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  She sighed. He was so out of touch. Some of the women at ag college had been way rougher than the blokes. And on the flipside, women had dominated the merit lists in different subjects.

  The two-way suddenly crackled to life, jolting her out of her reverie.

  'On channel, Mandy?' came her dad's gruff voice.

  Sighing but not shifting her head, Amanda felt for the two-way receiver and responded.

  'I'm in number one paddock and I've just checked the dam,' he said. 'It's getting a bit low and there's two dead sheep stuck in the mud on the edge. You'll need to come and pull them out.'

  'Why don't you do it, since you're on the spot?' she found herself snapping, resentment sweeping away her good intentions.

  The answering silence stretched into minutes, till finally Amanda swung herself up and drove the front-end loader into the shed, collected a rope and climbed onto her four-wheel motor bike, still fuming as she sped away.

  Riding through the open gate into number one paddock, Amanda saw her father sitting on the edge of the dam staring at the dead sheep. She could tell that his thoughts were elsewhere. Her gaze shifted to the dead ewes. As far as she could see, he hadn't even tried to pull either of them out of the mud himself.

  As she approached, he stood up and came towards the bike, an angry frown on his face. 'Don't ever question my instructions on the two-way again!' he shouted. 'The rest of the district doesn't need to know what's going on at our place. You do as I say and no backchat, understand?'

  Amanda folded her arms, her face set. 'Dad, it would have been quicker for you to pull them out than for me to leave what I was doing and come out here. Time efficiency is important on a farm. What I've just done isn't efficient. Time costs money. It's not that hard a job. Not pleasant, granted, but not hard.'

  Brian completely ignored her. 'Understand?' he repeated.

  'Yes, Dad,' she answered doing nothing to hide her fury.

  As she uncoiled the rope and tied it onto the back carrier, she heard her father walking towards his ute, the gravel crunching underfoot. As he closed the driver's door, she lifted her head to look at him, and felt a wave of pity wash over her. He looked so thin and grey and unhappy.

  'Sorry about last night, Dad.'

  There was a brief pause as he processed what she had said but then, without speaking, he turned the key in the ignition and drove away.

  Staring at the sheep carcasses, tears threatening once again, Amanda suddenly understood that his silence and these sheep were punishment for the night before. More than that, she saw the blame in his eyes every time he looked at her – he thought she'd caused her mother's death! As if she didn't already feel enough guilt without him heaping it on her. Oh, she understood how deeply he was grieving – she was too. But to survive, they had to move on. She realised now that when she'd lectured her stony-faced father, he'd seen her as cold and heartless. If only he could understand her, see her own overwhelming sadness, then perhaps he would understand that her way of trying to cope was to focus on Kyleena, on their future. But her father was so immersed in his own grief and guilt he didn't have any understanding of how much she and other people close to her mother were grieving.

  Ah well, she thought, coming back to the immediate demands on her. She needed to get the animals out of the dam before they contaminated the water any further. Fixing the rope around one of the sheep's legs, she rode slowly away, dragging the animal behind the bike. She steered carefully towards a cluster of trees which would become the ewe's final resting place. Breathing through her mouth to avoid the stench, she unhooked the rope and rode back to the dam to remove the other dead animal.

  As the sun sank lower in the sky, Amanda made her way back to the house. She felt so lonely and sad knowing her mum wouldn't be bustling around the house when she got home. Instead her father would be in his office, listening to the radio and drinking beer. Avoiding her.

  As a child, the house had been bright and cheerful, full of laughter and fun. Her mother, Helena, had been a wonderful cook and gardener, as well as working alongside her father and keeping up with her original profession, journalism, by writing an occasional article for the rural papers. Since her mum's death, the garden had grown wild and the house had lost its cosiness. It was as if it knew the life and soul of the family was dead and the remaining occupants were slowly self-destructing.

  Pushing open the door of her mother's study, Amanda smiled at the fresh clean aroma. Finally the room smelled like someone loved it again. When Amanda had first summonsed the courage to come into the room, not long after the accident, it had still smelled like her mum. The moisturiser she used, her shampoo and soap. The book her mum had been reading was still on the coffee table and the latest editorial she'd been working on sat unfinished on her desk.

  Her mother's fragrance had faded over the months until the room had started to smell musty and rank Amanda knew she had to do something. Deciding she couldn't bear to leave her mother's favourite room to become unloved, two weeks ago she had moved her computer onto the desk and claimed the room for her own. After giving it a thorough vacuum and cleaning down all the surfaces, Amanda had flung open the curtains, and set a vase of her Mum's favourite lavender on the table. Her father had been aghast when he saw that she'd moved in, arguing that it was Helena's space and should have been left the way it was.

  Once again Amanda realised she should have been more sensitive to her father's feelings before making a decision. She hadn't used the room for a while but then after an argument with her father she'd found solace sitting in the study and after that, she'd kept using it. Tonight she opened the window and sat on the soft couch her mother used to curl up in and read on rainy days. She smiled at the memory of her mother chortling over some book, her feet tucked up under her, her long, dark, wavy hair tumbling over the couch's arm.

  There was a photo on the desk of Helena, Brian and a young Amanda in the garden. Amanda could just recall the day it was taken. Drought-breaking rains had arrived from nowhere that day and a fierce storm had swept through, cooling the sweltering day. But it hadn't fazed her mum, who'd been wearing a thin cotton dress. She'd danced in the rain, her arms outstretched and face turned towards the heavens as she laughed with joy, with hope. Amanda remembered how her dad had run from the shed and taken Helena in his arms and together they'd delighted in the downpour, while their only child watched from the verandah in wonder.

  Fifty-three was too young to die, thought Amanda, tears springing to her eyes. And twenty-two was too young to lose your mum. She buried her head in the soft cushion, hoping to catch a hint of the fading essence of her mother.

  Later that night, Amanda woke from a restless sleep, thirsty. Stumbling out to the kitchen to get a drink of water she was alarmed by odd noises coming from her dad's room. She made for the door, but was stopped in her tracks by the sound of gut-wrenching sobs and muttered words. Carefully pushing the door open a crack, she peered in. Standing at the foot of the bed with his back to her was her dad, his shoulders heaving with sobs.

  'Why, Helena, why? How could this happen after everything we've been through? After all we did to stay together? How could you leave me now?' he cried, clutching a photograph of Helena, its silver frame reflecting in the moonlight filtering through the open curtain.

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