Loner

by Georgina Young

  IKEA makes her resent her parents for never buying her an elevated bed with a built-in alcove study desk. IKEA makes her resent herself for living in a house that has a plastic crate instead of a television stand. IKEA compels her to buy useless crap just so she feels justified in having spent three hours attempting to navigate the shortcuts and having infuriatingly ended up back where they started.

  Cassidy is enthralled. Nick says, ‘I apologise for my psycho little sis,’ but in this really loving older brother way that Lona can see makes Tab’s ovaries ache, whether Tab wants them to or not. Tab and Nick peruse stacks of decorative hourglasses with some part of their bodies always attached. They buy wine tumblers and ice trays with moulds shaped like little boats. Cassidy jumps on every bed they pass.

  Lona eventually finds what she came for: a folding room divider. It’s plastic made to look like wood which is made to look like it has cherry blossoms on it. It is kitsch beyond belief. It is most likely culturally inappropriate. Lona says, ‘This is the one.’

  New thingo

  ‘You’ve got a new thingo,’ George says, nodding at the room divider. Lona wipes her eyes with the back of her hand and nods. Her eyes are blurry with tears. She is dicing onions. ‘You need some help there?’ he asks.

  ‘No, no, all good,’ she says, brushing the onions into the saucepan. Her eyes continue to stream. She can’t help taking this as a bad sign.

  She’s nervous. George doesn’t know why, because George doesn’t know that a decision has been made. George doesn’t know that the new thingo is a symbol, that it is a metaphorical, as well as literal, structure.

  The sheet pegged to a piece of string is gone. Her single bed and her books, now neatly stacked in a bookshelf, are completely out of view. The room divider is tacky and wonderful. Lona is making minestrone soup.

  Sim and Rach careen in and out of the living room looking for their phones and their keys and their lip-gloss. They are getting ready. They have been getting ready since four in the afternoon. Sim is curling her straight hair and Rach is straightening her curly hair. Faces are done and outfits are swapped twice.

  ‘Lona, can I borrow your denim jacket?’ Sim asks. Lona says ok, yes, but it’s Rach who ends up wearing it over her printed jumpsuit.

  The soup’s just started to boil by the time they finally leave for their party. ‘You guys should totally come,’ Sim offers half-heartedly, knowing there’s no way she’s dragging Lona off the couch on a Saturday night.

  ‘Another time,’ Lona says.

  George has the news on. It’s just them, alone in the house, and she’s cooking soup and he’s watching the seven o’clock news. George asks, ‘What’s so funny?’ because she’s bent over laughing.

  They eat on the couch and watch the last ten minutes of Spider Man 3 on Channel 7 and then the last ten minutes of The Incredible Hulk on Go!. Lona’s bowl is a fifty/ fifty split of soup and parmesan cheese. George brings up Netflix and starts the mind- and soul-destroying process that is: deciding what to watch. Lona puts down her empty bowl and takes the remote from him. He says, ‘I swear, if you make me watch The Social Network one more time…’

  She shuts him up in the most efficient way possible, covering his mouth with her own. ‘The Social Network is a seminal modern classic,’ she says, and then she kisses him again, harder and more insistent.

  There is a point in the running of a tongue around inside another person’s mouth that it goes from being the main act to the support artist. There is the being horizontal with her on him and the little moan he makes when she presses her lips to the base of his jaw. There is the hot feeling between her legs and the pressure at the front of his jeans.

  She slides a hand down and she finds him, finds a way to make his breath catch. She is surprised by how powerful she is, how powerless. The difference just a matter of him touching her touching him touching. His fingers slip inside her underwear and she freezes momentarily, pulls away from him and the screaming famine of it.

  He exhales, mistakes her, whispers, ‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ But this is not a question Lona wants to be asked. She wants to be reckless with her surety.

  ‘Yes,’ she says.

  In the after

  There is hurt in it, and an almost excruciating closeness. In the after there is bleeding and holding. His thumb brushes over her forehead. ‘How do you feel?’ he asks.

  This is too enormous a question. She kisses his bottom lip and leans her head against his chest.

  ‘Overwhelmingly,’ she whispers, the word just breath on his skin.

  West Footscray

  George walks Lona back to West Footscray station. She is squeezing her hands into fists and freaking out. ‘Oh, Jesus, I called your mother Mrs Qiu. I’ve never called anyone Mrs Anything in my entire life.’

  ‘What about at school?’ George points out reasonably.

  Lona is not capable of processing reason at this point in time. Lona has just met George’s parents for the first time and it did not go well.

  ‘You were fine,’ George says. They bump shoulders and arms as they walk. It’s almost nine. George didn’t want her walking to the station on her own.

  ‘They think I’m a deadbeat,’ she whines.

  ‘You are a deadbeat,’ George reminds her. He stops her so he can kiss the side of her face and she feels prickly all over, an echidna rolling into a ball. She shrugs him off and keeps going.

  ‘I’m going to go back to uni eventually,’ she says.

  George takes her hand. ‘You know I’m joking.’

  Her hand is hot and twitchy in his. ‘Me too.’

  Lona hasn’t been to George’s side of town before. She doesn’t cross the West Gate much because there’s no real point. Up until now she’s always thought there was nothing over that way except Sovereign Hill and probably Adelaide eventually. She rarely leaves the south east because there’s rarely a reason to.

  They get to the station but the train doesn’t arrive for twenty-three minutes. George sits with her. ‘You look so much like your brother,’ she tells him.

  ‘I hate when people say that.’

  ‘Why?’

  The wind has picked up and it’s cool. The skin of George’s bare arms is beginning to goosebump. Lona asks him, ‘You want my jacket?’

  He gives her a look like he does when she says things that have no place in her mouth. He says, ‘Nah, all good.’ It’s unfair because she wants to feel cold and feel good and strong about that while the one she cares about is warm. It’s unfair she’s not allowed.

  Her train pulls in and they kiss quickly, perfunctorily. He waves from the platform like they’re wartime sweethearts. It’s dark by the time she gets back into the city. She runs for the Westall train with her finger jammed inside her book.

  Recital

  George has a recital on Wednesday night. Lona and Tab sit right up the back of the recital hall, a crisp cardboard programme unfolded on each of their laps. They have made it through Brass Section and Soprano Soloist and the Piano Wunderkind. Lona is counting them off. Five more until George’s performance. Eight more until the concert ends.

  She is wearing a nice dress. Black corduroy with pink roses all over it. It is, admittedly, more of a pinafore than a dress. She is, admittedly, wearing a t-shirt with Nicolas Cage’s ‘Not The Bees!’ face on it underneath. Perhaps not exactly the definition of smart casual. Tab has her hair swept up in a patterned scarf for the occasion. She is nodding slowly with her eyes half-closed as if to express how deeply she is engaging with the music.

  George appears on stage hefting his cello. It’s just him and an accompanist on the grand piano. There’s this big swell of silence before it starts and Lona feels an unexpected pinch in her gut. She wants this to go well for him, almost like it’s her up there.

  There’s the first slice of a note. A few moments later there is another. His bow screeches across the strings. Then just as suddenly he is riffing back and forth, building up a storm of sound
. The audience is taken aback. They look down at their programmes and confirm that what they are hearing is correct. ‘Back in Black’ composed by B. Johnson, A. Young and M. Young. Lona can’t tell from this far back, but she doesn’t think that George is smiling. He is concentrating hard, and this is music, the same as the Bach and the Handel.

  Tab elbows Lona. ‘He’s incredible, Lone.’

  She feels that swirling, giddy pride again. The crowd is murmuring. They like it, even if they won’t let themselves. George strikes the strings so violently Lona is convinced one will snap. It builds up and up as the song reaches its crescendo. Each squeal grips Lona’s insides. Because he’s so good. He’s just so, so good.

  The foyer

  They wait around the foyer afterwards. George’s parents spot Lona and they come over.

  ‘George was very good tonight,’ Mrs Qiu says.

  ‘Yes, very good,’ Lona echoes.

  Mr Qiu shakes his head. ‘I don’t know why he plays that shouting music.’ He can’t stop himself from beaming though. ‘He is a stubborn boy.’

  ‘He is,’ Lona says.

  The Qius look at the bunch of flowers Lona has in her hands. Pink, yellow and orange ranunculus, sagging and bruised from being kicked under her seat. ‘For George,’ she says, her voice coming out strangled.

  ‘Speak of the devil,’ Tab says, and there the devil is, looking glorious in a white shirt and a thin black tie. He grins bashfully at all of them as he approaches.

  His mother hugs him around the waist. He’s about two feet taller than her. He looks embarrassed and pleased and his eyes catch Lona’s over his mother’s head. She smiles, suddenly so shy it’s like this is the first time they’ve met. She holds the flowers out like a baton in front of her, arm straight and static. ‘Good show,’ she says.

  He takes them, looks at them like a man will look at flowers, like: what do I do with these? Gives them a sniff even though they only smell like chemicals. ‘Thanks,’ he says.

  George’s parents want to take him out for dinner and they invite the girls along. ‘It’s ok,’ Lona says. ‘We were just going to head home.’

  This is the wrong thing to say and George looks hurt. He wants her to want to hang out with his parents, but she doesn’t want to hang out with anyone. George and Tab being the exceptions, and even then, not together. Tab gives her a slight nudge with her elbow. Tab is chummy with Nick’s parents. She calls them Roz and Trent and they call her Sweetpea. They call everyone Sweetpea according to Nick, and according to Nick it is horrendously mortifying.

  The Qius share a bemused glance. Lona grimaces at everyone’s shoes. Tab says the it was lovely meeting yous and the hope you have a good evenings. She does such a good job, the Qius end up apologising to her for their not being able to make dinner. The conventions of polite discourse are restored.

  George kisses Lona’s cheek, keeping it G-rated for the parents. Tab gets a cheek kiss too so Lona feels like she’s part of a harem. She holds the flowers for George while he goes and gets his cello. He forgets them when he leaves and she is left standing with them clutched in her hand.

  Tab hooks an arm through her elbow. ‘Lone, you know you should’ve—’

  ‘I know,’ Lona says.

  Tab squeezes her wrist. ‘Let’s get some Macca’s, hey?’

  Birthday drinks

  Tab organises birthday drinks for Lona. She invites all their mutual friends, possibly assuming Lona’s friendship circle does not extend beyond hers. This is not unfair. It is debatable whether Lona’s friendship circle extends beyond Tab herself.

  Lona allows herself to be dragged out. She knows what’s going on. She enjoys the charade of feigning irritation. She enjoys the effort to get her out that indicates: someone cares.

  George and Nick are there when they get to the bar. Nick and Tab busy themselves with the first round. George kisses her, tasting like rum and cola, and presses a box into her hand. It’s a jewellery case. There’s a small drop in her belly, an: I thought you knew me better than that.

  ‘Open it,’ he says.

  She does and there’s a small card inside. In fast-scrawled handwriting it says: you could at least TRY to look pleased.

  She looks up at him, bewildered. He says, ‘Please don’t ever play poker,’ and he reaches for the table behind him and hands her a parcel. She knows before she opens it that it’s the collector’s edition of Six of Crows. She’s picked it up in bookshops so many times she knows its exact dimensions and the feel of it in her hands.

  ‘You…’

  ‘Are the best, I know,’ he grins.

  ‘It’s not that I don’t like jewellery…’ she starts.

  ‘It’s just you only like it when it’s something your mother has dug out of her things from the ’80s, or when Tab gives you a set of hairclips shaped like cupcakes which are ridiculous but not wearing them would be even more ridiculous.’ He shrugs. ‘I know.’

  She stares at him. She’s never said those things. But he knows. He’s noticed.

  ‘George,’ she says.

  ‘Lona,’ he says.

  Nick comes over with a handful of tequila shots. Tab brings the lemon wedges and the salt. ‘Happy birthday to our favourite loner,’ Nick says. They chink their glasses and then lick the salt, drink the petrol and bite down on the lemon. Lona hasn’t eaten since lunch. The forecast is: a somewhat messy night.

  Around 9.30 p.m.

  People from school and uni and nowhere in particular show up. They stand around booths until the people in them leave. Lona is pink-cheeked and loquacious. She says things that make people laugh.

  Sampson arrives around 9.30 p.m. He buys Lona a pot of cider and wishes her a happy birthday. ‘No longer a teenage dirtbag,’ she says wistfully.

  ‘Now just a regular dirtbag,’ he comforts her.

  He has done something different with his hair. It’s longer and scruffier. Throw a grey hoodie on him and he’d look like the socially inept founder of a successful social media platform.

  They sit out in the beer garden and talk about television shows. Sampson makes her laugh when he’s being serious. There’s still a part of her that wants to kiss him and touch him the way she touches George, make him shiver the way she makes George shiver. She’s never been in a relationship before so she doesn’t know if this is normal. She’s spent all her life wanting whoever was near enough to want, and here Sampson is, leg pressed against hers on the bench seat.

  Every time she leans back or forward, he does too, like he’s mirroring her.

  ‘Lona,’ he says. ‘I’ve…’

  George sits down opposite with Nick. Lona makes the appropriate introductions: nerd from uni meet boyfriend and boyfriend of friend.

  ‘Or just friend,’ Nick smiles, extending a hand for Sampson to shake.

  The men talk about the things men always talk about:

  a) The Simpsons

  b) men throwing and kicking around balls

  c) what beer they are drinking

  Tab slides in beside Lona and says, ‘Thought you could escape your own party, did you?’ Tab never got the memo about invading people’s personal space. She is always just this side of: go away please. She rests an elbow on Lona’s shoulder and assures her that her twenties are going to be the best years of her life if single-camera sitcoms set in Manhattan are anything to go by.

  Sampson no longer has his leg pressed against Lona’s and she misses it. George is eyeing her across the table. She asks, ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Too early to leave,’ Tab says, reading her mind.

  They stay out until one-something in the morning. They dance to butchered mash-ups of songs they used to like. George pogoes up and down until Lona grabs his flailing arms and puts them around her waist so that they can sway together to music that’s too fast for swaying but it doesn’t matter because she’s never felt as good, as wanted, as his hands on that strip of hot, bare midriff can make her feel. They make out a bit like they’re kids who’ve just
met at a nightclub. Lona says, ‘Take me home.’

  She nearly falls asleep in the taxi. Tab is in the front seat and she’s conned the driver into letting her use his AUX cord. Nick begs for anything other than Fleetwood Mac. Their Sri Lankan driver knows all the words to ‘Rhiannon’. George sings and he’s got this muddy amethyst of a voice and when he gets Lona into bed and pulls off her shoes and lies down and holds her, she tells him: I wish they’d played The Greatest Band Humanly Possible.

  She means: I am so in love with you.

  Running with the bulls

  Pat and Bill have the Wallaces around for a barbeque lunch. Shrimps are not thrown on the barbie, but sausages and rissoles are. Bill cooks them until they’re crusted black and indistinguishable from one another.

  Jodie has been accepted for a study abroad program in Nice. She models the jacket and the jeans she’s bought to take with her, the same way she and Lona used to when they’d get new polar fleece jumpers for school camp. Mum and Dad have a lot of questions for Jodie about what she’s doing and where she’s going. She tells them that she’s planning on doing a Masters in Marie Antoinette Letting Them Eat Cake once she finishes her degree and they are impressed. Lona reserves her enthusiasm for the skerrick of edible meat she manages to extract from the centre of her rissole.

  No one asks what Lona is doing or planning on doing because it is widely accepted she is having some sort of prolonged mental lapse, and it is deemed impolite to bring it up in company. She is partly relieved about this, and partly peeved.

  Jodie explains that she will be staying on in Europe for an extra couple of weeks after the program ends. She has booked herself onto a fifteen-countries-in-five-drunk-days bus tour. ‘I just want to see more of the world,’ she says.