The Bit In Between

by Claire Varley

  Their fights were never serious, but still Oliver worried.

  One day, almost a month and a half after they had arrived in the Solomons, Alison was wandering aimlessly through Central Market. She had bought eggplant, bok choy and tomatoes, and was trying to work out which of the two types of practically indistinguishable ferns was the one that tasted amazing and which was the medicinal one that tasted like a marathon runner’s feet at the forty-kilometre mark. The market was full of people, and as she turned down the aisle she accidentally bumped into a tall man in a torn singlet, his well-defined arms covered in tattoos. Alison opened her mouth to apologise, but the man wheeled around and started shouting at her, his words slurred and angry. She backed away but the man followed her, gesturing wildly. He raised his arms. ‘He’s going to hit me,’ Alison thought to herself and looked around helplessly. Suddenly there was more shouting, this time in rapid Pijin. It was a young female voice, strong and commanding. Another voice joined in, then another, until it seemed everyone around her was shouting at the man, who looked around him in confusion, his arms still raised. He shook his head as if trying to clear the voices from his ears and then stumbled off, pushing his way through the crowd. They all went back to their shopping except one small young woman who came up to Alison and put a hand on her arm.

  ‘It’s kwaso,’ the young woman explained. ‘Really strong alcohol people make at home. Makes people angry.’

  Alison recognised her voice. She had been the first to start shouting at the man.

  ‘Are you okay?’ The young woman gave her a concerned look.

  Alison was about to say that she was fine when she suddenly realised that she wasn’t, so instead she burst into tears. The young woman patted her on the arm until Alison calmed down. She wiped her nose on her sleeve. ‘Sorry.’

  The young woman shook her head. ‘No apologies. Kwaso makes people scary.’

  Alison nodded pitifully. ‘Thanks for making him stop.’

  The young woman smiled. ‘Come. I’ll walk you to a taxi.’

  ‘No, it’s okay. I want to walk. Clear my head.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll walk you out of the market then.’

  She waved goodbye to the young woman at the market gate and then walked quickly along Mendana Avenue until she reached the Lime Lounge. Alison tended to avoid it because there were so many busy-looking expats in there but she wanted somewhere quiet and air-conditioned and she needed a coffee. She sat by herself in the corner so that she had a full view of the café. Then she pulled out her mobile and called Oliver. He answered on the second ring which told Alison he was not having the most productive of writing days.

  ‘Guess what just happened . . .’

  As Alison recounted the story to Oliver she could hear him listening intently.

  ‘Do you want me to come get you?’ he asked, concerned.

  ‘No, no, keep working,’ Alison said, though she was comforted by the offer.

  ‘I’ll see you later then,’ he told her. ‘I better get back to writing.’ He hung up hastily as if suddenly distracted by a more pressing task.

  Nursing her latte, Alison glanced over at the pile of newspapers and magazines on a small table to one side. There was a copy of an Australian broadsheet that was a couple of months old. She had originally read the front page article sitting in a café in Melbourne’s CBD while taking a break from shopping for the trip to the Solomons. How long ago that seemed now. Alison took another sip of coffee. Suddenly her hand started trembling uncontrollably. She put the latte glass down. Her hand wouldn’t stop shaking, so she tucked it under her thigh.

  ‘Hello!’

  Alison looked up. The young woman from the market was standing there beaming at her.

  ‘Hi,’ Alison replied and then didn’t know what to say. ‘Are you here for coffee?’

  The young woman shook her head. ‘Cakes. My sister works in the kitchen. She tells me what cakes they make each day, and if it’s good I come and buy for my husband.’ She gave Alison another cheeky grin. ‘He’s getting fat.’ She held out her hand. ‘I’m Sera.’

  Alison pulled her hand out from under her thigh and shook Sera’s hand.

  ‘Would you like to sit down?’ she asked. ‘I’ll buy you a coffee and some cake. It’s the least I can do.’

  Sera sat down happily and began to talk. Sera was interesting and had plenty to say. She had won a scholarship to study politics at the University of the South Pacific in Fiji and when she returned she had worked as a journalist. She had given up her job only a few months ago, when she had married, because everyone told her it was the right thing to do, and besides, they were trying for a baby. Sera was from Isabel province and had beautiful open features with the most amazing smile Alison had ever seen. It lit up her entire face and made her big brown eyes sparkle when she laughed, which was often. Her thick dark hair was pulled back into a tight bun that sat at the nape of her neck. Sera spoke mostly English but reverted to Pijin every so often when she got excited or when she couldn’t find the expression she wanted.

  Alison was mesmerised.

  ‘What does your husband do?’

  Alison was expecting her to say computers. Lots of young men in the Solomons seemed to work with computers. Sera looked away shyly and lowered her voice. ‘He’s a minister.’

  ‘Like a priest?’

  Sera didn’t look up. ‘No. A government minister.’

  ‘Oh. Wow.’

  Sera looked up. ‘Yes.’

  Alison thought about the photos of the stout old men she had seen staring back from the pages of the newspaper.

  ‘Is he, um, old?’

  ‘Older than me but not like an old man. He’s thirty-five.’

  ‘Oh.’ Alison wanted to ask so many questions but didn’t know if she should.

  Sera took a sip of her coffee. ‘He was married before but his wife died in childbirth. So did the baby.’

  ‘What’s he minister of?’

  ‘Aid coordination and planning, at the moment. His father was a minister too, so it was easy for him to get voted in. He is a good man. He cares about his people.’

  Alison nodded. She knew what Sera meant by ‘at the moment’. Politics was a very transitory place in the Solomons. Members shifted parties easily and cabinets were constantly being reshuffled due to various alliance shifts, rule infringements, court cases and votes of no confidence, not to mention to constant accusations of corruption. Alison didn’t ask all the questions she was dying to, instead spearing a piece of cake with a fork. She somehow managed to lose it down her top en route to her mouth. Embarrassed, she debated whether to fish it out or leave it there. She didn’t want to get boob ants so she tried to subtly stick her hand down her top. She continued talking whilst doing so, hoping Sera wouldn’t notice.

  ‘And is he from Isabel too?’ she asked.

  Sera watched Alison root around for the cake, a small smile on the edge of her mouth. ‘No. Makira-Ulawa.’

  ‘And is it a happy marriage?’ Alison wondered why she was suddenly talking like a nineteenth century etiquette book.

  ‘So far.’

  Sera leant forward and took Alison’s hands. ‘Alison?’

  ‘Yes, Sera?’

  ‘Will you teach me English?’

  Alison made a face. ‘Your English is pretty good. I reckon it’s better than mine.’

  Sera scrunched up her face. ‘No. It must be better. It must be best.’

  Alison thought for a moment. What else did she have to do?

  ‘I would love to, Sera.’

  When Alison finally arrived home that afternoon she skipped through the door of the little blue house and found Oliver hunched over his laptop, typing furiously. She tossed a plastic bag at him. ‘I brought you cake, darling Oliver.’

  Oliver stopped typing and looked in the bag. ‘It’s half-eaten . . .
Is this your leftovers?’

  ‘Could be, could be.’ Alison smiled, pulling a beer from the fridge. ‘Guess who I saw at the Lime Lounge?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The young woman who saved me from the crazy kwaso guy.’

  ‘Really?’ Oliver sounded distracted.

  ‘Yes. And guess what she asked me?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘She wants me to teach her English. Now I have something to do, Ollie! Isn’t that superb?’

  Oliver’s face lit up. ‘English lessons! Yes! That’s an excellent idea!’ He started typing again, fingers racing over the keyboard, and Alison skipped off to the shower to wash away the grime and heat of the day.

  CHAPTER THREE

  SMOOTH SAILING (IS FICTION)

  Geraldine placed her hands on the table in front of her and looked gently across at Mary.

  ‘Now, Mary, let’s get to this learning English caper. It’s a marvellous language – kind and generous on the mouth with the most wondrous pronunciations. Such as ‘artisan’. Can you say ‘artisan’, Mary?’

  Mary looked shyly at her hands.

  ‘Artisan,’ she repeated and looked pleased with herself before frowning gently.

  ‘Please, Missus,’ she asked gently. ‘What is artisan?’

  Geraldine gave her a gentle smile. ‘Why, an artisan, Mary, is

  Oliver paused. He thought for a moment. He hovered his mouse over the word artisan, then clicked on Thesaurus. Nothing. He drummed his fingers on the keypad, then scrawled in his notebook: Google artisan. He turned back to the computer.

  Geraldine picked up a fountain pen and wrote the word ‘artisan’ on her notepad.

  ‘Artisan,’ Mary said again. ‘Oh, I see.’

  Just then the door burst open and Colonel Drakeford strode in.

  ‘Ah, Mary, practising the Queen’s English, I see!’

  Mary looked down at her hands and answered gently, ‘It’s not the Queen’s English, Sir, it’s mine.’

  Geraldine’s hand flew to her mouth as she laughed gently.

  Oliver read back over what he had just written and frowned. He had a very adept internal critic and right now this internal critic was weeping openly. Why were his characters talking like Jane Austen characters? And why was everything being done ‘gently’? Oliver groaned and slumped over his desk. His forehead pressed against the keys and made a long

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  across the page. It was the most productive thing he had done all day. But if Oliver was being fair to himself, which he seldom was, things were, for the most part, coming along relatively well. The introduction of Mary and the English classes had been a bit of a turning point for him and had made the last couple of weeks less painful. He’d greeted their two-month Solomon milestone feeling far less despondent than he had at the end of their first month. He still had no idea where the novel was going, but he wasn’t quite so convinced it was going to be an absolute train wreck. It now read less like something people lined their pets’ kitty litter trays with and more like something you’d find in a bargain bin for a dollar at a place with a name like Crazy Charlie’s Book Warehouse Extravaganza Pty Ltd that made its own advertisements which aired on local TV stations at three in the morning featuring the owner and his wife dressed as clowns. Worryingly, Oliver found this comforting.

  Alison placed her hands on the table in front of her and looked gently across at Sera.

  ‘Now, Sera, let’s get back to this learning English business. It’s an annoying language full of inconsistent rules and words we stole from other languages. Such as “artisan”. You’ll never need to know this word unless either Subway or hipsters make it to the Solomons, so I’m not going to teach it to you. What you will need to know, if you’re going to have successful conversations with white people, is the word “random”. As in “That’s so random.” Your turn.’

  Sera smiled. ‘That’s so random.’

  ‘Perfect. You can use that for a range of situations, like when something is unexpected or unbelievable or unplanned. Or just at any time, really. Whenever. At random.’

  The waitress arrived with their coffees.

  ‘Sorry, but no more low-fat milk, so they’re both regular milk,’ she explained.

  Sera nodded. ‘Hem oraet, no wori.’

  The waitress left and Sera turned to Alison. ‘That’s so random.’

  Alison smiled. ‘Kind of. We’ll keep working on that one.’

  Sera poured a couple of packets of sugar into her coffee. ‘Okay, I have a question. Why do some people pronounce “the” in different ways?’

  Alison contemplated this. She tipped a single packet of sugar into her coffee and then stirred it carefully until she was sure it had dissolved. Then she poured in another packet and stirred it thoroughly. After a while she stopped stirring, took a sip and then looked pensively across the café.

  ‘You know what? I have absolutely no idea . . .’

  Sera nodded. ‘That’s so random.’

  The English lessons, which had been taking place for a fortnight now, were going well, though Alison was quickly learning that there was a lot about the English language that didn’t really have any explanation other than ‘because’ or ‘I don’t know’. Most of the time they met in one of the handful of cafés in Honiara because it meant coffee and cake. She suspected they were both getting a bit thicker around the middle, but neither of them cared because life is too short to not eat cake.

  There was a sudden crash of plates followed by a high-pitched scream and both Alison and Sera started. The waitress was standing in the middle of a pile of broken plates and food, while a young child sat to one side rubbing his head and howling. An embarrassed young woman rushed over.

  ‘Timothy!’ she exclaimed as she picked him up. Alison had seen the woman trekking around Honiara with a small army of children. She vaguely remembered meeting her once and was pretty sure her husband worked in one of the High Commissions. The woman looked apologetically at the waitress.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said.

  The waitress smiled. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, and together they started cleaning up the mess.

  ‘It’s not okay.’

  Alison looked over her shoulder. An older woman was sitting at the table behind them with an older man. They were both dressed in business suits, which always seemed so out of place in Honiara. The woman shook her head.

  ‘There are places you bring kids and places you don’t bring kids,’ she said to the man.

  ‘Like cafés?’ he asked.

  ‘Like the Solomons,’ the woman replied.

  The man smirked but didn’t say anything. ‘Should we get back to that report, Gwen?’

  Gwen nodded and turned back to the paper in front of her, but not before adding a stern tsk-tsk.

  Gwen had done everything in life that she had planned to do. She’d started with field work in Africa and a master’s degree at a prestigious university, then worked her way up through the levels at a well-respected international NGO. She was now a country director for a major agency, and with the money she earned she had managed to buy a couple of houses back in the States that she rented out, securing her financial future. After she had done all these things, she had met a man who ticked enough of her boxes and who didn’t mind loving across two continents, so they had married and Gwen had crossed off another goal. He had grown-up children of his own, so she went right ahead and crossed motherhood off the list too. She didn’t like children. No, Gwen did not like children. She told herself so every day, just as she told herself how lucky she was to have done nearly everything
she had planned to do. Nearly everything. And she didn’t regret anything. That was what she told her reflection in the mirror – I don’t regret a single thing. And most of the time she didn’t.

  Alison stared at Gwen for a moment and then turned back to Sera. Sera made a face.

  ‘I think she doesn’t have kids,’ Sera said knowingly and Alison nodded. Sera gave Gwen a sad look. ‘Who wouldn’t want kids?’ she asked the world in general.

  ‘Do you want kids?’ Alison asked her.

  Sera gave her a look. ‘Of course. And you? Do you want children, Ali?’

  Alison paused. ‘I’m not sure. I’ve never really thought about it. I always just assumed I would have them, but I don’t know if I actually want them . . .’ She trailed off and stared thoughtfully into her coffee. For a long time Alison had been terrified by the thought of having children. Children were tiny little needy things that changed people and made them different. She was possibly the only person in the world who used three different types of contraception and still lived in terror that one day her period wouldn’t arrive. But then one of her friends had a baby and it hadn’t really changed her. Alison had realised it one night when her friend confided to her as they looked at her sleeping infant: ‘I know all mothers are supposed to think their babies are the most beautiful thing in the world, but god mine is ugly. I assume she’s going to get cuter, but right now it’s like suckling a piglet . . .’ And they had both stared a while longer at ugly baby Millie, who had stirred in her sleep and made a sound like a wet balloon being sucked through a vacuum cleaner.

  Alison and Sera continued to meet regularly at the Lime Lounge over the following weeks. Alison’s lesson plans were rather vague and Sera’s attention roamed so widely that their English classes were more like an informal conversation that was occasionally punctuated by one of them correcting the other’s pronunciation or grammar. Deep down, Alison suspected she was a terrible English teacher, but she was learning so much about the people and culture of this new country that it almost made up for it.