Blueberry

by Glenna Thomson

  I took a mouthful of the pinot and rolled it around my mouth before swallowing. So. I wouldn’t live on my knees either. I would stand and turn away from the people and things I didn’t want in my life. Nick. Lena. Michael. Jane. Spinning stories for the twenty-four-hour media beast. The list was long. The traffic, always chasing the clock, being in a hurry, being tired, feeling guilty about Sophie, being lonely, just being.

  I would make an offer on Charlie’s property. In that moment, I wanted to move to Huntly more than anything, to Charlie’s house and I wished I was already there. It was bloody madness and felt dangerous. But I was going to do it.

  It was past ten and too late to call Mark, so I kept researching – doing my sums, working out how much the apartment was worth and what I could afford to pay. I sent Nick a matter-of-fact email with no mention of the magazine article. He would be getting enough raves from his fan club.

  I’m planning to buy a blueberry orchard in North East Victoria, but am short on funds. Am proposing you forfeit child maintenance for your share in the apartment. Then I can proceed. Please advise asap.

  I walked away from my half-filled glass and went to bed.

  In the morning when I woke, the decision still stood. From my bed, I stared across the room into the side of the rosewood wardrobe, testing how it would be to sell up and move to Charlie’s property. I played it out in my mind, and there I was in the house already with a new galley kitchen with an island bench in the middle. My stomach tightened with fear at everything ahead of me. It was all unknown and so many things could go wrong. But when I considered the alternative – staying in the apartment and getting another job – I wanted to turn on my side and go back to sleep.

  In my dressing gown, I sat at Nick’s desk and downloaded my emails, watching for his name, not really expecting a reply. The kettle boiled and stopped and as I went to stand, there it was. Nick Wilkinson.

  A blueberry orchard!! Sounds brilliant. Go for it. Happy to do whatever to facilitate. Nick

  That he was supportive of me buying an orchard was not a real surprise. We had talked about quitting the city and finding a quiet place to live in the country. But his open enthusiasm for me to live our dream on my own upset me. I felt very alone.

  I tried to hold off a couple of hours before calling Mark but couldn’t wait past eight. He didn’t answer, so I left a message.

  He called me back at nine.

  ‘They want four hundred and fifty thousand, right?’

  ‘That’s a fair price,’ he said. ‘And you’ll make good money on the blueberries. I’ve told you that already.’

  ‘I’ll pay three hundred and seventy thousand. And I want the old Fergie tractor and trailer and ride-on mower thrown in.’

  ‘That won’t be accepted.’

  ‘I’ve been checking land values. Properties around Huntly have been selling for three and a half thousand an acre. The house needs a lot of work. The orchard is rundown. There are no records on how the property even makes money. It’s not worth four-fifty.’

  ‘What’s your best offer?’

  ‘Four hundred. With the machinery included.’

  ‘All right then. I’ll put it to Warren.’

  There was nothing to do except wait for Mark Palmer to call. With Sophie at school the apartment felt claustrophobic – there was too much of Nick around the place, all his artefacts and gifts from his travels. I wanted air, to feel the cold on my skin, so for a good part of three days I sat on a wrought-iron chair out on the balcony, rugged up in my pink ski jacket killing time. It was just me and the dead plants in their pots, two turned on their sides – a pitiful symbol that I was no orchardist. I put my feet up on the opposite chair and stared into the unknown future, trying to imagine what it would be like to work outside every day and to be my own boss. Knowing Charlie’s wife Audrey had managed the orchard was my only comfort. I tried to erase the memory of Michael. And I kept thinking Lena might call – she liked me, I was her senior consultant. For sure by now she would need me. I chewed my fingernails and flicked through fashion magazines and drank Earl Grey tea until I couldn’t stand the taste. When Sophie was home from school we walked to the park, taking big and small steps along the footpaths so we didn’t tread on any lines. At the local pool we played Mermaids and Dolphins, a made up game with imaginary waterfalls and underwater caves. And when she was in bed, I reached in and took another of Nick’s wines.

  By Thursday I couldn’t stand the waiting any longer so went to Prahran market. It was there, staring into the display of fish, deciding between a tuna fillet and rockling, that I had a vague thought that my phone was ringing. I grappled with the zip on my bag and by the time I answered, I was sure it’d be too late.

  ‘Hello. Greer speaking.’

  ‘Mark Palmer here.’

  Inhale. I turned away from the fishmonger.

  ‘I have good news for you. Warren’s accepted.’

  And when I told him the news was very good, it belied my shock – the feeling that everything around me was suddenly silent and far away. Glass doors opened into a courtyard. I found a chair at the end of a long table already taken by a group of old men drinking coffee and talking. They glanced at me, not knowing my life had just changed forever.

  Mark Palmer wanted my email address and the name of my solicitor. My mind was blank. I couldn’t recall any of it, except my solicitor had dark hair and worked out of a terrace building off Commercial Road.

  ‘I’ll have to text you later,’ I said.

  And I did, anxiously, and remained tense and disbelieving until he finally replied, saying all was good.

  That night, I put my ski jacket on and opened the balcony door. Cold air pinched my face. I was happy. Leaning against the rail, I stared to the left, between my apartment block and the next one, over the neighbourhood rooftops, the dome of the Coptic church, the faint narrow lines of the cityscape and out into the horizon, and further than that. My mind flew up the Hume Highway, into Euroa, along the winding roads into Huntly and I felt a gentle ache for the house on Josephs Road that was waiting for me.

  The auction was held on Saturday 16 May at two in the afternoon. It was a clear, cold autumn day and the breeze had a chill to it. I’d dressed the place up, boxed all the clutter – Nick’s books, old photo files and clothes – and stacked them in the cupboards down the hall. I’d wiped every surface, fluffed up the cushions and put tall-stemmed irises in a glass vase on the coffee table.

  Jane came early to help, but she was no use, walking around texting, living her life as I was changing mine. There was an undiscussed vibe between us now, since I’d described over drinks one night how traumatic it’d been for Sophie when she’d left her alone with Jacob, Liam’s housemate. She’d breathed in and glared at me as if I were unappreciative.

  ‘Jacob’s a good bloke,’ she’d said. ‘He’s got kids of his own. It was fine.’

  ‘It wasn’t fine.’

  And so we’d not bothered much with each other since.

  Jane went to the fridge and took out the champagne.

  ‘It’s for after. When I’ve sold,’ I said.

  She ripped the foil wrapper off.

  ‘Not now.’

  ‘Don’t be so uptight.’

  ‘I’m not uptight.’

  ‘What are you selling up for anyway? Nick gets his picture in a magazine, and a new girlfriend, and you run away.’

  ‘Is that what you think?’

  ‘That’s what everyone thinks.’

  So there it was. Jane and I no longer liked or understood each other. It seemed strange, yet unsurprising. We’d been through a lot together. I’d taken her to the clinic and cared for her afterwards when she had her abortion, and held her as she wept when her married boss broke up their affair. So how long had we been pretending?

  ‘Maybe you should go,’ I said.

  ‘I think I will.’

  And she did.

  I stared into the space where she’d been standing and had no
words – none that I could grab hold of, anyway. I was frightened enough without her, or anyone else’s judgement or baggage weighing me down. With the champagne back in the fridge, I made a sandwich lunch for Sophie and me.

  When the bidders and gawkers arrived they entered a warm, attractive apartment with plenty of light. No matter what I thought of Nick, his vast collection of art, paintings and sculptures made for interesting viewing. Angus & Julia Stone played softly from the dock. Freshly ground coffee beans made the kitchen smell like a café. The apartment was cramped as people wandered around, taking it all in.

  The couple who bid the highest were from the outer suburbs, overweight and in their fifties. He was an electrician and she worked in a primary school office. It was an investment property, they said. The rental market in Prahran was good and a thirty-day settlement was fine. They paid a few thousand over the reserve, which meant I had some extra money. She was already talking about painted feature walls, one in turquoise, and changing the curtains. She frowned at the kitchen and made a small clucking sound of disapproval. That’s where Nick had spent days cooking Moroccan banquets and Cypriot mezes for our friends. And the bedrooms would have built-in robes. My grandmother’s solid rosewood wardrobes, with the mirror panels and silver rosettes, would come to Huntly with us. As for the lighting, he was going to redo it all, fit the place out with with LEDs. He was surprised I’d not already had them installed. I stood, amazed, with no idea what he was talking about.

  At the front door they shook my hand while glancing over my shoulder. They had already claimed the place as their own.

  The apartment was quiet when everyone left. Sophie put on the TV. And I pulled one fluted glass from the cupboard and opened the champagne.

  7

  THE tyres thrummed across the cattle grid as I drove down the driveway, through the archway of naked liquidambars. A faint mist was in the air, among the trees and rising from the ground. Potholes slushed with dead leaves tinged red and gold. The sky was low and grey.

  When the house came into view I stopped the car.

  ‘We’re here.’

  Sophie unclipped her belt and hurdled across the backseat and onto my lap – the two of us stared through the windscreen at our home. It loomed very large, larger than I remembered. The Prahran apartment would fit inside it three times. The car shuddered with a gust of wind from the south.

  Autumn had passed. The heavy weight of the climbing rose along the front veranda had fallen and now drooped halfway to the tiled floor. The garden was lush and overgrown. A magpie was watching us, head side-on, from the dry stone wall that separated the garden from the driveway.

  Sophie’s arms were folded on the steering wheel as she stared, wide-eyed, into this new life I’d been telling her about. No more after-school care and we would buy a dog – two easy promises to make her smile.

  ‘What do you think?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s big and old and looks a bit …’

  ‘A bit what?’

  ‘A bit wrecked.’

  My only comfort was on the floor in the backseat. In my canvas briefcase were two folders: ‘House’ and ‘Orchard’. Inside were lists and pages of notes of things to do, budgets, timelines on activities and contact numbers. I was as organised as I could be.

  I pulled up outside the back door. The gravel was spotted with weeds and the lawn was overrun with capeweed. The clothesline slowly turned. The cold hit as we stepped out of the car so I grabbed our coats and hurried us up the back steps, running towards warmth. I pulled the flywire door open, set the key in the lock, twisted and pushed.

  The house smelt like mulch in a dark forest and it was colder inside than out. Holding hands, we stepped through the sliding glass doorway into the ugly kitchen with its green laminate benches and burnt-orange tiles. The first time I was here I hadn’t noticed how much mission brown there was. On the kitchen bench was a manual for the hot water service and oven. There were some keys, with no note to say what they were for.

  In the lounge, there were large milky imprints on the walls where Charlie’s paintings had hung. The Persian rugs were gone and we stood on thin floral carpet. The leather couch and armchairs and his antique furniture had been hefted up and carried away and his clutter had been removed.

  It was easy to conjure the atmosphere from the last time I had stood here – Charlie’s jazz, the muted wail of a sax, the warmth, and the charm from his things lying around.

  The stillness was unsettling and I kept glancing around trying to listen beyond the perfect quiet. I looked down at the length of my body – the pink ski jacket, jeans and boots, the closest outfit I had for country living – and was glad Sophie was the only witness to this forsaken shell that was now our home.

  Our footsteps echoed as we walked the loop of the house: down the hall, glancing into the cold, empty bedrooms and back into the kitchen. When I pushed the amber glass dining room doors open, Marilyn was still hanging on the wall, waiting for us. The brightness of her colours shocked me. As I stood before her I considered Charlie’s artistic boldness: the thick carved oil strokes and Marilyn herself, that brazen red pout and black-lashed half wink. Beside her, I was small – she was twice as wide as my outstretched arms and half my height again. Since Charlie’s personality had been erased from the house, neither of us fitted here now. I reached out and touched her as if for comfort.

  My skin prickled with the cold and I moved deeper into my jacket. When I reached for Sophie’s hand it was icy and condensation puffed from her mouth.

  The firebox’s glass door was stained with soot, the handle stiff to open. Inside was the ash from Charlie’s last fire. I pictured a teepee of paper and little twigs and bark. I knew what to do.

  It was gloomy inside the woodshed. A dark uneven line of logs was stacked against the back wall. There would be spiders, mice, maybe rats or possums, but it was the idea of unearthing a snake that made me hesitate. Even though I knew they’d be underground hibernating, I stomped and kicked at the fallen bark and threw pieces of wood at the stack to scare away anything in there. Then I grabbed a log and ran breathless, load after load, one by one, to the back door, before hauling them inside to the hearth. I made the teepee. I hadn’t thought to bring matches. A tight twist of a ripped notebook page against the stove’s gas flame and smoke trailed from the kitchen to the lounge as I ran. The paper smouldered on the kindling and I closed the firebox door. I waited and watched it die. Again and again. I wrapped Sophie in a blanket.

  By five it was getting dark. I put the lights on, pulled the blind down, tugged the triple-pleated purple shantung curtains closed and locked the doors and windows. The removalists were arriving the next morning so I laid out our sleeping bags and set up camp on the lounge room floor. I thought of going to the neighbour for matches, but it would feel awkward introducing myself then asking for something. So I tried to light the fire again, this time with an elaborate mix of bark, tiny twigs and paper. The dash from the gas flame to the waiting teepee created a whimpering glow and this time it stayed. Slowly I added expanded sizes: a pine cone that I’d found, a small log and another. The fire didn’t grow, remained a tired pathetic thing, but it gave comfort, if not for its warmth then because at least it was half-alive.

  Dinner was sushi I had brought up from Melbourne. Adele tried to keep us company, but the music ricocheted too sharply off the empty walls and high ceiling, making me feel more alone than before. I turned her off and Sophie and I sat side-by-side on the floor. For a moment, I thought I heard the skate of a Chapel Street tram and the faraway racing of city traffic, but then I saw where I really was, sitting in the lounge room of a big cold house surrounded by a garden and vast unknown paddocks.

  I took a selfie of the two of us sitting on top of our sleeping bags, chins up, with sushi in hand. It was another snap-freeze grin from Sophie, the on-command smile, and I posted it on Facebook.

  When she fell asleep, cocooned in a sleeping bag and blanket, I ran my hand down her long brown curl
s. Nick’s hair, not mine.

  I had saved his last and best red for this night. The shiraz gleamed prettily in the glass and I drank as the Facebook likes and comments came in. Forty likes in half an hour and a dozen comments, all cheerfully dreary. Looks like you’re having fun. The fire looks warm. Sophie is so cute … I was happy to have the attention and at the same time depressed at being cheered in such a witless way. I drank the first glass too fast.

  The wind picked up. I could hear the pressure billowing against the side of the house. Something clattered on the roof.

  Then the bleep of another Facebook comment. The wireless connection from the Huntly tower was slow. I stared into the screen and waited.

  Nick Wilkinson had sent a comment.

  My heart quickened.

  Sophie was an arm’s length away, now on her back. Her eyelids were perfectly still, rosebud lips slightly apart. Her dad had momentarily connected with me, rather than her, for the first time in weeks. The last time had been via my solicitor: him signing the Prahran apartment over to me, in lieu of child support.