The Elusive Language of Ducks (42 page)

So you want to go back?

No, I don't think so. I'm relieved to be out of it because it was constantly frightening. And I was an outsider anyway. I had the choice to leave or not. Some don't. But I can't help thinking about it. Ideally I'd like to be with you, as we used to be, whether we were together or not, just knowing we were there for each other.

We'll never be the same. Nothing will ever be as it used to be. My mother's dead, you've been in a tragic earthquake. She would have liked to add ‘And I have met a duck', but it didn't seem appropriate. She said, Things have happened that have shifted our outlook from its axis.

She shoved herself closer to him, desperately drawing from the warmth of his body.

The thing is, he said, I think I'm nursing a terrible sense of despair.

She conjured an image of him sitting on a hilltop, rocking a grey bundle of non-descript gloom.

Simon, she said. I'm sorry. She curled her fingers around his cold knee. She could have said instead, ‘You'll come right', but remembered how dismissive it felt when he'd uttered the same words a few months ago.

It sounds stupid, I know. But. That man dying in agony, alone, under a crush of rubble. What would he be thinking? All the thoughts, the stream
of his consciousness that fed his whole living being, flying from him, through him, unreceived, his life leaving him. The data of his life flowing from him. And so . . . Of course you find yourself thinking of all the other people crying in pain, alone. Our lives in general have become very isolated and selfish. And then. Toby. I don't know whether you know, he so nearly died from a drug overdose. It was terribly distressing for Maggie. I think she was pleased I was there, for the little support I could offer.

Simon, she said again, hating her simplistic words. I am sorry. What can we do? Her fingertips explored the bones of his kneecap, around the rigid tendons behind and into the known flesh of his thigh, then rested there.

He pulled her closer.

That's it: I have no idea.

Actually, I don't hate you at all.

That's progress I suppose. But it feels there's a way to go.

Remember that time, she said, when we were young. When you and Roy went for a tramp in the Tararuas. I had a cold. Was happy to stay back in the hut, a fire in the potbelly, waiting for you. And you didn't return when you should have. We'd known each other for about a year. By the time I realised you were late it was pitch dark. I only had candles. I lay there, the wind and rain lashing at the windows, worrying about you. No cell phones then, of course. I started trying to imagine what life would be without you and decided that if I didn't have you, well, I may as well be dead. But when you turned up . . . Roy had twisted his ankle . . . When you walked in, I just looked up from the book I was reading, in my sleeping bag on the bunk, and said ‘hi'. Grumpily. I remember so clearly how I was surprised by my own display of nonchalance. I don't know why I'm telling you this . . . God, I'm so cold, she said finally.

So am I.

I'm absolutely freezing. Let's go inside.

I don't think I can move. My hips are aching. I've turned to stone.

Me, too.

Perhaps we're dead, he said.

We could be. We seem to have all the symptoms.

Oh well, that sorts that out.

I suppose it does.

I'm glad we're together, though.

Me, too.

She took his hand and held it to her breast.

I really, really, really don't hate you, she said.

That's good, he said, unravelling himself, groaning, stretching. He helped her up and together they went inside.

Chapter 30

The woman lay comfortably in the arms of her husband as the sun sluiced its way through the bedroom curtains.

What was it that had wrenched them apart, so insidiously that the distance between them had seemed insurmountable? Unbridgeable. But here they were. They must have fallen from on high, turning over and over like stones from the moon, to land neatly into the nest of each other's grasp.

She shifted to watch his face as he lay sleeping, curiously examining the corners and expression of his newly revealed lips. They were parted now and he was snoring softly.

She was waiting, patiently, for him to wake up. The night had been particularly tender, and they had both felt so grateful, and relieved, that she knew that nothing could interfere with the contentment they had found once more. It had been there all along, a misplaced recipe tucked as a marker in a book they'd been reading. A life they'd been living.

He suddenly gasped, his lips and mouth panicking, chomping on a dream-feast before it disappeared. He opened his eyes, closed them again, opened them, looked at her, and then relaxed, his face melting.

Oh. Hello, he said, smiling warmly.

Hi, she said, pressing her body more closely to his.

After a while she said, Simon?

Hmmmm?

I think it's going to be a lovely day.

It is already, he said. He stroked her hair from her face. I feel it in my bones. The walls around them were pristine white, but on the ceiling above the window, a daddy-long-legs was tremulously occupied with building its web.

I've been thinking . . . she said.

Hmmm?

Do you feel like a drive?

That sounds nice. Why not?

Do you think we could go to . . . Te Awamutu? Not to stay, just to say hello to the duck, and back again. I promise I won't ask for any more than
that. We won't tell them. We'll just surprise them.

He tensed, itching his ear urgently, as if her suggestion had landed badly there. Abruptly, he turned his face to the wall. Then back again, to look at her. He was frowning now, bringing his bottom teeth over his lip to comb a moustache that didn't exist any more.

I mean if you really don't want to, we don't have to.

She waited.

Oh all right, he said with a short sigh. He kissed her forehead. OK. All right then. Why not.

Claire was in her gumboots in the garden when they pulled up. She stood up, grimacing as her hands propped her back. Squinting at the car, then walking over.

Well, this is a surprise, she said, pulling off her gardening gloves, combing her fingers through her hair in a futile effort to tidy her appearance. Her hair was like the willows in the area, Hannah thought, the ends chewed level by cows reaching up for more green.

Claire gave them both a hug as they emerged from the car. Just trying to get at the weeds. They never let up. Come on in. I'll put the kettle on. I was just going to have an egg on toast. Come in. And you must take some eggs back with you. We can't get through them all ourselves. All well with you, Hannah? Lovely to see you two back together again. I don't know where Bob is. He might be at the neighbours'. Oh dear. There's a nip in the air, isn't there? Now, where did Bob say he was going? Come on then, come in.

Hannah moved towards Simon, slipped her hand into the protective glove of his own.

Actually, Claire, Simon said. She was engaged in prising her foot out of her gumboot, banging the heel at an upturned spade head buried in concrete. Once done, she yanked up the wad of green woollen socks over her pearly legs, pulled her jean legs over the top and stepped into fur-lined slippers waiting at the porch.

Actually, before we have a cuppa, Hannah was keen to see her duck. Do you mind?

No, of course, of course, of course, Hannah dear. Take yourself down. You know where it is. Are you coming in, Simon?

He caught Hannah's eye, and she shrugged.

I'll be fine, she said. In fact, she was happy to greet her duck alone. She didn't want their meeting to be compromised or sabotaged by the man, or to have the old jealousies rekindled.

As she wound her way around the side of the house, she was almost effervescing with excitement. Her feet swishing through crunchy leaves, the fragrance of autumn sweet and earthy. She loved the full range of
countryside smells, so natural and evocative. She walked around the paddock and down to the macrocarpa trees where muscovy ducks were waddling, their tails propelling them along. And chooks scuffing and pecking at the ground. As she approached, some of the hens squawked, scurrying for cover, triggering a general movement away from her.

She slowed her pace. The muscovies also had their eyes on her, keeping their distance. Most of the drakes looked scruffy and she could see patches of naked wing. Moulting time, as Bob had said last time. She went to the pens where there was another brood of ducklings squeaking around their mother, as well as the larger, more gangly ones, probably the little ones she had seen a month or so ago. In the pen next door, the forty-four-gallon drum sat empty, and its pillow was pegged onto the wire netting. The lid that had held the mash was empty. Where was her duck? She wasn't aware that he had been liberated into the company of the other muscovies.

She checked the other pens, as well as the chook house, then took herself around the trees to an elevated place where she could view the pond. A couple of muscovies were puddling around the edge of the water, vacuuming up bugs with their eyes turned upwards, as her duck used to do. Bulrushes grew in the shallows, alongside clumps of flax bushes with arcing spears of spent flower heads. The surface of the pond had fraying strips of duckweed. A kingfisher launched itself from a nearby branch and flew away.

And now she found herself looking for a scattering of white feathers on the grass or floating in the water. She scanned the paddocks. She spun around, checking and re-checking the grass, the trees, the pens, the pond, the grass, trees, pens, grass trees pens pond grass. How ridiculous to feel so anxious. There would be an explanation. Perhaps she didn't recognise him. Perhaps he had adapted to his flock life so completely that he was hiding from her, fearful that she might take him away.

Down at the pond she called him, her shoes flooding in the swampy mud. A rat suddenly rocketed from beneath the flax, across the field, and disappeared down a hole.

Then she noticed in a far paddock, almost obscured by a patch of manuka, the figure of a man closing a gate. She could see him climbing into a white ute waiting on the near side. The truck started up and she
could now hear it rumbling its way along a dirt track around the base of the hill, bouncing and jogging its way in her direction. As it approached she became aware of a flyaway mop of hair above the steering wheel. Bob, of course. He stopped near his shed. She hurried up to meet him, and was there to greet him impatiently as he clambered out. The door hung open from the cab like a broken wing. She kissed his sweaty fat cheek.

Claire rang me, he said. Told me you were here. Where's Simon?

Up with Claire. I was just . . . just looking for my duck. She knew by his face that something was amiss. She could feel tears collecting, in readiness.

Oh, didn't Claire tell you? Just yesterday . . .

He stopped.

What? What happened to my duck? Where is he?

Ssssh, no it's OK. He dipped his hand under his shirt, into his arm pit, beyond his arm pit, scrabbling intently for an evasive itch. I was out. I was out and someone drove to the house from the road. They do that sometimes. We've got a sign there.

He was watching her to see how she was taking it. Let's have a cup of tea.

Tell me. What have you done with my duck?

They didn't ring. They had a little boy in the back, very pale. Ill, as it turned out. They wanted a duck to take back home. They'd had one before but they'd been . . . overseas and had to let it go somewhere. A lovely family. An Indian family. They wanted another one as a pet for the little boy.

So you gave them my duck.

Well, Claire said they could choose which duck they wanted, and they selected your duck. Claire didn't realise it was your duck.

But he can be aggressive and then what'll they do? How old was the boy?

About ten or eleven, apparently. Very pale. Big brown eyes. And
really
wanting a muscovy, apparently.