Page 124 of Weekends with the Sunshine Gardening Society
‘What? It’s true.’ He looks cross.
Lorraine glances at Cora, who appears stricken.
‘He made a mistake, that’s all,’ Lorraine says, because even though she agrees with Terry she wants the boys to havea relationship with their father. The boys are probably the only reasons Mike has to set things right, given that upsetting Lorraine and his mother didn’t seem to be a deterrent.
‘It’s a pretty big mistake.’
She can’t argue with that.
‘Being an adult isn’t all that easy,’ she says softly. ‘We don’t always get it right. But he loves you and he loves Simon. Just remember that.’
Terry bites his lip and glances quickly at his brother, who is kicking at the floor with his heel.
Ah, adults and the things they do to kids. Lorraine has tried all these years to protect her children from harm and the major cause of it was in the house the whole time.
‘Anyway, the Sunshine Gardening Society gives me … well, sunshine,’ she goes on, hoping to steer the conversation to safer ground. ‘I have fun. I see my friends. And I’ve learnt a lot about plants. About respecting the land. Plus I get to see a lot of the coast and it’s pretty bloody beautiful, I have to say.’
‘Maybe I could join you sometime,’ he says, and that makes her even happier, even if she has to refuse, because the society is sacrosanct, even from her boys.
‘Sorry, mate – ladies only. But you could always start your own little garden gang.’
‘As if!’ he says, then smiles. There’s the boy she remembers from before puberty.
She checks the clock on the kitchen wall. ‘Shoot – I have to go.’
A glance at Rose and a nod in return tells her that things will be taken care of, and she’s grateful that their parent-and-child shorthand is intact despite Cora’s incursions.
‘See you!’ she calls as she slings her handbag over her shoulder, then swears and doubles back to the laundry to get her gardening gloves before hurrying out the back door to the car, to the road, to her few hours of sunshine with her society ladies.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
MarcoLopes was as good as his word, only too happy to help Elizabeth move the little bits and pieces she didn’t want to put in the hands of indelicate moving men. Now she’s thinking about how to arrange those bits and pieces in her new sitting room, and considering which box to open first.
She decides to unpack the stereo so she can have Bach playing as she decants their lives into the small house in Sunshine Beach, two streets away from her parents.
Elizabeth didn’t need to impose herself and Charlie on them, as it turned out, because they have a friend who’s moved interstate and wanted to rent out their home. The timing was perfect – things came together as if they were meant to.
In the end, it wasn’t hard to leave the old house. Elizabeth packed up each room calmly and quietly, Charlie playing in another room as she’d asked him to do. It’s not a little boy’s job to pack up his life. That’s her responsibility, as his parent. His only parent.
As Elizabeth comes to the box containing the framed photos of Jon she smiles and thinks about how he must have helped with the move, making sure they were looked after. It all happened so smoothly – Cynthia made the offer, it was accepted, the settlement was quick because Cynthia paid in cash – that Elizabeth can’t help but think she had assistance from elsewhere.
That’s what Reverend Willoughby thought too when she told him the news.
‘I know God works in mysterious ways,’ he said, with a warm hand on her shoulder, ‘but so do our loved ones. And who are we to say they are not one and the same?’
Elizabeth knows what he means. Since making the decision to sell the house, she has felt lighter than she has in a long time. Since Jon’s diagnosis, she thinks, although that was so long ago she can barely remember who she was then.
That’s theMinuet in G Majorplaying now. A simple piece and one Elizabeth has loved since she learnt it as a child. Jon regularly encouraged her to return to playing piano and she thought about it, then he became ill and she didn’t think about it much, apart from towards the end, when she felt she needed the comfort of her fingers on the keys, the sense of satisfaction and accomplishment that came with creating something beautiful with her fingertips simply because she could follow little black dots on a page.
‘Knockknoooock!’
Even over the Bach Elizabeth can tell that’s Lorraine’s voice.
‘In here!’ she calls. When Lorraine asked for the address she knew that an appearance was likely – why else would she need it?
‘Beaut place,’ Lorraine says as she enters the room, Cynthia not far behind her. ‘Hope you don’t mind but Cyn and I thought we’d help you unpack. I asked Kathy too. Gee, that was a bit bold of me, wasn’t it? Inviting people toyourhouse.’
She cackles and Elizabeth knows that Lorraine doesn’t feel at all bold. No doubt she cooked up this scheme before she asked for the address and Elizabeth is the only one who didn’t know.
