Stella and Margie

by Glenna Thomson

  I appreciate it that she apologises to me, saying, ‘It was a bloody dumb idea coming this way in the rain.’

  Stella puts the car into reverse. The space for turning is tight. I think to suggest she should get out and have a good look to see exactly where to back and angle the car. But I don’t want to distract her so remain quiet. She takes her time staring through the back windscreen. The big wiper is doing its job, but it’s dark; nothing can be seen.

  Looking over her shoulder, she carefully presses the accelerator and the car creeps backwards. Then a little further – it feels like centimetres – edging back, back, back, until she stops. She turns the steering wheel to the right and moves forward. We’re still a good way off being in line with the bridge. I hold my breath.

  Stella’s neck is craned; she’s looking in every direction – front, back, out the side window. Everything is dark; the rain is pelting down. She must be cold and ignoring it while she sorts this out. She taps the accelerator a little more, and she must think that she’s in drive, that we will go forward.

  We reverse. It happens so fast. The car slips and slightly tilts. Then a metal scraping thud. We’ve smashed into something.

  Stella hits the brake, but I think the car stopped moving before then. She says the four-letter word three times, turns the motor off and then gets out of the car. ‘Don’t move,’ she says to me, as if I might be going somewhere.

  The door slams. I twist around to see her walk behind the car. She bends down and I don’t see her for a minute. Back behind the wheel she starts the car, puts it in drive and tries to move forward. The motor roars.

  Nothing, not even a budge.

  She shakes her head and turns the motor off. ‘We’re stuffed,’ she says.

  ‘What’s happened?’

  She tells me that she is the four-letter word and an idiot. Then explains that the back left wheel has rolled into a thirty-centimetre ditch. She opens her arms to show me, about a foot. ‘It’s stable,’ she says. ‘I’m so clever, a pine tree trunk is wedged in there too.’

  I would like to relieve myself, but decide not to mention it. Stella takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. ‘Ross will be wondering where the hell we are, and he won’t think to look here.’

  ‘You need to dry off,’ I say.

  She talks with her eyes still shut. ‘We’ll have to sit here and wait for someone to find us.’

  ‘It’s all right. We’re unharmed and safe.’

  ‘Thank you, Margie.’ She’s taking deep breaths and I’m not sure what’s going on with her.

  ‘Perhaps you should put the motor back on and turn up the heater so you can get warm.’

  ‘I’m too angry to get dry. I deserve to get fucking pneumonia.’

  ‘It’d be better if you didn’t swear so much.’

  ‘Thanks for that.’

  The pressure in my bladder has been building for some time. I should’ve used the facilities before we left the Town Hall, but I thought I’d wait until we got home.

  ‘I’d like to go to the toilet,’ I say.

  She looks across at me. It’s so dark I can only see the halo of her blonde hair, the shadowy mask of her face. ‘Can you wait? It’s still raining. I don’t want you to get wet, too.’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  She presses her fists against her forehead. ‘Ross will be out of his mind. We should be home by now.’

  ‘We can’t be worried about that. Everything will be all right. We need to relax.’

  She turns to me again and I hold her stare. I know she’s got lovely hazel eyes, but right now her eye sockets are large black pools. ‘So you’re good in a crisis, Margie?’

  ‘This is only one night and it will pass.’

  She turns the motor on and twists knobs to make the temperature rise to twenty-four degrees. Shifting in her seat, she presses her jeans straight, pulls the sleeves and collar of her shirt, and tousles her hair – motions to be rid of creases and make herself tidy.

  Rain pats on the roof and drips on the windscreen. The wipers are off. Ross might be worried about where we are, but he’ll be thrilled with this weather.

  An hour passes and I feel the rain has eased enough for me to raise the issue of my bladder. Actually, it has become an emergency.

  ‘Toilet,’ I say as I open the car door. My tan shoes sink into the fine wet gravel. I step behind the car so I have privacy. Balancing with one hand on a pine tree, I pull my trousers, then my underpants, down to my knees. It’s not enough, so I tug more. It’s not raining anymore, but the air is damp and cold. Squatting is impossible; I cannot get down that low, and I now have a terrible dilemma. I try to hold on so I can work out what to do.

  Stella’s door closes. ‘Margie,’ she calls.

  Then the full force of warm release. It is a joyful letting go and a disaster.

  I turn to her.

  ‘You all right?’ she asks.

  ‘I’ve wet myself.’

  She snorts a single laugh. ‘Need help?’

  I tell her I’m quite capable of pulling up my own pants.

  ‘I’ve heard that before,’ she says, and I don’t know what she means.

  When we’re back in the car, Stella searches around to see what we have and concludes there’s nothing except what’s in the basket. Leftover pieces of Holly’s cake that were supposed to be for the children. Half a bottle of water.

  It’s almost ten and we were due back at Maryhill about two hours ago. Stella thinks Ross might imagine we’ve dropped in to do some supermarket shopping or made a last-minute decision to have a drink with the group. Yet when she spoke to him, it was clear to me we were headed home.

  Inside the car is the smell of my urine. I apologise to Stella, but she says she doesn’t notice, although I see that her window is down a couple of inches. The motor is still running, the temperature displayed on the dash is twenty-four degrees, and I feel we’re about to germinate: with the heat and the yeasty scent, it’s like being in a smelly hothouse.

  ‘Turn the heater off,’ I say.

  She must agree. Her hand touches a button and we instantly cut to silence. There is no knife to slice the cake so Stella breaks it apart, a rough half each. It’s more delicious than ever because it’s all we have. I eat slowly, trying to make it last. We lick our fingers to clean up the messy icing. Two mouthfuls of water each; I’d say another three each to go before the bottle is empty.

  Stella puts her seat back, an unseen lever on the side. She tells me how to do it. I’m thankful for it. I can stretch my legs out and, in a wishful way, pretend I’m fully lying down.

  Sometimes rain lashes the windscreen; a leaf sticks. The wind lightly buffets my side of the car.

  Time passes. I cannot sleep. And I know Stella is watching and waiting for Ross to find us. I can’t say I’m cold, but I wish for the comfort of a blanket, something to snuggle into. Huddling into a blanket has always provided relief; it’s where I can close my eyes and know I’m safe and secure.

  Stella speaks; her voice is soft but louder than a whisper. She’s almost sighing. I turn and see the circles of her eyes and realise they are closed.

  ‘What were you telling me this afternoon about wanting to go to Melbourne?’

  I take a breath and consider if I’ll answer. Part of me wishes to remain silent because I am tired. And yet, it was a peculiar thing today, being back in the old Town Hall where I graduated from high school. Mum and Dad were sitting in the middle of the hall, about twenty feet from where I was sitting today.

  I can no longer bring their faces to mind or hear the pitch of their voices. Or, if I do, I don’t trust it; there are too many fragments to make sense of, like a complicated puzzle that no longer feels worth the effort. Their memory is more in my heart, more of a feeling than an image or sound. I’m clear about my mother’s large, steady hands; she had arthritis in the end knuckle of her left pointer. And the shape of Dad’s small, wire-framed glasses, his brown bushy eyebrows sprouting above them. Over the
years, photographs have fused with my recollections: the posed, serious expressions on their wedding day; Mum holding me in a white crocheted blanket that draped almost to the floor; black-suited Dad looking important in the bank manager portrait. These reflections can lead me to feelings of regret and, if I’m not careful, to melancholy – a burden of sadness I sometimes find difficult to shake off.

  And so I tell Stella it’s foolish to regret things, then immediately contradict myself by telling her I always wanted to live in Melbourne and even travel overseas. ‘I didn’t have the courage. My parents weren’t willing to let me go. I was their youngest, the baby. So I stayed.’

  Stella doesn’t have anything to say. And it’s not like me to share private things, but here we are in the dark, in the middle of nowhere, and over the past few weeks I’ve developed a fondness for her. She’s not my type of person, but she is always kind to me. And there’s no one else. Caroline hasn’t called me in at least a fortnight, and the last time all she did was complain about her job at the art gallery, how tired she was. Before she hung up, a pause, an afterthought – she said she was seeing someone. I assume that means a man, a boyfriend. Caroline has always had form in that area, so I didn’t ask; I wasn’t sure what to say. She said his name, but I can’t remember it: something unpronounceable and foreign. An ethnic man, which troubles me. Although those dark-skinned workers at the hospital were very pleasant. But I can’t be worried about her life. It’s hard enough living my own.

  ‘Do you have any regrets?’ I ask Stella.

  Between the limbs of trees is the trace of the half-moon, a sprinkle of stars. Deer will be moving about, navigating in this terrible dark. Something scratches the side of the car, perhaps a fallen twig. We both turn as if trying to see it.

  Stella exhales and looks into the distance, probably hoping to see that Ross is approaching.

  ‘I wasn’t very nice to my mother,’ she says. ‘I was angry with her for a long time, even for years after she died.’ She releases a single burst of laughter. ‘I could even blame her for us being here.’

  ‘How on earth is your mother responsible for this?’

  Stella shifts in her seat, hugs herself. ‘Grace is my mother.’

  I’ve no idea what she’s saying.

  ‘I wrote the play as a way of trying to get to know Mum. She died from a brain tumour when I was seventeen. But in the end, I don’t think a child can fully relate to a mother as a regular person.’ Stella rubs her arms, as if to get warm. ‘It got boring analysing all that old stuff. She did her best, like all of us try and do. Anyway, here we are. Thanks to her.’

  It takes a moment for me to piece together what this means. The play is about her mother and is going to be performed in public – the private confidences of a broken family. The implications come in waves. Ruby is Stella. I feel vaguely astonished to know so little about her past, but then I’d never been interested enough to ask anything.

  Ross and Stella married in a funny old building in Melbourne, an abandoned bakery that had been converted into a theatre. The guests were a strange mix, from bedraggled types to the very glamorously attired. I spent the afternoon and evening in shoes that pinched, nursing a head cold, anxiously waiting for the whole affair to be over. Stella’s mother wasn’t present, and it was Caroline who whispered to me that she’d died: ‘Cancer.’ I studied the man she pointed out as Stella’s father. Red curly hair, pale face and green eyes that I couldn’t bring myself to look into. He moved his body too freely as he played the piano, and I said back to Caroline that he was ‘full of himself’. But he was good enough to take requests all afternoon while people danced and drank – and did the alcohol flow; I’ve never seen anything like it.

  And now, for the first time, I’ve made the connection to Isobel’s talent. And Jemima’s red hair and green eyes.

  ‘So Ruby is you?’ I ask.

  ‘Yep. Two years before Mum died, she kicked Dad out. And within a fortnight of her funeral he returned to the family home with his girlfriend. That’s when I moved out.’

  ‘You should be proud,’ I say.

  Her voice is loud, demanding. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because, in spite of all that, you’ve made a good life. You’ve got a good marriage.’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘It’s what I see.’

  ‘That’s a big thing for you to say, Margie.’

  Her tone seems accusing, or perhaps I’m too sensitive. Either way, enough has been said between us. I press my arms across my chest and feel my inhalations. This talk of regret and marriage returns me to the day Norman died.

  The roses were late that year. Perhaps the cooler winter was the cause, but it wasn’t until early December that I needed to sharpen the secateurs and deadhead the finished blooms. I’d woken early with the desire to go to the garden. The paths needed sweeping too, some weeding and mulching, always little jobs. The whole morning was ahead of me.

  I tidied my front porch refuge and closed the door. Passed the red-and-green panelled front door, down the long hall to the family room. Norman’s bedroom door was closed, and since our estrangement I had no concerns about knocking on the door to check on him.

  Ross was already up and dressed in his school uniform. We ate breakfast in silence, and before I drove him to the bus stop I made his lunch and put it in his bag. I also filled Norman’s thermos, cling-wrapped a slice of pineapple fruitcake and put it in his canvas workbag.

  So, it was about 8.30 when I pulled the small green wheelbarrow around to the east side of the house and started snipping the dead roses off their stems. I vaguely expected to hear the back door slap as Norman left the house.

  It was as though the birds were whispering that morning; their quiet songs seemed hymn-like and took me to a place of peace. It was warm, and even at that hour I felt heat on my back. I breathed in the sweet fragrance of Louise Odier, probably the oldest rosebush in the garden.

  At ten I returned to the house to make a cup of tea. Norman’s canvas bag was still on the bench. I put my hand to my mouth, wondering.

  I stood outside his closed bedroom door. It was a room I’d shared with him for twenty-four years. A fast movie of humiliations came and went. Sometimes I can pretend I’m not the woman who slept in there. Other moments I can only swallow and clench my jaw so I don’t weep.

  I didn’t knock, but twisted the knob and entered. The curtains were closed; the room was dark, only the edges of yellow light framed the window. I smelled urine. I pulled the curtains back and opened a window. Norman was lying deep in the old mattress. He was on his side; a cream woollen blanket was pulled up to his chin.

  ‘Norman,’ I said.

  He didn’t reply.

  I peered down and at first thought, He’s asleep. His eyelids flickered. A dribble of saliva had wet the pillow.

  ‘You should be out of bed,’ I said.

  He didn’t move. Or he couldn’t.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked.

  He made long rolling sounds, trying to say words, but it was as though he had no control over his tongue.

  I pulled back the blanket. His knees were bent up, foetus-like; one arm was ramrod straight against his hip, fingers strangely curled. Through his blue and white striped pyjamas, I could see his body was rigid as if all his muscles had seized. His groin and the bottom sheet were wet.

  I covered him up. And stood watching.

  His eyelids opened and closed, and he repeated the mumbling sentence.

  He knew I was standing there.

  I didn’t say anything else to him, but walked away and closed the bedroom door behind me.

  I went straight outside, without my tea, and resharpened the secateurs. Then I pulled my wheelbarrow along the lawn to the hedge of pink scabrosa – their petals were as pretty and delicate as fairies’ skirts – and started cutting away the dying blooms.

  The morning passed. I drank water from the garden hose and didn’t eat lunch. And when all the roses were beautifully groomed and
looked their best, I still didn’t enter the house. I went for a walk down the lane and sat for a good while beside the old stone ruin, the first Ballantine house that William built a century ago. Belonging to this family was all I had to be proud of. I considered I’d done my best as Norman’s wife. Nothing else could be asked of me. A feeling, and I looked across to the layered granite near the peppercorn tree. A brown snake was uncoiling, moving deeper into the stones.

  It was hunger that led me back to the house. And knowing that the school bus was due in an hour.

  I was afraid to enter Norman’s bedroom again. He might’ve been standing in the centre of the room waiting for me, a knowing shift in his eyes, ready to punish me for leaving him earlier.

  He was dead. I stared for long enough to see that he didn’t move. His eyes were open and didn’t blink. My breath was shallow and I felt cold.

  I sat on the dressing-table stool and watched his still body. I wanted to feel pity for him. Something. We’d had three children. I had been his wife. Nothing. Not even relief.

  I’d not eaten since breakfast, so I went to the kitchen and ate a large slice of the pineapple fruitcake and drank a cup of tea. Then I phoned the ambulance.

  Poor young Ross, I see now that I failed him. I sent him off to Keith Sanders and his wife for a few days, and didn’t see him until the funeral. I didn’t want him to witness me reordering the house. Caroline stayed in Melbourne, so she wasn’t around.

  I packed up all of Norman’s things in the car and dumped them at the tip. In the bull paddock, I burned his clothes, and all our towels and bedding. Then I redecorated our bedroom, bought a new bed and had an oil heater installed. I claimed something back for myself, a sort of healing.

  Yet when Ross returned home, I can’t say the two of us were happy companions. His interest in flying aeroplanes was a problem. We often fought.

  Stella uncaps the water bottle and passes it to me. I wipe the opening and take two sips. She finishes the bottle. I wonder if we should put it outside to capture any coming rain, but I don’t speak up. I lie back on my reclined seat.

  ‘Another regret I have, Margie, is that we haven’t always got along. Before we met I had this hope that Ross’s family would love me. But we all got off to a bad start.’