Free Touching Earth Lightly by Margo Lanagan

table, and Chloe could see Rachel’s pale, pointed face among the hair, and the difference in Isaac’s bearing, his consideration-of-Rachel turning his body slightly towards her.
    Chloe kept brushing; it was one of those activities that needn’t ever finish if she didn’t want it to, and it made soothing noise in her head that stopped her thinking. Then she found herself in the middle of her room, pulling every last hair from the brush bristles. She put the puff of hair in the bin and sat on the end of her bed staring at the brush. Maybeshe didn’t have the energy to go down today, to face all those people, to make all those hullos. Rachel probably felt like this when she got up this morning, but then that momentum of being-in-love-with-Isaac would have picked her up and carried her here, because it was new with them, still, and anything done
with Isaac
was worth doing. Chloe remembered that elation of being picked out right at the start, a solitary being with no family around her, shining in her own self that suddenly seemed so defined and so wonderful, reflected in Theo’s eyes.
    She stood up abruptly, and caught her own eye in the wardrobe mirror. Yuk. It was these
clothes
. She looked like a dying moth, flap flap, flutter flutter, everything pale and wan. The faded print on the long skirt—that could even be
floral
. Almost shuddering, she shed the layers, and put on jeans so rarely worn they almost creaked when she bent, and a close-fitting top.
Now I look like a sex bomb
, she sneered at herself in the mirror, and softened the top a little with a blue cotton blouse tucked into the jeans, and tied her hair back into a thick plait. Farm girl, she thought, pulling on her boots. Bushwalker, charity car-washer, eater of wholemeal. She debated whether to take out the stud in her nostril, but decided that would be going too far.
    She went to the window again. Rachel down there like a delicate smiling
toy
, Isaac’s hand on her thigh under the table—
what is wrong with this picture? What exactly is the problem here?
    She looked again in the mirror. ‘God, it’ll do! It’ll do just
fine
!’ Suddenly she was all jittery energy, slimlined and sparky and focused. She was downstairs and in the kitchen and carrying the bowl of pasta to the table, smiling and saying hello to Carl, Jube, Maurice.
    ‘And this is Chloe,’ Isaac said to Rachel. ‘Chloe, I want you to meet Rachel.’
    ‘Hi, Rachel,’ said Chloe, careful not to overdo the smiling or the casual tone.
    ‘Hullo, Chloe.’ Chloe hated the prettiness of her own name, suddenly, hearing it in that mouth.
We
aren’t
precious treasured daughters together, she thought fiercely, with our pretty names. Why do they
call
girls these things, these decorative, sappy things? I mean
, Chloe;
I mean
, Tinkerbell
!
    It was easier, though, to have the introductions out of the way. Chloe could just sit back in her family, invisible, watching. She felt weirdly as if they were being showcased; she found herself stealthily monitoring Rachel’s reactions, which were faultless: polite, understated, faintly ironic at times. She had a nice, intelligent smile. She was perfectly
likeable
, Chloe heard a voice in her head insisting. And Isaac did seem to like her, and there was a certain
thing
between them that Chloe assumed was sexual, despite their eyes not meeting; it was to do with points of contact being maintained—shoulders, knees, hands—
    ‘What’s Janey up to today?’ said Maurice on Chloe’s left.
    ‘Tidying up. Making covers to disguise her pillows as cushions. Homemaking.’
Washing pee off the walls
, she added gloomily to herself.
    ‘Enjoying her independence? Well, she always has, hasn’t she? Been a bit of a lone wolf, in terms of her own family.’
    ‘She likes having her own place, that’s for sure. And they’re kind of another family there—I mean, the landlady’s lending her the sewing machine today, and there are these other tenants, all really old,