Chapter Eight

The train tracks were new. Stephanie watched the train steaming past her, heading east. The two huge locomotives were pulling a seemingly endless line of wagons piled high with ore. She'd left Coorah Creek long before the mine was even a dream, but she had read about it. The train was the first sign of the massive change that must have come to the little town she had known all those years ago. The last two carriages were not ore cars. It seemed the town had grown so much, the train also carried people. Steph wondered about the people in those carriages. Mine workers, she assumed. Or maybe there were townsfolk too. Maybe someone she had known a long time ago.

The train passed and grew small in her rear-view mirror before she lost sight of it all together.

She drove slowly into town. So much was familiar … and so much wasn't. The old wooden shacks by the railway line were deserted and looked even more forlorn than she remembered. The school, which had been a simple one room affair, now boasted at least two new buildings. And was that a swimming pool?

The years, and the mine, had obviously been good to Coorah Creek. There was money here now, it seemed, and a feeling of prosperity. With all those new people, there might actually be a social life. All things that Coorah Creek had lacked when she lived here. Things certainly had changed. The town didn't look quite so shabby as it had before. Or maybe she just expected less now.

Stephanie had changed too. She looked down at her hands on the steering wheel, and the rings on the third finger of her left hand. The rings that were a lie. She had benefitted from that lie, but in the end, the lie had caught her out. Now she was coming back to face the truth, with no guarantee it would serve her any better than the lie.

Her stomach churned a little as she approached the T-intersection at the centre of the town. The pub was there on her right. And opposite it …

Steph glanced at the garage. That looked as if nothing had changed. She slowly turned the corner and parked nose in outside the pub. From there, still sat behind the wheel, she took a good long look at her former home. The garage was exactly as it always had been. Two bowsers out the front covered by an awning and a long low workshop cum shopfront stocked with cans of oil, wiper blades and other car-based needs. The big sliding doors of the workshop were open, but Steph couldn't see anyone. The house was barely visible behind the garage, but the garden looked reasonably neat.

What if he wasn't there anymore?

She opened the glovebox and pulled out the newspaper clipping. The notice didn't say Ed still lived in Coorah Creek. But nor did it say he had moved. It simply said he was trying to contact his wife. It was dated two months ago. An impulse had made her tear it from the papers and keep it. She'd never expected to act on it. That part of her life was over, and she had sworn long ago that she would never go back.

Steph wasn't big on regrets. She had never regretted leaving Coorah Creek and she didn't regret coming back. At least, not yet.

She tensed as a car pulled off the road and pulled up at the petrol bowsers. She ducked a bit lower in her seat as someone come out of the workshop. He was dressed in blue overalls, and was wiping his hands on a rag. She strained to see his face, but he remained in the shadow of the awning as he filled the car with petrol.

Steph wasn't sure if it was Ed. He must have changed in the intervening years. Or … the thought suddenly struck her … perhaps it was Scott. The child she had left would be a man now. Was he still here, working with his father? Somehow she hadn't considered that. She had assumed that she would face Ed alone. Could she cope with the strain of seeing both the husband and the son she had left behind all those years ago?

And would Ed or Scott even recognise her? She looked very different now. The dyed blonde hair was brown and she had lines on her face that weren't there when she left Coorah Creek.

Steph's hands started to shake. Her way suddenly didn't seem clear any more. The car across the road drove away. The attendant had gone back inside the workshop and the garage was deserted. Now would be the perfect time. She could just start the car and drive away. She'd done it once before. She could do it again. Or she could get out of the car and walk across that road.

Or she could just sit in the car for a few more minutes, and give herself time to deal with the unexpected assault of memories and emotions that had set her head spinning.

‘There you go. Isn't the colour just lovely?'

Helen looked in the mirror at this new, improved version of herself. Olga, of Olga's Outback Hair Salon, had gasped in horror when Helen walked through the door and admitted that it was years since her hair had been ‘done'. Spending time and money on her hair – on herself – had seemed a terrible waste during the long years of searching for Tia. She had never given up on her daughter, but she had given up on herself. Today, after what seemed like hours in the salon, that neglect had been rectified to Olga's satisfaction, and Helen had to admit she was pleased with the result.

Her hair had always been a mousy brown. Tia's glorious auburn locks were a gift from her long gone father. Under Olga's ministration, Helen's hair now glowed with soft golden highlights. It had been trimmed and blow-dried and now framed her face in soft waves. She looked ten years younger. Felt it too.

‘That's lovely, Olga,' Helen said. ‘Thank you so much.'

‘It does look beaut.' Olga's accent was far less exotic than her name, but she certainly had a way with a bottle of hair dye. ‘And I haven't finished yet. When did you last have a facial?'

‘That's kind of you,' Helen said quickly. ‘But I think that I'll leave it with just the—'

‘Over my dead body,' Olga said bluntly. ‘There's no way I'm gonna let you walk out of here without a facial. I have a reputation to protect. Don't worry – it's included in the price. And you do want to look nice, don't you?'

Yes, she did. Helen was still a little shocked by her sudden decision this morning to have her hair done. It was so unlike her. In a moment of honesty, she sort of admitted to herself that Ed was the reason. He'd asked her out. Well, not on a date. He'd asked her to go with him to select a new puppy. That was a pretty personal thing, so it sort of made it a date. Didn't it?

Whatever it was, for once in her life, she had wanted to look good, and to feel good about herself while she was with a man. As for money … For more than a decade, she had saved every spare cent, just in case she needed it to find Tia. Or in case Tia needed it when she found her. But Tia was all right. Better than all right. And for the first time in many years, Helen decided she deserved to pamper herself. Just this once.

‘All right then.'

‘Ace!'

While Olga was assembling her creams and lotions, Helen couldn't help asking,

‘I suppose everyone here knows everyone else.'

‘Pretty much.' Olga carried a tray over. ‘It's not gossip really. Well, not nasty gossip anyway. Trish at the pub knows everything. And what Trish knows, everyone knows.'

‘Oh.' It suddenly occurred to her that Trish and the town might have been gossiping about her too.

‘Don't worry, love,' Olga patted her on the shoulder, ‘we all know about you and Tia. We're all happy for you both that it's worked out. Happy for Max too. He's a good man and Tia and him make such a lovely couple.'

Helen blinked, totally at a loss as to how to answer that. Then another thought struck. If Olga knew what Trish knew, she probably knew a lot about Ed. If only Helen could bring herself to ask.

‘How long have you lived here?' Helen asked.

‘I've been here since the mine came,' Olga said as she started to apply cream to Helen's face. ‘My old man, he's a miner. We came here when the mine opened. I started this place not long after we got here. A good thing I did too because …'

Olga's voice droned on, and Helen just let the words wash over her. She wasn't really listening, until suddenly a name leaped out at her.

‘… Ed Collins and his son. Sad story that, but I guess it ended well, so that's all that matters.'

‘What was so sad?' Helen asked, trying to keep her voice casual.

‘You just let me do the talking.' Olga tapped her with an admonishing finger. ‘Let that face mask set and I'll tell you. Most of it was before my time, of course. Ed's wife ran out on him and his son, Scott. Everyone said it was because Ed had an affair. He raised that boy on his own. It must have been a tough life for the boy, Ed being the sort of man he was.'

‘What do you mean … the sort of man he was?'

Olga didn't press the face mask issue a second time. She was too caught up in the story she was telling.

‘He was bitter and so terribly sad,' she said. ‘Tough on the kid. No one ever saw him smile.'

Helen's heart sank. This wasn't the sort of thing she had hoped to hear. Nor was it the sort of man Ed seemed to be. But what did she know? She barely knew him. She almost told Olga to forget the facial. That it wasn't necessary any longer, because she had no reason to want to look good. Before she could do so, Olga was off again.

‘At least that's what we thought. But just over a year ago, his son turned up. Just before Christmas, it was. They hadn't spoken for years, you know. Anyway, it turned out that it was the wife had the affair. Not Ed. Nice kid, Scott. The son. The town had just got a new nurse. English. Pretty little thing she was. He obviously thought so too, because before you knew it they were off back to England together.'

Helen sat there beneath her face mask, her head spinning. It would seem that Trish was not Coorah Creek's only gossip. In fact, she might not even be the best. But Olga's gushing had done two things. It had told Helen that Ed was innocent of the affair – and it told her that she shouldn't listen to small-town gossip, but should take Ed as she found him. She turned off her ears and her mind and relaxed as Olga opened a few more bottles of her magic creams.

Steph took a deep breath, got out of the car and slung her handbag over her shoulder. The car beeped as she hit the clicker to lock it. That was something she had never done before in Coorah Creek. Locking her car was a habit she'd developed after she left.

She walked up the stairs and into the bar. She needed a bit of space and time before she went over to the garage. She had to settle the memories and emotions that were starting to flood back. And prepare herself. She wanted to comb her hair. Maybe apply a bit of lipstick. She wanted to look her best when she faced her past.

It was early afternoon, and the bar was empty. But the memories that assaulted her filled the space as she slowly turned full circle. This was the place where she and Ed had come when they were dating. They'd laughed here, and drunk beer and eaten burgers. There were nights they had staggered back across that road, their hands pulling at each other's clothing in their eagerness. But that hadn't been enough. This was the place where she'd decided there was a bigger, better world out there, just waiting for her. She'd found an opportunity and taken it. She couldn't be blamed for that, although there would no doubt be those who did.

That thought had barely formed when she heard approaching footsteps. A flash of panic hit her, dragging her back from the past. The woman who had owned the hotel back then had been a terrible gossip. The last thing Steph wanted today was for word of her return to get out before she was ready. The panic faded as a man she had never seen before walked into the bar.

‘G'day,' he said. ‘Welcome to the Coorah Creek Hotel. I'm Jack North. What can I do for you?'

‘Hi. I'm Mrs Wills. I have a room booked.'

‘Of course. We've been expecting you.'

Steph signed the register and proffered her credit card, before following the barman up the stairs.

‘It's a nice room,' Jack said. ‘It opens onto the veranda. We've got two guests at the moment. The other one is a woman in the room at the other end of the veranda. You'll probably meet her at some point.'

The room was clean and looked comfortable. A nice room, by Coorah Creek standards. Steph had seen far worse and far better in the last few years. Jack dropped her bag on the bed.

‘Those doors lead to the veranda. All the rooms open onto it. We serve food in the bar. My wife Ellen will be cooking tonight, so there'll probably be a bit of a crowd.'

He held out her key and turned to go. Steph followed him to the door.

‘Thanks,' she said as he walked away.

He waved a hand in her general direction, and vanished down the stairs. She turned to go back into her room, but paused when she heard voices. A moment later a woman appeared at the top of the stairs.

‘Hello, you must be Mrs Wills,' the woman said tentatively. ‘Jack told me I had a neighbour. I'm Helen. Helen Walsh.'

‘Hello.' She turned to go as she spoke. She didn't want to encourage the woman.

Closing the door behind her, Stephanie caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She looked tired. And crumpled. And old. That woman in the hallway had looked fresh and happy. Her pretty hair had that newly washed shine. He face was shining too – with pleasure and some sort of inner happiness. Stephanie wanted to look like that. And she didn't.

But she could look at least better than this. She would rest up after her long drive. Then take a shower. A change of clothes would help too. Then she'd be ready to face Ed.