by Karen Zelas
Four long months her mother lay in bed and followed Sue with dull eyes as she moved about the bedroom, tidying, smoothing, dusting, drawing curtains, carrying basins of water, dispensing medicine. Those eyes. To this day, they followed her – she could see them now, boring into her. No child should have such responsibilities, Sue thought. Had she still been a child though? Her mother’s illness had made her grow up abruptly. But Sue sensed something had been aborted, left unfinished, something soft deep inside, like an unbaked gingerbread woman.
The road followed the geography of the coastline: in and out of bays, up and down hills, each turn, each crest offering another spectacular view. But the colours had dulled for Sue. The birdcalls through the open car windows sounded just like birdcalls, not like the silver notes that usually rang for her. After a slow cruise through the main street of Akaroa, they parked the car and walked. Food was a priority for the visitors, but Sue had little appetite.
‘Where shall we lunch?’ Ben asked her.
‘You choose,’ she replied.
‘What about Bully Hayes?’
‘You always choose there.’
‘You said I should choose.’
Sue shrugged again and forced a smile. The droop of her shoulders was making her neck ache. ‘The food’s good,’ she assured their guests, and once more she was aware of relief drawing Ben taller. Today his dependence on her was conspicuous and weighed heavy.
Hank steered towards a table by the open doors, not exactly outside, but hardly inside either. Gaye followed purposefully, while Ben and Sue trailed behind. The two couples sat across the table from one another.
‘Bully Hayes was an American buccaneer who sailed the South Pacific. I Googled him once,’ Sue volunteered, making an effort. As they waited for their food, she examined the two moon faces above the silver jackets. She had read somewhere that many people are attracted to a partner who approximates what they would like to be: their ego ideal. If that was so, Sue thought, grinning inwardly in spite of herself, then Hank and Gaye must be in love with themselves as well as each other. She contemplated what had drawn Ben and herself together, that winter at university, when she was a graduate student and Ben was among a group of undergrads she was tutoring. It was not that she had wanted to be like Ben, but that each had something the other needed; together they were more than the sum of their parts and approximated a whole. The trouble was, she decided, nothing remains static. She was no longer the person Ben had married; she was quite sure of that. And she had a sense that somehow the marriage itself had changed her, that with time the parts had reshuffled and formed two distinct and new patterns rather than one whole, not that she could see the patterns clearly yet.
Ben’s right hand moved restlessly over his cutlery, rearranging, straightening, aligning. Sue placed a hand on his, seeking again that comforting whole feeling, but he pulled it away. She felt reproved. Had he thought she was censuring him? She caught Hank’s eye; he had noticed, and she felt humiliated. Abruptly she turned her head, gazing across the road, through the palm trees at the shimmering sea. The leaves stirred like gull wings in the rising breeze. Sue felt herself float and hover, drift up and out, over the road and its tourist buses, over the line of trees along the sea wall, over the water and up above the collar of volcanic hills. She wanted to drift forever in clear blue salt air.
For there was something else Sue was sure about: she was not ready to die. She had never expected anything abnormal to show up in her mammograms; even though her doctor considered her “high risk”, she did not. There was no sense of relief or gratitude whenever a negative result was confirmed. She was not her mother, nor her grandmother; she led her own life with its own course and could see no reason to expect her cells would become malignant and turn against her, as theirs had. Over the years Sue had dismissed the kernel of anxiety that lurked within her. In fact, she had barely recognised its presence. Remnants of the immortality of adolescence had clung to her – until, as the result of this morning’s phone call, those remnants had fallen to the floor, a tangle of tattered rags.
The afternoon passed in a blur of sights and sounds, movement and stillness. Sue felt she was in slow motion in an accelerated world. Even language could not be relied upon to mean what it seemed. She had not felt so alone since she was sixteen and newly motherless. Could she keep this to herself? She did not want to worry Ben, especially if it turned out there was nothing wrong; he was immersed in the beginning of the academic year. And she certainly was not going to alarm the children. She wondered whether she could share the burden with Jayne. It was relevant to Jayne, but would she want to hear of it? Reason told her she would not. Jayne was so much younger that they had never been true companions or confidantes. They exchanged only good news: news of Jayne’s advancement in the international finance company in which she worked, news of Jayne and Nigel’s latest ski trip or their hike up Kilimanjaro to see the sunrise. Jayne had only half an ear for Sue’s news, which comprised mainly what the children were doing. Sue always came away feeling rather dull after speaking with her sister. But she knew it was important to keep in touch; it was what their mother would have wanted and she took it upon herself as the older sister to ensure it happened.
Through the windows of the restaurant, Sue watched a toddler running rings around her mother, determined not to do as she was told. She was cute, but boisterous, giggling and shrieking. She reminded Sue of Jayne at the same age: a bundle of blonde, blue-eyed curiosity. Sue remembered the crayon scribble in her favourite books, her doll, Molly, with her sleeping-eyes poked to the back of her head. She had failed to protect her precious belongings and only had herself to blame, her mother had claimed; the accusation did not feel fair – then or now.
With time, Sue had learned how to protect. She had sheltered Jayne from the seriousness of their mother’s condition and did all the motherly things she could not. Sue did not mind; in fact it had made her feel important. Only she and their father knew her mother had cancer; only they knew she would get progressively worse.
But Sue had to talk to someone. She would ring her friend Annie Henderson, and arrange lunch. Annie would not overreact; she would keep her confidence. Having made the decision, the rush around Sue seemed to slow down and let her catch up.
‘These pearls are magnificent,’ said Gaye. ‘Abalone. Who would have thought?’
‘Paua,’ Ben corrected.
‘Abalone – paua,’ said Sue. ‘Come and let’s see if there are any dolphins out there.’ She took Gaye’s arm and they walked to the end of the wharf. A smooth-feathered gull perched on a pile, rotating its white head to cock a red-rimmed eye at the approaching women. Laser-beams of sunlight shot from the crests of the rippling water. Blinding. Two men and a boy fished from the end of the wharf, their legs and lines disappearing over the edge.
‘Dunno wot he wis thinkin’ of,’ said the older man, staring from under his floppy hat into the distance.
‘Beats me,’ said his mate, with an incredulous twist of the head. His chuckle morphed into a bout of chesty coughing. The boy hauled in his line and examined his bait. Sue noticed their bucket was empty but none of them seemed concerned.
Three tourist launches milled about in deep water, mid-harbour.
‘You should be out there,’ she said to Gaye. ‘That’s where the dolphins will be.’
‘We’ll have to come back some day,’ said Gaye. ‘Coming from a land-locked city, I find this scenery just …’ She gestured wide, her mouth wide also, waiting for words.
‘Every time. Whatever the season,’ Sue said, and turned back to see Ben and Hank staring down into a fishing trawler moored against the wharf. Large crates of glistening silver stood on the deck. A string of gulls decorated the rigging like regatta bunting.
Sue felt in and of the world.
On the ride home, Sue fell silent again. She thought of Jayne in her reportedly large, suburban London house. Jayne’s plans had put paid to her own. Her departure for Europe had tied Sue
to Christchurch; she could not leave their father alone. The resentment she had failed to voice then still smouldered, a hot cicatrice. But then, if she had not remained, she would not have met Ben. And there would be no Charlotte, no Jason; it was impossible to picture a life without Charlie and Jase.
They stopped for coffee at Little River. Sue slipped her hand into Ben’s as they wandered through the adjoining art gallery.
‘You’re quiet today,’ Ben said. His tone was not accusatory.
‘Just thinking,’ said Sue, ‘how lucky I am.’ She meant it as she said it. Ben squeezed her hand.
Shrugging off the family had not been easy for Jayne; Sue could see that now. She had left in a fury of defiance and protest that had diminished her father and enraged Sue. ‘You’re a self-centred little bitch,’ Sue had shouted one night, defending their father. But she had not confessed her own hurt, her own feelings of rejection and her dashed hopes. Jayne had never returned to New Zealand and had not seen their father since. She would not recognise him now, Sue thought sadly.
They said goodbye to Hank and Gaye outside their hotel. For a moment, Sue was afraid Ben was going to invite them home for a meal. Another time she would have been pleased.
Evening light slanted across the room, casting long-legged shadows of the dining table and chairs against one wall. Curled in an armchair, clad in her dressing gown, Sue felt small, foetal, incomplete. She looked around as if seeing the room anew. It had always been a comfortable space for her, but tonight it felt foreign, larger and impersonal, as if the Sue who had been living here for nearly twenty years had been a different person. A glow washed the room, repairing the aftermath of family living – snags of sandal buckles on the sofa, bumps in the paint-work. She got to her feet, running her fingers along the wall lined with books for all ages, almost surprised to recognise the titles. She lifted from the coffee table a volume Ben had been reading and pressed it against her chest. There was fleeting comfort in its hardness, its solidity. Her forefinger lingered a moment on its stiff spine, then she slotted it back on a shelf. It was only a book.
The intoxicating perfume of roses drew her towards the ranch-sliders, the smell of something familiar in the sea of strangeness. Beyond lay her garden, the end already in shade. The shadow was creeping nearer and nearer; Sue could feel it. It had substance; it was invasive. She shivered though it was not yet cold and turned back into the room. Above the couch hung a painting by Charlie, created last year for her Bursary art portfolio. Sue loved it, and, rather than do battle with Ben, had dipped into her own savings to ensure it had a frame that did it justice. The rich colours and abstract forms set her wondering, as she had many times, at her daughter’s talent. She shook her head gently in amazement, while her arms wrapped her middle as though holding herself together. In the distance, strident strains of rock music emanated from Jason’s room. How she wished he would keep it down; but, if that was the worst of his crimes … Ben, as usual, was in his study.
Tao wandered in from the garden, aristocratic head held high, tail erect and twitching, announcing himself with a throaty, inquisitorial grumble. A place inside Sue warmed and she mimicked his growl. He leapt lightly into her lap as she sat. Smoothing his chocolate fur was soothing. ‘Such a pretty boy,’ she cooed. He settled with his paws on her breasts – her possibly cancerous breasts – his nose pressed to her chin, purring loudly.
‘If I died tomorrow, Tao, what would I have to show for my life, besides my children? Tell me that.’ There was nothing that defined her, Sue realised. Somewhere along the line, she had become … invisible. What she did had substance, but it gave weight to others, not to her.
Tao made no satisfactory reply.
Sue wondered where the determined, ambitious young woman of her adolescence had gone. She had not thought of her for years, but now, suddenly, she missed her; she felt bereaved. Lying on her narrow bed – watched over by James Dean on one side, Ringo, Paul, George and John on the other, “Eleanor Rigby” flooding her senses, Joni Mitchell stacked beside the tape-deck – young Sue had made plans. She would be an historian. Past lives were fascinating; she found they held a richness and portent lacking in the present. She would bring them alive for others.
Intuition had told Sue even then that the past gives meaning to the present.
The sun dropped behind the neighbours’ trees as if a light had been switched off and the Dalí-esque dining table and chairs no longer graced the eastern wall. Sue and Tao had not moved when Ben walked in half an hour later.
‘What are you doing in the dark?’ He switched on the light. Sue hid her eyes from the glare, feeling naked. ‘Something wrong?’ He crossed the room. His hand on her shoulder was firm and reassuring, but she shrank from his question. She had to hold in her fears; she had decided. But it was all she could do not to spew them out.
‘It’s nothing,’ she said. ‘Just hold me.’ Tao dropped to the floor as Ben gathered her to him. She pressed her face into his shoulder, feeling the coarse weave of his polo shirt, inhaling his Ben-smell, and knowing he would wait till she was ready to tell him whatever it was; he was good that way.
‘Stay here and I’ll make you a drink,’ he said. He switched on the standard lamp and extinguished the main lights. Sue lay back with her eyes closed, thoughts whirling and interweaving like gymnasts’ ribbons, oblivious to Tao sitting upright a metre away, flicking his tail and glaring, slit-eyed.
2.
They made love that night.
Sue’s resolve not to tell had melted in the presence of Ben’s concern and attention. Suddenly her reasons for keeping the news from him became spurious. She could not shut him out. They were in this together – this life, everything: kids, cancer, Alzheimer’s, the lot. Besides, there was no good reason Ben should be protected when she was suffering.
They sat on the couch under Charlie’s painting, nursing their coffee mugs, while Sue spoke of the woman with the nasal voice, of the results of the mammogram and the need for a biopsy. But she could hear her clipped tones giving away little of what she felt inside: her fear, her worry that a cancerous growth would be discovered and her certainty that she would be dead in six months. She was still pretending; pretending to be strong. Sue searched Ben’s face for signs that he, too, might be afraid, and found them, flickering briefly deep in his eyes and lingering in the tight creases around his mouth.
‘You should have told me sooner,’ he whispered, burying his face in her hair; his breath sawed in and out, its warmth spreading through her. She felt her body relax and a wave of relief wash her mind clear. As Ben pressed against her, heat welled inside her unbidden. She arched her back while his fingers fumbled with her shirt buttons. He had not undressed her since … she did not remember when.
‘Don’t,’ she said, sitting up abruptly and wriggling away from his touch. ‘My breasts. I don’t even know which one it is.’ She imagined malignant cells being squeezed from a cancerous lump and disseminating around her body, lodging in other organs, to multiply, expand and take over, squeezing the life from her, as they had from her mother and grandmother.
‘It’s all right. I don’t mind,’ Ben said. He had missed the point completely, but Sue was too shocked to describe her imaginings. ‘I won’t hurt you,’ he added.
‘The children,’ Sue mumbled, a second line of defence. Ben led her to their bedroom. Seamlessly their movements evolved into their familiar pattern of lovemaking, urgent but passionless, leaving Sue bewildered, dissatisfied. What should be – what used to be – replenishing, no longer was. It was like trying to catch an eel with bare hands: you thought you had it by the tail and then it slipped away into the murky depths and all you had in your grasp was slime.
Sue lay awake for hours, long after Ben was asleep, exhausted but sleepless, snippets of memory scrapping for attention: her mother, her father, her children. Jayne. Ben – her dear husband, who had helped her dare to love, to lose herself in another again, after the loss of her mother. Somehow they were now at ris
k of losing each other in dangerous waters. Reaching out and just missing. Grasping a handful of coat or sleeve, but nothing substantive. Would they drown? Tentatively, Sue extended a hand and laid it between Ben’s shoulder blades, but her touch did not penetrate. In another age, they had fallen asleep entwined. One plus one making one.
Akaroa,
25th August, 1840.
Ma chère Maman,
I do not know when you will receive my letters. This is hard when I know you will be waiting anxiously for them, as I am for news of you. Occasional cutters, I am told, come into this harbour on their way to or from Australia and will take our mail. So, too, will the French whalers, when they head to northern waters for your summer. I shall write when I can and be ready to avail myself of an opportunity when it arises, all right?
Although it is winter, the weather is quite warm by day when the sun shines. But the cold envelops us as soon as the sun drops behind the high hills that surround the harbour like a collar. And, can it rain, Maman! And the mud! Mon Dieu! In some places it comes right over the top of my boots and seeps through my stockings and between my toes. Everything is encrusted with mud. We are so much at the mercy of the elements. The canvas of our shelters provides little protection and sometimes I have to speak most sternly to myself to avoid becoming discouraged. It is difficult to keep warm at nights, once the fires burn low. Rather than undressing for bed, we put on all the clothing we possess, which is little enough, since we had to come with but one change.
As you know, the Company undertook to provide all our needs for the first year. But it gives us meagre rations. And my husband has learned that goods are not to be free as promised, but supplied on account! And at such prices, Maman! You can imagine he is not best pleased, and I have discovered he can be a fearsome force when angered. We did not expect to start our married life in debt. There has been much talk about it amongst our people, but it seems there is little to be done. I have to admit to feeling cheated and share this sentiment with the other women, as we strive to make our encampment feel like a home.