Page 40 of Indigo

We sit for a moment, just enjoying the quiet and each other's company, until I nod over at the freshly planted seaside daisies. “They look good, yeah?”

“I love them,” she gushes, reaching out, and taking a flower between her fingers, stroking the tiny petals with her thumb.

I watch as she handles each one delicately, as if they’re all unique and not just a bunch of common flowers.

The words slip from my mouth before I can stop them. “They were my mum's favourite, too.”

Fuck. Shouldn’t have said that.

She freezes, staring down at the daisies. “Really?” The question comes out in a whisper, as if she’s worried that if she asks too loudly, I won’t answer.

I pull my knees up slightly so that I can rest my forearms on them and lace my fingers together in front of me. I focus on the lines running through my knuckles and nod, knowing if I want this woman, I need to let her in more than I have been.

“Yeah. She used to buy bunches of them from the farmer’s market on Saturday mornings and bring them home. She had this one ceramic vase covered in sunflowers. Looked more like a jug than a vase, but that’s what she used it for.”

I can still remember the day my father threw it against the wall, shattering it and the memories it held.

Indie slowly shifts around so that her legs are crossed, and as I look up, she looks down at the grass and starts mindlessly picking at random blades. “Where is she now?”

I clear my throat and take a second to figure out how to word the answer to her question. “I’m not sure. She, uh, took off when I was about nine. Not long before I met you. Dad used to beat the shit out of her, so she took the first opportunity she had to get away from him.”

Her head jerks up, her eyes wide and her lips parted slightly. “Oh, Pax.”

I pick at the corner of my thumbnail, not wanting to meet her eyes while I continue. “Beat the shit out of me, too, my father, that is. Being so little, I don’t remember a lot from when Mum was around, but I have some memories, the most vivid ones being of times I’d try to shield her from my father when he’d go for her.” I groan quietly and scrub my hands over my face, trying to get the image out of my head, of a tiny me taking hit after hit as my mum trembled and screamed from underneath me, begging for him to stop.

“Did she…” Indie stops herself, and to my surprise, when I look up at her after her prolonged silence, the muscle in her jaw is ticking, and my girl looks well and truly pissed. “She didn’t try to take you with her? Get you out of that house? Jagger would have been, what, five?” I shake my head and her nostrils flare. “She just left you both with him, knowing that he was hurting you just as badly as he was her?”

I snort at the indignation in her voice, her anger regarding the situation lessening mine. “No. I just woke up one morning, and she was gone.”

“Did she ever come back?”

I nod. “Showed up at Jagger’s twenty-first. Apparently she’s an advocate for domestic violence now, or some shit. Lives in Melbourne. Said something about being too scared of what our father would do if she came back to town, so she just stayed away.”

“You’re serious?” she hisses, clearly ready to throw down with the simple memory of my mother.

“Mhmm. I told her to fuck off, just ‘cos she’s blood doesn’t mean shit to me and too much time has passed for me to forgive her. Jagger took a little longer, and I told him he could have whatever relationship he wanted with her when he asked. Eventually, after a couple of days, he told her to get lost, too. She wanted him to go back to Melbourne with her and speak on some podcast about the difficulties of being raised within a violent household. She hasn’t come back since. He gave her a card for Shep Auto before she left, apparently, but she didn’t do the same, so we’ve got no way to contact her, but she sure as shit has our details. She just doesn’t use them.”

Indie shifts her jaw from side to side for a moment, a deep scowl on her face, making the frown lines on her forehead more prominent. Just when I think she’s about to lose her ever loving mind, she takes a deep breath, closes her eyes and exhales. The anger disappears from her features and as she slowly opens those indigo eyes, the love I see shining back at me just about takes the fucking air from my lungs.

“Well fuck her then,” she says, her lips pulling into a smile as she climbs to her feet. “I’ll grab the hose,” she adds, making her way across the yard. “Need to water the flowers.”

I chuckle as I watch her practically skip across the grass; the fury pouring off her moments ago, nowhere to be seen.

Only Indie would manage to successfully lighten the mood as gracefully as she just did, after an admission like mine.

I’m thankful she didn’t ask more questions. I told her more about my mum today than I’ve told anyone, Jagger included. I tried to only share the good memories I have of our mother with him. Felt like he deserved good memories of at least one parent, even if they weren’t his own.

I attempt to brush the dirt and grass from my sweatpants as I stand, but give up when I realise nothing but a shower is going to get me clean at this point.

“It’s not working,” Indie whines from beside the house, bending over the tap, turning it with one hand, the hose held in the other.

I spot the knot and make my way over to her to help, but as she shakes it out and turns the tap a little more, the water sprays against the wall and splashes back onto her, drenching her from head to toe.

She lets out a shocked squeal and jumps backwards, dropping the hose, causing it to flail wildly around the air, wetting her even more. I throw my head back and laugh at the sight of her, soaking wet, scowling at me as tears build in my eyes.

“Oh, that’s funny, is it?” she yells, a mischievous grin pulling at her lips as she wrangles the hose and turns it my way.

I jump out of the way just in time, but she doesn’t give up, and I back away as quickly as I can, my hands raised in surrender as she comes for me. “Now, now, Blue.” I laugh, still trying to catch my breath. “No need for that. We’re all friends here. We can work this out.”

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