only twenty-one-year-olds could be. Phoebe wanted to know whether what she and Jez felt was merely a circumstance of their past. Would Hellie feel unmoored by seeing Marc?
‘Hells, I need to ask . . .’ If she opened this particular door, Hellie would launch into a barrage of questions Phoebe didn’t yet know the answers to.
‘I still can’t believe it. You and Nathaniel were good together.’
Phoebe paused. ‘Were we?’
‘Yeah. It made sense, you know?’
‘No, but now that you know it’s over, tell me—did we have chemistry? Were we right? He doesn’t think we did, that we were, obviously.’
Hellie was quiet and baby sounds filled the receiver. ‘In my experience, if you have to ask someone else if you have chemistry then you probably don’t. But you looked great together.’
‘So, no.’
‘Yeah, but we both know that chemistry isn’t the be all and end all. Look at you and Jez, and me and Marc. Sometimes it’s just nice, better to have chemistry as a pubescent memory.’
‘Hells . . . Jez is here. I wasn’t going to tell you but—’
‘What, living there? I thought he was married and living in Canberra.’
‘He was, until recently. They moved back into Driftwood and run it as a guest house of sorts.’
She clicked her tongue. ‘Why am I sensing there’s more to this particular story?’
Phoebe went quiet. She didn’t know what to say, where to start.
‘Oh my God. There’s something going on.’
Phoebe sighed. ‘Yes. Something, but I don’t know exactly what, or why, or . . . but I just—’
‘You’re feeling bad. He’s married.’
‘Not happily though.’
‘Is any cheating man happily married? Sorry . . . I’m just worried that you’re on the rebound and all those first love feelings are just stirring up—’
‘I know, I’ve been so aware of the rebound thing and keeping my distance, but I can’t explain it, we just seem to always end up alone talking—just talking, but there’s this thing between us.’
‘Chemistry.’
‘Maybe. Yes. I don’t know. And then there’s all these feelings I’ve been having about Karin.’
‘Of course you have. Everything of hers is down there. The anniversary is coming up.’
‘It’s more than that though.’
A knock on the front door interrupted her. ‘Hang on, sorry, there’s someone at the door and this phone isn’t cordless. Give me a sec.’ She placed the handset on the bench.
Her heart thumped thickly against her chest when she opened the screen door to find a police officer on the step. He was short and muscular with a neck and shoulders that looked too big for his body; the human version of a bulldog. He wore dark glasses, which he slid up to sit on top of his closely shaved head. ‘Sorry to disturb. Are you Phoebe Price?’
‘Yes.’
‘You reported a missing dinghy.’ He studied his notepad. ‘A rowboat, a few weeks ago?’
‘Yes.’ A rush of relief took her adrenalin down a notch. ‘It’s not worth much but I just thought I should let the police know there are people taking things from the river.’
‘We’ve located it.’ He flipped through the notepad with deft fingers. ‘Down at Burra Lakes. A whole heap of stolen goods, motorbikes, boats, jet skis. Trying to sell them at a garage sale, if you can believe that.’
‘Really?’
‘We have one of the suspects in custody. A pretty violent individual to be roaming this area, so it’s good you brought the theft to our attention.’
‘Oh?’ Phoebe replied, feeling a shiver run through her.
‘Yeah, but there’s nothing to worry about, forensics will release the boat shortly if you’d like to pick it up.’
She felt like mentioning her feelings about her sister’s death to this policeman but she’d seen enough crime shows to know that he would look at her kindly, as though she were a bit simple, and repeat the facts at hand.
‘Oh, I’m not that keen to have it back, to be honest. What about the other boats that were stolen on the same night?’
The policeman’s shoulders lifted. ‘Yours was the only one found at this stage. We think it was probably the same people, but they may have already gotten rid of the others.’
‘And who was the man you arrested and what did he do?’ She crossed her arms and hugged them to her.
‘The man we have in custody is on domestic violence and manslaughter charges.’
Phoebe felt her stomach drop but she smiled and thanked the man. Was she really now imagining that Karin could have been hurt by some random violent thief? But Ginny’s words came back to her. She’d been sleeping next to a random man that Phoebe never knew about.
She watched the policeman walk down the drive then remembered Hellie and rushed back.
‘Sorry, a policeman was at the door. Can we continue our conversation another time Hellie? And yes, I promise I won’t sleep with Jez.’
PART THREE
Undercurrents
THEN
‘Can we go up a bit further?’ asked Jez, one hand on the dog’s back, the other skimming the water as he and Tommy pulled the boat off the sand into the deep.
Tommy bit his lip and stuck his finger up, as if testing the air for something. Karin wondered what it was. He looked down the river towards Driftwood and then upriver. ‘We could just motor up to the bend, I guess,’ he said, checking the face of his watch. ‘It’s still early.’
‘Are you sure we should do that? We told your mum we’d just go to the picnic area,’ said Phoebe, hopping into the boat, her eyes meeting Karin’s and asking silently if she was okay with it.
As second in line, if she said no, they wouldn’t go. Karin shrugged off the uneasy feeling those strange men on the bank had given her. They were still near the rocks but they looked like they were packing their fishing stuff into the back of their big truck anyway. She actually did want to see what was beyond the bend of the river. She’d never been that far and it was where the sharks breed, and it would be kind of cool to see one.
She nodded her agreement and squeezed Phoebe’s hand to let her know it was all okay. Tommy revved the motor, the boat once again cutting through the glassy water like a knife. It was hot with the life vest snug around her body and Karin wanted to lean out to dip her hand i
n the cool water but she wasn’t game this far out. It was so deep with nothing but green underneath them.
Ever since that day she’d nearly drowned, she’d avoided going in the water. It was hard to explain to her friends back in Sydney, but everyone in this boat had been there. In a strange way, that actually made her feel safer.
The river was a darker green at the place where it bent and narrowed. The sun didn’t reach this part, and it was as though an entirely new shadow-world existed beyond the bend, one that was quieter and cooler and more remote. There were no houses on the banks here, just trees.
‘Hey, what’s that?’ Jez’s voice was small under the sound of the motor.
Tommy cut the engine and there was suddenly silence. They glided through the green. A sheer rock wall reached up to their right. A cockie screeched.
Karin was expecting to see a shark and she felt her heart beat faster, but Jez was pointing to something up in the trees on the left bank. She squinted but she couldn’t make out what he was pointing at.
‘Can you see anything?’ she asked Phoebe.
‘Nup,’ said Phoebe, letting go of her hand so she could strain forward.
‘It’s like, I don’t know, there’s like something in the trees.’
‘What, an animal?’ asked Camilla, standing up.
‘Sit down,’ called Tommy.
‘No, no it’s wooden. Like a treehouse,’ said Jez.
To their left was a narrow mouth where the river snaked off, dense bush crowding the banks.
‘Get the oars out,’ said Jez ‘It’s shallow here. Let’s go up this little stream here so we can check it out.’
The clunk of the wooden oars as they sliced through the water was calming. Jez and Tommy rowed, their shoulders working hard. The air smelled damp and mossy here, like mosquitos and water lilies. They were all craning their necks to see what was in the trees.
‘I can see it! Yeah, it looks like a treehouse,’ said Camilla. For once she sounded excited instead of bored.
‘Look, there’s a sandbank. Let’s pull up there,’ said Phoebe.
The dog began to bark.
‘Shhh, boy, it’s okay.’ Karin hugged his neck. ‘I don’t know, it seems a bit far away from everything,’ she said, the hairs on her arms lifting. She hugged the dog closer and he made a little whimper.
‘What if someone lives there?’ asked Phoebe, also wrapping her arms around the dog.
‘I don’t think it’s anyone’s house. It’s just a rundown treehouse in the woods,’ said Tommy, steering the boat towards the shore. The certainty in his voice was reassuring. She and Phoebe exchanged a look.
The boat hit the shore and they all piled out, the dog last. Crabs scuttled into tiny holes in the sand and a kookaburra’s cry cut through the trees above.
‘Look, there’s a path,’ said Tommy, making his way past a bank of dense green mangroves.
They followed the narrow path cut through the bush. ‘Snake,’ shouted Jez, and then laughed.
‘You shouldn’t joke about that,’ said Tommy. ‘There might be snakes.’
Jez laughed again. ‘This is so cool; the path leads right up to the tree. It’s as though it’s been made to lead there.’
From the ground, the treehouse seemed high up. Planks of wood had been nailed into the gum’s trunk, leading up to the small house, camouflaged from where they stood by leaves.
‘Cooee, anyone there?’ shouted Tommy, his head back, hands cupped around his mouth.
They all stood still, listening, but they could only hear the wind in the leaves and the tide pulling out.
‘Who’s first?’ asked Jez, looking to Tommy.
‘We’ll go. You girls stay here and keep watch,’ said Tommy, already on the first rung, testing it for strength.
‘Why do you get to go first?’ asked Camilla, hands on her hips, bottom lip stuck out.
‘Because we’re older than you,’ said Tommy. ‘We’ll just make sure it’s safe first.’
They waited, the dog’s whines piercing the strange, quiet atmosphere.
‘It’s a bit spooky here,’ said Phoebe, linking her arm through Karin’s.
‘I know, it is a bit,’ said Karin, thinking of the men at the picnic area. She knelt, playing with the dog’s ears. ‘It’s okay, boy,’ she said. ‘They’ll be back. It’s only a treehouse.’
But even Camilla was hugging the dog close to her body.
Jez came down from the treehouse first. He landed on the spongy ground with a thud. His face looked flushed. ‘It’s just an old treehouse. Tommy says it’s a bit rickety and dangerous for you girls to come up.’
‘It doesn’t look rickety from here,’ said Karin, craning her neck skyward. She set her mouth into a line and shared an annoyed look with Phoebe. They weren’t going to let the boys leave them out of this adventure just ’cause they were girls. ‘It actually looks like someone’s made it really carefully. It even has a window and a kind of balcony thing.’
The treehouse had been made with long planks of light wood and it even had a sloped roof and small window overlooking the river.
‘I want to see what’s up there,’ said Camilla, her hands on the lowest rung of the ladder.
‘Me too,’ said Phoebe, slapping at a mosquito at her ankle.
Jez looked up and scratched his head. He looked torn. ‘Tommy said you shouldn’t though.’
Karin stood to her full height. ‘Well, I’m the second oldest and we want to see it, too.’
Jez shrugged and kicked at a tree root.
Karin gave the dog a quick hug. ‘You stay here, boy, okay?’ As if understanding, he settled his body against the tree trunk.
‘They’re coming up,’ Jez yelled into the sky.
Tommy’s head appeared out of the small window. ‘I told you not to let them.’
‘You’re just saying that because we’re girls,’ shouted Karin, hoisting herself up onto the first rung. She might be afraid of water but she wasn’t afraid of heights. She wanted to see what the river looked like from the tops of the trees.
‘Go on,’ said Phoebe, letting Camilla go ahead of her. Karin knew it was because Phoebe was bigger and wanted to be behind Cammie in case she slipped, but she would never let on.
Her arms and legs were aching a bit by the time she reached the top. There was a rope to make it easier to get off the ladder and onto the wooden platform. She helped her sisters.
They could see all the way down the river and she got a rush of exhilaration that went from her toes to her fingertips at being so high. The river looked like a long, green snake. The wind in the leaves filled her ears.
‘Hold on tight,’ she told the others. ‘It’s a bit windy up here.’
Jez and the dog looked tiny on the ground. The dog barked twice, two yips, as if in greeting.
Karin carefully inched over the wooden planks to the little cabin fitted snugly into the ‘V’ of the huge old branches, as though it had always been part of the tree. It wasn’t very big. Inside Tommy was bent over. Even his twelve-year-old frame was too tall to stand straight. She was eleven but a few centimetres taller. It was a bit of a competition, their heights etched in pencil on the corner of the kitchen wall at Driftwood.
She entered the cabin and it smelled like rain and damp ground and something else sharper, maybe urine. There was a makeshift bed in one corner; some old blankets and a faded blue cushion. Tommy was kneeling now at the other end, in front of the window. There was a funny expression on his face that Karin hadn’t seen before. His eyes flicked to Phoebe and Camilla who had just squeezed in behind her.
‘Are you okay?’ asked Karin, inching closer, her head skimming the roof even though she was bending her knees. He had his hands behind him. She could see a pile of magazines in the corner next to him. The rude pictures on the cover made her stop short.
He’d seen her see them. ‘I told you, you shouldn’t have come up,’ he said, his hands fumbling behind his back.
‘What’s wrong?’ sh
e asked again, because she could sense that he was nervous, an emotion she’d never really seen in all-confident Tommy.
‘It’s just . . .’ He hesitated and bit his bottom lip.
‘Ewww,’ said Camilla. ‘This is so gross. It smells in here. It’s a homeless person’s treehouse.’ She pinched her nose and pretended to vomit, but then she saw the window and stuck her head out. ‘Nice view though.’
Phoebe snorted. ‘Don’t touch anything,’ she said, pulling Cammie away from the window.
‘As if I would. It’s gross. Don’t pull me,’ Cammie said, smoothing down her T-shirt.
Tommy nodded for Karin to come closer. ‘Look behind me,’ he whispered, his neck rigid.
She gasped as she spotted a black gun lying on a blue plastic milk crate.
‘It can’t be real,’ she said, her hand over her mouth so the others wouldn’t hear, but he nodded and widened his eyes.
‘It’s heavy. Toy guns are never that heavy,’ he said.
‘You haven’t touched it, have you?’ She felt breathless.
Tommy’s mouth scrunched at the corner, which meant he had. Everyone knew that Tommy wanted to be a policeman so Karin was pretty sure he knew what he was talking about even if he was only a kid.
‘What are we going to do?’ Her eyes searched Tommy’s and she felt cold suddenly and shivered. She thought of the men she saw at the picnic area and her stomach ached.
‘Oh my gosh,’ said Phoebe, seeing the magazines. ‘Don’t look, Camilla.’
But their little sister was looking. For once she was speechless, her eyes wide like saucers.
CHAPTER 16
The white tablecloth glowed in the early autumn light. It was April now and Phoebe had been here for months, but time had stretched and yawned and the days ran together like summer holidays, like when you were young. They had assembled a long table under the old willow tree and the sound of the wind in the leaves accompanied the clang of cutlery being laid. Phoebe stood on a ladder, stringing white lanterns through the leaves. She was relishing the cooler turn of the shortening days, and the sun was losing its sting. She didn’t remember feeling the seasons as much in Sydney, but here her days were spent outside, tending the vegetables in her garden, raking leaves into small piles, fishing from the jetty and stoking the fire on the deck at dusk.
The Lost Summers of Driftwood Page 16
