by Guy Salvidge
“Glass of wine?” Clarissa asked, returning from the bathroom. She sauntered off in the direction of the kitchen.
“Just a small one. I must be leaving,” he called after her. But where were his clothes?
His fingers felt clumsy and unresponsive and he found that he could barely pull on his underpants. He was definitely having some kind of episode, and he was glad that the girl was in the kitchen and not here to witness his trembling hands and his fumbling attempts at dressing himself. He just needed to rest on the bed for a minute and then he would be able to put on his shirt. Some fresh air would revive him, if he could make it outside.
“Can you bring me some water?” he said, but not loud enough for Clarissa to hear him. He heard the hiss of the fridge and the clink of glasses.
“Are you all right?” she said when she returned, clearly seeing that he wasn’t well. She put the wine glasses down on the dressing table and came over to him, and in that moment he loved her with all his misfiring heart. He wanted to embrace her but he could barely lift his arms for the pounding in his chest.
“You’ve gone very pale. Your lips are blue,” she said.
“Some water please,” he whispered. It felt better to lie on his back than to remain sitting, and it no longer concerned him for the full extent of his corpulence to be displayed in the unforgiving light.
Clarissa rushed back into the kitchen and returned promptly with a glass of water. Propped up on pillows, he sipped at it but could not seem to take more than a small mouthful at a time.
“I’m ringing for an ambulance,” she said, pacing.
“I’m all right now,” he said. “I think... something sweet, but not wine. Have you anything like that?” She went away and the glass in his hands hit the bedside table with undue force, but not quite hard enough to break it. Water sloshed onto the carpet.
He closed his eyes.
His pulse no longer raced in the way that it had done before, but now he felt clammy and ill. He could request a driver to take him home – nothing easier – but that might lead to rumours on two fronts, both that he was a philanderer and that his health was poor. It wouldn’t do.
“Jeremy,” Clarissa said, standing over him. She really was very beautiful. Even if he never slept with her again, she’d done more than enough to earn that promotion.
“Jelly beans?” he said. He took a handful from the packet in her hand. Munching them, he felt immediately better.
“My sister’s a diabetic,” Clarissa said by way of explanation. “Maybe you should get yourself checked out?”
“You know, I really should,” he agreed, sitting up almost in triumph. “Now where did I put my trousers?”
The night air did revive him somewhat, but he still felt deeply wrong as he tottered out in the direction of the bus stop, his overcoat wrapped around him despite the relative warmth. Clarissa offered to escort him but he assured her that he could manage. Besides, he couldn’t be seen with her. He imagined that he cut a pitiable figure: a sad, wheezing man with a dodgy heart peering short-sightedly into the night. Not that he could come to any harm on the streets of Yellowcake Springs. But even a simple misstep might fell him in his current weakened condition. He had to be vigilant.
At the bus stop he blinked repeatedly, trying to focus in the bright light of the advertising hoardings, many of which his office had designed. He couldn’t be seen alone in the Green Zone after dark. CIQ Sinocorp’s Director of Advertising didn’t catch the Reactor Line bus like an ordinary plebeian. The bus wasn’t long in coming, and thankfully it was empty except for a young couple who were undoubtedly on their way to an Amber Zone nightclub. He swiped a blank multicard instead of his own ID and sat in the vacant disabled seat at the front. Driverless, the bus continued on into the night.
Safely deposited at his doorstep on the more salubrious side of Antimatter Avenue, he shuffled up to the door and swiped his card to let himself in. It was twenty past nine. He hung up his coat and walked along the hall, past the open doorway of the home theatre where some boorish nonsense blared away on the 3V, and went into the kitchen. He needed a drink, preferably his finest Scotch whisky.
Hui stood at the kitchen counter, arms folded across her stout middle. Not now, he thought. He didn’t have the strength for an argument tonight.
“Why is your fliptop switched off?” she asked. “I was worried.”
He pulled the fliptop out of his pocket and looked at it. It was powered down, except for the time and temperature. “I think the battery’s dead,” he said. “I’ll get someone to look at it tomorrow.” In truth there was nothing wrong with the fliptop, except that he hadn’t wanted to be disturbed in flagrante delicto. He edged past his wife and, opening the liquor cabinet, reached for the crystal decanter of single malt.
“It’s just that Mr Li called,” Hui said. “I think it’s something important. I tried to ring you.”
Decanter in hand, he turned around to face his wife. “The Grand Director called? At this hour?” He got a glass out of the cupboard and put it on the smooth benchtop.
“You smell strange, Jeremy,” Hui said, moving closer. “What have you been eating?”
“Ah, very little,” he said. He uncapped the decanter and poured himself a generous measure of the precious amber fluid. He took a large sip and a pleasant fire began to burn in his belly.
Hui pointed to the corner of the confectionery packet sticking out from his trouser pocket. “What’s that?” she asked.
“Jelly beans,” he said, pulling out the packet. “Would you like some?”
Hui stared at him for a second and then went into the home theatre and sat down. He sipped his whisky and stood in the theatre doorway. “I’ll ring Mr Li from the office.”
Hui said nothing, absorbed by the shimmering colours emanating from the 3V.
Nestled in the belly of the house, his office had no windows and was his hiding place. He could close the door and shut out the light and just sit there in silence. Just him, his thoughts, and his whiskey.
It took the rest of the glass before he was ready to make the call to the Grand Director. It was after ten but he didn’t think it too late to make the call. Better to get it over with now rather than stew on it all night. There was a tiny chance that this was his day of reckoning. It could be that word of his indiscretions had reached the Grand Director’s ears. It could be the hammer that he had long half-expected to fall on him.
He placed the call on the desktop.
The rotating ‘pending’ image was replaced by a hologram of the elderly Li in his dressing gown.
“Mr Li,” he said, bowing his head. “I hope I haven’t disturbed your rest.”
“Ah, Jeremy,” Mr Li said. “You should know by now that old men rarely sleep and never for long. What troubles you?”
“My wife informs me that you rang earlier this evening? I apologise for being unavailable at the time.”
The Grand Director dismissed his concerns with a nonchalant flick of the wrist. “Everyone needs a little downtime,” he said and Jeremy scrambled to read the meaning in his serene expression. “I’ve got some troubling news, but for you I think there is a silver lining.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Yang Po has had a heart attack. He’s in a critical condition.”
“I saw Mr Yang just yesterday at lunch! My goodness, do they think he’ll recover?”
“Yes, these things can happen suddenly,” Mr Li said. “Especially when one doesn’t watch one’s weight sufficiently. Yang Po may recover in time, but he will need to rest and to regain his strength. He’ll be returning to the homeland for his convalescence, and thus I need a new Director of Security.”
“Mr Li, you mean to say that you are offering the position to me?”
“I am, but on an interim basis to begin with. But let us just say, between you and I, that Yang Po’s heart attack comes at a provident moment. I had been dissatisfied with his performance for some months.”
“But who wil
l take up the Directorship in Advertising in my absence?”
“I thought your deputy, Tiffany Cramer, would suffice. That is, unless you counsel otherwise?”
“An Australian? Are you sure, Mr Li? Tiffany will be delighted. And yes, she is more than capable.”
“So you accept?” the old man asked. “I felt certain that you would jump at the opportunity, Jeremy. This pleases me. And you are an Australian yourself, or at least you were born here. An ethnic Australian could not be trusted with Security, perhaps, but Advertising? I don’t see why not.”
“I accept wholeheartedly, sir,” Jeremy said. It was impossible to do otherwise.
“Excellent! Then you may take the rest of this week to hand over the Advertising portfolio to Ms Cramer. I trust all is well with you and yours?”
“Never better,” Jeremy said. “Thank you, Grand Director. I’ll leave you to your rest. I must inform my wife of the good news!”
Mr Li laughed and shook his head. “Your skill in persuasion is your primary virtue, Jeremy. Try to make honesty another.” He nodded curtly and terminated the call, leaving Jeremy in the dark, an empty glass in his hand.
6. Purifier
Sylvia lay on the bed she’d slept in as a teenager, the wobbly ceiling fan above her offering little respite from the heat, as she tried to recuperate from the nightmarish last leg of her long journey. This was Greywood, the Perth inner suburb where her parents had lived for decades. Once it had been relatively upmarket, but these days it was in sharp decline.
Earlier, she’d allowed her mother to lead her like a child from the airport terminal in search of her rickety, banged-up Daihatsu. The car’s inner workings were known to be in a dire state, thus the likelihood of a safe journey home was left to providence. Sylvia had never been the panicky type, but the thought of breaking down on the tarry, car-choked, smog-filled, sun-blasted freeway was more than she could bear. Her mother had seemed inured to the terror, casually switching lanes and swearing at other drivers, all while keeping an eye on the car’s steadily climbing heat gauge. Perhaps she’d been pampered by her life at Yellowcake Springs and indeed her prison experience, but Sylvia could not recall the sun ever shining as harshly as it had shone this afternoon. She couldn’t remember a time when the air had been drier, the roads as jammed, other human beings as alien and unyielding as they had been today. It was after 06:30 and the temperature must still be well over thirty degrees. And it was only November; summer still lingered on her mental horizon.
Her mother came into the stuffy room and looked down at her. “Your father’s awake and he wants to see you,” she said.
Sylvia got to her feet and trudged out of the room. My room, she thought with reluctance. The lounge room was piled high with junk that her mother was too busy to re-organise between working and caring for her ailing husband. The kitchen sink was full of dirty dishes and the bench was covered in crumbs and something sticky, maybe jam. Sylvia picked up a glass from the rack and filled it with water from the purifier. The water tasted bad and she screwed up her face. She went to pour it out but her mother grabbed her hand with surprising vigour and wrenched the glass away.
“Don’t,” her mother said.
“What’s wrong with the purifier? It’s got sediment floating in it.”
“It’s broken. Give it to your father if it isn’t good enough for you.”
“Then get it fixed. Dad can’t drink that.”
“Have you got the money? Come on, he’s waiting.”
The master bedroom was, if anything, even hotter than the rest of the house, and a terrible smell emanated from the bed. Her father’s skin was waxy, his eyes glazed, and he couldn’t sit up. She went to his side.
“Sylvia,” he croaked, looking up at her. “You made it back. I’m so glad.” Each word seemed to be spoken with great difficulty.
“Dad!” she said. “What’s happened? You should be in hospital.”
“Sylvia,” her mother said. “Your father’s very ill. Please don’t upset him.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
“We don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” She grabbed his limp hand and pressed it to her face. “Dad!”
“Hush,” he said. “We’ve no money and the hospitals are no good now. It’s all right. We can discuss it. In the morning.” His eyes fluttered and closed.
“He needs to rest again,” her mother said. “He’s so weak.”
They withdrew and her mother shut the bedroom door. “I know it’s a shock. Come and sit down,” she said.
Sylvia sat on the edge of the couch in what had once been the formal dining room. Tears and sweat streamed down her face.
“Here,” her mother said, handing her a bottle of mineral water from the fridge.
Sylvia drank from it and would have kept drinking until it was gone except that she saw her mother’s pained expression. She only drank half and handed it back. Her mother took a small sip and recapped the bottle.
“How much did that cost you?” Sylvia asked.
“Too much, but I wanted you to have it.” She sighed. “I didn’t want you to worry about your father.”
“How long has he been like that?”
“Months. He would have gone already, but he wanted to see his daughter again. It gave him a second wind when we heard you were coming home.”
“He would have gone,” Sylvia repeated dully. “He needs to be in hospital.”
“Things have gotten so bad here,” her mother said, her hands balled into fists. “You get used to it. Every day when I come home from work I expect to find him dead. I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this.”
Sylvia put her arm around her mother’s scrawny shoulders. “I’ll get a job,” she said. “And then we can put Dad in hospital and fix the purifier. Okay?”
She left her mother on the couch and went into the bathroom. She peered at herself in the grimy mirror that hadn’t been cleaned in a long time. “You want me to contact Misanthropos?” she said to the mirror. “You do something for my family or the deal’s off.”
“Sylvia, who are you talking to?” her mother called from the other room.
“No one, Mum. I just need a minute.” She shut herself in the bathroom and the face in the mirror scowled.
Later, as she lay sleepless for hours and hours, Sylvia’s thoughts turned in circles and she was returned endlessly to herself. Defeated, she got up again and was surprised to find that her feet still knew their way around this place in the dark after all the intervening years. She moved quietly and found herself hovering near the front door, near her parents’ bedroom, dying to escape from this restless place. She wondered whether she could turn the front door handle without waking her mother, and finally decided that she couldn’t. It would have to be the sliding door at the back.
The door shunted across on its rollers and she stepped out onto the ancient, moonlit patio. The night was not entirely quiet even at this unwanted hour. She heard car engines, dogs barking, even people shouting at each other somewhere in the distance. She sat down on the old two-seater rocker and stretched out as best she could. One moment the moon was shrouded in clouds and the next it emerged again, driving out the darkness.
When she woke it was morning and the sun had already vanquished any semblance of cool. She dragged herself inside and sat guiltily over a breakfast of dry cereal and the rest of the mineral water from the fridge. There was no milk or butter or anything else like that. At first she thought her mother was not yet up but then she realised that she’d have already left for work. The time on the fliptop read 08:21.
The door to the master bedroom lay slightly ajar, and inside the room her father lay supine on top of the bed. She crept over to him, horrified and yet transfixed by his wasted flesh and shallow breathing. One calf lay exposed from where his pyjamas had ridden up, and it was covered with splotchy red blisters. Gingerly, both wanting and not wanting to touch him, she rolled down the pyjama bottoms and straightened th
e pillow beneath his head.
“Evelyn,” he suddenly called out. “Are you there?” His eyes remained closed.
“It’s Sylvia,” she said. “Mum’s at work now. Can I get you anything, Dad?”
“Some water,” he said, and then mumbled something she didn’t catch. She returned to the kitchen and the first thing she saw was the empty water bottle on the bench where she’d left it. The second thing she saw was the malfunctioning water purifier affixed over the sink, its barrels browned with age and neglect. Drawing out a glass of water for her father, she attempted to scoop out the worst of the sediment with a spoon, but only succeeded in sending it swirling around. To prove to herself that it wouldn’t kill him, she forced herself to take a sip. The water tasted brackish and unpleasant.
Her father had drifted off again and he didn’t respond to her voice. For a terrible moment she thought that the end had come to him already, but no, his chest rose and fell. Taking his hand, she tried to squeeze some life back into his clammy fingers.
His eyes flickered open, and in that split-second she knew that whatever she wanted to say to him, she’d need to say it soon. “Sylvia,” he said. “You’re here.”
It wasn’t clear to her whether he remembered their previous conversation, so she propped up some pillows behind him and helped him to sit up a little. He was so thin she thought she could probably carry him. He reached for the water at the bedside and drank a small amount, then handed the glass back to her. If the taste bothered him, then he gave no sign. “Can you open the blinds?” he asked. She opened them, letting the harsh light into the dust-filled room.