One Heartbeat

Chapter 4-1

Chapter 4

Hana made the twenty-minute walk next door in good time and only fell twice in the thick mud. The morning’s rain had widened the gully, but she scrambled across without missing her footing. She knew the way but stopped to examine the hidden markers she and Maihi planted the year before as an escape route. The cloth strips looked stained and tatty, blending into the rustic fence as though part of it. Hana wiped her filthy hands on the grass and wrinkled her nose, hoping it was mud and not cow dung.

Maihi’s husband grazed steers on the back blocks of Hana’s land in return for meat every time they killed a beast. The bulk of the beef herd grazed the higher slopes and Hana edged around their paddock as brown eyes with designer lashes turned to follow her progress. Chewing mouths continued their circular action. A city girl at heart, she sighed with relief when she put a fence between her and the herd before starting the treacherous descent to Maihi’s welcoming cedar wood house. The last rays of the late sun dipped below the range, leaving greyness in its wake. Hana dreaded a nightmare stumble home in the dark and knew Logan would be worried if she left it too late. She’d seen the concern in his face and felt grateful to him for not pushing. The quizzical look in his eyes told her he’d guessed already. “I didn’t lie,” she pleaded aloud, startling a nearby falcon feeding on a rabbit carcass. “I thought my father died years ago.”

Maihi responded to the tentative knock on her back door with a hug and barrage of kisses. “Kōtiro,” she cried, her brown face crinkling in pleasure. The word meant girl in Māori, but to Hana, it meant daughter.

“Hello, Maihi,” Hana responded, kicking off her wellies on the porch. She allowed herself to be coddled and loved, fed tea and soup and given sympathy. The craving for maternal affection ate at a raw spot in her heart and the older woman kept it at bay with her ferocious love. Maihi warbled on with the latest news about her son’s family, chatting away as she buttered bread and pushed it towards Hana.

“Eat some kai,” she demanded. “You look real skinny.”

Hana ignored the comment, not wanting to admit what she saw on the bathroom scales. Her weight had plummeted since Phoenix’s birth and she hadn’t yet worked out why. The approaching black and white cat distracted her. “Tiger!” Hana exclaimed. She reached down to stroke his soft coat and he wrapped his body around her legs, pressing close and purring. “How are you doing, old man? I miss you.” He rubbed his head against her hand but the second she bent to pick him up, he fled. “Oh,” she said, her voice laced with pain. “He thinks I want to take him home.”

Maihi chuckled. “You do.”

“Yeah, I do,” Hana admitted. “It feels like we broke up.” She watched Maihi’s lavender female lick Tiger’s tattered ears and face with a rasping tongue.

“Eat!” Maihi insisted, jerking her head towards the plate in front of Hana. She obeyed, though anxiety made the food roil in her stomach afterwards.

The visit spared Hana fretting for a while and her panic receded to a distant ache. Until the older woman zapped her as usual. “So, my love,” Maihi said, plonking another cup of tea in front of Hana. “What’s eating you then? Tell me.” She peered at her over her glasses, her fingers deftly chopping kumara and taro and dropping it into a roasting tin.

“I saw my dead father this morning,” Hana said, keeping her voice matter-of-fact. “In one of the fast-food places on Greenwood Street.”

“A shock then?” Maihi said, not missing a beat.

Hana nodded. “I feel angry, frightened and disappointed.”

Maihi c****d her head and diced a carrot. “Disappointed in him?”

“No.” Hana pursed her lips. “In myself. He tried to talk and instead of saying the things I’ve spent twenty-six years bottling up, I ran.” She clapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh, no!” she groaned, “I forgot something important. Please could I use your land line for a moment?”

Maihi frowned at the randomness of Hana’s conversation with the manager of the restaurant. Hana rolled her eyes with embarrassment. “It’s probably a fire hazard,” she apologised. “Yes, it’s a piece of tufty black fabric. It’s meant to be hair. Hair. No, hair. No, not a person’s hair. A doll’s.” She sighed. “It’s Action Man’s hair and it fell off in the dryer. Somehow it got sucked into the vent at the bottom.” Laughter erupted through the handset and Hana jerked the phone away from her ear. When the voice resumed, it sounded strangled. Hana tipped her head and her unseeing gaze raked the blank ceiling as though searching for answers. “Ah, I see. Yes. Thanks.”

Hana climbed back onto her stool and watched Maihi’s wrinkled brown hands chop a carrot with surgical precision. “Apparently an angry Indian gentleman hauled a small boy kicking and screaming from the restaurant. A service repair man is trying to free the wig now. Bodie gave them Jas’ address and they’ve promised to post what’s left.”

“Will you get the bill?” Maihi worked hard to control the escaping smirk.

“He said there’d be no charge but insisted Jas didn’t stick Action Man’s head in the dryer again. Oh Maihi, don’t laugh!”

Maihi struggled to contain her snorts, contrary to Hana who could see no funny side. “What will you do?” Maihi asked, wiping the tears from her face with the hem of her apron.

“Write and thank them,” Hana mused. “Or make Jas do it. They only laughed a little.”

“No!” Maihi replied, her expression growing serious, “About your matua, your papa?”

“Oh, nothing.” Hana voice dropped. “I ran away from the only opportunity I’ll ever get to tell him how he made me feel. I went to him for help after I messed up and he discarded me like an imperfect blotch on his pristine landscape. There’s nothing I can do. He isn’t still sitting in the restaurant. I’ve missed my big moment.” Hana sighed and bit her lip. Her voice became soft. “He’d aged so much I hardly recognised him. I have to let it go; let him go.”

“Seems a shame.” Maihi’s chopping slowed. “All these years you thought he’d died. But he isn’t. You shouldn’t miss out on your chance to release all those emotions. They’ve stained your heart for too long.”

“I don’t have a stained heart!” Hana snapped. Her voice rose at the end. “I forgave him years ago. Dada held onto grudges and offences, not me. I dealt with it.”

“Dada? Is that what you call him?”

Hana gave a slow nod. “Mother was Irish and my father is Scottish. Yes. He liked me calling him that.”

“So how come you ran then?” Maihi asked. “If you dealt with it before your God, you’d have given your matua a hug and told him you were pleased to see him.”

Hana’s mouth opened but nothing emerged. She gaped and swallowed, speechless at Maihi’s accusation. Injustice made way for recrimination and Hana felt un-forgiveness and bitterness steal back into her heart. “I thought I forgave him,” she stammered.” She sulked in silence, isolating those emotions which surfaced with such force in the restaurant and turning them over in her mind’s eye, examining them for flaws. Maihi continued with her food preparation, humming the same song Logan played in the kitchen a few hours ago.

Hana jumped up in alarm, noticing the darkening sky and disappearing afternoon. “Oh gosh, it’s getting dark. I should go home.” Her eyes widened at the thought of making the bush walk alone.

The unmistakable sound of a motorbike climbing Maihi’s steep driveway made the house rumble as reflected headlights bounced around the room. “It’s your tahu,” Maihi commented, drying her hands on her apron. “He’s come for you.”

Logan unfolded his tall frame from the motorbike and removed his helmet, running strong fingers through his messy fringe. Hana melted at his thoughtfulness, overridden by the realisation she’d have to ride pillion. “Oh, no!” she groaned. “Last time he took me on the bike, I melted my wellie-boot on the exhaust pipe.”

Maihi ignored her and let Logan into the kitchen, closing the door to keep in the heat. He stood on the mat in his cowboy boots and accepted her hug, trying not to clout her with the helmet in his hand. “Your carriage awaits, my lady.” He raised his eyebrows and she rose from the stool with obvious reluctance. “Come on,” Logan said with a smirk. “It can’t be worse than last time. Get a move on, wahine.”

Maihi cuddled her, fortifying her for the bracing cold and the ride down the breakneck driveway. Hana tried not to think about it too hard as she grappled around on the deck outside for her wellies. Maihi’s arm slipped around her shoulders, her mouth close to Hana’s ear. “Don’t you think it’s time you trusted your man?” she asked, raising an eyebrow flecked with grey. “You need to let go sometime, Hana Du Rose.” Maihi closed the back door with a wave over her shoulder.

Hana griped at her words, knowing she spoke of trust on more levels than just the bike ride home. She sighed, tensing as Logan settled her on the pillion behind him. He fired it up and Hana cringed as he handed her the spare helmet. It fitted better than last time and a scent of newness rose around her face. “Keep your feet here,” Logan mouthed over the sound of the engine. He leaned down to place her feet onto the rests, hoping to avoid a repeat of last time.

Logan’s neat bum looked good on the wide seat and Hana afforded herself a longer stare as he righted the machine. He kicked away the stand and brought it upright. As she felt the powerful surge of the engine, her confidence failed her and she snatched at the back of his leather jacket. “Use the handrail,” Logan called, his voice muffled inside the helmet and dulled by the powerful engine. When she shook her head so hard the helmet wobbled, he grappled for her hands and placed them over his chest. Hana gripped the leather of his jacket and clung on, reminding herself to breathe. The bike rolled forward and Logan kept his feet near the ground as it pitched and tossed over the rough driveway. Hana fought the urge to lean the opposite way to the turn, forcing herself to relax and follow the graceful movements of her husband’s body. She put all her trust in him as Maihi suggested, finding an eroticism about the release of pent up terror.

Hana began by shutting her eyes but opened them half way down the mountain. The stomach lurching seemed less of a fairground ride if she could see the road. The headlights picked out bush and trees as the bike descended. Hana concentrated on her posture, conscious of not slumping forward as a dead weight against Logan’s spine. At the bottom of the driveway, Logan checked the winding road and eased the bike left. He got up to speed before the first bend and Hana turned her face and leaned her head against his back. She snuggled in as close as the helmet allowed. The gear changes reverberated through the chassis and Hana felt the movement of Logan’s body as he depressed the clutch and swayed with the bike. An experienced rider, he accounted for the extra passenger and how it altered the bike’s handling. Hana felt trust blossoming in her gut and relaxed her fingers around Logan’s chest.

Logan took the full force of the air buffeting them as they rode towards home and Hana experienced a budding sense of exhilaration cutting through the fear. She saw the last bend before their driveway as they hurtled around it, feeling a stab of disappointment. But Logan blasted past and onto the open road, increasing speed along the straights and handling the sharp bends with precision. Hana felt a strange peace as though something blew from her soul that shouldn’t have been there. A tickle rose in her stomach as they sped forward and it bubbled up inside her helmet as a giggle. A yearning to go faster woke in the back of her brain, but she couldn’t communicate with Logan. She satisfied herself with the brilliant night sky above and the glint of starlight on the Waikato River to her right. The Milky Way spread out before her, the same view from Logan’s mountain where Phoenix burst into the world amidst leaves and dust. Hana grinned into her helmet, glad no one could witness her momentary lunacy.