Chapter 5 Kelp Forests
kelp forests
Grow thick and tangled; impossible to escape once caught inside.
We go shopping early the following week, and I insist on carrying the bags from the truck. Maybe to show I’m helpful. Maybe just to keep my hands busy. I keep fidgeting with Ika’s wristband, and Trent keeps looking at it, and . . . Eyes elsewhere!
“I can take that one, too.” I grab the paper bag and heave the four in that hand out of the back seat.
Oof. The paper handles dig into my skin.
Just a short pedestrian hill to the house . . .
But from that direction, a female voice calls, “Your chicken’s trying to escape.” Grandpa starts cussing, and Trent eases the truck door closed—slowly, holding up the handle, so it doesn’t even click—and yanks me into a crouch behind the truck.
I blink at him and he gives me a look that says, stay still. Then he peers around the truck towards the path and jerks back again, almost smacking into my face. His lips are pressed tight, and I hear the clop of shoes coming nearer.
He turns his head, exhale sweeping over my cheek, and whispers, “Aunt Sara.”
I give him a puzzled look and turn my aching wrists. The handles were gnawing into my palms so I’d plonked the bags down and . . . oops. One has tipped over and a lime is rolling down the gutter. Past Trent, towards the clop-clop-clop—
Trent winces. In the space of a second, he hesitates, and then darts his hand out. I can feel his held breath as he clutches it to his chest, pressed tight and low.
Her shadow drifts along the truck’s paint, then passes. A car starts; tyres churr down the street. Trent lets out a breath and rests his head back against the door.
“What?” I murmur. “She scary?”
Trent picks himself up and takes the bags off me. “She’s lovely.”
“Then . . .”
“I didn’t . . . know how to introduce you,” he says. The words come out young, boyish. Not like the thirty-year-old he seems like the rest of the time. He turns towards the path. “She knows he’s alive in Grandpa’s memories; she knows about the postcards.”
“Then—”
“But she doesn’t know those postcards have turned into . . . you.”
A missed lime splits under my shoe, scent sharp and clean against the tension stuck in the air.
Trent shakes out his shoulders and keeps moving. “She doesn’t come by much. And when she does, she tries not to bring up Ika at all. It’ll be fine. It’ll be all right.”
I follow after him, once more plucking at my wristband.
Kitchen. Dawn. The kettle clicks off; outside in the backyard, a kākā is stripping bark off a pine tree, and I wonder if the chicken is watching on. Watching on and approving. Get that sap, then poop on the fresh washing. Hehehe.
It’s been two weeks. And those kinds of random thoughts are becoming a frequent occurrence.
I blame the lack of sleep. I can’t get any of it.
I’m sure Trent hasn’t got any either. How could he with me tossing and turning above him, rattling the whole bunk frame?
Yet he says nothing, and even if he looks slightly more wrecked with each passing morning, he still makes sure to make us scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast.
At the table.
To which I am now totally accustomed.
Stop side-eyeing me! It was one sneaky forkful.
Grandpa is around three of these mornings in a week; the other mornings, he’s picked up earlier for daycare. On the mornings he’s around, at least I have an ally. At least I can hide behind Grandpa’s uncensored banter, and nod when he complains about the lack of pig on his plate.
This morning he comes into the living room and startles at finding me at the table. He squints. “Trenty! Look who’s back!”
Trent calmly brings over scrambled eggs on toast. “Grandpa, Ika’s been here a couple of weeks.”
“As long as he’s back.” Grandpa points the end of his walking stick at the postcard wall. “We have the best beaches here. Stick around.”
Trent eyes me quietly, and I know what to do. I pat Grandpa’s hand. “You bet. Now eat up.”
Grandpa sighs at his plate. “Where’s the bleeding bacon?”
“None of that,” Trent says. “Doctor’s orders.”
Grandpa begins an epic rant that I am both appalled at and fascinated by, while Trent shakes his head in resignation and opens the paper—something they still get.
“The short of it is, doctors don’t know a damn thing. I’ve eaten bacon and cursed at the radio every morning for seventy-nine years, and I’m still here. Fit as a fiddle.”
“Only eleven months to go,” Trent says dryly, not taking his eyes off the sports page.
“Don’t worry, Grandpa,” I say under my breath. “I’ll cook you an entire pig before then.”
“With the crispy crackle bits?”
“The whole hog.”
Trent looks over at me flatly. “I’ve yet to see you make more than two-minute noodles in the kitchen.”
Grandpa cheers. “A man of hidden talents, my Ika.”
“Very hidden,” Trent says.
I lean over the table, raising a brow. “You must admit, I’m good at faking it.”
Trent hesitates, lowers the paper and rises, collecting all our dishes. “It’s a two-person job anyway. I’ll help you until you make it.”
Grandpa barks out a laugh, and I wonder if this is another act. If Trent and I will end up eating half a pig each to save Grandpa from himself.
After cleaning up and seeing Grandpa off, I head to the bedroom to change. Audition first. Studio later. What to wear?
The front door slams—Trent leaving. Good. I can dress here instead of the bathroom.
I exhale, turn up my music, and pull out shirt options.
The wardrobe is open to the inside mirror and I angle it away from the light spilling through the windows. It means I have a better view of my body and Trent’s side of the room behind me. Neatly made bed, folded clothes, lingering scent from an earlier shower. Not even here, and I can sense him.
I shake off a stray shiver and pull on the blue shirt. My eyes catch in the mirror. Kind of cool, kind of sharp. Blue makes them stand out more.
But the green one . . . yeah. That’ll be better.
I slide out of the blue shirt. The swishing reflection as it falls catches my gaze, followed by a familiar navy canvas sitting atop Trent’s desk. I realise too late what it is. His work bag. He’s forgotten it.
He’s coming back for it.
Correction, he’s come back for it.
The bedroom door swings open and Trent steals all the air out of the room as he strides in.
Maybe if I didn’t move so quickly to shove on the shirt, he wouldn’t have looked.
But I do, and of course, he glances over.
His gaze flicks, quick and processing.
His eyes meet mine, then move away. He doesn’t linger. Doesn’t react.
Instead, he crosses the room, picks up his bag, slings it over his shoulder.
At the doorway, he hesitates, his back to me.
He clears his throat. “Are you working today?”
I snap my arms properly into my shirt, fumbling with the buttons. “Studio from lunch on. Why?”
His grip shifts on the strap of his bag. “For the next month I’m tracking kelp regrowth near Island Bay. If you’ve got the space, could I work there? Do some data analysis.”
Mid-button, my knuckles brush the long, jagged scar that runs down and around my side. My scar. My mistake. My clammy fingers press too hard, the button slipping from its hole.
Working at the studio. Regularly. Him, around. When it’s the only chance I get to nap. “Sleep deprivation is all the rage these days.”
“What was that?”
I force my hands to keep moving, my voice steady. “Sure.”
At three o’clock, he still hasn’t come to the studio. There’s only so long I can keep Spray’n’Wipe-ing the surfaces. Once the kiddos come in for their lesson, it’s over. Fatty finger smudges everywhere.
“Since when do you care about a polished finish?” Moana asks, eyebrows up around her hairline.
“Outrageous!” I say, absolutely horrified. “I’ve always prided myself on appearances.”
She looks me up and down. “In one respect.” She sweeps to the costume cupboard and nudges it open. “In others . . .”
I wince and hold my breath. But it’s useless.
It all tumbles out in an avalanche onto the reception floor.
An aqua tutu, a forgotten Cinderella slipper—only one, of course.
A rogue pair of fairy wings; a crumpled performance program from three years ago; half a bag of collected shells from my half-baked idea to direct a play about mermaids; a furry fedora that someone should have told me was a bad idea; a floppy rubber dolphin.
I don’t know where that came from. No one does. No one dares get rid of it.
The crash, bang, clanking has the kids popping their heads out of the practice room door. Holly is peering out curiously too, and her eyes jump with laughter at the chaos—and just that makes the prospect of pushing it all back behind the door worth it.
I wave Moana towards the giggling kids. “You’ve made your point.”
Moana pokes a finger towards the spray bottle as she heads in for her lesson. “I still have questions.”
With a hefty groan, I glare at The Flood still moving towards my feet.
And that’s when the door jingles.
I make the split-second decision to get rid of the evidence. Not the unorganised mess evidence. The other evidence.
The spray bottle takes a flying leap out of my hand, landing on the furry fedora—
—just as a boot thuds inside.
The real Flooder has arrived. The air suddenly feels heavy.
Trent pauses, taking in the costume-pocolapse. Then he takes off his sunglasses and gives it another assessing look. He’s sliding the glasses into his shirt collar when he speaks, and I tense, waiting for the commentary. The shake of his head. The deep sigh.
Instead—
He looks at me, nodding. “Thank you for acting so hard at home.”
I open my mouth and gob it shut again like a fish.
Trent waits.
The problem with this little studio space is there really is no place to run off and hide. My only option was the wardrobe. Though it would’ve been a tight fit. So, as usual, I’m left hiding behind my own laugh.