Page 80 of Chasing Blue
“Burger and a beer will be fine, thanks.”
My brother hovers for a while as I open my case and start pulling out clothes and toiletries, unsure of exactly what’s inside thanks to Zoe packing for me.
Grabbing a tee and a clean pair of sweatpants, along with my toiletry bag, I look across to Ash.
“You wanna talk now, or shower and eat first?” he asks.
“Is it bad?” Instantly rolling my eyes at my crass question. “Well, she’s dead, so obviously it’s bad, but . . .”
“I know what you meant, Scar, and yeah, it’s pretty bad. I’ll order us a nice bottle of red along with the beers. I think we’re gonna need them.”
I give my brother my first genuine smile of the day. “Thanks, can you please add some onion rings to the order too?”
“’Course,” he replies with a chin lift before adding, “I know the circumstances are shit, but it’s good to see ya, Scar.”
“You too, Ash.” My nose starts to tingle, and I find it hard to swallow as I look at my big brother. “Go,” I tell him with a flick of my wrist. “I need to go and have a good cry in the shower.”
He smiles, gives me a head shake, and leaves.
* * *
Two hours later,I was staring into the fire pit’s flames in my brother’s backyard. After eating our burgers and finishing our beers, my brother had opened a decent bottle of Malbec. I’d sipped on the wine as he explained how my mum had been driving with her two little dogs in the car while under the influence, without wearing a seatbelt, when she’d managed to wrap it around a tree.
Along with her dogs, she’d been killed instantly.
When we were growing up, it was my dad who had the drinking problem. As far as we’re aware, my mum’s habit hadn’t taken hold until we were older, unless she’d just hidden it well.
My dad had multiple affairs during their marriage, and when we were really young, she’d managed to protect us from that information, along with the evidence of his drinking, but as we got older, she became angrier and gave up hiding it. Instead, she’d use us, ask us to beg him not to drink, not to stay out all weekend.
By that stage, we’d worked out for ourselves that our dad was an alcoholic and serial womaniser, especially when he moved out for six months and in with the mum of a boy in my school year.
I think I lost a degree of respect for my mum when he just came home one night, moved back in, and we all carried on as if he’d never been away.
“I didn’t know the drinking had got that bad,” I say quietly without looking from the flames to my brother.
It wasn’t cold, not even a little bit. With a nighttime temperature of twenty degrees, compared to Melbourne, it was positively balmy. The fire, along with the wine, was more of a comfort thing. My big brother, always the protector—except for that one time I’ve still yet to address—thought the fire and wine would make the retelling of my mother’s demise a little easier on me.
“Yeah,” Ash says on an exhale. “I think it has been for years, along with everything else. She just hid it well.”
“Did you find out why she came back here? I thought she was happy up where she was.”
I finally look at my brother who, like me, is staring into the flames.
“I think she got lonely up there, Scar. After that Nick bloke she was seeing on and off for years died, she realised she had nothing to stay for. We all move away, but we all seem to come back.”
“I won’t be,” I tell him quietly.
“Never say never.”
“D’you think the reason we’re still both single at our age is because of her?” I ask while fighting not to yawn. It’s not late, but apart from my nap on the plane, I’ve barely slept in the past forty-eight hours.
“I think that’s on both of them, not just her. What they had, what they put us through was toxic. For me, it just means I’ll never settle. It’ll take someone special to make me want to make a permanent commitment.”
“Never say never,” I repeat his words back to him. When I cast my eyes his way, he holds his glass out to tap against mine. “Touché,” he says with a small smile.
“Can I ask you a question?” I say after a short silence. I wasn’t going to address his apparent betrayal tonight, but emboldened by the wine, and almost delirious due to lack of sleep, I figure I might as well just get it over with.
“Go for it,” he replies, turning his eyes back on the fire. I keep my eyes on him. Either wanting or needing to see his reaction, I’m not sure.
