Love You Two

by Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli

  I asked Luigia if she’d ever fallen in love again since marrying Dario. She said yes, without hesitation, without flinching. ‘I blocked it out, couldn’t let it be. But it’s affected everything.’ She took a shaky sip of her chamomile and looked out to where Dario and Ren walked the fields. ‘I don’t talk about it, even with friends. Most people wouldn’t even notice that there’s been any change. Funny how you can go through the motions.’ Luigia looked at me. ‘Please don’t say anything to anyone in Adelaide, Gianna. I don’t know why I’ve told you. I mean, look at you and Ren. You don’t know what it’s like, this knife slicing silently between two married people. But you’ve always been so trustworthy. Not really treating other people’s dramas as entertainment to spice up your life.’

  I think of the time Luigia’s sons were ecstasy-dealing teenagers and the police and counsellors were called in. Such strife and gossip from the community, some of whose kids were the regular clients. Luigia speaks again. ‘It’s shameful to admit to having these feelings. Even with you. Even though I’m sure this is so common. Well, look at the divorce rate! Dario and I wouldn’t want to get divorced. Jesus, we’ve been married since I was eighteen! We’ve grown up together.’ She smiles and shrugs with resignation. ‘But there’s no way it could’ve been. How could I destroy Dario and my parents, after all they’ve done for me? And of course, I would’ve been blamed for my druggie entrepreneurial sons! I’m sure my sons would’ve blamed me too. “My mum’s affair made me sell drugs!” A no-win situation, Gianna. So I took what I thought was the less painful road, but it’s changed everything anyway.’

  She reminded me of that poem Don used to have pinned to his bedroom wall when we were teenagers – ‘The Road Not Taken’, by Robert Frost. I never thought it would apply to me.

  Two roads in a wood – and I’ll take both … Because I love Ren and what my life has been with him, I made myself consider somehow staying put and losing Nat. Yet I feared that I’d also lose myself and lose Ren anyway, and lose who I am with Pina and Leo. And will divorce follow anyway? Even if Ren and I stayed together, would what Pina and Leo know as home and love be forever tarnished?

  Ren and Nat had said I needed to decide. Whatever decision I made would be painful to both of them. Nat didn’t want to break up my family. Ren knew he’d lose me if I lost myself. So it’s in Bordertown that I decided I would not stay put, and I would not cross over to the other side. I would move onto the border itself: I would love both men, I would take both paths and yes, there would be pain enough for us all in that decision, but hopefully, with time, the pleasure of forging a new life.

  As our car drove away, I watched Luigia and Dario in the side mirror, slightly apart. They slowly got smaller and clouded over by dust and my tears. Next time I saw them, I might seem the same to them but I wouldn’t be the same, nor would I simply be different. I would border the same and different – but this means a shroud would come over aspects of my life that my friends could not, must not, see.

  ‘You’re now leaving Bordertown. Please come back soon,’ said the road sign. But it’s actually there, in my own borderland, that I was about to take up residence, in perpetual motion.

  I’m shivering slightly now. The air seems crisper. The brick wall beneath my usually well-insulated bum seems to have iced somewhat. I need to move but I don’t seem to be able to. This dusty little town is where my mother chose not to choose. If I walk across the highway, head towards the darkness pointed out by the sign to Bordertown, I could find my way to Luigia and Dario’s farmhouse.

  I remember scampering about on their property. I roamed around the farm sheds and climbed haystacks, thinking I was on top of the world and could see for miles and miles. Every now and again during my explorations, I’d reassure myself that I could keep exploring because Dad and Zi Dario were in one side of my vision strolling around, and if they should go too far away, Mum was seated, fixed, in the garden with Zi Luigia. If Mum stayed still, I could roam more freely as she’d be the stable point, the compass point, to remind myself I wasn’t lost. If Mum had stayed still.

  Most of the passengers are back on the bus now, a few are taking that final cigarette puff near the door. Some are looking out at me from the bus windows, blurry faces I can hardly make out. I must look weird sitting under a bright light, buried in a book, a moth-ballet performing around me. The driver’s glaring at me, the caffeinated tapping fingers joined by a tapping foot on the bus’s step. He makes a move as if he’s about to hoist himself up.

  So-Not-Miss-Havisham is at the bus door, still smiling, but one hand’s raised and waving at me, the other gripping the handle tightly. ‘Come on, love, time to keep going!’ The bus suddenly starts up with a shaking roar and she looks ready to topple over.

  I run to the bus, my bum-cheeks like blocks of ice as I just manage to steady her by gripping her tiny, bony, but oh-so-strong shoulder. The driver’s settled in his seat, leaning forward over the steering wheel, while his gut settles itself under it. He’s shaking his head but not looking at us. As I climb on board, supporting this smiley old lady in front of me, he’s smirking as he reaches out to grip the lever that will seal shut the door.

  Back in my seat, I lean against the window, thinking about the still figure doing ordinary things like sipping herbal tea and crunching on taralli that day in Bordertown. She was my point of stability, fixed and secure, and yet she was hovering, floating, wavering between leaving us and staying. In the end she chose internal transience even as she ensured that for us, on the outside, she was fixed and easily located. Even as she ensured that for us, life would continue smooth, secure.

  9

  How hook turns lead to Narnia

  I AWAKE TO THE BUS groaning and spluttering into a station. At least all this exhaustion and trauma has made me sleep for a few hours. So-Not-Miss-Havisham’s wide awake on some kind of happy pill as she grins past me through the window, and squeezes my hand in her tissue paper one with a ‘Good morning, love!’

  My body’s stiff like I’m the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz. I need oiling and new springs as I clank down the steps of the bus behind her. I begin to look around for Zi Don, feeling the nervousness in my stomach wrestle with the rawness of hunger and weariness. But my bus Buddha’s tapping my arm, pulling me down so she can kiss my cheek and wish me ‘a life of wonderful journeys’ before she turns and is encircled by mainly darker-skinned younger people. I see them as family now.

  It suddenly dawns on me I didn’t get to know her name. But I don’t think she’s bothered with all that.

  Someone else is touching my shoulder and I turn to look at Zio Donato. He’s a taller, swarthier, hairier, male version of my mother and Zi Elena, and a middle-aged bulkier version of my brother. He has the same lovey-dovey grin, same bright dark eyes, the annoyingly long eyelashes. Next to him is a diminutive, delicate-looking Asian woman with shiny straight black shoulder-length hair. This must be Wei Lee. Such opposites they are, standing there next to each other: but the same warm smiles, warm dark eyes, one lot large and round, the other almond-shaped.

  Zi Don wraps me into him and I feel such relief as my nose burrows into his chest, breathing in the smell of his leather jacket, expensive cologne and ironing spray. He holds me like that for ages, as if he’s waiting for something tense and terrified to slip slowly away from me.

  Then he’s introducing me to Wei Lee. She steps up and she’s even shorter than me but way prettier and so much slimmer. In the less harsh light of the morning and the bus station fluoros, she’d look even younger than me. ‘May I hug you?’ she asks in a soft but strong voice.

  I stoop a little and we hug. She smells fresh and clean. I feel like a giant – dirty, dishevelled, dusted with sleep and soaked in bus fumes.

  Zi Don grabs my bags and heaves them effortlessly over his shoulder as he asks about my trip. He’s not as good-looking as I remember him from Easter, but I guess he’s now in his late forties. Plus, I’ve never seen him at six in the morning with his desi
gner three-day growth untrimmed and bristly. Wei Lee gently entwines her arm into mine and steers me towards some glass doors. Zi Don strides along with us. ‘Okay, let’s get you home to freshen up, have a good breakfast and a comfortable sleep!’

  I follow them to the car, a bright blue sporty sleek expensive thing. It’s parked outside on the street, covered in a fine dew on this chilly morning. I absentmindedly run a finger along the windscreen before I get in. Zi Don notices. ‘Guess you’ve heard of Melbourne’s four seasons in one day. You think you’re stepping out into a foggy chilly day but slowly the fog burns off into a warm summer’s day and then maybe blurs into a chilly night again.’ He opens a back door for me, and rests a warm paw on my shoulder. He looks worried as the breeze ruffles his greying curly hair. ‘This is very sudden for us, Pina, but it just means you’ll become part of our lives here ’cos we haven’t had a chance to prepare for you.’ He glances at Wei Lee and she glances back before sitting in the front passenger seat.

  I sink into the seat and lean my head back into the smelly but oh-so-comfy leather. ‘I promise I won’t be in your way.’ I watch him fold his big but flexible body into the driver’s seat.

  ‘Oh Pinuccia, you don’t know how much we hope you’ll want to be part of everything in our lives. It just may not be what you expect or what you’re used to,’ he says, again with that worried smile at me over his shoulder. He starts the car. It purrs and weaves smoothly into the morning traffic – yes, traffic at this hour! – while ridiculously cheerful and over-caffeinated DJs come chatting incessantly through the car radio. ‘Sort of throwing you in, you might say. We’ve got a Christmas party happening at our place, so you can meet our friends, our little community here, and get to know us very well, hey?’

  He and Wei Lee look at each other briefly, then awkwardly look away. Their hands link up between their seats, hers thin, graceful and pale, his brawny, tanned and hairy. I notice an amethyst and diamond gold ring on her right ring finger. A solid silver and amethyst band sits on his left ring finger.

  The car’s gliding through busy streets, tall buildings rising around us, windows glinting in the sunshine that’s burning the clouds away. Maybe they don’t really want me here. Maybe they don’t know what to say about why I’m here.

  ‘Did you talk to Mum?’ I ask, looking at their hands.

  ‘Yep. Of course, she and your dad are worried but she said you obviously needed to come here, and that you can call them if and when you want. She’s confused and upset, bella, but wants you to know she and your dad love you very much.’ Zi Don turns a little to look back at me over his left shoulder.

  I turn my eyes to the window. We’ve paused at an intersection in the left lane and just as the car picks up and moves forward to turn left, Zi Don turns right. I’m caught a bit off guard and sit up, clutching the back of Wei Lee’s seat, thinking that any second someone behind us or ahead of us is going to crash into this blue car, its flashiness no guarantee against death.

  But it doesn’t happen. Zi Don notices I’ve sat up and am trying to look into the windscreen ahead. He chuckles. ‘We do hook turns here on some city streets, and it works well.’

  I sit back again and think about what Mum said to him. I look at the back of his head, the strong shoulders in the pastel green shirt, the curly hair snuggled against the collar.

  ‘I don’t give a shit about how upset she is. It’s her fault. She’s insane and a liar.’ I stop just before my voice gets swallowed up.

  Zi Don and Wei Lee exchange another look. He speaks again. ‘It’s like left-hand turns into right lanes, Pina: some things can look very confusing until you see them a few times.’ He suddenly laughs and points ahead. ‘So what will you make of this?’

  He’s slowing down as he approaches a green creaking tram and then stops because it has, right in the middle of the road. These little red stop signs slide out from the side of the tram and politely signal cars to stop. Then people nonchalantly step off the tram and walk across our lane, right in front of us, to the footpath. Meanwhile, people who’ve been standing on the footpath at what I now see is a tram stop, walk in front of us and board the tram.

  I’m sitting up. ‘This is so loser. What if cars don’t stop?’

  ‘It’s what we do here. Again, I felt just like you the first time. But it works.’ He navigates his way around the tram after the polite, almost apologetic, little red stop signs have slid back again.

  We’re approaching a wide tree-lined street that becomes a bridge over a brown river. This must be the Yarra. Then we’re heading through the crushed cardboard, glass and steel look of Federation Square on one side and the mini Eiffel Tower of the Arts Centre on the other side. ‘This is St Kilda Boulevard, bella. It takes us down to St Kilda Beach, where we live.’ He glances back at me. ‘Hey Pina, I think I told you Wei Lee’s coming to Adelaide for Christmas Day. Time I introduced her to the nonni. You’ll drive back to Adelaide with us.’

  That gives me one and a half weeks here. One and a half weeks to get sorted out. ‘Yeah, that’s fine’. But I don’t sound so convinced. ‘Or maybe I can stay at your place while you go to Adelaide.’

  ‘It’s a big step for me, so having you with us will make it easier,’ Wei Lee says, turning to smile at me. ‘I’ve heard so much about your mum, and your dad, and Leo, and your aunty’s family. I really want to meet them. But I admit your grandmother worries me.’

  ‘They’re all a worry,’ I say. ‘I am too. Except Zi Elena and her Rock and my perfect cousin Stella. Actually, they’re a worry ’cos they never seem to have any worries.’

  Zi Don shrugs and grins. ‘Hey, they’re gentle people travelling lightly through life. They don’t have troubles but they don’t cause any either, and they don’t get off on anyone else’s. They got the easy roadmap at birth, while the rest of us have to draw our own maps, hey? How’s my number two gorgeous niece Stella, the star of my sister’s universe?’

  ‘She’s cool, doing well at school. Happy.’ I sigh. ‘No dramas there.’ I check out the ringed fingers clasped in front of me again. ‘Zio, did Mum mention Leo?’

  ‘Yeah, she did. He’s good. But your dad said he’s definitely going to have to give up the soccer. Apparently he took quite a beating during a game.’ We’re at a stop light/tram stop combo so he has time to turn to me seriously, waiting. I avert my eyes by pretending to be incredibly interested in the tram-ritual outside.

  But then it’s as if Zi Don decides to lighten the mood and the smile comes back. ‘Looks like I’m the only footyhead in the family.’

  Wei Lee laughs affectionately and gives him a playful shove. ‘You’re so gorgeous. Footyhead in digestible doses, thank goodness.’

  More nauseatingly loving adults behaving like love-struck teens. Are they hiding secrets too?

  We drive on for a while. ‘This is Fitzroy Street. At the end is St Kilda Beach and we’ll be nearly home,’ Wei Lee says. I notice heaps of people in heaps of cafés having way too many early morning coffees. I pick up smells of bacon, eggs and fruit that leave me nauseated. Am I already getting morning sickness?

  Zi Don shifts a little in his seat. ‘Pina, your mum asked me to ask you something.’ We’re at a roundabout. He navigates around it as he speaks. ‘A notebook of hers has gone missing.’ I can see the ocean up ahead, a sleek grey surface. My skin suddenly feels cold. ‘A kind of writing journal she keeps.’

  We’re turning onto what a sign says is Marina Parade. There is the vast span of water, tinged blue now that we’re closer, glistening under the warming sunny sky while a jetty stretches out into the horizon.

  ‘The one you gave her. Yeah, I have it.’

  I don’t know if they look at each other again. I’m fixed on the line where the sea meets and blurs with the sky, until my view’s obscured by a large laughing-grimacing clown that’s also the entrance to an amusement park. This is Luna Park. Lunatic park. Maybe I should get dropped off here.

  We pass a busy intersection and then turn in to a
street of pastel coloured cottages gleaming in the spreading sun. Aluminium lacework in various colours and small, flowering front yards give the street a peaceful feel.

  Zi Don swings the car gracefully into the driveway of one of the cottages. It glows like it’s creating its own sunshine, with peach walls and pink window edgings, white lacework trimming the verandah, and lavender bushes and white roses encircling two small green patches of lawn. A terracotta stone path leads up to the front verandah.

  I get out with Tin Man squeaks and crunches. I smell the fresh seaside air, the whiffs of lavender and rose, and they begin to act like a kind of oil on my joints. I step onto the verandah and notice a plaque near the pink-trimmed lavender front door: ‘Narnia’. What’s that got to do with his house?

  Wei Lee’s holding the front door open for me and I step inside. The walls are a light rosy mauve, the ceilings a light blue. It’s as if the sea and sky are meeting at sunset or sunrise inside this house. And everywhere, a lingering background scent of lavender. The high ceilings and ornate plaster cornices and mouldings remind me how old the cottage must be, but it smells fresh and new.

  ‘This is so cool,’ I say as I wander in, looking at the antique sideboard filled with memorabilia and framed sayings on the wall. There’s also a figurine of a person, cross-legged and in traditional Indian gear, with many arms coming out of its body in many directions. In front of it is a plaque. I’ll read it later.

  ‘Wei Lee did the renovation and decoration,’ Zi Don says proudly, an arm reaching down around her tiny waist.

  ‘Well, that’s my trade,’ Wei Lee says, her face disappearing into his chest.

  They take me for a tour. The front room on the left is their bedroom. It’s more like a romantic boudoir, with so many candles of different sizes and colours, pieces of sheer fabric draped everywhere and a large cast-iron four-poster bed.

  On the other side of the hall is their study with the works: two laptops, a printer, scanner, fax machine, his shelves of books on law, her shelves of books on architecture and interior design. Yet the sheer drapery on the window, the love seat and the plushness of the green office chairs soften the study into a sensual, sleepy room.