The Kookaburra Creek Café Page 7

  ‘Why are we leaving the party? What’s happened?’

  Harriett pushed her into Buckley’s Jag and started the engine. She took off down the street and drove and drove and drove.

  ‘Hattie, can’t we stop somewhere?’ Genevieve yawned and stretched. ‘We’ve been driving for hours.’

  ‘Not far now. Close your eyes. I’ll let you know when we’re there.’

  She knew they couldn’t have been far now. At least she hoped they weren’t. Fatigue enveloped her body, her mind. She wasn’t sure she could drive much longer. She’d never heard of Kookaburra Creek before Buckley had bought her the house, but it was on the map. As long as she was following it correctly. She picked it up to double-check. They’d stay a few weeks, give him some time to think about what he’d done. Give her some time to decide what she wanted to do. Just a few weeks.

  When she raised her eyes back to the endless black stretch before her, she saw a large, furry brown lump in the middle of the road. Was it a wombat? Harriett had never seen a wombat. Why wasn’t it moving? Couldn’t it see her hurtling towards it? It wasn’t moving. Oh shit.

  Harriett swerved to avoid the creature and lost control of the car.

  The tyres screeched as she took the corner too fast and lost traction on the loose gravel shoulder. Genevieve screamed beside her as the tall gum trees sped towards them. They spun round and round, and the side of the Jaguar slammed into a tree.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Harriett reached across to her younger sister. ‘Gen?’

  Silence.

  Harriett opened her eyes and saw Genevieve slumped forward on the dash, her face lying in a sea of shattered windscreen.

  ‘Oh God, no.’ She unbuckled her seatbelt and got out of the car. They weren’t far off the road. Which way? She had no idea how close to town they were. Could she walk it? No. She couldn’t leave Genevieve.

  ‘Evening, ma’am. Need a hand?’ A man with a thick, black beard peddled up beside her on a pushbike.

  ‘My sister’s hurt.’

  He ran around to the side of car. When he saw Genevieve covered in blood he gagged.

  ‘Oh hell.’

  ‘Help me, please,’ Harriett cried.

  The man pulled off his jacket and held it to the gaping wound in Genevieve’s head. ‘Hold this here. Tight. I’ll go get help.’

  ‘Don’t leave me,’ Harriett pleaded.

  ‘Ma’am, we need help. It isn’t far. I won’t be long.’

  He turned and got back on his bike and sped off down the road.

  *

  The hospital was small and old, but at least it seemed clean. Harriett was worried about Genevieve. She wasn’t sure what was more concerning: Genevieve’s silence – she’d not even muttered a groan since the accident – or the blood covering her face and soaking her clothes. Then, of course, there was the number of doctors and nurses surrounding her little sister. The pain across Harriett’s middle was not subsiding like she assumed it would, but she would not take her eyes off Genevieve. Not even when the mean matron asked her to move back. Now, an hour later, they prepared Genevieve for surgery.

  ‘Miss Brookes? You’re looking very pale.’

  Where was that voice coming from? Why was everything so bright all of a sudden?

  Harriett felt herself swaying. She had to focus. Focus on Genevieve.

  ‘Miss Brookes?’

  The room began to spin. She felt something wet and sticky between her legs. Then everything went black.

  Harriett woke. Her head was propped up on a pillow and a white sheet covered her body.

  ‘Welcome back, Miss Brookes.’

  Harriett tried to sit up, but the doctor stopped her. ‘You’ve suffered quite a trauma.’

  ‘I just fainted. I’m fine.’ A dull ache pulsed through her stomach and she placed a hand on her belly.

  The doctor put his hand on her shoulder, gentle yet firm. ‘You did more than faint. You suffered internal bleeding. I’m afraid you lost the baby.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you know you were pregnant?’

  Harriett shook her head.

  ‘We couldn’t stop the bleeding, unfortunately. We had to perform a hysterectomy,’ he said in a matter-of-fact tone.

  Harriett closed her eyes. His words made no sense. She squeezed her stomach tighter. Baby? Hysterectomy?

  ‘How’s my sister?’

  ‘Did you hear me, Miss Brookes? We had to perf—’

  ‘I heard you. How’s my sister?’

  ‘I’ll take you to her once you’ve got your strength back. Is there anyone we should call?’

  Harriett shook her head. Once the doctor left the room she began to sob. She wanted it to stop, but she couldn’t hold back the floods of anger and sadness.

  By the time they let her see Genevieve, Harriett had managed to pull herself together. What her sister needed now was Harriett’s strength. What Harriett needed now was to focus on anything other than her loss.

  When Harriett was wheeled in to see Genevieve her skin turned cold. Her baby sister lay there with two broken arms, a broken leg and her face covered in bandages seeped in blood. But Harriett would not allow herself to cry. Tears were no use to Genevieve.

  She sat in her wheelchair at the end of Genevieve’s bed and watched over her sister in silence.

  2018

  If only, if only, if only. Well, Hattie couldn’t change a thing in the past, could she? No matter how much she wished she could.

  Yes, it all began with Buckley Hargraves, but she’d be damned if he’d get the last say in how the remainder of her life would turn out. There must be something she could do. She walked through the quiet streets of town with a new purpose to her stride.

  She’d been so young then. So naïve. Well, she certainly wasn’t young anymore. She hastened her step. It wasn’t just her life that was about to be ruined. She couldn’t let this happen to Alice. Or Becca. The destruction of lives at the hands of Buckley Hargraves would stop today.

  ‘I simply won’t stand for this, Mr Buddle. This is thievery. Plain and simple.’ She had rung the lawyer in Glensdale as soon as she got home.

  ‘Calm down, Miss Brookes,’ he replied harshly.

  It wasn’t surprising, Hattie supposed, seeing as she’d rung him at home and got him out of bed. But this was important, and he owed her a favour. So, really, an early-morning call was nothing to complain about.

  ‘I need all the facts before I can advise you what to do. Why don’t you make an appointment to see me next week?’

  ‘How about now, Mr Buddle. I can give you the facts here and now and you can get to work as soon as you get to your office.’

  ‘But Miss Brookes . . .’

  ‘But nothing, Elliot. How is your lovely wife, by the way? Still blissfully ignorant about that trollop you visit whenever you go to Sydney on business?’ Desperate times, thought Hattie, definitely warranted desperate measures.

  ‘Tell me again what’s happened.’

  Hattie told him all she knew, leaving out the more salacious details of course, and all about the letter from Smythe and Smythe.

  ‘It’ll be a long shot. But if we can somehow prove intention, that Hargraves always meant you to have the property, maybe . . . Do you have any proof? Anything in writing? Anyone who can verify your story?’

  Only two other people knew that Buckley had given her the property as an engagement present. One of them was dead, and the other hadn’t spoken a word in nearly a decade.

  The fact was, Buckley was gone. His children were as greedy as their mother, and there was nothing Genevieve could do to help. Besides, there was nothing in writing. Unless . . .

  ‘Right then,’ Hattie said with determination. ‘You get to work on finding precedent or whatever you need and I’ll get to work on finding proof.’ She hung up the phone and ran into her bedroom, lifting the heavy lid of the old trunk. Genevieve had told her it wasn’t healthy to hang on to the past. Obsessive, she’d called her. But maybe there was
a reason Hattie hadn’t been able to let go. Maybe this was the only chance to save the café. Surely somewhere in all the magazine and newspaper articles she’d collected over the years, there was something about Buckley and Harriett and the engagement and his generous gift. She just had to find it.

  Kookaburra Creek, 2018

  aturdays hadn’t been so busy in the café since, well, Alice couldn’t remember when since, with an unexpected coach stopping by making things more hectic than usual. Thank God Becca was there. The girl was certainly earning her keep. Her Cajun chicken burgers had flown off the menu and Becca had had to whip up extra patties on the run after they’d sold out of the batch they’d already prepared for the day.

  As the sun began to fall to the west, casting long shadows across the grass through the gum trees, Alice finally felt like they’d caught up with the day.

  Becca took Joey a cup of coffee and then cleared table three. Alice thought she might just have seen a scowl cross the girl’s face when Joey thanked her, but she couldn’t be sure. He was the last customer left inside and Alice was quietly thankful he’d only popped in for a cuppa and not a meal.

  Out on the deck only Freddy Harris was left, with his school books spread across the table.

  ‘Studying again, Freddy?’ she asked, taking him a chocolate milkshake. He always drank a chocolate milkshake when he was studying.

  ‘It’s too noisy at home. Mum’s yelling at Fiona about wasting her life as a paralegal and forsaking the gifts God gave her.’ He rolled his eyes.

  ‘Ahh. Assignment due?’ She looked at his schoolwork.

  He nodded. ‘Monday.’

  Alice looked at him fondly. He was always leaving work to the last minute. ‘Anything else I can get you?’

  ‘One of those coconut lime cupcakes would be great.’

  ‘Of course,’ Alice said, and walked back to the counter.

  ‘Table ten,’ she said to Becca, handing her a plate with Freddy’s cupcake in the middle. ‘Thanks.’

  Becca took the plate then hesitated before stepping out onto the deck.

  ‘This isn’t a library, you know.’ Alice heard her say as she searched for a spot to put the plate down.

  ‘Sorry,’ Freddy apologised as he made room.

  Alice couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw Becca blush.

  ‘Alice, you with us?’ Joey asked, placing his money on the counter in front of her.

  ‘What? Yes. Of course.’

  ‘I said can I take one to go?’ He tapped the cupcake stand.

  ‘I heard you.’ She grabbed a small box from under the counter. She hadn’t heard him at all. She was too busy watching Freddy do his homework, an idea forming in her mind.

  ‘What kind of loser does their schoolwork in a café?’ Becca grumbled as she came back into the dining room.

  ‘Freddy’s a great kid,’ Alice said. ‘He’d be in the same year as you.’

  ‘I don’t go to school.’

  ‘Maybe we can fix that.’

  ‘No bloody way.’ Becca shook her head.

  ‘School isn’t that bad.’

  ‘School sucks.’

  ‘Maybe, if you just give it a chance . . .’

  ‘I said no way.’ Becca stormed out of the café.

  Joey shook his head. ‘Her temper hasn’t got any better.’

  ‘Thank you for stating the obvious, Joey.’ She slammed his cupcake down on the bench in front of him.

  After Joey left, Alice went out the back to find Becca on the jetty. She knelt down beside her.

  ‘I didn’t mean to upset you,’ she said.

  ‘You didn’t.’

  Alice raised an eyebrow.

  ‘I just can’t go back to school.’

  ‘Maybe, if you just give it a try . . .’

  ‘I said no.’ Becca jumped up and ran back towards the café, taking the stairs to their apartment two at a time.

  Alice sat and put her feet into the creek. This wasn’t getting any easier.

  She thought about Freddy, and a new plan started forming. She just had to convince Becca of it somehow.

  No way I’m going back to school.

  If Alice thinks for a second I’m going to put myself through that again, she’s kidding herself.

  They all knew what was going on, though they pretended they didn’t. Teachers are useless. None of them helped. Too hard, I guess. The kids knew too and treated me like somehow they were going to catch it. I will never go back to that. Ever.

  And seriously, what would be the point anyway? It’s not as if I can do the stupid work.

  It’s like he said: ‘A dumb cow like you isn’t ever going to amount to anything.’

  And he was right. The tests at school proved that. Learning is a waste of time.

  Especially for someone like me. Besides, school would mean enrolment and enrolment would mean a paper trail. I’d be easier to find.

  I knew what I did was wrong. I knew what it meant. If Alice ever finds out, she’d kick me out in a heartbeat. She can never know.

  In the morning Alice sat alone in the living room and arranged the sheets of paper on the coffee table in front of her. She was nervous about her plan to convince Becca that finishing school was a good idea. The whole thing could backfire terribly.

  Becca shuffled into the room, rubbing her eyes. ‘What’s this?’ she asked, looking down at the paper.

  ‘They’re maths worksheets. Betty left them for you to try. She used to be a schoolteacher, you know.’

  Becca sat down in front of the coffee table and inspected the worksheets. ‘There’s no point. I can’t do them,’ she said.

  ‘Well, I was thinking you could get some tutoring, and Betty said she’d help. And Freddy. He’s very good at English, you know. Between us I reckon we’ll have it covered.’

  ‘I’m not going back to school. You can’t make me. I’m old enough to have left and I’m working. You can’t make me.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to send you to school.’

  ‘Then what’s this about?’

  ‘Betty’s had a lot of success getting students through their exams through TAFE. There’s one in Glensdale. I’ve just finished a marketing course there. They’re pretty good.’

  ‘Do you mean, like, homeschooling? That’s for hippies.’

  Alice shook her head. ‘Not actual homeschooling. You’d enrol through TAFE, and when you’re ready you’d do your exams.’

  ‘Why would I want to do that?’

  It hadn’t even occurred to Alice that Becca might not actually want to get her HSC. When she was that age it was all Alice could think about. It was her ticket to freedom, a better life. Didn’t Becca want that too?

  ‘You don’t have to,’ she said. ‘It’s just an idea. One day you might want to move on and it might be handy if you’ve officially finished school.’

  ‘Do you want me to leave?’ Becca frowned.

  ‘Of course not.’ Alice shuffled off the lounge and sat on the floor beside her. ‘I love having you work here. I’d have you here forever, if it were up to me.’

  ‘Who’s it up to?’

  ‘Well, you, of course.’

  Becca sat up straight and eyed Alice with suspicion.

  ‘Here. Let me show you.’ Alice grabbed a pencil and started showing Becca how to work out the first problem.

  They went through the first page together. ‘What are you, a maths genius?’ Becca asked.

  Alice hadn’t been called a genius in a very long time. Her mind flashed back to that cool September day with Dean, when they’d sat under the grey gum by the dam.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ said Alice. ‘But I was pretty good at it at school.’

  ‘So, you’re a nerd?’

  ‘I guess you could say that.’

  Becca thought for a moment. ‘You finished school and you were a nerd and you ended up here. Exactly where I am. So what’s the point?’ She stood up and went to her room.

  Alice d
idn’t know what to say. Granted, school hadn’t worked out for her the way it was supposed to, but that was no reason not to try. Becca’s situation was different. She had Alice in her corner for starters. It wouldn’t end the same way for Becca. Alice wouldn’t allow it.

  She got up, went into the kitchen and started on breakfast. When she turned around she saw Becca back at the coffee table, head down, pencil in hand. She tiptoed closer.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘What?’ Becca looked up.

  ‘That answer. It’s correct.’

  Alice could see a small smile touch Becca’s lips, a look so familiar it tore at Alice’s heart.

  ‘Maybe we could give it a shot.’ Becca shrugged. ‘I mean, it might help pass the time until . . .’

  ‘Until?’

  But Becca didn’t answer. Alice sat back down beside her and they went through the next sum. The unease she felt all morning would not subside, try as she might to ignore it. She’d hoped embarking on this new project with Becca might have distracted her, but all it did was bring back memories of sitting in her own living room with her mother going through homework, before everything changed and the world turned black. Alice had learned to lock away the memory of the day her mother was taken from her. It was kept deep down in a hidden part of her soul she rarely dared to open.

  Lawson’s Ridge, 2003

  lice wrote the day’s date at the top of her English book and her stomach tightened. It had been doing that all day – tightening, turning into a knot every time she had to write the date.

  She looked up at the big white clock above the whiteboard, the same clock her mum would have watched when she was Alice’s age. The hands ticked over ever so slowly.

  At exactly 2.48 p.m. Louise leaned forward and tapped Alice on the back, slipping her a scrap of paper. Alice unfolded it under her desk.

  ‘What do you call a cow with no legs? Ground beef!’

  Alice grinned. She could always count on Louise to remember what day it was. Count on her to tell some lame joke to try to make her laugh.