by Susan Duncan
I turn to Bob. 'What do you think it's all about?' I ask.
'I don't know,' he says, instantly understanding what I mean. 'But all you can do when the pressure is on is try to survive.'
He stands up, ready to head home. 'Not many people remember this pathway,' he says, closing the subject on death.
We begin walking back along an even rougher route that takes us past two dams built nearly a century ago when food was grown here to supply Sydney in the early days of settlement.
I have never thought much about the history of European settlement or the history of this land. My generation was taught English history at school, as though it was the only history that really counted. Will future generations have more respect than we did for this fragile country? Are they being taught about how every plant regenerates differently? Sometimes from bushfire. Sometimes from smoke. Sometimes from seeds falling in autumn, sometimes from tubers. Or will they go on to trash it like we did out of ignorance and greed? Mostly ignorance, though. This is a land like no other and I am only now, at my age, beginning to understand a little of it.
The house painting goes ahead in a frenzy of drop sheets, ladders and singing painters wearing splattered overalls. 'They're Italian,' Bob says, as though that automatically explains the singing.
Bob and Barbara move into my still unrenovated house, for a short stay – just while their bedroom is being worked on. For me, it is a wonderful time. Every night there is a team to cook for, which gives me a central purpose. Every day Barbara rests and Bob disappears to his workshed, returning on the dot of twelve for lunch, then vanishing again until about five or six o'clock. Unless I am out and Barbara is alone. Then he sits on the sofa closest to where Barbara rests. While he sketches ideas for whatever problem he is working on, he can also hear her breathing.
Bob, it turns out, can do almost anything. Fix taps. Build houses. Design boats. Fix engines. Even repair appliances. He is an engineer with a licence to do electrical and plumbing work. He fixes a leak I didn't even know I had in the bathroom. Gets the exhaust fan working over the stove. Rips apart an iron I planned to throw out, orders a new part, and gets it going again. Give Bob a broken hose and he'll return with a new watering system.
I see his mind whirring constantly. When he's tongue-tied, I realise it's because his words can't keep pace with his thoughts. When he is silent, he is observing, assessing, storing information, thinking. He is not frightened of the kind of responsibility that means making hard decisions. Perhaps because he knows he is compassionate. And he is clear about what is important. He does not need applause to make him feel big. Only the knowledge he has given his best. He is, I understand one day, one of the few grown-ups I have ever met.
I am often gone for part of the day, seeing one doctor or another, trying to rebuild my strength and, to be honest, seeking constant reassurance that the cancer has not returned. I usually come home in the afternoon, crash for a couple of hours, and then brew my evil tasting concoctions. Do they help? I don't know. Once I ask Sophia how much of illness – of cancer – is mind over matter.
'Well, Buddhist monks have pretty good minds. They meditate, live peacefully, eat simple food and don't smoke or drink. They still die of cancer.'
Right. I am strong and my body is strong. Or is it all in the lap of the gods, after all?
On the first Tuesday morning of Bob and Barbara's stay, I leave home early for an appointment but the phone rings when I am halfway to the city.
'Barbara can't get out of bed,' Bob says. 'What should I do?'
Without asking any questions, I turn the car around and head home, alarmed by the sound of panic in his voice. On the water taxi I explain what's happening to the driver, Geoff.
'If we call you,' I say, 'come quickly. Barbara is ill.'
Because we are a community, nothing else needs to be said.
Everyone has known about her cancer for months.
I race up Ken's jetty and run up the steps to the house. At home, Barbara lies in bed, happy and smiling. For a moment, I can't understand the panic. She is pale, as usual, but looks quite relaxed.
'I'll get up in a minute,' she says.
Bob grabs my elbow and takes me outside. 'She's been saying that since eight o'clock this morning. If she could get up, she would. Today's the day for another chemo treatment.' Barbara would never skip those little bolts of poison that she felt were extending her life.
Bob goes up the hill to his house to call her doctor.Then he rings me, so Barbara can't hear what he says.
'They say to get an ambulance and get her to hospital.'
'How do we do that?'
'I'll take care of it.You stay with Barbara.'
When you live in water-access-only areas, the Water Police become your water ambulance. They are based in McCarrs Creek, only minutes away, and generally know the community well enough to have a list of who's pregnant, who's sick and who's dying. The Water Police then call an ambulance, and when everyone is assembled at the police office at the marina, the police and the ambulance staff both come over in the police launch to fetch the patient.
The police arrive wearing their practical navy overalls with the ambulance attendants and their gear. A stretcher, little suitcases, even oxygen. Once again, Barbara tells everyone she is fine and she'll get up in a few minutes. Half an hour later, the stretcher is brought alongside the bed and she is gently moved onto it.
'I'm not bedridden, you know,' she says emphatically. But her eyes are filled with tears and all we can do is hold her hand and nod.
They carry her down the steps, those lovely young men with open faces and strong bodies, and place her in the boat so gently Barbara feels no pain.Then they cast off, with Bob on board, and move slowly across the water.
I gather the puppies and go inside. Memories of my husband and brother, of the nightmare rushes to hospital with an infected bone flap in the skull after brain surgery, of seizures, of more surgery as the tumours grew rapidly, yammer in my mind.
I want to run from all this. I don't want to go through it all again, the sense of helplessness, the drawn-out wait for death, the grief that grinds through every day even while a loved one is still alive. Grief that leaves you without the strength to feel, for a little while after they die, anything but relief. And when the relief fades and the final reality of death seeps in, you're left with huge waves of pure, lonely grief and it's all you can do to keep standing.
I call in to see Barbara in hospital with a huge bunch of hydrangeas gathered from the old garden behind my house. Once the doctor lived there, and then new houses were built until the last one burned down in the 1994 fires and it's never been rebuilt. Only the stone chimney remains, sticking straight up like an ancient monument. And a few of the toughest old-fashioned plants. Canna lilies, wisteria, magnolias and, in spring, daffodils and snowflakes.
The hydrangeas give the barren hospital room a lift but it is a bleak place. Hard to bear when the elegant verandah of Tarrangaua beckons with its views of a teeming outside world.
'I want to be at home,' Barbara says.
'I'd want to be home, too,' I reply, holding her hand for a moment.
There are three other people in her room, wheezing, coughing, leaking life at the same rate as plastic pouches of fluid are being pumped into them. Better by far to hear the music of the bush and the water.
Barbara has no tubes hanging from her arm but she can barely move. Her body is closing down slowly.
'Can you cope if Barbara comes home?' I ask Bob after I return to Lovett Bay that evening. 'It's a huge job. Relentless. A bit like having a baby. It's utter dependence we're talking about. Hard stuff.'
'We'll manage,' he says. And he quietly explains he's been ready for this situation since long before our chat on Flagstaff. Without any fuss, he's planned each stage of Barbara's care with love tempered by the hard edges of reality. He will care for her while she can still get out of bed and for as long as she can get by with oral painkillers. As her hea
lth breaks down even further, their children will be called on. First Kelly, an experienced intensive care nurse. When two people are no longer enough, Meg, an engineer, will come.
'Three of us can handle it,' Bob says.
'Four,' I say. 'Let me help where I can.'
As soon as Barbara returns home, the community kicks in gently. Debbie from Frog Hollow brings Thursday night desserts. Ann from Little Lovett Bay comes to read on Wednesday evenings or an occasional afternoon when Bob has to go out. I call in for chats, loaded with cakes or a stew or a giant frittata.Veit, from the boatshed, carries the food up the steps and occasionally stays to eat some of it.
Somewhere amongst all the visits, Dolce scoffs some rat poison hidden in peanut butter and Bob and I rush to the vet to get her stomach pumped. Barbara lets Vita onto her bed while we are gone and cuddles her until we return a couple of hours later.
Barbara talks as though one day she will be well and makes us all feel that perhaps there will be a miracle. As each week unfolds, there are new dramas and problems, but mostly the transition from being unwell to invalid is smooth and dignified.
One day, despite Barbara's ravaging illness, one of the neighbours calls in to see her to try to drum up support to put pressure on me to get rid of the puppies, which I still don't have completely under control.
'I love all God's creatures,' Barbara says, putting an end to the discussion.
'Bloody social engineers,' I rage when Barbara tells me what's happened. My rage is with the neighbour, for her selfishness when Barbara is so ill. But I also feel threatened. My puppies are my anchors, part of the reason I get up, go walking, and remember to eat. They are my family.
Not long afterwards, the puppies flush a dying wallaby out of the bush onto the sand flats where it collapses. The puppies circle it, yipping hysterically, trying to get at its throat. Up the hill, Brigitte, who is pregnant, is watching through binoculars and crying even more hysterically. Her two little boys are distraught.
'Jesus, what's going on?' I ask, unaware at this stage of what's happening on the sand flats.
Pia is staying for a few days and we go onto the deck to take a look.
'Oh shit,' I say.
I rush out and grab Veit from the boatshed, telling Pia to get up to Brigitte's house to shake her out of her hysteria. 'And take those bloody binoculars off her. And take the kids some cake.'
Veit and I run for the wallaby and grab a puppy each.
'Wait here while I lock the puppies inside,' I tell him.
I tramp through the wet sand, a puppy under each arm, and chuck them into the shower stall, pulling the screen closed. They won't escape from there. Then I grab antiseptic and scissors and cotton wool in case the wallaby is hurt. When I return,Veit is sitting next to the animal, stroking its shoulder.
'It's nearly dead,' he says. 'But not from the puppies. It's old. Look. There are beetles crawling all over it and it has sores everywhere.'
The puppies have nipped an ear and we bathe it.Then Veit lifts the wallaby and carries it into the bush, lying it down on a bed of leaves to die in peace. When we return to the house, I tell him to strip and throw his clothes into the washing machine. He can wear some old trackie daks of mine until his gear is clean and dry. He jumps into the shower with the puppies and it takes half an hour to scrub away the smell of decay and get rid of all the insects on their bodies.
'Thanks, Veit,' I say, when he emerges smelling of soap and shampoo. 'Thanks.'
He shrugs. Says he wouldn't mind a cup of tea. 'And do you have any of that lemon cake?'
I smile. 'Sure I do.'
Pia returns looking pleased with herself. 'All calm up there now,' she says, dusting her hands.
When Veit has gone, I put the puppies on their leads and Pia and I go up to Tarrangaua to see Barbara. I'm distraught about the whole episode. Wonder what I should do. I figure Bob and Barbara will have the answer. To my horror, I sit by her bed and burst into tears.
'God. I'm so sorry,' I say. 'This is appalling.'
Barbara smiles and pats my hand. 'Tell me what's wrong,'
she says.
And I blurt it all out. Ashamed of burdening her with triviality compared to a life that's shutting down. And yet unable to stop myself.
'Talk to Bob about it,' she says. 'He'll know what to do.'
'Barbara, I am so sorry. What an awful performance.'
'Don't mind a bit. Quite good to have a person behave normally around me.'
And I am suddenly aware that despite the loads of morphine, she knows exactly what is happening. She doesn't miss a nuance.
Bob is waiting for me in the kitchen. By now, he knows the story and all the details. We are, after all, a small community and Pia, a great storyteller, has filled him in on the details.
'What do you think I should do?' I ask.
He looks at the floor and says nothing.
'Do you have any ideas?'
'Only one,' he replies, 'and you won't like it.'
'What?' I ask defensively.
'Find a new home for one of the puppies. Together, they're a pack. Alone, they become a pet,' he says.
'No way! Absolutely no way!'
I storm into the sitting room and tell Pia I'm going home. With the puppies. Her eyes open wider but she says nothing.
'Lovely cup of tea thanks, Robert,' she says, getting up to follow me. 'So it's fishing tomorrow, is it?'
Bob nods. 'On the incoming tide. I'll give you a call,' he says.
Outside, I explode. 'Fishing! How can you think about fishing?'
'Oh, get over it,' Pia says, not unkindly. 'It will all blow over in a couple of days. Come fishing. At least the puppies won't be able to get into any mischief on the boat.'
She's wrong, of course. First they eat all the bait. Then when Bob hauls in a big octopus, red with fury and fear, they hunt it around the boat until it scrambles up Pia's leg. She's torn between laughing and screaming until Bob yanks it off, its little suction cups popping as he pulls each tentacle loose.
'This will make terrific new bait,' he says happily.
I burst into tears. 'You can't kill it! Octopuses are great mothers, you know. They're really maternal. She may have babies waiting for her to come home.'
Bob starts to look trapped. He looks at the octopus, which is going redder and redder, then chucks it overboard just as Pia catches a fish.
'Should I whack it on the head?' she asks, pleased with herself.
Before he can answer, the puppies leap for the wriggling fish and land in the tackle box. Hooks, sinkers and all sorts of paraphernalia go flying.
Bob takes the hook out and tosses the fish back in the water. 'Leatherjacket.Too small to get much meat off.'
He starts the engine. 'Let's call it a day, shall we? Looks like a storm might be coming in.'
Pia and I look up. The sky is spotless.
At the pontoon, we invite Bob in for a drink. He shakes his head. 'Think I'll go home. Give Kelly a break.'
'Is there anything we can do?' Pia and I ask, almost in unison.
'Nothing anyone can do, is there?' He turns towards the steps, three fishing rods and a tackle box in his hands. He looks beaten.
'Think it was all a bit much for him. On top of everything else,' I say.
Pia gives me a hard look. 'Who told you octopuses are great mothers?' she demands.
'Barbara.'
'Oh.'
About three months after I quit my job, the news editor calls and asks me if I'm well enough to take on a little work from home and it suits me magnificently. Write. Rest. Reread. Focus ten times harder than I ever had to, but sit at my desk until the job is done. One or two stories a month and a little income starts to dribble in again. And I can see the sky from my desk. Feel the weather as it changes.
Bob invites me to join his crew, sailing on his boat, Larrikin, for the Woody Point twilight races on Wednesday evening, and I jump at the chance. The Woody Point yacht club is a local institution, created about t
wenty-five years ago by a group of 'social drinkers with a boating problem'. Not one of the original members even owned a yacht. It is not a swish yacht club. It is not even a very organised yacht club. Basically, you can sail anything that floats and if you want to protest about someone else's behaviour in the race, your protest has to be delivered to the commodore along with a slab of beer. No slab, no protest. By the time everyone finishes the slab, no-one remembers what the problem was in the first place.
'Don't expect much comfort,' Bob says as we head for Larrikin's mooring.
'What! No sofas or fridges?'
Bob looks at me to see if I am being critical so I keep my expression neutral.
'It's about weight, you see. When you're racing, you want as little weight as possible. But we've got a toilet. If that's any help.'
'Big decision, was it, to allow a toilet? Bit of weight there?'
He thinks I'm being serious.
'Yeah. Blokes are ok about peeing over the side but girls like a toilet. Knew I'd never get Barbara on the boat without one.'
Larrikin is a racing yacht, the kind that is all about speed and wind and testosterone. There is no femininity here at all, just winches, rigging and enough hardware on the deck to make it difficult to know where to put your feet. It is as cheeky as its name, with a stern that sits half out of the water as though she is always on her mark, ready to fly off with the slightest puff of wind.
The first time I sail on Larrikin, it's a sauna of an evening, thick and still. There's five of us on board but only three skilled sailors.
I'm a novice and I've brought a friend who's never been on a boat before. We're trapped amongst nearly thirty boats stalled at the start line. There's not enough breeze to fill a handkerchief and we're all slopping around pushing away from each other with our feet.
Being on a yacht when there's no wind is like running out of petrol on a freeway. There's not a thing you can do and nowhere to go.To ease the boredom, people are jumping overboard for a swim. Or else having a beer. Or both.
