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.‘I think I should be there.’‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ he groaned.‘As if Leo would have given a fuck if you were there or not.’Her hand slipped out of his.Her eyes were cold, distant.‘More than anything,’ he continued, lowering his voice, introducing a note of pleading, ‘I want to be away with you, just you.That’s what I’m going to need after the funeral.’She gave no answer, just kissed him on the forehead and went back into the ensuite.In the mirror he watched her finish applying her creams, watched her floss and brush her teeth, grinned as she slid the door shut to take a pee, enjoying as he always did the fact that even after so many years she could still be shy with him.He’d also caught the hint of relief in her expression.She would have willingly come to say her farewell to Leo.He had always made her laugh.But Saverio knew she would have been dreading the idea of spending time with any of Leo’s old friends.As the plane began its descent into Coolangatta, Saverio took out his earphones and, ignoring the sleeping man next to him, looked down at the splendour of the Pacific and the ugly town thrusting out of the lush green landscape.Matthew had been rendered almost dumb by the news of his uncle’s death—not from any personal shock or grief, for he had very few memories of Leo, but rather out of fear of having to communicate somehow with a supposedly mourning father.He had created a playlist on Saverio’s MP3 player filled with uncomplicated rock and roll from the late seventies and early eighties.A tinny whisper of ‘Brass in Pocket’ still seeped softly from the earphones and an unsmiling stewardess leaned over to scold him.‘Please turn it off, sir, we are about to land.’ Saverio settled back into his seat.He did appreciate Matty’s clumsy effort at sympathy; it was a loving, masculine gesture.Words would have been impossible between them.Saverio didn’t dare confess to his son his ambivalence about Leo’s death.He had always been more comfortable with his daughter.On hearing the news, Adelaide had rushed to him, and clutched him tight, whispering, I know it’s difficult, I know it must be.It had been exactly the right thing to say.He had marvelled at her innate wisdom: only two years older than her brother and, no matter how much Saverio still tried to deny it, undoubtedly an adult.He gritted his teeth and held tight to the armrests as the aeroplane surged.In a few seconds the wheels would touch earth, the moment he always feared, the point where the hubris of this mass of steel and wire defying gravity would end in calamity for all on board.The bronzed gentleman farmer sitting next to him, with the open-necked polo shirt and the clearly expensive Italian loafers, stifled a yawn.The wheels of the craft touched asphalt, the plane pogoed, swayed from side to side, then righted itself and screeched forward on the runway.They were safe.The drive from Coolangatta to Mullumbimby cut through some of the loveliest forest in the country.Saverio could see that if one believed in deities, one could call it God’s Country, could imagine that the hills and coves and vast open space were the garden and sky of Eden.From time to time, as the rental car climbed into the hinterland, he would catch sight of the ocean sparkling in the rearview mirror, the silvery light of the sky touching the glimmer of the sea.It was beautiful.No wonder his brother had made this part of the world home.But as he veered off the highway onto Demons Creek Road, Saverio felt a knotting in his stomach.He tightened his grip on the wheel.There had been money put into the communities that dotted the verdant hills.Eleven years ago the road had still been gravel.Now it was shiny black bitumen.Architect-designed holiday houses jutted out of the greenery, all with prominent verandahs overlooking the sea.When Leo had first moved here in the early nineties there still existed the remnants of a commune, the property itself owned by a septet of academics who were radicalised as students at universities in Sydney and Melbourne
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