A Hundred Small Lessons

by Ashley Hay

  ‘Let’s go to Paris,’ she’d said again this morning. ‘Let’s fly there.’

  ‘You and me,’ said Ben, lacing his fingers through hers.

  ‘You and me and Tom.’

  And they lay there, saying nothing, until Tom woke with a cry.

  ‘I like the pre-Tom-wake-up Lucy,’ said Ben as she pulled herself up out of bed.

  She stood there for a moment while Tom’s cry surged. ‘Don’t we all,’ she said.

  Now, stretched out like a starfish, she realised that the last song had finished and she was listening to the afternoon’s silence. She listened to the round nothingness that the headphones pressed against her ears, and then a floorboard creaked somewhere in the bedroom near her head, and she turned to acknowledge its noise.

  Expansion, she thought. Contraction. The house is breathing.

  That’s all it was.

  She closed her eyes and pictured herself in Paris. She’d buy Tom ice cream at Berthillon. She’d show him the bat-shaped aeroplane. She’d watch him run through the gardens at the Tuileries.

  It was all right. Of course it was all right.

  He was asleep. Then he’d be awake. Then they would walk down to the river and explore. So many houses still stood empty after the flood; it felt like walking through a ghost town or a film set. She liked their game creating stories for the disarrayed buildings—aliens having a party; bears on some wild spree.

  Something creaked again. And then the phone rang and she leapt up, reaching for it.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Well, hello.’

  She knew the voice, but couldn’t place it. A man’s voice, deep, familiar. She held the phone out from her ear—it showed no number that she knew.

  ‘Sorry. Who is this?’

  ‘It’s your deep and distant past.’

  ‘I don’t—I’m sorry—’ as Tom cried out. Lucy took a breath, felt her heart race. ‘I’ll have to go—my son’s just woken up.’

  ‘I’ll ring back later.’

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t.’

  ‘But it’s me. It’s Ferdi.’ As if it were the most normal thing in the world.

  ‘Ferdi? Ferdi Klim?’

  ‘The one and only.’ The man was laughing at the other end of the line, and now Lucy was laughing too.

  ‘Hang on,’ she said. ‘Hang on—I’ve got to get my boy.’ And she lifted Tom out of his cot, shushing him and holding him, her phone wedged between her shoulder and her ear.

  ‘He’s got your lungs then?’ said Ferdi Klim.

  ‘You know,’ said Lucy, ‘I never thought of it that way.’ She set Tom down on the living room floor, scooting blocks and trucks towards him. Here was the paper aeroplane she’d folded from Ferdi’s letter, swooping high across her memory, and far. ‘So, Ferdi Klim,’ she said. ‘Where did you spring from?’

  ‘I ran into one of your sisters on a train the other day, in Sydney—what are the odds? I’m home for a bit, and I thought it was you. She’s dyeing her hair red. It’s very confusing. Anyway, she said you’d moved up north, and then work said, Fly north, young man, so I’ve come up and—’

  ‘Hang on—you’re where? You’re here? From where?’ Was this the text message from her sister that she’d never gone back to read?

  ‘What? No—I’m just up here for work. Be nice to see you.’

  She thought of dancing in her lounge room; she thought of dancing on her own those years before. She remembered how she’d felt, so young and free. After him.

  ‘I was thinking of that summer we broke up,’ she said after a moment. ‘All the bands I went to see then, on my own. You sure you’re real?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure.’

  ‘Then come over,’ she said quickly, before she could change her mind. ‘Come for dinner. Come tonight.’

  He laughed. ‘I can’t come for dinner—I’ve got to meet a colleague—but I could come and see you now, if you like.’

  ‘Where are you?’ Lucy looked around the room with its jumble and clutter of toys, books, clean clothes. ‘Do you know where we are?’

  ‘I’m at the station: your sister said it wasn’t far away.’

  ‘What? My sister gave you the address?’

  ‘Well, just the suburb,’ he said. ‘She said she thought you could use an old friend. So, where do I go?’

  ‘I guess . . . well, I’d love to see you.’

  And she gave him the address, talking as he walked down from the station—crossing, turning, like the blue dot that moved with her on the street maps on her phone.

  She was rushing through the house, kicking at piles of Duplo, pushing a basket of unfolded washing under her bed. ‘So, the house is a bit of a mess,’ she said as she went.

  ‘And of course that’s all I care about,’ said Ferdi. ‘Is that you? The blue house? The bright red front door?’

  ‘Yes. It is.’ Lucy opened the door. ‘And there you are. You’re here.’

  There he was. He held out his arms and Tom, alert to any chance of a hug, ran past his mother and arrived, blinking at this unknown man, his arms out in return.

  ‘You must be Tom. It’s good to meet you.’ Ferdi crouched down, and his face grimaced as if at a sudden stiffness. He held out his hand and inclined his head—his hair more of a faded, greying blond than Lucy remembered—towards Tom’s. ‘You shake, like this.’ He demonstrated, right hand to right hand, and Tom held out his left hand to give it its fair turn.

  Lucy scooped up the little boy, and stepped onto the porch towards Ferdi as he straightened, one hand propping his hip while the other arm reached around her in a hug. ‘You’re getting old, then.’ She laughed. ‘And if we’d known you were coming—’

  ‘Well, here I am.’ He held her for a while. ‘I think I’ve shrunk—or have you grown?’

  ‘Me?’ Lucy shook her head. ‘Utterly average, as always. My sisters grew two centimetres each after they’d had their kids. Me, perfectly static. One-sixty-two on the dot.’ She pushed back from Ferdi, looking him up and down. ‘A bit more creaky,’ she said at last, ‘but you look just like you—I’d have known you anywhere.’ Not saying a thing about his hair.

  ‘You look just like your sister, which was confusing when I saw her the other day. “Lucy!” Bounding over like an idiot. “No,” she said. “That happens all the time.”’

  ‘Really?’ Lucy smiled a measured smile. ‘She never tells me about it. I wonder who else she’s confused. Come on; come in. And mind the Duplo. How long are you around?’

  ‘Flying visit—overnight. I’m based in the US these days. Still working with money. Always money. It’ll send me grey one day.’ He waved away the question she was about to ask. ‘Brokerage: that’s all you need to know. What are you doing—apart from this one? Whose university are you sorting out now?’

  Ferdi sat straight down with Tom on the floor and was picking out pieces of Duplo and clicking them together in a long, unstable line. ‘Light sabre?’ he said, offering the drooping stick to the small boy.

  ‘He doesn’t know about light sabres yet,’ said Lucy, watching from above. ‘We’re more into Dr Seuss around here. I’m currently kept busy by the University of Duplo, as you can see.’

  ‘Flamingo,’ said Tom with certainty. It was his current favourite word.

  ‘Well, yes, I can see that,’ said Ferdi seriously. ‘I see that now. Let’s make some legs then.’ Clicking wider orange pieces to its base.

  ‘Yay!’ said Tom. ‘Flamingo!’

  ‘Now you make one,’ said Ferdi, leaning back. ‘Yes, brokerage. Chicago, Illinois. And you’ve just moved here? It’s for—sorry, I forget your husband’s name.’

  ‘Ben; we moved here just after Tom turned one.’

  Ferdi nodded. ‘And Brisbane. You like it?’

  Lucy laughed. ‘I’m fine as long as I’ve got a map—I still can’t quite work out where I am. Ben’s writing for one of the papers. He’s very good at what he does.’ She blushed. ‘I mean, I’m very proud.’

&nbs
p; ‘Of course you are—did I meet Ben?’ Ferdi had begun to build another Duplo shape.

  ‘Maybe at a party?’ If certain moments were essential, she thought she’d have held on to that one.

  ‘The nine-letter-word guy? The writer?’

  Lucy nodded.

  ‘I did meet him. I tried to trip him up with “astrocyte”,’ said Ferdi. ‘Don’t even know how I knew the word. He had it in a flash.’ He bowed his head, flattened his palms towards the floor. ‘I conceded immediate defeat—although “brokerage”, I could try that one now.’

  ‘We’ve been together ten years. And he’s only getting better at those puzzles,’ Lucy said with a laugh. ‘You’d have no chance now.’

  ‘No chance indeed.’ Ferdi admired his own construction. ‘You have quality Duplo, Lucy Kiss—I should never have left you.’

  ‘I believe I left you.’ Lucy pulled the toy box a little closer. ‘And I don’t think Duplo would have helped.’

  Ferdi smiled. ‘You may be right. But come on, we both ended up in the right place.’

  ‘No hard feelings.’ She turned to go into the kitchen. ‘Now. What. Tea. Coffee. Beer. That’s all we’ve got.’

  Ferdi laid a mat of blue plastic pieces in front of Tom, then stood up to stretch, to follow her. ‘There’s a lake for your flamingos, my small friend.’ He smiled at Lucy. ‘Tea? Do you drink tea now? Well, this is new.’

  She was talking as she filled the kettle with water. ‘I blame this house. I even held off in London, and then we came here, bought this place, and that was it. I blame Elsie.’

  ‘Elsie?’

  ‘The lady we bought the house from. I found a teacup and I thought how nice it would be to have a cup of tea with Elsie. I liked to imagine her just dropping in. I think it all started from there.’

  Ferdi leaned against the doorframe; he was still smiling. ‘I should say something about wonders never ceasing. Tea! My mother won’t believe that.’

  ‘Is it such a big deal?’

  ‘You always made it one before.’

  ‘Did I?’ Lucy felt strangely defensive: she wouldn’t have cared about such a small thing, would she? She wasn’t sure. All those other Lucys lost in other pasts.

  She’d liked Ferdi’s mother more than she’d liked Ferdi a lot of the time—a woman with generously sized wine glasses and a scathing opinion of most men, particularly the ones she was related to. ‘Your mum’s OK?’

  ‘Mum and Dad, both mainly fine.’ Ferdi had pulled a phone from his pocket and was flicking through for photos. ‘Here—my birthday dinner, the other day.’

  ‘Happy birthday,’ said Lucy, peering at the screen and then at Ferdi. ‘Your mum looks exactly the same. And you’re looking more like your dad. Although he—’ She paused. The older man looked old.

  ‘He’s not had the best year,’ said Ferdi. ‘Old age. The usual.’ He bent closer and swiped the photos on. ‘So—here: my lot. Three girls—nine; six; three.’ A separate image for each one.

  ‘They’re in Chicago?’

  ‘The youngest in Chicago. The middle one in New York. And the eldest one in Maine.’ He took a deep breath. ‘You know I always liked to leap from thing to thing.’

  Three girls; three wives? What a life. Lucy poured the boiling water onto the tea leaves and turned the teapot to steep.

  ‘You really have embraced the whole tea ceremony.’ Ferdi nodded to the teapot.

  ‘I know; I told you—Elsie. All the pots she must have made; I think it must be something in the air.’

  ‘The ghost of teapots past?’

  ‘She didn’t die here.’ Lucy looked aghast. ‘She just moved out, and then we bought the place. I like to think that she sort of pops around.’

  He was smiling as he shook his head at her—she’d forgotten the warmth of that smile. ‘You’re just the same; you haven’t changed at all. Your sister made it sound like things were grim.’

  Lucy blushed a little. ‘We all have our moments,’ she murmured, reaching for her cup.

  There was a clatter from the other room and Tom appeared beside Ferdi. ‘Fall down, Mummy,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Flamingo all fall down.’

  ‘Never mind,’ said Ferdi, picking him up as if he was the creature who’d fallen. ‘Let’s see if we can build them again.’ And he went into the lounge room with the small boy curled against his chest.

  Lucy leaned against the edge of the kitchen table, an idea flashing through her head. If I had married Ferdi Klim, I’d have three girls. Or I’d be divorced. Or I’d have this moment daily—him, and Tom, and tea. As unthinkable a thing as it was inevitable to think it.

  She poured the tea, calling to check that Ferdi took his the way she remembered—‘just a touch of sugar at the end?’

  She’d had such energy when she left him, a full, rich certainty that had made her feel alive. Best thing she’d ever done. Then she’d met Ben. And then—and then came everything that had carried her from there to here. The best things. Still, it was lovely to see an old friend.

  ‘Just a touch of sugar at the end,’ Ferdi called back from the next room. She could hear him talking to Tom. She could hear Tom’s one-, two-word replies as she tipped biscuits onto a plate. And then she stirred the lightly sugared tea and balanced the two cups in one hand, the biscuits in the other.

  ‘It’s good to see you, Ferdi,’ she said, walking into the living room. It was empty. Ferdi and Tom were gone.

  Lucy set the tea things down, and blinked.

  If I count to five, I will know what to do.

  She counted: nothing.

  There’s nothing wrong. There is an explanation. I’ll stand here. I’ll call out. This is all all right.

  She could call the police. She could ring Ben. She should remember to breathe.

  As she breathed, she found her voice. ‘Tom? Love?’ she called, and heard a hinge, a doorknob rattle. And there was Tom leading Ferdi by the hand, coming out of the bathroom.

  ‘What the—’

  ‘He said he needed to do a wee, and I asked him if he minded me taking him, and he said no.’ Ferdi sat back down on the floor and crossed his legs. Which was where Tom settled himself. ‘I shut the door—sorry, force of habit.’

  ‘He what?’

  ‘Needed to do a wee, and didn’t mind me taking him,’ repeated Ferdi. ‘Toilet training a bonus service—for you, there’ll be no extra charge.’

  ‘I thought—I—’ And as she spun around, she knocked Elsie’s cup, the plate of biscuits, and sent them crashing to the floor. ‘It doesn’t matter. He’s never asked—he’s never been before. I’ll get—’

  And she went back to the kitchen, where the tap turned on faster than she expected when she went to wet the sponge, and the water spurted across her body.

  ‘Shit!’

  ‘Well, maybe I’m some sort of kid-whisperer,’ Ferdi called from the other room. ‘Are you all right out there?’

  ‘I’m fine.’ She went back in and crouched down beside her visitor and her son, dipping her head. Her face was burning; she could hear her own pulse, loud, inside her head. She mopped up the tea, the crumbs, the tiny flecks of china—Elsie’s cup had broken clear in two and she took it into the kitchen, where she paused a moment, very still, easing its halves gently together.

  We can fix you. We can fix this up.

  ‘That wasn’t the magic cup, was it?’ Ferdi called, and she ignored him.

  She boiled the kettle, let the leaves steep, made the same two drinks again—in fresh, new cups. Carried all these items, one by one.

  ‘Tea—half a sugar. Biscuits too.’ She felt like crying, and if she started she wasn’t sure she’d stop.

  But they sat a while, and talked of bits and pieces. Ferdi had done a better job of staying in touch with people, and Lucy could listen to the roll call of old friends without having to offer a thing. And now he’ll add me to the story—‘I saw Lucy. Up in Brisbane. With her kid.’

  There was a lull in their words then, and Lucy he
ard the double-thump of small feet in the roof.

  ‘Ben thinks it’s a possum,’ she said as Ferdi looked up. ‘And Ben lived here when he was a boy—I mean in Brisbane.’

  ‘These children,’ said Ferdi as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘They’re a crazy roller-coaster of a ride.’ He dipped a biscuit into his tea and offered half of it to Tom. ‘Is he allowed?’

  An afterthought; Tom had already gulped it down.

  ‘When my first girl was born, my first wife struggled—I made every wrong decision in the book. Never there. Not much use. Fairly clueless. We were over within the first year. Second wife; second child. much the same. My mum was furious. Said she’d raised me to do better than that. I cried off about how busy I was—how hard it was for me. The only time I’ve heard my mother swear. Third wife; third child—we’re doing better. It’s pretty sad it’s taken me this long.’

  He reached across, took Lucy by the hand. ‘I meant what I said—this stuff suits you. You look really good in all this.’ She stared at their hands, linked together; the gold of her wedding band was bright in the gap between two of Ferdi’s fingers. What did it feel like when you left your wives, both times? Some part of her wanted to know.

  ‘I’m no better at it than anyone,’ she said at last. ‘And I don’t think anyone always knows what to do.’

  ‘Tom’s hand—Tom’s hand.’ Her son was wiggling between them, wanting in.

  ‘Yes,’ said Lucy. ‘I’ll hold Tom’s hand.’ And she let go of Ferdi, pulling Tom onto her lap and knitting her fingers with his. Beyond the porch, she could see the sky dimming to a dark grey; the start of rain smelled heavy in the air.

  ‘Where do you need to get to for this dinner?’ she said to Ferdi. ‘We might have to call you a cab. You bring an umbrella?’

  He reached behind him for his satchel, spilling notebooks, a t-shirt and a small umbrella across the floor as it tipped upside down. ‘Things that I know about Brisbane,’ he said. ‘Beware of the afternoon rain.’

  ‘You can set your watch by it,’ said Lucy with a smile.

  He stood up and stepped towards the doorway, and part of Lucy wanted to say, No, please; don’t go.

  ‘I didn’t mean that you had to rush off.’

  ‘No, I should, Lu—do you still object to people calling you that?’ He reached down and pulled her up while she held Tom.