by Dean Mayes
Another framed portrait featured just Russell and Lavinia, smiling at one another, she in a formal dress, he in a jacket and scarf. As Hayden gazed at his mother, he felt a pang of grief. An awkward twinge pinched him when he looked at his father.
A final frame housed a wedding image of Hayden and Bernadette. He glared at this, biting his bottom lip. He reached across and slapped it down, hearing the glass crack under the frame.
Hayden sat himself up and walked to the window, gazing out into the dewy morning. Sunlight played across the hillside opposite, creating shards of light that cast the thick Australian bush in a golden glow. Mist rose from the foliage of majestic eucalyptus as the sun’s warmth evaporated the dew.
Warmth, Hayden thought. That’s what I need.
He turned and shuffled through into the central living area of the cottage, scratching his head. Canvas sheets covered the furniture here, too—sheets Hayden had draped there himself. He opened the front door, peering out.
He frowned. A wicker basket sat in front of the screen door, covered by a checked tea towel.
He shook his head as a flicker of recognition registered.
“Max,” he whispered.
Opening the screen, Hayden bent down and retrieved the basket. He pulled back the edge of the towel and found a selection of grocery items inside: tea, coffee, sugar, jam. There were a couple of cartons of long-life milk, some sweet biscuits, canned vegetables—even some ready meals.
He ferried the basket through to the kitchen where he set it on the bench.
His handiwork with the bed linen had contained the puddle in the middle of the kitchen and the bucket had done its job, collecting roughly half its volume of rainwater. Dropping to his haunches, Hayden touched his hand to one of the sopping blankets, then looked up at the ceiling.
What to do? What to do?
He knew he was going to have to get up there and assess what had happened to cause such chaos. But he wasn’t about to do that in the state he was in just now. He needed to warm up, first and foremost. Then he needed something to drink—a cup of tea. He began surveying the kitchen, his gaze passing over the single, most dominant feature, an ancient cast-iron stove.
Memories flickered.
The glow of a fire from the oven. An odd duo of pots on the stovetop, their contents bubbling away and releasing pungent aromas into the air. A woman’s delicate hands drift over the top of them, depositing herbs. A second pair of hands appears, masculine hands. They open the stove door and logs are dropped inside, fuelling the flames.
Hayden remembered a feeling of love in this kitchen, a love sustained by this very stove. Resting his hand on the rusted hotplate, he nudged open the stove door to examine the remnants of its last fire. A fire his father would have lit.
“Right,” he murmured. “Let’s get started.”
A flicker of confidence encouraged him. It helped to think about something simple and immediate. Something other than the situation he’d left behind.
Stepping through the back door of the house, out onto the little enclosed porch, his nose wrinkled as the crisp air invigorated him.
The porch was cluttered with all manner of junk and refuse, which appeared to have been left there and forgotten. It was unlike his parents to have been so haphazard, although given the tumultuous events of the last few years of their lives, their sense of house pride was perhaps the last thing on their minds.
Hayden looked out onto the overgrown lawn and the beds that were more jungle now than pretty cottage garden. Along the red-brick pathway leading from the house, in the centre of the wild and unruly lawn, stood a small shed with clapboard sides and a pitched roof.
His father’s work shed.
A smaller lean-to with an open front lay at the rear of the garden, stacked with firewood which had been cut to size to ensure each log would conform to the kitchen stove.
Moving tentatively along the path, Hayden regarded the vestiges of his mother’s long-forgotten flower garden.
It had once burst with colour and life. Remnants of a hibiscus, a camellia, one or two roses, and an apple tree were in evidence, but they were strangled under a mess of creeper and rotted plant matter. This garden had been his mother’s pride and joy, among the finest in the township.
An ache of sadness pulled at him.
He retrieved an armful of wood from the pile, then turned and glanced sideways on his return. The Holden was sitting just beyond the fence in the driveway.
He couldn’t remember having put it there.
He shook his head, angry at himself. It was a miracle he hadn’t killed someone, driving so far across the country in a state of physical and emotional exhaustion. And then when he arrived, surrendering to a dusty bottle of Scotch he’d found in a cabinet in a destructive effort to numb his pain. He felt ashamed of his behaviour. It wasn’t like him.
Returning to the porch, Hayden set the wood down in a box beside the door and brushed off his hands. Along the porch, he spied an old table tucked under the kitchen window, surrounded by clutter and piled with junk: old hand tools, rusted screwdrivers, hammers, wood lathe chisels, empty seedling pots. It was a chaotic mess.
Hayden went over to the table and flicked a finger through the pile, revealing more of the ephemera underneath. Old glass bottles of an indeterminate age, an upturned tin of rusted nuts and bolts, a couple of railway sleeper bolts. A record player.
A record player.
Hayden stopped, his hand hovering over the corner of the dusty turntable. Clearing the junk from the top of it, Hayden recognised it instantly. Sporting a dark, moulded-plastic chassis and a clear lid, the machine, while dusty, appeared to be otherwise intact.
Another flash of memory.
This very player, on this very table. The echo of music drifting up into the mountain air. A woman sits beside it, one delicate hand resting on the speaker where she can feel the vibrations, the other wrapped around a cup of tea. She sips from it, smiling.
Hayden searched behind the turntable and found the familiar squares of album covers. He extracted them from their resting place.
He clucked silently.
Cosmo’s Factory by Creedence Clearwater Revival. Cold Fact by Rodriguez. Neil Diamond’s Hot August Night. David Bowie’s Young Americans.
Greta Bradman…
Hayden lingered on this title, setting the others aside.
Searching under the table, he traced the end of an electrical cord snaking from the rear of the record player. The end terminated, not with a plug, but with two bulldog clips, both hanging just out of reach of a dusty old car battery. Though he doubted the battery was still serviceable, he attached the clamps to the terminals nonetheless.
To his surprise, he noticed the turntable spinning underneath the lid and he lifted it, seeing the armature hovering over the playing surface. Hayden slipped the record out, holding the disk in his hands, and brushed aside some dust. He set the record down. An audible crackle issued from the adjacent speaker.
The gentle refrain of a woman’s voice marked the beginning of the aria, “I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls.” It emerged as the accompanying orchestra rose in behind the beloved Australian soprano.
Hayden let the music lift him into its embrace and, for a moment, all the trauma of the recent past melted away. The aria rose into the air, teasing at the fronds of the tree ferns dressing the steep mountainside behind the house. It echoed across the valley, the way it had done years before.
He remained still, smiling as he remembered his mother sitting on this very porch, looking out across her glorious garden, transcending her deafness and “listening” to this very music.
And, for the first time in…how long had it been since he’d arrived here? Hours? Days? Hayden felt a flicker of light in his heart. The mess he had left behind in Adelaide seemed distant and he felt detached from it. As though it belonged to someone else entirely.
And with that feeling came purpose.
Hayden glanced at the wood he h
ad set beside the back door.
“Time to fire up the old girl.”
ON THE MAIN ROAD, SAM trotted along a few feet ahead of his master, his long tongue lolling.
Max blew a visible puff of air as the cottage came into view. Raising the brim of his hat, he stopped.
Music floated down from the hillside behind the house. It was music he recognised, even if he could not place it.
He brought a hand out from his jacket pocket and ran it through his beard. He tapped his hand to his thigh and clicked his tongue at Sam. “Come on, fella.”
Together, they turned and walked back towards the town centre to undertake a new errand.
A SMOKE TRAIL CURLED up from one of the cottage’s three chimneys.
Hayden ferried a wheelbarrow piled high with wood from the stack to the back door. From there, he transferred it to a chest in the kitchen.
The stove creaked and groaned with satisfaction from the fire burning in its belly. Its heat banished the chill from the air. The floor where the puddle had lain was almost dry and the ceiling above was no longer dripping. The cottage felt cosy.
Having toiled with the fire and the wood supply, Hayden knew he needed to formulate a plan to repair the damage to the roof and ceiling—but not before that cup of tea.
An old kettle steamed on the stovetop. A cup and saucer sat on the bench next to a ceramic teapot with some loose-leaf tea from Max’s basket of supplies.
Hayden resolved to thank him as soon as he could.
Opening the stove door, he shoved one more log through the gap and rose as the kettle began to whistle. Grasping the handle with a towel, he poured the boiling water into the cup and a new, sweet aroma wafted into the kitchen, helping to mask the odour of must and mould.
With each task, Hayden felt just a little more human.
Taking the teacup and pot, Hayden passed through the back door and set them both of the edge of the table, now clear of junk. An old, high-backed dining chair he’d found under several boxes at the far end of the porch waited beside it.
Sitting down, he exhaled and raised the cup to his lips. The tea was good. So good.
“Good morning.”
Hayden jumped at the sound of the gravelly voice and almost pitched his cup into the air. Recovering, he glanced in the direction of the driveway.
Just outside the gate stood Max Trumbridge.
Hayden tensed. “Good morning.”
Max shoved the gate open, breaking the grip of a tenacious creeper.
Though it had been years since Hayden had seen him, Max hadn’t changed. The same thinning hair, greying at the temples, tucked underneath a battered Pastoralist hat. The bushy beard, streaked with ginger, fell neatly over a thick scarf that had seen better days. Even his gentleman’s tweed was the same ill-fitting garment Hayden had always known. Moleskin jeans and Wellington boots completed his signature ensemble.
Max Trumbridge was a gentleman of the mountains—the gentleman of the mountains.
Sam bolted ahead of him and turned an excited circle on the grass. After closing the gate, Max turned towards Hayden, revealing a large loaf of fresh bread wrapped in paper. He set it down on the table. “For you. I had strict orders not to eat it on the way here.”
Hayden regarded the huge loaf with a blink.
He opened his mouth, but suddenly, he didn’t know what to say, how to address Max. Hayden could not meet his eyes and a blade of grief knifed him.
Max held out his hands and clasped Hayden’s arms. “How are you going, son?”
All Hayden could do was shake his head. A tear escaped and trickled down his cheek as Max drew him in for a warm hug. And then the floodgate had been tripped and Hayden felt himself let go.
“I know,” Max soothed. “I know.”
Hayden submitted to Max’s embrace, the older man letting him weep for several moments.
Drawing back, Max studied Hayden as he composed himself.
“I’ve just boiled the kettle if you’d like a cup,” Hayden whispered. “I used your tea. Thank you—for that.”
“That would be lovely.”
Hayden disappeared into the kitchen and returned in short order, cup in hand, and passed it across to Max, who had taken up a seat on a small oil drum. Max helped himself to tea.
“You must tell me how much I owe you for the basket,” Hayden said, sitting in the dining chair.
Max brushed him aside. “Your dad still had money on his account when he…” Max’s voice trailed off and he blinked self-consciously. “Don’t give it another thought.”
Hayden managed a smile and sipped.
“Three years, eh?” Max ventured. “It’s really good to see you, son. Even if it is under unfavourable circumstances.”
Hayden looked down at his feet.
“I-I didn’t know where else to go. I’ve left quite a mess behind.”
Max looked out across the overgrown garden, where Sam sniffed around the trunk of the apple tree. “This is your home,” he said. “You’ve known you can come here whenever you need to.” He sipped his tea. “Besides, messes can be cleaned up.”
Hayden’s attention glazed as the recent events echoed.
“Maybe not this one. It’s terrible, Max,” Hayden confided. “My marriage is done. And there was an ‘incident’ at work. The parent of a patient. He attacked me and I retaliated. I’m on administrative suspension with pay for who knows how long, pending a review.”
If Max was shocked by Hayden’s admission, he didn’t so much as twitch. “What happened with Berni?” he ventured.
Hayden’s stomach knotted and he felt himself being sucked back to the events of that night. “It seems Bernadette has been seeking…satisfaction in the arms of someone else. They got careless. I came home to find them in our bed. Our bed.”
Max leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Oh dear.”
“Oh dear, indeed. Now, I’m here. I’ve lost my job. I’ve lost my wife. The life I had is gone.”
Max looked up at him. “Sounds like a damned good country song.”
The quip caused Hayden to laugh and Max joined in with an empathetic chuckle. The sound of their laughter coaxed Sam out from under the tree and he trotted over the dewy grass to Max’s feet, where he sniffed the air and whimpered.
As their laughter trailed away, Hayden stiffened. “I have no idea what I’m going to do.”
“Don’t do anything,” Max suggested. “For now, at least. Take your leave and focus on something else for a while. Eventually, you’ll find a way forward.”
He stood, drained his cup and set it down on the table. “In the meantime, Nette and I are just down the road if there’s anything you need. Anything.”
Max rested a hand on Hayden’s shoulder. “In any case, it’s good to see you, son. We’ve missed you. Walhalla has missed you.”
Hayden felt the affection in Max’s words.
There was a time when he would have resented being told that.
Now…
Tapping the dog’s rump, Max turned towards the gate. “You better see if that solar array still works and fire up the fridge. I’ll bring by some meat later on. We’re getting a delivery in from Moe today. In the meantime, be sure to try the bread. Pumpkin and poppy seed. Best loaf in the mountains.”
With a nod, Max ushered the dog through the gate and was gone.
~ Chapter 8 ~
HAYDEN EMERGED FROM THE COTTAGE AND STOOD AT THE TOP OF THE STEPS, LIFTING THE COLLAR OF HIS JACKET.
He was well rested, having had a decent night’s sleep. After clearing out the majority of the detritus from the kitchen, he had spent the better part of yesterday taking the bed apart and repairing the old frame. He’d found some linen in a cupboard, relatively protected from the years of accumulating dust, that would do until he could get the washer and dryer going. He’d kept the fire burning in the stove overnight, which had kept the cottage cosy. All in all, he felt decidedly more human.
Looking out from the veran
da, Hayden saw the trees on the very top of the mountainside sway, teased by a breeze carried down from far colder peaks to the north. An abundance of bird life twittered up on the ridge, their song carrying across the valley.
He locked the front door, picked up the now-empty basket Max had brought, and descended the steps.
Outside the gate, he glanced at the ruined section of the fence and felt a pang of remorse.
As if he didn’t have enough to do, with the repairs to the cottage roof to somehow manage and the issue of establishing a stable power supply to the cottage, not to mention taming the overgrown jungle of a garden that threatened to consume everything.
Hayden sighed.
On the other hand, the fence presented another task that would focus his attention and take his mind off things back home. In a perverse sense, Hayden was grateful he’d rammed into it.
Turning away from it, Hayden lifted his head and listened to the soothing chatter of birds high up the hillside. The sun would not appear for another hour or so, yet its rays were already caressing the trees. It promised to be a pleasant autumn day. Hayden began a slow walk towards the centre of Walhalla.
Though Max had brushed aside his offer to pay for the groceries, Hayden wasn’t going to allow them to be so generous.
They were special people.
Max and Annette had been his parents’ closest friends and Hayden had known them his entire life. They were family. There wasn’t much the Trumbridges wouldn’t do for Lavinia, Russell, and Hayden Luschcombe.
During Lavinia’s illness, Annette would prepare baskets similar to the one she’d sent for Hayden, filled with everything his parents could possibly need. Max would bring them to the cottage so Russell wouldn’t have to leave his wife’s side. He would ensure payment for the provisions was waiting for Max in an old tobacco tin he kept beside the front door.
After Lavinia’s death and Russell’s slow decline, the tradition of those deliveries continued with Annette preparing them twice a week and Max depositing them by the front door. This went on for a year, until Max arrived at the cottage one day to find the basket untouched, a line of ants trailing from it.