Yearning (23 page)

It was always so easy for him to apologise and sound like he meant it. Even worse, she felt guilty enough to give in to him. But she had Josh and the new baby to think about. She was deciding for them as much as for herself. She could make do without a partner, but they needed a dad. And was a father willing to change better than no father at all?

Overwhelmed, she gave in to the sobs that filled her to brimming. Grief and anger dissolved her into a misery of submission as she realised that, in the end, for the sake of her children and peace, she would take Max back.

Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it.

The Song of Solomon

It took her parents no time at all to safely entrench her back into her marriage. They were well-connected, respected community members and could make opportunities materialise like doves from a magician’s hat.

She watched in melancholy stupor as they negotiated her new living arrangements directly with Max, ignoring her pleas for some time apart from him. They agreed on a fresh start. Max would move up to be with his family, her father would find work for him. The only options offered her were those that fit with her parents’ vision of her future with Max. Do you want a job in Sheila’s coffee shop or Marge’s bakery? Would you prefer a unit in town or a house and land? Do you want us to look after Joshie or do you want to put him into daycare?

She felt like a prisoner in her own life, bluntly manipulated by her parents and Max so that she might be rehabilitated
from her lapse of judgement. Bad marriages were a result of bad decisions, her father advised, and since she was unable to make a good decision for herself it was his responsibility to make sure it was made for her. She despised his interference but experience told her that to argue was only to delay the inevitable.

With her parents encouragement she reluctantly revised the terms of her relationship with Max, insisting on sobriety and exacting his promise to be a more attentive, available father. In the end she decided she should settle for a peaceful life for herself and her children.

‘I’m so sorry.’ He kept saying it over and over again. ‘I’m so sorry. I love you. I’m so sorry.’

She hated those words. Every time he uttered them she felt resentment winding its roots a little tighter around her heart. In phonecall after phonecall he begged her to forgive him and she felt guilty enough to offer him a mean shadow that he willingly mistook for absolution. Deep down she knew it was closer to pity.

Her father found Max a job with a local builder and rented them a farmhouse to call their home. ‘Comfortable as old slippers,’ her mother said. She also arranged part-time work for her in the bakery and had reorganised her shifts at the op shop so she could babysit Joshua while her daughter worked. A local obstetrician, or ‘baby doctor’ as her mother called him, was found and a booking made in a maternity ward at the closest hospital, forty minutes’ drive away.

Flannel-shirted blokes and a van were corralled to help move their tired belongings up from the city. The day they arrived, three weeks after her attempted escape, they
brought a sheepish and repentant Max with them. She stood outside their new home watching them lift beds and lounge chairs from the rear of the van, wondering what had happened to her flash of bravery. How she had come to allow her fate to be so effortlessly sealed by her parents?

Unpacking their new home, Max looked alternately satisfied and anxious. She tore packing tape off boxes of linen and broken crockery feeling him watching her, his once welcome closeness now irritating her.

His voice was unusually light and hopeful. ‘This will be great, hon. We’ve always said we wanted to try life in the country. It’s just what we need, don’t you reckon?’

She stared at him though cardboard eyes, her voice a monotone. ‘Yep. Sure.’ Delivered with a practised smile.

She retreated, accepting this version of her life as necessary to the task of raising her children. Flatness pervaded everything she did. Like the dry sheep country that stretched in all directions beyond the boundaries of the town, she became a faded blanket of boring open space. Her eyes were glazed and cold like the acres of midday sky that stretched endlessly above them, a bright void with no variation in colour or light.

Over the weeks that followed, Max watched her waist thicken, her belly rounding outwards as if the child within were reaching towards him. Mistily he’d caress his wife’s stomach, as if to prove he was worthy of fathering it. Through half-closed eyes he watched her undress each night, her fair bare skin quivering against the cool air in the bedroom. She’d slide into the softness of the mattress beside him, the bloom of her making him want her, his lust rising against her buttocks under the blankets.
Helplessly he’d gently rub himself against her, hoping she’d respond, but too afraid to expect or demand it.

He waited for her with new found patience, approaching her as he would a wounded animal, with gentle reassurance. Now that he’d managed to catch her in his arms again, the last thing he wanted was to frighten her off. He was determined to prove his love with tenderness. He would show her he was capable of understanding her needs.

He lit candles, massaged the tightness from her shoulders, touched her with reverence. She usually fell asleep quickly, leaving him lying awake with a repentant erection. He refused to feel rejected. That she shared their bed was enough – for now. Occasionally she allowed him to caress her until she was slick and ready for him and they would make love quietly, gently, until they both sighed with relief. Their sex was like the wake of a funeral, polite and filled with platitudes.

*

Once settled Max made a real effort. He felt he owed it to her. As a parent he became willing where once he’d been reluctant; in bed he tried to be considerate where once he had been careless; in marriage he was affectionate where once he had been dismissive. And he waited, hopeful she’d to return to him.

Before long he saw he’d lost his grip upon her. She seemed to be in free-fall, floating in slow motion around him, the tie that once bound them lost to the blame that shifted from one to the other. He watched her drifting through their days together, melting in and out of the rooms of the house like a mirage. When he came close
to her she faded, reappearing again much further away. Still, he longed for her. Longed for her thin fingers to encircle his wrist and bring his palm flat against the heart-space between her breasts. He yearned for the old pearl-like sheen of her happiness and her succulent heart. But he was at a loss as to how to revive it.

*

There was a haunting sound that swallowed her sometimes. It was the sound of her soul keening for the broken promises she’d made to herself. There was no going back, she knew that. She’d been so preoccupied with Max, so focused on his woes, she’d forgotten herself in the process. Life had become about him. Then it had become about Josh. Then suddenly she woke up and realised she had disappeared into a lightless trap.

That’s where she found herself in her dreams. In a place where there was no light and no sound, except that vague, distant wailing coming from . . . where exactly? The way it drifted in and out of her hearing, it was hard to locate. She couldn’t place it. Everything around her felt wasted. Time. Money. Energy. Love. All of it. She could do nothing but sit in an anaesthetized haze, wondering about that hollow noise that kept coming and going in her ears.

Her diaries lay flat, unused and gathering dust in her cupboard. Their refuge offered her no solace now. What comfort was there in memories, good or bad? Thinking about the present was depressing enough, reinventing the past only depressed her more. Save for her little boy, love had abandoned her. She lived. She breathed. She did what she needed to do. That was all.

*

She gasped. Her stomach surged and her knees softened. The shock of seeing him again made her stagger as if she’d been punched. She stepped gingerly from the bus and eased herself down to the bus-stop seat. She peered through the traffic to the café across the road. It was unmistakably him. The tilt of his head as he read, the familiar lock of curl falling across his forehead, the reflective way he raised his cigarette to his lips.

Fascinated, she squinted between passing cars trying to get a better view of him. He had aged. Of course he had, what did she expect? There was a softness to his belly and graceful lines edged his face. He hadn’t cut his hair. The once jet-black curls were laced with grey now but were still gathered together in a ponytail. His beard had been replaced by a goatee and a sophisticated little moustache. The years had been gentle with him. He was still handsome. There was none of the weariness usual to men of his age. She watched him turn the pages of his paper and recognised a familiar deftness to his fingers that made her flush.

How long had he been in town, she wondered? She was sure her parents would have said something if they knew. Maybe he was visiting for some reason. In the years that drifted like clouds between them how often had she imagined meeting him again? She’d given up on the idea of ever seeing him again. And now here he was, no mirage but human flesh. In her fantasies their eyes met and aliveness surged through her and she would know then, with the bare reality of his face before her, the truth of what
had happened between them. Lust or love? She didn’t know. Its mystery was always just out of her grasp.

If she approached him would he remember her? What would he say? Would he see the silly school girl who nearly ruined him? Or would he see her as she was, a haggard, pregnant woman with a pleading look in her eyes? Perhaps he’d forgotten her – or worse – hated her? What would she do if he was cold to her, or embarrassed, or dismissive?

The closeness of him filled her with doubt. She’d spent years craving this moment but was suddenly afraid. After all the wondering, she didn’t want to know anymore. Before he had a chance to spot her she was on her feet rushing away from the possibility, pulling the hood of her raincoat around her face.

The small town was in the grip of the iciest of winters. Pale and open skies let in a heartless cold that was freezing everything to snapping point. Today melancholy clouds twisted and complained above. Brief shafts of sunlight speared the cast iron sky and fat rain drops began to plop noisily around her feet. She was moving fast, striding away from that moment of truth she had dreamt of for twenty-five years.

When she glanced cautiously back she saw he was gone. She relaxed and rubbed her swelling stomach. ‘Perhaps it’s for the best, hey, baby?’ She patted the tiny being tucked tightly inside her. ‘I don’t think I’m ready to see him again. Not yet anyway.’

Her pace slowed as she realised that destiny had somehow washed over her. She was grateful for it. Hard pellets of hail speckled the ground now as the weather
gained momentum. Gathering herself inside her coat she picked up speed. The walk home would be longer for the rain. Lightning briefly lit the street made dark by the heavy storm. Scrunching down into her coat she headed towards the dirt road that would lead her home. A passing car pulled up beside her and tooted.

Glad for the kindness of country people, she bent to the window to thank the driver for offering her a ride. But, as the misty window glided down, her relief dissipated. She looked into a kind but penetrating gaze. His gaze. His face. His voice uttering her name with warm surprise. He was inviting her in, away from the storm and into the sanctuary of his car.

Her hand rested on the car door handle. She teetered on the edge of the moment while thunder growled behind her like a suspicious dog.

It was the moment she’d longed for. A weighted moment, concentrated with gravity. Over an abyss of more than two decades, the secrecy of her past – a past she’d worked hard to conceal – began to crack open. As she stood awash in the storm, all her attention was drawn to the deep brown of his eyes. The universe seemed to pause, converging to the pinprick of his pupils, so small and perfect that she knew, in that moment at least, fate existed.

So, Destiny, she thought, you hunted me down and caught me, and this is what you look like, an old lover in a tarted up Monaro offering me a ride home in the rain.

Words from her letters, words she’d written years and years ago, returned to her.

I ache for you in ways I never thought were possible. I long to hear your voice close to my ear, my body longs for your touch. I smoulder in your presence.

His smile was fading in the face of her silence. She realised she needed to respond. She searched frantically for some words, appropriate and sayable words, but none came. A river of rain ran over them with such intensity it threatened to melt away all that was solid. He continued to watch her from the dry centre of his car, the engine gently idling, the rain dripping onto the passenger seat beside him.

Finally she opened the passenger-side door and climbed in next to him. It was done. She was here. There was nothing for it but to live through this now. She stared mutely out of the windscreen. He reached across her to wind her window up. His scent rose up and wrapped her in a forgotten longing. She shut her eyes and willed the memory away.

Water dripped from her face onto her coat. She felt herself soaking the seat. She apologised for messing up his car. He dismissed her apology with a laugh and a wave of his hand.

He let the silence settle and rest between them as he examined her face. His eyes made her want to hide. What was he looking for? The weight of years of repressed emotion pressed at her temples.

‘It’s really good to see you,’ he said. ‘You look great.’

His voice was just as she remembered it, gentle and persuasive. Looking down she fiddled with her jacket zipper. Silence resumed. She stared uncomfortably at her
hands and noticed with surprise how bitten down her nails were. He turned on the CD player. Joni Mitchell filled the air with plaintive song.

‘Which way are you going?’ he asked, shifting the car into gear.

‘We’ve just moved into Cuddihy’s farmhouse on Old Gully Road.’ She emphasised the ‘we’.