by Sasha Wasley
She was tempted to stop for more photos at the floodway closest to home but didn’t want to inconvenience him so she continued until they reached the stone and wood sign that read Paterson Downs. That familiar sense of comfort washed over her. As they approached the homestead, she tried to look at it through Finn’s eyes, knowing it was the first time he’d ever seen the place. It was an unfashionable house, she realised, giggling a little. Mission-brown brickwork and lichen-encrusted orange roof tiles. Those seventies-style arches. Lacy curtains over copper venetian blinds.
But beyond the house were massive sheds, busy cattle yards and the Herne River snaking through thousands of kilometres of red and green land beneath a vast azure sky.
Free parked, pointed Finn towards a spot and popped her boot. He arrived beside her and picked up their bags before she could, and they looked so light and easy to carry in Finn’s hands that it would have been silly to offer her help. She led him towards the house, almost skipping with excitement.
‘I can’t wait to show you around the station. Excuse our house. It’s super daggy, I know. Apparently, there was an old cottage farmhouse here once, but they knocked it down and rebuilt when Dad was a young bloke. I’m sure you can appreciate how in vogue this design was in the 1970s. Hi, Jazz!’ Free greeted a farm dog, whose tongue lolled in a welcoming grin. ‘She’s the friendliest of our dogs. The others are real workaholics. Look – there’s Willow’s pony, Tuffie. He’s too old to ride nowadays, but he’s got the best possie, in the yard that overlooks the house. Willow insists on him having that spot. It’s got good shade and he’s kind of a pet, so she likes having him close to the house. See this?’ She pulled open the screen door and paused to tap the dragon-embellished brass bell missing a clapper. ‘This was Mum’s bell. I used to think that if you rang the bell, you’d summon the dragon.’ She pushed through the dust-coated wooden door. ‘Dad! We’re home!’
‘In here!’ came Barry’s voice.
Free led Finn to the kitchen. She bent down to hug and kiss her father where he sat at the kitchen table working on a jigsaw puzzle of watery canals. She’d bought it for him in Venice.
‘Happy birthday, sweetheart.’
‘Thanks, Dad.’ She indicated Finn. ‘This is Finn Kelly. Do you remember him from the wedding? He’s a constable in Mount Clair, and also my neighbour. He’s been so good to me, especially when my car got broken into.’
‘Yep, I remember ya, Finn.’ Barry stood, shaking Finn’s hand. ‘Free told me she was bringing a mate along for the weekend. Thanks for looking out for her. Things can be a bit rough in town, crime-wise, and we’re not used to having to lock up.’
‘I did lock the car, Dad,’ Free put in.
‘Is that right?’ Barry looked surprised. ‘Bethie said you’d left it unlocked.’
‘No, that was the garage door.’ Free couldn’t help a flicker of annoyance at Beth for dobbing her in to their father. ‘Anyway, it’s all fixed now. Car’s as good as new, and the farm ute’s back here, thanks to Finn. Come on, I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping,’ she said to Finn.
‘Dinner in the station kitchen tonight,’ Barry called after them. ‘Six-thirty.’
‘Got it,’ she called back.
She showed Finn the guest room, glad that Willow had cleared it out for Tanya’s recent stay. The boxes of old art gear were back in Free’s paint-wrecked room.
‘We’ve got an hour before dinner,’ she said. ‘Want to come for a ride around the farm?’
‘A ride!’ Finn rubbed his jaw uncertainly. ‘I don’t know how to ride a horse. Or did you mean something else?’
She hadn’t meant horses or anything like that, but maybe he wanted a farm-style ride. ‘We could take the quads.’ Free recalled her last attempt on a quad bike. ‘Except I might crash mine. I suck at anything but cars. I can drive the farm ute around the tracks, though.’
Finn looked relieved. ‘The ute sounds good.’
‘Cool! First, I’ll introduce you to everyone.’
She took Finn out to the station kitchen, where Jean made raucous jokes about Finn’s height and Devi just stared in silent amazement. Free rattled off the names of the string of station hands, domestic staff and the couple of stockmen who’d arrived in preparation for mustering season.
‘And this is Vern, our assistant manager,’ she finished, presenting Finn to the quietly spoken man Willow trusted more than anyone else at Patersons. ‘There’s no-one who knows more than Vern about cattle.’
Finn shook the older man’s hand. ‘I’m in awe of you guys who can ride horses and muster cattle,’ he confessed. ‘All I mastered in my lifetime was a skateboard.’
Vern thought that was hilarious. ‘You’ll wanna be around tomorrow, then,’ he said. ‘Some of the boys thought they might have a barrel race.’
Free’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Does Willow know about this?’
‘Yeah, she knows,’ Vern said. ‘She just didn’t wanna be here while it happened.’
Free practically danced out to the ute. ‘You are in for such a treat, Finn! I haven’t seen a barrel race out here for years.’
‘What the heck is a barrel race? I’m thinking, you’ve gotta chase a cow around a barrel . . .’
Free shrieked with laughter. ‘Wrong! The cow chases you around the barrel.’
He groaned but cracked a real smile for the first time that afternoon. ‘I guess I’ll have to wait and see.’
‘That’s right. Now, let’s go for a bash round the farm.’
She stopped by the kitchen before they headed out, and asked Vern for a farm job. He helped them load up some bales of hay to take out to a paddock on the western side of the station, where foraging pasture was scarce for the small herd that had taken up residence there. Free drove through some yards and paddocks until they hit the western track in the dying sunlight.
‘Now, in a minute,’ she said, ‘you can get onto the back of the ute and toss the bales out to the cattle.’
‘Me?’ Finn was smiling. ‘How about I drive and you throw the bales?’
‘Not a chance,’ she said firmly. ‘I’m an artist and have delicate fingers. You’re a copper and you have brute strength. You’re throwing hay bales, not me.’
He laughed but consented. She bumped through the pasture gate and the cattle came running. Finn jumped onto the tray and tossed out hay like he’d done it his whole life. Free watched him in the side mirror, marvelling at his strength.
Hot damn. She could watch him do that all day.
‘Oops,’ he said, when one of his bales flew too far and half of the hay landed on the wrong side of the fence.
Before Free could stop him, he’d jumped down to the ground and was crouching down, reaching through the fence to recover the hay.
‘Finn, no!’ she cried, but it was too late. An impatient cow had shoved past him to stick its massive head through the wires, sending Finn sprawling in the process. Finn lay half through the fence, coughing in the red dust, face in the dirt. Free yanked on the handbrake and scrambled out to help him. He heaved himself back through the fence and they both made a mad dash for the ute tray in advance of the arrival of the rest of the herd. Safe on the tray, Free giggled helplessly.
‘Holy shit!’ Finn gazed at the cattle, chest heaving. ‘What happened?’
‘You turned your back!’ she managed through her panting. ‘And you got in between a cow and its tucker.’
Finn watched as the herd arrived in earnest, shaking the hay bales apart and grumbling at each another. ‘I always thought cows were docile.’
‘Yeah, people think that.’
‘Big, soft-eyed, calm, kinda stupid . . .’
‘Not at all stupid.’ Free slapped his arm, which made dust rise from his shirt. ‘They may be big and soft-eyed, but they’re also curious and surprising.’
He grinned at her, then the grin faded slightly. ‘That explains you, then. Raised on a cattle station. Curious and surprising.’
She was startled into s
ilence, but Finn edged closer to the rear of the ute to look at the cows. He kicked the last bit of hay off the tray, in among the herd.
‘I think they’re distracted. Should we make a break for it?’
‘Go!’
They both jumped down and scrambled into the cab of the ute.
‘Phew,’ said Free. ‘Gotta say, cows scare the hell out of me.’
‘I think they scare me now too.’
‘Next time, stay on the ute.’
‘Oh, I will.’
Free got the ute moving again, bumping along the track back home.
‘If you head west along here, you get to the Herne River. That’s the boundary of our property. I’d take you out there, but it’s getting a bit dark. Maybe tomorrow?’
‘Sounds good,’ he said. ‘How far is it?’
‘Only about forty-five minutes from the homestead.’
He laughed. ‘I love it. “Only” forty-five minutes, she says. Most people can walk from one end of their property to the other in forty-five seconds.’
Pride brought a smile to Free’s face. ‘Not up here. To get to the southernmost point of Patersons, you’d have to drive for a couple of days.’
He shook his head. ‘Incredible. I wonder how you’d cope in the city.’
‘I lived in a tiny apartment in Stockholm once. I mean tiny. It was okay, but it never really felt like a home – like someplace I could stay. I think I feel like that about all cities. It was pretty cool being able to go downstairs to the cake shop right underneath us, though.’
‘Us? You lived with someone?’
Loaded question? ‘Majken, yeah.’ Finn was watching her, she could feel it. ‘She was a student,’ Free added casually, just so he’d know.
‘Ah, right.’ Was that relief in his voice?
‘You hungry?’ she asked.
‘Starving.’
‘Awesome. It’s almost dinnertime.’
The station dining hall wasn’t at full capacity but it was still buzzing with a Friday night atmosphere. Since it was Free’s birthday, Devi had got involved in cooking the meal. She knew how much Free loved authentic Malaysian food, and had made mee goreng and nasi dagang. Free was in ecstasy.
‘I need to do an apprenticeship with you,’ she told Devi. ‘You’re the dagang master.’
Finn devoured his own meal, Free was delighted to see, and was listening to the small crew of stockmen who loved telling tales of their daring and mastery to any newcomer. She was glad Finn had left the sadness of his family’s news behind for the night. He caught her eye and shot her a smile, but one of the stockmen asked him a question about his work so he focused on the conversation again. He was a special guy, she thought. The men liked him, but he didn’t get caught up in the alpha-male contests she was used to from blokes who worked in high-risk jobs like droving. His job was high-risk too – and yet Finn didn’t carry that around like a trophy. He wasn’t in police work to fight criminals. He was simply into helping people, and he expected goodness from them in return. She sighed. What a beautiful inner spirit Finn had.
And his exterior was pretty darn fine as well.
After dinner, her father ordered the lights turned low, and Devi brought a cake out from the kitchen, burning with twenty-seven candles.
‘Here’s my Freya, twenty-seven years of age,’ Barry announced when the cake was sitting before her, candles melting all over the chocolate. ‘Still our little fairy, flying across the world and making bloody beautiful creations. I don’t pretend to understand you, sweetheart, but I love the hell outta you and couldn’t be a prouder dad.’
His speech made her cry so hard she could barely blow out the candles. The cake – a croquembouche-style wonder Jean and Devi had concocted – was a hit. The social chatter continued into the evening but farm hours were rarely late hours, so the staff began to wander off to the dormitories by nine. Free and Finn returned to the house and Barry presented Free with a voucher to spend at Bostons online.
‘How did you know?’ she gasped.
‘A little birdie told me,’ her father said.
‘You’re the best, Dad.’
They worked with Barry on his jigsaw puzzle for a while, but soon enough, her father wished them goodnight and went off to bed.
‘Do you want one last cup of tea?’ Free asked Finn when it was just the two of them.
‘That’d be good.’
‘Listen,’ she said, pausing as she went for the kettle. ‘It’s raining. Hear that, the rain on the patio roof? That’s my favourite sound in the whole world.’
‘Let’s go and sit out on the patio with our tea, then,’ said Finn.
He went outside to sort out somewhere to sit, loading up the double wicker couch with cushions and arranging the ancient bamboo coffee table so they could rest their feet on it. He’d pushed it right up to the edge of the patio so they could hear the rain and watch the lightning flicker on the horizon. Free placed their teacups on the table and settled down beside him.
‘My dad’ll be flying out in a few hours,’ he said. ‘It feels bloody weird knowing I’ll be the only one of the Kelly clan left in the country. Permanently, too.’
‘Are you totally sure you don’t want to go with them?’ she asked, although she didn’t like the thought of him leaving one bit.
To her relief, he nodded. ‘I’m sure. I remember Ireland well, especially how cold, grey and wet it was. I love Australia. There’s no way I could go back. It’s happened, it’s all decided. I just need to deal with it.’
Free glanced his way. ‘Doesn’t mean you can’t feel sad about it, at least for a while.’
‘No point wallowing in misery.’
Free was a little puzzled by this. If it were her, she’d be in floods of tears. ‘I guess not.’
He paused. ‘You lost your mum when you were young, didn’t you?’
She nodded. ‘How did you know that?’
‘Briggsy mentioned it. I was bloody sorry to hear about it.’
‘Thanks. She died of breast cancer. I was eleven – not exactly a little kid, but it feels like a lifetime ago that Mum was around.’
‘So around the same time I was moving to Australia, you lost your mother. Big life changes for both of us. Not that mine compares to what you went through, even remotely, but . . .’
‘No, I know what you’re saying,’ she said. ‘Formative moments.’
‘It must have been so hard for you to understand at just eleven.’
‘Yes.’ Free reflected. ‘Sometimes I wonder if I’ve blocked out bits of that time from my memory. It all feels vague and surreal. I hardly remember any details, especially about how I felt. I remember everyone being really sad and quiet for a long time, but that’s about all. I don’t even remember much of what it was like having Mum around. I struggle even to remember what her eyes looked like.’
‘Maybe it’s a coping mechanism?’ he ventured. ‘I mean, you may have shut down a little when she passed away. Perhaps that’s why you can’t remember much about it.’
‘Yeah, it’s possible.’ Free watched the lightning for a few moments. ‘I saw Dad cry, and that scared me. I thought he never cried. Willow was barely holding it together, and Beth totally changed. She turned into Bossy Beth overnight, always telling me what to do and forcing me to go to bed on time, stuff like that. Trying to parent me, I suppose. But she vanished halfway through Year Twelve and went to stay at a boarding house in town. And then she went off to uni for years and years.’
‘I can’t even imagine what it was like.’ His voice was full of sympathy. ‘I suppose it must have brought you closer with your sisters, in a way.’
She dropped her eyes to her teacup and bit her thumbnail. ‘Sort of,’ she blurted, almost involuntarily. ‘Just, I can’t help but feel like they were luckier than me. They got more time with Mum.’ Oh dear Lord, had she said that out loud? She’d never told anyone that – and she wasn’t even drunk. How immature and selfish —
‘Yeah, I’d feel the
same way.’ Finn sighed. ‘With my parents leaving, I’m trying to rise above being petty, but I can’t help resenting Aislinn for settling over there. This wouldn’t even be an issue if she still lived in Perth.’
Free exhaled, overjoyed that he hadn’t judged her admission. ‘I know Beth has a letter from Mum, and Willow has her pendant. I have nothing. I try not to be jealous, but . . .’ Free trailed off and looked at Finn. ‘But it’s probably not useful to dwell on it – for you, either.’ He made a noise of agreement. ‘What was it like, where you lived in Ireland?’ she asked.
Finn took a sip of tea. ‘We had an old terrace house on a busy road, so there was a lot of traffic flying past. Mum never let us go out the front because she was terrified we’d get hit by a car. We had a lane behind the row of houses that led to a sports field, though, so we would run down there to hang out with our friends. I played a lot of soccer.’
‘What about school?’
‘School was walking distance from home, so we walked every day, rain, hail, shine or snow.’ Finn laughed suddenly. ‘I remember, just before we emigrated, my teacher called me up the front and announced that Finn Kelly was moving to Australia. She assumed I knew all about the country we were moving to, and told the other kids they could ask me questions. She didn’t know I was as ignorant as any of them. They were all asking questions like, did I need to get immunised against snake bites before I left; what language did they speak in Australia; would I be getting a pet kangaroo – that sort of thing.’
Free grinned. ‘What did you say?’
‘I did my best.’ He slapped a mosquito. ‘No, I hadn’t been immunised against snake bites but I would probably take a course of antivenom. They speak Aussie in Australia, which is like a dialect of English. And, yes – hell yes, I’d be getting a pet kangaroo and a pet koala.’
She giggled. ‘Awesome. Your family, what are they like?’ she asked. ‘Tell me more about them.’
‘Dad’s tall, like me, although I ended up taller. He’s car-mad. He was a mechanic when he was younger, but these days he works in the workshop at a service centre, doing parts-ordering and stuff. I’m sure he thinks I’m subnormal, not owning a car. He used to spend hours looking for good deals on a motor for me but I never quite got around to buying anything. It drove him nuts. He’s got an eye for a bargain, you see, and had no comprehension of me not caring about cars. When I was . . .’ Finn broke off and half glanced at Free in the darkness, but continued awkwardly. ‘When I was with Elyse, we shared her car. Then I found out I was coming up to Mount Clair, so I figured I’d buy something locally. But I haven’t urgently needed a car, not so far. I can walk to work or get a lift, and Briggsy lets me use his vehicle if I ever need it. And the rest of the time we use the troopies.’
