Read Online Names for Nothingness by Georgia Blain - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Georgia Blain
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too, enfolding both of them in his embrace as he told them that they would leave, together. In the drowsy heat of the afternoon, she thought she had never seen her mother so happy.
âWhy did you have me so young?â she had once asked Sharn, and Sharn simply said that she had wanted to, brushing aside the question with an embarrassed discomfort that confirmed what Caitlin had always known; motherhood had been forced upon her, and it had horrified her.
But when Sharn met Liam, it was as though she finally allowed herself to breathe, not to open her arms to Caitlin,not entirely that, but to live side by side with her without the wariness that Caitlin remembered in each of her senses.
Alone in her room at night, Caitlin would sometimes hear them fight. It was, invariably, about money. Or at least, that was how the disagreements began, soon spiralling into Liamâs failure to get a job or to follow up a job or to chase a job, moving next to his inability to grasp the realities of life, and finally collapsing into the bottomless pit: his inadequacies per se.
Their heads were only just above water, Sharn would say. He was hopeless. He had no idea. She couldnât go on carrying them all.
Caitlin could not ask them for money. She had three hundred saved, not through any attempt to save, but because she was a person who had little interest in spending, putting her birthday cheques from Margot into the bank, unsure as to what, exactly, she should do with them.
Margot had money. She was the only one who did, and she bailed them out regularly, but always at Liamâs request. Neither Sharn nor Caitlin had ever asked her for anything, and Caitlin did not want to do so now.
She explained the situation to Fraser, certain that her lack of ability to pay would mean the weekend would not be possible.
âIâll see what can be done,â he promised. âExceptions are made.â
But it was not until the morning of the departure that he rang her, wondering where she was. When she expressed confusion, he assured her that of course it didnât matter, her three hundred would be fine, he couldnât believe he had forgotten to tell her.
The note she left for Liam and Sharn was vague: she was going to a friendâs for the long weekend, she would be backMonday night. She knew they would not worry, she had never given them any cause for concern in the past, and she packed a bag and caught a taxi to the meeting place.
Later, Caitlin would realise that those three days were her turning point, the moment when she stopped sitting in the middle and chose a path that she would follow, without deviation, for the rest of her life.
They camped, thirty of them in five tents, huddled into the side of the mountain, the cool air sweet and pure, the mists tinged with blue from the eucalypts that stretched straight and ghostly white into the sky. Several of the others were familiar to her from the meetings, but they exchanged no words of greeting, no nods of recognition. They were forbidden all forms of communication with each other, expected only to obey the instructions of the three devotees who had been appointed as their leaders. But their abstinence extended beyond denial of words. They were there to purify mind, body and soul. Only water was to pass their lips, and this was to come from the bottom of the waterfall that cascaded down the cliff face next to their campsite.
Caitlin had to fetch this water, sliding down slippery shale in bare feet, working her way back up again with a bucket at a time. The calls of the whip birds lashed through the stillness, and each of the rocks that she dislodged rocketed like a bullet through the quiet. She set herself a task: to complete each trip without disturbing the silence, to float without existence down the slope, drifting like the mist that rose from the floor of the valley, weightless and without impact upon the world. When she reached the bottom and the water ran like
âWhy did you have me so young?â she had once asked Sharn, and Sharn simply said that she had wanted to, brushing aside the question with an embarrassed discomfort that confirmed what Caitlin had always known; motherhood had been forced upon her, and it had horrified her.
But when Sharn met Liam, it was as though she finally allowed herself to breathe, not to open her arms to Caitlin,not entirely that, but to live side by side with her without the wariness that Caitlin remembered in each of her senses.
Alone in her room at night, Caitlin would sometimes hear them fight. It was, invariably, about money. Or at least, that was how the disagreements began, soon spiralling into Liamâs failure to get a job or to follow up a job or to chase a job, moving next to his inability to grasp the realities of life, and finally collapsing into the bottomless pit: his inadequacies per se.
Their heads were only just above water, Sharn would say. He was hopeless. He had no idea. She couldnât go on carrying them all.
Caitlin could not ask them for money. She had three hundred saved, not through any attempt to save, but because she was a person who had little interest in spending, putting her birthday cheques from Margot into the bank, unsure as to what, exactly, she should do with them.
Margot had money. She was the only one who did, and she bailed them out regularly, but always at Liamâs request. Neither Sharn nor Caitlin had ever asked her for anything, and Caitlin did not want to do so now.
She explained the situation to Fraser, certain that her lack of ability to pay would mean the weekend would not be possible.
âIâll see what can be done,â he promised. âExceptions are made.â
But it was not until the morning of the departure that he rang her, wondering where she was. When she expressed confusion, he assured her that of course it didnât matter, her three hundred would be fine, he couldnât believe he had forgotten to tell her.
The note she left for Liam and Sharn was vague: she was going to a friendâs for the long weekend, she would be backMonday night. She knew they would not worry, she had never given them any cause for concern in the past, and she packed a bag and caught a taxi to the meeting place.
Later, Caitlin would realise that those three days were her turning point, the moment when she stopped sitting in the middle and chose a path that she would follow, without deviation, for the rest of her life.
They camped, thirty of them in five tents, huddled into the side of the mountain, the cool air sweet and pure, the mists tinged with blue from the eucalypts that stretched straight and ghostly white into the sky. Several of the others were familiar to her from the meetings, but they exchanged no words of greeting, no nods of recognition. They were forbidden all forms of communication with each other, expected only to obey the instructions of the three devotees who had been appointed as their leaders. But their abstinence extended beyond denial of words. They were there to purify mind, body and soul. Only water was to pass their lips, and this was to come from the bottom of the waterfall that cascaded down the cliff face next to their campsite.
Caitlin had to fetch this water, sliding down slippery shale in bare feet, working her way back up again with a bucket at a time. The calls of the whip birds lashed through the stillness, and each of the rocks that she dislodged rocketed like a bullet through the quiet. She set herself a task: to complete each trip without disturbing the silence, to float without existence down the slope, drifting like the mist that rose from the floor of the valley, weightless and without impact upon the world. When she reached the bottom and the water ran like
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