Vivienne Wallington - In Her Husband's Image

Late that afternoon, as she swung her Land Cruiser into the dusty road winding back to the homestead through the parched paddocks of Yarrah Downs, she saw that Zac’s plane was back. There was no sign of her old utility truck—her ute, as he’d remembered to call it—when she reached the yard, so he and Danny must be still up at Bushy Hill.

Buster bowled up to greet them as she brought the big four-wheel-drive to a halt behind the house. She gave Mikey a bag of provisions to carry in and picked up some shiny black plastic bags herself. She’d bought Mikey’s birthday presents in Roma while he was out of the way with his young playmate Josh, and she wanted to sneak them into the house without him seeing what she’d bought.

Through necessity they were modest gifts—a dinosaur picture book, a new shirt and knee-length shorts, a toy racing car in his favorite red and a bright yellow water pistol, which had seemed less blood-thirsty than a toy gun.

She’d also secretly made Mikey a monster mask out of papier-mâché, painting it in vivid colors at night while he was asleep. Monsters and dinosaurs were his latest craze.

She wondered if she would ever be able to afford to give her son a playground slide or a fancy two-wheeler bike or anything more ambitious. His grandfather had given him a shiny new tricycle for his last birthday, but Mikey had just about outgrown it.

At the thought of her father her mouth drooped. In two days’ time he would be flying up here for Mikey’s birthday and no doubt would give his grandson another lavish gift to show up her own failings in that area.

He’d be sure to point out that both she and Mikey could have whatever their hearts desired if only they’d come back to Sydney. And he’d probably say it in front of Zac, who’d no doubt support her father and urge her to sell in favor of an easier, more comfortable life back in the city.

She’d have no one on her side but Mikey, who loved it here and relished the open, free-and-easy outback life, despite the heat and the dust and the flies. But Mikey, as her father would remind her, had never known life in the city. There were plenty of attractions there that her son was missing out on—movie theatres, science museums, sporting arenas, playgrounds, zoos—attractions that a young boy, he’d argue, ought to be exposed to.

He’d often begged her to let Mikey go and stay with him in Sydney, or for her to come, too, for a short break, but so far she’d resisted, using the excuse that her son was too young and that she was too busy. Her father was a powerful man, and she was half-afraid that once he had them back in town, he would find some way to keep them there.

Since Adrian’s death, her father had been more single-minded than ever about her coming back home and reclaiming her heritage—Barrington’s—and helping him run it, as he’d trained her to do. Having lost her mother last year—the one person who had seemed to understand her need for independence and a different kind of life—her father now had no one to curb his burning ambition for his only daughter and grandson.

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