Mallawindy (25 page)

‘Annie?' Ben's head emerged from behind a stand of magazines.

‘In the flesh.'

‘Annie?'

He walked towards her, his smile too wide, his hands full. Then he dropped the magazines, reached out a hand, but changed his mind and pushed it into his pocket. ‘Well, you're about the last person I expected to see today.' He was behi
nd the counter. He reached beneath it and picked up a women's magazine. ‘I saw your photograph in it, Annie, and I wrote to them,' he said. ‘Did they get in contact – ?'

Ann took his hand away from the papers, and she squeezed his hand, then signed. ‘I miss you. Little Annie miss you too much. Think this morning, better go home, see Ben. Make him come my wedding.'

He shook his head and his green eyes threatened to overflow. ‘Course I'll come.' He coughed, turned away, looking for something to do. ‘I'll telephone Bron,' he signed. Signs were safer than words right now. Ann watched him escape to the back room.

She heard him blow his nose. She heard the dialling, and the, ‘I told you so. Guess who's just walked in the door?' He was smiling his gentle Ben smile when he came back to his counter. ‘She said, don't go away. She'll get one of her boyfriends to drive her up. Should be here in half an hour. She's in Daree. Who are you marrying?' He leaned there, smiling, shaking his head.

‘The red-headed Yank in the – ‘ Deadeye Dooley wandered in the side door, and she stopped. His hair was the same carrot red.

‘Look who's just turned up,' Ben called, and Deadeye stared
at Ann with his two matching pale blue eyes. The white blob had been replaced by glass. No thunderbolts, but a modern-day miracle. He was better looking than Roger. She laughed.

‘How a ya doing?' he said. ‘I seen you on the television.'

Then Jimmy Willis arrived, booked in for a late haircut – but it wouldn't take long to cut what he had left on his head. ‘G' day, Annie. Bloody famous now, Ah?'

Did he really think that one lousy television commercial had nullified all her years as Dummy Burton? Didn't they know that little Dummy was still cowering in the dark place, wanting someone to talk for her?

‘Hello, Jimmy,' she said, then she commented on the weather, offered them a topic to pursue. She'd have to get away. She wanted Ben, not them. She wanted – .

‘They say it's going to be another hot one tomorrow.'

‘All the old blokes are forecasting a long hot summer.'

‘Is Mr Fletcher still here?' she said.

‘Yeah, the bloody old soak. Dunno how,' Jimmy said. ‘I've got my oldest starting school next year. I was hoping the stupid old fool would be dead.'

‘Tell Bron I'll be at the school, Ben.' Ann left them with their forecasts and their haircuts.

The old schoolhouse looked smaller. Everything in Mallawindy looked smaller. Would he look smaller? She walked to his front door, a door she had never entered. Always the back door had been left open for her, but she knocked at his front door. Knocked twice. Waited.

He flung it wide. Bigger, older, his face belligerent, then his features collapsed and he cried. He grasped her, held her to his bulk and he cried.

She drew him inside his house, safe from prying eyes. She closed the front door and he disappeared into his bathroom. She walked to his kitchen, filled the jug, at peace here, finally at peace. He, who still smelt of brandy, he, of all the ones she had left
behind, had given her what she needed this day. Peace in those old arms. God that he had been my father, what a life could have been mine, she thought.

The tea was made and poured when he joined her at the table. ‘No ghost,' he said. ‘No ghost.' His podgy old hand grasped her own, and he held it long, patting it. Patting it.

They talked, talked of many things, of work and cars and Melbourne, and of Narrawee, and when she looked at her watch, he hurried to his den and returned, his chubby old cheeks unable to hold back a smile as he slapped two paperback books on his kitchen table, unashamed of the voluptuous near-naked women featured there in high colour. Like a guilty boy, he waited expectantly for her reaction, his eyes watching her expression as she frowned over first one, then the other.

‘I've read these, sir.'

‘Have you, indeed. You read this trash, Burton?' His smile was wide.

Her mouth fell open. She lifted her eyes to his, holding his with an unspoken question, which he replied to anyhow.

‘I cut down the cherry tree. I am the rogue, the unscrupulous capitalistic abortionist.' They laughed together, their laughter real. They bellowed with laughter, until the windows rattled in their frames, and the table shook, and the chairs squealed on aching legs. Then they drank more tea and controlled their laughter while he signed the flyleaf of the two novels, signed them with his real name, and he placed them in her hand.

‘When I am dead, you may give up my secret.' She allowed him the floor, knowing he had been starved of an ear in which to pour his secret. She listened and she laughed and it was so good.

It was almost six when she told him she was to be married in January, that she'd be living in America. She spoke of May, and Sam. She looked him in the eye then, and said, ‘I don't want Sam to walk me down the aisle, sir. Would you? I'd prefer to have someone of my own – make it mean something to me.'

He hurried from the room again, his face crumpling. He stayed away a long time. When he returned, she was sitting relaxed where he had left her, and he sat beside her, taking her hand in his, seeking words that wouldn't come.

‘Proud. Proud and honoured, Burton. You do an old fool the greatest honour. The greatest honour, Burton. Proud,' he repeated. ‘I am so proud of you, child. Seeing you this day, seeing what you have become. Knowing that I played some small part in ... Ah.' His sigh shook his massive frame. ‘Proud,' he said. But the old man of words was lost for more words. Head shaking, mouth trembling, he turned away.

Ann left soon after. Branny was banging down his front door.

Eyes flashing a language of their own, Bronwyn sent her friend and his motor-bike on their way. ‘See you at Ben's after ten. Don't forget me, ' she yelled and she ran to Ann, hugged her, danced her up and down the footpath.

Little Bron, all grown up. A dry wit, her cigarette packet offered to Ann before she lit up and sucked life from the weed, as her father did. As if resentful of its escape, Bronwyn attempted to possess the smoke to the end.

‘I'm getting married, Bron,' Ann said, studying her sister's hand, its shape around the cigarette. It was her hand, but smaller. Strange. Bron, so vital, so alive – and she? ‘I thought you might be my bridesmaid. Ben said he'd come. He'll be best man. Mr Fletcher will be there. I hoped maybe ... I'm going to ask Mum, but I don't want – '

Bronwyn laughed, spraying smoke, wasting smoke. ‘Mum? Invite Mum and not her Prince Charming? Do you really think she'd leave her cows and Jack just to go to a wedding? Big joke, Annie, but I'll be there with bells on. I'm dying to see Narrawee. Can I bring a friend?'

‘Bring as many as you like. Most of the guests will belong to Roger's parents and to May.'

Bronwyn was an explosion of nervous energy, limbs tossed to the passenger seat, mouth erupting in chatter, she puffed smoke as Ann drove again over the bridge.

‘Will he be home?'

‘You've been away too long. Don't you remember? He always eats at six,' she mimicked his voice, and did it well. ‘Get the bloody food on the table. It's six.'

‘Is he safe these days?'

‘Ah. He's weak as shit. Ben has got the young cop dogging his footsteps. He's scared of cops. He hasn't hit Mum for six months. Not that we can see, anyway. And if he ever placed as much as one finger on me, I'd kill him, and I've told him so. Told him I'd blast him to hell with his own gun while he slept, then I'd scream long-term child abuse from the roof tops. Everybody is doing it these days – and getting away with it.'

Jack's eyes were watching the fly-wire door; he was ready for Ann, but he hadn't expected Bronwyn, who walked to t
he corner where his gun was kept. He watched her pick it up, break it professionally, and remove the cartridges, her eyes daring him to comment. She took out her cigarettes, lit one, then tossed him the packet. He caught it, lit his own and pocketed the rest. Tame.

Ellie left her stove to kiss Bronwyn's cheek, but Jack's eyes were on Ann.

‘What are you doing home, you crawling Narrawee bitch?' he commented.

‘I thought crawling home to Narrawee was a Burton neurosis I inherited from you.' She watched Ellie return to her stove, to her pumpkin. Two hours ago she was forced from her pumpkin patch; at five she was peeling pumpkin, now she was mashing it. She hadn't kissed Ann's cheek, hadn't touched her, wouldn't look at her. ‘At least they were pleased to see me down there,' Ann said.

‘Good old Sam, and how was he?'

‘Bought you a new car, I see, or did you win the lottery? Rob a bank?' He laughed cynically and emptied his glass. ‘I don't get you. I would have crawled for that place. I would have developed calluses on my belly, licked the old coot's boots, and backside, if Narrawee had been the prize.'

‘You don't know what you're talking about.' He pushed Ellie away from her plates, picked up his bottle and refilled his glass, while Ellie stood, spoon raised, pumpkin pot in her hand. ‘You don't know the half of it, you stupid bitch.'

‘Don't drink any more, Jack. Annie! Don't go making trouble as soon as you walk in the door,' Ellie said. ‘Sit down, Jack love. Don't let her upset you.'

Jack tossed the whisky down, while Ann stood smiling. ‘You come back here thinking you can lord it over me, you smiling bitch. Thinking you can tell me what I should have done. This is my bloody castle, and I'm God here, and never you forget it. No-one tells me what to do in Chook-Shit County. Get out. Get back to Narrawee. A poor bloody man had his life stolen from under his nose by his bastard of a brother, and you come here and laugh about it.'

Ann had walked to the door. She stood there, looking at the two oddities in the kitchen. A love match. A marriage, made in hell. She shook her head, no longer able to raise energy enough to tolerate one meal. ‘Well, it's been lovely seeing both of you, as always.' She held her plastic smile as she stepped down into the passage, and the wire door slammed behind her.

‘I've cooked enough dinner, Annie. You're welcome to stay if you just behave yourself,' Ellie called after her.

‘I'll take a raincheck, Mum.'

‘Don't stay away so long then, and good luck with your career.'

Ann turned, looked at her mother through the fly-wire. Stared at her. She'd driven here with so much hope. Driven eight hours,
almost got a speeding fine for this. For this? ‘Crap,' she said. ‘Good luck with my career? You don't know what my career is. You didn't even ask. I can take your disinterest, Mum, but don't insult me with pretence. I've been a problem to you all my life. I know it and you know it. I'm trouble you prefer not to have around.'

‘That's not true, love. It's lovely to see you looking so well.'

‘But more lovely to watch me making a fool of myself on television. That's my daughter, Annie. Electronic tube that you don't have to touch. Don't understand how it works, of course, but I don't try too hard either. Well, now trouble has gone away for good. I'm off to America. I'll do a real Johnny this time – '

‘Don't you mention that disloyal little bastard's name around me,' Jack yelled. ‘Don't you bring his name back here. Get out. Get off my land. Stay away from me, you wild-eyed bitch.'

‘You can bank on that,' Ann called back, she was already halfway to her car. Bronwyn came at a run through the eastern door.

‘Get!' he bellowed through the window as the car took off, eager to be gone, to return to bitumen and sanity. ‘Get out of my bloody life.'

Ann drove wildly along the rutted track, Bronwyn bouncing, laughing, spraying smoke at her side. The old gate closed behind them, Ann drove again. Her brain was on fire. Migraine? Stroke? She wasn't sure. She only knew she had to get out of this
town and fast. ‘What was I thinking of, Bron? What did I come back here for? Her approval? Her blessing?'

‘Self approval is all that counts for me, Annie, and I'm pretty good at it. Where are you staying tonight?'

‘Where are you living?'

‘Daree.'

‘I'll take you home, then head back to Melbourne. I'm supposed to be in Narrawee entertaining my future in-laws. It's the
last place I want to be, but it's the only place I've got to go. Funny, but not funny.'

‘I'll have to hang around until Mark comes back. I didn't know your plans, Annie. I told him to pick me up at ten, and there's no way I can contact him. Do you drink? Let's go to the pub. Show the town what Jack's daughters are made of.'

‘Stuff the bloody town – and him, and Mum. I've got to get out of it, Bron.'

‘You just got here, for Christ's sake. What about Bessy? What about Ben?'

‘I didn't come back to visit with Bessy. I thought Mum would be finally pleased to see me. I talked myself into thinking she'd give me a kiss, Bron. She always gives you a kiss. But she gave me a rundown on who died. “Oh, and by the way, love, old Mrs McDonald had a stroke. Oh, and by the way, old Dave Eva finally passed away. They opened up Rella's grave and put him on top, love”.'

Bronwyn giggled. ‘Poor old bastard. So he finally got on top, did he? I wonder how many he had to push off to get there?' Ann couldn't even raise a smile. ‘Mum can't help what she is, Annie. Any normal responses she might have had were gone long before we knew her. She's his punch-drunk puppet and she's learned to love it. It'll buy her points in the hereafter.'