Maddie took the ring out and pushed it on to her engagement finger. ‘It’s beautiful.’ She stared at it as though her past had a hold of her once again, and she moved her hand so that the diamond caught the sun’s rays.
And then slowly she wiggled it off and carefully pushed it back into its box. ‘Riley would’ve been proud of you today, Caitlin.’ She watched as a bird with a white chin, red head and a yellow belly hovered at the edge of the water, contemplating which way to fly next.
‘I think he would’ve been proud of us both.’
The bird took flight as they talked about Riley, about Richard’s retirement, about Maddie’s career and her baking hobby that was growing more and more by the day. Maddie pulled open the packet of chocolate frogs that Caitlin had brought with her and they both savoured a couple as they reminisced: Riley cooking dinner for Maddie and nearly burning the house down by leaving the pan of oil unattended; Riley getting his fingers bloody on thorns from the roses he tried to pick for Maddie on their first Valentine’s Day; Riley taking the bins out in his underwear and bumping into their neighbour Mrs Urquart.
‘Her face was a picture!’ Maddie creased up with laughter. ‘I’m not sure she’d ever seen a partially naked man in all her life.’
‘I think you could be right.’ Caitlin declined Maddie’s offer of another chocolate frog. ‘Can I ask if there is another man in your life now, Maddie? It’s okay, I want to know.’
Maddie pushed the ring box into the pocket of her cardigan as though holding it and talking about Evan at the same time were at odds with each other. ‘There have been guys, since Riley, but nobody ever got me like Riley did. That all changed when I met Evan.’
‘Evan?’ Caitlin sat forwards. ‘Maddie, I mean it when I say I want to know. Don’t hold back because of what I said all those years ago, please.’
Maddie took a deep breath and then said, ‘Evan is the first man who made me feel that zip of magic since Riley. I don’t just mean the excitement when you find someone attractive – that can happen to anyone at any time. What I mean is that pull that tugs at your heart when you look into their eyes, that leap in your tummy when they speak to you.’
Maddie pulled her cardigan more tightly around herself as the wind picked up to remind them that winter hadn’t quite passed yet. The sun was still out but had started to descend, and the clouds were forming a blanket overhead, ready to tuck it away until morning. She recounted the story of Jem’s party, the mix-up with the location, the huge faux-pas with the penis cake.
‘So what happened to Evan?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You seem to be talking about him in the past tense. Didn’t it work out?’
Maddie shook her head, and that was when she fell back into the role of surrogate daughter and told Caitlin everything: their first date, their second, Hamilton Island, the near-fight with Josh over the doughnuts.
‘And you’ve no idea why he walked away?’ Caitlin asked.
‘I’ve dissected that day, over and over, and I can’t work out how he went from pushing Josh off the scene and wanting me to walking away for good.’
‘Oh, Maddie, perhaps it isn’t for good.’
Maddie let out a long sigh. ‘I really don’t know. He was the first man since Riley to put the thought of the future in my mind, and now …’
‘You know, I never imagined for one second that you’d have trouble finding another man to love.’ Caitlin pulled an old-fashioned handkerchief from her bag and dabbed at her eyes. ‘I hate myself for what I did to you.’
‘Don’t be daft. I’m responsible for myself. I’m a big girl now and I should’ve known that you didn’t mean what you said. You didn’t even get to bury your son, and I hope to God I never ever find out what that’s like.’
‘Maddie, I—’
‘Just words, Caitlin. I know they were just words, and I know that you would never wish for that either.’
Maddie’s eyes followed the turquoise embroidery around the edge of the handkerchief that Caitlin was holding. ‘You still have it.’
Caitlin looked down at the delicate flowers scattered across the material. ‘It reminds me of you. I remember you bought it for me that first Christmas after you started to date Riley. Oh, your face was a picture that Christmas Eve. You were so nervous that I wouldn’t like my present, or that we wouldn’t like you – Riley told me – but you couldn’t have been more wrong.’
‘I thought you would’ve got rid of that long ago though. I don’t think I know anyone who uses hankies anymore.’
‘It’s only for the tears.’ Caitlin pulled out a Kleenex from her handbag and blew her nose. ‘And it’s in my bag for the memory. I thought of you often over the years, wondering where you were, who you were with, wanting to see the girl who was like a daughter to me.’
It was Maddie’s turn to ask questions that had been buried in her mind for years. ‘Do you find the anniversary events and coverage of 9/11 year after year hard to deal with?’
‘Funnily enough I don’t. I mean, the first one was horrendous, of course.’ She paused for a moment, discarded the soiled tissue and toyed with the embroidered handkerchief instead. ‘But after that first year, it was a comfort to know that other people had been through the same thing, still had the same pain. I knew how I would feel every year, it wasn’t like a big shock to hear the news or hear victims talk on television. The videos of the planes hitting the towers, the carnage in the streets … those pictures are etched in technicolour on my mind. The television makes little difference to pre-existing images, and my grief doesn’t pour out on that one day year after year. My grief gets me when I least expect it, and it gets me in different ways.
‘It took me a while,’ Caitlin continued, ‘but I have nice moments now too. Last week in the Haigh’s shop I must have looked like a crazy lady because I found myself thinking about buying Easter chocolate with Riley when he was little. His eyes were like saucers, as though he had just stepped into Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, and when he got a taster at the till he looked as though he’d hit the jackpot.’
‘Riley was all about the tasters.’
They fell silent for a while, both lost in thought. Caitlin was the first to speak. ‘When the grief hits, it’s like a tsunami.’
The powerful word made Maddie swallow, hard.
‘About a month ago I was in Myer when a lady ran past the lingerie section, her face stricken with fear. I could see she had a stroller with her but no child. She was frantic, calling for her boy, calling for ‘Riley’. For a moment I froze at the name and it felt as though the ground was coming up to meet me. But then my mind snapped into gear. I went to her; I knew how I’d felt when I lost my boy. We got out a description on the loudspeaker and he was found quickly enough.
‘I watched that woman hold her Riley to her chest so tightly.’ Caitlin bunched up her fists against her chest to show how firm a hold that woman must have had, how tightly she missed holding her own son. ‘I watched her tears of joy, listened to her cries of relief. I walked out of that shop in a daze and I just kept on walking. I’m not sure even now if I could tell you where I went exactly, but I walked until my feet hurt and until I phoned Richard to come and get me. When I got home I vomited and I cried and cried and cried. I slept solidly after that for almost twenty-four hours.’
Maddie didn’t think she had any more tears left, but her eyes watered as Caitlin continued.
‘So you see, Maddie, the coverage every year isn’t when I grieve necessarily, but I do find some solace in watching people paying their respects to loved ones. It’s their bravery that gets me every time, and the way they can hold their heads up, hold their limbs up when back then they could’ve collapsed with the shock of it all. Wives, husbands, children, parents: we all suffered tragic loss and the coverage to me says that life goes on, and that when we all pull together, we can become stronger, help each other. I know now that’s what I should’ve done for you.
‘I thought th
at it would be so easy for you to find happiness with someone else after Riley, and I guess I was angry because I had no idea how to move on with my own life. If I hadn’t had Richard, I’m not sure I would’ve wanted to go on.’
‘You don’t mean—’
‘I don’t think I would’ve taken my own life, not really, but there were times when the pain was that unbearable.’ She turned to face Maddie. ‘We went to Ground Zero.’
The skin on Maddie’s arms tingled. ‘What was it like?’
‘It was incredible. Painful, but nowhere near as painful as I thought it would be. It helped to see how many people were struggling to cope in the same way that I was, and still am. I felt so selfish, thinking I was the only one. It hit me just after the readings of every name of every single victim. I cried as I heard Riley’s name, I barely heard any of the others, but almost three thousand people died, and looking around at the sea of faces I knew I was wrong to think that other people couldn’t possibly be in as much pain as I was. And that includes you, Maddie.’
Maddie smiled.
‘Riley loved New York, didn’t he?’ said Maddie after a moment of reflection for both women.
‘He did. He’d always wanted to go and see the big wide world, right from when he was a toddler and we bought him a bright red pedal go-kart with the number 7 on its bonnet, like a racing car. He wanted to know whether pedalling hard enough would help him reach Canada. I think he wanted to see the snow more than anything, but the next day it was America, then it was Scotland. He always did have that sense of adventure.’
‘That’s one of the things I loved about him.’ Maddie’s face lit up. ‘Not the passion about travel and his need for adventure, but his sense of fun about what the future could hold. We used to talk about the usual things, but he always had this twinkle in his eye, this look that showed part of him wanted to let life unfold and take him to the unknown.
‘I saw that go-kart in your garage.’ Maddie grinned. ‘Richard once told me that Riley had refused to put it on eBay because he wanted to someday give it to his own child. I never knew the Canada story though.’
‘Oh, it wasn’t just other countries he wanted to go to,’ said Caitlin. ‘He loved reading The Famous Five and The Secret Seven too, and he’d go off on adventures in that thing, making up all kinds of worlds.’ She put a hand over her mouth as though he could hear her. ‘He would’ve strangled me if he knew I told you that story.’
‘I bet he would’ve told his own son or daughter himself, in time.’
They sat in silence, both lost in the cherished memories of the life cut short too soon.
‘I met many other mothers, daughters, sons, friends, girlfriends at Ground Zero.’ Now that Caitlin had started talking it was as though she couldn’t stop. ‘I really connected with one lady who had lost her daughter and not only because we had both lost a child. We gelled as mothers but also as ourselves.’
Maddie listened to Caitlin talk about the friend she had made, the emotions she’d felt standing at Ground Zero. And while she listened Maddie fiddled with the ring box, her fingers edging nervously around the opening. She thought of how excited Riley must have been buying it, and wondered if he’d been nervous too; she imagined he would’ve been and the thought warmed her right through.
‘Beth, the lady I met,’ said Caitlin, ‘stood with me on the deck of the Empire State Building and that was when we stopped chatting. A silence fell over us and we both stood looking out over the city that had captured our children’s hearts and spirits. That day Richard had made his own way around the city: the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Statue of Liberty; all the places that Riley had raved about to him.’
As the temperature of the afternoon fell, Caitlin shivered. ‘Shall we walk? I promised I’d meet Richard in the city. Perhaps we could sort out another day for you to see him too?’
‘I’d like that.’
They made their way across the Northern Lawn towards the Yarra River. Unconsciously, Maddie double-checked her pocket for the ring box that was safely ensconced inside. She cupped it with her hand to be doubly sure.
‘One of the things that I found the hardest,’ said Caitlin, ‘was not being able to bury my son. When someone dies you have a body, right? But we had nothing. It took me a hell of a long time to come to terms with that, and for years I thought that if they found him … even part of him … then that would make me better.’
‘I’m not sure it’s as simple as that.’
‘No, it’s not.’ Her eyes glistened over, but she kept the same smile, warm and genuine. ‘I’ve made peace with it over the years and I’m not sure how much good it would do now to know that ‘bits’ of my son had been found. I think I’d rather remember him how he was: my son, rowing down the Yarra River, or my son arguing with me because I told him he had to clear his junk out of the garage before moving day. My son bringing home the girl with whom he saw his future.’
‘Your son shouting at me when I pranged his car against the gate post,’ Maddie added.
‘Golly, I’d forgotten about that!’
When the laughter stopped, Caitlin looked at Maddie. ‘You know that if you were my daughter then I’d be telling you not to give up on this young man, Evan.’
‘Where did that come from?’
‘I’m a woman, I multitask. Just because that wasn’t the topic of conversation, doesn’t mean that I’m not turning it over and over in my head.’
From memory, Caitlin had always been the queen of multitasking, whether it was baking a Sunday roast while filling out a tax return, or booking an overseas trip as she sorted through piles of washing.
‘I didn’t want to give up on him, Caitlin, but I can’t chase someone who doesn’t want to be found.’
‘You know, one of the things I always admired about you was your strength and your ability to see the good in people, even when there isn’t a lot to see.’ Caitlin’s words came from personal experience. ‘Life takes us in unexpected directions and they’re not all bad. Take it from someone who buried their head in the sand hoping that it would all go away.’
As they reached the road, Caitlin pulled Maddie into a hug and stroked her hair in the same way that her own mum would when she was upset. ‘I have to go, but we’ll stay in touch.’
‘I’d like that,’ Maddie replied.
Maddie waved Caitlin off as she walked towards the city. The elastic band of their relationship had been stretched beyond measure, but today it had gone slack and settled right back where it should have always been. Meeting with Caitlin had helped Maddie to sort through her own grief, and as the clouds parted above it was as though they were showing her that the path was finally clear to move on towards the future. She just wished she knew whether that future could include Evan.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
‘Thanks, Maddie.’ Ally took the cake, shaped like a clock, with chocolate mice that had been rolled in crushed Maltesers. ‘My niece will love this.’
‘It’s my pleasure.’
‘Do you want to come in?’
‘No thanks, I’m off for a run next,’ said Maddie.
‘Are you okay? You know, today I mean.’
The question was expected. Maddie always took the day off work on September 11th and this year was no different in that respect, yet it had changed in so many other ways.
‘I did what I said I’d do; I put on the TV this morning.’ Maddie took a deep breath. ‘For the first time in thirteen years, Ally, I finally put on the TV. When I thought about what Caitlin said about how watching the coverage had helped her, I thought I’d see if it could do the same for me. But you know what?’
Ally shook her head as she stood at the front door, Maddie out on the path in the sunshine.
‘I’m not avoiding the coverage any longer, but at the same time, it didn’t capture me quite how I expected. Caitlin was right about one thing: our grief doesn’t always plan when it’ll strike. The media can’t inflict any more pain than what I experience alread
y, and for some people it goes a long way to help. But it’s not for me.’
With the time difference between Australia and the States, there was plenty more coverage to come, but for Maddie, what she had seen so far had been enough. She would no longer live in fear of the reminders. Instead, she would embrace her own memories and try to reflect on the good times but also allow herself to have quiet moments when she would still grieve for Riley in her own way.
‘Today is the start of a new beginning,’ said Ally.
‘It certainly is.’
On a clear day without a cloud in the sky, Maddie started to run the second she shut the front gate to Ally’s sister’s place. Her heart beat in time with her footsteps, the air was still and she felt as free as the rainbow infused hot air balloon that sailed above the treetops and far into the sky. Every step she took felt like a step in a new direction, a fresh start, a change of pace.
When she reached Albert Park Lake, she ignored the unusual crowds that were gathered near the barbecue area and ran past the throng of school kids who must be out on an excursion. There were dozens of adults too – possibly teachers and parents – and it was then that Maddie realised she was right in the epicentre of a charity fun run. She diverted around the crowd and turned back towards the main barbecue area so that she could take the road rather than the track and head back to her apartment, but the second she did, she stopped dead. Her chest moved up and down as her breathing failed to come to a stop along with her body.
Evan stood a few metres away clad in running gear beneath a blue banner. The banner flapped in the wind and she couldn’t make out the words, but he turned as he balanced on one leg to stretch his quads. His surprise matched hers as he let his leg drop to the ground, and he stared back at her.
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