She ordered a lemonade. ‘I don’t drink, it’s bad for me,’ she said, then pulled out a packet of cigarettes and asked the skinny waiter for an ashtray.
I said, ‘Mineral water, please.’ And noticed how my voice shook slightly with each word.
Everything about this seemed strange, eerie almost. I suppose she felt it too, because it took her ages, fiddling with her lighter, to even spark a flame.
‘Want one?’ she asked.
‘No thanks.’ I patted my bag, ‘I have my own.’
‘What do you smoke?’
I pulled out the pack of Marlboro Menthols.
Her eyes widened. ‘Wow. I used to smoke them too.’
I nodded.
‘Maybe you got that from me,’ she inhaled her cigarette and blew the smoke to the ceiling.
‘My last tour was a doozy,’ she said. ‘I was at the hospital with some of the passengers – gout, bad knees, gastro, the list goes on. They say it’s a 5 am to forever job, this one, and they’re not lying. This one was a much quieter bunch, thank goodness.’
She spoke rapidly using her hands – a trait I recognised until now, as only my own.
My mind went spinning and I forgot to listen as she continued talking. I thought of William Blake’s lines:
I am in you
And you in me.
She called the waiter over.
‘Another round?’ she asked.
I nod.
I hadn’t dared ask at first, but now I felt the urgency lift. It gathered in my throat and when it found more force, the courage lifted it to my mouth.
‘How did it all happen? Me, I mean.’ The words slipped out.
LILLITH HAD moved from New Zealand to Australia in 1978. There were ‘places that needed exploring,’ she said as she waved her hand tracing an imaginary globe.
‘Everyone was doing it, even though our parents felt that they were going to have to look after their farms by themselves. Sydney was magnificent, refreshing, and fast-paced. There was always something to do, rather than count stars and sheep and all that.’
She rented a house with friends, who had also drifted over the Tasman sea from the lower New Zealand coast when their families weren’t looking. It was a sizeable house in the inner west of Sydney with a great garden, and the rooms were filled with anyone who wanted to stay.
‘We had rockers in leather jackets, hippie girls that gave up shoes and bras in return for hair flowers, and people with guitars who would sing as we cooked. Our house had an open door and was always full and lively, with constant chatter.’
She found a job as an administration clerk for a government department.
‘I worked hard, and I was good too. I was promoted several times within a year.’ She stops to re-light the next cigarette.
‘Peter was my new boss. He was a cricket-loving, beer-swilling lad, you know? Typical Aussie bloke. Like Shane Warne.’
She shook her head. ‘Exactly. Exactly like Shane Warne. I’d be surprised if he was still alive, all the damage to that liver.’
A Christmas party come early (September and they were cost cutting), but Lillith didn’t drink. She smoked. Never drank. Peter had told her to lighten up, have a drink. Not one to be challenged, she had one drink. Then she had many.
She woke in Peter’s bed, and crept out in the early dawn, before he was even awake. She claims not to remember anything else. Alcohol and time will do that; smudge the mind of its memories. Shame will cleanse it even more.
‘I hadn’t known. Of course, I can see it all clearly now. The extra weight. The soothing taste of vanilla ice cream. The nausea when the smell of chicken pieces frying in spitting oil lifted up to my window from the Chinese shop below. And I am embarrassed to say, for many weeks – twenty-four weeks and five days to be exact – I did not see the connection.’
Sleepless nights and morning burps took her to the Mornington Medical Centre. The doctor looked up from a green clipboard and said, ‘You’re pregnant.’
‘I took a vow of silence. I told no-one. I wore floaty larger dresses. I complained about winter weight, though I refused to believe it – even as my stomach grew more rotund, and my breasts distended like engorged water balloons. I had stretch marks that appeared like cracks across a barren dry desert.’
She took a sip of lemonade.
‘My legs grew clotted purple veins like old cottage cheese and my feet ballooned until I couldn’t shove their meaty fatness into my heels.
‘Then, when I couldn’t hide my bloated belly as extra weight any longer, I took a leave of absence from work. My flatmates started to guess and question, and despite my silence, my off-balance waddling told them they were right.
‘There were no Lamaze classes, no breathing, no nothing.’
The waiter arrived to clear our glasses. She ordered another lemonade before adding, ‘This is my daughter.’
She said this as proudly as if I were the pope and she was claiming me as her own. I smiled and nodded, and took a large gulp of my drink. I wasn’t sure it was a title I was ready to have.
She lit a Marlboro and blew a long smoke trail.
‘And then you were there,’ she said. ‘Small, and pink, and yelling at the world. And I signed the papers,’ she blew a ring of smoke to the ceiling. ‘And I—’
It took her a few seconds to finish the sentence. After a pause she said, ‘I left.’
A FEW hours before we leave Malawi, I slip out of the campsite and find the makeshift tent. I never tire of watching Raffa whittle. I sit for a while, the scent of grass freshly cut hanging in the air. Sweat. Earth. Fish with salt.
He is carving a hippo standing squat and proudly in black ebony. The front leg slightly bent and lifted, as though it could be about to charge, or perhaps wants to be greeted, extending his leg to politely shake hoof to hand.
I wonder what other jewellery boxes he will create for new campers, and if they too are a locket that will open the past. Perhaps they will just be what they were created for; a place to store jewels and bits and bobs.
When I tell him goodbye, he cheekily grins and extends his hand. ‘Thanks for the sandals.’
Not to be outdone by Raffa, Hunter has been working on his own creation. He’s waiting at the top of the driveway for me as we amble up to say goodbye at the school.
He digs around in his short pockets. I notice he is wearing the same shorts as yesterday, the same stain over the right knee. He pulls out the most perfect ring with a beautiful copper-coiled flower.
‘For you,’ he reaches for my hand and places it in my palm.
I put it on, holding it up like he’s given me a diamond. In the middle somehow is a knot of copper wire, and then the wire is carefully folded on itself to form petals. It’s more precious than any expensive stone.
I had wanted to write him a letter, so I had dug around until I found some clean white paper at the back of an old diary I hadn’t scribbled my way through. At the top of the page I wrote Dear Hunter, but I didn’t know what to say next.
Hope you’re well.
It’s been wonderful meeting you.
Good luck.
Those lines mean nothing at all, less than nothing.
Instead, I reach down into my pockets and pull out a wad of cash. I had known early on this is what I wanted to give him. He can spend it on matches. Or games. Or food. He can spend it on anything he wants. I just want him to have it.
He stares at the money like I’ve just given him a diamond.
We stand there looking at each other. My ring. His money. I don’t know what to say. Sometimes, I’m extremely awkward in these situations. I’m the type to hug and run, so it looks more like a game of chase, or tip, than it does a heartfelt goodbye.
I smile. He smiles. I make the Wait please sign. He laughs. I begin to walk away. He raises his hand in a half wave. I turn around and shout, ‘Tomorrow?’
He cups his hands and yells back, ‘Yes!’
I keep walking. I’m laughing, and I c
an hear him laughing too.
Don’t look back, I think. Because if I do, I’ll want to stay. I know me. I’ll see Hunter standing there. I’ll think of his Wait please. The ring he made. The walk we had around town. I’ll wonder what life would be like if I stay. If I teach him English. If we live in a basic hut by the water. If we become people of the lake. A family.
And it’s likely I won’t get on the bus. So I don’t look back; sometimes it’s best not to.
THE OKAVANGO is a large inland delta in the middle of Botswana. And we are about to set sail into the very middle of it.
We must make sure everything is watertight and zipped before we leave. The canoes (mokoro), are shallow, dug-out tree trunks, and it’s likely we won’t arrive dry. We have cases of canned food piled in the guide’s canoe – bags of bread, flour and maize, tomatoes already bruised, their skin sagging and wrinkling.
Water, precious water, splashes in large tin cans, the tops tightened until they click and lock, then wrapped in wet shirts to keep them cool under the burning hot sun during our ride. There are no taps, no water vestibules, no springs where we are going. If we run out of water, we’ll go thirsty.
The sun has been up for several hours when we’re finally ready to push off the dank, sandy banks. Black sand. Sticks to our thongs and sandals and muddies the canoes. Dirty water soaks our shorts before we even start.
Ant takes the front seat. I like this because I get to be closest to our rafting guide and the sound of the pole brushing away the weeds, carving our way through water. He pushes off the sandy banks and for a few seconds we jerk. Clumsily. Then the hull is free. We find the depths, the mokoro skims the surface, we are gliding.
The delta is beautiful. Hollow reeds bend at their waist, dipping their heads underwater and taking a sip. Delicate white water lilies push blossomed flower heads along the surface, skimming. Delta frogs use these as launching pads and resting spots while searching for snacks of crickets and flies. Baby reeds, saplings, reach upwards, breaking through the soft brown membranous surface.
Ant and I sit and listen to the splash of water against our canoe, the refreshing dip as the pole emerges, the thunk as it hits underwater sand. The swell as we move silently forward. When we have enough momentum I can no longer feel the jerk and thrust, our pole-man masterfully weaves us in and out of the reeds.
Our canoe surges forward silently, the pole pushing on the bottom of the sandy banks only several feet below. If I fell out, I’d still be able to stand, the water seeping at its highest to my underarms. Instead, I close my eyes, the heat lulling me to sleep. I let my hand fall over the canoe, skimming the top of the water.
We arrive at a bay that doesn’t look like it’s ever been arrived at before. This is real. Jungle camping.
Guides use machetes to make a space big enough for our tents. Vines are strewn in piles by the time they finish. Sap still oozing, brushing past our legs and leaving sticky trails that won’t wash off and need to be rubbed dry.
Once the tents are up we need to talk about the most important communal facility – the toilet. A large hole is dug more than six feet into the ground behind some trees. I notice that the guides put their tents up on the toilet side of the trees. There’s a clear view from their tents right to our bums. This will be no problem at night, but during the day this is perturbing.
It is a balancing act not to fall into the coffin-deep hole of poo, crouching low enough that the guides do not catch a glimpse of my pale nether regions. This is why, after toilet time, I normally need a lie down.
Which is fine, as there’s nothing to do here. Nothing. For most people this becomes the art of relaxing; the sweetness of doing absolutely nothing. For me, I get cabin fever. Or tent fever. We can’t walk more than ten metres outside the radius of our camp without a guide because of animals. And the guides are all in their tents.
There is little food due to our new and wonderfully inept guide called Gift, a local Kenyan who watches himself in the bus reflection window whenever he speaks. To my dismay, this is often.
Gift has taken the art of packing lightly and being minimalist to the extreme. On the first afternoon of three days in the delta, we’ve already eaten half our food. He has also inconveniently forgotten that I am vegetarian.
‘No problem,’ he tells me head-deep in a plastic bag. ‘I’ve found you food,’ and waves a tomato soup packet.
HUMIDITY LAYS thick at night in the jungle. Perspiration bubbles on the inside of our tent like cane toads’ mouth froth. Outside, fireflies light the camping ground. I hear the sounds of Gift’s thickly drunken voice asking Mel back to his tent. She declines.
He asks someone else back to his tent to ‘listen to some music’. That’s a strange description, I think, for taking one’s pants off.
I sigh and stick a jumper across my head to drown out the sounds of Gift opening another can of beer and talking about his morning ritual – selecting which shirt to wear. Thankfully this sends me to sleep.
Ant and I wake feverish and early before dawn. The tent is already a sauna. I am so hot my thighs are sticking together like I’ve made a batch of toffee and poured the boiling sugar between my legs, leaving it to set.
But the miracle of being in Africa: today we’re off on foot to see elephants and lions and cheetah and, most importantly, leopards. Although they’re often the hardest to spot. Loners who prefer the cover of trees. The intrigue makes me want to see the leopard even more.
Our trip to find animals reveals nothing. We trek for a few hours, binoculars in hand, looking for signs of lumbering elephants or the lone whip of a leopard’s tail hanging from a branch.
‘Better luck later,’ the local guide shrugs.
That afternoon we’re back on the hunt. Leopards. Or cheetahs. Or lions. Lost for things to discuss, our guide brings us close to a large sand hill almost six feet high. And for the next forty minutes, proceeds to tell us everything he knows about termites.
That night I cook with the bare ingredients we can find. Onions in oil until translucent. Spinach gently heated, then wilted. Rice stirred in a flat pan. A packet of tomato soup for flavour.
Our bellies are left empty. We take them to bed, gurgling and wanting.
ANOTHER DAY on the hunt. No animals.
All morning people laugh and chat and make cups of tea, but there is something that stops me from joining the group. I sit nearby on a log instead and listen to them without hearing a thing.
For lunch we share bread and an unsatisfying side – half a cup of boiled rice with some pieces of wilted spinach that look as though they’ve been fished from the lake.
After eating I try on normality: talking with everyone, laughing at things I’m not sure I find funny. People are talking about the weather, their last big party, the art of making a good coffee, what to wear – scarves and hats and sunglasses – before we go out walking again.
I see an interconnectedness between them. Their ends circle back to each other until they become a medley of loops and knots and there are no spare ends. They continue chatting, bonding, tightening the knots.
I look down. Each of my arms lies empty. I feel I have two ends flapping against the great skies of Africa and no-one is reaching out to grab them.
A chill sweeps through me. An eastern wind rises from the delta and pounds my lungs. Inside me, a furious wind, flailing against my ribs. The kind of wind that slices you from the inside, silently, without anyone knowing.
In one glance, I see it all – the sourness of holding secrets. Africa, and my entire trip, crashes around me in pieces.
I am still trapped. I have blamed jobs and work, and people who told me life should be this way or that. I blamed winter, and her wild winds, and the bitter cold that seeped in my bones. How easy it is to blame something that roars and seeps and freezes and dampens. Yes, winter.
But I’ve been in Africa for weeks now, and surely I should be warm. I have been under the sun – baked beautifully like the crust of cake; golden bro
wn – so you see, it mustn’t be winter, it mustn’t be him, poor introverted soul of seasons offering forth death and transformation.
No, it mustn’t be him at all.
I’LL TELL you something I wanted to keep secret. I once held Jason’s baby inside me.
I took a test in my bathroom when I was tired and bloated and my breasts were too sore to be bound in a bra. I looked at the white stick and saw two bold pink lines. Jesus, Jesus. I’d been on the pill. Never skipped a day. We’d been so careful.
He said excitedly, ‘We’re going to be a family.’
In his mind, he saw a future. Pushing a stroller coffee in hand, scarf wrapped around my neck, a sunny winter day. Bouncing chubby legs. Baby giggles wrapping us together, tightly.
My future had looked like plane tickets and woods and lakes that needed discovering. I was twenty-one and the idea that I was suddenly going to be responsible for someone’s else’s life – for the rest of mine – made me sweat. I couldn’t breathe.
‘I can’t,’ I told him.
When I made the appointment he couldn’t bear it. He went away with a friend. They had too much rum and slurred to each other about life.
Life.
After that I left Jason and travelled through Europe and tried not to think about what our child would have looked like.
I can’t help thinking that this makes me exactly like Lillith; giving away children; creating things and then leaving.
THE AFTERNOON seems to stretch forever. I walk from my tent to the water, to the edge of the jungle, and back again. I don’t know where I’m going. I feel the urge to leave camp. To just dive into the delta and swim somewhere else. Instead I stand at the edge, barely a toe in the water, looking out.
Ways to Come Home Page 15
