Fava Beans For Breakfast

by Suzanne Salem

  Fred’s face went pallid. ‘What’s happened? Has she been found? Is she okay? Tell me what you know.’

  ‘Word is that she showed up at her parents’ door first thing this morning.’

  ‘What? Are you serious? Is she alright? Has she been harmed in any way?’

  ‘Mate, she’s as right as rain. You were right all along. The kid just got jack of being at school and home, and she took off … she ran away. Guess she started to feel homesick or guilty about her folks or something. I’m not really sure why she decided to come back today after all this time, but the good news is that she has. No point over-analysing the way a teenage kid thinks.’

  Fred’s mouth and chin quivered but there was no visible register of happiness or relief on his face. The guy just stood there dumb and mute with his mouth twisted awry.

  ‘I tell you what, Fred, this is bloody good news for you. I wanted to make sure that you weren’t forgotten about in all of today’s excitement with her coming back.’

  ‘That is most kind … most kind. You say she is okay?’ he repeated. ‘Unharmed?’

  ‘Yup. And you know what else? It’s the craziest thing, actually, that’s come out of all this. She’s been hiding in our own backyard the whole time. She hadn’t even left Burraboo.’

  ‘In our backyard? You mean … she has been in Hungerford Place?’

  ‘No, you goose. She’s been up on that hippy compound, the Rainbow Lily joint, the whole time. She’s been looked after real well. Turns out those hippies have been concealing a minor. Just wait and watch the dust fly on them now. They are in big shit.’

  Fred looked at him, stunned.

  ‘Well, I guess the whys and wherefores of her being hidden on that compound is a different matter altogether. Bargearse Barry owes you a big apology, Fred. He should be rapped across his fat knuckles for the way he bungled the entire investigation.’

  Fred watched seagulls swoop and glide some way off shore, before the waves broke and turned to foam. A tentative smile formed for a few brief seconds, before he shook his head in disbelief. ‘I’ve been waiting for her to return for so long, but even I had my doubts. Sometimes I wondered if she ever would return. It has been almost five weeks.’

  ‘Doubt no more. This is great news. You must be dying to tell Neema.’

  ‘Yes, of course, yes …’ His voice trailed and he looked out to the breaking waves. ‘She will be most pleased.’

  ‘You know, Fred, there will be lots of red faces among the rats in town.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter for me. Not now … not anymore,’ said Fred, with a hollow voice.

  ‘Well … then.’ Tom cleared his throat. Fred was such an awkward bloke; you just couldn’t read him straight. ‘I just wanted to let you know the good news. I’ll be off now. Leave you to celebrate.’

  ‘Thank you, Captain,’ said Fred, bringing his hand to his head in a mock salute. The look on Fred’s face, of shock and pain and disbelief, was disconcerting. Fred lifted his head skywards, and all that emotion slid away into a void, leaving him featureless, like his nose and ears had been erased.

  * * *

  Wendy’s barbeque lunch was turning out to be quite the show of community bonhomie. Five weeks too late, Tom thought. News of Annabel’s re-emergence from the Rainbow Lily den was still the talk of the town, though no one dared speak of the girl today. Half of Burraboo was there to slap Fred’s shoulders or shake his hand. Not because the residents of Burraboo were necessarily overjoyed that the kid had returned, though everyone was certainly relieved she was unharmed. No, the barbeque was an event to let Fred know that everything would be just fine.

  Pat Morris was there. Kev, Stan, Tina. Even Frank Pritchett’s tasty nurse showed up. Who could blame her for wanting to enjoy an afternoon away from the festering old cockroach? Bargearse Barry hadn’t shown up. After his disgraceful show of incompetence in handling the Annabel White situation, Bargearse would probably stay low for a bit. It came as no surprise to Tom that Annabel confessed to having stolen from the pharmacy for some guy in Sydney that ran a clandestine lab. Annabel refused to offer names or too many details. She was scared. She refused to rat on any other kids in Burraboo. At least there’d be a proper investigation into this amateur drugs racket now. Oh, Annabel would be in the shit for a while. Fred’s suspicions had been right all along.

  Tom would continue to shoulder blame for opening the door to the Rainbow Lilies, he was certain about that. He’d offered Annabel White a job at the Horizon as a trainee in customer service, once the operation was open for business. She’d accepted. It wasn’t just a show of good will, he really wanted the kid to do well. He’d offered Annabel’s mother, Noelene, a job handling the phones, and even though she’d knocked him back at first, he persisted. It felt good when she accepted. It felt good to be the type of man who knew the majesty of a sublime moment. He was done with borders. He was done with looking back.

  As Tom mauled a piece of burnt lamb chop with his teeth, he heard Pritchett’s nurse loudly volunteer her news to the Hungerford Place congregation. Goldie Pritchett had done a runner. She’d taken all her things with her and left without telling her maggot uncle.

  ‘In the dead of night, like she’d had something to hide. She left a note, on the kitchen bench.’

  ‘What did the note say?’ someone asked.

  The nurse shrugged. ‘It was short. Two lines long, that’s it. Something about it being time to move on.’

  It was good riddance as far as Tom was concerned. Still, he was relieved that she’d upheld her part of their deal. He scanned the group quickly. Neema had retreated from the huddle of people. She looked like she’d been gored.

  He walked over to her and lifted his eyebrows. ‘Geez,’ he said. ‘You okay?’

  ‘No, this is impossible.’ She shook her head.

  ‘Guess she hadn’t told you that she was leaving?’ Tom said, for lack of anything else to say.

  Neema just shook her head.

  Sometimes the rot in a piece of fruit was hard to see. You had to cut beneath the skin to find it. Neema could never see the rot that was in Goldie, not even now. She adored the girl. That land sale proposal of Goldie’s was one of the most underhanded proposals that had been put to him. And that was saying something.

  ‘You’ve heard about that consortium,’ he said, to change her sullen mood.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘They buy Frank Pritchett’s land and the pier.’

  ‘Which is great news … really.’

  ‘You think … you can get a lease for a new floating cafe on the pier?’

  He winked and lowered his voice. ‘I know it.’ He leaned closer. ‘It’s a done deal. That I can guarantee.’

  ‘What about Big Bertha?’ Her eyes were sorrowful.

  ‘Big Bertha is now owned by that consortium. I reckon we’ll get her back. This time, it will be less complicated, I can guarantee that as well.’

  ‘We’ll see.’ She hugged her slender arms around her chest and looked at him in such a way as to suggest that she doubted him. He instinctively placed his hand on her shoulder.

  ‘Neema, I am the consortium. I bought the land back, the land that my grandfather gambled away and the pier, I took it back from Pritchett.’

  ‘You are the new owner?’ She smiled and her face bloomed golden for a moment. He’d fought hard to see that radiance return to her face.

  ‘We can be partners again, if you’ll have me, for the cafe. I know I did the wrong thing, cripes … I was an arse selling to Pritchett without talking to you about it. I won’t do that to you again.’

  ‘We have a cafe again?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But Goldie is gone. Why didn’t Goldie tell me she leaves?’

  ‘Ah, well, my guess is that she left without thinking things through, in the spur of the moment. I’m sure she’ll call you when she gets settled.’ He looked away for a moment, not believing a word he’d just said. Goldie’s duplicitous role in brokering the sale of her u
ncle’s property delivered her a clear financial benefit: a substantial cash fee. In return, Tom had required her to hand in Annabel, cut all ties with Neema and leave Burraboo immediately.

  ‘Maybe,’ Neema said.

  As drawn as he was to Neema, it was Fred who took his attention. The man seemed to be relieved but not at all relaxed. It was clear that he was uncomfortable with all the warm attention and the sudden offensive of good tidings. His smile had returned, his charming manner of speech and fluid conversation was in abundance, and yet he seemed quite altered. His face was not put together in the same way. Like a vase that had broken into pieces, then reassembled, with all the pieces now glued to the wrong places.

  CHAPTER TWENTY - EIGHT

  How Fawzy’s face flushed with zeal as he said the name. ‘St Kilda.’

  ‘Saint kilt?’

  ‘St Kilda,’ he repeated.

  ‘Why? Who tells you about this place, St Kilda?’

  ‘My friend George—you remember him, from the pharmacy bridging course? He moved to Melbourne after we completed our studies.’

  ‘No, I don’t remember him.’

  ‘Yes, ya butta, you do. He gave you a bag of henna,’ insisted Fawzy.

  ‘Oh. Sameer?’

  ‘Yes, yes. That’s right. George was Sameer. I’ve been talking to him … on the phone. He loves this St Kilda. We should think about it.’

  ‘You mean, we should move to St Kilda?’

  ‘Yes, finally, back to the city. Isn’t this what you wanted?’

  ‘The houseboat …’

  ‘There are places in Melbourne that are just like the Paprika Triangle, if not better, ya butta. You will never be lonely! All your favourite foods will be right there, at your fingertips. You won’t need to work so hard at your English.’ He looked at her, his eyes searing her skull. ‘All the things I forced upon you in Burraboo, I won’t do it again, not ever.’

  He scanned her face earnestly as she shuddered. The prospect of leaving behind her beloved bay was as painful to her as the thought of losing a limb. He was asking her to leave another home. Not just any home. This was where she belonged. Her piercing palace dream had passed over her the way a hot manic wind charges over a desert, leaving her calm but changed and eerily still.

  The deepest of sorrows tugged at her breath. She and Fawzy would never be in unison on anything. She looked up at his deflated face, disappointment burrowing in the hollow of his cheeks, the lump on his neck rising and falling as he swallowed, and saw in him the same sorrow mirrored back.

  ‘I’d help you, this time, with the earring parlour,’ he implored her. ‘St Kilda, it sounds like a most dignified place to live. Ya butta, I haven’t always honoured you with the truth and that has been undignified of me. I am changed and you deserve the truth. You must know about all of me if you are to know any of me at all.’ He wriggled like a half-crushed worm. ‘A man must behave with dignity, always. Edward bey taught me this.’

  Oh Fawzy. Not now. She threw up her hands. Not Edward bey.

  ‘Ya butta, there is something I must tell you. You see, although Edward bey was enjoying the life of a wealthy English expatriate in Alexandria, he was exiled from England. He’d been cast out of his society like … like a common criminal. I didn’t know this, until much later, when I was about to start university. I never told you.’

  ‘What had he done in England that was so bad?’ She’d always thought that he was as foul as a dirty shoe. This information was not alarming or surprising to her. Edward bey’s misadventure interested her as much as his platitudes. What had her paying attention was the tapping of Fawzy’s foot and the blush of his entire ear.

  He cleared his throat. ‘Edward Campbell, I still believe him to be the most dignified of men … had been falsely accused of acts of fraud in England. One would never have guessed Edward bey’s delicate situation from his dignified demeanour. Dignity is everything.’ His fingers shook. His cheeks and lips were molten, as though he were burning from the inside. ‘There is something I haven’t told you. Something I have hidden from you.’

  From her chest, Nayeema felt a scraping movement, sudden and certain and painful, as though an old heavy piece of hardwood furniture was being dragged away.

  ‘About the reason we cannot have children. It is my shame. My shame.’

  She opened her mouth to speak. He pressed his fingers gently against her lips and rested his head against hers for a brief second.

  ‘When I turned eighteen, Edward bey insisted that we celebrate, as men. We drank. He took me to a place, a place where there are women. He introduced me to a woman he had known for a long time. He told me I had to learn how to be a man, with a woman who could show me.’ His face was averted. He spoke to the carpet. ‘So I did.’

  Nayeema stared at his flared bell-shaped sideburn, saw the sweat that streamed from his forehead down his nose, felt the heat from his body fill the room.

  ‘After that, I started to notice a rash, mainly on my feet. I had fevers. I was sick. I hoped it would go away. I ignored it. At university, I researched my symptoms. I panicked. I asked Edward to take me to his English doctor friend … He treated me, successfully. The illness … it went away. But I had left it too late. The damage was already done.’

  ‘What was it?’ she whispered.

  ‘Syphilis.’ His voice quivered. ‘You were never at risk, the doctor assured me.’ His long, bony fingers lay folded over one another. ‘But I’m sterile.’

  ‘I knew we couldn’t have babies, from the beginning you told me—’ She stopped. She’d always wondered how Fawzy could know, from such a young age, with absolute conviction that he could never conceive children. Whenever this subject had come up clumsily between them she saw his shame deeply scorched in his cheeks, and his shoulders slumped in humiliation and she could never bring herself to ask him this question. She’d accepted his truth. Now she knew. She wasn’t sure how she felt. These things happened, sometimes; she’d been warned about young men gallivanting before marriage, but Fawzy? Of all men … Fawzy? How could she have possibly guessed?

  ‘The way you are looking at me, you see me differently. Maybe you are repulsed by me.’ He stared intently at his hands, palms facing upwards, as though he were seeking a message in the creases. ‘I understand,’ he said, quietly.

  ‘No, it’s not that. There is something else, something I have to tell you, as well. About the afternoon Annabel ran away, and you came home early and I wasn’t there. I lied to you. I told you I was running errands for the cafe but I was in Jindy, at Tom Grieves’ office. I had to see his accountant. I had an appointment with his accountant every afternoon. For thirty minutes every day.’

  ‘You went to Jindy after working at the cafe? Every day? How?’

  ‘I borrowed Goldie’s car. I dropped it off at her house. I walked home. Sometimes she drove me home.’

  ‘For how long was this going on … and why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘I had an agreement, with Tom. He insisted that I learn how to run a business properly. In return, he helped me. Helped us, really.’

  ‘I’d like to hear about the way in which Tom Grieves helped us, exactly.’

  ‘It’s like … a loan. He gave me a loan so that I could be his partner in the cafe. A financial partner.’

  ‘I thought you were a partner in name only.’

  ‘I know.’

  His voice stiffened. ‘So you paid him interest. You have a repayment schedule? A contract?’

  ‘Of course! Everything was documented … it was all above board.’ Sucking in her breath, she told him about the thirty per cent reduction in their rent at Hungerford Place, which was redirected to Tom as a loan repayment. ‘He knew I had no way of saving the money. My wages from the cafe, well, you know where that goes. Into a savings account so that you can buy your pharmacy.’ She flinched as she saw the hurt in his eyes.

  ‘You think that buying the pharmacy was just for me? You don’t think I want you to be happy, too?’
/>   He pulled her limp shoulders towards him and hugged her. She felt his chest tremble against hers, felt his bracketing heartbeat and sank into his embrace.

  CHAPTER TWENTY - NINE

  Fawzy glided his hand across the bonnet of his HQ Holden Monaro. He’d insisted on an Australian car. This one had such little mileage on it, it was almost brand new. He had purchased the car a week ago. The moment he’d laid his eyes on the forest-green 1971 model, GTS coupe, he knew it was perfect. ‘Perhaps it is a little indulgent, ya butta, perhaps it is an undisciplined choice. But it is truly a thing of beauty. Me and this car, we are going to get on very well indeed,’ he’d said.

  She stood back and watched him open the boot. The money that he’d so diligently saved to buy the pharmacy had been partly frittered away on this purchase. Still, it was a long drive to Melbourne. It would take him several days and he needed a solid car to get him there.

  He had wanted to leave just after breakfast. But she had made such a fuss for him, with her gifts and a card, with the formality of the breakfast she had set out in the English tradition, to please him, to let him know that her heart was still warm towards him, to let him know they would always be connected. She wore the dress he most liked and kohl on her eyes. When he had seen all that, he stayed an extra half hour. And then another half hour, and then an hour, and then he stayed for lunch.

  She handed him a plastic bag filled with snacks. That look he had given her as she handed him the bag. That look had seared her. When she thought of Fawzy’s last few weeks here in Burraboo, her fingers trembled with rage. He’d been shackled to Bargearse Barry’s useless investigation for so long. Annabel White was best forgotten. His good reputation was now restored and his name cleared of any misdoings. This meant everything to him. ‘A man cannot show his face to the world when there is a blight of dishonour around him,’ he’d said.

  He slowly placed the plastic bag on the passenger seat and looked up at her as she swallowed her sadness back into her chest. She remembered his soft brown eyes last night as he stroked her hand and told her that one day she would thank him for their estrangement; that perhaps their final severance from one another, when it came, would give her the opportunity to bear a child, with someone, well … capable. He would never come back to Burraboo. He would not pressure her to join him in St Kilda. This, he owed her, he’d said.