An Ordinary Epidemic (4 page)

With a plunger full of coffee in one hand and a mug in the other, she let herself out the back door and headed to the office in the garage. Like all the houses in this row, theirs backed onto the tiny laneway.

She heard the neighbour's garage door open. Hannah considered whether to pretend that the fence provided privacy, but it was Natalie, not Stuart. ‘Hi, how's things?' She raised
herself on her toes to smile over the fence.

‘Oh, extra busy. Everyone thinks they have Manba.'

‘Give it time, they probably will.'

‘That would be easier, I could send them to hospital. Now all I'm doing is ordering tests and trying to talk them down. Oh, wasn't today the big day? Did Zac get off all right? They didn't cancel it did they?'

‘They got off fine.'

‘He's so big now, isn't he? So grown-up. I can't imagine I'll ever think Ella is old enough for a school camp. Stuart says he's not letting her out of his sight 'til she's thirty-five. When he's not saying she has to leave on the day of her eighteenth birthday.' Natalie paused for a moment. ‘I guess that's only a few years off for Zac.' She reached her back door but hesitated with her hand on the lever. ‘Many of the people overseas, the ones who've died, have had pre-existing conditions.'

‘I guess that makes sense. It's a relief that we're healthy.'

‘So what I'm saying is, you should take care.'

Even though she hadn't got anything done, by the time Hannah arrived to pick up Oscar the bell had gone and a fan of kids streamed out the school doors.

On the far side of the playground, Oscar and his friend Dylan chased each other, like satellites around Dylan's mum. She smiled at Hannah as she made her way across the yard. They had almost covered the distance between them before Oscar caught sight of Hannah and broke off his circling to run straight at her, his sprint ending as he slammed into her with a hug that nearly knocked her over. She murmured, ‘Careful, Oscar.'

‘Sorry Mum. Can Dylan come over today? His mum says he can, but she says you have to say so.'

Dylan's mum gave Hannah a shrug.

‘Please Mum.'

Oscar had spent the day in a classroom of kids doing she knew not what but, even so, Dylan was a potential reservoir of germs.

‘I don't know, Oscar.'

Oscar drew out every word. ‘Oh no. You never let me have anyone over.'

‘That's not true, Oscar. Dylan came over last week.'

‘But that was last week.'

Dylan's mum broke in. ‘You know, Oscar, today isn't a good day. Maybe we can do it a different day.'

‘But you said...'

‘Oscar,' Hannah cut him off, ‘a different day.'

By the time they reached the gate, Oscar's dark mood had evaporated. He doubled his journey each time he skipped forward and ran back to her. ‘Can I have a chocolate?'

‘Sure.'

He ran the length of each block, stopping at the corners for Hannah to catch up. The unalloyed joy he could get from the promise of a chocolate bar made her smile.

The small knot of shops that they passed through on the way home from school would once have been all the necessities—a butcher, a greengrocer, a bank—concentrated around the intersection. Now they were the new necessities—a cafe, a Thai take-away, a bottle shop. Only the pharmacy and the corner store bridged the changes in fashion.

On the other side of the crossing, a tall, thin woman in a long, straight shift dress meandered in their direction. Hannah frequently saw her around the area, spewing forth obscenities. The woman took an erratic course along the path, peering around as if looking for someone. As they crossed the road, Hannah took Oscar's hand and manoeuvred him so as to keep herself between him and the woman. She walked a little
faster, tugging gently on Oscar's hand. Her arm jerked back, and she looked to see him picking up something shiny from the ground.

‘Come on Oscar, we don't have time.'

‘Why?'

‘Don't touch that, it's dirty.'

‘It's a bead, it's pretty.'

‘Now your hands are dirty.'

Oscar dropped the bead surreptitiously into his pocket and looked at his hands in distress.

‘Don't pick things up from the ground. You don't know what's touched them.'

‘Can I still eat the chocolate?'

Dirty hands. If she said no, he'd have a meltdown, and the woman was heading straight for them. ‘We'll take it home, you can wash your hands before you eat it.' She cursed herself inwardly—this was the kind of situation she should be prepared for.

The woman's hair was cropped so closely that her scalp showed through. Hannah considered covering Oscar's ears, although that would only make it more of an incident for him. If they could get past quickly, if the woman wasn't too loud, he might not even register her. Hannah braced for the tirade.

The woman's voice was high-pitched, piercing and strangled. ‘Are you Jesus today? I am, I'm Jesus today.' She reached a hand out to Oscar and Hannah realised, with guilty relief, that he wasn't looking. Hannah had never noticed how thin her arms were and wondered if someone looked after her. Her hands were clean enough, but her fingernails were crusted with dirt.

Hannah softly jerked Oscar back out of reach. ‘Not today.' She smiled at the woman, trying to divert her attention from Oscar.

‘I am. I'm Jesus today.' She seemed satisfied with Hannah's
answer. Something on the other side of the road captivated her and she wandered onto the crossing, oblivious of them and the cars. Hannah loosed her grip on Oscar and he shot into the corner store.

By the time she caught up with him, he was picking up and putting down the different bars in turn, slowly reading the words he knew to work out what each was. His hands transferred the germs from the bead onto every wrapper, which in turn would be transferred to the hands of the people who bought them. ‘Mouse, look with your eyes and not with your hands.' Since when had she become a compendium of parental platitudes?

Lily leant over the counter. ‘He's fine. It's hard to choose.'

Hannah restrained herself from hurrying his decision-making. That way led only to buyer's regret, tears and, sometimes, another chocolate bar. Oscar walked all the way along the shelf and back again before he hesitantly stopped in front of a particular box and picked one out. He took it to the counter and put it down in front of Lily.

‘He's a good boy,' Lily said to Oscar with a smile.

Normally Hannah would give the money to Oscar to give to Lily but today she handed Lily the coins herself. She flinched when Lily picked up the chocolate and pressed it into Oscar's hand, embracing it with her own.

‘A good boy.' Lily opened a jar of jubes, pulled one out with her fingers, and put it in Oscar's other hand, cupping it with hers. Oscar had popped the jube in his mouth before Hannah got a word out.

Lily's hand had held the coins that Hannah had given her, that Hannah had got from who knows where, that had been held by who knows who, like all the other coins and notes Lily had handled today. And the jube. She didn't want to think how many children's hands had gone into the jube jar even in the last few hours.

Lily watched her looking at Oscar. ‘Every day more cases. You make sure you look after this boy.'

Hannah walked the rest of the block and around the corner as if the disease were on her heels. Oscar ran ahead, pulled by the chocolate he couldn't quite have. It was safely unobtainable, in her pocket. He'd never been so eager to wash his hands.

As they came through the front door, Oscar suddenly said, ‘Why is she Jesus?'

‘I don't know. I guess she thinks she is.' Oscar seemed satisfied and ran to the bathroom, leaving his backpack, his hat and his fleece dotted down the hall. Hannah let the front door fall back behind her. It closed with a reassuring click.

Oscar came rocketing back up the hall, his hands held out. ‘They're clean.'

She looked at the water dripping off them. ‘You have to dry them, germs like water. You gave them a big pool.'

‘Okay.' He was already halfway back down the hall.

‘And pick up your stuff and put it in your room.' Oscar was gone. ‘After you eat the chocolate.'

He was back again, hands wiped but still damp. Holding the bar at the bottom, with the other hand she carefully peeled it like a banana so that the wrapper never touched the chocolate.

Oscar grabbed it and ran off again, ‘Thanks Mum,' hanging in the air behind him.

She heard sounds from the living room. The world she had just shut out with the door was leaking in through the airways. ‘Television off until you've done your homework.' She picked up the bag, hat and fleece and tossed them in the bedroom as she passed. When she got to the living room, Oscar was on the floor in front of the blank television, holding the remote.

As a treat, Oscar was allowed to stay up. When Hannah
suggested it, Sean raised his eyebrow, said, ‘Really?' but didn't take it any further. He was the one who liked to bend the rules. She drew the line closer, so the laxness surprised him more than the bedtime. Calling it a ‘treat' allowed her to gloss over the fact that she'd lost track of time on the computer and hadn't got around to running Oscar's bath.

Oscar came bouncing into the kitchen. ‘Can we eat outside, like a picnic?'

Sean frowned, ‘It's dark outside buddy, and your dinner will get cold.'

They ate at the table over Oscar's groans but he quickly forgot, losing himself in retelling his day to Sean. He kept up a stream, Sean only having to throw in ‘Oh really?' and ‘What happened then?' occasionally to keep him going. Hannah had already heard these stories this afternoon, which left her mind free to roam. She tripped upon the realisation that there hadn't been a single moment in the day when all four of them had been together.

The absence of Zac was so strong it felt like a presence. Watching Oscar now, it was hard to superimpose Zac's looks and personality on that small body. But he had been that little once and they had eaten in this kitchen before Oscar was born, three around the table. Two grown-ups and a five-year-old. Then it had just been normal, now it could only be strange. Three around the table meant Zac was missing. In four years, Zac would be an adult. By the time Oscar was Zac's age, they would be three around the dinner table again.

Before the renovation, where this table stood had been a laundry. Then, the washing machine looked out on the garden. The kitchen had taken up the other half of this room, and its only view was of the side fence. The ghosts of the old Zac, Sean and Hannah sat at the ghost of the old kitchen table, and
the ghosts of the walls she had pulled down cut the room in half.

Sean sat in the dark on the edge of one of the garden beds, backlit by the string of coloured fairy lights on the fence. Next to him were two glasses of wine. He held one out to her. ‘Here, I thought you might need this. To recover from your big day.' She sat down on the cold brick and let the tension dissipate as she leant into him. He was warm, even through their clothes.