LITMIR.BIZ

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concentration.

      Suddenly, he stilled, as if aware of how close they were standing. “Speaking of time, it’s getting late.” He handed the clock back to her, cautious about making contact, either by skin or by eye.

      Rafe walked back to the dining room. Lexie followed carrying the clock. He began packing up his briefcase. His movements appeared casual, but she noticed he was cramming papers in any old how.

      “I’ll be back tomorrow,” Rafe said. “I suggest you keep looking—”

      Someone knocked.

      Before Lexie could answer it, the front door opened. Her mother, Hetty, stood on the step in a long tunic top and flowing cotton pants, a suitcase in either hand. Her spiky gray hair stood up from her head.

      “Mom,” Lexie said, going forward to embrace her. “What are you doing here? Is everything all right?”

      “No, it’s not,” Hetty said tartly. “Your father and I had a terrible fight. I’m moving in with you.” She stepped inside, and noticed Rafe. “Sorry. I didn’t know you had company.”

      “He’s not company, he’s—” Lexie broke off. “Moving in?”

      RAFE SLIPPED OUT while Lexie bombarded her mother with questions and Hetty made vague and weary responses. He got behind the wheel of his ten-year-old Mazda and had to slam the door twice before it would stay shut.

      He glanced at his fishing rod lying across the backseat. That would have to wait another day. He was tired and Murphy, his dog, would be waiting for him. As it was, he had to drive home in the late-afternoon heat through the tail end of rush hour traffic. With the windows rolled down because the air-conditioning didn’t work, he headed north, away from Melbourne’s bayside suburbs and into the Dandenong Mountains.

      Mulling over the day, he found himself worrying about Lexie, if she would find her envelopes, if she could pay her taxes—

      He was doing it again. Getting involved, feeling compassion.

      Hell.

      “YOUR TAX AUDITOR is rather gorgeous.” Hetty dumped her suitcase on the antique quilt covering the single bed in Lexie’s spare room. “Where did you find him?”

      “He’s not mine, he belongs to the government. And he’s turning my house upside down,” Lexie said from the doorway. “I wish he was never coming back.”

      Did she? Or was she already thinking she’d wash her hair tonight.

      “It’s no fun being audited but surely it’s just a matter of letting him do his job.” Hetty opened her suitcase and started to unpack.

      “The problem is, I can’t find the envelopes that have all my tax receipts in them. They’re somewhere in the house but I have no idea where. Plus I’m going to have to pay back taxes with money I don’t have. Plus I have to finish Sienna’s portrait because the deadline for the Archibald is coming up and I can’t tell what’s missing but something is. Something crucial.” Lexie’s voice seemed to have risen an octave. She sucked in a breath. “I’ve been blocked for ages. All I can do is paint stupid beach huts and make pencil sketches—”

      She broke off, thinking about the sketch of Rafe and how there was a hint of something tragic in his eyes. She would try to capture that tomorrow. No, she wouldn’t. Tomorrow she would work on Sienna. Or find the envelopes.

      “Oh, God. My life is unfolding like a Greek tragedy.”

      “Don’t overdramatize. Everything will be fine.” Hetty draped a cotton blouse over a hanger. “I know you. You get blocked and it feels as if it’ll be forever. Then one day something clicks and away you go again.”

      Lexie slumped onto the bed. “I hope you’re right.”

      Hetty went to hang the blouse and clicked her tongue at the crowded closet. She pushed through the hangers and brought out a faded pink dress. “Honestly, Lexie, I recognize this from when you went to art school. Why not get rid of it?”

      Lexie’s mouth dried as she recalled being seventeen and living away from home in her first year at art school. She’d bought the dress because the cut was loose and hid her thickening waist. No one in her family knew, then or now, that she’d been pregnant.

      “It holds memories. I—I can’t throw it away.” The crush of soft fabric between her fingers brought a sudden rush of grief and guilt. Why did she torture herself by keeping it around? She should get rid of it. In fact…

      What if it was all the excess stuff in her house that was blocking her? Declutter. Wasn’t that what all the women’s magazines were telling her to do?

      “On second thought…” Lexie grabbed the pink dress and an armful of hangers and hauled them out of the closet.

      Seeing space open up felt good. With a burst of enthusiasm she took down the folded piles of clothes from the shelf and threw them into the hallway along with the clothes on hangers. This might be another form of procrastination but at least it would achieve something.

      “What’s going on with you and Dad?” she asked, standing on tiptoe to reach the jigsaw puzzles. “I thought you wanted to get back together with him. I thought you were going to give him another chance.”

      “He’s not giving me another chance,” Hetty said, hanging up her blouses in the space Lexie’d created. “Even though Smedley is fine, Steve still blames me for the dog eating fox bait.” Hetty’s voice wobbled. “Steve wouldn’t even look at me at the Fun Run. It’s been two weeks now and we barely speak. While I was at the yoga retreat in Queensland he converted our house to a bachelor pad complete with car parts on the kitchen floor and a pool table in the living room.”

      “Get him to change it back.”

      “He’s never home to do anything! He’s out all the time, volunteering at the Men’s Shed Jack founded, at Toastmasters meetings….”

      “You wanted him to find a hobby,” Lexie reminded her.

      “He’s found a hobby all right.” Lexie read the anger in Hetty’s gray eyes. “Her name is Susan Dwyer.”

      Huh? Lexie dropped the puzzle boxes on top of the pile of clothes. Steve, her stolid conservative father, the man who’d been dependent on Hetty for years, had another woman? “No way. Dad wouldn’t have an affair.”

      Hetty lifted her shoulders, her mouth twisting. “What do you call it when he’s out with her three nights of the week? He says they’re on a committee to organize some speech contest or other. And he says she’s his mentor and is helping him with his entry. But he’s not the type to get caught up in committees. He has to be doing it because of her.”

      “Not necessarily,” Lexie said, trying to be fair. “Renita and I went to the Toastmasters meeting the night he did his Icebreaker speech. It was obvious he enjoys the meetings and everyone there, not just Susan Dwyer.” She paused before adding, “He really has changed while you’ve been in Queensland. Maybe you don’t know him as well as you think you do.”

      “I don’t know him at all anymore.” Hetty burst into tears. “Lexie, what am I going to do?”

      “It’ll be all right.” Dismayed, Lexie pulled her mother into a hug. “You wanted him to be more self-sufficient.”

      “I didn’t want him to stop needing me.” Hetty hiccupped on a sob. “Or loving me.”

      “He loves you. He needs you,” Lexie said helplessly. Her father had been through a lot in the past six months, including being diagnosed with type two diabetes. Renita had encouraged him to join the gym and start jogging. Steve had taken up Toastmasters of his own accord as a way to get out and meet people. He was a completely different person from the over-weight depressed man who couldn’t adjust to retirement. Everything should have been great for him and Hetty.

      “You changed when you took up yoga,”

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