Page 20 of Higher Ground
She lined the dirty plates into the dishwasher and turned the tap on to wash the pans stacked on the stovetop. It was the least she could do, given Byron was hosting them for the immediate future and had cooked them breakfast twice now.
“I need to get the cows into the top paddock, but Clayton can come. I’d rather you not be distracted on the drive down.”
She was elbow deep in hot, soapy water, but glared at Byron over her shoulder. “I’ve driven that road plenty of times with Clayton in the back. He’s not going to distract me.”
With an eye roll, she turned back to the sink and got to work on the dishes. Byron had some sort of magic pan because all the bacon grease was washing off with more ease than she was used to, but she scrubbed away out of habit. She was so focused on making sure the pan wasspotlessthat she didn’t hear Byron moving until he was right behind her. His hands dropped to the edge of the sink, caging her in, but he kept a small gap between their bodies.
The breath that whispered along the back of her neck was shaky. “Please, Emory. This is important to me.”
“Why?” She shouldn’t have pushed his buttons, but she snapped at him anyway. Who was he to suddenly tell her she couldn’t drive with Clayton in the back? Against her betterjudgement, or maybe because of it, she dropped the sparkling pan onto the drying rack and turned around.
They were so close. So goddamn close that Emory’s breast skated across Byron’s front. With every breath she took came a searing heat that spread from the contact. She had to tilt her head up to look at him, holding her breath as she did so. What she saw had her mind reeling.
From this close, she first registered that Byron’s eyes were no ordinary brown. His irises were laced with gold and surrounded by a deep rim of chocolate. She could get lost in them. She would have, too, if they weren’t so wet. His tears overflowed, clumping his eyelashes and spilling down his cheeks.
Emory squeezed her hands up between them to cup his face. It was well-meaning; she’d wanted to wipe away the moisture. Only her hands were still wet from the sink, so instead she only added more. Byron chuckled, batting her hands away and stepping back.
“Thanks for that,” he mumbled. Picking up the hem of his shirt, Byron wiped his face.
Emory did her bestnotto look at his abs while he did, but it was a futile attempt, really. Who could resist looking at such a fine specimen? It reminded her of the hero from her book. Abs on abs, with a truly edible V of muscles that led below his belt. She squeezed her eyes shut until she heard the rustle of his shirt as he dropped it back down.
“Wet roads are dangerous, Emory. This family knows that all too well. I don’t like the thought of you driving on them at all, especially not with Clayton in the back. You forget that I’ve driven with him, too. I know how he squeals.” Byron had folded his arms across his chest and was talking mostly to his feet. Every now and then, he glanced up at Emory, and she caught a glimpse of his eyes, welling with tears again. She reached for the tea towel on the bench, drying her hands.
“What do you mean, you know it all too well?”
Byron’s chest heaved as he sighed. He shook his head, and for a moment, Emory thought she might have prodded too deep. Clayton started imitating a siren,nee naw-ing from the lounge room as he ran around with two little cars. But Byron and Emory ignored the sound, trapped in a silence she thought neither of them was going to break. After a few more heavy breaths, Byron ran a hand over his face and finally started to speak.
“I guess I never told you about Josie, did I? Tucker and Jaxon’s mum.”
Emory mirrored his stance, tucking her hands under her arms. She shook her head. It stung behind her eyes a bit, the mention of Byron’s late wife. Sure, she’d known about Josie. Small details that she’d gathered up here and there. Mostly from Mya, though, if she were honest. Jaxon had never mentioned his mother, and maybe that should have been the first red flag, but Emory had always ignored it. But the thing with small towns is that everyone knows everybody else’s business. So sure, after Jaxon had left, Mya had told Emory that his—and Tucker’s—mum had died when he was little, but she’d never gone into detail. That same stinging feeling behind her eyes started up in Emory’s throat. She should have cared more, should have been a better friend to Byron after he had shown her so much kindness all these years. He’d always seemed so closed off, though, and she’d never been one to pry. Didn’t stop her feeling bad about it now she could see the hurt in his eyes though.
“Tucker would have been about Clayton’s age, Jaxon a bit older,” Byron started. Emory had never heard his voice sound so grim. It burrowed into her until she wished she could take away his pain. “Night before, the rain came down like nothing else. Different to now, though. It didn’t flood because the ground was already so wet, and there was no rain up north. Josie tookTucker into town and I was fixing fucking fence posts like I do every day.”
The next sound from Byron was inconsolable. He sank to the floor with a sob that shook Emory’s bones. She followed him down, crawling across the floor to wrap her arms over his body.
“I had Jaxon with me, and I should have told her to leave Tucker with us, too, but she took him.” Byron spoke to the ground, hugging his knees. “They think he distracted her, and when she tried to correct her steering, she went into the ditch. If he’d been with me, she never would have lost control.”
“It’s not your fault,” Emory whispered. Other people had probably told him the same over and over, but she had to say something.
Byron sniffed and wiped his eyes with his shirt again. As he began to compose himself, Emory slid back, unsure of what he needed.
“I know,” he said when they were no longer touching. “It took a few years of therapy, but I know. Still, if I could do something different, that would be it. I’d take Tucker with me to fix the fence.”
Emory understood then why he needed her to leave Clayton while she went to town. Maybe even why he helped with Clayton as much as he did. Byron’s hand found hers on the rough, tiled floor.
“That’s why,” he whispered. “Please.”
She squeezed his fingers and whispered back, “Okay.”
Grief was still flooding Emory’s veins as she pulled into the crowded car park at the small independent supermarket inthe centre of Gardner Creek. She wasn’t sure what it meant that Byron was opening up to her after all these years, but it seemed like everything about their relationship had changed in the kitchen this morning. They shared something now, an understanding. It made all the little nuances of how Byron acted around her and Clayton make so much more sense. For a while, especially recently, Emory had been fooling herself into thinking maybe he acted the way he did because of her. But it wasn’t that at all. He acted the way he did because he was trying to atone. He clearly held a lot of guilt, even if he said he had moved past that, and looking after Clayton was how he made up for it. It had nothing to do with Emory at all.
She did three laps of the overflowing, tiny supermarket parking lot before giving up and pulling out onto the road. She had more luck at the school across the street. The kiss and go parks on the side of the road were all labelled for five minutes only, but being the Saturday before a flood came through, Emory doubted it mattered. She wasn’t the only one; three cars pulled in behind her as she exited her car. If the ticket inspector did care to come past, he would be chuckling. Emory took the risk and headed for the supermarket.
Nappies, she reminded herself. And something for Clayton to do that didn’t involve reruns of Bluey and Play School.
Her basket full of Play-Doh tubs, cheap paints, a few sticker books, and a ream of paper, Emory juggled the packet of pull-up nappies under her free arm. Clayton still needed one most nights, and although he occasionally woke up dry, Emory wasn’t ready to risk night training him just yet. That was a Future Emory problem.
Making her way through the aisles, just in case, Emory added plenty of snacks and chocolates into the bright green basket.You can never have enough snacksmight as well have been her lifemotto, and she wasn’t about to run out while stuck at Byron’s farmhouse.
