‘That’s it, then.’
He put his pen down, her husband, and they tidied their sets of notes; money and belongings anaesthetised and sliced in two.
Alice couldn’t imagine what came next. ‘So we’ll hand these over to lawyers?’
‘Yes, they’ll need the information. You’ll need to find your own, of course. Lawyer.’
Would she? Did it have to be like this, two opposing teams?
She felt his hand briefly on her shoulder, its absence when it was lifted away. ‘Will you be alright, do you think?’
‘Oh, Duncan, you’re being more than generous.’
Alice went to the kitchen sink, leaned over it, splashed water onto her swollen eyes, over her puffy face, combed it through her hair.
‘Well, it’s not just that. You’re very alone here.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘But I need to be.’
His face was older in the stark electric light, wrinkles pronounced, hair dull. He’d be forty-five this year, she calculated, and suddenly he looked every day of it.
She picked up their mugs, rinsed them out.
‘And what about the pain?’ he asked. ‘Is it any better?’
‘Oh, look, it’s okay. Well, it’s not – it’s still there all the time – but it’s manageable. I’m cobbling together all the things that help.’
She wouldn’t tell him that the acupuncture wasn’t making any difference – not that seemed to last, anyway. She wouldn’t tell him about what had turned out to be her final session with Sasha and the physio saying that Alice was doing well, that she might be able to manage on her own. About the panic that had flooded her, the sense of abandonment and defeat, and her own words: You think I might never get better, don’t you? About Sasha explaining that, no, it was just needing to think about it differently, the vulvodynia, ironing out the highs and the lows, and that, maybe, over time – it may be months, it may be years – management might lead to improvement, even recovery. She wouldn’t tell him that she knew, now, she was not to be one of those lucky ones with an uncomplicated trajectory – better, better, best. That she was trying to accept who she was right now, taking charge of her own body, finding whatever was good in her life and making it enough, otherwise she’d be miserable. Bitter. Resentful.
‘And uni?’
‘I’ll only be in the one day a week.’ She laughed ruefully, ‘I think we can be civil? And I don’t think it’s anyone else’s business, the details. But I’ll leave that up to you.’ At his nod: ‘I’m going to keep an eye out for postdocs at other unis. Maybe something will turn up closer to here – even some sessional teaching.’
‘It would help if you got that collection of stories published. Make you a more attractive proposition.’
‘I know that, Duncan.’ Did he still think he had to manage her? Give her permission?
‘No, I don’t mean just that. What I’m saying is that your writing is good. It really deserves to be published. And that will open doors for you.’
‘Oh, thanks. Thanks, Duncan – I mean it.’ She thought for a moment. ‘And you? Are you okay?’
‘Not really.’ For a moment, he looked angry. Then he spoke again through a sigh: ‘It’s a lot to adjust to – but I was alright before and I’ll be alright again. And I think you will be too. At least, I hope so.’
Why couldn’t they be this honest with each other before? This kind? The graciousness, she supposed, was a measure of their defeat. But he wished the best for her and that was something – that was important, she supposed.
The tap dripped. Dawn entered the window. She turned off the kitchen light.
‘Okay, then.’ He stood slowly, lifting his bag. ‘I’ll ring you, Alice. We’ll sort out the rest. It’ll just take a bit of time.’
‘Yes.’
On the deck, she slid her feet into thongs. The sky had that pearly dawn glow and the air was parched. Families would make their way to the beach later, once they’d rolled themselves from their Sunday beds.
Duncan stepped down to the path and she walked behind him to the car, making a memory of that loping walk. Something to keep.
He put his bag on the back seat, started the engine and raised his hand.
Then he was driving down the road.
Then he was at the bend.
Then he was gone.
She turned her feet towards the ocean. In the eucalypt at the corner of her street, a magpie carolled and, further along, the casuarina was a conversation of rousing pink-and-greys. She followed the path through the patch of scrub with its tiny, hectic birds. A jay rearranged itself as it darted up from a bush, its wings the sound of ruffling pages.
She crossed the front road and passed through the bank of melaleucas, their tops angled by onshores, a punch of green in the lee of each stunted shrub. She slipped off her thongs, slid a finger into their loops and stepped onto the path that led through the dunes. Against her feet the sand was cool and she dug her toes into it, feeling its soft squeak against her skin. Then around the last bend and the beach stretching like a woman’s flank to the north and south. She walked over its sweeps and curves and stopped at the water’s edge. The sea was on the verge of waking, each small wave gathering, hovering, momentarily stilled, as if the world were holding its breath.
She closed her eyes and felt froth between her toes, her feet sinking deeper into the sand with each rippling eddy. She tried to fill her mind with that sensation, tried not to imagine diving deep and floating, feeling the joy of the ocean against her body. She opened her eyes and the sky was lighter still, the beach flooded in pastels. She scooped up a hank of seaweed and burst its tiny brown bubbles as she walked along the shore.
Near the old boat ramp she cut back through the dunes, meeting the path that went to the tiny beachside shop. The car park was empty. A crow stabbed at some paper beside the bin, gave a short, rusty cry and lumbered away over a stand of banksias.
She headed inland for the loop back to the shack. The narrow zigzag roads were empty too, each house still. Even the birds hushed themselves as the sun edged over the hill to the east.
She walked through the quiet streets until she reached her home. She nudged a nail jutting from the verandah. Another thing to fix. She upended a terracotta pot over it to remind herself and walked to the bedroom. She lowered herself into the impression their night-time bodies had made, felt the ghost of his arms around her. Felt fresh tears on her cheek. Felt the reminder of her constant companion, clamping, stinging and aching; turned herself inward with that, through that, to the fragments inside: her life in bits and pieces, and all of it shifting around. And as she cried, she felt them again, Arthur and Emily, all the fragments of their lives milling inside her, too, all their possibilities – for good, for evil – jostling for position, jagged words forming phrases, the scattered scenes of their lives weaving around each other, threading themselves together into some kind of sense.
But she couldn’t force it, she knew that. And there was something important, she could feel it – something almost … necessary about being in this in-between place, purged by sorrow yet brimming with uncanny expectation. Something was being demanded of her. Something was on the verge of happening: hope, a world shaping itself, a future.
So she would hold them, Arthur and Emily, in the midst of their pain and suffering. Believe in them. Trust that the writing knew what needed to be done.
She stood and smoothed the night from the sheets. Pulled out fresh undies, bra, shorts and t-shirt. Looked out of the window with her clothes in her arms, watching the sun rise. The 25th of February. A date to mark. Her new life.
The bedroom was luminous in the moonlight. Was it this that had woken her, or Emily and Arthur – their lives, their stories? She rolled the sheet off, let the fanned air whisper across her skin, tried to breathe herself into drowsiness, but the tightness in her chest and belly told her sleep would be impossible.
She padded to the kitchen, pulled the hanging cord. Her papers, scattered over the table in the evening, switched into life, the pen sitting on top.
It was Arthur, she could feel it – his confusion tying the knot in her gut, his wavering that was a leaping pulse, unsettling hers, his distress and despair sitting in her bowel like stone; his decision that must be made, about Emily, for Emily. And for her, too, she understood. He must make the right decision for her too.
Alice leaned forward onto the bench, closed her eyes and slowed her racing mind with deep, long breaths. And when her body was quiet enough and her mind still enough, she took herself to him.
Here he was, her Arthur, asleep in the bed he shared with Emily. The embers of the small fireplace highlighted the shadows of weariness on his young face; his eyelids fluttered and his mouth worked. No, he said, throwing his body around. No!
She sat on the bed next to him and smoothed his cheek. She felt her way into his fears, his confusion, his anger, his sorrow. She imagined herself a rook and flew into his dream. The elm trees, their crimson flower-bursts. The nest. The egg. Then she bent to his ear and whispered the words that might help: Sometimes, Arthur, we must fend for those who are not able to fend for themselves. A sweep of her hand through his hair. And sometimes we must listen for the quiet voice that tells the truth.
And then it was gone, that world, in a rush, in a backward plunge that left her dizzy and alone.