the way. Those long walks home were the forever of my childhood. Niki was with me, of course. Niki was always with me — she still is. What I had told Sunny was true; I had loved my little sister right from the start. Even though her birth heralded the death of my mother — our mother — I’d loved Niki right to the end. Dad had never been a major figure in my life before her death and he became even less of one after Mum died. It seemed to me he set about replacing her with a series of good-time women, none of who were interested in taking the time to win over a couple of needy motherless girls. No doubt I’m being unfair. No doubt I made it difficult for them. I let the memory of those walks home with Niki drift away. I’m careful with memories of Niki. I don’t want to wear them out with overuse. I take them out like treasures, touch them gently with the tips of my consciousness, then wrap them in tissue and put them away again.
I don’t run often enough to learn the tricks seasoned runners have been taught that enable them to keep going, but even with my stop and start method, it still works for dissipating nerves. After twenty minutes or so, red-faced and panting, it’ll even quieten, if not completely mute my chattering inner voice. Personality disorders that include voices must be the pits. I have trouble enough with my so-called normal mental narration. Plugging into music helps to both quieten that chattering brain talk and to help keep me moving.
By the time I’d tried to get hold of Fanshaw, failed, left a message, lost my key, found my key, lost my phone, found my phone, opened the fridge door several times to eye up that bottle of wine, admonished myself and closed the fridge door an equal number of times and then finally changed into my running gear, it was coming up to eight-thirty when I left Norma’s place and started on my run. The traffic had thinned out again after rush hour on the Jervois Road stretch, leading to the harbour bridge on-ramp. I plugged in my headphones and started at little more than a walk while I warmed up, and k.d. lang singing ‘A Case of You’ was well under way by the time I passed the street Justin and Sunny lived on. About an hour had passed since I’d left the message for Fanshaw. I glanced along the street, half expecting to see police cars parked outside the house, but all was quiet. No cops; in fact, no people at all. All those big empty mansions; in the wealthy suburbs no one is ever home.
The steps leading down to Cox’s Bay were slimy and I had to watch my footing. A spring dusk was looming and the temperature would drop dramatically as soon as the sun dipped behind the hills. The tide was well out in Cox’s Bay, leaving nothing more than a shimmering snake of water to reflect the last of the blue sky. The beached yachts tipped sideways in the mud exposed their rudders like sea lions displaying rotund underbellies to their harem. A heron high-stepped through the mud, pausing occasionally to prod the glutinous swamp, but it was just going through the motions, unconvinced. It would have to wait for the tide to turn to deliver up a quivering morsel. By the time I crossed the road into Cox’s Bay Reserve a heavy purple cloud hovered directly above me. Like a cartoon depression cloud, it followed me through the park. I’d got my second wind slowing for the traffic on West End Road and ran easily now past kids playing soccer, a young boy checking the paw of his muddied terrier. The Dusty Springfield song ‘The Look of Love’ started up at the exact moment the terrier held up its paw and turned a beseeching look on its young owner. The appropriateness of the song and the pathetic look from the canine made me laugh out loud. The emptied culvert waited patiently for the tide to return, mangroves on tiptoes, roots exposed. The soft warm breeze accompanied by the scatter of leaves above was a reminder that summer was close by. Such a time of promise is spring. It was all beautiful in the way a previously ordinary place and time can suddenly seem to have meaning; can seem to