A Box From Bundaberg (Lindsay Ratcliffe)

A Box from Bundaberg

by Lindsay Ratcliffe

Harry, my 6 week-old baby, roused just before 5am, with a pre-cry gurgle. I leapt from the blissful ignorance of sleep, conditioned to respond in whiplash time before the gurgle shattered into a ravenous, torturous cry. I carried him out of the bedroom, glaring enviously at his oblivious dead-to-the-world father, who responded to my absence by rolling over into the warmth of my space and the comfort of my duck-down pillows.

I entered the lounge, aware of an intense glow, as if the room was bathed in the light of a raging fire. I looked out of the window and where the sky should still have been the colour of the dark slumber of the last hour before the dawn, a thick blanket of red dust suffocated the world. I could see nothing of the trees, apartment blocks and city skyline that was usually the view from my third floor apartment. Instead, the little I could see, was swathed in a crimson fog that looked like it had escaped from hell itself.

Harry’s hungry cry brought my attention back to an immediately more pressing matter. I fumbled with one hand trying to connect the gaping mouth with my breast, while fingering the TV remote with the other hand to see if there was any explanation for the Mars-like atmosphere outside. The early news reported that gale-force winds had carried dust and sand from the Westerly deserts to settle in large clouds over Sydney and its sprawling suburbs. It was eagerly followed by a recommendation from the director of Environmental Health that the aged and the very young and anyone with respiratory difficulties should remain indoors.

A superstitious or religious person might have seen this as an ominous portent of a bigger catastrophe to come. However not being able to see much beyond the next couple of hours I just merely dismayed by the fact I was supposed to attend baby clinic at 10am followed by a mothers’ group lunch at midday and was now unable to. They were the only events on my calendar for the entire week and instead I was to be imprisoned in my own home by clouds of red dust.

Less than ten weeks ago I had a very different life. I was the head of public relations at a Foxtel. I had a network, I had a schedule and I had control. Ten months before that I had a wonderful life that was more than just a successful career, it was centred more on a fabulous non-work life. My weekends were booked months in advance, weeknights similarly so with friends, events, openings, shows, parties and had-to-be-seen in bars and restaurants. The rest of my life was glued together by Adam, the father of my child, my husband of 2 years and boyfriend of 7 years, who I loved, respected and above all still fancied the pants off! We had a mutual appreciation of life, which saw us both with enough time to pursue our own careers and interests and enough time together to still make the relationship work. He was also a head of, some division that changed its name as frequently as it’s product disclosure statements, in a blue-chip insurance company. We enjoyed life so much that somewhere along the track, we had silently, but mutually, agreed that children didn’t factor into our life equation.

That was, until the little window at the end of the fortune telling plastic stick revealed a blue positive symbol that heralded the growth of a baby in my belly. While we didn’t actively plan to have children neither of us could justify taking deliberate action to change the situation. We were adaptable, agile; so we shifted our schedule and decided we could fit a baby into our plans. The reality of course is that most of the shifting and changing was done by me. I swapped the tailored blouses, heels and the cocktails in of-the-moment bars for over-sized t-shirts, swollen ankles and instant hot chocolate alone in front of the TV. As my belly grew towards beached-whale size proportions, Adam was home less and less. I didn’t complain so much as drop subtle hints. However his mitigation was that he needed to give his work as much attention as he could now, so that he could spend time with us when the baby arrived.

Despite what he said, Adam took only 2 days paternity leave, which started on the Monday morning that I went into labour and ended with him returning to work on the Wednesday morning only ten hours after his son was born.

Being confined to the four walls of our Pyrmont apartment, that hadn’t intended to house children, was bad enough but knowing I would miss out on my week’s social activities was salt in my wounds. But to add insult to injury the particles of dust and sand that permeated the air was aggravating the delicate trachea and sinuses of Harry and as a consequence he spent the rest of the morning letting me know just how uncomfortable he was.

Somewhere around 11am the unexpected buzz of the intercom put a welcome stop to my tragic renditions of out-of-date and out-of-tune nursery rhymes. I had a brief altercation with the courier about whether he could make an unauthorised trip to the third floor, I pleaded ‘new-baby’ and he reluctantly relented and arrived via the lift at my door. I scrawled an illegible signature, which I was positive would not hold up in a court of law if I sued for non-delivery, onto a PDA device and took possession of my surprise package.

I set the small box on the table wanting to preserve the intrigue for as long as possible. Had I have gone out this morning as planned I wouldn’t have been home to receive the parcel. It gave me something else to focus on except being trapped indoors by the dust storm. I’d received parcels in a moderate flow over the first few weeks since the baby was born, but as far as I knew all the relatives and good friends who were likely to shower us with baby gifts had already furnished us. So this parcel was something of a mystery.

The parcel was from, a G Kelly, a name I didn’t recognise and the return address was Bundaberg. Both my husband and I are from England originally and have boomeranged between London and Sydney for the last 7 years. I was fairly certain that neither my husband nor myself knew anyone in the state of Queensland, never mind the town of Bundaberg. More intriguing was the fact that it was addressed to ‘Baby Harry Stokes’.

I was enjoying the distraction and decided to leave the parcel unopened; at least for a little while longer. However the parcel sat on the table in the middle of the lounge, like an island in the middle of a busy waterway. It was goading me but I was quite determined.

The phone rang. It was Sam, one of the other mothers from the group, calling for consolation about also being imprisoned by the storm. In my pre-baby days it was highly unlikely that Sam and I would have ever collided in the same social circle but at the moment she was the closest I had to a best friend. The changes in my post-baby life were seismic for me. The friends with whom I’d trust my darkest desires and secrets I found I no longer had anything in common with. All they wanted to talk about was either partying, social gossip or work; none of which I could relate to anymore. All I had to talk about was the latest miniscule changes in my baby, which was apparently not of the slightest bit of interest to anyone other than me.

Other than the storm, the parcel had been the most exciting event of the day so far so I told Sam about it and the fact that it was still sat unopened on the lounge-room table. She was as devoid of excitement as I was, being in the same baby-storm imprisoned situation, so goaded me to open it. I gave in. I cradled the phone between my ear and left shoulder and grabbed the parcel. As if on cue, the moment I started to pick at the clear packing tape that sealed the box, Harry started to cry.

“I’m going to have to call you back. His lordship is awake!”

“No, wait, you can’t do this to me. Just open the box! I want to know what’s in it.”

“Sorry, I need to settle him before he gets hysterical.”

I put the phone down before she could protest further.

I went into see Harry. He was grizzling but his eyes were still closed. Normally I would spend time rocking him, stroking him and singing to him to persuade him to go back to sleep. This time I decided to break my own rule and take the easy option of giving him the dummy to suck on.

With Harry resettled in the nursery I went into our bedroom, which was also now our office. I powered up the laptop and took it back to the lounge, still averse to using the computer in the bedroom. I launched the address book and searched for an entry for Kelly. The only Kelly I knew was a Kelly by first name not by surname and she lived a couple of suburbs from me in Sydney, not Bundaberg. So I launched Firefox and checked my Google mail, just on the remote chance that I had saved the name there and not synched it with my address book. However the results confirmed that I didn’t know anyone with the surname Kelly from Bundaberg.

I picked up the box again and looked at it for clues, still unsure as to why I didn’t want to open it. The box wasn’t new. It had been used before and recycled by the sender. A label had been used to cover the previous details and our address was written in quite a meticulous, probably female, handwriting.

The phone rang again. I expected it to be Sam.

“No, I haven’t opened it yet!”

“Hello to you too and what haven’t you opened?”

I laughed.

“Hey Adam, sorry I thought it was Sam. We were having a conversation before when the baby started to cry and…oh never mind. How’s your morning? Survived the trip to work in the dust storm?”

“Uurggh it’s disgusting out here, you’re better off staying indoors.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“What do you mean?”

“I just mean it’s easy to say stay indoors when you have a choice. I was really looking forward to getting out this morning.”

“So why don’t you go then?”

He sounded distracted and impatient. I hated it when he called me when he was busy.

“They don’t recommend it for babies.”

“Oh right, well yeah I guess that makes sense. Ummm anything else exciting happened this morning?”

“As if! Oh well actually as you mention it, it did. I got a mystery parcel delivered about an hour ago.”

“Oh, who’s it from?”

“I don’t know! That’s the mystery.”

“What’s in it?”

“I haven’t opened it yet.”

“Huh? Why not? Why don’t you just open it and find out who sent it?”

I could hear someone in the background telling him the meeting was about to start.

“Well the name and address of the person who sent it is on the box, it’s just I don’t know who it is and I’ve searched the address book…”

“Listen hun, I’ve got to go…meeting…sorry.”

I knew I was clutching at straws but thought I’d try anyway.

“Do you know anyone in Bundaberg?”

“What?”

“The parcel, it’s from someone in Bundaberg.”

There was no response.

“A ‘G Kelly’. Anyone you know?”

“G Kelly?” he emphasised the G.

“Yeah. Mean anything to you?”

“Erm I gotta go. Sounds like it’s not for us.”

“But it’s addressed to Harry.”

“Maybe leave it until I get home. I’ll see you later”

With that the call ended.

I can’t tell you why but as I redirected my focus from untimely ending to the conversation with my husband and focussed back on the parcel I realised anxiety was welling in the pit of my stomach to the extent that I felt nauseous. I was also developing a headache. I knew this was crazy and that I had no reason to feel intimidated by this stupid parcel.

I picked up the box and tore at the tape, ripping the address label. The phone rang again. I let the answer machine get it. It was Sam.

“Comon! Don’t be so selfish! You know I’ve nothing to look forward to! What’s in the box?”

There was tissue paper in the box. I tore that open to expose a couple of cute baby-grows with matching bibs. I don’t know what I was expecting but I felt momentary relief to know it was just another present for Harry. Although, there was no labels on the items and I wondered briefly if they were pre-loved.

The phone rang again. Thinking it was Sam was being persistent to the extent it was almost annoying, I told her so.

“God! Won’t you give me a minute!”

“Anna, it’s me. Did you open the box yet?”

It was Adam.

“What’s with the interest around this box? I’m just doing it now…”

“Can you leave it? I’m coming home.”

“What? When.”

“Now. I’m getting in a cab. I’ll be there in 15 minutes.”

“What do you mean? Why?”

“Just promise me you’ll leave the box?”

“Erm, sure... Adam what’s this about?”

“Just promise! I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

He knew me. He knew I wouldn’t wait. That’s why he was heading home.

I put the baby grows and bibs to one side. I carefully lifted out the small solid square object, still wrapped and unscathed in the remaining tissue paper. I peeled back the paper to reveal a small photo album. It’s a normal gift given the circumstances, so why then was Adam so insistent that I didn’t open it? And why the hell did I feel so apprehensive?

I flicked open the photo album and instead of blank pages I saw pictures of a baby. A baby who looked remarkably like Harry but as his mother I knew this wasn’t Harry.

I fanned the pages looking for any other clues. Every page had a different photo of this unknown infant, except the very back page, which had a message.

“Dearest Harry, the clothes no longer fit me so I thought you might be able to make some use out them while you’re still little. They were my favourites, I hope you’ll like them too. I thought I’d let you know what I look like. Hopefully we’ll be able to meet soon. Lots of coos and gurgles. Your brother, James, 14 weeks old.”