Sailmaker by Rosanne Hawke

Where we’re sitting we might get some trevally. Tommies are always a possibility. The breeze is up – it’s the windiest place on the peninsula here, maybe even in the whole state, and when the wind brings in that smell of the open sea and the fish it makes me think I’m out on the boat again.
    â€˜He’s not crazy, Dev. I know he thinks there’s a ghost and he talks to his dog and all, but he’s okay.’
    Dev’s with me. ‘I’m sure you’re right, mate.’
    â€˜So can I go out to the island again?’ Dev takes a little while to answer. It gets me worried for a bit, but there’s no point rushing Dev when he’s thinking. So I listen to the suck, suck of the water hugging the jetty posts and letting go again while a seagull screeches overhead.
    â€˜Don’t see why not,’ Dev finally says. ‘Seems a nice enough bloke to me.’
    Then, stone the crows, as Grandad used to say, guess who comes and plonks herself down? Zoe. She sits close by us too. Neither of us said she could. Then I think, maybe she knew Dev wouldn’t mind, and I watch them like a terrier outside a ferret hole. There’s no kissing at least. Dev hasn’t changed his tone at all. I don’t know Zoe well enough to see if she’s putting on any of that stupid flirty stuff that half the girls at school do. It’s so dumb. Glad Mei doesn’t – she’s a good mate.
    Nah, Zoe’s just talking about some boring thesis she has to write for uni. Dev’s trying real hard to look interested. Says a few ‘hmm?’s. He sure doesn’t look like a guy who can’t keep his hands off her. Isn’t that what people are like when they’ve got the hots for each other?
    Maybe Shawn’s wrong about it all.
    Later, when we get back home, we find out Nancy’s taken sick. Dev may have to go and see if she’s okay. My life starts crumbling again. I’m just like the island melting away at the mercy of every storm. If not Zoe, maybe Nancy will take Dev away. What if she ends up in a wheelchair with no one to look after her? Dev’s a nice bloke; I can just imagine him offering, and then what would happen to me?

14
    Today I’m back on the island. Dev’s gone to see Nancy and I’m trying not to think about it much. The sailmaker is pleased to see me. Turns out he knew who I was in the first place. It comes about when we’re having eggs and bacon for lunch out on the verandah and I ask him if he’s lonely out here. I’m thinking of Dev. He’s got me, but I’ve often thought there could be some other ways he’s lonely.
    Vern’s not lonely at all.
    â€˜I’ve got Olsen, the birds . . .’ he says. ‘Even this island is my friend. That’s why it’s hard to see her slippin’ away like she is. She’s like a beautiful ship to me, boy, her sails unfurled; the lighthouse is the mast. The birds love her too, but she’s sinking and there’s nothing more miserable than that.’ Nah, he’ll never leave; captains don’t leave sinking ships.
    He’s quiet for a while and I’m thinking maybe an island seems like a woman to a guy as old as the sailmaker, but what about Dev? And so I ask Vern, ‘When you were forty or a bit younger, did you want a real woman?’
    Vern’s got this shrewd look in his one eye. ‘Why are you asking that, boy?’
    And I tell him. All about Dev and Zoe. He doesn’t talk for a long time, just lets me spill. Then, ‘Dev’s a good bloke. If he says he wants to be your pretend dad, I don’t know what you’re worried about.’ He hasn’t heard Shawn mouth off.
    â€˜Besides,’ Vern carries on, ‘from what you say, your Zoe doesn’t sound like his type.’ I didn’t say, but he makes me think extra hard. It’s true. The only thing that matches with Dev and Zoe is the amount of