Leave Taking
Page 5
and Uncle Samuel will bring his guitar,’ I say.
Then Mum gives me a hug.
I remember the last time Uncle Samuel came to
our farm. Leah was in bed recovering
from her latest round of chemo
and Uncle Samuel sang to her, even made up
little jingles about Shelley and Tilly.
That made Leah laugh. We all heard that
laughter and I try to recall it now, but all
I hear are the funny songs Uncle Samuel loves
making up.
‘We’ll never forget Leah.
Never,’ says Mum as if she is also remembering
Leah’s laugh.
‘I think Dad will be glad to have his brother here too,’ adds Mum.
‘Uncle Samuel always gets a party going
with his singing.’
I don’t want to see Mum cry,
so I hug right back, even though
it’s getting hard to hug her properly,
and then I go to my room.
I unfold the map of ‘Leave Taking’.
It’s getting a bit of farm dirt on it
and I like that. I have said goodbye
to almost every marked spot,
but there is one place left to go.
I roll up the map, tuck it into
my pocket and head around the back way
to go outside.
I just have time before some early neighbours
arrive to help out. I know there will be lots
of hugs and tears and cups of tea, coffee,
soft drinks, eating and storytelling.
Trigger has been dozing by his kennel and
he jumps up and follows me.
I wave to Dad putting some more stumps
onto the bonfire and keep walking
until I reach the oldest shed on the farm.
Pa called it the old black smithy shed.
Dad was going to knock it over with the
front-end loader, but I yelled and spluttered
and carried on, so he just shrugged his
shoulders and said, ‘Alright son, maybe the O’Brien
family might restore it. Who knows?’
Pa said he could remember an old workman using
that shed when he was a boy.
‘Always something breaking on a farm,
so it was handy to fix something yourself
or fashion a new part. Can’t do that these days.’
This was one of Leah’s favourite spots, even though
we had to make big stomping noises as we went
near it just in case
a snake or a rat was inside.
And we mainly went in winter. Such treasure,
Leah had said as we found old shrunken leather straps
from bridles and huge padded harnesses to put on the
Clydesdale horses that pulled the ploughs
before Great Grandpa had tractors.
Leah really liked the horseshoes
she found; some on nails on the wall,
others under layers of dirt on the earthen floor.
I know what I am looking for and I reach up
to take the smallest of all the horseshoes.
For a pony maybe or a magical tiny horse,
Leah had said. I will pack this with the gumnuts
and the map.
We’d made up games of cooking and feasts and
wishing potions,
leaning over the bricked furnace, thinking
of the fierce heat and the sweat and the hammering.
Leah had gathered lots of horseshoe nails
in an old tin pot. But I leave those
for the next family.
Trigger is scratching in the corner.
‘Come away,’ I order. ‘No time to chase anything
now, we have to get back home. Tidy up.’
I go outside; already the sun is sinking.
Pa said he would wash down the yard for me tonight.
‘Goodbye old black smithy shed,’ I say.
Dad lights the bonfire.
It roars like a wild dragon.
People move back until the lick of flame
becomes less hungry.
Then the huge tree stumps
Dad has placed at the bottom,
with more at the top of the bonfire,
begin slow-burning.
I think of the box of Leah’s drawings
and know that she’d like the ashes
left here.
The BBQ is already sizzling sausages,
hamburgers, chops.
Uncle Samuel is in charge.
He has a striped apron
on, a chef’s hat and is waving
a huge pair of BBQ tongs.
He calls, ‘Toby, has your mum got
any more onions?
Need more plates too.’
Then my friend Emmy comes over
and Jaxon joins her.
They follow me to the house.
In the kitchen they look at the little map
I placed on the noticeboard last night,
seeing that everyone in my family already knew
what I was doing.
‘Places to say goodbye to,
this is my Leave Taking’,
I’ve written in thick texta
and then drawn all the places
where I’ve camped so far.
Emmy smiles. ‘Good idea Toby.’
Jaxon asks, ‘What was it like camping
in each spot? Were you scared? I would be!’
And I smile for the first time tonight.
Somehow I don’t care if my friends think
what I’m doing is weird,
not anymore.
But sometimes it’s good to have friends agree.
‘Only in the machinery shed,’ I say,
then I tell them about the mice, the hessian bags
and lastly the snake.
‘Yikes!’ shouts Jaxon and he’s jabbering on
about all the snake stories he knows
and I laugh.
Jaxon can be nearly as funny as Uncle Samuel.
I remember the errand I was running
for my uncle.
His wife, my Auntie Helen,
wipes her eyes as she hands me
a huge bowl of freshly chopped onions.
‘Chopping onions always makes me cry,’
she says with a watery smile,
and Mum hugs her.
It’s good Mum has some friends
with her too.
I show Emmy where the plates are
and we race back out to the BBQ.
We line up like everyone else
for salad, bread, meat.
Then our friends show what they’ve been cooking
all afternoon.
The slices, cakes, pavs and cheesecakes.
‘Wow!’ Jaxon lines up for seconds and thirds.
Then Mum brings out lemon meringue pie.
‘Leah’s favourite,’ is all she says.
Soon we are all full.
Trigger is having a ball,
jumping for meat scraps,
wagging his tail so hard that it scrapes
the dirt and pushes puffs of dust into the night air.
Uncle Samuel is trying to get Trigger
to roll over before he gives him a scrap of meat.
But the cats hide; they don’t like strangers.
Jaxon’s dad
cleans up the BBQ,
/>
and Uncle Samuel sits and begins to tune his guitar.
Soon he’s singing and we’re joining in.
An owl flies from the old sugar gums.
And the bonfire hisses
and smoke curls up as high
as the night stars. It’s like tinsel tonight,
and away towards the south there is a small
seam of light from the nearest town.
We are leaving.
Goodbye cowshed, machinery shed,
hayshed, chook pen, old red truck,
Memorial Hill, old black smithy shed,
blue wrens, magpies.
Goodbye sugar gums, White Tail, Streak,
kingfishers, dam, old pig sties, dairy cows,
tree house, galahs, old mother cat,
deep well, fruit trees …
I run out of special things to farewell.
Emmy and Jaxon curl up on the cushions and rugs
Mum has placed away from the fire
and Shelley creeps softly to Emmy.
I lie down near Trigger and close my eyes.
Uncle Samuel has stopped playing and singing.
Jaxon’s dad is talking to Dad,
putting a hand on his shoulder
and Mum is surrounded by neighbours
talking softly. I hear Leah’s name,
my name, but I am drifting.
Pa puts a rug around me and later
I hear cars starting up, someone shovelling all
the stray bits of wood and ash back into
the still-burning bonfire.
I hear Auntie Helen say, ‘I’ll help wash those dishes.’
Dad lifts me and carries me
to my bed. I feel his kiss on my forehead,
and then I am asleep.
Next morning, Uncle Samuel is cooking bacon
and eggs. He and Auntie Helen are
helping with the shift today, organising the boxes
already stacked for when the removal van comes to the house,
and the semitrailer
for the beef cattle,
and a truck for the tractors we are taking.
‘Great evening Toby!’ grins Uncle Samuel.
‘Hey, love the map you made. I was reading it
while you were still snoozing. Can’t say
I remember half those places on the farm,
but then I was never a farmer like your dad.
Leah would have loved your map.’
‘Yes, she would Toby,’ smiles Mum warmly.
I haven’t seen Mum smile like that for a long time.
‘The map was a great idea.
I’ve been too caught up with grief for Leah
to help you through this.’
Mum comes to give me
my good morning hug.
‘But Dad and I can’t stay here any longer.
We need a fresh start,
need to make new memories.’
Dad walks in then, still in his work clothes
and smelling like the cowshed. But comes straight
over and hugs me.
And there we are with bacon sizzling, the smell
of cow manure on Dad’s clothes,
Auntie Helen smiling at us
and Uncle Samuel yelling out,
‘Hold it. This will make a great photo.’
And he snaps us just like that
in the middle of our last morning here
on Deep Well Farm. Trigger comes
charging in; he senses something.
And Pa walks in. He smells like
smoke from the bonfire. ‘Just dampening
down the coals – lots of rubbish still burning.
It was the biggest bonfire I’ve seen.’
And I know I need to record that on my map.
I take it down from the wall and write,
then I place it in my backpack.
‘Can’t forget it,’ I say.
‘Well, that was the last milking.
The O’Briens will take over for tonight’s milking.’
And I know it has been just as hard for Dad
to decide to shift.
Mum hugs me tighter and
I feel the large swell of the new baby
growing in her tummy.
‘Toby, after we go to our new farm,
in a few weeks’ time you will have a brother.
We haven’t had much time to talk about
the coming baby,
but I thought you could help me choose some drawings
of Leah’s to make a mural for his room.
What do you think?’
I don’t know whether to pull away
or hug more.
Instead, I take a deep breath
and say, ‘Leah would have liked that.’
And suddenly I realise that I would like that too.
Then Uncle Samuel starts singing,
Trigger barks,
the kettle whistles furiously
and Pa says, ‘I can hear the first truck coming off
the highway. Better get some breakfast down.’
And we all sit and Auntie Helen is talking about
making a patchwork quilt for the baby,
and Pa leans across to me
and says, ‘We won’t be leaving Leah behind,
she will be coming with us,’ and he gently punches
his chest, right where his heart is beating.
‘Here’s something for you,’ says Uncle Samuel
as he ruffles my hair, just like my dad does.
‘Your mum told me about your
Leave Taking map on the phone the other day,
so I thought you might like to write in this
and call it “Making a New Beginning”. Well, just a suggestion.’
And he chuckles as I pull the wrapping paper away from a thick notebook.
As I eat my toast I open up the book
and write:
‘Our goodbyes are nearly done.
But we’ll never leave Leah.
She will always be with us.’
I take out my texta and add a thick smiling mouth.
Leah would have liked that.
Acknowledgements
Of course a family, my family, is the inspiration for many of my stories. This particular book mirrors, to some extent, the leave taking of our own farm life, and my adjusting to living with a cancer diagnosis. I experienced a deep satisfaction in melding the two together in a story for anyone needing to come to terms with a farewell of their own. But inspiration is only the initial part of the writing and I have some very important people to thank for their support and encouragement throughout the book’s growth.
To my wonderful editors at UQP who loved this story enough to guide, suggest and inspire me again to flesh out Toby’s story even more. Thanks Kristina Schulz and Vanessa Pellatt.
To Peter Carnavas who has brought Toby and Trigger to immediate visual life, thank you.
To my agent Jane Novak for her encouraging support and belief in my writing.
To a residency in Brisbane in 2016 through the May Gibbs Children’s Literature Trust Fellowship for allowing the words and tears to grow into a manuscript. Special thanks to Judy Russell.
To my husband Kelvin, to my big supportive family, to the little dog who lies at my feet, to Katrina Nannestad and my writing friends – thank you.
Hard journeys often come to an end at a startling new destination.
Leave Taking is such a destination.
Lorraine Marwood was born and raised in rural Victoria and lived with her husband and their six ch
ildren on a dairy farm. She has eleven grandchildren and loves to craft, sew, garden, walk her dog Monti and bake for family gatherings. She has been a headmistress of a rural school and has studied literacy. Early in her writing journey, she wrote poetry for literary magazines in Australia and overseas. Lorraine has published several children’s novels and collections of poetry and won the inaugural Prime Minister’s Literary Award for children’s fiction in 2010 for her novel Star Jumps. She has enjoyed three fellowships with the May Gibbs Children’s Literature Trust.
www.lorrainemarwood.com
First published 2018 by University of Queensland Press
PO Box 6042, St Lucia, Queensland 4067 Australia
uqp.com.au
uqp@uqp.uq.edu.au
Copyright © Lorraine Marwood 2018
The moral rights of the author have been asserted.
This book is copyright. Except for private study, research, criticism
or reviews, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part of this
book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means without prior written permission.
Enquiries should be made to the publisher.
Cover design by Jo Hunt
Illustrations by Peter Carnavas
Author photograph by Kyle Marwood
Typeset in 13/22pt Adobe Garamond by Jo Hunt
Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group, Melbourne
The University of Queensland Press is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
Leave Taking was developed as part of a
Creative Time Residential Fellowship provided
by the May Gibbs Children’s Literature Trust.
ISBN 978 0 7022 6011 7 (pbk)
ISBN 978 0 7022 6139 8 (pdf)
ISBN 978 0 7022 6140 4 (epub)
ISBN 978 0 7022 6141 1 (kindle)
University of Queensland Press uses papers that are natural,
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