The Boy in the Olive Grove

I want to thank Dave Monahan, a designer and managing director of Upton Oaks, for his kindness in showing me a working
furniture-making
business and answering my many questions.

MY BEAUTIFUL LIFE
crashed and burned on the evening of my eighteenth birthday. Two days earlier, the world was my oyster, but now the oyster was not something you’d want on your plate. The crashing of my life was completely my own doing. Dumb, stupid and all my own work.

The burning, though, that was a different kettle of rotten fish. Two days later I still had no handle on what it was all about, and it scared me rigid.

‘Bess! Get up, it’s nearly nine o’clock.’ Clodagh put her head around my door. ‘The hierarchy won’t be impressed if you’re late. You want a hand?’ She scanned the sorry sight in front of her. ‘Yes, you do. Jump in the shower. I’ll get your clothes ready.’

I struggled out of my boarding school bed for the final time. ‘Thanks, Clo. And thanks for saving my …’

She pushed me towards the shower. ‘You’re a prize idiot, Bess Grey. It’s not going to be the same next year without you.’

Without you
. I stood under the cascade of water and wished I could sluice away the night of my stupidity. I still ached from the crown of my head to my left ankle with its multi-coloured bruise. I had no idea how I’d done that. I knew exactly how the ache in my heart had got there.

‘Bess! Get out! Hurry up!’ Clodagh again.

I got out, put on the clothes she’d set out for me — my plainest mufti skirt and the pale green blouse with the little-girl ruffle down the front. She came back in as I was standing in my skirt and bra, glaring at it. ‘Put it on and don’t argue.’

I did as she said. We didn’t call her Clodagh the Wise for nothing. She dried my hair and pulled it back in a ponytail.

‘I look all of thirteen,’ I grumbled.

‘Ten,’ she said. ‘Don’t behave like you’re two.’

I stared at her reflected face in the mirror. ‘Clodagh! Don’t cry! Please!’

‘You nearly died!’ She was furious now. ‘The whole sixteen of us didn’t sleep till Miss Wilding came up and told us you’d be all right.’

I couldn’t look at her. Three of the girls had had their final NCEA exams the following day. Guilt and sorrow aren’t a heady mix to be raging around in a body battered by alcohol and a stomach pump.

She came with me to the door of the principal’s office, knocked on it, gave me a pat on my shoulder and disappeared back to the dorm.

I walked inside. Miss Wilding sat behind her desk. The assistant principal, Mrs Janes, sat on her right and the deputy, Mrs Bunning, was on her left.

‘Sit down, Bess.’

Their faces were stern, and it didn’t help that I knew there was disappointment behind their expressions. Disappointment, fury and sadness.

‘Well, Bess?’ It was always Miss Wilding’s way to let the perpetrator speak first, to tell her side of the story.

‘I was an idiot. A stupid, dumb idiot.’ I gripped my hands together. This was a new experience for me, a star of the school for all the years I’d been there, all seven of them from the time I was ten. If I cried, then so be it, and I would take what was coming. ‘I’m so sorry. I regret what I did. It was all my fault — Maddy and Charlotte had nothing to do with it.’ Other than to smuggle in a bottle of vodka which I’d skulled like there was no tomorrow. I’d nearly taken myself out of all my tomorrows.

‘I have dealt with Madison and Charlotte,’ said Miss Wilding.

I knew that. She’d sent them home the following day, forbidding them to visit me or even wait behind in the dorm until I was released from hospital.

‘Why did you do it, Bess?’ The words burst from Mrs Bunning. ‘A drunken binge! It seems so out of character.’

They regarded me, the same question in all three faces.

I’d thought about this, about how I could explain, what I could tell them that wouldn’t land me up in a psychiatrist’s office clutching a prescription for anti-psychotic drugs. ‘I got a fright,’ I said slowly. ‘It was horrible and …’ How to go on? My brain still felt pummelled.

Miss Wilding frowned. ‘Somebody frightened you?’ Her tone said,
You, Bess? I can’t imagine you being frightened
.

‘No. Not really a person.’ I paused, trying to think how to tell them without going back to the scene that had sickened me. ‘It was a kind of dream. But like a movie that I was acting in. I was lying on my bed but I was awake — I know I was because I could hear Anita playing her cello in her room.’

‘Had you started drinking at that point?’ Miss Wilding asked.

I shook my head. ‘No. But then I saw this … whatever it was … unfolding in front of my eyes and … It was ghastly, worse than any horror film, and I just wanted to blot it out.’

‘Hence the alcohol,’ said Miss Wilding, giving me no indication as to what she thought of my story. ‘Did it achieve the desired effect?’

I felt sick all over again, sick in my heart, in my soul. And I could feel myself starting to shake. ‘No.’

‘Are you going to tell us what this — occurrence — was?’ Mrs Janes asked.

‘I don’t want to talk about it. It’s still too real, too horrible. I can’t. Please don’t ask me to.’

They were silent, each of them watching me and probably thinking they’d never seen me in such a state and should they call in a mental health professional? At last Miss Wilding said, ‘That is worrying, but at the same time I’m rather relieved there was a reason for your behaviour. You’d better chat to Ms Billinghurst before you go home.’

She was the guidance counsellor. ‘No. Not yet. I can’t, I don’t want to … talk about it, or remember it.’

‘But have you ever had other episodes of —’ Mrs Janes frowned ‘—altered reality, I guess we can call it?’

‘No. Yes. Maybe. It wasn’t scary, though.’

A different image flashed in my mind, bringing me the comfort I always felt when I saw it. I didn’t want to tell them about that one either, to expose it to their analytical minds.

They watched me, waiting, and so I told them about the first time it happened.

‘I was ten. Mum was driving me to school.’ She’d never taken me again. After that it was the bus if Dad couldn’t take me. ‘I only saw it for a few seconds. It was completely different from … the last one.’ I stopped, hoping that would be enough. It wasn’t. They did the teacher thing and sat in expectant silence.

‘This was happy. That’s what I remember. I saw a boy. About sixteen maybe. He was wearing peasant clothing and he was happy.’

Mrs Bunning frowned at me. ‘That’s it? Where was this boy? Did he have a context? A background?’

‘He was working under some trees. They were old, with gnarled trunks and twisty branches. Small leaves. I thought it was an olive grove. That’s it. That’s all I saw.’

I would not tell them how, in the next few
difficult
, homesick weeks, I kept recalling the happiness from that image, how I used it as a buffer against the strangeness of my new life. Once I settled in, I forgot about the olive grove boy, but he didn’t seem to want to stay forgotten, for I’d seen him two or three times every year since. He was always joyful, brimming with zest for life, and always he was alone among the olive trees.

‘Hmm,’ said Miss Wilding, treating me to her
and what’s the rest of the story
expression. ‘It would appear that this phenomenon, if not a pattern, is something you need to have investigated. The one you have just described didn’t upset you, but it would appear that whatever is happening is increasing in severity. Quite frankly, I’m very concerned for you.’

Mrs Janes said, ‘Whatever the current episode was, it obviously traumatised you. What will you do if it happens again?’

‘It won’t happen again.’ But it might. It too might return the way the olive grove boy did. I wanted to vomit.

‘You don’t know that,’ Miss Wilding said sharply. ‘I want your promise that you’ll see a psychologist if anything of this nature happens again.’

I didn’t want to promise. Promises were binding, especially those made to Miss Wilding. ‘I’ll think about it.’

‘Not good enough,’ she snapped.

‘All right. I will. I promise.’

Miss Wilding relaxed, but she sighed too. ‘Good. I’m afraid, though, that none of what you’ve told us alters the outcome for the school. You will still have to appear before the Board of Governors, and you’d best prepare yourself because I can’t see that they’ll have any choice but to exclude you.’

I tugged the band from my hair. I hated having it tied back. ‘I’ve thought about that. I don’t want to be expelled. Can I just leave?’

She consulted the other two with a glance, and got nods from both. ‘Very well. We would certainly prefer not to have to put you through the formal process.’ She dropped the principal persona, propped her elbows on her desk and gave me the quizzical gaze I knew so well. ‘Let this be a lesson to you. Several lessons, including the fact that a girl as slightly built as you are can’t handle much alcohol. Secondly, find another way to deal with distress. Thirdly, I — the whole school — will miss you. But we believe in you too. Keep your head up and keep going.’

Tears were rivers down my face by now. I sniffed and said, ‘Thank you. Thank you all so much for everything. I’ve been so lucky to be here.’ I choked up. Next year would have been my final year. I would have been head girl. I dragged my thoughts away from regrets. ‘Is Mum coming to pick me up, do you know?’

A flicker of expression crossed Miss Wilding’s face. ‘She said she would.’

My mother hadn’t rushed up to make sure I would live, though.

Mrs Janes leaned forward. ‘She’s very angry, Bess. You need to know that.’

‘Yes. She would be.’ That was nothing new, although this time I fully deserved her anger. I seldom seemed to please her, whereas my brother could do no wrong. We figured it was because he took after her side of the family with his sandy curls and blue eyes, while our father’s Samoan heritage had given me my black hair, olive skin and brown eyes. She ignored the fact that Hadleigh and Dad were cut from the same pattern as far as build and temperament went.

‘Your dad has rung several times,’ Miss Wilding said. ‘
How’s that girl of mine, Miss W?
He said he’d come up, except that he has a lot on his plate.’

And Iris, my stepmother, wouldn’t sit him down and tell him his daughter was more important than his plate. My mind shied away from thoughts of my stepmother.

Miss Wilding stood up, came round the desk and gave me a most un-principally hug. ‘We’ll say no more about this regrettable episode, Bess. Know that we wish you well. We believe in you, and we’re going to miss you more than you can imagine.’

The other two hugged me too, told me they were deeply sorry my time at St Anselm’s had ended this way, but sent me on my way with love and best wishes.

Saying goodbye to the girls left in the dorm was wrenching. Clodagh and Anita helped me strip my room and pack my gear. The rest of them sat on the floor, getting in the way and trying to make wisecracks while all the time sniffing back tears. I wanted to tell them how much I’d miss them, how much St Annie’s meant to me and how sorry I was for the fuss I’d caused, but the words wouldn’t come.

The room was bare. They all came downstairs to keep me company while I waited for Mum to arrive.

Some of them I’d probably never see again. Alice would go back to Rarotonga. Lucy would return to Hong Kong. I’d been such a fool to throw all this away.

A car turned into the drive. ‘Not your mum, I’m guessing,’ Clodagh said.

‘Hadleigh!’ I took off in a tottering run.

He stopped the car and leaned out the window. ‘Greetings, little drunken one.’

Only a couple of the girls had met Hadleigh before. All of them were properly impressed by my tall, built, gorgeous brother who played to the crowd by spreading around charm and smiles as he loaded my gear into the boot. ‘Thirty seconds to say your goodbyes, sis. Then I’m going, ready or not.’

I hugged Clodagh last of all. ‘Thank you again. For everything. Especially for my life.’

I got in the car, waving as they called out, ‘Bye! Love you, Bess.’

As Hadleigh drove out of the school grounds, much too rally-driver-ish for the state of my head, I swivelled to take a last look.

‘Sad?’ he asked.

‘Yeah.’

‘You, my dear little sister, are going to tell me why you did it. No bullshit. No excuses. The whole ugly truth.’ He had Dad’s voice, Dad’s pig-headed determination to get his own way.

Images crashed into my brain.

‘I can’t.’

He bloody pulled that car to a stop, diving over from the outside lane to do it. ‘Get out then. Get out and find your own way home.’

I gaped at him. ‘You don’t mean that!’

‘Try me.’ He grabbed hold of my shoulders and shook me, his fingers digging in. ‘You damn near fucking killed yourself. My only sibling nearly takes herself out and you say you
can’t
tell me why?’ He let me go and blew out a couple of breaths. ‘Talk or walk, girl. Make up your mind.’

Rage and fury radiated from him in a burn zone.

Burning
.

‘All right! I’ll tell you and don’t yell at me if it makes you puke, you great lummox.’

‘Lummox? Where in hell did you get a word like
lummox
? Never mind. Keep to the topic.’ But calling him a lummox seemed to bring him back to his normal, equable self.

He moved the car back into the traffic. ‘We’ll stop for coffee. Talk then.’

‘Okay. But how come you’re not at work? Did Dad give you the day off?’

Hadleigh worked for our father during the uni holidays. It was now near the end of November when the factory would be at full stretch, turning out furniture for last-minute Christmas orders.

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Nope. I walked out.’

‘Whoa! But you’ll go back?’

‘After this latest stunt of his, no way.’

We stopped at a traffic light, which would have been a good opportunity for him to elaborate, but he just sat there looking like a lump of old granite — silent as one too.

‘The latest stunt being what?’ I asked finally.

‘To inveigle me along to Allan Stubbs’s office under false pretences.’

‘Who is … oh, the lawyer. Sorry. Keep going.’