by Kylie Kaden
‘Listen to you! Why do you care? You barely know me. You were a mistake, Will. That’s it.’ And she stomped down the hall, late for the next arsehole.
* * *
Abbi couldn’t get Will out of her head after that morning. She wasn’t sure why, exactly. He wasn’t movie-star handsome, but by the third drink she’d failed to see why his looks hadn’t instantly drawn her in. There was something masculine about him (that wide jaw, those broad shoulders). Something robust and reliable that made her feel safe. Her throat tightened when she thought of how she’d left things. She was never usually one for regret, and wasn’t sure which bit hit hardest – the guilt over her own cruel words, or the truth in his. He was out of line – she was still sure about that. Arrogant. Patronising. But since meeting him the previous night, she’d come to realise that she was, as he insinuated, slowly but surely fucking things up. It was like he’d cursed her life in that empty apartment. Or was it a simple case of him shining a spotlight on her glaring denial about how off course things had become?
It had started with the electricity being disconnected. She was sure she’d set up a direct debit, certain she would forget to pay her own bills unless it was automated with all the time she spent at her mum’s at Lago Point, but apparently not, she discovered by candlelight. Then a letter arrived to warn her that she was no longer eligible for Austudy due to her lack of attendance. (Was it really her fault that her mum’s chemo coincided with her tutes?) Not to mention her uni library privileges being revoked until she paid her outstanding parking fines. (Was she really to blame if they didn’t approve her parking permit application?)
It was Rosa, the sixty-year-old regular at the bar, who gave Abbi a different point of view. ‘But he was so pompous about telling me what to do with my life,’ Abbi had told her a few days after meeting Will, as she poured her best client another shandy. ‘Like he knew best. Like he was the grown-up, lecturing a wayward teenager.’ Abbi had worked a double shift, and Rosa had been there for most of it. ‘And he was kind of stupidly big. Like a giant person.’ Abbi impersonated a puffed-up blowfish to demonstrate. ‘The kind of guy that shops at Big and Tall, ducks for doors and barely fits in airline seats, you know?’ But for some reason, she felt disloyal about making jokes at his expense. If she were honest, she was a little turned on by his size. He was solid, manly, not like the flimsy fellas she’d dated of late who thought kale was a meal.
Rosa didn’t seem put off. ‘The sex?’
Abbi faked outrage. ‘I only just met him.’
Rosa looked down her nose at her in obvious disbelief.
‘Not awful.’ Abbi cleared the empty glasses, placed them in the racks. ‘Polite.’ She was lying because the truth didn’t fit with her story. Abbi took the bartending job in the hope that the clientele’s stories would help inspire her screenplay, but she felt like she was the one telling tales. ‘It was good, actually,’ she then admitted. ‘Unexpectedly good.’
‘So, this tall, responsible bloke picked you up, had nice, considerate sex with you, made you breakfast, then pleads with you to stick around and help fix your fucked-up life instead of settling for your cheating ex? What a bastard!’ Rosa laughed a guttural laugh, throwing her hands in the air like she was at one of her Italian family dinners.
Abbi failed to find it funny. She wiped down the bar with menacing strokes, arcs of wet shining the glossy tile.
‘What’s the catch? I mean, is he married? A meth-head? A pimp?’
Abbi frowned. ‘Don’t think so. No evidence of a girl in his house – he had no curtains for God’s sake, but he has a job. A doctor, or something medical.’
Rosa’s painted-on eyebrows rose in unison.
‘Well, he was. Now he’s working with the Red Cross – or so he says. I actually thought he was joking when he told me he shipped out the next day until I saw the suitcases. He’s in Haiti now – you know, the Caribbean island hit by the earthquake, cholera, poverty, all that.’
‘I do watch the news, yes.’
‘But doesn’t even that seem a little strange? To leave your life for nine months, like you have nothing to lose, and go to a foreign country?’ Now I sound superficial, as well as crazy. I need sleep.
‘To help displaced people manage a natural disaster? Kind of heroic, if you ask me. What if no one did that stuff?’
Abbi’s lip drew up into a scowl like she was five. She usually left when people told her truths she didn’t like, but she was stuck behind a bar for two more hours. ‘Oh, and guess what else – my frigging lease is up. I’m as homeless as Harry over there.’ Abbi gestured to the guy on the other side of the bar who slept in the Lifeline bin out the back.
Rosa’s lips thinned. ‘Mmmmhmmm.’
The night manager, all black-shirted and stubbled, frisbeed a tiny package across the bar to Abbi. ‘Says it’s for you. Someone dropped it off.’
Abbi held the small, sticky-taped wad of paper in her hand like a stress ball, clueless as to what it contained.
‘Well, go on,’ Rosa prodded. ‘Open it.’
All eyes were on her. Even corner-booth-guy looked her way.
Abbi peeled back the layers of tape, finally revealing tissue paper folded in a neat square. Inside was one of her earrings – cognac amber framed in gold. Her mind reached back to wearing it the night a broad-shouldered doctor with kind eyes left his rowdy mates to walk her to the bus safely (avoiding her ex, who hadn’t got the message they were over). Somewhere between the bar and Bus Stop Seven, it had dawned on her that she wanted to hold onto this feeling, so she’d gone home with him. Gone home with him and told him things she’d hardly realised about herself (like how she wanted kids, a career in photo journalism and a house with a giant bath). He was like truth serum – a sliver of sanity on the mad canvas that was her life. A life she’d once expected more from.
Rosa leaned in to inspect the single teardrop stone, then looked up at Abbi, confused. ‘What? No note?’
‘I know who it’s from,’ Abbi said, gazing at the stone. Precious, not because it was amber, but because it was a gift from her mother. She’d said it matched her daughter’s spirit – full of light. But Abbi felt heavy and lonely and far away from that version of herself. She served a pint of beer to the drifter, now balancing on the corner stool, but kept her attention with Rosa, who was looking at her strangely, and it wasn’t because she needed another pour. ‘What’s with the face?’
Rosa shrugged. ‘Think the universe is telling you something, is all.’
Abbi pressed the earring to her lips. Perhaps the crazy Italian was right. The earring – it was her favourite thing. It reminded her of who she was, and yet she hadn’t even noticed it was missing.
Chapter 4
Hannah Worthington laughed at the luggage-allowance warnings on her Qantas boarding pass. She knew she had far more baggage returning to Australia than when she left – all of it weighing on her mind. She slumped and watched strangers waving to their families behind the glass of the departure lounge as she waited to board her flight. At that moment she realised it wasn’t just her luggage in limbo. It was her life.
When she’d phoned the week before to tell her dad she was flying home, he’d been stoked. When she’d politely asked Molly to ‘move her crap’ from her old bedroom, the news was met with radio silence. No smart-arse comment or adolescent attitude, at least not at first just simple garden-variety shock. Hannah had threatened her return for years. Molly must have thought she was all bluff.
Eventually, she had grunted, ‘Like, for real? Why now? Did his old lady catch you?’
She was surprised by how perceptive Molly was, despite being half Hannah’s age. Molly had been nearly twelve when Hannah left for the States. She cringed when she thought of how long it had been since she’d seen her. Somehow it was easier not to. Last Christmas, Hannah had sent money home to both of them for tickets to New York, but her father had explained that they needed it for rates, and Molly wanted driving lessons instead, if that was ok
ay. What could she say?
‘Mol, Lago Primary offered me a job. It’s just a floater at this stage, some curriculum office work, but it means I can come home, and that psychology course I started can be done online, so I can still finish it.’
‘Psychology?’ Molly asked. ‘You want to be a shrink?’
Hannah hated when people referred to psychologists as shrinks. It was so unenlightened. The same people complained about the amount of crime and broken homes and terrorists, but had no respect for the occupations that tried to help people avoid those negative life paths. She’d already learned so much from the unit she’d completed. ‘Maybe. Or a student counsellor.’ Hannah heard Molly clear her throat to hide a snigger, but decided she wasn’t in a position to call her out on it.
‘But you hate people crying,’ Molly said. ‘Your face goes all weird.’
‘Thanks for your support.’ She laughed, but it hurt. It hurt because it was true. She’d had her own share of low moments, so it was fair to say Hannah was more interested in the theory of psychology than the practical. She’d have to work on that. Do some … What did her lecturer call it? ‘Exposure therapy’, to become more comfortable with emotions.
‘Soz.’
‘Do Aussie kids talk like that too, now? I was hoping it was just an American thing. And it’s not about the stupid job or the stupid course. Dad’s not getting better …’ And I want to make up for lost time.
The unsaid had settled on the phone line. ‘You say that like he has the flu.’
‘You’ve got uni next year.’
‘So you keep saying.’ Molly’s voice changed in tone. ‘You really think Blake’ll take you back? After everything?’
Hannah let out a noisy breath. ‘Who’s saying I even want that?’
‘Don’t you?’
Hannah’s ribs squeezed. Of course I do. ‘Is he seeing anyone?’
‘Besides his sister?’
‘Funny. You’re a funny girl.’ It had prickled. Blake and Abbi always had the ability to speak without words, like their thoughts broadcast on a network Hannah didn’t have the passcode for. Molly mumbled something stodgy, and Hannah could hear the ching of cutlery on china. Weet-Bix, she guessed. It’s all their father ever had in the pantry (they were probably half wheat by now). ‘Can you not eat for five seconds, Mol?’
‘You know Abbi’s been brainwashing Blake against you ever since you dumped him the third time. Could get awks.’
Hannah knew this. She didn’t need to hear it. Didn’t need relationship advice from a seventeen-year-old.
Molly slurped, then rustled something against the phone. ‘Gotta get ready for school. Duckface is still deputy – I know, crazy hey–so I’ll have detention if I’m even five seconds late for assembly.’
Halls full of farting adolescents; Hannah hadn’t missed that. She’d worked at the high school before swapping to primary teaching. Younger kids were more appreciative than those swearing, spitting teenagers who were too far gone and made her cry half the time. The younger children needed their noses wiped a little too much for her liking but were still preferable to teach than feral high-schoolers.
‘Catcha.’ Molly hung up, a series of hollow beeps replacing her voice.
* * *
On her way to school that day, Molly Worthington felt guilty. Guilty for not feeling how she figured a nice person was supposed to feel when their sister tells them she’s moving back. There had been times when she could have used a big sister (having to learn about tampons from your dad, for example, was nothing short of mortifying). But now she was seventeen, and fully formed. Admittedly, things had been a little chaotic recently, but Molly had the feeling that they were improving – a new normal had begun. Looking out for her dad, ploughing through the same essay topics, working at the bakery, and then there was Gwen.
It wasn’t cool to admit that your best friend was an old librarian with chin hair who never left her house, but if she were honest, that’s what Gwen had become.
The day they’d met, back at the start of term, was still etched in Molly’s mind. And strangely, it was all thanks to Blake Newell. Sweat had soaked the navy cotton brim of her senior’s hat, the canvas rucksack cutting lines into her shoulder as she trudged through the quiet, callistemon-lined streets. She’d dawdled in the shade, admiring the lorikeets bickering over bottlebrush when she heard the ping of tyres on hot bitumen at her back.
A police sedan crawled to a stop, and through the loudspeaker Blake’s voice bellowed, ‘Want a lift, Miss Molly?’
A heavy sigh. ‘Please stop doing that.’
He wound down the window and she saw his beaming smile. ‘What? It’s fun.’
‘People will stare!’
He scanned the street. Not even a dog bore witness to their exchange.
‘They’ll think I’m some sort of crim, coming home in that thing all the time.’
‘You kinda are, aren’t ya?’
She rolled her eyes. The summer heat had been exhausting. She got in, pointed the aircon vent towards her sweat-beaded face and removed her hat. ‘Before you ask, my sister did mention she was thinking of coming back to Australia the other night, but don’t get your hopes up – she says that every time she breaks up with a bloke.’
Molly heard him inhale. ‘She’s single?’
‘I don’t know why you bother with her. Didn’t Miss White have a thing for you? She seems normal. And lives in the same time zone.’
‘She’s got man hands.’
Molly laughed, and Blake had passed her an opened envelope, her name next to the subject line: Community Service Order. She flicked through the letter. Meals on Wheels has been appointed as the service provider to receive one hundred hours labour, to commence 12th February. Molly groaned. ‘This week? How long have you had this?’
‘Sorry. I’ve had it here to give to you but I didn’t want to send it. I know you wanted me to keep all this between us so your dad doesn’t blow a fuse.’
‘Couldn’t I pick up rubbish from vegetation strips or something? That’s what they do in the movies.’
‘Boiling peas and talking to old farts beats scraping roadkill.’ Blake edged the car out from the gutter.
Molly remembered Blake picking up Hannah on the same street when she was little, and him letting her sit on his motorbike after he got his bike licence, her tiny face swallowed up by his huge helmet.
‘You never did quite explain what happened with all that. I mean, a vandalism charge; it’s just not like you.’ Blake gave Molly a sideways glance. ‘Hope you’re not taking the rap for anyone, like What’s-His-Name? The pants-too-low dickwad who hangs around the bakery like a stray. Looks like Ed Sheeran but without the talent.’
‘Jake?’
‘Jake! That’s his name. I think I called him Ed last time I saw him skulking around.’
‘He’s a douche. Why would I do that?’
Blake pulled up just down from her house. ‘Why did you do what you did?’
Molly opened the door, a rush of oppressive heat filling the cabin. She grabbed the letter with a sigh. ‘Thanks for the lift. And for, you know …’
She had started her community service sentence the next week and that was how she’d met Gwen.
Lady Gaga’s ‘Shallow’ belted through the speakers of Molly’s car stereo. She’d sung along, feeling the emotion before misjudging the driveway, clipping the corner of the garden. She parked her rusty 1965 VW Beetle, got out and noticed the first in a line of French lavender had been trampled under her tyres. She groaned. She’d got her open licence two months ago and already had three casualties: a letterbox, a pole and now a living thing. A neat row of old-people plants stared at her as she approached the lowset cottage, the delivery resting on her hip. She manoeuvred the tray so she could reach the doorbell. ‘Mrs Andrews?’
Molly approached each social interaction like a puzzle. An equation where she plugged in values based on her best guess of the person’s needs and expectations, like a chemist
with a prescription to fill. She avoided new people, as a rule. But she had no choice today.
She stretched her neck as she waited. Mabel had warned her that many customers were too frail to get up to answer the door easily, so when no one arrived she turned the knob. The paint cracked as the door opened, like it hadn’t budged in a while and she hoped her customer hadn’t carked it. The vacuum-wrapped roll almost fell off the foil tray as Molly glanced down the hall in the dusky light. ‘Hello? Mrs Andrews?’ The house was clean, technically, but the lounge was cluttered with stuff that had no business being together: kitchenware, vases, a pile of records balancing on a suitcase. She felt like she was reading I Spy, searching for a thimble in a circus.
‘Meals on Wheels,’ Molly sang, and relaxed when she detected movement under a rug that wrapped around a recliner in the living room. The source of the movement, a grey-haired woman, was sophisticated and younger than she’d expected. The woman had a Pilates posture in lieu of the senior slump, and Molly wondered why she needed cooked meals provided. Molly coughed and the woman turned, startled, and slipped her headphones to her neck. ‘Hi, there. Where would you like your tray?’
‘You’re not Mabel.’ There was an elegance in her speech despite the distrust in her tone.
‘I’m Molly. From Meals on Wheels?’
Mrs Andrews gestured to the side table next to her chair. Her skin was mostly smooth, and Molly wondered if she was actually her own father’s age, but then she noticed the Cadbury-purple blouse and lilac pants, and figured she must be older – the only people who wore purple were either eight or eighty.
‘Molly Worthington? Dan’s youngest?’ The woman’s tone had changed again. She seemed ruffled suddenly, when it was Molly who was in unfamiliar territory.
‘Is something wrong?’ she asked.
The woman recomposed herself. Chunky headphones nestled around a thin bob of helmet hair, nonspecific colours of grey, white, beige and whatever else grew. She had puckered lips, as if she’d spent her whole life hushing people. ‘Always thought that was an old person’s name.’ Her considered way of speaking reminded Molly of a fortune teller she’d visited when she was still young enough to believe in things she couldn’t see. ‘Mollys should be my age. Like Eunice or Beryl.’