by Anna George
Below, a woman and a golden retriever were chasing each other across the high blankets of weed. They had the beach to themselves.
Neve took in the panorama of seamless blue. No rocks; no clouds. All-encompassing and boundless. She could see the woman and her dog, progressing along the sand, the dog scampering at the woman’s side. With so much space and freedom, it was running to and fro.
Neve tickled Cliff’s toes. His feet were thin and narrow, like her own. Like, she realised, her mother’s.
‘Want to go for a walk, chicken?’ she said.
Beyond the cliffs, in the cloudless sky above Bass Strait, two hang gliders were poised mid-rise like balloons, purple and pink. Neve watched them suspended in the air, as she jiggled Cliff in the newly found sling. He was facing out, taking in the sun, the blue. His arms and legs wriggling, lifting and falling like a puppet on a string.
Across the never-ending mat of weed, Neve strode out. What, she wondered, was Jessie having for breakfast?
Thirty metres up the beach the woman and her golden retriever continued to play. The woman was scavenging in the seaweed and debris, hunting for her dog’s ball, when Neve came upon her. One of the neighbours from the roadside on Thursday night, the woman was older than Neve had thought, say seventy, with flowing hair and tawny eyes.
‘You’ve come down to us,’ said the woman, tugging at Cliff’s feet.
‘Yes.’ The sun-spotted hand held her baby’s clothed toes. Extraordinary, thought Neve, the liberties people took with babies and pregnant bellies: touching, tickling, patting.
‘Isn’t he a sweetie,’ said the woman, who introduced herself as Faye.
Neve smiled politely at the assumption prompted by Cliff’s blue jumpsuit. She made a note to dress him in rosy dots tomorrow. But adult female company was a welcome novelty. As Faye fell into step, they walked on the sand in the laneway between the weed and the water, in a light silence, until they passed the first rocky point. This was the furthest Neve had walked in months. Momentarily, she fantasised about adopting Faye as a surrogate grandmother for her baby.
Faye cast her gaze ahead. Her dog was digging at the base of a collection of branches leaning on a fallen tree stump. Perhaps at something black and dead in the weed.
‘You found someone to fix your wall,’ said Faye.
‘Yes, thank god.’
Faye gave Neve a look she didn’t understand.
‘I remember being at your stage,’ Faye went on. ‘How are you bearing up?’
Neve stared ahead. An urge to reveal all reared up in her. She wanted to say it was the most challenging, most lonely thing she’d ever done. That, until three days ago, she’d been sinking. But, miraculously, she’d acquired another child; and everything had changed. Then last night, around midnight, her sweet houseguest had gone.
After the alarm scare, Neve had nursed Cliff on her terrace and watched a speck of torchlight move up the hill then stop. She wanted to tell Faye how she’d run from the balcony to the roadside calling, ‘Hello?’ and, ‘I’m coming!’ But how she’d found no trace of any of them. How she’d returned inside, cast off, without a proper goodbye. And their two worlds had parted again.
Tears sprang to Neve’s eyes. Though sleep had transformed her, she felt raw and new, like a snail without its shell.
‘Some days are better than others,’ she said.
Already, the last three were feeling like a dream.
‘If it’s any consolation, no one knows how to do it,’ Faye replied.
Neve smiled, heartened, as Faye bent to examine a pearly seashell, and found it empty. ‘But make the most of it, they’re with you so briefly.’
Neve had heard that one before. Older men, older women, they all said it – in the green grocer’s; at the newsagency; in the bank queue. As if your children were like birds, alighting on your shoulder for a mere decade or so before flying free. The observation, of course, was well intended. But today it held a fresh poignancy.
Faye gave a salute then skipped off to coax her dog away from its foul-smelling find. Together, they chased a ball. Watching the woman play, Neve walked on. Her limbs grew warm, her breath quickened. She felt the sun on her back.
Looking up the beach, fleetingly, she saw Jessie running inland through the seagrass. A nymph in denim shorts and a t-shirt. Time seemed to slow and stretch again. Then the girl, like a shimmering mirage, evaporated and Neve stirred, as if from a daydream. She smiled.
Walking on, she had an overwhelming sense that, wherever Jessie was, she was one with her, and with her mother. And with Faye and her dog. With Cliff and the bay, the distant islands and the floating gliders. They were all interconnected, their boundaries collapsed, merged, gone. An energised calmness enveloped her. Around her, the horizon, the sand and the air pulsed.
They almost made it home. Neve was striding up the beach, when she saw him. He was sitting on the dry sand among the setback bushes. He stood, dusting down his jeans, and waved, as if he was her lunch date. Her heart twisted and squeezed. Seeing him like this seemed so normal; she missed him. She still could not comprehend he was not hers. She had stitched him so completely into the fabric of her life.
Cliff murmured on her chest and she stopped. If she hadn’t seen his wife yesterday, she might have believed he’d come back. Today, she could admit, she’d been expecting his return. His contrition. Three months was longer than she’d anticipated.
Gathering her thoughts, she spun, extending her hand as if to reassure Jessie. But of course the girl wasn’t there. A breeze flicked fine strands of dried seagrass at her legs. She floundered, as if cut loose from an anchor.
Kris approached, his focus swinging between her and her baby; and her baby’s pull was greater. In Kris’s face she could see excitement, though he was trying to mask it. She knew that expression: the clenching of his jaw, the raised brow. It was also his trying-not-to-laugh face. She didn’t know what she’d expected from him, from this moment. But it wasn’t this.
He raised his hand to touch the baby’s but hesitated. His eyes moistened as he looked at her. Up close, his face registered hers, and something in his expression shifted. Was he surprised by the natural, unfussy look of her? Or was he moved? Regretful? She sucked in her breath and stood stock-still, feeling as if she had been pricked. It wasn’t fair. The way he’d ripped her world apart and left her in tatters. He was searching her face. For what? Forgiveness? But then he gestured to the baby. He’d always had to ask: ‘What are you thinking? What do you feel?’ But this asking before he touched her or rather her baby . . . was new.
She nodded, once.
Kris extended his hand to within Cliff’s reach. Then he peered into the baby as if into a wondrous magnifying glass. She wondered what he could see. What she could see was disorienting. Kris, up close, looked precisely like Cliff, forty years hence. Despite herself, she compared their features, noted deviations. Thick, dark eyebrows and full, sculpted lips were a clear match. Hair was a key difference. Kris’s was fair and thinning, Cliff’s was fair and thickening.
Neve watched, struck by the novelty of another adult so invested in her progeny. Then Cliff clasped the unfamiliar index finger with his entire hand and Kris smiled. For a moment, impossibly, the three of them were joined.
38
Sal paused, with a piece of granite in his hand. He tried not to think about the psychologist inside with Neve, or whether she’d had an uneventful night once he’d left. He rolled his neck, stretching his muscles, and felt the heat rising from his body. He hadn’t been able to reach Kris until morning and Neve hadn’t answered his calls. Was she mad at him? For challenging her and for leaving? He didn’t really know her. What would Kris make of her story? Earlier, when Sal had arrived to find the house empty, he’d been concerned. Concerned enough to knock on her neighbours’ doors . . . But then Kris had pulled up. He’d tried not to watch as the man kissed his wife on the lips. Their farewell had seemed especially earnest, like he was going on a trip or off to b
attle. Once Kris had gone in, Sal wondered if the man knew his business and whether Neve would ever forgive him for calling the ex.
Sal focused on his morning’s work. The new course that he’d laid, the pattern of protrusions. This part of the wall was the first you saw of the property and he wanted to do it justice. The patina of the older sections was hard to match, though. You couldn’t fast-track age. But as he went along, the newer stonework would look better. Blend.
Taking a sip of water, Sal assessed the row of properties on Spindrift Avenue. Every house at this end had a high wall, like a stern face staring at the road. As much as he admired Neve’s house, in one particular way he preferred his and his neighbours’ places. He’d noticed it as soon as he’d moved back that morning. And again when he’d erected the bird feeder. You couldn’t tell where one lot began and another ended. The properties were built together in the eighties, and animals and children played across the yards. The whole strip was inviting. That’s why they had street parties at Christmas, book clubs, barbecues in summer. He liked his neighbours. This last year, he’d missed them.
Working fast, he tried to ignore the woman in the station wagon and her occasional glances. He tried not to think about what was being said, in the house. He dabbed at his forehead with a hanky and tried to shake his memory of the touch of Neve’s fingertips, the reach of her face. He pictured her haughty expression as she talked about the girl’s mother, and the sensation of her fingertips faded.
He kept at the wall: lifting, placing, setting. It wasn’t his style to go moony over a woman. Not after one night. But, while he had his reservations, he did like her. A lot. Was this grief? Projected, externalised? Whatever it was, thinking about a living woman, no matter how confounding, was a welcome development. And a long time coming. It was good to feel needed again too. Despite how the night had ended, he was looking forward to her coming out, saying hello.
As he positioned a piece of granite, he glanced up at the woman in the car. She was reading; he couldn’t see what. She raised her head and caught him and smiled. A gracious, subtle smile. A fine-looking woman she was too, chestnut-haired, freckle-dusted. He almost felt sorry for the bloke then, having to choose between them. He didn’t smile back.
__________
Springing up the path, Neve could hear stone being scraped and a ballad. Adele? She smiled, ascending the steps two at a time. Sal wasn’t supposed to be back until Tuesday. A part of her hoped he’d come to see her, to make amends. Yet another part of her was reeling and in retreat, thanks to Kris. Curiously, the two parts didn’t cancel each other out. The sling was biting into her shoulders now and Cliff was due for a change. At the top, she could see the white ute and the golden Subaru. Her step faltered. She was beginning to feel surrounded. Under siege. She had a peculiar feeling Jessie was creeping behind her.
Over her shoulder, she whispered, ‘Jessie?’
‘Hope you don’t mind,’ Sal called, from his side of the wall. He’d thought she was speaking to him. ‘I got my hands on some Dromana granite.’
‘Of course not.’
Craning over the wall, he seemed wary and something else she couldn’t name. She focused on the stonework.
‘It’s coming up quickly.’ She didn’t mean to sound surprised, or disappointed.
‘I don’t muck about.’ He examined a long, thin piece of stone. He seemed to make a decision. ‘You’re looking well today.’ This time, his glance to her was shy; despite their words last night, she felt their friendship still budding.
‘I had a good night’s sleep . . .’ She hesitated. ‘Things were looking up until he arrived.’
She rolled her eyes to the Subaru but Sal had ducked behind the wall again. When a branch snapped, she turned, certain now that Jessie was hiding near a cactus. Neve half wished Sal would raise his head; then he would see the child too. And he’d understand. But he was focused on the granite in his hand, as if it was the blade of a sword. Neve considered what she was seeing, rationally. It wasn’t possible.
When Sal bent to retrieve another piece of stone, Neve crouched, whispering, ‘Jessie? Is that you?’
Jessie was further down the garden now, near the house; stealthily, the girl curled her pointer finger. Her brow was pinched. Urgent. She gestured: come. Then she vanished.
Neve shivered as a cloud crossed the sun. This was bizarre. How could Jessie be here? And in that t-shirt, those denim shorts?
When Neve returned her attention to Sal, he was wiping his hands. The day was mild but his shirt was stained with sweat and powdered stone. The hair at his brow was damp and his face was slightly flushed. The exertion made him look younger, amplified the whites of his eyes. He’d been working with an intensity she hadn’t noticed the day before.
He fixed his warm black eyes on hers. ‘Were you talking to me?’ his voice broke, ever so slightly.
‘Nope.’ She smiled bravely, adjusting the sling at her neck. ‘Are you up for a break?’
By the time Sal had cleaned up, she’d managed to conduct a brisk search of the upper level and form a short sequence of thoughts. Ten minutes later, Sal was changing Cliff in the nursery; she’d placed a call to Hannah Sorenson, her solicitor in Melbourne; and Kris was having a cup of peppermint tea on the balcony. Alone. In a blue mug that used to be ‘his’. Why she’d saved it, she didn’t know. But it’d placated him.
Other than deliver the tea, Neve hadn’t spoken with Kris, and she hadn’t quantified Sal’s presence. Contrary to the last few days, her instincts were usually good so she trusted them. She didn’t mention the status of Jessie to Sal and she didn’t let Kris inside. It was her house, her prerogative. If Sal was concerned about the whereabouts of the girl, he didn’t ask. And if Kris had an issue with being kept outside, he didn’t let on. She needed the two men apart and Cliff out of sight; seeing father and son together was unnerving. Discombobulating. While yes, over the weekend, her bearings had shifted, she had yet to reconcile a future with Kris and Bec in it.
Stepping onto the balcony, into the afternoon sun, she suggested they sit in the garden. Kris followed, nursing his tea and peering into the kitchen, the living room; but, finding them empty, he said nothing.
At the foot of the garden was a limestone bench, built in memory of Charm. This part of the property, near the shed, was shaded and rarely visited. Side by side, but apart, they sat. Neve felt the chill of the stone, numbing and damp, through her skirt. Kris seemed calmer, having had his tea and time to reflect. He was wearing black jeans and a jumper she didn’t recognise – grey, with a central zipper at the neck. He lifted the zipper until it was done up to the top. Its silver clasp, suspended under his chin, dangled, like a second, miniature tongue.
‘I’ve been trying to reach you for weeks: you and Cliff.’
When he spoke, the clasp swung to and fro. Neve inched her body from his. She could hear the crash of the incoming tide. The cries of nest-bound birds. Her thoughts rearranged themselves. Last night, had Jessie reached the beach too late?
Kris was perfectly still and resolute, as she imagined he might be with a client.
But then, why didn’t Jessie return to the house?
He gave her one of his penetrating stares. ‘How are you?’
Involuntarily, she touched her hair; though washed, it was pulled back simply and her face was free of make up; her clothes, though also clean, were shapeless and functional. Of course, she’d put on weight too, since he’d last seen her. Beneath his stare, she remembered herself – as she was.
‘I’m fine.’
He leant towards her and picked a piece of lint from her shoulder. She recoiled. Often, he’d sat too close, hugged too tightly. She rose and, half-heartedly searching for Jessie, parted the branches between nearby bushes. Finding nothing but weeds, as a cover, she tugged at them.
Kris placed his mug on the limestone arm of the bench, as if he was positioning a chess piece. A pawn, or the queen. ‘Have you been sleeping?’
She shrugged. I
n the distance she could hear Sal’s music and she felt herself blush. As Kris stroked the surface of the buttery stone, she moved to another bush, another patch of weeds.
‘I’m worried about you,’ he said.
From within her garden, above the smell of the sea, came another strong odour. She frowned.
‘Neve, are you listening to me? I’m worried about you.’
‘We’re fine.’ When she stepped towards the shed, the odour intensified. Fertiliser? She was puzzling at the shed’s unlocked door, when Kris said: ‘I hear you’ve been caring for a young girl.’
Damn it, Sal.
She stopped. Is that why Kris was here? Not for her son but because she’d cared for another child? A stranger’s child?
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘Please don’t keep shutting me out . . .’
Frustrated, she wiped soil from her fingers. The irony was she’d thought she’d let him in. Permanently. Though, of course, he never believed that. Her throat contracted. Perhaps he was right . . . Hesitating, she turned towards the sea but her view was blocked by the wall. Doubly exasperated, she sighed. Why’d they built the wall so damn high? She looked from it to her home. Why had she and her father built the house, with its high, soaring views, at this very spot then fenced it off from the beach, from visitors? All those years ago, what’d they been trying to keep out?
Kris watched, with a hand across his mouth. He was as worried as she’d seen him.
Returning to the bench, Neve took his empty mug and hugged it with her palms. The last of its warmth was leaching away. She walked the short distance to her gate, then flung it open and peered out. One or two straggling rugged-up clans were on the beach. But not a hint of Jessie.
‘I care about you, about Cliff . . .’ said Kris. ‘That doesn’t stop.’
The mug in her hands was cool and comfortless. That he could come and go, opt in and out of parenthood, galled her. That he could be entitled to her son, even so, felt cruel. That he still cared about her, hurt.