Page 37 of Weekends with the Sunshine Gardening Society
Cynthia glances over to a framed photo of her mother that’s displayed on its own, almost like a shrine, next to a pot plant that Cynthia is sure was in that same spot when she left years ago. In the photo her mother is sitting in the garden, two flowers in her hand, her head thrown back, laughing. She looks relaxed. At home.
‘Is that the same peace lily Mum bought when Odette was born?’ she says, gesturing to the plant.
Her father nods slowly. ‘It is.’
‘I can’t believe it’s still alive.’
Her father gives her a look. ‘You mean you can’t believe I’ve kept it alive since your mother died.’
Cynthia’s cheeks feel hot. ‘No.’
‘I don’t mind,’ he says lightly. ‘Not known for my green thumb.’
‘All right, then … Yes, I didn’t think you’d be able to keep a plant alive that long.’
‘Just needs a little care and also to be left alone every now and again.’ This time his look is freighted with meaning.
‘Like you, you mean?’ She laughs. ‘Are you trying to tell me that you and the plant are kindred spirits?’
‘Could be.’ He shifts in his seat. ‘Not walking, are we?’
‘Not with your limp.’ Cynthia’s gaze goes once more to the photo of her mother. ‘Von told me something the other day.’
‘How is that old warhorse?’
‘Old? Warhorse? You can hardly talk.’
He smiles, and inside the wrinkled face of this elderly man Cynthia sees her handsome father.
‘True,’ he accedes.
‘The old warhorse is well,’ she says. ‘Still living with her art and her music. And you know how I’ve been going out every Saturday? I’ve joined the Sunshine Gardening Society. Von told me about it because she was one of the founders.’
Her father says nothing. Is it possible he didn’t know his wife was in the same group? They were so close. But Cynthia’s curious, and now that she seems to have become a member of the society simply because she keeps turning up every week she wants to know more about it, especially about her mother’s role in it. She could ask Von, but her father is the more direct route – or so she believes.
‘She said Mum was in it.’
Wilfred’s eyes half-close. ‘Did she now?’
‘That’s how they knew each other.’
He nods slowly. ‘Yes, you may remember your mother going off on Saturday mornings from time to time.’
‘I thought she was seeing friends,’ Cynthia says. ‘Although I guess that was also true.’
‘She needed a break,’ her father says, his tone sharp.
Searching her memory, Cynthia can’t recall her mother ever expressing dissatisfaction with home life or acting as if she needed time away from them. Yet Cynthia also never expressed dissatisfaction with Pat and look what happened there. Perhaps she learnt to be a good actress from her mother. Although in her experienceall women have sophisticated acting skills, usually acquired when they want to escape the presence or clutches of an intrusive man without him taking offence and becoming more aggressive as a result. Or perhaps it starts earlier than that, with the pressure to be a ‘good little girl’, while little boys are allowed to get away with tantrums and small acts of violence because ‘boys will be boys’. There’s a continuum of behaviour there, on the girl and boy side, but she feels too wearied by a lifetime of trying and failing to be a good girl to examine it more closely. Because leaving Pat made her decidedly not a good girl, and it was her mother who pointed it out first and most often.
‘Were Kit and I that horrible?’ Cynthia says. She remembers her brother could be a handful, always wandering into the bush and not coming home for hours.
‘Not really,’ her father says. ‘But she had … troubles.’ He looks down and Cynthia sees that he’s kneading his fingers.
‘Troubles?’ She can’t remember any. Her mother was always steadfast and capable; not full of joy, necessarily, but dependable, the way a child wants her mother to be. Always there when Cynthia needed her. The sort of mother Cynthia tried to be and, at a certain point, realised she’d failed to be when Odette moved back to Australia.
‘Sometimes she wasn’t right in the head,’ her father says gruffly. ‘You know?’
Again Cynthia scours her memory, trying to match something to what her father has said. Then it comes to her: being woken at night by the sound of glass breaking; muffled sobs, not from the next room but somewhere beyond; her father’s voice low, almost a monotone.
