Hello from the Gillespies

by Monica McInerney

  She kept her voice polite as she stood in the office doorway.

  ‘I’m off, Nick.’

  He turned around only slightly. ‘Safe trip.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  She was in the hall before he spoke again.

  ‘Good luck at the doctor.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, without turning back.

  That was it, she thought. After thirty-three years of marriage, that was the best they could do.

  As Angela drove away, Ig ran beside the car as he loved to do, racing it, waving in at his mum as she waved back at him. He wasn’t going to cry, even though he really wanted to. She was only going away for one night. She’d be back tomorrow. He wouldn’t have time to miss her, she’d told him.

  But he knew he would. He already had a kind of sick feeling in his stomach. He used to get it all the time at school in Adelaide too. Some of the boys there had teased him when the teacher asked once who was the person they most admired in the world. The others named footballers and pop stars. One named an astronaut. When it was his turn, he told the truth. His mum.

  He stood at the homestead gate and waved until her car was out of sight, just a cloud of dust from the dirt road trailing in the air behind her. Genevieve joined him, tousling his hair. He half-hated the way she did that, half-liked it.

  ‘She’ll be back tomorrow, Iggy. Don’t be too sad. Want to come and help me make chocolate biscuits?’

  ‘Not yet. Soon,’ he said.

  He stayed outside watching until even the cloud of dust from her car was gone.

  In her bedroom, Victoria was doing some broadcast practice, recor­­ding her introduction for the third time. She hadn’t done any presenting for more than two years, not since she’d moved into a producing role. It felt good to be back doing it again. Maybe Mr Radio had actually done her a favour. Dropping her in that mess. Getting her sacked. Forcing her to run home, shamed, ashamed . . .

  Pregnant?

  No. She couldn’t be pregnant to him. Of course not. It was just stress delaying her period. And it had to be the jet lag delaying Genevieve’s. But perhaps it would be a good idea to get a pregnancy test the next time they were in Port Augusta. And perhaps they should go there soon.

  She pressed the on switch of the microphone again. ‘Hello, I’m Victoria Gillespie. Welcome to “Outback Lives”, my new series on —’

  ‘NO!’ A cry from Lindy suddenly filled the room. ‘It CAN’T be wrong. It CAN’T!’

  Victoria switched off the microphone and swore under her breath.

  In the kitchen, Genevieve was trying to calm Lindy down. ‘I’m sorry, but it is. Anniversary definitely has two Ns. Didn’t you check before you started?’

  ‘I just sewed it exactly as they wrote it on their order form.’

  ‘Then they obviously can’t spell either. So maybe they won’t notice.’

  ‘Of course they’ll notice. Or one of their kids will notice and I’ll be a laughing stock again. I can’t do anything right, can I? I’m a complete and utter failure!’

  She snatched the cushion back from Genevieve and threw it onto the table. They both moved but not fast enough. They could only watch as the tin of cocoa powder spilt onto the white cushion.

  Another wail filled the house. In her room, Victoria turned off the recorder again.

  In the office, Nick shut the door to try to keep out the noise. He had no intention of going to see what was happening. Once again, he cursed the fact they hadn’t got around to getting the office phone fixed. If ever there was a time he needed to make a call out of earshot of his family, it was today.

  A call to Angela.

  He should have said more to her before she left. He shouldn’t have let it go on like this between them. He might have made a bad job of keeping the station running, but he’d made a good job of staying angry with Angela. She hadn’t even told him about the specialist’s appointment until three days ago, when he’d found Genevieve and Ig in the office booking a hotel for her. That’s when it had hit him. He and Angela had become one of those couples who only communicated through their children.

  The only option was to go out to the kitchen and use the landline phone, or call her on the UHF radio. But not with Genevieve and Lindy in there, making a racket about something. Or with Victoria, Ig and Celia all in listening range. He didn’t want any of them overhearing him attempt to apologise to Angela.

  Not just to apologise. To explain.

  He’d read her Christmas letter again that morning. He’d read it so many times now he almost knew it by heart. He’d gone through every emotion – anger, hurt, embarrassment. Despair. He’d talked about it with his doctor. He’d also talked about it with his psychologist, during their last appointment.

  It was Jim who had asked him the question. ‘Do you recognise yourself in what Angela was saying?’

  Yes, he’d said. Eventually. In the past few days, he’d realised something else too.

  Angela hadn’t just written the truth about him. She had let him off lightly.

  Because everything she’d written about him was the truth, he realised. He had shut himself away. He had stopped talking to her. He hadn’t involved her in any of the decision-making about the mining lease. His family research had become an obsession.

  He recalled his speech at the party. Getting emotional like that, in front of all his neighbours. Once, he and Angela would have talked about it the next day. She would have made him feel better. Not this time. He’d been too ashamed to ask her about it. It had been easier to say nothing.

  Easier.

  Is that what had happened to him? He’d started taking the easy route, because it was just that: easier, safer? That’s what the family research had become, he knew that. A safe hobby. At least when he was researching the past, there could be no nasty surprises, nothing that would actually affect him, hurt him. It was also helping him assuage his guilt. He might have had to lease out half the Gillespie land, but look how much he now knew about his Gillespie ancestors.

  In the past week or so, he’d begun to look at that in a different way too. If he hadn’t signed that contract with Carol’s company, he might have stopped the research. Shelved his plans for the reunion. But he was committed now, not just to hosting a reunion with two hundred strangers, but to his first overseas trip in just a few weeks’ time.

  Without Angela.

  His wife, his best friend, the woman who knew him better than anyone else in the world.

  That’s why her Christmas letter had hurt so much. He thought he had hidden his pain from her. The letter was proof he hadn’t. She’d seen right through him. She’d seen him for what he had become. She was right. He wasn’t the man she’d married.

  Was it any wonder some old English boyfriend she hadn’t mentioned in years had become her ideal, fantasy husband? Nick had been so angry about that at first. Not just angry. Hurt. Humiliated. Knowing their neighbours and friends had also read all about this Will. The successful architect. The soft, pen-pushing Londoner, who did all the cooking, who made her laugh, talked to her, who’d given her a life of luxury, of money, one perfect daughter, in a big city. There it was, Angela’s ideal life laid out in her own words. All that she had really wanted. None of which Nick had been able to give her. Round and round his head the thoughts had gone: Angela didn’t want to be married to him; she regretted meeting him. He hadn’t been able to get past that.

  Then he’d remembered something the psychologist had said to him. That just because Nick thought something didn’t mean it was real. That for every negative feeling he had, there could be a stronger, positive one. It was a matter of choosing a thought that made him feel good about himself, not bad.

  During his long walks on the station over the past weeks, he’d tried. Over Christmas, he’d tried. When the kids were acting out that concert, before they all fell sick, he’d tried. He’d heard afterwards what their plan had been. To act out highlights from Angela’s letters, everything she had written about the t
wo of them over the years.

  Four days after Christmas, alone in the office late one night, unable to sleep, he’d found the letters in the filing cabinet. He’d read them for himself. All of them. Yes, they mostly told the positive stories. And yes, sometimes Angela had used more flowery language or gone into more detail than he might have liked. That was one of the reasons he’d stopped reading them.

  But Angela had also written about the tough times they’d had over the years. When his parents died. When Angela’s parents died, and she had twice gone back home alone to London. About how their lives had started to change when the drought came. When the wool industry collapsed. What it had been like to wait for rain year after year, to have to start selling off the stock. She hadn’t ignored any of the realities of their lives on Errigal. But she had always stayed positive. Every letter had remained upbeat. She’d always included the good things that were still happening, with their children, among their friends, in their community, with her station-stay business.

  With him.

  In every letter, from the first one to the last, she had talked about him. Year after year, in letter after letter, he’d read, in her words, exactly what she thought of him. How much she loved him. How proud she was of him. How much she loved her life here on the station with him and their children. How much the two of them had gone through.

  Together.

  After he’d finished reading the letters, he’d gone outside and sat on the verandah, in the darkness. An hour had passed, maybe more. No wonder she had felt shut out. No wonder she had felt lonely. No wonder she had needed to take up pottery, invent a fantasy husband to keep her company. He had thought telling her nothing was the best way. The only way. That by keeping his troubles to himself, he was shielding her. He had been wrong. All he had done was cause her more pain.

  He hadn’t even had the decency to say goodbye to her properly this morning, before she drove off on a four-hour trip to find out once and for all if she had a brain tumour. Enough, he decided. Enough silence between them. He needed to apologise to her. To explain. And, once more, to ask her if she would come to Ireland, to London, to Europe with him.

  He couldn’t ring her, but he could email her. She only had an old-style mobile phone that didn’t have the internet, but there’d be a computer in her hotel. When she rang later, he’d ask her to check her email.

  As he moved his chair closer to the desk, he realised something. This wouldn’t just be the first time he’d emailed her. It would be the first time in thirty-three years that he’d written her a letter.

  He stared at the blank screen for a long moment, and then he began.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Angela was halfway to Adelaide. For the first hour, she’d been able to think of nothing but Nick. About that moment in the office. About what she wanted to say. What she should have said. Could have said. Hadn’t said. As every day passed, it was as if the gulf between them widened.

  That morning, she’d tried to fix it. She’d woken early, Nick beside her, physically close. Once upon a time, she might have moved closer to him, put her arm around him, kissed him awake. Perhaps there might even have been more touching, caressing, leading to sleepy morning sex. But that was out of the question now. Their love-life had been another casualty of the distance between them over the past months.

  But was it out of the question? Perhaps it was exactly what she should do. Sex had always helped them in the past, especially in the early years of their marriage, whenever they’d had rows. They’d always argued in different ways. She had a quicker temper than him, was inclined to speak her mind, let it all out, whereas he moved more carefully through any minefield in their relationship, was easily hurt by careless words, inclined to fall into silence. Many times in their marriage it had been Angela who’d made the first move towards a reconciliation. It had bothered her at first. She’d always thought it should be a two-way street. She’d talked about it with Joan.

  Joan had given her usual straight advice. ‘Marriage is a one-way street, love. Imagine you are two cars in a narrow alley, bonnet to bonnet. One can’t move any further without the other moving too. If neither of you move, you’re both stuck there forever. But if one of you does move – and it doesn’t matter which one does – voilà, the road is cleared and you can get back to business. Just don’t keep count of who said sorry first. Don’t get into the habit of saying, “But he never does this” or “He never does that”. As long as one of you is making a move, that’s all you need to get started.’

  It had been good advice. She’d decided to try it that morning in bed. She put her arm around his waist, inched closer against him. Again, the familiarity struck her. The feel of his skin. The shape of his body. The smell of him. The sound of his breathing. Even thirty-three years on, she found him so attractive: tanned, lean, and fit from all the outdoor work he’d done over the years. His hair was still dark, just greying on the temples. His face was lined now, but so was hers. Of course they could get through this. Of course their marriage wasn’t over. As she tightened her arm around him, he shifted in his sleep, a quick, sudden movement that felt like he was pushing her away.

  She’d edged back immediately. Perhaps he was still deep in sleep. Perhaps he hadn’t even registered she was touching him, his reaction just a reflex. But it had been enough to stop her. She’d got up, left the bedroom. When she saw him next, in the kitchen, the kids around, the noise level high, there had been no opportunity to even try to talk, let alone anything else.

  She passed through all the familiar towns. The highway stretched out in front of her. Her car was an automatic; it almost drove itself. There was very little traffic. She had the air-conditioning on full. The sun was bright outside, shining in on her right arm, which was more tanned than her left from so many years driving in light as harsh and strong as this. In her early years in Australia, there’d been no talk of sunblock or skin cancer. Everyone soaked up all the sunshine they could, especially the kids. She was paying for it now, with early wrinkles, older skin.

  If she had gone back home and married Will, would she look different now too? Fewer wrinkles? More wrinkles? Grey hair? Dyed hair? She’d certainly have been paler. Unless, of course, they had a home in Spain where they spent most summers, and quite a lot of time over the winter months too.

  Her mind began to drift.

  Yes, she and Will did have a holiday home in Spain. They had always loved to travel. They thought they’d satisfied their travel bug when they were young, when he went backpacking in search of architectural wonders and she came to Australia for a few months, travelling around, doing some bartending, but never any in Sydney, even though her friend in the hostel begged her to do her shift one night. Angela nearly said yes, but she’d been offered tickets to a comedy gig the same evening. She’d chosen the comedy. Her friend ended up losing her job in the pub. Angela always felt a bit guilty about that.

  Recently, though, Angela and Will had begun to talk a lot more about travelling again, even farther afield this time. He was the one who suggested Australia.

  ‘I’d love to go there again,’ she said. ‘But it’s such a long flight. We’d want to stay a month at least. Six weeks, ideally. And you’re so busy at work.’

  ‘I’m also the boss. And I could easily take that much time away, if it turned out I was doing some work while I was there.’

  She laughed. She should have guessed he was up to something.

  Will explained that he’d been asked to work on a new eco-tourism development. It was a company based in Italy, but with properties in Spain, Portugal and Croatia. Plenty of money behind them. Will had researched similar developments, and the best of them just happened to be in Australia. Some in Queensland. Others in outback South Australia. ‘It would still be mostly a holiday, of course, but we could stay in a few of these eco-places as well.’

  ‘And then claim the entire trip as a business expense?’

  ‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ he said. ‘But
you’re right, I probably could.’

  He was teasing her, of course. Will was a very astute businessman.

  There was nothing stopping them. Nothing except that Angela would miss Lexie so much. Once again, Will read her mind.

  ‘I rang Lexie last night. She can’t take a six-week holiday, but she can take a fortnight. She’s going to come out and join us for the last two weeks. Wherever we decide to be, somewhere tropical or somewhere outback, she doesn’t mind which.’

  They spent the rest of the evening in front of the computer, researching business-class airfares with stopovers in Hong Kong and making notes about their Australian itinerary. Will was right, the Australians were world leaders in the kind of eco-tourism ventures his new client was planning. But there were also even more down-to-earth ways of seeing the real Australia.

  ‘Look at these places,’ Angela said, clicking on a website for outback station stays. ‘You can stay in actual homesteads, with outback families. That would be something special, wouldn’t it? Not just being in a luxurious eco-cabin, but living the real life.’

  ‘Sleeping in a bed that the youngest kid has just vacated? In a bedroom filled with sporting trophies? Seriously, Angela?’

  ‘No, listen to this.’ She clicked on a station at random, situated in northern South Australia, near the Flinders Ranges National Park. She read aloud. ‘“You’ll stay in the old governess’s quarters attached to a hundred-year-old stone homestead, and be the personal guest of the station owners. Guided tours of the station; expert information on local Aboriginal history and culture, and native Australian flora and fauna; overnight camping trips, including dinner around a campfire; four-wheel drive tours conducted by the wife of the station manager, a fourth-generation sheep farmer.” I’ve heard about these somewhere. Wouldn’t that be fun! We could stay in a few of the eco-places as well, but why don’t we have some time on a real station too?’