Chanel Sweethearts
Page 8
‘Caro, darling, hello!’
‘Oh, Jess dear, hello.’ The women air-kissed and Caro stood back, relieved at the distraction from the queue, to appraise her sister-in-law. ‘Honestly, Jess, I know it’s just a country market, but you really do need to get up to High Street, Armadale, more often: you look like you’ve rolled around in an op shop. That Miyake piece is decades out of fashion, and what’s with the wool scarf on a summer’s day? And is that a Chanel Baguette? I can’t believe those bags are back again, though yours looks a bit well-loved.’
Jess smiled at Caro’s customary tactlessness and said, ‘I love your blazer, Caro. Have you got a meeting today?’
Caro had been a formidable real estate agent before becoming a mum, and now kept her hand in by buying and selling properties privately.
‘A meeting?’ she repeated. ‘Don’t be silly, dear, it’s Ralph Lauren; my country look. Although I really ought to get my finger in the pie down here. It’s positively rocketing. Let’s drop in on the local real estate agency on the way home. How have you been?’
‘Quite busy. I opened the store this morning and did the breakfast shift, so it’s already been a full day for me.’
Caro stared at her blankly. ‘I mean really, how are you, Jessica? How are you feeling?’
‘Oh, good, fine, getting there.’ Jessica didn’t feel like delving into her true feelings in the middle of the coffee queue. ‘So, where are the children?’
‘On the jumping castle. Now, I just spoke to your father, he’ll be at the house for lunch so I thought I’d buy some organic bits and pieces and do a cold meal. Is that okay with you?’
‘Sure, Caro, you know the house is for all of us to enjoy. Angus coming down?’
‘This evening: he has a client golf day or something. I saw your hippie friends. They have frightful concoctions on sale, haven’t they? Do they ever sell anything?
‘Oh, you’d be surprised, that look’s quite popular down here, and with the tourists.’
‘Yes, I’m sure it is.’ Caro sniffed in the direction of a local woman who was standing in front of her decked out in what appeared to be an alpaca wool beret and fingerless gloves. ‘But it’s hardly designer label, is it?’
‘Perhaps that’s not important to some people,’ Jessica suggested, smiling.
‘Ha, don’t make me laugh,’ Caro replied. ‘Now, I’m worried about you. Frantically worried.’ She turned to place her order. ‘Decaf latte please, skim milk, and not scalding like you normally do it.’ She frowned at Doris, the coffee lady from the local CFA, to make sure her message was clear, but fortunately her recent Botox injection turned her frown into a blank look and Doris just smiled and nodded.
She turned back to her sister-in-law. ‘What was I saying? Oh that’s right, I’m worried about you. I told you that Graham was no good from the beginning.’
‘No you didn’t.’ Jess shifted uncomfortably as a group of Pony Club mums wandered past. ‘Can we do this later, Caro?’ she suggested.
‘Oh, didn’t I tell you what I thought about Graham?’ Caro continued, ignoring Jess’s concern. ‘Well I certainly thought it. How dare he leave you for another woman after you raised those children of his? I’ve been thinking about it, you should really send him an invoice for nanny duties. Four years at eighty thou a year is a fair figure. Angus could handle the case for you.’
‘Here you go, love.’ Doris passed over a steaming latte. ‘Something for you, Jess?’
‘No thanks, Doris.’ Jess blushed, sure the woman had heard Caro’s rant.
She pulled her sister-in-law over to a bench under the gums.
‘Look, Caro, it’s over. Good God, I’ve told you this for almost a year now, why won’t you let it go? I really would prefer to put it all behind me and just move on. Is that okay? Can you help me with that?’
‘Humph, if you insist, but it’s just not right.’
‘Life sucks I guess,’ Jess said to end the topic. ‘Now, how are the kids?’
‘Oh, it’s terrible darling, just awful,’ Caro said, tipping artificial sweetener into her coffee and stirring vigorously. ‘There is a hideous bully who is making little Hamish’s life absolute anguish at the moment. Such a dreadful boy.’
Jess nodded absently, distracted by the sight of Hamish, whom she spied over Caro’s head trying to bounce smaller children off the jumping castle. It was hard to imagine the strapping ten-year-old in the role of playground victim.
‘Well, he’s very, ummm, assertive,’ Jess reassured Caro. ‘I’m sure he can look after himself.’
Hamish was now holding a little boy’s cap above his head as the smaller child fought to get it back.
Caro went on. ‘I said to the principal, “If you can’t guarantee my son’s psychological wellbeing I will just have to–”’
‘Hamish,’ Jess called sharply, unable to watch him taunt the other child any longer. ‘Come here and ... ah ... give Aunty Jess a kiss.’
Hamish dropped the cap and ran over as fast as his solid legs would carry him.
‘Hello, Jess,’ he said, wrapping his arms around her waist, his sweaty hair in her face. ‘Mum, I’m hungry. Can I have some money?’
‘You’re insatiable,’ Caro said with a grin and selected a twenty-dollar note from the thick wad in her purse. ‘He’ll eat me out of house and home,’ she laughed indulgently as he pushed in front of harassed mothers in the poffertjes queue.
‘Well, I’m off for a wander.’ Jess stood and shook out her shawl. ‘See you at the house this afternoon.’
‘Ciao, darling.’ Caro shaded her eyes with her hand as she looked up at Jess. ‘We’ll have a lovely lunch and sort you right out, you’ll see.’
Jess trailed around the colourful stalls, enjoying the spicy aroma from the satay vendor, blended with the familiar sizzle of the scouts’ barbecue and the gentle waft of incense from the Tibetan craft stall. She was relieved to be free of Caro: her sister-in-law meant well, but she could be hard work sometimes.
Smiling and waving at the familiar faces soaking up the late spring sunshine, as she walked past a flower stall Jess suddenly felt a jolt of sadness. Her boys had loved this market. It was a family ritual to get up early on market days, eat breakfast beneath the dangling gum branches, stock up on fresh-baked goods and locally grown fruit and vegies. The last time they’d been here the boys had pooled their pocket money and bought her a bunch of fragrant sweet peas from this stall, their little faces flushed with the excitement of the gift.
The joy of the memory was quickly replaced with the pain of missing them. Was she even a mother anymore? She had loved them, she still loved them; her heart ached to hold them.
She stopped walking and stood frozen, lost and directionless. Suddenly an arm slipped through hers and she was being gently led forwards.
‘Come on, Jess,’ Nick said. ‘How about a cuppa? I’ve got a thermos in my ute.’
Mute, Jess allowed herself to be steered through the bright morning away from the pain and dislocation that sat jagged and painful inside her.
‘Thanks, Nick,’ she said, grateful for his presence and support. He nodded, but kept his head down and his hand thrust in the pocket of his khaki shorts as he propelled her gently towards the car park.
‘It’s okay, Red. You looked like you could use a friend,’ he said, his blue eyes meeting hers briefly.
‘It was the boys,’ she said quietly.
‘I figured.’ They picked their way over the bumpy paddock that served as market car park.
‘I’m sorry, Nick, I know we’ve been over this so many times...’ she started.
He stopped abruptly between a sleek midnight blue Mercedes and a rusty Landcruiser. He pulled Jess in front of him. ‘And you’ll probably need to keep talking about it again and again until you can make peace with it in your head, and that’s okay.’ He was grasping her hands tightly and Jess saw the pain flicker across his own eyes.
‘It’s okay for me to talk about my stuff, but you never talk about yours,’ s
he said hoarsely.
He immediately dropped her hands. ‘Some things are better left alone.’
Jess shook her head and they made their way to his ute in silence.
Caro – arms laden with shopping, grizzly children in tow– observed Jessica and Nick stand face-to-face in the grassy car park and she tilted her head to one side. What was that about? she wondered. Could a relationship between them be beneficial to the family? Caro walked towards the highly polished Cayenne, unlocked it and dumped her stuff in the boot.
To Caro, family was everything and she had worked hard to get the one she wanted. When they’d met at university, she had been determined to marry Angus Wainwright. He was wealthy, connected, from a good, strong, well-known family and owned acreage. (As a country girl, she well knew the value of acreage.) And besides, she’d really, really liked him. She remembered something about weak knees. They’d met in first year: he was studying Law and she was doing an Arts degree. Although she’d attended a private school, the young Caroline Phillips wasn’t from a wealthy family. Her family lived in a remote country town and Caro had boarded in the city since Grade Four. She never really got to know her older sisters, who both married young and moved away; one to a Queensland macadamia nut farm and the other to pursue a corporate career alongside her husband in Sydney. Once the older girls were married off, her parents felt that their parenting duties were over, and had little interest in their ‘surprise baby’, Caro, who had muscled her way in fifteen years after they thought they had completed their family. Her mother had been delighted with what she had thought was menopause, but distraught when she’d discovered she was actually pregnant at the age of forty-seven.
Caro had vague memories of coming home for holidays to parents who were constantly working: fencing, shearing, watering, feeding. She would get a tired smile from her mother, and an occasional conversation with her dad. She presumed they were proud of her; she had no evidence to the contrary. She never looked back on her childhood with regret or sadness. What was the point?
These days she was fiercely protective of the beautiful family life she had built so carefully. She would never risk feeling as lonely and isolated as she had as a child.
She looked over at Jessica, now perched on the tray of Nick’s ute, her head on his shoulder and clearly in the middle of a deep and meaningful conversation.
Caro started the ignition with a roar and gripped the steering wheel with determination. She had plans for this family and she hadn’t decided yet if Nick Johnson would fit into that picture.
15
Richard felt a familiar rumble of excitement in his guts as he turned onto Old Quarry Road.
What a place, what a view! He never got sick of it. The uninterrupted expanse of paddocks flanked by hills that reached to the edges of the sky. He was almost home. He wound down his window to breathe in the familiar aroma of the lemon-scented gums.
Richard had been raised on this property. His family had bought it when he was a boy and he’d moved down with his three brothers, parents and grandparents. He’d gone to boarding school with his brothers, but it was nearby so he came home every Friday night. The weekends were a glorious ruckus of catching up with all the local news, enormous meals and helping the old man with a bit of farm work. Local mates would drop in to kick the footy, family would drive up from town for a house party and the barbecue sizzled from dawn to dusk.
He and Eva had met at a produce export company in Melbourne. After they had married and were expecting their first baby, Richard’s elderly parents had asked them to come back home and help run the property. They’d been thrilled with the opportunity and together had turned Springforth into a vibrant business and a basis for their busy family and social life.
A similar, if somewhat more gentle, lifestyle continued at the property nowadays and Richard always looked forward to coming back. He just wished Genevieve had been free to join him this weekend: she liked to roam the property, soaking up its ambience and admiring its many aspects. Mind you, he thought ruefully, Gen’s absence would save him having to deal with Caro’s frostiness towards his girlfriend.
He swung his Mercedes into the long driveway and crawled along the gravel to savour the landscape. A few sleepy heifers chewed slowly and gazed at him passing by. As he pulled up in the circular driveway in front of the house, he gave three quick toots to announce his arrival.
‘Pop!’ A welcoming committee of two small people came racing around the corner. Richard put out his arms and hugged his grandchildren as one. ‘Hello, Hamish, what a big strong lad you’ve become, and little Charlotte, what a pretty frock.’
The two stood smiling expectantly, waiting for their grandfather’s regular routine to begin.
‘I suppose you guys want money?’ he asked, as he always did. ‘But I’m all out,’ and he pulled out his pockets in an exaggerated pantomime to demonstrate their emptiness.
‘Pop!’ The children squealed in delight.
‘I’m completely broke!’ he replied with a smile. ‘What about your money? You’ve got money. Don’t you keep it in your pocket?’
Hamish beamed madly while Charlotte cackled in hysterics.
‘You don’t keep it in your pockets? Well, where do you keep it then?’
Charlotte could barely contain her mirth and bounced up and down as she giggled.
‘Hang on, what’s this?’ Richard appeared confused as he peered at the side of Charlotte’s head. He reached forward and tickled her on the ear, then drew his hand back and, with a flourish, presented her with a two-dollar coin.
‘In your ear! What a crazy spot to keep your money. And what about you, Hamish, are you as silly as your sister?’
Again his hand moved into the child’s ear and pulled out a gold coin.
‘You’re both as mad as hatters. You should keep your money in a bank, not in your ears!’
The children, clutching their windfall, ran back inside the house, and Richard followed.
‘Dad!’ Jessica came from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her floral pinny.
‘Hello, my girl,’ Richard said and embraced his only daughter.
‘Hello, Richard,’ Caro was close behind and offered her powdered cheek for Richard’s peck. He ignored it and gave her a big squeeze as well.
‘Something smells good!’ Richard said and led the way into the kitchen.
‘Oh, that’s the pumpkin roasting for the spinach, fetta, pine nut and pumpkin salad for lunch. I know it’s your favourite,’ Caro said as she took the sizzling golden vegetable from the oven to cool.
‘Mmm,’ Richard murmured and looked nervously at Jessica.
‘And roast beef,’ Jess quickly reassured him as she brandished the carving knife over the cooled piece of eye fillet.
‘Mmm!’ Richard repeated, this time with infinitely more enthusiasm.
‘No Genevieve?’ Caro asked from the kitchen bench as she vigorously stirred a jug of margaritas.
‘No, she has family stuff on,’ Richard replied.
‘Shame, we just don’t get to see her enough,’ she said.
Jessica shook her head; her sister-in-law would make a terrible actress.
They settled out on the deck that overlooked the property. Richard accepted his salt-encrusted drink from Caro with thanks. ‘How’s business, Caro? Still wheeling and dealing?’
Caro looked smug. ‘Yes, faaabulous, Richard.’ She placed the jug onto the table. ‘Carnegie is a little gold mine. I knew it would be. I’d predicted that place would go off for years. I’ve just done a twenty-four per cent increase in profit in six months.
Richard grinned. She was a tiger, and he admired that. She’d always get what she wanted. He sat back on the Adirondack chair and let out a huge sigh that dispersed all the stresses of his week in the city. A huge smile came over his face as he surveyed his land.
‘It looks fantastic, Jess. Nick’s doing a great job.’
‘Yes, he is. He’s coming for lunch to see you, by the way.’
‘He certainly knows what he’s doing. I think he wants to talk to you about the rear fence on the top paddock.’
‘Oh, yes, I know what he’ll want. That’s fine: it needs electrifying if we’re going to have Billy the bull back next season. He’s a bugger of a thing. Nick seems so much better nowadays. He was in such as state after the baby died, wasn’t he? Does he ever talk about it?’
‘Yeah, he was a mess,’ Jess nodded. ‘He still won’t talk to me about it. I feel rotten that I wasn’t there for him, but he just disappeared. I didn’t even know about the break-up till months later. I don’t even know that many details because we’d drifted apart at that stage. I mean, I wasn’t even asked to the wedding so I just figured he had a whole new group of friends.’
‘Hmm, tragic business,’ Caro said.
Richard sat and enjoyed the sun on his face and the view of the bay in the distance, nestled between the two hills in from his bottom paddock. Having Jessica live here to keep the homestead humming was a great arrangement, he thought happily. The hundred hectares had been in his family for sixty years now and he was proud that it paid its own way with Wagyu beef cattle.
He watched Hamish and Charlotte chasing each other around the front lawn and smiled with satisfaction. He had visions of his grandchildren bringing their grandchildren here one day. It would be his legacy to his descendants. Generations of Wainwrights would touch this soil, make a living from it, walk on it and love it as much as he did.
‘So, Richard,’ Caro interrupted his thoughts.
‘Yes, Caro,’ he replied, somewhat distracted.
‘What are your plans for the property?’
‘Well, there’s that top electric fence we were just talking about–’
‘No, no – the future of the property. It’s a lot of land, you know.’
‘You’re right, and it’s tricky to manage with just that one shed. I’m thinking of building a large barn, just up the back behind the rain tanks. And getting a new tractor with a thresher so Nick doesn’t have to rent one each season. I’m also considering a highly confidential agricultural proposal at the moment.’