Caim

by T. S. Simons

  Lying him on our cleared dining table, Sorcha examined him thoroughly and looked up at me, my lip quivering, just holding it together.

  'He is lucky,' she pronounced after an eternity. 'The coldness of the water likely helped. The body shuts down the extremities, squeezing blood to the body and brain and slowing the heart rate. His ribs will heal. I will x-ray them tomorrow. It doesn't look like there will be any lasting effects.'

  I exhaled, and my shoulders slumped forward, unable to maintain the weight any longer.

  'He will need to be closely monitored,' she warned, 'and will need oxygen to ensure he doesn't develop hypoxemia. I'll set it up.'

  Sorcha sent Illy and Luca away, ordering Illy to send my children home. Luca's help was enlisted to move Jorja to Sorcha's home and remain under observation for the night, but passed on instructions that Bridget and their girls could go home. As I stood dripping on the kitchen floor, Sorcha stripped a frozen, exhausted Thorsten, rubbing him briskly, avoiding his chest and dressed him in his favourite warm flannelette pyjamas. The blue ones with bugs on them, I noted. He loved those.

  By the time Cam arrived home a short time later with Louis, filthy and exhausted, Thorsten was sitting up in our bed, oxygen mask fitted, his sisters waiting on him. Cam looked at me puzzled, my jeans still wet and mud-spattered, and his mouth hung open. Sorcha, seeing my distress bubbling over, filled him in.

  'Those little…' he fired up, but Sorcha placed a calming hand on his arm.

  'I suspect Illy will put an end to their troublemaking. At least for a while.'

  Cam simmered down slightly, crossing the room to check on Thorsten. Seeing he was fine, and rather enjoying the attention, he embraced me.

  'Oh fuck, Jorja!' I gasped, remembering my patient.

  'That's okay.' Sorcha said. 'I have taken care of that. You did a damned fine job there. Better than most of the med team. We might call you up to help us when we are overworked. We need an orthopaedic specialist.'

  I heard Sorcha slip out the door as I collapsed in his arms.

  'What happened to Jorja?' Cam murmured as we lay in bed, unable to sleep, Thorsen asleep on a trundle on the floor.

  'Slipped off her doorstep. Snapped her tibia and fibula. It was a nasty break. Especially the tibia. It will take a long time to heal.'

  Cam shuddered. 'Sorcha said you did an amazing job. That is high praise from her. No one meets her exacting standards. So does that mean you have forgiven them? For lying to us?'

  'Not really. I would always help someone in pain, and Jorja needed help. The longer you go without orthopaedic surgery, the greater the risk of complications. Truthfully, I don't think I will ever forgive them, but I sort of understand why they did it. If they had turned up here with those girls and told me the medical team on Auckland were holding Katrin captive, and she had known for years, I would have been furious at them. Refused to let them stay. Questioned why Jorja hadn't done something to save her. By lying to me, I took the time to work through it all. The girls couldn't have been mine. They assessed that I cared enough about Kat to go myself. But mainly the reason they lied to me was to protect their children. The reality is, they didn't need to tell me at all. I have been oblivious for years. They could have stayed on Clava and lived a far more comfortable life. Either there or Auckland would be a safer place to raise children, with far better medical treatment and superior opportunities. I believe Jorja when she says that they left so that their daughters would be free, wouldn't be caught up in the selected breeding program.'

  'You are a wonderful woman.'

  I sniffed derisively. 'I just started with, "I don't think I will ever forgive them." I am no saint. Luca, on the other hand, we owe him. He just plunged in and saved them all. Not just Thorsten. They all could have drowned if he hadn't been there.'

  'How did Isla cope?' Cam asked.

  'Fine, I guess. It isn't like her children were even there.'

  'After all these years, and you never asked her about her life before we came here?'

  'Of course I have. She told me her parents were both doctors, and they encouraged her to go into veterinary science, not medicine, because of the unsocial hours. They met at university in London and then moved to Aberdeen. Isla was born in Scotland but sent to boarding school in England.'

  'Yes, they sent her to boarding school… after her younger sister Rashna drowned whilst they were on holiday visiting her mother's family in India. Isla saw it happen. She was only young, maybe five or six. They were playing near the pool in the hotel, and her sister slipped, banged her head on the concrete and fell in. Isla has never learned to swim herself. Her mother also couldn't swim. Isla is terrified of the water.'

  'Ahh, fuck. No wonder she hung back. Why did she never tell me?'

  'Maybe she didn't want you to know.'

  'How did you?'

  'Lae told me. I suppose Isla confided in her. Lae couldn't swim either, although she was never given the chance.'

  'Not even at school?'

  'Her mother couldn't afford the swimwear or the lesson cost. She also lived in Glasgow. Not Australia. Not exactly summers at the beach and every town with a swimming pool like home. Swimming programs part of the school curriculum. Not all of us grew up with a fully maintained pool in our manicured gardens, darling, with a cabana and a scantily clad pool boy bringing us cocktails.'

  'Holy crap. Can you imagine the fear in them both when the raiders took them?'

  'I suspect nothing I can envisage can come anywhere close to how petrified they must have been. I can't even come up with an equivalent. Fraser told me she still wakes screaming, remembering that time.'

  'I don't understand the fear of water, I admit, but the memories of being held captive I can understand. Do you remember what it felt like when we were kept prisoner at the farm?'

  'I do. Sometimes, for no reason at all, I get flashbacks of being hung from that butcher's hook, wondering if it was possible to die from the pain. But it is likely that is why she never mentioned it to you. You saved her from the raiders along with the others. You saved yourself and me from the farm. She didn't know you well, and she probably didn't want you to see her as a victim.'

  'We have had this conversation, before we went to Auckland. Why didn't she tell me then? I would never see her as a victim.'

  'It doesn't matter that it isn't the truth. It is her perception. Think about it. She watched her sister die, helpless. Then, in her parents' grief, they sent her away, likely in an effort to keep her safe, but what she felt was punished. The raiders kidnapped her and kept her on a boat from which she knew there was no escape. Even if she could get untied and jump overboard, even if the water wasn't toxic, she couldn't save herself. She couldn't swim, and they likely would have killed her before she made it over the side. She was a prisoner in more way than one. Crippled with fear. Then you arrived, all guns blazing, and saved the day. She didn't know you well when you came after me in Edinburgh. So when we came back full of stories of how you had saved yourself and rescued me, complete with scars as proof, she couldn't compete.'

  'It wasn't like that. Anyone would have…'

  'No, they wouldn't. Most people, my love, would have been paralysed with fear the same way Isla was. Most people do not have the cool level-headedness that you possess. Most people could not plan their way out of that. Think of all the skulls we saw. Hundreds. Probably thousands by the time they excavated the pits. Not one of those people managed what you did. Likely no one before us ever got away. Those monsters would have been caught sooner if they had. You, my warrior goddess, are a phenomenal woman.'

  'I wouldn't say that. Seeing Thorsten unconscious was the most terrifying moment of my life. I truly thought he had drowned.'

  'He is your child. Anyone would have been scared. But judging by the state of you when I got home, you were planning to swim after him?'

  'Luca got there first. I'm so glad he was there. I can never thank him enough.'


  'So, you would have swum out to him yourself. Then you helped with the CPR. I don't know many people who could do that on their own child, but you did, even when his ribs snapped. Illy told me you didn't even flinch. Likely you make Isla feel inadequate. She can't swim, and you don't hesitate to dive fully clothed into an icy lake to save six kids. You are a hero, and that is how Isla sees you. Is there any wonder that she doesn't tell you about her fears?'

  'I'm no hero. How do I deal with this? Make her see I am nothing special?'

  'You don't. You don't need to fix problems, Frey. Just be aware of them and be there.'

  'That is stupid advice. Who told you that?'

  'Two people, actually. A psychologist of mine told my mother once that it wasn't necessary to fight my battles for me. When I was bullied at school, or people treated me badly, mum would always want to fix it. Mum and Sorcha are so alike. Mum would rage in on her high horse, demanding a meeting or that something be done. Fired off an angry letter demanding answers. But this woman made mum stop and think. Instead of responding, "How can I fix that?" she told her to just be there for me and say, "That must have felt terrible." Just be there emotionally and let me deal with it. Goodness mum struggled with that.' Cam smirked. 'I used to watch her fighting with it. Sitting back and doing nothing wasn't her way.'

  'It isn't Sorcha's either. It is what makes her such a good doctor. She sees a problem, and she fixes it. She was wonderful with Thorsten, by the way. Just took control. There aren't many people who would order Luca to do something, but she did. And he complied.'

  'There is no way we can express our thanks to him, is there?' Cam murmured, thinking aloud. 'He saved our son. I owe him an enormous debt. Although I suppose it was his daughters that took him out there and tied Katrin up.'

  Not wanting to dwell on the recalcitrant twins, I asked, 'You said there were two places you learned it wasn't necessary to fix problems.'

  Cam paused, and I knew the answer.

  'Laetitia?'

  'She taught me the value of standing back and taking it in. Just being there for the person, in many ways, is better than trying to solve their problem.'

  'She was very different to me, wasn't she?' I phrased it as a rhetorical question, but he answered it anyway.

  'In some ways, you couldn't be more different. But in others, you are very alike. Your loyalty to your family and friends in particular. You both place those you care about at the centre of your world, and they know, without doubt, that they are loved.'

  'Do you?'

  'Every minute of every day.'

  Cam had that distant, unfocused look as he gazed out the window, his coffee going cold clutched in his hands.

  'Got something planned for today?'

  Cam pulled his attention away from his thoughts to look at me.

  'Just the usual. You?'

  'I'm heading up to the north-eastern crofts. Probably my last trip before winter, and no one has been for a while, so I might be late. Can you organise dinner for the kids?'

  Cam nodded. 'Could you swing past town?'

  'Sure. I need to get some supplies from the warehouses. I used a lot of my consumables on Jorja last week. Why?'

  'Well, I am sure she appreciates it. She is home now, thanks to you. Do you think we could ask Bodhi for a large supply of meat?'

  That wasn't at all what I was expecting. I raised my eyebrows mid-bite of buttered toast. 'Why? Got a sudden hankering to be a raging carnivore? Not feeling the urge to convert to veganism?'

  Cam's wandering attention focused on me, and he grinned. Neither Cam nor Luca could deal with the predominantly plant-based diet we ate. Both moaned for meat at least twice a week, Luca more so. Even whilst travelling, Luca had a ravenous appetite, largely unsatiated with canned food, pasta, and rice. Fortunately, he was a superb cook. Jamie, since meeting Jacinda, had become vegetarian. Several times, in the privacy of our home, Cam had griped that Jacinda was slowly murdering him. "She may as well ram a carrot stick through his heart". But Jamie appeared happy, and their children were thriving.

  'I'm thinking that it is time we hosted a celebration, a Thanksgiving, if you can call it that. A party. You know, our way of saying thank you.'

  'For Luca, you mean?' Luca had bluntly ordered me the day before to stop thanking him for saving Thorsten's life. His daughters were responsible, so he was happy to have done what he did. I had agreed, but still didn't consider that words were adequate for the gift he had given me.

  'Luca loves meat. He would love a barbeque, or a dinner, although we couldn't invite Jamie and Jacinda if you are planning a roast.'

  'Absolutely, for Luca. The man lives for food. But… it is for everyone, really. If you think about it, many people have enabled us to live the life we have. My sister and Di, Jamie and Jacinda, even Fraser and Isla have picked up the load so many times. But outside of Roseglen, Hamish and the entire medical team picked up the slack when we needed Sorcha here. Going back a few years, the people who helped when Louis sustained the head injury. Those who supported me when Lae, Isla and the others were taken. Everyone who helped when we went to Edinburgh, to Newgrange. Every single person here, in some way, has supported us. Helped us. I can't think of a better way to say thank you than to host a party—can you?'

  I could see where he was going and nodded. I swallowed my mouthful of toast. 'It is a great idea,' I acknowledged, but addressed the elephant in the room. 'Won't you struggle with so many people in your home?'

  'Yes,' he admitted, 'but it will be by choice. There is time to prepare. I'm also not thinking in our home. I doubt I could cope with that. Initially, I thought of lunch but realised that by the time everyone got here, they will stay for hours, so dinner makes more sense. Those with young children might go home early. But I accept we will have guests, at least for one night.'

  'I could clear out the vet shed, and people could bunk down in there?'

  'That is a great idea. We can put on a big breakfast the following morning, and everyone could be on their way?'

  I smiled at his enthusiasm. Cam was friendly, not social, as he phrased it. He found it confronting and uncomfortable to have people around, and especially lots of people. This must mean a lot to him.

  'When would you like to do this?'

  'A few weeks? Autumn equinox? People need time to get organised, and we need to arrange all the food and such.'

  'How are you planning to feed so many people? Our kitchen isn't that big. We can barely cope with cooking for eight or ten people for Christmas with that tiny oven.' I was no cook. Cam usually did the cooking when we entertained. But half the community?

  'It will take some work, but I am thinking of a fire pit. Digging a pit in the ground, heating stones, and cooking meats and vegetables. I can't see any other way to feed so many people. A hangi, the Maori call it.'

  'They are fabulous. I have been to a few myself when my family travelled across the Pacific. Lots of communities have a similar method. I remember a fantastic bougna our family went to in northern New Caledonia. Fish, chicken, cassava, and lots of root vegetables I had never tried before.'

  'That's it. Jamie gave me the idea.'

  'Jamie was talking about meat?' I asked curiously.

  'Not exactly. We were talking about celebrations, and he mentioned he had been to a few before he left New Zealand. It got me thinking. It would be nice to host an annual event. Something that brings everyone together.'

  'What about the smoke?'

  'We can avoid generating a lot of smoke, Jamie tells me. While traditionally, the Maori used fire to heat the rocks, it is the hot coals that form the underground steam oven. We can get the biogas quite high, so if we heat the rocks in the ovens overnight, it should have the same effect. A small amount of smoke will be produced when we open it up, but it will be minimal, and mostly steam.'

  'Are you sure you want to invite everyone?'

  'I figure if we are going to the trouble of digging a pit
or two, we may as well make it worth our while.'

  Standing and placing my dirty dishes in the sink, hoping one of the kids would wash them, I turned to him.

  'I will ask Bodhi. But you may need to come up with a better name for your gathering. Thanksgiving has negative connotations to native Americans. Much like Australia Day to indigenous Australians. Not that there are any native Americans here, but we have worked hard to leave offensive traditions behind.'

  'Really?'

  Not really having time to explain in detail, I suggested, 'What about a harvest festival? I assume you want music and entertainment as well as food? Many cultures hold a harvest festival to give thanks, both to the earth for her bounty, but also it was a way to celebrate each other and recognise the season's hard work before the long winter hours.'

  Cam considered for a moment. 'I like it. The Roseglen Harvest Festival.'

  Weeks of gruelling preparation led to the big night. Children running around happily, playing in large groups. Parents collectively sharing the load, keeping a watchful eye on them all and jumping on silliness before it got out of hand. All the Roseglen residents were busy. I had been tasked with ferrying vegetables, meats, and other items to be cooked from the cool rooms to the pit. On one of my trips between the house and hangi pit, I overheard Luca giving Ally and Summer a lecture about playing appropriately. In the lull, Ally enquired, in the sweetest voice possible, 'What is appropriate play, daddy?'

  Thorsten's tiny voice piped up in the pause, 'Well, no tying people up. Unless you are a grown-up and it is con-sen-shoo-all.' He sounded out the strange word. 'Then it is okay, isn't it?' he asked in a very earnest tone.