The waitress whisked away the number that had stood in the middle of the little table between them. Natalie smiled at Bronwyn, wondering why she hadn’t thought of it before. If Milt wouldn’t leave the bloody property, she could, and she’d take a holiday with her sister.

“Where would you like to go?” She’d taken Bronwyn’s silence for interest in the idea.

Bronwyn lifted her cup, took a sip of her coffee then leaned in, lowered her voice. “We can’t afford a few days off let alone going away on a holiday. Marcus wants to go to uni next year and I don’t know how we’re going to manage that.”

“You haven’t put money aside?”

“Keeping the business afloat takes all our time, money and energy.” Bronwyn’s normally cheerful outlook was nowhere to be seen.

“I can relate to that.” Natalie thought of the years they’d done it tough. At least in between there’d been good years, a little cash put away.

Bronwyn gave a soft snort. Took another sip of her coffee.

“What’s that mean?” Natalie frowned at her.

“I know your overheads are much bigger than ours and there are huge fluctuations in income on the land but have you ever truly had to worry where your next mortgage payment was going to come from? Do you even have a mortgage?”

“There’re constant ongoing costs in running a property. It’s like having a mortgage, a huge one.”

Bronwyn clutched her cup and stared into it. “Have you ever lain awake at night, staring into the dark, a lump as big as a beach ball in your throat, wondering how you were going to pay the school fees…put another meal on the table?”

“Sometimes my teaching wage was all we had.”

“Well…at least you had that.”

Natalie stayed silent a moment. She understood the look of despair on her sister’s face. There were other things besides lack of money that could keep you awake at night. “It hasn’t always been easy.”

“I’m not saying I envy you but from where I’m sitting it looks like you’re doing okay.”

Discomfort built in Natalie’s stomach. Was she doing okay? Looks could be deceptive and there were some things one sister couldn’t tell another. She wondered briefly if Karl had ever cheated on Bronwyn and immediately pushed the idea aside when she pictured her easy-going brother-in-law. Still, what had she just thought about looks being deceptive?

“I did envy your Christmas holidays down here though,” Bronwyn said. “You’d take several days around Christmas and I know you pitched in with cooking but it was a holiday for you.”

“You came our way some years.”

“Only when Christmas coincided with an extra day’s holiday and then it would be a quick overnight trip. We rarely get time away from the business.”

“Nor do we.”