CHAPTER 62

We sat for a few moments, each of us clearly needing to order some thoughts, or manage reactions, until Kul lifted his bottle.

“Gerald Barker, then?”

We almost whispered his name as the old ritual was followed, and I noticed Melissa squirming a little.

“Are you okay, love?”

She shook her head.

“Not sure, Mike. It’s one thing… Dal told me how close you all were, but hearing and seeing, two different things, ey?”

I looked across at Kul, who for once actually seemed embarrassed. Time to push him further.

“Took me a while to get my head round it, Melissa. I mean, first day at work, and he’s there, and then I needed a hand with a move, and there’s Dad and Lad front and centre”

Sangeeta held up a dismissive hand.

“This one, and that one as well, both my men, they’d just come out with some rubbish, so always remember what you gave them, Mike, all those new friends, plus the whole of the mountains. I was going to say ‘no small thing’, but mountains aren’t, and I KNOW Kul would need to be pedantic. You gave us music, as well. How could we not be as we are?”

She started to laugh, then fought it down.

“Maz, though, oh dear. Kul was so busy singing Mike’s praises she ends up marrying him, and I was just hearing ‘Marrying Maryam’ in my head, and how much wine have I had, duck?”

I couldn’t help my own laughter, turning to Dal’s girl with a grin.

“One of Kul’s games is using Aussie slang inappropriately”

The man himself called out, “Ripper cobber bonzer she’ll be right Manchester globes and lollies!”, so we all shushed him as I continued.

“I’m just imagining him making you use Sheffield and That Other L-Place dialect, ‘appen as like, midduck, and feeding you bread cakes and parkin”

LC was clearly paying attention.

“What’s bread cake parking, Dad?”

“Bread cake is just a local name for a bun, love, a bread roll. I’ve no idea what parkin is; some sort of cake, I think”

Dal snuggled up to his girl.

“Don’t ask me, love. I did my best to find the True Aussie Path, of Lamington and Tim Tams”

Kul yelled, “P-p-pick up a Penguin, son! That’s the original”

“Yeah, dad, but ripper, cobber, she’ll be right, ey?”

Sangeeta was right, it seemed, in her suspicions about our alcohol levels. Later that evening, as Maz cuddled into me, she was far more serious.

“I had a chat with Melissa in the kitchen, love”

“Worries?”

“Possibly. She’s a little like Clara, I think---no, not that way. Without her own family. Bit like Frank, too, Debbie’s husband”

“I thought they were well-matched, love”

“Oh, Mike; you miss so much at times. It’s his second marriage. First wife went off with someone she met on holiday. Took him for just about everything he had”

“And Melissa?”

“Ah, not sure which one, but her parents, similar set-up, and they really hate each other. Big split down the middle, using the kids—she’s got a younger brother---using the kids as weapons. She walked away from it all”

Maz paused for a while, wriggling closer.

“Clara, she found her second family, with Debbie and the other girls, but she still looks at us, how we are, how a family should be, even with… Even with that, well, hiatus. I suspect Melissa is going to be a bit like that”

“Problems, you think?”

“I don’t know, darling. If she’s a dreamer, like our son’s girl, she’ll look to dive in, be part of the family. If she has the same issues as we both have, will she feel unworthy? Dal’s really taken with her, isn’t he?”

“Yup. He’s a very deep lad, love”

“Then we just be ready for whichever way things go. And… did Ish speak to you about his letter?”

“No, not yet”

“Well, leave him to his privacy, darling, but she is applying for a visa”

“When for? I thought she had a year to go at Uni”

“That’s the thing, darling. She has something else in term time after their Summer”

“What’s that?”

“Surgery”

“Bloody hell!”

“Indeed. She’s taking a gap year. Gets into hospital in August, something like ten weeks of recovery, which would wreck her first term in her final year”

“So… She’d be here for about ten months, then, I am assuming”

“Yes. I think we need to start asking around for placements”

Why couldn’t life be simple? At least we had the accommodation available, for I had no doubt as to where she would end up sleeping. I also suspected that the cost of her ticket would be largely met by that new family of hers. One thing had struck me, when watching how the remaining girls acted around those who had moved on into marriage or other long-term relationships, was that while there was clearly envy in play, there was also pride, satisfaction; that same phrase that came to me each time Ish lifted my pride once again, ‘Here’s one our family made earlier’. Not a complaint of ‘Why not me?’, but an almost smug acceptance that their turn would come soon.

I drifted off to sleep with visions of Clara in an apron in some greasy spoon or other, paying for her board at ours with leftover doner kebabs.

I resolved to let the lad approach me first.

A fortnight later, we were out at our local beach, LC now happily free of her buoyancy vest but rarely without her snorkel, except when we took lunch in our café. We were busily disposing of some fresh seafood baguettes and salad when my phone chirped to indicate a new mail.

“It’s from Tom Edwards, love. Just… Bloody hell!”

“What’s up, darling?”

“Nothing at all—that documentary’s been nominated for an award. BAFTA”

“What’s BAFTA, Dad?”

“Like a sort of UK Oscar, son. I think it stands for British Academy of Fim and Television Arts. Says it’s up for the ‘single documentary’ award. Apparently, Tom’s lot got that one before, for that ‘Sharp End’ one”

He perked up.

“Does that mean they’ll want to fly us back to England?”

“I doubt it, son. I mean, they did our bit in Australia. And I thought you’d prefer Wales”

He looked down, clearly trying to find suitable words.

“Dad…”

“Something in that letter, Ish?”

He nodded, still studying his plate.

“Clara’s having to take a year off college. She’s… while the other lot will be at Shrewsbury, she’ll be in hospital”

“Would this be for surgery, son?”

Another simple nod.

“And, Dad…”

“Gap year over here, then?”

Another single nod, and it was so typical of Ish, not to ask for things for himself. He had been the best of big brothers for our girl, the strongest of sons for me, and yet he still saw asking for something that was purely for himself as being an imposition.

“Where is she going for the surgery, son?”

“Brighton, Dad”

Why so far away? Never mind.

“Who’s looking after her there?”

“Chantelle and her mums, then she’ll stay with Annie or Steph”

“Right. What has she done about visas, tickets and so on?”

“Um… that working holiday thing. And she flies on September twentieth”

Suddenly, he was gushing, nerves clearly taking over.

“She says she can find a hostel, B&B or something, not just rock up at ours, expecting---”

“Ish”

“Dad?”

“Not a problem, son. But you will have to tidy your room”

His eyes came up, as he looked form me to Maz and back again.

“You sure?”

Maz answered for both of us with a couple of nods, before turning to LC, with an aside to Ish about us being a family.

“Sweetheart?”

“Mum?”

“Would you like it if Clara came to stay?”

Her face lit up with delight.

“My sister! YES!”

I couldn’t hold my laughter.

“Hands and feet and snorkel and sister?”

“YES!”

I looked back at my boy.

“You’ll want us looking for a placement, then”

He looked back down at his knees.

“Um, no. I spoke to Dal”

“Why Dal?”

“His mate, Dad. That Murdo’s nephew. Clara’s got a job offer at Hillary’s”

Maz guffawed.

“We have trained this one far too well, darling! One thing only, and that is what she is planning to do to keep up to speed with her studies”

“She’s bought some courses from their Open University, Mum”

“Then that is the make-or-break part of this. You have your own studies, so your father and me each need your promise about that. Not one long holiday like we had in Britain, okay?”

“Promise”

“That’s that then. We’ll need to sort some new pillows for you, plus towels and… Leave it with me, darling. Now, I need to get wet again. Carolyn?”

Ish wasn’t the only one who had to buckle down over the next few months, for the State had just pushed through a recruitment drive and they all seemed so frighteningly young. The Butts had been right, and I was only then emerging from what felt in hindsight like a coma. Our Aussie holidays could have made things so mush worse; if it hadn’t been for the Horvaths, I might have stayed as locked in as I was only slowly coming to understand.

Our boy did surprise us with one achievement, though, in insisting that he did a solo floor spot at our folk club, singing, of all things, a Tom Lehrer ditty accompanied by his cooly aily. I had to be fairly inventive, however, when explaining to LC what Lehrer had meant by ‘monogrammed his wife’. Let’s just say that I lied.

Our winter was as typically Aussie as we could manage, including Ish sustaining a broken finger in a footie game two weeks before Clara was due to arrive, the silly young man. He’d managed to avoid injury all season, so trust the luck of the Rhodes.

I pulled that thought back when it emerged, for in reality, despite what had happened to Maz, we had been blessed with more good luck that I felt we deserved, especially in comparison with Neil and his poor lost wife. I resolved to drop Diane a mail and see if there were any more developments regarding Dear Nigel. I needed a gloat, and I could not think of a better subject than that bastard.

Wind it back in, Rhodes.

We got the bus to Perth centre that day, followed by the Airport Line to the terminal, Ish almost dancing with nerves, the splint brilliant white on his left hand. Phil’s lot would pick us up once we were ready, so I directed our boy to the phone shop to buy an Aussie SIM for his girl.

She was flying the same route as we had, via Singapore, and it was delayed by around two hours, so we simply slumped outside in the Spring sunshine, until Ish held up his phone.

“Landed!”