The Forrests - By Emily Perkins Page 0,118

wrists – the baby’s face was clear, wide, his gaze roving the air, his body light as though hovering in space, just touching her lap. Donald lifted the baby and she kissed the top of his downy head. Caramel.

The growth on the rocks in the fishpond was like those canned Halloween cobwebs she sprayed on the windows for the children each October.

Rain fell straight into the pluming water fountain. The drops of fountain water slowed as they reached their peak and turned and fell, and turned and fell. Across the pond stellata flowers shone yellow-white against the pearly sky, the branches black in the rain. A marmalade cat pawed the dirt under the tree, turned and settled, and rested, its face content.

The young criminal smiled at her and walked over the miniature horseshoe bridge, towards the cat. The cat was enormous, the world a willow pattern on a flat plane. Slowly the cat blinked, rose and walked away, glancing back once, shaking itself before disappearing indoors. The young man smiled at Dorothy.

She leaned forwards in the chair and paddled her feet on the ground, inching out from under the awning so that the rain fell first on her bathmat-like slippers, now on her knees, on her hands, her lap, her hair. Rain hit the permanent wave they’d given her and some of the drops found their way through the jolly grey curls and down to the skin of her scalp. It was a balm.

Daniel stood in the smoked-glass doorway off the living room, where dances were sometimes held. His tallness was stooped with age, and he said to Dorothy, ‘Something something.’ She turned her head and Daniel shifted his weight, he had a stick, and like a tall three-legged creature he stepped closer, shuffle tap, shuffle tap, step ball change

His hand was large and worn, and his eyes were topped by peppery brows, the hairs ticking upwards as though surprised, and past the marks and wrinkles, deep behind all that those eyes were there and they were so warm and dark, and they really did flicker, and he sat back slowly in the rain with her

The tide was a long way out and they stepped down over the rocks carpeted with tiny blue-black mussel shells onto the mudflats, the sky high and ashen above. For a while they were walking close to the cliffs, beneath trees that captured light and held it clustered between their leaves, then braver they ventured out towards the moored boats that sat nakedly on the gunmetal-grey mud, near each other but not so close that they could swing and collide in a storm when the water was deep. The mud smelled rich and salty, and green algae lay streaked across it like handwriting. Some of the surface was ruffled and this was where the mud was softest and it sucked at their sneakers so that they took big quick steps like slapstick astronauts, and Daniel talked about things that he pretended to find amusing but secretly loved. He laughed away his view of the world as a way of holding onto it. She would remember to tell him that, later.

They rounded a large yellow sailboat, its belly traced with mould, and a creek opened up in the mudflats, light reflected on its silvery water. The sandy banks of the creek were cut by the water into perfect angles. On the other side, shoots of some kind of estuary plant stood straight up towards the sky. Their feet were under the mud, they were sinking and doubled over with laughter, reaching down into the cold gritty mud to pull their feet out, to push at the heels of their mud-soaked sneakers, get the things off, now, feet and ankles caught, the mud spotted with wormholes and bubbles, and they both tipped over on their knees just as the rain started. The wind blew in a great thickening rush. A dandelion clock tumbled past mid-air, thin black-tipped wisps floating from the pored seed-head that rose, released, like the microphone thrown by the singer from the band they heard that time, and she remembered the fierce, elated way he flung it high into the air to turn and fall, an invitation, towards the upturned faces of the crowd.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to my friends and family, and to those who read early drafts, including Lisa Samuels, Travis Gasper and Damien Wilkins, Chris Morgan Jones and Suzy Lucas, and Gillian Stern, Georgia Garrett and Alexandra Pringle, for their generous advice. Thanks to Brita McVeigh and Fergus Barrowman for the serendipitous reading suggestions that also shaped this book.

Versions of two chapters have appeared as extracts in the NZ Listener and Metro magazine. A version of Daniel and Dorothy’s conversation in ‘Spells’ appeared as part of a story ‘Jack, Internationally’ broadcast on BBC Radio 4.

Reading Group Guide

These discussion questions are designed to enhance your group’s conversation about The Forrests, a novel of family relationships, of life cycles and changes and growing up, and the great sensory thrills of the everyday.

1. The story of Dorothy Forrest is in many ways ordinary; she falls in love, gets married, has children, grieves, and gets older. What makes The Forrests different from other, more traditional stories of growing up?

2. Dorothy and Evelyn are often mistaken for twins, but are they that much alike? What are the similarities and differences between the two sisters?

3. Why do you think Ruth has such a close relationship to Lee and Frank? Why do you think the other children have such difficulty getting on with them?

4. How does the novel treat the passing of time? How do the characters react to the experience of growing older?

5. Discuss Emily Perkins’s narrative style. How much is rooted in the physical world? What sort of impressions does it give you?

6. How does Daniel’s role in the family change during the book? Why do you think he has such a profound effect on both Eve and Dorothy?

7. How does having children affect the lives of the central characters?

8. Describe the importance of family in the book. What holds the Forrests together as a family and what keeps them apart?

9. Discuss the secrets that are kept and revealed in the novel. How much does each character conceal and why?

10. Has reading The Forrests made you feel any differently about getting older? How important is art in helping us to understand our lives?

The Forrests - By Emily Perkins Page 0,118

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