Everybody starts shouting over each other as they’re used to doing, the usual insults, and friendly attacks at the ready, until Barnaby silences them with a calm Jedi motion of his hand.
‘It’s not your decision,’ he reminds them all softly.
Everyone looks at her expectantly.
‘I really don’t know,’ she says. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know.’ She holds her head with her hands and closes her eyes.
They look at each other with concern.
‘Give her time,’ Barnaby says.
‘But the sowing season—’
‘Give her time,’ he repeats.
In the car on the way home, her husband Deacon is silent. She takes a breath and goes to say something but catches herself.
‘What?’ he looks at her, full attention, anxious eyes. He even slows the car.
She shakes her head.
‘You were about to say something.’
‘It’s gone,’ she says, looking out her window. ‘I don’t know.’
The pressure from the community grew immense, despite Barnaby’s efforts to calm the waters.
Every day the woman would travel to the new land in the south, the acre that she had to begin sowing. The land had been prepared, ready for sowing, ready for cultivation, but she still had no idea what to plant. She brought out a deckchair and sat watching the land, hoping for inspiration, but instead her mind would wander, over and over again, back into her own life. So many questions, so much doubt.
Her friends and neighbours from the community would take turns visiting with her with their proposals and leaflets, presentations and well-thought-out ideas for the land, information on every fruit, nut, vegetable and crop imaginable and each with his or her own personal reasons.
Arthritic Billy with the cannabis proposal, Sally who wanted to plant tea, to relive an illicit affair with a boy on a tea plantation in China from her travels as a student. They all had their ideas, good ones, valid ones, but when they’d ask her, she would invariably offer the same response:
‘I don’t know.’
Nothing else, there was nothing else for her to say.
And there was Jacob, whom she’d watch every chance she had. This stranger, somebody from ‘outside’, exotic and athletic. Handsome, brooding, often in a state of undress. While he was alive, her father had caught her staring at Jacob too many times. He’d given her that knowing look. That warning look. She’d watch Jacob from the window in her kitchen that overlooked her parents’ land. Most days he’d work alongside her husband, the two of them total opposites in frame. Jacob broad and athletic, muscles rippling from his shoulders, arms, back, his narrow waist. Her husband strong and lean but tall and thin like a bean, ropey muscles in his long arms.
‘What are you looking at?’ her father would ask her.
‘I don’t know.’
It had begun back then. The questions and doubt. Before he’d passed away.
She repeated that phrase so often to everyone, all of the time. It would come out of her mouth without her even thinking of it. The doubt in her seemed alive, as if it had a life of its own, flying out of its own accord, taking over her thoughts, taking over her words. Even her actions. It came as a surprise to most people: the woman who was so self-assured, who always had a plan, who always had things figured out, who never worried even if she hadn’t.
It seemed to rock the community as much as it rocked her. Her lack of certainty was contagious, and forced them to start thinking, questioning what was never previously questioned. The small everyday decisions became big questions, inspiring lively town hall debates.
The woman, it seemed, became the queen, the leader, the president of not knowing things and this made her the person everybody wanted to share their own uncertainties with. Her doubt fed theirs, and the doubts grew. And as the doubt grew in their minds, the land that she stared at daily began to grow a mystery crop.
She would sit at the plot each day staring at the soil, wondering, questioning, trying to move things around in her head, slot things together. People travelled to see her; knowing she’d be there, they’d bring with them picnics, canteens of coffee, alcohol, whatever they needed or desired, and they’d pour their hearts out about all the things they didn’t know. She listened – it was all she could do, because she didn’t have the answers any more than they did.
They couldn’t decide whether to re-elect Mayor Alice, who had been their mayor for so many years. Under that cloud of doubt, Alice came to the woman to confess she was in doubt whether she wanted to be re-elected mayor anyway. Her daughter had just had a child, she wanted to revel in being a grandmother. And then Bizzie Brown decided that she was in doubt as to whether to continue living in the community at all. She’d been wondering about it for a while, was afraid of making the change, but it seemed so many changes were happening around her, so perhaps she should embrace the change too.
They would discuss their doubts while watching the unusual crop rising from the soil. The crop was odd, it grew in different directions as if it couldn’t decide, and it grew in different colours. Some parts flowered, some looked like grain, some looked like vegetables or vines. It was so confusing, they couldn’t figure out what it was and doubted whether it was anything specific at all.
‘What did you sow?’ they’d ask her, on their hands and knees, studying the peculiar growths.
‘I don’t know,’ she’d reply.
Bizzie’s doubts about staying reached the point that she left, after fifty years. But in order to fill her place, the community had to decide whether to follow the old entry laws for new neighbours. Doubt led them to change their minds; thus a young man and woman, newly married and under the usual age of acceptance, were invited in. The new neighbours met with the woman, who wondered whether they should use the peculiar new crop of botanicals for gin. Should they begin an artisan gin distillery, should they infuse the herbs and flowers into their gin to give it expression, something unique to the area that the rest of the world couldn’t offer?
This unusual crop of doubt was like a treasure trove, a unique biosphere harbouring a mixture of things that didn’t know what it was.
After hearing the artisan gin idea, Barnaby wondered if winemaking was a logical extension of that, and then wondered why they weren’t making wine with their wonderful vineyards. So they did. And the same with the olives, which became oil, and then Bobby’s tiny almond allotment became an almond orchard and so too came the almond oil and butter and milk.
And all this doubt caused so many questions and so many meetings and so many discussions about what they were unsure of doing, which led to changing their minds and their ways, which had once been so solid. All of this activity carried on around an unmoving lone woman who sat daily in a deckchair in a field watching an unidentifiable crop, musing and wondering.
‘What is it?’ she asked Barnaby one day, who was on his knees examining the crop stretching up through the soil.
And Barnaby, who knew everything about the soil, looked up at her. ‘I don’t know.’
She snorted, to her and his surprise, and her hand flew to her mouth, but she couldn’t stop her laughter.
‘Well if you don’t know, then how can any of us know?’ she laughed.
‘I do know something,’ he said, standing and fixing her with his knowing gaze. ‘It is a field of I Don’t Knows. You planted the seeds of doubt, and now you are growing an entire crop of doubt.’
She looked at the field of thriving doubt.
‘I think you’re wrong about not knowing, though,’ he said. ‘I think it is clear to see that you do know one thing. You know that you don’t know. That is a solid certainty. You know it so well, that you have succeeded in growing an entire field of it, with your thoughts alone. However, only you can know exactly what it is that you don’t know so very much.’
He was right.
She looked up at him as if his words had triggered an epiphany.
He nodded at her to go.
She hurries away from the crop, straight to her car. She races home, knowing exactly what it is she doesn’t know about. She needs to get straight there immediately. She searches the land for Jacob, but there’s no sign of him. Nor is her husband at home.
She thinks quickly. She runs across the field that her husband and Jacob have spent so many months cultivating together, straight to the guesthouse at the back of her parents’ home where Jacob is staying. She rattles on the door and Jacob opens the door as if he’s been expecting her.
‘I need to speak with Deacon,’ she says softly.
He steps aside and Deacon stands up, surprised to see her. ‘Hey, honey, we were just stopping for lunch. Would you like—’
‘Stop,’ she says, holding a hand up. ‘There’s something I have to say to you. Something that you must know.’
Jacob looks downward. Deacon looks nervously from Jacob to his wife.
‘You have been my loyal husband from the moment you said “I do.” My best friend for as long as I can remember. My confidant. My everything.’
His eyes start to fill with tears.
‘Don’t do—’
‘No, let me speak. You’ve been asking what’s going on with me for long enough. It’s time I told you.’
Jacob looks up. She sees the hope in his face.
‘I was filled with doubt for such a long time, probably longer than I realized, but it’s been brewing inside me. I wasn’t even sure what I wasn’t sure of, but it was there nonetheless, niggling away. I grew an entire field of doubt, and it looks mighty pretty too. It came up quick, then it grew faster, and spread. But it’s not going to grow any more, Deacon, because now I know. I know what I didn’t know before.’
She takes a deep breath and lets it out.
Jacob stares at her. Deacon braces himself.
‘I know that you are in love with Jacob. I know that Jacob is in love with you.’
Deacon looks startled, afraid. Jacob does not.
‘I can see it. I can feel it. I’ve been watching you both every day for a year.’
Deacon gently crumbles, covers his face.
‘You alone could have cultivated fields of doubt for years, all over this mountain head. But you kept hiding it and so you cultivated what everybody else wanted instead. The time for that is over, Deacon. Now, just be together. Be good to each other.’ To Jacob, ‘Be good to this man,’ she warns, her voice cracking.
Deacon asks, ‘Where are you going?’
She smiles, suddenly filled with excitement. ‘I don’t know.’ And she’s one hundred per cent sure of that.
1
The woman watches Anita stir her tea around her teacup, the spoon tinkling as it strikes the china. Twelve times and three little taps on the rim of the cup to shake off the tea before placing it in the saucer.
Her other friend, Elaine, bites into her scone; the jam and cream ooze out between the gaps in her teeth, land on her lip and a glob in the corner of her mouth. A fast lizard tongue whips it away.
‘But the dress was lovely on you, why are you sending it back?’ Elaine says to Anita, through her full mouth, crumbs spewing out with her words.
Anita scrunches up her face. ‘The colour was the same as my skin tone, it made me look anaemic.’
‘Did you hear Diane is anaemic?’
‘That would make sense. She passed out twice in spin class.’
‘It happened to me too, maybe I’m anaemic too,’ Elaine says, taking another bite of her scone. The crumbs land on her enormous bosom.
‘Are you going to get a refund or exchange it?’
‘Full refund.’
‘I’m returning Paddy,’ the woman finally blurts out.
They both look at her in surprise, as though they’d forgotten she was there.
‘You’re what?’ Elaine says, putting down the scone.
‘I’m returning Paddy,’ she repeats, less confidently now. It was easier just saying it once. ‘I’m bringing him back to the shop.’
‘Does the shop still exist?’ Anita asks.
‘That’s your main concern?’ Elaine asks.
‘Well! It’s been thirty years. I bought a dress online and the boutique was gone when I went to return it.’
‘Husbands get a lifetime guarantee, you can return them whenever you want, and get your money back,’ Elaine says.
‘It’s not about the money,’ the woman says, feeling prickly.
‘Of course not,’ Elaine and Anita share a guilty look.
‘It’s about getting my life back, getting me back,’ the woman says, feeling her confidence return again. ‘I’m sixty years old on Friday; it’s made me think about things, about how I want to spend the next, and final, twenty years of my life.’
‘Twenty if you’re lucky,’ Anita says, and Elaine elbows her.
‘Of course, we understand,’ Elaine cooed. ‘But just be prepared not to get a full refund. They don’t make it easy to get full refunds on husbands. They’ll probably make you exchange him.’
‘That’s how Valerie ended up with Earl.’
They wrinkle their noses in disgust.
‘Earl is nice,’ the woman defends him.
‘Earl was caught sniffing the seats of women’s bicycles. Three times he’s been warned.’
‘She must have ticked the requirement box for lewd.’ They make a disgusted face again.
‘I don’t want to exchange Paddy,’ she explains, trying to stay calm, wondering if they’re listening to her at all and if her next step in her new life would be to rid herself of her intolerable friends too. Even her friendships have grown mildew. ‘It’s not about wanting somebody else, it’s just about not having him.’
‘You seem very sure.’
‘I am very sure.’
‘Have you told him yet?’
‘Yes. I’m returning him tomorrow afternoon.’
They gasp.
‘If you do have to exchange him, you’ll have to choose somebody of the same value,’ Elaine says.
‘You think he’s worth more now?’ the woman asks, drawn into this aspect when she doesn’t want to be.
‘Less!’ the two women say in unison.
‘He’s forty years older now,’ Anita says. ‘Not much demand for a sixty-two-year-old granddad.’
‘Yes, but I always thought maturity was an asset,’ the woman says, thinking of Paddy who will no longer be her Paddy.
Elaine snorts and smears more jam and cream on her second fruit scone.
‘Anyway, you can add your own money to it if you see someone better.’
‘I’m not exchanging him,’ she says, rolling her eyes. ‘I’m returning him, and that’s all there is to it.’
‘We’ll see,’ Anita says, hiding her smile behind her teacup.
‘You know, there are women there too,’ Elaine says. ‘They’ve modernized it since the laws changed. You might want a wife.’
‘I certainly do not want a wife,’ the woman huffs.
‘Wanda Webster bought herself a wife.’
‘Well, Wanda Webster can do what she likes. I’m not buying a wife. I’m just returning Paddy.’
Silence.
‘How does Paddy feel about it?’ Anita asks.
Finally, the woman thinks.
Her eyes fill then, her guard down. ‘He was upset.’
‘Well look, he should have known this would always be a possibility. And the kids can still visit him, wherever he is, or if someone else takes him,’ Anita offers gently.
The woman’s throat closes up. ‘I never thought of that. Of someone else buying him.’
‘Ah, I wouldn’t worry about that,’ Elaine says, biting into her scone, and adding with a filled mouth, ‘I’m sure that won’t happen.’
There’s cream on her nose. The woman feels defensive of Paddy. She decides not to tell her about the cream. That one’s for Paddy.
2
The woman stares at the paperwork in front of her, her eyes finding it hard to fo
cus. Reasons for Return/Exchange. The words blur together, she struggles to breathe in the small cubicle where even the green rubbery plant looks depressed. The ceiling is low with one panel missing, revealing the pipes, the dust, the skeleton of the warehouse.
Paddy has been taken away from her, escorted to another office to file paperwork. He’d given a gentle sad smile just before his door closed. It had hurt her heart, the gentleness in his face, the memories that came flooding with every image of that expression, the way he was still trying to tell her it was okay, he forgave her, he understood. In a way, after all the guilt, she feels relieved. She’s thought about this moment for so long, lived it in her head, wondered if she would ever be able to build up the courage to make a change in her life and here she is, doing it. It’s awful. The most awful thing she’s ever done, but at least she’s finally doing it. Amidst the tornado of terror, there’s swirling exhilaration. It’s happening, and she will soon be on the other side.
While they’re both here in square grey offices signing forms, the Spousal Market van, black and unmarked to be discreet, has been removing Paddy’s belongings. When she returns, it will be like he was never there, like their marriage never even happened. A life together wiped out.
Again that tug. Forty years, all carried away in a truck.
‘Are you having difficulty deciding which box to tick?’ The manager, Susan, with the bouffant and bright red lips, interrupts her thoughts. ‘Between you and me, sweetheart,’ she lowers her voice to a whisper, ‘it doesn’t really matter what box you tick.’
‘Not to you perhaps.’ The woman straightens up and lifts her chin. She surveys the list again. There’s so much of Paddy that bothered her over the years: his disorganization, his messiness, empty toilet rolls left on the holder, empty packets going back in the cupboard. His closeness with that woman twenty-seven years ago. His snoring. His awkwardness with sensitive issues. The radio up too loud, sports always on the TV. Shoes, jackets, abandoned wherever discarded. The same long anecdotes with the same old friends. She feels like she’s been picking him apart every day, unpeeling his character layer by layer to find another part of him that annoyed her.
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