Rebecca Handler

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.