Holier Than Thou (11 page)
fon216‘Holly Yarkov, if I was trying to sleep with you tonight, I’d offer you a ride home and have a pre-prepared CD with “A Sorta Fairytale” playing in the car stereo and you would be putty in my smart but sensitive hands.’
‘You’re ruining my story. Anyway, we tended to gravitate towards the earlier albums. This one time—’
‘He was trying to get it on with you.’
‘He was not! He just liked the m—’
‘Trying-to-get-it-on-with-you.’
‘Shut up. This one time, we were walking home from the station. I was in first year uni and he was in second year, and we’d been into town to hear a lecture on Che Guevara. We did things like that then. And we were walking in a rare silence . . . and then, right at the exact same time we both sang the exact same lyric from the exact same song . . . It was weird! Like we were sharing the same mind.’
Nick grimaced. ‘Awesome,’ he said. So why isn’t this a simple “boy meets girl” story? Why aren’t you and Mr Liam surrounded by a throng of happy grandchildren, while you tell them of the love you’ve shared?’
‘Skanks. Two of them.’
‘Oh dear. Thwarted by skanks.’
‘Too right. And, well, I guess he just wasn’t into me that way.’
‘That’s not likely is it?’
‘Er—’
‘You are hot, Holly, and that’s not even the best thing about you.’
‘Hmm. Well – I’m not sure, maybe there was a dearth of smart hot chicks at Appin High and UWS Campbelltown . . . ’
‘That there was.’
‘ . . . but where I come from I was fair to middling in the smart and hot stakes.’
‘I don’t believe it.’
‘Believe it.’
‘So what happened? Why is this story in the dump-off?’
‘It was worse than being dumped.There was a crossroads.’
‘Metaphorical?’
‘Actual.’
‘Tell me.’
The sun set on that horribly hung-over day with me still nursing a splittpos=000ing headache and shuffling around in my pyjamas. Mum went, muttering, to the chemist and bought me some Gastrolyte and Nurofen Plus. I vowed I would never drink to excess again. I also checked my phone obsessively and felt sick to my stomach all over again as there was nothing from Liam. Nothing. It was rare for a couple of hours to pass without a message from him, even if it was nothing more than,
Her name was Holl-y… She was a shoooow-girrrl ;P
I checked that I had bars of service on my screen, that there hadn’t been a satellite fall out of the sky. I tried again and again to remember whether I had kissed him or he had kissed me. I couldn’t. I tried to conjure up the memory of him stroking the side of my face, but it kept dissolving into fantasy and was, in the end, wholly unreliable. Not even the worst hangover in the world could stop me from having fantasies about Liam. And I had an exam the next day.
At 11 p.m. I cracked and sent him a message.
Hey, what u up to?
was what I settled on, figuring that I love you Liam Keller, I love you so fucking much, I want to kiss you sober, I want to kiss you forever, I want to kiss you and then some, please get over here immediately and tell me you feel the same way and stay the night in my bed was too much of a risk.
After a torturous twenty-minute interval he messaged back.
Studying I’m afraid. You?
WTF!
I deliberated and then, on extreme impulse, rang him.
‘Hello?’ he said formally, as if his caller ID had not announced it was his best friend calling.
‘Hi,’ I said. Beat. ‘It’s Holly.’
‘Hello.’
Hello?!?
‘Hello. Isn’t your caller ID working?’
‘Yes.’
‘So how come you didn’t know it was me calling?’
‘I did.’
‘Then why did you sound like you had no idea who I was?’
‘I didn’t.’
‘Yes, you did.’
Impasse.
‘So,’ I continued, ‘are we just going to pretend it never happened?’
‘Oh, honey . . . ’
‘Cause I can do that but it’s not my style.’
‘Hol, I wasn’t even sure if you’d remember.’
‘Of course I remember!’ I shrieked.
Okay I don’t remember the crucial detail of who started it, but I remember everything else. Hazily. But I remember!
‘Okay.’
‘And we’re going to
not
talk about it?’
‘No, we’re going to talk about it.’
‘When?’
‘What about tomorrow night after your exam?’
I sniffed. ‘Okay.’
‘How did you pull up today?’ he asked gently.
‘Rough.’
‘Me too.’
We met the next night. In a pub, but not the same one. We sat in a booth, far away from each other on opposite sides, and looked everywhere except at each other. It was like that pained scene in
When Harry Met Sally
where they sit at a restaurant after their indiscretion. Except they had actually had sex. And Sally’s opening line is, ‘It was a mistake.’ And Harry says, ‘I am so relieved you think so too.’ Except she doesn’t really think it was a mistake. I bet Liam thought it was a mistake.
‘I hope you don’t think . . . ’ I began, not knowing exactly where I was going. ‘I mean I hope you don’t think you’re just . . . some . . . ’ I trailed off.
I hope you don’t think you were just some drunken indiscretion, because you weren’t. I have been trying to get up the courage for years and, well, I think that six shots of tequila gave it to me. I have been lying to your face every day, Liam, and pretty much every night too. I have been pretending to be your friend. Pretending that being your friend is what I want. I am two-faced, duplicitous, cowardly. We have this perfect thing going with our friendship.You are the best company, the best, and I have unfettered access to you every day and night. I couldn’t risk that. Actually ... sitting here tonight, I know I can’t risk it even now. If you knocked me back it would be worse than your run-of-the-mill dumping. It would be excruciating. And we could kiss this perfect dynamic goodbye.
‘Hope I don’t think what, Hol?’ he prompted.
‘Hope you don’t think . . . I mean that I don’t . . . I mean, I respect you so much I would never mean to uh, sully . . . ’
‘Sully?’
‘Well—’
‘You don’t hear a lot about sullying these days.’
‘That’s true.’
‘I like it.’
‘Oh. Well good, Leigh-mond, I’m glad you like it.’
Silence.
‘I can’t believe I’m drinking beer. I said I would never touch alcohol again. And it’s actually making me feel better.’
‘Hair of the dog,’ said Liam dispiritedly. ‘How was your exam?’
‘I don’t know. I was writing the whole time. That’s better than when you freeze up and can’t write anything, right?’
‘Right. A rare “glass half full” moment for you, Ms Yarkov.’
Tell him, Holly. Come clean. Just tell him. Tell him you’d like to do it sober some time and ask what are his thoughts on that? What’s the worst that can happen?
‘So what are you up to for the rest of stuvac . . . I mean, the exam period?’ I asked.
‘Just studying . . . oh and Ffion et al. are having a party at their house on Wednesday night. To show how laid back they are.’
It really pissed me off how Ffion invited him and not me to those parties. It was the only time we didn’t go places together.
‘Oh,’ I said.
We were not going to talk about it. We were going to talk about everything else but it. And gulp down our beer.
Outside we huddled under the pub’s awning, taking in the fact that it was now dark, freezing cold and pissing down with rain.
‘I didn’t bring an umbrella,’ I said.
‘Me neither.You can have my hoodie.’ He undid the zip.
‘No, no! You wear it. I’ll just get wet and change as soon as I get home.’ He did the zip back up but left the hood off in solidarity with me, I guess.
We walked in silence. Across the train tracks and down Terminus Street until we reached the turn off of my street. The crossroads. We were soaked through, hair and clothes. The rain was all we could hear.
‘Bye,’ I said, above the din.
‘Bye.’
We hugged awkwardly. He usually insisted on walking me home, even though it was out of his way. Not that night. It was raining after all. And he was probably afraid I’d molest him again. I so wanted to molest him again.
In a romantic comedy, I would be walking off down my street and then I would hear footsteps splashing behind me and his hands would be on my shoulders, spinning me around, and we would kiss passionately while the camera spiralled around us and the music soared.
But I walked alone for a good twenty metres, and nothing.Then I stopped and turned around to survey what I could see of the wet empty street. Tell him. I knew this was one of life’s crossroads and that somehow, if anything would ever progress with me and Liam, it would have to be tonight. I ran. I backtracked down my street, not even bothering to dodge the puddles. I reached Terminus Street and kept on running until I could see him walking up ahead. Exhausted and unfit, I slowed to a jog. And couldn’t help but notice that he was walking purposefully, and without the slightest hesitation. Away from the crossroads. I came to a full stop and bent over, puffing mightily, rain splashing down on the crown of my head. If he wanted me he would be running toward me too.
He disappeared off the footpath and into his house.
I got my breath back. Sort of. And turned and walked, bedraggled and defeated, home.
‘Tell me that’s not the end of the story.’ Nick was spellbound.
‘Well . . . ’
‘No! That can’t be the end of the story! He was just walking away from you because he thought you had shut the whole thing down.’
‘
Me
shut the whole thing down?’
‘Yes, you! You were the one who bolted from his bed at dawn without a word or a note or even a text message! You were the one who said “I hope you don’t think . . . ” And he probably thought you meant you hoped he didn’t think it was anything more than an alcohol-fuelled mistake.’
‘No way. I know him. Knew him, I should say. I knew that he was more than capable of letting a girl know if he was interested. And he wasn’t.’
‘His tongue in your mouth wasn’t an indication that he was interested? Kissing the palm of your hand . . . that’s
beautiful
. In fact, I’m going to write that one down and use it.’
‘I knew him.’
‘Okay, Holly. Let me put it to you this way. Historically, have you been capable of letting someone know that you’re interested? Ever asked someone out or flirted madly or manoeuvred yourself into prime position? Or gone ahead and jumped someone’s bones?’
‘Er . . . yeah. I have done. I have that power.’
‘So why didn’t you just go for it with Liam. Just straight out let him know you were interested. With any of the above methods.’
‘There was too much at stake. He was one of the pillars of my existence. I just couldn’t rock that boat. Go out on that limb. Take a risk like that.’
‘It was probably the same for him.’
‘Nah. Keep listening for the next part of the story.’
‘Ooh! There"0em"’s a next part? I love this story by the way. Its
tragique
.You should write it down and have it published.’
‘Noted. Later that week I was walking through campus. I had an exam in the morning and studied in the library in the afternoon.’
‘You studious little thing. I never studied in the library.’
‘I hadn’t heard from him since the night we didn’t talk about it. So I was smarting. And distressed. And it was all the worse because I couldn’t tell Abigail and Lara.’
‘Why not?’
‘Just couldn’t. Too embarrassed. Didn’t want to ruin the group dynamic. But in the end I found out that they knew anyway.’
‘How?’
I laughed. ‘Liam’s mum ran into Abigail’s mum in the commuter rush at Central Station, on their way to work that week, and told her that something had gone down, and she told Abigail and Abigail told Lara. Anyway.’
‘Anyway. You were walking through the campus.’
‘I was walking through the campus, it was almost dark, and I saw Liam across the other side of the road carrying a big bunch of roses.’
‘Red ones?’
‘Yep.’
‘Er . . . Were they for you?’
‘They were not. He didn’t even know I saw him. I thought maybe they were for his Honours thesis supervisor but the history building was in the other direction. Plus red roses for his supervisor just didn’t make sense. So I followed him.’
‘Oh, Holly.’
‘I followed him down to one of the big student union buildings. He went into the lower entrance. I waited a minute and then sneaked in after him. All was deserted but I could hear voices behind a closed door. It was the door to this big meeting room where clubs and socs would do their thing . . . including Drama Soc.’
‘Mmm.’
‘There was a sign on the door . . . there usually was when it was in use, saying who was in there and how long the room was booked for. Et cetera.’
I took a big swig of my beer. Funny . . . this was all from five years before, but it still made my tummy churn a bit.
‘By the way, Nicholarse, was there a dramatic society at the Campbelltown campus of UWS?’
‘That there wasn’t.’
‘Lucky you. So, I came up and read the notice . . . Rehearsal for
Equus
. . .
Equus!’
‘
I have no idea what
Equus
is.’
‘Good! Enjoy your life that way! Anyway, there was the dramatic society’s logo . . . and I didn’t know what it all meant, but I knew that something was off.’
‘Ffion?’
‘Well, I thought maybe, but I knew that she was sleeping with one of the girls in
Equus
,
and
her flatmate Joseph who was directing it, and also with the guy who was about to start directing the Arts Revue, so I doubted whether she would have time for little old Liam and it just didn’t seem that likely.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘What could I do? Burst in there and demand to know who he was bringing roses to?’
‘Guess not.’
‘Anyway, the following Saturday he messaged and said he was going to the opening night of
Equus
– he didn’t ask me to go too, not that I had any desire to see it – but we were all having brunch in the morning in Surry Hills, me, him, Dan, Abs, Lara . . . ’
‘The gang.’
‘Right, the gang. So I said I would drive, and pick him up at ten.’
‘Okay.’
‘So I arrived to pick him up in the morning, still all “meh” about how weird he’d been that week and had we actually ruined the friendship anyway and maybe I should call him on it . . . And Ingrid opened the door instead of him. And she hugged me, and said it was good to see me, it had been too long, and she gave me a look like she used to give me when my dad was dying.’
‘Uh-oh.’
‘So, actually I knew I was fucked before he and Alix even walked out of his bedroom and into the hall.’
‘Alex?’
‘Alix.
Uh-leaks
. Oh look, I sprang
a leaks
. That sort of a deal.’
‘Well that’s not promising.’
‘Not for me anyhow. Liam on the other hand. He was fucking smitten. He was in deep smit. He was in smit all the way up to his armpits. Make that his eyeballs. He’d gone to that party at Ffion’s house on the Wednesday night and met this chick, who was part of Ffion’s balcony posse at the union bar, taken her out to dinner on the Thursday night, taken roses to her at rehearsal on the Friday night and then . . . Big night. Opening night of
Equus
, cast party
chez
Ffion et al., and back to his place for their first night together of . . . what happens when a man loves a woman. I was seeing them in their first blush of coupled bliss.’
‘Oh,
sweetie-pie
.’
‘So, brief introductions . . . and I’m just standing there, somewhat unable to comprehend what has just taken place, and Ingrid’s not sure whether to put a hand out to steady me . . . ’
‘I bet she wished it was you.’
‘
I
wished it was me. So he is bringing her to brunch with the gang, his newly minted girlfriend, and I am driving. They both sit in the back seat, canoodling . . . ’
‘That’s brutal.’
‘And I sit alone in the front, driving, and
crying
, I hope silently so they can’t hear me. Not that they were paying attention to what I was doing. I could hardly see the road ’cause it was swimming with tears.’
‘Okay stop stop!’ Nick cried. ‘You win! You win the dump-off. This is the worst story ever. I’m sorry I doubted you, Hollier-than-thou.’
‘Yeah well.Yeah.’
‘So what happened after that?’
‘Well, brunch was awkward. People were all like, who the fuck is this chick and where did she spring from? Plus Lara and Abs knew about me and Liam, but I didn’t know they knew, and it was pretty damn obvious that I was not the happiest chappy in Café Lounge.
‘Alix would just not brook with me from the start. I almost saw her decide that I had to go. I just about never saw Liam on his own after that, we saw him every now and again with the gang but she was always there and looking at us like we were some crime against humanity.’
‘You said he’s not in your life anymore.’
‘No. He’s not.’
‘When did the final axe fall? Was there a final axe? Or a gradual petering out.’
‘I. Will. Tell you about that some other time. I’m getting maudlin, Nicholarse. Tell me about your worst dumping. Then we gotta get out of here; my mum’s expecting me for dinner.’
‘I’m not as good at telling stories as you.’
‘Throw me something.’
‘Okay . . . once a girl broke up with me during sex.’
‘During?’
‘Yes, my . . . was . . . I was inside her, and she said
Nick
and I said
Sharn!
thinking it was some big passionate moment. And then she said,
This isn’t working.
And I came to a standstill. Well, a full stop, and I said,
This isn’t working?
pointing to our pelvises,
or
this
isn’t working
I pointed at both of our hearts.’
‘Oh you sweet thing.’
‘And she said . . . ’
‘Uh oh.’
‘ . . .
both.’
‘Oh, fantastic. That’s what we like to hear. Cheers, Nicholarse, let’s drink to . . . er . ..
Sharn
’s health and hope she has gone on to . . . uh . . . whatever. Here’s looking at you kid.’
‘And you.’ Clink. ‘It’s not as bad as you running through the rain, but . . . ’
‘Oh, it’s pretty bad, Nicholarse. Pretty bad.’
‘Can I just clarify . . . um . . .’
‘Clarify what?’
‘You know she said that the . . . it wasn’t working, in the uh, well I would just like to clarify that . . . these days especially, you know, she was the only one who’s ever . . . I would just like to say for the record that I guarantee a good time.’
‘I believe you, hon.’
‘I don’t know what she was going on about . . . I
guarantee
a good time!’
‘I bet you do.’
‘It’s time to go now isn’t it.’
‘Yes.’
Do I believe in God? I don’t know. But I know that regardless of whether I believe in God, I believe that Tim was sent to me by God. As a gift. Like the rainbow after the flood. A sign that the world can be a good and kind place and that we can hope for better things.
At the end of fourth year uni, we organised a trip to Byron Bay. In celebration of Dan and Tim finishing Honours. Both with first class Division 1. Dan got the University Medal by a whisker. Tim was very good-humoured about this, as with everything, but it had been a long year for all of us. I had one more year to go of Arts/Social Work, Lara had one more year of Arts/Law and Abigail two of medicine.
Liam was working as a union organiser, living with Alix in Annandale, and sighted very rarely. The last time we’d been together for brunch, Lara had talked about her successful application for a summer clerkship at Wolf Parkinson White, a big corporate law firm that represented, among other good causes, big tobacco. Daniel said he had signed on with Xavier and Co, a large international consultancy firm that had courted him away from continuing with science. They were both soon to exist high above the city in Governor Phillip Tower. Liam glowered, having become even a teensy bit more bolshie since he started working for a union and projecting just a teensy bit more superiority now that he’d started hanging with Alix’s crowd.
I was ljust a teeess than impressed with the choices that Lara and Dan were making, but I wasn’t going to make a thing about it. I didn’t think much of Liam’s choice to drop his friends for his girlfriend, if we were going there. But we weren’t. Not openly. However that brunch was the last time I saw him. I heard the following year that he moved to Canberra for a job. With Alix.
We booked a house up near the lighthouse. Masochistically, I had emailed Liam and asked him if he wanted to come with us. In memoriam, I suppose, for past summers. He didn’t reply. Worked out well for numbers anyway. The five of us flew to Ballina and then hired a car to drive to Byron. There was another house of Dan and Tim’s science crowd just down the road from us and we walked together into town along the main beach every night, and home again, singing and carrying our shoes.
Tim’s attractiveness was something I had always been vaguely, and then increasingly, aware of, but I had never taken it upon myself to crush on him or anything. For the first part of that year I was still coming and going everywhere with Liam, talking mainly to Liam and not concerning myself with much outside of Liam’s company.
‘Are you and Liam going out?’ Tim asked one night, when we found ourselves next to each other in line at the uni bar.
‘No,’ I said shortly, well used to fielding that question but getting heartily sick of the answer I always had to give.
Tim was a rower of some sort – he often would bemoan his state of drunkenness in the early hours of the morning because he was rowing at 7 a.m. He rowed for some northern beach surf club, most likely with a bunch of fellow graduates from his North Shore private boys school. I didn’t concern myself with it very much, beyond noticing that he had very pleasant shoulders and arms. Later when we moved to Dulwich Hill, he gave it up. He was ready to give it up he said, but I wondered at times whether I was the reason he gave it up. Whether his family think I insisted he give it up.
One Friday night, not long before Byron, we had all gone out together to celebrate Dan’s and Tim’s Honours results. We straggled in to the Town Hall Hotel at about 2 a.m., and saw Liam, Alix and some of the drama crowd ensconced around a table. Alix draped herself over Liam when she saw us. He gave the tiniest flicker of recognition to my instinctual smile and wave, and looked away.
‘Don’t
bother
,’ hissed Lara. ‘What’s the point?’
I was just drunk enough to have tears brimming and a flush of anger that threatened to send me marching over there to demand some answers.
‘Woman-of-Steel.’ said Dan. ‘Don’t.’
‘Just sit down Hols,’ implored Abigail.
‘It’s my round,’ said Tim, looking wholesome. ‘Why don’t you come and help me, Holly?’ And he gently tugged me over to the queue.
‘She’s not even that good-looking!’ I expostulated earnestly to Tim. ‘What the fuck. I mean, I am actually thinner than she iner".="" mean="" why="" would="" he="" choose="" her="" over="" me="">smarter. What does she have? What does she
have
?’
‘Umm, I don’t know. But I do think you are, er,
empirically
better-looking.’
‘Thank you!’
‘I’m sure if I did a randomised controlled trial, you know, a real quantitative study of . . . you know, comparing the two of you, you would walk all over her in every area of, um, key performance indicators. I could do graphs.’
‘Okay, science boy. Easy on the graphs.’
‘Or a pie chart.’
‘No pie chart.’
‘So you never went out with him?’ Tim pressed. ‘With Liam.’
‘No. I did not. That honour was never accorded to me.’
‘I like how you talk.’ Gee he had a beautiful smile, Tim did. Such white teeth and shapely lips. And a twinkle in his blue eyes. His colouring was quite similar to mine actually. His was DNA you’d want to mix with yours. And when I say yours, I mean mine.
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I just talk normally don’t I?’
‘No,’ he replied. ‘Now, what are you drinking?’
When we returned to our friends with their drinks, there was only one chair free around the table. I looked around for another.
‘Don’t bother,’ Lara said. ‘I looked everywhere.’
Tim sat on the chair and patted his thighs.
‘Sit here, Holly. If you like.’
‘Thanks, Timothy. I do like.’
I sat down on his lap, which was surprisingly comfortable.
‘Am I squishing you?’ I asked.
‘No.’
A few minutes later, I relaxed a bit, you know, untensed my thighs, leant back on him a bit more.
He rested a hand on my hip.
Nice.
The first night we were in Byron, we walked into town for dinner and ended up watching a band at the Great Northern Hotel. Some random backpacker in a micro-T (ew!) kept dancing too close to me, putting his hands on my hips and generally bothering me.
‘I just want to listen to the music,’ I shouted at him, I hoped politely.
‘I’m Todd!’ he shouted back, grabbing me around the waist and shimmying down my body grotesquely.
‘Oh for . . . ’ I fought my way away from him and moved further up the back to where Tim was standing with some of the guys from his year.
‘Timbo!’
‘What’s up?’
‘There’s this guy that won’t let me alone.’ I turned and saw ‘Todd’ blow a kiss at me through the crowd. ‘Can you . . . can you pretend to be my boyfriend for a while?’
The music was so loud I’d had to put my face real close to Tim’s in order to be heard.
I put my arms around his neck and his arms were instantly around my waist.
‘Sure,’ he said. ‘Happy to.’
The noise and crowd sort of faded away. We were kissing and we didn’t stop. We were the perfect height for each other. Zero neck crickage. I don’t know how long we stayed on that dance floor kissing, but we didn’t come up for air until the pub closed and the houselights came on. Our friends had discreetly melted away.
‘Bloody hell, Timothy. You are . . . you are the best, the . . .
best
, I wish I could think of another word, the best kisser I have ever . . .The best.’
‘Thanks,’ he said, kissing me very softly on the mouth. ‘I have a whole philosophy on kissing.’
‘You do?’
‘I do.’
‘I’d love to hear about it. Shall we head?’
We walked slowly out into the warm salty air and down to the beach. He had his arm around me, firm but not too tight, and his hand at rest in the dip just above my hip. I have always loved the intimacy that is stored in that pose.
‘My philosophy,’ he said, with his trademark twinkle,‘is that kissing should be passionate but soft.’ He demonstrated. ‘You don’t want to overwhelm the other person . . . with too much pressure, or too much unconsidered tongue.’
‘Uh-huh,’ I said, weak-kneed and completely unable to engage in any kind of sexy banter. ‘Unconsidered . . . tongue.’
We made very slow progress down the beach, past some other couples, to the quiet far end with its rising peaks of dense scrub. Knowing that we were returning to a house where I was sleeping in a room with Lara and Abs and he was in a room with Dan, we felt some anticipatory sexual frustration. I dropped my shoes onto the sand and pulled my T-shirt off over my head. Tim did the same with his T-shirt. His chest was covered t wlt in dark hair, strange given how smooth the rest of him was. I thought we were going to fool around some more but he looked out over the sea, at the small waves dancing under the glow of moonlight.
‘Let’s have a swim,’ he grinned, and unbuckled the belt on his jeans.
I didn’t think twice before slipping my skirt off.
‘Er . . . are we leaving undies on?’ I asked shyly.
‘Nah.’
Blimey. He was going to see me naked before we had slept together. I was going to see
him
naked! Albeit only in moonlight.
We arranged our clothes in a little pile and then stood to face each other. I was surprisingly not embarrassed, and enjoyed the sensation of the air on every inch and crevice on my body.
Timbo. He was near perfect to look at. He
was
perfect. And he had that ‘I’ve hit the jackpot’ expression that my small list of former lovers all had the moment they saw my body unclothed. They couldn’t believe their luck. Having been attracted to me for other reasons, how were they to know that my nondescript and less-than-sexy dress style covered up a size 8 body with doubleD boobs? They were rewarded, amply, for their lack of superficiality. We walked, giggling, to the water’s edge, where I hesitated as I thought of sharks.
‘Hey,’ Tim said, putting his arm around me, ‘I would never let anything happen to you.’
In we went. It was fantastic. If the section of my brain that holds the memories of that swim ever dements, shoot me.
I freaked when we finally made it back to the house and I realised that my watch was missing. The watch that my dad had given me for my fifteenth birthday. The last birthday we were together. I had taken it off to go swimming and put it in the pocket of my skirt but it was gone.
‘No! No!’ I frantically turned my pockets inside and out. ‘It cannot be gone! Fuck. Fuck!’ I burst into tears.
Lara appeared sleepily at her bedroom door, as did Daniel.
‘What? What’s the matter?’
‘She’s lost her watch,’ said Tim.‘The one her father gave her.’
‘Oh no,’ said Lara, coming out and putting her arms around me.
‘I will find it,’ said Tim. ‘Dan? Come with me; we’re going back to the beach.’
‘You’ll never find it!’ I wailed. ‘It could be anywhere on that beach!’
‘I’ll find it. It probably dropped out when you picked up your skirt.’
‘Is that right?’ said Lara, rubbing my back.
‘Come on, Dan.’
Tim and Dan left the house, and Lara made me a cup of tea.
I whimpered.
Abigail appeared in her pyjamas. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Holly lost her watch.’ Lara got another mug down.
‘Oh crap.’
‘The boys have gone to look for it.’
‘Good. Now, what the hell is going on with you and Tim?’
I managed to grin through my tears.
Tim found my watch. Without a torch, just moonlight. He found it on the enormous beach, amongst the infinite millions of grains of sand. He brought it back to me, and I hugged him profusely.
‘Okay everyone, it’s 4 a.m.,’ said Abigail, sounding just like her mother. ‘Bed.’
I slept soundly and woke to her gently prodding me in the bright morning sunshine.
‘Hols. We’re going into town for brekky and to get tickets to British India for tonight. You stay here and . . . sleep.’
‘Who’s going?’ I asked groggily.
‘Me, Lars and Dan.’ She raised an eyebrow at me ever so slightly and kissed my forehead.
‘Bye.’
‘Bye . . . ’
I rolled over in bed and closed my eyes. Then opened them abruptly. I got out of bed, went to the bathroom, peed, cleaned my teeth and splashed water on my face. My hair was everywhere. My Bonds singlet and Foghorn Leghorn boxer shorts were less than sexy but they’d be off soon enough. I went to the door of Dan and Tim’s room and knocked.
‘Come,’ called Tim, like Captain Picard.
I pushed the door open. He was lying on the bottom bunk, covered by a sheet from the waist down. Maybe a bit below the waist. The trail of hair from his navel downward was visible.
‘Come here,’ he said.
Something incredible had been delivered into my arms. Like in the Nick Cave song.
‘You know what amazes me?’ I said to Nick as he sat down next to me in the alcove at break time. ‘Old people getting it on.’
‘Who’s getting it on? Kristo and Tessa?’
‘No, no. Anyway they’re not that old. I saw . . . Stan and Wendy.’
‘Wendy who?’
‘Well, I was at Bannerman House late last night doing a family session. And by the time I was finished it was 6 p.m. and dark.’
‘I wish you’d texted me,’ Nick said. ‘I was worried.’
‘I wrote it in the movements book. Why didn’t you look there?’
‘That would have made too much sense.’
‘Anyhoo, I was sitting in the nurses’ station doing my notes and I happened to look up at the locked ward, and I saw Stan out in the courtyard having a smoke and gazing up into the sky.’
‘Poor old Stan.’
Stan was one of my clients. He was about fifty or so and he had raging, chronic schizophrenia. When he was well he was a really sweet man. When he was unwell he was a (literally) screaming mess of angry paranoia. His family had deserted him, so he lived alone and had no one. Occasionally, dodgy buggers that preyed on him at the RSL would move into his house and squat there. Nick and I went round and turfed them out. He had set his whole house on fire just before being admitted to the unit, to burn the hidden cameras and smoke out the hallucinatory ‘bastards’ whose voices taunted him constantly. The fire brigade arrived and called the police, who brought him to hospital. I felt a failure whenever he got really sick. But I was relieved that he was in hospital and I didn’t have to worry about him for a while.
‘The nurse out in the yard was Wendy,’ I continued. ‘You know Wendy?’
‘The old girl . . . with the face like . . . ’
‘You know, Choong told me she’s actually only about fifty. But she looks much older. Her face is so lined. She looks like one of those cats with the funny squashed-in faces.’
‘And she’s not a happy chappy.’
‘She’s pretty dour. I have never seen her smile. And she’s short and fat. Must’ve had a hard life. So, all the other acute patients were sitting down to eat their dinner, and Wendy was waiting for Stan to finish his fag. That’s why it was just Stan and Wendy out in the courtyard. And the glass door was wide open so I could hear everything. Stan threw his cigarette down on the ground. There he was in his bare feet and filthy clothes . . . got no one to bring him in clean ones . . . ’
‘Yeah, poor bugger.’
‘Overweight madman, prime candidate for a heart attack or suicide in a moment of insight, and he turned to Wendy with this enormous grin on his face, and danced over to her.’
‘Danced?’
‘Like Fred-fucking-Astaire! I’m telling you he waltzed, he cha-cha-ed, he . . .
somethinged
over to her and said,
Wendy, have you seen the moon tonight? It’s beautiful .. . Just like you
.’
‘Stan did? Was he manic?’
‘No! He was just intoxicated by the moonlight.’
‘I bet he was manic.’
‘He doesn’t have bipolar, Nicholarse! Shut up, you’re ruining the story.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Then he said,
If only you and I were twenty years younger.
And he put his arms out to her, inviting her to dance.’
‘Go, Stan!’
‘And Wendy – grizzled, bitter Wendy – let out this . . .
peal
of laughter, this delighted, girlish giggle, and put her hand in front of her mouth, and said,
Oh, Stanley!
like some blushing ingénue.’
‘And did they dance?’
‘Well, no Nicholarse, she’s a nurse in a psychiatric ward; they’re not allowed to dance with patients.’
‘Yeah but . . . they’re old and it sounded so romantic.’
‘It was! It was this perfect flower in the desert. This beautiful moment that sprang to life in a place of lost souls and drug-addicted system-abusers and the smell of unwashed paranoid bodies . . . and they were
old
Nicholarse, if you looked at them you’d think sheesh those buggers have already run their race
.
I just . . . it’s hard to imagine still having those feelings and those abilities when you are old. But they were.’
‘That’s nice. I guess.’
‘I got the hell out of there ASAP, scribbled the rest of my notes. I felt like such a voyeur.’
‘You are a bit of a voyeur, Hollier-than-thou. I’ve noticed.’
‘What? Back that up.’
He just smiled and sipped his coffee.
‘Back that up, Nicholarse. Right now. You’re making me out to be some kind of sex weirdo.’
‘Relax. I don’t mean you’re a voyeur in any kind of sexual way. Well, maybe you are, but I wouldn’t know about that side of you.’
‘I’m not!’ I squeaked.
‘It’s okay Holly, we all have our little quirks and deviances.’
‘I don’t! I mean . . . I—’
17;r little
‘Just teasing you, tiger. What I meant was, you love to observe people.You see little dramas everywhere, human drama. Sometimes it makes you sad, sometimes angry, or happy. You can’t walk past an open-blinded window at night-time without looking in. Part of the reason you like this alcove is because we can see all the comings and goings of the waiting room, the staff entrance, the driveway into the parking lot. You love that rooftop car park in Marrickville because you can see all the goings-on down below in the street and on the train platform. You’ll notice the heavily pregnant woman sitting alone in the corner of our train carriage crying, and be consumed with the why and the wherefore and the sympathy.’
He was kind of right.
‘Isn’t everyone like that?’ I ventured.
‘No, Holly, not everyone is like that. None of my other friends give me a running commentary on the goings-on of the people in the opposite apartment block, gleaned from looking in through the windows.’
I felt such joy when the husband of the Pakistani lady in the apartment across from me returned home in the evening, scooped up the toddler and threw him into the air. The toddler squealed with delight, the husband was so happy to be home, and the wife looked on, smiling. Good times.
Same with the two women who lived as platonic flatmates in the apartment below. They were youngish, maybe thirty or so, both quite attractive girls with proper haircuts and crisp work clothes. They both got home in the evening at a similar time to me, and busied themselves with cooking dinner, watching crappy reality TV while they ate. The dark-haired one must have been studying as well because she sat at their table after dinner with her books and notes spread everywhere. The other one would make them both a pot of tea.
Until one day it was apparent that they weren’t platonic flatmates anymore. One evening I was stirring a stir-fry on my stove and I gazed out of my kitchen window and into their kitchen window. The dark-haired one was stirring a steaming boiler, and the blonde one came up behind her and kissed the back of her neck. The dark-haired one put the wooden spoon on the spoon rest, turned around and there they were, pashing in their kitchen in the suburbs! Each touched the other like some exquisitely delicate treasure.
After that there were all kinds of daily kindnesses and canoodling in that flat. It made me happy to see it. Not that I . . . I mean they could always have drawn their curtains but they didn’t.
Honestly, the comings and goings in just this one tiny corner of the world.
I told Tim all about it when he got home, that I had witnessed love bloom in one of the red-brick boxes opposite ours while I was stirring our dinner.
‘That’s . . . Should you be looking in other people’s houses?’ he said.
‘Well, I just can’t help myself. Anyway it’s not like I look into their bedroom or bathroom.’
‘If their bedroom or bathroom windows faced us I bet you would look into them.’
‘No I wouldn’t.’
‘Hmmm.’ Tim unfastened his tie. ‘Well, let me see this lesbian love nest for myself.’ He went out onto our balcony and I followed, wrapping my arms around his torso.
The Pakistani family was seated and eating dinner, the little one flapping his arms and squealing in his high-chair. Below them, the two girls were nowhere to be seen in their well-lit living room or kitchen.
‘They must be in one of the bedrooms,’ I said.
‘Maybe they went out.’
‘No way. I’m telling you, Timbo, love was born in their kitchen about half an hour ago. Plus if they’d gone out they wouldn’t have left the lights on.’
‘I’m hungry,’Tim said, losing interest.
‘You mean,
Where’s my dinner, bitch?
’ I teased him with our in-joke, which is not really funny when taken out of context, or if you’ve actually lived under the rule of a domestic violence tyrant, but Tim and I always collapsed into paroxysms of laughter when either of us got home and called out
Where’s my dinner, bitch?
‘Precisely.’
‘Dinner is just about served. Want me to help you get out of your work clothes?’
‘No, you’ll get us both distracted, and I am seriously starving. Go into the kitchen. Bitch.’ And he smacked my arse.
‘Well . . . ’ I heard myself saying to Nick, ‘I think that watching people can sometimes balance out the bad news.’
‘What bad news, Hollier-than-thou?’ Nick gave me his full attention in such a way as to let me know that I could hold his full attention. If that makes any sense. I knew that in my darker moments he wanted to reach out and soothe me somehow. He wanted to protect me, to bathe my wounds. He’s such a nurse that way. And my darker moments, my darker preoccupations, were okay with him. Sometimes I worried that my darkness was too much at odds with Tim’s blonde healthy sunshine. So I kept it from him and curled up alone in our bed, or on the banana chair on the balcony and looked at my tree.
‘The bodies of a man and a woman in their thirties were found chopped to pieces in a garage in the Sydney suburb of X.’ I said, putting my coffee down on the cement and wringing my hands. ‘A toddler was killed instantly when a four-wheel drive ran up the rear of a hatchback. An elderly widow was found strangled with her own pantyhose in her own bedroom. But not for a few weeks. A mother and baby were swept away in a flash flood while the father tried in vain to rescue them.’
‘That kind of bad news,’ Nick said.
‘Actually, I prefer it when a mother and baby are killed together,’ I said. ‘It’s worse when the mother survives and has to carry on despite being . . . butterflied.’
‘And how does watching people relate to . . . you know?’
‘Balancing out the bad news? Well I will tell you, Nicholarse. I really resent the way that kind of news makes me feel. And the randomness of it. It’s as if nothing good exists in the world. But it does exist. It just doesn’t get reported in the news.’
‘Like . . . ?’
‘A Dulwich Hill woman, aged 24, sat on her balcony tonight contemplating a large eucalypt and for a moment thought that she comprehended the nature of the universe and her place within it.’
‘A Marrickville man, aged 26, lifted himself up to the roof of a community hall with his own muscles and two cuts of silk, and felt like he had conquered all.’
‘Last night, unbeknownst to anyone but their voyeuristic neighbour, two platonic flatmates realised that they loved each other and left a half-cooked stew on the stove while they consummated their love.’
‘A nurse and social worker took fifteen minutes out of their shitty thankless job in the roughest corner of town, sat on a couple of milk crates drinking coffee, flopped their real selves out on the cement and both liked what they saw.’
‘Nicholarse. That’s beautiful.’ I didn’t know where to look.
‘You get me through the days Hollier-than-thou.’
‘Likewise.’ I drained my coffee cup and our moment was shattered by the shouting of one of Nick’s clients who had spied us in the alcove. Duc Than Tran. Schizoaffective Disorder. Insightless. And always spoiling for a fight about the sorest of sore points – his fortnightly legally mandated injection of antipsychotic medication.
‘Nicholas!’ shouted Duc. ‘I no have injection today! I no have injection any day! I am the father, the son and the holy ghost.’
‘Hi, Duc,’ said Nick in his usual friendly tone. ‘Gotta have the injection, mate. Then it’ll be over for another fortnight.’
‘No injection!’
‘Hmmm.’
‘I have injection if you bring me two western women to be my sex slaves.’
‘Beg pardon?’ I said.
‘Go on, Duc; wait for me in the waiting room,’ said Nick hurriedly.
‘Two! Not one! Two western women! To be my—’
‘We’ll discuss it in a minute, mate.inumen! To be8217;
Duc walked back around to the main entrance with his filthy great-coat billowing behind him.
‘Nicholarse,’ I said. ‘Just before you go.’
‘Mmmmyes?’
‘I was looking at you in handover this morning.’
‘You were?’
‘Yeah.’
‘And . . . ?’
‘Did you smoke this morning?’
He looked at me. But not immediately. ‘Did I . . . ?’
‘Pot. Did you smoke this morning before coming to work?’
‘Yes.’
Something in me sagged.
‘You shouldn’t do that.’
‘Believe me, Holly, you wouldn’t want to be around me if I didn’t do it.’