Hindsight Read online

  The thought of giving everything up created feelings of resentment, even anger towards Chris. Why should he get a career while mine was over before it even began? My degree still had two years left until completion, not to mention my own two-year internship. Over the next three weeks we argued, planned, tried to figure out a way to make ends meet and allow me to finish my degree and work. But with nothing behind us, it seemed improbable that my dream would ever come to fruition. My career would probably consist of working part-time as an administrative assistant or in retail. Not quite PR divadom.

  Days after reconciling our future I began to experience sharp, stabbing pain that felt like my insides were being shredded. Then came the bleeding, light at first, but growing heavier until it was like a regular period. Chris took me into the Women’s Hospital where they admitted me immediately and conducted all sorts of ultrasounds and blood tests. It showed that a miscarriage was in progress. The result was a mixture of relief followed by guilt at being so relieved. It changed our relationship and allowed me to accept that Chris really loved me and would always be there for me. It was the second time I had fallen in love with him.

  Is Will that baby? Perhaps he just wasn’t ready to come to us at that time. Or more likely, perhaps we weren’t ready. We don’t plan on having any more children; it wouldn’t be fair to them. It’s hardly fair on the two we already have. Will’s existence here is like a tease of what might have happened; the person our first child may have grown into.

  “He reminds me of my Dad. Will has his smile.” Dad’s face dances before me and for just a moment, I allow myself to think of him, to feel his presence. To miss him.

  “Yes, he does. You say that often,” she says quietly, rubbing my back.

  We arrive home within five minutes of leaving the schoolyard. The walk is peaceful, cleansing. The warm afternoon sun peeps through the trees, leaving a dappled pattern on the footpath; a virtual sea of shadows. The breeze is starting to lift and soon it will be time to find a light jumper. Autumn is underway and will bring with it cool mornings and late afternoons, the type that are warm for as long as the sun is in the sky. Once it is swallowed by the tree line, the cold starts to creep in, rolling along the ground and curling around windowsills until the whole house is chilled and it’s time to close up.

  Autumn is my favorite time of year. The colours: earthy browns, russet reds, amber and orange, the colours of fire lend warmth to a chilly climate. Long hot summers, filled with electrical storms that light up the sky in dazzling displays of Mother Nature, resulting in days and days of humidity, are draining. After three months of cracking heat the opportunity to eat a warm meal and pull on a long pair of trousers is exciting. The trees shedding their leaves gives me hope of being able to start fresh each year, to emulate the change within nature. But every year, my halfhearted attempts fail and once again my family is subjected to another term of Juliette the perpetual promise-maker/promise-breaker.

  Dinner-like aromas emanate from the kitchen, so delicious that my stomach starts to grumble. All the kids move into the backyard to see Chris and Callum. Will unpacks his school bag and gets changed into shorts and a t-shirt and his boots. Immediately he is outside, helping his father with the garden, digging and turning over the soil while Chris sorts the bulbs into rows.

  Cal runs up and launches into Will’s arms and them squirms out and repeats the process with Ethan. Rosie tries to pick Cal up but he’s too heavy for her and she only manages to lift him up to his tippy toes, his shirt riding up to his underarms. Then he launches at John and the two of them tip over onto the ground into a heap of giggles.

  Chris puts down his shovel and approaches us, his hands and face covered in soil. Wiping sweat away from his forehead, he kisses me on the cheek, leaving a dirty handprint on my shoulder.

  “Whoops, sorry love.” He moves to brush the soil off, but hesitates, “probably best you do that, I’ll just make it dirtier. There’s four casseroles in the fridge and two on the bench from the neighbours. Anne and Regina, Esme and Beryl and Aunty Maeve all dropped around while you were gone. Gran came by too, she’s really worried about you. Can you go and see her tomorrow please?”

  “Gran?” Gran who?

  “Yes, and Aunty Maeve too, love. They’re both anxious to see that you are alright, they won’t take my word for it.”

  “Aunty Maeve?” I say.

  Chris and Lily look at each other and then back to me. Chris sighs.

  “After the kids are in bed we’ll go through the photo albums. They might help to jog some memories. If Gran knew the extent of your memory loss, she’d move in here to look after you.”

  “She would?” Oh, how horrifying.

  “Where do they live? Just so I know where to go tomorrow,” I ask.

  “Gran lives opposite Lily and Aunty Maeve behind Gran, across the alleyway.”

  Deep inside me a little scream of terror is being released at the thought of family living two houses away. It’s almost worse than wearing flat shoes and flowery dresses.

  Lily helps to unpack the kid’s bags while I wander off and have a look around the house. The two beds in Ethan’s room make sense now. The other bed is Will’s. It didn’t ring any alarm bells before because a small nervous breakdown was in progress at the time and it wasn’t about to be paused to do a bed count.

  There’s no toilet to be found anywhere, so I walk back into the kitchen.

  Lily whistles as she opens the fridge to retrieve the milk.

  “You won’t need to cook for a week,” she says.

  I cast my eyes over the plethora of casserole dishes in the fridge and on the bench, it strikes me how giving these people are. Never in my life have I ever cooked a meal to help someone out, mainly because my cooking comes with its own death certificate. Yet here they are, assembled before me like entries in the Royal Casserole Show.

  “Umm, this is going to sound really odd,” I say.

  “More odd than anything else today?” she smiles.

  “Where’s the toilet? It’s not…” where it should be. A bit like me.

  “It’s in the backyard Jules, where it’s always been.”

  “In the backyard, that’s a good one,” I laugh.

  But she’s not laughing. In fact, her expression tells me that she’s serious. Touching my arm, Lily points through the window to a little wooden building in the yard, about the size of a broom cupboard, bordering the back fence, linked to the house by a concrete path.

  An outdoor toilet? You’ve got to be kidding!

  She starts to laugh, “it’s not very glamorous, is it? I’m sure Marilyn Monroe doesn’t have to wander into her backyard to visit the ladies’.”

  “But what if I need to go in the middle of the night? It’ll be cold and dark.” A shiver works its way down my spine.

  “You either hold on until morning or wrap yourself up and take a torch, and an umbrella if it’s raining,” she answers.

  My lips move but no sound comes out.

  “Oh, and be careful of spiders too, redbacks like outhouses.”

  “So, if I want to go during the night I have to get fully dressed, find a torch and umbrella, leave the house, wander through the backyard and then worry about spiders attacking me?”

  She nods. “Yes, that pretty much sums it up. Bet you miss hospital now — with their indoor plumbing. Anyway, we’d best move on now. Bath- and dinnertime.”

  Lily rounds up John and Rosie and is about to head home for dinner.

  “Just one more thing: how do I heat dinner up?” I ask. From memory, microwaves weren’t invented until the mid-Eighties.

  “The oven usually works best for me. It’s this box over here with the front door. See, you turn this dial and light a match inside and voila — fire!” she giggles. “Let me know if you need anything, won’t you? Otherwise, I’ll see you tomorrow morning, eight-thirty out the front.”

  My expression must be one of confusion.

  “For the walk to school,” she fi
nishes.

  “School, yes, of course. See you then, and thanks for everything today.”

  “Pleasure lovey, glad to have you back.”

  Will has a quick shower, followed by Ethan, while Cal’s bath is filling up. His clothes are filthy after helping Chris in the garden; it looks as though he was buried. But that’s not the worst thing. Underneath his clothes is…a cloth nappy held in place by the world’s largest safety pins. How do these things work?

  I try not to stab him in the thigh while removing the pins. It falls open to reveal nothing but wee. Today has been enough of an eye-opener without having to face my first shitty cloth nappy. The hard part is putting the nappy back on properly. After a fumble of fingers and safety pins it still looks pretty loose. Cal stands up and while it doesn’t fall off, it does look very gapey in spots. It wouldn’t even hold in a fart.

  “Chris? I need to ring Lily and see if I can pop over for a minute, this nappy is giving me grief. Where’s the phone?”

  “The phone?” Then a short pause. “It’s in the shed, with the car.”

  These 1961 people are crazy; toilets in backyards, phones in the shed. “You said we didn’t have a car.”

  “We don’t. We also don’t have a phone. Just pop over, but don’t be too long though. I’m pretty hungry, I’d like dinner soon.”

  He’d like dinner soon? What is this, a restaurant? Both his arms and legs work, so why doesn’t he get dinner ready? Maybe this is still the era where it’s acceptable to be a Neanderthal, which would make me nothing but a liberated cavewoman. Ug!

  Cal is spread-eagled in my arms as we rush over the road to Lily’s. If he craps himself now I’m in a world of hurt. It will make his modern shit-bombs seem like skid marks.

  The house is very Lily. It’s painted pale blue with a white roof and deep blue ironwork. The garden is like something out of a magazine — roses in shades of pink, red and white, sprays of lilies and oceans of lavender cuddle the house. The aroma envelops me, imparting calmness and tranquility where only panic and fear existed. It’s a little haven.

  “Lily,” I cry out. “I need help again.”

  “Come on in, lovey. I’m in the kitchen,” she sings down the hallway.

  “Cal’s nappy is giving me a hard time. Can you give me a quick lesson, please?”

  “Of course I can. Come here, Cal.” She places him on the kitchen table, flips him onto his back and expertly pins the nappy. “The trick is to make it a bit tighter when you first put it on because it will loosen with movement. Here, you undo it and do it up again.”

  “Right.” My tongue pokes out the side of my mouth in extreme concentration. Anyone would think that putting a nappy on is more complex than performing brain surgery.

  “Tighter, that’s it. Hang on, not too tight,” she coaches.

  “How can you tell it’s too tight?”

  “See how his eyeballs are bulging out of their sockets? Well, they’re not supposed to do that. Just a touch looser. Yes, that’s it. Well done. Anyone would think this is your first nappy.”

  “One more thing. What do I wipe him with when he craps himself?”

  Lily laughs out loud. “Chris was right, you have another personality emerging. I love this new language. Head injuries suit you. All I got from my fractured skull was constant headaches. It’s simple, you just use toilet paper with a bit of water if you need it. Then you scrape the poo, or the crap as you call it, out of the nappy and flush it down the toilet, rinse the nappy and soak it in a bucket of sanitiser until you have enough to do a full wash. Then wash and dry as normal. Just make sure you don’t run out.”

  “Ewww, really? What do I scrape the poo off with?”

  “Toilet paper. Some women have a scraper or a stick they use especially for it, but you usually use toilet paper.”

  “A shit stick? How disgusting.”

  Lily dissolves into hysterics again, “Shhhh, not around the kids. Don’t let Chris hear you swearing like that, OK?”

  “Why, is he against swearing?”

  “Most people are. It’s not what ladies do, but you and I swear occasionally when it’s only the two of us.”

  I thank her and make my way home. Perhaps this cavewoman existence will be temporarily bearable with Lily by my side. At least she has a sense of humour.

  Chapter 13

  Dinner is Anne’s lamb casserole, and it is the best meal of my life. Every tastebud in my mouth sits up and applauds simultaneously. Mum’s casseroles, or ‘spews’ as we called them, were the culinary equivalent of a benign brain tumour — horrid but not bad enough to kill you. We have dinner with some bread and at the end of the meal Chris uses his bread to mop up his left over gravy, which looks like a good idea, so I do the same. He looks at me oddly.

  “Whaab?” I say around a mouthful of lamb gravy-soaked bread.

  “Nothing,” he answers, “it’s just that women usually don’t do that at the end of a meal. It’s not very ladylike.”

  “Really? It’s delicious, Anne makes a wonderful casserole. I’ve never tasted anything like it. There’s a bit left, do you want it?” The ladylike reference has flown straight over my head.

  “No thanks.” His face is contorted in disgust.

  “Thank Go…goodness for that.” My constant blasphemy has to stop or Chris will suspect something. “My tummy is about to explode but…”

  “I’ll have it Mum, if that’s alright?” Will looks hopefully at the remains in the dish.

  “Oh, OK.” Trying to keep the disappointment out of my voice is like trying not to cry through a tearjerker.

  “I’m a growing boy. You keep telling me my legs are hollow.”

  “Yes, I guess so…” I manage to dip my bread in once more before he swoops in to devour what’s left. Growing boy, blah, blah, blah. What about me? A pathetic thirty-four-year-old woman who hasn’t eaten properly in fifteen years for fear of putting on weight, because, for some strange reason, it would reflect on my ability to perform my job properly.

  As I speak a tiny trail of gravy pops out of my mouth and slowly trickles down towards my chin. Chris looks at me as though a new head has sprouted. Not wanting to waste any of this scrumptious dinner, I wipe the gravy trail with my fingers and then stick them in my mouth. If Chris could possibly display any more disgust he would implode.

  “What?” Although it sounds more like “Mhot?” around my mouth full of food.

  He just shakes his head. “Righto, you clean up here and I’ll take the boys in and watch some TV. Don’t forget to make everyone’s lunches for tomorrow too.” He gives me a kiss on the cheek.

  Hang on! I get to clean up and make his lunch while he sits down and watches the TV? How does that work?

  Chris sees the confused look on my face and says, “You can’t expect a man to do the dishes and make lunch, can you? That’s women’s work, love.”

  My eyebrows disappear under my hairline, like a face-lift performed by an inexperienced surgeon. Well, it seems I have a bit to learn about the role of men and women in 1961.

  “No, thanks for clarifying things. No man could do women’s work.” Because no man is tough enough to own a vagina. My PR smile comes out, which disguises the fact that nothing would give me more pleasure than to point that out to him. Mrs O’Shane.

  So, my hands get busy with the ‘woman’s work’ of cleaning and preparing food.

  “Chris, what do you have for lunch?” I call out.

  “Same as always, love,” he says from the lounge room.

  “And that would be?” Two parts of fuck-all, a fresh air sandwich and a cup of up yours?

  “Two sandwiches with the leftover roast, pickles and cheese; some fruit and a piece of the cake you baked. My lunch box is in the cupboard. The boys have the same but Ethan has only one sandwich. Thanks love.”

  “OK, no worries. You just sit in there and watch television. Don’t worry about me…”

  Silence.

  “Suffering a head injury, wandering around the
kitchen using sharp implements all by myself…”

  Nothing.

  “No, really. I’ll be fine. You just go about your business in there.”

  Mumbles emerge from the next room. Ethan pokes his head around the corner and says,

  “Mum, Dad told me to tell you to please be quiet. He can’t hear the news.”

  Will comes into the kitchen and stands next to me. He’s like a bamboo shoot, tall and willowy. The widest part of him is that smile, it seems to take up most of his face. His French cheekbones, plump lips and flawless skin would have him signed up by a model agency in my own time. But it’s more than just beauty, he possesses a quality that is hard to define. His persona is all Zen garden. We share the same energy; there is light that links us.

  “Mum, do you mind if I make a sandwich please? I’m starving.”

  “Of course you can, can’t have you going hungry, can we?”

  He smiles at me as he butters the bread.

  “So, what’s new in the world of Will?” I ask, hoping that he will reveal all.

  “Well, the scout from the grammar school will be coming to watch us during the second game in May. They’re deciding on footy scholarships after that.”

  “Scholarships, yes. So you can study medicine.” Thanks to Lily, at least I don’t seem like a total flake.

  “So I can matriculate and perhaps gain a scholarship into university.”

  He collapses into a chair and sighs.

  “What’s wrong, Will? Are you concerned about the game?”

  “A few nerves, I guess. I really want this Mum, there’s no other way I’ll get to university otherwise.”

  “What about academic scholarships?”

  “They always go to the private school kids. No one from St John’s has ever got one. Footy is my best option.”

  It’s so unfair. Never once did I feel privileged to go to uni.