Return to Stringybark Creek

by Karly Lane

  ‘Maybe we need to think of a way to change things.’

  ‘How?’ Ollie asked and his gaze was fixed on her with a solemnity she’d never seen before.

  She wished she had an answer for him, but she didn’t. Not yet. But she was determined to find one. He was right, things couldn’t continue to go this way. They couldn’t afford to lose anyone else.

  It was good to be busy, she enjoyed lending a hand when things were hectic—more so now than when she’d been a teenager. She gave a soft snort as she recalled how grudgingly she had helped out back then. She’d done it because that was what you did—everyone got in and pulled their weight. Looking back, she knew that it had made their family stronger, having to work around the clock harvesting, racing to finish before rain or strong winds approached, or worse, crops over-ripened and lost value.

  She didn’t mind being dusty and sweaty—she’d spent more than her fair share of days that way. Life as a foreign correspondent was not glamorous in any shape or form. She understood the romance of farming, the thing that separated those who worked the land and those who didn’t. It was that need to be outdoors, not stuck inside an office; the simple joy of feeling the sun on your face, and the soul-filling satisfaction of watching something you planted or raised, something you toiled and sweated and worried about, grow into a healthy crop or animal. She had the soul of a farmer, and even in the worst of situations she had encountered in her work she could find something to hold on to. A child’s reunion with its mother after an earthquake. A birth after a death. A tiny green shoot pushing from the ashen earth after a fire. There was always light even in darkness.

  Today she was over at Moorbrook with Griff and her father, lending a hand to the Dawsons to finish off the last of their harvest. It was a hard slog but they were determined to finish it today.

  Ollie, her father and Griff were all out in the big harvesters, gliding across the paddocks, perfectly aligned. It was Hadley’s and Olivia’s job to drive the chaser bins, lining up with the harvesters as they filled the bins with the freshly harvested seed, then headed off once more. It was a job that took quite a bit of concentration and skill, but Hadley had been doing it since she was old enough to reach the pedals of the truck.

  The farm was a hive of activity. Huge semitrailers crawled along the dirt roads leading to the silos Olivia and Hadley were filling with the seeds they’d collected from the harvesters. Utes were scattered the field that had only a few weeks earlier been full of crops waiting to be harvested. Radios constantly burst to life with chatter from drivers and harvesters and chaser bin drivers. It was all part of a well-rehearsed routine. Today had a celebratory feel about it—subdued but still noticeable. You didn’t get too excited about the last day of harvest until the last of the bins had been loaded. You never knew when something might go wrong—and it usually did. It was all part of the game. Farmers learned early how to live with frustration. It didn’t make it easier to cope with when the crap hit the fan, but it wasn’t unexpected. But so far today at least, everything seemed to be working like a well-oiled machine.

  Hadley hadn’t seen Ollie for a few days but she’d heard his voice over the radio and was relieved that he still sounded like the Ollie she knew—maybe a little quieter than usual, but he was still there.

  At the end of the day, when the last bin was emptied, they gathered around the stationary machinery and quenched their thirst with cold beers. Silence echoed beyond the chatter and celebration—for the first time in weeks there were no harvesters, no tractors, no machinery at all rumbling in the distance. As a small child Hadley had loved driving out with her mother to take a picnic basket of food and an esky of cold drinks to feed the workers. Even when it wasn’t the end of harvest, it felt like a party. Today the atmosphere was even more festive with the Callahans, Dawsons and workers all happily lounging on the ground or perched on the backs of vehicles, feasting on delicious food baked and delivered by two of the best cooks in the district.

  As the afternoon faded, people slowly began drifting off, leaving only Hadley, Griff, Olivia, Ollie and a handful of others to continue unwinding. She wasn’t sure if it was the beers or the release of long hours of work and the stress of Luke’s funeral, but a few of the men started to act the larrikin, led by Griff, as per usual, and closely followed by his best mate, Ollie. Hadley couldn’t recall who brought it up but suddenly a dare was made. And everyone knew that combining beer, country boys and a dare was going to end in either something hilarious or illegal, or maybe both.

  Either way, she was glad she’d brought her camera along.

  ‘Let me get this straight—you dare me to jump in the back of the chaser bin?’ Ollie was saying to Griff when she came back from retrieving her camera from the ute.

  ‘Yep,’ Griff drawled. ‘Naked,’ he added smugly.

  Hadley froze in the process of taking off her lens cap. Naked? Her stomach gave a weird lurch. He wouldn’t do it.

  ‘You’re on.’

  Hadley felt her mouth drop open and quickly shut it. A warm flush began creeping up her neck and she turned away quickly. Oh. My. God. Pull yourself together, Callahan.

  The cheers and egging-on started and Hadley knew without turning that Ollie had started disrobing. Swallowing hard, she turned her head. She was going to look pretty damn stupid if she didn’t snap out of whatever this thing was.

  ‘Are you getting this, Hads?’ Griff called, spying her holding the camera.

  Automatically she lifted the camera. At least behind here she could hide her stupid reaction. Surely Ollie wouldn’t really get naked? It had been funny when they were kids—seeing someone streaking about naked was a regular occurrence then—but they weren’t teenagers anymore. Lord, she was sounding like a grandmother.

  Ollie tugged his T-shirt up over his head and dropped it on the ground.

  No. Ollie was definitely not a teenager anymore. Hadley swallowed painfully as her gaze swept across his chest, resting on the two quite prominent pectoral muscles he’d just revealed.

  ‘Sorry?’ Olivia said, beside her.

  ‘What?’ Hadley dragged her gaze away from Ollie to his sister.

  ‘I thought you said something.’

  ‘No,’ Hadley said quickly, turning her head back in time to see Ollie unzipping his jeans.

  ‘All right,’ Olivia said, holding her hands up. ‘Hello? Your sister is standing right here. I do not need to see your hairy butt in all its splendour, thank you very much.’

  Relief filled Hadley at her friend’s intervention, and she firmly squashed the little pouting voice that protested at the interruption.

  ‘Fine. I didn’t want to climb into the bin bare-arsed naked anyway,’ Ollie said, strutting over to pull himself up the ladder on the side of the bin and gracefully swing over the top. Shortly afterwards a pair of denim jeans flew over the side, followed by some boxers.

  A chorus of hoots sounded through the air and Olivia shook her head. ‘How old are you guys?’

  ‘Get up there, Hads. We need photographic evidence,’ Griff announced.

  ‘Unless he magically has a spare pair of jeans and boxers up there, I’m pretty sure we can take his word for it that he’s naked,’ she said drolly.

  ‘Then give me your camera,’ Griff said, walking towards her.

  No one touched her camera. Ever. ‘Okay, I’ll take a stupid photo,’ she agreed reluctantly, moving towards the ladder. She hauled herself up and closed her eyes for a moment. This had started out as a joke, but the way her hands were sweating suggested this was no longer funny. Seeing his hat hanging off the top of the ladder only added to her dread. Dread. Yes. Not excitement. What the hell?

  ‘It’s okay, Hads. I’m respectable,’ Ollie called out teasingly.

  ‘Yeah right,’ she scoffed, gingerly pulling herself the rest of the way to the top and looking over. She gave a nervous chuckle. There was Ollie reclining on his side, one arm casually bracing his weight, stretched out looking for all the world as though he
were casually sunbaking on the beach. Except for the pile of lentils he’d scooped up over his hips.

  ‘I don’t think I’ll be eating any lentil-based products for a while,’ she said dryly, raising her camera and clicking off a few shots.

  ‘I’m pretty sure I’m more at risk of catching something from this stuff,’ he reasoned.

  ‘This is so wrong,’ she said. ‘Here,’ she tossed him his hat, ‘sit up and place that strategically.’

  ‘It’s only supposed to be proof I’m actually in the nuddy, not a photo shoot,’ he complained, but followed her instructions.

  Hadley moved her camera up and down a few times, getting her focus right before snapping a few more shots. ‘Move your arm a bit to the left.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Just do it,’ she said, forgetting for a minute her earlier discomfort. She was loving the colour of the grain against the strong lines of the man half buried in it. The texture and feel of the image excited the photographer in her. When was the last time she’d enjoyed the actual artistic appeal of a photo session?

  ‘Put your hands behind your head,’ she said, cocking her head slightly as she studied him.

  Her gaze followed the slow movement of his arms as he linked his fingers and placed them behind his head, the movement making his biceps bulge. Hadley licked her suddenly dry lips as her eyes moved lower across the trail of hair that dipped below the strategically placed lentils.

  ‘Ah, Hads?’

  Hadley gave a start, causing her to momentarily lose her balance. Ollie was halfway to his knees before she righted herself and called out an alarmed, ‘I’m okay! Stay where you are.’

  ‘Everything okay up there? What are you doin’? Is he naked or not, Hads?’ Griff called.

  ‘Ah. Yeah.’ She cleared her throat quickly. ‘You owe him fifty bucks.’ She saw Ollie relax slightly now that he knew she wasn’t in danger but found him watching her with an expression she found hard to read.

  She shifted her gaze from Ollie’s as she felt her brother climbing up behind her, his loud chortle breaking the strange moment. ‘That’s gold.’

  ‘Yeah, okay, show’s over. Throw up my gear,’ Ollie said wryly.

  ‘You sister’s gone home, so I think you can get down and grab ’em yourself.’

  ‘What? Hey, Griff, don’t be a dick,’ Ollie said, sitting up straighter, digging himself out of the heaped grain.

  ‘Whoah. Okay. I’m done with the official photos. Get out of the way, Griff,’ Hadley said, elbowing her brother so she could climb back down.

  ‘Comin’ down, Ollie?’ Griff called from the ground once he’d reached the bottom.

  ‘Toss up my stuff, Griff,’ Ollie yelled from inside the bin.

  ‘Griff, throw him his clothes,’ Hadley said, trying to keep a straight face. It wasn’t funny, and yet … well, maybe it served him right for agreeing to such a stupid dare in the first place.

  ‘Nah, let him come down and get ’em himself. You don’t have to look,’ he said, sending her a narrowed-eye stare, ‘unless you want to,’ he added, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

  ‘Whatever,’ Hadley scoffed, stepping around her brother. ‘Like I’ve never seen a naked man before.’

  ‘Don’t let Dad hear you say that,’ Griff warned to her back, before his loud hoot of laughter made her turn and gape at the sight before her.

  Tired of waiting for Griff to send up his clothing, Ollie had decided to get them himself, ignoring the catcalls from below. The stark white of his backside and ankles stood out in almost comical relief against the rest of his tanned skin and she clicked off one more photo.

  Hadley bit her lip to hide the grin that had formed as she’d watched his defiant descent down the ladder. When he reached the bottom, Ollie took his hat off his head and shielded his groin with it, storming past to pick up his clothes.

  She chuckled the rest of the way to her car and was still wearing a smile when she eventually pulled up back at Stringybark.

  You’d think once the craziness of harvest was over that things would settle down, but there was no such luck. If it wasn’t time to harvest something, then it was time to prepare the next paddock to sow something, and then there were the cattle that always needed drenching, marking, feeding, weaning and selling. The list of jobs never ran out.

  Ollie found himself thinking back to yesterday and the whole naked dare thing. It hadn’t been the smartest idea, and he’d only done it to show off. Sure, as a seventeen year old, getting naked to impress the girl you liked was understandable—seventeen year olds were not renowned for making the best choices—but you’d have hoped he’d have grown out of it by now. He wanted to blame the beer, and the hot weather, and sheer bloody relief that harvest was done and dusted … but, really, he was just showing off.

  He glanced at his wrist and felt a twinge of irritation at the cracked screen that greeted him. Another reason he should have behaved more sensibly—he had broken another watch. That was the second one in the last year. Why didn’t they make anything that actually lasted anymore?

  He forced away his frustration and went back to thinking about Hadley. Over the last few weeks they’d gotten closer. She’d helped him through a pretty rough time and he knew without her he would be in a lot worse shape now than he was. Maybe it was in his head, that strange feeling that something was happening between them. Up until the other day, he’d almost convinced himself he was imagining it, but then they’d had that moment. They’d looked at each other and something had happened. He didn’t know what; maybe it was the first time she’d seen him as someone more than her brother’s best friend or her best friend’s brother. Maybe it was the first time she’d allowed herself to see him as someone different. A ripple of excitement ran through him, just as it had when she’d looked at him that way.

  Was it possible he and Hadley might finally have a shot at something? It seemed hard to believe after wanting it for so long. Yet if these past few weeks had taught him anything, it was that you never really knew what life was going to throw at you. Where he’d been content to sit back and wait before, now he felt an urgency to act. At night he found himself lying awake thinking about where this thing with Hadley might go—was there any point starting something that had no hope of becoming long-term? He knew how much Hadley’s career meant to her and he wouldn’t want her to give it up. He gave a mental snort: if he were being truthful, he knew he wouldn’t stand a chance in a contest against Hadley’s career. Very little in this world could. And yet there was a burning inside his chest that he couldn’t ignore. How many more years was he going to sit back and wait? An image of himself old and alone floated before his eyes. He pulled himself up abruptly. When the hell had he become so melodramatic?

  Eleven

  Hadley was busy writing an article for one of her freelance projects when she heard the ping of her phone alerting her to a new message. She glanced across and felt a smile spread across her face as the name flashed across the screen. Ollie.

  Hadley’s gaze fell on her camera sitting on the table nearby and she reached to pick it up. She’d been out earlier that morning taking photos. Her spontaneous photo shoot in the chaser bin had sparked a renewed interest in photography. The morning air had felt cool on her face, summer mornings were her favourite time of the year. Everything smelled fresh and sweet. She’d walked down to the stock yards and caught the first hint of the sun peeking up from the horizon, the solid old timber posts silhouetted in stark contrast against the soft colours of the morning sky as dawn gave way to daybreak. Hadley scrolled through the images, particularly loving the one of a single dew-drop hanging like a diamond from a silver-threaded cobweb.

  As she scrolled through she came to the photos of Ollie and gave a strangled kind of chuckle. While the image itself was hilarious, of a handsome young farmer laying naked, in a bin full of lentils, his groin covered with a hat, there was also an undeniable prickle of something that felt very much like attraction. He was a good-looking,
virile male and she was finding it difficult to remind herself that this particular guy had been like another brother to her growing up. She should not be having these kinds of thoughts about him. She’d known Ollie all her life—why was she suddenly seeing him like this? Maybe it was some kind of reaction to Mitch’s betrayal. Maybe this was a rebound response because Ollie was safe—maybe that made him appealing all of a sudden. Whatever it was, it seriously baffled her. How did you go from having platonic feelings for someone to, well, very unplatonic feelings?

  ‘Morning tea, darling,’ her mother called through the kitchen screen door.

  Hadley jumped, turning the camera off quickly, before placing it on the table carefully. You’re acting like a twit. Knock it off. Was it creepy to be having these feelings about Ollie? She felt like a teenager again. In fact, the last time she’d been this stupid over a boy had been when she was a teenager.

  ‘Everything all right?’ her mother asked as Hadley came inside.

  ‘Yep. Right as rain.’

  ‘Morning, Gran,’ Hadley said, leaning over to kiss her grandmother’s soft cheek.

  ‘Good morning, dear. Let’s see who we’ve managed to offend today, shall we?’ Gran said, dragging the newspaper across the table towards her.

  Hadley bit back a chuckle. She loved this woman so much, but political correctness was not part of Gran’s vocabulary. ‘It’s nice to see the headlines not dominated by that scoundrel of yours for a change. Thank goodness the politicians have created another scandal. They’re always good for that.’

  ‘I think we’ve seen the last of Mitch for now.’

  ‘Good riddance. His eyes were too close together.’

  ‘Ida,’ Lavinia sighed, and Hadley gave a snort.

  ‘You were right, Gran,’ she admitted.

  ‘Of course I was. But what’s the point of being young if you can’t go and make a few mistakes now and again? If you don’t make mistakes, how will you ever know when something’s right?’