Being Here (18 page)

‘Hey, Mrs C. Hi! How are you?'

Carly runs across the grass towards me. She waves a hand above her head and her backpack joggles on her shoulder. I feel light-headed just seeing her.
Youth is
wasted on the young,
they say. They lie. It fits her contours perfectly. Better than a glove. I want to wave back, but by the time my body has obeyed my brain's instructions, she has collapsed in a heap on the grass at my feet.

‘Hey, Leah. Mrs C. Got a proposition for you!' She is excited and in her excitement forgets her manners. She sees Jane and blushes. ‘Oh, hi. Sorry. Am I interrupting?'

‘Not at all, not at all,' says Jane. ‘In fact, I should probably get along, leave you girls to chat. Do you want me to wheel you back, Leah?'

‘Oh, can I?' says Carly. ‘Please. Please? If that's okay with you, Leah?'

‘Don't fight over me,' I say. ‘It's a burden being so popular.'

Carly springs to her feet. She is so energetic it makes me tired.

‘Let's stay here for a while,' I say before she can grab the handles of my wheelchair. ‘It's such a lovely day and I want to enjoy the sun on my face.'

‘I'll leave the two of you to it,' says Jane. ‘Not too long, though, Leah. I don't want you dehydrated.'

‘If I shrivel any more, I'll be indistinguishable from a prune,' I say. ‘Don't worry. Carly here will water me.'

I hear the faint tread of soft shoes on grass. They are quickly swallowed by silence. Carly sits at my feet, cross-legged. She tears up blades of grass and scatters them to the wind. Her face is open. Life has not yet scored it with lines.

‘The proposition,' she says. ‘Wanna hear it?'

‘I'm listening.'

‘Do you want to come for dinner tomorrow night? It's Sunday and Mum always does a big roast dinner. You know, chicken, stuffing and vegies. Roasties. I've already asked her and she says it would be great to have you over. Dad's keen, too. I've told them heaps about you, Leah. They really wanna meet you.'

‘Dinner? Well, I'm not sure about that Carly, though it's a lovely offer.'

‘Aw, come on, Mrs C.' She screws her face up in frustration. ‘Live a little. Mum says she'll pick you up and bring you back. I mean, it is okay for you to leave here for a bit, isn't it?'

Gulag Geriatrica. Barbed wire on the perimeter, rott––weilers, armed guards in towers, searchlights picking out the occasional old person in her Zimmer frame tottering towards freedom. I like the image. It makes me smile.

‘Yes,' I say. ‘We can leave.'

‘Then do it. Please? Pretty please. Pretty please with sugar on top.'

I think. She is too young to consider all the implications. Her mind and her body are synchronised. Everything works as it should. What does she know about the unpredictability of bladders? I decide to spare her the details. Jane could help, anyway. There are … devices. Insurance. Though, as with any type of insurance, there is never any guarantee it'll pay out when you need it.

I am unaccustomed to making decisions.

This is a pity. Decision-making is evidence of life.

‘You're not thinking of adopting me, are you, Carly? A sort of rent-a-great-grandma?'
At least you'd be able
to return me when you get bored
, I think.
The real thing
normally comes with a guilt-tag.

‘Tcha!' She waves the comment away. ‘It'll be fun. And you need to get out more. When was the last time you went anywhere? When it didn't have something to do with someone dying?'

I don't even want to think about the answer to that.

‘Are you sure your parents don't mind?'

‘I'm sure.'

‘Then thank you. I'd be delighted to come.'

I feel almost dizzy with the notion that I've made a decision, that in a few words I've broken what appeared to be the unbreakable destiny of routine. Sunday night is hard-boiled potatoes studded with dark eyes, and meat fried to leather. It will be a relief to miss that as well.

‘Yay!' Carly punches the air. For a moment I think she is going to spring to her feet and embrace me. She doesn't. ‘Fantastic. Mum and I will pick you up at five o'clock. We'll eat early. I figured you probably wouldn't want to party most of the night.'

‘Want to. Able to. The distinction is a form of tragedy.'

‘That is so cool you are coming, Mrs C. After dinner, you could tell me more of your story. It'll be fun to hear it somewhere different, you know?'

‘We are approaching the end. I see it in the distance, looming larger with every sentence.'

‘Tell me some now.'

‘You are anxious to find out what happens to Adam?'

She shrugs. ‘Sure.'

‘Then I have not been a total failure as a story-teller.'

I, too, am anxious for the end, though I suspect my reasons are different. The sun has ducked among the branches of a tree. It transforms them into a lattice of brilliance. The pond shimmers, reflects flashes of light. The air drones with the language of insects.

CHAPTER 16

T
HE NEXT SUNDAY I
put on my best dress and waited for Mamma on the verandah.

The paint was peeling from the house in great flakes. It was decaying before my eyes. Or shedding its skin. Perhaps beneath the old exterior something new was struggling to emerge. Something bright and shiny.

Mamma opened the door and stepped outside. She carried her Bible. Everything was as it should be. I took a pace towards the rickety steps that led to bare earth before her voice stopped me.

‘We are not going to that church today, Leah.'

For a moment I wondered if I had got the day wrong. But that was absurd. It was Sunday. On Sunday, at seven-thirty in the morning, we started our walk to church. Always. Not doing so was as unimaginable as the sun not rising or the dark refusing to gather. I turned towards mother. She brushed a hand through my hair and smiled.

‘Church is not just a building, my baby,' she said. ‘I've explained this before. It is a state of mind, a willingness to open yourself up to God. And we can do that anywhere. This farm is a church, this verandah.
You
are a church, Leah, and so am I.'

I had heard the idea before, but that didn't make it easier to grasp. If that was so, why had we gone to the church in town in the past? Every Sunday. Never before had mother suggested we worship elsewhere.

‘So today, Leah, we will have our own service. Just the three of us in this church of our verandah. You, me and God. How does that sound, my baby? Would you enjoy that?'

I wouldn't, but I didn't dare express the thought. I nodded.

‘Good,' said Mamma. ‘We will sing and pray and I shall conduct the sermon. It will be just like always. But better. Because we will have God to ourselves. We won't have to share Him.'

* * *

In the afternoon I lay in the orchard with Adam.

By this time, I had discovered Shakespeare. I'd found a dog-eared copy of the complete works tucked away in a corner of Mrs Hilson's shop. At first it had been daunting. The histories, in particular, were very difficult to understand. Almost instinctively, I gravitated towards the tragedies, though there were still many parts of those that remained locked outside my comprehension.

I had no copy of the text with me, but I told Adam the story of
Othello
. As always he listened intently. When I'd finished, he stared at me.

‘Aren't you going to say it?' I said when the silence had stretched to breaking point.

‘What?'

‘That you've seen that place.'

‘I haven't.'

This was the second revelation of the day. I felt there was nothing I could trust any longer.

‘What do you mean?'

‘I mean I haven't seen it.'

I wondered for a few moments if he was angry with me. It had happened in the past, particularly when he felt I allowed Mother to dominate me too much. But there was nothing in his eyes except puzzlement. He picked a blade of grass and split it along the spine with a fingernail.

‘It's you, Leah,' he said. ‘It is you who sees these places.

In your head. Because of the words you read. And when you read them to me, then I see them. And I can take you there. But this …' He threw away the shredded blade. ‘This is just what people say to each other. I can see the people. I just can't see the place.'

I didn't read drama to Adam after that. Many years later, when I went to my first theatre and saw Shakespeare on the stage, I was overcome with sadness. The seat next to me was occupied by a stranger. Three-quarters of the way through the production I was assailed by a longing so intense it made me gasp. I needed Adam there, so he could, with me, visit a land the dialogue could not reveal. I wanted him to lean across and whisper to me, ‘
Now
I've seen the place.'

But Adam was long gone by then. And the man sitting next to me sniffed throughout.

Mother was on the verandah when I returned. She had the shotgun nestled in her arms. My heart hammered in my chest. It was the first time I'd seen the gun since that stormy night.

‘What is it, Mamma?' I said.

Mother scanned the ground before our house. She glanced up at my approach, but didn't reply. Instead, she continued to examine the dusty track, occasionally lifting her eyes to peer towards the horizon.

‘Have you seen anyone, Leah?' she said finally.

‘Mamma?'

‘A stranger? Someone on our farm.'

‘No, Mamma.'

Adam wasn't a stranger. I did not lie. But I knew this was about him.

‘Someone has been snooping around,' she said. She gestured at the dirt with the barrel of the gun. ‘Left footprints.'

‘Are you sure, Mamma?'

‘Of course I'm sure, Leah. We do not have visitors. So who could have left these?' She crouched by a set of Adam's prints. They were clear, the outline of his toes distinct in the red dirt. I said nothing.

Mother stood and squinted against the rays of the dying sun. The barrel of the gun rested comfortably in the crook of her arm, but her finger was curled around the trigger.

‘Keep an eye out, my angel,' she said. ‘We must be vigilant.'

Adam didn't stay in my room that night. I felt so alone, I cried myself to sleep.

Three weeks later, I found myself trailing behind Mother on the track to town. It was seven-thirty on a Sunday morning.

I had no idea why we were going to church, but I assumed that must be where we were headed. Mother carried her Bible. She walked so briskly I had to scamper to keep within twenty metres of her. Adam flanked us, a considerable distance to my left. I'd wanted him to stay home, but he'd refused. Once again, mother kept her eyes fixed firmly on the horizon. She said nothing to me the entire trip.

The pastor was at the church door, greeting his congregation. His smile was as broad as I remembered it. Mother attempted to walk straight past him, but he partially blocked the entrance.