The Marriage Gap Year, page 28
She was annoyed now, felt trapped between leaving and going inside. Either option felt unacceptable, like defeat.
So what if she didn’t like being around stuff other people had been forced to give up because it was their only way of paying the rent, or buying food, or settling a debt. Her own parents had shopped that way, through op shops and pawn shops, long before these places were cool.
The smell of mothballs and piles of old blankets would bring her right back there, putting on clothes that were several sizes too big so she could “grow into them,” the feel of her toes finding the imprint of someone else’s foot inside a running shoe. It’s not that Emma was a snob, she just didn’t feel comfortable so close to desperation. It felt precarious, reminding her that, whatever her hard work and good fortune had earned her, she was only ever a few mistakes away from being back there herself.
This was silly, wasn’t it? Her not wanting to go in there. It was a preference, not a phobia. She had to go in there now, not for Erik, but to prove to herself this place held no power over her. She walked up the steps, tucking her hand inside her coat sleeve to pull open the sticky door.
It was warm inside, almost tropical. Guitars were strung up along the wall behind the counter, hanging by their necks. There were acoustic ones, their bulbous, hourglass frames. There were electric guitars too, painted in bright metallic colors that sparkled, even under these dim fluorescent lights. There was even one of those spiky, glam-rock guitars that looked more like street art than a musical instrument. Her eyes moved to a violin hanging up there, so small and delicate next to the other instruments, the runt of the litter. Emma would’ve thought someone who played the violin was someone who could afford to keep it.
Erik was down the back of the shop. The shop attendant, a round man with a walrus mustache, was handing him an acoustic guitar.
Erik propped his foot up on something and started to play, those long, creamy fingers sliding up and down the length of the instrument.
The skin on Emma’s face prickled as the lyrics brought back a lost memory of her father. Her dad sang it differently, his voice smaller, frail, almost a whisper that whiskey alone drew from him. But this is what her father sang:
Tell me you’ll stay
Oh, tell me you’ll stay
Until the ghosts of our fathers they carry us away
Our lines are unbroken
Don’t lead us astray
Be here in the morning and stay on all day
So, tell me you’ll stay
Oh, tell me you’ll stay
Until the ghosts of our fathers they carry us away.
It was an Irish protest song. Dad had sung it because his life was a protest looking for a cause. This had to be some kind of sign, even if Emma didn’t believe in signs. Erik finished the song with closed eyes. He handed the guitar back to the man with the walrus mustache and they started chatting.
Her eyes moved down to the long glass cabinet underneath the instruments, filled with electronic gear: laptops, flip phones, old cameras and game consoles.
She could understand the odd person buying an item out of nostalgia. But Emma struggled to comprehend why young people liked this stuff. It wasn’t the same as buying an antique lamp or something. These gadgets didn’t do whatever they were made to do as well as new stuff could. Why would someone want a Discman, for god sake? She couldn’t shake the suspicion that an entire generation was making fun of her, somehow, buying this stuff as an inside joke. “Look at this old crap. Lol.”
“Hey, Em,” came Erik’s voice from the dimly lit back of the shop. “Check it out.”
Emma averted her eyes as she passed the jewelry display cases. Those earrings, bracelets and rings used to belong to someone. How’d they get here? Stolen? Had someone died? Some of it would have been given up willingly when needs demanded, or after whatever had once compelled the owners of this jewelry to wear it faded.
She thought of her own wedding ring, sitting on the base of the reading lamp on her nightstand. She kept it there because she didn’t like the way it jiggled on her finger, but it now seemed foolish to have left it there. What if someone broke in?
Flashing lights and electronic beeping interrupted her scheming the best place to hide her wedding ring.
“Oh, you fucker,” said Erik, clapping at the side buttons of a full-sized AC/DC-themed pinball machine. He tilted his whole body as he smashed the buttons, the console ablaze with all the flickering lights of a rock-and-roll stage show. “Yes!” Erik beamed, having done something to set off the opening guitar riff of “Thunderstruck”. “This thing is awesome,” he said, without turning around.
Emma looked over his shoulder at the little metal ball zipping around a plastic chute. It disappeared and was then shot back into play through a tiny cannon.
“You know,” she said, “that night at your festival…” She paused, waiting for him to respond, but he kept his attention on the game.
“Yeah,” he finally said, still tapping the machine and his eye on the metal ball bouncing around inside.
“Well…” She looked him up and down, willing him to stop playing, but he only glanced at her. “We haven’t really talked about it.”
He licked his lips, concentrating on the ball rolling toward the flippers. “We talked about it outside?” He scrunched up his face as the machine made a disappointed noise.
She leaned toward him. “You have to be more careful with people’s hearts.”
He smiled without looking at her. “I know,” he said, moving his head around to follow the ball. “I said I was sorry, remember, and you told me not to apologize anymore.
“I’m not just talking about other people, Erik. You need to be true to your own heart as well. It’s not always clear what it wants.”
He nodded.
“Hey!” She slapped her hand on the glass top of the pinball machine. “Can you please stop playing and look at me?”
“Okay.” He raised his hands from the controls like he was being held at gunpoint and leaned back against the table, its lights flashing on the side of his face. “I thought we’d already talked about this, but okay, you have my undivided attention.”
“Do I?”
His eyes narrowed. “What’s with you? I thought we were cool.”
“Yeah, no. I said I didn’t want to come in here.” Emma looked at him. “I don’t like all this shit.”
“But it’s AC/DC pinball.”
“Please. I just don’t buy this, that you’re so aloof, so cool and Zen about everything. And please don’t say ‘really,’ or I’m literally going to freak out.”
He took a breath. “What do you want from me, Emma?”
“I want to know that you felt something. That I was more than an afterthought, something you did on a dare.”
“On a dare?”
“You know what I’m fucking talking about. Bag an older chick for the trophy case.”
“You know what,” he said, looking straight at her. “I think you want me to get pissed off. You want me to be the prick.
“You are a prick! You fucked that sour-faced Briley brat.”
“Hey! What is with you? You have any idea how push-pull you are? Hold me close, fuck off, when am I going to see you again? You don’t know what the fuck you want and now you want me to get mad at you so you can feel better. Then someone else is the problem, not you.”
“That’s the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.” Emma turned as if to leave.
“Is it?” Erik called after her. “Let’s look at you for a second. Bored housewife in midlife crisis seeks—”
“Fuck you!” she spat.
“Nice, Emma. Classy.”
Emma looked away, tried to catch a glimpse of the world outside. Light. Open space. Fresh air. Everything in here felt dark and cluttered and hot and moldy and it all seemed to pile on the shame.
“Oi!” The walrus mustache man appeared behind the counter. “Youse are going to have to take this outside.”
Emma craned her neck to look at the shopkeeper past the boxes of junk on the counter. “Are you serious?” she spat.
“Serious as a heart attack,” he said, stone-faced.
“Right.” Emma nodded. “Wouldn’t want to degrade this place.”
“Ma’am! I need you to leave.”
“Sorry, mate,” said Erik, and put his hand on Emma’s arm. She pushed it off.
“Both of you.” The shopkeeper fanned his hand, shooing them away. “Out.”
Emma looked back at the man with the walrus mustache, who walked alongside them on his side of the counter, cell phone phone in his hand.
Emma stabbed her finger at him. “I don’t need you to shepherd me out the fucking door.”
“We’re going,” said Erik, raising both hands as he walked to the exit.
“Get her out, mate, or I’m calling the cops.” He waved his phone.
“Pffft, the cops,” she scoffed. “Fuck off, mate.”
“Em, seriously.”
“Oh, I’m leaving, don’t worry.” She swatted Erik’s hand off her arm. “Who’d want to be in this place anyway? It’s a shithole,” she called over her shoulder. “At least I get to leave.”
“Out!” He shooed them.
“Em, seriously. Let’s go.”
“You know what, fuck you and this dogshit place.” She pushed over a stand of earrings sitting on the counter and flung a Hello Kitty statuette into the glass cabinetry.
The mustache ran for cover and tapped at his phone with sausage fingers.
Erik pushed Emma, still flailing, toward the door. She grabbed a stiletto heel and chucked it at the counter where it crashed into something glass.
Erik pushed open the door and moved her outside and down the steps. She stood on the sidewalk, panting, cars whooshing past.
“Was that fun for you?” said Erik.
“That guy was a dick.”
“He was just a guy, Em.”
She burst out crying and covered her face with her hands.
“Hey.” Erik hesitated but put an arm on her shoulder. “Come on.”
“I’ve blown up my whole life,” she said.
“No, you haven’t,” he said quietly.
“I did.” She struggled to find rhythm in her breathing, her mouth opening and closing silently. “I fucked everything up.”
“You didn’t.” He patted her shoulder. “Well,” he said, rubbing her back, “maybe just a tiny bit.”
She snorted, and her nervous laughter turned into a cry. She wiped her nose with her sleeve. “What am I going to do?”
He put his arm around her and pulled her to him. “Well, what do you want to do?” She didn’t answer. “Do you want to go home or back to my place?” he said.
Emma took a breath and slowly pulled away from Erik. She sniffed and dabbed at her eyes with the back of her hand.
“Well,” said Erik, scanning the street, “whatever we do, we should get out of here before the cops come.”
She laughed, wiping her eyes with the back of her hands, and the pair of them ran down the side street.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Rob sat on an upturned milk crate and stared out the big picture window of the stone house. The view gave directly onto Bass Strait where the gray water rippled from a passing breeze. It was bright outside, the light sharp enough for him to shield his eyes. Silhouetted figures walked past, flickering as they came between him and the light pouring in through the glass.
He could recognize them all from their shadows. There went Steph, with that unmistakable bounce in her step. There was Kim, a foot shorter than everyone else. And there went Alex, with her stiff march like she was trying to catch up to someone without breaking into a run. “Hey Alex,” he called out. She stopped and turned to look over her shoulder. He waved her over. She took two steps toward him and stopped.
“All good?” said Rob.
She raised her eyebrows. “Yeah.”
“Good.” Rob flattened the hair at the back of his head. “I’ve been meaning to ask you what you want to do next?”
“About what?”
He smiled. “In the industry,” he said, scratching his chin, “is there a trade you like more than the others?”
She looked up as if she was thinking about it, screwed up her face. “I don’t know.”
Rob laced his fingers together to stop them fidgeting. “You don’t have to. Nothing wrong with general labor. It’s usually a starting point, though. You could use it to move into something else.”
“What, like carpentry?”
“Doesn’t have to be.” He watched her, waiting for her to speak. She was fiddling now, scratching at her palms.
“Probably gardening,” she said at last.
“Oh yeah?”
She made a face like she was still thinking about it. “Yeah,” she smiled. “Landscaping, I reckon. Be good to be outside most days.”
He considered Alex. She suddenly looked younger, softer. He stuck his thumb out behind him. “What do you reckon we should do with the garden out by the shipping container?”
“Out there?” she jutted her chin toward the derelict yard, all chewed up with tire marks, the granite flowerbeds overgrown with weeds. “I’d go all natives,” she said, self-assured. “Grevilleas, banksias. Stuff like that. Hardy. It’d get the birds in too. Parrots and that.”
Rob tried to look her in the eye, but she wouldn’t meet him. “What if…” he said, turning to look over his shoulder. “What if you did it?” He turned back to her. She was looking at him now, hands on her hips. She shrugged, a funny little one shoulder shrug, like she was pretending not to care. “Sure,” she said. “I could do that.”
“That’d be good,” Rob said.
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” he squinted, tilted his head to the side as if reconsidering. “Are you?”
Alex nodded, slowly. “Yeah,” she said.
“Well, okay then.” He pulled out his phone as if he had other things to do. “Make it look nice,” he said.
“I will,” said Alex and walked off. Rob cracked a smile as he checked his phone. No messages.
“Taking a break, Rob?” Sareena’s shadow leaned to the side, the jet plume of her ponytail shooting out the back of her hard hat.
Rob looked up from his cell phone. “You heard from Aaron?”
Sareena raised her palms. “Said he was coming. He’ll be here. Relax.”
Rob glanced at his phone again.
Sareena took an audible breath. “Hey, I heard what you said to Alex.” She tapped the milk crate with the toe of her work boot. “That was nice.”
Rob nodded, barely looking up from his phone.
“She’s pretty green,” said Sareena. “You cool with that?”
Rob nodded slowly, eyes still on his phone, looking for Aaron’s number. “Yeah,” he said. “She may not know everything, but she’s got fire in her belly.” He chewed his bottom lip and looked up at Sareena. “I have confidence in people who have something to prove.”
She smiled. “Yeah, me too.”
Rob craned his neck to get a better view out the window. “You know if Aaron’s bringing Will?”
“How should I know?”
Rob frowned. “Said he would.”
“Well, then,” she chirped, “he will.” She put her hands on her hips. “What’s crawled up your ass this morning? Is this about whatever you’ve got going on in the shed?”
Rob looked at her sheepishly.
She smiled. “Yeah, I see you.” She twirled her finger at him. “Don’t forget, I know everything that goes on around here. I’m a wall of ears and eyeballs. Nothing gets past me.” She turned to look out the window. “Oooh, it’s them. Coming down the hill.”
Rob eagerly got up from his milk crate and looked out the window. He frowned and turned to Sareena. “There’s no one there.”
Sareena laughed and clapped her hands. “Your face,” she mimicked his wide eyes. “Priceless.”
Rob rolled his eyes.
“Look at you,” said Sareena, still smiling. “All worked up and impatient. Maybe you better sit down, Rob. Take a breather. You’re going to hurt yourself getting all excited, a man your age. Don’t worry, they’ll get here, driving that little man van.” Sareena laughed to herself and sauntered off, disappearing into the shadow of the hallway.
Rob put his phone in his pocket and looked around. The banging and sawing felt good, like all this effort was being poured into making the rest of the house look like this living room, solid and unpretentious, a beauty you could trust. He didn’t even mind the low thump of doof-doof music they had playing upstairs. Work was happening. Full steam and full stride.
And there it was at last, Aaron’s van bouncing on the uneven dirt road. He watched it come closer and park in the circular clearing. Will stepped out of the passenger seat and Rob felt a flutter of nerves, an electric current of affection tingling through his body.
No sooner had the boys got out of the van than Sareena was on them, tapping on her wrist, pointing at the house, giving them directions. Will made as if to follow Aaron but Sareena put a hand on his shoulder and redirected him toward the house.
Rob pulled out his carpenter’s rule and a pencil. He crouched, randomly, near the entrance to the kitchen, pretending to measure the skirting board.
“Hey, Dad,” said Will. “You want to see me?”
Rob took a moment, squinted at the meaningless measurement before looking up from his false labor. “Yep, great.” He put an unnecessary pencil line on the plaster with a flourish and made a mental note to rub it out later. “Come on,” he said, getting to his feet. “I want to show you something.” He went out the back door, held it open for Will.
“What is it?”
“You’ll see.”
Rob pushed open the creaky door of the barn and invited Will inside. They made their way into the old place, the floorboards creaking under their boots. Will pointed at the pile of timbers and assorted hand tools laid out on a tarp. “What’s all this?”
