Page 26 of Wings Above the Mallee

‘Ploughs and Pies one side, Tractors and Tarts opposite. Settlers Bridge used to be busy enough to support a cafe and a bakery. Maybe we’ll get back there again. Thoughtartsputs me more in mind of …’ She drifted off, fiddling with Bear’s lead. Then she shot a glance at Sean. ‘Years ago, I said to Marian that I’d love to have an op shop. To raise money for a good cause, like the Flying Docs. I could use Tractors and Tarts. Put the farm and work wear on one side—you know,tractors.And women’s wear on the other.Tarts.’

He guffawed, surprising himself with the sudden lightness of spirit. ‘I like your vision, but I’m not too sure that name would be politically correct.’

Tracey waved off his caution. ‘We don’t care about that kind of rubbish out here.’ Her eyes gleamed. ‘When you get to know me better, you’ll discover I rather like bending the “rules”.’

Sean was struck by how Tracey seemed to embrace life, the simple joy she evidently found in strolling the main street of a tiny country town, chatting about people and memories and dreams. ‘In that case, Tracey, I think I most definitely want to get to know you better.’

12

Heath

‘You two have the worst taste in music.’ Sophie’s voice was raised over ‘Bat Out of Hell’.

‘You have no taste,’ Charlee chipped back. ‘That stuff you play is for funerals.’

Heath had to agree with his daughter. Sophie was one of the few people who actually enjoyed inoffensive elevator music, and she complained when the on-hold music in a phone call was interrupted by an automated voice telling her she’d progressed in the queue.

‘You can turn it down a bit, Charlee.’ He raised his voice. ‘I’m trying to concentrate back here.’

‘And I’m trying to concentrate up here.’ Their daughter had an answer for everything. It was exhausting, exasperating and endearing. ‘You always say the driver gets to choose the music and the temperature. I’ve had to suffer for sixteen years, so it’s my turn now.’

‘It’s your turn when you get your Ps,’ Sophie said. ‘You don’t need any distractions.’

‘You know how many studies there are into music helping with focus, don’t you, Mum?’

‘Sorry, can’t hear you.’ Sophie pointed to the console as the track switched to Joan Jett’s ‘I Love Rock ’n’ Roll’. ‘I think there’s a tumbler of gravel stuck in the engine. Slow down as you come up to the intersection, Charlee.’

‘I’ve got right-of-way.’

‘Yes, but you can’t assume all the other drivers on the road are as brilliant as you are. So slow down and look, anyway.’

‘We’re in a hundred zone, it’s dangerous to slow down for no reason. I’m supposed to maintain a constant speed.’

Sophie sighed. ‘Just slow down, Charlee.’

Charlee eased her foot off the accelerator, but Heath knew she’d keep arguing the point. Sophie was just about as bad, though. She never understood that the only way to deal with Charlee’s need to win every discussion was to terminate the conversation.

Heath shuffled the papers on his lap together and reached down to put them in his briefcase. It was too dark to work in the back of the car, and they’d be home in five minutes or so. He’d pull out the files again after dinner.

‘Besides, you have to drive to the conditions,’ Sophie said, and Heath groaned inwardly. That doggedness, the need to win, was where Charlee got it from, yet it was their similarity that had the two women he loved at loggerheads so frequently. His daughter’s laughing gaze met his in the rear-view mirror, her eyes sparkling beneath the jaunty chequered golf hat that was her latest wardrobe quirk. He nodded toward the highway, redirecting her attention and tacitly supporting Sophie’s instruction.

‘It’s roo o’clock,’ Sophie continued, ‘and you need to be constantly scanning the verge for kangaroos. I don’t know how you can even concentrate with the radio so loud.’

Any second now, Charlee would start citing statistics from research into loud music aiding concentration. She had either an eidetic memory or a brilliant flair for inventing plausible quotes. ‘It’s not the radio, Mum. It’s a playlist.’

‘Whatever. Look at this idiot. His headlights aren’t even on.’

Heath pulled out his phone. He couldn’t see his files properly in the gloom, but he could draft a few emails before they got home. Although they’d have loads of typos: Charlee could text with both thumbs flying across the keypad, but he pecked at the screen with one finger, often hitting the wrong key.

‘I’ll flash him.’

‘No, you won’t. I’m quite sure that’s illegal on your Ls.’

Heath winced at the tightness of Sophie’s tone. Her patience with their daughter’s relentless assertiveness had worn thin. They had a deal that she would oversee Charlee on the drive into town to pick him up once a week and he’d be the instructor on the way home. He’d bailed, though, figuring the twenty minutes would be better invested in knocking over some extra work. Besides, it wasn’t like Sophie was snowed under: with nothing but their neat house to worry about, she had plenty of time she could use to help Charlee sign off her required hours. Though it was the night driving their daughter needed more experience with, and Sophie wasn’t keen on that, because her night blindness played up.

‘You’re confusing flashing headlights with using the horn as anything but a warning device,’ Charlee said, never willing to let an argument go. ‘Right, Dad?’

Her eyes searched the mirror for him, and he held his phone up, conveying that their argument had nothing to do with him. ‘I’m not going to get any work finished at this—’

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