The Road Back (2 page)

‘Sweetie, your mother discussed marrying Trevor with you,' said Chris gently. ‘She talked to me about it. She wants you all to be part of a proper family, especially as I'm away so much. And the boys are included in that. Maybe they're as unhappy about this adjustment as you are.'

‘They're not unhappy. They have each other and they can make my life hell. Why would they be unhappy?' Megan gave him a thunderous look.

Chris was at a loss as to how to deal with this outburst but managed to say, ‘Listen, Megan, sweetheart, give it a chance. Not everything can be bad. Now that I'm back, at least for a while, you can come and spend weekends with me. I know my place is very small and you'll have to sleep on the sofa, or I will. But it's only for a night or two at a time. And you still like school and you seem to have a busy social life, don't you?'

‘I'd die without my girlfriends.'

Chris suppressed a smile. ‘Well, it's great you have such good mates.'

‘You have to meet Ruby. Can she come over to your place sometime, please?' said Megan, a more cheerful note entering her voice.

‘Is she your bestie?'

Megan laughed. ‘Are you trying to keep up with the lingo, Dad? Not easy, 'cause it changes every week. Some new word comes out.'

‘It's all a foreign language to me, honey. I'm just going inside to get a glass of water. Can I get you one, too?'

When Chris returned with two glasses of water and put them on the table, Megan looked up from her phone.

‘Texting a friend?' her father asked.

‘Yes, Ruby.' She held up the phone. ‘
Chilling with my dad. Don't think he knows he's still got the looks. Some grey hairs starting. LOL. He wears bad American shirts. Wants to meet you.
'

‘Cheeky possum. I like my Yank shirt.' Chris laughed, but he was pleased that Megan wanted to share her friends with him.

When they were finished they went back to Chris's flat for the afternoon. Chris checked his email on his laptop on the dining room table. He'd got in touch with his old friends and colleagues telling them he was back in Australia waiting for his next assignment and fishing around for news and gossip about the local media scene. Megan lolled on the sofa listening to the Thundamentals on her iPod while updating her four closest girlfriends with the details of what had happened so far that day on her smart phone.

A couple of hours later, Chris tapped her on the shoulder. ‘Can you hear me? Where do you want to go for dinner? What sort of food would you like?'

Megan pulled the earphones from her ears. ‘Dinner? I'm easy. What do you like?'

‘I'd like some good Asian. How about we go to Chinatown?'

‘That sounds really cool. I've never been there. Way too far from Newport. I'll go and change.'

Chris was pleasantly surprised when Megan emerged from the bedroom dressed in a short cotton floral dress. She'd paid a lot of attention to her hairdo and accessories. However, Chris was a bit startled that she had completed the outfit with a pair of multi-coloured basketball shoes.

‘You look lovely, except perhaps for the shoes. What happened to sandals?'

‘Dad, these are Converse! They call them Chuckies after the basketball player. Anyway, sandals are so, so . . . sixties.'

‘Got it,' said Chris humbly. ‘You look terrific.'

They trawled through Chinatown, deciding which restaurant looked good. The narrow streets were crowded, full of people enjoying themselves.

‘I love the palace places with all the red and gold,' Megan commented.

‘Okay. You choose.'

Chris followed his daughter up the stairs of one of the large restaurants and into an immense room already filled with families chattering in Cantonese. As they were shown to a table, they dodged teams of waiters carrying huge trays of dishes with appetising aromas. Taking their seats, Megan's eyes popped as she leafed through the lengthy menu.

‘Dad, this menu is huge. There are pages and pages.'

‘What would you like to do, Megan? Have a dish for yourself, or share dishes with me?'

‘I'd like to share.'

She took her time choosing the dishes she wanted and when they ordered the food she asked for a Sprite, eschewing the jasmine tea.

Chris leaned his chin on his hand and studied her. ‘So, Megan. What's next?'

‘You mean at school? What do I want to do with my life? Boyfriends? Or Mum and Trevor?'

‘Boyfriends? Do you have one? Someone special?' Chris asked, his eyebrows raised.

She smiled at him. ‘Chill, Dad. I'm just tuning.'

‘Translation, please.'

‘Tuning is like a flirtationship. Sort of just having someone to flirt with. A bit more than a friend, but not a relationship.'

‘So are you tuning with anyone special?'

‘Not at the moment, no one that's serious.'

‘And school is fine? I know from your reports that you're a hard worker. Have you given any thought to what you want to do in your final years? I don't expect you to have any clues about a career at this stage, unless there's something that really grabs you. Sometimes it's good to try different things.'

‘I tell everyone who asks that I just want to be happy. They like to hear that. Sometimes I say that I want to be a lawyer, but I don't.'

Chris chuckled and shook his head. ‘I hated being asked that, too. The other question I hated was, “What's your favourite subject?”'

‘Easy. Commerce.'

‘Really?' He was surprised.

Then Megan asked, ‘Can you come to my next school parents' night? I hate Trevor coming along, even though Mum does all the talking.'

‘Sure, honey. I'd like to meet your teachers. I'm glad that you like school. It's meant to be one of the best girls' schools in the area.'

‘It's a great school. Everyone is fantastic. It's just a long trip each day from Newport, but I can hang out with my friends and talk about things on the bus.'

‘And you like that it's only girls? You wouldn't rather change to a co-ed school that's a bit closer to home?'

Megan shook her head. ‘No way, Dad. One of my girlfriends goes to a mixed school and I can see the pros and cons, but I like where I am better.'

‘Why is that?'

‘She says the girls don't want to show that they're smart and be seen as geeky by getting high science marks or whatever. I think you can take more risks if it's just
girls. Who wants to fail or look stupid in front of the
boys in the class? And my friend says that if you date a boy from school and then it crashes, everyone knows and it's a big deal. It's good to learn to get along with guys as friends, which would be one good thing about co-ed, but I like all-girl classes. Anyway, we do things like dances at St Peter's, and we put on shows with the boys. We're going to do a combined musical this year as a fundraiser for a school in Myanmar.'

‘Are you in this show?'

‘Not out the front, but I'm doing backstage stuff, and helping out. I haven't found my true talent yet.' She smiled.

As their first dish arrived, Chris thought, and not for the first time, that Megan was a delight. He was pleased that she seemed so level-headed and he knew that she was very intelligent. Jill had done a good job in raising her. It was just a shame that Megan's life had become so complicated lately.

‘Want some noodles?' he asked.

‘Wow, all this food looks amazing. Nothing like our local Chinese.' After loading up her plate, Megan continued chatting.

‘Dad, did you always want to be a foreign
correspondent?'

Chris thought for a moment. ‘Well, being a journalist came first, then my ambition was to become a foreign correspondent but it took a process of elimination to get there. It goes back to my love of books and reading and being interested in communications, I think. I used to write and make up my own newspaper when I was six or seven and take it around the neighbourhood. Your grandparents were news fanatics, especially your grandfather. Had the radio on all the time, and when the TV news came on, not a word could be spoken. I guess their interest in what was going on in the world rubbed off on me.'

‘Dad, I think it's really cool that you're a foreign correspondent. It's great when I see your name in the paper. I tell all my friends.'

‘That's very nice to hear.'

‘Yes, they all think you sound very cool. Dad, who were the most important people you met in America?'

‘I didn't really get a chance to meet that many,' admitted Chris. ‘Foreign correspondents are regarded by the local press as blow-ins and it's not easy to trespass on their patch, but when the Australian Prime Minister was in town, I could get a pass to attend any joint press conferences they had with the President at the White House.'

‘Wow! Did you meet President Obama?'

‘No, I'm not nearly important enough. I was just in the same room.' Chris smiled.

‘That is amazing. He is such a cool dude.'

‘I'm glad you think so. Another “cool dude” I did interview, one on one, was Hillary Clinton.'

Megan stared at him. ‘No way. Wait till I tell everyone at school about that. How come?'

‘She let me conduct an hour-long interview with her. It took months to set up and I didn't think that it would come off, but I did it just before I came back. The story will be in the paper's weekend magazine in a couple of weeks.'

‘Fantastic.'

The next lot of dishes arrived and Chris picked up a piece of fried duck with his chopsticks.

‘Tell me, have you spoken to Bunny recently?'

Megan tried to follow Chris's chopsticks style but with only partial success as she manoeuvred a piece of duck into her bowl. ‘We talk on the phone all the time. And she's even learned to text and she follows me on Facebook. She came down for my birthday a few months ago. When are you going up to visit her? I bet she wants to see you.'

‘Yes, the feeling's mutual. I'll go up to see your grandmother as soon as I can. What about Trevor's family, do you get on with them?'

Megan pulled a face. ‘God, no! His mother is a dragon and his father's a bogan. Even Mum doesn't encourage family get-togethers.'

‘I'm sure everything will work out. Just give it time.'

‘That's easy for you to say. I'm under the same roof as them. I so hate it when Mum introduces those brats as my stepbrothers.'

‘The school holidays can't be far off. What say we trundle up to Neverend and visit your grandmother then?'

‘Yeah, that'd be pretty cool. I love visiting Bunny.'

‘I'll raise it with your mother, but I can't see that a visit to your grandmother's would be an issue.'

‘It's nice having you home, Dad,' said Megan after a pause.

Chris's heart twisted. He was glad to be home and to spend time with his daughter and he was looking forward to visiting his mother in the house where he'd grown up. These were the two people he loved most. But he felt a twinge of guilt, because he knew that what he wanted more than anything was another overseas posting. His job as a foreign correspondent was busy, fascinating and stimulating. It was the job that he had always dreamed of doing. He reached over and touched Megan's hand. ‘It's nice to be with you, too,' he said.

*

The next afternoon, Chris and Megan walked up to the bus stop so that she could get the bus back home to Newport.

‘Sorry about not being able to drive you. Do you think that you could come here next weekend and the two of us could go car shopping? You could give me your input as to which you think would be suitable.'

‘Really? That would be great. I promise I'll get all my homework done before Saturday, so I can spend the whole weekend with you. See you, Dad.' She hugged him and stepped onto the bus.

As he waved to her and the bus moved along Military Road, Chris reflected on his weekend with Megan. It had been a lot of fun. He was interested in her thoughts, and he enjoyed the ease of her company. She wasn't demanding because she constantly entertained herself with Snapchat and Instagram and whatever other apps she had on her beloved purple phone. He was touched that she was interested in and proud of what he did, but he could also see that Megan's life had become difficult in his absence. Acquiring an instant family when she had been used to being an only child had not been easy for her, and Chris could empathise with her struggle to cope with these changes.

Walking back to his apartment, he thought of the years since his divorce and how he had come to treasure his own space. He liked just pleasing himself and not having to fit in with anyone else. He looked forward to a quiet drink in the evening to digest the hurly-burly of the day and appreciated not having to socialise if he didn't want to. He liked to return to the serenity of his apartment and listen to music, or watch his favourite TV programmes. He suspected he had a reputation as a bit of a loner, but that didn't worry him. When he did seek company it was to feed his curiosity, to discuss current events, ideas and off-beat news, but generally he was content to be on his own. That said, next weekend he would enjoy taking Megan out to look for a new car. It would be fun to decide on one together.

*

A couple of days later, before he was due to report back to the office, Chris decided that he'd look up his old friend and mentor Sam McPhee, who had been his first news editor when he had started out. Even though he was now retired, Mac (as everyone called him) always knew what was going on in the newspaper business and it would be good to catch up.

In a quiet corner of the Black Swan, known to the journos who frequented it as the Mucky Duck, Chris put a schooner of beer in front of Mac and a light lager on the table for himself.

Mac lifted his glass. ‘Cheers, Chris. Good to see you.'

‘Cheers, Mac. Good to be back, for a while at least.'