The festoon lights that hung between his cabin roof above the veranda and the tree a few metres away across the other side of a minute green space swayed in a gentle evening breeze and lit up the small table as they settled down to eat. He’d thought opening the memory jar would be powerful and he’d been right. He just thanked goodness they’d had a few funny memories first, rather than the one that had put a stop to the activity.
‘This is good, Nina.’ Fork in his hand, he’d already eaten half of his meal before he said much at all. He wanted to give her some time after seeing those words, the words that hadn’t faded over time. He wondered whether the pain had.
‘You must be hungry.’
‘Very.’
She nodded in the direction of the water, a forkful of chilli with the white of sour cream and the yellow of cheese on top visible in the low light. ‘It’s nice out here.’
‘Are you warm enough?’
‘I think the chilli is helping keep me warm,’ she said. ‘And the wine.’
He topped up both of their glasses. ‘Do you see much of your mum and dad?’ He thought he’d ask the question out here while they were eating and looking at the water rather than all the focus being on Nina. It might make it easier for her.
‘A bit, but we’re still not close. Mum is with someone else, Dad too, they have their lives and I have mine.’ She waited before she added, ‘Sometimes I get sad that they even had kids.’
‘I get that.’ He knew they’d had their own lives even when they should’ve been parenting. It was one thing to keep a sense of self as a mum or a dad, but quite another to do it in the way Christy and Graham had. And although he’d never say it, he and most other people who talked about her parents thought them selfish. The upside was that Nina and William had turned out all right even without their attentions, and lucky for them they’d had Walt and Elsie, two of the most doting grandparents a kid could wish for.
He had to add, ‘If they hadn’t had kids, you wouldn’t be here. And that would be a shame, a real shame.’
After a pause she said, ‘I like to think that if I ever have kids I’ll want to spend time with them. I get it that parents work and they’re still individuals, I think that’s a good thing, but mine took it to a whole new level. Work and their social life seemed to come before everything else, me and William were way down in the pecking order.’ Her fork clinked against the porcelain bowl as she set it down and picked up her wine instead. ‘I was only glad how close I grew to Grandma and Grandad. I never felt like I had nobody.’
‘Not the same though is it?’
‘No, it’s not. And that worry in the jar just brought it all back, the way I felt as a kid, the crying I did over them, the pain I felt every time I had to say goodbye.’
‘I remember how upset you’d get.’
‘I still felt loved in a way though. In some respects it might’ve been easier if they’d gone for good, but they weren’t, they were there enough for me to realise I wasn’t all that important. They’d hug me goodbye, they’d tell me they loved me, and in those moments I was kind of happy.’
‘But they’d still leave.’
‘Every time.’ She set down her wine and resumed eating her dinner.
She didn’t speak again until she’d finished her food. ‘Me and William talked about it recently. He was as hurt as I was, but he was better able to see that his world had moved on. He’s helped me start to see that mine has too, with our parents on the very edges rather than front and centre.’
‘But it’s hard.’
‘It is. And being here made it harder. This was the place they left me … us. Getting away from the bay was partly because of what happened and the realisation that any of us on the boat that night could’ve been a victim, but it was also because I’d reached a point where I had to process.’ He wasn’t going to interrupt, he wanted to hear this and she’d obviously reached a point where she felt ready. Leo liked to think it had a lot to do with how they were with one another, how they were growing closer again after all this time. ‘I didn’t know what my parents meant to me, never mind what I meant to them. I couldn’t see things clearly at all.’
She sighed. ‘Most people my age are getting ready for the years when their parents will need them to help out, but for me, it’s Walt who has my attention. I’m not sure what I’ll do, what William will do, if Mum or Dad ever need us. I know it sounds terrible, but I’m not sure either of us would come running. We wouldn’t turn our backs, but …’ Her voice trailed off.
‘That doesn’t make you a terrible person. It doesn’t,’ he added firmly when her look suggested otherwise.
He stacked his empty bowl into hers and picked up his wine glass. They were almost next to one another at an angle, both chairs behind the table and with a view over the railing and across to the water of the bay. ‘You’re not a terrible person, Nina. I know Walt and Elsie always struggled to accept the way your mum and dad parented.’
‘They said something?’
‘No, they’d never do that. But you could see their frustration, and my parents talked about it often. You and I spent so much time together, you were one of our family for a long while.’
‘I love your family. I missed them when I left.’
‘They missed you too.’ He held her gaze for a moment. ‘My parents hated the way you and William weren’t a priority for Christy and Graham but they also talked a lot about Elsie and Walt and how much of a blessing it was for you to have them around.’
‘I wish I’d been able to look at it differently when I was still here.’ She didn’t break eye contact. ‘I didn’t feel I deserved to be happy either, part of me wanted that family you and I once talked about, but looking at the mess my parents had made of theirs, I didn’t think I could do it to you, or to anyone else for that matter. I assumedsomewhere along the line I’d mess it all up. And then when I left you and didn’t say a word, I couldn’t come back here, walk around the bay or town knowing what I’d done to you and to your family. You’re well thought of, I couldn’t bear knowing that people hated me for what I’d done.’
‘Nobody hates you, Nina. I certainly don’t.’
