A Taste for It

by Monica McInerney

“Sorry, Bern, someone urgently needs to use the phone,” Maura fibbed again. “I’ll ring you again soon.” She said goodbye and hung up quickly.

  Over the next two days, Maura, Nick and Fran took turns sitting by Quinn’s little cot, not wanting him to wake up and not have someone who loved him sitting close by. They each snatched some sleep back at the hotel room they were staying in, quickly showering then coming back to the hospital to let someone else take their turn having a rest.

  The doctors were cautiously optimistic, but reluctant to announce a firm prognosis until they had finished running a series of tests.

  Maura confronted the ward sister late on her third afternoon back in Adelaide. They had had a frustrating morning, waiting for Quinn’s specialist to turn up. Two hours past the appointment time, the ward sister had informed them that the specialist had been called away and wouldn’t be in to see them and Quinn until the next morning. Nick and Fran had received the news calmly, so used to shocks and let-downs that another one hardly registered on them.

  Maura wasn’t so easily put off and followed the sister back to the ward office. “What do you mean he’s been called away?” she asked the young woman, once Nick and Fran were out of earshot. “Isn’t Quinn important enough? What is it, a golf game, I guess?” Her voice was tight with anger. The thought of Nick and Fran waiting with taut nerves on the results of the tests fuelled her temper.

  The sister gently steered her back to the ward, hushing her as she did so. “We need to be as quiet as we can, for everyone’s sake,” she whispered, her hand on Maura’s arm.

  A wave of tiredness swept over her. “I’m sorry, I just feel useless for Nick and Fran. There must be something we can do?” she pleaded as she thought of her little nephew.

  “Just keep willing him to get better – we always think they pick up those feelings,” the nurse said with a sudden smile. “He’s a little battler, you can tell just by looking at him.”

  A day passed before the specialist finally appeared and brought good news with him. The tests showed that Quinn had suffered from a series of sleep apnoea episodes. “It’s more common in adults than babies,” the doctor explained. “The easiest way to explain what happens is that the sleeping person simply forgets to breathe. An adult will eventually wake up enough to take a deep breath but in a baby it can be much more serious.”

  Maura looked across at Nick and Fran, knowing they were both remembering the first frightening night, when Fran had found Quinn in his cot.

  The doctor continued. “The tests have also detected a weakness in one of his lungs, and we want to keep a close eye on that, and keep him here until all the risk has passed.” He went on to advise that when Nick and Fran took Quinn home they should install a monitoring device in his cot, which would send off an alarm if he stopped breathing again during his sleep. “But he’s a strong little fellow,” he said, touching Quinn lightly on the head. “He’s going to be fine.”

  As the doctor moved on to his next patient, they were quiet, letting his words sink in. Fran held Quinn close against her chest, gently kissing his little dark head. She smiled at Maura and Nick, for what seemed like the first time in days. They grinned back at her. The relief trickled through them.

  As the day passed, Maura watched Fran gradually emerge from the barricade of worry she had built around herself. Her eyes cleared, the tension eased from her body and she seemed to become aware of everything around her again.

  Maura smiled at her. “Welcome back, Fran.”

  Fran smiled back. “Welcome back too, Maura.”

  The mood changed from that moment on. As they sat around Quinn’s cot, Maura started telling stories about her trip to Ireland, deliberately keeping it light.

  It wasn’t until Fran was at the hotel later that afternoon that Maura told Nick the whole story about her trip to Catherine’s village. She was surprised how easy it was to talk about it. She wasn’t running away from it any more. She’d actually done it, discovered something about her mother. Nick didn’t say much at first – that wasn’t his way, she knew that. But he listened intently as she spoke, and she knew that he was carefully watching her face as she related the story.

  As Fran came back into the ward, Maura changed the subject. Fran knew the sketchy details, and Maura didn’t mind if Nick told her everything later. But for the time being she wanted it just between her and Nick.

  “Just in time, Fran,” Maura looked up with a smile, noticing that Fran looked years younger now the tension had eased. “I was just about to give Nick the rundown on how Lorikeet Hill was greeted by cheering crowds in every Irish village.”

  Nick was hungry for all the details about the response to his wine, and Maura noticed with pleasure that he avidly read the notebook in which she had written every comment she had heard about it.

  “I’m proud of you,” he said unexpectedly, as they sat in the foyer later in the day, again attempting to drink the terrible coffee.

  She looked up suddenly from the newspaper she was reading. “Pardon?” she said, not sure if she’d heard him correctly.

  “I’m proud of you.”

  “Don’t be silly,” she said hurriedly, unused to comments like this from her brother. “It was your wine, I just had to talk about it.”

  “I’m not talking about the wine. I’m talking about you looking for Catherine and the fact that you did it. Terri would have been really glad you did.”

  Maura felt her eyes fill with tears. She blinked them away. She tried to think of some wisecrack to lessen the mood, lighten the moment, then realised she didn’t need to do that with Nick any more.

  “Thanks,” she said softly. “I’m glad too.”

  Chapter Thirty-four

  “Has anyone else noticed this is the third day in a row I’ve worn this T-shirt?” Fran asked the next afternoon in the hospital. Clothes and food and sleep had hardly mattered in the first worrying days, but now the storm had passed, all sorts of ordinary things were becoming important again.

  “Do you want me to go shopping and get you some fresh things?” Maura asked, looking up from her impromptu desk at the bedside cabinet. She was trying to make a start on her magazine article.

  “I’ve a cupboard of these at home,” Fran answered. “It’s a waste to buy new ones. If it won’t bother you both looking at me, it won’t kill me to wear it for a few more days,” she added with a grin.

  Maura volunteered immediately. “Look, why don’t I drive up to Clare, pack a few suitcases of fresh clothes for us all, and check on the winery and café while I’m there?”

  She could tell Nick was relieved at the idea. While Gemma and one of Nick’s fellow winemakers in the Valley had been keeping an eye on the most urgent matters, she was sure he must be getting slightly anxious about being away.

  “Can you check if the new tanks have arrived yet?” Nick asked, confirming her thoughts.

  “And could you give our garden at home a good watering?” Fran asked. “It’s been so dry, I just hope everything’s survived these past few days.”

  “And could you check the water pump in the back vineyard is still working?” Nick added.

  Maura laughed as the list got longer. She stood up, deciding to make a start for Clare there and then. “Why don’t I get going with this for starters and you can ring me if you think of anything else.” She said goodbye to little Quinn, smiling as she noticed again the healthy pink glow coming into his skin. His eyes were getting brighter and more alert every day too. He was well on the way back.

  As she headed north, driving with the late afternoon traffic, it took some time to get used to the stiff gear-change in Nick and Fran’s battered old four-wheel drive. She hit the end of the peak hour, a stream of traffic around her, as she drove through Adelaide’s flat northern suburbs – a series of car yards, suburban shopping centres and housing developments.

  Once she was clear of the town of Gawler, forty minutes north of Adelaide, she knew she would virtually have the road to herself. She had
done this trip many times in her life, and could name the small towns along the way with ease, knowing each bend and turn of the highway.

  She looked at the scenery with fresh eyes, comparing it to the Irish countryside. She remembered the way she had described it to people in Ireland. She’d talked about the space and the isolation. As the sun set, throwing huge splashes of dark pink into the sky to her left, she noticed that space even more, especially after the confinement of the past seven days, on the plane and in the hospital.

  The spectacle of the sunset had a soothing effect on her as the car filled with the strange pink light she always associated with late summer in South Australia. For the first time since she’d arrived home, she let herself dwell completely on Dominic and the last night she had seen him, caressing a naked Carla.

  She didn’t feel angry this time. Instead, as she recalled that evening, she felt the tears start to well up. Cross with herself, she roughly wiped them away with the back of her hand. She pretended it was a release of tension, a mixture of the worry about Quinn and the shock and jet-lag of her sudden departure. But she knew, if she was honest with herself, that most of it was sorrow about losing Dominic.

  She had felt so close to him that night in London, emotionally as well as physically. She kept getting flashes of memories from their trip together, the strange tension and awareness that had been between them since the moment they met, her dawning realisation of her strong attraction to him. She had hugged the secret of him close, after London really believing that there was the possibility of something, somehow, between them.

  She cried aloud, feeling some relief as she drove faster than the speed limit. It made her feel a little better. No happier, but better. She hadn’t felt like this when she and Richard had finished. Did that mean that he hadn’t been her true love and Dominic was? Or was this just a fantasy too, and her reaction worse because of that?

  As she drove further, she felt a weary calmness. In the fading light, she noticed the yellow paddocks lining both sides of the road. It looked like there hadn’t been any rain at all in the month she’d been in Ireland. All along the roadside was high yellow grass, and she could see plenty of rough undergrowth under the trees in the paddocks either side of the road. She frowned as she noticed it. The Mid-North of South Australia had suffered terrible bushfires several years before, and many of the trees had only this year grown back enough new, light-green leaves to hide the black stumps. It looked like all the natural bushfire fuel had grown back too.

  She felt the familiar skip in her heart as she drove around the sweeping corner into the village of Auburn and read the sign welcoming her to the Clare Valley.

  The green of the vines was as calming and beautiful as ever. She was impatient to be home now, and had to keep a careful eye on the speedo to stop herself from driving too fast in her haste. The villages of Leasingham, Watervale, Penwortham and Sevenhill flashed by.

  Just on the outskirts of Clare, she saw the sign for Lorikeet Hill on the main road and laughed aloud. Nick must have had it freshly painted while she was away. He’d added a line to the bottom: Now enjoyed in Ireland.

  She pulled into Lorikeet Hill’s driveway, the heavy wheels crunching on the gravel. She didn’t get out of the car immediately, taking a moment to lean back against the seat, and savour the view around her. As she did, the front door opened and she saw Gemma come out onto the verandah, followed by a well-built man wearing an Akubra hat. As she watched, Gemma pulled him into her arms and gave him a very long, very passionate kiss.

  Maura grinned. So that was why Gemma was so keen to stay on.

  The noise of the door of the four-wheel drive creaking open caught their attention and they both spun around. To her surprise, Maura recognised the man as Keith Drewer, a successful local farmer who had been several years ahead of her at school.

  “Hello, Gemma, hello, Keith,” she called, an amused tone in her voice.

  Gemma pulled back from Keith and ran toward Maura with a beaming smile.

  “Welcome home, it’s great to see you!” she smiled, throwing her arms around her friend.

  Maura hugged her back, whispering as she did so. “Sorry to interrupt, will I come back later?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Gemma laughed out loud, and threw a remark over her shoulder. “It’s fine, Keith’s just leaving, aren’t you, darling?” Gemma exaggerated the endearment and Maura was amused to see Keith blush.

  Imagine, Gemma, with him of all people. He was a country boy through and through and Gemma was Sydney glamour from her head to her toes. But from the looks they were giving each other – and their tousled clothes – something had obviously clicked between them.

  Keith politely asked her about her trip, before Gemma practically pushed him into the car. “See you tomorrow, Keith. I’ve got a night of talking to my dear friend ahead of me.”

  After Keith drove off, Gemma hugged Maura close again, then stood back and held her at arm’s length.

  “How are you, darl? How’s Quinn, how’s Nick, how’s Fran, how was Ireland, how is everything?”

  Maura smiled back. “Quinn is getting better in leaps and bounds and so are Nick and Fran. Get us a bottle and a glass each, a seat on the verandah, and I’ll tell you everything.”

  As Gemma fetched some chilled drinks, Maura stretched out on the comfortable garden seat on the café verandah, and felt her muscles relax. She could hear Gemma bustling around in the kitchen and she smiled to herself. They had a good night of chat ahead of them. She could just see her own cottage through the trees in the adjoining paddock. She was looking forward to sleeping in her own bedroom for the first time in weeks. It was nice to be home.

  Gemma broke into her reverie, coming out onto the verandah carrying a tray laden with a bottle of sparkling wine in an ice bucket, glasses, little bowls of locally grown olives and the portable phone.

  Maura raised an eyebrow at the phone. “That desperate for bookings, are we, or are you expecting a call yourself?”

  Gemma started to deny it, before bursting out laughing. “Well, he said he might ring. But let’s forget Keith for a moment,” she said, passing her a fizzing glass. “It’s great to have you back, Morey. Tell me everything, every single detail.”

  Nick had obviously already told Gemma about Bernadette’s accident and the sudden appearance of Dominic, but Gemma was hungry for all the facts direct from Maura.

  They took turn and turn about, Maura keenly hearing all the details of Gemma’s meeting with Keith, when she had called him to source some local lamb for the café.

  “It was like a slow motion film, Morey – our eyes locked, our hearts leapt and I had to stop myself from running into his arms then and there.”

  Maura laughed uproariously. “And you haven’t stopped yourself since by the looks of things.”

  “It’s the country air, it gives a girl a great appetite, as you’ve often told me yourself.”

  Maura shook her head at Gemma’s boldness. “Well, good luck to you, it looks like it’s doing you the world of good.”

  Gemma stretched luxuriously. “I’m a new woman, believe me. Now, what about you, did you manage a quick windswept romance with any rugged Irish poets or red-faced bottle-shop owners?”

  To Maura’s surprise, she didn’t tell Gemma anything about her feelings for Dominic. Nor about the night in the Mayo hotel room, or the night in London, let alone what had happened the night she had found Dominic with Carla. She couldn’t explain why, even to herself. It was too raw at the moment, she guessed. Instead she lightheartedly changed the subject, asking Gemma to fill her in on the latest Clare Valley winery gossip.

  The mood was easy, until once again Gemma shifted the focus back onto Ireland, tentatively raising the subject of Catherine. She knew of Maura’s confused feelings about her birth mother and was curious and sympathetic as Maura haltingly told the story.

  Gemma carefully pressed for detail and Maura was glad of her interest, feeling herself coming to terms with it
all even more as she spoke her thoughts aloud.

  Around ten in the evening, the phone rang. It was Fran, calling with good news from the hospital. The specialist had been in again earlier in the evening, just after Maura had left.

  Fran reported that Quinn’s lungs were definitely getting stronger.

  “The doctor reckons the last monitor will be removed in the next couple of days,” Fran said in a happy voice, “and Quinn’ll be breathing completely on his own again.”

  Maura passed on the good news to Gemma. “Around these parts, good news means more good wine,” Gemma announced, filling both their glasses. They had barely taken a sip when the phone rang again.

  “Keith?” Maura suggested.

  Gemma gave a saucy smile, before answering the phone in an exaggerated husky voice. “Lorikeet Hill Winery Café, hello,” she breathed. “Maura Carmody, yes, this is her number. Who is this, please?”

  Maura looked up in amazement, her brow creasing. Who knew that she was back in Clare already?

  Gemma repeated the caller’s name for Maura’s benefit. “Dominic Hanrahan,” she said, arching an eyebrow in query at Maura.

  Maura felt her blood chill suddenly and shook her head violently. “I’m not here yet,” she mouthed, her eyes wide.

  Gemma didn’t miss a beat. “Maura is actually still in Adelaide at the hospital with her family,” she said smoothly. “Yes, he’s much better, yes, it’s a great relief. Shall I give Maura a message? No, well, I’ll tell her you called. Goodnight.”

  Gemma hung up, turned to Maura and made a whooping sound.

  “That’s Dominic? What a gorgeous voice! What’s he doing ringing here and how does he know so much about Quinn?” she shot the questions.

  Maura didn’t answer, her thoughts a whirl. Bernadette must have filled him in on the situation with Quinn, and given him her number.

  Gemma looked at her closely again. “Why are you being so weird and silent, girlie? What haven’t you told me about this Irish trip? You haven’t left out the juicy bits by any chance? Why would he be ringing here?”