by Ally Blake
Stubbornly holding back on starting up with Sable for years before she’d finally demanded he give in. Then refusing to even entertain her desperate desire to have a family. Had he always looked at her expecting rejection? Expecting her to disappoint? Had he always held back a piece of himself? Punishing her for his mother’s mistakes? So that he might never be cut that deeply again?
Sable was insanely sensitive to vulnerabilities. It was what made her art so touching. Meaning she had to have sensed the wall he’d kept between them.
No wonder she’d left. No wonder she’d left again.
It must have hurt like hell to put herself out there, to lean on him, to trust him, to open herself up to him, and to have known that he wasn’t doing the same.
The bell above the door tinkled, then, “Is he ready to go?” Janie’s voice.
Rafe’s shoulders dropped. “You called my sister on me?”
“Thought she could roll you on home.”
“Hey, brother,” Janie said, scraping the stool noisily beside him. “You okay?”
About to say he was fine, instead he went with, “Nope. I’m not in any way fine.”
“Well, it shows. You look like hell. What happened?”
“Sable happened.” That was Bear.
Rafe raised his hands in question. “Really, man?”
Janie tugged on Rafe’s sleeve till he turned to her. Her face was distraught. And...and disappointed. As if she knew it was his fault.
Rafe shook his head. “Don’t hate her.”
“Hate her? How could we hate someone who loves the someone we love so very, very much? We love her to bits.”
“Good,” said Rafe. “She’s my one and only.”
Janie made a little mewling sound beside him. Rafe, big brother to the end, lifted a dead arm and hauled his sister in tight.
While Bear’s voice turned gruff as he said, “Hell, yeah, she is.”
“She has to know that, right?” Rafe asked the big guy. “I mean, if you guys know it, she does too?”
Bear shrugged. “Did you tell her so?”
Rafe opened his mouth to tell of a time he’d told Sable she was everything he’d ever wanted, but couldn’t think of one.
He’d shown her, in every way he knew how. Feeding her, holding her, protecting her, standing up for her, spending every available second with her, opening his home to her, letting her have control over the remote...sometimes.
She’d known how it felt to be loved by him.
But had he said the words? Ever?
No. Because he’d grown up knowing the sway of words. Powerful words. How they could not be taken back.
“Could it be possible she doesn’t know?”
Janie made another pathetic sound beside him. Rafe shot her a frown. Not helping.
While Bear said, “If not, only one way to make sure.”
Rafe pushed the stool back, only to discover he was not so good on his feet. The world swayed. The ground with it.
“Can you...?” Janie asked.
And there was Bear, an arm around his waist helping him out to Janie’s tiny little modern car with its aluminium frame and sorry excuse for an engine.
“When are you going to let me build you a real car?”
“Get in so I can drive you home, you stupid lump,” Janie said with a growl. “And you’ll see how real my perfectly lovely car is.”
The rest was a blur bar Janie and Bear rolling him into the sofa bed in Janie’s Airstream. Someone taking off his shoes. Opening one eye to find Janie, laughing and pushing Bear out of the door, telling him she could take it from there.
Then Bear’s deep voice at the door. “Will he be okay?”
“He survived losing her once, he can do it again.”
At which point his brain gave up and unconsciousness kindly took him under.
* * *
Sable hadn’t gone back to Rafe’s to pack. She’d snuck into Mercy’s house instead, needing to be near her mother. Even if her mother was as mothering as an ice cube. After crying till it gave her hiccups, she’d fallen asleep for most of the day, and had woken to find a blanket draped over her and a cup of cold tea on the desk in her room.
The next day she couldn’t have bought a ticket out of town if she’d tried, for it was the opening day of the Pumpkin Festival and every bus, car, bike and horse and cart within fifty kilometres was heading in, not out.
All slept out, Sable trudged into town when the sun had only just risen, her hands tucked deep into the pockets of her jacket—Rafe’s leather jacket, to be precise, as all her clothes were still in his loft.
There was enough light to see the entire town had been decorated in orange and purple streamers, orange and purple flowers. Even the street lights in the centre of Laurel Avenue flashed a permanent, thematic amber.
Every shop window boasted signs talking up pumpkin soup, pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice coffee, market stalls, live music, and re-enactments harking back to early days of the town when the gold rush and bushrangers were the talk of the day.
If she weren’t feeling so rotten, it might have seemed delightful. A marked improvement on the town parade and pumpkin-judging contest that were highlights of the festival a decade before. Right now, all that orange just gave her a headache.
Sable dragged her feet into Bear’s, the bell ringing cheerfully overhead. She breathed out in relief to find the place empty and sat at the counter.
“I wondered when you might show your face,” said Bear, eyes roving over her bed hair, her old jeans, her oversized Cure T-shirt—also Rafe’s. She’d decided she wasn’t giving that one back. A spoil of war.
Slowly, slowly, Sable’s head sank until it hit the counter with a thud. Even the scent of a freshly brewed strong hot coffee placed next to her barely registered.
“Like that, is it?” Bear asked.
Sable sat up and ran both hands over her face, tugging the skin over the bones before letting it spring back into place. “Very much so. What did you mean by, ‘I wondered when you might show your face’?”
“Mmm?”
“Bear,” Sable growled. PMS and heartbreak having sapped her of her civility.
“Rafe was in here yesterday. And last night. In fact, Janie and I might have rolled him home only a few hours ago.”
“Bear! Did you get him drunk?”
“No! Maybe. How was I to know he was such a lightweight?”
“His father only drank so he never drinks.”
“Oh. Oops.”
“How was he?” Angry? Sad? Chatty? Inconsolable? Fine... “What did he say?”
Bear shot her a wry glance, before picking up a perfectly dry glass and drying it some more.
Fair enough. But why couldn’t he be the town gossip? Sure, she was glad he wasn’t before, but now it would be so helpful.
Sable reached out and grabbed her coffee, wrapping her hands around the hot glass. She drank deep, letting the smooth dark roast fill the parts of her tears had sent dry.
Then someone broke into her peace and quiet, slipping into the seat to her left. Another someone sat in the seat to her right.
“Coffee,” said Mercy.
“How ’bout adding a nip of that Pumpkin Spice liqueur I know you have stocked back there?” That was Carleen. The two had become firm friends after the dire dinner party, connecting over disappointment in their respective children.
Bear baulked. “Sun’s barely up.”
“Meaning it’s practically still night time,” said Mercy.
Carleen laughed. “As your Queen of the Pumpkin Parade, I decree it’s time to get the party started.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
While Bear moved to the back room, Mercy threw an envelope on the counter in front of Sable. “This came for you.”
Sable opened it up to
find the name of a Melbourne-based specialist photo developer on a package. The photos from the original film in her box Brownie. She’d sent it to a specialty developer in Melbourne when she’d hit the end of the roll a couple of weeks back, and had been planning on taking her second and third rolls in person the day before. Before their plans had changed.
Sable tore open the envelope, saw the large negatives spilling out. The feel of them—crisp and cool—gave her a sweet little thrill.
The pictures had been loaded back to front. Starting with the ones she’d taken over her first few days in town. The contrast was heavier than she’d have liked, something she’d work on with the next film, but the composition was fair.
Her critique came to a full stop as she saw the photo before the first she had taken.
“Mum?”
“Hmmm.” Mercy took one look before screwing up her face.
The photo was of her mother’s sunroom—a ray of buttery summer light pouring through her drying lavender hanging from the ceiling.
The next—Wanda and Carleen and Old Man Phillips sitting around a poker table, laughing till you could see their back teeth.
“You took these,” Sable said, knowing it to be true.
Mercy waved a hand her way. Called, “What’s taking you so long, Bear?”
The next photo was a stray kitten, sitting on Mercy’s front stoop, looking right into the lens. The next, Mercy’s view looking down at her skirt with her shoes poking out, the wild colours of the clothing contrasting with the raw rough streaks in the wooden floor.
Smiling, Sable shifted to the next photo, then lifted a hand to her mouth.
For there was a photo of Rafe, putting up the tomato trellis on the side of Mercy’s house. He’d built that? Neither had said. His hair was shorter, the dark curls cut closer to his head. The roping muscles of arms were brought into sharp relief by the black of his T-shirt, the hard midday light.
Mercy must have called his name, as he’d turned towards the camera, a small smile on his face.
It amazed her still that over the years they had found a way to put aside their differences. But over the past weeks she’d come to understand why—they’d missed her. And in one another had found a way to keep her close.
Carleen asked if she could have a look, so Sable went through them all again. Happy with the stunning contrast of brilliant autumn leaves against a harsh grey sky. The old red McGlinty truck, the back filled with pumpkins. Loving the photo of the shops of Laurel Avenue as evening hit, right after a rain shower, light spilling onto the street creating puddles of gold on the footpath. The view thorough The Barn’s new porthole window.
Markers of her time in Radiance. Memories she’d take with her as she left.
While she felt as if she’d been hollowed out with a spoon, the pictures reminded her that her time there had been pretty wonderful.
As she scrolled through the last shots, and hit the last picture, she had begun to see a theme. Different from the one she’d described to Nancy. There was none of the discord that had given her career such a great start. No focus on things lost and broken and cast aside. Quite the opposite.
Every single one of her new photographs exuded warmth, nostalgia, harmony, comfort.
She ran a thumb over the corner of the picture of Rafe leaning against the railing of the carousel. The dappled light. The warm foliage. And could all but see the exhibition title written on the marquee outside her favourite little New York gallery: Home.
Sable reached out blindly for her coffee and took a sip. Only to find it no longer tasted quite like coffee. “What am I drinking?”
“Clove,” said Mercy, sipping her own coffee as if it were manna from heaven, “spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, pepper, ginger and pumpkin.”
Sable grabbed the bottle of home-brewed Pumpkin Spice liqueur and read the label. “And vodka.”
“Which is made from potatoes. Wholesome as can be. Unless... You’re not pregnant, are you?”
Sable coughed on her next sip. “No. Not pregnant.”
Though she’d thought she’d kept her voice normal, her mother paused. Looked at her like a hawk. Even Bear seemed to stop breathing.
Sable looked his way. Saw the sorrow in his face.
Rafe... Rafe must have been really toasted if he’d told Bear that much. And for Rafe to even go near a drink, well, he must have felt truly wounded.
“Not pregnant,” she repeated. Then, “Not living with a guy. Not in a relationship. Just not.”
What a mess.
“Drink up,” Carleen insisted.
And Sable did as she was told, figuring she had nothing else to lose.
* * *
An hour and two espresso cups later Sable was nursing a bruised heart and a sore head. The constant low roar of vintage engines, as entrants in the classic car show rumbled down the street, didn’t help the latter. The almost empty bottle of liqueur had a lot to answer for.
Including the words Not pregnant. Not living with a guy. Not in a relationship flipping and twisting inside her head.
“You know what my problem is?” Sable asked, expecting no one to answer.
“Where do you want to start?” That from her mother.
Bear shot Mercy a look and she held her hands up in surrender. Then he looked back at Sable and said, “Tell me.”
“I go about things all backwards.”
“What things?”
“My career, for one. I started out on a high—gallery show, prize money, fame—and only then did I have to work like crazy to earn a reputation.”
“Right.”
“And then, there’s...the other thing. If you love someone, you don’t ask them to have your baby first. You ask them if they’ll have you.”
The one time she would have liked for her mother to perk up with a sharp comment, Mercy remained all too quiet.
Sable licked her dry lips. Leaned towards Bear and, voice low, said, “But I couldn’t do that. Because I didn’t come back here for him.”
“Please.” Now her mother perked up.
While Bear said, “But you just said you loved him.”
“What? No, I didn’t!”
“Yeah, you did,” said Carleen, most helpfully.
Bear gave her a soft smile. “You said, and I quote, ‘If you love someone, you don’t ask them—’”
Sable flapped a hand at Bear till he stopped talking. Till the café was deadly quiet.
“She did,” said Mercy, “didn’t she?”
Sable’s breaths were suddenly hard to come by.
“Sable,” said Mercy, waiting for her daughter to look her way. “Answer me this: if you had to choose, right now, would you pick Rafe, or Rafe’s child?”
Bear sucked in an audible breath and held it. Mercy looked so hard into Sable’s eyes there was no hope of faffing her way out of the question. While Carleen began singing “Stand By Your Man” under her breath in what amounted to a gorgeous singing voice.
Sable’s voice shook as she said, “You told me my whole life never to believe a man is more important than my dreams.”
“No,” said Mercy, pointing a finger Sable’s way. “I told you to figure out what those dreams are, before you even think about finding yourself a man. Unfortunately we had to move in next to Rafe Ruddy Thorne. And that was it. One look and you were a goner.”
A muscle car revved its engine as it ambled slowly down the street, the noise shaking the windows.
Rafe, Sable thought, her heart now thundering so loudly she could barely hear herself think. Rafe had been her dream. Wanting a child, a backyard, a home, that had all come later, when she’d begun believing that life might actually be possible, with him.
And yet she’d pushed him away.
So as not to hurt him. Because she thought he was better off without her. When she hadn’t s
topped to ask what he wanted. What he now thought was possible.
“Quick, I need Janie’s number.”
“Why? What are you going to do?”
“Really? You want me to say it out loud? Fine. I’m going to enlist her help in doing whatever it takes to show Rafe how much I love him. And want to be with him. For ever and ever. If he’ll still have me.”
“Hallelujah.” That was Bear, his voice hitching with emotion.
A beat later, maybe two, Mercy sighed. Then she called out Janie’s mobile number by heart.
Thank you, Sable mouthed as she held her phone to her ear.
Sable gave her mother a big kiss on the cheek, before she waved to Bear, who was swiping a tear from his cheek, and bolted out of the door.
* * *
It took Janie another hour to open The Barn, move some exorbitantly expensive vehicles, find the keys to the VW and drive into town, giving Sable time to drink copious amount of water.
She sat in the passenger seat, running a hand over the dimpled dash, the old junkyard seats, wondering how she hadn’t realised—seeing it kept under a protective cloth next to Ferraris and Lamborghinis and Mustangs that were near priceless in value—how precious it was to him.
Because she was precious to him. Even after what she’d done. Even after how she’d left. He’d held a flame for her. And he’d forgiven her.
Only now she realised, she had never forgiven herself.
It explained why she’d let herself fall into such one-sided relationships. Why she’d convinced herself Rafe was better off without her. Why she’d been so ready to push him away at the first hurdle.
Because she loved him so much she only wanted the very best for him.
Never stopping to wonder if she might be the best for him!
She wasn’t perfect. Mistakes would be made. Differences navigated. Disagreements hashed out. And bad things might happen, to them and theirs.
But she loved Rafe. Deeply, wholly, ferociously. So much it expanded to encompass the people around her. Bear and Stan and Janie and this town. This beautiful, charming, crazy little town.