by Bryce Taylor
He laughs genuinely for the first time and remarks shyly that he would love a Hawaiian pizza more than anything he can ever remember wanting in his entire life. He tells me how he ended up here, nothing extraordinary, a violent father, a mother who preferred drinking over facing reality. His own naivety at believing he would be able to take care of all the necessities of life with hard work.
Of course, the main problem being homeless is that no one wants to hire you and without a job you can't change much about your life.
He tells me that he wanted to be a carpenter when he was a kid but I'm not listening because I've spotted Leigh standing across the road.
She is appropriately dressed for the weather in wellies and a navy all-weather jacket, in the fashion of an English landowner taking a turnabout the fields in the drizzle, screaming of money. I've never asked her about her childhood but I can imagine that isn't far off the mark, in my head her family being equal parts posh and taciturn around the fire in the drawing room of the manor house.
I'm debating whether to call out to her or not when she spots me, her face changing from seriously thoughtful to a broad smile in an instant. Then she sees that I'm with someone else and her face instantly falls back into reserved disinterest, a mask dropping back into place.
I wave her over and she reluctantly crosses the road.
"Hi," I say to her, smiling at her in the way that I have only ever previously smiled at someone I'm in a relationship with.
I wonder if she can tell.
"Hey," she says wryly, neatly putting down her umbrella, "nice night?"
She looks from me to him, including him in her greeting and I realise that I don't even know his name, a fact that Leigh immediately realises as she takes in his dishevelled appearance, understanding that I have taken apparently taken an unnamed homeless guy out to dinner.
"Leigh," she says smoothly, reaching out to shake his hand.
"Oh, uh, I'm Jason, uh, Jase," he says, it clearly been a while since he has said his name out loud.
Leigh is staring at me strangely, not in the kind of way that Warren would look at me in this situation, that I am being an idiot and unworldly, more that I am so far away from her world view that she barely even knows who I am.
"Do you want to join us?" I ask her, fervently hoping she will say yes because even though she isn’t acting as if I have done the wrong thing, suddenly in my bones I feel that I might of.
That I don’t trust my own judgment anymore and I want some reassurance from someone who is sound of mind.
Leigh looks unsure, her eyes narrowed at me as if she is trying to work out what I might want her to do.
"Jase was just telling me that he wants to be a carpenter," I tell her, gesturing at a spare seat, hoping she will just sit down and take it.
"Oh," Leigh says, looking across at Jason and folding herself into the chair, "why is that?"
Jason suddenly seems nervous, Leigh looking so ridiculously wealthy, from her jeans and watch, to her hair. Even her plain white t-shirt just has that look to it that says it was sold on an expensive wooden hanger at a shop that only sells five different items of clothing and has one salesperson for each of them.
"I guess," he says eventually, pulling at his pizza slice with his fingers, "that I want to do something practical and a trade, well, you know, everyone always needs something like that done."
She is nodding in agreement.
"Ever thought of being an electrician?" she asks casually and somewhat oddly.
Jason laughs a little.
"These days I’d do anything at all," he says after a moment, "being an electrician would be amazing."
Leigh nods thoughtfully, whilst both Jason stare at her a little sideways because of her off key question.
"Would you excuse me for a moment?" she asks us both politely, waiting for an answer before we both nod, bemused at her manners.
We both watch as she stands outside the shop talking on her phone for a few minutes, the two of us eating our pizzas in silence.
She returns and sits back down, I slide my pizza across to her, wordlessly offering her a slice.
After a moment she reluctantly takes a slice and politely has a small bite before placing it on a napkin.
We talk for a few minutes of this and that, Leigh somehow able to extract from him a love of football and he talks animatedly of his team and the last few games.
We are interrupted when a burly older guy comes over to our table, he looks as if he might be the owner, he was certainly ordering around the staff earlier as if he was.
"Leigh," he says smiling at her broadly, "it’s so nice to see you, can I get you anything, pizza, pasta?"
He turns to Jason and I before she can respond.
"You should have said Leigh was in your party," he tells us in an injured tone. Then immediately turns back to Leigh, waiting for her answer.
"No, thank you, Rafe," she says smiling, "this slice is really good though."
He frowns at her, seeing the almost untouched slice of pizza in front of her.
"You never eat anything," he says, sounding worried.
This is true, the only things I see Leigh eat are the plainest of foods, an apple, a grilled chicken salad, toast with butter, very occasionally with vegemite.
She frowns at him. "Perhaps I could have a mineral water," she says, a transparent ploy to get him to go away.
He glares at her before throwing up his hands in the air and turns on his heel, unwilling to argue with her.
I stare at her.
"His son was in a motorcycle accident," she tells us in explanation.
Ah.
"Leigh is a surgeon," I tell Jason, since this explanation isn’t enough for him to go on.
Jason’s eyes widen and he looks impressed.
"Ah, here we are," Leigh says in tones of recognition looking down the street, "another man with a son who has been in a motorcycle accident. What I’d do for spare time without motor vehicle related accidents, I don’t know?"
She is standing and walking towards a man who is striding up the footpath a wide smile on his face.
She holds a hand out to him but he ignores it, grabbing her in a bear hug and I wince internally, imagining Leigh’s horror at being hugged like that, her doing a good enough job of hiding her discomfort but I can see from the way she is holding herself that she would prefer that he take at least two or three steps back.
They talk for a few moments on the footpath before she gestures towards our table and I instantly understand her electrician question.
"Jason, I’m Gary," he says heartily, approaching our table and smiling broadly. "I hear you might be interested in being an electrician?"
Jason is dropping his slice of pizza and hurriedly rubbing his hands on his pants, holding out his hand.
"Yes sir," he says eagerly, "yes, sir."
They talk for a while, still standing, Gary telling him of the work he does and Jason nodding enthusiastically, not caring of any of the details, just incredulous that this guy appears to be offering him a job.
"Now my wife," Gary is saying to Jason, "she is going to be happy to have another mouth to feed now that my son has moved out, I hope you have a good appetite?"
Jason is biting his lips and I can see that there are tears welling in his eyes.
This would be the point that most people would say thank you or some such.
"Yes sir," he says hoarsely instead, his eyes on the table.
"Good lad," says Gary looking pleased, "we should probably get going then, we’ve got an early start in the morning, up at five, son."
Jesus wept.
Men.
Then I look across at Leigh who is nodding in agreement, that yes, they should get going, because it is going to be an early start in the morning. That no further gratitude or acknowledgment is necessary.
Am I the only sane one here?
They leave, I hug Jason firmly and he hugs me back awkwardly, not wanting to leave me
with any stain of the street, but still whispering 'thank you' in a voice that is breaking in my ear before I let him go.
He shakes hands with Leigh, who is still pretending to eat her pizza, sipping at her mineral water.
After they go I look across at Leigh and tell her thank you meaningfully. She grins at me and shrugs.
"It’s not often I get to call in any of the favours people think they owe me," she says offhandedly.
I kick her with my foot and instantly regret it when my flip flops bend and my bare toes jar against the hard sole of her boot.
Leigh is giving me a look that clearly says she has not a single clue why she just got kicked, all injured innocence.
I glare at her and am about to explain at length why she is an idiot when the restaurant owner guy is back at our table, clearing away our empty pizza trays, asking hopefully if we would like dessert.
I can already see by the look in Leigh’s face that she can’t imagine anything worse.
"Oh, I'm so sorry," I tell him, "we really do have to get going."
Leigh’s face is pure relief, his face utter disappointment.
He refuses to accept any payment which is fortunate since that would be all of the money I’d have till payday for the bill.
Leigh clearly wishes that she could pay and looks horribly uncomfortable when he loads her up with two large bags of food, just some pasta and tiramisu, he tells us.
We walk down the street in silence and when we turn the corner I hold out both my hands to Leigh.
"Hand it over," I tell her firmly.
She shoves both bags into my arms. "Thank you," she says fervently.
I eye her incredulously.
"Free dinner, a job and a home for Jason and tomorrow night’s dinner and you are thanking me?" I ask her.
"Yes," she says simply, nodding seriously. "Thank you."
I see that it is true. That she is relieved that I understand, that she likes doing things for other people but that she rarely gets the opportunity, that she detests other people doing things in return for her.
She drives me home and I smile when she gets out and jogs to the other side of the car, opens the door, takes the bags from my lap and hands them back to me when I climb out of the ludicrously low seats. She takes a half-step towards me as if she is going to hug me and then stops. Not intending to have initiated physical contact, always my role, except that I have my hands full of food and can’t.
I raise an eyebrow.
"Yes, I would like a hug," I tell her firmly.
She grins at me and wraps her arms around me, unpractised but just right nonetheless.
I invite her up, not actually wanting to introduce her to Diarmuid and Katie who have heard far too much about her to not have to make a few smart comments. Especially considering how ridiculously posh and English she looks right now.
And sounds.
Sometimes the words that come out of her mouth horrify even me and I have a blinding crush on her.
She shakes her head and I feel relieved and disappointed at the same time, unable to decide which one I feel more.
The takeout bags end up having not just food but two bottles of wine as well. The food is amazing, Diarmuid and Katie destroying the pasta in minutes. We finish both bottles of wine and each of us eat multiple pieces of tiramisu and retire to the lounge room with groaning stomachs.
Diarmuid falls asleep in his chair, but Katie and I sit on opposite ends of the couch our bare feet touching and I tell her all about my evening. Katie opens another bottle of wine, one of ours and of distinctly average quality in comparison to the other two, but we have drunk enough to hardly notice.
At the end of my tale Katie sits there smiling at me enigmatically.
"How much do you like her, Aednat?" she asks probingly.
I shrug and shake my head.
"I don’t know," I tell her tersely.
She stares at me flatly for a long moment, not believing me at all.
"I think I’m in love with her," I tell her, my voice cracking, "but I don’t know if I can trust what I feel anymore."
Warm tears are falling down my cheeks and I feel worthless admitting this out loud, admitting it to myself. That I don’t have an inner voice I can rely on anymore, it left when I let Warren judge me on my every action.
Katie’s face looks sad beyond belief as she makes space between her legs.
"Come here, Aednat," she says.
I do, because she is the one person in the world who I don’t mind seeing me at my worst. She wraps her arms around me and strokes my hair, kisses my head.
"I don’t know if she even likes me like that at all," I tell her when I stop crying, my throat sore.
"Oh, my god, Aednat," Katie says equal parts sympathy and annoyance, "everyone likes you like that, you just never bloody well see it."
I’m laughing and hiccupping both because honestly Katie is gorgeous. People think we look the same, that we might be sisters when they see us in passing, we have similar long brown hair and heart shaped face, light blue eyes, hers greyish blue and mine a muddy green. It’s there that the similarity stops, I’m averagely pretty, guys tend to like me like that after a few hours of conversation, after they find out that I can be fun to hang out with.
Katie on the other hand, guys make utter fools out of themselves in mere moments, fall at her feet, just for a glance, for her to notice them.
Women, well women, don’t really go for her at all and for that I’m grateful. At least the occasional woman tries to pick me up.
"What?" she says grumpily.
"You never liked me like that," I tell her, picking holes in her logic.
"You never liked me like that," she repeats back, amused.
This isn’t entirely true, for a few weeks when we first met I kind of had a bit of a crush on her.
Diarmuid and I both.
Katie pokes me in the side.
"You didn’t," she says sounding surprised.
I try to pull away from her, but she holds me tighter. I could get away from her because Katie is about as strong as she looks but I don’t.
"Only until I got to know you," I tell her grumpily.
I can feel Katie thinking, trying to come up with the right thing to say.
"At least you seem to have far better taste in women than in men," she says eventually.
I laugh, relieved and we sit there in companionable silence for a while, Katie still stroking my hair.
"You should be more confident in yourself," she says conversationally after a while, "I kissed this girl in Barcelona one night who asked me to."
I turn around and eye her incredulously.
"And?" I ask her.
She shrugs knowing the question I want her to answer.
"It was nice, but on the whole," she says and then shrugs again, "it was kind of like kissing myself."
I frown at her.
"You are right," I tell her grumpily, "you should have kissed me instead, I’m a good kisser."
Katie grins at me.
"Is that an offer?" she asks, "because you really could use some help with your lines if you are going to get Leigh."
"You wish it was an offer," I tell her derisively.
"I would have," she says seriously, "if you’d asked."
"What so you could find out that you actually don’t like girls with me, instead of with some random girl you met in Barcelona?" I ask her tartly.
"No," she says, ever so seriously, "so that we would have all been together at some point."
I raise an eyebrow. I think both of us would like to forget making out with Diarmuid who we both agree was a terrible kisser when he first started college and neither of us have tried again since.
"Is that an offer?" I ask her.
She shrugs, asking me, why not?
Only Katie would think that there should be symmetry in all things.
I quirk my eyebrow because this is utterly ridiculous, not least of all because neither of us
have any interest at all in the other.
Only Katie is leaning in and I'm a little drunk and I haven't been kissed in months and before I can think her lips are softly pressed to mine.