The Cait Lennox Box Set

by Roderick Donald

  “Just making a comment, Kaz.”

  They continued walking southeast along the canal, chitchatting about this and that, recipes, kids, periods (or the lack of them), their husband’s foibles, and whatever else came into their minds. This was Secret Women’s Business and the girls usually left no stone unturned about the comings and goings in each other’s lives.

  Halfway.

  Reaching Glenhuntly Road, with the efficiency of unspoken routine, they crossed to the other side of the Elwood Canal and started walking back to St Kilda.

  Jools paused to allow Bec and Kaz to catch up, taking a swig from her water bottle as she glanced up at the powder blue sky. She stared vacantly at a lost cloud drifting northward, blown along by a cooling southerly breeze. Pebbly goose bumps appeared and the soft hair on her forearms momentarily stood on end as the breeze kissed her skin.

  Mia appreciated the brief break and nuzzled up beside Kaz for a quick pat before running off in excited anticipation back down the canal, barking at a flock of seagulls that had just landed on a grassy patch fifty meters in front of her. She then stopped and turned, barking again in a “come on, let’s go” voice, and then sat and waited for the girls to join her.

  When Melbourne turns on good weather, it really is a stunning place to be, Jools thought to herself. Now, it’s time for a change of topic. Kaz has had long enough to vent her spleen. And I need to find out the gossip on their business.

  “Hey, wasn’t that was terrible about Rishi on Sunday? The poor kid, he really wasn’t well when he left in the ambulance. I hope they catch the bastards who did it.” Jools was being deadly serious. She liked Rishi and wouldn’t wish his prognosis on anyone.

  “Cait checked with the hospital this morning and they’ve had to put him in an induced coma. They did a CT scan and there’s evidence of a subdural hematoma. That’s not good.”

  “That sounds awful,” said Kaz, a concerned look on her face as she turned toward Jools. “I didn’t realize he was that bad. I hope Jason and Sammy are okay. They both liked Rishi a lot.”

  “Kaz, you just said ‘liked.’ He’s not dead yet,” quipped Bec, quick to correct Kaz’s voice of doom and gloom.

  “You’re the medical person. What’s it all mean?” Kaz continued, totally disregarding Bec’s last comment.

  “A subdural hematoma is bad. It can cause long-term brain injury, or worse still, even kill you. It’s a bit like having a stroke except the hemorrhage is usually caused by a severe blow to the head.”

  “So he’s got bleeding into his brain then? Or what? How can that be? He seemed okay at the BBQ until he suddenly passed out,” said Bec, in an equally concerned voice.

  “That’s almost right. Except the bleeding is into the layer between the inside of the skull and the brain itself, not directly into the brain. It’s caused by what they call venous blood oozing into this space. The pooled blood then puts pressure on the brain. So they’ll monitor his intracranial pressure and if it starts rising, they may have to drill a hole through his skull to vent the blood.”

  This rather frank explanation shocked Kaz and Bec so much that they simultaneously stopped walking and turned toward Jools.

  Jools whistled to Mia. Turning midstride, she immediately ran back to Jools, ears flopping backward like a racehorse, a huge smile on her face.

  “I didn’t realize it was so serious. That’s just awful. How’s Cait taking it?” Bec may have been scatterbrained, but she was always one to think of others.

  “Cait’s worried sick, of course,” Jools continued, her eyes dancing with worry and emotion. “It’s bad, Bec. But Rishi’s got an excellent chance of pulling through. It’s actually good he’s in intensive care so he can be constantly monitored.”

  Kaz was gobsmacked, and for once she stopped thinking about her own problems. “Oh my God, intensive care. That sounds really life-threatening.”

  “Kaz, intensive care is standard treatment for all induced-coma patients with a brain injury. It doesn’t mean he’s got one foot in the grave if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  The girls started walking again and the conversation continued. But the usual gossip, jocularity, and lighthearted chatter was replaced by a more somber moment, as if the menace of a dark and stormy night had suddenly enveloped them.

  “I never thought this Indian-bashing problem would be so close to home. You read about it in the papers, but you never think it’ll happen to someone you know and love. It’s always faceless people who’re simply names in newsprint.” Jools was speaking from the heart, but she also wanted to know how the problem was affecting the student accommodation business.

  “You feel desperately sorry for them, but you can’t really grieve because you’re not close enough. And then this happens.” Bec and Kaz nodded sympathetically.

  “Rishi didn’t deserve this,” Jools added as an afterthought.

  “Funny, Sean mentioned this to me the other night. He said he’d been talking with Gordy at the club last week and that things weren’t too great in India for the student accommodation business. Apparently we’re not exactly the flavor of the month.”

  “Yeah, I can understand that,” Jools replied. “You’d have to think twice about sending your kids to Melbourne with the way the bashings are apparently being reported over there. Mind you, I’m sure there’s been a lot of selective reporting so the papers end up with juicy headlines.

  “It’s strange, Rishi’s at our place all the time and he’s never complained to me of any problems with racial discrimination or prejudice, so it’s hard to rationalize.”

  “Well, the boys must have been talking about it because Paul mentioned over dinner the other night that there were a few ‘problems with the Indians’ that had to be sorted out.” Kaz traced air quotes with both hands.

  “Headlines like that can’t be good for business, can they?” Jools was probing.

  “I’d never really thought about it until now, but you’re right. I’ve been more concerned about dropping property prices and the credit crunch by the banks. I know Paul’s been complaining lately about the slowness of presales. The banks are really tightening up on lending,” said Kaz.

  “And Sean mentioned to me that the vacancy rate for student rentals is up too,” Bec added. “According to Steve, he reckons Chinese students will fill the gap if the Indians fall off though.”

  “Hey guys, Chinese or no Chinese, surely you can’t just dismiss Rishi’s bashing like that. It’s got to have knock-on effects. Your business is geared up to the Indian market, isn’t it?” said Jools, looking for clues.

  “Yeah, it’s food for thought, Jools. But I’m sure we’ll be okay,” replied Bec. “Sean said Steve and Paul told him all was good. This is only a minor hiccup.”

  By this time they were approaching 21 Squares again. Jools’s gaze traveled over to the full tables outside and she decided to call it a day.

  “I’m off, girls. Got to go to the supermarket and replenish the pantry after the onslaught by the masses at the BBQ.”

  Turning to walk back home, flashes of what Kaz and Bec had just told her were rushing through her mind like a flood tide. Her powers of insight and perception—The Gift as she liked to call it—were taking control and she instinctively let her mind wander.

  The Gift was telling her there was more to this than meets the eye. Paul and Sean aren’t filling the girls in on the whole picture, I’m positive. A cold shiver raced up her spine, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end as she contemplated the alternative: the development falling through.

  Just a thought . . .

  Jools whistled for Mia and she spun around and bolted ahead along a route that was as familiar to her as a cow heading to a milking shed. Jools took the shortcut through the St Kilda Botanical Gardens and Mia was off, barking joyfully in the distance at the squawking sulphur-crested cockatoos noisily flying overhead.

  Stepping out of the shower, Bec allowed herself a quick glance in the mirror at the imperfec
t image staring back at her. The person occupying the reflection was a pasty, dowdy, fat stranger, dull and uninteresting; certainly someone who was at the end of the queue when good looks were handed out. Bec loathed her body, especially from the waist down: large butt, thunder thighs, cellulite, and cankles, as she liked to call them. She felt she had totally missed out on ankles when they were being dispensed at birth, so her calves traveled straight down to her feet.

  “Damn you, mother,” Bec said venomously to the familiar pear-shaped image menacingly peering back at her.

  “Why did you have to give me your Jewish hips? Why couldn’t I have inherited Dad’s slim physique like Naomi did?”

  I hate you for what you’ve bequeathed me . . . hate you, hate you, hate you, Bec silently thought to herself, too afraid to mutter those awful words out loud.

  But then as if her conscience took over from irrational thought, a bad case of the guilts overcame her for even thinking such terrible things about her mother, let alone muttering them out loud, and Bec began worrying that she may have put some underworld curse on her.

  “I’m sorry, Mumma,” said Bec, reverting to her childhood name for her mother.

  “I didn’t mean to think those nasty thoughts about you. Of course I don’t hate you,” she whispered softly to herself as if to break a bad spell she may have inadvertently cast her mother’s way.

  Bec quickly wrapped a towel around her naked torso, covering it up to make her ugliness go away and walked into the dressing room. She had a busy day ahead and already Bec’s mind was spinning with the logistics of fitting everything in: drop Rory off at school, visit her mother, call in and see Jools at her clinic, a late morning catch-up coffee with some old work friends, volunteer work at the Brotherhood of St Laurence in the afternoon, and then pick up Rory from after-school care. Then of course there was dinner to prepare and the housework to squeeze in somewhere.

  Bec was one of those busy people who were almost cartoonish in their approach to life. She always had more things to fit into her day than there were hours available to achieve them in, so in the shotgun approach that was her way, she was constantly on the move, attempting to multitask beyond the possibilities of what was actually achievable.

  Sean remarked to G once when they were discussing the foibles of their respective wives on Fig Jam, “It’s as if there’s a permanent cloud of unfinished bits and pieces permanently following my wife around everywhere she goes.”

  But this trait is also what made Bec so endearing, as she was always willing to help, even if she never fully followed through. She was inwardly shy and insecure and this was her way of finding acceptance from her friends. Bec was constantly worrying about being left out, so she did her best to ensure that she was included in everything.

  G once joked to Sean that Bec would go to the opening of an envelope if she was invited, to which Sean heartily replied, “To be sure, my friend. She hates missing out.”

  Gentle and good-natured, Bec had a social conscience and a heart of gold: she was one of God’s kind, beautiful people who was often more concerned for the welfare of others than herself, which Sean rationalized as to why she was so affected by Rishi’s bashing.

  “What’s going on with you?” Sean had even asked the other night after Bec had yet again brought up Rishi’s bashing, this time after her walk with the girls. “The poor kid’s in the hospital, so give it a break, will you. There’s nothing we can do about it.”

  Bec valued friendship far above worldly possessions. She tended to be a bit scattered in an artsy-fartsy way, but she found solace by channeling much of her energy into her acquaintances and relationships. She had a wide circle of eclectic contacts whom she liked to call friends. In fact, keeping in touch with all her mates was almost a full-time job: she had school friends, her playgroup friends, her ex-work colleagues, her friends at the art center where she painted and sculpted, Sean’s friends, her overseas friends, her family here and back in the UK, her friends at the Jewish mother’s support group that her mother”forced” her to join, her social work contacts, her buddies at the thrift store where she volunteered part-time, and of course her close girlfriends, Kaz and Jools. For Bec, life was one constant round of texts, emails, phone calls, coffee with the girls, catch-up lunches and social get-togethers. She was simply far too busy to work, as she also had young Rory, her eleven-year-old son, to care for and worry about.

  And of course there was her eighty-four-year-old mother Esther. Bec had to look after her as well. Actually, she didn’t require”looking after” at all; the nurses and staff did that very well at the King David Aged Care Facility where she lived.

  Instead, Bec constantly had to placate her.

  “Yes Mum, I know. But Naomi’s back in the UK and there’s no way I’m taking you and Rory over to see her, whether I can afford it or not. You know Dr. Mendelson doesn’t want you to fly anymore. He’s concerned about your heart.”

  Lately Bec and her mother had been having this conversation on a weekly basis.

  “Just because Naomi’s in a wheelchair doesn’t mean she can’t fly. There’s nothing stopping her from coming out here.”

  “They do allow cripples on planes these days, you know,” she would prefer to have said but no, not to her mother. Not about Naomi, the favorite daughter. Bec couldn’t say anything untoward to her mother about her younger sister because Naomi was special.

  “Naomi’s world was destroyed back in the UK by that drunk driver all those years ago,” Esther would remind Bec of at every opportunity. “She needs special treatment. How can you be so nasty and cruel to her?”

  Yet it was Bec who visited Esther every week. As if the tyranny of distance played its part, Naomi did virtually nothing for her mother other than offer verbal support over the phone. She had a comfortable life in the UK, a good job in the public service, and a live-in carer, Anne—more like her live-in lover as far as Bec could make out—and she really wanted for nothing.

  “It’s important for Naomi to keep in contact with Rory. He needs to get to know his aunt better. God knows, they hardly ever see each other. Especially now that Rory’s approaching his Bar Mitzvah. He really needs to start preparing for it now, and Naomi needs to be involved.”

  Esther was niggling again.

  “You’re not capable of organizing it all yourself. You’re always too ‘busy’ with the Brotherhood or whatever charity it is you’re currently involved with to do something for your own family.”

  Thanks for the support, Mum. And for the obvious lack of interest in what I do with my life.

  But Bec let that thought slip to the keeper.

  “Mum, we’ve been through this a hundred times before.”

  She can be so exasperating. She simply refuses to listen.

  “Rory’s not having a Bar Mitzvah. I haven’t brought him up in the Jewish faith. He knows about his Jewish roots, but I’m leaving it up to him to choose his own religion when he matures.”

  “Oh Rebekah, you can’t do that. It’s not fair on the boy. He’s Jewish. It comes through the female line. He should have a Bar Mitzvah.”

  “Mum, look at it this way. You’re Jewish, Dad wasn’t. That makes me half Jewish. Sean’s Irish Catholic. That makes Rory a quarter Jewish. He’s got more Christian blood in him than Jewish blood. And besides, he’s never even been inside in a synagogue.”

  Out of character, Bec was standing up to her mother for a change.

  “So we’re not giving him a Bar Mitzvah. End of story.”

  Esther looked at her daughter with a confused, old-person’s look, but said nothing.

  “Now, I’ve got a naturopath’s appointment in half an hour and then I’ve got to get down to the Brotherhood. I’m filling in for one of the girls who’s away at the moment.”

  Bec was getting exasperated by her mother’s constant nitpicking. She just wouldn’t let up about Naomi seeing her antipodean nephew and it was time to cut the conversation short and leave before it drained her totally.
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  “Bec, you have to see past the negative body image of yourself that you carry around in your head. You really are attractive and just so lucky,” counseled Jools. They had already chatted for five minutes or so about the superficial pleasantries of kids and friends and Jools wanted to move the consultation forward.

  “Hey, snap out of it, kiddo! Life’s good.”

  Jools noticed that Bec was often in a moribund, depressive mood like this after she had visited her mother.

  Jools now had her practitioner’s hat on and she thought to herself that Bec’s insecurity may have made her a wonderful person to have as a friend, but the downside was that she had a totally downbeat, pessimistic image of herself, and Bec’s mother certainly didn’t help out in this regard.

  Really, thought Jools, if Esther could just see the damage that her constant niggling and put-downs are doing to her daughter. And there’s always the never-ending comparison with Naomi—”the perfect one” who needs pity because her wheelchair status has prevented her from achieving the great heights she was supposedly destined to achieve.

  “Bec, you’ve got the most beautiful peaches and cream complexion, and cheekbones that a model would die for,” continued Jools. She needed to commence the consultation on an uplifting note to snap Bec out of her melancholy mood.

  “Here, just take a look at yourself.”

  Jools stood up, removed the mirror on the wall, making a mental note to clean off the few cobwebs that had collected behind it later, and held it directly in front of Bec’s face.

  In the three paces to the mirror, like a chameleon adapting to a new environment, Jools morphed from chatty friend to practitioner. She was now in full-on professional mode, Bec was her patient, and this was a consultation.

  “Bec, I want you to take a look; a really good look. And not your usual ‘I don’t like what I see’ view. Instead, I want you to be positive. You’re into sculpture. I want you to imagine chiseling your features out of stone. What would your face look like?”