Anna woke up feeling like she’d slept on a bed of nails. Faith, however, claimed her bed was great but she couldn’t help feeling a bit precious, like the lead in the Princess and the Pea story.
When they stumbled out of the van, it was to the most unpleasant sight. Klaus and Helene were having a rather bendy, noisy shag in front of the now-cold fire pit, his pale naked arse rising and then falling with a loud slap. They tried clearing their throats and banging around to make the couple realise they were up, but it didn’t seem to deter them. If anything, it may have spurred them on.
When Anna saw Klaus wielding one of the very charred sausages left on the barbecue, she decided it was time to move on.
They stopped at the toilet block to have a quick, shockingly cold shower and brush their teeth. Anna ran a brush through her long hair and looked around futilely for somewhere to plug in her hairdryer. There were no outlets. She groaned inwardly. Her hair would frizz up without a good blow-wave and become unruly. Still, she supposed it didn’t really matter, but she was used to drying it and it felt odd to leave it wet.
She’d only packed for two nights in Wellington, so she was running very low on clean clothes. Putting on her last clean pair of knickers, she was quietly glad that she always overpacked a little. She bypassed her Karen Walker top as being a little nice for a trip on the road and did a sniff test of her other tops to find the cleanest one. She’d need to either do some laundry or buy something else to wear — once she got her finances sorted.
The fact that Greg had been such a jerk and had cut off her card was infuriating. She was going to have to talk to a lawyer when she got back to Auckland. She’d left things too long, worrying about the kids, and feeling like she owed it to them to put up with an unhappy marriage.
They hit the road, breaking open a packet of biscuits for breakfast.
“I’m dying for a coffee,” she told Faith as they pulled out onto the main road.
“I’m mostly a herbal tea girl myself, “ Faith told her. “Unless I’ve been drinking. Then it’s Earl Grey. We weren’t allowed coffee growing up, just herbal tea, and try as I might to like it, I just don’t. Unless it’s a mocha, I guess. I love chai now though.”
“Okay, so tell me if I’m being too nosy, but what was it like growing up in a place like that?”
Faith unscrewed the top and passed her a bottle of water.
“In a lot of ways, it was good, you know? Lots of fresh air and nature, and other kids. No television, but we didn’t know to miss that. But, we had a lot of chores. And there’s a lot of praying. A lot of indoctrination. It’s a funny thing. You’re expected to just believe what you’re told is God’s will for you, no questions asked.” Faith drank her own water and took another biscuit before she continued. “We had to do a lot of cooking and a lot of laundry. I liked it a lot better when we got bigger and had to attend mainstream school.”
“So how many kids are there in your family?”
“Five, including me — three sisters and a brother. My parents would have had more, but Mother had complications with me and had to have medical intervention and a hysterectomy.”
“Oh, so did your dad get another wife?”
“No, they don’t do polygamy. Probably only because the community is too small.”
“So, what are your siblings’ names?”
“There’s Isaac, he’s the oldest, and he’s turning fifty next week. Then Grace, who’s married with five kids, Charity who’s forty-three, I think, and Hope who has four kids. Isaac and I are the only ones who left the commune. So then there’s me, and I just turned forty.” Faith pulled a face. “How old are you?”
“Forty-four,” Anna told her. “So what made you leave? Was it your husband? Ohh, are you, like, banned? You know how like no one can talk to you if you leave the Amish?”
“Excommunicated, you mean? No, not really, but my parents were very unhappy with me, and I haven’t seen them since Daniel and I got married.” The van made a weird grinding noise as they went round a windy corner and they both paused nervously to see if it did it again. It stayed quiet, so Faith continued.
“I somehow convinced my parents to let me do nursing. A school friend was going and she and I went together to Christchurch and stayed in the nurses homes. Which is where I met Daniel.”
“Was he doing nursing too?”
“No, teachers college, but he was going out with another girl on our floor until he met me.”
“Aww, cute.”
“I suppose so. Anyway, I struggled through my first year, and Daniel finished his training and then I got pregnant.”
Anna gave Faith a look. “Ohhhh. Shit.”
“Yeah, my parents were not happy. We got married, but of course they had imagined I was behaving myself and would come back to be a nurse in their community and marry a follower.”
“Still, all these years later, and two kids? You’d think they’d have gotten over it?”
Faith sighed. “You don’t know my father. He’s staunch. To him, sin is sin.”
They spotted a small bakery with a footpath sign advertising coffees and Anna pulled the van up outside. There were no tables so they sat back in the cab to eat their Danish and drink their hot drinks.
“I feel bad that you’re doing all the driving,” Faith said. “But I only learnt to drive after I got married and had the kids, and we never had a manual. I could try though?”
“Nah, it’s fine,” Anna told her. I grew up on a farm, so I can drive most things. I’m kind of enjoying it actually.”
“Do you live on a farm now? In Auckland?”
Anna laughed. “Hell, no. Greg is no farmer. He wouldn’t know a ewe from a ram. No, we’re on the North Shore and so is the packaging company we own. It’s all in the city.”
“Oh, sounds … interesting,” Faith said unconvincingly.
Anna laughed again. “No, it’s really not. I wish I’d never dropped out of my studies.”
“So we’re both dropouts then,” Faith said.
They both smiled.
“Yeah but you went back and did something else later. I didn’t.”
“You still could.”
“Maybe.” Anna realised she would have to think about what she would do when she got back. She’d be out of a job, after all. And she didn’t want to do office work.
“So, what else do we have in common, I wonder?” Faith said.
“Well, tell me something else about you. Hobbies? Weird habits? Favourite book?”
“Oh, the Bible for sure,” Faith said and then cracked up at the horrified look on Anna’s face.
They spent the rest of the drive to Christchurch chatting and getting to know each other better. When they got to the city, Anna googled the nearest bank and parked outside. The van made another strange grinding noise as they stopped.
The bank was closed. It was Saturday and Anna hadn’t even considered they wouldn’t be open.
“Shit. I’ve lost track of days. We’ll have to stay till Monday to sort things.”
“Oh well, I assumed we’d be here at least one night anyway. I don’t think it’ll make too much difference.”
“No, I suppose not, but it means another few nights sleeping in the van.”
Faith looked happy enough at the prospect and Anna steeled herself not to be such a diva, but she wasn’t looking forward to more nights on the lumpy mattress.
It was a mindset thing, she realised. As a kid, she and her brothers had loved camping out on the farm, swimming in the river and getting grubby. What had changed? She wasn’t that old. She needed to find the old her who would have found it an adventure.