The Good Teacher

by Richard Anderson

  Someone from the family usually rang or checked on him every day, but he had spoken to Andy earlier that morning which meant he would have to wait at least until tomorrow morning. Could he could survive all night on the lawn in late winter? Lion in winter. What? Hardly. The pain was so all-pervading it was beginning to make him light-headed, as if his body was deciding to cop out.

  Strangely, chief among his pains was embarrassment. He was embarrassed to have fallen down a couple of simple steps that he’d been up and down a hundred times, to have been stupid enough not to replace the steps with a ramp or something, to have caused his family worry. And the talk. ‘What was he doing living out there on his own anyway?’ He could imagine it. ‘It was bound to happen. Silly old bugger. What were Andy and Jennifer thinking?’ For that reason alone he wanted to get up. But he couldn’t, so he lay there, grabbing Leo close when he could, listening for a sound and thinking. Leo came and went. He couldn’t work out what his master was up to but he seemed to know he was in distress. He would return to him periodically, suffering Mack’s desperate cuddling, and then move off.

  On the lawn, racked and almost hallucinating, Mack could still feel pleasure that Jennifer had been separated from her lover and the farm had been saved. It had been saved for what? Future generations? Possibly. He’d always wished that Andy had a son who could take over the place, but that time had come and gone and some things couldn’t be helped. Madison was a great girl and maybe she’d take it on or marry a bloke who would. And what about Frank? He had a son, Brad. Must be fifteen by now. Perhaps he might take up the reins.

  He suddenly couldn’t remember why Frank left and it scared him. The departure all those years ago had been one of the most difficult times on the farm. He remembered that. But what made Frank leave in the end? Did Andy hunt him out with a rifle? No. He made himself think hard about it, retracing the years when the boys had worked together and when they had started to fight and then he remembered it was him who had to put a stop to it.

  Frank had wanted to stay, said he wanted to be a farmer, but he didn’t get it. He wasn’t prepared for the relentless slog of the workload. He thought it didn’t matter if you didn’t get round to maintaining machinery or checking water and fences. He’d get to those jobs when he could be bothered or an employee could do it. No matter how many times he told him, Frank wouldn’t take it on board. He liked the pub and the races and beers after field days and all-night impromptu parties. Plenty of farms might have existed on attitudes like his but not ones that paid their bills on time and bought the neighbours and made a profit that city businesses would be respectful of. He thought he’d got that message through to the boys when they were growing up but only Andy seemed to understand.

  Mack visited Frank and his family in the city over the years. He was some sort of financial adviser and appeared to have done well for himself. Any fool could see the right decision had been made, but Frank couldn’t let it go. The house was full of photos of the farm back when Frank was a boy. Memorabilia—rabbit traps, stirrups, plough discs and straps and chains—filled his garage. He never let Brad or his daughters, Georgie and Nellie, get close to their grandfather. When Mack visited they thanked him for presents and answered questions sweetly and then were ushered away. He left it up to Celie. Celie decided she wouldn’t take that treatment and be denied her grandchildren so she kept visiting whether they asked her or not. She babysat and helped out and did whatever she could to show those kids that she was an important fixture, someone they could rely on, someone who wasn’t going away, no matter what. Well, she did go away, but not before she had the love of those kids, who wept as loudly as anyone at her funeral. He wished now that he could have done the same. But he hadn’t and he had sent Frank away and that was the price paid to keep the farm strong. He shed another tear but he was happy with his choice. The farm counted and if you didn’t feel that way then you would never have been able to hold onto one.

  As the light started to fade he wondered if death wasn’t a better option. If he survived he would definitely be committed to a home and to eternal pyjamas and slippers and the glorious state of gaga. A terrible way to go. He hated the idea of Madison seeing him like that—unable to recognise her, rude, crazy and irascible.

  He knew what death was. So many times he had tried to think that Celie was somewhere in the next life looking down on him, but he could never really believe it. It was a false comfort. He’d seen her body when she passed. It was like so many living things he’d seen die. The light just went out. End of story. Whatever it was that made them what they were was gone. Not gone. Ended. You had to have a powerful imagination to believe otherwise.

  It would have been so nice to believe that it was just a process of stepping into another phase, a kind of change of clothes, but he simply couldn’t.

  He’d spent the last ten years of his life accepting the idea of his own death. Friends died, funerals were so common they became social outings. ‘He had a good life’, ‘He had a good run’, ‘You can’t go on forever’ became the phrases of the day. He’d thought he was ready, but he didn’t feel so ready right now even in the cold and the hunger and the hurt. He tried to think of pleasant things, times with Celie, Andy and Frank as wild and carefree young boys, good seasons and Madison. In the dark he began to drift in and out of sleep. Leo now settled in next to him. He thought about Jennifer and the sort of women who had affairs. Had Celie been unfaithful to him? He didn’t think so. Wasn’t her style. But it was hardly Jennifer’s style until recently, and Celie had spent many days at home alone, at school as a lone parent, not seeing Mack for more than a few minutes over a late evening meal. There was one bloke he remembered. Allan somebody, owned a small farm the other side of Stony Creek. Very social and cultured. Liked to have wine appreciation nights and book readings that Celie looked forward to going to and Mack never had the time (or the interest) to attend. He remembered Celie giggled a lot around him. It made him uncomfortable and suspicious of those nights. He did actually question Celie about it, he remembered, but she dismissed it as him trying to ruin her fun. She was probably right about that. She had been, in the end, right about most things. Maybe she and Allan … Who could have blamed her? It wasn’t the most exciting life he had made for her. Allan soon moved away so the problem disappeared, just like it had for Jennifer.

  At first light he woke with frost on his shoulders and over his ears, buoyed by thoughts of Madison. His teeth were chattering and he felt weak but strangely not beaten. He had made it through the night and for sure sometime today someone would find him. In his many dreams, he had seen himself lying to Madison, covering for Jennifer again and again. He felt shame. She deserved better than that from him. She was the only grandchild he’d been close to and he’d always respected her with the truth. But at this crucial point, right when the end seemed to be yelling his name, he had lied to her. Why? To protect her? To protect Jennifer and Andy and their marriage? They didn’t have a right to that. If he ever got the chance, he would right that wrong. Then the sun was up, weak but warm and, compared to anything else, full of promise.

  He called Leo and the dog appeared, happy to see him awake, and sat down next to him, taking the opportunity to lick his face. Then he could hear the phone ringing inside the house. Good news.

  JENNIFER

  And then the word came from the department that Brock was returning. When she saw the P&C email, Jennifer choked on her tea. She had been sitting at the computer thinking she was checking a message of no significance. It was a process of filling in time, not hoping for anything of interest. But this was a heart-shaker. She wanted to bash her head on the table repeatedly but did it just the once. Twice. Three times.

  Later, Andy stomped out of the office, grunting his disbelief. ‘He cannot be coming back. What the fuck? The hide of him. We’d better sort this bastard.’

  Jennifer was quick to reassure, laugh off and talk down, but she was dread-filled. Andy would again expect a significant display o
f solidarity from her, while each day she was less sure she could deliver it and less convinced she wanted to. The truth of it, the stupid regrettable truth, was that despite everything she had said and done she ached for Brock. God, she ached for him.

  Before Brock, Jennifer would have said, just to herself, that she didn’t believe in love. Of course, the first few years with Andy were special, exciting and something like love. But that was a long time ago and she had come to see the truth of their relationship as more practical and work-a-day. What she had with Andy was a partnership—a platform for bringing up a child and making a business work, for being a productive part of a community and getting on in the world. These were not small things, especially on a farm. Sex was an important part of this, but it was like watching a favourite television show together: enjoyable, a good thing to share, but something you would forfeit at a moment’s notice. It had never included the kind of fireworks she’d experienced with Brock. That kind of need. Even in the earliest days. She was still waiting for the need to pass.

  But if this love was real, and she was hesitant to say it to herself, then wasn’t it worth pursuing? Didn’t she have a responsibility to herself to follow it? To give herself the opportunity to have that sort of happiness? Wasn’t that what other women did? Thought?

  It was the kind of logic she’d always detested. Selfish, wayward, stupid. Silliness from a romance novel. It had no place in the life of a respected mother, partner and community member.

  But it was also unavoidably intoxicating. She found herself fantasising about a life with Brock: sharing a cute little house and garden while they ran a school together: he ran the children, she ran the parents, and they used the lengthy school holidays to travel the world.

  But in the here and now she was left with two choices: to accept that Brock was back and whatever came of that or to again try to get rid of him.

  Could she really mount a sexual harassment case against him? It had been a powerful theoretical tool but could she carry it out? Could she stand in front of him or the police or a magistrate or someone from the department and make a believable accusation? Jennifer doubted it. But the alternative was terrifying. She still cared for Andy, and most of the time the thought of life without him and the farm seemed preposterous. And Madison. Her guilt about Madison was building. It was her final year and Jennifer had been so engrossed by her own problems that she hadn’t been a good mother. Madison hadn’t been a good daughter either but Jennifer could not stop a recurring feeling that Madison’s bad behaviour was some sort of symptom of her mother’s neglect. Neglect was a ludicrous word to use, wasn’t it? Jennifer did everything for the girl, provided for her, organised her, counselled her, sent her to the best school. Madison had thrown that back in her face. And yet what had happened with Brock was creating a new perspective. What if Madison found out she had been sleeping with the school principal? Everything she had told her and taught her would be made ridiculous.

  Jennifer went to the kitchen. It was a place she could take some control, make some recompense and at the very least cook Madison a nice meal. As she prepared chicken in a cream sauce with sun-dried tomatoes, cutting and chopping and blending, she felt her spirits rising. She had to remember to have faith in herself. She was the sort of woman who could find a solution for anything.

  But as she browned the chicken in her lovely kitchen, her beautiful family so close, she finally acknowledged that her breasts were hurting. They had been hurting for a couple of days. And she was late. Really late. It was as if her brain had deliberately sidelined the two things and was now pushing them out at her, right when she was struggling to feel more stable.

  Her period was often late. It wasn’t something to panic about. In stressful times it could become irregular. And she had taken that morning-after pill, which was supposed to have a very high success rate. But she was more than two weeks late and unable to face a pregnancy test.

  Andy had to be the father. It stood to reason. Of course he was the father, he was her husband.

  But she could feel that it was Brock’s child. She had used contraception with Andy. The only time she had messed up was with Brock, because it was unexpected. Back then, she hadn’t had relations with Andy in such a long time she had been casual with her pill.

  It had been easy to push it to the back of her mind. But it would not go away, quite the opposite. Soon enough she would be large-stomached, walking down the street to the hubbub of gossip like an accidentally pregnant sixteen-year-old.

  She felt sure she was pregnant—stupidly, childishly pregnant.

  MADISON

  On Saturday mornings, she took the family car and drove herself in to Fresh Well to play hockey, one privilege she’d managed to keep during her grounding. Despite a nine o’clock start there was still frost on the oval and the girls were blue at the knees and red around the nose. The thought of the ball making contact with the body was not a pleasant one. But by the time they had finished and won they were all hot and red-faced from exertion. The other team members were going to spend some time in the coffee shop but Madison had to wave them off, knowing Mack would be anticipating her company and his weekly order

  She left a message with her mother telling her she was going home via Mack’s to drop off his food. She knew Jennifer might ring Mack to check that Madison was where she said she’d be. Mack would appreciate the visit.

  She knocked on his front door, the box of groceries in her arms, but there was no answer. His hearing was still pretty good but he didn’t always bother to listen. She called out and then put the box down. He was probably down at the veggie garden and couldn’t hear. And then she heard a sound, faint and unrecognisable. A calf in the distance? A bird in trouble?

  She walked round the back of the house and saw him lying on his side, broken on the grass. His eyes were closed but he was making a low moaning sound that might have been three syllables if it wasn’t so tortured and might have been her name. When she got to him and knelt down she was astonished by the light in his eyes.

  She helped him get down a warm, sweet drink while they waited for the ambulance. It eventually found the house and loaded him to take him into Fresh Well hospital. He smiled for her as the paramedics shut the doors. Her father had arrived too, looking pale and concerned, ready to take Mack into town in the car, but quickly realising that wasn’t going to happen.

  When she went to the hospital the next day, the nurse said he wasn’t ready for visitors but had left a message that he wanted to see Madison.

  She found him sitting up in bed in his blue striped pyjamas, in a ward with another older grey-faced man. There was a TV, a couple of books and some cards, but otherwise it could have been a cell. It was depressing to see someone she only ever associated with the outdoors in this kind of indoor sanitised limbo. But it was way better than the sight of him crumpled on the lawn, and he was pleased to see her.

  ‘Here she is, the life-saver.’

  She kissed him on the cheek. ‘Not me. Just lucky I came when I did. You’re looking a bit better.’

  ‘I am. Didn’t get hypothermia. Don’t know why. The hip will take a while to heal but other than that I should be fine.’

  ‘Good news, Grandpa.’

  ‘I’ll be an old bastard with a walking stick for a while, though.’

  ‘Better than a dead old bastard.’

  There was a knocking on the frame of the ward door. A large man in a tight suit was looking at them expectantly. ‘Mr Booth?’

  ‘Ah, Detective. Good to see you.’

  ‘Don’t want to intrude. Had a hit-and-run victim in here that I had to check on and saw “Booth” on the list. Hoped it wasn’t you.’

  ‘It’s me. Just a stupid fall. I’m all right.’ He patted Madison weakly on the hand. ‘Got my granddaughter keeping an eye on me.’

  The detective’s shoes squeaked as he stepped across the smooth floor, his hand outstretched: ‘Very pleased to meet you. My father and Mack are old mates.’

/>   Madison shook his hand or at least had her hand shaken by his cushioned paw.

  ‘Madison.’

  ‘Grant.’ Mack said it as if it was a new word for him. ‘He did the detective work on the school fire.’

  Detective Johnson suddenly looked pale. ‘I did.’ He looked at Mack and back at Madison and muttered: ‘Might have been the one that got away.’

  ‘Sorry?’ Madison thought she heard a confession of sorts.

  He ignored her question. ‘The principal. Brock? Did he settle back in? It was a rough time for him.’

  ‘He moved on,’ Mack said. ‘I think it was all too much for him. Poor fella.’

  Madison had the sense that Mack knew more about the school drama than she did.

  ‘He’s gone? That’s no good. I thought the department was keen for him to stay on.’ He looked around the room as if for answers. ‘I certainly didn’t want anyone to lose their job over it.’

  Madison looked at him carefully. There was an awful lot going on in a few words and a single face.

  ‘Why would it be your call if the principal lost his job?’ It wasn’t actually the probing question it might have sounded like. Madison genuinely didn’t know how these things worked. Did the police have control over everything?

  ‘Aha. You’re absolutely right. It’s not my call at all. I was just feeling for him. Not so easy to get a good job these days.’

  Mack was nodding at him, not to suggest he was listening but to suggest he didn’t want to listen anymore.

  The detective took the hint: ‘Anyway. Hope you get better, Mr Booth. All the best. Nice to meet you, Madison.’