by Bowes, K T
“I dunno,” Hana replied. “They’re both awful situations.” She leaned across and removed the plate from Caleb’s lap. “You don’t want this, do you?”
He shrugged. “The man said I had to eat it.”
“Mark. Mark’s a doctor.” Hana kept her voice light. “He’s my brother.”
“Ohhhh!” Caleb turned sideways to face her. “You talked about him in the gully! You found out he’s really your cousin?”
“Yeah, that’s right. So maybe don’t be so hard on him. He’s had his own troubles. I’m not gonna make excuses for him because he’s not making them for himself. Live and let live, Caleb. Life’s a journey for us all.” Hana pressed the sandwich plate back into the boy’s fingers. “The doctor said eat, so eat. I’ll check on Mac and come back.”
Hana leaned against the kitchen doorframe and watched her son in his car seat. Small, vibrant green eyes watched shadows move across the ceiling as the trees swayed in the breeze outside the kitchen window. He flapped his arms and opened his mouth as though intrigued. Hana squeezed the bridge of her nose and the baby’s sharp eyes caught the moment, drawing a smile of glee from his pink face. He made popping sounds with his lips and knitted his brow in a pretence of irritation.
Hana bent to undo the straps of the car seat and lifted the child onto her hip. “I love you so much, little boy,” she mouthed and kissed his forehead. She smoothed down the unruly auburn locks and smelled his clean, baby scent. Lurching for a long strand of Hana’s red hair, Mac clutched it in his hand and balled his fist, poking his thumb into his mouth and resting his temple against her shoulder. “You don’t want much out of life, do you baby?” she cooed, enjoying the weight of his head against her. He sighed, a peaceable soul in a tortured world and closed his eyes. Hana patted his nappy. “Don’t go back to sleep, Mr Sloth. Let’s show Caleb where he can take a nap and then we’ll ask Nonie Leslie to bring Phoenix and Wiri home, shall we?” Hana felt the familiar sinking in her breast, hearing herself asking questions like someone with verbal diarrhoea and receiving only silence in return.
Chapter 11
The Inconvenient Du Rose
Leslie headed up the mountain in the old red Jeep which Jack ran on the farm for over twenty years. She waved her wrinkled hand at Hana as she met them at the front door. “I know, I know,” she soothed. “I didn’t wanna bring it up here and upset youse but Alfie took ours out to the reserve with that brother of yours.” She opened the rear door and Phoenix and Wiremu spilled out of the same seat.
Hana cringed and bit her lip at the realisation they shared a seat belt past washouts and sheer cliffs. “You should have called,” she said, cradling Mac. “I would’ve come for them.”
“Look what I did, Ma,” Wiri said, waving a picture at her stomach. “It’s our fambly.”
“Beautiful,” Hana intoned, biting back the cringe of dismay at how the child’s drawing depicted him at the centre of her family.
Leslie rolled her eyes, sharing Hana’s concerns. The children pattered towards the house and kicked their shoes off under the porch. Hana spun round but was too late to warn them. “What’s up?” the elderly woman asked, puffing up the porch steps into the hall.
“I wanted to ask them to be quiet because Caleb’s gone for a sleep in Mark’s room. I didn’t say it fast enough.”
“Hmmmn!” Leslie humphed. “Least said about that, the better.”
“Not you too,” Hana sighed. “I’ve already had David’s opinion on the matter. He’s just a homeless kid, Leslie. What else could I do?”
“And that’s why we loves ya,” the old woman said with a smile. She hefted the gurgling baby from Hana’s arms and pushed the front door closed with her foot. “What’s happening with the other wee cuckoo? I hear you’re heading back to Hamilton in a few weeks.” Leslie’s smile lost its sheen. “I’m gonna miss youse.”
“It’s only for a term,” Hana said, flicking the switch on the kettle. “Logan wants to re-register for teaching and I’ve good reasons for needing to be in town for a little while.” She glanced across at her son as he lurched for the jade necklace around Leslie’s neck, staring at it before pressing it between his lips.
“So, will Wiremu go home to Nev then?” Leslie asked, jerking her head towards the lounge and the sound of Lego being tipped onto the floorboards.
“I don’t know what to do.” Hana slumped into a kitchen chair and put her head in her hands. “He came to us because Nev couldn’t cope and it’s meant to be temporary. I saw what he drew on his picture and his attachment to us gets harder to break the longer this goes on. What should I do, Leslie?”
“Well, this is one calamity youse didn’t put yerself in, kōtiro. Nev don’t talk about Anahera much but I heard him tell Logan she wasn’t improving. Can’t be much fun being sent to the mental hospital. Nev said them clever doctors diagnosed her with a mate hinengaro.” She put a gnarled hand up to her mouth and covered it when she said the Māori word, leaving Hana sighing in frustration.
“What’s that?”
Leslie flapped her hand and then used it to cover Mac’s ear. Hana tried not to dwell on the irony. “She’s a porowairangi, a lunatic. She’s not coming out soon.”
“Mama! Peese m’av bissit?” Phoenix stood in the doorway, extracting her thumb long enough to utter the request. The fingers of her other hand writhed through her cousin’s and Wiri pursed his lips, attempting an angelic face.
“Playing’s quite tiring,” he said, affecting a perfect yawn and rubbing his stomach with his free hand to add to the prompt.
Hana stood. “Wash your hands in the bathroom first and you may have a drink and one biscuit each. It’ll be dinner time soon.” The children turned to leave and Hana halted them. “Guys, I need you to be quiet. There’s a poorly person in Uncle Mark’s room.”
“Tama’s room!” Wiri insisted with a frown. “Not Uncle Mark’s.” Hana saw a flash of jealousy cross the sparkling grey eyes. The little boy floundered in a sea of adult mistakes and had thrown his energies into anchoring himself in this branch of the Du Roses. Wiri lessened the impact of his statement with an endearing smile and led Phoenix along the hallway towards the family bathroom. Hana heard him telling her to be quiet as she chattered away.
“He’s becoming very emotionally involved,” Hana mused, frowning as Leslie remained quiet while dandling Mac on her knee and bouncing him until he burped. “Help me out here,” Hana demanded. “What can I do? He’s stopped asking for his parents and calls me Ma. I’ve told him to call me Aunty Hana or just Hana but he slips it in there when he thinks I don’t notice. Give me a clue, please?”
“Tama calls you Ma and he’s not your boy,” Leslie said, raising a dark eyebrow.
“That’s different,” Hana protested. “His parents abandoned him; he has no relationship with Michael and doesn’t want one.”
“Obviously Wiri feels the same way.” Leslie grinned at Mac and delighted in his beamed response.
Hana shook her head. “It’s completely different! Anahera’s suffered a breakdown and Nev works full time. I offered to take Wiri to school and then it was, ‘Could you have him overnight while I help with the foaling?’ Then it was, ‘Can he stay with you a bit longer while I go to the cattle market because I’ll be late home?’ That was months ago and Nev shows no signs of wanting his son back.”
“Get Logan to talk to him,” Leslie suggested, a smirk lifting a corner of her mouth.
“Been there; done that!” Hana grumbled. “His honest opinion was that Wiri wouldn’t be taken care of properly if Nev took him home. He’s got massive concerns, which is why Wiri’s still here.” Hana chewed her lip and shrugged. “I’ll talk to Logan again tonight but I’m assuming nothing’s changed.”
“That settles it then.” Leslie pressed her lips against Mac’s crown as he sat facing the table, patting the scarred wood with his hands. “Youse got seven children.” She chuckled. “You taking Ryan to Hamilton with yas? Youse got one of Michael’s meamea, yous
e might as well have the other.”
Hana’s eyes widened in horror at Leslie’s tactless use of the expletive. Logan’s status within the Du Rose family as Reuben’s bastard made her sensitive to such slurs on his behalf. She glanced around nervously, relaxing at the sound of Phoenix singing amidst running water.
“I left her there,” Wiremu announced, flouncing into the kitchen. “She won’t turn it off.”
“Oh.” Hana eyed the empty table which should have contained warm milk and biscuits. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
She reappeared with her two-year-old under her arm, Phoenix giggling as she hung like a limp rag doll. “She turned it off,” Hana told Wiri in response to the worried look on his face. “I checked.”
Phoenix clambered onto the seat next to her cousin and poked her face into his. “I gettin’ paint off,” she said, her voice insistent as she jabbed at her stained palm with an olive finger. “It dirty wiv Nonie’s paintin’.” She kissed Wiri in the eye and sat on her seat, only her eyes and forehead visible over the table top.
All eyes turned to Hana as she heated milk in a saucepan and she felt the pressure of provision like a weight around her shoulders. Phoenix’s clear voice cut through the leaden atmosphere like a knife. “I ‘ave brandy in mine, fanks,” she said.
Hana’s jaw dropped and she narrowed her eyes at Leslie. “I don’t think so,” she said, keeping her voice light.
Leslie rolled her eyes. “Poppa Alfie has brandy with his milk, don’t he mokopuna?”
“Yes,” the children agreed in a well-rehearsed chorus.
“We never has brandy in it does we Nonie? Nope, never, we don’t.” Wiremu’s insistence only strengthened Hana’s concerns. She shook her head and poured the milk into two mugs and two beakers. “Is that with his wacky baccy or instead?”
“Shhhh!” Leslie flapped her arms in horror and the children laughed at her duck impression.
Hana’s eyes widened. “Please tell me he’s not driving my brother round the property unlicensed?”
Leslie shook her head. “Na, kōtiro! He’s got my licence with him, just in case.”
“It doesn’t work like that and you know it. I hope they don’t go on public roads or the cops will throw the book at him.”
Wiri sniggered. “Throw the book at him,” he repeated. “How big’s the book?”
“Very big.” Hana glared at Leslie and laid tea plates on the table and gave each child two biscuits each. Leslie looked at the packet with the hopefulness of a Labrador and Hana gave in and put two on a plate for her, rolling her eyes and wondering which of them was meant to be the adult.
“I saw somebody’s dad who we can’t mention right now, but were talking about before.” Leslie shoved a cookie into her mouth whole, widening her eyes at Hana’s lack of comprehension and jerked her head towards Wiri.
Hana nodded in recognition. She’d seen Nev. “Ah yeah?”
“He’s heard from his brother. Kane’s making good money building in Christchurch. There’s lots to repair after the earthquake. He mentioned something about that blonde woman whose name I won’t mention either.”
Hana winced, not wanting to hear news of Caroline Marsh, her rival for Logan’s affections. Something told her the woman would never give up and even thinking her name felt like poking a wasps’ nest and anticipating trouble. “I don’t want to know,” Hana sighed with sincerity but Leslie never kept gossip to herself. She told Hana the latest news and left her poleaxed.
“You’re not serious?” Hana said, her porcelain skin paling further and her red hair standing out like a fiery halo. “It’s not true.”
“Is true,” Leslie said, reaching for another biscuit, unaware of the devastation those two small words had wrought.
Chapter 12
Caleb
Hana waited as Caleb dragged himself up the ramp to his motel room, situated along a lane next to the main hotel. The museum curator followed in his wheelchair, watching as the teenager coped with his crutches on the wooden deck.
“Youse more pathetic than me,” Will grunted, holding the wheelchair halfway up the ramp using the strength in his rippling biceps and Hana shot him a look of rebuke.
“I offered you to go up first!” she hissed. “He can’t help it.”
“Didn’t know youse’d be all day,” Will grumbled, his face scowling so that the dark eyes became obscured by the drooping grey eyebrows. Phoenix sat on Will’s knee in the chair, adding to the ballast.
“I’ll push you,” Hana offered, switching Mac to her left hip and reaching out for the wheelchair handle with her right hand.
“Don’t!” Will snapped. “I got no legs. Me brain works fine. Last time I let you push me anywhere we ended up in the bushes.”
Hana withdrew the proffered hand. “That wasn’t my fault. I didn’t know the ramp would be icy.”
A ranch slider hissed on its runner as it drew back, disgorging the guest in the far room. The man strode out and seeing the ramp filled with people, changed direction and leapt the low railing enclosing the widow’s walk in a single fluid leap. He landed on the gravel below and moved towards the knot of bodies with a blank look on his angular face. “What’s up?” he asked, directing his question at Will.
Hana pursed her lips and ignored Logan’s new stable manager, still seething and embarrassed by their last encounter.
“Kid’s moving in next door to you,” Will grunted, smiling to reveal neat, pink gums. “The missus likes her staff all broken.”
Hana glared at him, resenting his reference to her tendency to ally with those whom the rest of society wrote off without a second glance. “You’d know,” she muttered, avoiding the sight of his trouser legs tucked beneath his stumps. The low chuckle Will emitted shook his body and Phoenix perched on his knee, joining in the merriment without understanding. Will reached out an arm and spanked Hana’s thigh, realising the stupidity of the movement as the released wheel slewed backwards, arcing him towards the safety rail and bushes beyond. Phoenix’s eyes opened wide in horror and she gripped Will’s thighs in a pinch which made him roar.
The stable manager moved with incredible speed, leaping the rail and snatching up the wheelchair handle just in time to yank it back into line. The chair stopped its horrible backwards descent and Phoenix let out a peel of laughter which sounded maniacal on the quiet terrace. Will gave the tall man a look of gratitude and then yelled at Caleb as the teenager made his tortoise maneuver. “Get a bloody shifty on, boy!” he shouted. “I got no legs and I get on better with crutches than you! I could’ve got to Auckland by now!”
“When can it be my turn on your knee?” Wiri asked with a whine in his voice.
“Sorry!” Caleb exclaimed. He leaned against the side of the building, his face pale and sweat beading on his forehead. “It hurts.”
“Just stand there,” Hana said, pressing her hand against his chest. “Let Will go past before he bursts a blood vessel.”
With the stable manager’s help, Will hauled himself up the rest of the ramp and wheeled to his motel room, stopping half way along the deck. He retrieved the key from his breast pocket and ignored Hana’s presence, speaking to Phoenix and Wiri, as the little boy bounced up and down next to him. “Let’s get inside and see what old Will’s got for you in his fruit bowl.”
Hana glared at the curator’s back, a look which also took in the new stable manager, his spine ramrod straight as he pushed the chair into the room and disappeared. She looked at the teenager as he let out a sigh. “Sorry,” Caleb said. “I don’t mean to be a pain in the ass.”
“You’re not.” Hana transferred her hand from his chest to his upper arm, fearful he might plummet south onto the wooden surface. His hands shook on the crutches and a greyness entered his pallor. As the first of the crutches went out from beneath his trembling body and he began to slide down the wall, Hana screamed for help. “I can’t hold him,” she shouted, balancing Mac and trying to hold Caleb upright. His slender body felt like a dead w
eight slumping against her, dragging her down with him. Hana’s brain took in the sharp edges of the weatherboard and the deck rail, knowing she’d hurt Mac if she fell sideways. “Help me!” she wailed, feeling Caleb become weightless as strong hands pushed between them, alleviating her burden.
The stable manager dipped his tall body and shoved his head under Caleb’s arm, lifting him over his shoulder like a fireman. Out cold, the boy grunted and the crutches fell away with a clatter. “Where’s he going?” the stable manager demanded and Hana forced her shocked self to react. She reseated Mac on her hip and darted past Will’s open door to unlock the ranch slider of the next room.
“In here,” she said, shoving the door aside and watching as the man carried Caleb over the threshold.
The stable manager spun on his feet for a second, rejecting the lounge and its two seater sofa in favour of the double bed in the room behind. An expanse of white cast dangled from Caleb’s knee like a millstone, pulling one leg longer than the other. The man lay Caleb down with surprising care and stood back. “Not good,” he muttered, He put his hands up to the teenager’s throat and Hana tensed, watching as he undid the zipper on Caleb’s jacket and rested a hand over his chest. “He’s still breathing,” he said. “But he’s unconscious.” Worried eyes darted back towards Hana. “An ambulance will take ages. Call the local doctors and get one of them to come out here.”
Hana looked down at her mobile phone and her heart sank at the lack of signal. The motel unit telephone sat on a sideboard and she reached for it and dialled zero for reception. She tapped the carpet with the toe of her boot, waiting for the receptionist to answer. Will’s wheels made a steady rumble along the deck as he travelled down to investigate and Wiri’s anxious face appeared in the doorway. “Hey, Marla.” Hana exhaled with relief as the phone gave a click and the receptionist’s voice came through the handset. “Could you find my brother, Mark?” Her shoulders slumped. “Oh, he’s still out? Then call Dr Seuli’s surgery please?” She gave a brief explanation and one last instruction. “Ask for Dr Francis.”