Hana’s breasts woke her at seven o’clock, unused to being ignored for so long by her infant. She woke the baby and coaxed her to feed which was unusual. The little girl seemed fine, sucking greedily and beaming at Hana. Her morning nappy was a little reminiscent of the night before, but not to the same extent. “You’re a grown up girl,” Hana crooned as she washed and dressed her baby and Phoenix squealed with delight. “I wonder what culinary delights Aunty Leslie has for you today? Whatever it is, I’ll have to clean it up tonight!”
Phoenix laid on the bathroom floor while Hana showered, giggling with glee as her mother peeked out at her. The mountain spring water smelled and tasted so different from the town stuff and Hana felt clean and fresh. When she emerged from the shower cubicle, the baby had rolled over onto her stomach and was kissing the bathmat.
Hana wrapped herself in a towel and retrieved her daughter. “You’re getting way too good at that,” she said, praising the child. Hana laid her on the rug, calling to her from around the room and finding her in a different spot each time she spied on her. “How are you doing that?” Hana asked, moving her back to the bedside rug. She frantically snipped up another sleep suit and squeezed the child into it but while she applied mascara and lipstick in the mirror, the little girl removed both socks.
“Oh, Phoe, don’t do that. You’ll get cold feet,” Hana said, kissing the twinkling olive toes. She stuffed them on again and packed more nappies and suits into the change bag, shoving the sellotape in too. She fitted the socks on again three more times before carrying infant and bag downstairs for Leslie.
“What’s she doing?” Leslie asked in the kitchen, watching Phoenix bend double to rip off the socks, grunting and dribbling a trail behind her.
“Pulling her socks off,” Hana said, wincing in apology. “I’ve run out of clothes.”
Leslie took the baby and put the bag over her arm. “Come on, little mokopuna,” she said, beaming. “Let’s get you fed and that’ll keep you too busy to strip naked.”
“Do you think she’ll be all right? I’m hoping I won’t be long.” Hana looked worried, twisting her fingers through each other.
“She’ll be fine!” The older woman shooed her away, taking the little girl around the dining room to say hello to the hung over, sexed up wedding party from the night before.
“Ok, if you’re sure.” Hana dashed to the mud room at the back of the house, finding Liza’s jodhpur boots and a pair of chaps to protect her calves. She sorted out the old hat of Miriam’s Logan once gave to her and clamped it down over her hair. Then she doubted herself.
“What’s wrong with you, kōtiro?” Leslie asked with a chuckle as Hana arrived back in the kitchen. “Youse got fleas girl?”
The other women rolled their eyes at Leslie’s familiarity with her employer’s wife, but Hana didn’t notice. “I’ll feel a total wally dressed as ‘Penelope of Pony Club’ if Bobby turns up out front with a quad bike, or the Jeep,” she whined.
“Shush woman and get youse arse out the front,” Leslie snorted.
Hana hovered inside the hotel lobby, tidying up the magazines and straightening the flowers on coffee tables in the lobby. The clattering of hooves on the gravel made her heart quail. She wasn’t confident on horseback and found it a trial with Logan. He always said he wouldn’t go fast and then did as though his understanding of ‘fast’ was different to hers.
“I’m not riding that!” Hana pointed at the stomping white mare on the driveway, blinking in the brightness outside. Logan’s horse eyed her haughtily and snaked her neck towards Bobby’s hand.
“Enough!” he snapped at her, pulling his hand free and dropping the rope.
Hana shook her head and backed away. “Nope, I’m not coming,” she said with determination.
Jack, the stable manager limped around the corner, waving his arms and causing both horses to act spooky. Hana wished he’d keep his body parts still and signed to him in his language to keep still. The deaf man read her hands and emphatically called her over, making his strange guttural noises and signing her to hurry. Hana shook her head and signed ‘scared,’ but he dismissed it, telling her Sacha would keep her safe.
Hana felt forty years fall from her life, leaving just six as she stamped her foot and pouted. Jack cackled loudly as Bobby struggled with Sacha and the gelding. “I don’t want to,” she whined, seeing Jack’s eyes narrow as he locked his will against hers.
“Bloody get on!” Bobby shouted as Sacha aimed a kick at the gelding and Hana clumped reluctantly towards the mare. She tried not to look her in the eye, facing Logan’s expensive tan saddle, her nose an inch away.
Jack intended to throw her onto Sacha’s back, making Hana bend her left leg at the knee and using the spring in the joint to chuck her into the saddle. “No,” she complained, flapping her hand behind her back. Jack grunted and slapped Hana’s bum, taking her by surprise as he flung her skywards.
She almost stabbed herself on the horn of the pommel as she went up, saving herself from being flung clean over by the enthusiastic old man. Jack shortened the stirrups but refused to do the dangling girth up tighter, shaking his head and telling her with his hands to ‘ride like a Du Rose.’
“I’ll end up riding like a freakin’ dead person,” Hana wailed as Jack threw Bobby onto his mount the same way. To Hana’s disgust, she noticed he rode Digger, the horse she often used. She pulled a face at him. “As soon as we get away from here,” she whispered, “we’re swapping!”
Bobby looked doubtful and set off in a clatter of hooves, going in a different direction from the one Logan favoured. A deep sandy track left the driveway fifty metres beyond the hotel gate, veering off left and making a steep climb up the mountain side. There were deep track marks from lorry wheels but the going was easy, despite the winter’s abuse of the freshly dug earth. “Does this go all the way to the top?” Hana asked in surprise and Bobby turned and nodded.
“What a pity Logan’s divorcing me,” she muttered, “especially now I don’t have to half kill myself visiting his favourite place on earth.”
The dappled white mare snorted beneath her as though understanding Hana spoke disrespectful thoughts about her master. Sacha hated following, undoubtedly used to Logan leading any string of horsemen and Hana let her pull alongside Bobby, noticing the wild look in Digger’s eyes at her appearance. “When can we swap?” Hana asked, her tone demanding.
“I can’t ride her, miss,” Bobby replied, giving her a look of complete sincerity. “She only carries Du Roses; nobody else. She’ll buck me off quick as a flash. I’ve seen her do it.” He patted Digger’s neck with a tanned hand dusted in blonde hairs. “I’ll stick with this old boy here, thanks.”
Hana tutted like a small child, planning to ambush Digger when they stopped at the top. Sacha blew through her nostrils again, telling her off. “I’m not a Du Rose anyway,” Hana complained under her breath. “I’m a...”
And there lay the root of the problem; Hana couldn’t decide who she was. In the tennis courts under the stars she was momentarily Hana Johal, doubles tennis star. With her father and brother she was Hana McIntyre. But who was she really; Phoenix’s mother, Logan’s wife? Even her older children were Johals. Hana huffed and Sacha puffed and Bobby observed the females with alarm, wondering what he’d gotten himself into. He chatted to Hana, distracting her with facts about the build.
“Why are you managing the project?” Hana asked. “Is it something you enjoy?”
Bobby shrugged. “Kinda. I worked as a carpenter in a previous life, well, before things went wrong and I ended up as a fugitive.” His brow furrowed and he fell silent.
“Are you happy here?” Hana asked.
Bobby nodded with enthusiasm, his cheeks colouring at the reason for his happiness, hoping Hana didn’t guess. She didn’t.
“But isn’t it hard, being trapped up here, unable to go anywhere in case the cops spot you and arrest you? You must miss your family sometimes; my son said your stepbrother and his wife are lovely people.”
Bobby shook his head long after Hana finished speaking. “The cops will find me one day, miss. When I need hospital treatment, or I have to leave for one of my boys; it’s inevitable. I’m all right in the township. Mr Du Rose’s word is law and if I’m ok by him, the townsfolk don’t have a problem with me.” He smiled sideways, his blue eyes glittering with passion. “I had my freedom and look what I did with it, miss. I burned myself and other people. Up here, I’m just me and I like who that is. I’m the man my step ma loved and had faith in. These people let me be him. Bobby.” He grinned at Hana. “And I ain’t riding that horse!”
Her face dropped and she looked grumpy. The horse snorted again as though laughing. “You horrid nag!” Hana exclaimed and Bobby threw his head back and laughed.
“Jack said it had to be this way - and he knows his horses,” Bobby said sagely and Hana glared at him, determined to get her own way as soon as his backside left the gelding’s saddle. “How’s things with you nowadays, miss? Now Laval Senior’s locked up and the other evil bastard’s hanged himself.”
Hana shook her head, surprising herself with her answer, “Coming apart at the seams.”
Bobby held her gaze for a long moment and Hana felt conflicted. Despite her need for a confidante, gossip from the hotel went round the township like a bushfire. She looked at the hotel roof hundreds of metres below them and sighed. “Miss,” Bobby said, his voice low, “I ain’t no gossip. I don’t speak about others in the hope they won’t speak about me; I can stay here longer then. If nobody don’t talk about me, the cops can’t find me.”
“I don’t know where to start,” Hana replied.
“Try the beginning.”
Half an hour later, the riders had skirted native bush and mountains until finally they rode through a gap in the fence at the top of the mountain. The breeze was harder at altitude and the air colder. Hana had talked until she was hoarse and Bobby listened, giving her eye contact and the occasional nod of acknowledgement. She talked about her first marriage and the baggage she inadvertently dragged into her relationship with Logan. Hana told him about her father and brother and their recent meeting. She even confessed to her time on the tennis court with the man who knew she could play. Bobby’s brow knitted at Hana’s recount of arriving home to find Amanda draping herself over Logan on the sofa. He shook his head. “Man’s an idiot if he’s messing around behind your back,” he said and Hana stared at the latent anger flashing in his blue eyes. His loyalty made her feel gratified. “I’d kill him myself!” he spat and Hana saw a flash of Flick, the other dangerous persona. Bobby shook his head seeing her fear and kept his eyes fixed on the horizon, making the effort to uncurl his fists.
At the top of the mountain, he dismounted, producing two halter ropes from the pockets of the saddle blanket and attaching them to the fence. He stripped off the tack and slipped rope halters over the beasts’ faces, making sure they could graze but not roam. “It’s no longer a paddock, miss,” he said. “It’s a building site.”
Hana wandered around the site as Bobby checked items off a long handwritten list. “Where is everyone?” she asked. “Why’s nobody working?”
“Waiting for supplies,” Bobby replied. He waved his hand towards the structure. “The framing is metal. It’s usually wood but the house will get a battering from the elements and needed tough, durable materials.”
Hana nodded and clattered over the sturdy concrete base, using the doorways to give her an idea of the finished house. The tiled roof protected her from the cold breeze but subjected her to an unnerving whistle as the forceful air pressed around the structure. The back of the house had external plasterboard installed and the builders had begun fitting split brick over the top. It was a pretty material resembling Cotswold stone and Hana imagined the rooms enclosed by walls.
Port Waikato was a cluster of tiny dots in the distance far below, with the estuary and sea beyond it. “It will be a beautiful house,” Hana said with sadness. “Logan’s spared no expense.”
Bobby smiled wistfully. “He’s built it for you, miss.”
Hana shook her head. “I don’t think so, Bobby.” She sighed. “You shouldn’t tell him you brought me here; I think he’ll be angry.” She jerked her head towards the grazing white horse. “Maybe don’t mention I rode his horse either. If he doesn’t already hate me, he will then.”
“You’re wrong, miss. He adores you.” Bobby looked up, checking dangling cables with interest. He nodded with approval at the veritable spaghetti covering the joists and running down walls. “All looks good,” he said.
“Where will the power come from?” Hana asked, sure Logan had already told her a million times.
“Generator,” Bobby replied. “That’s what the tradies have been using. It works fine and there’s a backup in case something goes wrong.” He saw her swivel her head around and anticipated her next question. “There’s a water tank and UV filter for rainwater. But there’s also a natural spring a hundred metres north so you have a pump on that too.” He smiled. “Should be more than enough for when your girl’s a teenager and using up all your hot water.”
Bobby laughed, expecting her to join in but Hana didn’t. She felt maudlin again. “I’ll probably be dead by then or too old to get out of bed. She can use my share.”
Hana turned away but found Bobby’s strong hand on her upper arm. She saw his eyes flick to her wounded wrist, avoiding causing her pain. His face was close to hers. “Seems to me, miss, you spend too much time thinking.” His breath caressed Hana’s face, smelling of chewing gum. Bobby lowered his voice and stroked hair away from her cheeks with the back of his hand. “You’ve got to grab each day with both hands and wring out everything life has for you. Who cares if you feel too old to be a mother again or if some other woman’s trying to seduce your husband? You have to put your head down and keep going because sometimes, answers are just around the next corner. Maybe you should play tennis again or take up Spanish or line dancing, but the important things are people, Hana. You just spent the last half hour telling me about the people who weren’t in your life but now are. That’s not a problem, miss, that’s a blessing. Decide who you are and then align yourself with those people who let you be her. Stop trying to be a superwoman who’s all things to all people. We get one go round and we’re a long time dead!”
Bobby let go, his eyes flashing with fear as he saw his fingers clasped firmly around Hana’s arm. Mutual trust passed between them and she nodded her acceptance. “Seen enough?” Bobby asked, his voice low and confidential and Hana nodded.
“I can’t see myself living here,” she replied, casting her eyes over the structure worth more money than she’d ever owned. Her green eyes met Bobby’s concerned face and he cocked his head and looked sad for her.
“Come on, let’s see if those bloody horses are still there,” he whispered.
His laugh split the air as under her breath Hana replied, “I hope mine’s not!”