Mountain Ash (21 page)

Jodie spent the rest of the week going through the motions. Mothering, working, domesticity, mothering, working, domesticity, round and round it went – the only break to the routine was a phone call from Alex on Friday night.

She and Milly were in the kitchen making souvlakis for an early tea. Her daughter had decided she loved cooking – Jodie had Mue to thank for that – and was grappling with a small blunt knife, trying to dice tomatoes. In the hallway the phone trilled, making Jodie's heart jump. Irrationally she thought it might be Nate.

Hardly, her mind countered. She hadn't told him her proper name or where she lived, let alone left a phone number.

‘Hello? Jodie speaking,' she said into the big old black handset. She loved how everything that had been left in this house was so
old
. Maybe that's why you want Alex? countered her traitorous mind.

‘Jodie. It's Alex here.' His voice was so strong.
He
was the man she knew and cared for, she reassured herself.

‘Hi,' she said.

‘I'm on the road to Melbourne. Thought I'd have time to call in but I didn't. I hope you'll forgive me?'

He sounded tired and her heart went out to him. ‘That's okay. We're fine. Milly's cooking me tea.'

‘Well, I won't keep you. Just wanted to make sure you were there. I'll be home mid-next week. Wednesday, at this stage. It'll take me some time to sort out the station affairs. Maybe I'll see you after that, perhaps Friday night?'

Jodie sighed, visualising her work roster. ‘I'm sorry, Alex, I've got a late shift that evening.'

There was silence on the end of the phone. Then a tight, ‘I really wish you'd let me look after you. You don't have to work.'

But she did. For herself. For Milly. No matter what Alex said, no matter what their relationship became, she would not be a kept woman.

‘I like my job, Alex.'

His voice softened. ‘I know you do, Jodie. But I had rather hoped one day soon you'll be looking after me. And that'll be a full-time job.' Jodie laughed awkwardly. She was embarrassed for him, for a minute. He had such outdated ideas about women's work. ‘I'll probably let Mue go, if you take me on. I'm sure you can run the house.'

Mue lose her job? On account of Jodie? Oh God, no! ‘It's such a big place, Alex. I'm sure I'd need all the help I can get. And besides, I'd want to spend my time with you.'

Silence again. Warm silence this time. ‘And I with you. I'll talk to you next week. Goodbye, my love.'

‘Goodbye, Alex.' She gently placed the phone back on its solid cradle. Then leaned against the wall, head flung back, eyes closed.

It was just her and Milly for the weekend then. Not much different from any other old time. She didn't know why she felt so disappointed. All she could see in her mind was a rugged man rearing above her. Eyes blazing with passion. Then a cowboy hat pulled down low, a slim-hipped, bow-legged walk, a ute with a sewing machine tied to the tray. There was even a dog in the scene. Even though he hadn't been a feature, she knew he'd been there somewhere.

‘Mum? I think I've cut myself!' came a wobbly voice down the hall. The note of panic had Jodie running and skidding sideways into the kitchen.

Milly, near the sink with a finger in the air, was peering dejectedly at a cut about as long as a grain of rice. A short grain of rice.

‘Oh, Milly,' said Jodie, coming to a stop and clapping a hand to her heart. ‘You had me worried.'

Her daughter was on the verge of tears. ‘
I'm
worried,' she said. ‘Billy said you can't play basketball if you're injured. I spose you might drip blood on the court.' Milly's first basketball game was tonight. She was as nervous as a flittering moth.

Jodie walked over to her daughter and inspected the proffered hand. She tried to look as serious as her daughter. ‘How about a Band-Aid to stop the bleeding then? I'm pretty sure they're allowed on the court.' A tiny pinhead-sized bubble of blood was welling.

Milly sank with relief. ‘Really? Thank you, Mum.' She threw her arms around her mother's waist and hugged her tight. ‘I knew you'd fix it for me.'

Above her head, Jodie smiled grimly and hugged her daughter back. She fervently wished that fixing her own confused life was as simple as applying a Band-Aid.

Parnie wasn't getting any worse but he wasn't improving either. He still had a limp so Jodie decided, after a weekend of gently working with him, to ring Clem.

‘Clem?' Mue's son was a man of few words so Jodie got straight to the point. ‘Can you come over and see Parnie? He's still not right and the vet says he can't do any more for him.'

‘Probably just the muscles,' he said. ‘Time, Jodie. Just time.'

‘
Please?
'

A sigh. A puff of resignation. Jodie hung on, knowing Clem would do anything for an animal.

‘All right. Friday night.'

Jodie grimaced to herself. ‘I'm working.'

‘That's okay; I'll come anyway. He in the same paddock I put him in after the draft?' He didn't need to add ‘where you came a cropper', because they were both already thinking that.

Jodie nodded distractedly. She didn't want to think about that accident, or ‘the aberration', or the near-fatal deer collision after that.

‘Jode?'

‘Sorry. Yes, that's the one.'

‘I'll ring you.' Clunk. Dial tone.

Clem's people skills were extraordinary. Thankfully he was a lot better with horses.

‘He coming?' asked Milly. ‘Buggsy's worried too.'

‘Is she now?' Jodie caressed her daughter's blonde head and wondered how she could have made something so perfect.

A noise erupted from Milly's bottom. ‘Oops!' The little girl clapped her hand over her mouth and giggled.

Okay. Maybe
not
quite so perfect.

‘Excuse me, Milly.'

‘Excuse
you
, Mum.' And her daughter was off, out the back door, plaits flying, legs pumping, little elastic-sided boots moving as fast as they could go.

‘The little bugger,' mumbled Jodie but she was smiling. That was Rhys coming out in the daughter. That cowboy's sense of humour had been legend, which was one of the reasons she'd fallen in love with him. There hadn't been much laughter in Jodie's family life after her mother left. Her father had been shattered and Jodie stunned. Why hadn't her mother loved them enough to stay? Instead she'd left them both for another man. In time Robert had moved from the coast to work at Riverton, while Jodie had gone backpacking and eventually found Rhys. Which led Jodie to think of a different cowboy at the end of another road-trip. His offer to sew her quilt, the raft race, his laughter tumbling down to her in the water, his smile as she surfaced between his legs. A swag laid out so beautifully on a riverbank. Torches like candles, cups like crystal, a man to be supped like fine wine …

Oh God. She had to stop thinking like this. She had to stop thinking of
him.
Nate was just like Rhys.
It gets boring doing the same thing year in, year out. You got to have a new horizon to look at …
' And what else had he said? ‘
We've come from the Northern Territory … on our way to a job near here …

Then they'd go back to the Territory for the next season. She'd been around that kind of bloke enough to know that's
just what they did. That's how they lived their lives. From one station to another, hopping like kangaroos, where the will and the want took them.

And with regards to women, well, she knew what happened there too. She saw proof of that every day, in an energetic bundle with blonde plaits.

They rode away.

But not Alex. He was a man who was here to stay.

Except Alex was also proving a jealous type.

‘Does McGregor own you?' Clem said abruptly when Jodie answered his phone call.

She groaned. ‘No. Why?'

‘He obviously thinks he does. Wanted to know what I was doing at McCauley's Hill.' Jodie could just imagine
that
showdown. Surly Clem and an affronted Alex.

‘What'd you say?'

‘None of his fuckin' business, pardon my French.'

‘Oh dear. He wouldn't have liked that too much.'

‘No, he didn't, but he's got nothing on me. I just got in my HiLux and drove off. I was finished anyway.'

Jodie could just see a pissed-off Alex, staring at the departing vehicle's headlights with frustration. It wouldn't have been a good look.

‘Mum, you're not really a good cooker, are you?' said the little girl after Jodie had to feed a whole batch of burned cupcakes
to the dog. If her look hadn't been so earnest Jodie would have laughed, or cried. The way she was feeling today, she wasn't sure which.

‘No, mate, I'm not much of a cooker, as you so succinctly put it. That's why we have people like Muey in our lives.'

Milly was nodding gravely as they heard Alex walk through the door. His arrival startled her. Floss hadn't barked. She supposed the mutt was too busy devouring Jodie's burned offerings.

‘I saw Clem Bailey here,' was Alex's opening line as he entered the kitchen.

Jodie blinked and took a step backwards. She crossed her arms and leaned against the sink. Two could play at this game, especially if she was innocent. ‘Yes; I was at work. He was here to check Parnie.'

Alex's piercing look flickered. It was like he wanted to believe her but couldn't
quite
get his mind over the line.

‘And what did he say?'

‘Clem reckons time is all he needs.'

‘Well, it's too late for me to buy you Warrior. He's gone. Someone else has bought him.'

‘I don't
want
another horse – I told you that.' She knew she sounded defensive but there was nothing she could do. He was having a go at both her and her horse. All she needed was him to say something about Milly …

‘And you, young lady, should be outside skipping or something while I'm talking to your mother.'

Milly looked like the deer Jodie had run into on the Barry Way. Her eyes were wide. At Alex's words the cake spatula she'd been licking dropped forgotten on the table. The little girl took off out the back door.

‘Milly!' Jodie yelled, starting after her.

‘Going to see Billy!' came her daughter's voice across the backyard. A gate slammed shut. Next thing, Jodie saw a pair of plaits flying as little legs pedalled a bike hell-for-leather down the hill.

‘Damn,' she muttered. Now she wouldn't see Milly until dark.

She thrust back her shoulders and stormed inside to Alex. How dare he talk to her daughter like that? How dare he insinuate she was having an affair with Clem Bailey?

But all the fire left her soul as she reached the kitchen. The man was sitting at the table, scraping his finger through the leftover cake mixture around the edges of the bowl. His face was so tired and forlorn she didn't know what to say. It was just as well he got in first.