Peninsula, page 13
The ledge doesn’t seem to extend around the next corner. This must be an up or swim point. Below, the kelp looks menacing. She cautiously dips her right leg into the sea. No indication of the bottom. The swell, stronger now as she approaches the point where the peninsula faces the open sea, has churned up a thick soup. It isn’t possible to see further down than a calf’s length. She pulls her leg back up, uneasy. So far, the climbing has been good, mostly solid rock, but it would be difficult to back-track.
Earlier, while on the top of the ridge, she’d spotted a couple of blokes fishing several hundred metres further round. They would have arrived by boat. There was a small one anchored further out at sea. She had seen their fishing rods more clearly than the men, as they had their backs to her. Occasionally she catches fragments of speech. If they are aware of her presence, they give no sign. It’s comforting there are people nearby, but she knows if she falls and cries out they are unlikely to hear her above the sea, and even if they do, she could easily drown before they come to her assistance. She hasn’t told anyone where she’s gone, and while Jack will guess, it’s a big area to search. The coast wouldn’t be the logical place to start as there are no marked trails.
She scans the cliffs above her. There are distinct horizontal lines indicating where the greywacke and fossil-filled rock gives way to crumbly orange clay. Vegetation clings to the land but even from this distance she can see the gorse, harakeke and clumps of grass. Anchorage is tenuous. If she weighted anything, it would come off. Worse, on closer inspection, the lip of the cliff is overhung.
Ascend and risk a fall, or keep going and risk getting smashed against the sharp rocks by the swell, tangled among the kelp and those crabs and whatever else lurks down there, ruined phone, good chance of drinking seawater if she panics. She decides to retreat a bit and climb toward the safety of the grass high above. It will be easier than it looks from here.
She had reached the point in her career where she had to choose. Either base herself in Europe or return here properly. Returning felt like retreating, a short step away from retiring, yet the shuttling between, the hypocrisy of it, shamed her. If she stayed here, there were ties binding her. She was afraid they would slowly choke the life out of her. She would miss the mountains, but the idea that Aotearoa was some kind of nature paradise was, to her, a myth. Plenty of beautiful wild places offshore wherever you chose to look, much of it appreciated far more than here. It sat beside the ugly, yin and yang. Complacency, it’s a transmissible disease in her home country. She found this disturbing, even as she knew she was complicit. This collective refusal to join the dots, to think the islands were immune to overcrowding, pollution, warming, habitat destruction, hard to see it ending well.
By the time she returned from Bonn, Willy had left the Carltons. Rachel was baffled when Di told her where he was living. ‘Who’s Natasha?’
‘One of the Smith kids, a few years behind Willy at school, brother in his class, Nathan.’
‘What’s Natasha like?’
‘She’s all right, good family. Cops were happy for him to move.’
Rachel considered this. The Barclay family had been decent too. Addiction was an equal-opportunity condition as far as she could see, and she decided to let it go. Her mother didn’t need her hope deflated. It wasn’t as though Rachel had done anything to help.
She talked to Jack. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Natasha’s a lifesaver. Dunno how she found out.’
Rachel had a sudden thought. ‘Does she know Tui?’
‘Oh yeah, she would know Tui, think they are sorta related. Anyway, Natasha started coming round when the other chick wasn’t there, got on okay with Di, incredible tolerance right there. Came up with a plan, squared it with the cops. Next thing she’s collected Willy. Seems they like each other, might be a case of star-crossed lovers.’
‘Jesus, Jack don’t go all Shakespearean on me, that whole star-crossed biz never ends well.’
‘The valley edition might, sis. Limited options, you get less choosy. She kicked her husband out a few years back, he was into P, her kids have left home. She’s a gem.’
‘She sounds too good to be true.’
‘Mum and Dad deserve a break.’
It must be close to noon. At the base of the cliff Rachel can feel sunlight blowtorching her exposed neck. She swivels her cap around so the fastening digs into her forehead. She has sunscreen in her pack but its application would only serve as a distraction and lubricated fingers would undermine the friction she needs when her fingers touch the rock. As it is, the temperature, combined with anticipation of the climb, are making her hands slippery. She rubs them on her shorts.
She takes a few deep breaths while she studies the terrain, figuring out a sequence of moves that will direct her towards the least overhung section of cliff top. A final sip of her water, willing herself to stay calm, she climbs in small precise pushes, pulling on pieces of vegetation softly to test them, determined to proceed only when she has two, ideally three, solid holds. Staring at the puzzle in the foreground she suppresses the sneaking thought that going back the way she came would be sensible. She’s committed now.
A couple of times she sends showers of soil and loose rock trickling to the sea below. Of the vegetation, the gorse seems most securely attached to the precipice. Her hands are scratched and bleeding. A scoop in the cliff face provides relief. It comprises a series of eroded steps she can wriggle her way up. The crux comes when she has to exit the steps and haul herself over the lip. There’s a fat harakeke bush, but it looks only loosely connected to the precipice, there is little soil in which to anchor its roots. She jerks the closest piece. It shifts but doesn’t give way. She inches up beside the clump. To her relief there is some gorse beside it. Looking up, she tries to estimate the distance to the top.
With her left hand she grasps a handful of gorse, with her right she grips the harakeke near its base and hauls, pushing down with her trainers at the same time. As the harakeke bush rips, she grabs the next piece and continues to pull from above and push from below. She manages to get her right hand to the top of the cliff, scrabbles with her feet, wriggles her chest up, and then she is over on her hands and knees, dizzy and shaking. Her arms sting, her legs and torso are covered in clay crumbs, yet she feels clean. She slumps over on her back, drinks some water, her eyes closed. A minute passes, she opens her eyes and sits up, brushes some debris off her hands.
When Rachel stands, the point is visible only ten metres away from her, a few hundred metres above the trickiest part to traverse. She’s hungry now and low on water. Her watch is smeared with clay and gorse fragments. Once she rubs the face against her shirt she sees it’s past noon already and she’s come all of six kilometres. With a final look towards the point, she heads in the direction of the car park.
The sun is behind him, but she knows it’s Clive standing beside her car.
‘Hello again,’ Rachel says.
‘You look like you’ve been in the wars.’
‘Yeah, I went around the coast and climbed up.’
‘It’s a bit dangerous round there.’
Rachel remembers the tone in Clive’s voice when he mentioned Sophey. ‘What’s Sophey up to these days?’
‘You don’t know about that?’
‘About what?’ Rachel has a sinking suspicion she has said the wrong thing. She’d only asked to change the subject, not out of any real interest.
‘She was killed in a car crash. Four years and five months ago, drunk driver.’
‘I’m sorry Clive. I had no idea.’
Clive keeps looking at her, his face the only cloud in the sky. ‘A waste all right. You should be careful climbing those cliffs.’
Rachel glances over her shoulder. The dazzling afternoon light is polishing the bland water in the lagoon, giving its surface the harsh glow that reminds her of fluorescent office light. For a moment she wishes she hadn’t left her sunglasses in the car. The water is running away to the sea which surrounds her and Clive on three sides. Lit up, every little horizontal wrinkle is clearly visible, like the ridges on pipi shells. All around her the peninsula is yielding to the sea’s rough embrace. Hundreds of years from now, its link with the mainland will erode completely, creating an island.
She turns back, squints at Clive. The sun’s fierce heat has plenty more hours to live. The inevitable bruises and muscle soreness, bycatches from her morning, will take a day to show up, but when they do, she knows they’ll pass as surely as she knows not every pōhutakawa sapling planted by the lagoon will flourish. She has no answers, only a sense she needs to keep moving, to search beyond the haze.
Trailblazer
Your bedroom is a waiting room. When sunlight heats the bed into a sauna, you kick off your blankets, lie reading and eating ice cream. In the cooler evenings you venture outside. Sunsets bubble up from the dark fields, reminding you of a witches’ cauldron. Tangerine flames melt into the yellow of your grandmother’s fake daffodils. Blush-pink infusions are stirred by a froth of boiling clouds. Clive and Harriet party, play cricket, tennis, surf and visit friends. Clive starts a band with a couple of his mates. Harriet brings a boyfriend home. Your parents are bemused. Harriet’s only fifteen.
Your mother appears at your bedroom doorway. ‘Sophey, phone for you.’ Her hands are floury, so is her apron, so is the phone.
‘Congratulations.’
You recognise the golden syrup voice. Your geography teacher. He’s got so many freckles it’s hard to tell where his ginger hair ends and his face begins. Everyone calls him Monkeyface.
You know your mother is hovering just out of sight.
‘Um, I haven’t seen my results. The mail doesn’t come till after three.’
‘That was one of your teachers?’ Your mother asks from the doorway.
You wipe the phone on your sheet and give it back to her.
‘What did he want?
‘Nothing.’
‘What’s got into you? He wouldn’t ring for nothing.’
‘Are you in the middle of baking? He thought we get mail first thing, like in Hereford.’
‘Has he not heard of rural delivery? Be lucky to get the Herald before your father goes to milk.’
You smile to yourself.
‘He knows how you got on?’ Your mother glances back towards the kitchen.
‘Dunno.’
For a few seconds she stares in your direction. You keep your eyes on the page.
‘Kiwi biscuits,’ she finally says.
All year your special mission has been to remember everything the teachers say so you can repeat it back to them come exam time. With exams over, it’s like somebody snuck into your room and hoovered up your life, or a pet died.
Your town clings to the edge of the highway like a limpet or a weed. You aren’t alone in expecting it to collapse, like an old barn emptied of hay bales and left vulnerable to the wind. Hereford’s resilience is surprising. Clive jokes that the town has tap roots. Acing the exams is your ticket out. You imagine there are places where you might fit in, you’re counting on it. After seventeen years you know what you want to get away from. There is nothing near Hereford except farms and surf breaks.
At the mailbox you feel around inside the folds of newspaper for the envelope.
Your mother makes you ring your teachers. Like suspects with well-rehearsed alibis, they downplay their involvement.
‘I didn’t do anything, you did it all yourself.’
Winning a scholarship, it’s as if it happened to someone else. Polite congratulations scarcely interrupt the test cricket commentary. A neighbour leaves a card, like it’s your birthday. Harriet complains that you’ve eaten all the ice cream.
You help Clive pick peas and shell them for freezing. The two of you pop the smallest, sweetest, juiciest ones into your mouths.
‘Looking forward to the big smoke?’ Clive asks. ‘You can go see bands, go to pubs.’
‘I’ll be studying, plus I’m underage.’
‘You need to suss everything out for when I come next year.’ Clive shells with an enthusiasm that outstrips his co-ordination. Some of his peas miss the ice-cream container and roll onto the lino. ‘Oops.’
You savour a mouthful of sweet baby peas. No more school.
Clive cracks open another pea pod, flicks the peas into the container, inserts the pod into his mouth over his teeth. When he grins his mouth is green.
‘You’re the trail blazer, Soph.’
As toddlers you and Clive would search the garden for small things. The snails you placed on the dewy path sat motionless. One night, after your baths, you snuck back outside. Several of the snails had emerged from their shells. Tiny tentacles quivered like silver pins caught in the pale light of the moon. As you watched, one glided forward leaving a faint fringe of slime in its wake.
In four weeks you leave for Auckland. You wouldn’t mind if Clive tagged along.
*
You remember it all beginning, winter school holidays at your grandmother’s. You were fourth form, Clive third form. Rain-filled days, a long muddy skid of boredom. Smearing the greasy condensation on the window to clear a porthole, hoping the rain had lost interest. Sick with cabin fever. Your frustration swelled. For two straight weeks it rained, a few pauses when the sun tried to sidestep the clouds. Nobody told the rain about the holidays.
‘We should play pool Soph,’ Clive said.
‘How?’
‘You’ve watched Pot Black. Deploy long skinny stick so as to shunt brightly coloured ball into little pockets.’
The table had experience. It was there in the faded green felt and the square of blue chalk you rubbed the tips of your cues with.
You watched for gaps in the rain and snatched a few glorious hours running around the waterlogged paddocks. Gumboots slipping on the slick grass. Fuelled by the soft kiss of the tepid easterly and constant moisture, the grass blades grew thick and lush as a monster’s eyelashes. Returning to the house you’d peel off your muddy clothes and deposit them in the wash house for your grandmother to deal with. Mostly you played pool, read textbooks and made notes.
Lip aside, the pool table made a reasonable study. Unlike your house, small, cluttered and full of Harriet, your grandmother’s house was spacious and quiet. You could run and get out of breath before you got to the end of her hallway, if you were allowed to run inside her house which you weren’t. There were three bedrooms off the corridor, each with sets of single beds covered by matching pastel-shaded candlewick bedspreads. Grandma’s intricate hand-crocheted doilies dozed on the dressing tables beneath vases filled with hideous artificial flowers.
You didn’t get why Grandma spent hours meticulously crafting fake blooms out of coloured plastic, wire and dull green florist ribbon. She had a big garden, heaving with fragrant daphnes, delphiniums, daisies, irises, pansies, gladioli, marigolds, dahlias and camellias. In spring, bluebells, freesias, snowdrops and daffodils cut swaths through her orchard, surviving long after the citrus succumbed to root rot.
There were more bedrooms up the front. Children slept in those rooms once. The pool table was an early move in a gradual repurposing of Grandma’s house. It began with careful consultation and her eventual consent, accelerated in her later years, culminated in her unceremonious removal, first to live with her eldest and later in a hospice.
The rain gave up when school resumed. By then you’d caught the study habit, it grew like winter grass into the bloodstream of the part of you that said and did, and for reasons as mysterious as your grandmother’s fascination with fake flowers, it never abated.
An agriculture service town, that’s what Monkeyface called Hereford. He had a way of telling stories that stuck. Students took turns asking him questions just to keep him talking. Monkeyface tolerated the game, actually seemed to enjoy it. He had an expansive take on his allocated subject, could loop his way back regardless of how tangential an inquiry seemed. Everyone loved him for it.
‘Your school chums, they’ll scatter to the four winds, but the friends you make at university will be your mates for life.’
You didn’t have any school friends. The closest university was in Auckland. Geography lessons had left you more familiar with the agricultural systems and weather patterns of Africa, Asia and Europe. Your parents considered Auckland a foreign country. Biannual excursions were undertaken to the North Shore to purchase lace-ups from Hannahs. Someone drafted in for the afternoon milking. Pocket money allocated for spending on inexpensive items normally forbidden. Store-bought ham sandwiches for lunch. Your mother complained, rightly, they weren’t as good as hers. Those day trips were the closest your father got to a holiday. He drove, so he called the shots.
Sometimes he drove you over the harbour bridge to Eden Park. You hated those expeditions. Squashed in the back seat suffering arguments about the route, traffic and parking. The long walk to the stadium. Waiting for something to happen before the game started, and during – you could scarcely tell the difference. The crowd heckling as you stood up, assuming the premature departure indicated a lack of faith in the Black Caps. You wanted to explain, all it was, your father wanting to beat the traffic. The car radio blurting the result.
You needed to figure out where to go by end of term. Your parents left school at the first opportunity, didn’t go far. The map was the territory for everyone you knew. You didn’t think consulting your penpals in Germany and America would help.
