Chapter 17
17
Ruth
Allie was still without hot water by the weekend. Mia and Cody were home again and I’d offered the use of my bathroom, but Allie declined, saying they’d manage. ‘A bit much to have the three of us traipsing around to your place and the plumber promised me he’d have the new unit installed on Monday,’ she’d said when she left work on Friday afternoon.
Saturday morning, Mia showed up early for work. I was glad because I’d woken with a headache and was slow to get moving. I’d wanted nothing more than to put my head back on the pillow and let sleep take over again. Instead, I’d forced myself out of bed, had a shower and taken painkillers. They’d dulled the thumping to a manageable throb. A cup of tea and food helped a bit.
‘How was the holiday with your grandparents?’ I asked Mia as we took down chairs and topped up the sugar sachets on the tables.
‘So-so,’ she said. ‘Nanna’s a bit bossy, but Poppa’s always fun. He played golf and I tagged along with him. That was okay. One day we went for a hike in Morialta Conservation Park. It was so hot. I wanted to go into Rundle Mall to the shops and to the movies, but—’ She shrugged and rolled her eyes. ‘They really have no idea. They took me to McDonald’s .’
‘That bad, huh,’ I said.
‘Yeah. I’ve never liked McDonald’s, not even when I was a kid. It’s junk food. Cody loves it. But then he is such a boy .’
‘Can’t say I’ve ever been a fan,’ I said. ‘But my brother Elliot, who’s over seventy, still enjoys a Big Mac from time to time, with fries.’
Mia paused, cloth in hand. ‘Wow, that’s old to still be eating junk food.’
‘He’s not that old, Mia, and I don’t think age has much to do with what we like to eat. He’d tell you he was still young at heart.’
She snorted. ‘Not with all that fat and cholesterol in his system.’
‘I’ll tell him you said so,’ I said, eyes wide.
‘Is he your favourite brother? I remember you said you had twin brothers.’
‘I suppose he is, not that I’ve ever really thought about having a favourite. Robert’s okay but he can be a bit prissy and his second wife, I find her difficult to warm to.’
‘What’s prissy?’
‘Prim, proper, basically a pain in the bum.’
Mia laughed. ‘Which twin is the oldest?’
‘Elliot, by seven minutes. They’re not identical and although they’re close, they are very different in looks and personality. Robert’s a lot like our dad was and Mum used to say Elliot took after her father.’
We’d finished the tables and chairs and moved to the kitchen. The grill and the fryer were on. I had water heating ready for poached eggs. Saturdays were always busy and cooked breakfasts popular. George would be in at ten to help. Mia went out to top up the dogs’ drinking bowl.
‘Might as well open up,’ I said to her when she came back through the kitchen door. She bounded off to unlock the front door and turn around the sign. I surveyed the cafe, ready and waiting for another onslaught. More of the same. The throbbing in my head worsened suddenly and I was struck by a wave of nausea that made me salivate. Not now! the voice in my head screamed. I stepped out the kitchen door and gulped in a few lungfuls of fresh air, vowing I’d make an appointment with my Adelaide GP on my next days off. I’d drive down and stay overnight with Elliot and maybe even look up an old friend, see if they were free for a coffee or lunch.
Feeling much better, I went inside just as Mia put in the first food order.
* * *
The headache hung around for most of the weekend. I’d kept the worst of it at bay with regular painkillers. First thing Monday morning, I rang for a doctor’s appointment. If I wanted to see my usual GP for a long consult on a Monday or Tuesday, the earliest appointment wasn’t until the middle of the following month—four weeks away. I was taken aback. I’d wait a couple of weeks before I let Elliot know I was coming to stay overnight, otherwise I’d be inundated with suggestions of what we could do while I was there. And it would all involve drinking wine.
Instead of doing housework and putting on a load of washing, I went for a drive. I could do all the chores tomorrow. A pity to waste such a beautiful summer’s day, hot and sunny, with a steady breeze blowing in off the ocean. Uncanny how much better I felt the further away from Cutlers Bay I drove. When I stopped at a cafe in Wallaroo, down near the jetty, my headache had almost disappeared. After choosing a table outside, I ordered a pot of tea and scones with jam and cream and whiled away the next hour watching the activity happening around me. It was a pleasant way to pass the afternoon but if I was completely honest with myself, it was lonely on my own. How much nicer it would have been to have company, real company, another person who wanted to be with me, not just the chatty waiter filling up the empty space for a moment. Would this be the script for what remained of my life? Tea and scones for one?
The tide was out so when the chatty waiter began throwing me the kind of looks I threw people when closing time rolled around, I went back to the car and drove until I found a spot where I could walk on the beach—anything to put off returning to Cutlers Bay for a while longer.
It was going on five when I trudged back to the car and shook the sand off my feet before wriggling into sandals again. I headed for home. Did I feel better after my afternoon out? Marginally, but there was still the housework and washing to do. I told myself this was all Graham Wurst’s fault. If he hadn’t decided to retire, I would have kept on keeping on. Satisfied with who I’d become and what I was doing.
Halfway home my phone pinged with a message; I didn’t glance at it until I was parked in my driveway. It was from Angie Daniels, or was that Cooper now? It said, THANK YOU!!!!!!! and had a photo attached: Angie and Zach on their wedding day, both of them beaming. She looked so lovely in my silk cheongsam. I sent a reply saying just that. A message bounced back: Thanks … Is it okay if Zach’s sister borrows the dress? She loves it and has an important work do coming up and nothing suitable to wear and no surplus funds… A bit like me.
Without hesitation I wrote: Of course she can!
And Angie was back in the blink of an eye: Thanks, Ruth, from both of us. A xx
The warm glow generated by having done a good deed lasted all of five minutes. No sooner had I let myself inside than the phone rang. It was Allie.
‘I’m sorry, Ruth, but I won’t be able to open up in the morning, or work at all, actually.’
‘Oh, bugger,’ I said, the words out before I could censor them.
Her response was brisk and defensive and, when I thought about it later, a tad over the top.
‘This is the first time I’ve ever needed a day off at short notice, Ruth, in all the years I’ve worked for you and I am only casual. I’ll be back on Wednesday and Mia has offered to work in my place tomorrow. Unless of course you want to ask someone else.’
‘No! Of course not.’ What I wanted to ask was if she was all right, if there was anything I could do, but I didn’t. Instinct warned me against it. And she was right in that she’d never taken an unplanned day off. So all I said was, ‘Tell Mia to come in at ten, thanks. And you take care.’
‘Thank you, Ruth. I’ll see you Wednesday.’ The line went dead.
I raised my eyebrows at the phone in my hand and said, ‘I wonder what that’s all about?’
By five past ten the following morning, I knew.
‘Dad went and hurt his back,’ Mia said without a trace of her usual reticence. ‘Mum had to take him to Adelaide for a scan and then back to see the doctor in Kadina.’
‘Did he do it at work?’
‘No, unfortunately. Mum said if he had, he’d at least be on compo. She is so pissed off. He can’t work or even stay at the hotel because he can’t get up and down the stairs. Mum wanted to go in his car to save some wear and tear on hers, but it isn’t registered. He’s been driving Cody all over the place in an unregistered car. When he told Mum that, I thought she was going to do something really bad, like kill him.’ Mia’s eyes all but bugged out and then took on a glassy sheen.
‘Oh, sweetie,’ I said and opened my arms. She willingly stepped into them. I hugged her tight and she hiccoughed loudly, then drew back and blew her nose and gave me a soggy smile.
‘I’d better get out there,’ she said. ‘I just heard a customer come in the front door.’
‘Before you go, where’s Cody now?’
‘Oh, he went with them. Mum said she was less likely to kill Dad in front of either of her children. And Cody knows how to work the GPS in the car.’
Mia went out to the counter to serve, leaving me in a stunned silence. How easy my life was by comparison. I glanced at the food orders I’d been making a start on when she’d burst through the kitchen door and then I set to work.
It was a standard Tuesday, dead as a doornail after lunch. I was scanning the order from the wholesaler—it’d seemed a bit light-on—when Mia cleared her throat. I looked up from the sheet of paper in my hand.
‘Ruth,’ she said and blotches of colour stained her cheeks. She rolled her lips together and looked everywhere but at me.
‘Promise I won’t let on to your mum anything you’ve told me,’ I said, taking a punt on the cause of her embarrassment. ‘You’re all having a tough time now, but it’ll pass, believe me. And remember, calm seas don’t make skilled sailors.’
She frowned and then her face slowly relaxed. ‘Ah … I get it.’
‘Here,’ I said and went to the freezer to retrieve the half-dish of lasagne left over from last week’s special. ‘Take this home for your dinner. Throw a salad together, make some garlic bread—’
‘I’m on it. And thank you, Ruth.’ Sometimes she could sound like a woman twice her age, other times the vulnerable teenager she was.
After I’d closed up and Laurie had been and done the floor, I went home and did housework and two loads of washing without complaint.