THIRTY-FIVE
Thirty-five
The day of the coroner’s inquest and handing down of the report finally came, and Damian was heading down to the city. This was a big filming day, the opportunity to wrap up the findings and finally bring closure to Catherine’s disappearance.
For Lottie, it was bittersweet. She would miss the time she’d spent with Damian researching and discovering things about this woman from a historical angle, but also as a woman. What an incredible person Catherine had been. She’d stood her ground and married her childhood sweetheart in a time when women were still very much obliged to take on whatever their family deemed the most lucrative union. She waited for her husband to prove himself to their families and then travelled, alone and pregnant, to a strange, wild land. Then went through the trauma of witnessing her husband and multiple men murdered, had her treasured ring stolen and then somehow died and was hidden away, alone, for all those years in the bush, forgotten.
‘It won’t be long. A few days at most,’ Damian told her when they kissed goodbye.
‘I’ll miss you,’ she said miserably. She really wasn’t sure how she’d survived being an independent, modern woman all those years before she’d met Damian. Suddenly, she felt like an abandoned child whenever she thought about him leaving. ‘I love you,’ she said, and then realised that was the first time she’d actually said it out loud.
He must have realised the same thing, because she felt him still before easing back to smile down at her. ‘I was wondering which one of us was going to bring that up first.’
‘It’s weird, because it just feels like it’s always been there, right from the very beginning.’
‘I feel the same way. I’ve loved every minute we’ve spent together. Working on this project with you has been … incredible. You’re incredible,’ he said, kissing her. ‘I love you, Lottie Fairchild. I’ll be home soon.’
Lottie watched the big black bike head out of town with its lone rider, her lips still warm from their kiss, and felt an uneasy sadness. She should still be on a high. They’d finally gotten out the words she’d been saying in her heart for months now. She was just feeling left out because she wasn’t going with him, she reasoned, shaking it off, before heading back inside to prepare for her day.
‘I hate to say it,’ Cher said as they took their seats at the first chamber meeting since the festival, ‘but I’ve almost missed this.’
Lottie sent her friend a sidelong glance.
‘No, seriously. It’s the only chance I get to sit and not make any decisions because, well, Daphney ,’ Cher muttered.
Lottie smirked. To be honest, she’d kind of missed the meetings too. They’d been well and truly over the top leading up to the festival, but when things weren’t so chaotic, meeting nights were a great chance to get out and socialise. Her life was fairly social, working in the store, but she didn’t get to sit and talk with other people who were having the same challenges and issues that running a business in a small town often produced. They were all too busy running the businesses. Nights like these gave everyone a chance to share their problems, both business and sometimes personal, with a group of like-minded people who had also become friends.
‘If it’s any consolation, I think you’ve worn Daphney down.’
‘I doubt it,’ Cher scoffed lightly.
‘Ah, hello? The phone call?’ The day the news spread around town that a body had been located in bushland, everyone had gone into a panic. ‘You were still on tour and Daphney came into the store, convinced it was you because no one had seen you in days.’
‘I bet she was bitterly disappointed when she found out it wasn’t me,’ Cher replied.
‘I think she was genuinely concerned about you,’ Lottie said, glancing at the woman in question as she abruptly clapped her hands together and brought everyone to attention. As they settled in for a run-down of the festival stats and Daphney’s personal, lengthy feedback on all aspects, Lottie considered that maybe she hadn’t missed these meetings as much as she’d thought.
Late the next afternoon, Lottie came in the back door of the kitchen with an armload of timber for her fire to find that her mobile was ringing on the kitchen bench.
‘Hi,’ she said breathlessly as she dived to answer it after dumping her load of firewood in the basket at the door.
‘Hey. I thought you might be tied up in a meeting or something,’ Damian said.
‘Sorry, I was just outside. I miss you. When are you coming back?’ During their last conversation, he’d hoped to have a date he’d be wrapping things up down there and coming home.
‘Uh, still not sure about that,’ he said.
‘How’re things going down there?’ She missed the sound of his voice—who was she kidding, she missed everything about him—but hearing him now made her miss him even more.
‘Yeah, you know. Crazy,’ he said seemingly offhand, but she detected something odd about his tone.
‘Is everything okay?’ she asked slowly.
‘It’s …’ He paused before he let out a long sigh. ‘This whole thing has really blown up.’
‘Blown up?’ she asked, uncertain if this was a good or bad thing.
There was a pause on the end of the line before Damian continued. ‘The documentary,’ he explained, speaking quickly, like he had to get it all out. ‘Everyone wants in on the new findings and the whole Catherine and Jack McNally angle is sending people crazy. Mike’s got interviews lined up and we still have a heap of filming to do. A new investor has come on board, which means the whole production now has a massive budget to play with, so Mike’s got this whole new vision. He needs me to go on tour with him,’ he ended, sounding miserable, which threw her momentarily as she tried to digest the news.
‘On tour?’
‘We’ve got a number of universities and historical groups booking in talks and the filming hasn’t even finished yet. So there’s like another six months of work to do on it.’ He stopped for a moment and Lottie felt a trickle of uncertainty begin to run through her. ‘The thing is … I need to be down here to get it all done.’
The uncertainty turned to dread. ‘For how long?’
‘I won’t be coming back up there like I planned. At least, not just yet.’
And there it was. The bomb she’d somehow been expecting to drop.
‘Oh.’
She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to respond. She couldn’t manage to get anything else out as her mind began whirling, realising all the plans they’d made were not going to happen. ‘So … you’re not moving.’
‘No, not right now. It’s not practical. I need to be here, and commuting from Banalla doesn’t make any sense. It’s just for a little while, until all this is sorted out.’
‘Oh.’ Why couldn’t she come up with anything better than that?
‘I know it’s not what we planned. It’s just … I can’t turn down these opportunities. Mike’s got these connections and it’ll launch my books and my career …’ He stopped talking and she heard the sadness creep into his voice. ‘I feel like I’m letting you down, Lottie. I know I am,’ he corrected quickly. ‘I wasn’t expecting things to take off the way they have. This isn’t normal. It’s like an unexpected lotto win, but for my career.’
‘I understand,’ she said softly. And she did. He couldn’t turn down these opportunities that had landed in his lap. They may never come around again. It just hurt to realise they came at the expense of their new life, the one she’d been picturing in her head.
‘This doesn’t change any of our plans,’ he said, sounding like he was trying to reassure her. ‘I still want to move to Banalla. I still want to make a life with you. All this is just a small hitch in the timeline.’
‘It’s fine. Really,’ she said with forced confidence. ‘You need to take advantage of all this. You’ve worked hard.’
‘Are you sure you’re okay with it?’ he asked. ‘I’ve kind of sprung it on you.’
‘It’s a bit of a surprise.’ Understatement of the year.
‘I honestly never expected it to have such a huge reaction. Nobody did.’
‘Then you need to run with it.’
‘Look, I gotta go. Mike’s here. I’ll call later tonight.’
‘Okay,’ she said and opened her mouth to say goodbye, but the phone had already disconnected. He was clearly in a hurry. She tried not to take it personally, but failed miserably.
She forgot about starting the fire and wrapped her meal in plastic before putting it in the fridge—she wasn’t hungry anymore. She just wanted to curl up under her blankets in her lonely bed and cry. Despite Damian’s words, she knew that everything had just changed.
The days that followed Damian’s announcement were hard. Lottie put on a brave face and told herself it was just a minor setback, but deep down she wasn’t convinced. These opportunities were amazing, but she suspected Damian wasn’t being exactly realistic. Sure, things would die down after a while over the whole Catherine discovery, but if his goal was to help promote his writing future, then this was only the beginning of bigger things. Once his career took off, living the quiet life in Banalla would no longer be something he’d be interested in.
The phone rang as she served a customer and she glanced over, somehow knowing it was Damian calling but unable to excuse herself from the conversation mid-sentence without being rude. When she eventually got away, she called back, but he didn’t answer. It was a frequent occurrence. He was on a busy schedule between travelling and talks, and their chances to say a quick hello were limited.
There were times when they did manage to catch each other and talk, and while she always felt close to him during the calls, as soon as they hung up, the distance was there once more.
‘Meet me in Canberra,’ he said one night while they were talking. ‘I’ll be there for three days. It’ll give us a chance to spend some time together.’
She considered the idea for a moment. ‘I can’t really close the shop for that long,’ she said eventually.
‘Can’t you find someone to open for you?’
She thought about asking her mum, but she was currently away with Gordon. ‘Not really.’
‘It’s only for a few days,’ he reasoned.
‘People count on the shop being open when they come all the way up to visit. And I count on those sales.’
‘Yeah. I guess,’ he said sounding disappointed.
After they’d hung up, Lottie continued to ponder the conversation. She was disappointed too, but she’d never asked him not to do something related to his job. In fact, she’d always been understanding and supportive, keeping her disappointment to herself. How many times had she closed the shop early or for the whole day to do things with him? She knew it was frustration talking—she just missed him so much—but each time she allowed a little niggle of resentment to creep in, it gnawed at her belly and made her more miserable.
‘You should have been there, Lott,’ he said one night, slurring his words slightly after he’d come back from a dinner with a number of colleagues and one too many drinks. ‘They’re treating us like we’re celebrities! Even the older professors who normally look down their noses at us ’cause we’re not in their league, they’re falling over themselves to shake our hands. It’s crazy. Mike’s taking it all in his stride, but it’s insane how big this thing is. We were even signing autographs on campus yesterday. Autographs , Lott,’ he chuckled.
It was hard to picture this version of him as the quiet, down-to-earth Damian who’d been so awkward telling her he was the author of the book she was reading all those months before.
‘Sounds like you’re having fun,’ she said dryly.
‘It’s not a crime to enjoy some of the success, is it?’ he shot back, his tone sharpening.
‘I didn’t say it was. I’ve just never heard you drunk before.’
‘I’m not drunk,’ he insisted. ‘I’m buzzed.’
‘Okay,’ she said calmly. ‘It’s really late. I have to get up for work in the morning, and you should probably sleep off your buzz before your flight.’
‘It’s like you don’t even want to talk to me anymore,’ he said grumpily.
‘I’d love to talk to you, it’s just a pity you didn’t have time to call me before you went out tonight, at a normal time, instead of at,’ she pulled the phone away from her ear and squinted at the screen, ‘two o’clock in the morning.’ Seriously? she thought.
They hung up and although she was tired, she had trouble falling back to sleep. She’d texted him earlier with no reply, and now when he wanted to talk, he was cranky because she’d been asleep.
The weeks dragged on and, despite their best efforts, they could never manage to coordinate their schedules.
The phone calls dropped from a few times a day to once a night, then once every few days. In the beginning, his calls were always full of interesting things that had happened through the day—people he’d met and the places he was visiting, but gradually they became shorter, and were mostly filled with small talk.
‘Are you happy, Lottie?’ he asked out of the blue one night.
‘I’d be happier if you were home,’ she admitted.
‘I feel like each time we talk we’re just going through the motions,’ he said. ‘Like you’re not interested in anything I’m doing anymore.’
‘I’m always interested. I have been from the start.’
‘You don’t ask about any of it.’
‘I always ask how your day was,’ she protested.
‘You don’t seem really interested, though,’ he huffed.
‘You don’t ask me about mine at all,’ she pointed out. Which was true. It was like once he’d left town, he’d forgotten all about how special he’d once found the place.
‘I figured you’d tell me if anything exciting happened.’
‘It’s Banalla! Nothing exciting ever happens.’
There was a long pause before he asked, ‘Is this working?’
Her heart skidded to a halt. She opened her mouth to protest and tell him that of course it was, but nothing came out. The silence on the line felt heavy, like a gathering thunderstorm hanging between them.
‘It’s okay,’ he said softly. And although she desperately wanted to disagree—to brush it off and pretend everything would be okay—in her heart, she knew that things weren’t okay. They were drifting further and further apart.
‘It’s not,’ she said, but her voice cracked and the tears she was trying to hold back suddenly poured forth.
‘I know,’ he soothed. ‘I’m sorry I put us both through all this. I wish I hadn’t. But … I’m in too deep to pull out of it. There are so many moving parts, between the books and the documentary, the speaking engagements. I can’t drop out now.’
‘I don’t want you to,’ she sniffed. ‘This is your big chance. You were right to take it.’
‘But … I didn’t think it would be this hard.’
Even though part of her was desperate to deny it, to tell him he was wrong, that they could survive this, the other, more sensible part of her knew that if they continued the way they were going, there would only be more frustration and, eventually, bitterness. She didn’t want to end things like that.
Even if the truth was that she still loved him, and nothing hurt more than breaking up with someone you were still truly in love with.
‘So that’s it?’ Cher asked. She had turned up on Lottie’s doorstep with a sympathetic shoulder and a lot of wine. ‘It’s over?’
Lottie refilled her glass and sat back in her chair. ‘Yep.’
‘Just like that?’
‘Yes,’ Lottie said, eyeing her friend sternly. ‘It’s finished.’
‘I can’t believe it,’ she said, looking deflated. ‘I thought he was the one.’
‘Well, apparently, he didn’t get the memo.’
‘What an idiot,’ Cher said, shaking her head.
Her broken heart wanted to agree, but she simply couldn’t work up the enthusiasm. He wasn’t an idiot. He was simply making a sensible choice. Unfortunately it came at the cost of their future, and all the plans she’d been busy making were now nothing more than a long-forgotten daydream.
‘I have a good mind to give that boy a call,’ Cher continued.
‘It wasn’t his decision to call it quits,’ Lottie told her. ‘It was a joint decision.’
‘But … why?’
‘Because he needs to be free of guilt about his future, without the burden of me back here, waiting.’
‘You are not a burden,’ she replied furiously. ‘That man was lucky to have you.’
Lottie smiled sadly at her friend. ‘Yes, he was,’ she said with a little slur in her voice. She studied her wineglass and frowned, momentarily distracted as she tried to remember how many she’d had. ‘Anyway, as my last act of kindness, I let him off the proverbial hook.’
‘I like this analogy,’ Cher said, her eyes brightening. ‘We’ll just cast the net further out. He’s not the one that got away, he’s the one you threw back!’ she said, warming to the theme.
‘Catch and release,’ Lottie said, toasting the air with her almost-empty glass.
‘Absolutely,’ Cher said touching her own glass to Lottie’s. ‘There’s plenty more fish in the sea.’
Lottie’s moment of drunken rebellion suddenly crumbled and she felt tears begin to well. ‘But I don’t want any other fish,’ she howled, placing her glass on the table and dropping her head to rest on her folded arms.
‘Oh, sweetheart,’ Cher said, rubbing Lottie’s back as she sobbed. ‘Men are bastards.’