Apartment 255

by Bunty Avieson

  Dr Black had left for the day. He had gone to visit some of his racehorses and that left Ginny to clean up the consulting rooms, prepare whatever would be needed for the next day and lock up.

  ‘Why don’t you leave the rest of that typing till tomorrow,’ she said kindly to Annie. ‘It’s much too nice a day for you to be in here.’

  Annie was surprised. Ginny being kind? Caring? What next? A girlie chat about boys? Annie wasn’t about to hang around for that. She had places to go and people to meet. Always. ‘Thanks, Ginny. See you tomorrow.’ She was out the door in an instant.

  Ginny locked the door after Annie left and pulled down the blinds. She turned on the answering machine and let herself into Dr Black’s medicine cupboard. The Limondol was standing among the row of earthenware jars. Its level had dropped since she was last there, which was a good thing. Dr Black had been using it and was unlikely to notice that more had gone. Ginny scooped as much as she dared into a smaller jar, then popped it into her handbag.

  ‘I’ve got a date with Tom’s dad, Tom’s dad, Tom’s dad, oh I’ve got a date with Tom’s dad …’ she sang loudly and happily as she cleaned up the last of the mess in the consulting room.

  *

  Ginny arrived at Toft Monks just after 7 pm. Kate and Anne were already there. Tom was out of town for a few days and Sarah had invited them all over for dinner.

  ‘Sit down, Sarah,’ said Ginny. ‘I know where the glasses are. I can help myself to wine.’

  Sarah rejoined her friends in the living room where Kate was in full flight mimicking the director of her new show. She minced around the living room, waving her arms and pouting.

  ‘Dahhhling, it has to have more emotion. You must make me cry …’ Kate was saying in an exaggerated camp tone.

  Ginny held her handbag tightly to her as she entered the kitchen. She looked at the pantry and deliberated. She wondered how long she might have before she could be interrupted. She wavered then decided she should wait. She put her handbag down carefully on the kitchen bench, took a wine glass from the cupboard and opened the fridge. She took the half-empty bottle with her into the living room.

  ‘Anyone for a top-up?’ she asked, smiling at the circle of women.

  They all nodded as Kate continued with her story.

  ‘So I did what any half-talented singer with an ounce of self-respect would do,’ said Kate. She stopped for effect. The women looked at her expectantly. Kate loved to work an audience, no matter its size. ‘I threw the chair at him.’ Kate laughed triumphantly at the shocked faces around her. ‘That made him cry!’

  ‘Oh, Kate, you didn’t,’ gasped Anne.

  ‘I most certainly did. More emotion! How dare he. What does he want, Celine Dion? Huh! The chair hit him on the arm. Which is a pity as I was aiming at his head. He burst into floods of tears. Threw a complete hissy fit and ran sobbing from the stage. I mean really. I can’t be expected to work with such amateurs.’

  Kate looked outraged and indignant and the women stared at her, wide-eyed and transfixed. Kate looked at their faces and burst out laughing. The diva was gone in an instant and it was their old mate Kate again.

  ‘Okay, maybe I didn’t exactly throw the chair …’

  The girls laughed and chatted, opened more wine, talked about Anne giving up work to care for the baby, Sarah’s tough boss McKenzie and everything in between. When Sarah got up to serve dinner Ginny followed her into the kitchen, propping herself on the bench close to her handbag in case an opportunity arose.

  ‘So why is Tom in Canberra?’ she asked as casually as she could. She was always self-conscious saying Tom’s name out loud to anyone else. That simple word carried so much meaning for her she didn’t trust her voice to sound normal.

  Sarah, noticing nothing unusual, answered happily. ‘He’s working on a story on drug abuse among athletes,’ she said. ‘He’s gone to Canberra to visit the Australian Institute of Sport to interview some of the coaches. It’s a follow-up to see what is happening at the world competition level since all the promises that were made after the Sydney Olympics.’

  Ginny felt a cold chill along the nerve endings beneath her skin. ‘Really. How interesting,’ she said, suddenly wary. She wanted to know more but was unsure how to elicit information from Sarah without sounding too interested in the subject.

  ‘Oh, it is really interesting,’ agreed Sarah. ‘You remember how much bad press the Americans got? Their achievements were completely overshadowed by the drug scandal. The way everybody spoke then you would assume they were going to clean it up starting right from the top.

  ‘Well what Tom is discovering is that while that may be so at the top there are still athletes who are using steroids to train. It hasn’t been stamped out, just pushed even further underground.’

  Ginny remembered the drug scandal of the 2000 Olympics. Living in Sydney at the time it was impossible not to know all about it. The media had been full of stories about the American team, the Romanians and the doping scandals. She had read a lot about steroid abuse and its effects at that time. In fact, she had devoured everything she could, subscribing to body-building magazines, borrowing books from the library and searching the Internet for more information. She had developed quite an interest in it.

  It was an article Ginny found on the Web describing the side effects of anabolic steroids that had particularly interested her. Then she had gone to the library and taken out every book she could find on the subject. She knew about steroids, of course, from her vet training. But the effects on the human body were really quite interesting. The side effects were horrendous. Body builders and sportspeople were often so obsessive that they were willing to put up with them to achieve their goals.

  The information had set Ginny thinking. What would happen to someone who wasn’t an athlete, who didn’t know they were taking steroids, if their body started to react differently? She was fascinated in particular by the pent-up aggression that was a regular by-product of steroid abuse. It was the sort of experiment that appealed to Ginny. In vet school she loved opening up animals to see how they worked inside, attaching electrodes to the muscles and stimulating them to react. She was as close to being happy as she had ever felt when she was working away in the science lab stimulating dead animals at her whim. Being so in control made her feel omnipotent, something she never felt in daily life. The idea of being able to do that to a living person was compelling. Oh yes, Ginny knew a lot about steroid abuse and the scandal of the Sydney Olympics.

  ‘How interesting,’ she said again, as she helped Sarah carry the dinner plates into the living room.

  Anne had overheard the last of their conversation and was interested. She had covered her share of drug abuse stories during the Olympics. Ginny sat quietly in her seat, feeling self-conscious and trying to shrink back into the fabric of the chair, as Sarah repeated the content of Tom’s story to Kate and Anne. Sarah prattled on, speaking fast, her words tumbling over each other. Her eyes were unnaturally bright and she had large grey circles under her eyes. Anne stopped listening to what she was saying, instead noticing the way she was saying it. Sarah came to an abrupt halt in mid-sentence.

  ‘Tom would kill me if he thought I was talking about a story he is working on,’ said Sarah. ‘Please keep it to yourselves. Or I’ll have to shoot you all.’

  The girls all agreed it was not for further discussion and Ginny took the opportunity to steer the conversation to a safer topic. She told Sarah she had seen Hal. Ginny delighted in the feeling that she knew more about Tom’s dad than Sarah.

  ‘He brought in his dog Laddie to see me,’ said Ginny.

  Sarah was keen to know all and Ginny savoured the moment. She explained the problem with Laddie, casually adding that Hal was taking her for a motorbike ride on the weekend.

  ‘That’s great,’ said Sarah. A raft of possibilities occurred to her. Ginny and Hal. Now that was unexpected. But it had definite potential.

  ‘Tom and I were planning to meet Anne and J
ohn for a barbecue at Palm Beach on Saturday. If you are heading in that direction you should pop in.’

  ‘Yes, you must,’ said Anne, feeling lukewarm about Ginny but enthusiastic to meet this Hal that they were all talking about. Palm Beach was a beautiful, rugged ocean beach about an hour’s drive from the city. It had once been a quiet beachside village but being so close to the city, the old weatherboard homes had been demolished to make way for substantial holiday homes where the rich liked to spend their time. Large modern houses had taken over all the clifftop blocks with their extensive ocean views. Anne and John were renovating an Edwardian villa at the not so fashionable end of the suburb.

  Ginny liked the idea. Another opportunity to share time with Tom and, she thought with a delicious thrill, as Hal’s date.

  ‘I’ll see what Hal thinks,’ she promised.

  Anne watched Ginny. There was something about her that was unsettling, or at least more so than usual, she thought. Anne had long suspected that Ginny had a crush on Tom. She noticed the way Ginny’s face lit up when she spoke to him. And whenever he wasn’t around it seemed to Anne that Ginny always seemed to bring the conversation back to Tom. The idea of Ginny seeing Tom’s new-found dad sounded a warning bell to Anne. There was something unhealthy about it. Anne couldn’t put her finger on why that should trouble her. It just did. She didn’t like it.

  Anne thought about mentioning it to Sarah but dismissed the idea. She had tried to talk to Sarah about Ginny before, but Sarah just didn’t get it. She could see no bad in her childhood friend. ‘Oh that’s just Ginny,’ she would say.

  Anne watched Sarah. There was something about her manner that seemed brittle. Anne didn’t like that either. She didn’t appear to be a happy bride, looking forward to her wedding day. She had bags under her eyes and she seemed uptight, testy. Not like the bubbly, easygoing girl Anne knew so well. There was an edge to her tonight. A sharpness. It was probably just that Tom was away, thought Anne. Sarah always hated it when he was away.

  But still … Anne felt a tremor of unease.

  The women returned to admiring Sarah’s ring and she started to explain its history. Ginny leapt up, offering to make coffee. Anne helped her clear the plates but Ginny insisted she sit back down. She was a new mum and Ginny declared she deserved to be waited on for a change. Anne was touched at her concern. She had never warmed to Ginny but maybe she was too hard on her, she thought. Ginny was just eccentric but really, her heart was in the right place. Anne resolved to be nicer to her.

  Once Ginny was alone in the kitchen she wasted no time. Quickly and efficiently she emptied the contents of her jar into the sugar canister, carefully stirring it around and screwing the lid back on. She reappeared in the living room with a tray, and watched with satisfaction as Sarah heaped three teaspoons of sugar into her coffee. Anne asked for the sugar bowl and Ginny felt a moment of concern.

  ‘Is that wise when you are breastfeeding?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh Ginny, you don’t know much about having a baby, do you?’ replied Anne with a smile.

  To Ginny she sounded superior and smug. Ginny shrugged and passed her the sugar bowl.

  ‘Help yourself,’ she said, smiling back at her.

  *

  On the way home from Canberra Tom took a detour to the coastal resort town of Kiama. Thel lived in a rambling old weatherboard a few kilometres out of town. The house was in the hills and surrounded by an airy, open verandah with views of the rugged ocean coastline. Thel spent hours on the verandah absorbed in the play of light and mood, which she would try to capture on canvas. She was sitting on the verandah on her favourite old torn leather couch, two glasses and an open bottle of wine on the floor beside her, when Tom parked the car. Her thick black hair was piled on top of her head with a pen and a pencil poked through it to keep it in place.

  ‘You look tired, honey,’ she said as she hugged Tom. ‘And skinny. Doesn’t my favourite daughter-in-law-to-be ever feed you?’

  ‘Not like you, Mum,’ replied Tom.

  It was a traditional, affectionate Thel-and-Tom greeting. Thel was making fun of herself, her mothering. It was a parody of how she thought mothers were meant to behave. Tom always played along, calling her ‘Mum’ just for the purposes of the exercise. Tom sat on the floor, putting a cushion against one of the solid verandah posts and accepted a glass of wine.

  ‘Here’s to my two favourite people getting hitched,’ Thel said, raising her glass in toast.

  It was a superb 1998 Vasse Felix Merlot from Western Australia. Quite rare. Thel knew her wines and had been keeping this one for a special occasion.

  Tom swirled the heavy red liquid around his glass, sniffed it appreciatively then took a small sip. He savoured the flavours, rich and deep.

  ‘Magnificent,’ he said.

  Thel nodded with pleasure. ‘Isn’t she a beauty?’

  Thel and Tom sat comfortably together, enjoying the superb wine as the sun set behind them and they looked out across the Pacific Ocean.

  ‘We have had so many wonderful times here, haven’t we? You, me and Sarah. I think you know how I feel about your girl,’ said Thel.

  Tom nodded. Sitting on the verandah as the day seeped away reminded him of many happy times. Thel often had an assortment of people staying in her rambling home – they came and went as they pleased. But always the day ended there on the verandah, with whoever was around, drinking wine and watching the ocean.

  ‘She’s got a good heart. And a good head. And she’s a bit mad. All my favourite things.’

  Tom laughed. Thel and Sarah had clicked from the start. He hadn’t realised quite how well they had clicked until he came home from surfing one afternoon, only a few days after introducing his mother and his girlfriend, to find them rolling about on the kitchen floor, clutching their sides in hysterics.

  Tom had been flabbergasted at the sight of them, tears streaming down their faces as they tried to explain what they found so incredibly amusing. They had been incapable of speaking, bursting into new fits of laughter at each new attempt. Tom had laughed along with them, not knowing why, except that their childish joy had been so contagious. Finally he had understood that whatever had so tickled Sarah and Thel was under the tea towel on the bench.

  Tom pulled it back and was stupefied at the sight of a freshly baked penis made from what appeared to be puff pastry. The look of bewilderment on his face sent the women into more peals of laughter. Tom had finally given up, taking himself off to shower while the women in his life continued to roll about on the floor.

  Tom marvelled at how the two women complemented each other. Sarah loved to cook while he didn’t think Thel had ever opened an oven door. But Thel had an earthy sense of humour and loved to create. Unleash the two of them in the kitchen and this was the result.

  He reminded his mother of that afternoon.

  Thel laughed.

  ‘We had so much fun baking that. I can’t remember what started us off. I think Sarah had asked if I minded if she cooked something for dinner. I think she had figured out that it was the only way she was likely to get fed. She went to the local milkbar, which as you know doesn’t have the biggest range of food, and came home with a roll of puff pastry so, voila. We baked puff pastry.’

  Tom and Thel reminisced some more as a gentle breeze wafted across the Pacific Ocean, rustling the leaves around them.

  Tom thought it was time to broach the topic that had brought him home to his mother. He was nervous but knew the best way was just to come out with it.

  ‘A month ago, out of the blue, I had a call from Hal,’ he said.

  At mention of the name Thel stiffened. It was almost imperceptible, a slight setting of her shoulders, a tightness about her mouth, which would have gone unnoticed except that Tom was so attuned, looking for any sign of a reaction.

  ‘He had seen my name in the paper and wondered if it was me, so he rang.’

  Thel stared out at the reflection of the half moon on the sea. She didn’t seem inc
lined to speak so Tom continued.

  ‘We caught up for a drink and I’ve seen him a few times now.’

  Tom wondered what was going through his mother’s head.

  ‘How do you feel about that, Thel?’

  Thel took a long time to answer. ‘How is he?’ she asked at last.

  ‘He seems great,’ replied Tom. ‘He owns a motorbike store in North Sydney.’

  Thel nodded. ‘Has he remarried?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘I see.’

  Thel disappeared inside to get another bottle of wine. She was gone quite a while and Tom wondered if he should go after her. He knew he was reopening a very personal wound. He wished he didn’t have to have this conversation but at the same time he wanted to. All his life he had carried with him a lot of questions that he had never felt able to ask. Hal had answered some of them, just by meeting him, but that had also left him with more questions.

  Thel reappeared with more wine and a plate of stuffed olives, dips and bread.

  ‘I’m sorry if I have upset you,’ said Tom.

  ‘Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. It’s just a bit of a shock. I wasn’t sure if he was still alive. I haven’t spoken to him in many years. I wondered what happened to him. So he is living in Sydney. How does he look? Is he well?’

  ‘He looks good,’ said Tom. ‘Actually we look kind of alike.’

  Thel smiled at her son.

  ‘Yes, you do. You get your height from him. Your eyes. Even your smile. It’s always reminded me of your father.’

  Tom thought how wistful she sounded. It had never occurred to him that by looking at him, she would be reminded of Hal.

  ‘That must have been tough for you at times,’ he ventured.

  ‘Oh, not really. Your father was a very handsome man. I was glad you took after him. You got my sense of humour, though. And my creativity. And my legs. All in all, a good combination.’

  Tom couldn’t see Thel’s face but he recognised her flippant and breezy tone, which most likely meant she was avoiding the issue. It was her way. If something disagreeable presented itself, she would try to find something about it she could like and would then concentrate on that. She had dealt with Tom’s school principal whenever he was in trouble in the same way. When Tom had been caught spray-painting graffiti on the school shelter sheds, Thel had applauded his use of colour.