The Jesus Man

by Christos Tsiolkas

  —I don’t want to go.

  —Please, Tom, you like Nadia and we haven’t been anywhere for ages.

  On the news there were two photographs, two young men. In Holland. Killed by a bomb. They were Australian and one of them looked Greek. The photo grabbed Soo-Ling’s attention.

  —That’s so sad.

  No, it isn’t. Tommy didn’t feel sad at all. His indifference was complete.

  —Please, Tommy? Soo-Ling was pleading. In the kitchen she could hear Sonja laughing on the phone.

  —Tom. She nestled under his arm. He groaned and assented.

  That night she wanted sex. She touched his arm softly with her fingers, tried to kiss his mouth.

  —Hon, I’m tired.

  She stopped, shamed. She waited till she heard the regular harshness of his snoring and then, cradled in his arms, softly rubbed at her clitoris. She masturbated without image, without memory. The orgasm that came was soft, a ripple, unsatisfying, but it allowed her to fall asleep.

  The young man, the one who died in the bombing, was fresh faced, handsome. In the dream he called out to her across a busy road and she kept losing sight of him as she attempted to negotiate the buses and the cars, the trucks and motorbikes. There was an explosion and the world collapsed to rubble. She was not hurt. In the dream she moved slowly towards the fallen body of the man who had called out to her. She knew it was Tommy and the dread so disturbed her that she awoke, clutching air, before she could witness any more. What disturbed her most was that in the middle of the rubble a young girl sat foetal, her hand between her legs, rocking, masturbating. This, more than the bomb, more than the death, this distressed her most.

  Nadia had changed. At first Soo-Ling could not pick it. The hair, of course, was shorter and instead of the neat pressed work skirts and blouses, Nadia now wore tight fitting black. They drank wine, Tommy hardly spoke, and Soo-Ling was shy. The rituals of dinner, she was shocked to discover, she had forgotten. Nadia put down her wine glass and excused herself.

  —I’ve still got some stuff to do in the kitchen.

  —Can I help you? Soo-Ling stood up suddenly, eagerly. Nadia nodded.

  —Can I put on the telly?

  Without waiting for a reply, Tommy flashed on the screen.

  He had taken a pill to steady his anxiety. Nadia reminded him of the old life and it seemed so long ago that he could hardly remember any of it. The faces of work had begun to disappear and all he retained of the place was the smell of the printing press. Ink. The pill had begun its work and he settled into the couch. The world compacted into the distance between himself and the screen, the bobbing miniatures of actors. Outside his vision, Nadia and Soo-Ling disappeared. The emanation of the screen kept him warm.

  —Things all right?

  Soo-Ling was chopping up tomatoes. She pulled her hair back from her face and smiled at Nadia.

  —They are, she dropped her voice, it’s just hard with Tommy, his not having work.

  —Are you engaged yet?

  Soo-Ling shook her head.

  —He won’t do it until he gets a job. He reckons he doesn’t want to have me supporting him.

  Nadia squeezed drops of lemon into a jar.

  —And would you put up with that?

  The question shocked her. Soo-Ling had started to feel annoyed at the poverty of Tommy’s existence, she wanted to lash out at him when he refused activities because of the cost. She knew that in her head she kept a mental tally of what she spent on him. She was unhappy at her own greed. But this was the first moment in which she understood it clearly. She wanted him to have a job, she wanted him to have money. She hated giving him money.

  She thought him weak now. She blushed.

  —He’ll find a job soon.

  —It’s hard.

  —What are you thinking of doing? Same sort of thing as before?

  —No fucking way.

  Nadia’s vehemence was exhilarating.

  —So, what?

  —I’m going to study. I’m not sure what, but that’s what I’m going to do.

  —Can you afford it?

  —Nah. Nadia laughed. I’ll try and get some part-time work.

  Nadia turned towards Soo-Ling, shaking a jar of salad dressing.

  —No more offices, no more shit work. That’s all I know.

  Soo-Ling was jealous.

  —Good on you.

  —Mum thinks I’m mad, she told me I was wasting my time. Not married, unemployed. She hates the fact that I blew my retrenchment on overseas. Wog mothers, Nadia shrugged, you know what they’re like.

  Soo-Ling realised what was different about the woman. Except for the faint pink of lipstick and a casual application of eyeliner, Nadia’s face was clean of make-up. She looked years younger and the harshness around her mouth had gone.

  Dinner proceeded slowly. Tommy shovelled down the food, ravenous: the salad, the cream and mushroom tortellini, the cheesecake. Conversation stumbled between Soo-Ling and Nadia. They both, at separate moments in the evening, shared the same thought: I wish Tommy was not here. He desperately attempted conversation but beyond the television and the food there was nothing he could talk about. Nadia was shocked at his thinness, the loss of colour in his skin. He seemed desperately unhappy and she could find no way to bridge his isolation. She kept pouring wine.

  After dessert she put on a CD and they retreated to the couches.

  —What’s this?

  —George Michael. It was playing everywhere in Europe. Nadia took out a bottle of vodka from the fridge.

  —Want some?

  —Yes.

  —Are you sure, Tommy, aren’t you driving?

  Fuck off.

  —I’ll be fine.

  —I’ll have one too. Soo-Ling wished to be drunk, to be intoxicated. Nadia brought in the glasses and Soo-Ling finished hers in two sharp swigs.

  —I’ll have another one.

  Nadia giggled.

  —That’s what I like to see.

  Tommy watched the women. The drink and the food, the pill inside his head. He wanted to fuck. Both of them. He tasted the sour softness of the vodka and for a moment, gratefully, he touched happiness. A swift bounce of rhythm jumped through the speakers. Nadia got up and began dancing. Come on, she roared, and clapped her hands at Soo-Ling. Come dance.

  First nervously, then excited, Soo-Ling followed Nadia into a dance. Tommy reclined back on the couch, his eyes closed, feeling the music. Freedom, the song sung and he smiled at his own detachment. Dinner with Nadia had not revived the past and for that he was grateful. He opened his eyes. Soo-Ling, her eyes shut, her face to heaven, was laughing as she swayed. Nadia walked to the stereo, turned a dial, and the music flooded the room, the house.

  —Come dance, she mouthed to Tommy.

  He refused, closed his eyes again, and listened to the song. He wanted it to go on forever, for an eternity, to find death within it. But the song ended and the silence at its demise saddened all three of them.

  —I haven’t danced for ages, said Soo-Ling as she sat down next to Tommy, a trembling of sweat on her lips.

  Six years, maybe longer, thought Tommy, and I used to go out to bands all the time.

  Nadia turned down the volume.

  —Maybe we should all go dancing soon.

  —Where? asked Soo-Ling.

  —Anywhere.

  —We’re too old. Tommy.

  —Bulishit. Nadia poured another round of vodka. You’re never too old.

  —We are.

  —Speak for yourself.

  I am.

  —That’s so Australian. In Greece and Italy, you idiot, where you come from, they dance till they’re dead.

  I’m not from Italy or Greece.

  —How old are you Tommy?

  —He’s thirty. Next February. Soo-Ling said this quietly.

  —That’s not old, said Nadia, and she drank from her glass.

  They watched a video of Nadia’s trip overseas. At first Soo-Ling w
atched politely. The tourist shots of London. The Houses of Parliament. Big Ben. The Tower. Then the images began to change. The camera no longer focused on buildings and icons but stayed to measure the everyday life of the city. A group of backpackers, over breakfast, laughed and talked into the camera.

  —Hello Australia. A big faced woman with a thick accent.

  An old woman, a bright orange sari, washing down a wall.

  —That’s Brick Lane, in London. The only decent place to get food.

  The wall washed clean, the old woman turned to the camera and smiled. She had no teeth. The video paused, then there was a close-up of the old woman’s brown face, speaking slowly into the microphone. She was wishing Nadia luck and prosperity.

  —Where are you from? Nadia’s voice.

  —India.

  —How long have you been in England?

  —Forty years. The old woman laughed. Since I was a young girl.

  Scotland. An old man searching through rubbish bins, a young girl playing hopscotch on the street. A line of bright washed clothing. A handsome young man, a mop of dirty blond hair covering his eyes, avoiding the camera. Suddenly smiling.

  —That’s Alan.

  —Who’s he? asked Soo-Ling.

  —A man I met in Glasgow.

  A line of apartment blocks, grey, ugly.

  —That’s where he lived.

  Alan on a balcony of a council estate. Waving to the camera, diminishing, disappearing.

  France. A woman in a field digging the earth. A man with an accordion, playing. The camera left him and encircled the watching crowd of villagers. In the very middle a teenage girl with a white T-shirt that fell to her knees. Aciieeed! it read. Yellow smiling face.

  —Now that was huge everywhere. Acid house. I’d never fucking heard of it before.

  —Lou likes that, doesn’t he?

  Tommy nodded, fixated on the images. And they came and came; the camera journeyed across Europe, picking on faces and moments. The faces were handsome and ugly, beautiful and damaged. The country on the screen was green and ablaze with geometry. Hills and towers, slopes and troughs. The camera wound around the faces and the land. In Romania lined old faces, sitting round a table, sung a plaintive song for Nadia. His mother had sung such songs. Nadia’s grandmother, raising a glass to her grand-daughter, crying; all shawls and scarves. Then the children, their faces dirty and their hair not brushed, picking at food and smiling and hiding from the camera. In the lounge room, watching the video, Nadia was crying. Soo-Ling took her hand.

  A river black; beyond it a factory poured a rain of dark smoke. Under a tree a woman was laughing. She too was dirty, her face marked by lines of grease. She was shaking and laughing. The camera stayed on her, the jerking of Nadia’s hands, the woman jumping up and chasing her.

  —Who’s that?

  —Eleni, remarked Nadia quietly. And Soo-Ling understood, shocked, that the two women had been lovers.

  Nadia. Getting dressed, a bra and panties. On the floor Nadia hid her face and giggled. Tommy wanted to fix the image. He noticed that the hair around the lace white of Nadia’s panties was thick and wiry.

  Nadia. Walking through a monumental desolation. A square of grey monstrous power; steps that seemed to lead to heaven.

  —Bucharest.

  Eleni waving at the camera. In a tiny cubicle of a room, a single bed, a swirl of damp and dirt on the wall. Pan across a wooden table. A photo of a man and a woman, around the frame a crown of thorns. Fuzzy image, clumsy framing. Then a close up of the frame: an entwining wreath of skulls and bones.

  —What’s that?

  —Eleni made it. That’s a picture of Ceaucescu and his wife. Requiem for a Dictator, she calls it. She carved the frame out of wood.

  —That would have taken ages.

  —She has plenty of time. Nothing but time.

  Tommy had watched the dictator and his wife be executed. On television. The woman rather than the man had stayed with him. Faced with the savage glee welcoming her death, she had responded with a defiant hate. Tommy thought the cheering crowds were fools. Her defiance had betrayed their victory.

  Greece. The waves of the Aegean rolled on the screen and then the camera focused on jutting rocky islets. A queue of people, T-shirts and shorts, disembarking. Men gathering nets onto boats. A frail young girl at a window, a lane of smoky white houses. The abrupt scream of the Athenian skyline, the jutting ugliness of dull concrete. A kiosk stand. A group of old men arguing and shouting.

  Soo-Ling turned to Tommy.

  —What are they saying?

  —I don’t know.

  The whisper of a wind at the Parthenon, tourists standing on the ruined steps, their hair flying with the breeze. A close-up of scaffolding.

  Tommy reached towards the screen.

  The video spluttered, flashed white lines across an empty blackness, stopped and became static.

  Nadia turned on the lights.

  The brightness disoriented Soo-Ling. Nadia offered coffee and, not touching, apart, on the floor, Tommy and Soo-Ling nodded in agreement. They looked at the blank television. Tommy reached for the remote control. Soo-Ling stopped his hand.

  —No television now, Tommy. I couldn’t bear it.

  In the kitchen Nadia was humming a song.

  —We should go. Soon.

  —Home?

  —No! Overseas.

  —I can’t afford it, you know that. And I thought you wanted to save up for a house. Can’t have both, you know, not with me out of a job.

  Soo-Ling, staring at blankness, wondered if he hated her.

  Over coffee Nadia began to tell the stories of the video images. She described the casual drug hedonism of Glasgow, Alan, and the wounded intensity of the beautiful Eleni. She talked of walking through Romanian fields made putrid by chemical emissions.

  —When we came back home, the rubber of my runners had turned grey.

  She described a war across the borders, the serenity of France and the confusion of Greece. She spoke of the loneliness of London and the nervous anxiety about a united Germany.

  —I can’t wait to go.

  —You should, Soo-Ling, you should. Nadia was eager in her passion. Oh, how can I explain it. We are so far away, everything is happening so fast over there. It could all be fucking ugly, I know. There’s a war in Europe, the Wall’s collapsed. She moved back, sipped her coffee. We’re so far away.

  Shut up. Just shut up. A panic crept through Tommy, a fear of the black night outside.

  Nadia turned to him.

  —You too, mate, you too, Tom. Greece, you’ve got to go to Greece.

  —Why?

  —That’s where you’re from. She turned to Soo-Ling. And you, you must want to see China.

  Soo-Ling and Tommy went quiet, watched the liquid turning slowly in their cups.

  They drove home in silence, Soo-Ling gazed out onto the elongated emptiness of the freeway. Tommy turned to her.

  —Do you mind if I don’t come in?

  The television was throwing sparse light onto the windows. Sonja was home.

  —I’m tired.

  —We can go straight to bed.

  —I just want to be alone tonight, Soo. Is that okay?

  It’s ending, isn’t it, Tommy? Soo-Ling scraped her shoes on the vinyl mat on the floor. Drunk. She wanted to say, simply, Please be with me tonight. But she didn’t. She leant across, touched his cold cheek with her lips, and said goodnight.

  Sonja was lounging on the floor, a man by her side, watching video. The roar of The Terminator. Sonja paused the video.

  —Where’s Tom?

  —He had stuff to do.

  —Dinner good?

  Soo-Ling nodded.

  —Soo-Ling, this is Andrew.

  They shook hands. The video came back on. Soo-Ling waited fifteen minutes, rang Tommy’s number. No-one answered. She watched more of the movie, another fifteen minutes. Rang again. No-one answered. She washed, brushed her teeth, fell into bed.
It would be foolish to say that she was sad. Her exhaustion was not from sadness. She was dreaming of a flight, across oceans and territories. In her imaginings she was flying. But alone. Tommy had disappeared.

  The shop was quiet. An old man, migrant, was thumbing the gay videos when Tommy walked in. Immediately the man moved aside, embarrassed, and left the shop.

  The man at the counter looked up as Tommy approached.

  —Closing up soon, mate. In ten minutes.

  Tommy stood there, engulfed by the mechanics of sex; the hunger to scout the room, to immerse himself in the siren call of mute genitalia. At Nadia’s he had watched the video with increasing horror, the gulf between himself and the world was immense. He needed to walk the shelves of video and magazines, to find equilibrium. Even with the store closing, his anticipation refuted, he was glad to stand still and arouse himself in merchandise. At the counter the man was settling the till. Tommy pulled the first video he saw off a shelf and brought it over.

  —Have I got time to buy this?

  There was a click, the red engaged sign slipped to the green vacant, and a man came out of the video booth. On seeing Tommy he was immediately distraught. He turned away and rushed out of the store. The man behind the counter laughed.

  —Scaring off the customers, you are.

  Tommy said nothing. The man who had emerged from the cell had disgusted him. He was fat, grossly overweight, rolls of flab. He was sweating. His thinning hair, his double chin. He was fat and ugly and obscene. He was familiar too. The dole office? Yes, probably, that was his world too. The dole office. This filthy frightened man, caught out by Tommy, scurrying away, an animal in flight. The eyes that could not look ahead, could only look down, look away. His eyes.

  —Have you got the right money?

  Tommy did not hear. The man behind the counter repeated his question. Tommy blankly handed over the money, took the video wrapped in the brown paper bag. He left, wordlessly.

  Tommy had just looked into a mirror. His reflection was repulsive.

  10

  The Great Schism

  When he was fifteen, Tommy began attending the North Blackburn Baptist Church. This was something he did not tell his family. Maria had refused to allow her children to sit in on religious instruction at school. These classes at the local primary school in Clifton Hill were taken by volunteer officers from the Salvation Army and Maria would not allow her children to be indoctrinated by Protestants. Tommy and Dominic visited the library the one hour a week allotted to religion. There, with assorted Irish and Italian Catholics, Greek and Serbian Orthodox, with the Muslim Turks, they would tease and make jokes and avoid the lazy eye of the librarian. The Bible was Easter and Christmas, the biblical stories glimpses of fables in storybooks.