The Atlas of Us

by Tracy Buchanan

  ‘But life isn’t a farm,’ Claire said, unable to help herself, the patronising tone Holly was using making her angry, upset. ‘It’s no excuse to be trigger-happy.’

  Milo looked down at his clenched fist.

  ‘Trigger-happy?’ Holly said, her voice heavy with hurt. ‘Is that what you think happened with my dad?’

  ‘Jesus, no.’ Claire put her face in her hands and moaned. This was all going so badly. ‘I completely understand what happened with your father, Holly.’

  ‘But not Luna?’ Milo said. ‘I thought you said you understood about that?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Claire said, not quite believing the conversation they’d all just had. ‘I think we’ve all had too much to drink, me especially.’ She stood up, unsteady on her feet. ‘I’m going to lie down.’

  She stumbled inside. How could Holly discuss her dad’s death so nonchalantly? And how could Milo get upset when she brought up what happened with Luna? He’d been the one in the wrong, after all.

  When she got to her room, she lay back on her bed and turned to look out of the window. Milo was examining a tree as Holly read a book of poetry. It was like the conversation had never happened. What was wrong with them both?

  Henry’s words echoed in her ears then. I told you that family is nuts, something runs through those veins of theirs, a connection gone wrong in their set up.

  She sighed and fell into a confused, wine-drenched sleep where she dreamt of the rainbow serpent slinking across the desert towards her, its head huge, its forked tongue flickering out at her. She woke muffling a scream, her heartbeat pounding so hard she thought she might have a heart attack.

  She turned on the light then noticed Milo sitting in the chair in the corner of the room.

  ‘How long have you been there?’ she asked, clutching her head as she sat up.

  ‘Just a few minutes. I was waiting for you to wake so we could talk. You shouldn’t have said all that in front of Holly.’

  She felt a tremor of anger. ‘But doesn’t it concern you how nonchalantly she talked about Dale’s death?’

  ‘She deals with it in her own way.’

  ‘By keeping it all buried deep inside?’

  ‘If she wants.’

  ‘Is that healthy?’

  ‘Is it healthy you thinking I shouldn’t have shot my brother?’

  ‘I’ve never thought that. You probably saved my life, for Christ’s sake!’

  He sighed, turning to look out of the window. Claire examined his profile, his tanned skin, his full lips, the way his fringe fell into his brown eyes. She thought of what he’d done for her that morning, all that effort to celebrate her dad’s birthday. Then she thought about what he and Holly had been through, witnessing Dale try to do what he did, then seeing him dead.

  ‘I just worry for Holly, that’s all,’ she said softly.

  ‘So do I, Claire,’ he said, his voice low. ‘It’s all I think about sometimes.’

  ‘Oh darling.’ She shuffled over the bed and wrapped her arms around him. At first, he didn’t move, just stayed stiff in her arms. But eventually, he turned and wrapped his arms around her too. They stayed like that for a while, just holding each other and looking into each other’s eyes. But soon, his hand started travelling down the back of Claire’s shorts, his breath quickening.

  Later, they held each other, Milo tracing the shape of the Milky Way in the sky outside with his fingertips. Then he peered over at Claire’s dad’s postcards that she’d stuck to the wall above her desk.

  ‘Happy birthday, Bo,’ he whispered.

  Claire closed her eyes, seeing her dad as he’d looked those last few moments she’d spent with him. ‘Happy birthday, Dad.’

  In the night, Claire woke to the sound of sobbing. She peered out of the window to see Holly sitting in the dark, staring out at Uluru as she rocked back and forth, tears streaming down her face. Claire ran outside, bare feet sinking into the dust, and wrapped her arms around Holly, feeling like her heart was breaking into a million pieces seeing her like that.

  ‘What’s wrong, Holly?’

  Holly didn’t say anything, just stared into the distance. Claire followed her gaze, thought for a moment she could see the rainbow serpent from her dream slithering towards them. But when she blinked, it was gone.

  Eventually, she managed to get Holly up and inside, brushing the dust off her feet as she sat on her bed with that same expressionless stare.

  ‘You know you can talk to me,’ Claire said.

  Still nothing. So Claire got up and gave Holly a kiss on the forehead then went to walk out but Holly grabbed her hand. ‘Stay,’ she whispered, staring up at Claire through her tear-drenched eyelashes.

  So Claire did, curling up next to her and watching as she fell asleep. When she woke in the morning, she found Milo standing in the doorway, a confused look on his face. So she gently disentangled herself from Holly and led Milo to the kitchen where she explained what had happened.

  ‘I’m worried about her,’ Claire said. ‘I think she holds everything in too much and when it comes out …’ She sighed, letting her voice trail off. ‘Will you talk to her?’

  Milo nodded, brow creased.

  Ten minutes later, Holly strolled in, spreading her new university books over the table and smiling at Claire as though the night before hadn’t even happened.

  Milo watched her for a while, brow puckered. Then he strolled over, picking up one of her books and casually reading the back. ‘I was thinking we could go into town to get some supplies for the farm, Holly,’ he said without looking up. ‘Just the two of us?’

  ‘Why not Claire too?’ Holly asked.

  ‘I need to start work on an article,’ Claire said. ‘You two go, it’ll be fun.’

  She shrugged. ‘Okay.’

  During the day, Claire tried to focus on her article about Finland’s land ownership battle then wrote a letter to Jay. He wrote the most wonderful letters, pages and pages long, regaling Claire with stories about all the wonderful parties and beautiful women he’d met since starting his new PR contract in Paris. Even though the job was still in the financial area, at least it hadn’t been his dad who’d got it for him. In his spare time, he was running an art and fashion e-zine too. He seemed happier in his letters, more comfortable in his own skin, and she’d often get an email or phone call from an editor friend of his, asking her to write an article, something she relished not just because of the money it brought in but also the opportunity it gave her to escape the mango trees and write.

  But she couldn’t concentrate this time, her mind returning to how Holly had looked the night before. She sighed, reaching for her mobile phone to find Jodie’s number. Maybe she’d give her a call, they hadn’t spoken for a few weeks. Then she paused: there was a text message from Ben. The reception was rubbish out here but the occasional message slipped through. She quickly opened it: what if Archie was ill?

  Hi Claire. I just wanted to tell you before you heard it from anyone else that Belle is pregnant. Archie’s doing well, he loves our garden. He can stay as long as he wants, even when our daughter’s born in February. He’s always been good with kids. I hope you’re enjoying it out there. Ben.

  Claire was surprised to feel tears flood to her eyes. She felt like she’d been hit with a sledgehammer. She’d known this might happen: Ben had bought a house with Belle very quickly and a proposal of marriage followed soon after. She’d been happy for him when she’d heard. She sunk into her chair and stared at the message. So why was she feeling like this now? She thought she’d come to terms with her inability to have children.

  She heard the door open and quickly closed her phone, forcing a smile onto her face as Milo and Holly walked in. They both seemed relaxed.

  ‘Did you talk to her?’ Claire asked in a low voice as Holly changed clothes in her room a few minutes later.

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And she said she’s just feeling tired and emotional from
the jetlag.’

  Claire shook her head. ‘It was more than that.’

  Milo stroked her cheek, his face softening. ‘I love it that you worry so much but she’s fine, really.’ He held up one of the shopping bags. ‘We got some pork so I thought I could do pulled pork?’

  Claire hesitated a moment. When it came to Holly, it felt like she was walking a tightrope between helping out and poking her nose in where it wasn’t wanted. She scrutinised Milo’s face for a few moments then sighed. ‘Sure.’

  The next day, the three of them woke at the crack of dawn to watch the sun rise over Uluru. Claire had done the same with her dad when she was a kid, leaving her mum and sister in bed and going out, just the two of them. He’d told some tourists off for climbing the rock and she remembered thinking he was the most special person on the earth, to be sticking up so passionately for such sacred beliefs. When she’d found him in that flat a few years later, she recalled that moment and wondered if society had climbed all over him, ruining him as a result.

  Claire squeezed the memory away, turned her attention back to the red rock, watching how the sun crept up from its hiding place and changed its colour, just as it had the time she’d watched it with her dad. It seemed as though it changed shape too, a living thing that stretched and yawned right before them. Around it, green shrubs sat like solemn parishioners in the red sand, paying homage to Uluru. Groups of tourists took photos, others gathered around an Aboriginal man playing a didgeridoo decorated with bright blue eyes, white dots and rainbow serpents, always rainbow serpents. Its hypnotic thrumming sound filled Claire’s ears, taking her back to her visits here as a child.

  There was a couple sitting next to her. They looked young, happy – honeymooners maybe. The man peered at the painting Holly had brought of the rainbow serpent coiled around itself, bright red like fire.

  ‘Symbolises fertility apparently,’ he whispered to his wife.

  Claire thought of Ben’s text message and felt that sting again. Milo squeezed her hand and she looked up into his brown eyes. Maybe she needed to accept the pain would never go away. But she had Milo and he loved her, dodgy eggs and all.

  But later, as they drove back, she found her eyes seeking out the painting again.

  The fertile rainbow serpent.

  She peered at Holly who was staring gloomily out of the window. She remembered reading once about snakes who ate their own eggs, just as Luna had eaten her own puppies. Is that what Erin was doing to Holly, slowly eating away at her with her abandonment and the dark memories she’d left behind?

  But over the next couple of weeks, as the mangoes began to mature into fat, green plumps of fruit, Holly seemed to return to her normal self.

  Then an editor who’d commissioned Claire’s Finland article got in touch requesting an up-to-date photo, so she asked Holly to give her a haircut. Holly sat her on a stool in the kitchen and carefully cut her hair.

  ‘Will you cut my hair too?’ Holly asked Claire after she’d finished.

  ‘God, are you kidding? I’m terrible at stuff like that.’

  ‘Please! It’s too long, it’s annoying me. All you need to do is chop a few inches off then I can tidy it up if you hold the mirror up for me.’

  ‘Fine. But don’t have a go at me if you end up looking like Worzel Gummidge.’ She sat Holly down and placed a tea towel around her shoulders. ‘You seem happier,’ she said as she began snipping at Holly’s hair, trying to keep her voice casual.

  ‘Yeah, I finally finished that book on post-modern poetry.’ She sighed. ‘I really hate all that stuff, I much prefer old school poets like Edmund Spenser. Have you read The Faerie Queene, the iambic pentameter in it is—’

  ‘I meant happier after that night I found you outside,’ Claire said softly.

  Holly flicked some hair off her hands. ‘I’m fine. I just get stroppy in this heat, that’s all.’

  ‘Are you sure? After what happened—’

  ‘Really! I’m still officially a teenager. I wouldn’t be normal if I didn’t get a strop on every now and again.’

  ‘But you’ve been through a lot more than most teenagers.’

  ‘And so did you with your dad leaving. Didn’t you have a few tantrums as a result?’

  Claire thought of the hell she’d given her mum the weeks after her dad had left. ‘Yeah, I did. That’s why I know how important it is to talk about it.’

  ‘Fine. So we’ve talked about it now and it’s cool.’ Holly held the mirror up and tilted her head as she examined her reflection. ‘I think shoulder-length would be best. What do you think?’

  Claire paused a few moments, considering whether to push the subject further. She wanted to bring up what had happened in Finland but she couldn’t force Holly to confide in her, just as she couldn’t force Milo to.

  So instead she focused on cutting Holly’s hair. When it reached her collarbone, Holly asked for more to be cut, then more, then more until eventually, it fell to her jaw, so much shorter than Claire had intended.

  Claire held the mirror up so Holly could see it from all angles.

  ‘Can I have the scissors?’ Holly asked as she stared at herself, tilting her head.

  Claire handed them to her and watched as she started snipping at her fringe until it framed her pretty face. When Claire stepped back to look at her, her blood turned to ice.

  She looked just like her mum.

  ‘What do you think?’ Holly asked.

  ‘It’s just like …’ Claire paused. Maybe she had no idea? ‘It’s lovely,’ she said instead. ‘Very different.’

  ‘I’ll go show Milo,’ Holly said.

  Claire frowned. Would Milo notice it too?

  She watched Holly run outside to him. He peered up, half a smile on his face. Then he frowned.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Holly asked, her footsteps slowing. ‘Don’t you like it?’

  ‘Why did you cut it?’ he asked her, his voice tight.

  ‘I fancied a change. Don’t you like it?’

  ‘I preferred it long.’ He turned back to the tree he’d been examining and Holly kicked at the dust then ran inside, shoving past Claire and slamming her bedroom door. But over dinner later, Holly did her usual and pretended like nothing had happened. Milo, however, still seemed tense, his eyes running over Holly’s hair every now and again, his brow creased.

  ‘Must’ve been strange seeing Holly’s hair like that?’ Claire said as they got into bed later. ‘I’ve seen photos of Erin, I know they look very similar now.’

  He pulled his T-shirt off and carefully folded it, placing it in their tiny wardrobe. ‘You’re reading into things. I just don’t think it suits her, that’s all.’

  ‘But Milo, I—’

  ‘—need to get ready for bed.’ He pulled her close to him, pulling up her T-shirt as his brown eyes sparkled with mischief.

  But it felt odd, like Erin was sitting there watching them somehow.

  She pulled away from him. ‘Don’t.’ He scrutinised her face for a few moments then sighed, getting into bed and staring up at the ceiling. She got in next to him and placed her head against his heaving chest. ‘What I mean is, maybe we should just hold each other and talk?’

  His eyes shifted to hers, scarily intense. ‘I love you, Claire, more than you know.’

  ‘I do know.’

  ‘I don’t think you do, not really. I feel like I can never do enough to show you. That’s why when we …’ His eyes slipped down her body, his voice growing husky. ‘When we make love, I feel like that’s the only time I can really show you.’

  She looked at his bare chest, his taut stomach and felt her body start to pulse. Why was she letting a spectre from his past get in the way of things? Wasn’t coming here supposed to be about getting away from all that?

  So she pushed the sheet down, exposing him, running her fingers over him as he moaned. ‘I don’t think I do actually. I think you need to show me.’

  He pulled her towards him and Claire thought she saw fe
ar in his eyes, a desperate, haunting fear.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Red Centre. Australia

  2001

  Over the next week, Holly’s last week in Australia, Milo continued to watch her with his brow furrowed, as if he couldn’t quite figure out if it was Holly or her mum. One afternoon, when Claire was working on her article, she heard shouting in the distance. She looked out to see Holly and Milo arguing. She shoved her hand into his chest and stormed away, her hair wild against the red landscape.

  Claire walked outside. ‘What’s up?’

  Milo raked his fingers through his hair. ‘Nothing, she’s just being a grumpy teenager.’

  ‘It didn’t look like nothing to me.’

  He paused a moment, looking in the direction Holly had run. ‘I’ll go find her.’ He gave Claire a quick peck on the cheek then disappeared after Holly.

  That night, Claire dreamt of the rainbow serpent again. This time its jaws were opening to consume her. When she woke, there was the sound of footsteps outside. She looked out of the window to see Milo pacing around in the darkness. She went outside and slipped her hand into his hot one.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked him.

  He looked up, a fleeting look of misery crossing his face. But then he quickly recomposed his features. ‘Just needed some fresh air. Let’s get you back inside before all those spiders and snakes you’re scared of come and bite your bare feet.’

  He went to take her hand but she stepped back, crossing her arms. ‘You’re lying, I can tell. We promised no more secrets.’

  He sighed. ‘Fine. Come see.’ He led her towards the closest mango tree and pulled down one of the branches. Then he reached into his pocket for his torch, shining its light onto the mango there. At first, Claire didn’t see anything. But when she peered closer, it jumped out at her: faded blotchy spots near the base of the mango.

  ‘I noticed it last week,’ he said. ‘I think it’s phomopsis mangiferae disease.’

  ‘What on earth does that mean?’