One Heartbeat

by Bowes, K T

Logan kept a straight face. “What and be accused of tampering with a crime scene? No thanks. This guy dug him up!”

  The words dug him up were the last straw for the horticulture teacher. He sank to the ground looking as white as a sheet and offered up the cup of tea his wife woke him with that morning. Logan raised his eyebrow at a furious Bodie and marvelled. “You know what? This guy’s a human vending machine that just keeps on giving.”

  Bodie got the late arrivals to cordon off the area, keeping Logan and the other teacher inside the tape. The clock ticked on and too soon the bell sounded, wreaking havoc on the scene as boys stampeded towards the boarding house. The cops tried to contain the hungry throng but failed. Unwilling to be denied their promised sausage roll and morning pie, the masses of testosterone went a different way and ended up at their chosen destination regardless – St Bart’s dining room.

  Unfortunately, the dining room windows faced the veggie patch and the defunct groundsman. As the medical examiner arrived, he was met by a hundred pairs of eyes peering through the windows. Within minutes, gossip of the body went around the small school community and became hot news, texted to hysterical mothers who passed it on. None of the boys seemed put off their food though, which was not unexpected as the boarding house did a great sausage roll.

  The horticulture teacher was led from the scene by an ambulance woman, dry retching the full length of the path. Logan warily eyed the mess he left and stayed out of it. He leaned back against the wall and waited to be told what to do. Presumably someone would come and speak to him. Someone did. But it was Detective Sergeant Odering and his face fell as he saw Logan patiently waiting, one leg bent at the knee and his boot against the wall.

  “Mr Du Rose,” he said with a sigh, as though sick of hearing the name. Logan smiled and continued unwrapping his gum. Odering continued, “Your family seems to lurch from one disaster to another, doesn’t it?”

  Logan shrugged and kept his face passive, feeling the man’s veiled frustration. The easier he made it, the quicker he could get away from the stink of rotting carrot and what looked like half a sandwich by the medical examiner’s foot. A couple of police women attempted to erect a white tent over the body. Logan tried not to laugh hysterically as the gusty breeze got underneath and almost sent them both into orbit. He turned away, finding it too funny to watch.

  Odering deigned to take Logan’s brief statement himself, not delegating it to one of the waiting uniforms. Out of the corner of his eye, Logan saw the tent get lift-off and one of the uniformed women’s feet come off the floor. He turned his laugh into a cough and Odering looked at him strangely. “Finding this humourous, Mr Du Rose?” he bit. “Want to come to the station and talk about it?”

  “No, but thanks anyway.” Logan took deep breaths and felt grateful Peter North, his deputy manager wasn’t anywhere nearby. He’d be guaranteed to turn the situation into a complete farce.

  “Hello,” came Pete’s voice as he trotted round the corner, trying to get his leg over the police tape and failing. He stood with one leg in the air and winced. With a look of confusion on his face, he forced his foot downwards and the plastic tape gave way with a twang, floating to the floor for its entire length and dangling from the tree it was tied to like a ribbon. “What’s going on, boss?” Pete demanded, wandering over to Logan and standing slap bang in the middle of the sick on the concrete. He watched the two police women with a smirk on his face. “Geez,” he said with a mischievous glance at the smartly dressed Detective Sergeant Odering, “don’t they teach you guys how to put up tents at cop school? One more puff of wind and they’ll be in Matamata.”

  Logan snorted and Odering fixed him with a steely stare.

  “Hey, love, watch what you’re doing!” Pete yelled to the tent wrestlers, tramping onto the soil and pushing past the medical examiner, “My Henrietta planted them potatoes! Don’t stamp all over them!” Satisfied his beloved’s food source was safe, Pete tutted loudly amid shouts and yells of warning and trudged right across the crime scene. At the trench he looked down at the partially exhumed body of his colleague and his eyes bugged. “Bloody hell,” he said, looking back at Logan. “Why has Collins planted himself?”

  Chapter 7

  Hamilton traffic was unconducive to a journey requiring speed. Something had taken over Victoria Street, causing a delay which stretched up Te Rapa Straight as far as the edge of town.

  “What’s taking so long?” Hana complained as Phoenix woke up grumbling.

  “Dunno,” Tama replied. “Climb in the back and sing a song or something.”

  “To move the traffic?” Hana peered at her driver as though he’d gone mad.

  “No!” He shook his head and wound the window down. “To settle your daughter.”

  Hana nipped into the backseat and utilised the tinted windows to feed her baby while the vehicle was stationary. Tama felt nervous, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel and wondering if his uncle might let him pick his own method of death, or if it would be instantaneous. He’d seen Logan fight. He usually laid people out pretty quickly. Tama admired his face in the rear view mirror. “Such a waste,” he muttered.

  “What is?” Hana asked and Tama shook his head.

  “Nothing.”

  They sat for half an hour, during which time the baby was fed, winded, re-fed and placed in the car seat. She smiled at her mother and babbled about nothing in particular with great animation. The vehicles moved a few metres and then stopped again, to allow half the Hamilton police force to charge through red traffic lights with their sirens roaring out into the wintry sky.

  “Must be time for morning tea,” Tama said sarcastically, as the last cop car zapped through. “They don’t move so quick for much else!”

  Hana ignored him and dared to think of her father. “Oh, this is a big mistake,” she breathed. “What am I doing?”

  Phoenix grinned beatifically in answer and then worked to fill her nappy. Hana groaned, “That’s all I need!”

  “I’ll change her,” Tama offered, “if you want to go in first on your own. That is, if we get there at all today!”

  The traffic cleared suddenly. There was nothing to show for the delay, no road works, no broken down vehicle, nothing. It was as though everyone stopped for no particular reason and then decided to get going again.

  “Weird!” Tama muttered under his breath.

  “It was probably all those cop cars needing to get through the lights,” Emma said, chewing her thumb nail and alternately rolling her eyes and squeezing them shut.

  At the motel, Hana went into the reception while Tama changed the baby on the back seat of the car. As Hana looked back, she spotted little pink legs waving in the cold air and contemplated doing it herself. But Tama was right; it would be better if she met her father alone. “I’d like to see Robert McIntyre,” she said to the receptionist, whispering for reasons she couldn’t fathom.

  “Certainly, take a seat and I’ll ring his room,” the woman replied, a fake smile plastered on her lips. The receptionist had a short conversation with whoever was on the other end of the line and then called Hana over. “Room 42. Go into the car park and turn right. It’s on that side of the building.”

  Outside, Hana walked through an archway into a courtyard. Cars were parked in front of units but the numbering scheme wasn’t easy to read, some of the signs faded. She looked around her, feeling stupid. “Hana!” A familiar voice called her name and she turned and saw him. He was almost three decades older, but very much her father. “Hana! Bairn!” Robert McIntyre held his arms out in front of him and ran towards his daughter on wavering legs. He seemed unashamed, drawing attention to himself without caring. The proud, reserved man was gone, shouting a name which for too long was only uttered in his prayers. Hana was almost bowled over, shocked by how frail his body seemed. Robert McIntyre was once a burly Scotsman, with a voice which boomed from the pulpit without meaning to. Everything about him had shouted power and authority but he was like a shadow of
that man, all clothes and winter jacket with no flesh beneath.

  Hana buried her face under his chin and tried not to recount the wasted years, smelling the familiar scent of his aftershave and his favourite Coal Tar soap. She felt his great drops of grief drip into her hair and clutched her father’s ragged body, hiding her shock. When she pulled back they spoke at the same time. “Sorry.”

  Their dual apology crossed the years, leaving healing in its wake. Robert led Hana to his motel room. It was clean and comfortable, practical but not plush and to her relief, Hana found it empty. Robert pulled an easy chair out for her. “Sit, please,” he said. Then he closed the ranch slider and fiddled with the remote control for the heat pump, trying to raise the temperature. Hana watched him sensing he was different. The years had stripped away arrogance and pride and left somebody else underneath like a clean, new skin. When he got the device working to his satisfaction, he sat on the edge of the double bed facing her.

  “I didn’t know if you’d come,” Robert said, his face twitching with nerves. “Your husband promised to speak to you, but I wasn’t sure...” He left the sentence unfinished and it caused a distracting lull in conversation. Meeting after all these years was emotionally draining and it felt like they needed the tide to come back in so they could continue. Hating the silence they both spoke at once and Hana’s father held out his hand to let Hana go first.

  “I want to apologise to you, Dad,” Hana said, ignoring his frantic head shaking. “I never considered what it meant for you, to have me turn up like that, pregnant and trailing a boyfriend. It must have been dreadful for you and Mum. Will you forgive me, please?” She felt tearful and raw as though her heart had been peeled.

  Robert held up his hand. “Of course, I forgive you,” he gushed, “but it’s I who should apologise. How I reacted, what we did to that poor boy, throwing him out like that; it was wrong. I’ve never before or since felt consumed by an anger like it, but it wasn’t worth it for what it cost me. I’m truly sorry, Hana.”

  “Thanks, Dada,” she said, hearing herself involuntarily using the childhood name. “I don’t know where to start,” she faltered. “I never thought I’d see you again, so I haven’t thought it through. I read you were...it doesn’t matter.”

  Her father smiled, his blue eyes the only thing which hadn’t changed in the intervening years. “On the contrary, Hana,” he said, “I’ve imagined this moment almost every day for the last twenty-six years. And I decided long ago we would go for coffee.”

  Hana laughed. It was unexpected. Her frugal father was offering to buy her a drink. She wanted to make a joke about the moths in his wallet getting an outing but daren’t, still feeling slightly hysterical. “I’ll tell Tama,” she said, pulling out her phone and ringing his number.

  Tama answered immediately. “Hey, me and Phoe are going for a walk,” he said. Hana heard the icy wind blowing around the phone and a slight shiver in his voice. “She’s in her pram and the chicks are loving it.” Hana tutted and he laughed. “Just kidding, Ma. I’m telling them she’s my sister.”

  Hana explained she’d be in the motel resident’s lounge and Tama rang off after asking if she was ok. Am I ok? Hana thought, but didn’t know the answer.

  Robert ordered two coffees and put it on his room tab. Then he sat next to his daughter. The embarrassing silence threatened to descend again and Hana tried to disperse it, not wanting to keep climbing out from underneath it. “Tama said you’d remarried,” she said, “but the useless boy couldn’t remember her name.”

  “Elaine,” Robert replied, looking at Hana oddly.

  Hana nodded. “Is there anything you want to ask me?”

  For the next hour they chatted, catching up on each other’s lives. Robert asked questions about Vik and their life together, how they ended up in New Zealand and about Bodie and Izzie. “I understand I’m a great-grandfather,” he said shyly.

  Hana nodded. “Yes, Bodie has Jas and Izzie has Elizabeth, Vik and Marcus Junior. The boys are twins, born last year. Elizabeth is...Elizabeth has...” Hana swallowed and eyed her father nervously, remembering his fear of the imperfect. He reacted badly to anything which threatened his veneer of perfection. Hana took a deep breath and refused to deny her adorable granddaughter. “Elizabeth has Down Syndrome. She’s an amazing little girl and we love her so much. The doctors didn’t think she’d be able to talk, but she’s managing a few words now.”

  Hana looked away, fighting her tendency to babble. She missed Logan like a physical ache, understanding why he hadn’t yet told her he’d found Robert; he wanted to be with her for the meeting. He would have sat with her and plugged the awkward gaps. Hana bit her lip, seeing how Logan complimented her so well, making up for all the bits she lacked in her scatty, nervous nature. She’d cut him out, circumnavigated his wisdom and regretted it like she always did whenever she acted impulsively and wrenched herself out from under his well-intentioned protection.

  “Did you know Mark was here in Hamilton?” Robert asked, inclining his head to drink his coffee. Hana saw the telltale hearing aid nestled in his left ear and realised again how much she’d missed. When did he notice he couldn’t hear?

  She gave a tight little nod. “Tama told me,” she answered, “but I didn’t know before today, otherwise I would have...”

  Her father lifted an eyebrow, clearly wondering what she would have done. Hana realised she didn’t know herself. She decided to steer the conversation to safer ground. “How is his...wife and family?” she asked politely, pausing to take out the word perfect, which she automatically slotted into the sentence.

  Robert shook his head sadly. “Mark hasn’t seen them for many years. Claire left not long after that awful day. They had problems before that, but Mark chose not to see what was under his nose. There were lots of contributing factors. His job didn’t make marriage and child rearing particularly easy and he wasn’t the most conducive man to get along with. They came to see your mother and I, to break the news they were separating. Mark was torn up with hurt and anger.”

  “Oh.” Hana put her head in her hands. “I’ve thought of him lots over the years and assumed he live a charmed life with two perfect sons and a perfect wife, tea on the table and slippers by the fire. I felt I was the family disgrace and needed to be swept under the carpet.”

  “No, bairn,” her father smiled. “That day was a day for shocks. Pregnancy and divorce in the space of two hours.”

  “Not a good day then?” Hana said, her voice soft.

  Robert shook his head. “No. I lost a daughter, a daughter-in-law and three grandchildren, all by myself.” His face seemed to change colour, turning grey in the dimly lit lounge. Hana touched his knee with feather light fingers.

  “Let’s not dwell, Dada.”

  Robert nodded. “Just one thing though, your husband let an intriguing fact drop yesterday.” He drummed his fingers lightly on the arm of his chair as though unable to contain a hidden beat. “I didn’t know Mark wrote to you after Judith died, or that he told you not to come to the funeral.” His eyes flashed as Hana nodded, fresh pain threatening to overwhelm her in her seat. “I didn’t tell him to do that, Hana,” her father said, leaning closer. “He told me he’d written care of the university and I wrongly assumed you didn’t want to come. Please forgive a foolish man for not following it up and checking with you. I apologise for that error of judgement.”

  “I look back now,” Hana said, nodding, “and it’s like a catalogue of disasters. Little miscommunications and ideas I had about you. I was wrong. I should have written because it would have been easier to say in a letter. But I was scared you’d ignore me and I couldn’t bear that. I tried phoning, but I’d wait in the queue for the phone box on the corner of the promenade and then when it was my turn, the pressure was too great and I’d walk away. After three or four times of making a fool of myself, I gave up.”

  Robert reached for her hand and it felt unnatural to Hana; he’d never been a demonstrative man. “Ah, s
weetheart,” he breathed and kissed the back of her fingers.

  Hana gulped. “Mark must be in his late fifties now,” she said to cover her embarrassment and her father nodded.

  “He’s a very accomplished surgeon,” he said with pride. “He arrived in New Zealand on a two year contract last January. He’s heading up the surgical unit here and has been offered the chance to stay permanently. It’s how come he ended up operating when you had your little accident.” Robert looked away with an awkward tilt of the head.

  “Did Mark think I slit my wrist on purpose?” Hana asked, with a little too much aggression and her father looked surprised. She surprised herself. “I suppose it doesn’t matter if my brother thinks I’m a fruit loop; we won’t meet again.” Hana chastised herself inwardly. Lots of people killed themselves for many sad reasons and not always because they were insane. Her mind ventured onto the dark path towards Laval and she pulled it back. Her father was speaking.

  “At first I think he did. I made the mistake of asking your husband yesterday if you were mentally stable. He didn’t like it one bit.” Robert looked contrite, pursing his lips and wrinkling his nose.

  Hana pulled a face, muttering under her breath, “I’m surprised he let you live,” regretting it as she recalled her father’s cancer. Robert didn’t notice.

  “Mark rang us so upset. But when he called again later, he said the police were crawling over the hospital in relation to a kidnapping. He wasn’t sure if it related to you but intended to see you again later that day. His next call ruined all my dreams of a reunion, because when he got to the ward, you’d gone. He was devastated. I wasn’t long out of surgery myself and the doctor made me see my radiotherapy through until the end. They wouldn’t let me fly until that was out of my system, but I strived to get better and come here to find you.”

  Hana bit her lip. “Perhaps this is a better way,” she said. “I’m not sure I’d have coped if Mark stood by my bed in his scrubs looking all judgemental. I’d have panicked and Logan would have reacted in my defence. The whole incident was a nightmare without added complications like long lost brothers.” A memory crossed Hana’s mind of the ordeal; a familiar gentle voice telling her she’d be ok, stroking her hair back from her forehead and offering reassurance. It gave her comfort and something to hold onto in the dreadful mist which swirled around her. She’d clung to the soothing tones and felt a sudden rush of understanding. She heard Mark; her brother. “It was an expensive crystal whisky tumbler,” Hana said, banishing the sight of her blood spraying an arc on the concrete driveway beneath her feet. She held her hand out, palm upwards for her father to see, as though holding out a sibling’s drawing for admiration. “Look, he did a good job.”