Tigerland

by Sean Kennedy

  “I took it back to the table.”

  “Well, what are you doing here? I thought it was only women who went to the loo in numbers.”

  “Like I said, I wanted to know you were fine.”

  “Peachy, now can I piss in peace?”

  “You’re not pissing,” Roger said. “You’re… washing your face for some reason. Have you been crying?”

  “For fuck’s sake, no! And I was going to have a piss afterwards!”

  Roger’s expression was one that would have put Sherlock’s to shame. “Kind of a roundabout way of doing it, isn’t it?”

  “Huh?”

  “Well, it means you’ve washed your hands and then you’ll piss and have to wash them again.”

  “Is it a sin to use two drops of liquid soap within five minutes?”

  “It’s just weird, that’s all.”

  “Fine. Now go away and let me go to the loo.”

  He stood there obstinately. “I don’t think you really need to go.”

  “Roger!”

  “Look, it’s not like it’s easy here for me, either. I’m pretty uncomfortable trying to have a deep and meaningful in a public bog.”

  “Don’t worry, Rog. If anybody saw you follow me in here, they probably just assume you’re coming in here for sex.”

  “You wish!”

  “No, you wish!”

  We both laughed, and I pulled some paper towelling free from the dispenser to dry my hands. “I’m fine. A bit stressed, I admit. I just wonder how long Heyward is going to keep this up for. I mean, how much attention does he need?”

  “It has to stop sometime,” Roger said. “But….” he trailed off.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Just spill it, Rog.”

  “Don’t you think that maybe it would end a bit quicker if Dec responded to it and told the true side of the story?”

  I shrugged. “Who knows what would happen? It could just make it worse.”

  “Yeah, but at least he’d be saying something.”

  “You know that, and I know that, but ultimately it’s his decision.”

  “Do you want him to do it?”

  I sighed and threw the wadded towel into the bin. “Honestly? I have no fucking idea.”

  We stood in silence for a moment, staring at the ground.

  “So, are we done?” I asked.

  “I guess.”

  “Okay, quick update on you and Fran: any decision made about IVF yet?”

  “We’re still trying to figure that out.”

  “Oh.”

  “Any official word on Abe and Lisa yet?”

  “Nope.”

  “They look pretty much like a couple, though.”

  “That they do.”

  Another short silence.

  “I guess that’s all the gossip covered, then,” I said.

  “Yep.”

  “So, should we go back out and join the others?”

  He shuffled from one foot to another. “I really have to pee.”

  “Then go.”

  “Get out of here! I can’t piss with an audience!”

  I shoved the door open with my butt and saluted him on the way out. “Great catching up with you, Rog.”

  But all I heard from him as the door swung shut again was “Oh my fucking God, I’m going to burst!”

  “DID you have fun tonight?” Dec asked as we drove home.

  “Yeah,” I admitted, resting my hand upon his thigh. “I didn’t think I would when I first got there, because I just wasn’t in the mood for dealing with anyone. But it was good to see them all.”

  “I just realised today that, as tempting as it is to shut out the world, we shouldn’t. At least not the part of the world we like, anyway.”

  “True. But there’s something to be said for locking the world out sometimes too.”

  “Is that what you want to do tomorrow?”

  I shook my head. “I have to go to work. Coby’s not going to be any use. He’s stressing too much about his film and Midsumma.”

  “The film fest starts Saturday, doesn’t it?”

  “Yep.”

  If he noticed my reticence, he decided to plough on ahead anyway. “Are you going?”

  “I have to. He’ll be crushed if I don’t.”

  Dec suddenly pulled into an empty car park on the street. “You haven’t asked me yet.”

  “What?” I asked, playing dumb.

  “To come with you to Midsumma.”

  “I didn’t think you’d want to go. I don’t particularly want to go.”

  “But I’d go with you.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  Exasperated, Dec whacked the steering wheel. “Goddammit, Simon! We’re a couple! We do this shit together, or what’s the point?”

  There was an evil part of me that thought we’re a couple except for when you want to make a decision by yourself. But I didn’t want to cause a fight. I was really too tired.

  “Fine, come, then.”

  “That’s a fantastic way to invite someone, Simon.”

  “You want me to do you up an official invite when we get home? Create an official Facebook event page for you to respond to?”

  “Neither of us are on Facebook.”

  “Well, there’s the fake one of you.”

  “Oh, yeah. The one who apparently loves NRL and Home and Away. I still think you did that, you know.”

  “I would have made it worse,” I told him.

  “I believe that.” He started the car again. “I want to come.”

  “Okay. Declan, will you come with me to Midsumma?”

  “I thought you’d never ask.”

  “You do know Heyward will be there as guest of honour?”

  “I promise not to spit in his beer.”

  “I can’t be held to any such promises.”

  “And that’s why I love you.”

  That simple declaration made me feel like a complete prick. “I always wanted you to come with me. I just didn’t want to pressure you.”

  “Oh, I knew there was no pressure from you. Coby, on the other hand—”

  “What?”

  “He rang me today to ask if I was coming. He thought you probably wouldn’t tell me.”

  “That little prick is so fired tomorrow.”

  “You wouldn’t fire him. You like him too much.”

  “He’s no Nyssa.”

  “And you can’t hold that against him forever.”

  “I just miss her.”

  “Then call her.” Dec found a break in the traffic and swung out of the car space.

  “I will,” I said. And it was the first decision I had made in a while that I was actually happy about.

  “THERE’S my boy!” Nyssa cried as she appeared on the screen of my laptop, moving in that jerky epileptic vision that only Skype could deliver.

  I had to stop myself from screaming, “Come back here!”

  Instead, I replied, “And there’s my girl.”

  “It’s been too long, Simon. You’ve been a bad boy.”

  “I wish I’d been a bad boy.”

  She didn’t say anything, but gave me a look that was so disconcertingly penetrative I felt that the computer screen and two and a half thousand kilometres between us was no protection.

  “Is this about Greg Heyward?”

  “How did you know about that?”

  “I’m in New Zealand, not Siberia, Simon.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “I’ve been meaning to call you, but things have been… a little bit complicated over here.”

  “You know I could make a really bad joke there.”

  She waggled a finger at me. “Don’t. I’m an honorary Kiwi now.”

  “That was your choice.”

  “Oh my God, are you still pissed at me?”

  “I was never pissed at you. I just knew I was going to miss you. And I do.”

  “Aww, I like needy Simon.”

 
; “Shut up. Anyway, you said complications?”

  “It’s probably easier to show you.” She gripped the sides of her desk and hoisted herself out of her chair to display a rather hefty belly.

  “I hate to tell you this, but you’ve obviously been eating too many pineapple lumps and Topps ice creams,” I said.

  She fell back into her chair. “Hilarious. I’m five months gone.”

  “You look ready to drop. Are you having octuplets?”

  Nyssa looked horrified. “Don’t even joke about things like that!”

  “Dec!” I hollered. “Come in here!”

  Nyssa began to laugh.

  “Congratulations,” I told her. “I’m really happy for you. I mean it.”

  “Thanks, Simon.”

  I couldn’t help but think of Fran, and how this news would affect her. Yet another couple succeeding at something she and Roger were so desperate to have for themselves. It felt awful being torn between being ecstatic about news for one friend and knowing how much it would hurt others—even though they would be happy on their behalf as well.

  Dec appeared over my shoulder and greeted Nyssa warmly.

  “Declan Tyler, looking good as always,” Nyssa purred.

  “Hey, enough of that,” I warned her. “Show him.”

  “Show me what?” Dec asked.

  Nyssa hoisted herself out of her chair again, and Dec’s jaw dropped.

  “Either you’re pregnant, or an alien is going to burst out of your stomach.”

  “It feels like that sometimes!”

  “So I guess we’re not going to see you for a while?” Dec asked.

  Nyssa shook her head. “Probably not until after the little bugger is born. You guys could always come over here for a holiday, though.”

  Running away to New Zealand sounded good to me. “You foul temptress.”

  Dec rested his hand on my shoulder. “We could plan a trip later in the year.”

  “Sounds good,” Nyssa and I said in unison, and Dec laughed.

  He kissed his fingers and pressed them against the screen. “Speak to you soon, Nyss.”

  “Bye, beautiful boy,” she called after him.

  I shook my head. “You’re incorrigible, and you’re going to give him a big head.”

  Nyssa snorted. “That man is the least egomaniacal I have ever known. Which is why what’s being said about him is hideous.”

  “It hasn’t been hitting the news over there, has it?”

  “No. But I’ve been following it on the net. So what are you guys going to do about it?”

  I shrugged. “Who knows? At the moment Dec’s not wanting to do anything.”

  “Uh, has anybody told him that’s probably not the best thing to do?”

  “Everybody.”

  “I wish I could be there to give you both a big hug. And then I’d find his address and whack Greg Heyward over the head with my handbag. And I pack a lot of shit in that thing, so it would really hurt.”

  “I would like both of those things very much.”

  I yawned, and that set Nyssa off, so we knew it was time to go. We promised not to let it go so long without contact again, but I couldn’t contain one last jab.

  “I can’t wait to see the bubba.”

  “Me too,” Nyssa said, her hands automatically going to her belly.

  “Just tell me one thing, Nyss.”

  “Sure. What?”

  “It’s not going to be a sheep, is it?”

  Nyssa rolled her eyes. “You just couldn’t help yourself with the New Zealand jokes, could you?”

  The screen froze on an image of her laughing before it went to black on her disconnection. And I missed her even more, despite having just spoken to her.

  Dec startled me by coming up behind me without a sound and hugging me. “Come to bed,” he whispered, his lips brushing against my ear.

  Even though it meant that tomorrow would seemingly come even quicker, I acquiesced.

  Chapter 13

  I WAS expecting it, but it was another thing to see it.

  I had just stepped off my tram at the top of Bourke Street, and was about to cut through the alley to the CTV building when I saw the poster for the latest Who plastered on the wall of one of the newspaper seller shacks. It was a large portrait of Heywasrd, in profile, looking as deep as he could muster with Declan and Me: How the Closet Damaged Us Both. Inset was a picture of him and Dec that I had never seen before—Dec looked younger than when I had first met him, and it was obviously taken when he and Heyward were together. There was nothing intimate about the photo, but the fact that it existed made my stomach churn. Heyward must have held onto it—it had now become his conclusive evidence of their relationship, and even though their pose was one more befitting friends, I knew that people would read into it whatever they wanted to see. To some they might as well have been captured pashing for posterity.

  Fuck, there might be a photo of that somewhere as well. Although if I thought about it logically, I doubted it. Heyward was so paranoid he wouldn’t have wanted something like that to be used against him at the time, although it never stopped him from cheating on Dec when he got the opportunity.

  I guess when it came down to it, I didn’t understand Heyward at all. The closet affects everybody differently, and fuck knew what happened to him to make him the man he was now. Dec was lucky enough to have been relatively well-adjusted beforehand, and although he had always been careful, he didn’t subscribe to the self-loathing or self-destruction Heyward seemed to. Dec had always wanted love and knew he deserved it.

  And I couldn’t believe that I was standing in the street and psychoanalysing Heyward and even feeling a little bit sorry for him. Maybe I was the one who was the most screwed up out of the three of us.

  “I’d have thought they’d send you a free one,” a voice said.

  I turned to find the seller grinning at me.

  “No such luck,” I said.

  “I guess you’ll have to pay the $4.95 like everyone else, then.”

  I couldn’t tell whether he was being a prick or just snarky without malice. It was so hard to figure that out nowadays. “I wouldn’t bother,” I replied. “There’s probably better stories on the net for free.”

  But I picked up a copy of The Age to show there weren’t any hard feelings.

  Coby was sitting at his desk when I entered the office, idly swinging on his chair.

  “Morning, boss.”

  “Good to see you hard at work.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “You know, I was talking to Nyssa last night. She was saying how much she misses Melbourne and how she might like to come back… if her job was available.”

  Coby snorted. “Yeah, right.”

  “It’s true.”

  “It’s not. I spoke to Nyssa this morning. She’s up the duff and totally in love with her Kiwi hubby. She isn’t going anywhere.”

  Dammit. “You spoke to Nyssa?”

  “She likes updates.”

  I bet she did. “And you gave them?”

  “She’s worried about you. I told her she had issues, and she had to learn to let go.”

  “You did not.”

  “Okay, I didn’t. If it wasn’t for the fact that she was in love and about to have a sprog, she’d probably still be here, and where would that leave me?”

  “Well, you would be elsewhere, and you wouldn’t know any different, would you?”

  Coby slowly turned in a full 360 degree arc. “Yeah, thanks.”

  I could tell it was going to be that kind of morning already. I had fresh Heyward issues to deal with, and Coby was beginning to dread the premiere of his film.

  Which reminded me…

  “Coby, can you please do me a favour?”

  “It’s my job to do whatever you want.”

  “This is a personal favour.”

  He sat up straighter. “I’m intrigued.”

  “Look, I want to know what it says. But I’m too embarrassed to go b
uy it myself—”

  Coby sheepishly pulled open the top drawer of his desk and handed over the Who magazine. “I could try and pretend that I bought this only because I knew you would eventually ask for it,” he said, “but I wanted to see for myself what was in it.”

  I stared down at the cover and at that awkward photo of Dec and Heyward again. “What did it say?”

  “I don’t know. I only got in a couple of minutes before you did, so I didn’t have the time to even open it.”

  I rolled the magazine up and nervously whacked it against my palm. “Thanks, Coby.”

  “Sure thing, Simon.”

  He didn’t even say boss. It must be bad, even if he claimed he hadn’t read it. I knew Coby—he would have been devouring the printed word as soon as it was in hand, probably bumping into other workers on the street as he read without watching where he was going.

  I closed my office door to give myself privacy and didn’t even bother unpacking my bag as I flicked through the magazine immediately to find the article on Heyward.

  They had printed one of the photos from Heyward’s upcoming photo shoot with DNA. They couldn’t print the more risqué ones, but they wanted to push the boundaries as far as they could. In a wannabe we’re not porny we’re arty black and white portrait, Heyward lay naked on his stomach with the profile of his butt being the only suggestive element of the photograph. The man was fit, you had to give him that much, and I guess if I didn’t know him I might have found him slightly sexy, even though he was a bit beefy for my usual tastes. Dec would have been taller and leaner against him. And hairier, although I guessed that Heyward might have done some waxing for the shoot, considering the amount of hair on his legs compared to the rest of his body.

  Flicking the page, I found what I was looking for. In a box inset to another picture of Heyward, fully clothed this time but doing one of those “soulful” I’m like pretty deep, and stuff poses, there was another pic of Heyward and Declan together. Here they seemed far more relaxed than the one on the cover. They looked like they were in somebody’s kitchen—Abe’s, maybe?—before they broke up and Dec and Abe found themselves on a football team across the Bass Strait, although I was only guessing. Dec was looking at Heyward with a slight smile as Heyward was giving whoever was using the camera a huge shit-eating grin. It was probably typical of him to be working everyone else in the room when he had the best person by his side.