Cafe Soleil

Episode 3

 

It was the weekend now and thirty or so motorcycles roared past the café up the hill to the beach.  He could just see them – all in black leather, some really overweight, reliving their heyday – sad grey ponytails flapping in the wind.  Why did they have need of so much noise?  He supposed it was the masculine sense of power throbbing between their legs combined with the speed that made them feel invincible.  He hoped they weren’t going to clog up the café later with their helmets and swagger.  Not much chance of that, they weren’t the coffee drinking types anyway.

The divers were also getting ready, squirming into wetsuits that had trouble accommodating their ample middles and trying to balance those heavy tanks on their backs at the same time. It seemed like so much effort to dive to an ancient wreck. He’d seen the boats coming in to shore and bobbing on the waves as the divers clambered aboard.  It seemed to take them ages, impeded by their gigantic flippers, masks and the heavy weight on their backs.

Then there were the extrovert Middle Eastern types with their gold chains and their “Hey mate…” loud but inoffensive in their souped up jalopies or really flash SUVs - generally just out to have a good time, coming up to the Coast with their botoxed girlfriends, who were more intent on shopping the boutiques than actually swimming or surfing.

He was due at the hospital again tonight and he was dreading it.  No change meant no change.  The only bright thing in his day might be a visit from Susannah.  He didn’t like to ask who the well-dressed man was, and he was scared to ask her out on a date.  A date? He must be out of his mind.  Why would someone like her be interested in him? He was never the athlete or the brainy type either and it was a miracle Judy had ever seen any potential in him.  She was fit, watched what she ate. Who’d have thought she’d die before him? It wasn’t fair. Now they’d never be like those impossibly youthful and tanned looking sixty-something couples laughing on the deck of an enormous boat the cruise lines advertised.  At least he had a good Public Service job and looked forward to an easy if unremarkable retirement.  But a drunk driver put paid to all that, and now he spent his days working like a Trojan and his nights keeping vigil over a ghost.

                                                                        ***

 

The automatic doors opened wide as if to swallow him and he started walking down the hall.  The place was terrifyingly clean, and smelled like a cross between antiseptic and air freshener.  He passed rooms where old men and women moaned and cried.  Sometimes they were completely silent, all tidied up in pristine sheets and blankets – laid out like corpses.  He wondered whether anyone ever came to visit them.  The Filipina night nurse on a Tuesday always gave him a beatific smile – and once told him how she worked sixty hours a week to send money home to her family.  He couldn’t imagine the dedication and sacrifice that took.  She was on duty tonight.

“Hi Darryl”

“How is he?”

“He’s doing fine.  We just give him his night feed.  He is resting OK.  You can go in now.”

“Thanks”

Mark seemed to just be sleeping peacefully. Darryl stroked his hand and sat down by the bed.  He usually sang silly children’s songs to while away the time.  Sometimes it was Pop goes the Weasel or some other song – anything to try to wake up that inert grey matter inside his skull.  Anything to fire up more neurons, to get some sort of reaction,  Creatively arranging his finances, he had managed to get Mark a private room – and it was costing an arm and a leg, but it didn’t matter.  He wouldn’t want to foist his out of tune tenor on any of the other patients – even if they were gaga.  So he sang,   He’d heard miraculous stories of people waking up from comas after months and still believed that it might happen.  He hadn’t been asked to pull the plug yet – that wasn’t exactly what they called it – but that’s what it meant.  

He didn’t want to remember that time when one of the new nursing aides had left the feeding tube in and Mark choked on his own vomit.  Come to think of it, she was Vietnamese and didn’t know how to explain what had happened to the ambos.  A close call.  He’d survived that episode and kept a close watch on the staff now – as much as you could when you weren’t there all day.

The diminished form with the still vibrant red hair under the covers was really a ghost.  And how did you communicate with a ghost?  Darryl had been a sort of Catholic in his youth – everyone was something – Catholic or Protestant mostly – in those days you never heard of Buddhists or Muslims and people would never admit to being agnostics or atheists – you had to have something to belong to – even then kids would tease you depending on which side of the religious fence you were on. Catholics went for drama in a big way with incense and those ghastly bloody figures nailed to crosses.  Proddies somehow seemed more genteel – arranging flowers in church and baking cakes. His Mum always covered her head when she went to Mass although she didn’t understand the Latin, and fingered rosary beads and sometimes cooked for the priest.  

Darryl had tried to believe, had tried to hope.  His God had deserted him.  There was now a void where before at least there was ritual and habit.  He eventually began to realise his prayers were falling on deaf ears.  Or maybe he wasn’t praying hard enough? What was he now?  He was just a man and this was just his son. 

                                                            ***

 

 

 

 

                                                                     Cafe Soleil

Episode 2

Darryl woke to a leaden looking sky and wondered if he should just dispense with outside tables today.  If it rained there would be fewer fitness fanatics about.  As he started pulling the chairs from out the back, he noticed they were getting heavier.  Or was it him, piling on the pounds? He was too tired for his late evening stroll on the beach, too tired to get up any earlier and join the buff trainers on the esplanade. The café was something that occupied most of his daylight hours and if he were honest with himself, he would have sold it at a loss after the accident, rather than keep trying to hold on in the hope that something would miraculously change.

He realised his day wasn’t going to go as planned when he ducked out at lunch time and left the new waitress in charge.  He just couldn’t hack another skinny thirty-something asking for almond milk in her soy chai latte with go lo or the tattooed sinewy trainer who accompanied her rabbiting on about his glutes and lats.  The guy was handing around flyers, right in the café, without even asking.  It was blah, blah, blah and I do forty reps of those and I bench press 200 any day of the week. These biceps? I recommend this little shop in town where I get my supplements.  If you want the real thing though, give the owner a wink, sling him an extra fifty bucks and he gives you the really good stuff from UNDER the counter.

Then there were the whippet thin blondes and their Buggaboos - their precious cargo strapped inside, fat and dreaming, while their mothers chatted and compared notes about the right formulas and schools. Poor little devils, Darryl thought, let them slumber on in complete ignorance for a little while yet.  They had no idea what was being mapped out for them and certainly wouldn’t be thrown out into the backyard with a simple suggestion that they go play! Like when he was a boy. What was that, nowadays?  Every single moment of every waking hour would be organised, with some tutor teaching them higher mathematics or something while they crawled, drooling, along the carpet.  Their mothers were now sipping lattes or piccolos. 

At mid-morning the retired old farts usually came in for their raisin toast and cappuccinos nattering loudly (most of them were pretty deaf) about their super funds and shares and what was going up and coming down.  Darryl’s brain was reeling from information overload.

He had to get out of that chaos just to clear his head for a little while.  In spite of the early cloud, it was already blazing hot and the sweat was collecting around his forehead, He thought a walk on the beach, just a short one, might be the go. 

He passed the drunk who was always sitting on the same bench, swigging from an innocent looking large Coca Cola bottle.  The beach had No Alcohol signs everywhere. Darryl had to quicken his pace because up close, the unwashed stench of sweat and alcohol was unbearable.

As he ambled across the squeaky sand, he realised he should have taken his sneakers off. He bent down to untie the laces and was whacked on the back – he screamed, jumped up, ready to go on the attack.  Luckily he realised just in time it was Luke, the local blind guy who regularly swung his white can back and forth along the beach and promenade.  Darryl had to mumble sheepishly…

“Sorry”

He picked himself up, took a deep breath into his lungs and began walking again, glancing at his watch.  Mustn’t leave Rosie too long at the café by herself.  Who knows what trouble she could get into?  Three wrong orders so far this morning.

He looked up to see the woman from yesterday walking towards him – he noticed she had a slight limp.  Her beagle raced to up to give a doggy greeting. Darryl bent down and fluffed his ears.

“Hi” she said.  “Sorry, he never forgets a face.”

“Don’t be sorry.  I’m delighted to see him.” He added shyly “And you too, of course.”

“You’re not working today?”

“Had to take a break.  It’s a bit overwhelming. Actually, I’d better get back.”

She pulled on the lead. “I was just coming in for a coffee.  Can I walk with you?”

“Sure.  And I’ve put out the doggy bowls.”

“That’s good to know.”

“I’m Susannah, by the way.”

“Darryl”.

They walked companionably back to the café.  He learned she’d taken early retirement – she didn’t say why – she was an ex lawyer.  He told her as much of his own history as he thought she needed to know.

She sat down while he went out the back to fix whatever Rosie had stuffed up.  A few missed orders, customers who were never coming back again, that sort of thing.  He should have fired her weeks ago, but she had a kid to support.  He was a mug, he knew. This couldn’t go on forever.  They were losing money and there were bills to pay – now that the insurance had practically run out. Actually, he needed a miracle.  Briefly he looked up at the sky, but didn’t hold out much hope of God granting him one today. Maybe it was enough that Susannah had turned up.  There was something about her that delighted him; he’d thought most lawyers to be hard-bitten and curt.  

The café crowd was thinning now that the lunchtime run had passed and he could take Susannah’s coffee out to her.  He brought one for himself too, in case she wanted company.

“Do you mind if I join you?  I need a little break, now I’ve got Rosie sorted out.  She’s been skating on thin ice, but hopefully she’ll improve.”

“You’re very patient.”

“I’ve had to be.  Hey, you look young to be retired.  Did you just get sick of sorting out domestic dramas or defending dropkicks?  What was it?”

“I had an accident.  I couldn’t walk for six months.  Several screws in my leg.  Things just got on top of me and I had a breakdown.  Lost my relationship – no children fortunately.” She pushed back her bob and he got a glimpse of a greying temple.

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”  He took her hand and she didn’t withdraw it.

Café Soleil  

 

At this hour it all looks very calm and peaceful.  A killer yellow sun is just coming up over the water, casting its spell on the lazy waves, glowing white as they sidle onto shore.   The sun rises and slowly illuminates the buildings - the swish low rise apartments have softer contours in the morning.   The beach and walkways look pristine since the mechanical street sweepers - giant tarantulas - have been swaying back and forth for hours, plucking up all the debris and tucking it inside their great whirring bodies. For hours the bakery has had its light on and cinnamon, apple and yeasty smells seep from under its as yet closed doors.  

A dairy truck lumbers up, and its driver pulls a trolley from the rear end, and starts loading it impossibly high with milk, pushing it on to the footpath up to the supermarket, where he rolls it inside. 

Across the street, portly Darryl, beads of perspiration already forming on his upper lip, wrestles piles of chairs onto the footpath, setting each one down in its place and placing menus on the tables, ready to entice the first joggers, gym junkies and personal trainers with skim soy lattes and egg white omelettes followed by mineral water chasers.  

The car park fills up with four wheel drives and sports cars as the buff trainers wait, after lugging their equipment along the beach effortlessly.  Bright red boxing gloves, pads, witches’ hats, balls, rope and chains put Darryl in mind of a medieval torture chamber.  For the relentlessly cheerful early risers it's the highlight of their day. 

Rosie, the part-time waitress he’s recently hired is late, so he’s busy taking orders, keeping an anxious eye out for her.  Darryl is not used to being front of house, and would rather be in the kitchen plating up or washing dishes, anything but dealing with the public.  Mark was the people person – he felt comfortable wherever he went. A chuckling baby, gregarious teenager and now in a persistent vegetative state, they called it.

“Can I take your order?”  

The trim young brunette checking her mobile phone barely glances up as she replies.

“Soy Skim Latte.”

“Anything else?”

“No, that’s fine.”

He wondered why young people had to be so rude.  Where were their manners?  On their iPhone – that’s why they called it an iPhone, it was always I, I, I,  iPad, I this, I that…in Darryl’s day it was not done to big note yourself.   You didn’t post selfies.  You waited until you could get your roll of film from your holidays processed and some of them would be grainy and out of focus, but that was half the fun.

He moved past a few more tables to an unremarkable middle-aged woman sitting on her own, except for a very friendly beagle tethered to the table.  He must remember to put out more doggy water bowls.

“Can I get you anything?”

She flashed him a smile. She seemed to light up from inside.  It was very attractive.

“Yes, what do you recommend?”

“Cute dog.”  Darryl ventured a pat.

“It’s alright” she smiled. “He loves people. In fact, he’d probably go home with you.”

“I’d have to get in a supply of dog food, then.”  They both laughed.

“The Eggs Benedict are really good.  Or if you’re vegan…”

“That sounds lovely.”

Rosie rushed up, sweating, slinging her bag down.

“Sorry I’m late.  I’ll just…”

“That’s alright.  I’ll take this one. Maybe you could see what those tables over there want.” To the woman he said – “Won’t be long.”

She grinned and he found himself smiling too as he went to the kitchen.

When he personally took the plate of food out to her, he was disappointed to see she had been joined by a well-dressed man.   He didn’t know what he’d hoped, that he’d engage her in conversation, what?  Was he that desperate that he had to start hitting on customers now? No.  That was not him.  Besides, there were so many other things to think about.  The daily visit to the hospital for one.  One which filled him with dread.  The tubes, the breathing apparatus, all that shiny metal.  And his son, who looked almost normal.  As though he was sleeping and would soon wake up from whatever dreamland he was in.  

 

 Wine O'Clock

 

‘Just the one’ Julie told herself, playing with the frost that had gathered on the wine bottle,

staring at the label, wondering whether it was grown on the right side of the hill – the joke

she and David used to share after their membership of the local wine club when they first

moved here. It was a way of getting to know people, David had said. You had to be a joiner,

if you wanted to win in life. It had certainly worked for him, as a sales director. For Julie,

she wasn’t so sure.

‘It can’t hurt.’

 

These excuses swirled around in Julie’s mind every time she got to ‘Wine O’Clock.

Nowadays you didn’t have to bother using the corkscrew and worry that the cork would get

stuck and you’d have to dig the thing out with your nails or a knife before you could even

take a sip.

 

No-one in Julie’s family ever drank, and because she was so painfully shy, her first glass of

champagne at a works Christmas party, gave her a confidence that was quite seductive.

Her friend Mandy’s husband was a lawyer in the city and they lived in modern concrete

boxes with manicured lawns and well-behaved shrubs behind traditional picket fences.

Whose turn was it to be under the limit to pick the kids up? They joked – they lived in the

same cul-de-sac and their husbands had good jobs. It wasn’t as if they lacked for anything.

 

Julie’s pigeon pair, Alex and Jessica, were the loves of her life. Alex was fourteen and on the

debating team. He always spoke the truth, or his truth as he saw it. Jessica who was only

eight, took after her mother, David was fond of saying – that meant pretty and compliant,

although that wasn’t quite the way he put it. Sweet and loving were the words he used.

Now it was Mandy on the phone. Julie let it go to message. She (Julie) needed to call back

urgently and she didn’t say why. Why didn’t she just call Triple O? Although, right now,

Julie was feeling headachy and she knew that just a sip would calm her down and restore her

equilibrium. She poured just half a glass. She filled up the glass and took a long gulp. Oh my

goodness, that felt great. Now she had the energy to call Mandy.

 

‘Hi Mandy, it’s Julie.

‘I just don’t know what to do. I’m beside myself.’

Julie braced herself for listening to another domestic disaster and took another sip. Julie

wanted to throttle her, making herself a mental note to avoid looking at Mandy’s throat the

next time they met, lest she be tempted to carry out the deed.

 

The kids were in bed and David was working late, so it seemed easy to pour another one

while watching the latest Scandi Noir. She’d never been particularly introspective, but

nowadays when she was alone, a pattern of asking herself how she had ended up here

emerged. It was a feeling of disconnectedness, going about her daily tasks in a robotic

fashion with an apathy she’d never encountered before. No-one had noticed, thankfully,

certainly not David, Mr Pollyanna himself. Life was a bed of roses, he himself a ray of

sunshine. It was only when the dog scrambling to the door, scraping the floor noisily with his

claws to greet his master, that she awoke with a start, realising she had finished the bottle.

She stashed it under the couch.

 

‘Oh, you’re still up love, sorry I’m so late.’

She yawned and said.

‘Oh, I just had to watch another episode, you know. They get you hooked. Do you want

anything?’

 

The sun streamed through the curtains like lightning rods at her waking eyelids making her

blink rapidly – Julie had overslept. She reached over to find David’s side empty. Where were

the kids and when had David left?

 

She stumbled down the hall to find Jessica and Alex glued to the television and crunching

through cereal. Pulling her dressing gown around her, she nonchalantly put the coffee

machine on. The children gave each other furtive glances, which she pretended to ignore.

‘So what’s happening today? I seem to remember you had a book day, Jessica? Have you got

everything packed?

Jessica grunted and kept chewing. Julie poured herself a milky coffee and drinking in large

gulps, smiling and waiting for her children to make conversation, to fill the morning silence.

‘Oh well, just give me a minute to get dressed and I’ll drop you off.’

Alex looked up from his plate, his hair flopping in his eyes.

‘Do you think you should drive today, Mum?’

She bristled.

‘Don’t be ridiculous. What do you mean?’

‘Buddy dragged the bottle out from under the couch this morning. Don’t worry, I put it in

next door’s bin.’

‘Oh well, he’s always finding strange things around the place, that dog. The cleaner probably

chucked it under there.’

 

The school route was jammed as usual with Range Rovers and the odd Porsche, clogging up

traffic as kids were deposited mothers lingered to chat. Julie was trying to keep up her usual

morning patter.

‘What have you got on today, Alex?’

He was glued to her phone, the earbuds firmly in place. Julie briefly looked back.

‘Mum!’ What are you doing?’ Alex screamed.

A little boy of about seven or eight was crossing the road aimlessly, far from the zebra

crossing. Julie braked hard.

She shot out of the car. She’d stopped just in time, the boy was walking away, the bonnet

having only nudged him. One of the mothers came racing over.

‘What are you doing, you crazy cow? I’m calling the police.’

‘He just ran out. I stopped. She said to the boy:

‘Are you OK? Where’s your Mum?’

 

The police were indeed called and Julie was under the limit. No charges were laid, but she

was given a verbal caution. Julie drove home very slowly. She spent the rest of the day

cleaning. She was good at putting everything out of her mind if she concentrated on one task

mindfully and expertly and exactly. After that, she re-ironed David’s shirts and then went out

and trimmed the already trim hedges at the front of the house.

 

By the time it came to pick the kids up – it was Mandy’s turn – she was sitting in the kitchen

watching the steam curling up from her cup of tea.

The children rumbled through the house to their bedrooms and Mandy threw her bag down.

‘Had a rough day?  I heard all about it from that snitch Bec at the canteen. Storm in a teacup.

So that’s what you’re drinking now? Tea? Where’s that marvellous Pinot Grigio you had?’

‘I just thought I’d take it easy.’

‘Oh, come on, what’s wrong with unwinding from a stressful day? I’ve got just the thing.’

She produced a bottle from her bag.

‘Not as good as the one we had last week, but just grabbed this one from the bottle-o. You

need cheering up. Come on, Julie, live a little!’

After that, Julie was honour-bound to produce said Pinot and poured them both generous

glasses. The kids were all rowdily enjoying video games upstairs and David wouldn’t be

home for ages and she ordered in a pizza. The beauty of all of them living in a cul-de-sac was

that Mandy could just walk home.

 

The following morning she asked David to drive the kids to school because she had a raging

headache. Alex looked at her strangely, grabbed his backpack and slumped out the door after

his father.

‘Bye, sweetheart, see you this arvo.’

 

She cleaned the house in a jiffy. Watching Dr Phil at lunchtime, her headache lingered. When

she saw those dysfunctional characters and their woes, she felt somewhat superior.

No, she could never see herself as that kind of victim, she who never drank before the

afternoon. She had a lovely house, a lovely husband and lovely children. Well, Alex wasn’t

so lovely these days. These days, he appeared to sneer. In fact, he’d become quite combative

and judgemental. He was meant to be learning, not judging.

She discovered the remnants of last night’s pizza. There was an unopened bottle of wine that

looked like it should be drunk. She resisted the urge and put the pizza in the microwave.

Julie sat on the deck, nibbling it. A hefty magpie was eyeing it off, edging closer. He was

about to overturn it, when Julie dropped the whole thing on the grass.

‘There you go’ she said. She went inside and took the wine from the fridge, pouring herself a

generous glass.

 

Julie entered the School of Arts building, all peeling paint and metal chairs that scraped, a

cough or two from the participants. She sat at the back while they spoke, wondering once

again why she was here, and praying for a new beginning but still feeling thirsty.

 

Tools for Tools

This is a tale told a few years ago, as part of my daily writing habit - using six randomly chosen words to write something, anything, in 30 minutes.  Raw and unedited. Enjoy!

 minute valve tweezer ruffle appetite brink

‘Julie, hand me that valve gasket cover, will you?

‘Um, what’s that?’

‘Right in front of you, dummy’

Julie never liked helping Jimmy with his car repairs. It wasn’t as if he was even a mechanic. Mostly he liked to use his short course at TAFE on car maintenance as if it were a PhD. His feathers would get ruffled if she handed him the wrong tool or part, and he would glance sideways at her, shaking his head, as if she were an idiot. Over the years she’d become a serf without even being aware of it. Handing him even the tweezers to pluck his eyebrows. You would think being a hundred kilo bogan with a long red beard and sideburns wouldn’t be so fussy about the unruly caterpillars that hovered above his placid blue eyes, but…

She handed him the somewhat cumbersome part. Wondering when she might ever get a starring role in this relationship. Of course the writing had been on the wall when she first met him, as after their first dinner he took her neatly manicured pinkie finger and used it as a toothpick. She was shocked at first but then Julie had thought it funny and quirky and as she hadn’t had much experience with blondish/reddish buff surfer boys out in the fibro wasteland of the Western Suburbs, where car wrecks and rusted playground equipment was the norm, she put up with it. 

When they’d first got married, she’d accepted his behaviour, because as her mother said ‘happy hubby, happy wife’ – she didn’t realise at the time that the expression was supposed to rhyme. Now that the kids had left home – Billy to the city to realise his dream of being a Reality tv star and Jemima also to the city to assuage her gargantuan appetite by becoming a pastry chef, it was her time – me time, as they often said in beauty ads on tv.

Now Julie was on the brink of freedom – all she had to do was pluck up the courage. Now or never – or if not actually free…her mind wandered, off into places she hadn’t been for years – sunning herself on the beach, reading a paperback without having to apply Jimmy’s sunscreen or wax his board. Going off to the country – driving off aimlessly without having to have a destination – not having to make Jimmy’s lunch and listen to him complain the bread was cut too thick – or the beer was too warm  - she was sailing off on a cloud of optimism when his voice cut through it.

‘Hand me that bloody wrench, Julie, how often do I have to ask?

When the paramedics arrived a couple of hours later, and poor Jimmy was declared non-responsive, Julie explained that the garage had always been a mess, and unfortunately the tool in question had fallen from one of the shelves Jimmy had rigged up without following the instructions on the box. 

 Another change of pace - a story I had published in the Seniors Magazine some time ago...

My time has come

As she gave the girl her credit card, Belle couldn’t help noticing her own hands - covered in sunspots and shaking slightly.  The veins were prominent and the fingers long.  Long fingers meant things. What was it?  She’d always had an artistic streak, her mother had told her so.  Now, sometimes she wasn’t quite so sure what those hands were for.

The girl behind the counter, with her black dyed hair and tattoo peeping from her long-sleeved uniform, looked harried, as though her mind was elsewhere. 

“Pin?”

Belle blinked quickly and punched in the numbers. She ventured:

“Nice day isn’t it?”

The girl mumbled something and turned to the next customer.  Belle believed it was always nice to be nice.  Maybe she had boyfriend problems – she didn’t look old enough to have children.  When Belle returned to her car, she realised she suddenly felt exhausted, gave up her plans for a drive and headed for home.

 She looked out at the garden.  The daffodils were just coming into their own - they looked lovely in spite of their faces bending downwards after the rain.   So many more weeds.  She sighed.   Now each time she got up from the comfy stool, her knees creaked.  Now she even hesitated to take the path down the side of the house, for it was always covered in a little moss, which sneaked up on you in the mountain winters.  Now the wet dropping leaves became a hazard to be avoided at all costs, lest she fall and break a hip or something.  In autumn the ashes, the oaks, the liquid ambers were morphing from green to yellow, russet to bright red.  Once it got colder, the confident wind blew soft flurries of snow down the main street.  Then the galleries and coffee shops did a roaring trade, as people escaped from the cold quite regularly to eat, drink hot chocolate, buy art and shop for that special gift.

When they’d first moved here, it was to get away from the city and enjoy the crisp clean air, although more often in the winter it was smoke laden, from all the wood fires burning across the valley.   Derek had taken early retirement and spent his days birdwatching while Belle ran a little boutique filled with lovely scents and beautiful imported knitwear. An idyllic life all mapped out for them.  

That August it was snatched from them as suddenly as the searing pain across Derek’s chest.   Fear and bewilderment crossed his face as the paramedics tried to stabilise him – two of them worked on him for twenty minutes before they gave up and quietly manoeuvred him in on the stretcher.  Belle was rooted to the spot.   The older one took her arm gently.

“Do you want to come, love?”

 She rode with Derek in the ambulance.  He was still warm when she touched his forehead.  Absentmindedly, she pushed back an unravelled thread on the collar of his fine wool sweater. Numbly she stared out at the black shapes of the trees flying past.

When her son, Colin, came up for the funeral, Belle was grateful for his brisk but tender efficiency.  He took charge of her finances and did the things around the house.  Her daughter-in-law, Moira, a short bulldog of a woman, was her usual aggressive, carping self,  making little digs that always made her feel old and inadequate.  Belle thought wryly that she was supposed to be the matriarch, yet Moira seemed to have all the power.  Somehow Colin was completely unaware of any discord at all.  Belle often bit her lip.  She certainly didn’t want to upset her son.  

After they left, she was alone once more. A huge weight lifted from her shoulders when she finally sold the shop.  Now at last she would be able to do something artistic, something for herself alone.

She tried watercolours, but there was too much unpredictability.  She couldn’t control the water sufficiently - it kept pooling in all the wrong places.  She went on to print making, but that was too arduous.  Where before she had regularly taken a brisk walk before dinner, with or without Derek, now it was an effort.    Belle started caring less about food too.  It was often enough just to have a bowl of soup or a sandwich.  When the weight started falling off, at first she was pleased.  It was nice to be able to fit into clothes she hadn’t worn in years.  But then, she started feeling unaccountably tired, and some days she couldn’t put one foot in front of the other.  

Her doctor suggested a change of scene – maybe visit her son?  The thought of Moira’s turned down mouth and all-seeing eyes following her everywhere filled her with dread.  She chided her for forgetting things all the time, as if Belle were her child.  

“Hello, Belle, it’s so good to see you.  Come in, let me get Colin to take this upstairs for you.  Colin?” she trilled. “Mother is here.”  She gave her the perfunctory peck on the cheek.  

“Is this all you brought?”  she said brightly, in that smarmy way she had, knowing that she didn’t really want her to stay.  She was probably even now plotting a way, through Colin of course, of making sure that this might be the last time she would be visiting them. She couldn’t help noticing some brochures for retirement homes on the hall table.

Belle knew that Moira would like to see her slotted away in one of those places.   That would be like the end of her life as she knew it. The thought was unbearable.  

She remembered clearly the time her friend Doris succumbed to family pressure and went into Morningside Glen.  Although the cold pale green walls were clean enough and the carpeted hallways and fresh flowers even hinted at opulence,  there was an overpowering feeling of being enclosed, being unable to breathe freely.   Wisps shuffling along in their old cardigans and slippers, pushing those Zimmer frames ahead of them. The musty slightly mothbally odour of old clothes.  She hoped that she didn’t smell like that. The dead eyes.  The resigned hunch of their shoulders.  The unrelenting cheerfulness of the activity supervisors as they tried to coax tired limbs to mild exercise and worn out brains to board games was so depressing,

 One day she’d had lunch with Doris in the communal dining room.  She’d pushed overcooked carrots and rissoles with gloopy brown gravy around her plate.  The residents couldn’t chew steak anyway.  Belle made her exit after the predictable dessert of tinned peaches and custard, citing a doctor’s appointment in the city. 

           ***.

 The more she thought about the time ahead the more she was convinced there was only one way out. Unless she acted now the days and months ahead would be rocky.  One long road, leading nowhere.                                                                                                                                                           

Belle picked up the book that had been sitting on her table for weeks.  A Calm Exit.  She opened it to the first page and the dedication.  For all those who deserve a quiet and dignified death without complications.  Make sure your wishes are followed.  As she turned the pages, she became more and more convinced -  this was the right solution.  

A little face appeared at the window.  Could she be dreaming?  Then a tap, tap, tapping.  Her brain snapped to attention.  She rose from the table.  

“Mrs Leighton, Mrs. Leighton...are you there?  Look at my new kite.”

It was the slight seven year old from down the road.  He always looked needy, seeking someone’s approval, someone’s attention.  Lost.  Hanging around, engaging her in conversation if she was out the front.  She wondered what sort of parents he had.  Might he be one of those latchkey kids?  The kids who seemed to bring themselves up.  At least, Belle could say she never neglected her child.  She had had the luxury of being at home when he was young and was positively thrilled when school holidays came around and she could take him to the Easter Show, make craft angels with him at Christmas. She smiled when she thought about the soccer games, with the under sixes all running in the same direction after the ball.  

But the tiredness now seemed to come from her very marrow.  It was hard to concentrate on what he was saying.

“Look...”  He started to run up the incline of their street, dragging the cheap flimsy fluoro  paper thing with him.   When he got to the top, flushed and excited, he was screaming at her to watch.  He ran back down and the thing was suddenly airborne, trailing behind him.  His little face was ecstatic.  

“Look, look....I’m flying!”

“I can see that...” she laughed suddenly, and it just bubbled out of her - it sounded strange, this laugh.  As though it were coming from someone else.  How long had it been since she had experienced real joy?  She continued watching him and he looked so happy.   When he finally came and put his arms around her, the shock made her recoil.  It felt almost alien, someone hugging her like that.  She picked up his kite.

“Don’t you think you should be getting home now, Aiden?”

He brushed the mucous from his dripping nose in a way that looked almost tough.

“Nah, Mum won’t be home for ages.  I go home whenever.”

Belle frowned. She looked anxiously down the street.  The sun had suddenly gone behind the clouds.  It was almost dark now. There was no-one around.  How worried she used to be if Colin was even fifteen minutes late from school.  What was the matter with these people?  Why did they even have children?

“Are you sure?  What time does she get home from work?  It’s getting dark. “

“I got a key.  I just let meself in.  Don’t worry, Mrs. Leighton.”

“I think you should come home with me.  Then I can ring your mum and let her know where you are.”

“Okay.”

He took her hand, almost too willingly, she thought.  What about stranger danger?  She’d been so paranoid about someone snatching her son from her, she’d often been over-protective, vetting his school friends, restricting his playtime, making sure he was never out of her sight.  Maybe she’d been too emotionally needy herself.  

After she’d heated up some soup and he was slurping it at the table, she picked up the phone 

“Hello?  Look, it’s Belle Leighton from number 44.  I just wanted to let you know that Aiden is with me.  It was getting dark....Sorry, what was your name?”

“Oh.  Sorry. It’s Rochelle.  Could you...?” It was a small breathy voice that sounded oddly familiar.  

“I’ll bring him over right now.”

The little fellow was oblivious, watching the cartoons.  He’d eaten every last morsel and was riveted to the set.  Now Belle was worried.  What if his mother reported her to DOCS or something?  Surely it wasn’t wrong to bring the little boy in out of the cold.  But maybe his mother saw her quite differently – as some sort of threat.  Or maybe she was just a single mother under a lot of pressure.  

“Listen, Aiden, your mother wants you home right now.  We’d better go.”

She buttoned her coat.  He was still sitting there.

“Aiden?”

“Can’t I just stay here?  It’s so warm.  I like it here.”

“Sorry, but you’ve got to go home.”

The tiny figure that came to the door had large eyes with dark circles under them.  It was the girl from the petrol station. She didn’t seem grateful that Belle had brought her son home.  She seemed embarrassed.  Belle could see from the doorway that the place was a mess.  Aiden slipped past her and turned the old television on.  Realising she wouldn’t be invited inside, Belle offered a smile and said,

“Well, I won’t hold you up then.  I just wanted to make sure that he was alright. “

“Thanks for bringing him home. “

She was already closing the door.  Belle left then, and as she walked slowly back to her house, she wondered whether it might be interfering if she kept an eye on the little guy.   Just to make sure he was alright.  Surely there could be no harm in that?

                                                                        ***

The hallway mirror gave her a glimpse of herself she hadn’t seen in a while – she looked the same, fair hair that would never quite straighten into a bob, kind blue eyes and tired lined skin.  That night she fell asleep in front of the television.    

 The next morning she walked slowly around every room, and thought about not being able to recognise her surroundings anymore.  Not remembering the day she and Derek had had a mock fight putting up the pale flock wallpaper.  How they both had glue all over them and had had to wash it off in a bubble bath later.  How Colin’s room still had a burn on the carpet when he’d pulled over the lamp.  They were lucky he hadn’t set the place on fire.    It was her job to navigate the family and all that that entailed – entertaining visitors and keeping everyone well-fed.   The kitchen cupboards had seen better days, but her trusty old Mixmaster had whirred its way through literally thousands of sponges and teacakes.

She had always taken for granted she’d live to a ripe old age with Derek - they’d be doddering about the house together making cups of tea, pretending to fight over the lifestyle and sport sections in the Herald.  He used to always get the sport and she would make a face, pretending disappointment. The tears welled up then.

There was a timid knock at the door.  That could mean only one thing.  It must be Aiden.  He mustn’t see her crying.  “I’m coming.....”  she said, as she, dashing into the bathroom, splashed her face with cold water and dabbed on some lipstick. 

But it was Rochelle.

“I hate to ask…but…could you possibly look after Aiden today?  I’ve got to do a late shift. If….um, if I don’t have a “responsible caregiver” (she said the words as if they’d been programmed into her) they’ll take him off me again….could you?”

Belle tried to hide her delight behind a responsible mature lady façade.

“That would be fine.”

                                                                  ***

Something shifted.  Belle got up early every morning and took Aiden to school.  She still made detailed to-do lists and was careful to eat right and stay active, now she had someone else to consider. She began to look forward to Aiden’s visits.  She made afternoon tea treats which he gobbled up.  Rochelle began to rely on her more and more. 

Belle planted more bulbs for the spring.  Narcissus this time.   Narcissus for the Greek god who saw his own reflection and fell in love with it but when she picked the first heavily scented flowers that September morning, she thought not only of love but gratitude.