About Hana

by K T Bowes

  Chapter 11

  The aroma of unwashed boyhood wafted in mists around the main building before dispersing itself into the clear Waikato sky. Doors were propped open to encourage the scent’s exit while birds twittered unconcerned from the huge oak trees lining Maui Street. During lessons the school appeared deserted, the silence punctuated by the occasional hum of voices or scrape of a chair.

  Hana deemed it a safe time for a person of below average height to venture into the corridor and avoid the crowd of unpredictable males. Armed with a stack of prospectuses for the brochure racks, she opened the back door of the office and poked her face through the gap. “I’m going to the life skills classroom,” she informed Pete. When he didn’t answer, Hana bounced a poster off the back of his head. “Did you hear me?”

  “Yesssss!” Pete complained, his face squashed against his desk. “I’m resting my eyes.”

  “You need to know where I am if Sheila or Evie want me,” Hana retorted. “And I thought Dobbs wanted those reports redone.”

  “Type them for me,” Pete begged. He lifted his head upright, revealing two paperclips and a row of staples stuck to the drivel on his cheek.

  “You mean write them.” Hana tossed her red hair. “No. I don’t know the boys and it’s your job.” She pushed her way through the gap, snagging a stray booklet off the shelf as she went.

  “I hope Nana talks you to death!” Pete shouted after her as the door clicked shut.

  The matronly life skills teacher had worked at the school for almost thirty years, hence the nickname. One Year 9 claimed she’d taught three generations of his family. The portly Ethel Bowman denied the aspersion, only admitting to teaching two. The Year 9 claimed that all three generations in question called her ‘Nana,’ suggesting her wrinkled appearance and supersize dresses were not a thing of recent acquisition.

  If gossip ever became an Olympic sport, Ethel Bowman would win gold every time. She loved to chat, engaging her listeners in a way which ensured they couldn’t leave. She had perfected the fine art of conversation manipulation. As a spider injected its prey to paralyse it before cocooning, Ethel Bowman threw out a, “You’ll never guess what,” sentence, guaranteed to shock the victim into silence. Then she wound in her listener until their reputation became as maligned as hers in the filth she spewed. Hana never understood why people listened, but figured Mrs Bowman had pre-empted enough dirt to be considered mildly accurate.

  Hana entered the classroom with caution, hoping to sneak over to the brochure rack and replenish it uninterrupted. The rack sat next to an ancient computer which served as the classroom’s gateway to the Internet. Hana unloaded her heavy stock into the flimsy shelves; shifting the remaining ransacked brochures and pamphlets into their designated places. A Year 10 student sat at the computer desk surfing the web. As Hana glanced at the screen, she saw him flick from a chat room back to the careers website and frowned. “I’m sure that’s not what you’re supposed to be doing.”

  The child, suffering from a nasty cold, sniffed with vigour and looked guilty. He stood up to leave, wiping his runny nose on the sleeve of his grey school shirt. Bending to retrieve an errant sandal, he let out a huge sneeze and a large green gob of snot catapulted out of his swollen nose and landed in the middle of the screen. Before Hana could utter a word, he fled, sniffing and wiping his nose on his sleeves.

  “Ah, Mrs Johal.” Mrs Bowman’s squawk cut through the airwaves and Hana sighed in defeat. She watched as the snot turned from a blob into a dribble and obeying the laws of gravity, headed downwards as a runny stripe. Mrs Bowman surveyed Hana with her hands on giant, wobbling hips. Noticing the alien on the screen, she wrinkled her face in distaste. “Would you like a tissue, dear?” she demanded.

  “It wasn’t me.” Hana hated how the woman made her feel like a child. Nobody listened to her then and it jarred her nerves with the muscle memory of defeat. “I’ve restocked the brochure rack. Let Sheila know if you need more for the older boys.”

  Leaving the snot to bake on the screen, Mrs Bowman turned her attention back to Hana and appraised her like a bird of prey sizing up a mouse. Hana estimated she’d just kissed goodbye to the next half an hour of her life.

  Flinging herself into her office chair much later, Hana oozed exhaustion. Pete eyed her sideways with a hint of satisfaction on his thin lips. “Yeah, thanks for cursing me!” Hana snapped. “I almost got away with it.”

  “You weren’t as long as I thought you’d be.” Sheila appeared from her office with a mug of coffee in her left hand and a ginger biscuit in the right. Pete’s eyes widened and she shoved it in her mouth whole and swore at him through the crumbs. “It’s like owning a dog,” she spat. At least, that’s what it sounded like.

  “I shouted at her.” Hana bit her lip and swung her chair around to face her computer screen. A collective gasp came from behind.

  “You what?”

  “I want to know everything.” Sheila dragged a visitor’s chair across the carpet and plonked herself in it. “You just made history.” She picked at a scabby mark on the arm and then wrinkled her nose in disgust. Putting it back again, she stared around the room as though realising her empire looked tired and under funded.

  “Life is complicated enough, without involving myself in other people’s business!” Hana groaned. “I thought I’d never get away alive.”

  “What did she tell you?” Sheila struggled to curb her excitement and Hana frowned.

  “You don’t want to know!”

  “Oh, well, if you’re telling, I’m obviously happy to listen.” Sheila walked across the room and sat in Rory’s chair, deliberately fiddling with the settings. By the time she’d finished, Rory would plonk down after class and find himself kissing the edge of his desk in a laying position.

  Hana shuddered as she remembered how Mrs Bowman’s ample frame wobbled and shook with glee, armed with the delicious details of who in the dean’s office fraternised out of hours with whom, where and when. Her cheeks coloured at a spiteful piece of gossip about the new head of English. Mrs Bowman brimmed with bile at her relayed tale of vice and spice, reliably told to her by someone in the administration corridor.

  “Come on, tell us,” Sheila urged. Hana shook her head and glanced sideways at Pete.

  “No. I’m not spreading it.”

  “What did she say?” Pete’s eyes narrowed and an alertness moved through his body. “Was it about Logan?”

  Hana kept her head down and turned back to her computer. A horrible creak from Rory’s chair marked the point of no return and Sheila looked guilty. “Oops, bugger!” she hissed. Rising with Swedish poise and grace, she edged nearer to Pete. “Rory’s chair’s broken,” she announced. “Let’s not tell him.”

  Hana put her head in her hands, feeling burdened by Ethel Bowman’s words. ‘That Logan Du Rose got publicly dumped at the altar. Have you seen the mess on his face? She’s an Aucklander, so they say. What can you expect? They’ve got no morals up there. Who fights in a church? Aucklanders, that’s who.’

  “Come on, what did she say?” Sheila’s eyes widened with curiosity.

  Hana cringed. “She said the new head of English hurt his face.” She felt Pete’s gaze on the back of her head, burning pin holes through her scalp as she kept the most salient details to herself. “In a fight.”

  “In a fight?” Sheila clapped her hands. “Oh, how sexy! I bet he caned the other guy.”

  “Yeah, he did.” Pete turned back to his paperwork as though the story bored him. “He always does.”

  “What else did Bowman say?” Sheila urged. “Why did you shout at her?”

  “Because I don’t like gossip; I never have.” Hana blushed and busied herself with her work. Her shoulders slumping with disappointment, Sheila resorted to messing up Rory’s desk. She switched items around to annoy him and then dripped coffee over the supporting documents for a student’s scholarship.

  Hana pinched the bridge of her nose, fighting the pressure build up b
ehind her eyes. Ethel’s words bit into her psyche, barbed and full of meaning. ‘I can see you like him. Some of the science girls are working up to asking him out. You should get a move on.’

  If Ethel Bowman saw her interest in Logan Du Rose, the rest of the staff would know too. Humiliation had flooded Hana’s chest as she took the bait, falling into a carefully laid trap. ‘I don’t need a replacement for Vik, thank you. I’m tired of being told who I should and shouldn’t date!’ Hana had stomped from the classroom, snagging her tights on the rough doorframe during her escape. Many a marriage had been jeopardised through Ethel Bowman’s bored fantasising, but the staff believed her, passing the gossip on and widening the net for the victims. Glancing back at the large woman’s supercilious smile, Hana knew another story had taken a sordid twist in Ethel’s imagination. Before home time, everyone would think she fancied Logan Du Rose. She’d become the butt of everyone’s jokes; yet another poor, deluded woman. His looks would change to pity or awkwardness and she’d need to quit her job.

  “Oh, no!” Hana let her head sink onto her forearms as Sheila moved out of earshot.

  Pete swivelled his chair around. “He’s been a boxer,” he said and Hana peered sideways to look at him.

  “Pardon?”

  “Logan. He knows how to box. I’ve never known him lose a fight. You mustn’t worry.”

  Hana sat upright. “I’m not worried. Why would I?”

  “I dunno.” Pete shrugged. “You just seem it. He’s fine.”

  Needing peace, Hana glanced at the clock above Pete’s desk. “Shouldn’t you be teaching now?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah. But I don’t like the kids. They call me names.”

  Hana groaned and put her head back in her arms. “That’s nothing compared to what Dobbs will do to you. Aren’t you on a written warning next?”

  Pete scraped his chair back and glared at Hana with injustice. “That’s a low blow, Hana! Why did you have to mention that?” His indignation carried him through the back door and into the lobby. Quick footsteps took him down the stairs in the opposite direction to his health science class.

  “I hate this place sometimes,” Hana sighed to herself.

  To cheer herself up, she created a wall display in the common room. Evie Douglas left a note asking for inspirational quotes and Hana spent a happy hour searching on the Internet and snipping out backgrounds from coloured cardboard. Needing the box of paper from beneath her desk, Hana contemplated the grotty carpet and prepared to retrieve it. Hunkering down, she noticed the ugly ladder snaking through her tights. She traced the line to her inner thigh and groaned. “It’s just not my day.”

  Crouching under the desk revealed some benefits, she discovered. “Ah, interesting,” she said to herself.

  “I’m just going to class,” Sheila called as she left the room.

  “Okay.” Hana’s voice sounded muffled. Next to the skirting board lay a wrapped mint which should have been on her keyboard after the holiday, evidence the cleaner disinfected her keyboard and left this little goodwill gift. Everyone got one, but North always ate them before anyone else arrived on the first day of term. He came in especially early. “Ha-ha, ya missed this one, Pete,” Hana snickered. “That’s where it went!” she exclaimed, finding a missing list, neatly typed on yellow paper. “Shame, I already printed another one.”

  Reaching for the huge box of rolled paper, Hana spotted little raisin-like shapes near the back corner of her desk. Her fingers itched to pick one up but just in time, she spotted a sharp movement through her peripheral vision.

  Beady eyes like blackcurrants stared at Hana almost in challenge as the rat weighed up its options. She froze in place, not daring to move her arm in case it attacked. A distant memory of her older brother chasing a black rat around the coal house with a shovel, sprang into her mind. The rat became airborne when cornered and appeared to dive for his throat. Mark used his cricket skills in self-defence, but the image left Hana with a terrible dilemma. A tell-tale stream of shredded paper led from the cardboard box to a hole in the skirting board and relief washed over her that she’d been spared putting her hand unwittingly into its nest. She held her breath and tried to edge out from underneath the desk, keeping the furry interloper in view. Her stiletto heel caught in a thread of the carpet and the rat jumped. Hana screamed.

  She backed out from beneath the desk at a speed she didn’t know was possible. Hitting her head on the underside of the table she shot out backwards, tangling up her legs and landing on her backside. Another ladder joined the first as Hana tried to roll out of danger, convinced the rat was in hot pursuit and would definitely bite her bum. Flipping onto her knees and scrabbling away, Hana’s breaths came in frantic gasps. Reaching the door to the common room, she met the knees and hairy feet of senior boys, attracted to heroism by the screams of a woman. “There’s a rat!” she insisted, pushing through their legs to escape on her hands and knees.

  Like all males in the presence of female angst, they didn’t believe her. “Na, miss. It’s in your head. My mum sees all kinds of things that aren’t there.”

  “Yeah! Mine does that,” another boy agreed. “Noises in her car too that nobody else can hear, aye.”

  Hana shoved past the gathering throng and bolted through the double doors of the common room, making for the female toilets with an understandable desire to scrub her hands until they bled.

  Recovering in the staffroom kitchen, Hana remembered she hadn’t seen her sandwiches since she laid them on her desk that morning. “Oh, wonderful!”

  “What’s the matter?” Anka appeared with a tea tray and began filling it with mugs, milk and a sugar bowl. She jerked her head towards a box of tea bags. “Please can you shove some of those in the teapot? Angus’ secretary’s gone home with a migraine and he’s got the trustees arriving in ten minutes.”

  Hana pushed tea bags into a pot and placed it on the tray. She found an empty bowl in the cupboard and filled it with coffee. “There’s a rat in my office and it’s eaten my sandwiches.” Her brow furrowed. “And it’s ripped up the paper in the box under my desk. Sheila refused to buy any more last year so I’ll struggle to do wall displays.”

  “I meant what’s the matter generally?” Anka filled another bowl with sugar. “You’re avoiding me.”

  Hana shrugged. “I felt you were unfair about the new English teacher.” She lowered her voice and cast around the sparse occupants of the staffroom. She spotted him near the windows, his head down as he placed red ticks and crosses in an exercise book at speed. His dark fringe covered his eyes and he didn’t raise his head.

  “I want what’s best for you!” Anka hissed, following Hana’s gaze. “And he’s not it!”

  Hana gritted her teeth and began the long count from ten backwards, ensuring she kept her opinion to herself. But Anka wouldn’t let it lie. “You know nothing about him,” she persisted. “He’s really bad news.”

  “On whose say-so?” Hana demanded, dumping teaspoons onto the tray. “Why are you listening to gossip? We’ve never taken any notice of what other people say. What’s changed?”

  Anka’s face altered. Her complexion paled to leave high spots of colour on her attractive cheek bones. Her jaw worked in an uncharacteristic loss of words and Hana watched in alarm as her friend snatched the tray and left the kitchen. Milk slopped over the side of the jug and dribbled off the tray, leaving a white trail across the worn carpet.

  “What’s with her?” Rory sounded grumpy as he fumbled for a mug and filled it with hot water from the urn. “I hate this place.”

  “Nothing.” Hana gave him a look of sympathy and touched his arm. “Maybe stay out of the office for a while.”

  “Why?” Rory’s brown eyes grew round like saucers. “What’s she done now?”

  Hana winced. “There’s a rat under my desk. Also, you might need to tidy your in-tray and alter your chair before you sit down.” She chewed her lip. “Maybe, don’t sit down at all.”

  “She
’s booby trapped the photocopier again, hasn’t she?” Rory raised his voice and Hana felt the burn of Logan’s gaze on her cheek.

  “No. Nothing like that.” She swallowed and Rory bent his knees so he could look into her eyes and read the lie.

  “Yes she did. And you put it right again, didn’t you?”

  Hana sighed and turned away. “I don’t need this, Rory. If it carries on, I can’t work with you both anymore.” The revelation surprised her and her guts clenched in response.

  Rory looked horrified, dumping his mug on the counter and pulling Hana into his arms. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he breathed. “Don’t leave; I’ll talk to Sheila and we’ll sort it out.”

  He let her go and took a step back as Hana raised her eyebrows. “Then stop spraying deodorant on her sandwiches. She thinks she’s got throat cancer because everything tastes metallic.”

  Rory’s eyes widened and he nodded in response, beating a hasty retreat into the post room. Hana made herself coffee, heaping in a generous amount of sugar. “My mother always told me it worked for shock,” she told a wide eyed science teacher. “Finding a rat under your desk is right up there.”

  She found only blue-topped milk left in the fridge and doubted the age of it when it left a floating scum on the surface of her drink. Sighing, she sipped the hot liquid and chewed the crusty bits whilst looking around the staffroom. An innocuous space, it was generously enough proportioned so that unsuspecting newcomers might believe they could sit anywhere. That was the lie. Each table, despite not being labelled, was designated to a particular faculty and each member commanded a chair which remained theirs for life. The epitome of hierarchy and regulation, it became the undoing of many a contract teacher who put their bum in the wrong unoccupied seat. Staff sat alone on their designated tables during free periods, calling across the room to one another or standing over each other to chat, never sitting down and committing the ultimate crime.

  Hana sighed with impatience, lonely and resenting the ease with which everyone seemed able to push her around. Logan Du Rose glanced up from his marking and caught her studying the cut beneath his right eye and the bruising around his jaw line. He jerked his head upwards in the slightest of invitations and Hana took a deep breath before navigating the puzzle of chairs to his table. He leaned back in his seat, one eyebrow quirked higher than the other. “You’re a brave woman, Ms McIntyre,” he smiled. “Not afraid of committing cardinal sins then?”

  Hana faltered, a look of confusion on her face. “How do you know my maiden name?” she asked. Her mug tilted and Logan reached up and took it from her.

  “Sorry, is it a secret?” he replied, his tone casual.

  Hana shook her head. “No. I’m not in witness protection, or anything. I just haven’t heard it spoken for a long time.”

  Logan pulled out the chair next to him and Hana sat, noticing the second ladder in her tights and sighing. She sensed the tantalising increase in her heart rate as the teacher studied her with uncanny perception. He knew her other name and it caused a flutter in Hana’s chest, part alarm and part gratitude that he seemed interested in who she was. His dark eyelashes fluttered as he looked at her and Hana babbled like an idiot as nerves took over.

  She entertained him for the next five minutes with the tale of the rat, which to the best of her knowledge was still in the office. Logan relaxed as they chatted, losing some of the hard edges and awkwardness which made him appear severe. Close up, she guessed his age at five years younger than her and chastised herself for ever entertaining the idea of romance. A latent nervousness robbed him of the ease his looks should have given and his hand shook slightly holding the red pen. He seemed agitated in her presence, invoking a curious maternalism in her soul. A long Māori nose gave him the look of a chief from the history books and his olive skin further betrayed his heritage. Brown eyes would have suited his dark features but instead, grey irises glittered like precious stones, giving him an ethereal look. Long dark eyelashes touched his cheeks as he blinked, giving Logan a deceptive look of innocence.

  The bruising on Logan’s face gave a form of truth to Mrs Bowman’s gossip, reduced by time and healing to the greenish hue heralding the end of the process. A nasty gash under his eye appeared held together by dark stitches and Hana tried not to stare.

  In his nervousness, Logan touched a hand to it, a hand with bruised and swollen knuckles. He sighed and made a noise with his lips like a huff of exasperation.

  “Sorry,” Hana said, biting her lip with remorse. “I didn’t mean to stare.”

  Logan’s face clouded with contrition. His fingers rested close to hers on the table. “No, don’t worry. It hurt when I laughed at your rat story. The doctor stitched the inside of my lip and you’re funny. Anyone ever told you that?”

  Hana bit her lip and shook her head. “Stupid, dumb, an idiot. Never funny.”

  Logan narrowed his eyes and hid his surprise. His irises shifted colour, from a gentle grey to the colour of grit. “You’re none of those things,” he replied. His soft tone resonated somewhere deep inside Hana’s soul. She felt the overwhelming déjà vu strengthen its hold as speechless, she watched with fascination as his irises lightened again with painful slowness.

  Hana’s stomach lurched as though she’d crested the highest point of a roller coaster ride and anticipated the fall. Myriad tiny scars littered his olive fingers and she sat on her hands to stop herself touching them. His immaculate clothing looked expensive to the point of perfection, but his aura screamed of emotional neglect. Hana pushed her own confused thoughts to the back of her mind, trying to listen to his words but mesmerised by the softness of his lips. “Sorry, pardon?”

  Logan repeated himself. “I tackled him and won the ball. He didn’t like it and took my legs out in the box. The referee pinged him for a penalty so he waited for me in the car park.”

  “Ohhhh!” Hana exclaimed.

  “I’ve started playing for Rovers this year,” Logan continued. “That was the plan, anyway. The indoor soccer’s meant to increase our fitness with friendly games.” Logan smiled ruefully, oblivious to the sordid make-believe-life invented for him by the gossip. “The locals don’t seem that friendly though.”

  Hana struggled to shake off the dirtiness which Ethel Bowman’s tittle tattling left on her psyche. She covered her wrong footedness with platitudes. “Hamilton folk are okay. You just need to be here a while.”

  “I’d like to be.” He sounded wistful and the smile he gave her looked tight on his face.

  “Is your role not permanent?” Hana felt a stab of fear in her heart and faltered, disobeying her own rules. She didn’t get attached to men. Never again.

  “It is,” Logan confirmed. His grey eyes seemed to look straight into her soul. “I need another reason to stay.”

  Looking and feeling flustered, she finished her horrid coffee and pushed her chair back. Logan got to his feet as she stood and waited for her to leave before sitting back down. “Nice chatting,” she said, cursing herself as the lame sentence emerged from her lips. She glanced back as she reached the sink, embarrassed to find him studying her.

  Hana dumped her mug into the dishwasher, squeaking with alarm at the sound of an angry shout. Paul Mannings, the biology teacher stormed through from the common room, his face puce with rage. An empty cage dangled from his hand.

  “What’s happened?” Hana asked the elderly man who cleaned the kitchen.

  He leaned in close and whispered, “Fluffy from the biology lab went missing a few days ago. Paul thinks the groundsman let him out on purpose.”

  “Oh no!” Realisation flooded across Hana’s face. “Fluffy’s not a rat, is he?”

  The old man nodded and she clapped a hand over her mouth, heading back to the office at a run. The common room erupted into noisy chaos and boys crowded ten deep round the office door. Hana pushed her way through the tall bodies, desperate to see between the jumpers and rucksacks.

  Larry Collins wore large glov
es and dangled a dead rat from one of them. A Year 13 boy leaned down to give Hana the details. “The groundsman murdered Fluffy. He did it seconds before Mr Mannings arrived. It’s a bit mean; he knew he was on his way.”

  “Why, Collins? Why?” a Year 13 shouted, impersonating Paul Mannings and laughing. The groundsman posed with the dead rat while boys snapped photos of him on their phones.

  “Vermin!” he hissed with a sour expression, enjoying the attention.

  Hana put her hands over her face and pushed her way back through the boys, spending the afternoon in the guidance foyer making a wonderful display discouraging suicide.

  Isobel phoned later that evening as Hana enjoyed the last rays of sunshine on the deck. “You caught me finishing this bottle of red wine I’ve been working my way through,” Hana sighed. “It’s nice, but it got quite vinegary towards the end. There’re bits of cork in my glass.”

  “You need someone to share it with,” Izzie remarked, her tone sad. “Normal people don’t take months to drink one bottle.”

  “Better that than an alcoholic,” Hana reminded her tartly.

  “Yeah, sorry. I feel down in the dumps. Being the wife of a pastor in such a small community is taking its toll. These people think they own us. The parish church committee’s decided I can run the Mums’ and Tweenies’ group by myself.” She sniffed and Hana sensed her holding back tears.

  “Oh, Izzie,” she sympathised. “It’s too soon after delivering Elizabeth. Can’t you explain how you’re feeling?”

  Elizabeth’s handicap made her more demanding than other babies. Izzie made it look easy, but it wasn’t. “The chairwoman left me sitting in a circle with thirty women and children and thought I’d sing nursery rhymes to them!” Izzie released the threatening deluge. “You know I can’t sing,” she wailed.

  Hana tried to help by delivering the usual platitudes which mothers are hard wired to produce, but Izzie resisted consolation. “I need to leave here,” she sobbed. “Can I come home?”

  Hana took a deep breath. “No.”

  “No?” Izzie’s voice rose to a squeal. “But Mum!”

  “You can come home for a visit but you know I’ll send you right back after a rest. Marcus is a great husband and this isn’t his fault. You’ve only been there a few months. We show people how to treat us and if you don’t like what you’re getting, change what you’ll accept.” Hana crossed her fingers and rolled her eyes, wishing she could follow her own advice.

  As Izzie rang off with the parish council chairwoman in her sights, Hana feared for the woman’s safety. Her daughter burned slow like her father but became volatile under pressure. Mrs Chairwoman was heading for a battle and wouldn’t see it coming. Hana thought of poor Marcus, bearing up in the middle of the debacle. He’d been so calm and strong when Elizabeth arrived, supportive of Izzie and loving and accepting of their baby girl. “He must feel stuck between a rock and a hard place,” Hana muttered to herself.

  Hanging the phone back on its cradle, Hana heard the doorbell chime. The imposing shape through the glass didn’t look familiar, so Hana opened the door with more care than usual. Standing on her porch with an expression of guilt, she discovered the last person she expected to see.

  “I’m not stalking you, I got your address from the staff list,” Logan said, sounding apologetic. Then he bit his lip and hesitated. “Geez, that does sound stalky. Sorry.”

  Hana laughed and stepped back to allow him entry. As he stood in her hallway, she acknowledged his height at well over six feet, compared to her five foot nothing. She found herself looking at the buttons of his shirt. “I’d forgotten about the staff address list. A few of the social sciences teachers live in this area.” She didn’t add that none of them ever visited.

  Logan removed his cowboy boots and waited for directions. A vein in his neck twitched with nervous energy and Hana fought the urge to touch it. Her old black and white cat hovered at the top of the stairs, examining the visitor through green saucer eyes. He looked funny, his neck extended so he could peep around the corner.

  “Come out of the way, Tiger,” Hana chided him in a gentle voice. She scooped him into her arms and led the way up the first flight of stairs, along the hallway and into her bright dining room. The cat struggled for release and fled through the open ranch slider, his tail pointing upwards like an arrow. Logan stepped onto the deck and looked at the Hakarimata Ranges in the distance. “Wow, what a view. Now I know why the house is so high from the street.”

  Hana nodded. “I love watching the mountains. The city is busy but lonely, yet it always feels like something’s happening up there.” Her eyes widened and she bit her lip, regretting the slip which revealed too much of herself. “What would you like to drink?”

  “Water’s fine.” Logan smiled revealing a dimple in his right cheek. The lack of a partner on the left suggested it came from an old injury.

  Hana surreptitiously lifted her wine glass from the dining table where she had abandoned it and laid it in the dishwasher. “Have you eaten?” she asked.

  “No.” Logan’s brows knitted and he looked awkward again.

  “Me neither,” Hana confessed. “It’s hard when you live alone, isn’t it? I either eat everything in the fridge, or nothing at all.”

  “Oh, I don’t live alone,” Logan replied and Hana’s heart plummeted into her stomach. She tried to hide her misery as it flopped like a dead fish inside her.

  “Of course you don’t,” she whispered and Logan studied her face expression with something like surprise.

  Hana made fried egg sandwiches which she passed off as an English delicacy. Logan relaxed and it made a pleasant change as they chatted, cooked and ate.

  After they cleared up, he pointed out his Triumph Spitfire parked out on the driveway. “Most of the history department live in this road,” Logan mused. “I remembered reading your address on the staff list weeks ago and then noticed your car out front. I’ve been exploring the city and giving the old car a blow-out.”

  They sat on the deck until well after dark when the cool night air bit along with the mosquitoes. Mrs Bowman’s tale of the jilting proved right but like most things, she mangled it in the telling. “My fiancé worked at the same school. I couldn’t face going back there. Our relationship ended in the summer holidays a fortnight before school started back. Planned for months and destroyed in a moment.” He looked wistful and embarrassed, picking at a thread on his jeans with slender, scarred fingers.

  “She must be crazy,” Hana whispered, her cheeks burning with embarrassment straight away. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

  Logan smiled at her, his grey eyes soft and expectant, as though she’d ticked some subconscious box or passed a test. “Thanks,” he replied. “But five minutes after arriving in Hamilton, I’m relieved it happened.” His intense look bruised her delicate features and Hana looked away, not sure what he meant.

  “How did you end up at Waikato Boys’?” she asked, changing the subject.

  “I travelled down a few weeks ago on my motorbike, saw the principal and gave him my CV. He called me back a few days later after his head of English left him in the lurch.”

  Hana nodded. “I bet he was glad to see you. Caitlin left without notice. Her husband secured a job in Dubai. There would’ve been a riot if Angus picked any of the others to be head of department.” She shivered in the dropping temperature and Logan stood up to leave.

  “You should go indoors. Thanks for dinner,” he said and smiled, his grey eyes studying her face for something. Again, Hana felt that curious sensation of having been there before, shaking it off as she followed him to the front door. Logan turned and looked as though he wanted to say something, losing his nerve at the last second. He pushed his feet into his boots and walked onto the porch.

  Hana caught his scent, a pleasant meadowy smell, like flowers and hay. It plagued her memory and she shivered as though touched by her past. He felt mixed up in the years she struggled to for
get, causing conflict and at the same time, excitement and danger.

  The car waited on the driveway, matt white with green leather interior. Hana stroked the paintwork. “It’s cute,” she said with a smile. “How do you fit your legs in?”

  “With difficulty.” Logan grinned and crammed his long frame into the front seat. The door groaned with age as he closed it and wound the window down with a handle. “See ya, Ms McIntyre,” he said and winked.

  With a splutter and a hiss, the car roared to life and reversed out onto the street. Logan waved and crunched through the gears. Hana stood on the drive for a while, staring at a patch of oil left by the car. It glinted in the light of the streetlamps. She shook herself and made her way indoors, still haunted by that inexplicable feeling of déjà vu which accompanied Logan Du Rose.