Water under the Bridge

by Lily Malone

  Ella pressed ‘post’ and quit out of Facebook. She’d get notifications if there were comments.

  ‘We’ll have you home in no time, boy,’ she said to the bird before she picked up her broom.

  * * *

  ‘We’ve got a bit of a problem,’ said Nita Kinworth when Jake Honeychurch answered the cleaner’s call.

  ‘What’s up, Nita?’ He was already training with the Fire Brigade boys so it wasn’t like there was a fire he didn’t know about, or a flood.

  ‘Old Irma’s wee bird got out again. I’d mopped the floor but Ollie took him out of the cage and he didn’t know I had the back door open to dry the laundry tiles. He’s a regular Houdini, that bird!’

  ‘You can’t see him?’

  ‘No, sorry, love. Ollie ran outside but he said he took off towards town.’

  ‘Okay, Nita. I’ll have a scout around Nan’s place. I’m pretty sure that’s where he’ll go. I’m nearly finished here anyway. Thanks.’

  ‘Sorry about that, Jake. Ollie said he won’t do it again.’

  ‘We’ll find him, Nita, no worries.’

  ‘Thanks, Jake.’

  Jake ended the call and watched as the local fire station volunteers wound hoses back into coils.

  ‘You got things covered here, Arnie?’ Jake called to the captain, and when the older man nodded, he added, ‘I’m gonna take off then. Nanna’s bird got out again.’

  ‘Wring its neck be easier,’ Arnie said with a huffed laugh.

  ‘And have Nanna haunt me from the grave? You wring the bird’s neck.’

  Arnie conceded the point, proving Nanna Irma’s reputation was still good for something.

  Jake waved to the remaining members of the volunteer brigade and shrugged out of his fire suit shirt and protective pants, getting down to his t-shirt and then pulling on a pair of clean jeans. He had a bottle of water in the Landcruiser; he picked it up and chugged the liquid as he rolled out of the staging area in front of the shed and accelerated, heading east towards Chalk Hill.

  Slowing as he reached the town limits, Jake craned his neck to see if Percy might be cruising among the trees. He didn’t spend long looking along the shops lining the highway because he was pretty sure he knew where Percy would go.

  When he reached the Chalk Hill Bridge Road he turned right. Another three hundred metres and he pulled up on the grass verge outside his nan’s place, behind a neat blue Mazda hatchback with personalised plates reading Perkins 92/96.

  ‘Dammit,’ he cursed beneath his breath.

  If he’d been any less sure this was the best place to find Nanna’s bird he would have kept driving.

  He knew the car. Everyone in Chalk Hill knew the car because it was the only personalised plate in town. The locals didn’t go for personalising much of anything except benches in the War Memorial park.

  Ella Davenport.

  His real estate agent was the last person Jake wanted to see.

  CHAPTER

  2

  Ella was trying to decide if she really could be bothered cleaning the oven when she heard a car door close on the street and took it as a sign that the oven could wait. Gratefully, she pulled off the pair of yellow dishwashing gloves and left them by the sink with her bucket of cleaning products.

  Facebook worked fast. Someone was here for the bird.

  Sam wouldn’t be happy.

  Irma Honeychurch’s house had a timber-floored hall dividing the bedrooms on the left and right, and as Ella made her way towards the front door from the kitchen, her thongs clacked at her heels. She got the screen door open in time to see a tallish man, about her age, late twenties, maybe a bit older, walk around the front of a late model silver four-wheel-drive, open the front gate and stride up the spider-splattered path.

  Something about him reminded Ella of Marshall. This guy had that same ‘I own this place’ swagger that Marshall Wentworth wore like a wetsuit. Ella’s pulse beat that little bit harder, and that annoyed her because her pulse should bloody well behave itself after all this time. Marshall was water under her bridge.

  ‘That was quick,’ she blurted, shaken by her unwelcome reaction to the stranger. ‘I only just posted the photo.’

  The man stopped before he reached the base of the steps, staring up at her with a question in his eyes.

  ‘I’m Ella,’ she said, wiping her hand against her skirt before stretching it out into thin air.

  He took a step, shook her hand once and let go before she could blink.

  ‘Jake,’ he said, and he paused. ‘Jake Honeychurch.’

  Ella forgot all about Perkins III and bird cages. This man owned the house. This was the man she was working for and hadn’t ever officially met. The paperwork had all been done by email, or via her boss, Harvey.

  ‘It’s nice to finally meet you in person, Mr Honeychurch.’

  ‘Jake is fine.’

  ‘Have you come to check out the house? Everything’s all falling into place. I’ve got the professional photographer booked for tomorrow—’

  ‘Photographer?’

  ‘All part of the package,’ Ella said, smiling at him. ‘I’ve got the first of the ads going in the paper next week. It’s a half page, about this big.’ She shaped her hands in an approximate brick-size box. ‘I’ve been sweeping and de-cobwebbing and thinking up the marketing words. I’ll do the first Home Open next Saturday. If that’s okay with you? I didn’t think to ask because no one’s living here so I didn’t really think the date mattered …’

  Jake shifted his feet. Of course he shifted his feet—he must be hot in jeans and those huge boots standing out there in the sun, and she was babbling.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jake. Come inside. It’s cooler inside. I imagine you want to look at the place? I’ve cleaned it up a lot.’

  His face got a bit grim. ‘You didn’t need to do that.’

  ‘Oh, it needed a spruce up. I don’t mind,’ she beamed at him. ‘All part of the service with Begg & Robertson Real Estate.’

  A smile tried to sneak its way across his face. ‘I doubt that somehow. I don’t think Harvey Begg does much by way of scrubbing floors as part of his real estate service, but never mind.’ He glanced left and right along the front verandah, then spent a few seconds staring at his feet in those boots.

  Huge boots. Huge feet.

  What was it they said about shoe size? Big feet, big … a blush tiptoed up Ella’s throat.

  ‘I’m confident about getting a sale for you and your brothers, Mr Honeychurch. It won’t be easy—’

  He’d ducked his chin towards his chest, but his eyes flicked up when she said that, and met hers directly for the first time. They were blue like the paint on the old house’s architraves. Dark, near-navy. The colour of a pool at midnight, the moment you dived in.

  Sheesh. Get a grip, Ella.

  ‘I didn’t come about the house, Mrs Davenport. I have every confidence you’ll do a fine job selling it.’

  ‘Miss. It’s Ella,’ she said automatically.

  ‘Sorry, Ella. I didn’t come to ask anything about the house. I came to see if you’ve seen my cockatiel? A bird about this big?’ His hands made a small shape, like he was trying to squeeze something too large into a tiny box.

  Why was she so obsessed with size today?

  ‘Of course. I’m so sorry. I thought you were here about the house. Yes. We found a white cockatiel. I put a photo on Facebook. He’s in a cage inside.’ She indicated inside the house with her hand, and Jake used that as an invitation to jog up the steps.

  ‘You got him into a cage?’ He sounded surprised.

  ‘There was an old one in the shed. My son found it when he was cleaning the shed out.’ Ella opened the screen door quietly and led Jake into the house. ‘I’ve put him in one of the rooms where it’s quiet. Native birds were chasing him, poor little thing. We gave him a drink. My son took a shine to him. Actually, he’s going to be a bit sad that you’re here now. Sammy wanted to keep him.’

  As if on
cue, the front gate squealed. Footsteps slapped up the path and Sam called, ‘Mum?’

  ‘In here, Sam.’

  Sam burst through the screen door, making it bang. He stopped when he saw Jake. He had to stop; there was no more room, and Jake Honeychurch had the type of shoulders you didn’t neatly sidestep in a metre-wide hall.

  ‘This is Jake, Sam. He’s the bird’s owner.’

  ‘The bird was my grandmother’s, actually, Sam. This is her house. Percy got out earlier today and flew here. He’s done it before, so I had a pretty good idea about where to go looking for him,’ Jake said.

  Sam’s face wilted, much like the celery clenched in his fist.

  Ella tried to keep them all moving along. ‘I put the cage in here.’ Stepping further into the house, she turned into a room on the right. She’d left the cage just inside the door, tucked near the wall in the darkest corner. Perkins III peeked up at them, all glinty-eyed.

  ‘I didn’t know this old cage was still here,’ Jake said softly.

  ‘Look, I hope I didn’t do the wrong thing. I ordered a mini-skip … we’ve been having a clean out. There was so much clutter in the shed. Harvey said you wouldn’t mind, and I hadn’t been able to contact you about it.’ Did that sound like she was accusing him of not getting back to her? ‘Maybe I should check your email address against our records. I might have the address wrong. That might be why you didn’t get back to me.’

  ‘You’ve got the address right. Ella, I really don’t care what you do if it helps you sell the house. My brothers and I are happy to leave the entire thing with you. Do what you think is best.’ He put his hand on the hook at the top of the bird cage and lifted it easily. ‘Thank you for looking after Percy for me,’ he said to Sam.

  ‘His name’s Percy? No wonder he was happy to come to us, Sammy,’ Ella said to both of them. Jake’s brow had creased at her comment about the bird’s name, so Ella explained. ‘Percy looks just like the cockatiels we used to have. We called them all Perkins. Perkins I. Perkins II.’ She indicated the cage. ‘He would have been Perkins III if we’d got to keep him.’

  ‘After Kieren Perkins. He’s Mum’s favourite swimmer,’ Sam added. He knelt to push the celery sticks through the bars of the cage, jiggling them to the cockatiel enticingly.

  Ella’s spine stiffened. She could have done without her son adding that bit of information, but she didn’t think Jake noticed, and to cover it she said, ‘Percy and Perkins are close enough he probably felt right at home with you, Sam.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter now, anyway. Nothing matters.’ Sam dropped the celery and the pale green stalks sulked to the bottom of the cage. ‘I hate this place. I want to go home.’

  ‘Sam—’

  ‘And I hate you.’

  With that, Sam stormed from the hall, slammed the door and ran.

  Ella did that thing mothers all over the world do all the time. ‘I’m so sorry, Jake. He’s not been himself lately.’

  ‘No need to apologise,’ Jake said.

  Ella thought he might be about to say more, but he didn’t. Instead he added, ‘Nice to meet you. Thank you for looking after Percy.’ He backed out of the room, and he was almost at the front door when he turned. ‘Please don’t spend any more time cleaning this old place, Ella. Not on my account.’

  He pulled the door open, and held it until it shut quietly behind him. Then he closed the latch.

  CHAPTER

  3

  ‘Well, thanks for that, Percy Bird. I could have done without that this afternoon,’ Jake said, as he put the old bird cage on the back seat of the Landcruiser and strapped the seatbelt around its girth.

  He climbed in the front seat and fired the engine, thinking about his real estate agent. Ella Davenport was younger and prettier than the photographs he’d seen in the paper, but that was probably because she’d been made-up for the camera and he’d never been a fan of that look.

  In the paper, and in the photo in the window of Begg & Robertson, she was business-like and professional, whereas today she’d been all school-girl brown pigtails, dust on her shirt, a bit of cobweb stuck in her hair.

  His plan about ‘not’ selling Irma’s house made more sense before he’d met Ella.

  Now it left a sour taste in his mouth.

  Jake glanced in the rear-view mirror and narrowed his eyes at the cockatiel. ‘You, Buster, are on notice. No more flying away and getting saved by pretty ladies. Especially pretty ladies who are selling Nanna Irma’s house.’

  Percy whistled at him.

  Jake picked up his phone and scanned through his contacts until he found Harvey Begg’s name. The Bluetooth kicked in as he pulled out from the kerb in front of Irma’s and did a U-turn in Chalk Hill Bridge Road, heading back to the highway.

  ‘Hey, Jake,’ Harvey greeted him.

  ‘Harvey. How are you, mate?’

  ‘Can’t complain. No one would listen if I did. We’re just about to sit down to Sunday roast. We’ve got the grandkids up with Molly and Luke for the day. What about you?’

  ‘Putting out fires, Harvey,’ Jake said.

  ‘Brigade Training Day, hey?’

  ‘Yep. Hey, I’ve just been around to Nanna’s house. I met your saleslady there.’

  ‘You met Ella?’ Harvey said. Jake could imagine the real estate licensee leaning back in his chair, patting at his pre-lunch stomach. ‘She’s keen, isn’t she, working on a Sunday?’

  ‘Too keen, Harvey. I coulda eaten dinner off the floor. I reckon she’s been sweeping and getting rid of cobwebs most of the day. She said something about getting in a professional photographer.’

  Harvey chuckled. ‘All part of the package, Jake my boy.’

  ‘Harvey, I told you I would put the place up for sale but you know I’m just testing the waters. I didn’t want anyone to go to any trouble on my behalf. Ella said she’s got newspaper advertising planned—I don’t expect that. I don’t care if it’s marketed at all. I certainly don’t expect anyone to fork out money for professional photography.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, Jake. It’s good practice for Ella; it’s her first listing. Let her go for it.’

  ‘She had her kid there, cleaning out the shed. I reckon she was about to start cleaning the oven.’ He hadn’t seen Nanna Irma’s house look like that in ten years. When he was a kid Nan’s house had always been spotless. It was only in the last few years that she said the dirt got harder to see and that was her excuse for letting a few marks and stains slip by the radar. What the family hadn’t known—because Nanna was so good at hiding it—was that her eyesight had deteriorated to the point where she really couldn’t see. She’d tripped on a branch in the backyard and fallen and broken her arm. That was when Jake’s mum and dad had to convince Irma to move into the nursing home in Mount Barker. Beginning of the end. Nanna hadn’t lasted long after that.

  ‘They didn’t throw out something you wanted, I hope?’

  ‘No. Nothing like that, Harve.’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure what you want me to do, Jake. It’s her first listing. Ella’s gonna want to do everything she can to sell it. Having the place spick and span can’t hurt a sale.’

  I don’t want the damn house sold. ‘I don’t want her giving herself blisters over it, Harvey. Next thing she’ll be oiling the deck.’

  ‘Wouldn’t put it past her. Can’t say I’ve known her long but I can tell she’s a determined little thing. Look, I’ll have a word with her if you like. I hope she didn’t come on too strong.’

  ‘No. Not at all. Shit, Harve, I’m not trying to get her into trouble. I just don’t like the thought of her at the place on a Sunday with her kid, tying up her afternoon.’

  There was a pause and on the other end of the line Jake heard Harvey’s wife calling the grandkids in. Harvey’s grandkids were only a bit younger than Ella’s boy. Sam must be ten or eleven. Same age his and Cassidy’s kid would have been.

  Jake rubbed at his eyebrow. Every time he saw a kid that age … he couldn�
��t help it. He’d go through life thinking about what might have been.

  ‘Look, if I were you I wouldn’t worry. She’s just starting out. This is one of those career-change things for her I reckon, a move out of the city with her kid. If she wants to clean the house, let her clean the house. She’ll give that sale a red hot go and she’ll learn a lot from it. That’s what she told me when I offered her the listing. Bob wanted it. You should have seen his face.’ Harvey chuckled. ‘Fact, Bob said I should tell you when you’re serious, drop the price by about half and list it with him. He’ll sell it.’

  ‘Okay, Harvey. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll let you get back to dinner, hey?’

  ‘Alright, mate. Catch you soon.’

  Harvey ended the call and Jake dropped his phone on the passenger seat.

  He had to slow for one of the forestry trucks moving through the highway intersection from the east road, and that’s when he saw Ella’s kid, standing on the pavement near the Post Office, throwing rocks into the red brick wall. There were rock shards all over the cement, spilling out onto the road.

  Jake stopped his car and buzzed down the window. He called out just as Sam smashed another rock into the wall.

  ‘Hey!’

  The kid jumped a mile before turning sullen eyes to Jake’s car. ‘What?’

  ‘You wanna give that a rest? It’s dangerous, mate. A little kid could walk through here in bare feet and they’ll get all cut up.’

  Sam’s face reddened, but he didn’t throw the rock he held clenched in his fist. ‘So? I don’t care.’

  ‘Imagine if a kid came riding on a bike down the hill there and slid out on the mess you’ve made. If he fell onto those rocks, he’d hurt himself really bad.’ Jake checked his rear-view mirror, but he was pretty safe stopping on the highway on a Sunday afternoon in Chalk Hill. Nothing was coming. ‘I’ve got a rake in the back. I reckon we should clean it up.’

  The kid muttered something below Jake’s hearing.

  ‘Just let me park the car up there in the shade, okay? It’s too hot for Percy otherwise.’