The Bit In Between (15 page)

‘That's a true story?' Alison asked.

Kenneth swore it was.

‘He drifted all the way to Australia?'

Kenneth swore he had.

‘And he still lives there today?'

Kenneth's father had told him this was the truth. Alison made a disbelieving face and took a mouthful of beer. Beside her Oliver spoke up.

‘If this was Tikopia, I'd be set adrift after tonight, wouldn't I?'

Kenneth nodded solemnly and they smiled as they sipped their beers.

Oliver dreamt discordant dreams that night, wood blocks banging away in his head.

Alison slipped out the door the next morning with lofty ambitions to swim for an hour at the Honiara Hotel pool. She managed a few lethargic laps, followed by ten minutes of floating in the shallow end pretending to be a starfish. After a while she heaved herself out of the pool and spotted some women she recognised from around town. When they invited her for a drink, she checked her watch. One o'clock. She shrugged and ordered a gin and tonic.

She was fascinated by the way these women talked so openly and confidently about themselves, their work, their relationships, their holiday plans, their views on how life should or shouldn't be lived. Alison tended to shy up in company when it came to sharing details about her life, terrified that someone would point out she was making a complete mess of it. She sat politely nodding, trying as far as possible not to answer any questions. When one of the women asked Alison what she was planning on doing with her life, she slugged back the rest of her drink and muttered something about ‘helping people', which was vague enough to be met with a round of appreciative nods. The women continued chatting and Alison smiled and laughed and oohed and aahed on cue.

She noticed another woman doing the same thing, smiling but not contributing. The woman was a volunteer from Japan who Alison had met briefly at an earlier gathering. The woman laughed along with everyone else, but every so often her eyes became distant. At one point she excused herself and didn't come back for almost fifteen minutes. When she returned, Alison noticed her eyes were rimmed with red, hinting at recent tears. Not long after, the woman excused herself a second time and didn't return.

Shiho had grown up in a home surrounded by wealth and love in a small coastal town in the Sendai district of Japan. Her parents had been born into working class families and had worked hard to build up their fortune so they could give their children everything they wanted, but they encouraged them to care for others and to do work that gave something back to the world. Shiho had chosen to study earth sciences at university. Her mother and father had been incredibly proud when she announced she had been accepted into a volunteer program in the Solomon Islands advising the government on disaster risk reduction strategies. A year later, Shiho had watched the international news bulletins in horror as waves of destruction swept across her homeland, tearing apart the land of her childhood and washing away her memories. Her parents were safe, visiting family in Tokyo, but other friends were not so lucky. Her devastated parents convinced her to stay away, afraid she would be destroyed by what she saw if she came home. So Shiho stayed in the Solomons, teaching people how to prepare for tsunamis and other natural disasters, but after every workshop she felt a lingering sense of failure, as all her knowledge had been useless when it actually mattered.

When Alison returned home she found Oliver lying on the couch gazing ruefully at his laptop screen. Their washing remained where she'd left it that morning, hand-washed and wrung out in a large tub waiting for Oliver to hang it on the line. A tinge of annoyance ran through her. She understood the pressure on Oliver to work, but he seemed to spend much of this time motionless behind his computer. He would be far more productive getting out of the house, at the very least to hang the clothes out. She filled the kettle and placed it on the stove and waited, her irritation subsiding.

‘Hey Ollie. Do you know what I heard someone say today? “With ambition, you can be anyone's wife.” '

Oliver thought about this. ‘Wow. That's . . . that's . . . how do you feel about that?'

She pulled two mugs from the drying rack and reached for the teabags. ‘Everyone I know is getting married, talking about mortgages and planning their careers. That's not me. Should it be? Should it? Because that's not what I want right now, but maybe I should. Maybe I'm going to wake up an old barren spinster because I was too busy doing other things to remember to reproduce and have a career. I haven't even worked out what I want to do yet. I just feel like I'm supposed to have all this stuff worked out and I don't. I haven't planned any of it. And the stuff with Sera, helping all those women, it's great, but it's hardly long term, is it? We don't even have a regular place to meet.'

She took their tea over to the couch and sat down beside him. He shifted over to make room for her and then put his arms around her.

‘You could think about the future,' he said. ‘About what will or won't or might or mightn't happen. Or you could think about right now, sitting here with someone who loves you so much it physically hurts and who would do anything just to make you happy.'

Her eyes welled up, but she blinked quickly and smiled – more a grimace than a smile. ‘I reckon we should make pancakes today. How do pancakes sound?'

‘Yeah. Sure. Let's make pancakes.' He clutched her tightly and held her gaze. ‘I love you, okay.'

Alison nodded, but she couldn't meet his eye.

A couple of mornings later Oliver and Alison sat side by side working. Alison was proofreading a letter one of Sera's friends had written to the editor of the
Solomon Star
, and Oliver was writing. He paused and looked up.

‘Hey, what's the most offensive thing anyone has ever called you?'

Alison told him.

‘Oh, that's good. That's nasty. I can work with that.'

There was a furious clicking of keys.

‘And what did you say back?'

Alison told him.

‘What? You actually said that to someone? Out loud?'

‘Mm-hmm.'

‘What are you, some kind of mafia wife?'

Alison shrugged. ‘What are you using it for?'

‘They're having a fight. Geraldine is accusing Colonel Drakeford of spending all his time in his office and not bothering to get to know anyone. She says that he can't really work with people if he doesn't understand their lives.'

Alison didn't look up from her notes. ‘She makes a good point.'

‘But Colonel Drakeford tells her that he can't help it if he has urgent deadlines that are chaining him to his desk. He says he wishes Geraldine understood the kind of constant pressure he is under and how if he doesn't complete his work on time, life will become very difficult for him. But Geraldine doesn't really get it, because she gets to pick and choose her work and has all the time in the world to wander the markets and drink tea and get to know people.'

Alison paused and put her pen down. ‘And so then they fight and he calls her that name?'

Oliver waggled his head noncommittally.

Alison cleared her throat. ‘Who are we talking about at the moment?'

Oliver stared at the computer screen and didn't look up. ‘Colonel Drakeford and Geraldine.'

‘Yeah?'

‘Yeah.'

‘Well, Colonel Drakeford should stop being such a wang and treat Geraldine with some goddamn respect, because she has managed to find herself some work and it's not her fault she doesn't have a goddamn office. And you know what? Geraldine's work is really important and is probably going to contribute a whole lot more good to the world than Colonel Drakeford's self-indulgent bitching.'

Oliver's jaw tensed. ‘Actually, Colonel Drakeford tells Geraldine that she should give him a break and stop acting like she's some kind of messiah who's going to save the world.'

Alison narrowed her eyes. ‘How does it end?'

‘Geraldine apologises and they share a gin and tonic on the balcony.'

‘Do they? I reckon it would be better if Geraldine told Colonel Drakeford to get stuffed and went to find somewhere to drink a beer by herself.'

Alison stood up and threw her pen at the table, then pushed her chair back and stormed out of the room. Oliver stared at the computer screen. She was right. That was a better way to end the fight. His finger went to the delete key.

When he had finished, Oliver sat back and read through what he had written. It was good. Oliver seldom felt that way about his work. He closed the computer lid and then leant back stretching. He noticed Alison's notebook out of the corner of his eye. Oliver checked behind him, then reached out for it. There was a rough outline of a lesson on possessive pronouns. He casually flicked through a couple of pages. There was a poem, untitled but dated, that she had written the day before. It read:

You want my advice?

Don't ever leave home

because the first time

only time

you shut that door and march out into the world like a wide-eyed prince

that door will close

and you can never go back.

And even if you try

it's never the same door

never the original

just a cheap replica

that leads you to a parallel dimension.

Nowhere else you try to live can be home.

Just a series of rooms under roofs

that you keep your stuff in.

So then people become your home

or at least you try to make them so

but people are so impermanent

and they tend to leave you broken

so nothing remains but a trail of broken homes.

Homes that left, homes that died

homes that got bored and found someone else.

Sometimes they ask you to move out

and you lose two homes simultaneously.

All your life you'll search for home

for a door that will lead you back to that first warm womb of comfort

but never will you find it.

You want my advice?

Don't ever leave home

because the first time you do

you shut that door forever.

Then, underneath, written in big bold capitals:

I DON'T KNOW WHAT I AM DOING

Oliver read through the poem a second time and then stared at the block letters beneath it. He knew what he needed to do. It was against all reason and logic and science, but that didn't matter, because when it failed, no one would know. At least he'd feel like he'd tried. Oliver pulled over his laptop and started to type.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE WRITING ON THE LITTLE BLUE WALL

Col. Drakeford stood on his balcony, took a sip of gin and surveyed the new nation that lay before him. It was the first time in his life that he had seen a country born; that he'd seen nationhood and unity attempting to be forged in a place it had not naturally arisen. The new nation would be fine without him, but where did that leave Drakeford? He drained the glass and thought of Geraldine, of the confusing changes in her he couldn't quite read, and the desperate fear that he could not keep her here. But Drakeford had a plan.

Oliver paused and stared at the screen. He deleted it all, then closed the lid and sat massaging his temples. There was a clatter of aluminium on cement and he heard giggling outside the window. Oliver crept quietly away from his desk and peeped over the window frame. Sitting underneath were Jo and Willy, two young boys who lived next door. They were both around ten years old with wild, unruly sun-bleached curls and cheeky smiles. Jo was the son of Bo, Oliver and Alison's landlord, and Willy, from what Oliver could put together, was a cousin who lived with the family. Sometimes the boys would visit Oliver to practise their English and to challenge him to a game of ‘rubbers', in which competitors won elastic bands off each other by flicking them and capturing their opponents' bands. Both boys wore countless captured rubber bands like trophies around their wrists. Oliver had a single manky green one and he suspected they had let him win it. The boys were tucked away underneath the window, taking it in turns to sip from a can of beer. There was another unopened can at their feet. Their eyes were wide and sparkling and they were both talking quickly, frequently breaking into hysterical giggles. Oliver leant out over the window ledge.

‘Hey, guys.'

The boys looked up guiltily and tried to hide the cans.

‘What are you two doing?'

‘Nothing,' Willy said quickly. Jo started giggling again.

‘Where did you get the beer from?' Oliver asked with attempted nonchalance.

‘Uncle Bo's cupboard,' Willy said, avoiding eye contact.

‘Is this the first time you've drunk beer?' Oliver asked.

The boys nodded.

‘How does it make you feel?'

Jo's eyes lit up. ‘It makes me feel like I want to run very quickly and laugh big and also to sleep.'

Willy looked at his cousin. ‘I just feel hot. It tastes rubbish.'

‘Yes,' Jo agreed, burping for effect.

‘What would your dad think if he knew you were drinking?' Oliver asked, knowing very well what he would think.

‘He wouldn't be happy,' Jo said, eyeing the house next door.

‘Yeah,' Oliver agreed. ‘So it might not be a good idea. You know, people can tell when you drink beer, because it makes you act different and you smell like beer.'

The boys' eyes widened.

‘Wait a moment.' Oliver disappeared into the kitchen
and came back with a bottle of water and a packet of
biscuits.

‘Why don't you guys go sit somewhere and drink some water and eat these biscuits, and then when you feel less like you want to run or sleep, go home?'

The boys eyed the chocolate biscuits with greedy smiles. They stood up and Jo grabbed the biscuits and water.

‘So yeah,' Oliver said, still trying to sound casual yet authoritative. ‘Maybe don't do it again.'

The boys nodded at him.

‘And stay in school,' he added, because it felt appropriate.

The boys wandered off and Oliver reached down and picked up the full beer can they had left behind. He watched them scamper down the embankment to the sprawling mango tree that separated the two houses. Oliver marvelled at how easy parenting was. I could do that one day, he thought to himself. He smiled, then opened the beer and took a swig. Beneath the mango tree, Jo and Willy stuffed biscuits into their mouths.

Willy's mother had been ecstatic about the birth of her first child and had barely let baby Willy out of her sight for the first two years of his life. Then came his sister, and Willy's mother had to work out how to divide her time in two. Then came his brother. Then the twins. And then there wasn't enough time or money in the house for Willy's mother to give each of her children the care and attention she wanted to, so she had asked her sister to take Willy so that he could have a better childhood in the capital city. It meant a better school for Willy and more opportunities, but it also meant he didn't get to grow up in his village surrounded by the living culture of the province. He grew up alongside his cousins, learning English at school and doing his homework under the electric glow of the lightbulbs his mother didn't have access to back home. Every holidays, if the money was available, he would make the long journey back to the village, where everyone told him how much he'd grown and his brothers and sisters tried to work out who he was. And at the same time, Willy did too.

Alison looked anxiously out the bus window. Sera had drawn her a map and told her to get off at the stop after ‘the tree that has a sign that says “Rainbow Juicy” beside the old red jeep without wheels'. Alison had assumed this would be easy, but there were a surprising number of wheel-less old red jeeps on the road to Sera's aunt's house. When she eventually saw it, she put her tongue against her front teeth and tried to make the soft whistling noise Solomon Islanders used to alert the conductor that this was their stop, but the ‘sssssstt' sound she made was more like a leaky camping mattress. Nothing happened, so she raised her hand, coughed loudly, and finally said, ‘Stop, please!' The conductor gave her a bemused smile and jumped up to slide open the door and let her out as the van slowed to a stop. Alison stumbled slightly getting out, squinting against the glaring noon sun. She looked at the instructions in her hand and then tried to work out which way was west. The sun was setting so she figured she'd walk in that direction.

After a while she found what she thought was the right house – it had a fence that looked ‘a bit like a castle' and there were two old petrol drums out front with ‘peace' and ‘rasta 4eva' spray-painted on them. She walked the length of the crenelated concrete fence and paused anxiously at the gate, double-checking her instructions. Sera appeared at the door and waved her in.

Sera was beaming and greeted Alison with a big hug. Alison felt the press of her belly, five months full of life, and savoured the moment.

‘I'm so happy you could come.' Sera smiled and squeezed Alison's cheeks with her palms. ‘Come meet everyone.'

There was Aunty Patti, who owned the house, a large woman with mountains of hair that cascaded down her back like a jet black mane.

There was Cousin Betty, who smiled shyly and refused to meet Alison's eyes.

Then there were cousins Kathy and Hanna, who were twelve-year-old identical twins with identical plaits and identical giggles, and who Alison could only tell apart by the small scar that ran down Kathy's chin.

Jennifer, Sera's younger sister, was a taller, thinner version of Sera with bright red streaks through her black curls and a T-shirt that said ‘kiss&tell'.

And then there was Dorothy, a tiny woman whose
ancient weathered face was etched with faded blue tattoos. She grinned a toothless grin at Alison and stroked her arm
fondly.

When the introductions were complete, Alison was ushered through the house and into the backyard, where a fire was already burning in the small kitchen house. The kitchen house was made from sago leaves, dried and then woven together to make a compact hut. Inside was the motu. Alison had eaten delicious food cooked in a motu oven since arriving in the Solomons, but had never actually seen one in action. The women had already started preparing it, laying firewood across the bottom of a shallow hole and then lighting the fire. Special motu river stones had been added atop the fire, and as the wood burnt away, the stones grew hotter and hotter.

The women were sitting on a woven mat on the ground behind great piles of food. Kathy and Hanna were washing and peeling kumara while Jennifer and Betty gutted fish. Aunty Patti stood to one side surveying the work and shouting instructions every so often. Dorothy was sitting cross-legged before a big pot full of chicken and was cutting it into bits with a large bush knife.

‘What do we do?' Alison asked eagerly.

‘Our job is to wrap everything in banana leaves,' Sera explained, sitting on the mat and pulling a pile of leaves towards her. They started wrapping the kumara in the leaves. Aunty Patti took a huge pair of wooden tongs and started removing red-hot stones from the motu. Once she had removed half, she began placing the banana leaf parcels atop the remaining stones.

As they worked, Dorothy chatted away happily to the other women in a language Alison couldn't understand. Alison looked at Sera questioningly.

‘She is speaking Maringe, our local Isabel language. She grew up in Malaita, which is where her tattoos are from, but learnt Maringe from her husband, who was from Isabel.'

Dorothy looked up and shouted something to Sera.

‘He's dead now, her husband,' Sera added, and Dorothy smiled at Alison and nodded.

When they had finished wrapping and packing everything into the motu, Alison helped the women use the tongs to place the hot stones on top of the wrapped food so that it was completely covered. Next they put more leaves on top, then added some more hot stones before covering it all with hessian sacks.

‘Now we leave everything to cook,' Aunty Patti said.

The motu would cook overnight and would make an early lunch the next day. Aunty Patti was a motu expert, Sera had told Alison earlier, and knew how to ‘measure' the fire and select the right wood so that it wouldn't dry out the food.

‘Tea!' Dorothy announced happily. Aunty Patti looked at the twins, who sighed and went inside to prepare the tea. Dorothy said something and laughed.

‘She said those two are city girls and couldn't motu to save their lives,' Sera told Alison.

Dorothy was sitting with her legs stretched out in front of her. She pulled a small pipe from her pocket and lit it with shaky hands.

‘I learnt all this stuff growing up,' Sera said. ‘All our cultural stuff. How to motu, how to make gardens, how to climb for coconuts. Everyone who grows up in the provinces learns these things. But some of the young kids in Honiara, they don't get the chance.'

‘I worry that they're losing their culture,' Aunty Patti added. ‘All this food from outside – packets of noodles and fish in tins – it's delicious, but if people don't make our kastom food how will our kids learn?' she said, passing around a packet of chocolate biscuits.

Jennifer rolled her eyes. ‘Who has time to motu all the time, Aunty? No one.'

‘Don't blame me when you have the diabetes,' Aunty Patti said. She turned to Alison. ‘What are your kastom foods in Australia, Alison?'

Alison tried hard to think of what she had eaten growing up. ‘Lamb,' she offered unconvincingly. ‘And beef. Lots of meat.'

Sera translated for Dorothy who grinned a toothless smile and said something as she patted her stomach. Sera giggled. ‘Dorothy says that must be why you're so fat, all that beef.'

Alison blushed. Dorothy sucked on her pipe and said something else.

‘She said it's good fat. Good enough to have a good husband.'

‘Tell her I haven't eaten meat for a long time, since I was little, and I don't have a husband,' Alison said.

Sera translated and then Dorothy said something that made her burst out laughing.

‘She said that must be why you don't have a husband, because he'd starve to death.' Sera's voice dropped. ‘I won't mention Oliver because Dorothy's a bit strict when it comes to that kind of thing.'

Alison nodded. She tended not to tell people that she and Oliver weren't married.

Jennifer gave her a mischievous grin that made her look even more like Sera. ‘Dorothy doesn't believe in dating either,' she said. ‘They're pretty strict about that kind of thing where she's from.'

Dorothy looked at them suspiciously. Sera smiled and offered her the packet of biscuits. The old woman narrowed her eyes and took one. Still glaring at them, she leant forward.

‘Don't think I don't know,' she said, pointing at them with the biscuit.

Alison froze but Jennifer and Sera burst out laughing.

‘Don't worry, she doesn't know what we're talking about. She learnt that in a movie,' Sera giggled. ‘Watch this. Dorothy, what should Solomon Islands do to fix corruption?' Sera asked.

‘Call the A-Team!' Dorothy beamed and everyone laughed. Dorothy giggled and said something Alison couldn't understand.

‘She said her English is so good she should be a tour guide,' Sera said and took Dorothy's hand. When they had all stopped laughing, Dorothy wiped a tear from her eye. Then she turned to Alison and said something else in Maringe.