by Pat Rosier
‘Oh.’ Isobel saw that Daniel’s hands in his lap were shaking. Ginger jumped off as he tried to stop them by pressing down on his knees. ‘It’s the medication,’ he said, ‘happens several times a day, it’ll be over soon.’ Isobel waited quietly, alarmed, saying nothing rather than one of the platitudes that were all she could think of.
‘There, it’s stopped. Sorry, Sis, the doctor says to try and ignore it but I’m not good at that.’ He stood up. ‘I’d better go,’ he said, ‘I told Sally I’d get some things at the supermarket.’
They hugged at the front door. Isobel couldn’t remember when they had last hugged. Daniel patted her back and said, ‘You’re okay, Izzie, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.’ At the bottom of the steps he turned and waved and she waved back. Sally wouldn’t let him drive if he wasn’t supposed to, Isobel told herself.
There was nothing further she could do on a Saturday morning to track down Iris’s father’s medical records. If she could find out anything at all she’d feel less guilty about not believing she would, she thought, then told herself off for muddled thinking.
‘Come on Barney.’ He woke instantly at the rattle of his lead and ran in circles around her, barking. ‘You and I both need a walk.’ When they reached the park she took the path upwards, to where she could see the harbour around to the heads where the water came in from Cook Strait. Soon she was puffing, and when she stopped to get her breath, let Barney off his lead in spite of the prohibitive notices, then ploughed on up, enjoying the winter sunshine. At the top of the rise she looked across the sea to the Hutt Valley, the water lightly rippling the reflections that lay on it as though someone had placed them there, gently. There was a bite in the breeze; she was glad of her gloves and her pull-down hat, but it was sunny and clear, the city looked clean. Barney was covering a lot more ground than he would have tied to her, but never went far. ‘He’s a circling kind of dog,’ Iris had said once.
Isobel walked slowly along the ridge, ignoring the few other people, refusing to catch the eye of the man with a small brown dog obediently on a lead. Iris and Daniel. Daniel and Iris. She couldn’t decide whether she was more concerned about her partner or her brother. ‘It doesn’t have to be either/or,’ she told a seagull on a post, ‘I can worry about them both.’ And Iris came first, of course, and she turned and headed briskly back down the hill, two plans of action taking place in her mind. First, she’d do what she had to do — it was so clear to her now — regarding Iris and Chris, then she’d talk to Sally about Daniel and to Daniel himself some more.
When they were back at the house Barney had a long, slurpy drink of water and was asleep on an armchair by the time Isobel had finished dialing. She half expected a machine, but it was Iris who answered.
‘Hello, it’s me,’ Isobel said. ‘I’m missing you!.’
‘Oh. That’s nice. I miss you too.'
Really? thought Isobel, you sounded as though you expected it to be someone else. She’d have been at the hospital, Iris explained, but Eleni had asked if she could have some time on her own with Chris this morning, as she’d been back at work the last three days and she, Iris, supposed that was fair enough. Chris’s blood pressure was almost down to the top of the normal range, but they still hadn’t worked out why it had gone up.
Isobel said, ‘I need to ring your work again on Monday, I promised Angelo. What do you want me to say?’
‘Another week at least.’ Isobel could hear Iris’s irritation at having to think about it.
‘Okay, I’ll make the call. Expect me on Tuesday.’
Silence, then, ‘What?’
‘I said expect me on Tuesday. No, don’t say anything, just listen for a minute. I’ll go to work Monday, make some more calls about your Dad’s medical records, fly to Auckland on Monday night and to Melbourne on Tuesday morning.’
‘But there are …’
‘Direct flights from Wellington, I know, but this way I can see Andrew, I hope.’
‘Oh.'
Isobel waited. She was not going to explain, or worse, defend herself.
‘It’ll cost a fortune.'
Isobel let go her breath. ‘I know. I don’t care. It’s not like we’re struggling …’
‘No, I suppose not.’ She can’t decide whether she’s pleased I’m coming or not, Isobel thought. At least she’s not outraged.
‘What made you decide …?’
‘A whole lot of things, nothing in particular, maybe talking to Daniel …’ And she told Iris about her brother’s visit.
‘Poor Daniel. And poor Sally too. But look, I’ve just thought, you won’t be able to stay here at Eleni’s, there’s barely ….’
‘I know. And I don’t want to go to Shirley’s. I’m going to book myself into that place near the hospital that we didn’t stay at before. You can join me there, or not, whatever you want. Or a bit of both, with me and at Eleni’s, I don’t mind. I’m taking the four days off, so I’ll come back at the weekend.’
‘Oh. I see. You’re so — definite!’
‘Uh huh. Is that all right?’
‘Yeah, I guess.' Then the change of tone Isobel had been hoping for. ‘And I’m going to be really pleased to see you. I’ve been — am — a bit strung out …’
‘Yes, I know. It’s been hard on you. Hey, I’m really pleased you’re pleased I’m coming. Let’s talk again tomorrow, and Monday too, and I’ll see you Tuesday. I love you.’
‘Love you too,’ said Iris in a small voice and Isobel thought her partner was crying by the time she put down the phone.
Andrew said he usually went to the gym on Monday after work, but he could easily put that off. And why didn’t she stay at his place in Parnell, it was surprisingly handy for the airport. So Isobel let herself be organized by this man she hardly knew. She got the last seat on the 5.30 flight, assuring the sales operative on the phone that she did want it charged to her own credit card, not a business account.
She spent the rest of Saturday and most of Sunday visiting their friends. Those who had known Iris for a long time knew Chris and were anxious to hear about him. It was only to Miriama that she said anything of her concerns about how agitated Iris was. ‘It’s not that I don’t expect her to be concerned,’ Isobel explained, putting words to her fears, ‘It’s that she’s, well, obsessed. She says she’ll resign from her job if they don’t give her leave, doesn’t care about anything except Chris. It’s as though he were a child, a baby. I think I might be going partly to find out how he feels about all this maternal attention. And Eleni, how she’s dealing with Iris. Is that awful of me?’
‘No, it’s sensible.’ Miriama said. ‘Remember, though, he’s her only living blood relative, and while we might all think of ourselves as family to each other ….’
‘You’re right. And really I’m going because I have to, for myself.’ She explained about Chris’s accident leading her to contacting Andrew and Neil and Iris’s angry reaction and how she couldn’t stop now whatever the consequences. ‘I’ve always been really passive about family stuff ….' Miriama’s eyebrows shot up. ‘I have! You’ve never seen me with my family! Anyway, I’m not backing off, even if Iris doesn’t like it.’
‘That would be the worst reason to stop.’ Miriama said quietly. ‘Now, why don’t I come and stay at your place while you’re gone. No animals here,’ she waved a hand around her fourth floor Lambton Quay flat, ‘and it’ll save you having to arrange for them.’
‘Bless you. That would be wonderful. And very kind. Now I’m going to cry.’
Miriama handed her a tissue. ‘That’s what friends are for, being kind when it’s needed, among other things, which you know as well as anyone,’ she said, and offered Isobel a meal of soup and toast.
‘Thanks, but no thanks,’ said Isobel, ‘Rei’s expecting me. And thanks, thanks heaps.’
‘If you keep that up I’ll have to remind you how you got me through taking a sexual harassment complaint ….’
Isobel laughed. ‘That was ye
ars ago!’
‘And not forgotten! Now off you go, you know Rei hates people being late. Ring me about keys and instructions.’
The figure standing at the back waving vigorously was Andrew. Isobel noted his smart suit, grey, well-cut, deep blue shirt, lighter blue tie with a subtle diamond pattern. He held her arms and kissed both cheeks continental style then stood back and took her arm, guiding her towards luggage claim, all in one smooth movement.
‘Hi,’ he said, ‘I call you Isobel, right?’
‘Right,’ she replied, ‘and I call you Andrew. Now that’s settled, I thought I was getting a cab.’
‘It’s not every day — that sort of thing. And it was fun announcing at work that I was off to the airport to meet my gay birth mother.’ Birth mother was a bit of a shock, Isobel thought, she hadn’t put him up for adoption. Not really.
‘I prefer lesbian to gay.' She hadn’t meant to snap.
‘Sorry.’ They both spoke at once. After a moment Isobel started to say she thought being awkward with each other would pass at the same time as Andrew said, ‘I guess it might take a while to get easy with each other.’ And they both smiled and Isobel felt good.
Andrew’s flat surprised her. The building was 1920’s-grand, a huge villa-style edifice on three levels, all its wooden lace retained or restored. Andrew had a third of the ground floor, on the north-west corner with code access into a wood-paneled foyer,. He showed her how to turn it on and off, the keypad number the year of her mother’s birth, which she found affecting but made no comment on. The furnishings looked expensive, in unusual colours — maroon, a light blue, various shades of off-white — and the whole place was inordinately tidy.
‘It’s lovely,’ Isobel said, ‘is it always so,’ — she searched for a word that wouldn’t sound critical — ‘neat?’
‘No. I tidied up especially.’
‘Oh. You needn’t have.’
‘It seemed like a good idea, and I like having a clean-up now and then.’ He was showing her to what he called the almost-spare room, which was large but contained an exercise machine and a big, well-equipped computer desk. The bed was double, the surfaces clear of visible dust. He’d planned for them to eat out, Andrew told her, at a Malaysian place two doors down. If she didn’t like asian food there was an Italian.
‘Malaysian is great,’ she assured him.
‘Good. In half an hour?’
She nodded.
‘I’ll let you get settled then. ‘You might need the heater…. I’ll turn it on now for later.’ He leant down to a switch on the wall then closed the door quietly behind him.
Isobel lay on the bed, wondering if an evening with Andrew, even this charming, funny Andrew, was the best preamble to a day when she’d be dealing with her stressed-out partner, an injured young man in hospital, his probably-stressed-out partner and possibly her sister. She hadn’t let Shirley know she was coming. Isobel felt remarkably calm apart from a hovering anxiety about her and Iris. She pulled the duvet over her legs and lay on her back, still and breathing evenly .
~~~
Chapter 20
After a meal Isobel insisted on paying for, they strolled the short distance back.
‘Well, I’m impressed Isobel. Over thirty years in one job!’
‘Not really.’ Thirty years in one job sounded stuffy. ‘Lots of different jobs in several departments — as I have been saying!’ Then she laughed at herself. ‘Well, okay, over thirty years as a public servant. Thirty years – especially the last twenty – of political change and more restructurings than I care to recall.’
‘So what kept you there?’
‘Liking the work and my colleagues more often that I didn’t.’ She thought some more. ‘Liking being a public servant. A good, if not brilliant, regular income.’ Andrew used the keypad to open the door, then stood back for her to go ahead. ‘I did come close to leaving at least three times. Once in a crisis of personal politics and twice during restructurings.’
Isobel declined coffee but accepted cointreau.
‘That’s enough about work,’ Andrew called out from the kitchen where he was making himself coffee, ‘I want to hear your coming out story.’ He had told his over dinner, a combination of teenage loneliness, gradual evaporation of the close relationship with his brother and sexual experimentation with both boys and girls. No hint of criticism of her for not being there.
‘Feel free to censor,’ Isobel had said at one point and he had raised his eyebrows in acknowledgement. This flat, she learned, was his consolation to himself when his so far, one true love, had left him under pressure from his family to marry a second cousin and return to the Pacific Island of his birth for a career in politics.
‘That was five years ago,’ Andrew said, and since then there had been a couple of casual affairs, and a lot of socialising with friends. He loved live classical music and had several concert buddies who shared his interest, one of them a woman with grown children who didn’t like going out at night on her own. ‘Enough already,’ he had said then, ‘now you.’ And she had talked more about her work.
Andrew came back with a small lacquered tray holding a coffee maker and cup — no milk or sugar — a small crystal glass full of oily liquid and a bowl of dark chocolates. He sat beside her on the sofa so she had to turn towards him. ‘Shoot,’ he said, passing her the glass, ‘how, who, when?’
‘Your Uncle Daniel,’ said Isobel, ‘would say you missed the family reticence genes and got a big dose of the questioning ones.' Andrew smiled and waited.
‘Nineteen seventy-three,’ she said eventually. ‘Rosalie.’ That trip to the United Women’s Convention in Auckland. And trip was the right word for it, even though there were no drugs involved, not for Isobel at any rate. She had been persuaded at the last moment to be the fourth in a car making the twelve-hour journey from Wellington on a Friday, spending the weekend at the conference, sleeping at a billet for two nights, and driving back on the Monday. At first she’d demurred at using two days of her annual leave and then thought why not? She had celebrated the passing of the Equal Pay Act the previous year with a sense of being a very small part of a big achievement. But ‘equal pay’ didn’t have the exciting ring of ‘women’s liberation’. Theresa and Jill, colleagues from other branches of the department, made the arrangements; they were going in Jill’s car, all chipping in for petrol. If she’d realized Theresa and Jill were lovers, would she have gone? Rhonda wouldn’t go, she said she’d be there in spirit, without enduring two ten-hour car rides.
There was no mistaking that Rosalie was a lesbian; within five minutes of joining them in the car at Plimmerton she asked Isobel whether she had sex with women. ‘No,’ Isobel had said, ‘but I haven’t bothered with men for while,’ and blushed at Rosalie’s raised eyebrows. Not since July 1967 when I left my husband and children she could have said and didn’t. She heard ‘patriarchy’ spoken for the first time on that drive and wondered whether she would find any answers at the conference or ever, or even whether she needed answers. Would she have had an abortion in 1965 if she’d had any idea how to go about getting one? Would it have made any difference to her if the newly-legislated Domestic Purposes Benefit had existed in 1967? None of the women in the car knew that she had any reason to have these questions in her mind; she had lived quietly on her own since her arrival in Wellington, in a rented flat in Kelburn near the top of the cable car
By the time they arrived in Auckland, Isobel was in love. She was in love with sisterhood, with challenging the patriarchy, with women’s liberation and she was in love with Rosalie. And she knew why she had so hated being Bob’s wife. All without telling or asking. By the end of the weekend she was a thirty-one-year-old (born-again she would say later, laughing at herself) lesbian-feminist. Being made love to by Rosalie on a mattress on the floor of a house in Herne Bay was a wild ride of sex as she had never known it.
For the long drive back from Auckland there were only three of them in the car. Rosalie had decide
d to stay in Auckland, go on the dole, and join the struggle for the liberation of women everywhere. When Isobel wouldn’t agree to join her — fear of being found or found out, the impossibility of this new identity growing in the same city as both her parents and Bob and the boys over-riding the desperate headiness of being around Rosalie — Rosalie lost interest. Even with the exhilaration of the big hall filled with fifteen hundred women all believing they would change the world, Isobel knew she had taken her great leap several years ago. The most heated argument was about women’s right to abortion. There was also a great deal of talk about caring for children, catering to husbands, that reinforced her relief that she was doing neither.
Once Isobel realised that she had been a mere incident in Rosalie’s life, she was miserable for several hours, watching her at the centre of one group after another. Then she got caught up in a discussion about equal pay and stopped looking around for her and forgot to be miserable. Jill, assuming correctly the events of the night before, sought her out, worrying that she and Therese should have warned Isobel about Rosalie.
‘I’m fine,’ Isobel had told her, ‘if, um, mortified’. She subscribed to Broadsheet and joined the National Organisation for Women.
‘I might have fallen into and out of love with Rosalie within twenty-four hours,’ she said to Andrew, in his elegant living room, ‘but women’s liberation stuck. Though we soon started calling it feminism.’
‘I didn’t think women went in for the one-off thing.’ So he was more interested in personal experiences than political epiphanies. Wasn’t everybody, nowadays?
‘Some did and do, some don’t. And just for the record, that was my only time. Since then it’s been strictly getting-to-know-you first.' Isobel stood up, shaking her head when Andrew offered more cointreau. ‘No, thank you. It’s been a lovely, lovely evening.' She felt her eyes go damp. ‘I’m so glad ….’