How Bright Are All Things Here Read online

  ‘We won’t be doing sales calls any more,’ said Clare.

  ‘But I’ve been visiting these places for more than a decade. That’s a long time in business. They know me, Clare.’

  ‘And they can continue to know you on the phone or by email. They’re busy, we’re busy; having you on the road each week is a luxury we can no longer afford.’

  Now, today, just before the afternoon tea break, Clare had asked her into her office for a chat.

  She started straight in with, ‘The administrative reorganisation, Paula.’

  ‘Yes, Clare?’

  ‘Your position has been . . . well, it’s no longer . . . There’s a new position description, and with business being the way it is, we’re looking at point five.’

  Paula had stared at her, disbelieving. ‘Two and half days?’

  Clare wouldn’t meet her eyes. She referred to notes on her jotter.

  ‘I know this must be a surprise to you. Well, not a surprise, exactly. I mean, since we made the decision to streamline our customer selection systems and distribute our catalogue online . . .’ She lost momentum for a few seconds, and then started on another track. ‘Obviously I will meet your preferences as to which days, Paula . . . Your valued contribution to . . .’ She derailed again. ‘Online of course, with big savings and of course – and this must please you – more eco-friendly.’

  ‘Eco-friendly?’

  ‘Yes, Viva’s now right on top of the website and the e-catalogues . . .’

  Paula looked through the glass partition. Viva was standing at the copier, and as if she sensed Paula’s eyes on her, she shook herself like a cat. They did this together, thought Paula.

  A window opened, very briefly, through which Paula could have leaped into the glaring light of freedom and truth. She could have said what she thought. Or said nothing at all, which might have forced Clare, for once, to be explicit.

  But it was too hard. She missed her chance. Team player and den mother that she was, Paula understood Clare’s panicked floundering and came to the rescue.

  ‘I’m so relieved, Clare! I’ve been feeling guilty about letting you down.’

  Clare looked bewildered. ‘You . . .?’

  She forced a smile. ‘Dave’s been asking me for extra time in the shop. He’s so busy, he’s been begging me to finish up here and now . . . well, the timing’s just perfect.’

  ‘Oh. That’s . . . that’s, er . . . Well, if you’re sure . . .’

  Paula pushed her chair back and got to her feet. ‘I think I’ll finish up today, if you don’t mind, Clare. Everything’s up to date. I’ve got heaps of annual leave. Is that all right? I’ll be in touch about the super.’

  Why was acting a part so much easier than telling the truth? Hell, why not go the whole hog? Why not just untether from flesh and blood, bricks and mortar, from Clare in her flowery chiffon and cat-like Viva, and go floating up to the ceiling? She could look down, blissfully detached, as Paula-down-below emptied her desk into two of the Kids & Co signature calico bags and shook hands with Clare.

  ‘Let’s keep in touch,’ said Clare, moving forward as if to hug her. She was so close that Paula could smell her hair and see the tiny skin eruptions under the make-up. ‘We’ll do lunch.’

  Paula swayed backwards to avoid Clare’s embrace, just as Clare pulled herself up short. For a split second their eyes met and each of them knew, but then Paula said in her best warm voice, ‘Thank you for everything,’ and Clare responded, ‘All the best!’

  She’d left the building and walked in a blind fog for three blocks in the wrong direction.

  Don’t make a fuss. Don’t insist. Step aside.

  She put a paper napkin to her lips to suppress the bile that flooded her mouth.

  FISH FINGER SAMBO

  Recognise. Redirect . . .

  What comes next?

  The tram inched along Bridge Road, stopping and starting, and Paula tried to remember the little mantra her therapist had taught her. It was for moments such as these, when she couldn’t bear how she felt, when she was afraid she might die of it or that it might burst out of her skin like the creature from Alien and devour everything in sight.

  Reuse?

  No, that was something else entirely.

  There was another mantra. It started with: ‘Name it.’

  Name it? Well, it wasn’t a panic attack. It wasn’t even anxiety. Paula knew what it was. It was anger.

  She was angry with Clare. She was angry with Dave. Fucking angry. Something molten and bubbling inside her chest threatened to gush upwards and choke her.

  Reflux, then?

  She couldn’t stop herself from smiling even as she imagined Dr Chen, her therapist, taking note of her use of humour to distance and deflect. Pointing out her incongruent smile, her excessive politeness even in extremis.

  She had every right to be angry. Fuck, yes.

  And then, as usual when she got the slightest whiff of entitlement, Paula damped it down. She saw little girls in Thailand sold into brothels, little boys in the Northern Territory clustered around petrol bowsers in the dark, hanging from the boughs of trees at dawn. She saw bitches in puppy farms, bleaching coral, the drift of evil Monsanto GM seeds onto the pastures of an organic farmer . . .

  ‘Shit!’ she said aloud, standing up and pulling the cord.

  If she got off at this stop, she could call in to the health food store on the corner. There’d been no milk in the fridge this morning, and she hated it when Dave bought supermarket milk. She’d been buying biodynamic, even though money was tight, ever since she’d seen that SBS exposé on the dairy industry. It wasn’t so much the antibiotics in the milk as those patient lines of cows with their suppurating udders. The thought still made her want to cry.

  Dave used to find her soft-heartedness sweet. Now, he shrugged as yet another appeal – Oxfam, Save the Children, World Vision – thudded into the letterbox.

  ‘They’ve really got your number, haven’t they?’

  ‘You know, don’t you, that only a quarter of your donation actually goes to the kids?’

  ‘Just letting you know – we’re closing at the end of the month,’ said the shop assistant as she scanned the carton.

  ‘Oh no!’ said Paula, and the girl told her the shop would have a refit and open as a gourmet food store.

  ‘Don’t worry, there’ll still be an organics section,’ she said, determinedly upbeat. ‘It’ll be great, really; bigger range, better prices. You’ll see.’

  ‘It’s not that,’ said Paula, looking around her at the rickety wooden shelves and mismatched jars full of herbal teas and spices. ‘It just seems sad. This lovely little shop.’

  ‘Oh well, that’s business.’

  That’s business.

  She pulled her coat around her and walked against the wind up the street to their house, ruminating. Sue’s decision to sell to Clare, Clare’s decision to stock profitable lines and cut Paula’s hours – it made perfect sense. It was time and money and utility bills; it was wages and mortgages and superannuation . . . Clare was a bitch, but nothing, really, was personal. It wasn’t her. It was business.

  But her decision to back Dave’s framing shop?

  He’d done all right for a while, but with cheap frames now readily available from the Asian import shops and Ikea, sales had nosedived. Then the GFC. The location had always been a problem because of parking, but the last nail went into the coffin when the busy Greek deli next door closed after forty years. The For Lease sign was still in the window.

  And now the shop had entered the death spiral. People don’t come, so you don’t stay open, then when they do come, you’re shut. They don’t try again. That was why, this morning, she’d persisted with Dave.

  ‘There must be something you can do. What about adding something new? Scrapbooking’s big.’

  Dave had rolled his eyes. ‘Can you see me with those women?’

  ‘You’ve got to find something else to bring the customers in.’r />
  ‘Sex toys? Stickbooks? Triple X is the only shop that seems to be doing any business on the strip.’

  She’d ignored him. ‘I know a couple of girls who make greeting cards. They’re really cute . . .’

  ‘The girls or the cards?’

  She’d ignored that, too. ‘I’ll set up a time to get them to come in with a stand and some cards. It can’t hurt.’

  He’d shrugged his shoulders. ‘Whatever.’

  His negativity. Oh, God, how tired of it she was. That was why his businesses died; he expected them to. He made failure inevitable. He wouldn’t try. Customers wanted suggestions, guidance, interest, and he’d say, ‘It depends on what you like,’ or, ‘It’s up to you.’ Perhaps he didn’t even realise that he seemed indifferent. There was no repeat custom, no word of mouth. The place haemorrhaged money.

  Was he waiting for her to ask Bliss for help? There was always Bliss. Bliss would lend her money, or give her money, whatever she wanted. Bliss would bail them out. Paula gave a little unconscious whimper.

  No. She wouldn’t, couldn’t ask again. They would just have to wait.

  A fishy fatty smell hung around the back door, and Paula could hear deep male laughter and the high excited voice of a little boy inside the house. Sam must have called around after collecting Simon from day care.

  The thought of her grandson usually brought with it a surge of joy, but it was just, Oh, please, not now. She let the two bags drop to the ground and leaned for a few seconds against the doorframe, feeling hollowed out and empty. She couldn’t let Simon see her like this. Could she just say a brief hello and head upstairs, pleading a headache? A migraine. Yes, that’s what she’d do. She was too tired for guilt.

  She opened the door.

  ‘Look, Nana – fish finger sambo!’ He held it up to show her. Tomato sauce trickled down his arm and he licked his wrist. ‘Pa made it and it’s secret squirrel business and we’re not allowed to tell Mum.’

  ‘I was just telling Simon how Davo used to make them for me when you weren’t home. It was secret squirrel business then, too.’

  Dave wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and grinned. ‘Sorry about the mess, love. I’ll clean it up.’

  She took in the supermarket white bread and squeezy bottles of sauce and mayo, the empty stubbies and carton of orange juice, the two mugs of tea with the teabags still in them. Dishes were piled beside the sink.

  ‘You’re home early,’ she said.

  ‘I worked for Graeme today. He’s stuffed his ankle, so I drove the truck. Short day.’

  ‘What about the shop?’

  ‘I put a sign on the door.’

  In the silence that followed, Sam began bundling Simon into his jacket.

  ‘But I haven’t finished!’

  ‘It’s okay, you can take it with you; Nana won’t mind if you take the plate.’

  Paula scarcely noticed them leave because of the rage that swept up her body. Her cheeks reddened, her scalp began to burn and itch. She wanted to yell. She wanted to sweep his fucking fish fingers off the table and grind them into the floor. But instead she collapsed onto a chair, put her head down on the table and sobbed.

  ‘What is it, love? Love?’ Dave patted her shoulder. ‘It’s all right, Paula. It’s all right.’

  She shook his hand away. ‘It’s not all right.’

  ‘What?’ He tried to turn her around to face him but she pushed her chair back and stood up so quickly that he stumbled against her.

  ‘IT’S NOT ALL RIGHT!’

  His face hardened. ‘So what is it now?’

  ‘I got the sack. No, that’s not true. I resigned. Clare put me in a position where I had . . . no other choice.’ Paula’s voice began to tremble.

  Dave stared at her. ‘You’re kidding me.’

  ‘I am not kidding you.’

  ‘The fucking bitch!’

  ‘Yes, she is a fucking bitch. And now I have no – fucking – job.’

  ‘Paula, don’t cry. Love, don’t.’ Somehow Dave got her seated again. He handed her a glass of water and dabbed at her face with a tea towel. ‘Love, love,’ he said, trying to hold her. ‘Listen. Graeme paid me, cash in hand, and I’d be lucky if I took half that at the shop. Paula, this might work out yet. The business is screwed, we both know that, and there’s no point hanging on. I was thinking about having a closing-down sale. If you’ll look after the shop, I’ll work for Graeme. He needs a driver. There’ll be some money from Bliss when she goes. It’ll be all right, love.’

  She couldn’t look at him.

  ‘Come on, let’s get you upstairs. I’ll make you a cup of tea.’

  He helped her to her feet. She felt weak and achy, as if she were coming down with flu.

  ‘Come on, love.’

  She allowed herself to be led to their room and put to bed with a hot-water bottle. Dave came back with a cup of tea – chamomile – and some Panadol, but she shook her head.

  ‘I’ve already had some.’

  ‘Have some more.’

  ‘The worst thing is,’ she said, ‘I pretended it was all right. I told her . . .’ Paula tried for a weak smile but she couldn’t manage it. She whimpered, ‘I told her that you wanted me to work for you. I lied, I pretended it was what I wanted . . .’

  She started to cry again and he sat on the side of the bed.

  ‘Well, that’s okay. Keeping your dignity; there’s nothing wrong with that. Don’t cry, Paula. C’mon, don’t cry.’

  He missed the point entirely, but it didn’t matter. He started rubbing her back through the bedclothes, much as he used to do with Sam when he was small, saying ‘It’s okay, it’s okay . . .’

  When she woke, Paula could hear Dave downstairs in the kitchen. He was washing up, and he was singing.

  THE HEART IN THE WINDOW

  ‘Who’s she talking to?’ says the little girl voice.

  ‘Her husband,’ says the mother voice.

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘He’s dead.’

  ‘Then how can she talk to him?’

  And the mother, who I realise is my neighbour Anna-Mae, explains that the dead are not gone as long as they are remembered, which Dimity, quite rightly, rejects out of hand.

  ‘When my guinea pig died,’ she says, ‘the ants got him.’

  Alec was cremated. None of us wanted an urn. The children and I scattered the ashes in his beloved garden in Moule Avenue, but I kept some back and took the surprisingly heavy plastic canister with me to the beach house. In the early evening, I waded into the water up to my knees and dumped him into the sea. The ashes were gritty and full of lumps. When I got back to the house, I had to hose my legs down.

  There was a storm that night, one of those fierce thunderstorms that come at the end of a heatwave.

  . . . if we gang to sea, master,

  I fear we will come to harm.

  In the morning the high-tide mark was a thick wedge of seaweed. Along the water’s edge were scattered shells and sticks and those plastic rings from six-packs. Were there bits of Alec, too, or had the storm carried him out to the middle of Port Phillip Bay?

  When I sat with my Scotch facing the sunset alone, I did try talking to him.

  ‘Listen, Alec,’ I said.

  ‘The ladyes wrang their fingers white,

  The maidens tore their hair,

  A’ for the sake of their true loves,

  For them they’ll see na mair.’

  There was no answer.

  Have I told you how we met? We always said it was a shipboard romance, love at first sight. It was for him, according to Alec, but as for me, I thought I’d never seen such a grey man. Grey hair, grey eyes, grey suit. Even his skin had a greyish tinge, as if he’d been lightly dusted with ash.

  I hadn’t been to Australia for nearly three years. There were things to see to but, more importantly, I needed a break. During the winter, I – who never got ill – had been struck down with the flu and I was still easily tired. The business
was humming along nicely and Bridget could do without me. Edward encouraged me to take a holiday.

  I’d flown over, even though I hated air travel, but had allowed myself the luxury (which I regretted within a couple of days of sailing) of a boat back to England. It was not the relaxing experience I’d hoped for; I’d forgotten that there was always some annoying man smitten with my charms. This time he was more than usually persistent, and I picked on Alec as a decoy.

  He was sitting in an armchair in the saloon with a bureaucratic pile of manila folders on his lap and I thought he would do nicely for my purposes. I leaned down towards him, and he looked up from his page of typescript. Though he told me later it was then that zing went the strings of his heart, he appeared to take me very much in his stride.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  I hesitated, and he spoke again.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I don’t smoke.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘I thought perhaps you wanted me to light your cigarette.’

  ‘No.’ Had he been watching me? But back then, nearly everyone smoked and it wasn’t a bad guess. I laughed, watching a slow blush travel up his neck, sweep over his face and settle in his ears. He had a nice smile. Slightly crooked.

  ‘I always carry my own lighter. Actually, I wondered if that chair was free. Would you mind if I sat next to you?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘I won’t disturb you,’ I said, slipping into the seat. ‘I have a book in my bag.’ I trotted out the practised charm. ‘It’s just if I sit alone someone always sits next to me and then they want to make conversation. You know how it is . . .’

  ‘I do,’ he answered gravely. ‘I shall protect your solitude.’

  ‘And I shall protect yours. Thank you for understanding.’ I opened my book.

  It was probably half an hour later that he put his papers down. I closed my book at the same time.

  ‘What are you reading?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, it’s nothing.’ Actually, it was the latest Mary Stewart, a mystery romance. More romance than mystery, really; in other words, a woman’s book. I turned it over so he couldn’t see the wistful heroine posed against a menacing landscape, for in those days I was still slightly ashamed of my reading habits. Years before, trying to remedy my lack of education, my first husband compiled a list of authors and I began to work my way from Austen to Woolf. I even took to underlining every phrase that caught my attention. The books were ruined for other readers but I was able to quote rather impressively for a short while. A very short while; I only got as far as George Eliot before I gave up in despair and returned to my mysteries. But, ah, there – nothing is wasted, is it? For I have always remembered this something, by someone.