The Opal Desert (31 page)

‘Aha! There you go then. Concentrate on Alia,' said Shirley.

‘That's easier said than done. What do I do?'

‘What's she doing now?'

‘She dabbles. The girls have always had money so they've been under no pressure to earn a living. But of all of them, Alia has been the most interested in her father's field. She was a fine arts student, and she worked in a studio for a while. Then all the girls opened a trendy fashion boutique, but that didn't last. The best thing she did was work in a friend's art gallery in Paddington, and now she's talking about setting up one of her own.'

‘Can't you help her do it?'

‘I could but I really don't know if she'd appreciate my involvement. At this stage there's nothing definite about the gallery. It's still all talk.'

Shirley looked thoughtful. ‘You said there was a retrospective planned of Milton's sculptures?'

Kerrie rolled her eyes. ‘Yes. Wonderful plan, but it's a lot of work.'

‘Why don't you get Alia to help you? Get her involved. She'll get experience setting up an exhibition, which, if she wants to open a gallery, she'll need, and it will make her feel that she still has a role in her father's life. And her help will certainly free you up a bit,' said Shirley.

Kerrie thought for a moment and smiled. ‘That is a brilliant idea. You are so practical. And smart. I don't know why I didn't think of that. I'm sure that if I approach her carefully and along the lines you've suggested, it might just work. Shirley, you are a gem.'

‘Maybe you could take the girls back an opal each.'

‘If they wanted jewellery they'd go to Tiffany's in Castlereagh Street,' said Kerrie.

‘Okay, not such a good idea, but do approach Alia about the New York retrospective.'

‘You're right. I'll give it a try.' She smiled at Shirley. ‘You have the knack of making me see things a little differently, a little deeper. You're a good friend, so I guess that's why I worry about you.'

‘Nothing will happen to me. My opals and my secrets are safe.'

Nevertheless, Kerrie was still concerned that a physically unfit older woman living in a dugout in a hillside in an isolated spot hoarding valuable opal, which others knew about, could be a sitting duck for a robbery. ‘You're so trusting, Shirley.'

There was a noise at the entrance and Davo stomped into the dugout, calling out to Shirley.

‘See what I mean? Your open-door policy could get you into trouble,' said Kerrie in a low voice.

‘Davo is a mate,' said Shirley and called back, ‘In here, Davo.'

‘I saw your outside light on. Not like you to leave it on, so I thought I'd check. Hello, again,' he said to Kerrie.

‘Hi. Well, Shirley, I'd better go. I'll see you tomorrow, with the promised bottle of red.'

‘If I'd known you wanted wine, I'd have brought some up,' said Davo affably.

‘It's fine, Davo.'

Kerrie kissed Shirley. ‘See you later. And thank you.'

Shirley nodded. ‘See you, sweetie. Bye, Davo, thanks for checking up on me.'

On a whim, Kerrie took a drive out to Opal Lake. The shimmering silver sand was, as usual, deserted. Through her dark glasses it glittered like some mirage. She pulled on a hat and walked a little distance, thinking of Shirley as a little girl with her father playing in the waters of the magical lake and, later, Shirley and Stefan camping here under the stars. She paused, shading her eyes to stare at a rusting coil of old barbed wire and a rotten fence post, the last man standing at the end of a hopeless march across the desert.

The beauty of this silent sandy lake now above the ancient inland sea still fascinated her. She planned to come and paint here when she returned in the cooler months. Maybe one day she, too, would see Opal Lake filled with water. She squinted, trying to imagine the surface covered in shining water with flocks of birds dancing upon it.

Maybe it was her specially tinted sunglasses but it suddenly looked as though the endless lake was smeared in muted colours as if a layer of opal lay just beneath the surface. In the sky above the same hot bright colours flashed like a reflection. It must be the glare of the hot sun, she decided, and turned and retraced her steps.

Kerrie left a note for Ingrid, thanking her for allowing her to use her dugout and saying that if she were ever in Sydney she was more than welcome to stay at Rose Bay. Then she propped up the small sketch she'd done as a gift beside it.

She packed the car and drove the few doors to Shirley's dugout. As she looked across the little town and the plains beyond, she committed the primary colours that burned on her retina to memory – deep blue sky and white clouds; russet red rocks; soft, deep green trees; the flash of scarlet flowers; the golden light; the soft-looking, tufted balls of grasses.

‘I'll remember all this on a rainy day in Sydney,' she said to Shirley as she came inside.

‘My muddle?' said Shirley as she pushed books aside on the kitchen table. ‘Time for a cuppa?'

‘Thanks, but no. I'll get a coffee in the Hill. I don't want to prolong the agony. I hate saying goodbye.'

‘It's
au revoir
. This is your second home. You have unfinished business here.'

‘I do?' said Kerrie. ‘Perhaps you're right. Anyway, I brought you a parting present. Just a small thing.' Kerrie held out a large flat envelope.

Shirley took it and opened the flap and slid out a sketch beneath a layer of tissue. As she lifted the gauzy paper she found her own face staring back at her. The painting was a double image, one of Shirley throwing her head back with a wide smile and laughter crinkling her eyes, and beside it a profile of a thoughtful, wistful woman, remembering.

Shirley cleared her throat and Kerrie could see she was touched by her efforts.

‘This is good, Kerrie. You got me, though I prefer laughing Shirley.' She looked at Kerrie and her pale blue eyes were watery with emotion. ‘You see inside people. You have the inner eye good painters have, to be able see a person's soul, not just their skin. You must keep painting, Kerrie.'

‘Shirley, you don't know how you've helped me. Not just with boosting my confidence in my art, but helping me be strong and stand up for myself. Might be a bit late, but I'm ready for my life again – dealing with the girls, putting Milton into perspective and getting on with things. I'm going to look up some old friends, have a bit of fun and paint.'

‘Sounds like a plan to me,' said Shirley, holding out her arms.

They held each other for a moment and then Shirley patted Kerrie on the shoulder. ‘See you when you come back here, girl.'

‘I wish . . .' began Kerrie, but Shirley put her finger to her lips.

‘No more talking. I'll be here when you turn up again. Drive safely.'

Kerrie nodded and gave a little wave and walked from the cool quiet dugout into the searing summer heat. Whether it was the heat haze or tears, the scenery wavered and danced as she drove slowly away from Opal Lake. The landscape was empty, no breeze, no animal or human moved in the midday sun, but in the cool caverns beneath the surface, in tunnels and shafts and man-made chambers, the search for the elusive opal continued to occupy the hearts and heads of dreamers.

S
HE STOOD BESIDE THE
other girls, stretching her legs and flexing her arms, her vision filled with the minutiae of the smooth red track curving away from her and the other poised athletes. She focused on the ribbon of track, screening out the closeness of the other runners either side of her. All of them knew that, in a little more than two minutes, only one of them would be the winner. The sounds of the crowd, the starter and the amplified announcer faded into the background as she waited for the one signal she needed.

The sound of the starter's pistol ripped into her nerve endings and sent her rocketing forward, even before she'd made the conscious decision to move. It had precipitated an instinctive severing of her stationary state. She was instantly in full flight. She'd sometimes wondered if racehorses felt the same. One minute they were at the starter's gate and then they had exploded onto the track at full gallop.

As she ran, Anna kept in her own mental zone. She could see only the two runners whose staggered start had put them ahead of her, and she was oblivious to the others as she ran her own race, against herself, against her pounding chest and straining muscles, hauling deep breaths into her lungs to race her towards her goal, eight hundred metres to the finish. Briefly, her trainer's words came to her about pacing herself, positioning herself, staying with her race strategy, but somehow her mind did not seem able to control the surging energy propelling her forward.

The runners merged into a single lane and jostled for position, passing the finishing line for the first time. Just one more circuit of the track, four hundred metres left to run. Anna overtook the leaders and the exhilaration of seeing the empty track ahead was so great she could hear, as well as feel, her blood pounding, which combined with her panting breath to drown out all other sounds. She knew that she had less than one hundred metres to go but as she neared the finish line she suddenly heard the pounding of feet behind her and, as she lunged for the finish, another girl flashed past her.

Anna doubled over, gasping for air. She shook the hand of the girl who had beaten her, and a slap on the shoulder by the third place getter acknowledged her own achievement. She finally looked around as if seeing the scene for the first time. Then she heard the PA announcements, the shouts, the calls of the crowd. It was all suddenly deafening.

Craddock, who coached her and others in the South Eastern University athletics club, led her away.

‘How was my time?'

‘Not bad. Could be better, but you can do it.'

‘But I came second, didn't I?'

‘Yeah. In a pretty mediocre field. Get some of that sports drink into you and I'll see you in twenty minutes on the bus. I want to watch one more race.'

Anna suddenly felt wobbly and lightheaded. She grabbed a bottle of energy drink, pulled on a T-shirt and track pants over her running shorts, picked up her bag and got on the waiting minibus at the rear of the stadium.

‘How'd you go, love?' asked the driver. ‘No good? Always next time, eh?'

‘Yeah, right.' Anna leant against the window and closed her eyes in the winter sun.

She must have dozed. As the other athletes jumped onto the bus chattering animatedly she jerked upright in the seat.

‘Listen up,' called out Craddock. ‘I want to run through the schedule for next week. We need to put in some serious effort.'

‘Isn't that what we've been doing?' called one of the boys, a lanky hurdler.

‘You wait. We're all going to have to go up a notch in the countdown to the interstate meet. We need to put in an extra effort, so I'm changing our training schedule, starting next week.'

‘We have exams!' wailed one of the girls.

The minibus headed through the sleepy Saturday afternoon streets towards South Adelaide while the group of athletes, most of whom were university students, discussed the rescheduling of their training sessions. It would clash with their studies and their social life, but they were prepared to compromise.

‘All right, that seems to suit everyone, then,' said Craddock, looking at his clipboard. ‘Anna, you can work in with the others as you're more flexible.'

‘I have to work,' she answered. She always had to fit in with the students and the coach seemed to assume that her job came second to running. She knew that the athletics club was funded by the university, so the students' needs took priority, but it annoyed her just the same.

The tall blonde in the seat in front of her turned around. ‘You ran a great race today,' said Sonja. ‘Have you put in your application to the Track and Field Institute?' When Anna shook her head, Sonja added, ‘The numbers are pretty tight. Only a few spots left, we heard.'

‘I can't see the point of applying. Unless there's a scholarship, I can't afford to go there fulltime.'

‘But, Anna, you're so good. You know Craddock boasts about you being a state champion, or even an Olympic contender.'

‘I'm not so sure about that,' said Anna.

‘Anna! He's always telling the rest of us that we should be more like you and train more. He goes on and on about us not having your dedication and says that we should put in the hours you do,' said Sonja.

Anna shrugged. Yes, she did a lot of training runs on her own, but it was hard to explain to the others on the team why she did so much more than they did. ‘I'll see how I go,' she said.

Sonja lowered her voice. ‘Couldn't Craddock give you more one-on-one time?' she asked. ‘I mean, he's always boasting about you.'

‘I suppose he could, but he has a lot of other runners to think about,' said Anna. ‘He seems to like the fact I keep training on my own even when I don't have to and my times are good.'

‘You do more than that, Anna. Your times get better and better. I hate the way that at some meets I do well and then at others I drop back. I wish I was more consistent.'

‘That's true of everyone and it depends on our state of mind and fitness on the day of the race,' said Anna as the bus pulled up in the university parking lot. ‘See you next week, I guess.'

‘Take care, Anna.' Sonja watched Anna sling her bag over her shoulder and walk quickly across the parking lot. It occurred to Sonja that she and her teammates knew little about one of the club's most promising runners. Where did Anna live? What did she do in her spare time? Did she even have her own transport? All they knew was that she worked as a waitress, which was why the coach probably thought she had flexible hours.

Anna wasn't a student at South Eastern University. The athletics club, a member of the University Sports Association, opened its doors to athletes of different disciplines who wanted to compete and improve their standards and move up the competitive ranks, even if they were not studying or working at the university. Sonja knew that Craddock had said Anna could be an elite athlete and that her rising star would cast a little glitter on them all.

For Anna, the contradiction in running for the club and running to satisfy a need in herself was causing her more and more disquiet. She'd had several disagreements with her coach, who constantly criticised her race strategy. He called her a bolter and tried to get her to hold back behind the frontrunners before making the final dash to the line.

‘Keep something in reserve! Don't you have any speed other than walking or flat chat? Be a racehorse, not a greyhound. Use your brain!' he admonished her.

‘I either win or I don't,' she answered him.

‘You won't win if you don't learn to strategise. You're not a sprinter, you're running eight hundred metres. Pace yourself. You don't have to be the frontrunner.'

Again and again she tried: ran and attempted to hold back. But she found it impossible. She always seemed to want to run as fast as she could from the moment the starter's pistol sounded. Race tactics evaded her.

Craddock was impressed with her speed but exasperated. He tried to explain once again how he wanted her to pace herself throughout the race. ‘Too much, too soon. What happens when you're almost at the finish and someone shoots past? You've nothing left in the tank to overtake them.'

Anna irritated him even more by shrugging. ‘That's me. I don't know, I can't change the way I am. Something just seems to happen and I can't stop myself.'

‘Yeah, right. In the zone, whatever. Don't give me that new-age shit.' When he saw her face close up, he softened. ‘Listen, Anna, you're good. You have a lot of potential, but athletics is as much about your mental preparedness as your physical fitness. If you can't keep focused and listen to what I have to say, we have to have a rethink. You have to really want this. You've been given a few opportunities here, so trust me. If you want to go to the institute, we have to know you're going to give it your best shot before we can recommend you.'

‘Have I ever not given it my all?' asked Anna evenly.

The coach hesitated before answering, unsure how to read Anna's expression. ‘What do your family think? Do they support you in your dream?'

Anna turned away. ‘I do my own thing. I'm twenty and I only live at home because it's near the uni track and I don't have to pay rent.'

Craddock spoke more gently. ‘Would it help if I spoke to your parents? Let them know that I think you have potential?'

‘What for? I make my own decisions.'

‘I know that travel to sports meetings and other expenses can add up and funding is sparse and hard to get. What do you want to do, Anna? What makes you happy? How badly do you want to compete in serious competitions?'

‘I like running,' she said simply.

‘But you need to focus, have a plan. Because if you don't want to dedicate yourself and see how far you can go, you're wasting our time. Mine and yours.'

Anna didn't respond for a moment, then said quietly, ‘I'm sorry if I'm wasting your time.'

‘It's not wasting my time if you take my advice!' he said. ‘You can't do this alone, but you have to choose. Either you dedicate yourself to an athletic career, and that includes your mind not just your body, or you consider it something you just do for pleasure, more a hobby than a career. Then you can have time for fun and boyfriends instead. But if you really want to take athletics seriously, you have to be in the right head space.'

‘I know that. I just like to run. But I have to fit running in with my job at the coffee shop. Mum and Dad didn't mind taking me around to Little Athletics meets when I was young but they don't see how it could be a career, you know, how I would make money from it. Maybe I should be doing something for the future, getting a proper job.' This small speech came out in a rush, expelled as if it had been long held inside her.

Craddock lifted his arms in a mildly helpless gesture. ‘Then it's up to you to decide. We all come to a fork in the road at some stage of our lives. You'd better do some serious thinking in the next month or so.'

Anna had a lot to think about but no one with whom she could discuss her feelings. What to do with her life? Should she try to pursue a career on the track? Or should she forget that idea and look for something that would make her money? She had fuzzy thoughts but no clear plans. All she knew was that she loved to run. But she needed a job that was flexible enough to allow her time for training. She didn't earn a lot from her job and what she did earn was quickly absorbed by living expenses and travelling costs. She was worried. If she couldn't run the way Craddock wanted, was she just wasting her time?

Anna mulled over these thoughts as she waited on tables at the coffee shop where she worked. She picked up a newspaper along with the empty coffee mugs where two backpackers had been sitting and noticed that a couple of position vacant ads had been circled. As she walked to the kitchen, one in particular seemed to jump out at her.

Find Opals in your Spare Time!
Girl or guy wanted to work in Hotel Bar.
Drinks and Food service. Some cleaning.
Accommodation provided. Opal Lake NSW.
Call Mick.

She tore out the small ad with the phone number even though she had no idea where Opal Lake was. It sounded intriguing and suddenly the idea of going to a remote little town where she knew no one and no one knew her, to work in a pub and maybe scratch around for an opal or two, seemed very attractive. So many thoughts crowded in on her. A bit of a break sounded good, and it would give her time to think and decide about her future. She decided to call this Mick.

‘Where's this place? Seems a bit remote just to go to think,' said Craddock. ‘How long will you be away?'

‘I don't know. I'm not making any plans. I'm looking forward to having no pressure and some freedom.'

‘No cranky Craddock, eh?' He grinned. ‘Listen, Anna, if that's going to sort you out, then do it, but don't be away too long. What do your family think?'

‘They think I'm crazy. They just want me to settle down in a steady job.'