by Allie Little
If I was honest with myself, I’d let Jack be here beside me. Beautiful, sweet Jack. My Jack. But I’m jumbled in my head and tangled in my heart. I know I love him, but it’s because I love this boy that I can’t allow him to comfort me or be here with me. Without him I’m adrift, floating in a sea of confusing emotion. Now when I’m with him I see every emotion play out on his beautiful face. The boy who lost his brother. The one who blames himself for his loss. When he forgets to hide it, the ache in his eyes is haunting. I think about the way he wrapped his arms around me that first night in his room on the river. The photo of Charlie on the wall. Sunny, smiling Charlie. And happy-go-lucky Jack. But that was before. Before Charlie died in the sea. And Jack’s pain is real. Tangible. Like you could grab it and bottle it. Because Jack won’t swim. And he certainly won’t surf. The ocean took his brother’s life and he’s just not ready to forgive it. Or so he says.
I’ve realised something about Jack. My Jack is not just afraid of the sea. He’s afraid to betray his brother. And afraid to let go of buried pain. Because if he did, that just might mean he’d finally, once-and-for-all finally, forgiven himself. And he just can’t do it. Not yet, anyhow.
I sigh, pulling out my phone from the handbag still slung over my shoulder. I call Dad’s room, speaking with the nurse to find out if it’s okay to visit. Yesterday, when his condition deteriorated, the staff asked we do that to make sure it’s a convenient time for visitors.
Dad’s nurse answers brusquely and asks me to wait. The doctors are busy with Dad, with a complication, and when they’re done they’ll find me in the waiting room. I end the call, staring at the carpeted floor. A complication? Strange. Something seems off. Not right at all. So not right that I begin to worry, with fear building heartbeats like drums through my chest.
The phone buzzes in my lap. I answer to Dr Floriet’s voice, distant and emotionally remote. I listen with ears that aren’t mine. Dad has gone into cardiac arrest, and right now, as I hold the phone to my ear, the doctors are performing CPR to try to bring him back. Bring him back? So he’s already gone? No. That cannot be right. Please, let that not be right. I want to shake the words from my ears. Tear my ears from my head.
I move like an automaton from the waiting room into an empty corridor, glancing nervously in the direction of his room. And the first thought that hits me like an air-raid through my fear-ridden heart is that Dad is down there, right now, being worked on. I imagine them clustered around his bed, pumping his chest. But I know. In my heart I know. He won’t be coming back. And my second thought is that Dad’s gone, he’s actually gone. This very second, beyond the glossy floors and dimmed lights, my father is dead. And in my blurry, fuzzy, bleary head I know it. They are not going to bring him back. And as more and more seconds tick by, I feel it in my airless soul. Dad’s gone. Forever. And as my legs begin to crumple, my third thought is that Ben and Mum don’t know. They are blissfully unaware, in this agonising moment, that Dad has gone.
The air is sucked viciously from my lungs. I desperately need to relieve my legs of the immobilising shake coursing through them, but returning to the waiting room where empathetic eyes will be glued steadfastly upon me fills me with a deep-seated dread. Tears roll over my face in burning rivers. I glance around, searching for a chair. Disorientated and alone. A young, very blonde woman makes her way sombrely down the corridor, her shoes clacking in decibels over the floor.
She smiles appropriately. “Are you Samantha?”
I nod.
“Come this way.” She takes me by the arm and guides me to a private room complete with fresh flowers and comfortable lounges. Boxes of tissues are dotted around the warm space. “Dr Floriet will be here momentarily.” She hands me one of the boxes of tissues and I take a couple before dropping into one of the lounge chairs. She places her hand kindly on my arm. “My name’s Holly. I’m the intensive care social worker. Dr Floriet won’t be long. Can I get you some water?”
I shake my head. “No, thanks.” Actually I’d quite like to leave, but I’m trapped like a prisoner between these walls. There are only four of them, but they’re squashing me oppressively between them. Crushing me. Entombing me. There is no escape. There will never be an escape.
“I’ll be back soon.” Holly smiles, tipping her head ever so slightly, and quietly leaving the room.
I’m not quite sure how I’m supposed to feel in this moment. Should I feel more? Less? Is this pervasive guilt I feel for not knowing how to feel? I mean, I knew this, right? Knew this was coming? Five minutes ago I had a father. And now he’s coasting the skies with the feathered angels, invisible in an atmosphere of heavenly blue. Free. Set free in the sky. And although I don’t know how to feel, I can feel him. Omnipresent. Everywhere. And the sensation calms me like a parent to a child. And for one brief moment I think I’ll be okay. But be still my flowing tears. There aren’t enough tissues here to ever blot them dry.
Dr Floriet opens the door and walks in seriously. Very seriously. Holly stands beside him, dressed in a cream silk shirt tucked into high-waisted black dress pants. And she wears a ruby-red flower brooch pinned below her collarbone. For some reason I’m fixated on the red sparkling brooch and wonder why at a time like this my brain would focus entirely on this triviality. There are five delicate points to it, like a gently curved starfish, and it glimmers red in the low light of this dimly lit room, where nothing else seems to hold light at all.
Dr Floriet clears his throat. “Samantha, I am very sorry to have to tell you that your father passed away at 10.45 this morning. I am extremely sorry for your loss.”
The words roll over me like a thick fog. “Thank you,” I choke out, not recognising my own husky voice.
“We tried very hard to revive him. You should know that we fought hard to bring him back, but in the end, it just wasn’t possible.”
I blink away the tears. “I understand. I want to thank you for everything you did. And everything you tried to do.”
He nods sympathetically. “We performed CPR for nearly ten minutes. Considering his age we wanted to give him every chance. Forty-eight is very young, Samantha. Your father had an undiagnosed heart condition of which he was unaware. He’d been in heart failure for some time. We were hoping for a good result, keeping his blood pressure up artificially, but unfortunately your father’s heart was just too weak.”
Holding myself together, I take in what he’s telling me. Barely, but I do it.
“Would you like me to call your mother, or would you prefer to inform her yourself?”
Shit. My mother. Not a conversation I desire to have. And Ben. He has to be told too. Are they together? Why aren’t they here already? She’s usually here so early. “Um …,” I cough through a constricting throat. “I think it would be better if you inform her. She’ll have questions and I won’t be able to answer them.”
“Of course. I’ll call her now. So, please excuse me. If you have any questions, please call so that we can answer them for you.”
“Yes, I will. Thank you again, Dr Floriet,” I say, as he almost bows from the room.
Holly moves to my side, hands me a bunch of pamphlets about funerals and grief, and what to do when someone dies. I’m not sure why she hands them to me. I’m not ready to deal with this stuff. I really need some air.
Before she can explain my phone rings, muffled by the leather handbag still slung over my shoulder. I rummage aimlessly, finding it vibrating like crazy at the bottom of the bag. I flip open the case.
I attempt to clear my throat and my head simultaneously. “Hey, Ben.”
“Hey. Someone tried to call Mum’s phone. A couple of times. She’s here, Sam. Lying in the dark, completely immobilised. I can’t get her up today. There’s no way I can get her to the hospital.”
I pause, wondering how to do this. The pain that tears me up inside is cutting through my heart. How do I tell my brother that Dad’s gone? Gone like a sunset in a dimming sky. It’s the forever that’s hard to comprehend.
“Sam? You still there?”
I hold the phone closer to my ear. So close I can hear breaths of frustration through the line.
“Yeah, I’m still here. But, um … I have some news. I hope you’re sitting down.”
A sharp intake of air is sucked through the phone. “Oh no. About Dad?”
“Yeah.” I say, bracing myself. Holding it. Holding it together because I must. “He’s gone, Ben. He died this morning at 10.45.” Tears rip from my eyes with the heartbreak. I hear Ben exhale slowly, saying nothing, then snatching for air in violent gulps. I glance at Holly, who I realise is still in the room.
“I’ll leave you for a few moments,” she whispers. “Take as much time as you need in here.”
I nod at her, keeping Ben on the line.
“I thought we had more time,” he says hoarsely, the pain audible in his tone.
***
I drive home on autopilot with rivers of salty tears tracking across my face. I don’t think about where I’m going or how I get there. I just drive. And all I want is to keep on driving. Forever. To rid myself of the heavy, lashing pain that courses through my chest. A baffled stupor has covered me in a haze so thick that comprehension deserts me. Because forever is so long. An eternity. And I can’t comprehend a forever without Dad.
The road into Tea Gardens curves with its patchwork of grassy paddocks on either side. When I drive over the rise at the Lion’s Club lookout I see the sea, the vast blueness crying in unison with me. Begging. Drawing me to it. And all I can think about is how I will feel, submerged beneath those waves.
Bennett’s Beach is busy at the Surf Club. Too busy for today. I need solitude. Isolation. Somewhere to hide my heavy-lidded eyes from view. I park further north, near the Golf Club with the buggies lurching blithely over the course.
I push out and lock the car, feeling the comfort of sand below the soles of my feet. And then I walk. Over the rise of the dune, catching my feet on spiky barbs and ignoring the pain. Across the sand to the water, where I dive fully clothed under rolling whitewashed peaks. And there is no distinction between my salty tears and the sea. Just a liquid tranquillity enveloping me within the serenity of its arms. Where the startling cold is my bewildering pleasure. Life let me be.
***
My legs are heavy on the steps to the veranda. These steps I’ve walked a thousand times over, and then some. The front door hangs open with no sign of life visible from the outside. Perhaps there’s no-one home. Perhaps I won’t need this encounter. To endure her pain as well as my own. Because knowing her, and knowing who she is, I know what’s coming.
“Sammy? Is that you?” Ben’s voice creeps from the rear of the house. Tentative. Soft. He meets me in the hallway, drags me into an embrace so tight I can’t breathe. He quickly draws back. “Why are you all wet?”
“I went swimming.”
He stands back and frowns. “Fully clothed? Are you mad?”
I smile weakly. “Not mad. Sad.”
He nods with sorrow filling his eyes. “You would do something like that.” He pulls me toward the kitchen and switches on the kettle. The angst is so palpable I feel it emanating from him. Pulsing in streams of heartache. As usual we need no words.
As I quickly head off to change out of my wet clothing the kettle clicks off. Ben pours water into mugs of instant coffee and stirs sugar through both. He hands one to me when I’m done and we sit on the couch looking over the river. The couch where Dad used to sit. The image in my mind is so strong and I never want to forget it. All the simple things. Just like this.
The river runs south toward the sea. We watch it coursing downstream, taking mulchy, dead debris with it as it moves. Ben runs a hand through his already ruffled dark hair and sighs. “So I told Mum.”
I look at him. “And?”
He gives a defeated shrug. “She just looked at me. Retreated to her room and hasn’t come out.” He glances away, skimming his eyes across the river. “I popped my head in a while ago and she’s asleep.”
In this moment I feel for my brother. Because he needs her to be here. Needs her to be present, like a mother ought to be. The strong one, holding us all together like glue. Instead it’s us, trying desperately to prop her up.
I reach for his hand and hold it. Tight. And when I do he grips it like a lifeline he doesn’t want to let go of. Like I’m all he has. We spend the next few timeless hours just sitting here, talking about anything else, because then today seems like just another normal day. Except my heart’s bleeding out and my head’s all hazy within a thick vaporous fog.
When I think about my mother my traitorous heart melts. Because I know she loves, or loved, Dad. So this must be agony for her. And she is my mother, flaws and all. I don’t wish her pain.
“It’s been ages. Maybe I should check on her,” I suggest, thinking about her formless figure lying bereft in the darkness.
“She’s broken, Sam. I’m worried this’ll be more than she can deal with.”
I rise from the couch with fear gnawing at me. I couldn’t count how many times I’ve had to do this. Bring her back from the brink. And it doesn’t get any easier, especially not today. Ben gives me a half-hearted, appreciative smile.
I knock softly on her door twice, holding my ear against the painted timber. Nothing. No sound reaches me from behind the door, and my heart beats faster. I push it open, the blanket of darkness shrouding me in its thick cloak.
“Mum?” I ask softly. “Are you awake?”
Nothing.
“Mum?”
A soft rustle moves from the bed. I shift closer, positioning myself softly on the edge of her chintzy bed. No light peeps through the chunky curtains casing the windows.
Mum exhales loudly. “I’m awake.”
“Are you okay?”
“Do you think I’m okay? My husband is dead.” She pauses, then sits herself higher on the bed. A glint shines from her wet eyes. “Are you okay?” she asks.
For one quick moment I think she cares. She leans forward and wraps me tightly in her arms. Arms that I haven’t felt around me for the longest time. Arms that feel strangely good. But when I lay my head tentatively on her shoulder, she whispers gently into my ear.
“I blame you,” she says, ever so softly.
With my guard down it takes a moment to process her words.
“I blame you for this. For his death,” she whispers saccharine-like while I’m cocooned in her arms. “It’s all because of you. Never here. All that worry. You should be ashamed.”
I try to push away, to escape this ambush. I’m caught, ensnared in her trap. And her syrupy words burn me like a fiery poker through the stomach. Twisting in my head and striking me off balance with her perfectly aimed blow. The gut-wrenching realisation that she blames me for Dad’s death hits me like a brick from above. And all I want to do is run.
“No,” is all I can say as I extricate myself, the tears spilling in rivers over my face. “No. You can’t possibly think that.”
I back from the room, wishing desperately to be away. From her, the pain, the reality, and her crushing, burning, scalding words. Just. Away.
I push past Ben, grabbing my keys and bag on the hall table on the way. “I have to go,” I sob. “I can’t stay here.”
“Wait,” he demands, grabbing for my arm. “You can’t go.”
I pull away. “I have to,” I gasp, trying desperately to draw air into my lungs.
“Why?” he asks, baffled.
“Ask her,” I throw back, needing to escape.
Ben follows me outside. “Sam! Stop! You don’t need to do this. She’s not herself. Whatever she said? She doesn’t mean it.”
“Really? Could’ve fooled me. Because I am a fool. Believing that maybe, just maybe, my mother loved me.” I watch his face as it drops. “I couldn’t have been further from the truth.”
Ben tries to comfort me. But I don’t need him. I just need somewhere to escape to.
“Can I have you
r house key?” I ask, the desperation crushing my insides. “I need to stay at your place for a few days. Get my head together. Get away.”
“In Sydney?” he asks. “You’re going all the way to Sydney?”
I snigger bitterly. “All the way? Sydney doesn’t seem far enough.”
Ben shakes his head, dragging keys from the pocket of his jeans. He twists the key from the ring. “This is a bad idea, Sam. For a start, you shouldn’t be driving. And second, there are people here who care about you. You should stay.”
“I can’t,” I choke out.
“What about Jack?” he demands. “He’s worried about you. He knows about Dad. I told him, because you weren’t going to.”
“Really? You had no right. He’s been through enough, Ben. Did you know he lost his brother? He’s been through this. He doesn’t need more.”
“How about letting him decide that, hey? He loves you.”
Hearing that cuts me. My heart flips over because I love him too. But I also need to protect him. Fuck. From this hideous pain. “Please, just give me your key.”
He hands it over and I back away to the car, just as Lily pulls up in the driveway.
“You’ll be fine,” I say, gesturing toward Lily.
She climbs sombrely from her car, thudding the door closed and meeting me in the drive. “I’m so sorry, Sam. I know how close you were to your Dad,” she says as she hugs me. “I am truly sorry. He was a beautiful man.”
“Thanks, Lil,” I manage, drawing back. “But I have to go now. Look after Ben, okay? He needs you.”
She nods. “That’s why I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
Ben comes up and circles her waist with his arms from behind. She turns in his arms and presses her lips against his.
“I have to go. You know where I’ll be, Ben.”