Page 2 of Higher Ground
“Did Papa put Spider-Man on for you?”
Clayton nodded but kept his hands over his mouth. “It’s a secret,” he whispered through his fingers.
“We don’t have secrets, remember?”
Bloody Byron and his obsession with Spider-Man. He was determined to make Clayton fall in love with his favouritesuperhero after he failed to do so with his own boys. It wasn’t a bad thing, it was just persistent, and Emory wished he’d give Clayton a little more agency in the shows he watched. Even if he was only three years old. A little less screen time would have been good, too, but Emory could forgive that. Byron was doing her a huge favour watching Clayton, she didn’t have the luxury to whinge over how much TV they watched together.
Clayton nodded again, this time pulling his hands down and clasping them together in front of his belly. “Sorry.”
Emory couldn’t resist. She dropped to her knees and spread her now free arms out for a hug. Clayton fell into them, and she clasped him tight, appreciating the closeness for a moment.
“Don’t be sorry,” she said, squeezing him and tickling under his arms. “Thank you for telling me. Let’s put Bluey on while I cook dinner.”
And brainstorm where the hell we are going to live.She knew more screen time was less than ideal for a three-year-old, but one evening of cartoons wasn’t going to hinder him. And she really did need the space to figure everything out.
It was a mission to find the remote in its hiding place under the mountain of cushions Clayton kept referring to as his cubby, but once Bluey’s family was playing musical statues and Clayton was happily dancing along, Emory was finally able to take a second to breathe.
She inhaled deeply, feeling the air fill her lungs for what felt like the first time all day. Every day felt like that. The same monotonous rush from the minute she woke up. Getting both her and Clayton fed and dressed and out the door, dropping him at his Papa’s house whilst trying not to swoon over the one man in town she absolutely shouldnotbe swooning over, racing back into town to start her shift at the café. Every afternoon, she repeated the whole thing in reverse, usually with an added stop at the library to sneak in an hour of uninterrupted study. Today,she’d only meant to pick up the academic texts that had been shipped over from Sydney’s immense collection of books, but spent longer there than she’d intended, getting lost in the aisles. For a moment, she managed to forget that she was stuck in a town where everyone knew her name, but no one ever said hello. It wasn’t until Mya, the librarian and her best friend, kicked her out that she realised just how long she’d been in her own little world.
For a small town, Gardner Creek had a beautiful library. The refurbished old farmhouse became Emory’s favourite place when she first moved here, and her safe haven when the life she thought she had built here started to crumble. Now, it was the means to her escape. She only had one month left of her marketing degree, plus a few exams. Then she could move back to the city and get a job and—if she was lucky—find her place in the world.
Until then, though, all she could do was make ends meet here. Juggle everything all on her own. Not that she wouldn’t be doing it all herself in the city, because she would be. But at least in the city, she wouldn’t be trapped in this place that always reeked of broken promises and pity invites. She didn’t fit in in Gardner Creek, that much was clear when she first moved here, hanging off Jaxon’s arm when he returned from his brief stint at city living. And it was somehow even clearer now that she was alone.
Because she was. Alone, that is. Even when the café was crowded and she made small talk all day. Even when she sat, snuggled against her son on the couch, watching Disney movies. Even when she picked up Clayton from his Papa’s house and Byron insisted they stay for dinner. She was always alone. No one truly got her, no one wanted to understand her. And that was okay. She didn’t mind, truly. But she was ready to move on.
Which is what she’d have to do now that Jaxon was finally kicking her out of the small cottage he had inherited from his dad. Originally, he said it was for them to share. Then he said she could stay, even when he left. The reduced rent was his version of child support, and Emory was thankful in the beginning. Finding a rental was never easy in a town as small as Gardner Creek, especially as a newly single mother who was a known flight risk. Everyone expected her to chase Jaxon back to the city. But she didn’t. She stayed because she needed a plan.
And she had one. A good one. Only, finding a new place to live while she finished the last few weeks of her course was not a step she had intended. Evacuating for the impending flood wasn’t either. But now she had to do both.
Serves her right for ignoring Jaxon’s emails. And for pretending not to hear the phone every time the property manager tried to call. She would have had more time. But now, she had none.
A deep grumble of distant thunder rolled through the house, reminding her of the immediate problems she was facing. Dinner first, then emergency bag packing. And she should call Clayton’s grandfather. His house up on his hill would be safe from any chance of flooding.
Emory hated the thought of asking Byron for more help than he already gave, but desperate times and all that. Plus, it was only temporary. It’s not like she was asking if they could move in there, even though that would have solvedmostof her problems. She couldn’t think of anything worse.
And not because she didn’t like her ex-boyfriend’s dad, but because she was worried she liked him a little too much.
The phone rang. And rang and rang and rang. Dammit. Emory supposed Byron was busy, out on the farm doing all the things that needed to be done to secure everything. Moving the cows to a higher paddock, securing all the machinery, and whatever else farmers did before a flood came through. Emory wouldn’t know, but she imagined it would be a lot.
With dinner cooking and Clayton still distracted by the TV, Emory had made quick work of packing their emergency bags. A backpack each if they needed to grab something quickly. All Clayton’s most precious toys, Emory’s most treasured books. And her laptop and its charger. Wherever they ended up for the next two weeks, she was determined not to let the situation stop her from completing her assignments.
Everything else she could think of was crammed into two suitcases. A few weeks’ worth of clean clothes, all the library books, the crochet baby blanket she had taught herself to make for Clayton. It wasn’t much, and truthfully, she could have used one suitcase between the two of them. But the thought of her entire life fitting into one suitcase made bile rise in Emory’s throat. Was that really all she had?
Looking around the worn-down cottage as the phone rang out in her ear, Emory supposed it was. She hadn’t really stopped to think about it until now, but everything else in this house held some pretty painful ghosts.
The faded grey couch Clayton now stood on, jumping as the Bluey credits rolled for the umpteenth time, was the very same one she and Jaxon had found at the second-hand markets. The same one they had sat on as Jaxon promised it was her choice,and he would support her either way. The same one she cried on when he left her, eight months pregnant, in a town that still didn’t feel like home. Her bed was the same one they used to share. The one she curled up on over sleepless nights with a newborn. The dining table was the one they used to sit around eating dinner, hosting guests. Even the dinnerware and cutlery, all mismatched from bits and pieces they could take second-hand or cheap, once belonged to her old life. She hadn’t changed a thing.
And maybe it was because she knew she wanted out. But, okay, maybe it was also because it hurt a little too much when she thought about getting rid of it all.
She didn’t still love Jaxon. Truthfully, she now wondered if she ever really did or if she simply loved theideaof Jaxon. But it was too hard to look back and admit she was wrong about everything. Maybe she should have gone with her parents when they moved back to New Zealand, but she’d just turned twenty and was drunk on love.
Besides, she wasn’t wrong abouteverything.
As hard as each day was, hearing Clayton’s laughter from the living room brought joy into her life, and she knew in her bones that she had made the right choice.
Giving up on calling Byron, Emory dropped her phone onto the counter to focus on dinner. The air fryer sang its song as the chicken finished cooking, and she pulled it out to cut up into small bite-sized pieces before mixing it into Clayton’s favourite pasta sauce. It was far from Emory’s favourite. All the hidden vegetables blended into a tomato-based sauce that was somehow incredibly bland. But Clayton drank it up like it was ice cream, so Emory kept right on making it for him.
Mixing the chicken and bow tie pasta—also Clayton’s favourite—into his bowl, Emory called out to let the three-year-old know his dinner was ready. He leapt over the back of thecouch, and Emory held her breath to avoid huffing at her son. She’d bet anything that Byron had taught him that, and she cringed at all the fun Clayton and his grandfather seemed to have. There was nothing wrong with it, but it made her feel bad thatshewasn’t the fun one in Clayton’s little life. It didn’t matter how hard she tried, how many games she made up, or stories she read, the nagging in her head that it wasn’t enough never let up. She shuddered at the thought of seeing the comparison between her and Byron up close. It was one thing toknowher son had so much fun with his Papa and presumably less fun with her, but it would be another thing entirely to see it play out before her. She could already imagine Clayton rushing to his Papa when he wanted to play, and it stung like needles along her spine.
