The Lost Summers of Driftwood Read online

  Her feet were bare and her hair was tangled and she was eating toast. It had been a long time since she’d been like this. Allowed herself to be like this. She was still wearing the dress from Camilla’s party. Usually at this hour of the morning her hair had been tonged into loose waves, her face made up, and she was at her desk drinking a super smoothie blended in the office bullet with chia, blueberries and almond milk. She was almost certainly wearing a new-season dress that was worth nearly as much as she was paid weekly. Sometimes this meant counting every cent at the supermarket and ordering only an entrée at restaurants, but it was a trade-off she had somehow felt necessary. Now it seemed absurd.

  For a long time Phoebe had convinced herself that the glossy surface of things was enough. There was a certain kudos working in the marketing department of a luxury champagne house. Everyone knew Joet et Halo. Everyone loved the bottles she gifted them. Nathaniel would boast that they had bottles of champagne coming out their ears, that once he’d found a few stashed in the bathroom cupboard. But for all the gloss, all the fabulous Instagram posts and the parties, the job itself was actually menial. When your favourite person in the world died, it was hard to find meaning in pretty pictures. Her dissatisfaction made its presence felt like an insect bite, waking her in the middle of the night. But even before Karin’s death, Phoebe had known that one day maybe she would need more. She’d earned distinctions at university even if it was only an arts degree. She wasn’t quite sure how she’d ended up cutting and pasting pretty pictures all day and pretending she had the best job in the world.

  She brushed the toast crumbs off her fingers and pressed the palms of her hands into her eyes. She felt tired. This was not the way she’d imagined spending the last week of her holidays.

  She looked up to see that the sun had just hit the river, making the deep green water sparkle. She found an old pair of thongs by the door and slipped them on. They felt good, rough and cracked, like dry earth beneath her feet. She picked up her mug and the long grass tickled her legs as she made her way towards the jetty. She’d been dreading going there. It was where Karin had died, but it was also tied to such happy times—fishing off the end, swimming in the cool water, picking pipis and oysters off the rocks. It was the first place they’d run to as children on arrival and the last place they’d go to say goodbye.

  The timber was sun-bleached and the tin bucket they’d used to collect oysters was still there, like an ode to the passage of time, its salt-sodden rope rotting and barnacle-laced. Phoebe could almost smell the pungent fish guts, see the sparkle of scales as her father cleaned his catch with a rusty knife. She took off the thongs to feel the sun-warmed wood. Had Karin clambered down the side onto the sand and waded out to her waist, let the tide pull her under? Or had she gone down the ladder at the end into deeper water? That same ache that had been there for nearly a year swelled fresh in Phoebe’s chest. What had Karin been going through to push her that far? Why hadn’t Phoebe visited her in the two years she’d lived here? It had always seemed too far to drive. Work was always so busy. Why hadn’t she ever brought Nathaniel here before? He and Karin had got on well, though the rest of the family had taken a while to warm to him.

  It had been early December. Phoebe had invited him to her aunty’s wedding in the gardens of a grand old home on the outskirts of Sydney. It was to be the first time the family would meet Nate, even though he and Phoebe had been dating for months.

  The garden hummed with humidity and the hushed chatter of guests as they waited for the bridal party. It was already hot even though it was barely 11 am.

  Karin had done the flowers for the event and wore tea roses in her hair. She’d found her dress—an old-fashioned lilac silk slip—in an op shop and had sewn silver beading into the fabric. She had looked so beautiful.

  Nathaniel had been running late and Phoebe scanned the crowd nervously.

  She saw Karin’s face—quizzical and amused—before she saw Nathaniel.

  ‘Babe, what the hell?’ she’d said, grabbing his arm and pulling him close, as though this would somehow hide him. His breath had the sharp smell of stale alcohol and his hair was a matted mess, as if he’d just come out of the surf. His eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot and his suit looked like he’d been rolling in the grass.

  ‘What?’ he replied, but looked sheepish. ‘It was the work Christmas party last night,’ he added, rubbing his eyes.

  ‘Tell me you haven’t come straight from there.’ Phoebe looked around wildly for her mother. It wasn’t too late to sneak Nate into the bushes and pretend this had never happened.

  ‘No, the boys dropped by my place so I could get dressed,’ he said, smoothing the crumples in his pants. ‘I didn’t want to be late.’

  Her heart softened a little. She must really like this guy, but it didn’t ease the panic stretched across her chest. ‘Oh God, you know how judgemental my mum is.’

  ‘Hi Nathaniel, lovely to meet you,’ said Karin, moving over to them and planting a warm kiss on his cheek. ‘Phoebe’s told me so much about you.’

  ‘This is my sister Karin,’ said Phoebe, thankful for her calming presence. ‘Nathaniel has come straight from his Christmas party. And I mean, straight.’

  ‘Oh, I just thought you were some kind of rock star,’ said Karin.

  Nathaniel scratched his head, looking both puzzled and pleased. ‘Sorry. Maybe I should go. I think I’m still a bit drunk.’

  Phoebe rolled her eyes. ‘You think?’

  Karin laughed. ‘Don’t worry, everyone here will be drunk in an hour. I know, I just arranged flowers on the champagne table.’

  Phoebe shot Karin a helpless look. There was no way she wanted her mother, or Camilla for that matter, to meet Nathaniel looking like this.

  ‘You know what?’ added Karin. ‘I have some things in my car. Hairbrush, deodorant, Panadol, bottle of water. I’ve been tasked with keeping Aunty Claire and the wedding party looking decent.’

  Nathaniel stared, his eyes glassy with exhaustion, and Phoebe had to give him a shove towards the car park. Karin put her hand protectively on his back, as though he was an old man rather than a hungover young one.

  Phoebe was breathing a sigh of relief when Camilla emerged out of the crowd like a spectre. She had managed to flout the garden party dress code by wearing a black dress, but looked incredible nonetheless. Phoebe felt a new rush of adrenalin.

  ‘Was that—’

  Phoebe put up her hand. ‘Don’t even. I can’t, Camilla.’

  She widened her eyes dramatically. ‘Oh my God. That’s Nathaniel? I mean, honest to God, I thought it was a homeless person who had wandered off the street. Maybe one of Karin’s lost causes.’

  Phoebe shook her head. ‘Can you please not say anything to Mum? Karin’s looking after things.’

  Of course, Camilla told their mother, and Nathaniel had been labelled ‘the hobo’ for a long time, even though Karin had transformed him into something presentable and, as predicted, everyone had been tipsy within an hour.

  Nathaniel had always liked Karin best too after that day. Why hadn’t Phoebe brought him down here? Why hadn’t they all spent time together here on the jetty where there was nothing but the water meeting the sky?

  Phoebe walked the few metres to the end of the jetty and looked across to the rich green bush on the other side. There was still only one house there. The stories she and Karin used to tell each other sitting in this spot. An old crone, a zookeeper, a giant. She heard a voice on the wind. Looking downriver she saw a man sitting at the end of the next jetty on a stool, rod perched in the air. There was something about the curve of the back, the way he held his head. Her heart lurched.

  He looked up as she stared at him. Even from the distance she saw his face break into a smile. He stood and waved. Her whole body flooded with a familiar feeling, like sunlight on cold skin.

  ‘Phoebe,’ he called, and it echoed across the water.

  ‘Jez?’ Her voice was constricted with shock.
r />   They both stood there with their hands shading their eyes. Phoebe was sure she’d heard they’d sold their property at the end of the road and that he lived in Canberra now.

  Jez pointed to a rowboat and mimed his intention. It only took him a matter of minutes to reach her, rowing upstream. She watched his shoulders move the oars against the current. They were the same shoulders. It was the same boat. She could have been seventeen again. There was a shine on his brow by the time he grabbed the ladder and looped the rope through it. She thought he was going to climb up but instead he looked up at her from the tethered boat. She sat down on the end of the jetty, letting her feet dangle off the end as she’d done a million times before.

  ‘Long time no see,’ he said, grinning. There was an openness to his face that time had snatched from her memory. A curl of happiness moved inside her.

  She shook her head. ‘It’s been so long. Ten, no, fifteen years?’

  ‘At least. More than fifteen by my count.’

  The way he said it made it sound like he had been counting. After all this time and even in the midst of the pain of the last few days, it made her smile.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ She looked downriver. ‘I thought you sold Driftwood.’

  ‘Nah. Couldn’t do it. Too many memories. We’re living back here full time now. Only moved six months ago. Got sick of Canberra. There’s plenty of work for me here. The good thing about being a tradie.’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Electrician,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t blame you, I’d forgotten how beautiful it is here. I haven’t been here since . . . for years.’ She picked at a piece of lichen, bleached white on the jetty.

  ‘I’m sorry. About what happened to Karin.’

  It was awkward when people talked about suicide. They never knew how to put it, how to attribute blame. But Jez had always been good with words.

  Phoebe pulled her knees to her chest. ‘Thanks. It’s strange being back here.’

  ‘Are you alone?’

  She laughed more cynically than she meant to. ‘I guess you could say that.’

  He narrowed his eyes, trying to read her meaning.

  ‘It’s a long story.’ She wanted nothing more than to sit here and tell him what had happened in the past fifteen years, find out about him, when she saw a woman out of the corner of her eye. She had long blonde hair that melted into the white of her dress. She wore a battered straw hat and was holding two mugs.

  Jez followed Phoebe’s line of sight. ‘That’s Asha.’

  She’d heard the name before. His wife.

  Phoebe watched as Asha put down the mugs, straightened and squinted into the sun.

  ‘Over here,’ Jez called and waved from the boat. ‘Just saying hi to the neighbour.’

  Phoebe’s chest contracted. That’s what she was now—the neighbour. She chastised herself. She was being sentimental, that was all. Just because she didn’t get her happily ever after didn’t mean others couldn’t. She bit her lip until the sadness retreated a little. What did she expect? It was she who had wanted to move to Sydney, travel, pursue a career. Jez had always wanted to stay here, have a family. He must have kids now, too.

  She forced a false note of brightness into her voice. ‘Well, it was great to see you, Jez.’

  He hesitated and made a sweeping gesture with his arm. ‘You know, come to dinner.’

  ‘Oh, no, I couldn’t.’

  ‘No, we’ve always got a full table. We’ve got a bit of a gathering of drifters going on at the house. Too big for just me and Asha. The Texan’s cooking tonight.’

  ‘The Texan?’

  ‘It’s a long story,’ he said and she smiled. ‘We’ve got two boarders. The Texan, also known as Tex, his partner Wendy, who lives just up the road, and our other boarder, Flick. And Tommy and his family come most weekends. I think Mum would have liked to think that her house was always full of people.’

  ‘Tommy. How is he?’ Phoebe would always remember Tommy as the tall, lean boy of their childhood. Always the boss of every game. Always the one to win an argument. It was not at all surprising that he was high up in the Australian Federal Police now.

  Jez nodded, picking at a piece of peeling paint on the boat’s hull. ‘Yeah, he’s pretty good. You’ll see him this weekend.’

  The promise of time with Jez. Phoebe couldn’t help how good that felt. She changed the subject. ‘Your mum was . . .’ She thought of Pauline, always wearing bright lipstick, working the vegie patch, cooking up big vats of jam, in her studio with clay-thick hands. ‘You’re like her, you know.’

  He looked out onto the water and she recognised the expression on his face. It held the echo of someone who wasn’t here anymore. Then his features softened. ‘You mean in my old age.’

  She shook her head. ‘We’re not old yet, are we?’

  ‘No,’ he said with a smile. ‘Thanks for saying that. About Mum.’

  ‘It’s true. I couldn’t see it back then but I can see it now.’

  ‘Jez.’ Asha’s voice rang out, bell-like across the water.

  ‘I just invited Phoebe for dinner. She’s an old friend,’ he called back, his voice loud on the wind.

  It was hard to make out Asha’s face, shaded by her hand, but she didn’t reply.

  ‘Are you sure it’s okay?’ Phoebe wrinkled her nose. She didn’t want to make anyone feel uncomfortable. But then again, she didn’t really have any food in the house and the thought of a table full of people she didn’t know was more comforting than she could have imagined.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. Come round at six. We eat early here in the country.’

  ‘Well, I have to meet the Texan, clearly.’ She shot him a wry smile.

  ‘Clearly.’ He hesitated as though he was going to say something else but then he shook his head and looked downriver. ‘Great, see you then.’

  He untied the rope with the deftness of someone who was born on the water. The boat floated, as light as a leaf, swept by the current. When he climbed the ladder and stepped onto his jetty, Asha picked up the mugs and handed one to him. She was almost as tall as him and encircled his shoulders with one of her arms as they walked up towards the house. They looked happy. He raised his arm to wave, and Phoebe waved back.

  The last time she’d seen him she’d broken his heart. Now here she was floating adrift in her own life after Nathaniel had broken hers. Her vulnerability felt like a nerve exposed to the air. Jez was another life; it wasn’t hers anymore.

  Phoebe took a deep breath, drank the dregs of her tea and stretched her arms. She would go into the Bay to get some supplies, and go to dinner tonight, but then she would come back here and keep to herself.

  CHAPTER 5

  The heat of the day had ebbed and the late afternoon sun cast a long shadow on the road. The kookaburras were noisy in the branches high above her. Phoebe had walked this road between their homes so many times. Their lives had been a constant to and fro between the cool of the dam and the salty jump off the end of the jetty. The dam came into view first now. It was still lush, surrounded by ferns and ringed with high reeds, a small timber weir the only access point among the foliage. Her heartbeat stuttered. That dam had been the first place where she and Jez had explored each other’s bodies, their own pleasure oasis.

  The birdsong intensified as the metal gate to the property squeaked open. Driftwood. The word had been smoothed by the elements. She ran her fingers along the woodgrain, feeling the passing of time. This sign had not changed in twenty-five years. Was there some essential nugget of herself she could still find, now that all the things she thought had mattered were gone?

  Phoebe knew the easy connection she and Jez shared was a tempting panacea for the pain. She just needed to keep her head screwed on tonight. She had gone into the Bay to buy some clothes even though it was unlikely anyone cared what she was wearing. She’d bought make-up from the chemist and found the lipstick she wore for work. She’d dressed in a cream
silk blouse, tan leather sandals and denim shorts. She felt strange, as though she was living another person’s life.

  The house was still beautiful, like good bone structure under age-weathered skin. It was set against the line of gums that flanked the river, and had a generous bull-nosed wraparound veranda. There was new paving leading up to the French doors of the entranceway. Frangipani trees flowered to the right like gorgeous intruders in the native scrub. As Phoebe walked the path, the wonder she felt at being back here was tempered by a wave of nerves and doubt. It was impossible to be here without feeling those stirrings of affection. Every part of this place contained a little piece of her history with Jez, like breadcrumbs of emotion to be picked up and crumbled between her fingers. It was right on these front steps that they’d had the talk that ended their relationship. The house was like a lush incubator of their youth, of that nubile sapling growth that only happened once.

  She climbed the steps now and reached the front door. A waft of tobacco smoke mixed with the aroma of roasting meat and onions.

  ‘Hi.’

  Phoebe jumped at the voice and swivelled around. Asha stood barefooted, wearing the same white dress, a hand-rolled cigarette between her fingers. She proffered her other hand, the nails bitten to the quick. ‘I’m Asha. You must be Phoebe, the neighbour.’

  She felt a jolt. ‘The neighbour’. But it was true; she was a stranger here now.

  She smiled as warmly as she could as she shook Asha’s hand. ‘Oh, yeah, my parents own the property just up the road.’

  ‘Jez said your family and theirs knew each other.’ Asha’s voice didn’t seem to match her delicate looks. She had a deep, strong intonation with an accent that spoke of growing up in the country. She took a long drag on the cigarette, her eyes flinching against the smoke. ‘Anyway, come in. I think dinner’s nearly ready and the mozzies are getting fierce.’ She crouched to stub the cigarette out in a metal tray on the ground, and then led Phoebe in through the French doors.