by Nanette Fox
“Watching the group around the pool, something’s not right.”
“Oh, that sounds like a beer for you Dave and a wine for Mum and me.”
“We can discuss it over the drinks.”
She came over to the window with the drinks. “That looks like fun,” Julia said looking down on the scene.
David looked at her earnestly, “No, watch Julia, watch Tim around Vicky particularly.”
“Something’s up,” said her brother.
Both her mum and her brother turned to look at her when she said, “He’s actually in love with Isabella so what you’re watching is a big cover-up while he pines for her and perhaps eventually gets over her.”
Ruth spoke, “I am up early every morning as you know; when Tim’s home he gets up and swims endless laps, it is like he is punishing himself.”
David and Julia looked to their mum and said almost together, “Is there anything we can do?”
Ruth looked at them both anxiously and said, “Watch and be here, I guess,” shrugging her shoulders.
David said, “He’s off to Perth again this week, how can we watch him there?”
Julia answered, “I phoned Rebecca today. She is in Perth with Paul. Apparently, that is who Tim has been staying with every week for the last few weeks. Paul and Tim have become close. Rebecca seemed to think it will be good for them both. Paul has company to come home to. Tim has Paul to talk to. Paul is a solid, very steady guy. Julia said,”It’s here that is the problem. Vicky has stuck herself to him again, and she is like a mollusc on a rock, hard to prize off."
“Mum, can you be a little less welcoming maybe, so that she gives him some space?” Ruth nodded.
Julia suggested they sit at the table with their drinks and have a cheese and deli platter to share just like they did when she and David were younger, and Marco and Tim would come home from wherever they had been. They used to call it the Martinelli family conference. They’d discuss any problems any of them were having. Over the years, it had ranged from hard to complete science projects, to Ruth struggling with a painting, to boy or girl troubles, to Marco consistently going into the rough on the course. No matter, they talked to each other as a family, and it had kept them strong.
The three of them started discussing all of the wedding issues. First was how to get Tim to relent and agree to go to Italy. Whether it would be possible to get Gran Rosa and Gramps to Italy? Would it be one big wedding, or should it be two, one in Italy and then one here at home? Even the date, when would it be, was a topic of conversation. Tim wandered inside the majority of his friends gone. Vicky was with him, and they heard him telling her it was time to go home. Julia and David did a victory punch and said, “Yes.” It was a half an hour or so before Tim and Vicky came back downstairs, and he saw her out the front door. Tim was freshly showered and clad in sloppy grey track-pants and matching t-shirt. Julia looked up at him and reflected how good looking he was, even in baggy clothes. He came over to them smiling, “Ah the old family conference resurrected.”
“Have you got time to sit with us?” asked Ruth. She looked up at him smiling and gestured towards a chair, hoping he would sit down with them.
“Can you guys hold that thought?” He went into the kitchen, stopped to pat Basil who was sprawled out asleep and pulled the step ladder out. Bringing it across to near the table, he put it near the shelving and climbed it reaching to the very top shelf where he pulled out a largish envelope. They all watched him and wondered what he was up to. He came and sat at the table, pulled some photos out and spread them across the table. They were all of Isabella. They looked at the photos and then at him. He explained that he wanted them to look at the photos and look at how the structure of Isabella’s face had changed.
He said, “This is really difficult.”
“I feel I am betraying her confidence.” He went on to say he didn’t know what any of them knew individually. He pointed to the first photo and said that it was taken when she was around eighteen at one of their family functions. The second photos he had found in her desk drawer when he’d refurbished her office and checked the old desk drawers before putting the desk on the skip. He said according to the scribble on the back, they were from the early days of her marriage. Then there were three photos he had taken on his phone camera as recently as a few months ago. She looked just as beautiful, but he was right the face structure was different. Julia started to be alarmed and asked him what he was getting at.
“Jules, Izzy wrote me a letter and in it she explained that she was terrified of giving herself to another man, of going into another proper relationship because of the violence she had suffered at the hands of Isaac.”
“Do you know anything about that?”
Julia sighed, “I saw him strike her quite violently once he knocked her onto the floor.” David muttered something unintelligible.
Tim looked straight into her eyes and questioned, “So that is all you know about.” She nodded.
“Dave, do you know anything?” His brother said Isabella had never confided in him about anything to do with Isaac.
“There is nothing at all Dave?”
“No nothing.”
“I guess I didn’t really ask. Wasn’t that interested?”
“Never really want to get too deep with the ladies.”
“Mum?” Ruth had tears welling in her eyes she looked at her youngest son, shaking her head.
Tim said, “Yes Mum, I know now, the full story.”
“I needed to understand. I have been doing some digging, investigating things, and then I phoned Aunt Lucy.”
“She is alive isn’t she because of Dad and Lucy?”
“Yes Son.”
Julia and David were immediately alarmed at the turn the family conference had taken and were full of questions. Tim pointed to the photos again. He touched the most recent ones fondly. Looking up, he asked, “How do I tell this story?”
He went on to explain that he had found out that there had been a lot of violence against Izzy. To make it up and ‘reward’ her for not saying anything, she had been given things like the Mercedes, trips overseas, even the gallery. Again, when he had been refurbishing the office, he found a file tucked down behind one of the filing cabinets. The file was titled ‘Apologies’ and documented the major injuries she had suffered with dates, times, receipts for whatever was bought to appease her.
“I don’t know maybe she thought she’d need all the details at some point.”
“I had many long conversations with Aunt Lucy because I was getting frustrated that she wouldn’t let me get anywhere near Izzy.”
“She told me the worst story I have ever heard.”
Ruth grabbed his hand, “Don’t say anymore, Tim, it is supposed to be buried in the past.”
“Mum, don’t, I have to tell you all because I can’t handle knowing anymore.”
“Particularly, as I am obviously not going to have Izzy in my life.”
“I have to Mum, I have to.” He was beginning to get quite agitated. “She was part of this family Mum and we should all know equally.” David and Julia sat very still looking at their younger brother.
Tim went on to tell them that Izzy had gone with Isaac to the UK to attend the funeral of her Uncle Robert. No one knew for sure, as Izzy has no real memory of what actually happened, but she was smashed up so badly that she was in a coma for several weeks. Her nose, one cheekbone and her jaw had to be rebuilt. She had many broken bones, an arm, an ankle and she had a fractured pelvis. He told them that Marco and Lucy went to the UK to be with her. Lucy for at least six months, before Isabella was medevac’d back to Australia. Isaac had told everyone including the Police she had fallen down the very steep stone stairs in her Uncle Robert’s historical old home. It was conceivable and while Izzy had no memory and wouldn’t press charges, Isaac had gotten away with either beating her to a pulp or throwing her down the stairs.
Julia had been reduced to tears, David was sitting looking solemn
and horrified at what he was hearing. Ruth could only watch her youngest son and hope that his heart would mend sooner rather than later. Julia said, “I don’t remember any of this, Rebecca’s never mentioned it.”
“She would know if her mother was away for so long.”
Ruth knew she’d have to explain to her adult children. “Your father did everything possible to camouflage what had gone on.”
“Julia, you and Rebecca weren’t so close to her at the time because she was with Isaac!”
“Remember, David, it was all about how Isabella didn’t choose you, and Julia you leapt to David’s defence.”
“It was when Rebecca was in the US on some sort of Study Exchange, so she was a bit removed anyway.”
“Michael and I knew, of course, because we were respectively married to Lucy and Marco.”
“Isaac paid big time, it cost a small fortune in medical expenses and rehabilitation for Izzy.”
“It was about fourteen months before she was finally returned to some semblance of herself: that is when Isaac gifted Isabella the gallery.”
“It is purely conjecture, Marco and I believed he did, as did Lucy; Isaac committed suicide in that car accident.”
Julia cried out, “Oh good lord no, how is it I did not know all of this?”
“I always knew there was some major issue in regard to Isaac, so did Rebecca but we assumed something like cheating on her.”
Tim blurted out, “He was a very nasty man, he probably did.”
“And you know what, I found out he was cremated, there was no service for him. It is only now that Izzy has to deal with his ashes.”
“I believe that is why she went to Queensland just recently to his family.”
Ruth and David were watching Tim, he had picked up the three photos he had taken of Isabella and was just sitting looking at them, expressionless. He’d been shocked the first time at what he had learnt from Lucy. Now it was just simply painful, deep down in his soul. He could never make it better or erase the hurt she had suffered. David got up to hug his little brother. Tim accepted his hug and said quietly, “That’s why she was happy to be with you, it was light and fun, and she knew you wouldn’t hurt her.”
Ruth pulled herself together and offered hot chocolate all around. Looking at Tim, she knew she would put it in front of him, he would, maybe, acknowledge it was there, but he wouldn’t drink it. He was so far away in his thoughts.
After a time, Tim rose in his seat, collected the photos and loaded them back into the envelope. He climbed the step ladder and put the envelope back into its hiding place. As he picked up the step stool, Julia queried, “Why up there?”
“Out of the way of prying eyes, but also I can’t have them close, I don’t want to be reminded.”
“Which brings me to something Mum, I have booked a locksmith and security firm to change the locks and alarm; they will contact you this week, this is a massive home and you’re mostly here alone.”
“I also have Vicky’s key.”
“I don’t want another 1 am visit.”
David looked at him, “Really?”
“Yeah Dave, really, it was nice but invasive.”
Tim then became all business and started planning ahead. “Jules, can you and Rebecca organize to cover next Sunday?”
“I leave for Perth in the morning, and at the end of the week, Paul and I are flying out of Perth to Bali for some R and R.”
“Half your luck mate,” whistled his brother.
“Hey Dave, are you Isabella’s accountant?”
“My business does her financials, not actually me though, why do you ask?”
“Do you want another client?”
David said, “What, who?”
“Me you goose.”
“I am an architect now with my own practice.”
“I’ll catch up with you in two weeks for an appointment.” With that, he wandered off upstairs with a, “Night all.”
Julia said softly, which Tim probably didn’t hear, “Take care, my little bro, take care.” She then said a teary goodnight to Ruth and David and gathering up Basil for a little wander to the garden on the way, headed to her room.
Ruth looked at David, “So you are off then.”
“No Mum, I am going to stay here tonight.”
“All of the family, under one roof.”
*
Ruth was up to see Tim off at the airport. He’d be gone for two weeks, and she hoped he’d be safe. “Mum, it is okay.”
“You can ring me.”
“If not ring Paul, do you have his number?”
“Here give me your phone, I’ll put it in.”
“I’ll keep in touch, I promise,” he said as he hugged her. “By the way Mum, Vicky doesn’t need to know about the Bali part; she thinks I’ll just be working in Perth.”
“She’d organize to come,” he answered her questioning look.
*
It was Monday and Ruth returned to her studio. She had three paintings, all commissions she was working on. She had decided to leave them and work on something new, an abstract for the wall in Isabella’s office at the gallery. It was easy to plan the piece, Tim’s very touching photo collection had inspired her, faces depicting youthful optimism, love’s beauty, the pain of discovery and then tortured acceptance.
She was still at a loss to understand how Isabella had refused to listen to her about Isaac. She couldn’t fathom how Isabella had let Isaac crush her spirit again and again. Why hadn’t Isabella left Isaac before that final incident had almost destroyed her? Did she so truly love him? Did she have no way out?
Ruth had often wondered if Isabella’s parents had been alive whether things would have been different. Ruth’s objection to Isabella had been so misunderstood. The family had always assumed it was about David, it was more than that. It was a frustration that if Isabella had chosen David, if David had been ready to choose Isabella, so much pain could have been avoided. She started to paint, her emotions spilling on the canvas as she worked.
*
Julia walked into the gallery on the Monday morning with a burning desire to work harder than ever to make it a success for Izzy. She didn’t look forward to seeing Rebecca, as she knew she would have to keep the confidence and hope that Lucy would one day tell her daughter. She also realized that the three of them ‘the girl triangle’ hadn’t always known the deep dark secrets; they weren’t as trusting of each other as what she had always thought. Julia was worried about how she would react when she first saw Isabella again. She knew she would really need to give her love and encouragement and above all be open and honest, but she suspected she would find herself embarrassed and unable to meet her eyes. Julia knew she would look at Isabella and immediately feel sorry for her and want to apologize that she hadn’t known what was happening.
*
Rebecca was in an odd mood when she arrived. She looked at Julia and somehow knew that Julia knew now too. Rebecca had been as horrified as Julia when she had first heard the story. Lucy had arrived back with Isabella about a week ago, just before Rebecca went to see Paul in Perth. Lucy had invited Rebecca for a meal before her trip.
Afterwards, Lucy and Michael had encouraged Izzy to tell the story of her marriage. The true story of the short marriage with Isaac Thompson had been told in stops and starts. Rebecca was somewhat more pragmatic than Julia and realized that what Izzy needed more than anything was lots of support and encouragement to move forward and make positive changes. Rebecca knew Izzy needed to re-establish her self-worth and believe she was a person worthy of being loved.
Chapter 21
A Conversation
Julia and Rebecca dealt with all the import export paperwork. Phoned glass and ceramic artists Australia wide, and planned their re-stock for the busy Christmas period ahead. They worked and skirted around the issue they really needed to talk about. They looked at the schedule of upcoming artist exhibits and discussed the next quarterly catalogue. Rebecca even squeezed i
n returning some calls to some of Tim’s potential clients.
The conversation starter was a call from the ceramic artist, Phyllis, who wanted to speak to Isabella. Rebecca had popped into see if Julia had any idea when or if Izzy could be reached. Rebecca went back to Phyllis and took the message that she had called and promised to pass it on to Isabella who would phone her back. Rebecca made some coffee for both of them and went into Izzy’s office to sit with Julia. “How did we not know?”
“I don’t know?” replied Rebecca. Julia asked Rebecca how she had found out. Rebecca explained that she had been at her parents and able to hear the story from Izzy, with lots of encouragement from Lucy and Michael.
“So, Izzy is home then?” asked Julia.
“Yes, she came back with Mum ten days ago.”
“How did you find out?” Rebecca asked Julia.
“My little brother was told a tiny snippet by Izzy. She apparently wanted to try to be open with him before they became too involved. Then, from what I understand, he found some papers and things in here, hidden down behind filing cabinets. He did some research with the information he had gathered, he compared photos of what she looked like, to how she looks now. He spent, from what I can gather, hours speaking with your mum until he had the full story. He is so deeply affected, he needed to share with Mum, David and I.”
“Do you think Izzy and he will ever be anything?” questioned Rebecca.
“No,” said Julia, “because he seems to have attached himself to Victoria again.”He is in so much pain about it all Rebecca."
“He can’t fix it, he can’t make it better, can’t refurbish it, like this office.”
“It’s good he is working in Perth then, and Paul is good for him to be with.”I hear they are going to Bali at the end of the week."
“Are you jealous, I mean about Bali, I know I am,” said Julia.
“Some cocktails would be the best medicine right now,” replied Rebecca.
“Yeah I know right, and some yoga and massages, some spa treatments, heaven,” said Julia. Just at that moment, Basil reminded them he needed to go for a walk with the cutest little bark.