Gang of Four

by Liz Byrski

  ‘And angry?’

  Grace looked at her in surprise. ‘Angry? No … I don‘t think … actually, yes. Angry, resentful … sort of put upon, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘I know what you mean.’ Vivienne paused. ‘So have you thought about not going?’

  ‘I did, for a moment, but it seems so … well, neglectful. I mean it wouldn’t be a very nice thing to do, would it?’

  Vivienne shifted her weight on the seat. ‘Actually, Grace, I think it would be very nice. Very nice for you, and possibly only just a little awkward for your son and daughter-in-law. After all, they can manage, they can get help, you’ve said so. They’re not going to fall apart without you.’ She picked up her stick and struggled to her feet. ‘I don’t need you to stay, Grace, but I hope you will. I’d like to sew and to sing with you some more. Of course, you must do what feels right – actually, I hope you do what feels good, what feels good in your heart and your gut, not your head.’ She put her hand on Grace’s shoulder. ‘Imagine all those years without a song?’

  And she hobbled off across the courtyard, back to the conference centre, from where the sound of African drums floated out into the morning sunlight.

  TWELVE

  ‘Okay,’ said Linda, standing on the edge of the pool wrapped in one of the hotel’s white towelling robes. ‘Here’s the deal. We’ve paid the day rate. That means we can use the pool, the spa and the sauna whenever we want. And, we each get to select three of the beauty treatments, that’s all included in the price. If you want more than that then you pay the rate on the tariff card. Coffee and mineral water are free, and there’s a running buffet that’s included, so you just help yourself.’

  Nancy pulled her robe closer at the neck and leaned across to Sally. ‘I’m not sure my body can stand three beauty treatments in one day – it may go into shock.’

  Sally smiled. ‘I know what you mean, although at the moment I feel so revolting, not even the whole list could make an impression.’

  ‘So how do we organise what we want, Lin?’ Nancy called out to her daughter.

  ‘Okay, Mom! Don’t hassle me, I was just coming to that.’ Linda started handing out cards for them to tick their selections. Sally stared at hers in dismay, feeling incapable of deciding anything. She wanted to close her eyes, lie back on the recliner, not move all day, not speak to anyone.

  ‘Oh, and don’t forget, folks, champagne and birthday cake at four o’clock! It’s not just my birthday but Sally’s too, that’s Mom’s friend over there. So try to fix your salon treatments so you can be out here by the pool at four.’

  Sally was finding Linda incredibly annoying with her long, singsong Californian vowels. This whole tedious birthday with Linda and her friends at the smart Orchard Hotel Spa was the last thing she wanted. She had been talked into it by Nancy, who had discovered that Sally and Linda shared a birthday. ‘Oh, c’mon,’ Nancy had said pleadingly. ‘Be a pal, Sally. It’s good to do something different on your birthday. Besides, if you don’t go I’ll be on my own with six smart thirty-something lawyers. Come and keep me company.’

  Sally sighed, ticked off her card for a massage, facial and manicure, and handed it back to Linda feeling churlish. Linda was a really nice person, interesting, intelligent, thoughtful and hugely energetic, but Sally just wasn’t in the mood. She’d done this once before with the Gang of Four, in a little less luxury. They’d gone to a day spa in Perth. Isabel had been given two guest passes, so they had split the cost of the other two between the four of them. They had been almost hysterical by the time they got there, joking about how they needed beauty treatments before they braved the atmosphere of a place that dispensed them. ‘It’s okay for you, Grace,’ Isabel had said. ’You always look as though you just came from some gorgeous salon. I feel like the before of all the before pictures ever taken. You know: “Look! We can even work with beached whales.”’

  ‘And I feel like some aged vegetable that’s been left in the bottom of the fridge too long,’ Robin had declared. ‘An eggplant that’s half slimy, half dried up.’

  ‘You lot are disgusting,’ Sally had said. ‘Shaggy’s what I feel, like some old, unkempt hippie.’

  ‘Hmmph!’ Grace had retorted, getting out of the car and straightening her immaculate cream pants and black T-shirt. ‘Well, for your information, I feel like a wrinkled old prune.’

  And they had bowled into the salon smothering their laughter and attempting to look as though they were accustomed to lazing around in expensive spas. What would they say if they could see Sally here now? What would they say if they knew what she was doing in California? She missed them desperately but felt, at the same time, totally cut off from them, unable to communicate with anything more than occasional postcards that revealed nothing. She had no idea how to bridge the gap created more by her own secrecy than by geographical distance.

  ‘Well,’ said Nancy, ‘I’m booked for that mud bath thing in five minutes time, so I’ll mosey on in there now, I think.’ She picked up her bag and glasses and got to her feet. ‘I’m so glad you came, Sally. You need to relax, make a fuss of yourself.’

  Sally smiled up at her without speaking. Just a few weeks ago Nancy’s generous support had been a gift, now it seemed like an intrusion.

  ‘I haven’t seen Steve around recently,’ Nancy went on. ‘Did he go away or something?’

  ‘Just busy, I guess,’ Sally said, flushing slightly and looking out over the pool. ‘I haven’t seen him. I haven’t been to classes the last couple of weeks.’

  Nancy folded her glasses and slipped them into their case. ‘I realised that,’ she said. ‘Are you going to go back?’

  Sally nodded. ‘Yes, on Monday. I just couldn’t quite cope the last week or so.’

  Nancy nodded. ‘Well, okay, a massage’ll do you a heap of good. I’ll catch up with you later, when I emerge from the mud.’

  Sally made her way to the manicurist and was relieved to find she was Japanese with limited English. Smiles, nods and noises of appreciation could replace conversation. She sat, her hand on the pink cushion, watching the transformation of her neglected nails, thinking about Steve. He had, after all, only been trying to help and she had behaved appallingly – slapped his face and stomped off in fury. When she reached the main highway an elderly couple heading back into San Francisco had picked her up. They were tourists, on holiday from Boston, and they took her to the station in their rental car. From there she took the train to Berkeley, back to the precious seclusion of her apartment, back to the self-imposed prison of her anger.

  She stretched out her fingers, the manicure had felt nice and suddenly she was sorry it was finished – maybe Nancy was right about a bit of pampering. She wandered through to the spa and, thankful to find it empty, slipped out of her robe. The warm bubbling water enclosed and supported her, and she closed her eyes and rested her head on the curved edge of the bath. The hum of the motor and the bubbling water were soothing, and she began to relax. She was almost asleep when Linda and a friend climbed in alongside her, with news of the excellence of the masseuse, and a guy in the hair salon who was a great cutter.

  Sally was torn between her desire to stay in the spa and her need to escape the chatter, but two more women arrived and it was clear that the peaceful interlude was over. She climbed out, took a hot shower and wandered out to the pool again to kill some time before her massage and facial. The Orchard Hotel was located high in the Berkeley hills and from the pool terrace the view to San Francisco was spectacular. Sally traced the landscape along the sleek lines of the Bay Bridge until it reached the city, past the Coit Tower and the slim pyramid of the Trans America building to the high ground of Russian Hill. She stared motionless, feeling nothing but emptiness and the brooding depression that had accompanied her each day.

  Linda was right. Hilda, the masseuse, was excellent, a tall, muscular woman with strong square hands. It was months since Sally had had a massage and she felt the knots crunching under Hilda’s fingers in
a relief that bordered on pain.

  ‘You have a lot of tension here,’ Hilda said, working vigorously around her shoulderblades. ‘I can’t fix it all in one day. Can you come back again?’

  Sally nodded, the tension breaking up with every knot that Hilda ground out of her back. A couple of hours later, her face covered with a fresh scented cucumber mask and cool, damp cotton pads over her eyes, she felt lighter and freer than she had for weeks. In the warm semi-darkened room, with a background of rainforest sounds on the CD player, she began to think that some day, sometime, she might feel normal again.

  There was no way to avoid the Monday morning lecture and the tutorial that followed it. She had missed two weeks and although she was keeping pace she knew she simply couldn’t afford any more absences. The lecture hall was crowded and she slipped into a seat high up in the back row, with just a couple of minutes to spare. As the lecturer organised his slides and overheads she looked around for Steve but there was no sign of him. The lecturer lowered the lights and the first slide lit up the screen. In the half-light Sally caught her breath as Steve struggled in through the ground-floor side entrance on crutches, his right leg in plaster to the knee.

  The slides flickered on and off the screen, the lecturer’s commentary drawing murmurs of interest and the occasional ripple of laughter from the students, but Sally heard nothing. Her eyes were fixed on the front row of seats where Steve sat, his leg extended in front of him, crutches resting alongside him. She could see him facing her in the sunlight, swaying precariously as he struggled to regain his balance on the rock and then crashing heavily to the ground, his leg buckling under him as he rolled down the slope.

  As soon as the lights went up she slipped out of her seat to make her way to the front, but a crush of students blocked the stairway down the side of the lecture theatre, so she ducked out of the back door and took the long path around the building, hoping to make it in time to catch Steve coming out. But the path was partially blocked by building works and she had to run a wide circle across the lawns to reach the other side of the building.

  When she saw him he was moving quite fast on his crutches, talking with another man who was carrying his bag. ‘Steve!’ she called, gulping for breath. ‘Steve, wait – please wait.’

  He turned as she reached him. ‘Sally, hi!’

  ‘Steve, your leg,’ she said, gasping for breath. ‘I didn’t know … What did … was it …’ She stopped, at a loss for something to say.

  Steve glanced at the man alongside him and then back at Sally. ‘I was walking on Mount Tam, tripped and fell,’ he said straight-faced. ‘Broke my leg.’

  Sally stared at him in horror as a deep flush crept up her neck. ‘Oh god, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I … well, I haven’t been to classes since, well since …’

  ‘I noticed you weren’t around,’ he said coolly, turning away. ‘Look, I can’t stop to talk. Tony here’s come to pick me up. It’s the only way I can get about right now. See you around.’ And the two of them headed off towards the car park.

  Despair engulfed her as she watched him manoeuvre himself into the car. She wandered away across the grass and sat down, leaning back against a tree. She must have been overtaken by some madness – first the Mendelsons, then Steve.

  She remembered how he had called for her that day, his thoughtfulness, and the courage it must have taken to confront her, the courage and the honesty of a real friend. Now Sally sat, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around them, and as the lump welled in her throat she sank her head onto her arms and began to sob. The clock in the tower struck five, the sun retreated and the air grew cooler but still she sat there weeping, unaware of passers-by who stopped to stare, ignoring the young woman who crouched beside her with an offer of help. For two hours she stayed there until the light had gone and she began to shiver with cold. Then she struggled stiffly to her feet, brushed the grass from her skirt and made her way off the campus onto Bancroft Avenue, where she caught a bus to the cross street nearest to Steve’s apartment. Then she walked the last four blocks to the brown shingle house with the purple rhododendrons out the front and stopped in the driveway, giving herself time to muster her courage before she went up to the door of the ground-floor apartment.

  ‘The door’s unlocked, Tony, c’mon in,’ Steve called, and Sally opened it and stepped inside. He was sitting in an old leather armchair, his plastered leg resting on a low footstool, crutches on the floor beside him. Half a dozen books were stacked on the floor near him, and lying across the chair arms his laptop rested on a short wooden plank. He continued typing, not looking up. ‘Just finishing this last sentence,’ he said. ‘Be with you in a flash. Wanna stick the groceries in the kitchen?’

  ‘It’s not Tony,’ she said nervously, and he looked up immediately, whipping his glasses off and staring at her in surprise.

  ‘Sally!’

  She stood in the dark of the doorway momentarily unable to move or speak.

  ‘Well, I can’t get up so you’d better come in,’ he said, taking off his glasses. ‘D’you want to sit down?’ He nodded towards the leather couch.

  Sally crossed blindly to the couch but couldn’t bring herself to sit. ‘Steve, I don’t know what to say,’ she began, unable to look him in the eye, her voice trailing away.

  ‘Nothing to say, really,’ he replied stiffly. ‘Hey, Sally, what’s the matter? Look at me, will you?’

  She shook her head, once again unable to control her tears. ‘I can’t, Steve, I can’t … I’m so ashamed. I’m so sorry …’

  ‘Sally, don’t cry, please don’t. I’m just being a miserable bastard, trying to make you feel bad. Please don’t cry.’

  ‘I can’t seem to stop,’ she mumbled through the tears, shaking her head again. ‘I’ve been crying for hours.’

  ‘I can see that. Look, it’s okay. I was pissed off, but now I’m so pleased to see you. C’mon over here – please, I can’t get up.’ And he reached out his hand and she stumbled over to him.

  ‘Steve, I feel so terrible. I slapped your face, broke your leg and then I just walked off and left you.’

  ‘Look, Sally, it was my fault. I had no right to say those things. It was none of my business.’ He squeezed her hand and tilted his head to look into her face. ‘It was just my typical male arrogance and I was way out of line. I deserved it.’

  She grabbed a handful of tissues from a box on the floor. ‘No! No! You were right, absolutely right. You were trying to help me and everything you said was right, about the past, about my shame and my anger at everything and everybody.’ She sank onto the floor stifling more sobs. ‘Ever since that terrible day at the Mendelsons I’ve been living through it all again, the fear, and the shame, and the pain of parting with Lisa. And the worse I feel the more I turn it into anger and try to blame the Mendelsons. Oh, Steve, when I think of how terrible I was to Estelle, that poor woman. I’m so ashamed. It could have been me in that car, but I was too weak and selfish to look after Lisa myself. And now look what I’ve done to you.’

  Steve lifted the laptop onto the table beside him, pushed his plank over the side of the chair and pulled her towards him. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I know and Nancy knows too, we just didn’t know how to get through to you.’

  ‘You talked to Nancy?’

  ‘Sure, she stopped me one day as I went out the gate. Before the Mount Tam drama, this was. She and Chuck don’t know what to do. They want to help and so do I.’

  ‘I don’t deserve any help,’ she said bitterly, holding on to both his hands. ‘Look at you, you must be in so much pain, and I’ve messed up your studying. How are you coping like this?’

  ‘Very little pain, but quite a lot of inconvenience. As I said, I was really angry for a while, but it’s been wearing off, and now you’re here, well … come and give me a hug.’

  She hugged him hard, burying her face in the shoulder of his sweatshirt. ‘I don’t know why you’re even talking to me, let alone hugging me,’ she mumbled.
r />   ‘I’m a masochist,’ he said. ‘I like getting beaten up. Look, why don’t you stick the jug on and make us some coffee.’

  ‘How long will you be in plaster?’ she asked when she came back from the kitchen with the cups. She had washed her face and combed her hair in the bathroom while the kettle boiled, and she was starting to feel a little steadier.

  ‘Another six weeks. And then another four with it strapped. It’s a long job. But you tell me what’ve you done. Have you contacted the Mendelsons again?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ve done nothing, Steve. Nothing except sit at home in my misery and put out miserable stay-away vibes to anyone who comes near me. For some reason Nancy and Chuck are still speaking to me. They must be saints. I just don’t know what to do. I might’ve been able to make some sort of connection with Lisa but I ruined it all. The Mendelsons’ll never let me see her again now. They were so good to me. Estelle even organised the photos for me. They trusted me and all I did was abuse them. Last night I thought perhaps I should just go back to Australia, pretend none of this ever happened. I could tell everyone that the course didn’t work out, or it was too expensive to live here or something.’

  ‘And start all the secrecy again?’ Steve cut in. ‘Lock it all up again so that it can come back and knock you flat some other time – only then it’ll be twice as hard. Look, Sally, you’ve let the monster out of the closet and it’s bitten you real bad, but you’ve got to make use of that. It was a terrible thing that happened to you, and you were all alone. Well, now you’ve got friends who know the truth. You don’t have to be alone with it this time. If you run away you’ll regret it. Anyway,’ he grinned, ‘I’m just beginning to get to like you – always had this fantasy about masterful dames!’

  Sally smiled. ‘Any of my friends would tell you I’m the least masterful dame around. I’m a wimp, a pushover. Usually I don’t even speak up for myself when I should. I’m sorry, Steve, really sorry. I never hit anyone in my life before.’

  ‘Well, I’m honoured to be the first victim of your latent violence.’