Salvation Creek

by Susan Duncan

  'So much for paradise, huh, little puppy? We're going to have to learn about these ticks then, aren't we?' I have quickly fallen into the habit of talking to the puppies in a way that non-animal lovers find borderline mad.

  'Take the pamphlet with you. I've got another one,' Barbara says.

  We sit silently then, until the sun drops below the hillside and the chill slams in, which is my signal to go home.

  'Stay and have dinner,' Barbara suggests, breaking our pattern.

  I don't need any persuading. The idea of going home to a cold, empty house isn't half as tempting as staying in the warmth of Tarrangaua.

  'How are you getting on with the neighbours?' she asks, going into the kitchen to tell Bob I'll be joining them for dinner.

  'Great,' I say, following her in. 'Well, I've seen more of Ken than anyone else because I walk past the boatshed all the time. But I've met Jack and his partner, Brigitte, and their two gorgeous boys. No-one seems to live in the house at the end. I've never seen anyone there.'

  'They're weekenders, but they don't get here very often. Good people, though.'

  'I haven't met anyone who isn't.'

  Barbara smiles with a glint in her eye. 'You will!'

  Bob is pulling vegetables out of the fridge.

  'Susan's going to stay for a meal. Can you manage?'

  'That's great,' he says.

  I follow Barbara into the sitting room and scoop the puppies onto my lap. They fall asleep immediately, curled into each other, their little black noses touching lightly, eight paws linked as though they're holding hands.

  'I'd like to build a garden,' I tell Barbara. 'Gordon's made a great start but I want to enlarge it.'

  'What kind of garden?'

  'Well, a few flowers for a vase. Some herbs and vegetables. Maybe some low growing shrubs along the boundary of the property so everyone who passes can't look directly inside the house.'

  'Native or non-native plants?'

  'Haven't given it much thought.'

  'Well, I'm probably biased in favour of natives. I reckon the bush should be allowed to be bush. Most people around here think like that and we'll pressure you a bit to follow that line.'

  I feel hackles rising as she speaks. I figure it's my land and I can do what I want. 'I'm the kind of person who doesn't much enjoy pressure,' I say slowly. 'The kind of person who'll plant a rose hedge if people get too bossy.'

  She looks at me for a moment and says nothing.Torn between her passion for all things Australian and keeping the balance in a new friendship. Then she shrugs. 'The bush has a way of sorting itself out anyway. A word of advice, though, if you don't mind.The wallabies will eat just about everything you plant and the cockatoos are merciless when it comes to breaking the buds off flower stems. A formal sort of garden could involve a lot of expense and heartbreak.'

  Bob comes in with a bottle of red wine and some glasses and looks at us enquiringly.

  Barbara shakes her head. 'Not for me. I'll have a little bit of brandy and a lot of dry.'

  'Susan? Wine?'

  I think about saying no thanks for half a second and then nod. 'Red would be great. Thanks.'

  Bob pours my wine and returns to the kitchen to fix Barbara's drink. There's a constant ping coming from the kitchen and Bob's tuneless humming. When he returns with Barbara's drink, he tells us dinner is ready. We sit down to carrots, beans, zucchini, pumpkin, potato and cauliflower and a piece of golden, crumbed chicken. When I cut into the meat, it oozes thick rivers of butter and garlic.

  'This is yummy. Thank you.'

  Bob grins and raises his glass as though he's going to make a toast but he doesn't say anything.

  'So, tell me what summer is like. Do you see many snakes?'

  'Yeah,' Bob says, 'but they're usually more afraid of you than you are of them. And the pythons, you know they're harmless, don't you?'

  'Saw one when I was staying at Towlers. On my walk to the ferry. Huge thing, it was, just sliding across the track in front of me ever so slowly.'

  'You're better off letting them hang around,' Barbara says. 'They eat the rats and mice and they don't let other snakes – poisonous ones, like red-bellied blacks and brown snakes, move into their territory. At least that's the theory.'

  'Gordon showed me his python. Sleeps in the barbecue.'

  'Siphon?'

  'Yeah, that's his name. I steer clear of him.'

  'He won't hurt you.'

  'Yeah, well . . . I let him have his space. Anyone ever been bitten?'

  'Never heard of it.'

  When I look up from eating, I see the puppies have climbed onto the sofa where they're asleep.

  'God, sorry. Look at the puppies.'

  I jump up to move them to the floor, but in unison Bob and Barbara tell me not to worry. 'They're fine. Let them be.'

  They're rock bottom exhausted. And Barbara looks worn out. So as soon as we've finished eating, I get up to go. As I push back my chair, Barbara claps her hands quickly and loudly, and a giant, hairy black spider falls from the ceiling.

  I scream. Feel like I'll faint.

  Barbara laughs, unaware I'm dizzy with fright. 'It's a toy,' she says. 'Don't worry. It's a toy.'

  But my heart beats wildly. I don't feel strong enough for this kind of joke. Bob must see it written on my face. He takes Barbara's arm and says once is enough with the spider joke for me. The shock has sent me into a huge flush. Sweat erupts from every pore.

  I hook up bleary-eyed puppies to their leashes and borrow a torch. On the way down the steps I imagine boojums lurking in every dark corner, giant ticks on every illuminated blade of grass. I duck and weave to avoid touching overhanging boughs and jump into the shower immediately I get home, pulling the puppies in with me. If they have a tick it is going to be either scrubbed off or drowned.

  The puppies stand wet and shivering, shattered and hurt. For them, the day has turned sour. I dry them off and make up their bed in the corner of the bathroom where I've put a ticking clock that is supposed to sound like a mother's heartbeat. Then I add a hot water bottle. Next, I spread newspaper all over the floor. A precaution only. The walk home was a final piddle stop before settling in for the night and they're partially house-trained. Right?

  It never occurred to me to ask how 'partially' fits with 'housetrained' until the next morning when I walk into a bathroom that looks like a shit storm. With a stomach already nervous and tender, I quickly close the door and retreat to the kitchen. Put on the kettle. Not ready to cope yet. But the puppies are awake and alert. The yapping begins.To quieten them, I open the bathroom door and let them into the sitting room where they both piddle instantly. Does house-trained mean they make a mess inside instead of out? It is the beginning of chaos, a chaos that escalates daily. About the best that can be said for it is that it takes my mind off cancer and the ex-lover.

  Over the next few weeks I test the breeder's notion that the dogs are trained to come to the call of 'puppies!'. They do. But only when they want to. They quickly become known around the bays as the 'terrierists', two tiny, shiny white streakers who think they've landed in the best backyard in the world. Every day an adventure filled with lip-smacking opportunities.

  At first, people are patient. And I have no idea when the puppies take off at dawn (when the first yapping begins and I let them out so I can return to bed) that they are wreaking havoc over kilometres of land – private and national park. All I know is that they run off and return a couple of hours later, happy and tired and ready for a snooze. I assume, as little puppies, they will hang around the neighbourhood, too timid to test the unknown boundaries where spiders and snakes, goannas and wallabies, and every kind of scary critter, including ticks, lurk. They are on the rampage, though. And the mad, yapping hunt begins from the moment I let them out. But no-one says a word to me. Although I hear later it is a nonstop topic at every dinner party around the bays. Everyone knows I am being treated for breast cancer. No-one wants to add to the burden. And no-one knows
what to do.

  As if the rampaging isn't bad enough, things are even worse on the nights I go out. Leaving them locked inside. With the unabated fury of the righteous done wrong, Dolce and Vita begin an incessant, high-pitched yap that carries up the hill and over the bay. When one takes a rest, the other starts up. They're relentless. Mostly, though, they yap together at a pitch that has the same effect as fingernails scratching a blackboard. My neighbourhood is fracturing. Across the water, over which the sound carries with an exquisite, ear-piercing purity, windows are being slammed shut, televisions turned up, and partners start to argue about how to handle the problem. Even the boat dwellers, the most laidback and tolerant of all because they live aboard illegally, are pacing their capsules, grinding their teeth, patience worn out.

  I, of course, know nothing of this. The yapping starts only after I leave home. And it stops when the puppies hear the water taxi return. To me, it feels like I leave in silence and come home in silence to two warm little bodies springing excitedly at the front door as though I've been gone for years.

  One morning, Bob calls. 'Ah, well, it's um, it's, well, the puppies,' he begins. 'Debbie's rung me.'

  Debbie's from Frog Hollow, the dark, misty bay east of Lovett where there are also only five houses.

  'What's Debbie's problem?' I ask Bob.

  'Ah, well, they're chasing . . . um. . . the dogs, well, they're chasing wallabies,' he finally blurts out.

  'Why didn't Debbie call me?' And yet, as I ask the question, I realise I barely know her. Each bay is its own tight community with informal hierarchies.

  'She called Barbara and Barbara thought I should tell you,' he says, his words suddenly coming out in a rush. 'Because we've thought of a way to help.'

  'Is it serious, then? Are people angry, or just Debbie?' I ask.

  Bob's reply is slow, the words carefully chosen. I do not know enough about him to understand that he never says anything he doesn't mean, never offers anything he can't deliver, never makes promises he has no intention of keeping.

  'Nobody is angry, they are concerned,' he says. 'People live here because they love the wildlife and the bush. They don't want to see it harmed.'

  'What harm?' I ask with iron in both syllables.

  'The puppies are causing a lot of trouble, chasing wallabies and brush turkeys . . . and it's better to face the problem now before it gets too big.'

  'But they're puppies, they're not big enough to hurt wallabies. And birds can fly away. This is just hysterical stuff, isn't it? I bet Debbie doesn't like dogs!' I fume.

  'It's not only Debbie,' Bob says. 'Brigitte's unhappy. Maureen around in Towlers has seen them running wild. She worries about the puppies and the wildlife.'

  I look across the room. The puppies sleep silently on their fluffy sheepskin bed just inside the back door, curled into each other like the underside of a cowrie seashell. They look peaceful and innocent. And too tiny to do any damage.

  'But they're so little. They can't be causing much trouble,' I insist.

  'There's two of them. Which means they're a pack. And packs, eventually, do damage.'

  Bob says he'll come down in the late morning to work out a plan and suggests I take them out on their leashes for the next few days instead of just opening the back door and letting them run free.

  'What you need,' Bob says when he arrives later, scruffy in dusty work clothes, one trouser leg hooked into the top of a boot, 'is a dog run.'

  'No way! I am not going to cage these puppies. I cannot, I just cannot do it to them. I'd rather take them with me wherever I go.'

  I hand Bob a cup of tea and he drains it quickly, as though it's lukewarm when in fact it's scalding hot. He focuses on the tea leaves, staring any place but at me.

  'I'll put in the dog run anyway. We'll see what happens,' he says quietly but firmly.

  We are silent for a while. I am inwardly raging, convinced it is more a political exercise to keep dogs out of the area than any real threat. I do not even think to say thank you, to appreciate he is trying to help.

  'Er, there's been another problem,' Bob says, still not looking at me.

  'What!'

  'When you go out, they yap. They never let up. Doesn't matter if it's day or night. Apparently you can hear them in Elvina Bay.'

  'Do you hear them? Up at Tarrangaua?' I ask.

  'No, but I have heard them. It's pretty terrible. Sorry to be the one with all the bad news. But their yapping is the kind that drives you nuts.'

  'Like I said, I'll take them with me when I leave the house. That will fix both problems.'

  Bob builds the dog run in the backyard that afternoon. But I won't use it. Every morning, still in my pyjamas, with a dressing gown over the top and a black woollen hat that my husband wore when radiotherapy made the hair on one side of his head fall out, I put the puppies on their leashes and take them for a walk. They are anxious and resentful at having their freedom curtailed and pull hard on their leads, coughing and choking and glaring at me. They are miserable and so am I. But the word goes around. I am trying to train them. The unspoken, unspecified pressure eases.

  Jan, next door, is encouraging. 'You're doing a good job. Keep it up,' she says.

  But in my vulnerable state, I feel as though I am at war with Lovett Bay and most of the Pittwater community.

  Hot on the heels of the puppy problems, I have a routine blood test and my white blood cell count is so low my third treatment has to be postponed. The result makes me feel like I am fading away, being slowly poisoned to death. Since chemo started, I've tried to deny the weakness and dizziness, the feeling of being constantly cold in between flushes. But this latest blow shakes my belief in the power of positive thinking and makes me wonder if I'm being a damn stupid fool to think I can use my mind to help me get well. How much of our physical well-being is tied into our emotional health? No-one's ever been able to figure it out. Not scientifically anyway, only anecdotally, which doesn't cut it in science.

  The reality is that most days, I am crying tired. I am stick thin and I have no energy. The dreaded hot flushes wake me at twenty to thirty minute intervals nearly all night, so I never seem to sleep long enough in one go to make it count. I feel as though my body is made up of bleached paper. But I tell myself every day, over and over, that I am strong and my body is strong until I believe it, despite the evidence to the contrary.

  The blood test news knocks me flat, though. My own, western doctor tells me chemo is chemo and you just have to handle it.The naturopath has told me to buy a whole lot of food supplements to help me put on weight. I'm also taking a mountain of vitamin pills. And I still can't stumble over the line for the third treatment without an extra week or two to build up my white blood cell count. It's firm, scientific evidence of a frailty I refuse to acknowledge.

  To boost my body I make an appointment to see a Chinese herbalist recommended by one of the naturopaths I am seeing. Chinese herbalism is just about the only avenue I haven't investigated. Maybe it's going to work brilliantly but, like everything else in this ferocious business of treating cancer, there's no way of proving its effectiveness.

  In his North Sydney office he tells me my pulse is very weak, not the pulse checked in western medicine, another, deeper pulse, which explains why I feel quite shockingly frail. His words scare the shit out of me. He writes out a prescription in Chinese and leads me into the reception area to a wall of jars filled with ingredients that look like the stuff of black magic – dried old bones, ground seashells, old bark, animals' intestines. I try to ask him what is actually in the jars but his English is erratic. 'Good Chinese medicine. Good Chinese medicine,' he answers to every question.

  He hands me seven brown paper bags each containing his mixture of dried brown bits and shell grit – well, that's what it looks like – with instructions to boil up one bag's worth every morning. I must drink one cup of fluid at the beginning and end of every day. It's a five year plan and I must not miss a day. I know that's impossible before
I leave the waiting room. And I hate the pressure it applies. If I miss a day, does that mean all is for nothing?

  The bill is around one hundred and eighty dollars, and I need a follow-up appointment in seven days. The costs are not reclaimable from medical insurance, like so many naturopathic remedies, and my medical bills are soaring. Memories of the boys and the search for miracle cures come surging back. Am I being a mug to try anything? No, just desperate, and desperate people do desperate things. My life is becoming increasingly bizarre. As each new hurdle comes along, I create a structure to deal with it.

  To help me cope with hot flushes during the night, I've set up a little fan on the bedside table, which I keep on all night. Of course it's still winter, which means it sends an arctic gale across the bed, but that's ok, because I sleep under the doona until a hot flush hits, at which point I poke my head out, like a turtle, until the fan cools me down, and then I hunker under the doona again.

  Every morning, I tip the contents of a brown paper bag into a saucepan and simmer it for half an hour, filling the house with a smell like decaying mushrooms.Then I strain half the concoction into a cup and drink it down as quickly as possible. It tastes absolutely foul. The other half of the brew is to have with dinner. Breakfast consists of lecithin, Missing Link, ascorbic acid, fish oil, flax seed oil, calcium, and on and on, all tipped into a blender with soy milk, a banana and maple syrup. That's followed by a handful or two of vitamins from what looks like a personal apothecary lined up on the kitchen bench. My entire life is focused on taking care of my body.

  Meanwhile the puppies haven't spent long sleeping by the back door. In a weak moment I lifted them onto the bed for a quick cuddle and they immediately assumed instant ownership of the entire area. Now, the bed is a mishmash of muddy paw prints and dog hair, and I don't give a damn. Dolce sleeps pressed hard up against me.Vita is more distant, curling tightly at the far bottom corner, as though she's the gatekeeper. They are comforting.

  Obi, the gorgeous golden labrador, calls in regularly and the puppies have fallen in love with him. Vita jumps all over him, licking his face, teasing him to play with her. Dolce lies alongside him on the floor and puts her head in his huge mouth. The first time it happens, I nearly faint. But sweet, gentle Obi spits her out like a cherry pip. He is truly the Rhett Butler of dogs.