Like I Can Love

by Kim Lock

  ‘I was making conversation! You’re taking it the wrong way. It’s stupid.’

  ‘I’m stupid? That’s nice.’

  ‘I didn’t say you were stupid, I said –’

  ‘Sometimes you really hurt me, you know that?’

  ‘This is insane! I’m not trying to hurt –’

  ‘Insane? Wow, Jenna. Tell me how you really feel.’

  Jenna gaped at him, her mouth opening and closing. Nothing came out.

  ‘And how do you think this kind of behaviour reflects on me?’

  ‘Can you even hear yourself?’

  ‘People know who I am. In that restaurant they sell two of my vintages, babe. It’s . . .’ He shook his head. ‘It’s embarrassing.’

  Seething, Jenna went quiet. The night rushed past the car, headlights illuminating a blur of ghostly gum trunks, the flash of the dotted line on the bitumen. The engine hummed and Jenna closed her eyes, her jaw aching with the clamp of her molars.

  After a while, Ark said, ‘I’m sorry.’

  Opening her eyes, she glared at him.

  ‘Hey, look, I am sorry that you’re upset.’ He gave her a brief, conceding glance. ‘It’s just . . . They always say that relationships are supposed to be based on trust and honesty. So I guess I was . . . hurt, that you’d flirt so openly with that guy.’

  ‘I wasn’t flirting,’ she ground out, ‘and you’re being a prick about it.’

  He paused, letting her angry words crash between them.

  ‘Don’t insult me,’ he said evenly. ‘You’ll kick yourself for it.’

  Jenna turned her face to the window.

  ‘Look,’ he repeated. ‘It’s because of her, you know? My ex. She . . .’ He rubbed the back of his neck. ‘Sometimes I overreact, because she stuck me, you know? She was a bitch – bled me like a fucking pig. So yeah, I guess it’s not my fault. I’m a bit damaged.’

  Jenna stared unblinking into the night, flicking her wedding band with her thumbnail. ‘I know she hurt you,’ she muttered. ‘You’ve told me. And I’m always sympathetic. But I wasn’t flirting. And it pisses me off that I have to defend myself.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said slowly. ‘Wow.’ Then he shook his head, chuckling. ‘Guess you are drunk.’

  When he didn’t offer anything further, she said, ‘Are you suggesting all men think basic manners are an invitation for sex?’

  ‘You were sucking your finger at him.’

  A single syllable of laughter burst out of Jenna. ‘I had garlic butter on it.’

  ‘Hey.’ He held up a hand. ‘I’m not saying we’re perfect. But we’re men. We’re always looking for an excuse. Especially when the woman in question is so hot.’

  Silence fell over the car. Jenna’s pulse still fretted in her throat, but she felt it slowing. Something in his point niggled at her. Maybe she had flirted with the waiter; he’d been sweet and funny and the meal had been lovely. Had she been single too long and forgotten how to act in a relationship? Or was it genetic – an audacious need for acknowledgement?

  ‘I mean,’ his voice changed, settled, ‘it’s awful, but it’s like what we hear on the news all the time: a woman in a short dress, alone at night – in an undeniable way, she’s asking for trouble. I’m not saying it’s an excuse – I’m not “victim blaming” –’ he air-quoted, ‘– but if you leave your house unlocked, don’t be complaining when your stuff gets stolen, you know?’ He gave her a long, almost sympathetic look. ‘I’m only saying you have to be careful. You’re not single anymore. And,’ he added, ‘you can’t keep taking examples from Fairlie. She . . . well, she gets around. Hey, hey.’ He held up his hand again as her head snapped up. ‘I’m not being derogatory. She even admits it. You call her a whore – I’ve heard you. I know, I know, you’re friends, term of endearment and all that,’ he finished.

  Jenna’s body stiffened. That day, her mother had said to her: I thought I knew it all. But I didn’t – I was blind.

  Ark put his hand on her thigh.

  Jenna took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. When she was thirteen, she and Fairlie had been allowed to go to the Spring Show alone for the first time. Jenna recalled the scent of sawdust, frying fat and animal shit; heard the hiss of hydraulics, the emboldening thump of rock music and the screams of revellers on rides. Despite Jenna’s pleas, Fairlie had flatly refused to accompany her on the Zipper, a contraption where riders curled inside tiny cages strung around an enormous, rotating oblong arm. Waiting in line, Jenna’s heart had pounded. Two boys, tall and lean, their voices cracking with testosterone and their hair a tribute to Kurt Cobain over their faces, had convinced Jenna she’d be safer snug in a cage with them, rather than loose in a cage on her own. She’d clambered into the cage, giggling, daring, with the boys. And when the cage began to move, and the music beat through her body, and she’d somersaulted, shrieking, Jenna had told herself the hand that had suddenly dug between her legs and remained there, fumbling and gripping, for the whole ride had been inevitable.

  As the car slid cocoon-like through the night, Jenna touched the silky back of Ark’s hand with the tip of her middle finger, felt the supple rise of the vein there and the pulse, faintly; the beat of his heart thrumming through her finger, up her arm and into her chest. There was a part of her that seethed with hurt; but there was a part of her that stretched out to him, wanting him to come to her, so they might soothe each other’s wounds.

  The roller door rumbled shut behind them, and the inside of the car fell into a taut silence.

  The leather seat whispered as Ark turned to her. ‘Don’t be upset,’ he said. Without the noise of the road his voice seemed deeper; in his tone was a calm, quiet plea.

  Jenna rubbed her forehead. ‘How do you expect me to feel?’

  ‘Relationships aren’t always easy,’ he said. ‘They need work to get through the bumps. That’s all this is – a speed hump. We can work on it.’

  ‘Work on it,’ Jenna repeated, more to herself than to Ark. Above him, the mild beam of the interior light rendered his face into light and shadow: the sweep of his brow, the strong line of his nose, the darkened pools of his eyes.

  His fingers squeezed her knee. The seat rustled again as he leaned over, his hand moving from her knee and sliding up her thigh. ‘Let it go,’ he whispered, his breath warm against her ear. Then he kissed her jaw, the touch of his lips sending a bolt of electricity down her middle.

  ‘Easy for you to say,’ she said softly. ‘You weren’t just accused of adultery.’ The word smouldered in her mouth.

  He chuckled, and she felt it shudder against her. ‘I have so much love to give. I need you to love me as much as that.’ His hand moved higher, his fingers spreading across the inside of her thigh; his thumb dug into her hip. ‘And I love you so much it consumes me.’

  Through the windscreen the inside of the shed was dark. The interior light faded, plunging them into blackness.

  Jenna closed her eyes as his lips moved to her neck and his hand slid beneath the hem of her shirt, stroking tingling streaks across her skin. Again she heard the soft talk of leather, felt the warm damp of his breath against her collarbone. She made her mind blank as he pressed her against the seat, as he found her mouth with a sudden hunger that mirrored her own.

  Because if she thought about anything, she feared she could trust nothing. If she let herself remember any of it she may come apart completely. So, as his tongue pressed against hers, she let it all fall away. Tangling her fingers into his hair, she breathed deep the sharp, spicy scent of him as though she could swallow him with it.

  One by one, he deftly tugged at the buttons on her jeans and slid his hand beneath her waistband. She arched towards him, pressing herself against his palm as he found the slippery centre of her.

  Her jaw fell open, her breath rushing back and forth hotly between her lips. He urged her thighs further apart.
And then she threw herself at him, heard the rapture in her satisfied moan as she took everything she could from him, in order to obliterate herself.

  vi

  The white netting was heavy and snagged on the vines. Although it was a cool day with a blanket of low grey clouds, Jenna felt a drop of sweat slide down her ribs.

  Only a small portion of the grapes had been netted, and Jenna thanked a deity for that small mercy as she heaved the net over the top of the last row and dragged it to the ground. It lay on the ground between the vines, a snarled, long white trail dotted with twigs and leaves.

  ‘Almost done.’ Ark gave her a smile as she bent over, her breath coming hard. ‘You need to work out, honey. Don’t want you getting all unfit for me.’ Together they hauled the long rope of net towards them, bundling it into a big pile.

  Jenna saw the snake before Ark did.

  The thick brown coil of its body was tangled in the net, shuddering as the net lugged along the ground.

  ‘Ark,’ Jenna said, dropping the net. ‘Look.’

  But the snake was dead; its thick muscular body was lifeless. Jenna felt only a fleeting spark of relief before she saw Ark’s hands begin to shake.

  ‘It’s okay,’ she said quietly, motioning for him to step away. ‘I’ll just get rid of it, okay?’

  A pained expression crossed Ark’s face: a look of frustration and terror and self-criticism. He lifted his hands to his head and pulled at his hair, tears welling at the corners of his eyes.

  ‘Ark, just turn away. I’ve got this.’

  Swiftly she approached the snake. Wrinkling her nose, she pulled her sleeves over her hands and tried to pick it up, but the slick long muscle was wrapped and twisted into the netting. With some difficulty, and revulsion, she managed to extract the snake – a smallish king brown, only young, but still deadly if alive – and toss it beneath the grapes. She would come back with a shovel later and bury it somewhere Ark wouldn’t come across. He had walked briskly to the end of the row and had his back to her.

  ‘It’s gone,’ she called to him. ‘But you know what, why don’t you just go inside? We can finish this up later. Besides,’ she glanced at the sky. ‘I think it’s about to rain.’

  Back inside the house Ark asked in a quavering voice if she could please shower: he couldn’t handle knowing she’d touched it with her bare hands.

  Out of the shower, Jenna sank onto the couch next to him, running her hand down the length of his arm. He was still shaken, shudders occasionally rippling through his body, and she could tell he was struggling to keep his breathing slow and even.

  ‘Tell me,’ she said.

  Ark took a deep breath. ‘You know my dad died when I was fourteen.’ He swallowed. ‘I found him. I found . . . his body.’

  Jenna picked up his hand.

  ‘I’d just gotten home from school. He was sitting at the kitchen table.’

  ‘And he . . . had already passed away?’

  ‘Yeah.’ The word came out in a breath.

  ‘Honey, I . . . I don’t know what to say. How awful.’ Jenna fought the urge to collect him up and rock him in her arms.

  ‘I couldn’t get hold of Mum. I had to call my neighbours, and they came over and called an ambulance but it was too late. He was dead. They said he’d probably been dead a few hours.’

  Jenna bit her lip. It wouldn’t help him to start weeping.

  Ark’s voice had become far away as the memory spilled out. ‘His eyes were open. And his lips were blue. Like – a really freaky blue, something from a horror film. I’ll never forget that. Whenever I try and picture him now all I can see is that. His blue lips and his eyes open, staring at nothing.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  He turned to her, his pupils huge. ‘I hated the cunt, did I ever tell you that?’

  Jenna started. ‘No. I thought you said –’

  ‘No matter how hard I tried, I could never do anything right. He was always telling me off for something. Half the time I didn’t even know what I’d done. At home, at school, on the vineyard – I’d try my damnedest to please him but it would never be enough. I was never enough. And my mum?’ He gave a kind of mirthless laugh. ‘She never stood up for me. She was scared of him, too. She was just his whipping post. Too frightened to say boo. She never stood up for me,’ he repeated. ‘Not even when he belted me. I learned to stop crying pretty fast, because there was no fucking point in it.’

  As she listened to him pour out his soul, Jenna tried not to think. Because with each damnation of his mother, Jenna could feel the words her own mother had spoken twisting bands of steel around her heart tighter and tighter until she might never breathe again.

  vii

  ‘I’ve been thinking about something,’ he said.

  Jenna lifted her head from the pillow to glance at the clock.

  ‘It’s 2 am,’ she mumbled. ‘Why aren’t you sleeping?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about us,’ he went on. ‘About the rift that’s between us sometimes. We can mend it.’

  He found her hand beneath the blankets and curled his fingers into hers. ‘We can make something that’s only ours,’ he whispered. ‘You and me. Something no one else can touch or make dirty.’

  She waited.

  Tenderly, he said, ‘I think we should have a baby.’

  Dear Jenna,

  All of these things I am telling you, it’s as if they are greater ­individually – swollen, somehow – than the sum of them pressed together. When I examine each of these moments alone, I recognise I could have made better decisions; I could have steered into a course less tragic, less destined for a certain doom. But at the time I believed I was nothing more than a hapless passenger, bound inexorably to my fate.

  Around midnight on the eve of your birth I awoke to a dull, low pain that made my belly rock-firm. As I placed my hands over my bulging middle, I could feel the tightening of the muscles deep under there.

  Oh, how this moment had been one for which I had so fiercely longed, and yet at the same time, dreaded with a quiet, existential fear! You were coming, our beloved baby, and as I curled over the contractions I whispered sweet words down to this child who would change everything. Silent tears rolled down my cheeks and my belly curved out into the night; I knew that it would represent a beginning, and inevitably, an end.

  I just couldn’t know whose end it would be.

  At one point, I believed I would die. The doctor’s voice was firm and encouraging, muffled by a green surgical mask as he told me to keep pushing. I had been bemused by that mask. Was the doctor covering his face to shield himself from the fluid and sweat and shit and the obscenities I muttered through teeth gritted so tightly they might splinter and fill my mouth with tiny, fatal shards? When I picture that green mask now, I can almost feel your father’s grip on my hand: tentative and clammy; I can almost feel my heart thundering in my ears through the pethidine’s foggy haze.

  And when I pushed, and Stephen’s face went white, the face of my mother flashed before my eyes. I saw her waving madly from the open window of that banana-coloured Kombi of my childhood as my parents rattled off up Jubilee Highway and left me, nineteen and entirely unaware that I wasn’t omnipotent. Suddenly, in labour, I wanted my mum. More than anything. My mother would fix this; my mother would make it all stop because that’s what mothers do, damn it, they hold you up when you feel like there is nothing left of you but the pitiful, soggy waft of your exhaled breath and the transparency of your unrealised expectations. Don’t they?

  Isn’t that what I, then – and now – was supposed to do?

  Do we ever stop needing our mother?

  Fixed flat on my back and staring up at the bright lights, the obscene bulge of my gut rising forth between us all and the blue sheet bunched around my hips, I gave a banshee cry that I thought would surely rip open the arteries throbbin
g thick and hot in my throat, and perhaps then there would be nothing again to fear.

  And then something happened. There was another cry. A strange, watery bleat that elicited a cheer from the nurses and a satisfied beam from the doctor.

  ‘Well done,’ the doctor said from behind his mask, ‘you have a little girl.’

  I stopped breathing. Trembling with the strain of it, I raised my head and stared at you – our baby – slick and gooey and defiantly shrieking in the doctor’s hands. Your head lolled back, neck gripped between the doctor’s blue-gloved thumb and forefinger. A ropey purple-cream cord pulsed from your belly.

  Your skin was wrinkled, blotchy pink and blue-white.

  I closed my eyes as a thousand kinds of relief sank over me. When I opened them again the room was brighter, softer. A rasp in Stephen’s voice as he whispered something strained and prideful in my ear; he ducked his head to wipe his eyes, furtively.

  I only knew I was weeping when you, bundled in a soft fleecy blanket, were nestled by a nurse into my arms. Your face, once scrunched and furious, smoothed and quietened as I looked down at you, and then I realised that my expectations had been wrong, all wrong, because everything that felt splintered apart was now glued back together.

  My baby. Stephen’s baby. Our girl.

  The rest of our lives would begin, now. We would start again and everything would be wonderful. This baby – you, Jenna – represented the two of us, Stephen and I. You represented everything that was perfect and laudable and right.

  Stephen and I looked at each other. We named you Jenna.

  And that’s when it all changed again. Perfection had surrounded us for a few minutes – a soothing, victorious taste of normalcy – before it all broke apart.

  But this will do for today. I need to stop now.

  Love, Mum.

  7

  NOW

  The main street is quiet, only a few people stroll listlessly under shop awnings. An empty flatbed truck rumbles past, stirring the odour of hot exhaust and rubber from the asphalt.