‘Jedda, I’ve got a four-wheel drive stacked up with gear, my alarm is set for four o’clock tomorrow morning, and then I’m driving out to what I onlythinkis the site where the Dirt Girls found your ornithopod femur. Tell me I’m not wasting my time.’
‘Are you excited about going? You sound it. You sound happy, Jo. You sound involved.’
‘Of course I’m excited about going.’
‘Then you’re not wasting your time, are you?’
Jo was so nonplussed by that statement that she pulled the phone away from her ear to look at it and make sure the screen really did say the caller was Dr Jedda Irwin.
‘Can you, um, email me whatever you’ve got on file from the dig you organised?’ she said. ‘Like, GPS coordinates would be a start.’ She crossed her fingers. ‘And … records of how deep you guys dug. Samples of soil with depth markers.’ She needed to know if they’d found siltstone. If she had achance.
‘I’ll try. I don’t have my laptop here in the hospital.’
Of course she didn’t. Jo nearly smacked herself in the head for asking. ‘Don’t worry about it, Jedda. Just get yourself well, that’s all I want.’
‘And I want you to be well, Jo. That’s what I want.’
Jo frowned. ‘You’ve heard, haven’t you?’
‘About the museum not finding a new contract for you? Yes, Jo. I’m sorry. If I was on my feet I’d maybe have some sway at the uni to see if we had a position for you but—’
‘It’s fine, Jedda. I’ll find something.’ She hoped.
Another voice cut in at Jedda’s end of the phone call, and then Jedda was back. ‘That’s the nurse come to do obs so I’ve got to go. Keep me posted on what you find, won’t you? And give my love to the Cracknells.’
‘Sure,’ Jo said, but she was talking to a black screen.
A glass of wine had appeared in front of her on a small cardboard coaster and she took a sip. Should she try Luke again? May as well. The phone was in her hand, after all. And soon, maybe as soon as tomorrow, she’d know if there’d be something to come back here for after water polo camp.
With Luke.
A fresh start.
She was so sure that if she could only get him out in some dusty paddock beside her, a trowel in his hands and a hat on his head and dust covering him from sneakers to eyebrows, she could show him how exciting it was to feel on the cusp of discovery. Show him who she was, too. Jo the person, not just Jo the mum.
She found his number at the top of her contacts list—the only starred favourite she had in there—and hit dial.
It didn’t even ring, just:The number you have called is not available. Leave a message.
Crap. She was pretty sure the new communication skills Dot and Ethel wanted her to work on didn’t involve a voice message.
‘Hey, honey. It’s Mum.’ She sighed. What could she say now that she hadn’t already said? When had it all become so difficult, this communication stuff with her son, the boy she’d grown in her uterus and given birth to with no small amount of hideous pain. The boy who now, apparently, had decided she was dead to him.
Luke was hers for the December-January holidays. Which was wonderful, because she’d been fighting an uphill battle to have him stay with her on a more regular basis, so yeah! Fist pump! Finally! She’d collected him from outside his father’s house at dawn on Monday morning—the December school holidays had started, which meant it was her turn to look after him—and dropped him off at junior water polo camp before heading out to the long-stay car park at Brisbane Airport. She was only going away for a week—and she’d only agreed to come out here because he had camp, which he loved. To her suggestion that—if her week in Yindi Creek went well—he come back with her next week for a full-on camping adventure under the stars out west with Mum had yielded nothing more than a grunt and a hunched shoulder.
A grunt and a shoulder movement. What did that even mean?
Did he not understand that she wanted to spend time with him? Be with him? Make him her number one priority?
‘It’s Mum,’ she said again. Just in case he’d forgotten. ‘I love you. I’m heading outback tomorrow so might have patchy phone reception for a few days. Can’t wait to see you on Sunday.’
Was that it? Was that all she should say? Something about her morning tea of biscuits and cake at the Cracknells, sitting at their ancient table, surrounded by photographs of their long-dead parents and tea cups from a distant generation had made her realise that she really didn’t have a moment to lose. ‘I’m sending you a text message. Promise me you’ll read it.’
She propped her phone up on one of Maggie’s serviette dispensers and pulled her portable keyboard out of her bag so she could tackle the text message with as much fluency as a qwerty keyboard would allow:
Hey Luke. I’ve been wanting to talk about something for a long time now but I’ve been conflicted about it. You remember the Mother’s Day when we were all still living together at Tarragindi Road and you spent all afternoon cooking a special dinner? And I didn’t turn up? I’m sorry for that. I’m really, really sorry. And if you ever want me to explain why, I’ll tell you. I love you. And I’m hoping that deep down inside you love me, too, which is why you’re so upset with me. Can’t wait to see you Sunday. Mum xxx
She hovered her finger over the send button for a long moment before hitting it. Sent. Now to wait for a reaction. Her spark at the prospect of heading out to the dig tomorrow had dimmed. Even the anticipation of Maggie’s sticky date pudding had lost its lustre.
