I nodded nervously.
‘Tara, I’m sure there is nothing to worry about. Come on – let’s get something to eat. You’ll feel better then.’ He led me past the reception and down the hallway to an elevator. I paused before stepping in and looked at him. ‘It’s all right,’ he said, holding a hand out to me. I looked at his hand and then reaching out, gripped it and stepped into the elevator. I figured I could spend my whole life worrying about things that would probably never happen or I could just get on with it.
I was feeling a little self-conscious holding onto Matt’s hand by the time the elevator doors opened again. It was one of those how long can I hold on and not look like a sad tosser moments. Had he actually expected me to hold it or had he just offered it to be nice? Was he right now wondering how he could get me to let go? Would it be funny if I let go for no reason, or should I wait till I was getting out of the elevator? It had obviously been offered as a comforting gesture not a romantic one, so I felt a little dirty getting any sort of pleasure from it, but it did feel nice having his large warm hand wrapped around mine. I wondered if he was thinking how nice it was to be holding my small sweaty one? I doubted it very much. By the time the doors finally opened, the silence between us was deafening and I was exhausted by the marathon my mind had just run.
‘This way,’ he said, releasing my hand and stepping through the doors.
He led me to an elegant room with water views. It was like something out of an old movie. All the waiters, dressed in white, moved efficiently through the room, weaving around the tables, which were decorated with large silver pots of tea and coffee, and tiered plates of tiny cakes and sandwiches. It was gorgeous.
‘I’ve never had high tea before,’ I said. The sight of the cakes had totally driven any fear of terrorists away.
The waiter led us to a table and Matt asked him something in Hindi. Nodding his head the little man moved us to a different table beside a window with a fantastic view out over the bay.
‘That’s better,’ Matt said as he sat down. The waiter held my chair out for me and I tried as gracefully as possible to sink into it. I hadn’t brought a lot of clothing with me to India, and nothing at all nice. I didn’t feel much like a lady in my walking boots, camouflage pants and I Love Edward T-shirt, which had survived the sniff test that morning.
It wasn’t long before we had our own pot of tea and towering platters of sandwiches, crust off of course, and little iced cakes. Our hands bumped as we both reached for a cucumber sandwich. Smiling he gestured for me to go first.
‘These remind me of my grandmother,’ we said at the same time.
‘Sunday afternoons,’ I added laughing.
‘Saturday mornings,’ he said. ‘I used to take her shopping and she’d show me off to all her friends before taking me home and making me cucumber sandwiches.’ He sighed. ‘I really miss her. She had a wicked sense of humour.’
‘Yeah, I miss my Grams too.’
I chose a little cake off the platter. It had pink icing and a cherry on top.
‘You can expect to be ripped off regularly while you’re in India,’ Matt said. ‘Some of their schemes are so elaborate that you don’t even know you’ve been had. But at the end of the day, everything here is so much cheaper than at home that it doesn’t really matter. If you pay a little bit more for something than it’s worth, it’s still normally a bargain.’
‘That’s true,’ I admitted. ‘I just don’t like being taken for a fool.’
‘Everybody’s a fool in India,’ he said. ‘Just in this little area around the Gateway there is the milk scheme and the big balloon scheme. Hell there’s probably a heap of other schemes I haven’t even worked out.’
I raised an eyebrow giving him what I hoped was a how-interesting-please-do-go-on-expression, and not an, I’ve-got-a-terrible-pain-in-my-gut-and-I-think-I’m-going-to-fart one.
He continued so I was guessing I had pulled it off.
‘In the milk scheme the mothers ask you to buy milk for their family. They take you to a shop where you buy them the milk, but what you don’t know is they take it back and get a cut of the money.’
‘Seriously? I hate to think what the big balloon scheme entails.’
He laughed. ‘We can do it after this if you want. It’s quite amusing but you end up with an awful lot of balloons.’
‘Sounds like fun. It’s not every day that you get ripped off in a balloon scam.’
‘Big Balloon scam,’ he corrected me.
About an hour later when I had crammed in so many delicious little cakes and sandwiches that I thought I would burst, I declared myself officially ready to be scammed. I felt a little guilty letting Matt pay for the high tea, but he insisted and I agreed on the condition that he would let me shout the next meal. We strolled back down to the market area, having first admired the gorgeous hotel, and proceeded to drift around waiting to be approached by the big balloon people. It didn’t take long.
‘Big Balloon?’ an Indian man said as he shoved a packet of balloons under my nose. He was carrying a huge balloon tied to a stick. I mean this thing was ginormous. It was every child’s dream come true.
‘Yes, very big,’ I advised him smiling.
‘You buy.’ He shook the packet under my nose and Matt handed him a 100 rupee note.
‘So where’s the scam in that?’ I asked Matt, after he had received his change.
‘Just wait, you’ll see,’ he said mysteriously.
We wandered further, stopping to look at some leather goods. I was admiring a handbag when another man with a humungous balloon approached us.
‘Big Balloon?’ he enquired.
‘Oh thank you,’ I said, ‘but we’ve already got some.’
‘No, not big balloon,’ he said.
‘Yes, big balloon,’ I assured him.
‘You show me,’ he insisted.
I pulled the packet of balloons from my bag and showed them to him.
‘Oh no,’ he said dramatically, pressing his hand to his head, ‘not big balloon.’
‘Yes big balloon,’ I assured him looking around for the other big balloon man who was nowhere to be seen. I noticed Matt had a big grin on his face.
‘No, this big balloon,’ said the concerned man, pulling a different packet of balloons out of his bag.
I examined it. Yep the balloons in this packet did appear to be bigger than the lot I had purchased. I looked at Matt, who was pulling another 100 rupee note out of his pocket. He handed it to the man who smiled happily and departed, leaving me with the packet of balloons.
‘So that’s the big balloon scam,’ I said to Matt.
‘Just wait, there’s more.’
About five minutes later yet another man with a big balloon approached us.
‘Nooo,’ I said to Matt, who just laughed.
‘Big Balloon?’
I took a deep breath. ‘No thank you,’ I said politely, ‘I already have small and big balloons.’ I felt like I was in a play and the only person who didn’t know the script was me.
‘No, not big balloon,’ he informed me.
‘How can you be so sure?’ I asked suspiciously.
‘Only I have big balloons,’ he informed me proudly, touching his hand to his chest.
‘So what are these?’ I asked, pulling out my packets of balloons.
‘Small balloons,’ he pointed at my first packet, ‘medium balloons,’ he pointed at my second packet. ‘These are big balloons.’ He pulled yet another packet out. These did indeed look like they had the potential to become truly, very large balloons.
I rolled my eyes at Matt who was handing more money over.
‘Is that it?’ I asked him.
‘Yep. Congratulations you have been officially scammed.’
‘So,’ I said, slowly working my way through it, ‘they were all working together?’
‘Like a tag team, it’s annoying if you actually want the big balloons. You have to insist they bring the final man to you. But t
hey make great gifts for the kiddies at Christmas.’
I thought of Lil and the girls and realised I had officially begun my Christmas shopping. ‘Do you have nieces or nephews or kids?’ I added the last option realising I knew nothing about this man.
‘No to all of the above. I have a sister but she doesn’t have any kids either.’ His face darkened for a minute and I thought he was going to say something. There was a play of emotions across his face and then he obviously changed his mind. ‘My Mum is gagging for grandkids. She’s all over her grand nieces and nephews. I keep telling her one day.’
Hmmm, so he wanted children. I filed the sliver of information away for future examination. Sad sack that I was I would probably use it later when I fantasised about the two of us together.
‘So,’ he said, changing the subject, ‘what shopping are you planning on doing while you are here?’
‘Shopping? I must admit I didn’t even think about the shopping options of India. It was kind of a knee jerk reaction to come here.’
He looked at me quizzically.
‘Long story,’ I told him. I really, really, really didn’t want to talk about Jake to Matt. Bless him he just nodded his head. So now, we both had a secret. ‘Well, what’s good to buy in India?’ I asked.
‘Leather products, handbags.’ He nodded at the bag I had been looking at. ‘Leather jackets, antiques – mainly fakes. Silver products, silk rugs, shoes, clothes, and jewellery; the shorter answer would be what things aren’t good to buy in India. You just need to know the best places to go. And this,’ he swept his hand around the market area we were currently standing in, ‘is not a good place to shop. This is a tourist trap and there are much cheaper places than this. Listen, I have to do some Christmas shopping for the women in my life and I was wondering if maybe you could help me?’
I tried to keep a bright smile on my face as I said, ‘Sure, sounds like fun. And then I can buy you lunch.’ But inside I was thinking, Women in his life? How many are we talking about? Had he met someone since our night of horizontal tangoing?’
‘I need something for my Mum, my aunt and my sister. Would that be too much trouble?’
‘No no,’ I gushed in relief at the absence of the mention of a Paris, or a Tiffany, or worse still a Portia, just casually thrown in like I was meant to know he had a girlfriend. ‘Where to first?’
Let’s go to the Chor Bazaar. It’s got the leather and the antique districts. Mumbai is split up into districts; like if you were looking for a second hand car you would go to an area with all the second hand car shops.’
He led me back to the main road and hailed a cab as he was talking. We jumped in and he fired off a series of rapid instructions that I didn’t understand.
‘When did you learn to speak Hindi?’
‘I worked here for about five years when I first graduated from Uni. Couldn’t get a job in Australia, and I had a friend already over here. I did a bit of work in Afghanistan and won a couple of awards, which pretty much guaranteed me a job in Sydney. But after all that I found that I didn’t really like working for the major newspaper companies. So now I survive on freelance work. That and I do the traffic reports for Sun FM in Sydney when I’m around.’
‘That’s a little obtuse isn’t it?’ I said in amusement.
‘A friend of mine runs the station. Thinks it’s funny to have me flying around in a helicopter doing the traffic. They call me The King.’ He paused and looked at me. ‘It’s really embarrassing.’
I was obviously looking at him with a stupid look on my face.
‘Matthew King,’ he said, probably wondering if I was clever enough to get it.
‘Ohh, the King, right.’ I laughed. ‘Yeh that would be bad. Do they make you sing the report?’
‘No thank goodness. I don’t think they’d get many listeners if they did that.’
The cab driver pulled up and after paying him, we jumped out.
‘Come on,’ said Matt, ‘let’s go shopping.’
He led me down a dirty little street to a tiny shop, which had its windows stuffed with leather jackets. It was just one shop among many along the road. As we entered, I inhaled the scent of the leather, and brushed against the material with my hands.
‘It’s so soft,’ I said.
‘It’s calf leather,’ said a man as he approached us, ‘we only use the best leather.’
‘We’d like to get some jackets made,’ said Matt. ‘What does something like this cost?’ He pointed to a knee length jacket and the haggling began.
‘How many jackets do you want Tara?’ he asked me a few minutes later.
‘Ummm. I’m not sure, how much do they cost?’ I asked.
He lowered his voice and said to me, ‘the more we buy the cheaper they’ll get.’ In the end I got three short jackets; cream and red for myself and olive green for Lil, and a chocolate brown three quarter length jacket with a belt for myself. I helped Matt pick out a jacket for his sister – whose name I found out was Gina – and we got a chocolate brown and a cream one for him. They measured us up and promised they would be ready for delivery the next afternoon.
From there we wandered through the antique area; tiny shops crammed with brass pots, wooden statues and copper ornaments and streets lined with refuse and inhabited by goats. After browsing for a while, I picked out a couple a brass elephants and Matt bought an enamelled brass vase for his Aunt.
After that, we hailed another cab and headed back to the water area.
‘There’s a great restaurant down here that I want to take you to, but I don’t want you to pay for me as it’s an expensive one,’ he said. ‘But the food is fantastic – you’ve got to try it.’
‘A deal is a deal,’ I said. ‘You can take me out when we get back to Sydney.’
God, it came out of my mouth without me even thinking it through. I had relaxed so much with him – he was excellent company – and now I had this cringe fully embarrassing sentence just out there in the air somewhere between us doing God knows what sort of damage to the fragile relationship that had been building. I had practically asked him out on a date. No worse, I had told him he had to take me out when we got back. I resisted the urge to put my face in my hands and groan. He was probably already sick and tired of me and looking forward to never ever having to see me again. I opened my mouth to retract the sentence but couldn’t think of a graceful way to do it.
‘I’d enjoy that,’ he said thoughtfully and smiled at me. ‘Here we are,’ he paid the cab driver and leapt out, leaving me sitting there with a stunned look on my face. A slow smile started to replace my stunned look. He’d enjoy that hey? Well there you go.
He stuck his head back in the cab, ‘Tara?’ he said questioningly. I realised that the cab driver had pivoted around and was also staring at me, looking slightly annoyed that I was still in his vehicle.
‘Yep sorry,’ I said, unable to wipe the grin off my face, ‘just checking I had everything.’
‘You don’t want to leave anything in a cab in India,’ Matt agreed.
The food at Trishna – the restaurant Matt had suggested – was out of this world.
I groaned as I lay back in my chair and undid the top button of my pants. ‘The heart is strong but my stomach’s too small. It seems such a shame to leave any of it.’
‘I know,’ he said, as he also leaned back groaning, ‘just wait about ten minutes and we’ll be able to keep going.’
I laughed. ‘I don’t think I’ll need any dinner.’
‘I always think that in India, but come dinner time I’ll be ready to go again. You just don’t get proper Indian food anywhere but India. So when I’m here I tend to gorge myself.’
I looked at my watch. It was 3pm. Jessie had said he’d be home at 6pm and we’d head out at 8.30pm. Matt’s mobile phone burbled and he glanced at the screen, laughed and then rapidly fired back a text.
‘Old friend of mine,’ he explained. ‘I emailed him a couple of weeks ago to let him know I was coming to
town and he gets back to me now to see if I can meet up with him tonight for a drink.’ He shook his head. ‘Typical. What are you up to tonight?’
Was that a what-are-you-up-to-tonight-maybe-we-could-meet-up question I wondered, or just a question that had absolutely no underlying meaning at all?
‘I’m going out with my friend to meet some of their friends.’
Nodding his head, he reached out for more food. ‘I think I can do it,’ he told me smiling. ‘I never can resist a challenge.’
Later – while I got ready to go out, I found myself analysing every part of our conversation from that day. Every look, every glance, every laugh was taken out and given the once over before being packed carefully away in my mental archive. We had agreed we would meet up for dinner in Sydney, but I wasn’t sure under what capacity we were meeting up; as friends who helped each other shop or as two people with potentially something between them?
Only time will tell, I told myself firmly. It wasn’t worth not enjoying the rest of my holiday because I was wishing I was already back in Sydney. That wasn’t fair on Jessie or myself, so I pushed Matthew King to the back of my mind and decided to enjoy the rest of my holiday.
* * *
We were in the cab on the way to a nightclub at Juhu Beach called Vie Lounge, which Jessie assured me, was THE place to be. I had met Tahlia earlier on in the evening, and in response to her English rosebud gorgeousness had ended up back in the bathroom – with my rubber thongs, applying more makeup. I think I had achieved an exotic look; my eyes darkened up with some kohl powder I had bought that day, and a lick of mascara and voila – gorgeous, sexy, smudged. Unfortunately, on my first attempt, I had poked myself in the eye with the kohl applicator stick and ended up red, watery, smudged, which – let me tell you – does not have the same affect. A packet of ice and a glass of wine later Tahlia showed me how to do it properly. She also loaned me a skirt, and I was feeling a little more feminine than I had in my cargo pants.
It was 8pm when we reached Vie Lounge. There was a warm breeze coming off the ocean and I luxuriated in the feel of it rustling my hair and stroking my skin. I relaxed on a lounge, sipping my cocktail and listening to the pleasant chatter and joking of Jessie’s friends. The sound of the waves crashing onto the beach was soothing and I could feel myself starting to unwind.
The Seven Steps to Closure Page 17
