by Juanita Kees
‘Hey, guys, glad you could make it. Tameka, sweetheart, I heard you reported your dad missing. Are you holding up okay? Is there anything we can do to help?’
Shirley’s high energy always left Tameka exhausted. Today though even Harley’s mum seemed a little preoccupied. Understandably so since they’d found fresh flowers on Ryan’s grave that said his parents had already been to visit their eldest son.
‘I’ll be fine, thanks. I’m sure he’ll be back soon. Maybe the ute broke down somewhere and he’s stranded. And Dad has never been a fan of mobile phones so I doubt he has his with him.’
Not that she’d found it anywhere in the house either, but any more elaboration would only raise more questions she didn’t have answers to.
‘I hope he’s okay, sweetheart. I’m sure he will be.’
‘He’ll be fine.’ Even though a small, selfish part of her wished he wasn’t. Hoped that he wouldn’t come back at all.
‘Has he gone off like this before? I didn’t think he left the farm very often.’
Tameka shifted on her feet. ‘He doesn’t normally, no.’
And so the questions started. Shirley’s heart was in the right place, but this would be one of the many times today she’d have to answer the same question and steer the town’s curiosity away from the raw truth. Maybe coming to the picnic hadn’t been such a good idea after all.
‘You must be so worried.’
Worried he might come back, relieved that he hadn’t yet and terrified for what would happen when he did. ‘A little.’
‘Well, it’s lovely to see you here today, Tameka. Hopefully the picnic will take your mind off things for a while. Will you be staying for most of the day?’
Harley stepped up beside her, the picnic basket in his hands. He set it down at his feet and placed a reassuring hand at Tameka’s back. ‘We’ll see how it goes hey, Mum? I might have to take Tikki home if she gets tired. We don’t want her overdoing it now that she’s on the mend.’
‘Of course, darling. I totally understand. I’ll make sure she doesn’t get caught up in anything too stressful.’
‘Great. I’ll leave her in your hands while I find Travis and Harry. I need to rub in the Eagles win over the Hawks last night and claim my five bucks.’
Tameka wanted to grab his arm and anchor him to her side because no-one understood her like Harley did. Shirley meant well, but she was no protection against inquisitive minds and prying eyes.
Harley gave her hip a rub. ‘I’ll be back soon.’
She cursed herself for having become so reliant on his strength and support again. How easily she’d fallen under his spell and rekindled their friendship along with the flame of attraction. As if the eight years they’d been apart had simply melted away.
But then the separation had been her father’s doing. He’d insisted she have nothing to do with the Bakers, threatened that if she did, he’d make her regret it. And because she knew he was capable of making her regret it in the most painful way possible, she’d obeyed.
She’d put her head down and bum up and tried her best to make up for her sins by working hard, only to learn she’d sacrificed everything for a father who would never be happy no matter what she did. And now the damage was done.
After today she’d have to rebuild her wall brick by brick, or she’d be leaving more than a little piece of herself behind if she left.
Shirley smiled knowingly at them, some of her sadness slipping away as she watched them standing close together. Tameka would have to burst her bubble the moment they were alone. She couldn’t have Harley’s mum building her hopes up only to have them blown up and destroyed in the days to come. The Bakers had enough to deal with.
As Harley walked away, Shirley linked her arm through Tameka’s. ‘Come along, sweetheart. The CWA ladies are keen to see how you’re healing up.’
Maybe the physical scars were but the mental scars kept being ripped open until they bled again, she thought as they walked across the park.
The ladies had set up a workstation under the shade of a canopy amidst chatter and laughter. They were met with a chorus of greetings and warm hugs, and not one single question, thank God. Before she could escape, she found herself buttering buns and peeling onions for the sausage sizzle, enjoying their company shoulder to shoulder with her new friend, Heather. She hadn’t realised how much she would enjoy it or how much she’d missed out on during her father’s self-imposed exile.
And when sunset rolled around, her feet were tired, her mind exhausted and she almost felt … happy. Tameka slipped her hand into Harley’s as he stood talking to Travis and Harry, their laughter and teasing easy in the dimming light as they talked football, farming methods and the future of Wongan Creek.
As his fingers closed around hers, enveloping them in warmth, she could dream that this happiness would last and the nightmare of tomorrow wouldn’t come.
Chapter 19
With the picnic a pleasant memory she’d taken away with her and reality kicking in, Tameka stood back to admire the new shoots, bright green against the rich, dark soil. Still no news on her father, but that didn’t mean she could stand idle until he decided to show up. Or not.
She checked her watch and shrugged off the burn from the still raw patches on her back. Why hadn’t the pump started? By now the drip-feeders should be leaking water into the rows at a slow and steady pace. Damn it, please don’t let the pump have packed up too. Hadn’t she spent enough time today with a wrench in her hand?
If only Dad had listened to her and upgraded to the solar-powered surface pump instead of the archaic siphon version they couldn’t even get spare parts for.
Resigned to yet another patch-up job, she slipped a screwdriver, wrench and can of silicone spray into her pockets. Just what she needed when she’d planned to have everything watered before midday kicked in. Turning from the crop, she took the service path between the two fields down the slope to the dam.
On the bank, the weeping willow dipped its branches into the water. The flattened grass around the dam indicated they’d had visitors in the night. Roos most likely, judging from the droppings.
She’d have to find a way to deal with them before they sank their teeth into her juicy new crop. If she could lure them back across the creek into the national park that bordered The Cranky Lizard vineyard, they’d have plenty of natural bush to nibble on and loads of shady cover.
In the early morning light, the sun sparkled off the surface of the dam, bright and cheerful. Tameka dropped her sunnies down from her head onto her nose to cut the glare. Normally this spot brought peace and tranquillity. Today it brought annoyance and yet another temporary repair.
To her left, the pump laboured in the silence of the morning. So it wasn’t the pump that had failed then. She sighed. That would have been the easy fix. Now she’d have to find out what was stopping it from pumping water out of the dam and into the irrigation pipes.
She moved to hit the emergency stop button on the top of the housing and listened to the instant silence that fell across the dam. In the trees that lined the west side of the water, a kookaburra laughed and was answered by the squawk of the cockatoos.
Irritation skittered along her nerve endings. The way her luck was running there’d be a blockage at the intake which was about four metres deep under the ice-cold water. She wasn’t exactly equipped to go diving into the dam in wintery conditions today. Not that she’d be able to anyway because of her burns.
Even if she could, the thought of diving to the bottom of the murky water to unblock the intake set her imagination running wild. Alone, she couldn’t risk becoming entangled in the mud and water grass at the bottom.
To her right, a flimsy-looking object floated towards the bank. Damn it, had more debris blown out of the remains of the homestead and found its way into the dam? How many more times did she have to pull scorched junk out of the water while she fought with the insurance company over the payments in arrears?
She mo
ved closer, looking around for a stick long enough to fish out whatever it was. God knew what else had found its way into the dam and clogged up the pump intake.
Finding a long, thin broken branch, Tameka edged her way towards the rubbish. Not plastic or anything that resembled something out of the remains of the kitchen, but rather something out of the laundry. Muddy brown material. Like a shirt maybe.
Her breath hitched in her throat. Oh God, Dad. Was this how her father had chosen to end his misery? What colour shirt had he been wearing the night of the fire? Blue and yellow-checked flannel, worn and faded.
No, not Dad. There was nothing weighing the material down, no-one attached to the tattered piece that drifted on the surface of the water.
Relief mixed with regret flooded her. How was it possible she could wish him dead and alive at the same time? She edged closer still and pulled the material closer with the stick, the water lapping at her boots.
The pattern. Oh God no. Something soft, cheerfully floral, once full of colour before it had been stained brown. Oh Jesus! The material caught on the roots of the weeping willow. No. Please God, no. The last time she’d seen that dress …
Forcing her feet to move, she edged away. Her heart pounded, tears stung her eyes. She blinked them back. It couldn’t be.
Her gaze fell on yellow-brown stained shapes wedged in the muddy feet of the tree, perfectly curved—like a bone with rounded edges that might fit into a joint socket. A few smaller ones scattered nearby.
Please let them belong to a roo. But as she looked more closely, doubt edged around the fringes of fear. There was no mistaking where she’d seen that pattern on a dress before and the bones were too delicate to belong to a roo.
‘No!’ Her cry chased the birds from the trees around her. She slapped her hands to her mouth, nausea rising in her stomach. ‘No.’
Slipping to the ground on her knees, Tameka struggled to focus her thoughts on what she’d seen that awful day. Mum standing behind Dad, her hands pressed against her throat as he hauled Harley out of the ute.
The floral cotton swirling around her legs, hanging from her delicate frame as she ran up behind him. Mum crying, begging Dad to stop as he dragged Tameka home, his grip on her arm tight and rough with anger. The pink floppy hat she’d worn to protect her skin from the harsh sun hanging from a string down her mum’s back.
Her father’s words, angry and loud as they echoed through the house and the locked door of her bedroom. If you leave, Mai, you’re never coming back.
No. The word echoed through her mind. There had to be a logical explanation. Not the one forming in her mind. Had Mum fallen into the dam? Unlikely. Too far from the road she would’ve had to take. Dad’s rage. The bonfire. His two-day drinking binge after Mum left.
Tameka’s hand shook as she stood and pulled her phone from her pocket. Signal. Thank God there was a signal here. She dialled the number for the police station, praying Sergeant Riggs was in and not out on the road somewhere. If not, she’d have to call triple zero instead. No, not even triple zero. That was for emergencies. This had gone beyond that point.
‘Wongan Creek Station, Riggs speaking.’
‘Sergeant Riggs.’ Oh, God. ‘It’s Tameka Chalmers out at Golden Acres.’
‘Hey, Tameka. How can I help? Has your father come back?’
Tameka’s hands shook as she gripped the phone to her ear in one hand while the other clung to the stick, her knuckles white, the wood biting into her palm. She’d been fine until she’d heard the policeman’s voice. Until the shock of her find tore the memories from their place locked in her heart.
‘You’ll need to come. Please.’ A sob rose in her throat. She swallowed around it. ‘There are … bones. I’ve found bones. And a dress. Mum’s dress. I’m sure it’s hers …’
Not even sure she was making sense, Tameka backed away from the tree, her boots clinging to the mud, her thoughts irrational and scattered as she tried to make sense of finding her mother’s dress in the dam.
If Dad was somewhere out there in the bush would he see the cop cars rolling up the access road? Would he come back and pretend he didn’t know about the fire? Would he be surprised that she’d survived it? And what would he make of her mother’s dress in the dam?
There’d be an investigation. He’d be angry she didn’t come to him first. But how could she when she didn’t know where he bloody was? Would he even care after he’d walked away from the burning house with her inside, unconscious?
Was that how Mum had ended up in the dam? Nausea rose in her throat but she forced it down as Riggs’ voice echoed in her ear.
‘A dress? Bones? Hang in there, young lady. Don’t touch a thing. I’ll come over right away.’
Hysteria rose in her throat, fear curled around it. She was staring at what could be her mother’s remains. The danger had passed eight years ago. ‘Please, come quickly.’
***
Tameka’s lime green beanie disappeared into the reeds around the dam. So far today, Harley had seen her take a wrench to the tractor and a crowbar to the seeder and it wasn’t even eight o’ clock yet. Now it looked like the pump on the dam was giving her trouble. Next to him, Loki nudged his hand and Harley delivered a quick ear rub.
He understood her need for independence, to get on with the job of taking care of her father’s farm. He’d offered to help, but she’d declined. That didn’t mean he couldn’t keep a close eye on things while he went about his own chores.
Since the day of the picnic, his gut had coiled around the feeling something awful was about to happen. As if it could possibly get any worse. Fires, punch-ups, flared tempers, the farmers calling an intervention from the National Farmers’ Federation—it wasn’t exactly all good news and cheerful tidings.
The cockatoos launched into flight from the trees on the dam’s west bank and Loki lost it to give chase. He launched through the gate and streaked off down the service lane on the Chalmers property.
‘Loki, heel!’
The dog ignored his command, his bark reverberating through the otherwise quiet morning air as he streaked off down to where Harley had seen Tameka in the reeds.
‘Damn it.’ He prayed nothing had happened to Tameka. If she’d slipped into that ice-cold, muddy water she risked infection in the burns that had begun to heal so well. Or if she’d fallen on her back and grazed them open again …
Harley broke into a jog and chased Loki down to the dam, the unease coiled in his stomach tightening to a knot. He reached her out of breath, the ice-cold air burning in his lungs.
Tameka sat in the mud at the edge of the water next to the willow tree, her knees hugged to her chest, sunnies dangling between them, her body shaking and her phone lying at her feet in the mud.
What the hell? Loki made a beeline for her, nudging at her with his nose. She lifted her face. Tears streaked the dirt smeared on her cheeks. His heart rose in his throat. The bad feeling in his gut clenched at his abs.
‘Loki, heel.’ He crouched down as Loki ignored his instruction and leant against her instead. ‘Hey, what’s up? Pump packed it in?’
Maybe the pump had been the last straw for her today. Even in the days when they’d shared the dam, it had played up regularly. And with everything else that had happened to her these last few weeks, perhaps this was the final nail in the cross she’d tried to carry alone for so long.
Tameka shook her head, but no words came as she tucked her sunnies into her jacket pocket and pulled her beanie from her head. Her short dark hair stuck up haphazardly where she fisted her fingers into it, her normally healthy olive complexion grey under the streaks of dirt and grease. Clearly, it hadn’t been an easy morning.
She opened her mouth to speak but her face crumpled and her bottom lip quivered. Twice now he’d seen her crumble like this and he didn’t like it. Not a bit. Not when it broke his heart to see her this way.
‘Oh, Tikki.’ Harley parked his butt in the mud next to her and gathered her in his lap, tugging a l
ittle harder when she resisted before giving in. ‘What’s happened, baby?’
Nothing. No response, except for the sobs that shook her body.
He tightened his arms around her, tucked her head under his chin and looked over at the weeping willow that held so many happy memories for them.
Harley narrowed his eyes. A tattered lump of discoloured material moved with each lap of the current but stayed stuck on a root without floating away.
The knot in his stomach tightened. He knew that dress. He’d caught a brief sight of it behind Tikki’s dad as he’d hauled Harley out of the ute by the scruff of his neck. Her mum’s cry of ‘Stop!’ as old man Chalmers raised his fist. Jesus. Loki settled against his thigh, leaning in close with a little whine.
‘Is that what I think it is stuck in the tree roots?’
Tameka nodded against his chest, her fists bunching on his jacket.
‘I’m so sorry, Tikki.’
He squeezed her closer, his hand cupping her head, his heart aching for her. Maybe Mai had thrown her suitcase in the dam before she left. Not that it would make any sense for her to do that. But then nothing about Tameka’s situation in the years they’d been apart made sense. He hoped with all his heart it was just Mai Chalmers’ clothes in the water and that the dam didn’t hold any other secrets.
‘Bones too.’ Her whisper feathered against his throat, tears wet on his skin. ‘I’ve been down here a hundred times … never saw it before.’
Jesus, bones? Where the hell had they come from? Had her mum’s remains been dragged out of the bush? There’d been an increase in dingoes getting past the dog fence two hundred kilometres to the east. Had they ranged this far down?
That would mean Mai Chalmers had wandered into the bushland surrounding the farms and got lost, a perfectly good explanation for why she hadn’t returned. Either that or she’d been in the water all this time. He didn’t want to think about how she got there, but his imagination took him on the journey anyway.