by Liz Byrski
‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘I’d like to hear it and you look as though you need to talk about it.’
‘Well, yes,’ she agreed, ‘I do …’
*
‘And so, you see, it became an incredibly hot potato,’ she said with a sigh, having related Kim’s suggestion and her own very mixed feelings. ‘It seemed to overhang everything we did together from then on. But, Will, I couldn’t decide, not just like that, not with Kim standing over me for an answer. And then Bonnie called a couple of times to see if I’d decided about the Boatshed. It was all just too hard. What do you think?’
The waiter removed the remains of the light, fragrant soup, and placed clean plates and cutlery in front of them. Will twisted the stem of his wineglass.
‘It doesn’t matter what I think.’
‘But how does it sound to an outsider? Am I being unreasonable and indecisive?’
He emptied his glass and reached out for the bottle, pouring some first into Sylvia’s glass.
‘Not in the least. In fact, you are being decisive – you’re deciding not to make any hasty decisions. That’s a decision in itself. A sound one. If you really want to know what I think, it’s that you should just take your time. You’ve spent your life doing what other people expected of you; don’t let anyone hassle you now.’
‘But Kim needs an answer and so does Bonnie.’
‘Sorry if I sound harsh about this,’ Will said, his tone brisker now. ‘I don’t know your daughter, but as well as wanting you there because you’re her mother and she loves you, she’s got her own agenda. If she wasn’t anxious to go back to work she’d be giving you time to make up your mind. As for Bonnie, it’s much the same – you’ve got the skills she needs, and she wants to work with you because of your friendship. But you don’t have to let their priorities dominate. They’ll both survive without you if that’s what you decide, and both of them will, in the long run, accept your decision.’
Sylvia nodded. ‘You’re right, I suppose, but I feel I owe Bonnie something because she’s been so good to me.’
Will shook his head. ‘Bonnie wouldn’t see it that way, I’m sure. But she does need to get on with the business. Can I stick my neck out and offer a bit more overbearing male advice?’
‘Please do.’
‘Moving to England is the big question – you must take your time – but you don’t have to see the Boatshed as a decision for the rest of your life. You need a job and Bonnie can give you one. Work for her, set up the gallery, enjoy that while you make up your mind.’
As they left the restaurant and joined the busy crowds of evening shoppers and sightseers, Sylvia felt as though she was in a luxurious space-time capsule isolated from her anxieties about the future.
‘Thanks, Will,’ she said as they strolled towards the harbour. ‘The conversation, the meal, everything … you probably don’t realise what a help it’s been – just what I needed.’
Spontaneously she took his arm, then felt him press it to his side. He placed his other hand over hers and they walked on in silence to the harbour wall. The water was a gently swaying mass of lights and beyond them the dark silhouette of Hong Kong Island, speckled with more lights, was outlined against the night sky.
‘Would you like to go across to the island tomorrow?’ Will asked. ‘Lots to see and the views from the Peak are magnificent.’
She nodded. ‘I thought I’d get the ferry.’
‘Would you like a tour guide?’ he asked.
‘Well …’ she faltered. ‘I don’t want to take up your time, you’ve got business here …’
He turned to face her, taking her hand in both of his. ‘Nothing that won’t wait,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing I’d rather do than introduce you to Hong Kong.’
It was after ten the following evening when, sated with the sights and sounds of Hong Kong – the streets hung with Chinese banners, dazzling shop windows, the colours and spicy scents of the markets, and the breathtaking views from the Peak – they stepped off the ferry from the island and made their way back to the apartment. Sylvia slipped off her shoes and padded to the French windows, sliding them open and stepping out onto the balcony, hypnotised once again by the lights of the city and harbour. She loved the humidity that turned tiredness into exquisite languor and she stood on her toes, stretching her arms above her head, enjoying the awareness of her own body in the night air.
She didn’t hear Will behind her but when he slipped his arms around her waist it felt totally natural to lean back into him, and gently he bent his head to rest his cheek on her hair before letting his lips brush the length of her neck. She stretched again, responding to his touch, relishing the feel of his hands on her body, his mouth against her skin. It was so long since she had felt desire she had forgotten its power, and now her body surged with life and she turned in his arms and reached up to touch his face.
‘I’ve dreamed of this,’ he whispered. ‘From the moment I first saw you in the kitchen I’ve wanted you.’ And in that split second of anticipation before he kissed her, Sylvia wondered what she was doing. She pulled back slightly but, sensing her hesitation, Will drew her closer, his mouth closing on hers.
She was nervous at first – Colin had been her only lover and always a somewhat distracted one. Even in their first months of marriage he was cautious and polite, gentle but uninspired, and she had followed his lead. As Will drew her into the bedroom she feared her own awkwardness and inexperience, but his touch seemed to ignite her passion so that she was yearning to abandon herself to him in a way she had never imagined. As the night wore on and merged into morning and they finally fell into exhausted sleep, Sylvia discovered that she could be wild and uninhibited, that she could take the initiative as well as simply responding. The old Sylvia had been blown away and in her place was a woman confidently rejoicing in her sexuality.
Two days later, on the morning of her fifty-sixth birthday and the day she was due to fly back to Melbourne, Sylvia woke, for the first time ever, to breakfast in bed.
‘Not really! Not ever before?’ Will asked in amazement, slipping back into bed beside her. ‘Not even on your birthday or Mother’s Day?’
‘Especially not Mother’s Day,’ Sylvia said, looking down at the tray covered with a white serviette, the toast cut in triangles. ‘Mother’s Day is a big day for the church but it doesn’t leave much time for church wives, or, at least, it didn’t in our house. But I did get breakfast in bed in hospital when Kim was born.’
Will pulled the bedclothes up to his waist, shaking his head. ‘What a strange life,’ he said, turning to her to take her hand. ‘I don’t want to go home.’
She smiled. ‘Me neither – this feels totally decadent. Perfectly in line with your reputation.’
‘Bonnie warned you, then?’
‘Warned me? No – I doubt it crossed her mind that I would be in a position to need a warning.’
‘So d’you think I’m an opportunist?’
‘Possibly.’ She reached out to stroke his shoulder, sliding her hand down over his chest. ‘But weren’t we both making the most of the opportunity? Here we are in the same place at the same time. It’s not as though you lured me here!’
‘I meant what I said that first night,’ he said, trapping her hand and holding it. ‘I wanted you right from the start. I schemed and dreamed and tried to look and sound really cool, but for the past few weeks I’ve been burning up inside.’
Sylvia tilted her head to rest it on his shoulder. ‘Dear Will,’ she said. ‘You made me feel young again, made me feel very special.’
‘You are special,’ he said. ‘Stay here with me, Sylvia. Let’s change the flights and stay a bit longer.’
She shivered slightly and turned to look at him, drawing the sheet over her, conscious suddenly of her older body against his smooth flesh. His touch, the scent of his body, his sexual energy thrilled her, but his intensity also threatened to overwhelm her.
‘I need to go back, Will, make the n
ext step of this journey.’
Will sighed. ‘This time tomorrow you’ll be in Melbourne and I’ll be in Perth, thousands of kilometres between us. Is that what you want?’
She shook her head. ‘Of course not.’
He slid down in the bed, drawing her with him. ‘I don’t want to let go of you,’ he said softly.
‘I thought that letting go was your thing.’
‘It has been, but not now.’
‘Ah, Will,’ she said, sliding closer, curving her leg across his. ‘I don’t have any illusions. This has been a wonderful adventure, you’ve transformed me. But you’ll soon file this in your black book and move on, and that’s as it should be.’
‘You have no idea, Sylvia,’ he said, his voice husky with emotion. ‘You simply have no idea.’
TWENTY-ONE
Bonnie stared into the mirror and peered closely at her face, inspecting what looked like enlarged pores on her nose and broken veins across her cheekbones. Just before Jeff died she had been thinking about cosmetic surgery: Botox for her forehead, an eye lift, perhaps, her lips, and maybe doing something with the telltale pad of flesh under her chin that screamed middle age. But since then she hadn’t given it much thought, it hadn’t seemed to matter so much back here in Melbourne, at least not until now. Not until her mother started behaving like a teenager.
Bonnie put a hand on either side of her face and gently drew the skin tight towards her hairline. She looked ridiculous, but if she slacked the tension a little she looked good, and she held it for a moment, contemplating a younger look. Who would she be doing it for? Herself?
Jeff had always been against it. ‘You’re beautiful as you are, Bon,’ he’d said whenever she mentioned it. ‘Why do you want to change? Growing older is okay. I’d rather have you than some bland looking thirty-year-old. Your face tells a story, our story, and I love it.’ But without Jeff around, there was no one to share the story written in her face.
She released the mask she’d created and looked at herself again. The haircut had been a sound decision, and overall she looked pretty good. Perhaps she just shouldn’t look at herself so closely with her glasses on. She took them off and straightened up – a little bit of distance was a big improvement. Anyway, no one cared what she looked like; she could go out looking like the Witch of Endor and no one would take any notice.
It didn’t seem so long ago that heads turned whenever she walked down the street. Europeans weren’t so hung up on youth as Australians; in Switzerland she had constantly felt noticed and admired as a woman, whereas here she might just as well have been invisible. But it was ironic how visible she suddenly became when someone, a man, realised that she had money. The architect, the builder, the designer, the project manager – all of them had treated her in a bored, dismissive manner until it became clear that she was not only talking big money, she actually had it. Then they started to take her seriously. She didn’t doubt that if she had been twenty years younger, or male, the original response would have been very different. There was considerable satisfaction in the knowledge that she could tell them all to get stuffed and she’d find someone else, but it had shown her that to be an older woman and not have the power of money behind you would make life a very different prospect.
Bonnie had encouraged Fran to respond to the offer for her house with a counter offer, driving the price up by another five thousand dollars, and she had gone with her to the real estate agent’s office. Watching Fran’s anxiety as they waited for the agent to call the potential buyer, she was reminded again of how comfortably insulated she had always been from the sort of financial concerns that had dominated her friends’ lives. To Fran, the five thousand additional dollars represented a great deal more than just a well-done deal.
Bonnie turned out the bathroom light, went downstairs to the kitchen and stared at the fridge, wondering what she would eat. It was strange being alone in the house. Sylvia was away, Will had left for Hong Kong and now, this evening, for the third time in a fortnight, Irene was out and presumably not coming home. Bonnie, thankful that at least she hadn’t yet been faced with Hamish in his pyjamas, realised that her own behaviour was probably holding this reality at bay. She had been so shocked when Irene told her that she and Hamish were ‘an item’ that she had actually dropped her cup and it had smashed on the kitchen tiles. The job of cleaning up the broken china and the tea had given her a few moments’ breathing space but when it was done she and Irene had stood there looking at each other and Bonnie had been totally lost for words.
‘You look rather shocked, dear,’ Irene had said, returning to the task of unpacking the shopping.
‘I am,’ she managed to say, wondering if it was really just shock that she felt. ‘You mean … you mean, you and Hamish are …’
‘Having a relationship,’ Irene supplied, not looking up. ‘Yes.’
‘Are you sure?’ Bonnie said, realising before the words were out of her mouth that it was a perfectly ridiculous question. ‘I mean,’ she said, blushing, ‘well … a relationship.’
Irene put a packet of flour into the pantry and turned to face her daughter. ‘Look, Bonnie, we both know what a relationship involves, or do you want me to spell it out? Hamish and I are old friends, and while we were in Greece we spent a lot of time together. I called to talk to you about it one night but it was awkward, you were busy. Anyway, our friendship has developed into something deeper, more intimate. We’re both very happy about it, and so are our friends.’ She paused, taking in Bonnie’s face and her body language. ‘I hoped you’d be happy too. I’ve been on my own for a long time and I never expected to love someone or be loved again.’
Bonnie’s shock and embarrassment outweighed sensitivity. ‘But you’re eighty, Mum!’ she said. ‘People don’t have … aff … relationships, at eighty.’
‘Of course they do, Bonnie, don’t be so naïve. People have affairs when they’re even older than us, even when they’re in hostels and nursing homes. It’s just that everyone pretends it doesn’t happen. People don’t stop being sexual once they draw the pension, Bonnie.’
Bonnie held up her hand. ‘Don’t! Please don’t! You’re my mother, for goodness sake.’
‘Yes,’ Irene said, clearly both irritated and hurt, ‘and you’re old enough to know better than to behave like this.’ With that she marched out of the kitchen leaving Bonnie alone, confused, and surrounded by unpacked shopping.
Since then the atmosphere had been arctic, but Bonnie couldn’t overcome her embarrassment and distaste. Why couldn’t they just be friends? Surely they were both old enough to know better than to disrupt everyone’s lives by behaving like teenagers. She had been too embarrassed even to tell Fran about it, and she just hoped it would all be over soon, certainly before Sylvia got back, and then no one else need ever know.
There was a plastic container of soup in the fridge and Bonnie took it out, put some in a bowl, popped it into the microwave and ate it sitting alone in the kitchen. She tried not to think about the fact that it was eight o’clock on Saturday night and here she was alone in the silent house. Sylvia’s presence had saved her from the emptiness she had felt when her mother first went away, and somehow she hadn’t expected to feel like this again. Now that she had the Boatshed her days were busy and satisfying, but suddenly her aloneness struck her with greater force than before. Fran had her mother and her children, Sylvia had Kim and her grandchildren and now, even her own mother had someone special. Bonnie couldn’t actually bring herself to say, or even think, the word ‘lover’. It wasn’t that she had anything against Hamish personally, it just seemed so undignified and confronting.
It was cold downstairs and Bonnie washed her soup bowl and decided that the cosiest place would be bed. She took a hot shower and climbed into bed at quarter to nine, surrounded by pillows, and flicked through the television channels to find something to watch. Harrison Ford and Julie Andrews seemed to be caught up in a European hotel avoiding some spies and she settled back to wa
tch. It was in one of the commercial breaks that she heard the front door open. She flicked the mute switch and heard voices, her mother’s and Hamish’s deeper one. Bonnie sank back onto her pillows, staring at the soundless pictures. Was Hamish going to stay the night? Would she have to face him in the morning?
Harrison and Julie climbed into bed together and Bonnie was consumed by a flush of heat as she pictured Irene and Hamish doing the same at the other end of the house. The thought that they might be having sex under the same roof while she lay alone in bed watching a movie had a horrible fascination. She flicked off the mute and the sound came up. Trying to force the images out of her mind she watched the remainder of the movie without really seeing it, until finally she turned off the lights and lay down in the darkness, wondering where they were and what they were doing, and what she would do when she saw Hamish in the morning.
Jacka Boulevard was busy with traffic and pedestrians. Despite the cold wind, the arrival of spring seemed to have brought everyone out of their houses. Fran turned away from the water-front and slowly made her way in the stream of traffic across Acland Street back towards St Kilda Road. She had driven past the house countless times but this was the fourth time she had arranged to go inside, and this time was different. This time she almost owned it – the contract was signed, the deposit paid and in three weeks’ time she could move in.
She parked on the opposite side of the street, got out of the car and stood looking at it, imagining herself inside her new home, her own things around her, familiar furniture filling the rooms, her books on shelves, pictures and photographs on the walls. Each time she saw it she was more convinced that she had made the right decision. She took a set of kitchen steps out of the boot, locked the car, crossed the road, and went in through the wrought-iron gate and up the three steps to the front door. She wanted to do some measuring, work out what would fit where and what would simply have to go. In her pocket she had a list of things to check, a measuring tape and a copy of the floor plan.
