“Wow, don’t hold back Tim,” I said. “Why don’t you tell me what you really think?”
“I think you should come up on stage with us and sing,” Tim told me. “I think you should let it rip, starting with the trapped song in your chest. Stop holding onto the tent pegs of your life and let yourself fly. Now, send me some pictures of Lyndon.”
“No, wait,” Janet said. “We haven’t finished here. I want to plant a few seeds in Margaux’s brain, from this reading. Margaux, please select one card from the ones you have chosen so far. This will indicate what will help you move forward. It will incorporate all the messages from the ones we read earlier.”
I picked the High Priestess.
“There are secrets as yet unrevealed. You have reached a point where you are ready to align yourself with your soul’s purpose. This path requires you to be able to know and trust your intuition, and The High Priestess will help guide you on this path. Your mantra is this; say to yourself: ‘I allow for quiet reflection, I allow my inner voice to be heard. And the more I listen to that voice, the louder it becomes and the more my intuition grows.’”
I repeated what he said, and I did feel happier and more peaceful. The horrible, restless fury that has been gnawing at the marrow of my bones left, and I felt the lovely buzz of harmony instead. “Thank you. Janet. You’re very good at this. Not that I’ve had a reading before, but still.”
“He’s famous,” Tim said. “How do you think he makes money? Not by being Sonny Bono, that’s for sure. Janet earns up to two grand a week, cash. Travels all over Sydney giving readings. North Sydney, Cremorne Point, Double Bay. The ladies love him.”
“I had no idea.”
“You thought I was a kept man.” Janet preened. “Loved for my beauty and my long, long legs.”
“Actually,” I said with smile, “yes, I did. I’m sorry.”
“I’m flattered you think my beauty is worth such a fortune,” he said, and he gathered up his cards. “Now, what are you going to do with the rest of your day?”
“I’m going to send Tim some pics and write an email to Adam to tell him I love him and that I’m sorry I hurt him. Because I am sorry. But I’m going to say that it’s up to him whether he lets this thing with Lyndon run or ruin his life because it won’t run or ruin mine.”
“Don’t tell him I am looking for Lyndon,” Tim said. “In case I can’t find him.”
“You’ll find him,” Janet said breezily. “He can find anyone,” he told me. “That’s what he’s famous for.”
“And here I thought you two beauties did nothing but emerge at night to sing,” I said. “I’ll grab my phone, Tim. Back in a flash.”
24. LYNDON
WE STAYED OVERNIGHT in a little town called Tarcutta. It was the midway point between Melbourne and Sydney. Actually, we stayed there for most of the afternoon and the night. Sean wouldn’t let anyone else drive his baby, and he was too tired to be on the road anymore. We three guys were sharing a room at the Tarcutta Halfway Motor Inn, a double-storied pale yellow building that reminded me of a couple of stacked custard cream biscuits. The spacious room had a view of the ocean with palm trees waving in the breeze. It was all very idyllic, but I was sulking after Martha’s cruel treatment of me. I told Jason and Sean I was going out and rushed out like a child, before they could say anything. Not that they would have, in all likelihood.
I took the time to wander around and think, and I argued viciously in my head with an invisible Martha and Jason.
I would have liked to have seen either of them cut it in the corporate world of magazine publishing. It was a harsh gig. You needed the stamina and the endurance of a long-distance runner or a triathlete. Plus you needed magicians’ skills and a Harvard business grad’s knack for numbers. I had done well to keep my head above water. It took a certain personality to stay afloat, and I had managed to be that person, unremarkable but indestructible, and on the right side of whoever was in power. And you never knew who would take the reins next, in an ever-changing world, so you constantly had to pay it forward, just in case. Yes, life was an old boys’ club and I had always known that. And yes, I had been mildly obsequious to my brothers in power, and there were days when the stench of shit stuck to my nostrils from having my nose so firmly attached to their asses.
Keeping one’s job was a life-or-death chess game. One had to be strategic at all times, and I wanted to see either Martha or Jason manage that. I had been kind but firm to the reports on my org chart, and I had tried not to let anyone go who had children, understanding their situation too well. I had been a positive and helpful mentor to my underlings, and I had a fine hand when it came to editing copy and polishing a magazine for print. I had kept my sense of humour under pressure and made sure my flock were acknowledged for their efforts. I had also been known for my incisive interviewing skills, not to mention my savvy insights into the stock market, which admittedly also helped Margaux and me feather our nest with the finest down.
There had never been a hint of insider trading, but I was given solid clues as to where the treasure lay, and I had made sure to mine every nugget of gold I could. Yes, I told myself now, as I stood outside a craft store advertising locally made mementoes to remind one that you had been to Tarcutta, New South Wales, I had done well. And yes, by way of thanks, they axed me in the end, the mere reminder of which forced me to acknowledge the ball of toxic sludge that lay at the bottom of my belly like an acrid old battery, oozing out poisons and leaking humiliating images of my being escorted out of the building without even being allowed to clear my own desk.
Yes, that memory leached my joy and corroded the perfect storyboard of my life. The powers that be had ruined the overall picture. They made a mess of the seamless slide show of who I had been and what I had achieved. They tripped me up, just before the finish line. Successes did not end their careers by being walked out of the building by human resources; no, they did not. They were given fabulous parties and a Breitling watch or some token of appreciation and everybody got far too drunk. And when you woke up the following morning, hungover and yet released, the rite of passage had been performed and you were on track to move on to the next elegant passage of your life. In my case, I had planned to write a memoir tracking the history and trends of financial gains and losses as measured against the timeline of my life. I had been certain I had a story worthy of telling, and I even had a publisher who had expressed interest. I had penned notes, preparing with complacent satisfaction for the final five years of my career. I daydreamed about the speech I would make at my farewell to announce my memoir—the cherry on the top of a stellar career.
But instead, my box of awards and framed certificates, lauding me with employee recognition, had been delivered to my house, along with a few books that had lined my office, although I had wanted none of them. There, stacked in the box, were my five-year, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five and thirty-year certificates, all thanking me for my valuable efforts. I wanted to take a hammer to them and shatter the glass and crack the frames, but I couldn’t.
I couldn’t because I needed to keep them for when management realized the error of their ways and welcomed me back to my desk, back to my magazine, and back to my job, but of course that never happened. They had moved on and my underling moved into my office, and he even messaged me about how much he loved the view but envied me my “freedom.” Bigger cuts were coming soon, he said, and he was sure they were going to shut down the magazine and he would be out of a job. I could only hope so. But in all fairness, it wasn’t his fault he was sitting in my chair, looking out at my view. It wasn’t his fault I was left with the ugly stain of failure—yes, I had clearly failed or I wouldn’t have lost my job. I had lost it. No one else had lost it but me.
My shameful exit no longer afforded me the luxury of a shiny memoir. I had been forced out and who wanted to hear the bitter ruminations of a loser? And, in addition to losing my
job, I had lost all notion of how to begin the book. I couldn’t even remember what it was I had planned to say. I had studied my notes, but it was as if they had been written by an alien. I hadn’t been able understand what any of it meant. This, in turn, filled me with panic—was I losing my mind? Was I getting dementia? I had sped off to my doctor on the quiet and he told me I was “simply” filled with anxiety. He recommended anti-depressants, which made me snort with sarcasm.
“Pills,” I said. “I’ve lost all the things in life that meant something to me. Drugging to forget would be an easy way out. As long as you don’t think I have dementia, there isn’t anything I want from you. And really, you should stop being such a pawn to the drug companies. That’s all you are. You listen to me with half an ear and then you prescribe. I tell you the story of the sad ending of my life, and you find a way to fund the drug companies at my expense. If I am not suffering from dementia, then I am suffering from grief and loss and I need to find my way through that, God knows how. Can’t you see how unethical you are? How you abuse your power?”
The doctor had looked at me mildly, as if my rant added more fodder to his suggestion that I needed the pills and, in my anger, I marched out, much as I had marched away from Margaux and from Jason and Sean in the motel.
I had wanted to write an article about how doctors played into the hands of large pharmaceutical companies and the consequential effect that had on stocks and shares, but then I remembered I no longer had a forum—my soapbox had been whisked out from under me.
Shortly after I saw the doctor, Margaux and Helen announced that the plans for the Around-The-World-For-However-Long-We-Want trip were finalized. We were ready to go. The change of topic had been a welcome excuse to flee from the pebble in my shoe that was the book, and I took that stone and cemented it to the wall of my life’s failures. The trip had been a way to keep fleeing the person I couldn’t bear to be, but I hadn’t been able to escape him. And even now, even as Liam Lemon in black clothes and killer cool boots, I still hated myself as much as I ever had.
25. MARGAUX
I WROTE TO ADAM. I told him how much I loved him and that I was sorry I had been cruel to him. I told him that I just wanted him to be happy and free. I said I was sorry about the conflict between him and Lyndon, but I couldn’t fix it for him, only he could. If that meant seeing a new therapist, then he needed to do that. I hoped I said all the right things to my son, the boy that I loved so much.
I also wrote back to Mr. Ex-Punk Rocker:
I think the lost soul is me. I think my anger manifested the angry apparition. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not usually the kind of person who uses words like “manifest.” I’m too much of a practical realist. Or, so I thought, anyway. You know when people say “Everything happens for a reason,” or “It happened for the best”? I always thought that was just a loser’s way of making a stupid excuse when things went wrong, but I do think that Lyndon’s crazy action was for the good. For me, anyway. I have no idea how he’s doing and that’s not why I’m messaging you. Please let’s not talk about Lyndon. I don’t really know why I’m messaging you. It’s like some pen pal thing back in the day when you decided to write to someone in Iceland, or somewhere you knew you would never go in life before the internet. And you could ask them about their country and their life. So, Mr. Nameless Ex-Punk Rocker, tell me about your exotic life and in exchange, you can ask me anything you like.
Margaux, over and out, for now.
And then I went to meet Graham.
“I got my cards read today,” I said. “By Dammit Janet. Have you heard of him? Apparently, he’s famous in Sydney.”
“He is,” she nodded. “Wow, that’s impressive. He’s got a waiting list as long as my arm and you just ‘got your cards read’—you’re hilarious. I see him once a year because that’s all I can afford. I love him to bits. And you got a free reading? Lucky you. Listen, are you up for a drive?”
“Sure. Where?”
“To find Nancy’s nearest and dearest. She lives out near Parramatta, not the best area, but I thought it might be helpful to you to meet her and talk about her.”
“You found out a lot then?” I asked.
“I found out some things. Our nurse is Nancy Simms. Or she was. She would be ninety-six now, but she died when she was only sixty-two. Ha, you know you’re getting old when you say things like ‘only sixty-two.’ When I was in my twenties and thirties, I thought people would be happy to die then, that they must be awfully tired of life. The article I found didn’t say what she died of. She worked as a nurse at the Chelmsford Private Hospital.”
So my feelings had been correct when I had made the connection between the sleep therapy, Dr. Bailey and Nancy. “I read about Chelmsford. It’s where the doctors performed terrible sleep treatments on their patients. I’m pretty sure she had a relationship with Dr. Bailey who was responsible for the therapy.”
“The math adds up. She was born in 1925, and started nursing in 1945. She died in 1987, two years after the not-so-good doctor committed suicide. Bailey practised his deep sleep therapy from 1963 to 1979, and she was on record as working there during that time.”
We were driving in Graham’s little Opel, and it was clear we were leaving the more affluent part of Sydney and heading for the western suburbs where graffiti covered the walls that ran along the train tracks. Small houses with a derelict air lined the roads, and the muffler parlours were a dime a dozen.
“From what I’ve seen,” I told Graham, “people around here go through mufflers like Kleenex.”
She laughed. “We’re nearly there. Brace yourself for a whole new Australia, my dear.”
She wasn’t wrong. We pulled up at a tiny house with a chain-link fence and sturdy gate. A Doberman was running around the yard, sniffing at car parts that lay scattered around like innocuous lawn ornaments.
The dog started barking as we approached the gate and both Graham and I paused, neither of us keen to go any further. We waited for a while, hoping someone would come out and see what the dog was barking at, but nothing happened.
We inched forward, and the dog only increased his volume. A neighbour emerged, clad in filthy white boxers, his hairy belly a massive straining water balloon.
“What’s your problem?” he shouted, and Graham pointed to the house.
“We want to talk to whoever lives in there,” she yelled back, and he looked at her for a moment and didn’t say anything. None of us moved.
I studied a child’s bicycle that was leaning up against the fence. It was fuchsia with shiny pink and purple cheerleader ribbons on the handlebars. It was missing the seat and the front wheel.
The man lumbered down the path and hitched up his shorts. He brushed in-between Graham and myself, and opened the gate. We stepped back, expecting the dog to rush out, but it cowered and crawled away, skittering to the house.
“More like a kitten than a killer, that one,” the man grumbled, and he ushered us into the garden and closed the gate.
“You’ve got visitors,” the man shouted. “Open the door.”
“What? Who?” We heard the letterbox open slightly. “Who are they?”
“Don’t be so paranoid, Nancy, open the door. They’re some yobbos from Sydney, rich folk.”
“I’m not rich,” Graham said indignantly, but we both knew that compared to these lives, we were millionaires.
“We just want to talk to you about Nancy Simms,” Graham shouted, and there was silence. Even the dog stopped barking.
“Auntie Nan? Why?”
“We just want to talk, that’s all.”
“Offer to buy her dog food,” the man whispered helpfully.
“We’ll buy you dog food,” Graham shouted.
“Two bags?”
“Two bags.”
There was a pause before a series of locks started clicking and the door opened. A tiny wom
an, no more than four-foot-two, skinny like a child and wizened like an ancient elf, stood there in a yellow floral print dress with a wine-coloured apron on top.
“Come inside, Mite,” she said, and the dog slinked past her. “Vegemite’s her name,” she told us. “On account of how she loves it on toast. You want some tea?”
We turned to thank the man, but he had already left and was closing the gate behind him. He didn’t look our way.
“I’m Nancy too,” she said. “Named for my Aunt. Not that I was happy about that when I realized what an evil woman she was. Let’s go and sit in the kitchen.”
We followed her through a hallway that was maybe two feet wide. It was as dark as a cave, with a low ceiling. We emerged into the kitchen—at least, we realized it was the kitchen when Nancy flipped the light switch on. If there were windows, they were covered with yellow-and-maroon striped wallpaper that was adorned with enormous tiger lilies. Nancy closed the door behind us, and I saw that wallpaper even covered the door. It was like being trapped in a surreal cage of giant flowers, and I couldn’t breathe.
I sat down at a child-sized table in the centre of the room. My butt spilled over the chair, and I worried I might break the thing.
Nancy put the kettle on and popped two slices of bread into the toaster. She poured some water for Mite who guzzled it. “Strange you wanting to talk about Auntie Nan,” she said conversationally, pulling down a Brown Betty teapot. “I’ve been having visits from her lately.”
“I thought she was dead,” Graham said, struggling with her chair. She gave me a look and I nodded. Whatever we had been expecting, it wasn’t this.
“She is, yup. But she comes and moves the pictures around when she’s in a mood. And the furniture too. This used to be her house. Although I did all the redecorating. She didn’t like my flowers, I’ll tell you that. When she lived here, everything was white. There was hardly colour at all. Except for the curtains. They were navy blue. And the carpet was grey. Those were her colours. Nurses’ colours, she said. Her bedspread was navy and so were her towels. The sofa was grey, the carpet was grey, the throw rug was navy. And she never would have let an animal in here. She was not happy when I got Mite, or the ones that came before Mite. But she died and left the house to me, and if she thought I was going to live in a navy-and-gray house, she had another thing coming.”
The Occult Persuasion and the Anarchist's Solution Page 17
