The Fine Colour of Rust. P. O’Reilly A.
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‘It doesn’t worry me.’ My bright voice makes my lie obvious.
‘That’d be right,’ Melissa mutters from the back seat.
‘Young lady,’ I start, but it’s too hot to argue so I swing the car backwards out of the driveway and set off.
It’s been three years since Tony left us. Three years in real time, and more like thirty years in looking-after-children time. I’m sure mothering years go even faster than dog years. I can feel my back turning into a question mark. Sometimes I catch myself hunched over the steering wheel or sagging in a kitchen chair, and I can imagine myself after a few more mothering years, drooling into my porridge in the retirement home. Come on luvvie, they’ll say to me, sit up straight now, after all, you’re only forty.
The road leading into the gully swings around the bend and we can see the whole town, or at least as many people as would normally be at the swimming pool, clustered around the small waterhole like ants at a droplet of sugar water. Bush pigs at a billabong, maybe. The waterhole’s half the size it used to be because we get no rain, but it’s still deep enough to swim.
‘What were you two talking about this morning? Bush pigs was it?’
‘Yeah.’
‘No.’
With the ground near the edge of the water trampled to mud, we find a spot further back underneath a stringybark tree and lay down our towels and unpack the iced cordial and biscuits. Melissa goes off to sit next to her friend Taylah. Jake and I make our way down to the water, saying hello to everyone on the way. Some of the mothers who have caught sight of me pretend to be reading the messages on their children’s T-shirts or searching for something in their bags. I know they’re afraid I’m going to ask them to do something for the Save Our School Committee, but I don’t have to now because the minister’s coming to Gunapan.
‘The minister’s coming to Gunapan,’ I call out cheerily, making a fist of victory, and they nod and smile anxiously as you do when a lunatic has decided to talk to you.
Further up on the hill I can see a family sitting apart from everyone else. Four children and a woman. They lean in together, talking.
‘Who’s that up there?’ I ask Jake.
‘Dunno.’ He doesn’t even glance up, as if he knows without looking who I’m talking about.
I keep squinting at them as I wade in, but I can’t make out their faces. Then I feel an eddy of water around my knees and before I can move someone has grabbed my ankles and I’m under, flailing around in the murky water, trying not to swallow any. I make it to the surface for a breath before Jake sits on my head. Even underwater I can hear his shrieks and Kyleen’s unmistakable snorting laugh. I finally manage to stand up straight, my feet anchoring themselves on the squelchy bottom where the silt oozes in silky bands between my toes.
‘Very funny.’
‘Yep,’ she says between snorts.
Further out, the bottom of the waterhole falls away and the water is dark and deep. Even on a day like this when half the town has swum here, water from the depths still swirls in cold ribbons to the surface. I leave Jake playing with Kyleen and her little girl near the edge of the waterhole and I swim out and roll on to my back where the water is cooler. The sun seems to have less power here.
Up on the hill I can see the lonely family still huddled together. They’re moving about now, gathering their things and putting them into plastic bags. They start making their way back to the road, but instead of walking down through the people bunched around the banks of the waterhole, they skirt the long way around the top of the hill until they reach the bus stop further down the ridge. I close my eyes and float for a while, trying to block out the sounds of kids screaming and parents bellowing and the rustle and crackle of the grass and leaves in the heat.
Melissa is waiting when Jake and I clamber back up to dry ourselves with our dusty hot towels. She’s wearing jeans and a long-sleeved top and her face is scarlet with the heat. I wonder if she’s nicked herself shaving again. It would be typical of a child of mine to decide that self-mutilation of the legs wasn’t enough. Why not shave your arms as well? And your stomach and neck while you’re at it?
‘Where’s Taylah?’ Jake asks her.
‘Gone home.’
‘Sweetie, I’ve got a spare T-shirt in the boot, why don’t you put that on.’
‘I want to go home. You said you were only going in for a dip.’
I stretch out my hand to help her up. She ignores it and pulls herself up with the aid of a tree branch, then winces and brushes her dirty hand on her jeans. I can see that nothing will make her happy today. Melissa was always Tony’s little girl. When he left I didn’t know how to make it up to her. She’s grown old in the time he’s been gone. I offered her a puppy for her last birthday and she refused it.
‘Why?’ I asked her.
‘Because it’ll die. And you never know when.’
At home Melissa goes off to her room and Jake hangs around the kitchen while I boil the water for frankfurts. I get him buttering the bread and I lean out of the kitchen window, trying to catch some air on my face. Across from our block is a small farm. Fancy clean white sheep appear in the paddock one day and are gone the next. The farm owners don’t speak to us. A few times a week I see the wife driving past in her Range Rover with the windows closed. She wears sunglasses and dark red lipstick. I can’t imagine her crutching a sheep, much as I try.
I’ve spent some of my great fantasy moments being that woman, usually on days like this when I’m hanging out of the window and moving my face around like a ping-pong clown to try to catch a breeze. In my imagination I’ve sat in her air-conditioned dining room, laughing gaily, my manicured hands and painted nails flitting about like coloured birds as I discuss the latest in day spas. I’ve waved goodbye to my tiresome yet fabulously wealthy and doting husband, and changed into a negligee to welcome my lover, the Latin horse whisperer who lives above the stables and takes me bareback riding in the moonlight. In this dream, my boobs are so firm that even the thundering gallop of the stallion cannot shake them.
‘Mum,’ Jake interrupts as I’m about to drift into my other world.
‘Mmm?’
‘Melissa’s crying.’
‘Don’t touch the saucepan,’ I say, turning off the gas. ‘And butter four more pieces of bread for your lunches tomorrow.’
She doesn’t want to open the door when I knock, but I can hear the phlegm in her voice, so I push the door open anyway. Melissa’s sitting on the carpet beside her bed. I go and sit beside her, my bones creaking as I lower myself to the floor. It’s a little cooler down here, but I’m still sweating. Melissa’s face is all splotchy and snot is coming out her nose. I pull one of my endless supply of tissues out of my pocket and wipe her face. She tries to push my hand away.
‘I’m not a baby,’ she sniffles.
‘I know.’
We sit quietly for a few minutes and eventually I slip my arm around her shoulders and kiss her forehead. She leans in to me and sighs a big shuddering sigh.
‘What’s up, kiddo?’
‘Nothing.’
We sit for a while longer. Her breathing gets easier and slower. She’s not going to tell me anything, that’s obvious, so I decide to finish making tea. When I get to the kitchen, Jake’s so hungry he’s ripped open the packet of frankfurters and is gnawing on a cold one.
‘Did you do girl talk?’
‘Where did you hear that line?’ I’m trying not to laugh.
‘Norm told me that’s what girls say they do, but really they’re gossiping about how to get boys.’
‘Well, Norm’s