The Seven Steps to Closure

by Donna Joy Usher

  ‘So Dinah was attracted to the men that she was, because of her relationship with her father?’

  ‘Yep. She chose men that made her feel like crap, like her father had.’

  ‘So why were you attracted to Jake?’

  ‘He was charming and good looking. I saw you and Martin, and Mum and Dad and I wanted what you guys had. You all made it look so easy I assumed it would be like that.’

  We sat in silence for a while, eating ice cream and thinking.

  ‘Do you think it’s bad that I don’t need to heal myself or regain control of my life?’ Lily finally asked in concern. ‘Maybe there’s something wrong with me?’

  I burst out laughing. ‘I can’t believe you just said that. You’re so lucky. But it’s not so much luck,’ I corrected myself, ‘you’ve made wise decisions to get where you are now. I didn’t. That’s all.’

  ‘When did you work all this out?’

  ‘I had a lot of thinking time in India.’

  ‘Do you know what I think?’ said Lil.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I think we both need more ice-cream.’

  ‘I think that’s the wisest thing you’ve said all day.’

  * * *

  Over the next week the radio competition progressed like this:

  Contestant number two.

  ‘What is your favourite colour?’

  ‘Ummmm. Pink.’

  ‘What is your favourite drink?’

  ‘Pina Coladas.’ (Followed by heaps of giggling.)

  ‘If you were in the back of a car that was pulled over by bandits, what would you do?’

  ‘I’m sorry….. I don’t understand the question.’

  Contestant number three.

  ‘What is your idea of a perfect date?’

  ‘Walking hand in hand along a beach while the sun sets.’ (Said with slight lisp so it was really thun thets, not sunsets.)

  ‘What is your favourite continent?’

  ‘Ummmm. Italy.’

  ‘What’s your favourite James Bond movie?’

  ‘Mission Impossible.’

  Contestant number four.

  ‘What is your greatest fear?’

  ‘Oh golly, that’s a hard one. Yeah, I would have to say – ahhhhh – yeah spiders.’

  ‘What is your star sign?’

  ‘Gemini.’

  ‘What would you prefer to eat for dinner, Indian or Thai?’

  ‘Neither. I hate foreign food.’

  Contestant number five.

  ‘What is your favourite movie?’

  ‘Gosh, it would have to be Breakfast at Tiffany’s.’

  ‘What is your favourite song?’

  ‘Moon River.’

  ‘If you could go anywhere on your honeymoon where would it be?’

  ‘New York.’

  ***

  Natalie and I were Christmas shopping. By her red eyes, I had surmised she was still frequenting the ladies at work for her spasmodic crying sessions. She told me she had started taking her laptop in with her so she could get some work done while she cried. I guess that was why they had made her a partner – total dedication.

  ‘What did you think about contestant number five?’ I asked.

  ‘Do you think she wanted to go to New York so she could go to Tiffany’s?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘I wish he had have asked her what her cat’s name was.’

  ‘Probably Cat.’

  ‘So is that it for the contestants?’

  ‘Yep. They have a week off over Christmas and then they’ll announce the winner.’

  ‘I’m breathless with anticipation. Where the hell did they find these girls?’

  ‘I guess it’s the type of girl that would enter such a competition. I mean would you ring up and go in a competition to marry someone you don’t know?’

  ‘No, it would be horribly demeaning. I guess in their defence they sort of know him from the radio?’ she said.

  ‘What listening to him doing the road reports from the helicopter?’

  ‘And seeing his photos on those advertising billboards.’

  ‘That would be enough to make them ring up. He looks hot in those photos,’ I said sighing.

  ‘Yeah, hanging out of the helicopter like that. He looks like a real Indiana Jones.’

  We both paused while Nat looked at some perfume for her Mum and I thought about Matt in those photos. Yummy.

  ‘Oh look,’ said Nat, holding up another bottle, ‘Ricardo bought me a bottle of this.’ She looked at the price tag. ‘He would have had to clean for ever to buy it.’ Tears flooded her eyes.

  I handed her a tissue.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I went through a whole box today at work. I’ve started buying those man size tissues, they last a lot longer.’

  ‘I love those tissues. All tissues should be man size.’

  She blew her nose noisily.

  ‘What do you want to do for your birthday?’ I asked, changing the subject. Thinking about Matt was making me start to get a little hot under the collar.

  ‘I don’t know. Go out to dinner? I’d be happy to do nothing.’ She sounded quite glum as she said it.

  I decided to bite the bullet. ‘Have you heard from Ricardo?’

  ‘No. I think I’ve blown it.’

  ‘He’ll come round,’ I said it more for reassurance than because I believed it. The truth was I didn’t know Ricardo enough to know what he would do. Maybe she had blown it.

  ‘Why don’t you ring him?’ I asked.

  ‘Why don’t you ring Matt? He’s obviously not into this competition.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘What? Why didn’t you tell me? What did he say?’

  ‘Nothing. I got the answering machine.’

  ‘What made you ring him?’

  ‘When I got home from your place the other night there was a message from him on the answering machine.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘I couldn’t understand him,’ I said frustrated. ‘It was all staticy. He said my name and something about India.’

  ‘So you left a message for him?’

  ‘No. He’s currently unavailable Nat, that’s what his phone told me.’

  ‘What, his phone told you he was unavailable?’ She looked at me concerned, as if maybe I was going crazy.

  ‘No, the message on his answering bank was that he was currently unavailable.’

  ‘Oh,’ she sighed. ‘At least he rang you.’

  ‘He could have been ringing to tell me that there was nothing between us.’

  ‘He could have been ringing to say that he loved you.’

  The total unexpectedness of the thought of him saying he loved me made my heart clench painfully. I stopped and steadied myself with a hand on the slipper selection. Bright lights flashed before my eyes and I had to remind myself to breathe. When I had myself under control, I continued. ‘I guess we’ll never know. Now do you think I should get Mum the blue slippers or the purple ones.’

  ‘You’re really not going to ring him again?’

  ‘I tell you what – I’ll ring him if you ring Ricardo.’

  ‘I think the purple ones.’

  ‘Great.’

  And we left it at that.

  * * *

  I love the lead up to Christmas. Even though I was lonely and morose – and missing Matt like crazy – I couldn’t help but be caught up in the festive season. Nat and I were hung-over and officially late for the 1pm departure time to my parents, as we sat on the floor in my lounge frantically wrapping presents. We had gone out for some Christmas cheer the night before and had ended up having a double celebration when Mark had pulled out an engagement ring and proposed to Rana.

  ‘Just wrap the ones for tonight,’ I advised her as I passed the sticky tape. ‘We can finish it up there.’

  ‘Hang on,’ she said, clambering to her feet. ‘I need to vomit.’

  ‘Feeling better?’ I asked when she finally returned.<
br />
  ‘There’s probably much more where that came from.’

  I chuckled, happy that for once it wasn’t me doing the vomiting.

  The drive to Umina was a nightmare. It seemed everybody in Sydney had joined the freeway at once. Nat took advantage of the traffic jam to get a couple of hours sleep and was feeling better by the time we arrived. She must have still looked a little peaky though because Dad took one look at her and handed her a glass brimming with champagne.

  ‘Hair of the dog,’ he said. ‘Merry Christmas gorgeous.’

  ‘Oooiiiiii,’ I said, ‘where’s my hair of the dog?’

  ‘Sorry beautiful.’ Dad handed me a glass as well.

  ‘What’s with all the beautiful and gorgeous?’ I asked Mum.

  ‘Your Dad started the hair of the dog quite a while ago.’

  ‘Is it just the four of us tonight?’ I asked.

  ‘Jake and Tash said they might drop in to say hi.’

  ‘What?’ I asked in alarm.

  ‘Gotcha.’ She laughed merrily.

  ‘I think someone else might have started the hair of the dog a while ago as well,’ I said grumpily.

  We had a merry evening, pulling bon bons and singing Christmas carols with our paper hats on. I found myself remembering last year, when I had still been almost comatose with grief. I had put in what I had thought was a good effort, but in retrospect I must have been a bit of a Christmas Grinch. It was amazing how far I had come in a few short months. The first part of the year had been an uphill slog, but it seemed I had been on the downward slope for a while.

  Would I have come this far without Matt? I doubted it. He had shown me there was life beyond death. The question was would I have come this far without The Seven Steps to Closure? Would I have been open to the experiences that had allowed me to move on from Jake? Would I have been in the right place at the right time?

  In the end I decided that it didn’t really matter about the what ifs and buts of the situation. I was where I was, and even though I was upset about the whole Matt situation, the emotions involved were a lot less convoluted and didn’t involve the excruciating confusion that had accompanied my break up with Jake. So yes, I was sad and depressed, but I still held on to my newly restored sense of self, and with that I would just have to be happy.

  * * *

  ‘Wake up, wake up, wake up,’ I said, bouncing up and down on the end of Mum and Dad’s bed. ‘It’s Christmas and guess what?’ Mum opened one eye and stared at me. I took that as an invitation to keep on going. ‘Santa’s been.’

  ‘What time is it?’ Dad groaned, feeling around on the bedside table for his alarm clock.

  ‘It’s ten o’clock.’

  Mum shot bolt upright in bed. ‘Oh no, I have to get the turkey in the oven, scrub the potatoes and make the salads. Bert we need to get some ice for the drinks.’

  I sat with a huge grin on my face. ‘Just kidding, it’s only eight.’ Mum flopped backwards onto her pillow. ‘I’ve scrubbed the potatoes, the ovens preheating and Nat’s started on breakfast. We still have a few hours till Lil and Martin get here so I thought we could have breakfast on the deck.’

  Dad lifted his head into the air and sniffed. ‘Mmmmmm, what’s that I can smell?’

  ‘Bacon cooking and coffee brewing.’

  ‘Good enough for me.’ He threw back the sheets and clambered out of bed. ‘I’ll just have a shower first.’

  ‘You’re mighty chirpy,’ Mum said to me when Dad had departed.

  ‘I’m feeling good.’

  ‘So you’re finally over Jake?’

  ‘I think I am. I guess I won’t really know till I see him again, but I can’t see that happening in the foreseeable future.’

  ‘So does this Matt have anything to do with it?’

  ‘How do you know about Matt?’ I asked, thinking Bloody Lil.

  ‘Oh a little birdie told me.’

  ‘Bloody Lil,’ I grumbled out loud.

  ‘Now dear, don’t go blaming Lil, you’ve only got yourself to blame for this one.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The postcards.’

  ‘What about them? They never showed up.’

  ‘Actually they did. All of them. Here.’

  ‘You got all the postcards?’ I could hear my voice going up a couple of notches. ‘How could that happen?’

  ‘You bundled them with rubber bands.’

  ‘I thought they would take them off,’ I said, remembering placing the bands around the postcards with Mum and Dad’s on top in case Matt saw them.

  ‘They made for some very interesting reading.’

  I put my head in my hands and groaned. Oh the embarrassment, my own mother reading about how I had got it on with Matt.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re so mortified,’ she said, ‘you always tell me these things eventually.’

  ‘Yes, but not quite in the same way.’

  ‘I wish you would. It’s much more amusing, and easier. Normally I have to pry all the nitty gritty bits out of Lil. So back to my original question – does it have anything to do with Matt?’

  ‘Yes and no. Yes he helped me rediscover what it was to feel attractive. But more importantly I’ve been able to find me again. I hadn’t realised how much of myself I had sacrificed to be with Jake. I gave up my identity.’

  ‘You were too lost to realise you were lost. It made me so sad watching you. You got smaller and smaller and then one day you stopped shining.’

  ‘Mother,’ I said saddened, ‘why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘Some things you have to realise yourself, and until you do, you drive anyone who tries to tell you away. I’d already lost so much of you I didn’t want to lose all of you.’

  We sat in silence holding hands.

  ‘So this Matthew,’ she finally continued, ‘he lets you be yourself?’

  ‘Even better, he likes who I am.’

  ‘I like him already. When do I get to meet him?’

  ‘You’re not.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Didn’t Lil tell you about the radio comp?’

  ‘Yes. Surely you’re not going to let a little thing like that get in your way?’

  ‘Mum, he’s getting married.’

  ‘Married, Shmarried. It’ll all work out, just you wait and see.’ She kissed me on the forehead and climbed out of bed leaving me sitting there bemused.

  * * *

  It was 6pm on the eve of Nat’s birthday and Nat, Dinah, Elaine and I were at the Sydney Convention Centre waiting for a medical convention Alistair and Gloria were attending, to finish. Gloria had met us out front and advised us that it had run over time.

  ‘Alistair has to present certificates to the newly registered doctors,’ she advised us as she ushered us into the conference room.

  What she had failed to mention was that the speaker before the registration ceremony was attempting to break a Guinness Book record for the longest and most boring lecture ever given.

  ‘Blah blah blah blahblah blah,’ he said as I fought my sinking eyelids. ‘Blah blah blah blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.’

  Elaine elbowed me in the ribs as I felt my head rolling forwards. ‘Wake up sleepy,’ she whispered.

  I straightened up my head with my hands and then said, ‘Why does Alistair have to hand out the certificates?’

  ‘He’s the current president of the Australian Medical Board.’

  ‘Impressive,’ I said.

  ‘He tells me it’s nothing special. They take turns doing it.’

  Eventually the ‘blah blahing,’ stopped and the lights in the room were turned up.

  ‘Shhhh,’ said Gloria, leaning towards us, ‘here they come.’ A line of people filed out onto the stage.

  ‘That’s Alistair,’ Elaine whispered proudly, pointing to a tall, dark haired man in a finely cut suit.

  ‘Cute,’ I whispered. ‘I can’t believe we haven’t met him before.’

  ‘Well, you know, I didn’t want to rush th
ings.’

  ‘You spent Christmas with each other’s families,’ I said, a little miffed.

  ‘Yes, but I’ve met them before.’

  ‘Twenty years ago.’

  Alistair’s deep voice boomed out through the microphone as he started to present the registration certificates.

  The rest of the room applauded politely as each name was read out, effectively muffling the gasp that Nat gave as Alistair called out Ricardo Gonzalez.

  ‘It can’t be,’ she said, leaning towards the stage.

  I was just as astounded as she was as we watched Ricardo shake Alistair’s hand, take his doctor’s registration certificate and re-join the rest of the group on the stage.

  ‘What the fuck is going on?’ Nat said to Elaine.

  ‘How the hell would I know,’ Elaine responded. ‘He’s your boyfriend.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ asked Gloria.

  ‘That’s Ricardo, Nat’s ex, the cleaner,’ Dinah told her.

  ‘Seriously?’ Gloria asked. ‘He’s pretty cute, for a guy.’

  Even from the back of the room you could tell that Ricardo was smoking hot.

  ‘Well,’ I said to Nat, ‘guess now we know what his secret was.’

  I watched in dismay as Nat’s blue eyes filled with tears.

  ‘Don’t cry,’ I said. ‘It’ll all work out.’

  ‘How?’ she said. ‘I behaved so horribly; accusing him of being unfaithful and kicking him out.’

  ‘You said he left.’

  ‘He did. But I didn’t try to stop him.’

  ‘Nat, I’m sure he’ll forgive you.’

  ‘As if he would want me when he could have anyone,’ she gestured to a gaggle of female doctors clustered around the foot of the stage, all apparently staring at Ricardo.

  ‘Well, I guess we’re about to find out,’ I said, indicating Elaine who was approaching Alistair.

  ‘Shit,’ said Nat, starting to stand up.

  I gripped her arm firmly. ‘No you don’t,’ I said.

  We watched Elaine smoothly move through the crowd to Alistair’s side. She whispered something in his ear and, taking her hand, he drew her over to Ricardo, who was talking to the other newly registered doctors. Nat tried again to break free from my grip.