The models are tall, willowy, blonde, sun-kissed fantasy cowgirls. Uma isn’t any of those things but she’s sure she can carry off his signature look.
The shirt is her mum’s. Uma has trimmed the collar with rhinestones, the sleeves with fringing. The sleeves drag. Uma turns them up. Better. She combs her fringe flat. It’s too short but she likes the wavy edge her mum’s pinking scissors have given it. She tucks her stonewashed jeans into her boots and looks in the mirror. Ralph Lauren, eat your heart out.
Her mum is out on the island this morning, with a customer. She isn’t happy with Uma. Last night they had one of their talks.
‘You must try to fit in.’
‘I do fit in,’ she told her firmly, ‘but in my own way.’
The house is quiet without the whirring of her mum’s sewing machine. The Singer, too awkward to dismantle, takes up most of the kitchen table. Next to it sits the sewing box Uma has just raided. It is stuffed full of braiding, threads, zips, buttons and scraps of fabric. When she was little, her mum let her play with the scraps. So many shapes, patterns, textures and colours. The possibilities were endless.
She stands by the window spooning Cornflakes from a bowl. Outside is sodden and grey, the hillside smothered in mist. There are no trees here. The winds would take them, her mum says. No woodlands or forest to hunt or hide in. In summer the hillside is covered in flowers. Short-stemmed with tiny heads, they cling to the earth. So unlike the big, blowsy roses and peonies her mum used to grow. Uma planted pansies for her, in a pot by the front door. Something to cheer her spirits. The plastic pot was too light and disappeared in a summer gale.
The stream behind the cottage is swollen from recent rainfall. Uma once found a listless frog on its bank. Prodded it with a stick to make it jump. Its back legs stretched then folded beneath it. She prodded it again. No response. Uma cupped it in her hands, brought it indoors. Her mum made her take it straight out. Told her to be sure to put it back where it came from. No creature, not even a frog, should be removed from its natural habitat.
‘What’s habitat?’ Uma asked.
‘The place it lives.’ Her mum had learnt the word in her reading class. ‘It needs its home to survive.’
‘But it’s sick.’
‘Put it back.’
‘You took us from our habitat.’
‘That’s different. I had to.’
Uma returns the cereal box to the pantry. Tucked on the top shelf is a magazine. She stands on a chair to reach it.Vogue. Her heart gives a little skip. Uma runs her hand over the shiny paper. It is cold and silky to the touch. She shakes her head. How could they put a library stamp on it? The cover’s ruined.
Inside is a special feature on him. At home on his Colorado ranch, with his wife and children. Midwestern casual, mahogany tans and perfect white smiles.
‘Why can’t we go to America?’ she asked her mum.
‘They won’t take us.’
‘Why?’
‘Not enough places. Maybe in the future.’
She made the future sound a very long time away.
Her mum makes clothes too. Not as well as him, obviously, but still pretty good. Outfits for women she barely knows. Beautifully tailored dresses, jackets and suits designed to make them feel good.
‘We all need a little glamour in our lives,’ her mum says.
Uma doesn’t need convincing.
Her mum puts her skill as a seamstress down to application. She learnt that word from Uma’s school report. With more application, Uma’s numeracy should improve. Uma is going to be a fashion designer. What good will sums do her?
‘You must put a hundred percent into everything you do’, her mum scolded.
‘Even if you’re not interested?’
‘Effort is the making of a good character.’
Her mum has that wrong. Effort can’t build good character, not if you have an evil one to start with.
Their old neighbour played the trombone. Badly. Still brought it out every festival. He was a happy fellow, a big bear of a man. Always laughing, telling jokes. You wouldn’t think he could butcher people with the same dedication he had to trombone playing.
Uma hears the key in the lock, her mum’s heavy sigh as she wipes her feet on the mat. She runs to the sofa and slides the magazine under the cushion. Her mum seems confused, as if she’s walked into the wrong house.
‘Uma? What are you...? Why are you not at school?’
‘Sore throat.’
Her mum looks her up and down. ‘Is that my shirt?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh Uma.’ Her shoulders droop. She looks as if she might cry. ‘I can’t do this any more.’
Uma feels a tightness in her stomach, doesn’t know what to say.
‘Every day, I try my best.’ There is a catch in her mum’s voice. ‘For both of us and you...’
‘Mum, I...’
‘Why must you make trouble? Huh? What will I say? The school has already warned me.’
‘You’ve spoken to my teachers?’
‘They said they’d report me if I let it happen again.’
‘It’s not your fault.’
‘Doesn’t matter. If a child misses school, they blame the parents.’
‘That’s not fair. Dad’s not even here.’
‘None of it is fair.’
Uma goes to her mum. She throws her arms around her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says, ‘for everything.’
With deft fingers and the finest of needles her mum stitches the delicate lace border to yards of white tulle. A veil for the young bride to be. Is she thinking back to her own wedding day? Another country. Another life.
Uma pictures her mum’s striking face, framed with lace. Large eyes, green like spring grass. Dark lustrous hair. Uma has the same dark hair but her eyes are small, round, blue. Must take after her dad. Yes of course she does. She hasn’t forgotten.
She misses him. Her mum does too but has trained herself not to show it. Uma read, in a beauty column, that the eyes are the window to the soul. If so, her mum is shutting off her soul.
Her mum glances up, sees Uma watching her. ‘Hungry?’
The last of the Djuvec is reheating in the stove. Made with the lamb the man brought her. Island lamb is good. Tender and slightly sweet. The animals are free to roam the pastures, hillsides and shoreline, grazing all summer on wild grasses, heather and seaweed. Gives it a special flavour. He’s promised rabbit today. Her mum never refuses the meat parcels he brings. Doesn’t like to offend. He is a good friend to them, she tells her, but Uma knows there is no such thing.
Her dad snared rabbits in the woods behind their house. Before the fighting closed in on them, he showed her what to do.
‘Once it’s caught, kill it like this.’ With a chopping motion of his hand he delivered two sharp blows to the back of its head. ‘Swift and sure so the animal doesn’t suffer. Then put your finger in its eye.’ He stepped away. ‘You try.’
The rabbit’s eyeball felt wet and squidgy. It blinked when she touched it. Uma jumped.
‘It’s not dead. Hit it again, hard, one more time. Think you can do it?”
Uma nodded.
‘Good girl.’ He patted her on the back. ‘Your mum can’t.’
As they eat their stew at cramped place settings next to the sewing machine, there is a knock on the door. Her mum opens it. The man stands holding a rabbit by its hind legs. Shot fresh this morning. Does she want it? She shakes her head. She doesn’t invite him in.
‘I can skin it for you,’ he says.
The scream rises from deep inside Uma. ‘Take it away!’
The man places the rabbit in a hessian sack, horrified his gift has caused upset. ‘I didn’t mean to scare her.’
‘Go, please.’ She shuts the door. ‘Uma?’
Her mum’s voice sounds distant.
Uma is in the woods with her dad. He is on his back, staring at the sky. ‘Tata?’ she calls. He doesn’t move. The first prickle of fear. She goes closer. Still he doesn’t move. She thinks ... Uma feels sick, needs to be sure. She crouches down and, with her index finger, gently probes the pupil of his eye. No blink. Her mum is beside her now. ‘He’s...’
‘I know.’ She holds Uma until the trembling stops. ‘Bring me your magazine.’
Uma searches under the sofa cushion. ‘I was going to take it back.’
Her mum turns the pages. ‘Shall we make something together?’
Uma doesn’t answer.
‘What about this?’ Her mum’s voice is soft, cautious. She points to a girl in a long floral skirt. Ralph’s prairie look.
Uma wrinkles her nose. ‘No. Let’s go for Navajo.’