Chapter Four #2
Striding outside, he tugged on his Akubra and headed down the front steps.
Making his way over to his four-wheel drive, he took in the dappled patterns of light and shadow that flittered through the towering paperbarks and danced around him.
The sound of gravel under his boots was a familiar one that usually brought comfort, but today it marked the start of an unknown path.
Barely holding himself together, he jumped behind the wheel and revved the LandCruiser to life.
With one last lingering look at his beloved home, he turned his gaze towards the sun-drenched horizon.
Accelerating down the driveway, he felt his heart thudding, not just with nerves and anxiety, but also with a glimmer of optimism, that perhaps the day might pave the way for healing for himself and Nyah.
Because his instincts told him their story was far from finished.
And his sister quite often reminded him of that fact—or maybe it was just wishful thinking that her childhood best friend and brother would one day reconnect and marry.
He tightened his grip on the steering wheel as his heart raced at the ridiculous thought.
Stop it, Hart!
As he neared the outskirts of town, the scenery began to shift as wild scrub gave way to neatly tended gardens and then storefronts.
And as he drew closer to the cemetery, the weight of time and resurfaced memories pressed down harder on him, serving as a reminder of all that had been lost and left unresolved.
Yet, despite his gathering apprehension, a dormant spark deep within seemed to stir, the potential for reconnection, closure, or perhaps even a new beginning, now a real possibility.
***
Nyah’s slender fingers trembled as they released the wrought-iron gate, its creak cutting through the muffled sounds of mourners quietly chatting.
The rusted metal felt cold against her skin, a stark contrast to the oppressive heat of the relentless sun bearing down on her.
The air was thick with the scent of eucalyptus and freshly turned earth, an agonising reminder that soon her mother would become one with the land.
With each hesitant step she took towards the gathering up on the rise of the graveyard, her long dress fluttered in the slight breeze.
She paused just inside the perimeter of shade offered by a lone bottle tree as her blue eyes scanned the congregation from under the tree’s protective branches.
They were a montage of figures, some with their postures bent like boughs under the weight of age, and others tall and still.
She barely recognised most faces, and some she didn’t know at all.
In their midst, she felt like an outsider—a daughter estranged from the woman whose life they now commemorated.
She felt her chest tighten with the insight, feeling the threads of her past unravelling at the edges.
Keeping to herself, her heavy-lidded gaze settled on Margery Furner, her mother’s stern and stoic older friend who stood among the mourners.
Their gazes locked in a moment, and within the elderly woman’s unyielding stare, Nyah sensed a novel’s worth of unsaid words—accusations and disappointments, loathing and mistrust, all tied up with Skye’s disappearance.
The birthmark on the nape of her neck tingled as if it too felt the weight of scrutiny and she reached up to rub a settling hand over it.
She wasn’t sure she could do this. But then she sensed movement by her side, and she turned to catch the chocolate-hued eyes of a man she’d loved long ago, and deep down, if she were being honest with herself, still did.
Her heart raced with wild emotions—ones trapped by old memories.
The sandy blond hair that caught the sunlight, the scar above his eyebrow that told the tale of a past battle with a branch of a tree they used to climb, each detail of his handsome face sent jolt after jolt through her body.
With her breath caught, she cleared it from her throat. ‘Caleb, hi.’ It was all she could manage to say in the head-spinning, heart-tumbling moment. And as their eyes met in a kind of embrace, they shared a silent conversation in a sea of unspoken words.
‘Hey, Nyah.’ His hand came to briefly brush her back. ‘I’m so sorry about…’ his voice trailed off, ‘…everything.’
Everything?
She felt her walls fortify against him, brick by emotional brick.
Once her confidant, her mate and, after they’d shared their first kiss, her loving boyfriend for almost two years, then her biggest heartbreak when she’d had to leave Wildstone, he was now a reminder of all things that lay unresolved.
And what was he apologising for, exactly?
Her mum’s death? Cutting her out of his life completely?
Not figuring out what happened to her sister?
The unspoken tension between them hung thick in the air, refusing to dissipate.
‘Nyah…’ He said her name with the cadence of a question.
‘It’s okay.’ She tried to ignore her clenched heart while finding herself increasingly unable to look directly into his deep brown eyes. ‘Don’t be sorry.’ And she meant it.
‘I can’t help it, because I am…’ He tugged the brim of his black hat down as he cleared his throat. ‘Deeply sorry.’ His clenched jaw betrayed his cool, calm composure.
His words were so earnest, so unexpected, so profoundly simple yet powerful, that she couldn’t conjure up a worthy response.
So they just stood there side by side, unspeaking but comprehending each other in a way that only former lovers could, both watching as an elderly couple, mere blurs in Nyah’s childhood memories, approached the coffin with hands clenched together.
They whispered condolences into the air, but their words oddly fell short of sincerity.
What Nyah sensed wasn’t the absence of genuine sentiment, but rather the unspoken acknowledgment that Claire had been a force of division to many, a hindrance to some, and a talking point to almost all.
Bearing witness to her mother’s lingering legacy, Nyah felt her knees wanting to give way but, taking comfort in the tall man standing stoically beside her and their long familiarity, she stood steely still as she observed one mourner after another drifting forward, their shadows lengthening across the lawn as if beckoning her to join in the ritual of farewell.
But she wasn’t stepping forward, not here and not now, for she was an outsider looking in on this communal grieving process.
She knew her place; her mother had made her very aware of it, and it wasn’t in Wildstone.
Next, a man in a crumpled suit hesitated before the casket, his hand hovering just above the polished wood, much like her own heart seemed to be.
His eyes closing, he mouthed inaudible sentences, as if reluctant to acknowledge the finality of a goodbye.
Suddenly realising who he was, she swallowed down hard, her hands clenching together as she witnessed her primary school teacher and former neighbour hover despairingly.
The past thirteen years had wearied William Keller in a way she’d never imagined possible, given that he’d always been a strong, strapping man, as had his slightly older brother, Nate, who was nowhere to be seen.
She stifled a rising sob as more memories surfaced.
She and Skye had always found William nice enough—as for his wooden spoon–wielding mother and oddball brother, not so much.
Catching sight of a ray of sunshine, she turned her gaze away from the coffin as she remained rooted to the spot, her raw emotions gathering and tethering her.
Her relationship with her mother had become a thorny path, overgrown with brambles of regret and misunderstanding.
Once she’d believed they may find a way through, but now she knew she’d never be able to get rid of the weeds.
‘I’ve got you, Ny.’ Caleb’s gentle yet commanding voice wavered into her consciousness as he called her by the name he’d used long ago.
Blinking faster, she offered him a quivering smile of acknowledgment as she shifted her gaze from the expansive green of the Wildstone Cemetery and back to the sombre sight of her mother’s coffin.
It stood unambiguously against Mother Nature’s raw beauty, a symbol of finality and loss.
Blinking back a sudden flood of hot tears, she fought to remain composed as the priest read the final rite and committed her mother’s body to the earth.
And once the coffin had been lowered, the mourners congregated, their hushed murmurs rippling through the air.
But none dared to approach her, and she was glad of the fact.
Instead, she stood among the living as if she were a ghost, haunting the edges of her own life and watching the sorrowful scene play out before her like a movie.
She oddly felt both intimately connected to and completely detached from the gathering, as if she were a mere observer rather than an active participant.
And as the final chapter of Claire’s life ended under the vast expanse of the Australian sky, she couldn’t help but feel an eerie presence lingering.
Caleb remained beside her, appearing strong and stoic, but she could see through his facade—the clench in his jaw and the avoidance in his gaze, as if he feared revealing too much in a single glance.
She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, savouring the dry country air, wishing it could cleanse her of the heavy emotions pressing down on her.
Because right now, in front of all these people and their judging gazes, she longed to be the resilient woman who worked with troubled children, who danced fearlessly like no one was watching, who’d tried to move on with her life.
But she felt like a lonely, lost, broken child.