Barbara Hannay - Outback Wife and Mother

‘Fletcher, what’s the matter?’

‘There’s been an accident,’ he said quietly.

Ally felt her stomach lurch with a sudden horrible fear. She watched him walk towards her slowly, awkwardly, his mouth twisted with the effort to hold his emotions in check. ‘My best friend, Jock Lawrence and his wife, Lisa—killed in a car accident in Sydney.’

‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’

‘Yeah.’ Fletcher let out a weary sigh and sank back onto the kitchen stool, his shoulders slumped. Ally quickly moved to the other side of the bench and slipped her arms around him. She rested her cheek gently against his and he turned and kissed her in a brief acknowledgment of her offer of comfort. ‘I just can’t believe it. He was such a great guy. We went to school, to university...’

There was nothing she could say or do except stay there, holding him, letting him talk slowly, haltingly.

‘I’ll have to go, Ally. I mean I’d go to the fune-ftmeral anyway. But there’s his son—little Connor. He was the only—only survivor, strapped in one of those little seats in the back. I’m his godfather and, according to old Mr. Lawrence, I’ve also been named as his guardian.’

‘Guardian? Does that mean he’ll live with you?’

‘Perhaps. I’m not sure yet. He’s with his grandparents in Sydney at the moment, but they’re pretty old and frail. Jock’s father sounded very shaken.’ He stood up quickly, so quickly that her hands, as they fell away from his shoulders, slapped against her sides. ‘I’ll have to ring the airlines and make a booking. Oh, God, I can’t believe it.’

Ally followed him into her lounge room and sat some distance away watching as he dialled and waited for a connection, before speaking to the airline. She felt cold and lonely, knowing with a sudden certainty that this time when Fletcher left Melbourne he would be walking out of her life. Going back to his own people—where he belonged.

Eventually he hung up and told her softly. ‘I got a cancellation on the 9:00 a.m. flight.’

‘This morning?’ cried Ally in panic. ‘That’s only two hours away.’

‘I’m sorry, Ally, but Jock’s parents—I don’t know that they have anyone to help them deal with this.’

‘Of course, I understand,’ replied Ally, ashamed of her selfish outburst. ‘I’ll make us a pot of coffee.’

Fletcher was still sitting in the lounge chair, staring thoughtfully at a spot on the rug when she returned. He looked up.

‘Smells good.’ He smiled, his blue eyes warming as they linked with hers.

She handed him a steaming cup and then sat opposite him, curling her legs beneath her and hugging the mug of coffee to her chest as if for comfort.

‘I guess this brings back bad memories for you,’ he said gently.

Ally felt her eyebrows lift in surprise. She had told Fletcher just about everything there was to know about her and she guessed that he was referring to her own parents’ death in an aeroplane crash when she was seventeen. But that was not on her mind now. Sad as this accident was, all she could think about was what it meant to her relationship with Fletcher. There was so much she wanted to say, had needed to say all week.

In all the talk and all the passion and happiness they shared, they learned a lot about each other, but they skirted round the truth. They had never discussed their future because the horrible truth was that there was no possible future for them. Fletcher’s biannual visits to Melbourne were hardly the grounds for an ongoing relationship.

Fletcher put down his cup of coffee and stood up. He looked at her so sadly Ally felt tears spring to her eyes.

‘Ally, I’m sorry about this...’

‘Don’t be, Fletcher. You have to go.’

‘No, I mean I’m sony about us, about coming back and making things worse. If I’d left on Monday...’ He reached down and scooped her into his arms. ‘I should have been stronger. Should have been able to resist your spell. You’re so damn beautiful, Ally.’

How perfectly her body nestled into his. How much she wanted him to go on telling her she was beautiful.

‘But what you’re trying to say is...we come from two different, totally incompatible worlds,’ she said, her voice shaking with the effort to sound calm.

‘Too right,’ he sighed. ‘You do understand, sweetheart, don’t you?’

She nodded her head against his chest. Her throat was burning with hot tears. Fletcher’s long fingers played with her hair.

‘They warn us so much these days about the need for physical protection in a relationship, but that’s easy to look after. But protecting our emotions, that’s a different story.’

‘Perhaps there’s a solution,’ she couldn’t help adding.

‘No, I’ve thought and thought about it. There’s no way ahead for us, Ally. You have your career and I have my cattle.’

‘City girls have been happy in the country before today,’ she offered timidly. ‘Perhaps I should come and live with you on Wallaroo Downs.’

He broke away from her then, staring at her, his sky blue eyes puzzled, clearly shocked by her words. He shook his head slowly.

‘That’s a pretty fairy tale, and if it could come true I’d be the happiest man alive, but it wouldn’t—it couldn’t end in happily ever after.’

Ally felt a painful lump form in her throat, preventing a reply.

‘You see,’ he continued, the tone in his voice a daunting mixture of tenderness and regret, ‘there are more differences between us than my paddocks and your tar and cement. You’d hate the life I lead, Ally. You live in a world you’ve worked so hard to reach—and it’s so elegant and artistic.’

‘It’s not glamorous all the time,’ Ally managed to protest.

‘Sewing machine oil is the closest you’d come to grease and dirt,’ he said with a lopsided smile that wrenched at her heart. ‘I’m just sorry I’ve messed you up. I’ve never done anything so damned stupid in my life before.’

Ally’s chin came up defiantly. ‘I don’t think it was at all stupid. I’ve never had anything so wonderful happen to me—ever.’

Fletcher groaned and pulled her to him. ‘Listen, passionfruit,’ he whispered, ‘I have to pack and then I’m going to Sydney. And after that I’ll almost certainly have to get back to Wallaroo. There’s a muster coming up and I have to be back for that. Then, with a bit of luck, there’ll be a wet season. I can’t see us getting together again in a long while. You’re a beautiful, clever woman and this is where you belong. You have to get on with your brilliant career. There’s no other way of looking at this.’

She knew that as a woman of the nineties she should be able to handle this. People had relationships and then they moved on. It was as simple as that. It happened all around her all the time.

But not to her.

Ally glanced at the clock on the wall behind Fletcher. If he were to make it to his flight, he would have to get moving.

‘I’ll check out the laundry basket. See if you’ve left anything there,’ she said grimly with a small, dismissive shrug of her shoulders.

Fletcher packed in silence while Ally tidied the kitchen. They had never been so quick and efficient together. She insisted on driving him to the airport.

As her small sedan zipped along the freeway, she tried to forget about her own sadness and think of the poor little boy left without parents.

‘This little boy, Connor. Do you know him very well?’ she asked.

‘No. I have to admit, I haven’t seen all that much of him,’ admitted Fletcher. ‘I went to his christening when he was just a tiny tadpole—hadn’t even reached the ankle-biter stage. He must be three or four now. Last time I saw him he’d just started toddling around. As far as I remember, he looks like Jock.’ His voice broke a little. ‘Brown hair and eyes—going to be tall.’

Once they reached the busy, bustling airport, and Fletcher had queued then checked in, there was little time for conversation. And there was certainly no privacy for the kinds of things Ally would have liked to discuss. All too soon the flight to Sydney was boarding and for the last time she felt Fletcher’s strong arms around her, and his warm, delicious lips on hers.

‘Be beautiful, Ally,’ he whispered, his eyes glistening with a betraying dampness. Then he swung away quickly and strode through the doors of the departure lounge, leaving her without looking back.

She was prepared for his silence; she hadn’t expected him to ring her from Sydney. And she was prepared for the sense of desolation that swamped her. But what she hadn’t expected was the lassitude with which she returned to her work. She’d hoped that once back in the swing of things, the old enthusiasm for dealing with designs, textiles and market trends and the fascinating array of individuals associated with that world would rescue her from her misery.

It was with a growing sense of alarm that she faced each day at the office. She took her designs home to work on at night, hoping the soothing atmosphere of her own apartment would help inspiration to flow. With the spring and summer collection behind her, Ally had to plan for next year’s winter season and a juicy contract with the wool board was on offer. Normally she would have been thrilled. But she couldn’t concentrate and what was worse, much, much worse, she couldn’t bring herself to care.

Her mind and her emotions were totally absorbed with Fletcher. Where was he now? Had he gone back to North Queensland? Had he taken little Connor with him? Did he think about her the way she thought endlessly of him?

After three weeks of silence and despair, she could stand it no longer. She had to make some kind of contact with him. Her first step was to ring Lucette.

‘Have I heard from Fletcher, Ally?’ Lucette repeated, her voice squeaking with surprise at Ally’s first question once the greetings were over. ‘Why, yes, I have actually. He rang from North Queensland just yesterday.’

‘You see,’ Ally offered with a silly little laugh, ‘I ended up seeing quite a bit of him while he was down here, but then he was called away for the funeral...’ Her voice trailed away as her tightly strung nerves clenched a notch tighter.

The stunned silence on the other end of the line didn’t help her feel any more relaxed.

‘Really?’ Lucette managed at last.

‘Does he have the little boy with him?’

‘No, not yet Connor’s still in Sydney with his grandparents. But as a matter of fact that’s why Fletcher rang me. He’s guardian for Connor and he wants me to find a nanny to travel up to Wallaroo Downs and help take care of him there.’

Ally closed her eyes against the frightening wave of dizziness that swamped her as a host of different pictures crowded her mind: pictures of Fletcher, sun-tanned, astride a horse somewhere in North Queensland; of Fletcher and a little brown-haired, brown-eyed boy walking hand in hand along a shady creek bank; of a young attractive nanny living with them both day in, day out.

‘Ally, are you still there?’

‘Yes, Lucette. I’m here. Listen, would you mind terribly much if I came and visited you? I need to talk.’

‘That’s fine,’ replied Lucette, unable to disguise her surprise. ‘I’ll be home all evening. You have my address?’

‘But, Ally, this is impossible!’ Lucette exclaimed an hour later as the two women sat opposite each other at the kitchen table in her tiny bed-sit apartment. ‘For starters you underestimate the stubbornness of the Hardy male. There’s no way Fletcher would have someone like you as a nanny on Wallaroo Downs.’