The Countdown

By half past eight, Seaview House had reached that dangerous stage of every family celebration when the drinks were flowing freely, and dinner was still nowhere in sight.

The old Victorian mansion seemed to glow from within.

Built in the late nineteenth century, the house sat proudly above Hobsons Bay, its weatherboard walls painted a soft blue-grey that changed colour with the weather. A wraparound veranda embraced three sides of the building, supported by lace-like cast-iron fretwork imported from England more than a century earlier.

Inside, high ceilings stretched above ornate plaster roses and chandeliers that had survived generations of family arguments.

The hallway alone could have belonged to a small hotel.

Polished timber floors reflected the warm yellow light from antique wall sconces. Framed photographs lined the walls: weddings, birthdays, graduations, babies who were now middle-aged adults.

Every corner of the house seemed occupied by memories.

Or ghosts.

Depending on your mood.

Tonight, the dining room was bursting with life.

The long cedar table groaned beneath bowls of salads, platters of cheeses, homemade pastries and half-empty bottles of wine. Crystal glasses sparkled beneath the chandelier.

Nobody was eating.

Everyone was waiting.

And becoming increasingly impatient.

Jack Morgan, dressed in a navy blazer that looked older than some of the guests, checked his watch for the third time in ten minutes.

"If dinner isn't ready soon, I'm ordering fish and chips."

"You most certainly are not."

Georgia's voice arrived from the kitchen before she did.

"People are wasting away in here."

"You've eaten six pastries."

"They were appetisers."

"Three of them were for tomorrow."

Jack sighed theatrically.

"This family has become hostile."

Across the room, Ty Parker was recording everything.

He wore white sneakers that looked brand new, fitted black jeans, and an expensive-looking beige shirt purchased primarily because it photographed well. His hair had been carefully arranged to appear as though no effort had been made.

His phone was never more than twenty centimetres from his face.

"Guys," he announced to his followers, slowly turning the camera around the room, "welcome to the final New Year's Eve at Seaview House. Historic moment. Huge family gathering. Massive waterfront property."

"It isn't waterfront."

Ty groaned.

Jack again.

"You can see the water."

"Seeing water and owning water are two entirely different things."

Ty turned back to the camera.

"Guys, this is Uncle Jack. He fact-checks happiness."

Several people laughed.

Near the French doors overlooking the bay, Michael Sheridan shook his head.

He had spent the past twelve years flying in and out of exploration camps scattered across the Australian desert.

Pilbara.

Goldfields.

Northern Territory.

Places where summer temperatures melted plastic equipment, and the nearest coffee shop was six hundred kilometres away.

His work had made him wealthy.

It had also taught him that real life usually happened far away from phone screens.

Michael had arrived in Australia from Romania almost twenty years earlier with two suitcases, hesitant English and a geology degree nobody seemed interested in recognising.

The desert had changed that.

The desert forged people quickly.

Or broke them.

There wasn't much in between.

He watched Ty addressing his invisible audience and wondered how long the young man would survive at a remote exploration camp.

Three days, perhaps.

A week if he surprised everyone.

Certainly not long enough to become an influencer.

Michael smiled into his wine glass.

The boy wasn't bad.

Just soft.

The modern world seemed determined to reward softness.

Ty pointed the camera towards him.

"Michael the geologist. Say something inspirational."

Michael didn't even look up.

"Go dig a hole."

"My followers won't understand that."

"Neither do most mining companies."

Ty laughed.

His followers would probably love it.

The strange thing was that Michael liked the boy despite himself.

Everyone did.

It was difficult to dislike someone so enthusiastic, but the problem was that enthusiasm and achievement were often confused.

His eyes drifted across the room where Claire Mason stood near the bay window.

A pale silver dress fell softly to her ankles, and he thought that the colour suited her hair and gave her a kind fairy glow.

In the warm light, she seemed almost luminous. The colour suited her hair and gave her a kind of fairy glow. She looked fragile and ethereal in a mundane world. He could never remember her without a composed air, even in the morning, when her hair was tousled by an artist's pale blue robe that made her eyes bright beneath long brown lashes.

She held a glass of wine forgotten in one hand and gazed out toward the dark water beyond the garden.

As always, she appeared slightly detached from the room around her.

Present yet like living elsewhere. Every time he was back from the desert, where his job kept him for weeks at a time, he was amazed. But the coming and going was good; the desert  had taught him many things.

Water mattered ,shade mattered, and above all, competence mattered. You needed to make do with whatever you had.

Out there, nobody cared how many followers you had, but you have mates and beer under the blasting sun

A broken drill rig, a failed generator, or a wrong decision could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars before lunch.

The earth was brutally honest.

It either contained gold or it didn't, and there was something comforting about that.

People, on the other hand, were far more difficult to r

Michael felt the familiar ache he never discussed.

It had begun years ago, as quiet admiration, and over time it had grown into a kind of affection. That much he dared to admit to himself.

Fortunately, Claire seemed entirely unaware of it.

Or perhaps simply too kind to acknowledge it.

She belonged to another world.

One built from books, stories and silences.

Michael had long ago accepted that.

Still, acceptance and surrender were not the same thing.

At the piano, Eleanor Hart was becoming progressively less predictable.

Three glasses of champagne had transformed her from charmingly eccentric into fully operational.

She sports a bright turquoise scarf draped over her shoulders tonight, and her arms are adorned with several silver bracelets that jiggle whenever she moves.

Nobody knew where she found them, but she always seemed to look in need of a stage somehow.

She struck a dramatic chord, and the room conversation paused.

Eleanor cleared her throat.

"Lost leaf in the wind..."

Nobody responded.

She nodded.

"Pity. It was a good opening."Then she continued.

"Lost leaf in the wind...

She seemed to search for a word that was floating above the piano, still trying to decide.

which season it belongs to."

Jack stared at Michael's eyes, questioning the sanity of the conversation.

"What does that mean?"

Then Eleanor burst into dramatic piano music.

“’Cold hands deep in my pocket

Forgotten coins

Tolling bells measure distance.

On the glassy rocks

Waves don’t reach fresh snow”

Jack said, “What is she talking about? There’s no snow in Melbourne.”

"I've absolutely no idea."

She struck another chord.

The room erupted in laughter before anybody took a swipe or made any nasty comments.

Eleanor smiled, then launched unexpectedly into a jazz version of Waltzing Matilda.

Halfway through, she abandoned it completely.

Instead, she began singing about seagulls stealing chips from tourists at Williamstown Beach.

Ty immediately started recording.

Daniel Mason did not appear amused.

Standing alone near the hallway entrance, he checked his phone again.

And again, with a hard frown forming on his forehead.

Whatever messages he was receiving, they were not improving his mood.

For the third time that evening, he disappeared down the corridor toward his study.

Claire noticed immediately. A dark shadow crossed her face. Quietly, she followed him.

Then she quietly followed him.

Michael watched them disappear, a feeling he could not explain settling uneasily in his chest.

Outside, beyond the veranda, darkness deepened across the bay.

Outside, beyond the veranda, darkness deepened across the bay. Inside Seaview House, laughter continued, but something else had begun to stir beneath it.