by B M Carroll
Should she mention Jarrod? Jarrod would hardly send his own wife a nasty email, would he? But it’s odd that he hasn’t received anything. Maybe he did and decided to keep quiet?
‘Some of the messages are emails, others are physical notes,’ she says instead. ‘I don’t know if that’s important.’
Mike stares at her. ‘Seems important to me. A note means they know where to find you.’
Her eyes widen. ‘Now you’re scaring me.’
‘Sorry.’ He reaches across the table and briefly squeezes her hand. ‘I don’t mean to freak you out.’
Katy is distracted by the sound of a chair scraping on the floor. She looks over her shoulder and sees that the staff are stacking chairs on tables and casting meaningful glances in their direction.
Mike seems just as surprised as she is. ‘I didn’t realise the time.’
He calls for the bill, and offers his credit card without giving her the chance to see what’s owed.
She puts fifty dollars on the table. ‘This is for me. I pay my own way.’
It’s one of her rules. Just like the waiting thing. Always pay your share, because you don’t know the financial status of your date, and you don’t want to create any false expectations about some form of ‘payback’.
He looks at the money, then looks at her face, no doubt seeing the determination there. ‘Can’t you pay next time?’
Once again, the suggestion of the future makes her heart miss a beat.
‘No, thanks.’ Then she grins to take the edge off things. ‘Besides, next time could be somewhere more expensive.’
He takes the money and the awkward moment passes.
Outside the restaurant is surprisingly busy for a Thursday night. Pedestrians and revellers walking past, cars whizzing by on the main road, a police presence outside the pub a few doors up.
What now?
Even as she is thinking the question, he draws her close. His lips are soft and questioning. She melts into the kiss, answering the question: yes, yes, yes.
‘Your place isn’t far from here?’
‘A few minutes.’
‘Let’s go. I’ll walk you.’
‘You should get home to Toby.’ She doesn’t know why she is dissuading him. She would love him to walk her home.
‘I can spare a few minutes.’
He takes her hand in his and they cross the road. For the first time they’re quiet. Katy is absorbing details that she didn’t notice at the restaurant: the slightly rough skin of his hand, the smell of his aftershave, the upright manner in which he walks.
It’s over far too soon.
‘This is me. Thanks for seeing me home.’
There seems no point in inviting him in. He must get home to Toby. And she has a rule – something about not letting strange men into her apartment – although she is sorely tempted to throw her rulebook in the gutter.
He kisses her again. A deeper, more intimate kiss. A kiss that makes Katy feel both weak and strong. They’re both breathing heavily when they finally stop.
‘Gotta go,’ Mike says reluctantly. Then he adds, promises, ‘I’ll call you. Don’t forget to get those copies for me.’
‘Goodnight.’ Her voice doesn’t sound like her own. It’s squeaky, feeble. ‘I won’t forget.’
She watches him retrace his steps down the street. He turns to give a last wave before disappearing from sight. She swings around to go inside and nearly jumps out of her skin.
‘Howdy, Katy.’ It’s Jim, her neighbour.
‘Jesus, Jim. You gave me a fright. What are you doing there?’ He’s standing half in the shadows. Was he watching her and Mike?
‘Sorry, love. Didn’t mean to startle you. Just taking out the rubbish. Did you have a good night?’
Katy can see he’s keen to chat but she desperately wants to get inside, to be alone, to examine everything that has happened tonight and rejoice over it.
‘Yes, thanks.’
‘No more strange notes under the door?’
‘Nope. Night, Jim.’
She turns on all the lights when she gets inside. Pours herself a glass of water. Sits on the couch with a smile that will not be suppressed.
He likes you as much as you like him. Unless you’ve got your signals mixed up.
It wouldn’t be the first time she’s got it wrong. A wonderful, promising first date followed by ... nothing.
No, this is different. Sometime in the future.
She realises that she hasn’t checked her phone for hours and retrieves it from her handbag. Dead. She sets it to charge and begins to get ready for bed. Her phone has come back to life by the time she emerges from the bathroom. There are several missed calls from Zach and another voice message.
‘Hi, Katy. Zach Latham again. We’ve been playing phone tag. Give me a call when you get this message.’
It’s almost midnight. Obviously too late to call now. And too late to text Nina, to tell her about the incredible night she’s just had.
Sometime in the future.
Katy climbs into bed, lies in the dark replaying every moment, and falls asleep with a smile on her face.
32
LUKE
Luke belts himself in and a female flight attendant snaps shut the locker overhead. ‘Jesus, this is weird ...’
Aaron laughs. ‘Planning on being one of those difficult customers?’
Luke grins back. ‘I’ll give them shit from start to end.’
The flight is full. Passengers sandwiched together. Strangers manoeuvring to keep their elbows and legs to themselves. There’s a baby crying somewhere up the front. Poor thing, its misery has just started. Thirteen hours to Singapore, a quick stop to refuel, then another eight hours to Sydney. It’s been a while since Luke’s been a passenger on a plane. Before Aaron, holidays were in far-flung places – Nepal, Russia, Iceland – taking advantage of generous staff discounts. In recent years he has favoured other forms of transport. Meandering car trips to Wales to see Aaron’s parents. Trains north to Edinburgh and Glasgow. A ferry over to Ireland.
He has written to his father to let him know he’s coming. A card with the cartoon image of an aeroplane on the front; flight numbers, times and dates written inside. An old-fashioned means of communication for an old-fashioned sort of man. A dinosaur who hasn’t embraced the convenience of technology. No computer or email or internet. No mobile phone or texts. None of that gay stuff either, thank you very much. Nonsense, the lot of it.
I’m bringing a friend, Luke wrote below the travel details.
What will his father make of that? What kind of reception will Aaron get? Civil, is the most Luke can hope for. Scornful is what he expects. Hostile is what he’s most afraid of.
They’re in the air, thick cloud obscuring the view of London. The drinks trolley seems to take for ever. Luke and Aaron order a wine each, on the understanding that Aaron will only drink half his and surrender the remainder to Luke. Luke needs the alcohol to numb his sense of foreboding. Duty calls him back to Sydney every three or four years: usually friends or extended family celebrating weddings or significant birthdays. He stays with Katy and other friends during these trips, calling on his father only a handful of times – the minimum he can get away with – every minute an endurance. The house is depressingly male. Everything clean and neat but woefully dated and drab. His father puts the kettle on and they try to talk about what’s happened in the years since they’ve last spoken.
‘How’s the job going?’
‘Still in the same flat?’
‘Living the same lifestyle?’
This is his way of asking if Luke is still gay. As though Luke might wake up one morning and suddenly decide he is not homosexual after all.
‘Dad, you should really redecorate in here. Make it brighter ...’
‘Why don’t you let me set you up with a computer or even an iPad?’
‘Have you met anyone special, Dad?’
Luke’s mother died when he was eight. He
was shielded from the gravity of her illness, her chemotherapy sessions scheduled for when he was at school, her long periods in bed put down to the simple need to rest. He remembers her making light of it, patting her scarfed head and laughing, ‘Like my new hairstyle, Lukey? It’s all the rage.’ He didn’t understand that she was bald under the scarf until she was long dead.
Later on, when she was gravely sick, she still made a supreme effort in his presence, cuddling him on the hospital bed, sometimes entangling him in her drips and wires. Acting like she wasn’t dying and those wires weren’t pumping her with drugs to make her last a little bit longer.
‘Tell me about your day, Lukey. What’s going on at school?’
He really thought she was going to get better. That she would be home any day. Then the morning his father told him she’d passed away in her sleep. Profound shock. Crushing grief. Feeling stupid for not ‘getting it’. Later, as a young teenager who was quite certain about his sexuality, and just as certain about his father’s opinion of it, he liked to think that his mother’s presence would have softened things, made it easier for his father to accept. As an adult, having seen first-hand how obstinate and immovable human beings can be, he isn’t so sure.
He has thought a lot about his mother in the days leading up to this trip. She’s the one who comes to mind whenever he thinks about home. Her laughter, her light, her loss. Luke has surpassed her age by two years; she was only thirty-five. So fucking unfair. Why her? Why the fun-loving kind-hearted parent instead of the miserable, bigoted one? He often imagines her alive, healthy and happy in a parallel life. Visiting him in London. Shrieking in delight at the sights and shopping. Linking his arm, calling him ‘Lukey’, loving Aaron to bits. His father doesn’t feature in this parallel life. She would have divorced him long ago.
Aaron reaches across and squeezes his hand. ‘How’re you feeling?’
Luke grimaces. ‘Like I need to be perpetually drunk to get through the next few weeks.’
Aaron rolls his eyes. ‘Don’t be a moron.’
Luke’s doing this for Aaron. Because Aaron is desperate to meet his family, to see where he comes from, to get to know that part of him. Luke has tried to explain what his father’s like – aeons from Aaron’s liberal-minded welcoming parents – but Aaron remains convinced he’ll be able to charm him. Aaron is not often wrong but this time he is. Is it too late to change their arrangements and stay with Katy instead? Oh God, some fucking holiday this will be.
Now it’s the food trolley, an unappetising smell preceding it. Aaron has fallen asleep, his head on Luke’s shoulder. Luke bypasses the food and orders two more wines, on the pretence that one’s for Aaron. The flight attendant gives him a knowing look. Then her eyes flick to Aaron, snuggled into Luke’s side, and she smiles.
Sometimes acceptance throws Luke just as much as bigotry does.
His thoughts reverse to Katy, who has always accepted him, who never had an agenda other than to be his friend – until now. He loves Katy, he wants her to be happy, but even she must understand that it isn’t just sperm they’re talking about here. Luke would be a father. How involved would Katy want him to be? Doesn’t she realise how inept he is, and how scarred from his own experience? It’s not like he’s had a good role model, for fuck’s sake.
Luke finishes the wine, goes to the bathroom, checks his watch: another eleven hours before the first leg is done. Jesus Christ. Time drags when you’re sitting there, doing nothing but thinking (and drinking). He’d much rather be busy cleaning up meal trays, or tending to passengers who need water, tissues or sick bags. He contemplates sticking his head around the galley, saying hello, striking up a conversation. No, this isn’t his shift. Back to his seat where he unwraps a blanket from its cellophane and tucks it around Aaron. Unwraps another for himself. Reclines his seat. Drifts off sooner than he expected.
He dreams of Katy. The young Katy with her sunset hair and her heart on her sleeve. He’s kissing her. Her lips are soft and luscious. He’s enjoying himself. Getting into it. One hand on her breast, the other entangled in her hair. His father is there. Grinning from ear to ear. ‘I knew you weren’t a faggot,’ he declares.
Luke wakes with a start. Takes a moment to determine where he is: mid-air somewhere over Eastern Europe, his whole left side numb from Aaron’s weight. He manoeuvres Aaron off him, ignoring the sudden temptation to rouse him, to blurt out what’s been plaguing him for months: Let’s get married.
Gay marriage has become legal since Luke’s last visit home. He didn’t ask his father how he voted in the postal survey. He didn’t need to.
He presses the button for the attendant.
He needs another drink.
33
ZACH
Zach looks up and down the street when he gets out of the car. Robbie knows where he works. Does he know where he lives, too? Has he watched the house, seen Izzy and Carson go about their daily routine? The thought makes Zach feel sick.
The house is in darkness, except for the light in their bedroom. He sees Izzy in his head. Hair in a long plait down her back. A book propped on her knees. She’ll be tired, gently affectionate, oblivious to what’s coming. Zach hates himself for the upset he is about to cause.
He slips off his shoes and socks at the door.
‘Dadda?’
‘Coming.’
He pads into his son’s bedroom. ‘Hey, mate, what are you doing awake?’
‘Waiting for you,’ Carson replies, his voice overly loud; whispering is something he finds difficult to do. ‘To tell you about my day.’
This is part of their routine, when time permits. Carson recounts the minutiae of his day and usually falls asleep well before he gets to the end.
‘Well, I’d be happier if you got your beauty sleep,’ Zach says, kissing his son’s forehead. ‘You need all the help you can get.’
Carson giggles – his sense of humour is more sophisticated than many of his other cognitive skills.
Zach puts a finger to his lips. ‘Shush. Now, tell me a short version of what you did today.’
Carson snuggles under the sheets, sighing contentedly. He’s at his happiest when everyone in the family is present and accounted for. ‘I wrote story about kitten ... His name Scratchy ... He black and white ... He go on bus and get lost ... and ... and...’
Carson’s eyes are drooping. He manages another disjointed sentence or two. Zach waits a few minutes, absorbing the purity of those closed eyelids.
‘Hey.’ Izzy smiles when he walks into their room, directly next door. ‘Long day, huh?’
Zach nods a reply. The toll of two late shifts in a row, dealing with ill patients and medical emergencies while those words – For the last twenty years, I’ve thought of nothing else but killing you – tumbled round in his head. He needs to tell Izzy. He should have done so last night, but she was complaining of a headache and he put it off.
The mattress sinks as he sits down. She reaches to put her hand on his arm.
‘Everything okay?’
‘No.’ He feels a surge of self-loathing as he extracts the note from his pocket. ‘This was left on my car last night.’
Her fingers brush his as she takes the piece of paper into her possession. Is this a moment he will look back on? A line in time, distinguishing between ‘before’ and ‘after’? ‘Before’ signifying love, trust and closeness. ‘After’ being the disintegration of their marriage.
She reads. Her eyebrows – fine and with a natural arch – rise until they almost reach her hairline. ‘This is scary ... Is this person mentally ill?’
‘Perhaps, I don’t know.’
‘You need to tell me something ... What is it you need to say?’
Zach forces himself to meet her eyes. ‘I need to tell you two things, actually.’
She takes a sharp breath. ‘Two things?’
‘The first goes back to my school days. There was this kid, Robbie McGrath. I was a shit to him.’
Her expression is gua
rded. ‘What did you do, Zach?’
‘Poor kid had epilepsy. Had a few seizures at school. I am ashamed to say it, Izzy, but my party piece was to mimic him.’
‘Mimic him?’
‘Having the seizure. Jerking and moaning on the ground. Then getting up and walking as though I’d wet my pants.’ Every part of Zach is cringing. He’s mortified and utterly perplexed by the cruelty of his teenage self. How had he thought it was even remotely funny? Why hadn’t someone punched him in the face and made him stop?
‘You did this “party piece” at school?’ Izzy’s voice drips with disdain. ‘In front of this unfortunate boy?’
‘Sometimes at school. Mostly at someone’s house, when we were bored or drunk.’
At school Robbie would’ve seen snippets. Zach contorting his eyes and mouth, or pretend-shuddering, clutching his crotch. Nothing longer than a few seconds, but enough. The ‘full performance’ was reserved for parties, and Robbie was spared because he wasn’t part of that scene. Except for one memorable occasion, when someone actually thought to invite him. It was a big party; Zach hadn’t even noticed Robbie was there. He launched himself on to the ground, writhing his body, lurching his head from side to side, hysterical laughter prompting him to exaggerate his movements even further. Then the laughter stopped dead and someone said, ‘For fuck’s sake, Zach. Cut it out. He’s here.’
By the time Zach got unsteadily to his feet, Robbie was gone. There were a few awkward minutes, when nobody knew where to look or what to say, then someone turned up the music, and the party resumed with as much gusto as before: Robbie’s feelings were no reason to stop enjoying themselves. The party was shortly after the HSC. Zach hasn’t set eyes on Robbie since that night.
‘And you think this boy, this man, left you this note on your car?’ Izzy asks now.
Zach shrugs. ‘Whoever it is has been waiting twenty years, which means it’s someone from school.’
‘Maybe there are other people who hated you. I would have hated you.’
Izzy has a point. There were other victims, other students and even some of the teachers: Mr Collins with his nervous facial tics; Mrs Romford with her masculine voice. He can’t recall wanting to deliberately embarrass or belittle anyone: his actions were prompted by the need to elicit laughter from his friends, nothing more. Does that mean that underneath all the bravado he was as insecure as everyone else? Or is that just looking for excuses?
