Although sensation had returned to my fingers and my eyesight was becoming clearer, it felt like someone was pressing their knuckles into my temples and I could still smell smoke. I was anxious that the oils wouldn’t get rid of the smoke stench or that they would make me sick. The pain was so intense that I found it difficult to sit upright and it was only because I had the two bottles I wanted so close at hand that I managed to unscrew their caps and take a big sniff. Nothing changed, the smoke refused to budge. The larger lavender bottle was easier to grasp so I raised it to my nose and inhaled once more. Relief spread through me as I finally detected its familiar scent. I closed my eyes and made a conscious effort to slow my breathing. I remembered my father, that one of the last conversations we ever had was about lavender. He’d found a study in a medical journal about its use in reducing anxiety and treating pain and mentioned that he liked the smell of the plant. He said it reminded him of his grandmother and I realised, with shock, that I’d never heard him talk about his grandparents, and that I didn’t know their names or anything about them. ‘Which grandmother?’ I asked.
‘The nice one,’ he replied. ‘The one who brought me home from Ireland. I sent her a fish that I caught. In the post.’
I assumed the pethidine was making him hallucinate, and it wasn’t until years later when I met his older brother that I learnt my father had been evacuated during the war, that he’d been shipped off to Ireland where he was billeted with a Catholic family. ‘I think he must have gone through hell,’ said my uncle. ‘He was the only Protestant in the neighbourhood.’
‘Do you remember anything about a fish?’ I asked. ‘He told me he posted a fish to his grandmother.’
My uncle shrugged. He didn’t know.
The brothers hadn’t kept in touch. They hadn’t talked or seen each other since my father left Britain. There were no hard feelings; it was as if keeping their relationship intact had somehow slipped their minds.
‘Your dad loved ferns,’ said my uncle.
‘Don’t you mean lavender?’ I asked.
‘No. Ferns. He had a flower press and he made a little herbarium of the specimens he collected. He took the press to Ireland but I think it must have got lost. Or stolen. He never said.’
I spent two days in bed, barely moving, and on the third day, still feeling the effects of my migraine hangover, I phoned Archer, telling him about my visit to Jerome’s and asking if it would be okay if I tagged along on his trip to fix his cabin. To my immense relief he seemed pleased, and said yes.
Before leaving I wrote three more applications. One to the city council for a six-month contract compiling a listing of Victorian landmarks and ‘notable’ residents, one to the television news reference library for the position of general assistant, and another to the Blind Foundation for the role of fundraiser. I knew I could do all three jobs but I also knew that there would be other, better qualified applicants. I almost didn’t bother sending them.
It had been a while since I last went away. As I’d aged, my desire to travel had diminished. When I was younger, holidays were largely a positive experience, something I enjoyed planning as much as doing, but in recent years all my breaks had been hurried affairs, booked in desperation in an attempt to escape work for an extended weekend. Melbourne had been my destination of choice. Getting there required little effort and it was a place I loved; in fact it was one of the few places I could happily live – if it weren’t so hot in summer.
Travelling to a hut somewhere near the Whanganui River was not on my must-do list, but I was grateful to get out of town nonetheless. My days were becoming clouded by dread. I found it hard to check my emails, not because I was scared of uncovering yet another rejection letter but because I was scared of having to deal with any correspondence, good or bad. I wanted to be left alone, to think or not think, as the mood took me.
Furthermore, I was tired of myself. Job applications forced me to evaluate, and re-evaluate, my skills, my experience, my strengths and weaknesses, a constant competitive ranking that left me convinced I was lacking in every area of my personal and professional life. The more I picked myself apart, or attempted to mould myself to fit employee requirements, the less confident I became. While trying to appear at my most attractive, I became more and more disfigured, unrecognisable to myself. I was a fraud; no one would hire me. I wouldn’t even hire me.
There were two messages that had made me panic. Out of the blue, my former real estate agent contacted me. She’d been approached by a cash buyer who was searching for a special inner-city, warehouse-style apartment. My apartment. Was I interested in selling? She would give me a follow-up call on the off chance that I was.
The second message was a reminder that the corporate levy for the apartment was due by the end of the month. The annual fee was $8000, up from the previous year. The levy came on top of insurance, currently $3200. I’d already renewed my policy, but the levy loomed over me, dark and threatening, absorbing all light from my world.
And then, finally, there was Jerome. I’d hoped a few days away would create the distance I needed to think through what had happened at his house. I wasn’t even sure what did happen at his house. Perhaps it was nothing at all. So why did I feel so sick?
Archer texted to say he was on his way but took an hour to arrive. I spent that time loitering around the entrance hall, persuading myself that he’d arrive in a minute. I caught sight of one of my neighbours, an elderly man, who asked if I was the cleaner. I thought he wanted to know if I was the person who had put the flyer about cleaning work in his letterbox so I said yes, but it turned out he wanted to complain about some black marks on the corridor walls near his apartment. When I explained, he still had a go at me, insisting that I take care of the mess right away. In the end it seemed easier to assure him that I’d fix the problem as soon as I could. This satisfied him for a moment but then, seeing me surrounded by luggage, he grew suspicious and demanded to know who I really was, and what I was doing in his apartment block. When I said that I lived on the top floor he accused me of lying. Fed up, I asked what he was doing in my apartment block. He gave me a look that suggested I was mad and said it was none of my business. The conversation went on for several more minutes and, to my surprise, I realised I was enjoying the interaction. It was so direct and blunt, so ridiculously straightforward after all the mindfulness and careful negotiating of my job interviews. I almost cheered when he called me ‘a rude young woman’ before stomping off.
When Archer arrived I was smiling, my mood lighter than it had been for days.
‘I don’t suppose you’ve heard about the libraries,’ asked Archer as he helped me with my bags.
‘No. What libraries?’
‘The fine arts and engineering libraries. The VC wants to shut them down.’
My spirits crashed. ‘I guess she really does hate us, after all.’
We drove in silence, our eyes fixed on the car in front, a late-model station wagon with a curly-haired dog that ran back and forth across the back seat. After ten minutes of constant motion the dog suddenly stopped and placed both front paws on the back of the seat, staring through the rear window. It seemed to be studying us, so I waved at it.
‘I really think that the university made a terrible mistake,’ I said. ‘I mean, on top of everything else, don’t you worry that the only people left will be the ones who communicate in bullet points? Haven’t you noticed the change already? Students who can’t string ideas together because they no longer read books?’ The dog began running to and fro again. ‘We used to read a lot of books, didn’t we?’
‘We still do,’ said Archer.
‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘The truth is I’ve only read a couple since leaving work, and one of those was The Awakening.’
‘That takes me back.’
The dog scrambled between the front seats and took up a position on the passenger side, its head poking through the open window, ears flapping.
‘Bet I can guess what you’re t
hinking,’ I said.
‘Oh yes?’
‘Bill Cannastra.’
Archer laughed.
‘It’s funny how single images take up permanent space in your mind,’ I continued. ‘They’re like the visual equivalent of jingles and sound bites, unenlightening but never forgotten. We had a terrific lecturer back in my first year. He was on a Fulbright exchange, from Brooklyn, and he used to shuffle into the lecture theatre and shamble up to the lectern. He always had a handful of mail and he’d place it in front of him and slowly begin to open each letter, and as he scanned his correspondence he’d start to speak. He seemed to begin mid-sentence, as if thinking aloud, and so it would take a minute to register that the lecture had begun and we’d all end up frantically taking notes, trying to catch up. He never shifted his weight, or moved from behind the lectern, and everything he said sounded like a personal memory he was recalling for our benefit. He was one of those people who was always several steps ahead of the class, so we’d be laughing at a funny anecdote about Marilyn Monroe while he was on to a serious critique of Miller’s After the Fall, and by the time we caught up he’d already moved on to a reflection on self-destruction and the inevitability of tragedy …’
‘Sounds terrible. What student wants to get lost like that?’
‘No, no. The opposite was true. The way he could connect so many disparate elements in such a conversational manner. We came away from each lecture convinced that he personally knew everyone he was talking about. When he mentioned in passing during a lecture on Ginsberg and Kerouac that their friend, Cannastra, had his head knocked off while leaning out of a subway window, we thought he must have witnessed it.’
‘What was the lecturer’s name?’
I paused. ‘I can see him, his brown suit, the pile of letters, his bony hands and long, tapered fingers. I can recall his glasses, his voice …’
‘But no name?’
‘No, that’s the funny thing about it. I can remember the name Cannastra but not the professor who mentioned him.’
‘Not so funny when you think about it.’
The car with the dog took an exit ramp and for a while the lane ahead of us was clear, then a bright blue coupe pulled in front of us.
‘I wish I could remember his name,’ I said. ‘I feel a bit guilty about it now.’
‘It was a long time ago.’
‘But I remember the others: Conway, Stowell, Wearing, Wilcox, Harlan. And the visiting Americans: Brooks, MacManus, Carillo.’
‘Did I mention,’ said Archer, ‘that I’ve been asked to do a lecture series on American society for the local U3A? I get paid, too. Cash.’
‘American society? That sounds like a wide field.’
‘They’re trying to establish a historical context for Trump,’ said Archer.
‘At least they’re not paying you in book tokens.’
‘That’s true.’
‘It will be fun,’ I said. ‘Those groups are usually well read and pretty smart.’
The blue car suddenly took off, overtaking a long stream of traffic, and disappeared into the distance.
‘I thought I’d start with the Puritans and cover the witch trials, the Great Awakening and the Indian Wars. I’d like to introduce Samson Occom’s writing if I can.’
‘I don’t know him.’
‘He was a Mohegan minister during the mid-1700s. Remind me to lend you his Collected Writings when we get back home.’
Archer had mentioned when he picked me up that our trip to his cabin was going to take a circuitous route. I assumed he meant he knew some minor gravel back road, once we got closer to the destination. In fact, he wanted to go via Rotorua, to take care of some business. When I asked what kind he merely smiled and said, ‘Wait and see.’
‘I wonder what house prices are like in Rotorua,’ I asked. ‘They must be a lot cheaper than where we are?’
‘Anything’s cheaper than where we are,’ Archer replied.
‘That’s true. Do you think you’ll keep your house?’
‘Which one?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, we’ve got three: our place, Hester’s central city apartment and then the cabin.’
‘Really?’
‘Renate’s always been good with money. She takes care of all our investments. What about you? Will you sell?’
‘I hope not,’ I said.
As the words came out of my mouth I pictured a well-dressed real estate agent walking her cash buyer through the spaces in my loft, pointing out the Oregon timber, the sealed brick walls, the steel frame, the earthquake strengthening, the designer kitchen, the well-appointed bathroom and so on, each part of my home itemised and scrutinised. What would my book collection, my perfume collection, the rows of essential oils say about me? That I was eccentric? Obsessive? Knowledgeable? I imagined the agent describing me as a university professor, as if that bestowed a level of respectability and glamour to the loft. Unlikely that she would mention I was unemployed. Retired, maybe? A university professor looking to downsize? An older woman who needed to trade flights of stairs for easy-access, ground-floor living?
The sun went behind a cloud and a fine mist of drizzle covered the windscreen. By the third sweep, the blades of the wipers caught and squeaked across the glass. In the distance a bunch of cyclists barrelled down the road towards us, taking up the entire width of their side. As they passed I noticed that most of the men were middle-aged, but that in their midst a single, thick-legged woman kept pace. Archer slowed as they raced by. Five hundred metres further on two more cyclists appeared, sprinting to catch the leaders. They were young, barely out of their teenage years and as they flew past, heads down, legs spinning, I caught an image of Charles’s face looking up from their saddles and laughed.
‘What’s funny?’
‘Oh, nothing. Just remembering my old boss – something he said a long time ago about bikes.’
In my side-mirror I watched the cyclists disappear, the bright colours of their Lycra tops glowing against the monochromatic scenery.
‘Renate has an electric bike,’ said Archer. ‘It’s very handy for getting around town.’
‘She must be doing well, then. With her heart, I mean?’
‘Yes, fine. Slowing down at work helped. No more eighty-hour weeks.’
‘I thought she retired after her surgery?’
‘She tried retirement but it didn’t suit her, she can’t sit still. It’s all consultancy now. Lots of travel.’
The drizzle turned to rain and I sat in silence. I preferred living alone to compliance with another person, but thinking about Jerome with Desna, and Archer with his consultant wife, I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d made the right decision. I envied the emotional support and financial buffer available to my colleagues. How much easier might my life have been if I, too, had had an intelligent, well-connected ‘wife’? It wasn’t about the money; I might have liked to be with someone who could advise or reassure me, someone who could provide stability and hope, a doctor for the heart maybe.
‘Do you mind if I turn on the radio? I’d like to listen to some music.’
‘There’s a few CDs in the glove box,’ said Archer.
There were five discs: two jazz compilations, an early Bill Evans album, Joni Mitchell’s Blue and a boxed set of Burl Ives’s The Wayfaring Stranger. I held up the Ives for Archer to see and he nodded.
‘If you like Burl Ives,’ he said, ‘I have a stack of his albums at the cabin.’
‘I like his voice,’ I replied. ‘And I remember him as Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.’
‘Which leads us back to Bill Cannastra,’ said Archer.
‘Does it?’
‘Yes. Because they say the character of Brick was based on him.’
‘I didn’t know that.’
‘That’s because you’re not as old as me.’
‘No, it’s because I don’t remember everything I’ve read.’
‘That too.’
We travelled through a rural landscape, farmland paddocks and snatches of scrub, large clumps of flax and toetoe lining the drainage ditches, cabbage trees standing tall in paddocks of bright green grass dotted with yellow gorse bushes. A large campervan with a Union Jack affixed to its rear panel was parked ahead of us, barely pulled off to the side of the road. The hazard lights blinked in warning and its occupants stood on the road taking photos of two white horses that were running around and around a paddock. Archer slowed to a crawl as we passed but the tourists barely seemed to notice; they were too busy posing.
We continued in silence broken only when I asked Archer if I would ever find a job.
We’d been travelling for over three hours and it was late afternoon when we finally drew close to Rotorua. I smelt the town before I saw it, and breathed deeply, holding the faint aroma of sulphur inside.
‘I love that smell,’ I said.
‘What smell?’
‘The Rotorua smell, of course.’
I watched as Archer inhaled and waited for his response. I saw him take another deep breath and asked, ‘Well?’
‘The thing is,’ he said eventually, ‘I don’t have a sense of smell.’
‘What? What about the perfume I made you?’ As the words left my mouth I remembered his unusual response to my gift, that he had never come out and said what he thought of the blend, always deflecting my observations with a question.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Archer. ‘I didn’t know how to tell you. You went to so much effort …’
‘So you can’t smell anything? Anything at all?’
‘No.’
‘Nothing?’
‘No. But I sometimes think I can imagine what something smells like based on its taste.’
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