Zigzag Street

by Nick Earls

  I am introduced to everyone as Richard Derrington, the guy who decked me, and the shoe incident dominates early conversation.

  Rachel tells me to put on some music and leans over close to me when I’m kneeling at the stereo cabinet making my choice. And the open door has the strange effect of separating us from everyone else.

  You have great CDs, I tell her.

  You expected crap maybe?

  I didn’t say there wasn’t crap. It would be a brave person indeed who would try to defend the place of The Proclaimers’ Sunshine on Leith among these fine albums.

  It’s a great album.

  Don’t do this.

  I stand by my collection. So what are you going to play?

  This one. The Triffids. Calenture. Did you know there’s a theory that you can’t actually have a successful dinner party unless this album is played?

  Really? I’ve heard the same theory, but about Sunshine on Leith.

  No-one ever said that about Sunshine on Leith.

  So she lets me play The Triffids and she goes into the kitchen with Kathy to get on with dinner.

  This leaves me with three women, all already on at least their second glass of wine, all thinking that maybe I set out to injure their friend (or friend’s friend), that I am a man whose intentions are far from honourable. But really, what’s an honourable intention any more? And as the conversation goes on it’s only a matter of time before I am expected to accept personal responsibility for the subjugation of women, the invention of war and the phallocentrism of architecture.

  And I tell them, sure, men have done a lot of bad things, but they weren’t all done by me. I’m as unenthusiastic about the patriarchy as the next person. This only makes things worse.

  Knowing I’ve got no chance on the subjugation issue, or on the matter of war, I take on the cause of the architects, from the Doric column to Harry Seidler. And argument seems to come at me from all corners, probably at least partly because I know nothing about architecture, even though I find myself raving about the little churches of Hawkesmoor, his fine pencilled spires, his neo-classical porticoes, his vestries just like home. And I tell them it’s all about intimacy, not about genitals. Can’t they understand that?

  So what exactly, Melina says, is your understanding of the neo-classical portico?

  I understand it to be the front bit, I tell her. Where you go in.

  And I know I’m gone.

  The conversation starts to resemble what I think must be Sal’s fantasy about this evening rather than mine. I’m half tempted to see if I can set up the Naomi Wolf joke.

  And in the middle of it all, I wonder if I did some awful subtle male thing that made Anna leave. Nothing as obvious as starting a war, but something criminally insensitive, and I can’t work it out. But with the energy of the discussion that all seems academic.

  Dinner’s ready, Rachel says, walking in with Kathy behind her, each of them carrying a fragrant curry. She sits next to me and says, It sounded interesting in here. I bet you’re glad you came.

  Well, I will go committing acts of violence, however inadvertent.

  And the debate ranges across other topics, and on occasions I am not required to be the enemy. But usually I’m treated like I’m fair game.

  When the table’s clear Rachel says, Come into the kitchen and help me make dessert, and she gives me fruit to cut. I’m sorry about that, she says. You were really cannon fodder in there weren’t you? In case you’re wondering, that’s not why I invited you.

  It was fine. I should take responsibility for my actions. I just didn’t realise they were so wide-ranging, or that so many of them had occurred long before I was born.

  So I cut. Bananas, strawberries, melon. Rachel leaves the pan she is heating a sauce in to inspect my work.

  Could the banana pieces be a little thinner maybe? And maybe the small strawberries only need to be halved.

  And the melon. You’d better let me know the problem with the melon now too, or I’ll keep cutting it just like this. And then everyone’ll be sick, won’t they?

  Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot to tell you. I’m impossible to help in the kitchen. That’s why Kathy and I did one curry each. That’s why no-one else is helping now. I’m aware that my ways of cutting are very particular, and that my requirements paralyse anyone’s attempts to help me. But don’t let that put you off.

  And I expect you really believe the search for the perfect bagel never ends.

  Oh, absolutely. Do you know how meticulous you have to be just to make a bagel, just to meet the minimum technical requirements, without even contemplating perfection? A bagel is a very specific thing. I had one today, I bought one for lunch and it was a focaccia with a hole in it. No way was it a bagel. It even had sesame seeds on it. It’s as though any bread product with a hole in the middle, with the possible exception of the doughnut, can be called a bagel.

  Maybe they were just concentrating on getting the hole right and they’ll work on the dough later.

  Come on. It wasn’t even a good hole.

  She looks again at my chopping, my clumsy damaging of fruit with a sharp instrument, wonders whether to say anything.

  So I tell her I’m actually working on the Chinese theory that any fruit or vegetable will tell the cutter which way it should be cut.

  Well I don’t think you’re listening, are you? Listen closer. You can hear them. Can you hear them now? And our heads touch at the temples as we lean down towards the chopping board. Can you hear them saying, Do it Rachel’s way. Do it Rachel’s way. Said with the tiny voice of a strawberry.

  I tell her I think the bananas disagree.

  Melina walks in the kitchen door, sees us leaning over with our heads together, turns on her heel straight away, says, Whoops, quite theatrically to the others at the table. There is a flurry of whispered voices.

  We’re just cutting fruit, Rachel shouts to them. For god’s sake. She looks back at me and says, You can’t even have a conversation with a strawberry round here.

  And she heats the fruit in the pan and we serve it into bowls.

  Melina looks at hers and says, Yes, it looks like fruit two people have been very close to.

  It was all a Chinese theory, Rachel says, but it was a bit beyond me.

  After coffee I call a cab and it’s there quicker than I’d like.

  I’ll show you out, Rachel says.

  We walk down the wooden steps to the path, and outside there’s the first hint of cool in the air with the beginning of autumn.

  I’m glad you could come, she says.

  Yeah, me too, thanks. It was nice. You have uncompromising friends.

  She laughs. The cabbie is waiting.

  I’ll see you soon then, I say to her.

  Yeah. Good. That’d be good.

  And there is a strange frozen moment when neither of us moves. Neither of us makes the move. The cabbie taps his horn.

  Okay, well I’ll call you, if that’s okay.

  Yeah. That’d be good.

  I get in the cab and as we drive away I can hardly see her in the dark, standing at the top of her concrete steps before turning to walk inside.

  51

  When I’m talking to Jeff after dinner on Saturday, I expect I’m sounding too excited about what is, after all, objectively next to nothing. There is no way I can stress to him the validity of eye contact or the bumping of heads.

  I’m quite prepared, he says, to accept that Rachel Vilikovski is all we had hoped. And that her telling of the Christmas lights story was very special and her artwork indicative of a great talent, as well as a facility for comedy. And ‘well-meaning fingers’? ‘Well-meaning fingers’ about that guy lying on the road. How bold is that? No-one uses the transferred epithet just in conversation any more. She’s formidable. But I still think you should keep it in your pants. Just in case it’s not happening the way you think it is. Don’t get me wrong, I think she likes you. I think that’s a very real possibility, but taking it all one
step at a time would be fine.

  Please. I’m so boned it’s like I’ve got three femurs. I haven’t been this barred up since the Propagation of Waves in Fluid. That must mean something.

  What?

  The Propagation of Waves in Fluid. Senior physics. You never did that?

  I never did senior physics. And you know, if I had, I just don’t think it would have given me a memorable boner.

  You had to be there.

  I’m kind of glad I wasn’t.

  Okay, what I’m saying is, I’m noticing the awakening of certain urges. These are compelling issues of biology that have been dormant for some time, other than one unfortunate recent though very intimate false alarm. And these urges are becoming difficult to resist, despite the recklessness inherent in answering their call.

  What are you getting at?

  Timing. This timing business. It’s not easy. And anyway, what about the other day? What about time being a luxury I don’t have?

  Who said that shit?

  You did.

  I think you’re taking it out of context.

  I think it couldn’t be more in context.

  It must have sounded good at the time.

  You give me advice because it sounds good?

  Sure. I know you like the sounds of advice. You find them very reassuring. Anyway, that timing shit was all about the initial call. She’s made the call now. You’re onto the next level, and these are the sounds of advice for the next level, and they are the sounds of calm. And anyway I think we’re both aware that, with the possible exception of the bean issue, you’re just not content-oriented. Advice is really just a warm, safe squeeze of reassurance for you and the content exists only at an intellectual level and has no practical role at all.

  Hey, I’m a very rational man.

  That’s a sweet idea, but don’t get attached to it.

  Sal comes back into the room, with a small box in one hand. We’ve bought you this, she says. Because we know planning isn’t your best thing. And you should know that it was Jeff’s idea, and I only agreed because of my interest in the safety of Rachel Vilikovski.

  I undo the bow, unwrap the paper, lift the lid. And inside is a yellow fluoro rooster condom.

  It’s for your wallet, she says. Since the days of Plum Bob may be over.

  You think this is worthy of Rachel Vilikovski?

  Hey, you think what’s in your pants is worthy of Rachel Vilikovski.

  I laugh. And I imagine myself wiggling my roostered penis in the direction of a perplexed, though glorious, Rachel Vilikovski, and this seems like the ultimate crap downfall. So I laugh more. I laugh and my feet lift off the ground, which is fine, until a week of double bean enchiladas has its say, and I fart. A monosyllabic, fairly loud musical fart.

  And it’s strange. I’ve been close to Jeff and Sal for at least a couple of years, and it never occurred to me to think of which of the three of us might be the first to drop a musical fart in a social situation.

  Jeff laughs so much that if he’d even gone near a bean recently he’d be farting right along with me.

  Are you just glad to be here or is that a goose in your pants? he says, when he can finally manage speech.

  It’s a goose, I tell him. I have it wedged between my buttocks and I pass my flatus through it, up through its fundament and out its beak.

  How very Rabelaisian of you.

  Rabelais. What shit you come out with, Sal says. A couple of boys laughing at a fart and you think you’re Rabelais.

  Rabelais’ entire career was based on laughing at farts. On taking old stories and putting the fart jokes back in. If Rabelais couldn’t have laughed at a fart he would have been nothing. Just some doctor.

  I expect Rachel Vilikovski laughs at farts. And if it’s good enough for her and Rabelais, then I figure it’s good enough for the rest of us.

  So what’s next with Rachel Vilikovski? Sal says. Have you got a plan? I mean, I’m sure you’ve got a thousand plans, most of them dangerous, but is there one you think you might actually carry out, assuming willingness on her part?

  Movie? I think a movie. I think a movie, maybe Monday, maybe call and suggest any day next week, but lean towards Monday because of understandable biological urges. I figure neutral ground, date movie venue, so I’m thinking Metro, maybe Village Twin.

  Village Twin is good, Sal says. Cheaper, lots of appropriate coffee opportunities for before or after. This is a very sane plan so far.

  Thank you. So. Coffee. Before or after? I’m thinking, and you’ll like this, I’m thinking before. I’m thinking a later session of the movie and coffee before. So not dinner, and not home to anyone’s house. Okay? Coffee, movie, see you soon.

  Good, very good, very calm.

  Yes, very calm. And this is its essence. Its elegant slowness. I will not be bringing her home. I will not be taking to her with the rooster. The cock will not crow. Watch me. Elegant slowness. But, that being said, I shall not undertake to resist her advances.

  52

  Sunday morning I pace. I tell myself calm. I tell myself elegant slowness.

  So why am I not calm? Why am I not elegant? Slow?

  I should call her, call her and, well, just suggest a movie maybe. Bullets over Broadway, eight forty-five tomorrow, Village Twin, coffee first, New Farm Deli, eight.

  I don’t call. I pace. I unpack a box with inconsequential contents. I walk onto the front verandah with a can of paint and a brush. I walk up to the unfinished railing third from the far left. I walk back inside.

  What’s going on? I haven’t been like this for years, not even with the girl at uni. It’s like I’m back at school staring down at the mesmerising patterns of the wave tank, thinking, well, if I’m going to fail physics I might as well do it with an erection, and thinking about some girl I met at a dance. And since then? Half the time since then was the girl at uni (and that’s appalling in itself, half of my adult life so far, such as it is, used up so pointlessly). The other half seems, now that I think about it, to have involved me falling into relationships with people I knew. Even Anna. I knew Anna through other people for a while before we started doing anything together. So this is my first good old-fashioned crush in ten years.

  And it has all the parts of the crush. The excitement, the fear, the ridiculous inability to get on with life (not that that’s anything new), but also the tenuousness of association. And that’s important. If you take an interest in the friend of a friend, someone you meet at a friend’s party, something like that, there are channels available. Not the same urgency. Not that school dance thing, where any meeting might be your last. This is more like that, a force that pushes hard against elegant slowness.

  So. Twenty-eight and a crush. Twenty-eight and a big fat crush. And like any crush, I’m making up the magical, powerful, clever, funny Rachel Vilikovski from the hints I’m given. And, a crush being based at least as much on what you don’t know as what you do, I’m creating a hell of a Rachel Vilikovski, and I have no idea if it’s like the real thing.

  The phone rings. It’s going to be Jeff, calling to see if I’ve called her yet. And I’ll tell him I haven’t got round to it. And I’ll try to make it sound casual, and he’ll recognise that for the crap it is. I get to it just before the answering machine cuts in.

  Hi. It’s Rachel. The magical, powerful, clever, funny Rachel Vilikovski even though I’m not ready for her yet. Rachel Vilikovski, the woman who comes with more adjectives than some languages, and she doesn’t even know it.

  Hi.

  So how are you?

  Good. Fine. Just doing some renovating.

  Really? I didn’t see you as much of a renovator.

  No. It’s a problem. As a renovator, perhaps like many other things, I’m a theorist rather than a practitioner.

  Why does that not surprise me?

  Hey, where would we be without theorists? We’d all just do things. We’d all just make things happen. And what sort of a place would this be then?
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  So do you ever do anything, or do you always just think about it?

  But thinking’s the best kind of doing, isn’t it? Once you carry anything through you really start to limit the possibilities. Anyway, I was just about to actually do some renovating and then I thought I’d call you instead.

  That’s easy for you to say now.

  No, I was. I’ve got friends who’ll back me up.

  Friends? Friends who’ll back you up? You have a support crew?

  And you don’t? Friday night you didn’t have a support crew? They didn’t seem like they were rushing to play on my team.

  It’s good for you. You need toughening up. So what do your friends think? Now that you’ve all got together and worked this through, somewhere down behind the tuck shop after school. What’s the plan?

  There’s no plan. I just have friends. Friends who asked what I did on Friday night, etcetera. And I might have said to them that I might be going to call you today.

  No plan?

  No plan.

  So what were you going to say when you called me?

  Okay. Well, I’d had an idea …

  As distinct to a plan.

  Exactly. An idea. It involved a movie, possibly Bullets over Broadway some night this week. Of course, you might have already seen Bullets over Broadway, in which case, this being merely an idea, that’s not a problem, and we could see something else. If you wanted to. And if you haven’t seen Bullets over Broadway, and you want to, we could see it. Maybe early-ish this week, since I might have work things on later.

  Okay, okay. So when-ish? When-ish is early-ish?

  Maybe, you know, maybe even Monday. Ish.

  That’s tomorrow.

  Well, some other time then.

  Tomorrow’s fine.

  Fine? Good. Well, maybe eight forty-five. There’s an eight forty-five session.