Anchor Point (17 page)

Beyond the building, though, Melbourne was molten. It stretched away, grey and uniform to the north, east and west, streets like veins of silver running through stone. A copper snake of river water wound through city blocks. To the south, Port Phillip Bay, a mirrored sheet of water the colour of steel, was almost still, as though the waves had melted under pressure from the sun. The perspective thrilled Laura, as freak shows thrill.

Being acclimatised to extraordinary height did scramble the scale of things, she felt. The frenetic energy of the streets was diluted by distance, made silent. At street level, everything looked too frighteningly large and close. She thought of the valley left behind in Kyree, the clean crispness of very dry heat, the screech of bird in blue blazing sky. She thought of sodden Sydney streets. It was hard to imagine how each place could exist even as the others did. Could go on existing.

Having thrown herself into the work of preparing for Vik's eventual discharge, anything to keep her fears at bay, to feel she was being useful, it was strange to arrive back at her own little flat. Nothing had changed; but something had shifted.

Luc came charging up to smother her in kisses. Laura let him press her into the wall, feeling the wind go out of her, unable to remember the last time he had seemed so energised. Her home looked strange over his shoulder: smaller, darker – old. A little stunned, she stared at the gallery of old movie posters in the hallway, cheaply framed. She had thought the place cosy, once.

‘Geez,' she joked into Luc's neck as he hugged her. ‘I should go away more often.'

But it wasn't her, she realised, as Luc excitedly outlined the revelation he'd had late one night while she was gone. ‘I'm going to study Law,' he said. ‘What do you reckon?'

It took her a moment to process the notion, clutching her bag, rubbing her eyes. ‘Dunno, sweetheart.' She eased herself away, set to brewing tea. ‘I literally just walked in the door. Let me think.' But she couldn't think clearly. She stumbled over the place by the sink where the lino was peeling.

‘Gotta play the game to change the game, I've realised!'

‘Sounds good,' she said neutrally. ‘Challenging.' Perhaps she would never be satisfied, a small voice cautioned. Perhaps he couldn't win.

‘You can handle it all without me,' Luc went on. ‘I'll still be here to help.'

It didn't escape Laura that by enrolling in Law, Luc was doing what his father had longed for.
Another bloody lawyer
? she thought, but didn't say as much. It was clear how desperately Luc needed her to confirm that he wasn't selling out. He led her over to the old futon couch, talking all the while. Sipping her tea, Laura picked at the Indian throw hung over the back, electric pink, covered in mirrors. Their images repeated, embroidering the fabric.

Taking his lovely face in her hands, she let Luc off the hook.

But by the next morning, Laura couldn't ignore that she felt dumped in it. Her resentment was a burn. Angrily buttering toast, she told Luc that he had set her up in his job, and gone off to tackle the next thing on his long, private list of things to achieve.

‘What am I, your worker?' Laura's fists were rolled like batons.

Luc told her she could do something else if she liked. ‘It's a free world,' he said.

Through clenched teeth, Laura fought him. ‘I thought we were doing all this together.'

She stormed along their street and into the main road, glaring at couples arm in arm, sharing umbrellas. Water ran into Laura's eyes; she turned her collar up, frowning. Despite the rain, the shopping strip was crowded. People everywhere, forcing her to slow and edge her way through, as though wading in waves. When had this daggy little suburb become fashionable, busy? It seemed to have happened without her noticing, time passing. Had she changed as much?

Have I lived here that long?
she thought.

Pouring from cafes, people sheltered under awnings, inhaling the steam of their coffees. Pedestrians carried small dogs, good-for-nothing animals with mashed-up faces: couldn't smell a rabbit, a fox, if one bit them on the arse. People with cloth bags of overpriced vegetables; people with imported cigarettes and fingerless gloves; people drinking boutique beers; eating meals worth less than half what they'd paid; with expensive prams; with old clothes they considered ‘vintage'; with laptop computers; with hours to while away, just reading the paper. Pushing through, muttering, ‘Excuse me, excuse me,' and then just pushing, Laura gnashed her teeth.

She hated them all.

She found herself at the bus stop, rode down into town. Walking along the harbourfront, she was filled with rage. That her whole life was spent taking care, being good, doing what she thought she should. She glanced about her through the drizzle and didn't know where she was.
Was there anything I ever really wanted to do?

She shoved the thought away. It was too awful. She was afraid of the answer – that there was none. Her eagerness to please, her loneliness, had ensnared her inside a perfectly workable life. She was a wife – or near enough; had a man by whom any woman would want to be loved. Luc was kind and smart and made jokes. They were both healthy. They had nice enough things. Her work was meaningful. It kept her busy. Most days she enjoyed it. What more could she want? But there was still the sense that she was living someone else's life.

Immersed in her work, in Luc, in the city, Laura sometimes found it hard to tell which of her selves was real. From the slick streets of Sydney suburbs, the bald, baking farm seemed so far off. When she went home, her damp Sydney flat, and Luc's back pressed against her chest at night in bed, seemed hazy, dream-like against the solid familiarity of the farm. It was disconcerting. She would try not to look back at Bruce's figure as she cycled down the road, heading for Kyree Station. Her father – shrunken and dusty, reduced by distance – looked inconsequential, part of the bald hill face. Made of drought-cracked earth.

Luc's semester started; the restaurant and nursery picked up. Laura rarely got an afternoon to herself – each hour was accounted for. As they had most of her life, the tasks piled up like foundation stones beneath her.

Months passed with little more contact than the obligatory calls she made of a Sunday – brief and business-like – in which Bruce filled her in on his week: jobs done and jobs left to do.

Then he announced that he was coming to see her. ‘Understand you're busy, love,' he said. ‘But you're my daughter!'

The intimacy of the words stunned Laura. How much she must mean.

‘Oh, Dad,' she said, voice a little wobbly. ‘Be back at Christmas, promise.'

‘But that's ages.'

It wasn't just about the extra pair of hands she provided, Laura realised. Bruce missed
her
. The longing was painfully sharp, a cracked rib: to be home in Kyree. How badly Laura wanted to feel the length of Vik's small body in bed at night, reassuringly solid; to see the pleasure on Bruce's face as she served up his meal. But the things she desired lay behind her, years in the past. They could not be exhumed.

Laura told Bruce that they would be delighted to see him in two weeks. Gazing across the room at Luc as she spoke, she was already defensive, pre-emptively annoyed by the way she knew he would respond to news of her father's visit. And guilty for making him put up with Bruce, guilty that she couldn't just go up to Kyree as she normally did, keeping everyone happy.

‘You take care, love,' Bruce said in her ear. His tenderness was there, uncharacteristically raw. ‘Hear?'

Luc watched, raised eyebrows asking his question for him.

As Laura put the phone down she caught Bruce distantly saying, ‘Lor? One more thi–'

But she'd already hung up. The unfinished thought hung in the air, a haunting.

Months after Bruce had come and gone, Laura would yearn to return to the instant she cut him off. If only she could listen a minute longer. Hear what he had to say.

She picked Bruce up from Central Station when he stepped off the train, busting through the crowd to get to him. He stood squinting into the steam, swaying slightly. She noticed his mangy clothes and thought,
I've left him alone for too long
.

‘Dad?'

He jolted when she took his arm, flinching it away. Then his eyes found her face, focusing. The smile he gave was radiant. ‘Oh, love,' he said breathlessly, staring at her. Were those tears? ‘I found you. At last.'

Laura felt a twinge that his pleasure was too great, somehow misplaced.

‘Reckon
I
found
you
,' she said blithely.

He resisted slightly, picking at her sleeve. The way he kept looking at her, like he hadn't seen her in years. ‘The storm, the flood,' he was rambling. ‘So dangerous. But you're safe!'

‘'Course.' Laura's annoyance was a low buzz. She hated herself for feeling it. But couldn't he just let her get him home? The crowds, the humidity, were impossible. It would be so much easier to catch up once they were in the flat. Laura was thinking of the nice cold beers, ripe tomatoes and fresh bread that were waiting. She pulled Bruce out onto the street. Once he had taught her how to make fire without matches, and here she was, hustling him like a child.

‘Where're my things?' he said suddenly, jerking away from her, craning back.

His luggage. Laura suppressed a groan – she should have realised. She left Bruce sheltering in the bus stop and dove back into the station. But there were no unclaimed suitcases on the platform, no bags in overhead racks.

‘I'm so sorry,' she said when she got back. What an introduction to the city. There five minutes and already robbed. It distressed her, how upset Bruce got then. Somehow, shakily, she got him back to the flat. Apologising profusely, talking him down. Thinking,
He should have never left the farm
.

Later, in bed, Laura turned to Luc and said, ‘God he's aged.'

But it wasn't Luc she wanted to talk to about it.

Vik just laughed her off, jiggling Cait distractedly, baby bouncer squeaking down the phone.

‘Shh, shh, Caity. Calm down, sweetheart,' Vik mumbled tiredly, lurching between conversations, hardly concealing her impatience. ‘'Course Dad seems older, Lor. He's
old
. What is he, sixty-something? Sixty-five?'

Listening to the baby scream, Laura understood now why Vik had declined travel, to bring Cait up to see Bruce. She wished she hadn't asked her at all, but she hadn't fully realised the toll it was taking, all those sleepless nights, the colic. So she didn't press Vik about their father, but let the issue drop, let her sister ramble on about dummies and nappies, mothers' group and sleep.

Desperate to keep things nice between Bruce and Luc, minimising contact, Laura tried to bustle her father out of the flat each day. He resisted, seemed hesitant to leave, scared of getting lost. Out on the main streets, he clutched at her arm as she propelled him along.

‘North is … what?' he kept saying as she said her goodbyes before work, squinting for the sun, trying to get his bearings. ‘That way?' But the rain and smog turned the sky uniformly silver. He found it hard to navigate through the jammed buildings and narrow, haphazard streets; he was used to wide-open spaces that offered up the lie of the land at a glance.

Bruce literally could not believe the weather, the daily rain. Each afternoon he came in soaked, having forgotten an umbrella. They watched the news together of an evening, as Bruce always did at home. Heard a story about climate change shifting demographics. Some in the south had packed up their farms and properties, sick with the smell of dust and dying stock, and moved north. Others, after watching their farms wash away, were moving south, preferring drought to potential drowning. Meanwhile, cities were filling with other rural families who had simply had enough. All over the country, citizens were reporting strange local weather: too much rain in one town, and in others, nowhere near enough.

It was a potential flashpoint between Bruce and Luc. Laura knew they both held fiercely strong views about this. In his darker moments, late at night and after one too many beers, Luc liked to talk tough. ‘No point moving,' he would insist. ‘My advice? You live in the south: secure your own source of water, and be prepared to defend it to the death.'

But they sat together, watching the screen, and pretended it wasn't happening. How hard Luc and Bruce tried with each other. How much they loved Laura, going out of their way. Luc was on his best behaviour. His books piled up by their bed, where he normally sat, cocooned, reading; he was cooking special meals, setting the table. Doing his bit.

Laura rushed home from work of an evening to find the house potpourried with spice, her men cheerfully waiting. Just a little strained.

She phoned home each day to ask, ‘Everything alright?'