Chapter 49 Kate
KATE
Truth is truth.
The mayor has been talking for some time.
Community project.
Wonderful effort.
Encouraging local involvement.
The crowd is getting restless. Kate can hear Tash’s voice from somewhere in the room, querulous.
There are a couple of people she knows from work, listening more politely.
And Simon seems to have put himself and the new girlfriend directly in her line of vision.
Coincidence? Kate isn’t feeling particularly good about herself—but she doesn’t think so.
The woman beside him looks nice. Kate hopes she’s not a dog lover.
“. . . and the winner for best newcomer goes to Kate Oliver for her magnificent painting, Migration.”
It takes a few seconds for the words to penetrate. Then Linda is pushing her gently in the back, whispering, “Go on. He wants to give you something.”
Kate looks around helplessly. She can’t accept this.
She had no idea there was going to be a prize.
What the hell is she going to do? Everyone is clapping and waiting.
Maybe take it, get it over with, then explain.
She heads to the front and shakes Bardy’s hand, which feels weird.
He looks confused. Has he spotted her eyes pleading, trying to tell him something?
Then she is shaking hands with the mayor. Sweaty. Him or her, she isn’t sure.
“Speech,” someone calls.
She looks down at the small plaque she has been handed. And finds she just can’t look up.
“Kate?” She hears Bardy’s troubled inquiry.
“Best newcomer? That’s a good one.”
If the room hadn’t just gone silent, watching and waiting for Kate to speak, maybe no one would have heard. As it is, people are turning to Simon, and his girlfriend’s voice is clearly discernible. “What do you mean?”
Simon looks around. Kate is now watching him. All she thinks is: Get it over with.
“Well, Kate is JoJo Rose. Spent years painting. I mean, hardly a newcomer.” Simon sounds almost apologetic. He is looking around at the crowd. He won’t look at Kate.
“But you said you’d never sold anything?”
Bardy.
Kate instinctively looks to Linda.
Shocked. And worse, Leonard looks horrified.
Then there is an outbreak of talking.
JoJo Rose? Blimey.
I used to have a few of her prints.
I’ve still got one of her aprons.
Tash, strident, outraged. “Well, that’s a bloody cheek. I’m an accredited sculptor, and they threw me out. That’s cheating. I always thought that JoJo Rose stuff was garbage anyway.”
“I’m really sorry,” Kate manages to say above the noise, “I didn’t mean to accept this. And I wasn’t going to enter my painting. It was just that . . .”
Her mind is too full of things she cannot share with these people. If it were just the group, she might stand a chance. But not here, not now.
She pushes the plaque back into the mayor’s hands.
“I’m sorry I lied.” She directs this at Bardy.
He just stares back. His face is blank.
She throws a look at Pia. Her friend is frowning.
Kate blindly pushes through the crowd. She sees Nate open-mouthed. A last glance at Satya’s photos, and she is in the foyer and heading for the door. She is brought up short by a smiling Hana. “Great painting, Kate. Is Bardy still in there?”
“What? Oh, yes.” Kate’s heart is racing. The delay is killing her. She wants to be gone.
“Brilliant.” Hana holds up her phone. “I think I’ve got a friend who wants to buy his flat.”
It only needs this. Without another word, Kate dodges Hana. By the time she is on the street, she is running. She thinks she hears a voice calling her name. Lou? But she cannot stop. All she can think about is being alone by the creek.
Kate sits in a hollow, looking down at the bones of an old boat that lie exposed in the creek bed.
The yellow gorse is a prickly neighbor shielding her from view.
She feels like she has been running forever.
Her heart is aching, but she is not sure if it is from the exercise.
Ahead of her is the landscape she loves.
The creek at low tide, a flickering, flowing ribbon filled with June sunshine.
Everything reflects everything.
Beyond this is a carpet of sea purslane and sea lavender stretching to the thin line of indigo that is the sea. Above it all is that sky. She thinks of Pia’s quilt. It really did capture the breadth of this land. The waders scouring the exposed mud and sandbanks remind her of Leonard.
She will find a way to apologize. In the gallery, she had felt her shame reflected back from the bright white walls.
Everything reflects everything.
Here in this huge open space, nature tells her that nothing matters that much, and this brings her some sense of peace. Anything is possible.
Well, maybe not everything.
Kate closes her eyes and tips her head back so her face catches the sun. She rests her head on the sandy bank behind her. She is sheltered, but above her, all is wind and the sound of the birds.
The migrants are here for a while, raising their young.
Family. Even with the birds, it counted for so much.
She remembers Leonard telling her that an avocet will fake a broken wing to draw prey away from its young.
She can’t blame Bardy for wanting to be with his boys.
Wanting to be with Hana? Well, that is a different matter.
She left that good man for nearly five years. Broke his heart.
Kate has an image of Tay walking into Hana’s open arms. She feels that this does count for something. That this weighs with Bardy in some important way.
But does Hana really love Bardy?
Who knows.
To be, or not to be . . . in love.
Does she love Bardy?
No.
But she knows she could.
It would be as easy as sitting in a hollow, falling asleep in the sun, listening to the birds.