Inconsolable

by Ainslie Paton

  He didn’t want her understanding. He didn’t want her consideration. She could fuck right off with her thoughtfulness and take that hot flicker flame of lust that ignited in his chest with her.

  He had no use for it. No use for her.

  The flatmate had it right. If he hadn’t heard the disbelief in her voice, he saw it in her eyes. He was trouble one way or another and Foley had more sense than get tangled up with him any further than her job demanded.

  A horn beep made him check his motion. He stood in the gutter and clocked the annoyed expression on the face of the driver who’d feared he’d step out. He almost had. He waved the car on, then darted across the road without waiting for the light change.

  He should’ve fed Foley’s wallet to the fish. He should’ve waited for Monday and dropped it at the council offices. He could’ve delivered it to the cops. He should’ve done anything but open it up to look for her address and, knowing the street shown on her driver’s licence, decide to walk there.

  Once he got to her red brick unit block he could’ve stuffed her wallet in her mailbox or slipped the cash and cards under her door and left the purse on her doorstep or with a neighbour. But he’d knocked and she’d answered and asked him inside and fuck, fuck, fuck, he’d nearly forgotten himself and gone with her. And it wasn’t the idea of a glass of water that’d tempted him.

  It was the feeling she was genuinely pleased to see him. Oh, sure she was shocked, she’d expected someone else entirely—the flatmate, probably, because it wasn’t like she was dressed to go out. She was dressed for lazing in front of the TV watching a movie, for sharing popcorn with someone she knew well and didn’t need to impress.

  For all of sixty seconds he’d wanted to be that someone.

  He wanted to be that someone now.

  When she came out with the offer to drive him home, the invitation to eat together, he had no option but to be rude about it because mentally he was already on her couch, his legs tangled with hers, her head on his shoulder like it’d been last night.

  He should never have touched her last night. Letting her fall asleep was a foul piece of business. She should’ve been home in her own bed. He should’ve bundled her off, made sure she knew not to come back in a hurry. But one look at her sleep-slackened body and her heavy eyelids and he’d had a whole other rationalisation.

  She was safer staying than driving home tired. Safer with him.

  So he’d let her drift off, and he’d sat close, taken her weight on his shoulder and his side and held a kind of vigil over her, watching the day break with sunshine in his arms. That screwed just about every rule there was, scrubbed out all the hard lines and left him with logic so fuzzy he’d thought showing up at her home was a reasonable thing to do.

  It was more unreasonable than living in a cave.

  So getting in her car, eating together, that was preposterous.

  He had to stop and catch his breath, choose a side of the street to climb; the side with the stairs and the handrail, which most people who had no option but take this hill chose, or the opposite side where the pavement ramped at extreme angles.

  No choice. They didn’t call it heartbreak hill for nothing.

  Exhaustion was one way of pushing Foley out of his head. The feel of her body, its weight against his, the way her breath swelled her chest and her lips parted as she relaxed into sleep, her head on his shoulder, her hand resting against his thigh.

  That was all far too intimate, a feeling he could easily start to crave; better to scald the memory of it out of his muscles than make another mistake, inserting himself into her life outside work like he’d just done.

  If she wasn’t so genuine, if she wasn’t so down to earth and open and sparkling with humour and life, it’d be easier to write her off as a professional pain in the neck. He could bark at her like an attack dog, bare his teeth and send her on her way without a qualm. That’s what he’d planned on doing. Playing the unstable caveman part, she’d hardly be surprised. If he made it difficult enough for her she’d give up on him. She wasn’t stupid.

  But Foley wasn’t so easy to get rid of either, especially when she looked at him like she’d done after the shock of seeing him at her door sloughed off.

  She looked at him like she was delighted to see him and not just her wallet. And yet he was tattered and torn, tanned and weathered and scruffy. But she wasn’t put off. She didn’t flinch. She blushed.

  And damn his soul if he’d hadn’t liked that, liked the way she lit up when she saw him. It’d made him think a ride home, a stop to eat, wasn’t the worst idea, before reality arrived in the form of the flatmate.

  His calves cramped, his legs burned and his lungs squeezed. He was halfway up and no closer to getting Foley out of his head. No closer to understanding why he was so affected by her. There’d been a lot of women before her, but none of them had managed to call his bluff quite like she did.

  His nostrils flared and he breathed deep. He turned to look back at where he’d come from, the suburb spread out behind him, the storm building above him. If you were scared of heights, looking down from here might trip your fear sensor.

  Foley certainly tripped his.

  There was lightning in the distance. At some point before he got home he was going to end up very wet. Better that than the range of humiliations he’d almost opened himself up to.

  He was falling for Foley, for her confidence and determination, for her pluck and her honesty. She was shelter for his storm and he didn’t deserve that kind of peace. It scared the hell out of him.

  9: New Deal

  Drum wasn’t anywhere she could see on the street. Foley got in her car and took off, not entirely sure which way he’d go, but given how overcast the sky was, assuming he’d take the most direct route, which meant heartbreak hill. Straight up, so steep there were stairs on one side, two codes of football used it for pre-season training and her car hated it, even in low gear.

  That’s where she found him, his powerful stride eating the sloped pavement as if it were fairy floss, his calf muscles bunched, arms swinging easily. The back of his shirt was wet, stuck to his skin, but he was almost at the top. She pulled up alongside him and lowered the passenger side window. He didn’t break stride. There were a couple of parked cars, so she pulled back out and around them, her engine roaring, and pulled up in front of him.

  When he drew level she called his name. He flicked an annoyed quick glance at her and kept walking. She kept pace with him. “It’s going to rain. You’ll get drenched.”

  He turned his head. “I’ll dry.”

  She accelerated and parked ahead of him, but when he didn’t show up, she checked her mirror. He’d stopped. He was standing a car length back, his head tipped up to look at the sky. He might cross the road to get away from her. That’s when she figured he really did want to be left alone. She was doing to him what she’d stopped Nat doing—harassing him. She sighed and watched him, as the first drops of rain hit the back windscreen. If he crossed, she’d drive on.

  He lowered his head, appeared to fix on the car and walked forward. She couldn’t stop the smile that filled her face, and when he got in she was practically vibrating silly with it. They stared at each other while the rain came down and for once he didn’t look away first. She did.

  “It’s pouring,” he said.

  She turned to face him again. Was he being funny, or was that his justification for getting in the car? He’d spoken first as well. She didn’t know what to make of that on top of what was the longest eye contact they’d ever held. His raisin toast scent was on speed, mixed with his sweat and the green metal smell of the storm, it filled the cabin of her old Mazda. It made her feel happy.

  There were raindrops in his hair. “You’d have been very wet.”

  “I’ve been wet before.”

  “I’m the same that way.”

  He smiled. Not as ridiculously broadly as she was doing, but it was a recognisable uptick of lips, a tightening of the
skin around his eyes as brief as it was transforming, as it was heating. If he did anything like that again she’d steam up the windscreen beyond what the air-conditioning could handle. Why did he have to be so this? Why couldn’t he be older, crustier, toothless, smell like cat piss and food gone bad?

  “I feel like a burger from Fat Barney’s,” she said.

  He turned his face to look out the front of the car. Whatever had been going on between them there, that moment of understanding, of mutual enjoyment, was over. Thank goodness. She reached forward and turned the aircon up. The rain was making it more humid, making her face feel hot. Barney’s was casual, people showed up still wet from a swim wearing towels around their hips. He wouldn’t be out of place there and neither would she in her tatty shorts.

  “Barney is the dog.”

  She looked across at him as he reached for his seatbelt.

  “The chef’s name is Paul. Barney is a lazy old beagle. I sometimes wash dishes there. I like their burgers.” He clicked the belt in place and his eyes came up to hers, and they were connected again. His skin was that golden brown cliché made real, and his eyes were so light, paler crinkles in their corners from squinting in the sun because he didn’t own sunglasses. “I could go a burger.”

  Oh God. Why wasn’t he a more obviously fucked up homeless guy? It made no sense but she could so go him.

  “Okay, let’s get a burger.”

  “Dutch.”

  It mattered to him, not being her charity case. “If you let me get coffee and dessert. I’d be lost without my wallet, truly.”

  He inclined his head and she took that for agreement, flicking the blinker on and pulling out.

  The rain lifted, the storm was blowing out to sea, and by the time she’d parked near Fat Barney’s clear skies poked through cloud, the first stars showing. Drum trailed behind her on the walk to the restaurant. She had half an idea she’d turn around to look for him and he’d have disappeared. She guessed he was worried she’d be embarrassed to be seen with him.

  The restaurant had outdoor tables where the more casually dressed people tended to sit, people who’d come off the beach and still had sand between their toes and salty hair. Drum wouldn’t look out of place at one of those tables.

  Foley turned to suggest it to him with a wave of her hand.

  He shook his head, but caught up, overtaking her. “I know a better place.”

  Now she was tagging behind him as he entered the restaurant through a back door. She followed him up a set of steps and found herself in the clattering heat of the noisy kitchen. Drum was talking to a bloke in chef’s whites. And he was smiling, engaged, using his hands to gesture. It was like looking at his doppelganger. If you put aside the ripped shirt, the ragbag shorts and shoes, the man she was watching might’ve been normal, better than normal, might’ve been the most interesting date she’d ever been on.

  But this was not a date and Drum was not normal. It wasn’t normal to want to live without plumbing, heating, walls.

  Burgers were being plated, the food smelled delicious and her stomach grumbled. She felt stupid standing there. She was in the way, a foreign presence in a hectic workplace, collecting sideways glances, and Drum was so into his conversation, he might’ve forgotten about her. But across the servery, over the heads of two crazy busy kitchen-hands, he caught her eye. And he might as well have kissed her, she felt him all the way to the rough crust of skin on her heels.

  He beckoned and she stumbled forward, in a daze of confusion, a waiter glaring at her as he stopped to let her pass. She was supposed to be the one in charge here. Impassive, professional. She wasn’t supposed to feel anything particular when the homeless man looked at her.

  She followed Drum again. More stairs. These leading out onto a rooftop deck strung with fairy lights and with a view of the beachfront. There was an outdoor setting and a made to order sky-pinked sunset that would reverse the process she’d watched this morning.

  “Oh.” She went to the balcony rail, the last of the sun was at her back and the suburb was at her feet. She was supposed to be treating Drum for his kindness and he was surprising her with his.

  He stood behind her. “This is where the staff eat. Paul said it was okay for me to bring you here.”

  “It’s wonderful.”

  “Your council won’t let him serve customers up here.”

  “Ah.” She laughed. “That probably has to do with fire regulations. Not my department.”

  “I ordered for us.”

  She turned to face him. He lowered his eyes. He’d been watching her. “You’re full of surprises.”

  “I don’t need you to look out for me.”

  She frowned. She wanted to grab hold of his big arms and shake him, shout at him. What was he doing living in a stupid cave? He clearly had skills, talents even. He could make a living wage, pay rent like everyone else, get his groceries at the supermarket and have enough change to catch busses. He could own more than two shirts, shoes without the toes torn through and the soles blown out. He could be somebody’s employee, somebody’s friend. Somebody’s lover.

  “I can’t work you out, Drum.”

  He went to the table and pulled out a chair, holding onto its back. He wiped water off the seat with his palm. He stood there looking at the chair until she realised he was pulling it out for her. She was pretty sure no man had ever done that for her and it was oddly hard to swallow. She went to the front of the chair and he moved it so it touched the back of her knees. She sat and her, “Thank you,” hit the air all crackly and unsteady, as if she’d fallen in a hole instead of planted her butt on a damp chair.

  He moved around to the other side of the table and lit an old candle. “Our food will be ready.” He left her and went to the kitchen.

  She scrubbed her hands over her face. He was killing her: this derelict with manners, this tough guy who spoke softly, refused to be classified easily as a mentally ill person or substance addict and didn’t care if he was understood or not.

  She’d composed herself by the time he came back with two burgers, a big serve of thick cut potato chips to share and two bottles of water. He put the tray down and distributed the food, putting a burger and a water bottle in front of her.

  She picked up a chip. “I wish I knew your full name.”

  He sat, screwed the top off his water bottle. “What difference would it make?”

  “I could thank you more personally for surprising me with this.”

  His eyes were down on his plate. “It’s not important.” He picked up his burger and ate. She did the same as the sky changed colour.

  “Sunrise and sunset.” She shook her head, such an unexpected day. He sat on silently, taking an occasional chip from their shared bowl. “We should be able to talk like normal people having a meal together.”

  “We’re not normal people.”

  She laughed. “Speak for yourself.” Then nearly gagged. “Oh my God, Drum. I’m sorry.” How was it that he could wrong-foot her so easily?

  He took his last mouthful of burger then wiped his mouth with a napkin. “You don’t need to care about me. That’s not normal.”

  In every passing exchange he was proving this point. She should go, pay for their meal before she foolishly tried to make more of this night than it was. She played with the blue plastic bottle top. “Thank you for letting me see your sunrise, for letting me sleep.”

  “You were tired.”

  “Have you slept at all?”

  “No.”

  “What will you use as a bed?”

  “I’ll manage.”

  She looked up expecting to see his face in profile or his eyes turned down. He was looking right at her. He was doing this more often now but it was still a shock to see him focused on her.

  “You understand why I’m worried about you?”

  “It’s your job.”

  “Yes, that and after what happened to your stuff. I’m very uncomfortable about you going back to the cave, tonight
or any night.”

  “Which is also your job.”

  She wasn’t going to win anything here. She couldn’t even get more of a name out of him.

  “They won’t come back. I’ll be safe.”

  “Hold on. That sounds like you know who did this?”

  He gave a brisk nod. “Not for sure, but I have a fair idea. They’ve had their fun.”

  “We can report them to the police, you know.”

  He shook his head, “I don’t want that kind of trouble.”

  “But it’s as much theft and destruction of property as it would be if they broke into a house.” She wasn’t entirely sure of the legal point of distinction there, it likely wasn’t that simple, but her bet was neither was Drum, and she was correct at least in principle.

  She smelt the rain before she felt it, hot tar and cooling engines, interrupting their conversation. Drum moved to gather their rubbish and dispose of it. She followed him down the stairs, through the kitchen and out onto the street.

  “Wait, I haven’t paid.” She fumbled for her wallet. She’d have to go back inside the restaurant.

  “It’s taken care of.”

  “What, you paid for me? No, no, no.”

  “We’re getting wet.”

  “We’ll dry.” His line, her turn with it.

  “You can buy coffee,” he said, and walked off.

  She was forced to jog to catch up to him. He took her to the takeaway window of a coffee bar, and he did let her pay, explaining that he’d do some odd jobs for Paul to earn the meal. When their coffees were ready, he led her to one of the covered picnic table pavilions fronting the beach. From where they sat you could see the part of coastline where his cave was. It was a craggy, dark shadow, gothic fairy story forbidding.

  They’d avoided getting too wet, most of the distance travelled being under shop awnings, except for the last dash to the picnic table. Had the weather been better, all of these tiny bright-coloured pavilions would’ve been taken by families, by couples eating their takeaway meals and picnic dinners, as they watched the beach and shooed scavenging gulls away.