Grandma is quieter than usual when we drive south the next morning. She sits in the front seat looking out the window as Jack points out landmarks and Fred dozes beside me. We leave the sprawling suburban network of Sydney behind and head south on the Princes Highway heading through the Royal National Park and then a string of small coastal towns, the road winding past surf beaches and rolling green hills. The day is overcast. When we stop for gas I help Grandma to the restroom, balancing the key tied to a plastic spoon on the edge of the sink. She uses the cubicle first and I hear her groan as she lowers herself onto the seat.

‘You okay?’ I ask.

‘I didn’t sleep well last night. As much as I love to see this, as good as it is to be here, I’d just love to sleep in my own bed.’

The toilet flushes and she comes out, washes her hands with lurid pink soap from the dispenser.

‘It’ll be good to see the farm again though,’ I say, keeping my voice light.

She puts her hands under the dryer and there is just the high blast of air, the roar of sound.

CHAPTER 39

CHAPTER 39

Driving along the road to the farm—still dirt, I notice—past the familiar curves and properties, I feel my pulse quicken. We roll down the windows; the air is sharp with eucalyptus, a mossy smell of rain. Jack slows as a wallaby ducks out of the underbrush, leaping halfway across the road and then turning back the way it came. Hannah gasps in the back seat.

She gets out to open the gate and waits for Jack to drive through before closing it behind him. Here is the drive down into the valley, land which is ours once more. Where I learned that you can work hard and still lose what you love.

How is it a place can speak to you? The way the bark on the trees catches the light, the sound of kookaburras laughing at dusk, whipbirds high in the trees. The snap of branches beneath your feet and the rustling sound they make above when the wind blows through. How is it that all these things can still wrap around you like a blanket?

They are all there to greet us as we drive up: Jack’s wife Ellen and their son and daughter-in-law, tall and tanned, with a baby and a toddler; Fred’s wife Sharon bent over, leaning on a cane. They kiss our cheeks then stand back shyly, the silence suddenly awkward. We all wipe our shoes on the mat and walk into the kitchen for a cuppa. The old house is gone, long ago replaced by a large, more practical place. It still has a wraparound verandah, but the windows are double-glazed, and there’s insulation and air con.