Page 7 of Lessons in Love at the Seaside Salon
There has never been any doubt that Stevo loves his son, and he’s a great father. That is not the reason why they’re no longer together. That reason is that they never really fit. Evie wanted a man who looked like Paul McCartney and ideally wrote songs like him too. Stevo has dirty blond hair, no doe eyes, and has never met a musical instrument he likes.
They met at a party at the surf club. Stevo asked her out, and they hung out, then Evie got pregnant and Stevo didn’t take off but he didn’t exactly want to stick around either. Not because of the baby – he was rapt about that – but because they both knew they didn’t love each other.
They tried to make a go of it. Even lived together for a few months around the time Billy was born. And it wasn’t that they argued or anything. They just … didn’t care enough about each other, and even Billy couldn’t make them.
So since Billy was a baby Evie has had him most of the time and Stevo takes as much time as he can get. Evie wants Billy to have stability so that’s why she keeps him living with her, but she likes knowing she has some freedom if she wants it. Not that she’s not free. She adores Billy. She loves being with him. She just wants more.
At thirty-three years of age, with some wear and tear on body and soul in the form of childbirth and disappointment and frustration and longing and the arm she broke as a ten-year-old, there is one big rite of human passage Evie has notyet experienced: love. The romantic sort. The sort she has read about, dreamt about, listened to songs about, obsessed over movies about.
She wants Love. Yes, with a capital L. The kind Trudy and her husband, Laurie, had. Right up until he died they acted like they couldn’t get enough of each other. Yes, Trudy is bereft without him – but isn’t that the price you pay when you love someone that much? When the love is so powerful that your life is forever altered? That’s what she wants: to love someone so much that it would hurt if he weren’t around any more. And she wants someone to love her that much too.
Yes, she had a child with a man she knew she didn’t love and who didn’t love her. But it brought her love in the form of Billy. Which is wonderful, huge, overwhelming and reassuring at the same time. Except she wants more, even as she thinks she may be greedy for wanting it.
She wants a romantic hero but he doesn’t have to be a white knight. He doesn’t even need to be handsome. He just needs to be strong and stable, and kind, preferably. And he needs to have interests. Maybe even hobbies. Women always have so many things going on in their lives they tend to have things to talk about, whereas the men she knows have work and sport and that’s it. It does not make for interesting conversation. Which is important to her: if you’re going to grow old with a man he needs to be able to hold a conversation. Because past a certain point joints start creaking and bits stop working and all that’s left is who you are in company with each other.
That’s what she wants. That’s what she looks forward to: knowing someone when he’s old. She hasn’t felt that before, that she wants to know someone when he’s old. Past sixty-four, that standard Beatles age.
The man who’s right for her will be the one she wants to know when he’s old. Also the one she wants to see naked. That’s thepart she doesn’t tell other people about: the part that wants to be kissed and held and other things. All the other things. The man who’s right for her will give her the best hugs, and when he holds her he’ll make her feel safe. He’ll take care of everything. Which isn’t to say she can’t take care of things – she’s been taking care of them for years – but she doesn’t want to take care ofeverything. So he can take care of a few things and in exchange she’ll take care of him. It seems like a reasonable exchange. It’s just so hard to find.
She is daydreaming about that love – the way she tends to do – the whole way home, and in the kitchen as she starts peeling potatoes for dinner, and she’s still doing it when the back door opens and she hears her son’s high-pitched tones and his father’s lower ones.
Once she realised it was Wednesday she remembered that Stevo will have taken Billy to athletics. Billy’s not much of a runner but he likes long jump. Given that he’s seven, though, she’s not going to hold him to anything. Unlike some of the other dads – so keen for their sons to play rugby league or don a baggy green – Stevo is relaxed about what Billy may or may not do on the sporting front. ‘Whatever he likes to do is fine with me,’ he told her.
They enter the kitchen from the laundry, Billy grinning, his cheeks flushed, Stevo patting his head.
‘Mum!’
Billy hugs her round the legs and she clasps his shoulders, kissing the top of his head.
‘Hi, darling.’ She straightens and smiles at Stevo. ‘Hi,’ she says. They don’t hug or kiss. That seems too formal for a relationship that is constant yet not close.
‘How are ya?’ He grins in the same way his son does – one side of his mouth lifting higher than the other, and the eye on thesame side squinting. Evie doesn’t know if it’s a genetic thing or if Billy has learnt it by watching.
‘Bit tired. You.’
‘Stinking of fish. Aren’t I, Billy-o?’
He ruffles his son’s hair and Billy giggles. Then Stevo holds out a plastic bag.
‘Brought you some fillets. Thought you may want to put them in the freezer.’
‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘That’s really kind.’
He shrugs. ‘Least I can do, keep you two fed.’
Sometimes when he drops off Billy he has this air about him, as if he wants to be asked to stay for dinner. Sometimes she does, in fact, ask him because that seems like the right thing to do. But he never accepts. So she’s not going to ask him to stay tonight.
‘Anyway, I’m off,’ he says, and he kisses his son’s cheek. ‘See ya, mate. Saturday, right? We’ll go fishing.’
‘Don’t you get tired of fish?’ Evie asks, because she’s genuinely curious.
‘Fishing’s not about the fish, Evie.’ He winks. ‘It’s about the peace and quiet. All right if I pick him up at eight?’
‘Yep. I’ll make sure he’s awake.’
‘Thanks. See ya then.’ He waves to them both as he heads for the back door.
‘Bye, Dad!’ Billy calls after him, then he picks up his school bag and heads toward his bedroom.
