Burning Fields

by Alli Sinclair

  “What’s the name of the farm you’re going to?” Rosie asked. “Do all your family work there?”

  Tomas gave a small, kind laugh. “In a way.”

  “Huh?” It felt good to walk, but now that they’d left the town and bitumen road behind them, her high heels found it hard going on the slippery gravel.

  “My family own a property.”

  “Is that why you’re here now, to help them run it?”

  “Yes.” He adjusted the suitcases in each hand.

  “I can carry mine, really.”

  “No, no. I can do this. However, I am not sure where I am carrying this to.”

  “Good point,” she said. “My family’s farm is called Tulpil.”

  “I like this name. What does it mean?”

  “The Yirrganydji people.” She glanced over and saw the blank look in his eyes. “Aboriginal—”

  “Ah, yes.”

  “Yirrganydji is the name of the people originally from this region. When my great-great-grandfather bought land to set up his sugarcane farm, it was overrun by wallabies. And the Yirrganydji name for wallabies is…” She waited for him to answer.

  “Tulpil!”

  “Spot on,” she said. “Piri is also an Aboriginal name.”

  “This means?”

  “Fire.”

  “Fire river?” He arched an eyebrow, his delight for learning more about his adopted home shining through.

  “We need the river to irrigate the sugarcane and we need to burn the cane to get rid of the debris and prepare the fields for the next season. Fire and water play a huge role in farming sugarcane.”

  “Ah.” He nodded. “So, the name of the town relates to fire and water.”

  “Exactly.”

  He tilted his head to the side. “Your hair is the color of fire.”

  “Yes.” She self-consciously patted it into place. Clearing her throat, she said, “I’m guessing you’ve not had any experience in sugarcane farming.”

  He grinned. “This is correct.”

  “How did your family end up here?”

  Tomas hesitated, as if debating whether he should impart the information. Was she being too nosy?

  After a while, he said, “My cousins moved to Australia many years ago. They make wine in New South Wales and they told us the sugarcane industry is strong. So, my family came to Australia and bought the property.” Tomas tilted his head to the side. “You like to ask many questions. Maybe you are part Sicilian.” He laughed and she joined in.

  “Nope, I’m Aussie, one hundred percent. Well, my mother’s family are French and my father’s are from good Ol’ Blighty.”

  Again, with the questioning eyebrow.

  “Blighty—England.”

  He let out a long breath. “It appears I have much to learn.”

  Her lips twitched. “It appears so.”

  The town was now far behind. A wisp of clouds drifted across the blue-black sky, obscuring the stars, though the moon retained its brilliance, lighting the way along the rocky road.

  Now that she’d started talking, she didn’t feel like stopping and the self-conscious feeling began to fade. “You don’t need to worry about learning everything about sugarcane in your first five minutes here, I’m sure your family have plenty of knowledge they’ll share with you.”

  “My family are not unaccustomed to working the land. They farmed olives and oranges.”

  Images of lush green trees with bright orange orbs filled Rosie’s mind and she imagined a zesty citrus scent surrounding her.

  “My great-grandparents did the farming; my parents and grandparents are people of the city.”

  She remembered being surprised at Tomas’s smooth skin when they’d first shaken hands. “You’re not a farmer, either, are you?”

  He shook his head. “No, but it is now my future.”

  “What did you used to do?”

  “I am an engineer by schooling, then I…” He drew his lips into a tight line. “I am an engineer.”

  She desperately wanted to ask more questions, but she suspected Tomas didn’t like to be rushed or pressured. Slowly, slowly, Rosie.

  The clouds now obscured the moon and she stepped around a large pothole and motioned for Tomas to do the same in case he hadn’t seen it. His feet hit a loose patch of stones on the downhill descent and he lost balance but regained it quickly.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I am good,” he said, holding his composure.

  They walked for a while longer and, once more, she couldn’t help herself. “What’s the name of the property your family own?”

  “Il Sunnu. It means The Dream.”

  “Oh.” She stopped in her tracks. Why hadn’t she figured this out earlier?

  “What is wrong?” Tomas stopped. The bags swung against his legs.

  “Nothing,” she said quickly. “Nothing at all.”

  “It does not appear to be nothing.”

  Rosie searched the darkness. For what, she wasn’t sure. “I’m just surprised.”

  “Surprised immigrants have enough money to buy a farm?” His voice held an edge.

  “No.” She kept her tone even. “I’m just saying I didn’t get the connection. So, your surname must be Conti.”

  “It is.”

  Trying to ease the strange tension that seemed to appear out of nowhere, she said, “I used to play at your property a lot when I was little. The owners had children the same age as me and my…” She let it trail away.

  “Your?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said quickly.

  “You have met my family?” Tomas sounded like he, too, was grappling to steady their conversation.

  “No, I’ve been away.”

  “Oh, yes, of course.”

  From her mother’s letters, Rosie knew her parents hadn’t made any effort in getting to know the Contis, which frustrated Rosie immensely. She’d never been able to comprehend her father’s peculiar attitude toward Italians. Then again, she hadn’t understood much about her father these past few years.

  They continued down the road, their steps in perfect sync.

  “I am sorry for my sensitive reaction to your question about my family. Because I am from Sicily, I have found some of your countrymen think I am uneducated and poor and of no value.”

  “That’s horrible.”

  Tomas shrugged. “This is a new world for me and, in time, I will adjust.”

  “I have no doubt you will. People can be strange and dreadfully racist. I’m sorry you’ve experienced it.” She took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of eucalyptus trees. It smelt like…home.

  “Do not worry, it takes all kinds to make the world spin, yes? Besides, a little bit of the racism is nothing compared to…” He shook his head as if to dispel a painful memory.

  “Compared to?” she asked, taking small comfort that she wasn’t the only one who started sentences then changed her mind.

  “Nothing, compared to nothing.” Tomas quickened his pace, as if trying to escape whatever memory pursued him.

  Rosie struggled to keep up, her heels making the going precarious.

  “Life must have been very hard in Italy,” she said, then immediately regretted it. Obviously, life had been hard. Italy not only had to contend with the world war, but it had to endure its own civil war at the same time. “Sorry.”

  “For?”

  “Sorry for prying,” she said.

  “I believe there are some topics that are better left alone.”

  His firm tone unsettled her, but his response was justified. War was a subject fraught with heavy emotions that often catapulted people into memories they’d rather forget.

  “You’re right.” Keen to change the topic, she said, “Your English is very good.”


  This time, Tomas met her comment with a smile. “Thank you. My nonna taught me. She loves languages. She knows English, Spanish and French. And, of course, Sicilian and Italian.”

  Rosie could make out the lights of the Russell house in the distance. Not far now. A sliver of disappointment and apprehension ran through her.

  “Like the Spanish and Portuguese,” Tomas brought her back into the moment, “the Italian language changes depending on the region. Sicily is my home…” He coughed. “My old home and I adapted to Italian when I lived in Rome… I am a chameleon, one might say.”

  As he spoke, Rosie concentrated on the way his face lit up when he spoke of his home country. Why would he leave Italy, a country he clearly loved with all his heart?

  “Where did your nonna learn all these languages?” she asked.

  “Textbooks. Speaking with people who had moved to our country. She would speak with Señor Alves from Spain for many hours, asking him different Spanish words and phrases. Nonna would do the same with Mademoiselle Eloise to learn French. My grandmother believed our city was a classroom.”

  “Oh, I love that. She sounds like a good egg.”

  “Good egg?” He raised a questioning eyebrow.

  Her light laughter danced through the warm evening. “A good egg means the person is special.”

  He nodded slowly, as if giving this new knowledge time to sink in. “Australians like to make up these sayings, yes?”

  “We do, indeed.”

  “My nonna would enjoy this. Me too.” He paused. “I hope one day you meet her.”

  Rosie hesitated ever-so-slightly and reminded herself that her parents should not force their opinions on her. “I would like that very much.”

  They climbed the last hill and her calves burned, even though she wasn’t the one lugging two large bags.

  They reached the crest and Rosie stopped and looked up at the sky. The clouds had floated past the moon, and, once more, a pale glow embraced the sugarcane fields. Directly in front of her was Tomas’s place and farther away, Tulpil. An empty feeling grew in the pit of her stomach about the hard conversations to come, while shivers of excitement danced across her skin as she realized how happy she was to see her childhood home.

  Rosie pointed at the newly renovated white Queenslander set far back from the road. “That’s your place.”

  “Wow.” Tomas placed the bags gently next to him.

  “It’s rather spectacular, huh?” The previous owners had always taken pride in the old house, but it had descended into disrepair when the patriarch had fallen ill a few years ago. By the looks of the fresh paintwork, Tomas’s family had injected some much-needed love into the place. “Welcome to your new home.”

  Tomas took in the view before him. “It is nothing like I imagined.”

  “Better or worse?”

  “I…I am not sure.” He kept his eyes trained on the house. “It is very different to my place in Palermo. Back there, we only had a courtyard. This is a whole new world. So many possibilities.”

  Tomas locked eyes with her, and, for a precious moment in time, all her worries slipped away as they stood under a star-studded sky.

  “I must go.” Tomas took a deep breath, picked up his bag and asked, “Would you like me to accompany you to your house?”

  She shook her head. “That’s very sweet of you, but I’m a big girl. Go see your family, I’m sure they will be happy to see you.”

  His grin was wide. “I will tell you a secret.”

  “All right.”

  “I did not tell them of my arrival.”

  “They’re going to be shocked when they see you!”

  “I think they will, yes.” He held out his hand, leant forward and kissed her on the cheek. Her face and neck flooded with heat and he pulled away. “I am sorry! Now I am in Australia, maybe I should forget this custom.”

  Rosie tried to catch her breath, surprised by how much she liked him being near. “Don’t ever lose that custom, Tomas. It’s who you are.”

  “Grazie.” He wrapped his hands around hers and gave them a gentle squeeze. Tomas held on longer than was necessary. “Ciao, Rosalie Stanton.”

  “Ciao, Tomas Conti.” Her cheeks ached from smiling.

  He slowly let go of her hand, grabbed his bag and took off in the direction of Il Sunnu.

  Picking up her suitcase, Rosie headed toward home and traipsed up the long gravel driveway. Visions of playing chasey with her younger brothers pulled at her heartstrings, weighing her down with sadness. She missed Alex, with his gangly limbs, wicked sense of humor and rebelliousness, just as much as she missed Geoffrey’s reserved nature and his passion for the family farm and business.

  Rosie looked up at the light shining through the living room window. Across the hall, her brothers’ bedroom remained in darkness. What she wouldn’t give to once more be in that room, snuggled with her brothers and telling scary stories by candlelight.

  Inhaling deeply, she took the last few steps up to the front door and gripped the handle.

  Chapter 2

  Rosie used her hip to nudge open the heavy wooden door of her father’s office. After arriving so late the night before, she’d been tired and had lost the nerve to start the conversation they needed to have. Her mother, and even her father, had been so happy to see her that she didn’t have the heart to burst their bubble—yet. Instead, she’d gone to bed and spent the night tossing and turning, wondering how the events of the next day would play out. There was no doubt she’d be met with resistance, but Rosie had dealt with that for many years.

  Interspersed between the building anxiety, Rosie had allowed her mind to replay her meeting with Tomas. He intrigued her immensely; she loved that Tomas Conti felt like a welcome sea breeze on a stifling hot day.

  Stepping into the room, Rosie balanced the tray in her hands as she struggled to keep the crockery and steaming pot of tea upright. Her father didn’t acknowledge her presence until she laid the tray on the battered desk that had sat in this room for three generations.

  “I thought this might help.” She poured the tea in his favorite china cup—the exact one her great-grandfather used to drink from.

  “Not even a stiff drink…” He leant forward and rubbed his forehead.

  “A stiff drink?”

  “What?” He looked up at her, as if finally registering she was there.

  “You said, ‘Not even a stiff drink…’”

  “It doesn’t matter.” He shook his head and returned to the pile of paperwork that now sat on his desk instead of in the wooden crates where they’d been stashed for the past year. “This never ends.”

  Rosie stood on tiptoe and studied the calculations scribbled on a scrap piece of paper. A few figures were way off.

  “I could do them for you.” She offered a small plate of Anzac biscuits fresh from the oven. The aroma overshadowed the faint musty smell of the papers.

  “Thanks, Rosie, but it’s complicated. Why don’t you go help your mother make lunch?”

  “But I…” Her father, John, stared at her over the rim of his glasses and she pursed her lips. Arguing would not get her anywhere. Instead, Rosie picked up the tray and moved toward the door, her heels clacking against the wooden floorboards. An unfamiliar ripple of annoyance travelled through her and before she could stop herself, she turned and faced her father, who was once again hunched over the tower of paperwork. “Is the co-op payment up to date? Because if it is then it’s not going to cover July. But if you move the excess from June and take the earnings from May then it all should balance nicely.”

  Her father drew his brows together and mumbled, his eyes fixed on the numbers in front of him. She closed the door quietly, satisfied she’d had a say, even if it irritated him. Heaviness wrapped around her heart as images of herself as a child with her father flashed before her. It had been
so easy when she was a young girl, cocooned in love as they’d sat at the kitchen table, solving mathematics problems for entertainment. In the past he’d encouraged her ability, offered her praise, but when she’d grown into a teenager and showed interest in doing the farm’s books, he’d backed off as if she had the plague.

  Rosie held the tray as she stood in the hall and studied her most treasured family photo. She’d been eleven at the time and her brothers considerably younger. A photographer had been travelling from town to town, and, as the family didn’t possess a camera, Rosie’s mother had insisted on taking advantage of the opportunity. She’d used the extra money she’d saved from the household budget and the family had spent a day preparing, with Rosie’s mother fussing over everything from a crooked collar on one of the boys’ shirts to a stray curl of Rosie’s. The photo had been taken in a heartbeat, but the memory stayed forever. She missed those days when her family had felt safe, when war hadn’t ripped them apart.

  Cecile, Rosie’s mother, looked up from the wooden bench, a streak of flour running from her face and into her strawberry-blonde hair. Her mother’s grace seemed better suited to American glamour magazines than the harshness of the Australian landscape.

  “What’s wrong?” asked her mother.

  Rosie pointed toward the office down the hallway. “He’s struggling. I could do it in a quarter of the time and with way less stress.”

  “I know.” Her mother rubbed her hands on the towel and placed it on the counter. The sun streamed through the open window, highlighting small clouds of flour floating above the dough. “He’s as pig headed as your grandfather and just like your brothers are…were…” Her mother bit her lip.

  Rosie wrapped an arm around her mother’s bony shoulders and pulled her close. Seeing her struggling only reinforced Rosie’s decision to return to Tulpil. Although she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was, Rosie had sensed something in her mother’s letters that implied life at Tulpil was still very difficult, and when Rosie had arrived, she could feel a heavy melancholy permeating the house. But, as expected, her father and mother pretended all was fine in their world.

  “Mum, we don’t know if Alex is really gone.”