Other Side of the Season

by Jenn J. McLeod

  16

  The Greenhill Banana Plantation, 1979

  ‘I said be careful, David. And be home before dark. You hear me?’

  Tilly often heard his mother call out across the neat front garden she sweated over in summer, all the while lamenting the harsh winter winds that prevented her from growing her treasured roses and daphne, settling instead for more rugged, salt-resistant plant varieties: coastal rosemary, colourful pigface, flax plants. Rose had her husband keep the Indian hawthorn shrubs hedged because she insisted they offered a little extra protection from the often relentless winds that pummelled the mountain from August until October, when the ocean would start delivering warmer north-easterlies in time for summer holidays.

  Rose’s repeated safety warnings were uncalled for. David was always careful. The closest thing to a risk he took was negotiating his way on foot and in the dark from the property boundary to Tilly’s bedroom window when his mother thought he was in bed. The journey was dangerous because, unlike Rose’s tidy lawn, the area surrounding Ulf and Hilda’s house was more junkyard than garden. Some of the bits and pieces–things like discarded tyres, obsolete machinery parts, splintered wooden crates and pallets–had lain in the same spot for so long that weeds and grasses had wrapped themselves tight, rooting the ugly clutter to the spot forever. Whenever Tilly suggested the Marhkts make Albie tidy up, Ulf would make wisecracks about the jumble being Albie’s unique artistic expression. Hilda would laugh.

  The open space at the side of the house could also be boggy after rain, so David would sometimes have to skirt around the edge on a makeshift path to make his way to Tilly’s window without being seen by the Marhkts or Albie. On that precarious slope, one misplaced foot was the difference between making Tilly’s house or tripping over and sliding, bum first, down the steep sides of the plantation, banging into a tree or two or four along the way. The trunk of a banana plant was ninety per cent water and crashing into one hurt like hell.

  ‘I’ve lived here my whole life, Tilly. Wouldn’t be the first time I took a tumble,’ David would say with a silly grin. ‘Besides, you make any risk worthwhile.’

  Tilly was worried this morning, though, because David hadn’t shown up at her bedroom window last night, as expected. On top of little sleep and desperate to see him, she now had to spend the day weeding the vegetable patch with Hilda. Albie was expected to help in the garden, but he’d feigned some pain and now lay crying on his bed.

  Tilly didn’t believe in crying. Manufactured tears were okay, though, and crying on demand could be very useful. Albie didn’t seem to care who heard him this morning, and as Tilly and Hilda picked at the soil with hoes to loosen the choking vine weed and recover the last of their pumpkin crop, they heard the occasional guttural moan. Hilda would look over at Tilly, give her a curt smile and nod of reassurance, and return to her task.

  There had been a cold snap overnight that wasn’t going away, even with the sun beating down. After a while Tilly stopped to chafe her arms, rubbing both hands back and forth to wipe away a sudden rush of goosebumps. With the exception of a bird chirping in the big poinciana tree, the morning seemed unusually quiet when there should have been noise. Today, David’s dad was meant to be breaking in some new workers. Tilly had been looking forward to them starting because more men on hand would free David up and allow him to work on his final assessment piece, which would go towards his end-of-year exam results. When he didn’t have to juggle the banana business with his studies, it meant more time for Tilly. Grateful she’d not been forced to stay at school herself, Tilly had often tried to persuade David to leave and focus on his art.

  ‘But I need a good result to get into uni,’ he’d tell her.

  ‘Why?’ she’d argue. ‘You don’t need a degree to paint. And you don’t need a degree to teach, because you’re going to be too busy being a famous artist to be bothered teaching others. Remember the plan, David.’

  Oh, how they would dream and plan and . . .

  ‘Aww, crap!’ Tilly gasped, dropping the hoe to press her arms against her belly as she felt a sharp pain.

  ‘Mind your mouth, young lady,’ Hilda said. ‘And I won’t have you faking illness too. There’s more to be done.’

  Just then the telephone rang in the house. Hilda gave Tilly another reproachful look before ripping off both garden gloves and making a dash for the back door.

  Tilly dropped to the ground, not caring the deep-brown dirt would stain her jeans. Was she losing the baby? Was she even pregnant in the first place? She still didn’t know for sure.

  The screen door flew open again, banging hard.

  ‘Tilly?’ Hilda’s voice had an unusual urgency. ‘Tilly? Where’s David?’

  ‘How should I know?’ Tilly called back, forcing herself to her feet.

  ‘David’s missing. He didn’t come home last night. Where is he, Tilly? And don’t give that innocent little shrug of yours. I’m no fool, young lady. I know about your night-time rendezvous.’

  Tilly could only stand there aghast, her eyes probably as wide as her mouth.

  ‘Get over to the Greenhill property and tell his parents what you know.’

  ‘But I don’t–’

  ‘Go! Now!’

  Tilly ran around the side of the building, hurdling junk and skidding onto her bottom in the boggy mud. She was halfway through the barbed wire boundary fence when she heard the scream track a path through the plantation. The sound was like nothing she’d ever heard before and it came from David’s mother, Rose. Tilly’s imagination took over, pushing her to run faster.

  • • •

  David was transported to hospital–first to the local hospital, then onto a specialist spinal unit in Sydney. For three days Tilly waited at the top of the mountain for a car, for news, for David. On the fourth day, Ted and Rose returned to the property. They returned alone, with downturned mouths.

  Ted was in a dangerous mood and had immediately summoned Ulf and Hilda, asking them to bring Albie and Tilly to the house. When they arrived, Ted was shouting at Matthew in the living room, Rose fluttering between them, helpless to protect her son from his father’s anger.

  ‘Are you stupid?’ As Ted’s backhanded slap across Matthew’s head knocked him to the ground, Tilly’s hand instinctively covered her own cheek–the memory of her mother’s cruel discipline never forgotten. Rose screamed for her husband to stop, but Ted was yelling so loud he didn’t hear her. ‘Do you know what you’ve done?’

  The older man was a giant, his brawny body looming, poised to strike again had Rose not clung to her husband’s forearm as fiercely as a mother can, while her eldest son huddled on the ground, arms wrapped around his head.

  ‘I’m sorry, Dad, I didn’t think–’

  ‘No, you didn’t think at all. Why didn’t you call for help?’

  Rose now buzzed back and forth, comforting her husband, then her son. Rose liked to make everything right in the world. Tilly had always thought her to be the best kind of mother a girl could want, but as god-fearing as the family was, their all-embracing tolerance and acceptance never truly extended to the likes of Tilly.

  ‘You might as well have broken his neck by stringing him to a rafter in the packing sheds with your own hands,’ Ted hollered.

  Tilly couldn’t believe Matthew would harm David. She’d seen the two brothers engage in half-hearted fisticuffs, usually over something insignificant. Matthew already knew he was the stronger and the fitter of the two. He didn’t have anything to prove.

  ‘We weren’t fighting. I swear. I found him there,’ Matthew said. ‘Only because I saw the slip marks in the mud. I wouldn’t hurt David. He’s my brother.’

  Rose clung to her husband’s arm–for all the good that would do. She looked like a bird holding back a bear. ‘You should’ve told us he wasn’t in his bed, Matthew. We might have got to him earlier. For God’s sake, why didn’t you tell us?’

  ‘I didn’t say because . . .’ Tilly held her breath when Matthew shot
her a sorry look. ‘Because I thought I knew where he was, and I didn’t think . . .’

  ‘No, you didn’t think,’ Ted berated.

  ‘I found him, didn’t I?’ Matthew said.

  ‘And you should’ve fetched me before moving him, you stupid boy. Why didn’t you call for help? If he comes out of the coma he’ll likely be paralysed. What kind of life is that? I’m holding you responsible.’

  Tiny thorns of terror needled, prickling Tilly’s skin like a swarm of wasps, making her want to scream. This can’t be happening. She wasn’t in David’s house hearing the saddest news, staring a warning at Matthew, his palms cupped over both ears as Ted raged. Tilly wanted to do the same, to block the shouting and sobs, but she dared not move for fear of drawing attention to herself. She could only stare at Matthew in a silent plea to not give her away.

  Ted had spun to face Albie.

  ‘What about you? I was coming up from the packing shed that evening when I saw the two of you near the boundary fence. You and David were arguing. What do you know?’

  Like a pitchfork had poked his bottom, Albie startled to attention. ‘Huh?’

  ‘What were you arguing about?’

  ‘I–’

  ‘Speak up, boy.’ Ulf moved forward and yanked Albie’s wrist. ‘If I find out you had something to do with this . . .’

  Albie’s eyes shifted back and forth. Tilly knew about his earlier falling-out with David, and Albie knew she knew, too. The two boys had been arguing over her. She’d listened, hidden from their view among the banana trees. While she hadn’t heard their exact words, she’d heard David laughing and goading Albie, teasing him, almost daring him to take his best shot. Tilly had left them to it and laughed to herself all the way home just imagining the antics.

  She wasn’t laughing now, though. Albie might blurt out everything: how he’d been upset over David and Tilly’s plans, and how Tilly had slept with Albie before dumping him for David. She had to stop Ted and Ulf from bullying him into confessing.

  Tilly stepped into the centre of the room, steeled herself and asked, ‘Can I see him? Can I see David?’

  Everyone turned to look at her.

  ‘Don’t you think you’ve done enough, Tilly?’ Rose stepped up, her voice aquiver. ‘In fact, you’re just as much to blame. All that provocative strutting around the property, tempting all the boys and making them fight over you. If David hadn’t been sneaking out to see you at night he wouldn’t have been on the pathway in the dark and he wouldn’t have fallen. I’d still have my boy. I’d have my David.’ Rose withdrew again, collapsing into a seat to wail in a way that Tilly had never heard.

  Ted glared, as though this was the first he’d heard about their son’s night-time adventures. But Rose was a mother and mothers knew there was no keeping a fledgling in the nest once they’d tasted flight.

  Tilly had wanted to like Rose. The woman resembled a small bird, always busy, nest building and feeding and flitting about the place. Right now, though, she looked stunned and frail, like the poor rosella that once struck Hilda’s kitchen window, landing heavily on the porch. By the time Tilly had grabbed an old shoebox–because she’d heard a secure, dark space gave birds time to recover–and rushed outside, the rosella was sitting, although clearly still stunned. Tilly had carefully scooped the fragile, feathered body into her hands and let it sit there while she talked to it, willing the creature to live and urging it to fly away. Within seconds the bird had fallen limp on her palm.

  ‘Oh no, wake up, little bird,’ she’d pleaded. ‘Wake up. Please, wake up. I need you to wake up.’

  For three days a lone rosella waited in the tree outside Tilly’s bedroom window, while its mate-for-life remained in the box on her dresser.

  Hilda had gently prised the creature away one day, telling Tilly, ‘He’s gone.’

  ‘Did I kill it?’ Tilly asked.

  Hilda smiled, shook her head. ‘Some things are not in our power to save. What’s important is you were there till the end.’

  ‘So was she,’ Tilly glanced out her window at the lone rosella.

  Tilly now turned to Rose, who’d stopped wailing. ‘Please, I have to be there. I have to be with David. I have to tell him–’

  ‘There’s no telling David anything.’ Ted had kneeled down to pat his wife’s small hand, his voice hoarse. ‘Don’t you understand, Tilly? David isn’t there. Our beautiful, spirited little boy is gone.’ Rose whimpered and fell limp against her husband’s body. ‘His mother will be going back tonight to be with him until the end. It’s a mother’s place to stay with her son. The rest of you–Matthew, Tilly, Albie–I can’t even look at you. Any of you. Leave us. And if I were you I’d pray. Pray for a miracle.’

  No one hesitated, with Ulf and Hilda Marhkt the first to shuffle out the front door.

  • • •

  Alone in the cold and draughty cave where winter winds whipped up the mountainside, Tilly felt nothing. How could she feel anything without David? He had to live. He had to fly away with her. They were mates for life.

  They had plans.

  They had dreams.

  They had a baby.

  At least she’d thought they did. Tilly was so confused by the horrible pains she’d had and the blood still spotting her underwear. She needed to see a doctor–only not the creepy old codger from the dingy surgery in the main street who’d tell everyone at the Fisho’s Club about the young girl who’d got herself in trouble. A doctor in the city was best. If she’d been allowed to go to David, she could have seen a doctor there. Tilly wrapped both arms over her stomach and rocked back and forth. Maybe losing the baby would be a blessing. She couldn’t raise a child alone and trust herself not to end up like her mother–single and on the street, desperate to do whatever she could to make ends meet.

  For now, with the cramping in her stomach no match for the ache in her heart, Tilly made a promise.

  When the time comes, when I finally get away from this place–with or without David–I’ll live the life we’ve planned. And if I have to, I’ll be the best mother in the world. I promise.

  17

  Watercolour Cove, 2015

  ‘Do you promise me?’ Sid heard Pearl ask.

  Her brother replied, complete with school-yard hand gesticulations, ‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’

  ‘Don’t say dumb things like that,’ Pearl berated. ‘And do up the straps on your helmet. You think the designers put them there as decorations?’

  ‘You tell him, Pearl,’ Sid called, joining the pair at the front of the gallery.

  ‘Hey, sis, what brings you out here?’

  ‘We need to talk.’

  ‘Uh-oh, sounds like family biz.’ Pearl picked up her dillybag. ‘I’ll give you some space. But before I go, and speaking of family, do you want to come down to my place tomorrow, Jake? You can check out the oyster leases. There’s always a cold beer at my dad’s.’

  ‘Cool.’

  ‘You too, Sid,’ she said as an afterthought.

  ‘I’ll pass. But thanks.’

  ‘Okay. See ya.’

  Jake waited until Pearl was out of earshot. ‘This better be important, sis.’

  ‘It is. Something’s been preying on my mind since chatting with a guy fishing off the breakwall and I need to ask you something about that.’

  ‘You want to quiz my fish brain now?’ Jake knocked his knuckles against the safety helmet’s hard plastic.

  Sid laughed. ‘You said that, not me. And no, I do not want to quiz you about fish. Do you remember you were wondering if our grandfather might have owned one of those old fishermen’s shacks on the beach?’

  ‘Could explain my love of fish.’

  ‘Not quite what I was getting at, Jake,’ Sid said. ‘When someone dies and there’s a next of kin . . .’

  ‘Spit it out, sis.’

  ‘Our grandfather died weeks ago.’

  ‘True.’

  ‘And the prison administrators would have family or next of kin d
etails.’

  ‘True again.’

  ‘I can understand the prison people are not going to give out inmate information to any Tom, Dick or Harry who waltzes in off the street looking for their long-lost relative. There’d be a process when a prisoner dies in custody, right?’

  ‘Also true, your honour. You wanna just tell me, rather than quiz me?’

  ‘Bear with me.’ Sid was pacing back and forth in front of the quad bike, as though she had to move to keep her brain ticking over. ‘If a solicitor acting on his behalf was able to get that first letter to his son, then presumably they’d also have sent another letter, the same way, notifying of his death.’

  Jake tried to scratch his head, his fingers instead hitting the safety helmet. ‘We’ve talked about this already, sis. We agreed there might be a letter sitting in the letterbox at home.’

  ‘Or . . .’

  ‘Or what? And would you stop with the back and forth thing? You’re making me dizzy.’

  Sid stopped and rammed her hands on her hips. ‘What if there’s no letter at home because another family member was listed for next of kin notification and they were advised of his death instead?’

  ‘You mean a relative? Like Dad had a brother or a sister? Surely we’d know if there was a sibling.’

  ‘I wouldn’t pretend to know the truth about anything anymore. Who’s to say there’s not still a blood relative out there somewhere? An uncle or an aunty. A real one–not like Aunty Tash. Maybe even a grandmother.’

  ‘Well, flip me a fishcake, sis! You could be on to something. But like I said, I’ve got prettier fish to fry as soon as I get these jobs done today. We’ll talk about this later.’

  The urge to interrogate her mother–yes, interrogate was the right word on this occasion–was so strong right now. But Sid remembered the unusually fragile woman who’d looked back from the taxi window as the cab drove away from her beloved Brushstrokes in the Bush. Sid had never seen her mother shut down so completely until that horrible incident. With a lot of help from Tasha, Sid had eventually managed to get Natalie to agree to stay for a while with her best friend in Melbourne.