Watercolours (6 page)

Four calls, five, six.

The pauses were heavy and loaded with longing. She couldn't help but listen in hope of a reply, any evidence of another, no matter how faint or far away. The silence was like a weight upon her, pressing down slowly, threatening to crush her until she was nothing but a slab of bloodless meat. But the pauses didn't last long. The bird was thorough and repeated itself quickly. On and on it appealed into the dying day and this sound, which for months had created a wistful backdrop to the afternoons, now left everything frazzled.

Camille ran harder.

She ran almost every day now, in the late afternoon when the heat had begun to ease, tackling the winding roads of her neighbourhood and finishing with a swim in the river. She welcomed the physical routine of it, watched with gratification as her legs grew strong and gained definition, observed the steady operation of her lungs. Her feet were battered but functional. She nursed shin splints with grim satisfaction and continued to pound the bitumen. Was she punishing her body or rewarding it? It was hard to tell, but she liked to know that she could still feel the strength of her heart; its brute force, at any rate.

On she ran, past the odd array of houses: red-brick boxes, all lawn and no garden but for a few yellow palms; sagging weatherboard cottages propped up by ancient mulberry trees; fibro places with bare dirt fronts hosting ragged assemblies of plants in plastic pots. She hurtled past cats blinking on sun-warmed concrete driveways and dogs that puffed out an obligatory bark but were too lazy to chase her. Her body was all breath now and her sense of smell acute; unwittingly she took in the odour of each house she passed: the halitosis of stale laundry and mildew; the chlorine fumes of swimming pools mixed with the Vegemite-on-toast smell of children; the musky reek of perfumed owners who, having grown desensitised over a lifetime of olfactory violence, continued their merciless dousing. She could tell when more honest odours were masked with a fumigation of Peach Bouquet, Vanilla Spice or Pine Forest. Already, this time of the afternoon, there were dinners cooking and she smelled chops bursting fat under grills and potatoes being pulverised. At one house a lone curry simmered, offering an exotic note. She was thankful it wasn't Thursday —
Thursday was garbage night and she had to make her way past wheelie bins full of putrefying prawn heads, sour milk cartons and indistinguishable items of waste, sweetly fetid in their twin towers of hot plastic.

Arriving at the reserve she plunged through trees and onto the river track. Long grass whipped her legs and spiky bushes fanned out to prick her but she welcomed the pain because it meant that soon she would be still and underwater. She reached a clearing and walked in small circles for a minute to catch her breath, noticing that the cicadas had fallen silent all at once, as if deciding enough was enough for one day. She pulled off her shoes and socks to find her feet pink and blind-looking, like baby marsupials. Peeling clothes down to her swimming costume she staggered over the sticks and twigs of the water line and flopped into the river.

It was tepid. She swam out to reach the chilled undercurrent, took a breath and dived under to linger in its cool depths. Surfacing, she pulled into a weary breaststroke and then dived under again to relieve her hot cheeks. Floating on her back for a while, she struggled to keep her hips from sinking and her legs dragging down into the soup of algae she had stirred up. Floating in the river, unlike the sea, required effort. The river pulled you down like a sinker and Camille found it vaguely unsettling, as though she were being gently but persistently claimed by a mysterious opaque underworld where all things turned quietly to slime.

Late sun skipped across the surface of the water. She closed her eyes, stopping her ears against the sound of the koel, which had taken up its mateless post in the canopy somewhere above. She felt embarrassed on the bird's behalf by its stubborn lack of
grace, its pitiful persistence and refusal to get on with other birdy activities that surely needed tending to.

She sculled backwards with a kick. She would
not
end up like that wretched bird. She would not spend each approaching evening lamenting her loneliness while everywhere around her families prepared their meals, shared their day and snuggled into their various odd-smelling nests for the night. Being alone was not lamentable. The loneliest years of her life had been spent with an unsuitable partner. She had always assumed she'd end up having kids but Simon was never keen and in the end it was the reason she'd extricated herself from the relationship. She had to move on; things could have gone on like that forever with Simon and she needed to give herself time to find someone else. And now here she was five years later with not a single contender on the horizon. Pete was keen but he didn't count; he had nothing to talk about except his ex-wife. Lately she'd begun to realise that it might not happen for her. She might never have kids. But at least she wasn't with someone who resisted commitment. At least she wasn't with someone who made her desires seem inappropriate, someone who made her doubt the best parts of herself.

She looked up into the trees. If love had passed her by then so be it. There were other joys to be had in the world. And if someone of her intelligence couldn't come up with any, well, that was the real tragedy.

She kicked frog-like towards the shallows and steeled herself for the slurry her toes would encounter on the climb out. She struck stones, leaves, something smooth and slippery that felt like bones, but she carried on until she was over the worst of it and up on the grassy bank once more, feeling brave and refreshed.

 

Later that evening, she picked through the box of new books distractedly. She started on a novel but after a few pages she found her mind wandering. She thought about Dominic Best under the sprinkler. It took her ages to put the image of him out of her head.

She forgot to call Pete.

Dom's flat was on Riviera Drive. The school had sorted it out with the estate agent within days of the job being confirmed — too easy, he'd thought, until they told him the rent; a flat that cheap in Sydney was a guaranteed rat-hole and straightaway he'd pictured swollen-chipboard cupboards, shag carpet matted with dirty splotches of candle wax, ruptured ceilings and nests of unstoppable cockroaches. But although it was one of the more absurdly named buildings he had come across, Camelot Mews was all right. It was modern, at least: two pale-brick double-storey buildings side by side on a nice stretch of river. Each flat had a small balcony, most of them crammed with outdoor furniture, pot-plants on stands, clothes horses and barbecues. The lucky inhabitants — and he was one — had views across the Lewis into town.

He was almost dry but he still felt immensely pleased with himself following the meeting. He rode past a sentry post of wheelie bins and flew down the steep concrete driveway to the common courtyard between the buildings, where a couple of skinny palms did their best to look tropical and a clothesline was strung with gigantic knickers and bras. He locked his bike up under the carport and took a moment to peer through the windows of a vintage white Falcon he hadn't seen before. It was a beauty, in immaculate condition with a classic gear stick
and bench seats in duck-egg blue vinyl. He pictured himself behind the wheel, cruising through town, barrelling down the coast road to the ocean. Then his father's voice started in his head:
A financial black hole, Dominic! Foolish, unless you have some mechanical knowledge.
Dom didn't have that knowledge. Reminding himself of his decision to save for something new, he turned reluctantly and headed for the stairs.

On the second floor he made his way down the corridor. Today it smelled pleasantly of frying onions. His flat was the last one in the hallway, and when he'd entered it for the first time three weeks ago he'd thought he must have had the wrong place — he'd checked the number on the door again to make sure: number 9, definitely his. He'd stepped inside and looked around, experiencing the weird sensation of trying both to absorb and repel his surroundings simultaneously. Against one wall was a prim-looking sofa in faded rose upholstery and beside it a standard lamp with a tassel-trimmed pink shade. Across the room a small television had been positioned on a fancy cane stand and there was a coffee table covered in white crocheted doilies, topped with a basket of dried flowers that looked like it had been sat on. The four-seat dining table was draped with a plastic cloth of purple flowers, translucent from scrubbing. A short hallway led to the bedroom, where a low double bed was covered in apricot chenille. Next to it stood a chest of drawers and another lamp in a pink can-can skirt. The second bedroom was arranged as a kind of study, with a small wardrobe, a bookshelf and a child-size desk with horse transfers cantering across it. At a glance he could tell he'd have trouble fitting his knees underneath it.

It was a demoralising array of furniture, the kind Dom had come across before in the holiday houses of family friends. He
hadn't bothered to bring along any of his own gear; it was all hand-me-downs and Ace had most of it now, except his futon, which was stored at the factory. In the end his luggage consisted of a rucksack of clothes, a couple of boxes of linen and towels, his CD player and stove-top coffee-maker. At the time it felt liberating leaving home with so few belongings, appropriately intrepid. Now he wished he'd brought something to make the place his own, a pot-plant or a poster or two.

Not that there was any free wall space. The flat was crammed full of art. Paintings were grouped together on every wall, dubious depictions of flowers in vases, blurry cottage gardens with distorted sundials, lifeless kangaroos chewing grass, native birds gnawing at unidentifiable shrubs. The work had a muddy quality that gave the impression of age, but when Dom looked closely he decided they were probably like that from the moment the last dull smear of paint was applied. Whoever the artist, he or she was prolific, and had spent a fortune having the work professionally framed.

Dom was getting used to the flat, but his mood always dipped a bit when he first arrived home. Peeling off his damp shirt and tossing it over a dining chair he made for the balcony, suddenly desperate for air. A set of cream net curtains shrouded the view. He wrestled them back, slid open the glass door and stepped outside.

The river was right there, a sharp crumble of bank the only indication of its previous might. Dom watched its viscous flow. He found it hard to imagine it full and rushing. The water was murky and looked too shallow for a decent swim; he needed to explore, follow the track along the bank until he found a better area downstream. On the grassy plateau below, the garden beds
were half dead from the drought, although a sparse planting of knobbly shrubs with red flowers seemed to be doing okay.

Directly opposite on the far bank of the river stood the monolithic RSL, a broad grey face full of glittering teeth. Beside it the bowling club's greens were deserted, the two rectangles of turf tranquil as lakes. A breeze came up off the river. Dom caught the smell of eucalyptus, dry grass and an undertone of cow.
The country
. There was something else in it, too, something green that clung to his throat. Slime green, pond-scum green. He breathed in the smell of his new home until he couldn't distinguish grass from dung from decomposition. Until they blended to become one hot breath.

The afternoon sun flared as it sank towards the range of mountains in the west. He closed his eyes and the world turned orange. He imagined himself in a desert, wandering among towering dunes and rivulets of sand. He peered down the length of the river until it bent under the iron bridge to the right and was out of sight. There were worse places than this to be posted, he thought. Arid places poisoned by salt, pricked by thorny plants and ravaged by dust.

Out of nowhere came an explosion of colourful lorikeets. Wildlife! They landed in the shrubs below and Dom watched in delight as they jumped and scrambled over each other for the hairy blossoms, tittering and shrieking, apparently unaffected by the heat. After a while they flew off, tumbling out over the river to graze further downstream.

The afternoon fell silent again. In the wake of the cheerful bird chatter the air felt heavy, almost awkward. The sky seemed to flush in embarrassment. The river wrung its thin hands and waited for someone to speak. As if to comply a bird called out
over the water, clear and strong. Dom searched the trees but couldn't identify the source. It called again in an upward tone and he tried to make out if it was five questions or just one, repeated for emphasis.

There was a pause, which lasted so long Dom felt like a thwarted lover on the end of a telephone, waiting, waiting for someone to pick up. He felt the urge to whistle himself. Just as he decided the bird must have flown away, up it piped again, five clear calls for the benefit of some distant mate that might have just caught the end of the previous set and was now paying proper attention. God, it sounded lonely! Especially after the lorikeets, all shouting over the top of each other to have their say.

Dom drummed his fingers on the railing. He hadn't really met anyone outside work yet. He was still a stranger in this place. He decided to call home. He felt like telling someone about Novi and his afternoon's triumph.

His mother answered.

‘What are you having for dinner?' she asked immediately.

Dom sighed. ‘Dunno, Mum. I only just got home.'

‘Well, make sure you eat properly up there. You can't live on McDonald's, you'll get sick.'

He fought down a surge of irritation. ‘I know.'

‘Buy yourself some fruit.'

‘Okay!'

Silence. Eventually she asked, ‘How's work going?'

Suddenly he felt too exhausted to explain about the meeting. Instead he just said, ‘Fine.'

‘Well, let us know if you need any money, all right, Nicky?'

In the background he heard his father bellow, ‘Christ, Angela, don't tell him that!'

‘I'll be right, Mum,' Dom said quickly. ‘Thanks anyway. Look, I'd better go. It was just a quick call. Say hi to Dad.'

‘Okay. Love you.'

He sat on the lounge and stared out the window. It was good he was here. It would take a while to settle in, that's all. Just as he sensed his elation fading, a knock at the door made him start. He wasn't expecting anyone. When he opened it, a thin old woman in a pink tracksuit and white sneakers was holding out a bottle of wine and a casserole dish, its contents hidden under a glass lid opaque with condensation. Her long white hair was pulled back in a wispy ponytail and her face was full of wrinkles but her grey eyes were clear and her cheekbones sharp beneath the sag of soft flesh, giving her an elegant appearance so unlike that of his own grandmother — she was as wide as she was tall. Dom struggled to guess the woman's age. Eighty, maybe? Her lips, pink with a layer of fresh lipstick, were caught in a half smile. She seemed as surprised as he was. For a moment they simply stared at each other. Her eyes wandered over his bare chest. He crossed his arms.

‘You're a boy,' she said finally.

Dom ignored the insult.

‘I was expecting a girl!' She sounded put out. ‘You're teaching primary, are you?'

‘Yes.'

‘I thought only girls taught primary these days?'

He felt himself bristle. Nosey old biddy. But eventually the pink lips and all the wrinkles drew upwards.

‘Well, good for you! I'm Mavis Hammond, your neighbour. From number 8.' She bobbed her head towards the door across the hall. It was the first time Dom had seen it open since he moved in.

‘Dom Best.'

‘Pleased to meet you, Dom. You're working with Mal Donaldson, then?' She smiled, emanating a generosity and goodwill found only in women her age — whatever that was.

‘That's right,' he replied.

‘Well, how lovely! Here, I've made something for your tea.' She pushed the casserole dish towards him. ‘I would have popped over sooner but I've been in hospital.' She waved her hand. ‘You don't want to hear about all that, though.'

It was true, he didn't. He was afraid he might get stuck talking about her ailments for the rest of the afternoon so he just smiled and cautiously took the still-warm dish from her mottled hands. Dom always found food offered by strangers slightly sickening. Normally he trusted grandmotherly types but lately he'd grown wary thanks to the antics of his own grandmother. She prided herself on her culinary authority, scoffing at cookbooks and insisting on passing on to her grandchildren the numerous recipes she had filed away in her memory. But in the last year or two she'd started taking shortcuts; she just couldn't be bothered anymore. Now, instead of making everything from scratch, she cheated, adding strange flavourings to her dishes — Vegemite was the most recent. Worse, she had also become obsessed with the health of everyone's bowels and took it upon herself to add laxatives to her cooking — the previous Boxing Day various members of Dom's unsuspecting family had spent the afternoon scrambling for the toilet after several servings of colon-cleansing tiramisu. Most disturbingly, when Dom reached the bottom of her latest batch of lemon butter, he'd discovered a layer of solidified boiled lollies stuck to the base of the jar that she hadn't bothered to remove before re-using it. Once legendary dishes
were now approached tentatively, as everyone wondered what had been added or left out.

He thanked Mavis for the food.

‘Bung it in the oven for twenty minutes or so on high when you're ready to eat.'

He nodded, wondering how anyone could think of turning on an oven on a day like this. Or wearing a tracksuit, for that matter. He lifted the lid off the dish and examined its sloppy contents. ‘It looks delicious,' he lied.

She pursed her lips. ‘It looks dreadful, love. But it tastes delicious. Chicken tagine. I hope it's not too spicy for you. Traditionally it's a mild dish but I prefer it with a bit of zing.' She glanced down the corridor and lowered her voice. ‘Now, Beryl downstairs will tell you the secret to a good casserole is a packet of French onion soup mixed in at the end. But don't listen to her — that woman's salt intake is criminal and she's had three kidney stones to prove it. Ever tried passing a kidney stone?'

He hadn't.

‘Well, it's possibly the most painful experience outside childbirth.'

Dom nodded warily. He didn't want to go there.

Realising she was still clutching the bottle of wine Mavis presented it to him proudly. ‘A sample of the local poison. Made right here from the town's own mulberries.'

He studied the label with genuine curiosity. ‘Mulberries?'

‘Of course!' Her grey eyes widened in disbelief. ‘Surely you've noticed the trees?'

Dom read the label:
Famous for over 100 years and still made to the original Italian recipe, Cherubini Mulberry Wine has a vibrant, fresh flavour. Capturing the purity of the Lewis River
and drawing on the therapeutic quality of mulberries, this easy-drinking wine goes with just about anything — or perfect on its own!

He should have known. He'd spent enough time picking mulberries as a kid; whole Saturdays had been devoted to the activity when it was the season — hunting for the biggest trees, sneaking over people's back fences to fill ice-cream containers with the squishy fruit. They were urban children relishing the chance to forage, imagining themselves lost in the wild, lost in time, hunting and gathering to survive. It was fun, all that purple juice staining their fingers and feet. Once Dom ate a stinkbug by accident, felt the bitter crunch on his tongue as he bit into it. His mouth gushed saliva and he spat violently while everyone laughed. After that he was always careful to look closely at each berry before putting it in his mouth. He could still remember the sensation of biting into that stinkbug: the crack of exoskeleton, the bitter squirt of soft innards. He grimaced, wanting to open the bottle of wine straightaway to drown his mouth's memory.