Sophia's Dilemma Read online

  At interval and lunch, Sophia bolted to the toilets to get in there before the smokers. She failed miserably at lunchtime when the teacher kept the class in for being noisy. Louise and Jane came in after Sophia darted unseen into the cubicle, lighting up cigarettes over by the window and chatting. They cut an oddly lonesome couple without the vicious Sandra in their midst, revolving around Dane’s old group of alpha males like satellites orbiting the earth. Even the boys had dispersed nowadays without Sandra and Dane. Sophia tried to be as silent as possible in the toilet, fearful of attracting their vengeful brand of attention.

  “Have you told him?” Jane asked Louise and Sophia heard the exhale of cigarette smoke, putting her hand over her nose and mouth as she tried to feed the fallen toilet roll back onto the holder.

  “Yes!” came Louise’s angry reply. “He says it’s not his and he doesn’t want to know!”

  “That’s awful. You can’t let him get away with that. Of course it’s his. You and him were always doing it. You can’t bring a kid up on your own. I bet he was happy enough when you were rolling over for him, but now there’s consequences he has to step up. We’ll make him,” came Jane’s sympathetic reply. “Has he said why he won’t get involved?”

  Louise practically spat out her reply and Sophia heard the venom in her voice, “He doesn’t have to, does he? I’ve seen the way he looks at her! I hate her. I wish Sandra chopped her bloody leg right off!”

  “Aw, babe. You’re not on your own. You’ve got us and we won’t let him get away with this,” Jane whispered and there came the sound of Louise quietly sobbing.

  Sophia thought she would be physically sick. It was her they were talking about. Sandra stabbed her in the leg. Louise was pregnant with Dane’s baby. She sat on the toilet seat and put her head between her knees, passive smoking for the whole lunch hour. When the bell finally rang and the girls left the room, Sophia crawled out of her hiding space and wagged off school. She drove down to the hospital and somehow managed to park the huge vehicle in the multi-storey, but the cops wouldn’t let her in. She sat outside the ward and cried like a baby. She felt like a massive fool and they wouldn’t let her ask Dane for the truth.

  With no support network apart from Edgar, who clearly had midlife and desertion issues of his own, Sophia found herself sitting in the Anglican Cathedral on Grey Street. The main doors were thrown open in the heat and various church staff pottered around, allowing her space just to sit, unhindered. The girl envied the Catholics who could wander into their church, hop into the confessional and download all their problems onto someone else. She heard somewhere they were the sanest people around, because of the regular, free, soul unburdening they had access to.

  Sophia liked the little Baptist church her family attended. It was slightly outside the city and she grew up in it, loved and cosseted by its congregation of ready-made aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters. The night her mother turned up and took back the car, was Sophia’s first night at youth group since before Sal left. Dane drove them and Sophia stuck close to him all night.

  It all went horribly wrong as they were leaving and the youth leader asked Dane for his mobile phone number. A kind man in his forties, he had run the youth group through most of his adult life alongside his gentle wife and could be forgiven for scenting the possibility of a conversion. All night, Sophia agonised over telling everyone her mother had left them, but in the end just fudged their well-intentioned questions with shrugs and excuses. She ran smack into Dane’s back as he stopped to eyeball the youth leader. “Do you have her number?” Dane asked, pointing backwards at his girlfriend.

  The youth leader nodded, a fatal mistake, handing his own rejection to Dane on a platter. Dane fixed him with a cold, hard stare. “So how come her ma’s been missing for over two months and she hasn’t heard from any of you?”

  The room silenced and the poor man quailed visibly under the teenager’s perceptive gaze. If he knew what was coming, he wisely gave no indication. “I think I’ll pass then,” Dane said and smiled, reaching back for his mortified girlfriend’s hand and leading her out into the warm night air. Sophia said nothing all the way home, finding as she reached her ‘safe place’ that Sal had taken away the car and with it, her new found independence. Sophia’s meltdown was swift and spectacular and Dane left, leaving Edgar to cope with his distraught daughter. “You’ve got no-one,” she said under her breath, hearing her lone voice echoing off the stone around her.

  Chapter Six

  Sophia sat in the pew so long she figured when she finally stood up; there would be a line on the back of her legs from the hard wooden seat. She heard the traffic noises increasing outside and knew the school mum’s were on route to get their little darlings, clogging up the roads and school car parks with their oversize vehicles and ‘me first’ attitudes.

  A woman sat down at the other end of the pew and closed her eyes. Sophia stayed seated, so as not to disturb her by getting off the pew and clumping out in her heavy school shoes. “Oh, God, please help me?” she prayed in her head, over and over like a mantra. “Everything’s a mess and I don’t know how to sort this. What should I do?”

  She dropped forward so her forearms were on her thighs and sighed heavily. The scar from the stab was still raw when she leaned on it. Sophia pressed deliberately for a second, feeling the sharp pain and experiencing a strange satisfaction from the reality check it gave her. Sitting upright sharply and looking around her, Sophia found the woman’s eyes resting on her face. She was attractive, blonde and fair skinned, wearing a red hair band to keep her fringe back. Smiling at the girl next to her, she shivered and said, “It feels cold. I think it might be raining outside.”

  Sophia nodded. She sat in the church so long she couldn’t remember what the weather was like outside. “Rain would be good,” she sighed. It would make her feel as though the earth at least cried in sympathy for her. Nobody else would. Sophia looked more closely at the lady and noticed that she wore a grey blouse with a white clerical collar at the neck. Her eyes widened in surprise. She was young and not at all the image of a lady-vicar Sophia had in her head. “You work here?” she asked sharply, regretting the question as it came out of her mouth, sounding challenging and rude.

  The woman nodded kindly and asked her where she went to school. They had a short, superficial conversation, just smatterings of small talk really, but the woman was an incredibly good listener. The deeper stuff came once she asked Sophia if she could help her. The girl to her great shame, poured out her myriad problems one after the next until she felt empty and devoid of feeling. The church grew silent around her as people finished their work and crept away, leaving their vicar to work her miracle with the troubled teenage girl.

  “So I don’t really know what to do now,” Sophia tearfully concluded, wiping her eyes on her jumper sleeve and leaving a slug trail of tears. “I feel certain I love him, but this changes things. I mean, we never talked about any of his other girlfriends, so it’s not like he lied to me, but it seems to make our relationship dirty somehow. The girl who’s pregnant said he won’t take responsibility and it makes me doubt him. I didn’t think he would ever do that, not after what he’s been through; especially when I think how he is with Will and Maisie. Those little kids mean everything to him.”

  Despite the anger Sophia realised she felt for Dane, she hadn’t betrayed his dreadful upbringing to the kind-vicar-lady, glossing over it and cutting straight to the events of yesterday, figuring the woman could draw her own conclusions. “I don’t have any blindingly clear answers for you, but...” the vicar smiled gently at Sophia, “if you would let me, I would be honoured to pray for you.”

  So the teenage girl sat with a total stranger and received comfort and solidarity in her misery. They sat side by side on the pew and the vicar scooted along, not wanting to shout her prayer across the expanse of wood between them. She prayed for clarity for Sophia and God’s grace and blessing and she prayed for God’s favour to be on Dane right the
re and then. Sophia sniffed and blew her nose loudly into the tissue the vicar handed her.

  “I was going to drive up and see Dane’s boss tonight and offer to do his shifts for him until this is all over. Now I don’t know what to do. I feel a bit of a fool already and I don’t want to make it worse.”

  “Would that stop him losing his job, do you think?” the woman asked softly. Sophia nodded.

  “I thought it would help. I know he needs the money badly. Things are...hard for him.”

  “So what do you think is the right thing to do?” came the vicar’s voice. “Is this about him or you?”

  “I need to do it, don’t I?” Sophia came to her own sad conclusion. “I guess I have to let the past stay there. If he does have a baby with Louise, I’ll just have to deal with it when all this is over. I don’t think I can still be his girlfriend, but I owe it to him to be his friend.”

  The vicar smiled sideways at Sophia and nodded, acknowledging the strength and courage in the teenager’s decision. Sophia surprised herself by giving the lady a hug before getting up to leave. The woman stayed seated, but as Sophia gathered up her car keys and contemplated driving her father’s huge car through the rush hour traffic, the vicar said sagely, “One thing I do have for you, Sophia, are the words -‘This too shall pass’ – that’s what I feel to say to you. It’s not from the bible, but I also think that Ecclesiastes 3 is relevant for now, ‘A time to weep and a time to laugh.’ There is a season for everything and this dreadful one for you, will come to an end. Don’t lose your hope.”

  “Thank you,” the girl said, genuinely comforted by the woman’s wisdom. “You’re right. A couple of months ago it seemed like the end of the world. Mum went missing and nobody knew if she was dead or alive. Fear and dread consumed my every waking moment and now, although my feelings towards her are confused and mostly based on anger and betrayal, it doesn’t hurt like it did.” There was at least a sense of resolution. Sophia realised the thing she most needed was resolution - in everything.

  Sophia was grateful to the vicar for not even broaching the subject of forgiving Sally. She expected it, but the woman left it unsaid. Sophia closed the heavy church door feeling much better and drove Edgar’s car north to the garden centre at Rototuna. It took great courage to go in and ask for the manager. The shop was just shutting its doors as she was led to the office and made the acquaintance of a rotund, jovial man, who leapt from his chair to shake hands with her. There was a South African twang to his lilting voice and Sophia liked him straight away. He didn’t have a single tooth in his head, but when Harold smiled, it was like the sun coming out on a rainy day, filling the world with a beatific glow.

  Haltingly, the teenager explained Dane’s predicament and Harold tutted and shook his head sadly. “He does all my potting up in the evenings. I’ve got a lot ready to be done now. And Saturday’s our busiest day, so I’ll have to get someone else for tomorrow.” He shook his head and looked genuinely upset.

  Sophia put her carefully conceived plan to him and he was astounded. “So...you’ll do his shifts and then I pay...him?” She nodded. “Why?” Harold asked and it was all she could do not to cry. ‘Because he’ll have a child to support,’ was what she wanted to say, but she didn’t.

  “Dane could really use the money right now. And I’m his friend.” The words felt like razor blades on Sophia’s tongue and the kindly man nodded.

  “Yes, I have some understanding of the boy’s circumstances.”

  To the girl’s surprise, he agreed. “Be here for eight tomorrow and I’ll show you what to do.”

  Sophia left with mixed feelings and a dreadful ache in her heart.

  Chapter Seven

  The next day, while the sun still rose and the birds twittered loudly in the overhead trees, Sophia sat in her car outside the front doors of the garden centre, an hour earlier than agreed. She daydreamed and tried not to torture herself with thoughts of Dane and Louise, jumping when Harold knocked on the driver’s window. There was an embarrassing moment as the window switch wouldn’t work because she took the keys out and as she tried to open the door to speak to him, she hit Harold in his large stomach. “I’m so sorry,” Sophia gushed, mortified at her terrible start.

  “Na, it’s big enough. Don’t worry.” Harold patted his midriff with a good natured sparkle in his eyes. “Put your car round there, away from the customers.” He pointed to a small track at the back of the car park marked ‘Staff Only.’ Sophia nodded and fiddled with the keys. “Yeah,” he commented, “they can garden, but they can’t drive.”

  Sophia had cause to be grateful later that day, when she watched a few of the most avid and knowledgeable gardeners struggle to get their laden vehicles out of the angled parking slots. Edgar would have been livid if she had dinged his SUV.

  “She’s a darn good little worker,” Harold commented to one of the other staff as Sophia lugged bags of compost into the potting area. She was willing and affable, carefully potting the tiny seedlings into bigger trays, exactly as Harold showed her, working quietly in a corner away from the general melee. Mid-morning, he called her for a break over the loud speaker and on her way back to the office Sophia saw an older woman looking perplexed. She stared at a row of large and expensive palms, running delicate fingers over her chin and seeming a bit lost.

  “Would you like me to get some help?” Sophia asked, fully intending to fetch Harold or one of the other assistants buzzing around. But the customer launched immediately into her problem and the girl nodded knowingly. “That’s exactly what my mum wanted to do,” she replied, remembering happier times. “She created a kind of native grove with a bench area and the birds loved it. She copied the design in someone else’s front garden and just changed it to fit out garden. The front of our house is very English but out the back is pure New Zealand, like a mixture of the two cultures. It’s a neat thing to do.”

  The woman in her fifties exuded a hurried air that hovered delicately on a state of panic, threatening to pitch over at any second. Looking around her, Sophia noticed the other three assistants deliberately avoiding eye contact with her. “Er, look, I’ll write the address down of the garden Mum copied. It’s on River Road. If you like it, come back and I’ll get someone to help you choose the right plants.” Sophia handed the scrap of paper over, adorned with brown fingerprints, an approximate address hastily scribbled on it in pencil. “You’ll know it as soon as you drive past,” Sophia said and the woman tore off in a hail of gravel to go and see.

  The girl wandered to the office and found Harold brewing tea. Elaine, a lady in her late sixties entered the room and slumped into one of the elderly seats. “What did you say to Mrs Barrett?” she asked Sophia casually as Harold handed out the thick, brown liquid, mouthing ‘builder’s tea’ and giving her a beautiful, toothless smile.

  “I sent her to look at a garden design on River Road,” Sophia replied. “It’ll help her clarify what she wants and then she’s coming back.”

  Elaine rolled her eyes. “Well, you can deal with her then. She comes every month with some big project or other and then criticises everything I suggest. She’s the worst customer we have and that’s saying something. I’ve been here thirty years and I’ve seen all sorts!”

  “She’s the best customer we have,” Harold corrected. “Her money’s as good as anyone’s.”

  Sophia nodded and sipped her tea, agreeing to deal with Mrs Barrett if she came back. She began to doubt she would as they started watering up the millions of pots and planters around the store an hour before closing and she still hadn’t returned. Misting the trays of vegetables with a steady stream of water, she was alarmed by a gentle tap on her shoulder and turned, almost soaking the woman who stood smiling at her. Mrs Barrett was back. “I’ve had a marvellous day!” she gushed at Sophia. “I went to that address and the lady there was so kind. I went in for tea and ended up staying most of the day. Margery’s lent me the design for the garden and written down everything I need. She’s a wi
dow and my husband’s away on business such a lot, so we’re going to get together tomorrow and go down to Hamilton Gardens for some more ideas. She’s also given me the phone number for her gardener, so I can get him to do the heavy work.”

  “Wow!” Sophia said, her face lighting up with genuine delight.

  “So,” Mrs Barrett launched, pushing a piece of notepaper into Sophia’s hand, “this is the list of things I’m going to need. Margery said to get the mature specimens even though they’re more expensive, because that way I get an instant effect.”

  “Do you want it all now?” Sophia asked doubtfully, remembering the tiny vehicle Mrs Barrett drove away in. She had listed a six foot Nikau Palm on the paper.

  “No, no, Margery’s gardener will fetch it all for me in his trailer on Monday. I’ll pay up front so you can mark the larger items as sold. I don’t want to have to go anywhere else, not now I’ve decided.”

  Sophia smiled and led the ecstatic woman over to the queue by the till. Then she fetched Harold and handed him the list. Harold was practically apoplectic with glee at the enormous payment Mrs Barrett happily made, as well as the prospect of shifting some of the huge tree specimens he had long since regretted stocking. But it galled him considerably in his generous heart that the day’s wages would go into Dane’s bank account and not to the willing little girl who worked all day without a single complaint.

  A car sped into the car park five minutes before closing and Elaine at the till rolled her eyes at Sophia, who was loading bags of compost and bark chippings onto a trolley to put inside for the night. A woman and girl dashed from the expensive vehicle and Sophia paid them little attention, busy with wrestling the heavy bags onto the trolley, wondering how many she could get on and still be able to push it.