The Seven Steps to Closure (9 page)

On the way I stopped at a bakery and bought some fresh croissants and pastries. Then I ducked into the fruit shop and bought some delicious smelling strawberries and homemade blueberry jam. It was 10 o’clock by the time I arrived and I could smell coffee brewing as I entered the front door.

‘In the kitchen,’ Lil yelled when she heard me.

Lily and Martin have a beautiful old terrace house in Paddington with sensational city views. They bought it about 13 years ago when they first got married. It had been a struggle for them back then to afford it, but it had been well worth the sacrifices they made in the first few years. Now it had been lovingly restored and renovated. I found Lily in the huge kitchen which opened up with bi-fold doors onto a deck. The living area – which was straight next to the kitchen – also opened up onto the deck. In summer the whole back wall of the house could be removed. In winter there were grand old fireplaces, restored to their former glory with pristine snowy white marble, to keep the house warm.

‘I’m jealous,’ I said to Lil for the umpteenth time, as I stared at the view.

‘Yeah well, at the moment I’m jealous of you. Look at me. I’m a monster.’ She gestured wildly at her belly which was beginning to bulge.

‘No,’ I said, looking at her, ‘you’re a miracle. Look at you, growing a living being. You’re amazing.’

‘Your haircut is amazing. And the colour is gorgeous. Maybe I should make an appointment with Tristan. Spoil myself a little.’

‘I think that’s a great idea. I’ll babysit for you if Martin’s not home. Speaking of which, when is he home?’

She examined the roster stuck to side of the fridge with a magnet from Dinah’s surgery.

‘Ummm, tomorrow I think. Funnily enough he is in Japan. He’s been climbing Mt Fuji.’

‘What, he’s on holidays?’

‘Nah, they had three days off waiting for the next 767 to come through.’

‘It’s a tough life hey. Where are the girls?’

‘Martin’s parents picked them up this morning so I could have a break.’

‘Geez that’s nice of them.’ I started to unpack the pastries.

‘Yeah, I told them they didn’t have to take them all, but they insisted. They’re off to the movies and then out to Sizzlers for lunch.’

We moved onto the deck with the coffee and food.

‘Yum, thanks for this,’ she said.

‘My pleasure, we should do it more often.’

‘I have something to tell you,’ Lil said, a distasteful expression on her face. I stopped with my croissant half way to my mouth wondering what bombshell she was about to drop. ‘I ran into Tash the other day. I would have brushed her off but she was with Aunt Jackie.’

‘I still love Aunt Jackie,’ I admitted, taking a larger bite of the croissant than I had been intending.

‘Yeah, it’s not her fault her daughter is a faithless hag.’

I smiled around a mouthful of crumbs. ‘So what did they say?’ I finally managed.

‘Well they insisted I stopped for coffee with them, and wanted to know all about the girls and Martin, even though I’m sure Mum bores her stupid with the details of my life. And then they started talking about the wedding. They’ve set a date, and they’re having it at the country estate.’

‘Jake will love that. The stupid bastard was always so impressed by the country estate.’

The country estate was Aunty Jackie and Uncle Edward’s house on the Central Coast. It was a copy of a huge English Manor house, with a sweeping driveway and impressive garden of manicured shrubs. They had stables around the back for their horses; there was even a dressage circle.

‘Anyway the wedding is in November.’

‘He always did like a speedy wedding.’

‘It was gag worthy. Tash was gushing about how much help he was organising everything, and how he’d come up with this great idea about writing their own vows, but making them cute and funny.’ She looked at me waiting for the outburst.

I tried to contain it. I felt my face go bright red with the effort. But finally it burst from me involuntarily. ‘That stupid jerk!’ I yelped. ‘That was my idea.’ (I had wanted to do that at our wedding but Jake had condescendingly informed me that it was silly.) ‘And where does he get off helping her with the planning when he left me to do it myself? For God’s sake he’s running for Lord Mayor. When would he find time to plan a wedding? Boo Hoo, poor little Tash needs help planning the wedding.’ I knew I was getting childish but I couldn’t help myself. ‘Can’t do it by herself? For fuck’s sake, she’s an events organiser; you’d think she’d be all over this.’ I stopped, panting for air.

‘Better?’

‘A little. Ahh, he’s such a shit.’ I threw the rest of my croissant onto the table.

Just then her phone rang and she ducked off to get it in case it was Martin. I couldn’t hear her, but I could tell by the look on her face that it was. After all these years they are still stupid about each other; always exchanging gooey looks and holding hands. I only hope someday I can find something as beautiful as what the two of them have.

Lily finally hung up the phone and came back out to the deck.

‘Martin,’ she said beaming.

‘I guessed by the stupid grin on your face.’

Laughing, she threw some of her croissant at me.

‘Any other news from Bridezilla?’

‘Only that she’s planning to get pregnant as soon as they’re married.’

I froze. ‘Really,’ I said slowly, ‘I wonder if Jake knows about that?’

‘Yeah – I was wondering the same thing.’

I tried not to think about them for the rest of the day. I spent the afternoon on the deck with Princess, reading a book and trying to ignore the abuse from Cocky. I had worked out where he was (living with the deaf old lady in the flat next door), and was concocting a plan to deal with him. I had tried confronting her about him, but hadn’t been very successful. From the doorway to her apartment I could see her hearing aids lying on the sideboard, and consequently the conversation had gone as follows.

‘Your bird is very rude,’ I shouted, while pointing at the balcony.

‘What’s that lovey?’ she shrieked back.

‘Your bird. He’s very rude.’

‘Why am I in the nude?’ she asked confused.

‘No, No,’ I shook my head, ‘your bird.’ I pointed to Cocky in his cage.

The door to the cage was open and, obviously mocking me, he jumped onto the table and squawked, ‘Fuck off.’

The old duck smiled warmly at him before shaking her head at me. ‘He’s not for sale,’ she advised me at the top of her voice.

‘I don’t want to buy him, I want to kill him,’ I mumbled under my breath.

‘Who do you want to kill?’ she asked, backing away from me with an alarmed look on her face.

Oh great, so she could hear that part no problem.

‘No, no,’ I said, thinking rapidly. ‘He’s got a nice bill.’

Eventually I had given up and headed back to my apartment. I toyed with the idea of ringing Mum, but gave it up as a bad idea. I was just going to have to put up with it till a better one came to me. I just hoped it was sooner rather than later.

Elaine picked me up at 6.15pm sharp. I was feeling a little conspicuous in my shortie, short shorts, and was glad to see she was sporting a pair as well.

‘Please tell me.’

‘Nope.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Nope.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Nope.’

When we finally arrived at a large warehouse I was still no closer to discovering the truth from Elaine. The room she led me into was large, with polished wooden floors and had long, evenly spaced, shiny poles extending from the floor to the ceiling.

‘Pole dancing?’ I mouthed at Elaine.

‘What can I say,’ admitted Elaine. ‘I’ve always wanted to try it.’

‘Oh well, I guess it’s far more interesting than knitting.’

Our teacher was an extremely fit looking lady in her mid-thirties. She had six-pack abs and fantastic deltoids and biceps.

‘Wow,’ I whispered to Elaine, ‘how long till I look like that?’

Her name was Penny, and she started by giving us an idea of what we would be learning over the next eight weeks. Then she showed us what we would be able to do if we persisted and came to classes for the next year. I watched as she sprung lightly onto the pole and climbed up it, twirling around. Once she reached an impressive height off the floor she clasped the pole between her thighs and let go with her hands, leaning all the way back so her head was pointing to the floor. She sat back up and, grasping the pole with one arm above her legs and one below, proceeded to lie back and do the splits in the air, supporting her body weight with her arms. Then she slid down the pole upside down, just holding on with her legs, until her hands were touching the floor, at which point she did a handstand against the pole and then flicked down off it.

‘Does that hurt?’ I asked.

‘Not anymore.’ She flicked me a quick grin. ‘Right we’re going to start with a move called a front spin.’

An hour later as we warmed down I could feel some of the muscles of my arms and back that were going to be sore.

‘Thanks,’ I said to Elaine.

‘You enjoyed it?’

‘Yep. It’s the perfect hobby for obtaining closure.’

‘And just think if Dinah ever fires you – you can work as a stripper.’

‘Or if I decide to go back to Uni I can work nights to pay for my fees.’

Elaine laughed.

‘If we hurry we can pick up that silver cutlery set for Dinah,’ I said, looking at my watch.

‘Excellent,’ said Elaine, ’cause I have a date now on Thursday night.’

‘Oh with the guy you’re bringing on Fri night?’

‘No silly, this is a new guy I ran into at Starbuck’s last week.’

‘You are incorrigible.’

‘You should try it some time.’

‘Yeah, maybe I should,’ I said.

‘Oh good – I’m glad you feel like that, cause you have a date on Thursday night as well.’

‘What?’ I heard my voice go up an octave.

‘The first of your internet dates in your quest for fast love and a one night stand.’

‘Elaine – I don’t think I’m ready.’

‘You don’t have to sleep with the first one, hell you don’t have to sleep with any of them if you don’t want to. You just have to get yourself back out there. Look, at least this way you won’t be as nervous, cause you won’t have to go through the initial run into someone, feel attracted to them, hope they’re attracted to you, wait for them to ask you out and then when they do stuff it up because you like them so much that your brain disconnects from your mouth.’

‘I see you’ve studied my dating style.’

She laughed. ‘Actually Dinah was telling me about it. This guy isn’t important because you know nothing about him.’

‘Yeah, but what am I meant to know about him, and what does he know about me?’

We were at her car by then and she pulled a manila folder out of the back. ‘Here, notes I’ve made on him.’

I flipped it open. There was a photo of a nice enough looking guy with a couple of pages of notes, and a print off of the typed conversations they’d had.

‘A little bit of light reading before bed time.’ She smiled cheekily at me.

‘Guaranteed to give me nightmares.’

‘All the details of the date are on the back. Don’t be late and wear something nice, maybe the black dress. He’s taking you to a new Scottish restaurant.’

‘Scottish? Seriously? What do they serve at a Scottish restaurant?’

‘I’m not sure. Haggis probably.’

I gagged a little at the thought.

‘He’s picking you up at 7pm. Wait downstairs for him. I didn’t give him your apartment number.’

‘Thanks,’ I said, reaching out to touch her arm. ‘Even though I don’t want to do this, I appreciate what you’re doing.’

‘Thank me when you’ve had sex again. Now that will be a cause for some celebration.’

‘Well don’t put the champagne on ice yet.’

‘Not on ice, but it’s in the fridge chilling.’

* * *

I was waiting for my date – my stomach a churning knot of nerves. I guess it was natural for me to be nervous, with the infinite number of ways this could become an excruciating experience, versus the slim chance of it actually being any good. What if I didn’t recognise him? What if we had nothing to talk about? What if he saw me and kept on driving?

In the end the date was short and succinct. A beat up old Volkswagen stopped beside me and a strange man said, ‘Get in.’

I peered through the window at him trying to work out if this was the same person in the little photo Elaine had showed me, or some guy who thought I was a hooker. In the end I decided it was the man in the photo with a few more grey hairs and a few more kilos. Wondering what photo Elaine had used of me, I climbed awkwardly into the car. Before I even had my seat belt on, he took off from the curb, his foot flat to the floor. I squealed in surprise and heard him snigger.

Great,
I thought,
a smart ass.

‘You’ve cut your hair short.’

Well that partly answered the question of the photo.

‘Shame – I like a girl with long hair, it gives you something to hold onto.’

‘Excuse me?’ I looked at him in disbelief.

‘You’re a bit dressed up aren’t you?’

‘You said we were going to a Scottish restaurant. I like to look nice when I’m out.’

He burst out laughing. ‘When I said Scottish I thought you’d understand.’ He beat the steering wheel with his hand as he laughed. ‘Wait till I tell the boys about this.’

‘About what?’

As if in answer he indicated left and turned into the parking lot of a McDonald’s restaurant.

‘You are joking?’ I said, gesturing at the restaurant. ‘You said a new Scottish restaurant.’

‘Yeah, well, this one only opened a month ago.’

‘You’re taking me to a McDonald’s restaurant for our first date.’

‘Who said anything about me taking you? You’ll be buying your own thick shake and fries thank you very much.’

‘Well,’ I said with as much dignity as I could muster, ‘I can see that this isn’t going to work, so let’s just call it quits while we’re ahead.’

‘Hey, you said you liked new experiences. I thought after we’d eaten we could have sex in the disabled toilets.’

‘Now you have to be joking.’ I looked at him in amusement waiting for him to start laughing, but there was no change in his facial expression. Okey dokey, not joking then. I opened the car door and clambered out.

‘Okay, well, thanks for the ride, nice knowing you,’ I said, backing away from the car.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Anywhere but here.’

‘Oh that’s just typical.’ I could hear him ranting as I walked briskly across the parking lot and back to the road. ‘You women are all the same. You want it all on a platter – gift wrapped. Everything for free. Well you’re all sluts. Big, fat sluts.’

I could still hear him yelling as I flagged a cab and jumped in. Wow, I thought Cocky had been bad. This guy had him beat hands down.

I texted Elaine on my way back home.

DISASTEROUS DATE. Call me when you get a chance.

And then I quite happily went home to my slightly psychotic cat.

* * *

I got up early the next day to decorate the tearoom for Dinah’s birthday. I had booked her in for a 2pm spa treatment at a Korean Bath House in town. Then we would be heading into Darling Harbour for drinks and dinner. Nat was bringing Ricardo – we were pretty excited to finally meet him. Elaine was bringing her toy boy; I hoped he was old enough to hold a normal conversation, and Creepy Doug was coming with Dinah.

‘Happy Birthday!’ we all shrieked as Dinah entered the tearoom. Susan and Tina had gotten her some flowers and a cake from Beethoven’s, Rana, the hygienist and Mark the other dentist, had gotten her a handbag she had been eyeing off at a shop down the road. I was sure that it was Rana not Mark who had organised that – the two had been dating for six months now.

The morning had gone well. No pain-in-the-ass patients had been allowed to be booked. Then a huge bunch of flowers had turned up from Creepy Doug, with a nice card on them saying how much he was looking forward to helping her celebrate her birthday. No mention of love I noted, but Dinah was thrilled. I packed her off to the Korean Bath house at 1.30pm and went home myself for a rest.

I arrived at Dinah’s at 6pm so we could have a little drink before heading in to Darling Harbour. ‘Where’s Doug?’ I asked as we popped the top off a bottle of champers.

‘He’s on his way.’

Pretty much as these words left her mouth her mobile phone burbled. She picked it up, read the text and then casually put the phone back on the table.

I looked at her.

‘Doug. He’s had an emergency extirpation, he’ll meet us there.’

‘Oh,’ I said in my most nonchalant voice, and then changed the subject to how good she looked. (I feel the need at this time to let you know that an extirpation is actually the removal of the nerve from the inside of the tooth. It’s done as palliative care and not as a form of torture. Well not in this country anyway.)

The traffic was bad so we had the cab drop us off at the entertainment centre and walked from there, strolling through Chinatown, peering at the ducks hanging in the windows. And that was when I saw them. I immediately panicked and tried to distract Dinah, but my body language must have alerted her and she peered through the window, past the ducks to the tables, where Creepy Doug sat with his emergency extirpation.

She gasped.

‘Ahh fuck,’ I said, shaking my head. ‘What a prick.’

Dinah stood like a statue, staring at the two of them. Doug and a person I was assuming was Tiffany, the young, new graduate endodontist, were laughing and eating what looked like Peking duck. I winced as Doug leant over and fed some to Tiffany.

Dinah started to turn away.

I grabbed her arm. ‘No way,’ I said.

She looked at me miserably, her brown eyes shiny.

‘No way Dinah – I let Jake walk all over me. I’m not letting you do the same thing with Doug.’

She looked uncertain.

‘You’re attractive, you’re intelligent, you’re a dentist, you own your own business, and now,’ I said, ‘now you’re thirty. You’re not some scared little girl anymore. You’re a woman, and I think the first task you have as a woman is to go in there, tell that asshole what you think of him and retake control of your life.’

She looked me in the eye and took a few deep breaths while she contemplated my words. ‘Right,’ she finally said, and marched in the front door of the restaurant.

‘Hi Doug, Tiffany.’ Dinah stalked up to the table and took a seat. I maintained my distance, ready to jump in as back up if things got nasty, and had the pleasure of watching Creepy Doug, with a panicked look on his face, trying to salvage the situation.

‘Dinah,’ he started, ‘look who I ran into on my way to Darling Harbour.’

‘Hi Tiffany,’ said Dinah dismissively. Her fight was not with Tiffany who – by the look of confusion on her face – had no idea that there was any type of relationship between Doug and Dinah.

‘Must have been a quick extirpation.’

‘Huh.’

‘The emergency extirpation, must have been quick.’

‘Oh you know – I’ve been doing them for years.’

‘Yeah well, you’ve also been doing me for years, not that you’d know. Anyway just here to tell you not to bother coming to my birthday party tonight, because I’m sick of your shit and it’s over between us.’

It was a beautiful moment. You could see Doug caught between wanting to patch things up with Dinah, and not wanting Tiffany to know the depth of his relationship with her.

‘Anyhoo,’ said Dinah dismissively, dumping the contents of Doug’s wine glass into his lap, ‘got to go, people to greet, champagne to drink. You know how it is on your birthday.’

‘Umm,’ said Tiffany, ‘happy birthday?’

‘Thanks,’ said Dinah, and we walked back out of the restaurant and up the road. Finally she stopped walking and looked at me.

‘Oh Dinah,’ I said, ‘you were amazing. It was perfect. Are you okay?’

‘Need alcohol.’

‘Yep, more alcohol. Come on let’s go get drunk.’

By the time we arrived at the restaurant Elaine, Nat and their dates were waiting. I had texted ahead to let them know what had transpired and God bless them they had alcohol waiting for us.

I spent quite a bit of time drooling over Ricardo. Christ the guy was perfect. Gorgeous – check, nice – check, amazingly sexy accent – check, intelligent – check. That had me wondering. Why was this guy a cleaner? When I asked him, he just said that he liked the hours and the peace and quiet that came with it. Nat giggled at that point, and he leant over and stroked her face while he kissed her. Elaine, Dinah and I let out a collective sigh. I didn’t know till that moment that it was possible to be incredibly jealous of someone at the same time as being insanely happy for them.

I think Dinah had a nice night – even considering the Doug scene – and at the end I took her home to my place to sleep. I arranged with the girls to be at my place at 11am with a breakfast perfect for a hangover. I was sure we were all going to need it, but I also knew from experience that once the alcohol wore off, Dinah was going to feel like crap.