An aged lace curtain hung ethereally and silent in front of a small window. There was a tiny tear in the bottom right hand corner, the light spilling through, illuminating an otherwise dim space. I stared mesmerised. The hole in the curtain was in the loose shape of a heart.
I walked towards it and peered through the heart shaped hole to the garden below. The view from the window was spectacular, overlooking the entire back garden. Impatient to see more, I swept the curtain back, and noticed that through a corridor of trees, a perfect snapshot of the Brisbane River was revealed. I watched as a lone kayaker headed for shore after crossing the wake left behind by a jet ski. Just then one of the iconic City Cat ferries came into view.
Brisbane River was the heart of Brisbane and the ferries made it an inexpensive and fun way to access the city and riverside suburbs, from Breakfast Creek right up to the Queensland University at St Lucia, where I had studied. Recently on one of my weekly dates with myself, I had ridden one of the Cats from one end to the other, marvelling at a city I had grown up in, but had never taken the time to explore.
Marty’s low whistle brought my thoughts back to the present. ‘What a find.’ He came and stood beside me, he too mesmerised by the river view, the trees framing the vision of bobbing yachts. ‘If only some of those trees were lopped, that view would be opened right up.’
He began to explore further, assessing the house with a professional eye. He turned to me, arms folded across his chest. ‘What are your thoughts Peach?’
‘I’m not sure what to say. Something like this doesn’t become available often.’ How well I knew. In all of my experience in real estate in the inner city, I had never seen anything come onto the market such as this. In fact, the entire time Davis and I had been trying to have a family, I had kept my eye out for a house like this, something to raise a family in. Heck, I would have settled for something a quarter as good as this and still been deliriously happy.
I was at the window. From out the front I had realised that the land dropped away behind, however I had no idea the house did as well. It was huge.
I began wandering and found a door at the end of a minor passageway off the kitchen. With some difficulty, I wrenched it open to find a courtyard. It was an extremely large, walled courtyard - sun filled, ventilated and watered by the recent rain. Large stone pavers had been laid in a grid pattern and in between, pretty native violets grew rampant. It was only as I stepped into it, I was able to see how big it actually was.
‘Come look,’ I called to Marty, my voice excited. ‘This must have been the herb and vegetable garden for the kitchen. Isn’t it wonderful? You never see anything like this in the city.’ There was nothing left of the herbs, but the citrus trees were abundant - lemons, Tahitian limes, cumquats, dwarf oranges and mandarins. The dwarf orange tree hung heavily with fruit, giving such a lovely burst of colour and fragrance. Mostly the pumpkins had taken over, smothering other plants and even escaping over the fence.
As we went deeper into the house I noticed that every downstairs room opened onto its own garden terrace. The ornate extravagance of the garden was key to every bedroom in the house.
Fleetingly, I wondered what had happened to Mr Carmody’s furniture, as the house was completely bare.
At that moment though, the garden seemed to take precedence. We wandered down to the terraced back garden to explore further. With every step, more surprising plants, shapes and colours came into view. The most eye catching display of cascading purple wisteria flowers tumbled down the face of a stone retaining wall, rendering me breathless in awe. Wisteria blossoms for only such a short time that I knew we were in luck to see such a show, as it is one of those plants that are mostly bare vines for the better part of the year.
The garden seemed to consist of a series of rooms unfolding one after another, linked by paths and stepping stones, making it a joy to explore.
Something was stirring in me as we wandered about. We followed a flagstone pathway where shadows and light danced about on the ground. I imagined little heart shapes among them.
We arrived at a set of stairs. On either side sat two huge urns. We took the steps and found ourselves at the pool. The large turquoise tiled rectangular swimming pool was derelict, the bottom full of green slimy water, with one large palm frond floating lost at sea. At one end was a sandstone fountain in the shape of a classical head that in its day would have spurted water into the pool, but now looked dry and lonely. Behind, a row of eight pencil pines awkwardly reached skyward.
We wandered further into the back garden where lilly pillys, gardenias, azaleas, flowering oleanders and overgrown bougainvillea grew rampantly. In the far left hand corner we found a small olive grove. I picked one of the deep green-grey lance shaped leaves with the silvery white underside, a smile forming on my lips.
‘What?’ Marty asked.
‘Olive trees are a symbol of peace.’
Marty nodded with interest. Silently we both continued on our discovery.
Finally, Marty spoke. ‘Your Mr Carmody had a spectacular garden in its time.’
Nodding, I began to wonder about Mr Carmody and what he must have left behind. But why me? Why did he think I should have first look at the house. Not much more than an acquaintance really. He had told me he liked my smile. That was good, because in the last year there were days when I thought my life had turned to utter shit, and I didn’t think I would ever smile again.
However, already I knew. This house and garden needed me. Or if I was truthful… I needed it.
Serendipity can play a large part in the real estate game, something I knew first hand. The house had found me. But what was I going to do with it? Yesterday when I received the call from the lawyer, if you had asked me if I would be interested in buying this house, or any other house today, the answer would have been an emphatic ‘No.’
With my arms folded across my chest, I turned and looked up at the house once again. Surprisingly, I noticed an upstairs window above the kitchen area. I wondered what was up there. I was sure I hadn’t seen a staircase. But what I did see was, beyond the house’s derelict state, was the house of my dreams.
If I put my real estate hat on, I would have had to admit that this property covered three important criterions: privacy, peace and quiet, plus an intimate connection to the river. It was the perfect mix of city and country.
‘What are you thinking?’ Marty asked.
I looked at him. ‘I’m thinking I want it!’
He blinked. ‘What?’ He stared at me in disbelief.
I exhaled heavily. ‘I want it. It’s as simple as that.’
‘But we haven’t even looked at the rest of the house yet,’ he spluttered.
‘I know. I’ve just noticed there’s an attic. But what does it matter? It’s not as if I’m going to change my mind because it doesn’t have enough wardrobe space, or not enough bathrooms. I think I’m meant to have it.’
Marty scratched his head and let out a low whistle. ‘Phew Peach, what the heck are you going to do with a house like this?’
‘I don’t know, but I am going to find out…’
Marty started the car and then looked across at me. ‘You want me to drop you at your mother’s?’
I nodded. I didn’t need to remind myself that I didn’t have a life. Well not yet anyway! It was funny, but it had taken my sessions with Emerald Green to realise I was still living Davis’s life by staying in the house. I guess I had been hanging onto it. But why? He wasn’t coming back, that was abundantly clear. He now had the long legged, blonde. Something I could never be.
Anyway, I couldn’t