‘Yeah, Auntie Joan would’ve brought these photos over, for sure,’ James said, fired up again. ‘There’s a whole bunch. Dad as a little kid, and his sisters, and Uncle Bob in navy uniform. You’d like them, too,
Olivia,’ he said, turning to her. ‘There’s some of Grandpa with his first dog.’
‘What sort of dog?’ she asked alertly.
‘Fox terrier.’
‘Oh, I
love
fox terriers!’
‘How extraordinary,’ said her mother dryly. ‘And you so indifferent to most animals. You know, I’m sure I’ve heard about this place. I knew Dad grew up near Castlemaine, but he never seemed interested in visiting. No relatives round there or anything.’
‘Yeah, no,’ James agreed. ‘I was trying to figure out when his parents left there. Sometime soon after Dad came to Melbourne to study, but he doesn’t seem to know. Or care much.’
‘That’s typical of Dad, though: the past is over and done, for him. No further interest. You know.’
‘Maybe, yeah,’ he nodded. ‘I’m sure you’re right, Deb. But gee, he remembers this house all right! And let me tell you the most amazing thing: not only is it still standing, it’s got all this stuff in it, almost like people were still living there! Beds, blankets, crockery in the cupboards, everything.’
‘Well, maybe there
are
people living in it, James! Maybe it’s somebody’s weekender!’
He shook his head. ‘If it is, they haven’t been there in ages. It’s really dusty and it smells of mice and it just has, you know, that uninhabited feeling. I got in through a window.’
‘God, Jaf!’ said Deborah admonishingly, but she was smiling.
Cool
, thought Olivia. ‘Did Grandpa go in, too?’ she asked.
‘Like a shot!’ James said. ‘Through the back door though, once I’d opened it. He went into all the rooms and described every single stick of furniture that used to be there. Who slept where. Some of the furniture that’s still there was actually the same stuff. The bed he slept in, for instance, with those sort of curved iron ends, you know. But it’s in a bedroom now, and he says he and Uncle Bob used to sleep out on the back verandah. They had one end sort of closed in,
but it’s not any more. But when you look on the floor and the wall, you can see where the partition used to be. Dad showed me.’
‘Wow,’ said Olivia. ‘That is
so
amazing.’
‘And he can’t have been there in sixty years,’ mused Deborah. ‘The human brain. What a strange thing it is.’ She shook her head as she spoke.
‘Honestly, he could’ve walked around that place blindfolded. He showed me where the vegie garden used to be. There’s still some of the old fruit trees, pretty damn straggly though. But with little apricots forming and stuff. A
huge
almond tree. He got a bit upset that they haven’t been looked after. Reckons he’ll go back next year and prune them.’
‘Could we?’ asked Olivia. ‘Could we do that? I’d really like to go there!’
‘Well, not without the owner’s permission we can’t!’ said Deborah. ‘I wonder who
does
own it now? We must be able to find out somehow.’
‘Would you like me to make some enquiries?’ asked James. ‘I could do that.’
‘Well…Why not? But this time, James,
try
to keep the rest of the family informed, will you? Of things that
might
just be of some relevance to all of us?’
‘I will, Deb,’ he said contritely. ‘I really am so sorry about… you know… not telling you about Rose when I should have. I don’t know why… Silver kept telling me I should, I just…’
Olivia looked away, shifting some fruit around in the fruit bowl, ears pinned back for her mother’s response.
‘How is Silver, anyway?’ Deborah asked, in a perfectly normal tone of voice.
Good, she’s letting it go
, Olivia thought.
About time!
‘She’s fine. Up in Brisbane this week, hanging a show. I’m flying up for the opening on Thursday.’
‘Could we maybe do dinner one night before you go?’
‘You bet! Tomorrow?’
‘Yeah, tomorrow, good.’ Deborah smiled at her brother, and then her eyes suddenly filled with tears. ‘I really need to talk to you, Jaf.’
Uh-oh
, thought Olivia, sliding off the stool and quietly leaving the room. Lately she’d started feeling like there were a stack of things she just didn’t want to know.
CHAPTER 27
Olivia paused across the road, her enormous schoolbag weighing down one shoulder, and gazed at her home.
So weird
, she thought.
It still looks exactly the same but inside it feels completely different.
Her dad slept on the fold-out sofa bed in the living room now, when he was there. But he was at Marion’s more and more. She missed him. Her mum – you never knew what state she was going to be in, just that it would be a state. Sad and crying one day, furious and bitchy the next. It seemed crazy to Olivia that they couldn’t make up their minds and tell her what was going to happen, but at the same time she figured she knew what it was going to be and she could hardly bear the thought.
She’d met Marion half a dozen times now. She knew she was supposed to hate her but it wasn’t truly possible: she was too nice, too sensible. And Angus was so happy around her, it was scary. Marion was going to have a baby and… and what? What would her family be then? More than ever Olivia felt that only her animals could be relied upon.
One night driving home from one of these dinners with Marion
she had said to him, ‘Dad, if you’re going to move out, you have to tell me first.’
‘I will, Ollie,’ he said.
‘Promise!’ she demanded.
‘I promise,’ Angus said.
Fleur invited her to spend a weekend down in the national park at Wilson’s Promontory, where her family had rented one of the Tidal River cabins. Olivia had been to the Prom once before when she was about six or seven years old, camping with her parents and another family. She remembered that it was really beautiful and there were lots of birds and animals. Wombats had got into the food tent and there had been scenes of consternation in the middle of the night. Wallabies had hopped casually about the place. And a large goanna had scuttled across the track when they were out walking and sent some foreign hikers into hysterics.
She wanted to go, but as always it was a struggle for her to go anywhere that she couldn’t take the dogs. It seemed so unfair for them to miss out, and Congo had been going through another difficult stage, getting out of the yard by hook or by crook and turning up at Olivia’s school, prowling the corridors and yodelling eerily until he found her. Then she would have to either leave class to take him home, the basenji running jauntily along beside her bike, or phone her father to come and pick him up. The fact was, Congo scared people. The school’s vice-principal called Angus in and told him it was
completely unacceptable
and
simply can’t happen again
. It made Olivia nervous. If she went away for a weekend and disrupted his training program, the wilful little dog might pay her back with even worse behaviour.
‘Go, Olivia, for heaven’s sake,’ urged her mother. ‘It’s ridiculous the way you’re tied to these animals and their routines. You’re thirteen, can’t you start acting like a teenager? Have a weekend with your pals! Be irresponsible!’
‘But they
need
things! The rabbits —’
‘Oh god! Just write it down, I’ll take care of your menagerie.’
‘But what if Congo gets into trouble while I’m away, then what?’ fretted Olivia.
Deborah’s lips thinned to string. ‘Excuse me? Congo is
my
dog, remember? And
I’m
going to take care of him.’
‘Okay, okay. I’ll go!’ And go she did, and had a really good time. Spring was being truly spring-like that weekend, thrilling with birdsong and the scent of spring flowers. The nights were thick with stars. They went with Fleur’s father and stepmother, and their twin toddlers, and Olivia watched carefully to see how this family configuration worked. It seemed fine, if a little frantic at times. The twins could be pesky but mostly they were pretty cute. On both afternoons the parents sat the wriggling littlies in baby backpacks and took them off on long walks, leaving Fleur and Olivia to wander around and explore and talk. Fleur’s dad had a camera, one of the old-fashioned ones with actual film and lots of settings, and he showed them how to use it, explaining about aperture and focus and depth of field, and loaded it with new film and told them they could use the whole roll.
They took close-ups of stones and flowers, and skyscapes and seascapes, and Olivia took two pictures of Fleur sitting on a huge rock at the edge of the river that she just
knew
were going to be special. A breeze came up and swirled Fleur’s long white-blonde hair around her head like ghostly streamers. For the first photo Olivia got Fleur to close her eyes. Her face was still and mysterious, and then Olivia said, ‘Now, open!’, and Fleur’s enormous eyes, a riveting brilliant blue with a ring almost of indigo around the iris, were fixed on her,
burning
, Olivia thought, and her face exactly as it had been before, still and inward,
like she’s in a trance or a vision or something
.
‘Wow. That gave me goosebumps. I hope it comes out something like what I just saw.’
‘It will,’ said Fleur. ‘I put a spell on the camera. Every photo will be perfect.’
‘Mmm. Could you just do that spell on my whole life, please?’
‘Sorry. Life’s not like that.’
‘Huh. Limited spell talent, more like it.’
‘O, ye of little faith,’ intoned Fleur, shaking her head slowly. ‘Let’s go and eat a whole packet of chocolate biscuits and ruin our appetites for dinner.’
‘Another excellent idea!’
Really, it was about the best weekend Olivia had ever spent in the company of humans. (Grandpa perhaps excepted.) But still, when she got home she was itching to see her animals, especially the dogs. She dumped her bag in her room, yelled hello to her mother in the study, and raced through to the backyard. Mintie and Fly-by just about turned themselves inside out, whining and lashing their tails and Fly-by trying to climb into her lap. But no Congo prancing up with his wicked little smile. Not chained up, either. Not locked in the shed.
Olivia went back inside to the study. ‘Mum, where’s Congo?’ she asked.
‘Congo’s gone to live on a farm,’ said Deborah, not turning around from the computer screen.
The words didn’t make sense. Did not compute. ‘What did you say?’
‘Congo,’ said her mother, turning from the screen now and speaking slowly, separating each phrase, ‘Has gone. To live. On a farm.’
It was her mother’s tone and the look on her face that convinced Olivia that this was not a joke. The words themselves still didn’t make sense. She turned and went to look through the kitchen window at the backyard. Mintie and Fly-by raced over to the back door and barked once, hopefully. Definitely no Congo.
‘It’s the best thing, Olivia. He was getting to be too much.’ Deborah had followed her as far as the kitchen and was leaning in the doorway.
‘Too much for who?’ asked Olivia. She was amazed at how normal her voice sounded.
‘Too much for everyone! For you, me, the school, your father, everyone! So I made the decision. He’ll be much better off, living on a farm. He was my dog, after all.’
‘What farm? Where?’
‘I’m not going to tell you, you’ll only pester them and want to go and see him.’
Olivia walked over to the kitchen bench, picked up an orange out of the fruit bowl and started to peel it with her thumbnail. Her eyes were filling hotly with tears but she kept peeling, staring at the piece of fruit, her hands. Suddenly she lifted her head and hurled the orange at the wall of cupboards in front of her. It exploded wetly and fell to the floor, leaving juicy marks on the cupboard door.
‘You
bitch
!’ she screamed at her mother. ‘You
bitch
! He was never your dog! He’s
my
dog!’
Deborah flinched and straightened up in the doorway. ‘Olivia –’
‘Where’s Dad? Where is he? As soon as Dad gets home we’re going to go and get Congo!’
‘Your father won’t be getting home. This isn’t his home any more. He moved out on Saturday.’
‘You
liar
. He wouldn’t do that without telling me.’
‘Well, he has. And don’t you
dare
talk to me like that.’
Olivia advanced on her mother, right up to her, and snarled in her face, ‘Oh, that makes sense then. You’d
have
to wait till Dad was gone before you could do this. Because Dad wouldn’t have
let
you get rid of Congo. Because Dad’s not a completely selfish control freak
bitch
!’
Deborah was millimetres, nanoseconds away from slapping Olivia across the face, like in some bad soap opera, and Olivia was daring her to do it. They both knew that. Slowly, deliberately, Deborah turned her own face away and stared fixedly at the chipped paint on the doorframe right beside her. Olivia waited a moment or two longer then stormed past her mother, down the hall and into her bedroom. She started hauling dirty clothes out of the backpack she’d taken down to the Prom and stuffing clean ones in.
‘You needn’t make me the baddie here, Olivia. Your father took Congo to this farm. It was his idea as much as mine,’ Deborah said, having followed her again.
Olivia ignored her.
Liar
, she thought. She grabbed underwear out of a drawer and hurled it into the pack.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Deborah said.
‘I’m packing my things. I’m not going to stay here,’ said Olivia. She was no longer screaming, her voice was low now and filled with furious intensity. ‘I’m going to live with Dad. Dad and Marion!’ She flung that at her mother.
‘Oh?’ said Deborah, with icy barbs in her voice. ‘In Marion’s flat? And how many animals do you think you’ll be able to have there? Not
one
, missie! Not one! A mouse in a cage if you’re lucky!’
Olivia froze. It was true. She hadn’t thought of that.