Rebecca Handler

I’ve got two hours to kill in the Sydney Airport. I am staring at people and the woman in the coral shirt eating toast just moved her tote bag two inches closer to her chair. Now she is poking at her phone and shaking her foot nervously. The foot is wrapped in Nike, a striped neon design that stings my tired eyes. Her shirt has a zipper down the front and a hood in the back. She is dressed for an all-day outdoor volunteer activity.

I am thinking about a strange occurrence, several weeks old at this point. I dreamed that my husband and I flew into space, but instead of a rocket, we sat on a couch and cradled large melons in our arms. As we ascended, passing spaceships and floating garbage, the melons exploded all over our shirts and helmets. My husband turned to me and said, “I don’t want to have to teach classes to aliens,” and then we both laughed.

When I awoke I called Dave to tell him about the dream. He was fifteen hours behind me, in San Francisco, and I could hear he was on a busy street. “I just left a store,” he said loudly. “I was looking at couches.” I couldn’t believe the coincidence, given my dream about a space couch, but he told me to keep listening, to wait for the weird part.

As he was leaving the furniture store, a couple of backpackers walking past asked my husband he knew anything about quantum mechanics. Dave said yes, and then they asked if he could answer a question for them. My husband replied, “Sorry, I don’t know that much,” and continued walking. Dave could not explain why he did not allow this couple to ask their question, and now, his refusal bugged him. He wanted to know what they were talking about, and regretted this missed opportunity.  

Two people in two different cities, simultaneously having encounters with couches and physics, and one of them avoiding a teaching moment. This coincidence has been floating around in my mind like a satellite, and now, staring at the woman in the coral shirt, I want to tell her this story. She will toss her phone in her tote bag and lean forward, elbows resting on her knees, captivated. This will be a nice way to pass the time.

My daughter’s digital watch lives on her crafts table in the dining room, surrounded by jars of slime, broken markers and gluesticks. The plastic purple watch beeps at 6:08 every night. The alarm is stuck. I half-tried to fix it but eventually became accustomed to the sound. As far as alarms go, this one is pretty mild. The tone sounds like a toy truck backing up. Beep-beep, beep-beep, beep-beep. The whole production lasts about ten seconds.

These days we read during dinner. With my husband across the world, by the time we scoop pasta into bowls, my kids and I have already caught up on the day’s events. There’s no need to talk about a hard test or a mean kid. We’ve done this already. We just want to eat and read. I’m usually scrolling through the news, which means I occasionally groan and say something about the state of the world. One daughter is currently reading Beverly Cleary and the other, something about a soul collector. Sometimes one of us will ask the meaning of a word or if anyone needs a salad plate, but in general we keep to ourselves.

The broken watch often goes off just as we are getting started on dinner. Between bites of bean stew topped with avocado, we look up from our reading. Happy 6:08, we say, and smile. It is a smile of relief. The alarm is a tiny beeping call to prayer, our collective exhale after an emotional day.

We have a lot on our minds. Very soon, after three and a half years in Perth, we will move back to San Francisco. Every day someone asks how we feel about this, and every day our feelings are different. Some days I am excited about Ocean Beach and burritos, and other times the grief sits heavy on my shoulders like a toddler. Being available for my children’s varied emotions, acknowledging my own, plus handling ten thousand logistics is exhausting.

Books are in piles all over the house because we gave away our bookcases. The big gray couch is gone, as is the rug. Artwork is propped up against the wall and large plastic bins are labeled Go Through and Donate? Some evenings, a neighbor will pop by to pick up a side table or a lamp. Recently, a painter was here to repair holes in the wall. He was originally from North Carolina and said Trump is the greatest president we’ve ever had.

Happy 6:08.

The best days are the ones where I forget. But it is getting harder to forget we’re moving when the bedroom dresser is gone and my underwear is in a basket on the floor.

I stare at the birds. The sighing ravens, the kookaburras, cockatoos, the adorable willy wagtails, and of course, the black and white magpies. Some magpies can remember faces for up to twenty years. Hey there, I said to one perched on my car’s side mirror. Remember me.

Last night, after the alarm went off, my older daughter looked up from her book and asked if we can keep the watch for San Francisco. It’ll be fun to hear it beeping there, she said. Of course, I told her. I didn’t add that 6:08 p.m. is the middle of the night in California.

This is the hardest part, I tell my children. The time right before we leave. The goodbyes.

The hardest part for me is wondering if I did the right thing by bringing them here, and if I’m doing the right thing by leaving. Of course there are no answers to impossible questions, so I will cross my fingers and break their hearts to make them stronger.

My daughter wanted to go to a farm and thought we needed snacks for the car but I said it’s just thirty minutes away. She brought Oreos just in case. And two bottles of water, a stuffed lion, and a deck of cards. Twenty minutes later, we arrived in the Swan Valley.

We hopped in the back of a truck and the farmer drove out onto the paddock where we hand-fed cows cabbage and tomatoes. Their tongues were long and coarse, and scratched our palms as they slurped up their salad. My daughter told me to distract the pushy one with the horns so she could call out to the shy one. Juicy tomato for you, come here girl. I put my face close to a brown cow and she licked me. Her eyelashes were an inch long and her nostrils blew air that smelled surprisingly sweet.

Eight piglets were born recently but the mother sat on one of them so now there were seven. Good thing you didn’t sit on me, my daughter said. I told her I could sit on her now and chased her but her legs are like harpoons and even in her rainboots – she calls them gumboots now – she easily outran me. The piglets were just as fast. We didn’t try to catch one because the mother was watching us closely and, for someone who smothered her baby, was very protective. The big pigs ate piles of lettuce and onions, and whole melons in just three bites.

Hundreds of chickens paraded by in stop-motion. One rooster launched himself on top of a chicken and mated with her while biting her head. I don’t think she wanted that, my daughter said. I said I agreed and then mumbled something about the natural world.

Later that night, we got into bed and played Would You Rather. A farm for two years or Tokyo for two years? She said a farm if she had her family, but a big city if she were alone. We talked about her sister who is down south with friends and her father who is in a big city on the other side of the world. There are so many ways to live, I said, yawning.

Our family will move back to San Francisco in July. We will leave this land of infinite space, this land of stories and sharks. I will seek out California farms so we can hold baby chicks and slow everything down. I will swim in the bay and the cold water will once again save me from sorrow. I love Australia but there are many other ways to live.

I recently escaped to Rottnest Island to do some writing. Off the coast of Perth, Rottnest is best known for its population of quokkas, its sandy beaches, and its car-free quietude. It is windy and peaceful, and my brain is happy there.

My family joined me for the weekend. The kids brought friends I will call Alice and Holly.

One hot afternoon, my daughter Willa, Alice, Holly, and I rode our bicycles up and down hills, across the island, to a quiet snorkeling bay called Parker Point. We drank from our water bottles and couldn’t wait to walk down the rocky steps to dive into the cool, turquoise water. The girls ran to the public toilet to change into their swimsuits. As I waited for them, I looked down at the reef below, at the reflection of a single white cloud. It was a beautiful day.

My reverie was interrupted by a child screaming, “Mom!” Willa was walking quickly away from the toilet, holding onto Alice who was hunched over, crying. Holly, the youngest of the three, ran to me and said simply, “We need you.”

Alice was doubled over, shaking and crying, her long hair masking her face. “Something bit her,” Willa said.

I dropped my water bottle and knelt in front of Alice. I moved her hair to one side. “What hurts, sweetie? What happened?”

And then, with a slight lisp, poor sweet Alice uttered the following:

“A scorpion stung me in my mouth.”

I am now going to pause so you can hear that again.

“A scorpion stung me in my mouth.”

While this verbal batter sets in your mind’s oven, let’s review the facts:

1. I was with three children, two of whom were not mine, in the most remote corner of a remote island off the coast of the most remote city in the world.
2. Scorpions kill people.

“Let’s sit you down,” I told Alice, as I led her to a fallen log. “Show me.”

Trembling, she opened her mouth and lifted her tongue. Sure enough, in the soft gum pocket under her tongue was a bright red patch. She sobbed. “It hurts.”

“Ouch,” I said, cringing. It looked painful.

Willa and Holly sat on either side of Alice, stroking her back. The three of them looked at me anxiously, reminding me I was the adult.

I took a deep breath. “Are you sure it was a scorpion?” I asked Alice.

Yes, she was sure. As she was removing her shirt, she caught a glimpse of it just before it fell into her mouth. It stung her and she spit it out.

“Look at me,” I said to Alice. I stared into her eyes, and searched her face for signs of… decline?

I rested my hand on her knee and said, “Yesterday, when you and I both got stung by jellyfish, that wasn’t too bad, was it?” I wasn’t sugar coating. It actually wasn’t that bad, as far as jellyfish stings go. She shook her head, agreeing with me.

I went on. “So say that pain was a three out of ten. What is your pain right now?”

“Nine.”

“Ok,” I said, taking a breath. “You’ll be ok.”

Shocked to discover my phone had two bars, I called the Rottnest Visitor’s Centre. I explained what had happened and where we were. The young woman on the phone confirmed there was a medical clinic in the center of town (by “town” here, I mean three shops) and it was open now.

“No one can come get you,” said the woman.

“I’m sorry?” I did not believe her.

“You can catch the bus.” There was a shuttle bus that circled the island. “Good luck!” she said in a tone more appropriate directed at someone about to do karaoke.

I put my phone away and checked on Alice. She was crying hard but neither frothing at the mouth nor having problems breathing, which I took to be positive signs.

Willa spotted a bus coming and sprinted to wave it down. I ran over as he opened the door. The sun was beating down on my face. I squinted up at him and explained the emergency.

He removed his hat and said, “I reckon it’ll take over an hour to get you to the clinic. I gotta make several stops on the way.”

“But this is an emergency,” I pleaded. “My daughter’s friend was stung by a scorpion.”

“I’m sorry ma’am. I have to pull over at every stop on my route.”

I decided that the quickest way to the island doctor was to get back on our bicycles and ride as fast as we could, up and over hills, into town. As I crouched in front of Alice, a quokka hopped by with a joey in her pouch.

I remembered my midwife.

Twelve years ago, when I was deep in labor with Willa and beginning to push, my midwife listened to the baby’s heartbeat and informed me the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck. She pulled an oxygen mask over my face, leaned close to me, and said something I have never forgotten. “I need you to get this baby out right now.” I pushed as hard as I could, and minutes later, Willa was born, healthy and inquisitive.

“I need you to get back on your bicycle,” I said to Alice in my most serious voice. She shook her head violently back and forth. I repeated myself and added, “This is the only way we can get you help. We need to bike as fast as we can, to the medical clinic.”

Willa looked at me in shock. How would her friend manage a bicycle in her current state?

Holly looked confused and slightly disappointed. I think she was hoping we were still going snorkeling.

“I can’t do it,” Alice said.

Of course she couldn’t do it. A scorpion just stung her in the mouth.

“Yes you can,” I said. “And you will. We all will. Let’s go.” I secured her helmet.

Those next forty minutes were a whirlwind of sweat, leg cramps, empty water bottles, and persistent cheering. “You can do it, Alice!” we kept yelling. “You’re doing a great job!” People passed us, smiling at all the positive reinforcement. They had no idea.

As we rode, I periodically asked Alice to rate her pain. By the time we arrived at the clinic, it had gone from a nine to a six. She even laughed when I suggested she keep her mouth shut in bathrooms from now on.

The doctor was wonderful. He confirmed that yes, there are “heaps” of scorpions on Rottnest but they are not deadly. We left the clinic with pain medicine and icy poles. I called Alice’s mother, and was reassured by her quintessential Aussie response: laughter. We stayed in that night, in our cabin overlooking the ocean, and watched the Olympics. Those aerial skiers are nuts.

I wake up at six-thirty to helicopters circling overhead. They are loud and the house is shaking. It is the last day of summer break in Western Australia, with a new school year starting tomorrow.

I reach for my phone. A friend who lives around the corner has written, “Hi Bek, I’m sorry to text you at this ridiculous hour but there is a fire at Kings Park. It’s quite bad. We have left the house but didn’t want to leave you sleeping if you hadn’t heard about it! I’ll send you the warning website. Cheers.”

Kings Park is two blocks away. I stumble out of the bedroom in my soft, slightly stained, button-down Eileen West nightgown leftover from my breastfeeding days, and find my husband in the kitchen. I show him the text. “I was wondering why there were so many helicopters flying around,” he says, sipping his coffee. “I guess we should wake the kids.” He seems nonchalant. I can’t decide how I feel about this.

The kids are sound asleep. The one on the top bunk is crammed against the railing due to the astonishing number of stuffed animals in her bed. “Girls,” I whisper. “You have to get up.” They don’t budge. “Girls,” I repeat loudly, “I need you to get up right now. We have to leave the house. There’s a fire.”

They sit up slowly. “I was in the middle of a dream,” one says. The other one rubs her eyes and asks, “Should we take Finn?”

I hadn’t considered the cat. I would have left the cat behind. I am a monster.

“Of course we’re taking Finn,” I say. “Get dressed.”

I return to my bedroom and shove our passports, two books and my laptop into a backpack. I pull on hiking shorts because they wash easily and this will be my only outfit for a long time. I snap on my fancy watch that I will pass on to one of my children someday, and slip on my wedding ring, which I haven’t worn recently due to Itchy Eczema Finger. I rub sunscreen on my face in case we need to sleep outside. Not in the park because that’s where the fire is, but possibly on the sidewalk outside of the shelter, in case it’s overcrowded or unsafe. By then, we will have made evacuation friends with whom we can play games and talk about the fire. I throw in a deck of cards, a notebook, and a few pens.

My husband enters the bedroom and announces, “I’m taking a quick shower.”

“Really?” I say.

“I’ll be fast,” he says.

Great. We are going to be living in a shelter and my husband will be freshly exfoliated and smell like lavender while the rest of us are dirty and clinging to the cat.

One daughter hands me her journal, a novel, and the stuffed animal she received for her first birthday. “Can you put these in your bag?”

The other daughter pulls on her gray sweatshirt that says “I’m So Freaking Cold,” and declares, “I don’t think I need anything.” She is smiling. She is often charmed by the possibility of disaster. (We started watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer the other night. She asked if Buffy was going to die and I told her no, I’ve watched the whole series and she doesn’t die. “But, she could, right?” I sighed and said, “Fine, I guess she could.”)

We check the warning website and can’t figure out whether or not to leave. Wouldn’t a police officer have thumped on our door by now? Wouldn’t someone have a megaphone? The garbage truck just came by for goodness sake. The sky is bright blue.

I turn on the news. A national morning show is doing a segment called “Smashed Avo.” Apparently the price of avocadoes has skyrocketed. And now we have Bruno Mars winning a Grammy, and then a two-year old was found wandering his Sydney neighborhood alone. His babysitter had fallen asleep on the couch and the little boy put on his shoes and went for a walk. “He put his sneakers on!” I tell the girls. “How cute is that?”

“Aren’t we supposed to evacuate?” one of them asks.

My husband informs us the warning website has downgraded the fire. There is no threat to lives or homes. He is going to work. “You’re leaving us?” I say. He glances at the news. An interviewer is gushing over skateboarding sisters who hope to make the 2020 Olympics. “My kids are spewing that I’m meeting you both in the flesh.”

“You’re fine,” my husband says, kissing me, and leaves the house.

It is seven-thirty. Helicopters are still circling but we don’t need to go anywhere. I kick off my sneakers and think about all the things I would have forgotten to take with me. My mother’s diamonds, letters from my father, my mother-in-law’s photo album. I turn off the news and ask the girls if we should make waffles. My younger daughter, still wearing her sweatshirt, whips the cream while my older daughter sets the table and giggles. “From now on, we should call these Evacuation Waffles.”

****

Evacuation Waffles

• 1 small container fresh whipping cream
• 2 cups frozen fruit (we used berries and mango)
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 2 eggs, separated
• 1 ¾ cups milk
• 1 ¾ cups flour
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• ¼ cup vegetable oil
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt

1. Whip fresh cream and set aside.
2. Toss frozen fruit with a splash of water in a saucepan. Heat slowly until bubbly. Add a touch of cornstarch to thicken. Keep warm on stove.
3. Beat egg yolks, stir in milk and oil. Add flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Stir just until large lumps disappear. Beat egg whites until stiff and gently fold into batter. Bake and serve with whipped cream and compote.

No one wants to hear about anyone else’s dream but last night I fell in love with a man with cerebral palsy. The more surprising thing was that he was barely twenty, and built like a lamp post. His mouth twisted when he spoke and he said funny things and pulled me onto his lap.

I woke up next to an international marketing saleswoman. Orthotic insoles. We were on a plane, flying from San Francisco to Sydney. She was going to Australia for ten days of meetings and also no one wants to hear about the person you sat next to on a plane.

I thought I would have moved back to the U.S. by now but this was just a visit. The saleswoman would be staying in Sydney and I would continue onto Perth. My husband was already there and had asked me what I wanted from the grocery store. Summer fruit, I had texted. Nectarines, peaches, something juicy.

Look, I said to the saleswoman, pointing at the window. She was reading a book called either A Whole New Mind, or Right Brain Rising. Both of these phrases were at the tops of the pages and I couldn’t recall if the title went on the left and the chapter on the right, or vice versa. Look at the sun, I said.

Generally I am not a talker on planes, but occasionally feel the need to point out the fact that we are in the sky and the clouds look like waves or the black specks could be mountains. Sometimes I add something about being in a flying machine built by humans, using words like majestic and illusion.

The sun was bright and round, and, through the shaded window, a veiny violet hue. The sky was dark and the clouds were lavender, a vampire’s bubble bath. Wow, she said, craning her neck, her long French manicured nails resting across the pages of her book. She looked like my brother’s mother-in-law but why would I say that to her.

My children were across the aisle. I tapped one of them with my foot. Look out the window, I said. My daughter put down the iPad because she knows that when her mother becomes a docent, it is easier to look at the thing than make a fuss. She said it looked like a book cover but couldn’t remember which one.

I have done this trip many times now, from one end of the world to the other. I have departed at midnight and landed the same day, hours earlier. Flying west, over the Pacific Ocean, I miss a day. I wish I remembered all the days I have missed. It feels wrong to overlook them, like forgetting the death of an acquaintance. On this trip, somewhere in the middle of the Emma Stone tennis movie, I breezed through the fifteenth of January.

The saleswoman asked me about the movie and I asked her about her book. She said it was called A Whole New Mind and I tried to look surprised, like I hadn’t peeked earlier. She said she likes self-help stuff and tugged lightly on her beige turtleneck sweater. I like to read them during big life changes, she said, clearing her throat. I nodded, and resisted the urge to squeeze her arm.

I shared the first self-helpy thing that came to mind, which is the expression, everything you want in life is on the other side of fear. She said she hoped to remember that, so I ripped out a page of my journal and wrote it down for her. Sorry, I shrugged. I don’t know if I have it right, or who said it. It doesn’t matter, she said. It’s so true.

We looked out the window again, at the big purple sun. I don’t know what she was thinking, but I was thinking about how we’re in a flying machine built by humans.