Chapter 9 — Uno Enters the Room

Molly rang Sosta from the car after work the next night because she didn’t trust herself to keep pretending everything was fine and because Sosta had always been the one who could hear the difference between tired and done. She pulled over before the call connected and sat there with the engine still running and her forehead against the steering wheel.

“I think I need some time,” Molly said as soon as Sosta answered. “From work and from Jess. I’m tired of having to explain myself every five minutes.”

“How long is some time?”

“I don’t know,” Molly said. “Long enough that I stop clenching my jaw without noticing. I’ve already had two fillings this year. I don’t think my teeth or my wallet can afford much more. Unless I develop a drinking habit.”

“Well, we can’t have that. Dentists have enough money. You, missy, do not,” Sosta replied. “We’ve got a corroboree this weekend at Grandma’s place. Whole mob coming through. You should come out.”

Molly laughed.

“You always say that like it’s simple.”

“And you always say you’ll come but never do,” Sosta replied.

Molly knew she was right.

“But work and mum,” Molly started.

“Will be there when you get back. You don’t work weekends, after all. You’ll be fresh as a daisy come Monday,” Sosta said. “You just come. You don’t have to do anything.”

“That’s usually the part that makes me nervous,” Molly said.

“Yeah,” Sosta said. “That’s why you should come.”

By the time Molly drove out on Friday afternoon, she already felt different but not in a way that felt like relief and more in the sense that things had gone a bit calmer once the decision was made. It was strange not to have to keep checking whether she was doing the right thing. When she arrived, there were already people there and more kept turning up without anyone tracking who had arrived when. Cars were coming and going and there were people moving past each other without introductions being required.

“I’ve never seen this many people in one place,” Molly said to Sosta.

“Nonsense,” Sosta said. “You've been to Woodford.”

“Yeah, but not in someone's bleeding backyard, Sos,” Molly said.

“You overwhelmed?” Sosta asked.

“I don’t think I am.”

“Good, then.”

“What’s that?” Molly asked as she looked down and realised Sosta was carrying two plates that were stacked far higher than they should have been.

“Nourishment,” Sosta joked. “Eat.”

Sosta handed Molly a plate without stopping to ask whether she was hungry.

Molly did and noticed that no one asked where she’d been or what she’d been dealing with or whether she was alright, and she realised after a moment that the absence of those questions wasn’t neglectful or careless but just what she needed. The more she talked about things, the less it seemed to solve. So, Molly wafted around and spoke when she was spoken to. She watched people like fallen feathers that had been returned to their rightful places.

Later, they sat together on the ground with their backs against the house while people moved around them and music started up without notice. Molly tried not to take over the space so much as sit alongside everything else that was already happening. She leaned toward Sosta and lowered her voice without thinking about why and felt how easy it was to be there without arranging herself for anyone.

“It’s strange,” she said. “I can feel everything that usually shows up just sitting off to the side.”

“It doesn’t get kicked out here. It just doesn’t get invited in.”

“What do you mean?” Molly said.

“You ask me that a lot, you know that?” Sosta chuckled.

Molly laughed and blushed a little.

“My grandma used to say some things only work if everyone agrees to listen to them,” Sosta said. “And if you stop listening, they don’t have much to say. You don’t have to intellectualise everything.”

Molly watched an older woman laughing with a group of kids and felt something familiar move through her without asking anything of her. It was nostalgic even though she had never experienced anything like it before.

“It doesn’t feel empty,” Molly said. “It feels. I don’t know.”

“It feels correct,” Sosta said. “Nothing needs to be sorted straight away. Nothing needs to prove itself.”

They sat like that for a long time with people coming and going and stories looping back on themselves and the night settling in without anyone announcing it. At one point, Molly realised she hadn’t checked her phone in hours and didn’t feel the usual urge to see what she was missing.

“I think this place is as close to the origins of Earth as it gets. That’s why it’s so correct. This is the way we’re supposed to be.”

“That, my dear friend,” Sosta said, “is Uno.”

“Uno?”

“The oldest of the energies we know.”

“I don’t think I lost this,” Molly said. “I think I just forgot what it felt like when nothing was trying to win. Like when we were kids, you know?”

Sosta bumped Molly’s shoulder gently.

“That’s why Grandma says you don’t go looking for it. You just put yourself somewhere it can be heard again.”

Molly stood there listening to the water and she didn’t feel split between staying and leaving. She didn’t feel like she was being unproductive. She knew she’d remember this feeling long after she went back.