"He couldn’t stop. No one hit a woman. No one": a campground story by Wellington writer Elspeth Sandys
When Colin arrived at the holiday camp he had his story ready. Colin Lawson, widower, retired, seeking peace and quiet. Former manager of a small Invercargill Tyre Company. Wife died a year back. Children long gone. Two in California, trapped by Covid. One further afield, trapped not just by Covid but by politics.
The manager of the camp received him warmly. “We're on first name terms here Colin," she said, as she signed him in. "Now you said in your email you wanted a cabin, but you didn’t specify whether it was to be self-contained or just the basics. There's quite a difference in price."
"If there’s a self-contained one free …"
The cabin was on a small plateau about six metres above the tents, caravans and motor homes dotted about on the flat. It had a kitchen, bathroom, bed, a rail to hang clothes, and a small dresser jammed into the only remaining space. "Perfect," Colin pronounced.
“I'll leave you to get settled," Loren said.
For the first few days Colin kept a low profile. His only foray outside his cabin was to stock up on necessities from the Four Square. By the end of the week he felt confident enough to show his face and greet the other campers, most of whom seemed more than ready to be friendly. It was autumn in the rest of the country, but here it was still summer. Listening to the cicadas humming their monotonous tune he could almost believe he was on holiday. “You're beginning to look like a local," Loren said as she sailed past him. Camouflage, he thought. Stay long enough and I’ll look just like everyone else. A traveller, seeking sun and solace, wearing singlet and shorts, strolling down to the wharf at the end of the day to buy a feed of illegal fish.
Soon he was on first name terms with all the permanents, and had got into the habit of shouting ‘Hi’ or ‘Kia ora’ to the casuals. Most of the casuals were fishermen, after snapper and kingfish. Some were pickers working in the avocado orchards, but they would be gone soon. Of the permanents, the person who seemed most anxious to be his friend was Fin (surname not provided), a runt of a man whose tales of his past life were so full of holes you could pour water through them. Fin had been an All Black, he’d crewed for New Zealand in the America’s Cup, he’d won trophies for skiing. Listening to him, Colin wondered how he managed to get away with his tall tales. Anyone could have checked his claims on the internet. He could have done so himself. Perhaps that was the explanation. What did it matter? Fin’s tall tales did no harm.
At the end of his third week, Colin received an invitation. Jake and Isabel, who'd arrived at the camp a month before him, invited him to share their tea. Trevally cooked on the barbecue, potatoes baked in the caravan oven, carrot salad and mayonnaise. Jake was from around these parts. He was Ngāpuhi, with other bits mixed in. Isabel was Pākehā. Like him they’d driven up from the South Island to the winterless north. Here to stay, they told him. Nothing to go back to.
It was a warm evening with extravagant stars and a slither of orange moon. They sat outside the caravan in fold-up chairs, drinking beer, and gossiping in a mild way about the other permanents, and the recent fishing competition, which had seen visitors turned away from the filled-to-capacity camp. “Bit of a rolling stone that one," Jake offered when the talk turned to Hemi, Loren’s mostly absent husband. "Even when he’s here, he does sweet FA to help."
"Any kids?" Colin asked.
"Just the one. A boy. Skedaddled off to Auckland day he turned 16."
Colin wanted to ask more, but the thought of the tables turning, and his new friends becoming curious about him, put him off. So far the story he’d told about himself had barely raised eyebrows. He knew about tyres, and he knew about cars, so he could hold his own when questioned. Compared to Fin, his story lacked excitement. Which was just how he wanted it. Jake and Isabel had volunteered very little about their lives. All Colin knew was that they’d lived for more than three decades in Ashburton. Now they were here.
Winter brought a change in more than just the temperature. The casuals disappeared. Early darkness put a halt to the convivial evening drinks and gossip. Even the fishermen seemed to have taken to the hills. Colin spent the evenings, and a large part of each day, reading and playing patience and listening to his radio. Some days Loren would call on him on to help fix a broken gadget. It was assumed his knowledge of car tyres extended to bust washing machines and worn-out farm equipment. Fortunately he knew enough to be useful. A good feeling. Especially when the person he was helping was Loren. Each time he was called on she would make a sizable reduction in that week’s rent. "Not necessary," he insisted. "Oh but it is," she insisted back.
Summer saw the camp fill up again. According to Fin, an authority on just about everything, Covid restrictions had made no difference to Loren’s business. Who needs foreigners when we can fill the camp with Kiwis?
By now Colin was a trusted member of the community. He’d been appointed a ‘camp-sitter’, someone who worked in return for paying only minimal rent. It wasn’t just machines he looked after now, it was the new arrivals, and the animals that were part of the camp’s attraction for families. Feeding the chooks and ducks, emptying the household pig bucket into Percy’s pen, moving the horses from paddock to paddock to ensure they got a good feed, checking the sheep for worms, he felt himself grow in stature, as if the man with averted eyes and pallid skin who’d arrived here almost a year ago had died, and a new man been born in his place.
With the approach of Christmas, Colin began to feel twinges of an old melancholy, a condition that predated the calamity he’d come here to escape. Loving the wrong woman. Missing out on family life. He should have taken the advice of the few friends he’d had back then, and moved away. Started again. Found someone else to love … But then Loren asked him to spend Christmas Day with her, and the melancholy lifted. Hemi wouldn’t be there. Away on business. Colin's feelings for Loren were complex. Having been in love with the same woman all his adult life, he’d forgotten how to behave around attractive women. Mostly what he felt for her was gratitude and respect. But there was something else, a pull towards her, a flicker of those feelings that had led to his undoing.
He dressed with care. His best jeans, and the t-shirt he’d bought on a recent trip to Kaitaia. He hadn’t been near a barber in months, but he wasn’t alone in sporting a pony tail. It could almost be said to be the fashion in this part of the world. Having shaved, and splashed himself with the remains of his David Beckham after-shave, he stood back to study the effect in the half mirror above the dresser. He was 58 years old, but looked younger. Odd that. You’d think what he’d been through would have aged him.
Loren’s cottage at the top of the slope had a commanding view over the campsite. This wasn't his first time inside her house. He’d worked - successfully - on both her washing machine and her hot water system. Both times she’d offered tea and homemade biscuits. “You're welcome to pop in anytime Colin," she’d said. "I say that to all the camp-sitters." But he hadn’t liked to presume.
Walking through the door his first reaction was disappointment. He wasn’t the only guest! Jake and Isabel were there, as was another permanent, Bev, her of the floaty gowns and multi-stranded beads. Soon two more people turned up, retired nurses called Bronnie and Rose. "Returnees" Loren explained. "Arrived last night. They’ll be with us for the rest of the summer."
As the day progressed Colin's disappointment morphed into relief. He could send those pesky feelings back into the shadows where they belonged. It helped that he was on to his third beer. And it helped that the smell coming from the kitchen - roast lamb was his guess - had seeped into every corner of the house. By the time dinner was served he was of a mind to pronounce this the best Christmas he’d ever had.
*
Another year passed. Colin grew a beard. More and more people invited him into their caravans and motor homes. He drank more tea - and more beer - than was good for him. He ate a lot of fish. He no longer had to call the animals when he tended them. They came running - or waddling - right up to him.
As a second Christmas loomed, Colin wondered if there would be another invitation. Hemi had been in residence for the last four months. Hard to think of him as the slacker Jake had described. To Colin he seemed a ball of energy. Though he’d noticed, as time went by, that most of that energy was spent riding his horse.
The invitation came over a cup of tea in Loren's kitchen. He’d just fixed the lawnmower, something he thought Hemi might have done. Loren, who was in thoughtful mood, wondered why there was no mail for him. Colin explained that he and his wife had lived a quiet life. They never really went in for friends. His three children communicated by e mail. “I'd have thought you might have got you a few cards," Loren said. "People do still send them."
"You should see my Inbox," Colin replied.
Christmas Day was almost a repeat of last year’s, except there was no Bev. She’d moved on. Temporarily. Come the autumn she’d be back. But Jake and Isabel were there, and Bronny and Rose. No Hemi though. He’d done a last minute disappearing act. "I invited Fin," Loren confided to Colin. "But he had other plans."
"All Black reunion perhaps? Or an America's Cup anniversary?"
"I feel sorry for him," Loren said, frowning. “He's a sad old man with no family."
At the end of the following winter the Government announced the lifting of all Covid-19 restrictions. New Zealand was opening its borders again. First to arrive were the backpackers, Australians mostly, but by the end of spring Europeans and Americans had joined the ranks. With the arrival of workers from the Pacific to pick avocados and feijoas, the camp was filled to capacity. Those who couldn’t be housed were allowed to erect tents in the neighbouring paddock. Occasionally the police had to be called in to break up a fight on a Saturday night, but that was the exception not the rule. Just as well, as there was only one local policeman.
Summer’s end saw most of the casuals depart, but a few diehards stayed on, picking up what work they could, keeping the party culture alive. Their bunk room, a long low building with a verandah, stood on a small rise behind Loren’s cottage. Too close for comfort, Colin had always thought. And too close to his own cabin half way down the slope from where, every Saturday night, he would turn a deaf ear to the drunken shouts, and the blasts of music from the loud speakers. The occasional brawl he simply ignored. He knew the risks of getting involved in other people’s fights.
But there was one thing he couldn’t ignore. The night he heard Loren's voice, trying to restore calm, he didn’t stop to think. Between one breath and the next he was out of the cabin and up the slope. Through the swirling pools of light and dark he made out three figures - two men, one woman - though later he would realise there were a dozen or so more, watching from the shadows. The men were locked in what looked like mortal combat. The woman was Loren, trying vainly to separate them. When a fist lashed out at Loren, that was it.
"Stop!" Loren yelled. "Colin stop! You're killing them!"
But he couldn’t stop. No one hit a woman. No one.
"Please stop, please …"
Suddenly there were hands on him, many hands, and he was forcibly lifted from the two now bloodied men.
"Jesus Colin …"
"Are you all right?"
"What got into you?"
Colin felt his nose, which appeared to be bleeding. Then he realised it wasn’t his blood dripping from his face. He looked down at his fists, then he looked up again. He appeared to be surrounded. Faces he recognised, faces he didn’t.
"Come," Loren said, touching his elbow. He followed her into the house. She sat him down in the kitchen, fetched a cloth, and cleaned the blood from his face. Then she made tea.
"Where did you learn to box?" she asked.
"What?"
"Box. You could have killed those men."
Colin fingered his knuckles, an old habit. "You don't know your own strength," his mother used to say to him.
"I know who you are," Loren said. “I've known for a while."
Colin put his cup down on the bench. He was in the grip of the strangest sensation. It was as if he were being lifted out of his chair. He touched his nose. Was that what gave him away? The Bud Jansen fight.
He waited to see if Loren would say more. The quiet in the room seemed to have seeped out into the surrounding darkness. The camp had never been so silent.
"I should probably go," he said.
"You sure you're not hurt?"
"I mean really go. Move on."
"Why? Why would you do that?"
"Has anyone else recognised me?"
"If they have, they haven’t said anything."
The silence followed Colin as he walked back to his cabin. The lighted caravans, the murmuring neighbours, the composty smell of the place, a dog barking somewhere in the township - none of this registered on his conscious mind. He wasn’t in the camp, he was back in the world he’d come here to escape. He saw himself driving out of the gates, his few books and even fewer clothes piled on the car’s back seat, destination unknown. In his rear vision mirror, Loren, Fin, Jake, Isabel, Bev, the gay girls, waving.
Next morning Loren was on his doorstep early. She was smiling. He ushered her inside and offered to make coffee. She kept on smiling. By the time the coffee was brewed he was smiling too.
