Page 89 of One Night on the Island

‘More cake?’ Susie says, clearing the table.

Dad puts his hand up, a hard no. ‘More than enough sugar for one day.’

He’s like that. Has a pious way of making himself seem virtuous at the cost of the people around him. Susie takes the cake back to the kitchen, probably questioning if she’d been a little heavy-handed with the chocolate frosting.

‘How’s work, son?’

I nod, tell him the bare bones about the upcoming Salvation exhibition. He narrows his eyes at mention of the island, and then laughs, too long and too loud.

‘That the place even exists is news to me,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘Way your mom used to talk about it, dragons and pirates and all that kids’ stuff.’ He’s amused, enjoying himself. ‘Tell me, did you find treasure, Captain Mack?’

It’s enough. The jovial tone, the ever-so-slightly superior note. This may not be my home any more, but it is my house and he’s leaving. I pick up his coat and hand it to him.

‘I’m just seeing Dad out to his car,’ I call to Susie.

She pops her head around from the kitchen. ‘Bye, Alvin. Thanks for dropping by.’

My father looks at me for a silent, assessing beat before slowly getting up and following me down the hallway. I don’t look back until we’re beside his car on the sidewalk.

‘Did I do something wrong?’ he says, and one could be forgiven for thinking he’s clueless. The hint of challenge in his eyes says differently, though.

I look at him, trying to decide if it’s worth the effort.

‘Today, or for the last twenty-five years?’

His eye-roll is so subtle you could easily miss it, but I don’t.

‘Come on, Mack, you’re a man now, and a father. You know it’s no bed of roses.’

No bed of roses. His words hammer home how differently we view the role of a father. His permanent sneer is making my fist itch.

‘Being a father isn’t supposed to be a bed of roses,’ I say. ‘It’s not just pretty for a while and then disposable when it’s useless to you. It’s a forest. Constantly changing, growing, evolving. It’s shelter and roots and branches to climb and leaves to break their fall.’

He doesn’t come back with anything. Maybe I’ve got through, or maybe he just couldn’t give a damn. Either way, this conversation ends on my terms.

‘You were right earlier. My kids are a chip off the old block,’ I say. ‘But my block, not yours.’

I watch his tail lights until he’s out of sight, and then I sit down heavily on the porch steps, winded. Leaning my head against the post, I close my eyes and listen to the high-pitched laughter and yells of the boys over in the neighbours’ yard.

I am the canopy over their heads, the ground beneath their feet, the soft pile of leaves to land on. I am their forest. I am their home.

Cleo

12 February

Salvation Island

KYLIE MINOGUE WILL LOOK EIGHTEEN FOR EVER

My mum has commanded the high seas to allow her safe passage, and the ocean has obeyed her bidding. I watch her climb from the boat in a far more dignified style than I could ever hope to manage and stride briskly up the sands towards me, waving one arm madly over her head in greeting. I half run towards her, feeling like six-year-old me at the end of the school day, desperate to hurl myself into her reassuring arms.

‘Mum,’ I say, rocking back and forth as I hug her tight enough to cut her circulation off.

‘Well,’ she says, shaking sea spray from her hair when I let go. ‘That was a bit of a faff.’

I laugh because that’s so typically my mother. When I came over here on the boat I thought I was going to die. Mum found it a bit of a faff. Tom always jokes that Mum and Emma Thompson must have been separated at birth because they have that same brisk, no-nonsense way about them that makes you feel comforted and protected and utterly sheepish simultaneously. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like my mum. Except maybe the physics teacher who called my eldest sister lazy, one parents evening, and received a public dressing-down for his trouble. Mr Jenkins aside, she’s universally acknowledged as all-round marvellous.

‘Come on, then,’ she says, linking her arm through mine, making light work of her backpack. ‘Show me the sights.’

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