Riptides by Kirsten Alexander

Author:Kirsten Alexander
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780143792093
Publisher: Penguin Random House Australia

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Monday 23 December 1974

Charlie

An empty chip packet falls out into the gutter near my feet when I open the passenger’s-side door to Abby’s station wagon. What is it with chicks and cars? It’s like they don’t care. I pick up the ripped plastic bag, throw it back on the car floor and sit on the crumb-dusted seat.

‘Why did you tell Abby we were helping Rick? I told you I’d come up with something,’ Dad says.

‘It’s not that bad of an excuse.’

‘It’ll do, I suppose. Won’t matter soon.’ He turns on the engine and slowly backs down the driveway. ‘Suspect she’ll be glad of some time alone.’

‘She spends plenty of time alone. Seems like the world might implode if Mark made it home before his kids went to bed.’

‘Stay out of it. Their marriage is none of our business.’

I close my eyes. I can’t figure how Skye put up with his old-school thinking. A woman who had a kid without being married, lived on a commune, then wound up with my dad. Weird. Though maybe it was his old ways that appealed to her. I could see how, given what I’d heard, she might crave stability, predictability, a man who used the words ‘chivalry’ and ‘gentleman’ without irony. Dad is rigid in his thinking about women’s roles, but he treated my mother like royalty. He opened doors, pulled out chairs, poured her drinks, made sure her petrol tank was always full, bought her flowers. I don’t recall seeing him do one thing that could be called domestic, but I think my mother felt loved. And safe.

‘So you’re clear on the plan?’

‘Dad, if you tell me again I’ll throw myself out of the car.’

‘It’s important you understand.’

‘Okay, for the last time: we head towards Eumundi, into the hills, take one road to another road, find a sign that says Arcadia, laugh at it, and walk for about a half-hour – not making noise. Once the trees start to thin out, we look down the hill and see communeland. At which point we become invisible and steal a kid who won’t make a single noise because we will have rendered him unconscious. We’ll take turns carrying him and, magically, no one will see us. Tell me a word that rhymes with failure and I’ll make a poem out of it.’

He frowns at me. ‘Don’t you know that calling this a failure before we’ve even left the city is a cop-out? You’re giving in before we’ve begun. It’s the same old –’

‘Same old what, Dad?’

‘We have a plan. I know what to say to the boy. And this will work.’

‘Same what? Same way I live my life? I’m helping you carry this out and you want to judge me?’

We ride in silence for a while until he says, ‘Your friend sorted, the one in Bali?’

‘Not quite. It’s complicated.’

‘Well, I’m sure she can survive without you for a while. How much longer do you plan to live in that place anyway?’

‘Forever.’

He’s pursing his lips to resist saying the things I know he wants to.

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