The Paler Shade of Autumn (30 page)

“They are all things you can’t help.”

Autumn’s chin dips to her chest and she frowns. “No, I guess not.”

“How about I run us a bath? Might help you relax a bit.”

She twists in his arms to face him. “It’s already so late, Jet, and we’ve got work tomorrow.”

His neck tightens. “Fuck work. We’ll go in late or not at all. It doesn’t matter. We haven’t had a break together since we got back from Mongolia.”

Autumn manages a tight smile. “A bath sounds perfect then.”

He paces off towards the bathroom and she finishes unbuttoning her dress; lets it drop to her feet. As she bends to retrieve it from the floor, her mobile rings causing her heart to thump rapidly. She looks at the screen. It’s her mother.

“Hello.”

“What kind of joke are you trying to pull, Autumn? How dare you. How bloody dare you.” Her mother is hysterical, screaming.

Autumn is lost for words. She spins to find Jet. He is standing at the door watching her.

“Well?” shrieks Mrs Leone when she doesn’t answer. “What kind of sick bloody thing to tell someone. You rob me of grandchildren by getting engaged to that man and then spring this whole drama queen act on my doorstep. Your brother is upset. I’m upset.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Well sorry just doesn’t cut it this time. You need to grow up and stop thinking about yourself all the time. You have a family to consider.”

“I know I do. I didn’t want any of this to happen.”

“Too late for regrets now. The damage is done. This so-called gift of yours destroys lives, Autumn, can’t you see that?”

Autumn’s mouth flaps open and shut. The barrage of accusations has rendered her mute. She hears her father’s voice rumble like thunder in the background and she cringes.

“Autumn,” comes Frank’s deep, authoritative voice.

A sob escapes from her swollen throat and Jet is at her side, his hand out, wanting her to give the phone over, his eyes blazing with anger. Autumn shakes her head at him.

“Autumn?” Franks voice sounds again.

“Yes,” she manages.

“Don’t you dare listen to a bloody word your mother has just said. She has no right to act as though anything that has happened tonight is in any way your fault, and she knows it.”

Autumn sighs, relief overwhelming her body. She crumples onto the bed.

“Darling, you can’t help what you have. You can’t. I know that. Your mother knows that. She’s just upset, that’s all.”

“If I could give the gift away I would, in a heart-beat, but I can’t. I didn’t mean for Rose to touch my hand, she just did. I didn’t want to see what I saw.”

“Honey, please don’t be upset. I understand. Really I do. I told your mother not to ring you while she was so upset, but you know what she’s like—bloody stubborn, just like you.”

“Oh God, Dad. What a mess.”

She hears him sigh through the phone. “Yes, a big bloody mess that your meddling mother hasn’t helped. This is Jordy and Rose’s despair to deal with and we will all be there for support when the time comes. But for the time being, and I know it will be hard, you need to try and put it out of your mind.”

She snorts. “Like that’s gonna happen.”

He sighs again. “Do your best to anyway, honey. You hear me?”

“Yes. I’ll try.”

“And by the way, Autumn, congratulations on your engagement. Jet is a great bloke and I know he’ll make you very happy. He has your best interests at heart.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“I love you, sweetheart.”

“I love you too.”

She hangs up and throws herself back onto the bed. “My mother is a freakin’ nutcase. I swear it.”

“What did she say?” asks Jet, lying beside her on the bed.

She paraphrases the phone call for him.

Jet shakes his head, absolutely incredulous. “So your father, who never allows one word to be spoken about your insight, defends you and your mother is the one abusing you for having it.”

Autumn nods. “Basically.”

“I guess everything I’ve heard about evil mother-in-laws is true.”

Autumn looks at him and doesn’t fight the smile shaping her lips. “Have I told you I love you today?”

Jet grins wide. “Yes, but it doesn’t hurt to boost my ego hearing it again.”

“I love you,” she says.

He kisses her lips. “I love you too and I love how happy you make me feel, knowing that you’ve agreed to marry me.”

“You know just what to say to make me feel better.”

He shrugs. “The truth does have a way of doing that.”

Autumn dreams of blood, gushing lakes of it, swirling waves, turning everything ruby red. She is drowning in an endless pool, flailing in the thick liquid, unable to keep her head from sinking into its murky depths. Her brother stands on a blood-stained rock, within arm’s distance. She reaches for him as a coppery gulp washes down her throat, beseeching him with her terrified eyes, but he turns away from her and she sinks underneath the warm, red waves.

She wakes in an empty bed, gasping for air. Her mobile is buzzing on the bedside table.

She grabs it and lifts it to her ear. “Hello,” she croaks.

“Hi.” It’s Jordy.

She sits up, rubs her eyes. “How are you?”

“I’m doing as well as I can. Rose is not too good. I’m sorry, but I had to tell her about your gift.”

Autumn coughs as a gagging sensation fills her throat.
It’s not a gift
.

“She just wouldn’t understand otherwise,” he continues. “She said she wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“That’s ok. I don’t mind. Whatever you need to get through.”

“I want to let you know that I don’t blame you for this.”

Warm tears skid down her cheeks. She catches them with the back of her hand. “You don’t know how good it makes me feel hearing that from you. Mum rang me last night and…”

“Don’t let her upset you, she’s not thinking straight. You just happened to be the one she took it out on. We’ll deal with it, Autumn. Rose and I, we’ll deal with it. We’re strong enough to get through whatever happens.”

“I do hope so, Jordy.”

“Rose is so precious to me. I never thought anyone could make me feel this way.” His voice cracks. “I can’t help feeling I’ve let her down.”

Autumn’s heart weighs in her chest like a boulder. “Jordy, you can’t think like that. Sometimes there’s no real reason why things like this happen.”

“Sad part is, it hasn’t even happened, and yet I feel like I’m mourning already. Rose can’t fully believe it. I guess some small part of me too hopes you’re wrong.”

“Every part of me aches to be wrong on this one.”

“Well, I just thought I’d ring and let you know what was going on.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll talk to you later.”

“Um, Jordy?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m really, really sorry.”

“Me too.”

Fifteen days later, Jordy rings Autumn to tell her that Rose has lost the baby. Fifteen days later and still no word from her mother.

Settlement on the apartment occurs amidst a flurry of events and emotions. It takes a full fortnight between redecorating, work, and dealing with the fallout from the miscarriage to make the transition from Autumn’s old apartment and to move Jet’s belongings, which were sitting in storage, to the new building.

Once in and semi-settled—though unpacked boxes still crowd the spare rooms—the apartment is simply beautiful, filled with furniture she and Jet chose together and decorated in a distinctly Japanese theme. Washy water-coloured wall paper, dark stained timber furniture, vases of blue and white, and authentic Japanese art-works fill the rooms.

But Autumn hasn’t been able to find total peace in the new apartment, or anywhere else for that matter, because with the more days that blossom and fade, the more she believes her mother does truly blame her for what she saw about Rose, as though Autumn is the one who consciously creates the future with her insight. And with every new day, she begins to believe this more and more about herself.

It has been forty-four days since Autumn spoke to her mother. So tonight, as a simple housewarming and a gesture of peace, Autumn has invited her family to spend their once habitual Sunday roast at the new apartment. It is her way of saying, ‘let’s please forgive and forget’. She needs this friction to be settled not only for her own sanity, but also to help rid her of the guilt that has threatened to overwhelm her since the miscarriage vision.

In the newly refitted kitchen, Autumn bends to look into the oven, breathing in the delicious caramelised aroma of roasting lamb. “So do you think it is ready to come out of the oven?” she asks

Jet looks at his watch, then to the left—she can almost see the mathematical calculations rolling through his brain. “Yes, according to its weight, it should be perfectly cooked right about now.”

Autumn scoffs. “Easy on the
perfect
talk. There’s a reason I don’t do this often and it’s because I can’t cook—at all.”

“You may surprise yourself.”

She screws up her nose as she shakes her head. “I’m not counting on it.”

Autumn reaches for some tea-towels to lift out the scalding tray. But as she bends to open the oven door, her mobile rings. She throws the towels to Jet and answers the phone.

It’s her dad.

“You should smell the aromas in here, Dad. Roast lamb.”

“That’s what I’m ringing about, honey. I’m sorry but we’re not going to be able to make it after all.”

Autumn is silent as her heart seems to sink from her chest to the pit of her stomach. “Busy with other plans?” she asks, sarcasm shaping every syllable.

“Your mother, she’s just not feeling up to it…”

Autumn thumps her thumb against the end-call button and throws her mobile across the bench.

Jet, juggling the tray of roast lamb towards the bench, asks, “What’s going on?”

“They’re not coming. Mum’s not up to it.” She storms past Jet towards the bedroom. “Am I really so terrible a person that my own mother won’t even talk to me?” she yells over her shoulder and then slams the bedroom door behind her.

Sitting on the bedroom balcony, Autumn stares out at the misty city and a sky filled with clouds, plump and iron-grey. It has been a tough week, especially now all the excitement of decorating and moving in has subsided. Emotions and reality have started to intrude again. But to have her mother refuse her peace offering is enough to send her into a whip-stall and she now plummets back towards the ground without the means of slowing her descent.

It breaches a woman’s biology—holding such buried resentment towards their mother. For Autumn, it feels like a choking shadow has attached itself to her spirit, tainting her with its wretchedness.

Jet slips through the balcony doors and sits on the empty seat beside her. She pulls her knees to her chest and wraps her arms around her legs. “I’m scared, Jet. I’m just so scared. What if Mum’s right? What if it is me that is causing these things to happen with my insight? What if I caused Rose to lose the baby?”

“Of course you didn’t make that happen. Your mother is wrong on so many levels to have ever said that to you.”

“I’m so frightened of what else I might see or what else I might cause. Already I wear gloves all the time, I can’t perform my job as I would like, I’m scared to interact with anyone. And you, my own fiancé, I haven’t touched your hands since we were engaged. It’s not right. You deserve a normal relationship. You deserve to love someone—normal.”

He shakes his head. “I love
you
. Regardless of all that, because I know you’re more than that.”

“You love the girl I was. Not the shadow I am now. Don’t you wonder what life would be like without me in it?”

His forehead wrinkles. “No,” he snaps. “Of course I don’t.”

“It’s just that you already have so much to deal with and so many people depending on you—surely you see how much of you I consume.”

“You’re talking nonsense. I’m not going to behave like your mother. I’m not going to ignore you because it gets a little rough. I understand you’re not yourself lately, but I love you and I’m not going to throw away what we have together because of temporary problems.”

Autumn angrily presses her palm to her head. “This isn’t temporary, Jet. This curse isn’t going to just go away. And it’s only getting worse as it gets stronger. I’m not coping with it. I can’t conceive that I’ll ever be able to cope with it.”

“What are you doing? Are your trying to talk me out of marrying you—out of loving you?”

She stares out across the city for a long, silent moment before she looks back into his eyes. Her throat is painfully tight as tears fight to appear. “Yes, I guess I am, because I believe you do deserve more than me.”

Jet releases a heavy sigh and pinches the bridge of his nose between his thumb and finger. “I won’t listen to this self-abasing bullshit, Autumn.”

Autumn nods. “Fine. Then don’t.” She stands and strides back into the bedroom. Jet follows, jogging to keep up. He grabs her arm and spins her so she is facing him.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I just hate to see you this way. It scares me too. I’ve seen how far down things have progressed since Mongolia and now with your mother.” Jet ruffles his hands through his hair, breathing heavily. “I don’t know how to help you and I really, really just want to help you.”

“Mum’s right, I’m selfish. I’m no good. I’m no good for you. All I’m doing is hurting the people I love.”

“How could you even interpret that out of what I’ve just said?” he says, impatience causing his words to sound loud and curt. “You are good for me. You’re all that’s good for me. But
you
need to believe it when I tell you. Instead you believe your bloody mother and her absurd notions that somehow you are the cause of what happened with your brother.” He bangs his fist hard against the bedroom door.

“It’s bullshit! Absolute bullshit, Autumn. Your mother knows that I can’t have children and it kills her. She knows she’s putting pressure on our relationship. That’s what she wants. And in order to achieve her ends, she’s filling your mind with absurd notions that you’re somehow in charge of everyone’s future simply because you have the ability to see it before it happens. And I find it so ridiculous that you’re even giving what she said any validity. I thought you were smarter than that.”