Meet Me in Bendigo

by Eva Scott

  ‘Won’t be the first time,’ he said as he lugged the bag off the bed.

  ‘Are you sure you want to go through with this?’

  ‘You’re more cautious than when you were egging me on to sell you my shares.’ Ripley, sporting a fresh red bandana, nudged his hand, keen to be off on the adventure.

  ‘Perhaps because I feel there is more at stake this time. Money is a concept. Love is real.’ Virginia sighed and he wondered how lonely she must feel. Whatever his father’s faults, Virginia had loved him deeply.

  ‘Which is why I have to go and do this. I have to show Annalisa the truth of who I am. You’ll know if I crashed and burned because I’ll be right back here looking for a shoulder to cry on.’

  She cupped his face with her hand, the diamonds on her fingers glinting in the light. ‘You will always be my little boy,’ she said. ‘I want to protect you from getting hurt.’

  ‘Too late for that. The world has been in and given me a good kicking already.’ He gave her a kiss on the cheek. ‘Don’t worry. I’m laying my cards on the table and while that’s scary, it’s also the right time. I have to stop hiding and put the past where it belongs.’

  ‘Good advice,’ she said. ‘Speaking of which, I’ve been wondering if it’s time for me to start dating again.’

  ‘Have you?’ He was genuinely struck by surprise.

  ‘Would you mind?’

  ‘Why would I mind?’ Again with the surprise.

  ‘I’d be replacing your father, I guess.’ She looked worried.

  ‘No one could ever replace Dad. Not possible.’ Ed laughed. ‘What you’d be doing is starting over and I think Dad would understand.’

  She nodded, tears glistening in her eyes. ‘I think you might be right.’

  Ed looked around the guesthouse, checking for anything he may have left unpacked. The place looked as neat as a hotel room after room service had been in. All that was missing was the chocolate on the pillow and, yes, his mother liked to put them there for overnight guests.

  ‘I’m going to miss Ripley,’ she said. The dog cocked his head at the sound of his name, no doubt hoping to hear it connected with a word for food.

  ‘We’ll come visit. I’ve clocked up so many miles coming and going from Wongilly that I think the car will know its own way. We may even be back by Saturday night.’ Ed made light of the fact he could fail in his mission.

  He’d deliberately stayed away from Annalisa for the past three days in preparation for Saturday. Friday did not come fast enough. Today he’d drive to a motel and spend a sleepless night worrying that he might have got everything wrong.

  ‘Don’t say that. Everything is going to be fine. How could Annalisa resist you?’

  He chuckled nervously. ‘Well, it’s been complicated between us so she might just.’

  Ed hadn’t been able to find a way to explain himself properly to his mother or to himself, so how was he supposed to tell Annalisa that things had started innocently enough, that he never meant to feel anything for her. She’d snuck up on him and before he’d known it, he’d come to rely on her sunshine during his darkest days.

  Then he met her and fell completely.

  ‘No going back now.’ He ruffled Ripley’s ears, grateful the chocolate lab would be down for the ride. He could use the additional courage from the dog’s big heart.

  GardenerGuy94 FRI @ 7:13 PM

  Tomorrow is the big day! Confirming that you’ll meet me in Bendigo at the Botanic Gardens in the Garden for the Future, a perfect place to talk about the start of us.

  GoldfieldsGirl FRI @ 7:16 PM

  I can’t wait! I’ll be there.

  GardenerGuy94 FRI @ 7:17 PM

  Let’s exchange photos. I’ll send you one of me and you send a similar one back. Here’s mine. [FILE ATTACHED]

  GoldfieldsGirl FRI @ 7:25 PM

  You look so cute! How old are you? Three? I bet you wouldn’t wear that outfit now. I’d pay to see you in it. Do you still look like that? Here’s mine. No laughing. [FILE ATTACHED]

  GardenerGuy94 FRI @ 7:26 PM

  You look so sweet in your tutu with your hair in bunches. Was that your first dance recital?

  GoldfieldsGirl FRI @ 7:28 PM

  Yes, it was. All the other girls had ballerina buns but I had too much hair and my bun looked about the size of my head. We settled for crazy bunches to save my mother a breakdown.

  GardenerGuy94 FRI @ 7:29 PM

  Did you have a nickname as a child? Something your family called you?

  GoldfieldsGirl FRI @ 7:30 PM

  Sure did. I’ll share mine if you share yours first.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Saturday morning brunch got off to an awkward start.

  ‘Your nickname was Possum Pie?’ Ed’s fork, containing a good stab of bacon, stopped halfway to his mouth. His expression told Annalisa he was contemplating whether to laugh or not.

  ‘Come on, it’s not that bad.’ Annalisa rested her fork on her plate and contemplated her brunch companion. He’d given in to his instinct to laugh, his face relaxing and becoming even more watchable than usual. She noticed other women in the café looking his way and a stab of proprietary jealousy shot through her.

  Ed stopped chuckling long enough for the bacon to finish its journey. He shook his head as he chewed. ‘Sounds very May Gibbs.’

  ‘Exactly, it’s cute.’ She took a sip of her coffee, making a note to ask Ed how to stop her brew tasting bitter. ‘You must have had a nickname when you were a kid.’

  ‘My mum called me Eddie when I was good and Edward when I was naughty. Rosie and Oliver called me Shithead when no one was looking.’

  ‘That’s terrible. I don’t know about siblings. Do they all behave like that or just yours?’

  ‘I think mine are in the minority. It must have been hard to have me come along and steal their thunder, being much cuter than either of them.’ He grinned as he cut into his corn fritter.

  ‘You know what Nonna always says? Self-praise is no recommendation.’ She liked watching him eat. Hell, she just liked watching him. She ate some of her eggs benedict, more for show than out of hunger.

  Her meeting with GardenerGuy94 later in the day had her stomach tied up in knots. She hadn’t told Ed about it yet and she had no idea how. He’d suggested brunching in his favourite café in Bendigo before GardenerGuy94 had suggested meeting in the nearby Botanic Gardens. Things couldn’t have worked out more conveniently if they’d tried.

  ‘What was GardenerGuy94’s nickname then? You know you want to tell me.’

  ‘Budgie. His dad used to call him Budgie.’

  ‘Why, because he’s so small? It’s that Napoleon thing, isn’t it?’

  ‘I have no idea why but he did send me a super cute photo of him at the beach when he was a toddler.’

  She’d loved the photo of the little boy with soft, round baby limbs and a mop of unruly blond hair peering up from under a floppy sun hat at the photographer, who’d interrupted the serious work of digging a hole in the sand at the beach.

  ‘Let me get this straight.’ Ed sat back and regarded her over his coffee. ‘You’re in an online relationship with a catfish named Budgie who sent you a childhood photo of himself as a way of identification?’

  ‘Good god, for the hundredth and ninety-ninth time, he is not a catfish.’

  Ed shrugged. ‘Maybe the photo is his way of telling you he’s underage.’

  ‘Now you’re being ridiculous.’ He had an unerring way of getting under her skin, and they’d been having such a pleasant morning too.

  ‘This man, this Budgie—he’s got you primed for the taking.’ Ed put his coffee aside and leaned in, as if sharing a confidence, his voice low so none of the other patrons could hear. They probably thought he was being romantic instead of chewing her out for her perceived naivety. So annoying.

  ‘He’s played on your emotions,’ he continued, relentless in his analysis, ‘creating an intimacy between you until you’re sure he is the only
guy for you.’

  ‘It’s not like that, Ed.’ She sighed, sick and tired of defending herself to everyone.

  ‘Sure it is.’ He would not let it go. The table suddenly felt small and overcrowded.

  ‘You don’t know him like I know him.’ Even to her own ears, her protest sounded lame, like every other lovelorn person who’d gone before her.

  ‘Me and the old guys are really concerned you’re being catfished.’ He sat back, allowing the space between them to return to normal proportions.

  ‘You’ve been talking about me behind my back?’ Her voice went up an octave with rising outrage. No wonder Joe had been so supportive of Ed. They were in cahoots.

  ‘Are you finished?’

  ‘I’m only getting started.’ Annoyance, the loyal handmaiden to anger, began to work up a head of steam.

  ‘I don’t mean the argument,’ he said. ‘I meant breakfast.’

  She looked at her plate, distracted by the sudden change of topic. ‘I guess.’

  ‘Good, then let’s go for a walk in the park. We can argue there without an audience.’ He stood up and nodded over his shoulder towards two women who quickly turned their attention back to their coffee cups.

  ‘Agreed.’ Her hand moved automatically to where her locket normally lay—a habit that might take a while to break.

  He held the café door open for her and she stepped into the spring sunshine. She could feel the promise of summer in the air, as if it simmered in the background, waiting its turn.

  ‘I couldn’t help noticing you’re not wearing your locket.’

  ‘I took it off. I thought it might be time to, you know, move on.’

  He nodded, letting the subject drop. Thankfully, as right now she wasn’t up to explaining how wearing Ben’s locket had begun to feel odd in light of her romantic feelings for GardenerGuy94 and her very lustful ones for Ed. She’d buried Ben and while his sweet memory would always be with her, it was time to let him rest.

  They walked in silence until they reached the Bendigo Botanic Gardens. The park was ablaze with flowers, bobbing their heads in the gentle breeze as if excited to be making their annual appearance.

  ‘Right, as I was saying—’

  ‘Don’t bother.’ She held up her hand to stop Ed going any further. ‘I know what you’re going to say and nothing is going to stop me from meeting him.’

  ‘You’re meeting him? When?’ Ed seemed genuinely surprised, shocked even.

  ‘This afternoon,’ she said, a little sheepish over how long it had taken for her to tell him. ‘I didn’t want to say anything to avoid having this conversation.’

  ‘Too bad, we’re having it. More so now I know you’re going to be meeting this bloke.’ He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and hunched his shoulders, straining the material of his T-shirt across the muscles of his back. The gesture told her he’d dug in and she’d have little choice but to listen.

  ‘If you have to lecture me, get on with it so we can move on to more pleasant topics,’ she conceded with poor grace.

  ‘I found an online article explaining how to tell if you’re being catfished. Let’s run through the key signs, shall we?’

  They walked slowly, taking their time past the bright orange and yellow poppies and pansies billowing out of their flowerbed, as if trying to make a break for it.

  ‘The first sign is your relationship has progressed quickly.’

  ‘Sure, that’s true but so what? When you know it’s right, you know.’ She desperately wanted to sound less defensive.

  ‘There is so much I could counter to that argument but let me agree on half a point, you’d know if you’d met him. I’ll concede that.’

  ‘Why, you are too kind, sir,’ she said with saccharine sweetness.

  He shot her a sideways glance in response to her sarcasm.

  ‘On a serious note’—she couldn’t let him win a point— ‘we’ve been talking for months and before you say a word about the opaque nature of online relationships, let me say that they are about listening to each other in a way face-to-face relationships often do not satisfy.’

  ‘Honestly? So, you’re telling me you’ve got nothing meaningful out of our … exchanges.’

  She couldn’t stop the blush blooming on her cheeks, no doubt in a shade matching the red rhododendrons they now passed.

  ‘You know what I mean,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘When you’re writing to someone, you read what they say and they read what you say. You both pay attention to what’s being said.’

  ‘Like pen pals?’

  She felt certain he was trying to goad her.

  ‘Moving right along, what’s number two?’

  ‘You’re going to like this one,’ he said gleefully. ‘They never show their face.’

  ‘You forget, he sent me a photo of himself.’

  ‘Yeah, of when he was three. I don’t think that counts. He could look completely different as a grown man.’

  ‘Nevertheless, I do have a photo of him.’ She stubbornly refused to concede the point even though she knew he was right. The photo she had told her little about the man and gave away nothing about who he’d grown into. ‘I’m sure you’ve got another point to make,’ she said grumpily.

  ‘I’m only doing this for your own good. Besides, I promised Joe I’d talk to you before you did anything rash.’ He sounded so self-righteous she could push him over into the bed of green, spikey grass things they walked beside.

  Ed kicked a stone that skidded across the path to disappear into the manicured lawn.

  ‘Okay, let’s move on to number three. At some point in the relationship they ask for money, usually to help a sick relative or child. Maybe to help pay off a debt they’re being threatened over. Something like that.’

  ‘Nope. Definitely not. Got you there. He has never asked me for money.’ She shook her head—she was on firmer ground now.

  ‘Not yet. How about sign number four: they seem too good to be true?’

  Her high ground crumbled beneath her feet. GardenerGuy94 seemed perfect for her in every way. They understood each other and she told him everything. Was he too good to be true?

  ‘Oh, I forgot.’ Ed slapped his forehead dramatically. ‘He stood you up, so not perfect in every way.’

  He’d conceded the point so why did she feel like he’d scored one?

  ‘How many more of these signs have you got?’

  ‘At least three but I’m happy to make up more if it helps.’ He grinned in a way that made her suspect Ed enjoyed torturing her.

  ‘I’ll let you have one more and then we’re done.’ If it hadn’t been for the sun, warm on her bare arms, and the undeniably magnetic quality of her unwanted attraction to Ed, the morning might have been ruined. Yet there was something about walking in the park with Delicious Ed while he teased her and challenged her that buoyed her heart at the same time it drove her nuts.

  The wattle looked pretty this year, their fluffy petals so soft she could imagine lying down on a bed of them and sleeping the rest of Ed’s catfish points away.

  ‘Number five,’ he announced, ‘he has an elaborate backstory.’

  ‘Nope.’ She shook her head.

  ‘You’re kidding me? All that stuff about working for his family and how he feels trapped.’

  ‘When did I ever say anything about him being trapped?’ She frowned, trying to place the conversation.

  ‘You probably didn’t,’ said Ed. ‘As someone who also works unwillingly for his family, I can tell you with all authority you do feel trapped.’

  ‘I guess,’ she said. Hadn’t she felt burdened by her family of ghosts, trying to keep their legacy alive when they would never be able to appreciate the effort? ‘You’ve got to admit, his story is no different to yours or mine, and you can’t call either of ours elaborate.’

  They walked on, falling into an easy step with each other, as if walking in the park was something they did every Saturday morning. Her sun dress of burnt
orange linen brushed her legs as she walked, an odd sensation for someone who lived in jeans. She wondered if she should have worn something she felt more comfortably herself in.

  The wind took hold of her hair and whipped it around her face so she was forced to stop and get control of it again. Ed stopped beside her, turning to face her as he waited. He made no move to start walking again once she was done.

  ‘You know,’ he said, ‘I sometimes wonder if I hadn’t been a Carpenter and you hadn’t been the last Cappelli …’ He hesitated, shifting his weight from one leg to another. Annalisa went perfectly still, a pressure in her chest telling her something big was coming. She swallowed hard.

  ‘If we’d just met in some little bar or coffee shop in a laneway in Melbourne, in some other universe maybe …’ His stellar-blue eyes captured hers and she could not look away, held captive by the intensity behind his words, the longing she heard echoed in her own heart.

  ‘I know,’ she whispered, willing him to stop before he broke her heart.

  ‘… I would have got your number and I would have sent you a text the next day to ask you out.’ Ed’s voice became more urgent. ‘I wouldn’t have waited. I might not have even let you go home alone. We could have had breakfast together every morning after that, for the rest of our lives.’ He gave a shrug as if surprised by his own speech.

  ‘Ed …’ He was killing her.

  ‘You and I would never have been at odds with each other. We would never have been on opposing sides.’ He grew more intense, stepping closer. ‘The only thing we would have to fight about would be what to binge-watch on Netflix on a Saturday night.’

  She thought for a moment he was going to take her hands in his and her breath grew shallow at the suggestion of his touch.

  His image of them curled up on her couch under her crocheted rug evoked a smile. ‘Do people do that?’

  ‘Some do, but not us. I know we wouldn’t.’

  Her whole body filled with a complicated cocktail of emotions: longing, regret, fear, lust, sadness, with a liberal shot of confusion. What was she supposed to do?

  She could give in right now, throw herself into his arms and be done with it. But GardenerGuy94 would be well on his way, driving up from Melbourne, and she owed it to herself to finally meet him, to see if the emotional connection they shared online translated into something real. It was too late to stop now.