‘His phone just went,’ she says, punching buttons on her phone.
‘Sam! Sam?’ she shouts. We all can hear Sam’s phone clattering onto the floor, his distant voice sounding unreal as he says, ‘Look, it wasn’t like that love … don’t do that, mate … [thud]’ and the Beach Boys sing, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice …’
‘We’ll go back, Valerie,’ Frank states.
‘Just stop the car.’
‘No, Valerie, we’ll take you back,’ Frank insists.
She pukes on my shalwar. ‘Oh, too late, sorry Fran, all over your new outfit.’
‘Don’t worry, Valerie. We’re here with you. You’re fine,’ Frank comforts.
‘It’s all right, I can clean it, I think,’ I say.
When we get back to the Johnny Cash Pub, no one is there. We take Valerie home and Sam isn’t there either. Frank offers to sit with her while I return to our house to tend to the kids.
‘You don’t think I’ve been through this with Sam Marks before?’ She vomits again.
‘I don’t know, Valerie, you’re not well,’ I say.
‘Comes with the territory, mate,’ she says with an unconvincing smile. ‘I’ll be right.’ She leads us out the door and adds, ‘I’m just pregnant.’
By about four in the morning, me, Frank, Huxley and Sadie are all sweating out our fever and taking Panadol. We watch some late, late movies and take turns adjusting the aircon and blankets. By seven in the morning, we’re still camped out on the living-room floor, eating toast with lime marmalade.
Susie is delivering soufflé to Francis.
Irish Kell is calling for her final taxi.
Valerie is 12 weeks pregnant.
And Sam is in jail for ‘outraging the modesty of a woman’. ‘Thanks love.’ (Pat pat.)
What will become of us?
A sobering silence fell upon the land and the whirl of social activity halted for many moons. Two masters of discipline were sent to me by the gods so that I might follow in their path – the path to a clean heart, healthy lungs and a damned good liver.
One day, I was minding my own business down at the pool, trying to get through some work, when I heard Samantha cry out, ‘There she is! Eating raisins!’ Well, actually, I was reading more than raisining, but what of it? Would I look up to find a few grapes after me? People for the Protection of Produce? Was she narking on me to the gendarmes? No, of course not. She was simply pointing me out to a couple of aliens. They were tall creatures with alabaster skin that shone as if it were made of marble; highways of finely developed muscles covered their whole bodies, including their glistening, shaven pates. ‘Hmmm, so this is what Man will look like in 10,000 years, eh Darwin?’ I think.
They stride over sinew-fully in their bathing suits. With an apparent understanding of English, they extend their hands, as we do, and introduce themselves. They are Marge and Tom.
‘Okay,’ I say, ‘but I’m gonna have to rename you for the book. You’ll be Majestic and you’ll be Magnus.’
‘Fine,’ they say.
Samantha met them at the pool the other day. Well, actually, she two-finger-whistled down from her balcony to them and then shouted, ‘You averaged 35 seconds a lap! That’s incredible. Wait there. I’m coming down.’ A few minutes later, she appeared before them in her swimsuit, clutching her goggles. And humbly, standing in the shadow of their large greatness, she implored, ‘Teach me.’
Maj and Mag are professional triathletes and after a small matter of paying a fee and undergoing a test of our commitment, which amounted to proffering said fee, we were taken under their tutelage. We were told to rise and shine with the bullfrogs at 0400 for time trials at the track.
A week later, I heard Samantha say, ‘Let’s have a clambake’ and I said, ‘Sure, why not?’ Except what she really said was, ‘I’m signing you up for the Singapore marathon.’ See, she did that thing you can do to a puppy – use the exciting ‘I got a treat for you’ voice when you’re actually telling him ‘You’re going to the vet’. Either way, you get the same doggy jig. Samantha made it sound like fun. Time trials! 0400!
Apparently, according to our track times, we were likely to do very well in the race. Maj waved a hand at me dismissively when I questioned how twice around a track could possibly tell the whole story of a 26-mile race. She said, ‘If you follow my workouts exactly and eat Biospliven bars, it will happen. And, here, take this carton to sell to other athletes in your neighbourhood.’ The side of the box read: ‘Liven it up with Biospliven. Yeah!’ and showed Maj striking a Mr Universe pose. That’s where I’d seen her before, on the Biospliven commercials. Yeah! ‘By my calculations, you will complete the race in under 3:30,’ she said.
Maj and Mag began emailing workouts to us. Every night, I’d see what new torture tomorrow would bring. Each day seemed to start at five, except for our day off, which was marked with ‘DON’T FORGET THIS IS YOUR DAY OFF – HAVE FUN!’ Oh my gosh, I forgot it was my day off and I just ran nine million miles in the blazing sun. Silly me.
I am not sure why I’m doing this. I don’t have time to answer the question, except when I’m already running.
Yeah! My alarm goes off. I generally don’t need it because my dreams are all about not forgetting to wake up. Big dream hands roughly shake me all night long. (‘All. Night. Long’ is grossly inaccurate. I should say ‘a very small portion of a very short night’.) Except on this night, I slept soundly for four hours. In fact, the same thing happened yesterday and a few times last week.
I have two minutes and 15 seconds before the coffee is ready so I climb back into bed to be with Frank. He isn’t there. And then I realise that this is why I slept for four hours straight. We didn’t have the ritual. Every night at about 2 am, for some reason, I get hot and he gets lonely. I am not horny hot; I am stuffy hot. Even if I were cold, I’d be frigid, because when you are giving yourself four hours of sleep and you’re at the midsection, you don’t want to use any up for sex or cuddles or human contact of any kind, not even 10 to 12.4 minutes of it. I sleep without a pillow and without covers. I don’t want to get too comfortable. Invariably, Frank will extend his quilted claw, hook it around my waist and reel me in to snuggle. Every night, I find myself whizzing backwards in bed until I thump against him. I pry the arm off and slither back to my side but as soon as I’m drifting off, I’m travelling over the prairie of our bed once again. Happens about four times in a row before I finally shove him as hard as I can and beg him to let me sleep. He flips around so his back is to me and calls me a bitch but it’s all in his sleep so I don’t get mad. Maybe he thinks he’s calling some other bitch a bitch. But, now that I think about it, several nights have passed undisturbed.
I look in the kids’ room and there he is, sleeping on Huxley’s trundle bed. They’re holding hands. It’s a scene I will never want to forget but I know that in a moment, I’ll think too much about it, understand it, and it will hurt me.
I go downstairs. Everything is so dark and quiet. I take my coffee and smokes outside and pray that Maj and Mag can’t see me. I flip through a three-month-old Variety that only arrived yesterday and read about the potentially bankrupting delays in releasing a movie I just rented. See, it all worked out, Mr Eisner, this is Hollywood. I read about a few exciting mavens-on-the-move. They all seem to be going from large companies to dot.com thingies that sound as alike as the taste of yellow, green and pink Fruit Loops, except there’s more of them. I’m just out of it, I suppose, but it seems so improbable to me. Then again, what doesn’t? I use one-tenth of my brain, one-tenth of my VCR, one-tenth of my watch (I make it light up and I read the time) and one-tenth of my computer and I don’t surf much. I mean, sheesh, who has the time? I stub a second cigarette and head out for a three-and-a-half-hour run.
I check Samantha’s balcony. No white sheet, so she’s decided not to go. She had said she wasn’t feeling great. Oh well, just me and my thoughts. When I get home, I’ll have just enough time to shower, check faxes, play with Huxley, pic
k up Sadie from pre-school, do the groceries. I think I’ll take them to story hour, get new running shoes and then meet Samantha, Maj and Mag at the gym to lift weights and swim laps after. Hmmm, what should I think about now? Reviewing my schedule took up, oh, roughly two minutes … just 207 left. Just do it! Yeah! Oh, I forgot, I also have an appointment with Dr Soondartisradnoosvishnuam this afternoon. I have to go. The other day I had a spell of temper so now I have to see this man. I tried to punch out the booking office guy. He said we hadn’t signed in for our reserved tennis court the night before. I said, ‘Yeah, ’cause the courts were wet.’ He said we still needed to sign in. I said it was pouring rain so we went to a movie. He said that we should have cancelled three hours before. I said that it wasn’t raining three hours before, just 40 minutes before. He said, ‘You did not cancel three hours before time. You cannot use your card for two weeks. No tennis for two weeks.’ I said, oh, I don’t know, something like ‘You’re a dead man’ and reared my arm back. Sadie and Huxley, who were with me at the time, can verify that I did not connect with his face. He sat behind his Plexiglas window and I swung my fist through the speaking hole, but he wheeled back in his swivel chair to avoid the blow. A flier about a ping-pong match fluttered down to his feet. He grabbed the phone and dialled. When the police arrived, I was already cooling off in the baby pool with the kids.
‘Mrs Rittman?’ It was a cop.
‘Yes?’ I got up and held Huxley against my chest and Sadie to my leg, trying to look like the last person in the world who’d become violent – l’il bit of a thing like me, a mother, just like your mother …
‘You’ve been accused of vandalising.’
‘What?’ I was insulted, outraged. I don’t wreck stuff. ‘I didn’t vandalise. A piece of paper came off when I went to punch the stupid idiot.’
‘Oh, I see. So you didn’t vandalise?’
‘That’s right, officer. No graffiti, no gum, no smashed glass. Absolutely no damage to property.’
‘I’m sorry then, Mrs Rittman. Thank you for your time.’
And that would have been that except for the fact that everyone at the pool started cheering for me and the story swept through every playground and playgroup, down the shop line and over to the beer garden at Fattys. Fran almost punched the booking-office man. Within hours, I was a legend. Fran of Arc. Fran Ali. Rebel with a cause.
I can’t blame Sadie. She thought her dad would share the wild adoration of the teeming crowd shouting ‘Fran! Fran! Fran!’ whenever I passed by. That night, before he even had a chance to put down the old briefcase, she flew over to him and said, ‘Mommy almost punched Mr Quiff. Isn’t she great?’
‘Fran!’ Frank gasped. ‘Do you have any idea what this could do? Look at poor Sam. Two days in jail and hundreds of thousands of dollars later …’
‘Daddy, don’t worry, the police were very nice to us.’
‘Police?’ Frank turned to me.
‘Just one guy … little guy … barely a cop at all … smallish fellow … yes, very, very tiny,’ I explained.
‘When did this happen?’
‘Um, about three. Okay, okay, don’t say anything.’
I knew Frank was going to say a whole lot of parental-sounding things to me about getting us all in a lot of trouble and not being able to control myself and ‘in front of the kids!’ and if I didn’t learn how to calm down … I don’t know the end of that one, actually, the one that starts with ‘if’.
I went over to Samantha’s with the kids to get away from Frank’s self-righteous, disappointed, master-of-the-family swagger, hoping to hear the echoes of my day in the sun. Samantha had heard the story and she smiled, but it faded. Squinting, she said, ‘Ya need to calm down, Frannie. You’re scaring me.’
‘Oh, God, I’d never do anything to you!’ My eyes welled up.
‘Not what I mean. I see you getting a head full of steam and worry that one day, I don’t know … look what happened to Sam. Listen, go see my doctor. I’ll bet it’s just a nutritional imbalance.’
Disturbed at being considered imbalanced, I left as I came, disturbed and imbalanced, but with an appointment to see the master of medicine, Dr Soondartisradnoosvishnuam, and that appointment is at three today. He better not keep me waiting. Ha ha!
I see the usual cast of characters in East Coast Park. I wave to some who have come to know me as the white thing that trots by at 5.25 am. I get some nice, big ‘hellos’ out of a few now.
When you turn the bend around the fish pond, the landscape opens. Until then, you are between trees and the NTUC villas, which are government-run chalets on the beach costing practically nothing to stay in except for the price of the phone call to reserve them. I am always inspired by the expanse of water, the various patches of trees and flowers, and on the way back, I’ll catch the red sun just coming up.
Today, as I turn the bend, I am stopped in my tracks. I stand before the most enormous and amazing moon I have ever seen and would never have imagined possible. This moon is here with me, so close to earth that, in a minute, I’ll be running through it, shattering it in a million pieces. It is the size of a stadium, bright white with sharp edges, perfectly round. I have never been so awed by any natural wonder in my life. I’ve seen glaciers and geysers, alps and orcas, and have thought each a glorious miracle, but this contains magic. This is simply incredible, improbable and shocking. This moon has defied its place in the solar system entirely. It has come down to deliver a message to the people: ‘Has the sun ever done this for you? Vote for moon!’
Oh, how I wish my friend Frank were here to see this.
And then I hear a baseline, a subtle, steady whoosh. It’s sort of like wind through the trees but more organised and powerful, almost like the sound you hear inside a plane. (That’d be a roar, Fran.) Yes, yes, I hear a roar. Where’s that coming from? I am not left pondering for long because 20 metres ahead of me, the water has begun to advance. It stealthily creeps over the sandy border and marches through the grass. It spreads around the trees, the granite picnic tables and telephone booths and topples over rakes, brooms and garbage cans. I am heading into the water’s conquest; as I run toward it, it runs toward me. I reckon it’s not wise to become a part of this natural disturbance, but I can no sooner turn my back on these forces than they will heed my cries. I let the black water flow across my feet, and up my ankles and shins, and soon I am stumbling through it like a mindless hyena, except for the fact that I feel glorious.
The rains begin, spoiling the moon’s moment of glory, and soon it is hard to see. It’s as if Mother Nature is scolding, ‘Get back in here, ya loony, Mr Levin is watching you.’
The moon resists and continues to navigate the advancing waters, culling up more gravitational force than he has ever attempted in all his billions of years. The sea has now extended to the rest stops and swells into the jungles beyond. In mere moments, the streets are flooded.
I note the signs along the path that say, ‘Warning: Beware of falling coconuts during storms.’ I’ve run in many a mighty rain and been lucky so far on the coconut–noggin encounter. I will take the gamble once again. After a few more kilometres, the winds are summoned and I might as well be on a treadmill for all the ground I’m covering. My shoes are buckets, my contact lenses have popped out, but I persevere. I can’t turn back. I can’t miss this. And, I can’t face not having done my workout. Two very different emotional responses, but each compelling nonetheless.
Puddles turn to lakes and lakes become bays as the sea defiantly conquers the plains, and I’m feeling like a foolish Pharaoh at the Red Sea. I am very far from home and now so uncomfortable, so alone, for everyone has left the park, and perhaps not exactly not in a great deal of danger and I have to pee. So I just do it, adding my signature to the end of the world.
I must always remember how marvellous this is, how lucky I am to be awake to witness the grave and quiet strength, the mysterious and powerful forces, that truly govern life. I try not to think of my bed at home
that smells like us and the loving arm I never endure with patience. I try not to think about how I haven’t seen my kids appear at my side of the bed, rubbing their eyes, pyjamas all twisted, because I am never, ever there in the morning. I try to stop asking myself: Why am I doing this?
I can’t not. That’s all. If I don’t, I will hold little conversations in my head all day long: Oh, it’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay to be a quitter.
I decide that tonight, I won’t work. I’ll sit out with Frank and we’ll talk. And then I’ll have a tuna sandwich – no, no, I’ll make us all something – and I’ll have a husband to hold on to for dear life and we’ll all, the four of us, sleep on Sadie’s queen-sized bed and giggle and tell stories around and around and I’ll make up some songs and everyone will say ‘I love you’ to each other a second time in one miraculous night.
I cut out of the park and run a few miles inland and circle back for home. The moon’s demonstration of gravitational sovereignty rages on without me.
But I did it. I ran for three-and-a-half hours. I barrel in and shout, ‘I’m home! Hey, guys, let’s get in the car and check this out. You won’t believe what’s going on out there. Hello? Hello?’ I can’t believe they’re not up. Where’s Susie? And, gee, can’t Frank do anything? I walk upstairs. ‘Frank! Sadie! Huxley!’ I shout as I pull off my shoes. ‘Get up!’
Susie is tucking her hair into a beret and carrying out a baggie full of snails.
‘Frank took the juenefilles out for petite dejuenes. ’Ere es a note from ’im. My Francis wants escargot so I deliver.’
I pick up the note.
Looked like a cool storm coming in so we went to the lighthouse. Kids begged to come to work with me, so, why not? Now that we’re out of the way, you can get stuff done. Love Frank.
I crumple the note. That’s not it at all. I wanted to show you the moon. I don’t want time. I fall to the floor and pound the wall, hot tears rolling down. That’s not it at all. I don’t want time. I don’t know what to do with time, you asshole. I use it for all the wrong things, over and over. I thought there would be picking Sadie up at pre-school and story time and another hellish trip to the supermarket that starts out great with all of us traipsing around looking for familiar foods and then winds up with everyone getting screamed at judiciously, from the clerk to the kids. Even the parking attendant pisses me off, the way he stands there, holding out a ticket, making change. But I always know that next time, it’ll go better and I’ll laugh and be easy and won’t sweat when Sadie opens her drink and spills it and I won’t let Huxley wander away so that I have to go out into the mall and call for him, finding him in the men’s department playing with ties, or at the information desk charming the assistants. I had promised myself that today we’d see things together, at the same eye level, and my lap would hold two small children and my hands would squeeze two small hands. And I’d kiss the children good night and they would feel safe and cherished instead of sometimes, quite frequently, like obstacles in my way, barriers to the next irrelevant thing I conjure up and am driven to do. Now, I have time to waste all of these promises and instead fill my day with, what? At least I have my appointment with Dr Soondartisradnoosvishnuam.
Tales From A Broad Page 26