Georgia nodded. ‘That’s true. It’s just so unfair that a girl’s life is completely altered by that one event, usually for the worse, yet very often the man just swings along doing his thing. Moves on to a new girl and doesn’t give a hoot about his children.’
Her words stabbed like a knife to the heart. ‘I’m not like that. I want to make it right. I want to be a proper father, a good father and I want us to be a family.’
‘Marry her, you reckon?’ Rufus cocked an eyebrow at him.
Simon frowned as the idea took root in his head. He hadn’t thought far, hadn’t had time but Tonia had bowled him over when he saw her walking towards him and it wasn’t just because of who she was, it was because she was a very attractive, very desirable woman. He’d loved her once, there was even more reason now for that love to be rekindled.
He grinned at Rufus. ‘Maybe. I won’t say no.’
Georgia exhaled loudly, slapped her hands on her thighs and stood up. ‘Excuse me, boys.’ She picked up an empty bottle and went inside.
‘Is she upset about something?’ asked Simon.
Aidan shrugged. ‘Probably. What are we going to do about the tractor? We have to make a decision. And Bernie said the truck’s going to be a few days while they get parts in from Sydney.’
‘Bugger. We’ll have to use the van for deliveries. That’ll take twice as long.’
***
While Antonia was away, Flynn went round to the Tracey house and replaced the pieces of rotting wood in the verandah. The guttering would need fixing at some stage but the roof didn’t leak so the place was habitable. He couldn’t rent out a house that was unsafe to anyone, let alone Antonia and her children.
Josef from next door tottered in on his gammy legs to see what he was up to and made himself useful by holding a new verandah rail in place while Flynn wielded the hammer.
‘What’s she like, the new neighbour? I saw you bring her in the other day. Looks young. On her own, is she?’
‘She is young but she has twin five-year-olds. She’ll fit in okay.’
‘I miss Jean, you know. Made beaut scones and the best marmalade I’ve ever tasted. Still got a few jars stashed away. Mango chutney too.’
‘We all miss Jean.’
‘Five-year-olds.’ He grunted.
‘She reckons they’re well behaved and quiet. She is too. You won’t have to worry about that.’
‘Yeah, well. We’ll see. Reckon she’ll mind if I take a few mangoes?’
‘You’ll have to ask her.’ Flynn whacked the last nail into place and straightened. ‘Reckon that’ll do for the front.’
‘You gunna paint it too?’
‘I’ll put a weather seal on it but the whole place needs painting.
‘Jean’s niece won’t come at that. Stuck-up bitch, she is. Barely said hello when they were looting the place. Wouldn’t have minded a memento of Jean. She was a good mate.’
‘You got that right.’ They’d been neighbours for about fifty years. Josef’s wife Greta had died twenty years ago in a car crash and the Tracey’s had kept him from giving in entirely to his grief.
‘Maybe this new girl will do the painting herself.’ Josef eyed him slyly. ‘With a bit of help.’
‘I’m only doing this so she won’t have an accident.’
‘Never known you put yourself out before for a tenant. You usually hire Tony to do your maintenance work.’
‘This wasn’t worth bothering him with. I could do it easily. I like doing odd jobs.’
Josef cackled, displaying teeth stained brown from years of tobacco and tea. ‘Yeah, she’s a pretty girl all right.’ He hobbled down the steps. ‘Lawn needs mowing too, while you’re at it. See ya later.’
He headed for the gate laughing like a loony, and scooped up a couple of mangoes on the way.
After applying the weather seal on the new wood, Flynn walked around to the rear of the house. The lawn did need mowing but he wasn’t sure what state Jean’s mower was in. If he remembered rightly, one of the neighbours used to come in to take care of the grass, but whether he used her mower or not he didn’t know. The shed was a relatively new metal one, unlocked luckily; although people rarely locked anything in Flynn’s Crossing, especially the older residents. But Jean’s great-niece wasn’t a local and would probably raise hell if a hammer went missing.
A wave of superheated stuffy air hit him in the face when he opened the door, but a cursory inspection revealed plenty of old rusty tools: two hoes, a couple of shovels, a leaf rake, clippers, shears, saws and old boxes and packets of garden maintenance stuff like snail bait, but no mower. He’d have to come back with his own.
He went inside and flicked the light switch in the laundry. The power was back on. In the kitchen the fridge hummed and water flowed from the tap, albeit a bit spluttery and brown for the first few moments. The stovetop worked, as did the oven and presumably the power points. If not she could let him know.
He flushed the toilet, turned the bath and shower taps on and off. The washing machine in the laundry was almost as old as he was, but when he pressed a few buttons, water flowed and the spindle turned.
All in all, the place was liveable. She’d need beds, more chairs and dressing tables but that wasn’t a problem. She hadn’t given him a date for her return and really she didn’t need to because she had the keys already. Technically, he needed her permission to come in but he preferred to see it as doing an agent’s inspection. Josef was way off beam with his insinuations. Silly old goat.
He locked up carefully on his way out. Roly-poly Bron on the other side was out the front trimming some plants. Still good-natured and friendly even while rearing five noisy boys, she waved and came over to his car in the driveway.
‘G’day, Flynn. I’m glad Antonia’s moving in. It’ll be good to have someone in the place again, specially with young kids.’
‘Do you know her?’ How could they have met?
‘We had a natter when she called in the other day. She came in for a cuppa before she headed back to Sydney. Nice girl.’
How come Josef hadn’t mentioned it? He didn’t miss much but maybe he’d been asleep, or listening to the radio with the volume on full blast, the way it had been the day he showed Antonia the house.
‘Did she say when’s she’s moving in?’
‘She wasn’t sure but she’s pretty keen, so as soon as she’s organised I’d say.’
‘Yes, she really likes the house.’
‘Be great if she bought it. I reckon she’d like to but I don’t think she’s got much money.’
‘Do you know who used to do the lawn for Jean? I was going to give it a once-over but there’s no mower in the shed.’
‘Kev did it usually.’ Her husband, the local mechanic. ‘But sometimes Gary or Stuey did.’ They were the middle two boys. The older ones had left home, the youngest was about to start high school. ‘I’ll send one of them over.’
‘Thanks. Give whoever does it this.’ He handed her a twenty.
‘Ta.’ She laughed and stuffed the note in her pocket. ‘I might do it myself. I told her I had odd job boys and babysitters on hand but she said she was keen to do stuff herself.’
‘She seems that way.’ He opened the car door.
‘She doesn’t say much, does she?’
‘City girl,’ he said. ‘They’re not used to everyone gossiping.’
‘It’s called community support,’ she said with a grin. ‘She’ll figure it out soon enough. She looks like she needs some.’
Flynn drove home, turning over Bron’s comments in his mind. She hadn’t mentioned Simon at all. Antonia had kept that information quiet. Of course, it wouldn’t stay quiet for long when Simon started visiting and taking the twins around town, but still …
Antonia had deeply hidden aspects to her personality. She was the most interesting, intriguing woman he’d ever met. No wonder Simon was bowled over by her, and judging by the glances they exchanged and his little intimate touches of
hand on arm, or kiss on cheek that she didn’t discourage, she felt much the same. She was comfortable with Simon in a way he doubted she would ever be with him, no matter how much he tried to get her to relax and how gently he treated her. Sure, she and Simon had known each other for a long time, and intimately at one stage, but he couldn’t shake the feeling there was more going on.
Something in her manner made him feel that deep down she was constantly on alert, wary and afraid even among the most non-threatening of environments. Or was that only when he was there?
Chapter 5
Antonia grew more and more nervous the closer Flynn’s Crossing came. Her father followed her car in his light truck, loaded with the numerous bits and pieces that represented her and her children’s lives, including a new chest of drawers wrapped tightly in a tarpaulin, for the twins’ room. Ultimately she was glad he’d insisted on coming with her but she couldn’t help the fluttering nerves in anticipation of his reaction when he saw the house.
A landscape gardener wouldn’t be impressed by the neglected yard or the peeling paint and he’d be worried by the rotting boards on the verandah. The power should be on by now but what if the wiring was shonky and nothing worked? What if the place had burned down in her absence? That was silly. Flynn would have told her. If nothing else, she had no doubts he was an honest businessman. In a small town like this he couldn’t afford not to be.
‘I’m hungry,’ Jacob called from the back seat.
‘Me too,’ came the predictable echo.
‘You’ll have to wait. We’re nearly there.’
‘No we’re not,’ Jacob said boldly and Sarah giggled.
Antonia smiled to herself. She loved how they were discovering they could be cheeky and a bit naughty without being locked in their room or yelled at randomly for saying almost anything. They were testing the limits, the therapist said, and she should be careful not to let them turn into obnoxious little brats. Not that she phrased it exactly like that but it’s what she meant. As far as Antonia was concerned they were a long way from brats because strangers immediately turned them mute and clingy, but her family spoiled them rotten and the twins learned quickly that Nana, Grandad, Frank, Jax and especially Uncle Damien were pushovers. Kindy would be good for them.
Half an hour later she turned into the driveway, drove alongside the house into the carport and switched off the engine. The truck pulled up behind her.
‘The Mango House, the Mango House,’ Sarah sang loudly while Jacob unclipped his seatbelt.
‘Everybody out,’ Antonia said. ‘Here we are at last.’
She helped Sarah out of the car. Jacob had already scrambled out and run to his grandfather who was stretching his arms over his head and straightening the kinks in his spine.
‘Look at the mango tree, Grandad,’ yelled Sarah.
‘The yard doesn’t look too bad,’ Connor said as he walked across to where Antonia stood. ‘It needs a bit of weeding and trimming but the basic design and plant layout is good. Someone knew what they were doing.’ Both children raced around, examining the tree and the shrubs.
Antonia looked about, puzzled. Something was different. The grass had been cut. Who did that? Flynn or one of Bron’s tribe of boys? Whoever it was had made the first good impression on her dad.
‘Can we go inside?’ Jacob bounded up the steps onto the verandah.
‘Careful,’ Antonia called. ‘Some of the boards might be rotten. They’re very old.’
Connor, following close behind Jacob who’d disappeared around the corner of the verandah, ran his hand along the railing. ‘It’s been replaced, and so have a couple of boards.’ He inspected the floor at his feet. ‘Done a good job too.’
Flynn?
‘Let’s go in.’ She unlocked her front door and stepped inside, with the twins pushing and shoving their way past. Someone had aired the house out. The closed-up smell had almost gone, the layer of dust on the remaining furniture had disappeared and the power was on because the fridge hummed from the kitchen. Two wooden chairs she didn’t recognise sat against one wall.
Connor surveyed the living room, nodding. ‘Looks better than I expected. Needs a coat of paint but that’s easy enough to fix. Let’s have a look at the rest.’
Antonia took him on a guided tour, her heart pounding with a mixture of excitement and dread that his good impression might suddenly evaporate.
Sarah tested the toilet. Antonia waited apprehensively for the flush, hoping the plumbing functioned properly. It did.
‘Where’s our room?’ Sarah said when she came out.
‘Wash your hands,’ said Antonia.
Sarah darted into the bathroom and water splashed and gurgled for a minute or two.
‘Here,’ shouted Jacob from the room at the rear of the house. ‘Mummy said this is our room.’
Sarah ran to find him. Connor continued out the back door through the laundry to the garden. Antonia followed like a child anxiously waiting for a good report.
‘What do you think?’ she asked when she couldn’t stand it any longer.
Connor put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her cheek. ‘Sweetheart, it’s fine. If you’re happy to live here that’s all that counts. The vegetable garden is great and you’ll never run short of mangoes. The twins have plenty of room to run around and the house is pretty much what I thought it would be. Old but solid and a good size for you.’
Tears sprang to her eyes. ‘Thanks, Dad, I was really worried you’d hate it.’
‘Have faith in yourself.’ He pulled her into a hug. ‘You know what’s best for you and the twins. You’re an intelligent woman and a good mother. Trust your judgement.’
He let her go and she walked over to the riotous zucchini plants climbing out of the garden bed. ‘The last decision I made for myself was pretty crap,’ she said. ‘It’s hard to forget that, hard to believe I can do something right.’
Understatement of the century. Her self-confidence was hanging on by a fingernail, completely undercut by years of being told no one wanted her except ‘him’, no one cared and he was the only one who’d bother with her. And the kicker underlying the whole thing was she’d brought it on herself, a fact he wouldn’t let any of his ‘family’ forget. ‘You chose to come here,’ he’d tell them and hammer it home with a backhander to the cheek. What did that say about her judgement?
‘Not many of us make intelligent decisions at seventeen, but you’re not that girl anymore.’ Connor came to stand beside her. ‘Finding Simon was right, renting this place was right and getting yourself a job was right. Start from there. Don’t forget we’re standing behind you ready to help when you need it.’
‘I know, Dad. Thanks.’
‘Let’s get the troops some lunch, then come back and unload the truck. Can we walk to a cafe from here?’
‘I’m not sure. It’s so hot it’s better to drive until I know my way around.’
***
Flynn was coming out of the pub when Antonia drove by in her red car. His heart bumped and added a few extra beats before he steadied his pulse with a couple of deep breaths. Had she been to the house or had she just arrived? He forced himself to stroll down the street in the same direction, barely stopping to say hello when people greeted him and making sure he maintained visual contact with the red car. As he’d hoped, she swung in close to the Paragon.
He’d been thinking of having lunch there today. That’s what he’d tell anyone who asked. ‘Just dropping in for a bite to eat, Cath. Oh hello, Antonia, didn’t realise you were back in town.’
She had a man with her, an older man who must be her father, and the two littlies being herded into the cafe would be the twins. Two dark-haired little cuties, the girl with a red ribbon in her hair. He slowed his pace and went in to the real estate office. Brandon was on the phone. He looked up and smiled.
‘Just nipping over the road for some lunch,’ Flynn told him and he nodded.
Now it wouldn’t look like he’d chased after her down
the street and into the cafe.
Her group was in one of the booths along the wall, Antonia with her back to the door. The family resemblance between the four was unmistakeable.
‘G’day, Flynn.’
Cath waved him to a table for two in the middle of the room. His usual spot on a stool at the counter was taken. He sat down and studied the blackboard menu on the wall. Antonia was in his peripheral vision. She must have heard Cath greet him but maybe they’d all been talking and she hadn’t noticed. A movement caught his eye. Antonia was sliding out of the booth. He returned his attention to the menu.
‘Hello, Flynn,’ she said.
‘Hello! Welcome back.’
‘Thanks. We’ve just been to the house. Did you mow the lawn?’
He shook his head. ‘One of Bron’s boys.’
‘What about the repairs to the verandah?’
‘Guilty. It was a bit dangerous. I didn’t want my rep as an agent to suffer if you had an accident.’
A frown appeared momentarily, as though she wasn’t sure what to think about that remark.
‘Would you like to join us? Dad wants to meet you.’
Dad did? Not Antonia? She issued the invitation like it was a duty. Flynn glanced across at the big man chatting with his little grandchildren. ‘All right. Thanks.’ He stood up and followed her to the booth.
The children’s faces underwent a startling transformation when he approached the table. One minute they were both giggling, the next wide-eyed with an expression akin to panic. The girl, sitting next to her grandfather, snuggled as close as she could. He slipped an arm around her.
‘Scoot over here next to me, Jakey. Then Flynn can sit with your mum.’ The little boy scrambled around to the other side of the table and nestled under his grandad’s other arm.
‘It’s not personal. They’re a bit shy with strangers,’ Antonia said. ‘Dad, this is Flynn. Flynn, Connor.’
The hand Connor held out was rough and work worn, his face showing the wear and tear of outdoor life. Flynn realised with a jolt of surprise the man was a similar age to himself. A few years older but no more than ten he’d guess. Maybe Antonia’s parents had been teenagers when she was born and knew how hard it was to raise children at such a young age, which was why they reacted the way they did. Something must have made them change their minds. Antonia?
The House At Flynn's Crossing Page 6