Song for Emilia Read online

  ‘That’s good,’ Sandra agreed. ‘Your parents will be happy.’ But I won’t, she thought, feeling dismal. Now Emmy would get to see Nick whenever he drove into town on his holidays.

  Meredith’s voice in the phone: ‘We’re having a party!’ Sandra heard her excitement. ‘We want you all to come, and Emilia of course. And why not invite Nick?’

  ‘That sounds great, Auntie, but Nick’s gone home for the holidays. When’s the party?’

  Meredith gave her the date and the time. ‘Don’t bring anything. Oh, a bottle of wine, if your father wants to.’

  Angela cheerfully circled the date on the calendar. ‘I’ll bring a plate,’ she insisted, reaching for her recipe book. ‘I’ll ask Meredith ... I can make vol-au-vents, maybe chicken and mushroom.’

  For the party, Sandra planned to do her hair like Ann-Margret in Viva Las Vegas, long and wavy, nothing too big, but Emilia back-combed her black hair very high and sprayed it till it set like varnish, leaving the back to sit stiffly on her shoulders.

  ‘We’ll wear our shifts and heels,’ they decided, spreading their clothes on the bed. Sandra looked with surprise as Emilia pushed her feet into stilettos. ‘How come your mother lets you wear heels that high?’

  ‘Mamma doesn’t know.’ Emilia gave a cheeky laugh, squirming into her dress. ‘And I’ve got long hems for the farm and short hems for Melbourne. Remember how last visit I made my skirts shorter, then I let them down to go home?’ She turned to the mirror, glancing over her shoulder at the back of her dress. ‘It’s got tight on my bottom,’ she admitted. ‘Well, too bad, it can’t be helped.’

  Sandra dug around in the wardrobe and found her kitten heels. They would have to do; there wasn’t time to shop for another pair.

  Several cars were already parked along the block. Don regarded Emilia’s pale frosted lipstick, her eyes outlined in black. ‘She looks ill,’ he confided to Angela. But Angela shushed him, whispering, ‘It’s the fashion!’

  ‘She’s growing into a little bombshell,’ Don laughed. ‘Old man Ferrari better watch out.’

  Before they reached Meredith’s gate, they heard the piano, the hubbub of voices. A string of coloured lights decorated the front porch, the crowded hallway lit by candles. Furniture was pushed back to the walls, the rugs rolled up; so many new faces ... friends of Mister L’estrange? Sandra had never met Meredith’s friends – their outings had always been just the two of them.

  Emilia’s face glowed with excitement as she surveyed the room. ‘Gee,’ she exclaimed, ‘I’ve never been to a real big party.’

  Meredith and Mister L’estrange were playing a duet, crossing their hands over, mixing the parts, till Meredith laughing, said, ‘That’s it, I’m going to see about supper. Keep playing, I can hear in the kitchen.’

  Instead, Eric slipped a record onto the turntable, calling, ‘Hey, everybody, Chubby Checkerrrr! Let’s liven up the joint.’

  He jumped to the middle of the room, immediately surrounded by dancers, their hips, knees and elbows twisting madly. Emilia joined in, careless of her tight dress, while Sandra watched with amusement from where she stood by the record player. When the song was over, someone flicked it to play again, and again the frantic twist filled the room.

  Another record began, and she recognized the slow, teasing start to Mambo Italiano. She longed for Nick to be with her tonight, to dance with her, and only her. The tempo increased, and in an instant, Mister L’estrange had grabbed her by the hand and pulled her into the noisy throng. Singing to the music, he turned her to-and-fro, until realizing her confusion, he put his arm around her waist, taking her unwilling hand in his.

  Over his shoulder, she saw Aunt Meredith, glass in hand, watching the dancers: Meredith stunning in a pencil skirt, a black sleeveless top; jade beads around her neck, red hair drawn into a topknot.

  ‘Go go Joe ...’ he sang happily. ‘Meredith looks beautiful tonight, doesn’t she?’

  When Sandra banged a foot into his shoe, he pulled her tighter. ‘Syncopated rhythm,’ he said with a wink. She stiffened at the unexpected closeness of his body, and as they danced into the kitchen in time to the final notes, he released his hold, leaving her propped beside the sink as he dashed back to the lounge room.

  ‘Eric’s such a good dancer,’ Meredith said. ‘You did very well, considering.’

  Considering what, exactly? Sandra felt she’d looked silly, wished he’d left her alone.

  In the crowded kitchen, Angela unwrapped a tea towel from her plate of pastries, putting it with the other supper dishes.

  ‘A bottle of claret for you, Meredith,’ Don said, adding the wine to a collection of bottles.

  ‘Thank you both very much.’ Meredith retrieved dishes from the oven, setting them among hors d’oeuvres and salads. She poured an orange juice each for Sandra and Emilia, topping their glasses with champagne. ‘Oops, you girls ... not quite old enough I think?’

  ‘I’ll be eighteen in April,’ Sandra protested. ‘But Emmy won’t be eighteen till July.’

  ‘Near enough,’ Emilia said. ‘No one’s going to know.’

  Meredith had already turned to the guests, ‘Supper’s in the kitchen,’ she announced. ‘Come and get it!’

  Auntie’s so glamorous, Sandra thought, tasting her wine – no wonder Mister L’estrange is in love with her. Some people were dancing a cha-cha, hips swivelling, Eric changing partners at random, and Sandra saw with interest how Emilia followed his every move, eyes narrowed over the rim of her glass.

  ‘He’s gorgeous,’ she whispered to Sandra. ‘Lucky Meredith. Those black eyes. I can see why you like him. Next to him, other boys are boring—’

  Sandra interrupted. ‘Not Nick. Nick’s never boring.’

  ‘Second-best,’ Emilia added rudely. ‘Come on, I’m going to get more bubbles.’

  Exchanging secret smiles, they quickly filled their glasses with champagne, camouflaged with orange juice.

  ‘What are these little rolled-up bacon things, do you think?’ Emilia asked, investigating a plate of savouries.

  ‘Angels on horseback,’ a woman answered, helping herself to several.

  ‘Oh, cute!’ Seizing one, Emilia popped the entire morsel into her mouth, chewed once, and her eyes and cheeks bulged with horror. Gagging, she abandoned her plate and ran for the bathroom.

  Amused, the woman explained: ‘Grilled bacon wrapped around a fat little oyster, simply delicious. She’ll spit it out, I suppose.’

  Slipping back to the lounge room, Emilia smothered a giggle. ‘I spewed! That was the worst thing ever—’ She pulled a disgusted face, then kicked off her shoes to wiggle and shake among the dancers.

  Show-off, Sandra thought, sipping her wine, enjoying the fuzzy sensation that made her light-headed, in a floaty, pleasant way. She wished her parents would dance together like at the Denalbo bush dance, happily twirling around the hall, that lovely night she’d danced for a moment with Nick in a barn dance, changing partners all too soon.

  The party became quieter as people helped themselves to supper and moved to the courtyard, dining room, or perched on kitchen stools. Eric was playing piano again – a boogie-woogie Baby Face, Meredith sharing the seat.

  Past midnight, guests began to depart – waving goodbye, singing into the night as Meredith laughingly called, ‘Shsssh, you’ll wake the neighbours.’

  Sandra couldn’t see her parents anywhere – maybe in the courtyard where conversation ebbed and flowed. Emilia was asleep on the couch, face squashed into a cushion.

  Into the almost-deserted lounge room Sandra heard the singular sound of violins. No one else was dancing and Meredith and Eric held each other close. His arm around her, Meredith’s hand on his shoulder, they stood toe-to-toe, listening for the melody to begin. Then slowly stepping, turning, gliding, their steps mirroring each other’s, they danced a tango, Meredith’s cheek brushing Eric’s as they stepped to the side, to swing around each other, perfectly balanced.

  Watching her aunt and Mi
ster L’estrange absorbed in each other’s embrace, Sandra wondered at her own indefinable emotion ... her impossible desire to dance like this with Nick, nestled against his shoulder, oblivious to the world.

  The rhythm changed from the earlier dramatic key to a lighter, yet equally yearning melody, and a couple joined in, woozily improvising. At the end of the record, Eric tipped Meredith back in his arms, kissing her to loud applause.

  Emilia sat up, bleary-eyed, her dress with sweaty armholes, hair a dishevelled nest. Sandra fished her shoes from under the couch, then leaving Emilia to thoroughly wake up, she searched for Meredith, determined to reinforce the fact that Auntie and Mister L’estrange were together. Eventually he would move in with her, his books, his paintings; his beloved piano. Vaguely, she wondered where he would give his lessons.

  Eric had returned to the piano. Hands loose on his knees, eyes half-shut, he paused as if to consider ... then with a little shake of his fingers, he began to play. Slow, slow, repeated pianissimo phrases gradually building in a crescendo. Sandra had never heard this piece before, and curious, she joined her aunt beside the piano. With a smile, Meredith put her arm around her, cuddled her close. Eric flung them a grin as he theatrically rippled the notes. His foot rhythmical on the pedal, the melody rose and fell, now treble, now bass, at times his right hand suspending the beat. The pianissimo phrases returned, built again in a crescendo that unbidden, carrying her back to the long-ago day she lay alone and dreaming on his bed. He was in England, she was only there to feed the kitten. She’d done her best to forget him – he was Aunt Meredith’s. He loved Meredith. The delicate aching phrases again, and again the engulfing crescendo. She’d been stupid ... stupid, stupid stupid. Deliberate big chords, the repeated phrases ... she’d meant nothing to him – his pupil, a kid, nothing more. No, she wasn’t jealous, Sandra had insisted so many times ... she was over her crush, grown up. Emilia had said he was gorgeous – well yes, she thought so too, and what was wrong with that? Angrily shaking her head, she closed her eyes as with a final crescendo fading to softness, the music ended.

  ‘You’re brilliant, darling,’ Meredith kissed the top of Eric’s head, her hand on his cheek. ‘That was delicious.’

  ‘Time to go, I think we’re the last to leave.’ Don and Angela already waited at the door. ‘Simply lovely party, Meredith dear,’ Angela said, as Emilia tottered beside them, and Sandra kissed Meredith goodbye, avoiding Mister L’estrange, lest by some weird design, he guessed how his music had affected her.

  Don closed the gate with a soft click. Behind them, as they walked to the car, the coloured lights switched off, returning the street to lamp-lit shadows.

  From down the hallway where Emilia lay asleep in Prue’s bedroom, Sandra could hear her snores.

  Dawn lit the sky before she finally slept, and it seemed like only five minutes passed before the sun poked an irritating light through the slats of her venetian blind.

  Angela knocked on the door. ‘Wakey wakey, rise and shine ...’ Regardless of Sandra’s closed eyes, she flipped open the blind and sat on the bed. ‘What a lovely party – we had so much fun, didn’t we?’

  Sandra rolled over, squinting through slit eyes. ‘Muuum, do we have to wake up? It’s too early.’

  ‘It’s eight o’clock. We want to take you girls on a picnic. Emilia’s leaving tomorrow, and we should do something special for her last day.’

  ‘Ask Emmy. Maybe she’d rather do something else ...maybe just with me.’

  Sandra pulled the sheet over her face, and waited for her mother to get up and leave the room. She knew Emilia wanted to go to the beach again – she wouldn’t want to go on a picnic with Sandra’s mother and father – a whole day out, eating sandwiches off plastic plates in a park somewhere? Uuurggh.

  A thump came from Prue’s room. Unless Emilia had fallen out of bed, she must’ve got up. Wrapping her dressing gown around her, Sandra went to check.

  ‘Ooh, Sandy, look at my hair!’ Emilia made a face at her reflection. ‘How ever will I fix it?’

  Sandra fingered a stiff hank of lacquered curl. ‘Wash it in a hot shower?’

  Emilia vanished to the bathroom, to emerge some time later with her hair wrapped in a towel.

  ‘You look very regal, Emmy,’ Sandra giggled. ‘Nefertiti, the queen of Egypt.’

  Emilia didn’t reply, but took off the towel and began to laboriously comb out the tangle.

  After watching the torture for a couple of minutes, Sandra took her comb, saying, ‘Here, let me try.’ Slowly and carefully, she combed the damp hair, occasionally pulling a strand, with an Ouch! from Emilia.

  ‘Do you want to go to the beach?’ Sandra asked. ‘Mum said they want to take us on a picnic.’

  Emilia was crestfallen. ‘Do we have to? It’s my last chance to go to the beach for a while.’

  ‘I told Mum you’d rather go out, the two of us, okay?’

  After breakfast, they gathered their hats and swimmers, taking a tote bag with towels and a bottle of suntan oil, Jackie Kennedy sunglasses perched on their noses. Angela drove them to Bronte, telling them to sit under the shady trees and not to get sunburnt.

  ‘Don’t get sunburnt!’ repeated Emilia. ‘That’s exactly what I want ... I want to get tanned all over, not all patchy like when I worked in Pa’s vegie garden.’

  To Sandra’s surprise, Emilia wore a bikini. Although she was slimmer, her curves nevertheless overflowed slightly, and she constantly hitched at the top.

  ‘I bet your father doesn’t know you wear that,’ Sandra said. Her own bikini was more like a two piece, and definitely more secure.

  ‘Shit no! Pa would rather I wore black, neck-to-knee.’ Emilia screwed up her nose, reaching for the suntan oil bottle.

  Slathered in coconut oil they raced into the water, dodging among bathers, Emilia immediately disappearing under a wave, to emerge grabbing at her top as it threatened to slide off.

  ‘Golly,’ she said. ‘I better watch out or I’m going to lose something.’

  Sandra noticed that several young men were watching them. The first swim Emilia had at Bondi two years ago, she’d flirted enthusiastically with the boys who swam around them both, but today she wasn’t interested, flinging the group a scornful glance.

  ‘Idiots, they’re only looking at my bikini.’

  ‘And the rest!’ Sandra said. ‘Every time you come up from a wave, you look like you’ll lose your top. They’re all waiting.’

  ‘They’ll be disappointed,’ Emilia sniffed, and returning to their towels, she pulled on a tee-shirt, smirking at the young men as she dived back into the surf.

  Later as they lay in the sun, Emilia said, ‘I drank a lot of bubbles last night. Did you, too?’

  ‘Not like you.’ Sandra spread oil on her arms and legs, smearing more oil onto Emilia’s back. ‘You looked really tipsy when you went to sleep on the couch.’

  ‘How embarrassing,’ Emilia sighed. ‘But it was a fantastic party. ‘Ooh, Mister L’estrange is so divine. No wonder you’ve got a crush—’

  ‘No, I don’t any more,’ Sandra said emphatically. ‘He’s with Auntie now, and they’re madly in love.’

  ‘That’s obvious. Maybe they’ll have beautiful babies.’

  ‘Gosh, I hadn’t thought of that. Isn’t she too old?

  ‘Back where my parents come from, even old ladies in their forties have babies.’

  ‘That’s Italy – maybe they can’t get the Pill over there.’

  It was an interesting notion: Aunt Meredith with a baby? But first Sandra had to get used to the idea of them being together, and Mister L’estrange hadn’t moved in yet.

  ‘Let’s get an icecream?’ Sandra was on her feet already, sunhat jammed on her wet hair. ‘I can feel my skin getting tight, I know I’m burning.’

  The little shop was busy and they waited to be served, the pavement getting increasingly hot under their sandals. Running into the park, they sighed with relief to lick their rapidly melting icecream cones un
der the trees.

  After dinner they sat in the garden trickling the hose over their feet. Sandra touched Emilia’s shoulder. ‘You’ve gone really red. Does it hurt?’

  ‘A bit. That tomato didn’t do any good. My back feels worse.’

  ‘Mine too. We’ll put on some baby oil before bed.’

  ‘I love Bondi and Bronte,’ Emilia said. ‘Where I live now, I can only go to the local pool, and that’s not so much fun.’

  ‘Do you like living there?’

  ‘Yep. I like Mrs Morgan’s parents – they’re real nice to me. Pa wouldn’t have let me go to Melbourne if I didn’t have somewhere good to stay. I like my course, and it’s not too far to go home for holidays.’

  As Emilia spoke, it wasn’t hard to feel jealous, but Sandra brushed it off. Nick had returned to Wilga Park after his exams... it was weeks since she’d seen him. He’d almost become a dream, leaving a little hole in her heart.

  ‘Lucky thing, to live away from home,’ she said. ‘Do you go out much?’

  ‘Not much, just sometimes to the pictures with girl friends.’

  ‘I’ll miss you when you go tomorrow. At school, my only real friend was Carol, and now she’s at teachers’ college I don’t see her much. I know a few students at the Con – there’s a nice boy called Billy studying saxophone—’

  ‘Ooh,’ Emilia crowed, eyes narrowed. ‘A nice boy called Billy?’

  ‘He’s just in my year, so don’t get any ideas. He’s keen to play in a club and he asked if I’d be interested.’

  Sandra’s best friend at the Conservatorium had turned out to be Billy. She liked his easy company, their talk always about music. The idea of a duo was tempting.

  ‘What’s he look like?’

  ‘He’s very tall with sort of ginger hair—’

  ‘Urk, a carrot-top ... he’s probably all freckly.’ Emilia dismissed him with a laugh. ‘Remember the pact we made?’

  ‘Of course I do,’ Sandra replied. ‘To always be best friends, for ever and ever – boys excluded.’

  ‘So, what about you and Nick?’