My phone rings as I trudge up the schoolhouse steps the following Friday night. I drop my bag on the floor. ‘Hello, Gus. Is everything all right?’
‘Sure it is,’ he says. ‘Can you meet me at the pub for a drink? My shout.’
‘I had parent–teacher interviews tonight. I’ve only just got home.’ Tumbleweed winds around my legs and wails for dinner. ‘Is it important?’
‘It’s about our next committee meeting. Thought we’d better get a few things sorted out.’
‘The meeting’s three weeks away.’
‘I’ll be here till nine.’
My hair is still damp from the shower when I pull back the heavy timber door of the pub. It’s the only place open after five, so serves as a bar, restaurant and café.
Leon, behind the bar, lifts a hand. ‘How’re you doing, Sapphie?’
Gus gets up from his chair at a small table by the window and pulls out another chair, dusting it off in the same way he does at his cottage when I’m dressed for work and he’s worried about dog hair and crumbs.
‘Are you sure everything’s all right?’ I ask him.
‘Just wanted a chat, that’s all.’ His hand, when he holds it out, is callused, scarred and twice the size of mine. ‘What can I get you to drink? The usual?’
‘Thanks. My shout next time.’
The crowd is mostly local—students from the high school who’ve just turned eighteen, the local policeman and his husband, and a few farmers who live a little further out.
Gus returns with his beer and my lemon and soda.
‘How’s my buttonhole flower coming along?’ he asks as he sits down. ‘Not long till the wedding.’
I show him a picture on my phone. ‘What do you think? River red gum flowers are delicate so they’re tricky to make, but April likes the colours because her gown is a similar shade of cream, and the leaf colour will pick up the greens in your tie. I’ll attach a gumnut from the river to the stem.’
‘I’ll be trussed up like a turkey at Christmas.’ He winks. ‘Maggie would approve.’
Gus’s wife passed away well before I came to Horseshoe, but she’s still his reference point for scores of things—including formal wear.
‘April asked me to make one for her father as well, so you’ll have a turkey friend to gobble with.’
He smiles and nods. ‘We’re on the same table, you and me.’
‘April has a lot of family to accommodate. Going to the church would have been lovely; I didn’t expect to be invited to the reception as well.’
‘What?’ He wipes froth from his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘With you being a friend, and making the flowers? Course she’d want you there.’
We chat about what’s happening with Gus’s farm, and the weather forecast, but whenever anyone we know nods in our direction, Gus turns back to me straight away, as if to make it clear we don’t need company. After half an hour, I put my empty glass next to his.
‘I have an early start tomorrow, Gus, and you’re bound to have an even earlier one. Did you want to meet about anything in particular?’
He links his hands on the table. ‘You’ll be up at the farmhouse in the morning?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I’ll see you at trivia at six.’
‘I saw Freddie on the way in. He’ll pick you up at five-thirty and Luke will drop you home when we’re done.’
‘As usual, you’ve got me sorted out.’ He leans across the table, raising his brows. ‘What about you?’
‘What about me?’
He turns his glass in his hand. ‘Mr Chambers and the rest of them, they reckon you’ll come around to having this Laaksonen bloke on the committee.’ When he frowns, his bushy brows almost meet in the middle. ‘I’m not so sure about that.’
‘He has everyone else’s support. And there are more reasons to have him on the committee than not. I see that clearly enough.’
‘I’ll back you if you didn’t think it’s the right way to go.’
I attempt a smile. ‘Matts is well qualified and has a good public profile because of his Ramsar role. And, as you said at our meeting, what’s good for the wetlands is good for all of us here. I’m hoping the politicians will want to impress Matts so much, they’ll commit to additional funding and support.’
He scratches an unkempt sideburn. ‘So why didn’t you want him to join us in the first place?’
‘I was surprised. But if everyone else wants him, I’ll make the best of it.’
‘He’s a city bloke, no mistake about it, but that shouldn’t worry you.’
‘Because I’m a city girl? How long till I qualify as country?’
He puffs out his cheeks in thought. ‘You know what, Sapphie? I reckon you’re like those flowers you make—they never grew out of the dirt, but no one can tell the difference.’
I laugh. ‘Using that analogy, I don’t think I’ll ever—’
He holds up a hand. ‘Some folk end up where they should’ve started out in the first place.’ He nods firmly. ‘That’s you, Sapphie.’
‘Thank you, Gus.’ All of a sudden, I’m teary.
He harrumphs. ‘Tell me what you think about Laaksonen.’
I clear my throat. ‘He’s from the city, like you said.’
‘Which wouldn’t have stopped my Maggie welcoming him to town. Fiona Hargreaves puts the kettle on for magpies, and you’re the same these days. But this bloke, he rubbed you up the wrong way. Isn’t that right?’
I sit back in my chair. ‘Was I that obvious?’
‘The rest of us were all cock-a-hoop, and there’s our Sapphie, ready to tear out the poor bloke’s throat. Haven’t seen you like that in years.’
‘It—I didn’t expect him to say what he did.’
He leans across the table and pats my arm. ‘Didn’t mean to offend you. Haven’t seen you so fierce in a while, that’s all.’
I blink. ‘Fierce?’
He shrugs. ‘The Hargreaves had kids with more problems than you could poke a stick at. You were quiet and courteous most of the time, different to the others, so long as everybody let you be.’ He winks. ‘Reckon Laaksonen must’ve overstepped the mark, that’s all.’
‘I’ve accepted what’s likely to happen. I’ll have to put up with him.’
Gus sits back in his chair. ‘When I was a young bloke, I did a bit of rodeo work. I met Maggie at a rodeo, as a matter of fact.’
‘You rode bulls, didn’t you?’
‘Roped them too. Which gets us to the crux of the matter. How does a two-legged man bring down a two-ton bull?’
I laugh. ‘What are you trying to say, Gus?’
‘This Laaksonen bloke, he’s a good talker with a flashy job, but that doesn’t mean he can trample all over you.’
‘You think I should rope him?’
‘Like you tackle Mr Chambers every meeting. You work out what’ll be best for the town, and find a way for the committee to get to it.’
‘So Matts is just like the rest of us?’
‘He was the one who put up his hand, so I reckon we should think up ways how he can help us, not the other way around.’
‘We all work together as usual?’
‘That’s right.’ He purses his lips. ‘You weren’t keen on having a full-grown bull in your yard, but that’s where he’s ended up. You’ve got to take him by the horns.’
I raise my empty glass. ‘I’ll do my best.’
Gus puts both hands on the table and pushes himself to his feet. ‘Can’t ask for more than that. Anyway, you know what I reckon?’
‘What?’ I say, standing and pushing in my chair.
When he holds out his arm, I take it. His knee creaks as we walk towards the door. ‘He’s got a thousand lakes in Finland, but what does he do? Leaves them behind for our marshlands over here. He can’t be all bad.’
Matts’s favourite subjects at school were physics, maths and chemistry, and I had about as much interest in them as he had in my flowers. When we were living in Canberra and he was in his final year of school, he caught me trying to look at my finger through the microscope he’d set up on a table in his bedroom.
He held my wrist firmly and pulled my hand away. ‘You said you needed help with your homework, Kissa. Stop mucking around.’
‘You look at such boring things.’
‘They’re important.’
‘Is Lily interested in them? Or is it Brittany this week? How many girlfriends do you have?’
When he turned his back, I assumed he was going to ignore me like he’d been doing on and off for the past few weeks. He walked to the window and opened it, letting in a blast of cold air. His room was on the second floor of the house and there was a large gum in the garden, one of its branches reaching all the way to the window. He leant outside and picked a leaf, before carrying a second chair to the microscope. He opened a box of slides and took a few out.
‘Sit down, Sapphire,’ he said. ‘I’ll show you what kinds of things you can see.’
He told me about stomata, the microscopic holes on the outside of a leaf, and explained how they opened and closed. ‘Species like gums have fewer stomata, so lower levels of evaporation,’ he said. ‘It improves their chances of survival in drought.’
My hands touched his as we took turns to look at the leaf and slides. I took my time, enjoying the physical closeness and the fact I had most of his attention. His hair fell over his forehead. When he pushed it back, I smelled pine.
‘Do you have to shave every day?’
He didn’t answer for a while. ‘Most days.’
‘I get waxed under my arms. Nowhere else though.’
He stilled. ‘Do you want to know about the leaf?’
‘I wouldn’t be sitting here if I didn’t, would I?’
‘You can detect changes in atmospheric composition by looking at stomata, and measure a plant’s response to stress.’
His sleeves were rolled up. I put my hand on his forearm. ‘We learnt about that in biology.’
He stood so abruptly that I almost tipped out of my chair. He walked to the far side of the room and stared out of the window.
‘Maybe you’re not as stupid as I thought,’ he said gruffly.
‘Now what have I done? Come back, Matts. Tell me something else.’
He didn’t sit next to me again, but leant over my shoulder to look through the microscope. He adjusted it carefully. ‘Stomata open in daylight to let gases in and out of the leaf.’
‘That’s photosynthesis, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Who is your girlfriend, Matts? Lily or Brittany?’
‘At night, or when a plant is dehydrated, the cells close in order to cut down on water loss.’
‘Why didn’t you answer? Are you two-timing again?’
‘I’m seeing Brittany.’
‘She turned eighteen last year, didn’t she? She’s older than you.’
‘A few months.’
‘She seems really nice, and she’s very pretty.’ I pushed back on my chair so it was balanced on two legs. ‘Will you take her to the formal?’
He pushed the chair forward again, righting it. ‘Don’t, Kissa,’ he said quietly. ‘You could fall.’
‘My balance is better than yours.’ I pushed my shoulder blades hard against the back of the chair, trapping his hands, before smiling up at him and grasping his arms. ‘Anyway, I’m fifteen. I can do what I want.’
He didn’t smile back. His jaw was clenched. He pulled his hands free. ‘You shouldn’t be here,’ he said. ‘Go home.’
I sprang to my feet and stalked to the door, yanking it open before facing him again. His eyes were bright.
‘I bet you let Brittany come into your room,’ I said.
He pointedly looked at the bed. ‘That’s different.’
Matts was never my brother.
I was never his sister.
Did he understand that so much better than I did?
A week after Gus advised me to take the bull by the horns, I sit at the kitchen bench with my laptop and send an email.
From: Sapphie
To: Mr Chambers, Cassie, Luke, Gus
Thanks for sending through your thoughts on Matts Laaksonen’s request to join the committee. In light of your overwhelming support, I’ll issue a formal invitation for him to join us as an ex officio member. Mr Chambers suggested six months.
From: Sapphie
To: Dr Matts Laaksonen
Cc: Mr Chambers, Cassie, Luke, Gus
You recently expressed an interest in becoming a member of the Horseshoe Environment Committee. Assuming you’re still interested, the committee would like to have you on board as an ex officio member (from September to March). I attach the relevant documentation for completion, signature and return.
From: Matts
To: Sapphie
Confirming acceptance of your offer to join the committee. Documentation attached.
To: Mr Chambers, Cassie, Luke, Gus
Cc: Matts
Confirming Matts’s status as an ex officio member. He has been added to the committee’s group chat, and will join us for our next meeting later in September.
Cassie: Great to have you on board, Matts!
Luke: Ditto.
Mr Chambers: We are delighted that you are able to serve on the committee.
Gus: Welcome to Horseshoe!
Matts: Thanks.