by Anna George
Natasha craned into the house. Hearing the Cuban-Spanish, she laughed. ‘Coming over, is she? Things are getting serious.’
Dave tried to interpret her sharp eyebrows. Was she jealous or teasing? He could never tell. ‘What do you want, Nat?’
Natasha smiled bravely as Amelia sprang onto the divan. ‘Her dad’s stopped paying again.’
Dave looked at his stepdaughter, her hair in its bun. It was a shock how much he missed her. From his pocket, he pulled a wad of fifties fixed with a silver clip. He gave her the lot.
‘Ta.’ Natasha’s fingers brushed his and he took a step back.
‘Amelia, sweetheart? Your mum’s going now.’
Amelia’s nervous frown echoed her mother’s. ‘Can’t I watch some TV?’
‘Nope, not tonight.’ He eyed the clock again; it was four minutes past eight. His voice hardened: ‘Natasha, I’ll call you tomorrow.’
‘I’d like to meet her.’
Dave understood his ex-wife better than he had for years. She didn’t want him, but she didn’t want him to move on either. He met her eye. ‘Not tonight,’ he said. ‘Amelia, how about we see a movie next week?’
Amelia, seeing her mother’s surprise and guarded irritation, nodded. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘We’re having sushi anyways.’ Skipping past him, she kissed his cheek and whispered, ‘I hope she’s pretty.’
Dave watched Amelia lead her dawdling mother from the house, beyond the gate and onto the street. Love and pain were like laces yanked in his chest. Next time, as much as he adored his stepdaughter, he had a mind to refuse his ex.
He’d straightened one cushion before the second knock. He paused, hearing Ibrahim Ferrer’s lilting vocals. If those gifted Cubans could become international hot shots in their seventies, anything was possible. He could find love again, at forty-two. Humming, he strode to the door; for a moment, he feared it might be Natasha, but no, there she was. In an indigo sundress and black sandals, elegant and willowy: Elle. He wanted to coil himself around her. Her eyes were startling against her vivid dress and pink cheeks and huge grin. He could see every one of her teeth. Buoyed by her excitement, he spun her in his arms. ‘Hello, you,’ she said.
‘Welcome,’ he said. They both laughed, giddy and close.
‘Thank you for finally having me.’
He kissed her nose and reluctantly put her down.
‘Is my bicycle okay out there?’ she said, ruffling her helmet-hair.
He recalled then that she’d caught the train from Seddon to Middle Brighton and peddled over. Having taken the bike path, she’d entered his property through a beach-side gate.
‘Allow me.’ He propped her bike in his foyer and grinned. Natasha, no doubt, was hiding behind a tree on the street.
He bolted the door and returned to Elle. With big eyes, she took in his house – the white walls, the Storrier, the sea. He waited for her reaction.
‘Mr Forrester, what a beauty . . .’
He smiled as she saw beyond his home’s grand bones.
‘You, ah . . .’ He could see she was tiptoeing. ‘You could do with some furniture.’
‘Yeah.’ To his surprise, he felt disappointment – his and maybe hers.
‘You have . . .’ she stepped into the space, ‘three living rooms?’
‘Yeah, and a fourth upstairs.’ Her eyes searched his, and they both knew he hardly used even one.
‘I like the music,’ she said. ‘Who is it?’
‘The Buena Vista Social Club,’ he said. ‘You remember them, in the nineties?’
‘Ah, no.’ She tried for a smile.
‘Oh.’ He frowned; he’d forgotten their eight-year age gap. She slid her hand into his and squeezed. Too tight. ‘So, here we are.’
He led her further into his house. He could see her eyeing the kitchen: the stainless-steel fittings, German oven, marbled benchtop. Fancy taps. The things women noticed. He wondered if she knew how much that unused room had cost. Her brow was crinkled, but not in calculation, with worry.
At the rear of the family room, windows opened to the tennis court and garden, they paused. A path wove around roses, lavender and grevilleas, which were surviving – just. An outdoor setting and umbrella built into the garden were dotted with leaves and cobwebbed. Next to the house a rectangular pool was covered with blue plastic. Sparkling water would have helped the view but it’d been beyond him. Under the cover the blue tiles were most likely green. Though summer was well underway, he hoped he could get away with it. Seeing the faraway look in her eyes, maybe he had.
He waited: a negotiator’s trick.
‘That’s a fine yard,’ she said.
His smile was quick and hungry.
‘I bet those liquidambars are spectacular in autumn.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, unable to picture his garden in fall. Maybe, as Nat had liked to moan, he did work too hard. ‘Wait and see.’
Spying a stubby beneath a shrub, he steered her back to the kitchen. Pouring the champagne she’d brought, he thought to toast her but couldn’t trust himself. He touched his glass to hers and sipped. He saw his house with her in it, and was heartened. Even her bike and backpack looked good in the foyer. This week he was seeing her for a third night. She was, he guessed, making allowances for their anniversary. Or for Christmas. Though her backpack was barely half full.
Beneath his quiet stare, she seemed distracted.
‘This place doesn’t feel like you,’ she said. ‘It feels like you’re house-minding or squatting.’
‘Squatting?’ He smiled, unsure how to respond.
‘It’s not what I expected inside.’ She was looking at him closely. ‘It feels like an enormous, beautiful carapace.’
He frowned, taken aback. Her directness was a taste he thought he’d acquired. She spoke into her champagne flute. ‘How did you end up here again?’
‘Natasha was a water baby,’ he said, glancing at the street, ‘and this was the closest place to the bay we could find.’
‘Okay.’ Her small nod made him nervous.
‘We were going to bowl the house over, but then she decided she liked the architecture. The turrets, as you call them.’ He stopped himself. Who the hell cared what his ex had liked?
‘It does have a lot of . . . potential.’
She didn’t sound convinced. He felt a twinge in his gut as she eyed his house again. The yellow tulips were already drooping on the coffee table. Maybe she could see streaks of Mr Sheen. He held his breath. This house, its view and location: it was the best he had to offer. As it was.
‘Ever thought of moving?’
‘Well, no. I’ve worked hard for this house.’
Though it was too big and mostly empty, some of its memories were good.
‘So . . . you work in a job you don’t like, to own a house you don’t seem to live in?’
That one he didn’t know how to answer. The mood threatened to dip – his and maybe hers. Abruptly, the CD ended. In the silence, he could smell disinfectant. As the pause grew, he feared the size of the gulf between them.
He reached out to tousle her hair but stroked air. Before he could speak, she was across the kitchen.
‘Is that your study?’ She was making her voice light.
At the archway, he caught up with her. Within, three walls of bookshelves and a fourth crammed with photographs, pencil sketches and water colours faced them. Seeing the mess, her eyes teased. But, wary now, he said nothing. She stepped over a box of cassettes and frowned. She studied a photograph of a young Muhammad Ali in the ring. Then a photograph of Amelia, aged four, her face painted black and white, a silver All Blacks fern on her cheek. He waited for that question too but, happily, it didn’t come. Instead, her eye went to a display of empty wooden frames, hand-crafted. She glanced at him as if to say, ‘You did this?’ When he nodded, her face softened. She looked then at the other striking thing on the wall. Long and narrow, a life drawing of a woman. She had full breasts, a narrow waist and hip-length, curling hai
r. She was sitting with her arms behind her and out of sight. Her legs were tucked away and her head turned to the left, taking her face from the viewer. The handful of black lines were crisp and sure.
‘Wow.’
He felt her recede as she focused on it. When she read the dedication and signature, he knew he had to speak first.
‘She was rather fond of mirrors.’
Was she pale, or was it just the light?
‘You’ve captured her in six strokes.’ He couldn’t tell whether she was still impressed, or horrified.
‘When she left, she begged me for it. And she’s stolen it twice. She doesn’t like her right leg there.’
Elle followed his hand to the curve of his ex-wife’s thigh. ‘Looks okay to me.’ And then, ‘Why didn’t you tell me that you still drew?’
‘I don’t. At least, not any more.’
After a beat she said, ‘You must take it up again.’
‘No.’
His ‘No’ echoed in the silence. When she retreated to his books, he felt a squeeze in his chest. Her gaze lingered on his misery memoirs. What would she make of them? Why did he like tales of miraculous survival? Or was it the tragedy and hardship? He watched her slide A Child Called ‘It’ from his shelf. Saw her study the little boy’s face on the cover. Saw her eyes change as she read the blurb.
‘Let’s go upstairs,’ he said. ‘You should see the view from the northern turret.’
‘Okay.’ Her smile trembled. Maybe she was out of her depth too.
At the front of the house, the sun had almost gone. He hoped the sky would hold its colour until they made it up the tower. Purple and pink fanned out from the horizon. He glanced at her but her face was downcast. The stairs weren’t steep but he’d caught himself once, in socks, so he didn’t interrupt. Natural light was fading rapidly and he’d forgotten to turn on the lamps. At the landing, the sun disappeared, making the space seem dull and almost derelict. The gleam left the staircase and, as she hesitated, the floorboards creaked. With her back to the windows, she surveyed the bare bedrooms and gutted ensuites, the shrouded television room and half-removed carpet. She put her hand to her mouth.
‘I’d forgotten . . . the renovation . . . How long’s it been like this?’ Her voice seemed tight.
‘About a year. When my wife moved out, work stopped . . . I mean ex-wife.’
‘A year? But you separated over four years ago.’
‘Yeah, we did, but then she came back. And she left again. And came back.’
Her frown was making her features harsh. ‘When exactly did you get divorced?’
‘Officially? Ah, around a month ago . . .’ He’d meant to tell her that night, but they were watching his favourite film, My Life as a Dog. She’d been hopping into chocolate mousse.
‘A month . . .’ The rest of her sentence abandoned her. ‘At least that explains the Fred Williams.’ She hugged herself.
He tried to hold her eye but she wouldn’t look at him, as if the sun were still behind him.
This conversation had caught him off-guard. Perhaps that was the theme of the night. He should’ve filled her in, from the get-go. Had her over in week one. He sat on the top step. Was this the time? He’d planned to do it over dinner, but dinner was in the fridge. When she didn’t sit beside him, he sensed it wasn’t. He took a swig of champagne.
‘I love you,’ he said, ‘and I’d like you to move in with me.’
‘Oh, David.’
She yanked open the closest cupboard. Washing tumbled out. He recognised long-lost socks. He prayed they were clean.
‘Elle, I love you,’ he said, more loudly. ‘Move in with me?’
This time, her eyes darted to her feet. He’d expected surprise, even hesitation, but not worry. Or was that panic? He laughed, to jolly her along. But she stepped over the washing and opened another cupboard. This time she stood very still. He half expected her to step inside and shut the door.
In the cupboard was a child’s clothes hanger with a teeny Hawaiian shirt. His last impulse-buy at a garage sale.
She slammed the door. ‘Okay, I have to go.’
He stood up. ‘What’s wrong with you?’ Seeing the fright in her face, he made his voice soften. ‘What is it? Is it the house?’
She was shaking her head.
‘Don’t let it put you off. You could put your stamp on it.’
She chortled, then, and seemed unhinged.
‘Elle, we can’t keep sleeping over twice a week, like teenagers!’ She wasn’t looking at him. ‘It’s not as if we can live in Seddon.’
She looked at him then, squarely. He had a bad feeling he was sneering.
Her head shook again. Her lips were shut but her eyes were full.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ he said again. ‘You’re like a flighty horse!’
‘There’s nothing wrong with me!’ she yelled. ‘You’re the one living in this. And you want me to put it back together! It feels like she’s just walked out – and the bed’s still warm!’ As she gestured to the bedroom, she knocked a lamp. Its ceramic shade cracked like an egg on the wooden boards. Startled, she shrank from the mess. ‘I’ve got to go,’ she mumbled. ‘I’ve got to go.’
She fled, taking the stairs two at a time. He swore at her back and her steps quickened. He picked his way over the lamp. His anxiety and frustration had melded into anger. Over the top. But he didn’t care. What was she on about? His divorce? Or his renovation? Or the house? He didn’t get it. This was the Golden Mile – home to some of the most expensive real estate in Victoria. With direct access to the goddamned sea.
What did the woman want?
She was out of sight for a second but that was all it took. At the foot of the staircase he heard the thud. Then he saw her. Her long legs were twisted, a foot tangled in her backpack. One arm was wrong, very wrong, at the elbow. Her head was turned, as if she couldn’t bear to look. Seeing her on his rug, he froze. The sense of deja vu was so strong. For seconds he stood, caught between a bad dream and the present. Memory and prophecy.
‘David?’ Her voice was small. ‘Take me home.’
He cursed and bent to her.
5
The night is cold and densely dark. The leaden clouds overhead remind Mira Raison of the smoke from melting plastic; they are oppressive, threatening, though not with rain. She forces herself to turn away, as if from an eclipse, and thumps on Elle’s front door. Her pyjama-clad boys, aged four and five, sit watching in her car idling at the kerb. Their eyes are big and their little mouths shut. She gives them a tight smile, as she adjusts her trench coat. Beneath the coat, she’s in pyjamas too, and braless.
Somehow the highly unlikely has happened.
Twenty minutes earlier, thanks to a random spark and the leaking cargo from an oil tanker named Eburna, her cosy house was quaking. The series of blasts at Mobil’s Holden Dock rocked her boys’ superheroes on their shelves. It can’t be, she’d thought. Though, of course, she knew it could. She lived opposite Melbourne’s largest fuel storage and distribution terminal, where incidents have ranged from escaping gas-like odours to the leaching of fuel into neighbouring Newport’s groundwater. Where grassfires have lapped at its boundary. The emergency siren was actually wailing the day she moved into her house, a mercifully affordable house, in her unlovely, wonderful suburb. But, despite the leaks and the near-misses, over the years she’d told herself the likelihood of catastrophe was extremely low. Which is why tonight, with the sound of that siren fresh in her ears, she’s rattled.
A risk may be small, she thinks now, but it still exists. It’s real.
She stops banging, her fist hurting. After the grassfires, Elle had suggested she and the kids consider relocating, permanently. When Mira scoffed at that idea, Elle had, only half-facetiously, devised their personal evacuation strategy. At the first sign of trouble, they were to meet here at Tennyson Street and, together, make a run for it. But back then, Elle didn’t lock her doors. Back then, Elle and David had j
ust met. Today, they’ve finally split and the locked door is one of his legacies. Frustrating. Double-edged.
Mira looks to her grubby white Saab for inspiration. In its recirculating air, her boys are being uncharacteristically quiet. Max, the older one, is still watching her. He’s waiting, she knows, for the safe appearance of his favourite aunt. And he’s doubly uneasy, adult-less in the running car. She fumbles for her phone. Hopefully Elle is inside, tapping on her battery-run laptop, oblivious to the nightly news and fading light. When the call rings out, Mira gives Max an encouraging wave, then holds her breath and dashes down the side of the house.
As she expects, the rear of the property is also dark. Few if any of the homes she has passed are lit up; the blackout is extensive. Footscray, Yarraville, Port Melbourne, Spotswood and Newport are out; and the Williamstown and Werribee train lines are at a standstill. The car radio is bleating every few minutes: what to do, what not to do. Starting with, thanks to that ungodly cloud, pull down the hatches and stay in.
Creeping alongside Elle’s house, Mira feels the eyes of neighbours at their windows. It’s an eerie feeling being out when everyone else is in. Her instinct is to dart back to her children and drive for the Surf Coast. But she won’t. Though their half-cocked plan harks back to days when they were closer, she intends to honour it. She won’t leave Elle, to be holed up and alone, waiting on the whim of clouds.
She bangs on Elle’s side door. ‘Hello?’ she yells. ‘It’s me. Elle!’
The sky is holding but it wants to descend; she can feel it. She looks to her phone: any minute now it will beep or ring with information from emergency services. She thinks of the dusty safety brochures on her fridge. Perhaps she was ought to have stayed put.
A flurry at an adjacent, lacy window distracts her. Elle’s neighbour, Doris Tippet, is eighty-one and deaf without her hearing aids. She has a dowager’s hump, remarkable violet eyes and fine, yellowing hair that is permed once a month, thanks to Elle’s chauffeur service. Mira ducks her head but it’s too late. Doris waves an arthritic hand at her.
