Poppa won’t see the new batch of kittens, and that pisses me off. Nothing can ever be right in the world any more.
Toby and I both stop on the intersection of the pathways. Dug into the fork, on a lean, is a signpost with hand-painted wooden flags on it. Most of the paint is either chipped off or worn away. A wonky red arrow points the way to the barn. Underneath the arrow in childish writing I’ve written ‘Charlotte’s web.’ The flag that says ‘Wild things’ has an arrow pointing to the path through the trees and down to the river. ‘Narnia’ points towards the house. Both of us look towards it.
I feel Toby staring at me. I shuffle my feet around in the dirt like I’m trying to unearth some treasure.
‘Libby, I know there is nothing I can say that will take away any of your pain, but I do share a little bit of it with you.’
I kick my toe into the dirt harder.
‘Most people pass through your life, but the special ones, like your Poppa, leave a fingerprint on your heart forever. I miss him too and it hurts, but I wouldn’t have missed meeting him for anything.’
I want to break down, here and now, and tell Toby everything. I can almost feel his strong arms wrap around me. My tears soaking into the front of his shirt.
As much as I want to share my grief and unload myself of my crazy compulsion, I’m too ashamed. I bite down hard on the insides of my cheeks, and taste blood. Someone has to hold on to the image of what I used to be like. I want it to be Toby.
From where we stand, I can see Mum on the porch. Her hands shade her eyes as she looks into the low morning sun. For once I’m grateful to see her.
‘I’ve got to go Toby, Mum’s looking for me.’
‘OK, you’d better not keep her waiting. You know where to find me if you need me.’
I march off in the direction of the house but stop after a few metres. I turn and watch the back of him as he walks towards the barn. His broad shoulders look like they could carry my burden for me. Part of me wants to run after him and blurt out all my secrets. But the closer he gets to the barn, the more ridiculous the idea of telling him seems. I turn and take my loser self back to the house.
Mum stands with her hands on her hips, and I see her lips moving before I even get within earshot. I gather I’m late for breakfast, and mumble an apology. I’m smart enough to have learnt that it’s easier to let Mum have her rave than to try and defend myself. I duck past her and wash my hands in the sink. Dad is sitting at the table with the newspaper shielding his face.
‘Hi Dad.’
‘Morning Libby.’ He lifts his head up for a moment, but something in the business section pulls it straight back down.
I take a meal tray from beside the oven. They have little legs that pop out the bottom so you can rest them on something. They were meant to be used only on special occasions, but now I arrange a tray for Nan every morning.
I find Nan’s teapot with the multi-coloured pansies on it. I put in some tea leaves, pour boiling water on it and leave it to draw while I hunt through the drawer that has our place mats and linen. I take a creamy coloured piece of linen with crocheted edges.
‘Why can’t you use one of the place mats that we can just wipe afterwards?’
‘Because she likes the cloth ones.’
‘Rubbish, she wouldn’t have a clue.’
I ignore her bitchy comment. I know it drives Mum nuts that I choose the best linen to line the tray. It always needs hand-washing after Nan has spilt her food all over it.
Today’s linen choice has a Victorian lady embroidered on each of the four corners. Each one has a bonnet on her head and a basket of flowers looped over one arm. Different coloured cotton has been used for every hooped skirt and bodice. Royal blues, luscious reds and vivid greens spill from their baskets. Nan embroidered this when she was a girl of sixteen and still dreaming about the man she would fall in love with. She tried several times to teach me this delicate craft, but after a while we both gave up.
I spoon a bowl full of porridge and place a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice on the tray. I ignore Mum’s look as I race outside to pick a flower. One night I stayed up late making a family of origami swans to place on her tray. Yesterday I gave her a few of my love-heart rocks. I put anything on that I think might jog her memory and make her remember us. I come back in clutching a small bunch of violets. I put them in a crystal bud vase.
‘That porridge will go cold if you don’t stop fussing, Elizabeth. You’d better be quick or yours will as well.’ Mum takes a pot from the stove and ladles spoonfuls of porridge into three bowls lined up on the breakfast bar.
I pick up Nan’s tray and carry it along the passage to her bedroom. Our house was built in 1875, and Nan and Poppa’s room was once the servants’ quarters. Close to the kitchen and away from the front of the house. At that time the room had no windows, but Poppa paid a builder to take out some of the old bricks and replace them with two large windows to let more light in. He got the glazier to make sash windows to match the others in the house, even though the old ones rattle around in the wind.
The room is in darkness. I place the tray on the bedside table and open the curtains. The coral tree is in full bloom. Nan and Poppa chose this room because of the access to the back garden. Some of the trees, like the eucalyptus, must have been planted about the same time the house was built. The coral tree is a South American tree. Ours reaches nine metres up in the air and has a canopy of bright red flowers.
‘Look Nan, the tūī are out eating the nectar already.’
I don’t expect her to answer me, but I talk to her like she might. There’s a part of me that still clings to hope; that ignores the facts. Like the fact that she hasn’t recognised or spoken to me or anyone else for three weeks. I tell myself that miracles do happen. I know that if I don’t believe in miracles, then no one will send me one.
‘How’re you feeling today, Nan?’ Silence. Her pale grey eyes stare blankly at me. I have to turn away so she doesn’t see the tears in my eyes. I concentrate instead on propping pillows up behind her back. I’m careful of her thin skin, not wanting to bruise her as I rearrange her body to accommodate the breakfast tray. I brush a strand of her hair back from her face.
‘Eat up, Nan, and I’ll come back after my breakfast. OK?’ Again, nothing, but I’m happy when she starts spooning her porridge into her mouth.
I’m not hungry, but I know that I won’t get away with skipping breakfast. I walk as slowly as I can back to the kitchen, slide into my seat at the table and pick up my spoon. I stir the porridge around and around in my plate and glance up and see Mum watching me. I put a spoonful in my mouth.
Dad has his newspaper folded into four beside his elbow.
‘It’s nice to see you out in the orchard again, Libby.’
I nod my head at him, but carry on spooning more of the cold porridge into my mouth.
He stands up and tucks the newspaper under his arm.
I quickly swallow my mouthful.
‘I was thinking, maybe I could give you a hand in your office today. Help you catch up with some filing or something?’
Dad glances at Mum, but I’m too slow to catch her look.
‘Thanks, Libby, but I’ve got heaps of phone calls to make and some paperwork I need to concentrate on. You could give Toby a hand in the barn. I know he’s feeling the pressure since …’ he stops himself from finishing his sentence.
‘You can say it, Dad. It’s not like I haven’t noticed.’ I take my plate to the sink without asking to leave the table. I don’t want them to see the tears that spring into my eyes. ‘Actually, I’ve got some things I need to catch up on too.’ I don’t look at either of them as I escape to my room.
The whole day stretches before me. I spend it working out a plan. When it’s dark outside and I’m sure everyone is asleep, I slide a shoebox from under my bed. It contains things that I’ve collected throughout the day. Rubber gloves, masking tape and rubber bands.
I sit on the edge of m
y bed and pull the gloves onto my hands. I slip two of the rubber bands over the fingers of the gloves and down to my wrists. They are too loose, so I double them over. I wind the masking tape over the rubber bands and halfway up my elbows before I run out of tape.
I climb into bed and clench my bound prisoners between my thighs. I squeeze my eyes shut as tight as I can. The tears manage to escape though, and soak my pillow. I wonder if there is any other person in the world that has to tie their hands up so they won’t pull their hair out. I doubt it.
When I wake in the morning, I feel throbbing in my hands. It takes my brain a few seconds to remember why. I flick on the lamp beside me and try to rip off the tape. I have to bite the tape so I can get a piece to unravel. I pull at the rubber bands until they break and free my hands from the gloves. My hands are a bluey colour, and I rub them hard for several minutes before I feel any sensation in them. I have an indent like a bracelet running around both my wrists where the band has cut in. I massage the groove, but the red marks remain.
Great, Libby, you didn’t pull out your hair but you nearly lost your hands.
I sneak past my parents’ bedroom door. I’ve fallen into a morning ritual as well as a night-time one. I tie a scarf over my head in the bathroom. Instead of going back to my room, I slip quietly down the stairs. I take my coat off a rack by the front door and throw it on over my pyjamas before stepping outside.
There’s a slight chill in the air and it makes me pull my coat tighter around me. Last night’s rain is still caught up in some of the leaves on the trees. Droplets fall down on me as I walk beneath them. I close my eyes and wait for the orchard to weave its soothing powers around me. But this morning the magic must be somewhere else.
One of our early fruiting trees has some bright red apples on it. Usually at this time of the year I’d be out helping to thin out the fruit, plucking off some of the smaller apples that are just beginning to grow so the fruit that’s left grows larger.
I pick an apple and look at the unblemished skin. A perfect specimen. On impulse I hurl it at the trunk. It splatters, spraying bits of apple everywhere. It feels good. I have a strong urge to pick all the fruit in the orchard and smash them up.
I march towards the implement shed to get a picking ladder. When the building comes into view, Toby is standing in front of it. He waves out to me, but I pretend I don’t see him. I quickly turn my head and walk back towards the house.
On the back porch, I sit on the wooden steps. I’m surprised to hear my parents moving around in the kitchen.
‘We need to tell her that this is a unanimous decision,’ I hear my mum say.
‘She’s not going to like it.’
I shuffle to my feet and practically fall in through the kitchen door.
‘Who’s not going to like what?’ I ask.
They are sitting at the dining table, and both turn their heads towards me. Colour rises to Dad’s cheek. Red must be the colour of guilt. Mum is not so easy to catch off-guard.
‘What on earth are you doing out in the orchard at this time of morning? Look at you, you’re all wet and you’ve still got your pyjamas on.’
I carry inside some of the anger I felt in the orchard. It makes me feel brave.
‘I went for a walk. Who is not going to like what?’
‘Sit down, Libby.’ Dad says, with a tone in his voice that scares me.
‘I’m fine standing.’
‘Well …’ Mum says, ‘We both think that it will be in the best interest of everyone, especially your nana’s, if we move her to that nice nursing home down by the river in town.’
I look at Dad. He looks straight down at the table top, but nods his head in agreement.
‘They can take good care of her,’ Mum says.
A chill creeps up my spine like a centipede. Claws containing poison wrap around my chest. Squeezing and making it hard for me to breathe.
‘But we can take good care of her!’ I plead. ‘Or I can. She won’t know where she is if you put her in a home!’
‘That’s the point, Elizabeth.’ Mum stands and moves into the kitchen. She takes some coffee beans from a canister, throws them into the grinding machine and yells at me over the noise. ‘She doesn’t know where she is now.’ Mum puts the ground beans and water into the percolator. With a bang, she puts it on the element to boil.
‘Elizabeth, it’s time for us to all move on. You look shocking. You’ve got black bags under your eyes and your skin looks dreadful. I’m worried that caring for her has already taken too much from you.’
‘I just haven’t been sleeping. I’ll get better.’
‘The nursing home will have trained professionals who are much better equipped to look after her.’ Dad sounds apologetic.
The steely look on Mum’s face tells me the decision is already made. I run from the kitchen, slamming the door as hard as I can. The sound of glass breaking doesn’t make me feel any better.
*
For a week, none of us mention Nan leaving. I’ve almost convinced myself that they’ve forgotten their stupid plan. Until I see Dad carrying two suitcases. They’re still dusty from the attic. I recognise the British Airways tags from when Nan and Poppa last went back to England.
I run down the hallway and into Nan’s room. I climb up on her bed and snuggle into her. I ignore her confused look and kiss her face. ‘I’ll come and get you out, Nan,’ I sob.
Mum comes in carrying a box of toiletries and a new toilet bag, like Nan’s off on an overseas trip. For once, I’m grateful that the wiring in Nan’s brain has gone funny. Dad comes in with the suitcases. I can’t stand to be in the same room with either of them. I kiss Nan, and leave.
Up in my room, I wonder if I’ve done the right thing. Maybe I should have helped pack some of her precious things. Maybe I should have explained what was happening. But I just couldn’t be part of it.
I hear voices in the foyer and then footsteps coming towards my room. A tapping on my door and Dad’s voice.
‘We have to go now, Libby. Do you want to come … or at least say goodbye?’
I ignore him. I won’t ever say goodbye.
After a while I hear his footsteps going back down the stairs.
The crunch of the gravel makes me peek through the curtains, just in time to see the car driving away.
Toby stands beside the driveway with his hat held in front of him, like I’d seen his grandfather do. We both watch the tail-lights on the car disappear. When he looks up at my window, I quickly step back.
Chapter Five
As far back as I can remember, Nan was my official story-teller. When she told me stories, real or made up, her hands would fly around, and I learnt to duck and weave like a professional boxer. She would hold onto the end of words for so long I wanted to shake her to get the next one out.
She must have read Alice in Wonderland to me about forty times. When they drove off with Nan, just like Alice, I jumped down a rabbit hole and spiralled through a tunnel. There was no one to call me back.
I lie on my bed and pull at my hair. I am Alice: I take myself to a world separate from anyone else.
I am so absorbed with my hair-pulling that I don’t notice my bedroom door open. Mum’s voice right beside my bed hits me like a thunderbolt. For a moment I straddle both worlds. Mum’s mouth is moving up and down rapidly, but I can’t make sense of the words.
I sit up so fast that it makes my head spin, and raise my hands to hide my head. The look on Mum’s face tells me that it’s too late.
‘What on earth is going on here? What’s happened to your hair?’ she screams at me. She whips back my duvet cover like I might be hiding something under there too.
I want to curl into a ball but I can’t move. Shame freezes my limbs.
Mum’s fingers are on top of my head, pulling and pushing hair aside to inspect my scalp.
‘For God’s sake, Elizabeth! What’s wrong with you?’ I can hear the hysteria rising in her voice.
I shake my
head from side to side.
‘You must have something to say! People don’t just decide to pull their hair out. How long have you been doing this?’
I don’t answer.
‘Does anyone else know about this?’
I say nothing.
She looks down at me.
‘Right. You stay in your room until I can work out what to do with you. Do you understand?’
I nod.
She turns from me and I hear footsteps move away and a door slam.
*
Dad is on his way to Auckland, where he’ll be for the week. I know Mum won’t phone him until she has a plan. She’ll be hoping to have me all sorted out by the time he gets back.
I read somewhere that seventy percent of the human body is made up of water. In this moment the only thing that I’m made of is shame.
A tiny bit of me feels relief at being caught. I’ve been treading water while cradling a heavy anchor. At some point I would either have to let go or be taken under.
I don’t know how much later it is when Mum bursts back into my room. The door bangs against the wall with the force of her hand.
‘I’ve been trying to work out why you would do such a thing. It just doesn’t make sense.’ She shakes her head. ‘It doesn’t matter why. We need to get you some help with your mental problems.’
I feel my jaw drop. Even though I’ve questioned my own sanity, I’m shocked by Mum’s words.
‘I’ve made an appointment with a doctor in Auckland. We’ll drive up in the morning and be back before nightfall.’
She stops and looks at me. For a moment I think she’s going to say something comforting.
‘What you’ve done to yourself makes me feel sick.’ She blows air out of her nose like a dragon.
I shuffle backwards on my bed and press my back into the wall, hoping to put some distance between her words and me. I thought that there was nothing she could say that would make me feel worse than I already did. I was wrong.
The Scent of Apples Page 6
